“I’m serious, Wolf. You don’t need to be drinking, it isn’t healthy. I worry about you.”

“All right, I won’t. I promise.”

Then I blurt out what I wanted to say to him before all that stuff happened with Rylee and Cora. “Did you know I love you?”

His face turns white as ice and fear flickers in his eyes. He looks at me like I told him I saw a ghost. Not the response I was hoping for.

It feels like a million bees sting my heart, but I can’t let it show. I was stupid to think he actually loves me. He’s an asshole, a broken, alcoholic asshole, but he’s my asshole. And I’m a wilting rose, dying for a drop of his water.

We’re both a disaster, trying to make our relationship work.

He gives me one last kiss on my cheek, and we walk in silence to his car.

“Cora is spending the night at Alana’s. She’s picking her up after ballet lessons,” he says.

Does he realize I’m on the verge of tears? If he does, he doesn’t seem to care.

Then he shuts the door in my face, leaving my heart on the cold ground.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Two

Gunner

Q: What is love?

A: Attraction based on sexual desire: affection and tenderness felt by lovers -Webster Dictionary-

I sit in the chair on my private jet as I wait for the pilot to take off for DC. I haven’t been there in five years, ever since Matt’s grandma’s funeral.

Love is like flying on a jet. It lifts you off the fucking ground to an unknown destination.

When did I know I was head over heels in love with Rainbow?

I think a part of me has always known, even back when I used to stalk her in college.

For most of my senior year, I sat at the table across from her while she’d do her homework, and I’d say whatever popped in my head. And when she thought I said something funny she would smile without uttering a word. But I wanted her words so bad.

So fucking bad.

So I asked her out on a date.

She stared at me, grabbed her stuff from the table, and shook her head no, on the verge of tears. Her rejection stung so much I went out to a bar and got fucking plastered to the point I missed my classes the next day.