The Rake (Boston Belles #4) by L.J. Shen

“What?” I asked, my eyes narrowing to slits. “What the fuck are you looking at?”

Cillian smirked. “This is how it starts.”

“How what starts?”

He and Sam exchanged amused looks.

“He’s already gone,” Sam observed.

“Never stood a chance,” Cillian said, inclining his head.

“Poor Livia,” Sam chuckled.

This time, I didn’t correct them.





Fourteen Years Old.



“Scumbag,” Dad spits on the floor.

Oh boy. Mom’s gonna smack him in the head for that.

He’s lying on his incliner, catatonic, in front of the TV after a long workday.

Mom is somewhere in the house, having a breakdown. Not a huge one, just a mini meltdown. She’s been a mess for … how long now? Since Auntie Tilda died, over a year ago. Auntie Tilda raised her. They had a ten-year gap between them. Auntie helped raise us too, so of course I’m bummed. But Mom … sometimes it’s like she’s on another planet.

“Daddy, language.” Persephone gasps from her spot on the carpet, working on her two-thousand-piece puzzle, her tight braid swung over one of her shoulders. She looks so wholesome. I wish I could be her.

“Sorry, sweetheart. I get riled up when I see stuff like this.”

I look up from my homework, which I’m doing on the sofa. It’s the local news channel, and they’re talking about a geography teacher who was caught having an affair with a junior at the local high school he worked for. They show his mugshot. He can’t be under fifty-five.

“People like him should rot in hell.” Dad stands up, starts stomping around the living room.

I tell myself that it’s no big deal.

That it has nothing to do with me and Coach Locken.

Besides, what the hell am I even thinking? Coach and I haven’t kissed, hugged, or touched in any way that’s inappropriate. He helps me with my bad knee and short thigh muscles. It’s not his fault that I’m broken.

And let’s get real here, it’s not like Dad’s mood is all because of this news article. He’s been worried sick about Mom, trying to convince her to go to therapy. But Mom says everyone is fed, clean, and that the house is in top condition. Which is all true. She’s a great mom, even when she is sad.

“I hope you girls know you should tell Daddy if something like that ever happens.” Dad points at the TV.

“Yes, Daddy,” Persy and I say in unison.

Later that evening, I get a text message from Coach Locken. It’s not out of the ordinary to get texts from him. Sometimes practice needs to be rescheduled or moved around because of the weather.

Only for the first time, the text is not dropped in the cross-country group with all the other runners. It is sent directly to me.



Coach Locken: morning practice time change. Meet at the entrance to Castle Rock Reservation at seven. Don’t be late.





Weeks chased one another like pages in a good book.

The only outward signs I was pregnant were the violent bouts of morning sickness I woke up to each day, paired with weekly visits to Doctor Bjorn, in which we watched Baby Whitehall (or Mr. Bean, as Devon liked to call her) growing nicely in my weirdly-shaped, polycystic womb, giving zero damns about the hostile environment she was in.

Atta girl.

Devon accompanied me to all of my appointments without fail. He always brought along something for me. A freshly baked pastry and a bottled water, vitamin gummy bears or ginger candy. He never missed our weekly calls, in which we made plans about what was going to happen after we have the baby.

“I want her to have a big room,” I told him once.

“Your entire apartment doesn’t qualify as a midsized room,” he said, cerebral as always. “You could move into my building.”

I cringed. Not because I didn’t want to be close to him, but because I could already see myself punching my way through all of my walls whenever I caught him sneaking home with one of his hookups. “Nah, I’ll find somewhere else.”

“Sweven?”

“Yes?”

“Tell me about a weird animal.”

We did that a lot lately. Talked about strange shit. It was tragic that on top of being viciously handsome Devon was also quirky and adorably awkward. He wasn’t at all the stuck-up ass I pegged him to be when we first hooked up.

I had slumped against my pillow, tucking my hand under my head and staring at the ceiling, smiling. “Ever seen a Southern Cassowary?”

“Negatory.” I could hear the smile on his face. It made my chest hurt.

I had closed my eyes, swallowing hard.

“It’s an Australian bird. It looks like a Karen who is asking to talk to the supervisor after discovering her fat-free latte had two pumps of regular vanilla syrup instead of the sugarless.”

He spluttered, delighted. “I’m Googling it right now. Oh God. You aren’t wrong. That face …”

“Your turn.”

He thought about it, then said, “I always thought naked mole rats looked like shriveled-up penises. Of the ill-equipped, might I add.”

I laughed so hard that I peed my underwear a little.

There was silence afterward.

“Should I still not wait for you, Belle?”

My body felt heavy and full of pain, but I didn’t cry. I never cried over a man. “No,” I had said quietly.