For always, p.23
For Always, page 23
She sniffled, wiping beneath her eyes and shaking her head. Her lips parted, and no words came out.
“Stay,” I begged. “Please.”
In her space again, I pressed until I backed her against the wall. Kate’s palms flattened behind her, and her chest heaved. Still, she said nothing. Her head continued to shake back and forth, her eyes locked with mine.
“Yes, Kate. Stay.”
I wasn’t giving her a choice, caging her in and holding her hostage. I placed my hand over her chest, feeling a pounding that matched mine.
“This. Us. This isn’t second place. I didn’t know this was possible, and now that I do, I can’t let you go.”
My voice cracked—my chest, too. Kate’s eyes fluttered closed, and she exhaled through her nose.
“This connection is real. You know it’s real.”
Keeping her eyes shut, Kate nodded once. It was all I needed. I pressed closer, chest to chest now, the heat of our upset calming with each inch erased between us. Her breathing was shallow, and she bit her bottom lip and refused to open her eyes.
“It’s real. Say you know it’s real.”
Kate was scared. She was scared of what it all meant and how it made her feel. This thing she’d never had before. This thing she wanted but wouldn’t let herself fall into. Kate had always been stubborn, doubling down on pride.
She let out a breath, a quiet whimper beneath the exhale. She was fighting me, goddamnit. Kate was fighting me. I wanted her to fight for this, for us. Not to let her fear find any reason to leave. I wanted her to fight that fear because it was worth it. Because she thought I was worth it.
My mouth was against her ear, my voice a rough plea. “Say you know it’s real.”
Her breath fanned over my cheek, my nose buried in her neck, and my lips traced the soft skin of her nape. Her hands, however hesitant, threaded through my hair as her body sunk into mine—giving up the fight.
“Say it,” I rasped, my throat scratched raw from the emotion clawing to get out.
Kate whimpered again, her fingers tangling in my hair and pulling to get my mouth to hers. Desperate and messy, filled with agony and desire in equal measure. Not an apology. This kiss didn’t feel like an apology.
It felt like a goodbye.
“Say it,” I pleaded into her mouth.
Her hands slid from my hair, planting on my chest as she gently pushed me back.
“Kate—” I reached for her, but she sidestepped me. “My feelings are all real. Please. I never lied about my feelings.”
She dropped her head, sniffling. “We both knew this had an expiration date. So.” Kate jerked her thumb over her shoulder. “I should get to bed. Goodnight.”
I moved to chase her, but she held up her hand and shook her head. I swallowed, letting her go and hating myself for not being enough for her to stay.
“I told you.”
I sat up on the air mattress, punching Beau’s leg.
“Asshole,” he muttered, rubbing his calf from the bed above me. “Hit me all you like, but it doesn’t change the fact I told you this would happen, and you ignored me.”
I hated that he was right about all of it.
“I was going to tell her.”
Beau raised his furry blonde eyebrows.
I punched him again. “Probably.”
He leaned down and punched me in the shoulder. I winced and shook my head.
“Fuck, fine. You’re right, okay? I should have told her from the start, but I stopped thinking about it as things progressed. It didn’t seem important. It didn’t matter. None of it factored into what I wanted with her. I wasn’t pursuing someone else while with her. It didn’t seem like a big deal that I lied about the roads or why I was there.”
He sighed, lying on the bed and pulling his legs up to safety. “It didn’t seem important to you. But it mattered to her, and that’s where you fucked up.”
“I know,” I said softly.
His fingers drummed over his stomach. “You made her feel stupid,” he said after a moment.
I propped on my elbows to get a better look at him. Tiffany Tits watched over us.
“How can’t you see it’s not about what you did? It’s about how you made her feel. Like you and other people were in on this thing she wasn’t—this lie. And everyone knew but her, and it made her feel stupid.”
Shit. I could kind of see why she’d feel that way. And after...
“Did she tell you about—”
“Prom?”
I nodded, and he flipped me off.
“Yeah, a few years ago when we were drunk, and I teased her about her stupid crush on you.” Beau eyed me for a moment. “Still stupid.”
Not unfair.
“She said you made her feel like a joke, but what she meant is you made her feel stupid.” He leaned over the edge of the bed and flicked my forehead. “Idiot.”
I didn’t even block him; just rubbed the abused skin.
“She’s always been into you, always wanted your attention. She never got it. Until one night when she did. I mean, Christ, Jason. She was sixteen. In those fleeting minutes, she had probably planned your entire fucking wedding just because you were ready to slip her the tongue.”
He made a gagging sound, and I was tempted to tell him all about where I’d slipped my tongue this last week, but I caused enough fights tonight.
“It’s not even that she hated you for it, man. But she was a dumb teenager and felt like second string, you know? Not the girl anyone actually wanted. Just the one that was a joke to everyone. To be messed with.” He sighed, punching his pillow to stiffen it behind him. “Then she gets you, only to feel like the second pick again. You know Kate. She’s prideful and hard-headed. To her fucking detriment, I might add. Right or wrong, her feelings are hurt.”
“None of it was a lie. Prom. The cabin. Here. My feelings were never a lie.”
Beau groaned and ran his hands over his face. “As I said,” he muttered through the cracks of his fingers, “it’s not about what you did. It’s about how you made her feel when you did it. Kate built a wall around her feelings growing up because of you.”
I shot him a look, and he grinned.
“Maybe me too,” he admitted. “Regardless, Kate built up defenses to protect herself from getting hurt. She lets them down with you for the first time, and what happens?”
I sighed, my voice hardly a whisper. “I hurt her and reminded her why she built that wall in the first place.”
Beau ran a hand through his tousled hair, entirely too pleased. “Louder for the people in the back.”
“This isn’t funny, asshole.”
He pinched his fingers together. “It’s a little funny.”
I slapped his hand away. “Just wait until you’re in a tough spot with someone, and we’ll see how funny it is.”
Beau rolled his eyes. “Unlikely. I’ve no interest in this kind of shit.”
I paused as his energy shifted. Tonight had been difficult for him, and I’d hijacked his pity party. “You know, Fallon—”
He kicked his feet down, shifting positions to sit up as he interrupted. “What’s your plan? You going to help her build back that wall, piece by piece?”
I shook my head. “Fuck no.” I ran a hand along my jaw, considering a plan of action. “I’m going to tear it down.”
Beau hummed in approval. “She’s going to make you work for it.”
“I know Kate. I’d expect nothing less.”
But I was a determined man, and I wouldn’t rest on my laurels while she used the time to stew in her upset.
Blankets off and tossed to the floor, I pulled my shoulders back and marched out of Beau’s room, despite his echoing warning behind me.
“Give her time.”
Time was something I didn’t have. I wouldn’t waste what little remained available to me.
Gently rapping my knuckle against her bedroom door as a courtesy, I didn’t wait for an invitation.
When a deep and impatient voice greeted me, I wished I had.
“She’s with her mother tonight, son. Close the door, and let’s pretend you didn’t try to enter my daughter’s bedroom in the middle of the night.”
I inwardly groaned. “Goodnight, Mr. Dalton.”
Of course, Kate would swap sleeping arrangements just to mess with me. Beau was right. She’d make me work for it.
I just didn’t know how much.
Twenty-eight
Kate
Wiping snow flurries from my face, I cursed until I finally managed to dig my keys from my purse.
“Victory,” I mumbled, unlocking the door and stepping into the warmth of the lobby.
Sweet, sweet victory. After a delayed flight due to ice, I wasn’t sure if I’d make it.
Upon climbing the stairs and dragging my suitcase like an anchor, I found an early Christmas present. I stopped in the hallway and smiled brightly at the disapproving friend outside my apartment.
“I said don’t come back early.” Taylor held a box of wine in one hand and a shopping bag in the other. I didn’t need to look in the bag to know she brought all my favorite candies.
“You’re terrible at following directions.”
I gave her a reluctant smile, the best I could muster, and let us into my apartment.
“Just a few days early. So. A half terrible listener.”
I called Taylor that morning from the airport and told her I’d be returning to New York. She didn’t give me shit, not really. Not when I explained that things had crashed and burned, and I couldn’t be stuck in a small house with Jason.
“Kick him out,” she’d suggested, but I couldn’t do that either.
Whatever happened between Beau and Fallon kicked Beau’s ass. He needed his friend more than I needed retribution. Besides, New York was home. A reminder that my past was tucked in the Cascades, just as unlikely to change as the tiny town I grew up in.
It wasn’t Taylor’s grumbling, Beau’s wallowing, or even Jason’s apology that gave me pause to leave. It was the enveloping hugs of my mom and her murmurs as she held me in her bed and reminded me that my feelings wouldn’t always be hurt.
I didn’t want to leave my mom earlier than I had to, but I promised I’d visit in the summer. Even if I’d have to work while there.
“So?” Taylor asked, handing me a glass of wine and plopping down on my couch with a bag of gummy worms. “Did you step in any dog shit or plow through a tray of beers on your way out of town? Or was that just your way of announcing your arrival?”
I puffed a laugh, more polite than sincere. “No. Nothing like that. It was a pretty anticlimactic fleeing. I left when it was dark, woke my parents to say goodbye, and left a note for Beau.”
“And Jason?”
Jason had been asleep on the living room couch when I slipped out of the house before daybreak. Like he anticipated I might leave suddenly and wanted to stand guard. But the man could sleep through an apocalypse. I don’t know why Jason thought he’d hear me if I got up.
He’d always been overconfident.
I swallowed down the lump of emotion in my throat. “I sent a text message telling him there are no hard feelings.”
Taylor sighed. “Took the coward’s way out, did you?”
“I’ve never claimed to be a hero,” I said, tracing my finger along the rim of the wineglass.
Taylor snuggled closer and rested her head on my shoulder. I rested my cheek against her hair.
“You can cry if you want, Kate. I promise I’ll look the other way or pretend it’s not happening.”
“Crying isn’t my thing,” I mumbled.
I’d been too proud to cry for most of my life. According to family lore, I didn’t even cry as a baby—just did some sharp pterodactyl screech to announce my displeasure or needs.
Beau liked to tease that I still did it. I hated that sometimes I did.
There was one night when I allowed myself to cry because someone hurt me, and the echoes of overlap between those circumstances only reminded me that the tears had been wasted.
Maybe Jason didn’t see me as a joke, but he made me feel like one. I’d given him trust and vulnerability, let myself lower my guard, and fall into daydreaming about more. More of him. More of me. More of us together. For what? To feel just as stupid now as I did then for letting my feelings get ahead of my reality?
Taylor ran her palm along my arm like she was soothing a toddler. “Can I ask you something, Kate?”
“Hm?”
She lifted her head from my shoulder, her hand taking mine. “Do you even know why you’re mad at him?”
I scoffed and set my glass on the coffee table, ready to list on my fingers and toes—and Taylor’s—how Jason had pissed me off.
“He lied to keep me in that cabin to fuck away his ex,” I started, but the words felt acrid in my mouth. Taylor cocked her head and raised her eyebrows.
“Fine, maybe it wasn’t quite like that, but he did lie to keep me there and—”
“Because he wanted to spend time with you,” she interjected. “Like it or not, but the man pursued you because he wanted to.”
She smiled softly, the softness reserved for situations when your best friend was being an idiot, and you knew it, and maybe they knew it too.
“He pursued you pretty hard.”
I flopped my head back on the couch and groaned. “He was going to fuck someone else. None of this would have been me if I hadn’t shown up.”
Taylor shrugged. “So? He didn’t do it, and for all you know, he would have chickened out.”
Yeah, that kind of did sound like Jason. The man could posture with the best of them, but I’m not sure Jason would have been the one to invite me into his bed at the cabin if I hadn’t been aggressive about it.
Because I’d pursued him, too.
“He didn’t have to pursue you, not with an easier option and less risk of getting his eyes clawed out. It’s not like the man was hard up for handling his hard-on.”
“I’ve always been the girl on the sidelines,” I said quietly, my hands folded.
Taylor sighed. “Except when he realized you were a possibility. He chose you. Not because there were no other options, but maybe because you are his first pick.”
She patted my leg and reached for the gummy worms, settling the pack in her lap. Taking one, she dangled it over her open mouth and dropped it in like this was an unserious conversation. Good grief.
I reached for one and did the same.
“What’s your point, Taylor? Get to it.” I elbowed her playfully.
She elbowed me back. “I think this has more to do with being scared of letting yourself have this thing you want, rather than his fucking it up. You’re not that sixteen-year-old girl anymore, and he’s not the eighteen-year-old with his life mapped out and a high school girlfriend on his arm. Acknowledging that is scary. I understand, but relationships are worth the risk of being wrong.”
Taylor divorced her husband last year and enjoyed using that as collateral for her relationship advice.
“But,” she emphasized, “you won’t know that if you don’t give yourself the chance to get it right.”
She wasn’t incorrect. I’d kept most of my relationships casual for various reasons. Sometimes it was the men I picked. Sometimes it was putting work ahead of a social life. Sometimes it was... being scared.
There was a reason I didn’t cry much. I’d spent much of my life steeling myself for anything that might hurt me. Jason and Beau’s observations about the safety of reading about love instead of living it were accurate. Instead of letting myself have it, I lived on the outskirts of it. Watching and coveting but leaving it alone.
“Shut up,” I muttered as Taylor broke into a told-you-so grin. “It doesn’t matter anyway. I left. He’ll be back in Seattle in a couple of days. I ended it early, but it would have ended regardless.”
Taylor clucked her tongue, standing to clean the mess of candy wrappers. “If you say so.”
She headed for the kitchen to toss the garbage while I finished my wine.
Taylor left soon after, inviting me to a New Year’s party in her building and making me pinky promise I wouldn’t alert Crappel I’d come back early.
A few days at home with nothing to do sounded heavenly, and living in my sweats and staring blankly out the window to watch the snowfall seemed a reasonable way to pass a few days.
When I stretched out on my couch and let my eyes wander to the world outside, I didn’t stop the silent tears that slid down my cheeks or my hand from gripping the phone and reading Jason’s earlier message for the dozenth time.
Jason: No hard feelings, okay, but there are still feelings. I’m not done with you.
I wasn’t sure if that was a threat or a sweet admission.
And like I’d done several times that evening, I let my attention wander to check the airfare for the red-eye to Seattle. But just like before, I exited the browser and sank deeper into the couch.
Taylor was right. I was more scared than angry. And I was a fool, more prideful than sensible. All I had to show for it was the safety of being alone.
Twenty-nine
Jason
“Godspeed, my friend. She’ll either love you or disembowel you.” Beau looked me over before glancing at Mama Dalton.
She shrugged. “Honestly, odds are fifty-fifty.”
Mr. Dalton stood with his gaze on the floor. He’d not spoken to me since I tried to sneak into Kate’s room last night. As if I could have anticipated it’d be his hulking frame in that bed.
Thank god he didn’t sleep like the dead like me. He woke before I could lift the blankets and slide in beside him.
Beau filled me in that Kate would do that as a kid when she needed comfort—sharing a bed with her mom. It was sweet and only made my heart drum louder for her.
Beau claimed he told me that as I stormed out of his room, a man determined to tear down the wall of the woman he loved, but Beau sure as shit did not tell me that.
