Long Way Down (Calloway Sisters 4)

A NOTE FROM RYKE

Fuck off.

RYKE MEADOWS

The longest blonde hair caught the wind, splayed wildly and fucking madly. I watched her grip onto the railing of a wooden ramp, suspended midair towards a bungee jump. She rocked back and forth like she was squeezing in early morning pull-ups for the day.

She wasn’t. Doing pull-ups for the fucking day, I meant.

She just couldn’t stop moving.

And I kept thinking, this girl is off her fucking hinges.

We stood near the back of the bungee line, and as she peered over the railing again, she lifted her hips onto it, hanging her head further down.

Fucking A.

When everyone bailed on bungee jumping, all but Daisy, I didn’t think she’d pretend to be a bird and crawl over the railing. I had no clue what sixteen-year-olds usually did, but for some fucking reason, I thought she would’ve complained about the long line or lack of cellphone reception.

I’d only known her for short spurts of time, and I was still trying to understand who she was at her core.

6:30 a.m. in the tropical climate of a foreign country.

My first real time alone with Daisy Calloway. Without her sisters or my brother present.

And my fucking issue: in the back of my mind, while I watched her hang headfirst, I thought, that looks like fucking fun.

And then, any farther over that railing and I’m grabbing her.

I rebounded between wanting to protect her and wanting to do crazy shit with her. I tried to block out whatever thoughts continued to churn, and I just went on impulse.

“What the fuck are you doing, Calloway?” I sidled next to her and rested my hand on her shoulder, but I didn’t pull her down. I leaned my waist against the wooden barrier and saw the answer in her green eyes.

She perused the landscape, as though appreciating the expansive view of Cancun, Mexico. The current location of my college Spring Break. Even though Daisy wasn’t in college, she tagged along to spend time with her older sisters, who were all happy by her presence.

Daisy tucked a flyaway strand of hair behind her ear. “They’re missing out.”

“They won’t fucking think so.” Most of them didn’t want to wake up this early, and Lily was too scared of heights to even contemplate the idea.

The line moved forward. “You coming with me?” I asked her, raking a hand through my unkempt brown hair.

She finally met my eyes, something devious behind hers. “Do a lot of girls come with you?” she asked.

My expression stayed in the same fucking darkened state. “If I’m with them,” I said vaguely, treading the line between the sexual innuendo and the safer space.

Daisy set her feet on the ramp, and despite her flirty fucking question, there was true intrigue behind her eyes and some confusion that I couldn’t read past. “So you’ve never had a girl not come with you?”

My head pounded, and I rubbed my lips. “Move, Daisy.”

I was twenty-two.

She was sixteen.

I would’ve never—in a fucking million years—taken advantage of Daisy, but I always had a hard time shutting my mouth when someone asked me for advice in so many words, in so many fucking ways. This wouldn’t have been the first time I talked to her about sex, but I worried that she would’ve start

ed relating these conversations to me and concluded that I thought about her in a sexual way.

Daisy skipped up the ramp while she walked two of her fingers along the railing. “I was just curious.” She glanced at me with a sincere apology on her face. “Sorry.”

“You don’t have to fucking apologize for asking me something.”

We stopped again, the line at a standstill. Her hair flew in every direction, and she tilted her head, like she struggled to rephrase her first question. Daisy’s expression could be summed up as pained confusion, and in my very fucking core, I wanted to help her. I just hoped I could.

“What’s eating at you?” I asked.

“Mosquitos.” She wafted invisible bugs. She always tried to lighten the mood when she felt it going sour by her own hand.

My jaw hardened. “What’s fucking bothering you?” I didn’t fucking care about whether or not the air tensed or discomfort passed between us. I just cared about her.

“Nothing.” It’s not nothing.

I rubbed my eyes in annoyance. “Daisy—”

“It’s not a big deal.” She wore that uncertainty again.

“Yeah? Why do you look like you need to throw up?”

She crossed her arms in a very Rose Calloway fucking manner. “You’re so pushy. You know that, right?” She’d reminded me of that before. “Are you like this with everyone?”

Only people I care about. “Look, I’m going to annoy the fuck out of you like you’re annoying me right now, so you might as well do us both the favor and give it to me, Calloway.” I waved her on.

Her lips lifted a fraction. “Do you want it hard or soft?”

“Hard as you want to fucking go.”

A gust of wind whipped her hair in her face, blonde strands sticking to her mouth. She looked frustrated by her waist-length hair, and so I helped comb it back so she could see. She grunted in irritation at the tangled mess.

“Give me.” I gestured to her hair tie.

She snapped it off her wrist, and I collected her fucking hair, putting it in the messiest bun. She said thanks and sighed in relief before I even finished.

I stepped back one foot. “You asked me if I’ve ever had a girl not come with me. Why does that fucking matter to you?”

“It’s not about you personally,” she said quickly.

“I never thought it was.”

Her brows scrunched, her expression fucking killing me. “I just wondered,” she began, “if maybe there’s something wrong with me.” She took a long pause.

My jaw locked. Nothing’s fucking wrong with you; the words sat like a pit in my throat.

“Or maybe,” she continued, “…maybe there’s something wrong with the guys I’ve been with.” She then hiked herself on the railing, sitting and swinging her legs.

At six-three, my head was still higher than hers, so I stared down while she looked up at me. I would’ve sat next to her, but I wanted to meet her eyes.

“Some girls are hard to get off,” I told her. “Some guys are fucking terrible at pleasing women. You’re not going to know which category you fall into, sweetheart. Not until you find someone that you’re fucking attracted to.”

She nodded a few times, looking crestfallen and incredibly fucking sad. When she sensed me staring, she gave me an I’m okay smile that I didn’t believe.

There was nothing I could do to fix how she felt, and that was the hardest part of the entire thing.

“Have you been bungee jumping before?” she asked, changing the topic so I’d stop worrying.

“A few fucking times. What about you?”

“Mostly at theme parks.” Daisy skimmed my features, her green eyes flitting over the carabiners on the belt loops of my jeans, rising up my green crew-neck to my unshaven jaw, hardened gaze, and thick, dark brown hair.

She wasn’t discreet about the once-over, but she wasn’t exactly being suggestive either. Just fucking curious.

She hopped back on the ramp, and we walked up the shortened line, tension winding between us.

“Can you say no?” I asked her suddenly.

She nodded and knotted the bottom of her loose fitting white shirt, a neon-green bikini beneath. No shorts.

“What if I was just some guy and I tried to pull down your bathing suit, what would you fucking do?”

Daisy shrugged. “I don’t know—a lot of factors would have to go into it, I think.”

“It’s not a fucking trick question,” I retorted, pissed—not at her. I was pissed because I knew what made her think like that. She’d started modeling at fourteen. She’d been touched and manhandled and told to get dressed in front of people, treated like absolute fucking shit. I’d heard snippets of stories from her sisters, and their mom was forcing her to stand still when all this girl wanted to do was run.

Right now, she could barely even keep two feet in one place.

“Why does it matter to you?” she asked me what I’d asked her.

I shook my head, thinking about how much my mom silenced me, and it’d taken me a long time to find my voice. I wouldn’t have wanted that rough road for anyone, but I started seeing pieces of my life inside of hers. And why the fuck were we the only two people here?

Why the fuck did I bungee alone all three other times in my life?

My head hammered again. I care about you. I want you to be safe. Please don’t fuck anyone that makes you uncomfortable. It’s going to kill me if it kills you.

Every word bled into my brain, but I fought myself from saying them out loud. I just kept shaking my head.

I rubbed my jaw and then noticed two twenty-something guys ahead of us. Staring at her ass. I ended up moving forward in the line. In front of her. I blocked them from view, and she spun around to face me once more.

She began to smile, understanding what I just did.

It was a better fucking smile. I liked those because I knew she was doing okay.

And then abruptly, I said, “You can ask me anything.” The phrase was weighted. Ask me anything. I rarely shared personal facts with people. I barely opened up to my own brother beyond the subject of addiction. And I was letting her ask me anything.

If I dug deep enough, I would’ve realized that I wanted her to know me.

I felt so fucking compelled to strip a layer away, and I’d never been drawn to do it. I had no idea why. I didn’t stand there and list out reasons on a diagram or chart like Connor Cobalt would’ve. I just followed my gut this time.

My stomach tightened as I waited for her to speak.

She wore confusion again. “I don’t know what to ask.”

Realization hit me in a second or two. She was still afraid of offending me or hurting my feelings if she asked the wrong thing.

We moved up the line again, and I said, “Maybe next time, Calloway.”

“Didn’t you hear?” She wagged her brows at me. “I may not be here tomorrow. Life could take me at any moment and then poof you’d be here again with another girl, in another time and asking her to ask you anything.” She said theatrically, “The unexpectedness of it all.”

My gaze darkened and muscles bound. “That’s not fucking funny, sweetheart.”

“You’d call her sweetheart too.” Sadness lingered behind her fleeting smile. I saw it before. Flickering inside of her. Like she would’ve been alright with dying. Like she was searching for something more that kept slipping out of grasp.

I rushed to say the first thing in my fucking head. To make her feel better. To fix this. Something I doubted could be changed by my hand. Light is dimming behind your eyes; do you fucking see that, Daisy?

So I said the truth. “You know, you’re the only girl I’ve ever called that.”

I didn’t tell her that it was the first term of endearment I’d ever used with anyone. I found baby and other pet names too fucking patronizing, but “sweetheart” fit Daisy completely and in a sort of nonromantic context. I would’ve never said it condescendingly or backhandedly. Always just kindly.

How it should be used.

Her lips almost pulled up. “You think I’m sweet?”

“I think you’re out of your fucking mind. And I’m going out of mine.” At that, I focused on the line, but I felt her smiling fully beside me.

Good.

Only two guys were ahead of us, already harnessed and on the platform. About to take their turn. An employee reached us and asked, “Are you jumping together or separate?”

Daisy nudged my waist and joked, “If you’re scared, I can jump with you. Lily said I’m a pretty good hand-holder.”

I thought about everything she’d been telling me along the ramp, and this underlying function inside of me said, don’t leave her alone.

“We’re jumping together,” I told the employee.

Daisy’s lips parted in shock. There was no way she could believe I was scared, and if she did, I didn’t honestly care. After her surprise wore off, she rolled with the new plan.

The employee gave us instructions and helped Daisy with her harness. Maybe because I had carabiners on my belt loop or because I looked like I knew what I was fucking doing—he never hovered over me.

In the passing minute, Daisy and I repeatedly glanced at each other. I watched her smile gain more life, which actually pulled my lips upward too.

Over the screaming of guys who just jumped, Daisy retied her hair into a pony, and I wondered what she was thinking. If she was overthinking what I just fucking did.

I decided to be blunt since I requested to bungee tandem with her. “You know that I don’t like you like that, Dais.” The words were fucking static and actually hard to produce.

I thought it might hurt her, but she just gave me a knowing look—like she understood more than I gave her credit for. To lighten the mood, she said, “It’s okay; you can admit it.”

“What am I admitting?!” I had to raise my voice over the next guy’s fucking screams.

We were ushered to the empty platform at that point, and two employees checked our harnesses, attaching more straps to our legs and clipping me to her. Face-to-face. They locked us together with another carabiner on our waists.

“That you’re scared.” She motioned to the descent, a playful look in her eyes.