30. Riley
Chapter 30
Riley
I ’m fine. Really. Never been better.
Actually, that’s a lie.
What I am, is mortified. Fucking embarrassed.
I knew it would only be a matter of time before Creed smashed through those walls he built between Collins and himself. I just didn’t think he’d crack this fast.
I pace around the small living space, willing my heated face to cool off at what I’d just walked in on.
I could tell earlier today that something had transpired in the conversation between Creed and Asher. Collins was too busy trying to snag the gift bags from me but I heard her name come up a few times during their talk.
I caught the way he glanced over at the window where we sat in the middle row of seats and was staring at it like he could see her through the blacked out windows. It was a look of longing.
Obviously that longing didn’t last very long because the breathy moan told me that Creed was well on his way to claiming her heart—and her fucking orgasms—if he hadn’t done so already. But fuck , could she moan. The rasp in her tone, causing her voice to crack with intense pleasure—the sound that I’m pretending didn’t turn me on to the point of blowing my load without even touching my dick—had caught my attention when I was done running my fucking mouth without even looking up to see that the two of them were…busy.
But like I said, I’m fine.
I truly feel nothing but genuine joy for the fact that they’re finally together in the way I know they’ve both wanted for the longest time. It’s not like I’d expected anything from her other than winning her friendship and giving her a kind of companionship she’d been denied for so long. The kind I had been denied for so long.
Growing up with a dad who’d said he hated me from the moment I was born before he left, and a mother who resented me because I was the reason he left will do that to you. I lived under her verbal abuse for years. Sure, she’d occasionally hit me or take a belt to me when I was certain I’d done nothing wrong, but it was her words that seeped into my young mind and spread like a vicious cancer, infecting every part of my being until I believed that all I deserved was the worst that life could give me.
When Creed found me, I had actually been living on the streets for a few days because I had nowhere to go, but I couldn’t stay with my mother a day longer, either. He took me in, made me the drummer of his band, but more than that, he gave me a family again. I’d told him my history, but he never once asked for more. He’s shown me nothing but the love of a brother from that day forward. I swear I don’t think we’ve ever even argued beyond playful banter.
When he fell into that stupor two years ago, he’d told me he lost someone who mattered to him. When I asked who, he just shook his head and said he’d find her. I’d felt better knowing that she wasn’t dead, and he’d ‘lost’ her by actually physically losing her. It didn’t take long to realize just what she meant to him when suddenly started living like a celibate monk.
That longing in his eyes never changed over the last two years when I’d catch him staring at an old polaroid that he kept either in his pocket or in his wallet at all times. I never saw the picture until nearly a week ago when he broke down in his closet.
He’s known her for her whole life, but he’s wanted her for two years. So again I say I’m not shocked that they’re finally together. Or that Creed finally got his shit together and finally got on the same page as Collins.
When they finally emerge from Creed’s room in the back, he stalks to the living area where I’m currently sitting, still red-faced and embarrassed at what I walked in on. He’s got Snow’s fingers laced tightly through his own as he tugs her along behind him. Her face is cherry red as well when she steps up next to him.
Beyond the flush of her chest and cheeks, I really look at her. It didn’t take long for me to become so finely attuned to her demeanor and her expressions. She’s not a super expressive person, but her eyes tell me everything. And though she looks a little apprehensive when her eyes look from Creed to me, I see a luminance there, shining like a newborn star within the swirls of jade and gold in her eyes.
She’s happy.
And that makes me happy. It’s all I want, her happiness.
Funny how I didn’t have much of a direction in life, other than playing music and writing songs, until this tiny but mighty snow white blonde fell into my lap. Literally.
I fight the urge to adjust my dick in my pants when I think about the way she danced for me. How soft her skin felt beneath my calloused hands.
Shit. Nope. Don’t—don’t think about that, Riley.
I force myself to refocus on the fact that my new favorite hobby is finding new ways that can bring a spark of joy to her eyes all the damn time.
I blink back into myself and realize that we’re all just staring at one another saying nothing and we’re slipping into an awkward zone. No one wants to talk because what the fuck do we say?
I swallow thickly, and just before I can blurt something fucking stupid that would unintentionally make this awkward situation worse, Collins darts toward me with a huge grin on her face and hops onto the couch cushion at the opposite end of the couch, the two presents, plus a new additional gift, sitting between us.
“Can I finally open these or are you going to hold them ransom again?” she asks, playfully glaring at me and raises a sassy brow before swinging it to Creed and giving him the same look, who raises his hands in mock surrender.
“They’re all yours,” he says, sitting on the couch across from us at the same time that I shout, “Dig in!”
She reaches for the pink bag first, and she rips at the tissue paper like a kid on Christmas morning, a huge smile on her face. I didn’t see which bag Genevieve packed my things in so I’ve got no idea what she’s going to open first. Her nose scrunches when she grips whatever is in the bag and my eyes are drawn to the way her septum ring catches the light with a little sparkle. The piercing works for her.
The framed shirt emerges from the bag and she takes it in silently for a moment. She’s holding it up in front of her face so I can’t read her expression but then her shoulders start to shake and when I think she’s going to sob, she shrieks. The loudest, happiest sound pushes past her lips and I look over at Creed to see him smiling at her reaction.
“Oh my god, who—” she cuts herself off and looks right at Creed. “You?” he nods. “How? Where the hell did you find this?”
“A vintage shop that was a few blocks away from the diner. Riley dragged us there and I saw it hanging on the wall. I had to hassle the owner for it.”
“Oh, bullshit, Creed,” I laugh, and Collins swings her head back to me. “She took one look at your sappy ass and practically ripped it off the wall for you, dude.”
Collins’ jaw drops and she looks from me to Creed, like she wants to question it, but she just throws her head back and laughs a deep, rasping belly laugh. It warms my chest and the sound is like a symphony that I want to listen to on repeat every single day .
The moment her laughter dies down, she looks back to Creed and her eyes well with tears. “Thank you, so much.” Her voice drops to a whisper as she tucks a wild white curl behind her ear that’s littered with colorful piercings. “It’s…these are the first gifts I’ve received since…” she trails off.
“Since Asher and I left?” Creed finishes, and Collins nods reluctantly, clutching the framed shirt to her chest before moving it away to look down at it.
She lets out this half-sob, half-laugh sound and I’m about to leap off the couch and exercise my new power as her self-declared best friend to make the tears disappear, but it’s the soft, sweet smile that still graces her heart-shaped lips as she grazes a finger over the pattern of the shirt behind the glass. The look in her eyes is reverent, and for a moment it looks like she’s lost in a memory.
She doesn’t look up as she whispers Creed’s name and he’s off the couch and kneeling before her in an instant.
I sit and watch how she melts into his touch when he reaches up and brushes a tear from her cheek before cupping her face in his palms.
My chest squeezes at the sight, but not in pain. Nah, this is a happy squeezing and I welcome it, because I know some of Collins’ past, like the importance of David Bowie in her life. How his music was her escape on the hard days until Creed and her brother could be there for her. How the distraction of his songs helped her to drift away to another world in her mind until she no longer felt the dangers of this one in her own home.
I know the particular album that correlates with the tour date on her shirt because she told me how she wore out Asher’s cassette tape by listening to it on repeat when she was a kid, before he gave her his old mp3 player that was loaded with music. She’d said how much more she loved the cassette player but took any escape she could find.
I lucked out when I dragged Creed to that vintage shop and happened to find the exact cassette hanging out in the midst of a huge collection of vintage tapes along the back wall of the shop.
But I look at Creed’s amazing gift and think about how much more insignificant and small my gift is for her. Suddenly I’m pulled from the tender moment between Collins and Creed as he whispers soft words of comfort to her when my mother’s words slam into my mind, her voice just as sharp and shrill, and fucking loud as if she were standing right in front of me.
“It doesn’t matter how hard you try to win a heart, Riley Benjamin.” She spits at me, my middle name sounding like a curse because it’s a name I shared with my father. “You can gift me, gift them—fucking anyone—with pretty words and shiny things, but we see right through you.” She says through gritted teeth in a low tone that only promises pain later. “We will always see that you are nothing but a mistake. The boy who takes good things and sullies them. Tarnishing and ruining and fucking destroying them. Nothing you do will ever be good enough to earn their love. Best you learn that real quick, Riley.”
I was eleven when she said those words to me.
She’d hurt me plenty of times, but that was the first time she ever made me cry. I felt horrible for setting her off before I left for school that day. I’d accidentally knocked over a flower pot on the porch while chasing after the bus and broke it. I walked home that day and used the money I’d earned from pulling weeds for our elderly neighbor to buy a new pot. It was pretty. It had blue flowers painted on it that matched my mom’s eyes. When I gave it to her, at first she looked happy, then she remembered why I was giving it to her, and that blip of happiness morphed into unchecked anger. She threw the pot at my head, shards of clay hitting my face as it shattered against the wall next to me and didn’t miss a beat as she spewed her hateful words at me.
Her life of hating me not only made me crave that unconditional love even more, but it also made it hard for me to feel worthy of it. The kindness people showed me had to be temporary. I was afraid to connect with anyone because I felt as if I would be rejected shortly after. It’s why I’ve never pursued a relationship with anyone. It’s why I’ve never even slept with another person. I’m a naturally emotional human being, I can’t help it. And I feel like having sex with someone would never be a mindless means of release. I don’t judge those who do, but I could never do one-night stands because I don’t think I could help but form an emotional bond over such an act.
So I stopped hoping. Stopped looking. I hadn’t bought gifts or spoiled anyone to try and earn their affections, or fuck, just because I wanted to. I didn’t want to hurt. To be rejected or found unworthy of their love.
Then I met Collins Adaire Weston. Her brokenness met mine and something settled in my bruised and battered soul with nothing more than her simple friendship.
But as I sit here knowing that Collins still has yet to open my gift, I’m now fucking terrified that she’s going to hate it, or that it won’t measure up to this amazing gift that Creed picked out for her. Sure, I spoiled the shit out of her when I dragged her to the mall, but that was different because she was there to choose the things she wanted.
I rub my sweaty palms against my jeans, trying to settle my nerves.
“Okay, mister best friend ,” Collins’ tone is teasing, yanking me from the shitty, self-deprecating thoughts. She shifts to face me, folding one leg beneath her while the other hangs over the side of the couch where Creed has now settled with a folded elbow resting on her knee. “Can I open?” She asks sweetly with both brows raised in anticipation, her green eyes bright and sparkling. The tip of her nose is pink from the tears she shed, but it heightens her freckles, making her look like a little doll.
Fucking beautiful.
A wave of nerves washes through me and I feel a little of that unworthiness creeping toward the surface, trying to settle itself at the forefront of my mind. I resist the urge to fidget and come up with an excuse to take the gift back because I’ve somehow convinced myself that it’s now lacking .
Collins bites her lip playfully as she sneaks her hand across the couch, creeping towards the bag like she’s trying to snatch the gift without my permission. Her eyes lift to mine and I can see not only excitement there, but also understanding.
Did she see me silently warring with myself?
Of course she did. That’s just a part of who Collins is. Her ability to read people without even saying a word is quickly getting added to the ongoing list of my favorite things about her.
Top of the list is her beauty.
Right next to her fiery personality.
Her playfulness is enough to snap me out of my own mind and just be present and in the moment. I smile back at her and shove the present the rest of the way to her.
“Have at it, Snow.” I laugh as she grabby-hands it and bounces in her seat as she tears into the bag with as much gusto as she did for Creed’s gift.
She hasn’t been given a gift in ten years?
Mental note: spoil the shit out of her.
She reaches into the bag and pulls out the old school headphones first. She sucks in a breath and eyes me, the corner of her lips turning up. “I like the vibe of where this is heading.”
I really fucking hope so.
She pulls out the little silver Walkman and her eyes get even brighter as she tips her head back and laughs, her hand covering her mouth for a second before slapping it on her thigh. “Oh, my god!” She squeals and does this little dance with her shoulders that makes Creed and me both grin like a bunch of goons. “My brother’s Walkman looked just like this.”
Creed nudges her knee with a propped elbow and scoffs, “You say you wore it out by using it constantly—which was a very convincing argument, by the way,” He pins her with a playful glare that has her shoulders shaking in silent laughter. I smile at the knowledge that’s about to be dropped on the cassette player she told me about the other day .
“What?” she holds her hands up with a shrug, looking anything but innocent. “I did wear it out!” she argues.
“Right,” he drags the word out, clearly not buying into her little act. “Which is why it smelled an awful lot like that Kiwiberry Rukus Frutopia drink that I bought for you the day before, huh?”
I fucking adore the way her face flushes the brightest red but they both laugh, and I can’t help but join in.
Creed turns his eyes to me and jabs a thumb at Collins, who is still giggling and fanning the rosiness from her cheeks. “You have no idea how much this one got away with because I never snitched her out to her brother.”
“What?” I look in disbelief at my little Snow with eyes as wide as saucers and a goofy-ass grin on my face. “I can’t imagine you being a little shit disturber as a kid.” I say, trying to picture it. “I bet you were a good kid, weren’t you?”
“I was a good kid!” She argues, smacking Creed’s shoulder, who just grins and dips his head.
“You were,” he says softly before looking back at me. “Doesn’t mean she wasn’t an expert little conman. She had these huge green eyes that were too big for her face, and she’d bat her lashes one time at me or Asher and we were fucking putty in her little hands. It’s how she ended up with my mp3 player.”
That sobers her up real fast. “Wait, what? That mp3 was yours?”
For a second, Creed looks like a deer caught in headlights, but he quickly brushes it off and smirks. “Obviously. You think your brother’s taste in music is as fucking divine as what you got to listen to?”
“I…guess not.” She huffs a small laugh, but she looks at Creed with a bit more emotion than before. She told me about the mp3. She thought it was her brother that had gifted her the mp3 player that helped her mental escapes at home. I can’t imagine how she feels finding out that it was the one person she’s harbored feelings for her entire life.
I clear my throat and rub at the back of my neck, “There’s more in there.” I nod toward the bag, shifting in my seat. “I wouldn’t gift you a cassette player and nothing to listen to.”
She wastes no time in diving back into the bag, pulling out several cassette tapes ranging from ZZ Top to the David Bowie tape I know she loves. The cutest little squeal leaves her lips as she fumbles to open the case and pops the cassette into the Walkman that I’ve already added new batteries to and plugs in the old school headphones that have neon orange foam pads to cover the speakers.
She hits play and starts singing along. Her voice is…shockingly adorable. She can sing on key, and actually has a bit of vibrato when she hits those lower notes, but it crackles and dissipates into a whisper when she tries to belt out the words. She doesn’t skip a beat while Creed and I watch her in awe.
She’s absolutely amazing and I’m mesmerized by her. God, could Creed be any luckier to call her his? The way he looks at her tells me that he finally knows exactly what he’s got and how much he’s going to cling to it. I want something like that. I can admit to myself I’d want it with her, considering I’ve never had feelings for anyone before—never wanted to even try— but that’s never going to be an option now. But that’s okay. As long as she’s in my life and allows me to spoil her? That’s enough for me.
The song comes to an end and she hits the stop button, the tiny machine pausing with a click. No sooner does she set it aside that she throws herself across the couch and wraps her arms around my neck, squeezing me tight. The weight of her forces me back and she ends up half sprawled over me. She’s too excited in giving her rapid fire thank you’s that she doesn’t even realize how we’re currently entangled.
I forget myself for a moment and wrap her in my arms and squeeze her back. For a moment I want to keep her here. For a moment, I want to tell her how she makes me feel. Just blurt it out and see what the hell happens. For a moment, I forget that she belongs to Creed, and he’s still in the freaking room .
Because six days. Six. Days. Is all it took for me to be completely dragged into the orbit that is Collins Weston.
I open my eyes to see him staring at us.
At me.
More specifically, my hands that are currently hugged around his girl.
Fuck.
I let her go and she releases me at the same time, her cheeks a little pink when she scoots back to her seat and reaches out to play with Creed’s hair.
He’s still staring at me with an unreadable expression. I have no idea what he’s thinking, but I’m taking it as a warning to never touch his girl. A heavy guilt settles in my stomach, causing it to drop.
It’s going to be a really long tour because I’m really and truly fucked when it comes to Collins Weston.