Ren and Della: Boxed Set (Ribbon Duet Book 3)

by Pepper Winters

  And when night-time descended, I lay in bed mulling over Cassie’s words.

  Over and over again.

  Ruining myself, condemning myself until I had no other path to take.

  “Well, my suggestion is to kiss someone you love with all your heart. Don’t settle for a cheap thrill. Save it for the person who means the world to you.”

  In bold, it looks just as bad as my last confession of being in love with Ren Wild.

  Her advice wasn’t meant to be taken the way I took it.

  She didn’t mean to kiss the only boy I’d ever known.

  She didn’t mean to set in action something that I’d regret for the rest of my life.

  I knew that then, and I know that now.

  But did it stop me?

  Of course not.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  REN

  * * * * * *

  2013

  DELLA HAD BEEN out of sorts for the past few days.

  I tried to ignore it and give her space. I trusted that if it was important, she’d tell me, and if it wasn’t, then I didn’t want to pry.

  However, the day after she got back from her ride with Cassie, she was standoffish and strange. She refused to eat dinner with me. She gave me her back the moment she slipped into bed. She didn’t want to watch TV or study or do anything that involved spending time with me.

  I tried not to be hurt by her behaviour, but I lay awake most of the night missing my best friend and wondering how the hell I could fix what I’d most assuredly broken because her mood must be my fault.

  Why else did she hate me?

  By the time the next afternoon rolled around, I finished early, had a shower so I didn’t smell of sweat and earth, and used the Wilson’s barbecue to make Della’s favourite: honey covered yams with brown sugar and soy sauce roasted chicken. I even threw on a few foil-wrapped bananas with maple syrup, indulging in her sweet tooth on all three elements of the meal.

  When she returned from school, she gave me a weird smile, opened her mouth as if to say something, then darted into our bedroom.

  She returned a little while later with blonde hair dark and damp down her back from a shower, and a turquoise summer dress with a heavy knit cream jumper to ward off the spring evening chill.

  I cleared my throat. “I made us dinner.”

  The weirdness in her faded when she pulled up the barbecue lid and spied the deliciousness underneath. “Wow, everything I love.” Her eyes gleamed with what suspiciously looked like tears before she blinked them away and beamed just like normal. “Thanks so much. You’re the best.”

  The Della I knew and loved was still hiding, but for now, I’d settle for the reserved little woman smiling at me. I couldn’t stop my arms from grabbing her in a bone-crushing hug.

  I held her so damn hard, wanting to delete the strangeness between us, wishing I could ask what she hid from me.

  There were too many unsaid things these days and it made me nervous, as if I’d already lost her when she was still in my arms.

  She returned my embrace but not as fierce as she usually would, and when I let her go, she sprang away quickly, when normally, she’d linger. We always lingered around each other. We liked each other’s company. I liked to know she was in reaching distance if she needed help. And she liked to snuggle up and make me laugh.

  Where had that ease gone?

  Why did her smiles make my heart thud in familiarity and foreignness at the same time?

  It seemed she no longer needed that closeness, and I did my best to ignore the pain as we sat down on the outdoor picnic set at the bottom of the garden to enjoy our meal.

  With birds roosting in trees, Della regaled me of tales about school and teachers and how she was excited to start high school because she wanted to learn the hard stuff and was done with primary.

  I nodded and grinned and fixated on the shiny blue ribbon that she’d tied around her throat in a choker.

  She’d often used the ribbon as a bracelet or even tied it around her ankle once, but this was the first time she’d used it as a necklace, and I couldn’t take my eyes off the way it showed off her stark collarbones.

  She looked like she’d lost weight.

  She looked older, wiser, moodier.

  If she was losing weight, why wasn’t she eating? Was it school? Was she being bullied? I made a mental note to ask Cassie if she knew anything while I piled another piece of chicken onto her plate.

  I merely shrugged when she raised an eyebrow in question.

  Even though the atmosphere between us was a little strained, we smiled and laughed and pretended everything was normal.

  So many things lately had been pushing us apart. The knowledge that something festered beneath the surface that neither of us was addressing itched at me just as much as returning to the forest did.

  Strange to think I’d only been a boy when I’d found my calling of living in the trees, yet as a man, I’d never accept anything else for my home.

  Regardless that circumstances like these made me hunger for space more often than when things were good between us, I forced away such thoughts and focused on Della.

  I hated to think of her growing away from me, but at the same time, I welcomed it because it meant she was becoming her own person. I despised the thought of her one day not sharing everything with me and having her own secrets and shadows, but that was a guarantee and yet another piece of growing up that I had to accept.

  I didn’t know how John and Patricia did it—watching their kids grow from entirely dependent to utterly independent.

  It was heart-soaring and soul-crushing all at the same time.

  We finished our meal in silence, sipping on fresh glasses of milk and staring at wildflowers dancing in the evening breeze. The chill turned icy as I took her plate and told her to get warm in our bedroom.

  She shook her head and followed me to the kitchen instead, standing beside me as I washed the dishes. She dried away the bubbles, and together, we walked from the Wilson’s home to ours in the barn and closed the door on the world.

  Normally, the sense of contentedness overflowed the moment we were back just the two of us.

  Tonight though, nervousness flowed instead, and I didn’t swap my jeans for pyjama bottoms like I usually did. For some reason, my instincts were on high alert, and the element of danger wasn’t coming from outside the room but within it.

  From her.

  From my Little Ribbon who perched on the edge of her bed alive and brittle and not paying any attention to the movie we’d chosen.

  To be fair, I didn’t have a clue what we watched, and by the time she yawned and the clock said it was time to sleep, my heart whirred with smoke and anxious anticipation.

  Of what, I didn’t know, but as we said goodnight and climbed into bed, I lay in the dark waiting for an attack…just not knowing where it would come from.

  * * * * *

  I had a dream.

  A nonsense kind of dream of darkness and trees and winter.

  I’d lost something in the dark, and no matter how fast I ran, no matter how hard I searched, I couldn’t find it.

  It wasn’t a simple trinket I’d lost but something fundamental. Something that would kill me if I didn’t find it.

  I kept searching, kept hoping, only to run through vast sections of emptiness, finding nothing.

  I didn’t know how long I ran for or where the trees disappeared to the longer I sprinted in nothingness, but eventually, sunlight beckoned, and I chased harder, faster. My legs burned. My lungs tore.

  But I kept running, kept gasping until the one thing I wanted more than anything found me.

  A figure appeared from the darkness.

  A woman with flowing blonde hair and white angelic dress.

  I slammed into her, halting my chase, welcoming me home.

  I moaned at the feel of rightness. The sense of belonging. The knowledge of finding the one person I was meant to find after all this time.

&
nbsp; Then I stopped breathing as perfect lips pressed against mine.

  Soft and hesitant.

  Innocent and testing.

  I couldn’t see the face of my dream-kisser, but I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, she was the one I’d been searching for. She was the one born for me. She was the one I needed to find before I lost everything.

  I closed my eyes and gave into the dream.

  I didn’t try to see her face or know who she was.

  All I wanted in that moment was to live beneath her touch, to taste what she gave me, to bow to whatever gift I was worth.

  Lips pressed harder, hesitation mixing with determination.

  It was as awkward as my first and just as intense.

  My heart thundered all around me in the dark forest where I stood.

  The innocence of mouths touching but no tongue or deeper invitation wrecked me until my knees buckled, and I collapsed before my dream-kisser.

  Lips vanished. Breath caught.

  And I groaned for more, to not be abandoned by those I loved, to not fear the future where I might be alone, to not have to clutch something so hard only to lose it anyway.

  She heard me.

  Lips returned, pressing sweetly, worshiping kindly, and I fell in ways I’d never been able to fall before.

  No other kiss compared.

  No other intimate moment existed.

  This simple faultless, guiltless, sinless kiss was everything.

  My hands came up, seeking to touch, to stroke, to claim.

  My fingers met long, soft hair.

  I opened my mouth to deepen the virginal affection.

  But then a noise interrupted the purity.

  A sound that wrenched me from the dream world, yanked me off my knees, and hurled me into an existence that was no longer fantasy but pure fucking hell.

  Della bent over me in the gloom of our bedroom. Her hair was tangled in my fist, lips wet from mine, eyes as wide as blue moons, and her face as gorgeous as untouched snow.

  No.

  “Stop!” I shoved her away, my fingers burning as if I’d touched acid, my mouth twisting as if I’d ingested poison.

  She stumbled backward, landing on her ass between our two single beds. Her nightgown rose up her legs, flashing me white underwear and cream-colored thighs.

  I almost retched.

  What the hell happened?

  My body trembled so bad, I scrambled twice for my sheets before I was able to tear them away and leap out of bed. Standing over her, I gripped my hair with terrified hands, and barked with horrified rage, “What the fuck do you think you were doing?”

  How could I do this?

  How could I sleep through something so sick and twisted and wrong?

  How could she do this?

  What the hell happened?

  “Della! Speak to me!”

  I was a trapped animal wanting to slaughter something for having the one person I loved more than anything be the entire reason I’d just lost everything.

  Pacing before her, I had to get out of there before I did something I’d regret.

  Wrenching open the door, I bolted into the stable and charged down the barn.

  The scramble of feet and the flurry of mistake chased me. “Ren!”

  I spun and swooped on her, grabbing her bicep, digging my fingernails in as hard as I could. She’d fucking gutted me. If I hurt her half as much, it still wouldn’t be enough.

  “Why?” I roared. “Why did you fucking have to do that?!”

  Tears sprouted from her eyes. She tried to hold my gaze but couldn’t match my fury. She stared at my bare chest as rivers spilled down her cheeks. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I-I don’t know what I was thinking.”

  I shook her. “You weren’t thinking. That was the problem.” I wanted an explanation. I needed it. Now. Before I went insane.

  Was she sleep-walking? Was it involuntary? Perhaps a dare or something just as stupid but understandable thanks to teenage guts and idiotic attempts.

  Shoving her away, I wiped my hands on my pants, desperate to get rid of the feel of her. The chilliness of her arms reminded me she’d stood over me, fucking kissing me, instead of snug and innocent in her bed. I rubbed my mouth, mad with the need to delete her golden taste.

  I wanted to vomit.

  I should stick my fingers down my throat and retch all over the cobblestones because that was the only way to get the devil out from inside me.

  Della collapsed on the floor, her hands fisting her nightgown, her face bowed behind curtains of blonde.

  She sobbed.

  She begged.

  And I couldn’t do a damn thing.

  I couldn’t console her even though every tear cracked open my ribcage and took a pitchfork to my bleeding heart.

  I couldn’t hug her even though her quaking shoulders buckled my knees and ordered me to fall before her.

  I couldn’t do anything I would normally do because she’d just ruined everything normal.

  Sudden tears filled my own eyes.

  Shock and horror and the knowledge that we could never sleep in the same room.

  That we could never return to age of innocence after this.

  That it was over.

  All of it.

  “You ruined everything, Little Ribbon.” My voice broke. “Everything.”

  She nodded furiously, gulping back tears, tripping over herself to explain. “I’m sorry. Cassie and I were talking about kissing, and I said I’d never been kissed, and I just thought about you and how much I love you and how nice it would be to share my first kiss with someone I love and how I know you’d never hurt me and I just wanted to know. I wanted to know, Ren. I’m sorry!” She crawled toward me, her white nightgown growing grey with dust and dirt. “I’m so sorry! It was wrong. I won’t do it again. I promise. Please...please say you’ll forgive me. Please!”

  She reached for my ankles just as the barn door swung wide, and Cassie strode inside with her arms wrapped around her pink dressing gown and her hair mussed from sleep. “I heard noises. What happened?” Her gaze landed on Della collapsed before me, then to me with a rogue tear decorating my cheek and the aura of brokenness littered around us.

  Della’s sobs turned louder as she buried her face in her hands. “No! Go away! You ruined everything!”

  Cassie’s face, normally so trusting and up for anything, turned black with suspicion. “What did you do, Ren?”

  “He didn’t do anything. It was me!” Della yelled through clenched fingers. “Leave. Go away. You’re only making it worse!”

  Cassie ignored her wishes, running toward her and sliding to a stop beside her.

  I backed away, unable to stop the sensation of waking up to kissing my little Della. Unable to stop the repeat of her taste and touch and the dream and the wondrous feeling of finding everything precious, only to lose it in a heartbeat.

  The exquisite joy of my dream was now crushed beneath utter despair.

  I couldn’t breathe beneath the weight of it.

  I couldn’t exist beneath the horror of it.

  How could she do this?

  How could she break me so spectacularly after everything I’d sacrificed? After every year I’d given her. After every milestone and accomplishment I’d shared with her? I fucking loved her, and this was how she repaid me? By killing me with a simple kiss.

  A kiss that could never be permitted.

  A kiss that was as dirty and dangerous as everything monstrous and evil.

  Cassie locked her fingers around Della’s wrists, forcing her to remove her hands and stare into her distraught, blotchy face. “Tell me what happened.”

  Della cried harder.

  Cassie’s gaze met mine. “Or you tell me. Someone better. Otherwise, I’m calling my father.”

  Della squirmed, trying to get out of her hold. “No, don’t call him. Please!”

  “You better tell me what happened then. Right now.”

  Her scolding worked, and Della�
�s bottom lip wobbled with confession. “I kissed him. I-I did what you said and only kissed the boy I loved with all my heart.”

  Cassie fell back, ripping her hands from Della the same way I had. Her own heartbreak shattered all over her face as she looked back at me.

  I couldn’t do a thing but stand there with my head shaking and my hands opening and closing in helplessness.

  “Is that true?” she breathed. “Did you kiss your baby sister?” Loathsome disgust painted her features. She switched from happy-go-lucky Cassie to judge and executioner. “What sort of fucking pervert are you? You let her kiss you? Are you insane? What the fuck else do you do in that one bedroom, huh?” She climbed to her feet, stalking me, backing me into a stable. “Have you fucked her, Ren? Is that why you won’t like me? I’m too old for you? All this time, you’ve been sleeping with someone half your age. Someone who shares your blood?!” She dry heaved as she slammed the stable door with me inside and slammed the lock home. “Don’t fucking move, you sick, twisted asshole. I’m getting my father.”

  The fact that I stood there, locked in place even as Cassie flew from the stable was a testament to how wonderfully Della had crushed me.

  I had no energy to fight for my own freedom.

  I had no ability to argue my defence so John Wilson wouldn’t call the police for suspected incest and child abuse.

  I just stood there, staring at Della on the floor.

  Begging her silently to fix this.

  To rewind time and never do what she did.

  “Ren…” she murmured between thick tears. “I’m so, so sorry.” She stood and wobbled toward me, grabbing the locked partition between us for support.

  I backed away, deeper into the stable until the hay net stopped my retreat. “Don’t come near me.”

  The desolate brokenness on her face matched the caving, crumbling destruction inside me, and we stood staring, silently cursing, painfully accepting that this was it.

  There was no turning back from this.

  “I love you,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean for this to happen.”