41. Reeve
FORTY-ONE
reeve
In and out.
That’s all this was going to be.
I hate how I inhale deeply before pushing Bay’s bedroom door open and amble quietly inside.
Who gives a fuck if she knows I’m in here or not?
Torin and Cairo have been up my entire ass to come over here, to deal with the result of Matteo De Leon and what he did.
And now, what I have to accept.
She’s probably glad it’s gone. She didn’t want it anyway.
So why my brothers are all up in arms about me being here and telling me I have to show my face around is beyond my level of comprehension.
I don’t wish to be here.
I don’t even want to be in this house, but it was the only way to get out of mine. Fucking Cairo has me locked up like a felon in my own bedroom and it was either this or spending the next few days tweaking and fiending for my next fix.
I have to accept this for what it is.
I’m not looking to go backward on the drugs—I’m aware I need to get my head screwed on straight to be somewhat normal again—but it’s still appealing.
I’m agitated, restless, and fucking exhausted.
And my dreams turned nightmares are pissing me off even more because they’re always filled with her .
Scanning the space, I find the small lump in the middle of the mattress. Bay’s currently rolled up in a ball, covers pulled over her body, and the room is barely lit with drawn curtains keeping the sunlight out.
It’s depressing as fuck in here.
Silently sighing, I don’t know what to do. It’s hard to imagine her being so depressed about the baby when she clearly expressed she didn’t want it in the first place.
Cairo insists she’s heartbroken.
I called severe bullshit on that commentary.
But now, I’m starting to believe he may have been right. Because the Bay Astor I know would be out running amuck on the world. She wouldn’t be holed up in her room for over two days. Cairo wouldn’t have bothered to drag me out of the house when, clearly, my first choice wouldn’t have been here. Torin wouldn’t have told me to fucking move if he could have done it himself and won some brownie points.
Don’t get me started with Oz.
Rounding the bed, I get in from behind her, hesitating for a moment before wrapping an arm around her waist and deciding against it.
I don’t know if she’s in any pain or discomfort, so I opt out of touching her there and scoot closer.
“What are you doing, McQueen?” I mutter lightly. “You’re scaring everyone.”
She doesn’t respond right away, could be sleeping, but I can feel she’s awake. I know she knows I’m here.
“Go away,” she grumbles flatly, not bothering to welcome me closer or into her space. “You don’t need to be here.”
“Apparently, I do. Cairo summoned me.”
I get no response, and I silently blow out more air from my lungs. I don’t know what to do. She lost the baby, the one I always wanted to put in her, and now it’s lost.
Like us.
I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it because I wasn’t around when she found out. She didn’t call me to come over and talk about it.
We are broken and fucked up and everywhere.
It almost doesn’t feel real.
My body wants to be closer, but my head denies the request. We’re not well. We’re not doing okay.
Bay and I are as dead as my hopes and dreams.
“What’s your deal?” I press onward. “Things like this happen. This should be a blessing for you. You didn’t want the kid.”
The stillness of the room answers me back with a fuck you and get the hell out.
Bay’s not being triggered. She’s not fighting back.
She’s not anything.
So, I push harder. “Do what you’ve got to do, and get over it. You’ve got sisters in the other room right now, and they’re not doing well. This place is a shithole of emotions and death.”
My words are harsh and unforgivable.
However, I need something out of her right now to show me she’s fine.
So I can report back to Cairo and say she’s back on the up, and I don’t need to be summoned again. What the hell he thinks I can do right now is beyond me.
“McQueen—”
“ Leave .”
The word feels like they did before.
That day at the garage when I found her underneath her dad’s Nova. I remember going in with every intention of making her mine. To solve the issues at hand with her sisters when Torin had them ripped away and fucking Wallace in jail on bogus drug charges…I don’t know what I’m doing here.
She’s right, I shouldn’t be here.
There’s nothing here for me. She lost the baby. We have nothing else tying us together anymore.
“I’m not sure why you’re so upset,” I continue, like a prick. “You didn’t want the kid. You got your wish. It’s fucking dead and?—”
Bay begins to slide off the bed, retreating away from me, when I mindlessly grip the back of her T-shirt and yank her back.
She lands on her spine with a bounce before her palm slams against my cheek so hard it makes my teeth grind against each other.
“Get the fuck out of my room,” she seethes before I can even register the look of sheer fury twisting her features.
Her icy eyes peer up at me like I’m the biggest piece of shit to ever land in her bed.
I might take the title now.
Nonetheless, she should be thrilled.
“You good now?” I profess roughly, refusing to run my palm down the sting. “The more you lay up in here like a sob story, the more Torin and Cairo are going to bug the fuck out of me.”
“We wouldn’t want to do that, would we? God forbid anything get in your way of your cocaine addiction.”
Ouch.
And touché.
I smirk at her anyway. “Definitely that. Can I report back that you’ll be leaving this room in the next century?”
“Go ahead,” she deadpans, and I can feel the tension locked up in her frame. The stubborn way she shuts down.
She’s not withdrawing from the room any time soon, and we both know it.
I could tell her we have De Leon in our grasp, but Cairo warned me not to. She’ll opt out of grieving or whatever it is she’s doing and go right into kill mode.
I can understand why he’s a bit terrified of that. I was just informed, as of late, that she shot the blonde friend of hers with zero remorse, allegedly.
I’m having a hard time picturing that.
But then I had a hard time imagining Ozzy would come out of the dark and play house with my—or what was—future wifey.
I know women.
And I know she needs comfort right now.
I just don’t believe I’m the best person for this shit right now.
“What do you need, McQueen? A few days? A pizza?”
“Peace.”
“Mhm.” I haven’t comprehended that notion in a long time. I’ve been haunted by her since the day she told me to practically go fuck myself and chose Ramsey.
Then Ozzy.
This is a fucking joke.
“Why are you here?” she asks me then, seizing my attention back to the present. Her gaze is filled with regret and something else I can’t put my finger on.
“Cairo sent me.”
“You could’ve said no.”
“Do you know how exhausting it is to argue with that asshole?” I lift my shoulders. “Besides, it got me out of my prison sentence.”
Her brows clip together, but she doesn’t pry.
She doesn’t fucking care.
“I’ll let them know you’re processing,” I convey evenly. “That should buy you some time.”
Bay bows her head, then turns back on her side and rolls right back up into a tight ball.
It’s depressing.
I don’t get it.
She didn’t want the fucking kid. She didn’t want anything to do with it.
She didn’t need me. She’s done with Torin.
We’re over.
And Cairo can fuck around with her all he wants, but it’s still going to end up the same way. The same goes for Oz.
This isn’t going to end well for any of us, period.
Fate had other plans. We weren’t supposed to be together; we must’ve bent something in the process, and now everything that could make us somewhat whole again is ripped away.
I wanted a baby.
Maybe not now, but eventually.
However, who the fuck am I to have a damn kid waltzing around with my fucked-up DNA in it?
I shouldn’t.
Now I’m starting to believe God stepped in and was like, fuck no .
Unable to remain in this room any longer, I roll off Bay’s bed and start for the door with every intention of telling my brothers to give her a bit more space, and she’ll come out eventually.
But that’s until she fucking says, “If it was going to be a girl, I was going to name her Rosie.”
I freeze mid-step.
My heart slams to a halt in my chest at the mention of my twin sister. The complicated yet simplicity of her existence again in this world, in the same shape or form, takes my breath away for a second.
She was going to keep it.
I’m not sure when Bay decided or how, but she just ripped my heart out of my chest again for the second fucking time.
The baby is dead.
Matteo De Leon took that from me.
From her.
If I didn’t know what it was before, now the baby has a name.
A memory.
A loss.
A painful reminder I was the cause of my sister’s horrific and hopeless demise.
Rosie.
I don’t reminisce about my sister much because it brings me down to a deep and dark hole of despair and guilt. I should’ve seen the signs. As her twin, I should have been able to feel the vulnerability of her thoughts and the dangerous thing she was about to do.
I’ll never forget that day.
I’ll never forgive myself for assaulting my fucking sister.
“I don’t know what you want me to say,” I mumble out, staring at the gray carpet of Bay’s floor. “Because it’s not going to be thank you.”
“Nothing,” she says without hesitation. “I just thought you should know.”
I wish she hadn’t.
There’s always something with this chick that fucks me up.
And I’m done with it.
Without an ounce of indecisiveness, I exit out of Bay’s room before she tells me she’s about to divorce Ozzy and beg for my ultimate forgiveness as my wife.
God only knows how much I’d probably fall for that line of bullshit.