Read Online Under the Orange Moon by Adrienne Frances - Free Book Online

hallucination of drugs and alcohol perhaps.
    If he crept up the stairs quietly enough, she would hopefully believe that he actually spent a night there. I slept here the other night , he would lie and say when she confronted him about not staying home. He walked into his room, pleased that he now had something to throw back at her when she nagged him to near death about being so neglectful.
    He fell back against his bed and felt peace when he realized he could still smell Dylan’s perfume. He couldn’t remember her ever wearing any before, another sign of her maturity after all these years. Perfume or none at all, he was drawn to her naturally.
    Ben rubbed his hands over his face and found himself wishing that he kissed her. She would probably have been angry at him for doing it when he had so much to drink before. He wondered what her lips felt like; he could only imagine after all this time.
    It was harder for him to move from Dylan’s bed that morning. She was so tangled up in him, almost holding him there in a way, that he hated to pry away from her. He knew he had to and she should as well. If Jonah or any of them caught him there, if they knew what he thought about when she was next to him, practically naked in nothing but her underwear and a small top, they would kill him for sure.
    The Mathews boys were his brothers, but Ben was on thin ice in this particular area. They knew him inside and out. They knew what a pig he was and how he treated all the women in his life, including his own mother. They would automatically justify killing him because they would fear him hurting their sister. And that was just the very point of it all. He would hurt her; he destroyed everything in his path.
    He couldn’t watch her get closer to Michael Olerson. That was asking too much of him. He thought of himself as strong, but not that strong. There was never competition before. He never had to watch her hold hands with anyone, flirt with anyone or, for God’s sake, talk about constellations and tea with anyone!
    His head spun with these thoughts and he quieted them instantly when he knew he was getting nowhere. He thought about staying away from Dylan. Last night was close enough. If she had kissed him or done anything inviting, he couldn’t have stopped himself like last time. He knew this. If it weren’t for his mother’s guilt trips, he would hop on the next plane to Massachusetts and never come back just to avoid it all.
    Ben flipped and sighed loudly into his pillow. He knew he just needed to sleep it off.
    “Benjamin?” Ruth’s knock on the door woke him, but he still said nothing back.
    She opened the door and sighed loudly. “It smells like a bar in here.”
    Ben sat up and stared at her tired face. He looked around sarcastically. “It’s a good thing I don’t see one. I could use a shot.”
    Ruth stared at him through squinted eyes. “Your father sent these.” She held out a white piece of paper. The longer blue paper at the bottom was a dead giveaway what they were. Ben stared at them and said nothing.
    “Did you know?” she asked through a lump in her throat. “You could have warned me.”
    “Mom, please. I didn’t.”
    “Divorce papers? It’s Christmas.” She squeezed at the papers and crumbled them between her fingers. “You didn’t know?”
    “How could I?” Ben turned and put his feet to the floor. He held out his hand, and asked, “May I see them?”
    Ruth handed the papers to Ben. She leaned against his door and cried into her hands. She sobbed loudly and even let out a muffled scream into her open palms. She tried to catch her breath dramatically. It was an Oscar winning performance.
    Ben never could tell the difference between a genuine cry and an attention-getting tantrum. Nevertheless, neither one made him feel sorry for her. Was this for his benefit? Was this so he would call his father and convince him to change his mind? Either way, how could she use him this way?
    He scanned over the