Thrive

One

0 years: 00 months

August

Lily Calloway

Whenever I envisioned my twenty-first birthday, it included lots of booze, maybe some drugs, and a giant pack of male strippers. A giant pack. Possibly even the kind of strippers that give you a little something special at the end. That imagination belonged to a different Lily. From a different time. Possibly a different cosmic universe. At least that's what it feels like.

My twenty-first birthday, in actuality, is far less toxic. And the only men I'm celebrating with happen to be my boyfriend and his brother-as far from male strippers as I can get.

In fact, I had proposed a nice birthday in front of the television, but Lo dragged me out of the house, seducing me with my favorite place in Philly: Lucky's Diner. I previously told my sisters that I would not be having a party, and this impromptu event resulted after Lo found out. Now I kinda wish I had invited Rose or Daisy or even my eldest sister, Poppy.

A long wave of awkward silence passes between Ryke and me, and I silently beg Lo to return to the table. But he stands by the hostess podium, still talking to the manager about closing the blinds.

Ten cameramen are stationed outside of the diner, some heftier cameras perched on their shoulders, the lenses pressed to the glass window. A week ago, we learned that Ryke's mom leaked my sex addiction to the press, the reason I am now on the front page of tabloids and discussed across social media.

Ryke keeps blaming himself, even when we tell him not to. If anything, this is all my fault. I'm the one who went down this path. If it wasn't true, it'd be a different story, right? But I'm a sex addict. Everyone knows it. And now we have to figure out how to deal with this spotlight.

The quiet grates on me, and I instantly break it without thinking. "You know what's funny, I always thought today would consist of a pack of male strippers," I blurt out. Why, Lily, why? I look anywhere but his face, already feeling my cheeks heat.

"A pack?" Ryke says in disbelief. "Men are fucking people too, Lily. Can you not talk about them like you're ordering a case of beer? And . . . what the fuck?"

I think he should have started with what the fuck. But I let that go.

He adds, "Don't tell me you used to look at men and only saw another dick to ride."

I flush but manage to reply despite my embarrassment. "Used to. Key word. Past tense," I say quickly. "Now I see all the other anatomy." I wave my hands toward him and then realize what I'm doing. "Not that I ever thought about you as just a dick. I mean, I thought you were a dick, but the metaphorical kind. Not the kind I would ride." Holy shit. I just need to shut up.

"You have some serious fucking issues, Calloway," Ryke snaps.

"So says you and the rest of the world," I mutter and tear open a packet of sugar. I try hard to avoid the cameras that click click click behind the giant glass window.

His eyes soften, and he shakes his head before letting out a gnarled groan. "Look," he says, "it's your birthday. I didn't get you anything-"

"I didn't expect you to."

"Let me fucking finish."

I roast again.

He shakes his head. "You have to stop, Lily. Everything I say isn't sexual."

"Sorry," I mumble.

"I was going to say, I didn't get you anything yet. What would you like?"

What would I like? There are too many things I want, but most of them have to be acquired by supernatural forces.

"Are you a warlock?" I end up asking him.

"What?" His eyebrows knot.

"Never mind," I mumble quickly. The cameras suddenly flash in quick succession. I slouch farther in the booth, so low that I'm practically hiding underneath the table.

"Get a fucking grip." Ryke glares.

"You shouldn't even be here," I hiss. I don't know why I'm hissing. The diner isn't even half-full, but I'm sure it'll be packed within the hour now that we're here.

"I was invited," Ryke retorts.

"By Lo," I whisper, "who somehow forgot that the press thinks you and I are hooking up. We don't need to give them another reason."

"So because I'm having lunch with my brother and his fiancée, we're obviously fucking." He gives me a hard look. "Makes complete sense."

"Don't say the f-word," I reply. "It gives me hives."

He glowers. "You're getting married in less than a year. That isn't fucking changing, Lily. You're going to have to accept it."

"I accept nothing," I say lamely.

He rolls his eyes. "You've stopped making sense ten minutes ago."

I'm about to refute, but Lo walks back to our booth, his cheekbones sharpened in aggravation. Shit. As he slides in next to me, he swiftly grabs my arm to lift me from my slouched position, as if it was the most natural course of action for him, as though he's done this a thousand times with me.

Has he?

All I know for certain is that my hiding place is gone.

Damn.

"He won't close the blinds," Lo tells us. "He says that it's good publicity for the diner." At least they were honest and upfront about it.

"Maybe we should leave." I throw it out there. Just like that. Wow that feels better. I wait for one of them to catch it. I spring up from the table, already expecting them to agree.

"No," Lo says, his hand on my shoulder, forcing my butt back to the seat. Double damn. "Today's your birthday, and you haven't been out of the house in a week." His arm fits around my waist, and I take a deep breath and lean into his warm body. I would like to admit that all my thoughts are chaste in this moment, but a brief flicker of a naked Lo fills my mind.

Of his muscles, his lean body . . . Naked Lo has a nice ass and a very large-

"Again," Ryke says roughly, eyes on me, crushing my dirty thoughts. "What do you want for your birthday?"

Cock.

I have to close my eyes while I curse my brain from automatically jumping to that.

"She wants something that you can't give her," Lo answers for me.

"Like telekinesis and teleportation," I blurt out, just in case Lo was thinking about the other thing Ryke can't give me.

"I was referring to sex, but that too, yeah," Lo says. Today isn't going so well. Nope.

I hide my face in my hands, and I wait for the perfunctory click click click of the cameras. Any second now.

Click.

Click

Click

There it is.

I don't come out from my hand-fort.

"Lily . . ." Lo starts, concern in his voice.

"I don't want to talk about sex or cock," I blurt out.

A man clears his throat.

Shit.

I look over guiltily. The waiter stands at the end of the table with his notepad in hand. His gaze lands anywhere but on me. I might as well wear a walking road sign that says: Pervert and Sex Addict.

"What can I get you to drink?" he asks.

"Waters all around," Lo orders. The waiter leaves, and the diner door jingles as more young people enter: teenagers or college students. They gather in a nearby booth and whip out their cell phones, snapping photos.

Hibernating in our home sounds much more pleasant than this. Maybe the bears know something we don't.

Ryke unzips his leather jacket. "It's your twenty-first birthday; does that mean you're drinking tonight?" He sets the jacket aside, wearing a plain gray tee.

"No," I shake my head. "I'm going to forgo those traditions." My reasons extend beyond Lo being a recovering alcoholic. I want to remember tonight, especially if it involves sex.

"She lived vicariously through my twenty-first," Lo adds. I did. It wasn't pleasant.

Someone bangs on the window by my ear, and I jump so fast that I knock my water glass over. Ryke curses under his breath and mops up the spill with a napkin before I have the chance.

A cameraman raps the glass with his fist again, and my eyes gullibly follow the noise.

The flashes go off like busted light bulbs. And then the table of teenagers erupts in laughter, their gazes flitting to our booth and back away. My nerves spike, especially as more and more bells clink together, signaling a rush of people entering Lucky's.

We're going to suffocate in here or be attacked or worse. There's always a worse.

And I let Garth, my bodyguard, go home early. Mob mentality will overtake three people. Two's a company, three's a crowd, right? That makes four a mob. We're down a man.

"Lily, calm down," Lo whispers, his palm on my cheek, his thumb stroking my smooth skin. "Hey, what's going on in your head?"

Nonsense. Fear. All of the above.

I don't have a chance to answer him. The waiter returns with his notepad in hand, ready to take our orders. I haven't even looked at the words on the menu (even if I almost know it by heart).

The sad thing: I'm craving a hot dog. Literally. But I know photographs of me, mouth wide open with a wiener between my lips, will end up on the front page of every tabloid. Could I cut it up and eat it? Maybe, but it's not the same.

My eyes drift along the salad options, slowly jettisoning my stomach's cravings.

"And you?" the waiter asks me. I didn't even hear what Lo chose.

"I'll . . . just have the soup of the day." Safe. But I can't hide the disappointment from my face as I pass the plastic menu to the waiter.

Lo stares at me like I grew three horns. "You hate broccoli and cheddar soup." Oh. That's right.

"Maybe theirs is better." I shrug, avoiding his amber eyes.

Then Lo starts to climb out of the booth. The teenage girls squeal because he's about five feet from their table. He never breaks his focus from me. "I need to talk to you." He nods to the bathroom.

Ryke's brows rise. "That's not fucking suspicious at all."

Lo sets his hands on the table and leans closer to his brother. "I can talk in front of you but not the fifty other people in this place."

Just as he finishes his declaration, another group of people breezes into the diner and collects behind a growing line.

Now there are no free tables.

My thighs squeak against the cheap plastic seat as I scoot toward the end of the booth. Loren straightens up and waits for me. When I've successfully left my hiding spot behind, Lo rests a hand on the small of my back and guides me to the bathroom.

Two

0 years: 00 months

August

Lily Calloway

We enter the unisex bathroom, the single kind without stalls. As soon as the door shuts, he flips the lock.

When he faces me, his eyes cloak with unmistakable concern. "What's wrong?"

Great. I'm so transparent that he's pulled me away for chitchat in the bathroom-over hot dogs. It's slightly pathetic, which is why I blurt out, "Nothing."

He grinds his teeth. "Lily."

"Lo."

"Don't Lo me. You're upset and not telling me why." He crosses his arms over his chest and blocks the door, maybe realizing I'd be darting out of it right about now. "We're not leaving until you explain."

"You're making a dramatic scene over nothing," I whisper-hiss. "Seriously, you're gonna feel awfully stupid."

"Why are you whispering?" he asks. "And let me decide if it's stupid or not, Lil."

I let out a defeated sigh. "Hot dogs," I confess. "I wanted a hot dog for lunch." I wait for laughter and the seriously, Lily? but it never comes. He stares at me for a long moment, processing, and his brows begin to bunch together in this frustrated manner.

"I'm sorry," he says softly.

I shake my head. "Sorry should be saved for rejections to colleges, breakups, and funerals. Not for a girl who can't eat phallic foods in public."

"You know this is more than that."

I suppose my life has been changing a lot these past few months. I was never normal, but the fact that this scandal has taken away the option of being normal-that hurts. I contemplate everything for a second.

Then I mutter, "I just don't want to feel sorry for myself anymore." I don't deserve to wallow in self-pity. Like my mom has said numerous times, this is my bed, and I'm going to have to sleep in it, dirty sheets and all.

He walks forward, closer, and my heart thumps with each inch squashed between us. When his arms wrap around my neck, it takes all of my energy to stay flat on my feet and not jump him right here.

I stay grounded and channel my inner statue, probably the least sexy posture I can muster.

"I'm proud of you," he tells me. "As long as 'not feeling sorry for yourself' doesn't connote holing up at home."

"Maybe a little. Like half. Half connotes," I admit.

He tries really hard not to smile, so I suppose I win. Or half win. Or would that be a draw?

His heady amber eyes fall to my lips, and my heart bashes against my rib cage, as if telling me now now now. But I don't say a word.

His hand slowly rises up my neck, clutching the back of my head while his gaze devours me whole. Any chance to breathe has been thwarted by the desire fueled in his eyes, the one that I'm sure I share. My lips part, and he watches me closely, his chest rising and falling in sync with mine.

He teases me first, kissing my cheek so lightly.

I whimper, "Lo."

And then his lips meet mine with carnal desperation, stealing the oxygen from my lungs. He lifts me up around his waist, his hand lost in my hair, his other keeping me firm against him. My palms disappear beneath his black crew neck, dying at the ridges of his abs, at his closeness. I don't unbutton him.

Not yet anyway.

But the spot between my legs pulses, and I tighten my thighs around his waist so hard that he groans in arousal. He stares at me while we both catch our breath for a second.

My lower back digs into the porcelain sink, and Lo never removes his narrowed, intense gaze from mine, the one that unravels me completely, that soaks my panties and leaves me bare.