by Amanda Perry
Cassie angles the card my way as she scans it, allowing me to read it along with her. I giggle, and Cassie grins at the contents of the card.
Sweetheart,
I’m a dumb ass, but you still love me. I’m really sorry for being an idiot. Don’t hate me forever, Caleb doesn’t cuddle as good as you do. Forgive me?
Love you more,
Jaxon
P.S. I’ll make it up to Riley, I swear.
“That’s really sweet, Cassie,” I tell her while she scans the card again.
She nods and sighs happily. “I know. He can be an idiot, but he’s my idiot.”
Before I’m able to respond, another knock on the door draws our attention. Cassie hurries to answer it, hooting with laughter after she swings the door open. “Ri, it’s for you.”
She pulls the door open wider, allowing me to see two large bouquets of flowers blocking the face of the person holding them. “Miss, would you mind helping me a bit?” the man carrying them asks of Cassie. She quickly grabs the deep red rose bouquet, and I hurry over to take the blue rose bouquet. The man thanks us for our help and scurries off.
Cassie and I set the new flowers next to hers. She finds the card in the red roses, and I dig around for one in the blue bouquet. “These don’t have a card,” I mutter with a frown.
“They’re from Caleb.” Cassie smirks and hands me the card she found in the red roses, resting her chin on my shoulder in order to read it, too.
Baby girl,
Words can’t express how sorry I am for not giving you a chance to explain yourself. I should have known you wouldn’t have objected unless you had a good reason. Please forgive me for being a jerk and not thinking before speaking. I love you so much and hate that I hurt you. Let me make it up to you?
Forever,
Caleb
P.S. Jaxon’s an idiot, I’m an amazing cuddler…
“Maybe they aren’t completely hopeless.” Cassie shrugs after she reads over Caleb’s message. She inhales the fresh scent of her lilies and sighs. “At least Jaxon remembered my favorite flowers.”
“I’ve never gotten flowers before.” I softly stroke the petals on the red roses. “They’re so pretty.”
“I wonder why he sent two different colors like that,” Cassie muses. “Maybe they have special meanings?”
“I’m not an expert on flowers,” I admit with a shrug. “I don’t know what they’re supposed to mean. The red ones match the rose on my Fire mark, though.”
Cassie scans the room, stopping when she finds her phone on the couch. She scoops it up and taps at it. “Well, I know red roses mean love. The blue, I’m not sure about, except they’re really rare. I’m looking it up now.”
She scrolls through her phone for a few seconds, then draws her brows together in confusion. “It says blue roses are a symbol of the impossible and unattainable.”
My frown matches Cassie’s as we consider their meaning. It’s an odd message for Caleb to send if it’s what he meant to do. Then again, the odds of him sending them as a message are slim. It’s more likely he thought I would like the colors or couldn’t choose between the two and decided to send both.
“Anyway, it was sweet of them to send these to us,” Cassie says, brushing off the meaning of the roses.
Cassie doesn’t seem to think the roses and their meanings are anything to think twice about, but something doesn’t feel right to me. It was kind of Caleb to send me so many beautiful flowers, but his choices bother me. I don’t understand why. The red roses are perfect from him, but the blue is out of character.
“Speaking of the guys,” she chirps, distracting me from my thoughts. “They’ve been blowing up my phone with texts and calls. It was on silent while we watched our movie, so I didn’t even notice.”
“Is everything okay?” Worry grips me. What if something happened and they needed to get in touch with us?
Cassie snorts. “Of course. They just want to talk to you and make things right. Mark texted and called a few times, too. However, he’s older and smarter, so he knows to just leave us be for a while.”
My gaze turns to the cell phone in her hand. “Should we call them? They did say they’re sorry. I’m sure I overreacted, anyway. I should probably apologize to them for everything.”
“Don’t even think about it,” Cassie growls. “You’re not going to feel guilty for how you felt or feel. They were in the wrong, not you. It’s fine to forgive them, but we’re still having our girls’ night. They can deal with it.”
“I miss Caleb.” I slink over to the bed and drop down heavily. “It hasn’t been more than a few hours, and all I want to do is find him and beg him to forgive me.”
Cassie finds a spot to sit next to me, wrapping her arms around me. “First off, that impossibly deep pull you feel to him is your bond. It’s new, and your instincts tell you to stay with him for every second of every day. As far as wanting to apologize, you didn’t do anything wrong, Ri. You can’t beg forgiveness just because you have feelings and they were hurt.”
I rest my head on Cassie’s shoulder and fight back the tears. My emotions seem to be all over the place tonight. “It’s hard to fight that instinct. I’m not used to having the freedom to be upset about things. I feel the need to make it right somehow.”
“It’ll get easier,” she promises, squeezing me tight. “The more you fight the urge to apologize for being yourself, the more natural it’ll feel.” She lets out a long, dramatic breath. “If you want to go to Caleb, then go. I won’t be upset about it. I miss Jaxon, too, and I know how hard it is those first few months, especially when the bond isn’t fully complete. Just don’t go to him out of guilt or for forgiveness. You’re worth more than that.”
While Cassie appears sincere in her promise, she won’t be upset with me, I can’t bring myself to ditch our girls’ night. My heart aches for Caleb, and my mind screams to find him and ensure he doesn’t hate me. The flowers show he’s not mad, but to see him in person and hear him say the words would be more real for me. My need for reassurance will have to wait for tomorrow, though. Tonight is about Cassie and me, and I won’t ruin our time together.
“Want to curl my hair?” I ask after a long stretch of silence. My question is my way of letting her know I’m staying. If Cassie could tie me to a chair and play with my hair all day, every day, she’d be a happy camper.
My offer perks her up significantly. “Hell, yes!”
Cassie jumps up and rushes to the bathroom, presumably to ready her supplies. I should have known she’d never leave her room and stay the night in mine without bringing everything needed to do her hair.
It’ll be a long while before we go to bed. I only hope I have hair left after she’s done with it.
Chapter 7
Cassie played with my hair for far too long before we finally called it a night. Hours have passed, yet I haven’t been able to sleep a wink. Without Caleb next to me, I can’t seem to relax. With his arms around me, I’m safe, and I sleep better because the bad dreams stay away. Without him, I’m destined to stare at the ceiling and wish I had a watch to check the time. I managed to fall into an exhausted sleep last night with him a few feet away, but being in separate rooms makes it impossible.
I’ve tried to stay still to avoid waking Cassie, but my efforts prove pointless when she rolls toward me and sighs heavily. I glance her way to find her as wide awake as me.
“I can’t even sleep without the doofus,” she growls. “This is crap!”
“Yeah, I can’t sleep either,” I mumble.
Her expression turns thoughtful, then she startles me by sitting up suddenly.
“I have an idea,” she exclaims. “Let’s prank the boys.”
I blink at her, waiting for more. She doesn’t elaborate, though. “Why?”
She shrugs. “Because, though you may forgive them, we can still seek revenge on your behalf.”
“But I don’t want revenge,” I mutter.
Cassie scoffs and rolls
her eyes. “That’s not the point. It’s the perfect excuse to mess with them, and they can’t even get us back for it because they deserve it.”
Her logic sounds flawed to me, but my curiosity is piqued. “What sort of prank are you thinking?”
“Follow me.” She giggles and jumps out of bed. She rummages around in her suitcase for a few seconds before finding whatever she was hunting for. She sticks the object in the pocket of her pajama pants before I can see what it is.
With a sigh, I roll out of bed, pull on a pair of sweats, then follow Cassie as she bolts out of the room. She skips happily down the halls until we make it about three doors away from her room. She slows her pace and walks on her tiptoes the last few feet until we stand in front of the door. She puts her finger to her mouth in a shush gesture, and I can’t help but roll my eyes. Does she really think I’m about to yell and give myself up?
We enter the room, and Cassie creeps over to the bed where the guys are both in a fitful sleep. I wonder if Caleb’s sleep issues are the same as mine tonight. Maybe he’s having a hard time sleeping without me, too.
While I watch Caleb toss and turn, Cassie places something between the guys and backs away. When she reaches me, I reluctantly pull my eyes from Caleb and seek out the object she set between them.
“What is that?” I whisper, tempted to move closer and inspect it.
She giggles quietly. “Handcuffs.”
“Cassie!” I hiss. “Take them off, they’ll kill us.”
She easily brushes off my concern for our lives. “No, they won’t. We’re teaching them a lesson.”
Another, not as important, thought occurs to me, and I can’t resist asking, “Why do you have handcuffs?”
She grins, pulling out her phone. “They’re for…recreational purposes.”
Before I can ask her what she means, she starts snapping pictures of the guys handcuffed together in bed. This may get ugly when they wake up.
Cassie lowers her phone and gasps. My heart stops, wondering if she noticed one of them wake.
“Wait here, I just got another idea.” She takes off out the door before I can so much as blink.
As much as I want to turn tail and run, I don’t dare move a muscle in case they wake up. Cassie stays away for about five minutes before she rushes back holding an alarm clock. It becomes clear nothing good can come of her newest idea.
“Here, plug this in over there, and hide it under the bed.” She hands me the alarm. “Set it for four-fifteen a.m.”
I don’t bother arguing with her. Instead, I go to Caleb’s side of the bed and quietly set the alarm. Cassie snatches Caleb’s phone from the charger, placing it on the dresser instead and setting another alarm for four-thirty a.m. She uses Jaxon’s phone to set a third alarm for five a.m., hiding it on the bathroom counter. The final alarm, the clock sitting on Jaxon’s nightstand, she sets for four-forty-five a.m.
Cassie finishes the alarms and grabs something from under the bed. I realize quickly it’s Jaxon’s laptop and worry what she has up her sleeve now. She pulls up the webcam, streams it to her phone, then sets it up on the other side of the room, so it points to the bed but the guys can’t see it. She turns and motions for me to follow her to the door.
We’re nearly home free when she gets a mischievous glint in her eyes and runs back into the bedroom. When she makes her way back to me, she giggles as she holds a pile of pants. The girl must have a death wish, but rather than telling her to put their pants back, I follow her from the room. There is no reasoning with her when she has an idea in her head. We make it back to my room at five minutes to four.
Cassie positions herself on the bed, enlarging the screen on her phone to watch the guys. Minutes later, Cassie’s phone vibrates with a text message, interrupting the camera. She glances at it, then hands it off to me without a word.
I frown down at the screen, shocked to see it’s Leanne asking for me.
Leanne: Hey Cassie. Can you pass a message along to Riley for me, please? Ask her if she and I can talk when she’s up.
Cassie: This is Riley. Cassie and I are awake in my room.
Leanne: On my way now!
I hadn’t planned on her rushing over here. My nerves flare, and I show Cassie the texts. She jumps up and unlocks the door, pulling it open and flipping the lock to prevent it from closing on its own. She twirls around and saunters back to the bed, dropping beside me once again. “She’s coming to apologize, Ri. Don’t be worried.”
My eyes widen. “How did you know I was worried?”
“Because you look like you’re about to cry and run away,” she tells me while not taking her eyes from the screen as she takes her phone back. “It’ll be okay, I promise. She’s not mad at you.”
It would be nice to have a bit more time to prepare myself for whatever happens with Leanne, but I don’t have time to worry further. The hotel door is pushed open, and Leanne calls for us, “Riley? Cassie? You girls here?”
“In here!” Cassie yells back.
Leanne walks in to find us sitting on the bed with the phone once again set up in front of us. Her steps falter, and her eyes jump back and forth between the two of us. “What’s going on?”
“Pranks,” Cassie states but doesn’t elaborate.
Apparently, Leanne doesn’t need any elaboration because she simply nods and joins us by sitting on the edge of the bed. A glance at the clock reveals we have five minutes left before the first alarm goes off. I turn my attention back to Leanne and watch her, wide eyed and readying myself for whatever she has to say.
“Riley, I want to say how sorry I am about yesterday… and the day before.” Leanne blows out a long breath and runs her hands over her ponytail to smooth it. “I’m so used to Jaxon and his cheeky ways, sometimes I forget you’re completely different. I shouldn’t have doubted you either time.”
“R-r-really?” Even with Cassie’s assurance Leanne was coming to apologize, it still shocks me to hear it out loud.
Leanne nods and takes my hand in hers. “Yeah, really. I promise I’ll do my best to remember you’re not Jaxon and the normal teenage snark isn’t something I have to worry about with you.”
“Th-th-thank you.” Her apology sounds genuine, and she isn’t upset with me. I allow the worry to fade away and smile gently at her. My heart stops squeezing in my chest, and I can take a breath.
“Honey.” She sighs. “I’ve always thought highly of you. You’re such a strong girl. But you’re only seventeen, and before we met you, I prepared myself for another teenager. You’re far from an average teenager, though. You’re more responsible than people twice your age and sometimes I forget that. So, do you forgive me for being so simpleminded?”
“You aren’t s-s-simpleminded, Leanne.” I grin, relaxing further. “You’re the c-c-closest thing I’ve ever had to the m-m-mom I always wanted. I was s-s-scared I ruined that by u-u-upsetting you.”
“Oh, honey.” She sniffles, pulling me in for a tight hug. The sudden move startles me and I stiffen at first. She doesn’t release me right away, though, and I’m able to relax into the hug and take comfort in her. “You didn’t upset me at all, and even if you had, I’d never walk away from you. You’re part of my family, Riley. You always will be.”
She pulls back and looks up at the ceiling, trying to keep the tears shining in her eyes from falling. I didn’t mean to make her cry, I just wanted her to know how much she means to me, but her tears nearly trigger my own.
“Okay,” Cassie mutters. “You two are too mushy. We only have one minute, so shush. I want to hear this.”
Leanne snickers at Cassie as we all settle in and turn toward the screen. Both of us manage to stop the tears and focus on the show.
“Revenge is going to be sweet.” Cassie grins wickedly.
I worry my bottom lip. “I hope the guys don’t kill us for this.”
We all quiet down and watch the phone as Cassie turns up the volume. One minute later, the first alarm goes off and both guys jump
up to shut it off. When they try to pull their hands away, they realize something holds them down and discover the handcuffs.
“What the fuck?” Jaxon yells as Caleb drags him out of the bed searching for the alarm. “Handcuffed, again? Is she fucking serious?”
Caleb finds the alarm under the bed and shuts it off. He unplugs it as an afterthought.
“I know she set more alarms on that thing, I’m not dealing with that shit.” He plops back down on the bed.
“Dude!” Jaxon jerks on his handcuffed arm. “Handcuffs!”
“I don’t give two shits right now, Jax,” Caleb gripes. “I’m tired, I’ve had to sleep next to your ugly ass all night, I slept like hell, and I’m over it. We’ll deal with this in the morning. Go to sleep.”
“Whatever.” Jaxon lies back down while muttering under his breath. “You’re ugly.”
“You’re a cover stealing asshat,” Caleb growls. “I need Riley and her cute little ass cuddled against me while I sleep. And before you ask, you aren’t getting anywhere near me with your ass, or anything else for that matter. Now go the fuck to sleep.”
“Grouchy, ungrateful jackass.” Jaxon closes his eyes.
“Cassie, you said you had those cuffs for recreational use. What does that mean?” I ask while we wait for the next alarm. “And why did Jaxon say they’d been handcuffed again?”
Leanne turns bright red and chokes on air, trying not to laugh. “Cassie!”
Cassie simply grins wide. “I’ll explain it to you one day, Grasshopper.” She pats the top of my head then turns back to the computer. Between Leanne’s reaction and my knowledge of Cassie’s antics, I decide it may be best if I remain in the dark about this particular subject.
At exactly four-thirty, the second alarm goes off, scaring the heck out of Caleb and Jaxon. Caleb growls a few curse words while he literally drags Jaxon over to the dresser, barely in view of the camera. He turns the alarm off, then as an afterthought, drops it into the top drawer of the dresser and shuts it.
