Tryst Six Venom by Penelope Douglas

“Don’t apologize, baby.” I hold her face and tuck her in close. “We all
got our shit.”
“I finally gave up on you, because you know why?” her dad fires back.
“We lost a son. We lost a son, and I needed you, and you know what you
did? You went to a spa! You got a prescription! You spent Henry’s college
fund redecorating this house and buying Clay a car! You wouldn’t come to
me. You wouldn’t talk to me. You wouldn’t go to therapy with me. You’ve
barely let me touch you in four years, Gigi, and when I did, you aborted the
only chance we had to be a family again! I needed you! I needed that baby! I
lost Henry, same as you!”
I hear her sob, and I try to picture it, but Clay’s mom has always seemed
like an icicle, and I can’t.
“I run to her bed,” Mr. Collins continues, “because if I didn’t have that to
look forward to, I wouldn’t be able to stick this out with you until Clay
graduates.”
A slap reverberates through the door, and Clay buries her face in my
neck, breathing hard.
A door slams and then moments later, another farther away, and a beam
of headlights flashes out the window before disappearing.
“Clay.” I nudge her chin. “Look at me.”
But she shakes her head, her face still pressed into my skin as she shivers
with tears.
“Clay,” I urge her, trying to tip her chin up. “Don’t hide from me. Not in
here.”
I hold her for a moment and then look down at her, touching her face.
“This could be it.”
She sniffles and lifts her eyes. “What?”
“The last time we see each other.”
She looks at me, and I don’t know if she understands, but I know she’s
like glass right now. One crack will splinter off into a dozen, and I can’t lose
her yet.
“Stay with me now,” I whisper. “Tonight is mine.”
She touches her lips to mine and in a way that’s so soft, it tingles over my
entire body, she says, “Okay.”
We kiss, her fingers tracing the symbol on my bracelet, and I love being
wrapped around her to the point where I don’t know my limbs from hers.
How am I ever going to leave her for school?