I stood at the pier's edge, fingers trailing worn grooves in the wooden railing, watching my brothers attempt to teach Laurence how to fish off of the edgeâ because of course they were.
It was strange. The sight of my brothers and Laurence together on the pier. Two pieces of my life that I never thought would go together, blending in a swirl in the afternoon sun and sea air like it was the most natural thing in the world. He was the first guy my brothers had met who truly connected with them. It felt precious. A rarity that made the moment that much more beautiful because of how uncommon it was.
After attempting to reel in a very large fish and watching the fish line break, sending it splashing back into the water to a chorus of my brother's cries of dismay, Laurence excused himself and came over to stand with me as they tried again. Shouting orders at each other, scrambling for the lone fishing pole like it was a prize.
"Hello," Laurence said as he leaned his arms across the railing.
"Hi," I replied.
We were both quiet for a moment as we watched my brothers.
"They like you," I said as Finn got a fish into a waiting water bucket. Jack slapped Finn's back in congratulations and nearly sent him flying over the pier railing with the fish.
Laurence actually smiled, his eyes still on the sight of my brothers. "I like them too." He swallowed, seeming to soak in the sight before turning to look at me. "I'm sorry I missed lunch."
"I'm not, " I said, eyes out on the water, thinking about how Laurence would have been closed off if he had witnessed his brother attempting to blackmail information out of my ex-boyfriend about me. "This was better."
I smiled to myself and patted the side of my dress where a hidden pocket full of cash sat. "I mean, how often can a girl make money off all her brothers like that?"
Laurence smiled out at the water, his easy demeanor still close. "I couldn't disappoint you. And the look on Jack's face was worth it."
"Thanks... for wanting to meet them," I said, my voice so quiet that it was nearly impossible to hear over the sound of the waves below.
"They are important to you," he said softly, the wordsâ 'and you are important to me' felt like they were just out of reach, unsaid but hanging between us like a crackle of energy.
"They have the type of relationship that I wish I had with Cater," Laurence said surprising me, his eyes back on my brothers. "They are so comfortable together." His tone was soft, heartbreaking in its vulnerability.
We both watched them try to catch the fish that had now jumped out of the bucket and was flopping its way down the pier. "They are something," I said with a smile.
I turned back to Laurence. "I'm sorry about Carter."
His eyes closed, the world vanishing for a beat, his lashes dark against his cheeks, a curtain hiding the pain inside. "I know," he said softly.
"I wish you could have that too," I murmured.
After a beat, when his eyes continued to stay closed, I touched his cheek, waiting until his eyes fluttered open. "You can borrow my brothers anytime you want."
His cheek brushed against my fingers like a gentle caress as he smiled.
The smile was amused, soft, his lips tugging up at the sides in a way that melted my insides. That smile sent a brief flash through me. An image of a potential future.
Where Laurence comes home with me for Christmas. My brothers pulling him into their world like one of their own. A family he always wanted. His hand in mine as we sit on my family's porch as the snow falls in our yard.
I shook the image away.
"I won't give them back," Laurence said, his fingers briefly brushing against mine against his cheek. "So don't make suggestions that you won't honor."
I pulled my hand away. "I have to tell you something."
The shift in my tone was so drastic that Laurence took a step forward, his brow puckered in concern. "What is it?"
I closed my eyes, unable to look up at him. "I don't want to tell you. You've been happy today and I don't want to ruin it."
"Lily," he said softly. "Please."
I forced my eyes open. "Carter..." Laurence's entire demeanor changed with that single word. But I pressed ahead and told him what happened. The conversation between Liam, Carter and Derik, forcing myself to relay what Carter now knew about me.
And with each and every sentence, I watched him grow more and more angry, his fingers working through his hair in his one tic of forced control, keeping his anger in check with the fullest force of his self control.
"I'm surprised your brothers left them alive."
"They set a tail on Carter and Derik so they'll know where they are at all times. I think my brothers will deal with them later if I don't keep them busy."
"You don't want them to?"
I shoved my hair out of my face, unable to look at him. "Liam's a lawyer, famous for his sweet talk, believe it or not. I've watched him work. And if my brothers come at him because he 'bad mouthed his ex-girlfriend,' they'll be punished and he'll be more careful. If they want to 'take care of it' they have to be smart about it."
I stared down at the ground, embarrassed by the entire ordeal.
"Lily," he said softly. And the way my name sounded in his mouth nearly broke me.
I took a step back, trying to breathe. "Don't... Don't say my name. Not like that," I said, frustrated, finally looking up at him
"Like what?" he asked, his gaze intense, all encompassing.
I waved my arms in an angry flail. "Like... Just..." I changed tactics. "Don't feel sorry for me."
"It's concern. You taught me that, Lilâ Miss Auâ Whatever you want to be called."
"Well stop being concerned!"
"No." It was a single word, hard as steel. "I'm allowed to be concerned. Especially when it comes to you." He continued before I had a chance to ask him to clarify. "My brother is trying to break you. And he will continue to try. So forgive me for wanting to keep you from being a casualty in my families twisted game."
"I'm fine," I said, my voice turning traitorous as it cracked on the second word.
"None of this is fine. I'm not fine, so I highly doubt that you are," he argued, his own voice cracking slightly.
"You don't know how I am doing," I replied defensively. "You don't get to assume things about me."
Everything about my day had left me battered and bruised and even the most gentle well intentioned touch left me wincing. I had been prepared for pain and criticism, and I couldn't bare kindness, something soft that threatened to mirror the soft parts inside of me.
Laurence took a step forward. "Let me correct a few of Liam's assumptions about you."
He stepped forward, his gestures tentative, like he somehow knew that I felt broken and fragile. "I know that you are strong."
My heart thundered inside of me.
His voice dropped lower, his tone unwavering. "I know that you work incredibly hard. That you fight for the people that you love."
My body seemed to crackle with electricity, every syllable of every word, powerful.
His eyes pinned me in place as he continued. "You love your family fiercely. You are loyal, and immensely patient."
I held my breath, forgetting how to think, how to stand, how to do anything other than stare back at him.
The ghost of a smile tugged at the side of his mouth. "I know that you throw a mean punch, and that you are an expert at breaking into houses but only do it to check on people."
He didn't move any closer, giving me space, but even with that space, I felt enveloped in his words. Something inside of me knitting back together.
I knew all those things about myself. But the fact that he knew them too. That he was serving as a life raft after someone had thrown me into the depths of hurt left me utterly breathless.
"And I know that you have been nothing but kind and supportive while I have been an ass."
He pulled his eyes away, and it was only then that I was able to breath again. "And I am desperately trying to fix things so I don't continue to burn the people around me while I hurt."
Laurence leaned his arms across the pier railing, like his next words took a physical effort that kept him from fully standing under his own power. "That's why I am seeing a therapist."
"A therapist?"
He nodded, turning to look back out at the water. "Yeah," he said with a huff, fingers running through his hair again. "The woman in my office this morning."
It all clicked into place. The blond. She is his therapist.
Laurence searched my expression and an amused smile slowly spread across his face. "Lily..." He shook his head, my name a near groan in his mouth.
"What?" I asked defensively.
"Jealousy is a good color on you, but I wouldn't drag a woman into the office to torture you."
"You were jealous of Dash," I argued trying to deflect.
"I never said I wasn't. He deeply bothered me. Even now that I know you aren't dating him, he still does."
His honesty threw me and my mind spun. "My therapist, Natalie, suggested that I work on expressing myself more clearly. So just to make things perfectly clear, it drove me up the wall watching you with him. Watching him flirt with you, making you smile, making you laugh." His eyes were soft as he looked at me, like a gentle breeze across my skin, trailing patterns that threatened to burn me beyond repair.
"I assumed you knew... There hasn't been anyone else. Not for a long while."
"And those dates?" I asked.
"My attempt to forget the breathtaking secretary sitting in my office every day, driving me up the wall."
I looked away.
"Didn't you ever wonder about the timeline? How I only started dating more regularly when you started dating Liam?"Â He ran his fingers through his hair. "It is impossible to forget you. Especially when you sit five feet away."
A loaded silence settled between us, something that could turn into something wonderful and dangerous and would leave me never able to let him go if I let it. But he spared me the possibility of the 'what if' when he spoke again, changing the topic.
"I'm sorry that Natalie's presence in our office hurt you."
He looked out at the water, thoughtful. "When I first started to see her, I didn't want anyone to know," he said. "I thought... that seeing a therapist meant I had failed. That I was admitting that I was too broken to function, to hold everything together alone."
"You aren't too broken. And you aren't a failure," I said.
"I'm starting to believe that."
"What changed?" I asked. And why are you telling me this?
He weighed his words carefully. "After how I handled everything in Costa Rica..." He trailed off for a moment. "I just needed to get my life in order."
"HEY!" Henry shouted running up to us. "Will wants to know if we are allowed to jump off the pier into the water."
"No," I said immediately. "Please don't do that. Please tell the others not to do that. Make sure Sam makes sure the others don't do that."
Henry shot me a salute and ran back shouting, "NO! SHE SAID NO!"
I caught Laurence smiling behind his hand as I scowled after my brothers.
"What?"
He shook his head. "I didn't say a word."
...
We left the pier a short while later, Laurence returning to the office after a twenty minute goodbye from my brothers who made him promise to spend more time with them at a later date. Once they started making suggestions that Laurence come visit them in Montana over the holidays, I dragged my brothers away before they could start making concrete plans.
As I shoved them all into the van, leaving Laurence laughing as he climbed into his own car headed back to the office, my brothers looked far too pleased with themselves when I asked what was next on Finn's extensive list. They refused to answer. Apparently they were taking me on a tour of Los Angeles County which I took to mean nothing but trouble.
We drove for an hour, my brothers playing the Autumns version of the license plate game where whoever spots a license plate from out of state first, got to dare someone else in the car to do something. It resulted in Finn mooning another car, face red with embarrassment the entire time, Henry serenading a drive thru window with the song "Milkshakes" by Kelis, in an operatic voice, and Sam breaking a traffic law while driving.
By the time we arrived at our destination, it was dark and my brothers all turned to look at me expectantly, excited to finally reveal their choice of activity.
"A drive in?" I asked as we pulled into the parking lot and my brothers began to unpack coolers, blankets and lawn chairs from out of the trunk, making a cozy nest in front of the large drive in screen.
Others cars full of people were doing the same, everyone around us similar in age, which was the biggest clue that we weren't watching a kids movie.
"It's a Fast and Furious marathon," Henry said, gesturing toward the screen dramatically.
My jaw dropped. I had lost count of how many of those movies had been made, but I knew it was a lot.
"The first three?" I asked, hoping I was right.
Will grinned. "Nope. ALL. OF. THEM."
"And... how many of these movies are there?"
"Ten."
"TEN?!?" I waited for the joke. The obvious punchline. It never came.
"Well, that's not actually true," Jack said, hauling a large cooler out of the car.
Oh good. Will actually was messing with me.
"There are eleven. The final one is a two parter."
"That will take twenty four hours! I'll miss work!"
Finn smiled. "Don't worry, we called in sick for you."
I groaned. "I'm not five. You can't call in sick for me. And did it ever occur to any of you that I don't want to watch all ten movies sitting outside all night?"
"Eleven," Finn corrected before holding up his list. "And you have to. It's on the list."
I threw up my hands. "I DON'T HAVE TO DO EVERYTHING ON YOUR LIST!"
My brothers shook with silent laughter while Finn looked genuinely confused. "It's laminated. Of course you have to."
After trying to convince Finn that laminated lists weren't everything, and failing epically, I settled in for a long night... and morning... and a second night of Fast and Furious, my brothers shoving popcorn into their mouths like it was going out of style, their tall frames shuffling comically into small lawn chairs around me.
As the first movie began, the lights dimming, Sam leaned toward me, his voice barely audible above the sound of opening scene. "About Laurence..."
I suddenly couldn't focus on the movie hard enough. Sam was the most difficult of my brothers to win over and I began to worry. They had all avoided talking about him since we left the pier. I had assumed they didn't want to grill me, but it turned out they were waiting for Sam to take the lead. My heart began to pound, my mind spiraling with concern.
Was Sam just being nice to Laurence on the pier? Is he going to give me a speech about liking someone who has such a terrible brother? Is he going to convince the others that Laurence is not a good person? Is he going to suggest I move back home because of how much of a disaster my life is right nowâ
"We like him."
I couldn't find letters to form coherent thoughts, my voice gone, my brain too focused on those three words to help me form any sentences.
My brothers like Laurence Royal.
I fought a smile, hiding my grin behind my hand. It left me feeling like a goofy little kid all over again, receiving praise from my brothers after mastering a skill they had taken all summer to teach me.
"He's a good man. And it's not his fault that his brother is a waste of a person." Sam glanced at me. "He likes you too, you know."
I sighed, looking back at the screen, Laurence's words on my mind.
It's impossible to forget you...
"I know," I said, refusing to look at Sam.
Sam offered me some of his popcorn, his eyes back on the screen. "It'll happen. I don't think he could keep himself away from you for much longer if he tried."
I wanted to bet otherwise. Laurence had been doing a decent job of it so far.
Sam glanced down at his phone, his brow furrowing at a recent text message, the screen lighting up his face in the dark parking lot.
He was currently receiving updates on Carter and Liam's whereabouts. When Sam had set up a tail to keep track of them, a group chat was startedâ Sam, Laurence, Me, Allie and Tate's contacts keeping us updated on Carter's movements.
I had turned off my phone, not wanting any more reminders of the first half of my day, so Sam did me the service of giving me the update. "Carter and Derik are meeting up with some guy. There's a picture here of a money exchanging hands... The guy is too blurry in the picture to make out. But he feels familiar."
As the movie bled into the second one, the messages began to create a sharp contrast. An Autumns movie marathon at a drive in with a sprinkle of messages on Derik and Carter going to a grocery store.
Me and my brother's sharing eight pizzas at three in the morning when the fourth movie started, the stars beginning to bleed away into daybreak, followed by a string of messages about Derik going home.
Me going back with my brothers back to their AirBNBâ because I didn't have enough room to house all six of them in my apartmentâ where we ate pizookies and watched another action movieâ because eleven of them weren't enough, and after being up all night they decided they might as well start the Die Hard franchiseâ where we received several notifications about Carter standing in front of someone's home, staring up at the building for several hours, seeming to analyze it from every angle.
By the time I got back to my apartment calling the night and the next day to a close, it was eleven a clock the following night, and I could barely think straight, which I believed was the point of my brother's plan. Keep me distracted so I wouldn't fall into a dark hole of sadness after Liam's terrible betrayal.
Mission accomplished, I thought as I shuffled to the bathroom, hardly able to keep my eyes open. I rubbed my eyelids before staring into the mirror, amused at the reflection that looked back at me.
I took in the sight of my smudged makeup, giving me the most raccoon eyes I had ever seen, dark mascara and eyeliner wrapping around my eyes like twin thick hoops. I had pizookie crumbs and pizza sauce on my face, and my hair was a mess of wild tangles. But my tired smile was the most prominent thing on my face. I looked happy. I felt loved. And even after all the chaos, I felt good.
Washing my face, I finally turned my phone back on and began to recite things I loved about myself as I got ready for bed. I love that I have a family I can rely on. I love that I have great coworkers that give me time off when I need it.
As I crawled into bed, burrowing deep under the covers, I checked my messages and found an update on Carter that had just arrived.
Bracing myself, I opened the message, hardly able to put the words in order, my mind complete mush for being up for so many hours. But after several attempts, the words left me feeling wide awake.
TEXT: Carter vanished. We don't know where he is. Be careful.
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Thank you for reading chapter thirty! I hope you are enjoying the story! Or are at least curious to see where it goes! Add this story to your reading list to know when the next chapter drops!
UPDATE DAYS - A NEW CHAPTER EVERY FRIDAY!
What is Carter up to?
Why does Sam recognize the person Carter met in the picture?
Will things get better now that Laurence is seeing a therapist?
When will Lily's brothers get revenge on Liam and the others?
What will happen next?
CHAPTER QUESTION - Have you ever had a movie marathon? What did you watch?