The flower’s not a gift, but it feels likeone.
I take the stem from his hand and turn it between my fingers. “When I lived with Aunt Grace, back before I learned Jax was my dad, we had roses in the house at least once a month. Usually red. Her husband bought them for her.” My chest squeezes hard at the memory. “I always knew when they were coming because it was the day after they fought. She’d sleep in that morning, spend extra time putting on makeup when she gotup.”
Tyler’s body stiffens as my words sink in. “Did he ever hurtyou?”
His voice is so low I nearly missit.
“He never touchedme.”
“That’s not quite thesame.”
My lips curve. “No, it’snot.”
I think of the backhanded comments he muttered when my aunt wasn’t in earshot. How I was useless, didn’t belong, didn’t deserve to live withthem.
I know now the words were directed at my dad, not at me, but I found ways to cope. Writing words of encouragement on myself, things I could hold on to, was one of thoseways.
Tyler looks past me, his jaw working. “Fuck, you must hateroses.”
He reaches for the flower, and I hold it away. “Not at all. They’re breathtaking and fragile and resilient. For everything in life that sucks, there’s something beautiful if you know where tolook.”
The disbelief on his face has me smiling inearnest.
“Our lives are the stories we tell about them. The stories wesingabout them,” I go on pointedly. “And our hearts don’t belong in cages. We’re meant to be fragile. We’re born tobleed.”
I squeeze his arm before turning to start back toward thedriveway.
“Annie...” His voice is awarning.
I pull up, sighing. “I need this musical. You can let me go to rehearsal, or you can helpme.”
He stares me down, emotions running together behind his dark eyes. Helping me would mean more than just going against my dad, and we both knowit.
“That’s what I figured,” I say when he doesn’trespond.
When I get to my room, I set the rose on my nightstand and call to tell Norelli I can’t come topractice.
Through the window, I hear Tyler’s voice, Brandon chuckling on thepatio.
I drop the phone on my bed and grab my music box off my shelf, the one that plays “It’s a SmallWorld.”
I lift the window frame and chuck the music box into the bushes, where it lands on a garden light with a sickeningcrunch.
The laughterstops.
9
“You gonna tellme where we’re going on a Friday?” I ask Jax, shielding my eyes against the morningsun.
He drums his fingers on the steering wheel. “A meeting. Last day of your suspension, so we might as well get somethingaccomplished.”
We turn off the main road and drive up to a gate. If there’s a house beyond, I can’t see it, just rolling pastures and white fence. Once the gate buzzes us in and we make our way up the driveway, a huge house revealsitself.
After we park, a butler shows us to a bright reading room surrounded by glass overlooking a stable in the backyard where horses play in greenfields.
“Jax.” The man walking in looks at ease in jeans and a sportcoat.
"Zeke." Jax shakes his hand. “This isTyler.”