Chapter 18
EIGHTEEN
Thick thighs save lives
LILA
When Reed closes my bedroom door, I expel air from my lungs with enough force to blast a circus clown from a cannon. Once I’m sufficiently deflated, I grab my phone and text Kenzie.
Me:
Don’t come home. Reed is here, and you’ll kill the vibe.
Sorry. That sounded harsher than I meant. I’m frazzled.
Allow me to rephrase. *ahem* Reed showed up for an impromptu date. Given your complicated history, he’ll be more relaxed if it’s just the two of us. Thus, he’ll be more apt to let his guard down. That’s what I would have said if I only had a brain.
We’ll be leaving shortly. You don’t need to stay away long.
Kenzie:
Slow down, silly pants. I knew what you meant. Plus, I never need an excuse to avoid Reed. I can stay out all night if it helps.
Nah. Just an hour tops.
Make me proud. You got this.
I don’t share your optimism.
Are you kidding? You’re a certified badass. Unleash your pheromones, and he’ll be spilling his secrets in no time.
Visions of him reaching for the vase traipse through my mind uninvited.
His body heat wrapping me up like a blanket.
His virile scent invading my senses. The twinkle in his eye when he realized how he was affecting me.
Someone’s pheromones were unleashed, all right. And he knew exactly what he was doing.
Reed’s always had the upper hand.
Who am I kidding? I’ll never be able to seduce that man.
He knows exactly what to do to make me weak in the knees and open in the thighs.
Just like when we were young, when he’d walk around in his trampy sweatpants, sans shirt.
And that was well before gray sweatpants season was a thing.
Perhaps he’s the one who started it. I wouldn’t doubt it.
He paraded through the house like he was the only model in an Adonis Belt fashion show.
If I close my eyes, I can still see those deep V lines leading down to the promised land.
I wanted nothing more than to run my tongue along them.
Years later, he still had the upper hand on the night we finally came together—repeatedly and in more ways than one. Much like he used his dashing good looks to make me salivate when we were younger, he used his sadness to manipulate me into giving him my body.
Nothing’s changed since then. Not really.
Considering how good he is at exploiting my lust for him, this plan is over before it’s even begun. He’ll have me spilling my secrets. Not the other way around.
I should bail now while I still have fragments of my heart left. It’s the only sensible thing to do.
Me:
ABORT! ABORT! I can’t do this. Switching to Plan B.
My phone rings two seconds later. It’s Kenzie.
“Listen to me right now,” she starts the very moment I answer, her tone already bleeding with tough love.
“What?”
“First, there is no Plan B, and you damn well know it.”
Although she can’t see it, my face screws into a scowl in response to her accuracy. “Curse those pesky facts.”
“Second, we are absolutely not going to the cops to turn in those fuck face monsters until we have their blackmail material. Your freedom is priority one. Do you hear me?”
I don’t answer.
She doubles down, her voice vibrating with conviction. “Not until you are free from this, Lila. I feel like a broken record, but you did nothing wrong, and I refuse to let you suffer for those shit-ass cunt weasels. Innocent people do not belong in prison.”
My reluctant exhale turns into a quiet whimper that’s on brand for my pathetic existence. She’s so much stronger than me. All that determination and grit, even though she’s still healing from trauma.
How I lost one powerful sister only to find another to take her place is a baffling mystery. I can only imagine how much worse life would be without her lifting me up.
Argh. There I go again, making it all about me. Even internally, I’m the worst.
My parents were so right about me. I’m too sensitive. Too needy. Too selfish.
Some things never change, no matter how much I wish they would.
She jerks me out of my self-loathing spiral. “Lila, did you hear me?”
I nod pointlessly, eventually adding a verbal agreement. “Yeah.”
“Good. Say it back to me.”
“Say what?”
“That you did nothing wrong.”
Dutifully, I mutter, “I did nothing wrong.”
“With some feeling this time, for fuck’s sake. You infuriate me when you get like this, woman. When will you ever realize all the horrible things that happened to you are not your fault? It’s like you can’t wait to suffer. You’re innocent in this. Innocent!”
My response turns to mist, disappearing in my mouth.
Am I innocent?
If I am, I don’t feel it.
After all, I brought Silas into our lives. I chose to work at the casino. I fell for his lies, blinded by the scraps of attention he offered. Same as I did with Reed.
Worst of all, I was the one who convinced Zara to go with me up to the top of—
Mercifully, Kenzie cuts off my thoughts before they go to that dark, dank place. “Your family was wrong about you, babe. You’re not a broken woman.”
“Really?”
“Absolutely. There’s so much beauty and love inside you. You couldn’t be broken if you tried. We’ll get through this together, just like we did when you lost your sister.”
She likely knew where my thoughts were going and threw me the life preserver.
With a touch of hope steadying my voice, I ask, “Promise?”
“Cross my heart.”
My sadness lifts like a morning fog clearing in the sun. While a few words on the phone aren’t going to change the way I view myself, it’s enough to get me back on track for tonight.
Let the past die in the past.
“Thanks for loving me,” I blurt out, grateful tears pricking my eyes. “You tease me so much that I sometimes forget the way you build me up when I need it most.”
“I only tease because I’m jealous of how awesome you are. You know that, right? I’m a terribly spiteful person.”
“Right, right. Sarcasm is your love language. I remember.”
“You good now?”
“Yeah. I got this. The plan is back on.”
“Good girl. You’ve still got that gummy I gave you if you panic again, right?”
“Yes, but I don’t need drugs.”
“It’s not meth. Just a little weed.” She sighs audibly. “Now go seduce my brother. But not like. . . all the way. Only a little. Just the tip. Savvy?”
A smile crests my lips. “Okay, Jack Sparrow.”
I’m giggling when we end the call.
With that out of the way, I put my phone on the charger and strip off my clothes. I’m tempted to have an everything shower, but if I do, I’ll be more likely to end up in bed with Reed. And that’s not on the agenda. So I settle for a quick shower and only shave below the knee.
My prickly thighs can serve as a chastity belt.
Looking down, I murmur, “Thank you for your service, thunder thighs.”
As I step under the spray of the shower, my facetious grin washes away.
I remember the first time that phrase was flung at me as an insult. Thunder thighs. How can two simple words cut so deeply while simultaneously sounding so absurd?
Over time, I learned to take the power back from those types of phrases. Control the narrative. If I use them first, they can’t hurt me, right?
Unfortunately, nothing ever fully erases the sting from the burn they once caused.
I couldn’t have been more than eight years old in either second or third grade.
Thanks to one of my mother’s hangovers, I was late to school and almost missed the field trip bus.
Looking back, I wish I had. As the last one to board, I didn’t have a choice of seats and ended up beside a boy named Nathan.
He was a jerk to everyone, which is likely why nobody wanted to sit by him.
Lucky me.
As I attempted to slide across the sticky vinyl seat as unobtrusively as possible, he made a show of scooting over toward the window as far as he could to get away from me.
I tried to ignore it and almost succeeded.
Until a girl across the aisle saw how Nathan was acting and started laughing, which only encouraged him.
He grew more over-the-top with his antics.
Next thing I know, he’s clawing at the window and bellowing, “Help! Someone, save me from her thunder thighs.”
Everyone laughed.
Except me.
That’s when I learned there are few things funnier than a chubby girl with the nerve to take up space.
Eventually, the teacher chided him, which brought an end to the teasing.
I just sat there for the entire ride, squeezing my thighs so tightly together that I got muscle cramps. But I didn’t dare let my legs relax out of fear they’d graze his, and then the taunting would return. My hips and glutes screamed in pain.
I held my breath as well, hoping my belly wouldn’t draw his notice next.
It took all my focus and strength to stay on that tiny corner of the bus seat, perfectly still and as compact as possible.
It was a challenge to teeter on the edge without falling.
I didn’t want to lop out into the aisle either because then the kids behind me would have joke fodder for days.
And it wasn’t just my class on the bus, since the entire second grade went on the field trip. The last thing I needed was for this moment to follow me into future grades.
On the bright side, the physical agony from the long-term full-body muscle clench helped me forget how badly I wanted to cry. Body pain drowns out emotional pain when it gets loud enough.
Once I finally got the courage to meet my teacher’s eyes, I remember the pity reflecting there. He pointed at the corner of his mouth as he curved his lips upward.
A silent order to smile.
Looking back, I wonder why he did that. Was he suggesting I smile through the pain so it wouldn’t hurt as badly?
Like a grin and bear it type of thing? Was he trying to cheer me up?
Tell me that I’m more valuable as a human if I’m smiling?
Or did he simply want me to appear happy so he wouldn’t have to feel sorry for me?
It probably shouldn’t matter why he did it.