Fifty-three

 

Conner

 

What the fuck am I thinking? What the fuck am I doing here? Coming here is the emotional equivalent to dousing myself with gasoline and striking a match. It’s like I want her to hurt me. Reject me. Make me feel like shit.

Like I need it.

Pathetic. Shitsack.

I don’t know. All I know is that when my mom turned the hose on us and told me Henley left before unceremoniously kicking us both out on our asses, I jumped up and pushed past her. Ran through the house, stopping long enough to grab my bag from the landing and my keys off the table.

Before I know what I'm doing, I’m in my car and halfway to her place.

Coming to a screeching halt in front of her building, I pop my trunk and jump out before the valet can open my door. He stands there, expectantly while I pull off my coveralls and toss them in the trunk. He wants my keys so he can park my car. Like hell.

“Sir, you can’t leave your car here,” he calls after me.

“Watch me,” I ground out, skirting around the front of it. I’m halfway across the lobby before some guy in a suit jumps out from behind the front desk and plants himself in front of me.

“Can I help you, sir?” He looks at me, his face a mask of polite professionalism but I’m not fooled. He has me pegged as an undesirable and will use force to stop me from getting on the elevator if necessary.

I don’t blame him. I’m sure I look crazy. Muddy hair. Busted up face. Grimy-looking jeans. Soggy T-shirt. If some crazy-looking motherfucker who wasn’t me was trying to get up to Henley’s place, I’d be pissed if this guy didn’t do his job.

So, I take a step back. Force myself to behave like a rational human being. “I’m here to see Henley O’Connell,” I say. “14-C.”

“Of course.” He lifts his hand, motioning me over to a waiting area full of expensive-looking furniture, seeming totally unconcerned with the fact that I’m wet and my boots are covered in mud. “Have a seat, and I’ll announce your arrival.” When I just cross my arms and stare at him until he nods. “Very well. This way, sir.”

He leads me to the front desk, and I wait while he re-rounds it. Picking up the phone, he dials, watching from the corner of my eye. Probably expecting me to bolt for the elevator. After a few seconds, he looks at me. “Sir, there’s no answer,” he says, but he doesn’t hang up, which means she’s home.

I pull my phone from my pocket and dial her cell. She answers on the fourth ring.

“Hello?” She sounds like she answered the phone against her will.

“Hey, Daisy—you want to answer your phone and tell the desk monkey down here to let me up?”

“What?” Now she sounds mortified. “You’re downstairs?”

“Sure the fuck am,” I say, pushing each word past clenched teeth. “And I want to come up.”

She doesn’t say anything else, but a second later the concierge starts to talk, his voice too low and rapid to make out any actual words but a few moments later he hangs up to offer me a fancy desk pen. “Please sign in, sir.”

I scrawl my name across the page, making sure it’s sufficiently illegible before tossing the pen on top of the registry and stalking my way to the elevator.

A few minutes later, I’m raising my fist to bang on her door, but she pulls it open before I can like she’s had her eye pressed to the peephole, waiting for me so she can hustle me in without a sound.

“What are you doing here?” she hisses at me, grabbing the front of my shirt to haul me into through the door. As soon as she shuts it, she turns on me. “How did even you find me? Did Patrick tell you—”

“I’ve got 198 IQ points parked in my brainpan, Daisy.” I toss my bag in the general direction of her living room. “Trust me when I tell you, there’s nothing Cap’n knows that I didn’t know first.”

She stands a few feet away, staring at me like she can’t figure out what to do with me. Like I’m a stray dog she knows will chew up her shoes and piss on her rug the moment her back is turned.

“Well,” she finally says, throwing up her hands. “What do you want?”

What do I want?

I want her to hold my hand in public. Let me kiss her in front of my parents. Put my arm around her. I want her to acknowledge me.

Us.

It’s all I’ve ever wanted.

But I can’t. I can’t ask her for any of those things because they’re things she’ll never give me.

She’ll let me make her come on my kitchen floor after she’s climbed in my bedroom window at five o’clock in the goddamned morning, but take her to dinner? To see a movie?

That’s never going to fucking happen.

So, I don’t ask for what I want.

Don’t even try.

I just take whatever Henley will give me.

Same as always.

“What do I want?” I say, kicking off my muddy boots. “I want a shower and then want pancakes. After that, we’ll see.”