“Alright.”
“Keep your phone on, alright?”
“Yeah.”
The line went dead and I took a deep breath before I hopped up. When I walked into the bathroom, Jiselle was still sniffling in the shower. I threw my clothes off and climbed in behind her.
“Come on. You’re going to make yourself sick, sweetheart.” I pulled her in and let my hands stretch along her back. She nodded and closed her eyes. “You want to breathe with me?” I asked and she nodded again. “Come on. Let’s breathe.”
I closed my eyes and took deep breaths with Jiselle. Then I scrubbed her body clean and helped her out of the shower. She went to work brushing her teeth and I climbed back in to take care of my hygiene needs. Once I finished, Jiselle sat on the bathroom counter while I brushed my teeth and we collapsed into Stone’s bed side by side.
I lay on my back, one arm around Jiselle while she snuggled into my side, and just stared at the ceiling. His bed still smelled like him.
I missed him already.
After spending damn near every night together after we got together, his bed felt too big with just me and Jiselle in it. It felt too empty, too cold. Jiselle’s arm and leg tightened around me and I leaned down and kissed the top of her head.
“What the fuck happened?” She breathed against my skin.
“It’s going to be okay,” I said and kissed her forehead again. “It’s going to be okay.”
19
I sniffed and rubbed my eyes while plastering a smile on my face and spinning.
“Boom. One for Xy and one for Joss.” I set their lunchboxes on the table. “Drake, are you good on lunch?”
“You realize I’m eighteen, right?” He chuckled.
“Yeah but you’re still in school. So you get all the perks everyone else in school gets.”
“Trust me. I’m good on lunch.”
“Okay.” I nodded.
“Alright.” He nudged me lightly with his elbow to be reassuring. “Come on, y’all. Let’s make moves.” Drake clapped his hands.
Joss hopped up and Xy quickly downed the rest of his orange juice before hopping up too.
“Be careful please!”
“I got you.” Drake picked up his water bottle and the three of them headed out.
Everyone was stepping up while Stone was in jail. It had only been two days and the hope was he’d be out tomorrow since the weekend had a shitty booking timeline. But in the meantime, Iwas using his house as mine and making sure the youngest of his siblings weren’t missing anything but his presence.
Kiano had gotten Drake a car the morning after Stone’s arrest. I wasn’t sure if it was because he felt guilty or if he genuinely just thought it would take stress off Stone, Morocco, and Leann.
I took a deep breath then got to work cleaning the kitchen. I liked feeding Stone’s family and cleaning up behind them. It kept me busy. It kept my brain focused on something that wasn’t replaying that night at the club.
I felt responsible just as much as Kiano.
It had been me and my big ass mouth getting into it with a man that led to all of this stupid shit. Should he have grabbed my ass? No. Should I have smacked the fuck out of him? Probably. That didn’t mean I wasn’t at fault for all of this drama.
“You good?” Morocco’s voice pulled me out of my thoughts and I realized I was standing in front of the sink just letting the water run.
I turned it off immediately.
“Yeah. I’m good.”