“Oh…that.” His tone is dry and edged, not at all what I was expecting.

I swivel a little so I can see his face. He’s glaring at the sky. The pretty sky. This can’t be good. “What happened?”

He grimaces. “I feel like if I say it out loud it will come true. Can you try to inherit some telepathy in the next five minutes?”

“I can try to guess.”

“That doesn’t sound like a fun game either.”

I narrow my eyes at him and try to put the pieces together. He was on a run, a perfectly normal run, with Ryke, Melissa, and…oh shit.

“Daisy. What did she do?” My little sister has a habit of seeking danger. I know I land on the right answer because tiny stress-wrinkles crease his forehead. It takes him a quick minute to tell me about the bartering on the beach, but when he finishes, he doesn’t look relieved.

“There’s something else, isn’t there?”

“Yeah, and it’s the part that makes me want to jump off this balcony.” He stops before spoiling the news, which only makes me curious and nervous.

“Are you going to tell me?”

He lets out a long sigh and rubs his eyes in slight distress. “I don’t even know what to call it, Lil. There’s so many words for it, but none of them really describe the situation. Inappropriate and fucked up are my favorite ones though.”

I frown. “Are we still talking about Daisy?”

“And Ryke.”

His eyes flicker to mine, taking in my reaction as he lets this sink in.

“Wait, what?” It can’t be what I think. That was all in my mind, wasn’t it?

“Daisy had cash in her bikini top,” Lo says. “Ryke made some offhanded comment about it and it led to…other comments.” His jaw tightens at the memory and then his eyes land back on me. “Why the fuck are you smiling? I just told you that my half-brother was flirting with your little sister.”

I press my lips together, to try and hide it, but I soon surrender to the fact that I’m happy. “Do you know how long I’ve thought it was all in my head?”

This doesn’t amuse him. In fact, he straightens up like he’s ready to go assault his brother. “How long?”

I put my hand on his chest to calm him. “January…but I didn’t want to worry you if it wasn’t true.”

He lets out an angry breath.

“Do you know how many times Ryke has called me a pervert?” I continue. “I thought this was just another illusion from my dirty mind, like I was interpreting something out of nothing and making it all up.”

“You’re not. Now move past that achievement and bring yourself down to my level.” He turns his body a little more, so that we’re looking straight on at each other. “My twenty-two-year-old brother is flirting, apparently not deliberately—I’m not even sure how that fucking happens—with your sixteen-year-old sister.” He waits for it to sink in.

“Shit.”

“Yeah, shit. So what are we going to do? I’m worried that your sister is going to like him in a bad way. I mean, most girls are like babbling fools around Ryke. The fact that she’s not…I can’t even.” He runs a hand through his hair. “All I’m saying is that Ryke is smart enough not to make a move on her, but Daisy probably doesn’t know any better.”

 “I’ve already talked to her.” On numerous occasions, but she keeps saying the same thing to me. “She knows that she can’t do anything with him. And…” I snap my fingers at the realization. “Ryke brought Melissa here, so he is clearly putting off the right signals.” Showing up on vacation with a girl screams “taken” and should let Daisy know not to act on her feelings, if she does have any that extend beyond a friendship.

I kind of hope we’re blowing this all out of proportion and no chemistry really exists there. Because they have to know that nothing can ever happen.

Our mother would be more than just furious if she learned that Daisy even had a crush on Ryke Meadows. For one, his age. And two, he’s the spawn of Sara Hale. After the separation between Jonathan and Sara, my parents chose a side—Team Jonathan all the way. And with our mother’s incredibly high standards, I can see her wanting something more for Daisy. Something better.

Someone as affluent as Connor Cobalt or Loren Hale. Someone that has more to offer than a trust fund inherited out of a quiet divorce and hurt feelings.

Lo tilts my chin so that I meet his eyes and come back to the present, pulled straight from my thoughts. “Then Ryke needs to stop ditching Melissa for Daisy,” Lo tells me. “I’ll have another conversation with him…when I’m not picturing tearing his head off his shoulders.” His jaw locks at another thought. “He’s older. He has to be the one to take responsibility.”

“Can you blame him though?” The words tumble out of my mouth before I can catch them. I’m so not used to defending Ryke Meadows, but being in his company for three months maybe opened me up to his ways.

My eyes widen, and Lo looks equally shocked by the words. “Explain,” he says.

“Well, it’s just…” I stumble. “Daisy is a high fashion model. She’s always around older people, and she doesn’t look sixteen. She has a career. She makes money and travels the world. Sometimes she acts her age, sure, but most of the time she’s basically twenty.” There are moments where I even feel younger than her. I’m less worldly, less cultured, and less experienced (not sexually but for everything else, sure). “I can understand how that might be confusing for someone who’s attracted to her.”

Lo presses his hands to his face, more distressed than I’ve seen him in a long while, at least in moments that don’t involve craving booze. “That word, don’t say that word.”

“What?”

“Attracted.”

Oh. “I think my fear is that the more we keep telling them to stop, the more they’ll just do it to spite us.” And what if nothing’s there but friendship and we involuntarily push them together. “…like two rebellious teenagers or something.”

He groans. “She is a teenager.” He drops his hands and lets out another breath. “This is so fucked up.”

I smile at this and nudge his side. “Doesn’t it feel good to not be the only ones?”

He meets my gaze with a tilt of his head, and his lips try hard not to rise. “No, I like being alone on the fucked up island with you.” He nuzzles his nose into the crook of my neck. I laugh, a sound that I didn’t think possible an hour ago, and he responds with two light kisses on my collarbone.

“So what do we do?” he asks me, intertwining his fingers with mine. I appraise our hands for a moment, trying to come up with a plan.

“Maybe…maybe we just keep them separated for the rest of the vacation. Or try to.”

“But what about when we go home? What do we do about them then?”

“How many times are they really around each other?” Daisy has school, and modeling occupies most of her time. Without her knowing about my sex addiction, she’s invited to less and less outings with our group. Sometimes I imagine telling her, but I don’t think it will improve our relationship. And that’s what I’m trying to repair.

“Then we have a plan.”

He extends his palm like we’re closing a business deal. As I go in for the shake, he drops his hand and plants a surprise kiss on my lips. It takes me aback, but it sends little happy flutters in my stomach. The kiss lasts longer than the others as he cups the back of my head and gently opens my mouth with his. I feel the brush of his tongue and more flapping fills my belly.

He edges back after a moment and I curl up in his arms. One thing is certain.

Surprise kisses are the best.

Four days of pool and beach have left me a little sunburned, tan, and tired. Lily and I have succeeded in separating Ryke and Daisy for the majority of the trip, at least enough where they haven’t had any opportunity to really talk.

Tonight we’re all eating at an authentic Mexican restaurant in the city. Chips and dip overflow the table, and the noise gathers by a stage, which sits close to the bar. I draw back at Daisy’s threat to make us all do karaoke later tonight. Not going to happen, even if the youngest Calloway girl can be highly persuasive. She seems to bat lashes, give us those big green puppy-dog eyes and everyone falls under her spell. The frightening part, I think she knows she has this power too.