Zip, Zero, Zilch

  “Of course we’ll go with you,” Paul says quietly. “We wouldn’t let you do it alone.”

  Logan hugs Emily against his side, and she has Kit in her arms. “I’m never alone. But I’d like it a whole lot better if you could all be there with me.” His voice cracks. “I kind of need you guys. All of you.”

  Paul holds up the I love you sign. And although none of the brothers can see one another, they’re all doing it at once. A sob forms in my chest, and I have to swallow it back. I wipe my eyes.

  Pete sits back and scratches his belly. “Well, Sam needs to go get laid, so we’re going to sign off.”

  Sam chuckles and pulls me closer, his hand on my hip. I put my arm around his shoulders.

  “Even though I couldn’t get laid on my wedding night because of my brother, I wouldn’t want him to miss out.” He scowls at Sam, until Reagan pops the back of his head. “Ow,” he complains. Pete grows serious. “Congratulations, you two,” Pete says. “We love you.” His box disappears from the screen. One by one, they all send their well wishes. Paul is last, and he sends his love and a warning. “Use a condom, numb nuts,” he says. Then he vanishes, too.

  Logan scratches his head and looks sheepishly at Sam. “I’m really sorry.”

  Sam lifts me off his lap so that he can get up and look behind Logan’s ear. “So that’s all it is?” he asks.

  “Until it gets activated, yeah.”

  “Cool.” Sam takes my hand. “I can’t wait to see how it works.”

  Logan heaves out a relieved sigh. “You don’t think they’re mad at me, do you?”

  Sam shakes his head. “No. Maybe a little confused, though.”

  “Sorry I took your spotlight.”

  Sam’s hand squeezes mine. “I got all the spotlight I need.”

  Peck

  Sam takes my hand as we walk back to the hotel. The lights of the city are bright, and the sun is about to rise. The sky is waking with purples and oranges and we stop to look at it.

  “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

  Sam brushes my hair back behind my ear. “Yes, you are.”

  Heat creeps up my cheeks. I’ll never get used to this. Ever.

  I cover my mouth with my hand when I yawn.

  “When does your bus leave?” he asks.

  “Ten in the morning.”

  “We had better get back to the room so you can get some sleep.”

  I lift a brow at him. “I can sleep on the bus.”

  “Are Logan and Emily going to be on your bus?”

  I nod. “They get the only bedroom.”

  His brow furrows.

  “It’s set up kind of like rows of bunk beds, and there’s one room in the back that has a full bed. They get that, since there are three of them. The rest of us get bunks.”

  “Well, that kind of sucks.”

  I laugh. “I don’t mind. If they didn’t take it, Fin would use it for whatever random hookup she found. At least this way, they can get some privacy. And maybe some sleep, too.”

  He makes a crude gesture with his hands. “Maybe some sex, too.” He grabs me and pulls me against him. “Speaking of sex, we have a wedding night to get to.” He growls against my neck and starts to nibble my skin. Heat shoots straight to the center of me.

  “Race you,” I whisper against his ear.

  “I can’t run, but you can. I need to stop at the convenience store, anyway.” He waggles his brows at me playfully.

  “Oh,” I breathe out as heat creeps up my cheeks.

  “Yeah,” he says, and then he kisses me.

  “I kind of need some time alone, anyway.”

  “For what?” He grins at me.

  “You’ll see.”

  He kisses me quickly and walks inside the hotel with me. He puts me in the elevator and I watch the doors close around his smile.

  I’m feeling as out of place as a fart in church, which is weird because it’s not like we haven’t already been intimate.

  I walk into my room and stop. On the bed lies a package. I pick up the note and see Fin’s chicken scratch.

  Thought you could use this. Don’t worry—it’s new. Never worn. Never sullied. So go dirty it up. Love you—Us.

  I open the box and a bright red nightie falls out. It’s long enough that it might fall to my upper thigh, and it has spaghetti straps with lace edging the top. It’s pretty. And not slutty at all, so I know Fin didn’t buy it for herself. She has a thing for lingerie though, so she could have bought it for any one of us. I guess I’m the lucky one.

  I take it into the bathroom with me, and get in the shower. I take all the care I didn’t have time to take earlier, shaving appropriate places and washing others. I get out and look at myself in the mirror. My hair is still dry, so I let it fall from the impromptu ponytail I put it in, and it lands around my shoulders. I wipe beneath my eyes to remove any mascara smudges that might be there, but I’m in pretty good shape, considering all the crying I did during the ceremony.

  I still can’t believe I married him. Or that he married me.

  I’m just about the luckiest girl in the world.

  I hear the outer door open and I take in a deep breath. I drop the slinky nightie over my head and adjust it so that it fits right on my boobs. I wish they were a little perkier, or a little less round. But Sam seems to like them.

  I take a deep breath and open the door to the bathroom. I peek out and see Sam lying in the center of the bed with nothing on but his boxers. He has even taken the boot off his foot.

  “Can you switch the l-light off?” I ask.

  “Nope,” he says. “I want to see everything.” He sits up and hangs his legs off the edge of the bed. “Come here,” he says gently.

  I walk into the room, my knees shaking, my legs like Jell-o. I cross my arms in front of me, but then I remember the length of my nightie and I reach down to tug it a little bit over my thigh. But that makes the bodice dip, and so I have to tug it higher. I growl and give up. I flop down on the bed beside him and fall back. I can feel the material sliding up my thighs, giving him a huge view of my thighs. I cover my face with my arms and groan.

  “You look so beautiful,” he says. It’s almost like a prayer. His hand lies flat on my stomach. I uncover my face.

  “Do you like it?” I ask. “The Zeroes gave it to me.”

  “Why do you call yourselves that?” he asks. He turns so that he’s facing me, and his hand skims my body. Goose flesh erupts on my arms and my nipples get hard. He sees it and licks his lips.

  “It’s something we started when we got to the group home. Lark and Wren were there first, and they were the Double Zeroes, because their room number was 10 but the one was missing on the door.” The memory of it makes me smile. “They didn’t really want me in their room, but they didn’t have a choice.”

  “So, all of you became the Zeroes?” He sweeps a hand beneath my breast, and my breath hitches.

  “Zero is rock bottom. We had Zip. Zero. Zilch. And we felt like we’d all fallen from zero. We were about as low as we could go.”

  “Then you met Emilio and Marta?”

  I nod. “First there was Mrs. Derricks, though. She was the guidance counselor at my school.”

  “I knew her. She helped a lot with Pete’s mentor program. That’s why we were at her funeral that day.”

  “She saved my life.”

  “I’m glad she did,” he says quietly. He drags his fingers down my thigh and hooks the hem of my nightgown. He draws it forward, his gaze hot as he uncovers me. I lift my hips as he goes higher and he stops and stares at me. “Damn, that’s pretty,” he growls.

  I hold completely still, except for my heaving chest and my thumping heart.

  He dips a finger into my folds and slides it down. I part my thighs for him ever so slightly. “So wet,” he says. He strokes my clit, making small circles.

  He’s still sitting next to me, so I reach for his waistband. I pull it down, and his dick bobs up toward his belly button.

&
nbsp; I sit up a little and push him onto his back. “Okay…” he says slowly, throwing up his hands. I lean over him and he gathers my hair into his fist, holding it so he can watch me.

  A bead of pre-come forms on the head of his dick, and I take it into my mouth, letting the salty essence of him spread across my tongue. He makes a noise, and I see him close his eyes and bite his lower lip. “God, you’re going to kill me,” he swears.

  I don’t say anything. I take him further into my mouth, and wrap my hand around the base of his dick, pumping as I take him all the way to the back of my throat. He pushes forward, urging me to take a little more. I gag and he pulls back.

  “Sorry,” he mutters, but his feet are jiggling, so I do it again.

  A hot flash of come shoots across my tongue and I swallow, but suddenly he grabs me and pulls me on top of him. He adjusts me so that I straddle him, and then he reaches between us to roll on a condom. I watch him and wonder what I’m supposed to do next. I have never been on top, and I’m not sure I want to be.

  “I want to watch you,” he tells me. He lifts me so that I’m leaning over him and he kisses me. I feel him nudge against my heat, and the head of his dick slips inside. I gasp against his lips, and he puts his hands on my hips and pushes in a little farther. “Sit up a little.”

  I sit up and I slide all the way down on him. A burst of pleasure shoots straight to my center and I gasp.

  His hands lift the edge of my nightgown, and he hesitates, searching my eyes, asking for permission. I grab the end of it and yank it over my head. I am naked in so many ways. It’s so much more than just being undressed, and he knows that, if the look in his eyes is any indication.

  He cups my breasts in his hands and his thumbs track across the turgid peaks. He lifts them gently, and he moves inside me. I get it. I rise and fall, taking him all the way to the base. I can feel him deep inside.

  Very slowly, I lift and take him to the very edge, and then I sink back down on him. He groans and closes his eyes, but his hands don’t stop their wicked moves. My breasts ache, and my whole body trembles.

  Sam lowers his hand to my curls and parts my sensitive flesh. My legs falter as he strums my clit, and I have to brace myself with the palm of his hand on my chest. “Don’t stop,” he urges.

  He pumps his hips, meeting my every fall, and countering my every retreat.

  My movements grow shaky, and I’m not sure I can do this much longer, but suddenly pleasure flashes in the center of me, and I come. I press down with both hands on his chest and ride the wave, gasping as my body convulses, until I can’t take anymore and I fall, weak and spent, onto his chest.

  He strokes my back, still thick and hot inside me, spearing to the very center of me.

  He rolls us over so that I land on the quilt, and then he flips me onto my tummy. I’m like a ragdoll at this point, so weak and warm that he could do just about anything to me. He lifts me and slides a pillow under my hips.

  I cry out when he surges inside me from behind. He’s so big and so hard, and he goes so deep.

  “You okay?” he asks, his voice right beside my ear. He covers me completely, and places his lips on my shoulder.

  “More,” I say. I push my bottom back against him, and he laughs and plunges deep. He lifts one knee out to the side, and adjusts his body so that he’s going deeper than anyone has before. This time when I come, it’s not a convulsive, body-shaking orgasm. It’s a feeling of warmth that seeps from my center all the way to the tips of my fingers and my feet. I’m hot and satisfied, and he shoves all the way inside me one last time, and grunts in my ear.

  “God, I love fucking you,” he says as he pounds out his orgasm.

  My nerves are raw and ragged, and I’m glad when he rolls off of me and lands by my side. He pulls the pillow from under me and I curl into his side, laying my head on his shoulder.

  He kisses my forehead, tugs the covers up over us, and I fall asleep to the beat of his heart.

  Sam

  I get up the next morning and gently slide out from under Peck’s sleeping body. She’s wrapped around me so tight that her hand is tucked beneath me. I try not to wake her yet, because she has a bus to catch in an hour and I want her to get all the sleep she can get before leaving.

  I get dressed quickly and go downstairs to get her some coffee at the hotel coffee shop. I don’t even know if she likes coffee, but I’m guessing she’ll need something to get her started.

  There are tabloids next to the checkout counter and I freeze when I see that one is about the Zeroes. On the cover is a picture of Peck with her lips locked against a man. He has his arm wrapped around her waist and she’s bent backward, he’s kissing her so hard.

  Heat travels up my body and floods my face. My hand shakes when I reach for the magazine. I buy it and the two coffees, and I go sit down at a table to read what it says.

  Zeroes drummer fires opening act after lovers quarrel.

  I flip the page to read where it’s continued. There’s more than one picture, and this one is just as compromising as the other. She was with someone else. Right before I married her. She was in someone else’s arms. In someone else’s bed. My gut clenches.

  I thought we were a sure thing. I asked her to marry me, and she agreed. I thought that meant that we were engaged, and engaged usually means two people—not two people and occasionally someone else. And she definitely had someone else. He’s wrapped all around her.

  I fold the paper and put it in my back pocket, and then I pick up the coffees and go upstairs. When I get there, I can hear the shower running and she’s singing softly to herself.

  I pace from one side of the room to the other. I don’t even know how to ask her about this.

  I know that I feel like someone has laid me open. Like all my nerves are raw and exposed. Like I can’t catch my breath.

  The shower cuts off and she comes out wrapped in a towel. “There you are,” she says with a smile.

  I’m not smiling. “Were you going to tell me?” I demand.

  She freezes, the smile gone. “Tell you what?”

  “Were you going to tell me?” I ask again.

  She stares at me. “No,” she finally says. She blows out a breath. “I wasn’t going to tell you.”

  I’m…floored. “Didn’t you think I deserved to know?”

  “I did, but I didn’t want to hurt you.” She sits down on the edge of the bed. “I’m sorry. If I had it to do over again, I’d do it differently.”

  “I can’t believe you did this.”

  “Sam—”

  “I thought I knew you.”

  “You do.”

  “I don’t.”

  “You do!” she cries. She gets to her feet. “I’m sorry!” She shakes her head. “I can’t say more than that. I can’t undo it. And Logan…” Her voice trails off.

  My heart stops beating. “Logan knew?”

  Her brow creases with confusion. “What?”

  “Never mind. I get it.”

  “I knew I should have told you!” she cries out. “I knew it. I should have gone with my gut. I should have told you. And I’ll never make that mistake again.” She walks forward and grabs my shirt in her fists. “I swear to you that I’ll never do that again.”

  “I know you won’t.” I won’t give you the opportunity.

  Hot tears scald the backs of my eyes.

  “Where are you going?” she asks as I walk toward the door.

  I walk out without another word. And I can’t go back. She just admitted that she betrayed me. She betrayed us, and to make it worse, Logan knew about it all the while.

  I go out the front door and straight to the airport. I don’t pass go. I don’t collect two hundred dollars. And I leave my heart behind, shattered into a million pieces.

  Peck

  I knock on Logan’s door, banging hard with the side of my fist. Suddenly, it flies open and Emily is standing on the other side. “What’s wrong?” she asks.

  I stumble into h
er room and look around. “Where is he?”

  “Who?”

  “Sam.”

  “Why would Sam be here?” Kit toddles over to me and holds up her arms. I pick her up, because I don’t know what else to do. She pats the side of my face.

  “He’s not here?”

  “Why would Sam be here?” she asks again, her voice stronger.

  “He got mad and left.” I start to pace. Kit doesn’t seem to mind, and she lays her face on my shoulder. “Where would he go?”

  “Why was he mad?” Emily is starting to worry. “Did something happen?”

  “He didn’t understand why I didn’t tell him about Logan’s surgery as soon as I found out. I knew I should have told him.”

  The door opens and I hold my breath when Logan walks in. He closes the door behind him and my heart drops. Sam is not with him.

  Logan’s looking at his phone. “I just got the weirdest text from Sam.”

  “What did it say?” I ask.

  He reads: Out of everyone, I never expected this from you.

  His thumbs are flying. I’d love to know what he’s saying. Emily goes to his shoulder and reads aloud over it. What are you talking about?

  You should have told me, Logan reads.

  I already apologized for that, Emily reads.

  You’re my fucking brother.

  What the fuck are you talking about?

  Logan throws the phone on the bed and stomps into the bathroom. Emily snatches it up. “Uh-oh,” she breathes. “I think there was a misunderstanding.” She holds up the phone and shows me a tabloid cover on it that Sam has taken a picture of. It’s a picture of me and the douche who kissed me after the show last night. I take the phone from her and stare hard at it.

  “That’s what he was talking about?” I look at her. “I thought he was asking me why I withheld the truth about Logan’s implant! I admitted to it. Now I realize I admitted to—” I hold out the phone. “—this!” I throw the phone down on the bed and walk out.