Luna and the Lie Read online

  I had a faint memory of writing a letter to Santa when I’d still been holding out hope that he would finally be able to find my house so I could ask for things. But Santa never took my letters. He never answered any of my requests.

  Christmas as a kid had included my uncle’s family coming over for whatever fast food whoever was sober enough to realize we needed to eat, brought over, and so much beer and alcohol, everyone over the age of fifteen got drunk and started arguing. There was always at least one fistfight or two and at least one drug. There were never any gifts. A single tree or ornament. Or any love. Christmas hadn’t been anything like what movies showed.

  For a long, long time, I would have done anything if the family I had at that point would have just been… a fraction of the people I wanted them to be.

  But they hadn’t been.

  A lot of people didn’t have that. I wasn’t alone, and that knowledge had helped the older I’d gotten. It still hurt, and part of me still couldn’t help but wish…

  I sighed.

  Then one little sister had come, and another, and then Lily… and they had been everything I could have hoped for. It probably helped that their mom didn’t have a nurturing bone in her body, but they had been my little people. They had given me their love, and I had taken it all.

  I had done my best to make sure at least my sisters had a tiny little something on Christmas Day from money I stole from whoever was dumb enough to leave their purse or wallet lying around. A hairbrush from the dollar store. Some barrettes. Maybe it wasn’t anything flashy, but it was something, and none of them had ever complained.

  That’s why I was going to go to San Antonio. So they wouldn’t. So even Grandma Genie wouldn’t be alone with people she hadn’t been able to stand either while she’d been alive.

  My best friend wrote me back immediately, saving me from going down that path of useless wishes that were never going to come true.

  Lenny: I have another arm, bish, and two good legs.

  Lenny: I know at least 3 guys at the gym that would pretend to be your bodyguard if you just fed them.

  That solidified plan B, even if I hated asking for favors almost as much as I hated relying on people.

  My only consolation with Rip was that he owed me in the first place. At least he thought he owed me. It also helped that I couldn’t think of a single person, a big MMA fighter or not, who was as scary or intimidating as Lucas Ripley was. That was the truth.

  The fact that I didn’t mind looking at him, and that I enjoyed him when he wasn’t grumbling at me, was only a tiny factor. Tiny, tiny.

  Only idiots liked men who they had no chance with.

  But this was my curse—to love and care for people who didn’t love or care for me back. At least not the way I wanted them to.

  With Rip, I’d accepted what our relationship was from the beginning.

  Out of all the men in the world that my heart could go whoosh, whoosh, whoosh over from time to time when I didn’t have it reined in, out of all of the men who could have the ability to make me master looking out of the corner of my eye, it had to be one of my bosses who had that effect on me.

  Of course it had to be.

  My not-so-very nice boss.

  Because it was my curse.

  I was so dumb.

  Holding my phone on my lap, I glanced up, even though a giant part of me didn’t want to, but all I saw was the same thing I’d seen moments before. A man, who I knew was six foot four, wedged onto a tall stool. A man with deep brown hair with a hint of silvery gray threaded through it. A man with a face that was usually set into an aggravated expression or an angry one… except when there was good news that was work-related. Well over two hundred pounds poured over a frame that was all solid. Huge thighs, big butt, forearms the size of my biceps if not bigger, a chest that could double as a bed for a medium-sized dog….

  Buck up, Luna, just ask him, my conscience told me. He owes you. He owes you big time. Sort of.

  Squeezing my eyes shut, I tried to tell my dumb heart to calm down. I tried to tell my eyes to go somewhere else. Anywhere else. Anyone else.

  But the heart wants what it wants. And it’s scared of what it wants to be scared of, no matter how reasonable you try to be about it.

  Like a fearless but total moron.

  The vibrating from my lap had me glancing down at the screen to see the last message that had come through.

  Lenny: Don’t go to the funeral if you don’t want to. Your grandma would understand.

  That icky, thick feeling flooded my stomach again, covering over the frustration I felt with myself for being attracted to Rip in the first place. But if there was something that could make me forget about that, it was the guilt I felt for walking out of my grandmother’s life so many years ago and never seeing her again.

  We had both known it was the only way things could be between us, but it still didn’t help me feel any better.

  Me: I have to, even though I would rather get stuck behind someone driving ten miles under the speed limit for an hour. You know what she did for us. It’s the least I can do.

  That much, Lenny did know. She and her family had been there for me when I had taken my siblings. She knew almost as much as I let anyone know, minus the Coopers. It wasn’t everything. No one knew about all the little pieces, but it was a lot.

  Two seconds went by before I got a response.

  Lenny: The offer stands, bish.

  Lenny: You’re the best person I know, fyi.

  I smiled down at my phone.

  Me: I love you too

  Lenny: [eye rolling emoji]

  Lenny: I was texting you because Grandpa G is making margaritas and he was asking where you were.

  Me: Tell him I love him.

  Lenny: I will. You find Rip?

  Me: I’m watching him.

  Lenny: Stalker

  Me: He’s standing in front of me, I can’t help it.

  Lenny: Pretty sure that’s what every stalker thinks.

  I chanced another glance at the man and held back a sigh.

  Me: Sometimes I don’t understand why him.

  Lenny: Because he looks like he’s been in jail and that’s about as far away from what every jackass you’ve ever dated looks like?

  Lenny: Grandpa G says he loves you too and to come over and bring the girl with you if she’s around. I didn’t tell him you’re at the bar, otherwise he’d want to invite himself. You know how that man gets in public.

  I almost laughed at the first comment and definitely laughed at the second one. Rip did look like he’d done time. That was unfair, but it was the truth.

  For all I knew, he probably had.

  Then again, I was probably judging him by a face he had no say in. For all I knew, he had a marshmallow heart and rescued and rehabilitated small animals when he wasn’t at work. Deep down, he might have a caring and loving disposition that he only shared around very few people—people who had won his trust.

  You never knew.

  The idea of that put a small smile on my face and kept it there as I typed a message back, leaving the first comment alone.

  Me: I don’t know how much longer I’ll be here, but if I leave soon, I’ll drop by. Tell Grandpa G that the girl is working tonight. You’re all coming for the graduation, right?

  Lenny: Yes. I’m legit ready to cry this Saturday.

  Lenny: I’ve got the blow horn ready by the way. TOOT TOOT, bish.

  She wasn’t the only one preparing herself to cry this weekend, and that made me happy for some reason.

  I was still smiling over Lenny’s text when Rip turned from where he was at the bar, holding a glass with some dark liquid inside, and instantly locked his gaze on me.

  I didn’t hesitate smiling wider before setting my phone back on the table, even as my heart started thumping at the fact that I was about to ask him for something.

  I didn’t want to. I had never wanted to. I had planned on never asking him for anything. />
  But…

  Well…

  I would ask him for this.

  I had to. For my sisters. For me, because I really was nervous going alone back to the place I’d grown up.

  Almost like he could sense what was going on inside of me, his eyes narrowed just a little, just barely enough for me to be able to tell that he had. And because of that, I made my smile go as big as possible, even flashing him teeth. He already had a feeling that something was going on. There was no hiding it, unfortunately. I was a decent liar until people got to know me.

  Rip stood there for a second watching me with those heavy, dark brown eyebrows low over his blue-green eyes. By the time another second had passed, he had taken a step forward. Then another foot went ahead. And another.

  He was coming toward me in his tight long-sleeved green shirt, showing off more tattoos on his neck than I had ever, ever seen in the years we had known each other. There was a skull—an actual skull—tattooed over his Adam’s apple with lines and shapes spread out along the sides of it. And I was thinking to myself that I wanted to change my freaking mind about the favor… but I couldn’t.

  I wouldn’t.

  I had done scarier things than this. I would do scarier things than this. Fear, I thought, was more like a hallucinogenic. It was all in your mind, and there was nothing to really be scared of as long as you knew and expected the worst and the best.

  “Hi, Birthday Man,” I managed to get out, still grinning at him with my stupid heart beating in my throat even though I told it not to, trying my best not to look too hard at the very dark ink permanently etched into his skin.

  Rip slid me a look out of the corner of his eye as he pulled the chair in front of mine out. He took the seat. Right there. Right by me.

  Okay. I could play it cool. I could take it easy.

  “You been here long?” he asked in that grumbled, deep voice that constantly sounded irritated… even now.

  I shook my head. “Just about twenty minutes,” I replied. “You?”

  He made a noise that sounded like a grunt as he raised the glass of whatever he was drinking to his lips and took a sip.

  Well, it wasn’t like it really mattered how long he’d been around.

  “Is anyone else coming?” I asked him when he didn’t say anything after setting his glass back down on the table. I’d overheard a couple of the guys talking about Rip’s half-hearted invitation when I had taken a bathroom break, but I hadn’t heard more than that.

  His gaze hadn’t left mine from the moment he had spotted me, and it didn’t go anywhere as he shrugged and said, “Doubt it.”

  I must have made a face because he added, casually, “I’m not exactly anybody’s favorite, Luna.”

  The smile fell right off my mouth, and I couldn’t help but frown at him. At the harshness of his words. At the… fact-like nature of them. That wasn’t very nice for him to assume. That wasn’t very nice to assume at all, and it bothered me… even if it was true that Mr. Cooper was my favorite person at the shop. And I was his. And Miguel’s—

  Crap.

  “I’m sure—“ I started before getting cut off.

  “I’m not,” he told me, tapping his short fingernails against the glass. Rip tipped his chin up a millimeter, giving me a slightly better view of the shading tucked up against his jawline. He swallowed, everything about his body language saying that he was telling me these words in this way because it wasn’t a big deal to him. He didn’t care. Why should he? His body said.

  His next words confirmed it. “I’m not around to be anybody’s friend.”

  All righty then.

  I wanted to tell him something that would make it seem that it wasn’t like anyone hated him or disliked him.

  Most of the guys were just… wary.

  Even I was wary, and he didn’t scare or intimidate me… unless I screwed up.

  But I didn’t know what to say to that comment. I hated liars as much as I hated aggressive drunk people and cooked carrots. So I did the only thing I could think of: I smiled at him and shrugged. He didn’t look even a little put out or hurt by what he’d been saying. Who was I to make it a big deal if he claimed he didn’t care? “Did you like your cake?”

  All he did was tip his chin down as he nailed me with that intense, bright gaze, his fingers still wrapped around the nearly full glass.

  And something told me “Do it now, Luna.”

  It was now or never.

  I gave him a big smile. “Hey, Rip?”

  He watched me as he lifted his drink and took another sip of it.

  I guess that was going to be his version of saying yes.

  Screw it. Do it.

  I kept the smile on my face as I rushed out, “Iwanttocashinmyfavor.”

  He didn’t say anything for so long, I thought for sure he would end up telling me to fuck off, that he’d only been joking all along.

  And it was right then, with the j-word at the front of my brain that I realized how stupid that thought was.

  Rip joking? In my dreams.

  If he was going to tell me no, he was going to need to say it. It wouldn’t bother me. It wouldn’t offend me. I’d move on and find someone else to go with me.

  But what he said instead was “You wanna cash in your favor?”

  The “yes” out of me was croaked and dumb-sounding, but if he didn’t understand it, my nod would have to be enough.

  Rip… Rip just sat there, lowering his glass to the table. He let out a deep breath that I barely managed to hear. A muscle in his cheek twitched. Then he just said one word, and it wasn’t the one I’d been expecting. The one I wanted, but not anticipated. “Okay.”

  Okay?

  That was it?

  I’d learned as a kid never to give someone a reason to second-guess their answer if you had already gotten the one you wanted. So, all right. Maybe I didn’t trust how easily the answer had come, but I was going to work with it. “I need you to go with me to a funeral.”

  The only sign I had that he’d heard me was his nostrils flaring. Then, he blinked. Lucas Ripley sat back in the stool, that tight shirt curving over his impressive chest, and pressed his lips together. His sentence was slow. “You want me to pretend we’re getting married or something?”

  Yeah. My mouth opened. Then it closed.

  It was my turn to stare at him. My turn to press my lips together.

  Then, and only then, did I tip my face up to the ceiling and freaking laugh.

  I slapped my palm over my eyes, leaned back in my stool just like he had done, and I laughed even more.

  I was so caught up in it that I almost missed out on the way he barked, “What?”

  Did he think I wanted us to pretend we were engaged?

  I laughed even more, dropping my palm but only to drag the back of my hand across my eyes.

  “What the fuck is so funny?” he growled.

  I couldn’t help but grin at him, at this moment, at myself, at everything, and I couldn’t help but keep laughing as I said, “No, I don’t want you to pretend we’re engaged.”

  I burst out laughing again, looking up at the ceiling as I did, before somehow managing to get out, “Why… why would I want that?”

  I would swear on my future children that his face instantly went red. If someone had asked me if I thought he was physically capable of blushing, I would have thought they were nuts. But there it was: red on his cheeks. Even on his nose.

  On anyone else, it would have been kind of adorable because he was scowling at the same time.

  “No, that’s not what I’m asking.” I laughed again, genuinely trying to stop but not capable of it because his face was still red, and I was eating it up. “I wasn’t expecting you to say that. It was straight out of a rom-com,” I pretty much cackled, imagining him watching one at home, smiling to himself.

  My boss full-on frowned. “What’s a rom-com?”

  Like he didn’t know what a rom-com was. Sure. I could let it go. For now.
r />   I took one look at his pink-red face and lost it all over again. Pretend we’re getting married. Who would have known that Rip would make me laugh when I’d been so stressed about asking him for my favor all freaking day?

  He didn’t even let me enjoy it because his expression went I’m gonna kill you-like as I cracked up at his expense. “All you want is me to go to a funeral with you then?”

  And there was the reminder of what I was asking of him. Why I was asking.

  The smile and the laughter instantly left my face and my heart when I nodded, the severity of it stripping all that joy away. “Yes, please.”

  His eyes didn’t narrow. He even lost the serial killer face. He just watched me. I wasn’t sure if he didn’t trust me or didn’t believe this was what I was asking him, but I didn’t really care.

  I just stared right back at him, one single memory flipping out of me as I thought about why I had never planned on going back home.

  I’m gonna fucking kill you, Luna! You ever come back, and I will literally fucking kill you, you little piece of shit! I can’t fucking believe you!

  It was enough to make me swallow. Enough to feel guilt for all of a split second before I squashed it with the heel of my work boots. I had no reason to feel bad.

  Rip waited, thinking who knows what before he gave me a brisk nod, like it was a business transaction we had finally come to an agreement to after a lot of haggling.

  Which I guess it was.

  I had done something for him, and now he was doing something right back for me. It was what he had offered. It had been his idea.

  But then he asked me something surprising. “You sure? That’s what you want your favor to be?”

  I nodded gravely. “I didn’t want to ask you for anything, but, yeah, that’s what I want.” I gave him a smile that made my teeth hurt from how hard they were pressing down on each other at the memory I had just pushed right back out of my brain. “Please.”