Long Way Down (Calloway Sisters 4)

“Are you crying?” I hear Lo ask as I toss diapers onto a case of water.

Lily wipes her red-splotched cheeks, more tears building. “No,” she refutes.

“Calloway,” I say to Dais. “Catch.” I chuck another package of diapers, this time at her. It hits her square in the forehead and thuds onto the bread.

“Oops,” she says, a smile in her eyes. She holds out her hands. “Do me again.”

Lo tilts his head at Lily. “Really, love? Then what’s that wet stuff running down your cheeks?”

“Snot.” Lily reddens. “That sounded better in my head.”

“I don’t fucking see how,” I say, throwing Dais the paper plates. She catches it this time and sets them beside her.

Lo looks infatuated with his wife, even with shrill screaming behind us.

I grab two more paper bags, and Daisy has lowered in her seat, the chants about dying Calloways gaining life again.

“Almost done,” I tell her.

“You can’t ignore us!” someone else shouts.

Lo and I shut the trunk at the same time, and Vic puts away the two shopping carts. We’re the only three left in the parking lot from our team of seven bodyguards and friends.

I turn around with my brother, and in a single fucking moment, someone suddenly pelts him with a projectile. Like slow motion, he raises his arm to protect his face, but it explodes into a white, dusty cloud all over him.

I waft the air. “LO!” I scream, unsure if he’s okay. I can’t fucking see him.

I hear him cough repeatedly and spit. “Goddammit,” he curses, squatting for a second. I bend down with him, his lips, face, shoulders, and hair are covered in the white substance. I rub it between two fingers. Flour.

Someone flour-bombed my little brother.

The BMW’s door opens and slams quickly. Connor approaches with a water bottle, unscrewing the cap.

I’m going to lose it. While he bends down to take care of Lo, I stand up, setting my hands on my head, my gaze fucking narrowed at the girls with signs. Who did it? I scan them rapidly, unable to spot the person.

They’ve all quieted, about twenty phones pointed at us, recording.

“Why the fuck would you do that?!” I fume. It makes no sense why they’d flour-bomb my brother. He’s loved by everyone on social media. He’s the fucking favorite. For a moment, I think they missed. They meant to flour-bomb me.

Then someone says, “We supported you and loved you. None of you even care about us!”

“What the fuck are you talking about?!” My violent register causes three girls to shuffle back in fear. I instantly feel like shit. I hate feeling like shit when I’m not the one who just harassed another human being.

“Ryke.” Lo tries to rub the flour out of his eyes, but he’s making it worse.

I rotate towards him. “Don’t fucking touch your eye.”

“Lean your head back,” Connor says in an easy-tempered voice that completely polarizes mine. I want to cool off—I just can’t. Not after this.

Lo follows both of our directions, struggling to hold open his eyes, and Connor rinses them with water.

“Blink,” he says.

Lo does, his eyes bloodshot and water runs down his jaw, creating trails in the flour. I pull off my T-shirt and hand it to him. He uses it as a towel, rubbing his face, and then he nods, standing up with us.

“Let’s go.” He tries to hand me my shirt back.

“Keep it.”

He nods again and motions to Connor. “You’re not going to give me your shirt too?” It’s lighthearted enough to cool my boiling blood.

Lo’s reddened eyes flicker to me like it’s okay.

It’s not. I don’t like seeing him hurt, not even for a fucking millisecond, and if it had to be someone, I’d rather it have been me.

“Next time, darling,” Connor says. “I just had this dry-cleaned.” He passes him the water bottle. “We’ll meet you at your place.”

“You deserved it!” a woman shouts while Connor walks back to Lily’s car.

I’m about to confront her, out of fucking instinct—to tell her why my brother doesn’t deserve any of this shit, why those girls don’t either—but Lo clasps my arm and drags me away.

“I really just want to go home,” he tells me, his voice so honest that I instantly back down.

“I’m driving,” I tell my brother, heading towards the driver’s side. I may have wrecked his car once, but he still lets me get behind the wheel this time.

I lock the door and put my seatbelt on the same time as my brother.

“Lo!” Lily leans forward in the middle seat.

“I’m okay,” Lo tells her, but she unbuckles and tries to dust off his hair and cheek.

I pull out of the parking lot behind the bodyguard’s SUV, one hand on the steering wheel once we’re on the street. I glance in the rearview at Daisy. She’s quiet, just staring out the window.

“Calloway,” I call.

It takes her a long moment to pry her gaze off the window and turn straight ahead. Her eyes are reddened, but for a different reason than my brother’s.

And she says softly, “We know why they’re angry at us.”

RYKE MEADOWS

I tense. “Yeah?”

“Celebrity Crush,” Lily whispers, her arms wrapped around Lo. He kisses her elbow. As much as I know he loves having her close to him like that—I need her alive.

“Put your fucking seatbelt on, Lil.”

She reluctantly detaches from her husband, leaning back against the seat. Moffy babbles something to her, his legs kicking out in his carrier. She responds in hushed whispers and a big smile.

Lo shoots me an agitated look and shifts uncomfortably. “I didn’t realize not wearing a seatbelt is more dangerous than rock climbing without a harness. Oh wait…” His cheekbones cut sharp.

I ignore his comment but feel the fucking sting. “What’d Celebrity Crush lie about?” I ask.

“They didn’t lie,” Daisy tells me.

I’m so fucking confused. My knuckles whiten against the steering wheel. “Then what?”

“At our engagement party,” Daisy clarifies, “Christopher Barnes asked us if we wanted to do a Queens of Philadelphia reality show—to document our lives as housewives. We said no.”

Lily adds, “And Celebrity Crush published an article telling everyone how we’ve had multiple opportunities for reality shows and we’ve rejected all of them. GBA even left a quote, saying they’ve reached out to us for years with six-figure paychecks and we’ve shut them down.”

“I think,” Daisy says, “people thought that the network didn’t want anymore shows, not us, and now the fans are upset.”

“We don’t owe them anything,” I say heatedly.

The car is quiet until Lily says, “They’ve supported Superheroes & Scones.” The store is packed full of fans every fucking day, I realize this. Lo also has a comic book publishing company. Rose has a fashion line and boutique, not to mention their family businesses: Cobalt Inc., Hale Co., Fizzle.

Sure, these benefit from loyal fans and support, but I don’t want Lily or Lo thinking they have to put their kid on the line as payment or that they owe millions of people. They can’t live with that kind of debt on their shoulders. No one can.

“You’re not indebted to anyone for that,” I tell Lily. “They can buy into your product or not, and it ends there.” I try to look at my brother, to see how he’s handling this, but I can’t stare at him and look at the fucking road too.

So I concentrate on the street, about to be stuck in morning traffic. To add insult to fucking injury, it starts raining.

“Someone say something,” I interrupt the strained silence, almost wishing Connor was in this car, spouting off words that’d knock down Celebrity Crush and reinforce our choices. I’m doing a fucking piss poor job.

Daisy rests her temple against the cold window, rain rolling down the pane. “Are you all ever ti