Page 92 of His Pretty Little Duet

I want complete control.

Fawn

The alfrescoand lawn area is dotted with overhead fairy lights, while the dense darkness of the bush creates black borders around the space. Anything could be within that black abyss, but it's not menacing. It's beautiful and wild.

Music soars around us, "This Town" playing through the speakers. The melodic voice of Niall Horan singing about love. The words remind me of Benji, being children and never saying the things I wish we had.

"Everything comes back to you."

Konnor and Blesk are dancing under the twinkling lights; her high ponytail flicks around as she giggles, not taking him seriously. He tries to teach her the steps Cassidy showed them earlier, but she's not as graceful as Cassidy. He seems to like that more, though, somehow.

I peer across the lawn at Shoshanna and Bronson tangled together in the free-standing hammock. She throws her head back laughing at something he says. He's animated as he talks. I've only known him for a day, but I'm sure whatever he's going on about is ridiculous or completely mad or both.

In the gazebo, Cassidy has fallen asleep in Max's lap, cradled in his big arms like a toddler. Beside him is a baby monitor, but he's fixed on his wife's face. His eyes, stormy grey, study the girl in his arms as though he has just in this moment fallen in love with her, as though he is helplesslyfalling.

"Butterflies, they come alive."

Clay's furrowed brows and tight assessing lips roll into my mind. I smile. There is no doubt that Benji's memory hovers around me; regret and uncertainty do that, keep the memories lingering instead of laying them to rest with him. But... the parts of me responsible for loving aren’t his anymore. If they ever were.

My heart is big for Clay

My hands shake for him.

My breath catches for him.

"Everything comes back to you."

At the sound of Shoshanna's laugh, my throat tightens around a knot of jealousy. I sigh, wanting moments of laughter in a hammock, wanting peaceful sleep in Clay's arms, wanting to dance on his feet like Blesk is doing right now with Konnor. They all look...comfortable.Maybe I'll have that with Clay one day. But Clay Butcher is at odds with comfort. And I'll take whatever that brilliant man gives me with the knowledge it's more than he offers anyone else. That's enough.

It has to be enough.

The sound of the sliding door breaks through the trance Niall Horan has me in.

"Get back inside, ya, boofheads." Xander blocks the dogs from coming outside with his leg, then sidesteps the tumbling canines, exiting the house and joining us. He walks across to me with a soft smile on his handsome face. "You okay, girlie?"

I nod, pretending it's just a passing question, but his trained eyes can't be missed even in the dim of the gathering night. Hemeans it on a deeper, more visceral level."Are you okay?"They all know. It was in their eyes all day.

Pity.

Deflecting, I say, "I bet Stacey passed straight out."

"Too much beer. She had three pints; that's a lot for her." He plonks down beside me on the bench. "She's usually not a beer drinker."

As the memory of my miscarriage being numberthreethrows a rock of sadness into my stomach, I mutter, "Three isthemagicnumber."

"What number is that?"

Cringing at my context-less comment, I dismiss it with a wave of my hand. "It's just one of those things people say." He arches a brow at me, not allowing my digression to take root. I roll my eyes. "Okay,my mumused to say,'bad things come in three.'Do you think that's true? It seems to always be the case."

"Nah, girlie." He scrunches his nose and shakes his head, a sweet kind of amusement, that isn't mean, rides his tone. "That's called a self-proclaimed prophecy. It's a dangerous thing."

I frown. "Huh?"

He twists to face me, and I mirror him. "It's like when you think don't trip, and then you trip. Your mind makes it happen or finds a pattern in the sequence of events. When they are just random. Shitty and random, buddy."

I collect up my hair, pulling it down the shoulder furthest from him so I can see his face without strands curtaining him. "I didn't make these bad things happen to me."

"No. Of course not, Fawn. But the number..." He stares across the yard at his brothers, not observing them but contemplating his words for several moments. He looks back at me, an idea dancing in his blue eyes. "Say, if something else happens, does it blow this conspiracy out of the water? Or do you restart? Start from one and just count to three again?"

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