Bide (The Sun Valley Series Book 2)

“Fuck.”

The guy underneath me grunts as I climb off him and flop in the passenger seat of his car. I only take a second to regain my breath before I start fixing myself up; I want to get out of here before the foggy windows start drawing attention.

And his heavy panting is starting to annoy me.

A welcome lick of cold January air cools my sweaty skin as he momentarily gets out, presumably to dispose of the condom. When he settles beside me again, slamming the door behind him, I wince.

Too loud. Too much attention-drawing potential.

A hand paws the back of my head. “Did you come?”

I hum a yes. I did, I guess. He does always make me come, he’s nice like that, but it’s just that.

Nice.

Nothing earth-shattering but I think nice is kind of what I need. Nice is easy not to get attached to.

When I first landed a job working as an assistant in a law office, I didn’t pay attention to anyone but my boss. I didn’t want to. I was too wrapped up in my head, in making sure I didn’t fuck up another part of my life. It was a miracle I even got the job, a fact I’m well aware of. But somehow, I did, and God knows I didn’t want to do anything to mess it up.

But then the months passed and I got comfortable. Comfortable enough to look up from my desk every so often, and he caught my eye. He was charming and handsome and safe because nothing beyond the physical stuff attracted me to him

And that’s what hooking up with him has always been. Purely physical. Scratching an itch. Sporadic. No emotions attached at all. Most of all, completely casual. Honestly, the guy could disappear tomorrow and I might not even notice.

But I’m not quite sure he’s gotten the memo.

“You wanna grab dinner?”

I grimace as I button up my shirt. “I have plans.”

“Oh.” I hate that he sounds disappointed, as if he doesn’t know the score by now. When the opportunity arises, we bang. We don’t linger, we don’t go out. That’s it. “Another time?”

“Probably not,” I can’t help but be honest as I open the passenger door, swing my legs out and slip on my heels.

Before I can escape, he latches onto my hand. “I’ll see you Monday?”

“Mmhmm.” I hum noncommittally, flashing a blank smile, shaking his hand off me and hightailing it away.

The parking lot is empty, my car and his the only ones remaining. Unsurprising, considering it’s a Friday night and work ended hours ago. I stayed longer to finish up a few things, he did too, one thing led to another and now I’m late for the plans I actually wasn’t lying about having.

I’m in for an ass whooping and the weak orgasm wasn’t even worth it. Didn’t take the edge off like I hoped it would.

I practically throw myself into my car, eager to escape the cold. Flicking down the rearview mirror, I grimace at my appearance. Smeared lipstick, smudged mascara, hair mussed. Smoothing the freshly dyed brown looks back into a ponytail, I fish a makeup wipe from my purse and scrub my face clean. Not like I’m trying to impress anyone where I’m going.

For a moment, I simply stare at my reflection in the small mirror. I find that I’ve been looking at myself differently lately. I used to always see my mother’s face staring back at me. Used to assume all my traits were from her since we looked so similar.

But now I look at him and I look at Pen and I see all these similarities and I wonder if me and my mom are really as alike as I thought we were. I wonder if things had been different, would people have compared me more to him or to her.

It hurts my head to think about all the what-ifs.

Pushing away those thoughts that tend to plague me lately, I flip the mirror up and plug the address into the GPS even though I know it off by heart by now. I just wish I didn’t so I pretend I don’t. Grasping the wheel tightly, I pull out of the parking lot and start towards the hell that has become my regular Friday night.

God, I need a drink.

I hate this house.

I hated it the first time I came here and I hate it six months later. I hate it even more when there’s a rental car parked outside like there is tonight.

The only thing I don’t hate is the familiar fake redhead leaning against her car.

“You’re late,” Pen chastises the moment I’m within earshot.

“I know. I’m sorry.”

She surveys me as I walk towards her, her eyes narrowing in suspicion. “You missed a button.”

Glancing down, I swear when I find the top button of my shirt unbuttoned, revealing a little too much bra than is appropriate for ‘family’ dinner. I hastily button it up while avoiding Pen’s gaze.

“You were having sex.”

God damn it. “I was not!”

“You have sex hair.”

My hand flies up to fix my ponytail. “Shut up.”

“The guy from the office again?” Pen presses as I push past her, jabbing my elbow in her side on my way.

“I don’t want to talk about this.”

“Ew, it was.” She wrinkles her nose in disgust. “I hate that guy.”

“You don’t know that guy.”

She levels me with a look. “He thinks breakfast is a protein shake and a wheatgrass shot. I hate him on principle.”

I snort at that. She’s not wrong. I fell asleep at his place by accident once, a big mistake that I regretted pretty hard when the morning after, I discovered his version of breakfast in bed was just as Pen says. I gagged as I forced down that godawful shot, closing my eyes and daydreaming of croissants. I swear, I tasted grass for a week.

“It’s not serious.” I tell Pen, and I mean it. It will never be serious. I don’t want that. I…

I just can’t.

Pen shoots me a sad look, her hand wrapping around my arm and squeezing. “I know.”

“There you girls are!”

We both jump at the sudden voice screeching down the driveway, gazes flying to the woman standing in the doorway. Pen and I paste on smiles and hurry toward her.

“Hi, Mom,” Pen greets with a kiss on her cheek and a fierce hug.

I keep a bit more of a distance. My hand lifts in a weird wave that Pen snorts at. “Hi, Mrs Jacobs.”

Her smile noticeably dims as it flicks to me but still, she tries. She always tries. Wary but welcoming.

She pats my shoulder as I pass her on the way inside, and that familiar wave of guilt crashes over me. I still feel it every time I see the woman. It hasn’t lessened over time. I’ve just learned to deal with it, just like how she’s learned how to deal with me.

The hand on my shoulder tugs a little, stopping me from following Pen further into the house. I glance back at Mrs Jacobs. “Your mother’s here,” she tells me carefully, barely containing her wince.

A wince that I copy. “I know. I saw the car outside and assumed.”

“Okay.” A comforting squeeze. “I just wanted to warn you.”

I offer her as real a smile as I can muster. “Thank you.”

Six long months and I still haven’t gotten used to the feeling that hits me when I walk into a room and find my mother, my father, and my sister all sitting together. It’s an indescribable emotion, one I feel way too fucking often. This awful combination of confusion and hatred and guilt and… grief, I guess. Grief for the perfect, happy life I lost.

It’s like one day I woke up and I was someone else. I was still a daughter but someone else’s daughter. Someone’s step-daughter. Someone’s sister.

I’m kind of grateful for that last one because at least there’s someone in the world who has some semblance of an idea of what the fuck is happening.

My cheeks hurt from how hard I force a smile. Briefly glancing at my mom, I nod. “Ma.”

She perks up the moment I look her way, her smile almost as fake and bright as mine. “Hi, hun.”

I have to look away, noticing Pen purposely sit on the sofa next to Ma so I don’t have to. I whisper my thanks as I sit on her other side.

“Luna.”

“Professor Jacobs.”

His expression twists to one of exasperation.

The man has tried, God has he tried, to get me to call him by something but I refuse. It’s too casual and he’s not casual. He’s not my friend. He’s not my dad. He was my professor and now he’s the guy who fucked up my life. Who fucked up multiple lives. All because he couldn’t keep his dick in his pants.

He’s barely even a person to me.

This whole arrangement was his idea. He claimed he spent twenty-one years not knowing me and he didn’t want to waste a single one more. I refused, at first. I was adamant that I wouldn’t play happy family.

It turns out the Jacobs men are just as stubborn as the Evans women. He pleaded. He begged. He offered money and cars and countless other shit that I didn’t want or need. I would’ve said yes just to stop all the fucking incessant bribery and begging, but in the end, it was Pen who convinced me to.

She always went because she didn’t want to leave her mom alone with him, and she’d come home after so fucking miserable and drained. So, I agreed to this whole bizarre thing because maybe if I was there it would be just a little better for her.

Drinks, as always, are the most tolerable part of the evening, mostly because they involve me and Pen subtly trying to outdrink each other while our father stares at us, disapproval evident but not enough balls to call us out. Ma, when she joins us once every couple of months for God knows what reason, alternates between casting pleading glances my way and apologetic ones towards Mrs Jacobs while quite skillfully ignoring Professor Jacobs.

By the time we move to the dining room—because of course they have a big, fancy dining room—I’m usually swaying on my feet a little. Tonight is no different. Except tonight, it seems like someone in this family manages to find their courage because Ma catches me by the elbow the second I stand.

“Lu.” She tugs me to face her. “Hi.”

I swallow hard and force a smile. “Hi.”

The awkwardness kills me. It genuinely feels like a knife to my gut. I can’t think of a single previous time in our life when it’s been awkward between us. But I guess everything has to turn to shit eventually.

“You look good, hun.” Better than the last time I saw you.

I hear those unspoken words, loud and clear, and barely contain a scoff. Of course I look better than the last time she saw me. A corpse would look better.

I can admit, I was a fucking mess, and not the hot kind. The first few months after the big news dropped, I was a liability. Drinking myself half to death, barely eating, barely moving. Finding out my mom’s a homewrecking liar, my dad’s a cheat, and my sister had been sitting beside me in fucking class for half the year… It was a lot.

Add in the breakup that cracked me in half and I was basically a shell of a person.

I was drowning and I refused to let anyone help. I think Pen was the only person I spoke to for most of the summer, and that was only because I had to. Hard to ignore the person you live with.

Then junior year started and I got a colossal kick in the ass. The first month or so of college, I was still a moping mess, skipping classes, most of the time not on purpose but just because I was too out of it to remember they were even on. And then I got an email informing me my scholarship was at risk. Even in the state I was in, I had the good sense not to fuck with the one thing shining any bit of light in my life.

So I got out of bed, rolled into a much-needed shower, and wised the fuck up because no fucking way was I going to throw my life away because of a lying, cheating, scumbag of a man.

I sorted myself out. I processed the Jackson-sized hole in my life the proper way; by getting new piercings and dying my hair and hiding the box of his things under my bed, out of sight but never quite out of mind. I got a job. Two jobs, actually, because Greenies fired me and even though the place was a steaming pile of shit, they paid well. The couple of nights a week I managed to pick up at a bar not far from campus weren’t quite enough to survive, and then the office job opportunity fell in my lap, so I took it.

I got it together. It was hard and the last thing I felt like doing, or even wanted to do. But I did it.

“I don’t leave until Sunday,” Ma continues, reminding me of her presence. I wince, already knowing what she’s going to say. “Can we do something tomorrow?”

“I can’t.” Her face falls. “I have homework to catch up on and I work tomorrow night.”

She arches an unconvinced brow. “The office is open on a Saturday night?”

I’m a little surprised she knows about the office job considering I sure as hell didn’t tell her about it but I shake it off. “No. My other job.”

“Two jobs, Lu?” Ma shifts in place, crossing her arms over her chest in an oh-so-motherly way. “Hun, if you need money-”

“No.” I butt in before the offer can fully leave her mouth. “I don’t want your money.” Not when it’s his money.

Surprise surprise, not only is Professor Jacobs my secret father, but he was also Ma’s secret buyer. I don’t believe Ma when she says she didn’t know it was him. I don’t believe anything she says anymore.

Without letting her get another word out, I walk towards where Pen is lingering, waiting for me. She offers me an encouraging smile as she links her fingers through mine, squeezing me tight when I give her the ‘I’m okay’ nod.

I am okay. I’ve been okay. I’m always okay.

I just want to get through this night, get through this dinner, so I can go home and forget these people exist for another week.

Dinner lasts a fucking eternity.

By the time we get through dessert, I’m ready to pull my own hair out. It’s just so awkward. So uncomfortable. So tense. Everyone is on edge, always. No one really talks because no one really knows what the safe areas of conversation are. It’s all ‘how’s work?’ or ‘how’s college?’ or ‘my, it sure is cold outside.’

All of it is nauseating.

The peaceful quiet of my dark apartment is like a warm hug when I finally, finally, shoulder the door open. I’m alone tonight since Pen’s staying at her boyfriend’s place. Needed the comfort after the dinner from hell, she’d told me.

I get it. I need comfort too. I just find it in different ways. Like meaningless hookups and bottles of wine and family-size tubs of ice cream. Tonight, I’m going for the latter.

My two-year roommate stint with Kate and Amelia ended pretty soon after the Evans-Jacobs family meltdown. Sydney moved in with us that summer, and while I love the girl to pieces, the apartment felt too full when all I wanted was to be alone. Especially considering Nick spends most of his time there, him and Amelia shoving all their happy, lovesickness down my throat. God, and then there were all the memories to deal with.

Pen was looking for a roommate since she couldn’t stomach being under the same roof as her father. I had to get out of the apartment, so I got the hell out of there.

Shutting and locking the door behind me, I kick off my heels and hurry through the modest-sized two-bedroom apartment, eager to get out of my clothes. I lied earlier, about all his stuff being hidden under my bed. I couldn’t part with the clothes. They’re just too damn cozy not to use. And sometimes, if I concentrate hard enough, I swear I get a faint whiff of that fresh, spring smell.

It’s probably a little masochistic considering how much my chest aches, how I get this tingly feeling behind my eyes whenever I slip the familiar Rays hoodie over my head, but I’m a weak woman. I can’t resist.

My phone buzzes just as I’m fishing an extra-large tub of mint chocolate ice cream out of the freezer. I smile at the message from Pen checking if I got home okay. Flopping on the sofa, I type out a reply with one hand, digging out a spoonful of ice cream with the other.

At least there’s one good thing in my unexpected new life. Honestly, I don’t know what I would’ve done if I didn’t have Pen. I would’ve lost it a hell of a lot worse. I’ve got a sister. A half-sister, technically, but I dare anyone to try to say that to our faces. Not that anyone knows or anything because we’ve kept our dysfunctional family secrets to ourselves, but still. For all intents and purposes, Pen is my sister.

I’m scrolling mindlessly through Instagram when I see it. My throat gets clogged, my head goes all fuzzy, I get warm all over. Ben’s on one of his posting sprees again, as he usually is on a night out. I knew they were going out. Either he or the girls always make an effort to invite me, no matter how many times I turn them down.

I just can’t bring myself to do it, and the reason is staring me in the face right now.

It’s nothing dramatic. It’s literally just a picture of him but I swear to God it hurts.

I’ve mostly gotten over that whole self-loathing phase that plagued me for a couple of months. It doesn’t pop up as often as it did, just the occasional time when I catch Mrs Jacobs looking at me a certain way or when I see the strain between Pen and her dad.

It always, without fail, reappears when I see him. Because out of everything, that’s the thing I hate myself most for. Ruining that.

I stare at the slightly blurry photo for longer than is considered normal before switching my phone off and tossing it aside. Eventually, after a gallon of dairy and a couple of hours of indulging in self-hatred, I doze off, curled up on the sofa with the TV playing low.

All alone, just like I made sure I would be.