by B. B. Reid
The sigh of relief I breathed was loud when I finally spotted her standing by the line of trees I’d chased her through the day we met. Her hands were covering her eyes, and she was shouting something.
As if on autopilot, I drifted toward her. I was halfway across the yard when I realized she was shouting numbers, counting down. Curious, I held my breath when she got to one.
“Ready or not, here I come!”
She moved into the trees, and I frowned as I followed, keeping my steps silent and Barbette oblivious.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are!”
Giggling had our heads swiveling in the direction of the noise. I could see the sneaky grin on Bee’s face as she tiptoed toward the hollow tree the sound had come from. She was two steps away when two small figures darted out, squealing as they ran farther into the trees to escape capture.
“Oh, come on, guys!” Barbette shouted after my brother and sister. “No fair!” She started to chase after them when she suddenly spun around. Her lips parted when she spotted me standing there. “Jamie,” she gasped. “You scared me.”
“You scared me, too,” I admitted as I closed the distance between us. Of course, it wasn’t what she meant, but I didn’t care. I needed her to understand why I’d been an asshole to her after she risked her life for me. It didn’t excuse my behavior, but at least she’d know the truth. “I read somewhere once that fear is temporary. It’s regret that lasts forever.” Before she knew what was happening, her back was against the tree. “I don’t want to let you go because I was too chickenshit to love you.”
Her small hands fluttered against my chest as her blue eyes filled with hope. “Then don’t let me go, James.”
The tips of our noses nuzzled as I brushed her lips with mine. “I’m sorry I’ve been such a dick. Do you still love me?”
“You’ve been a dick since the day we met, and I still fell for you.” She frowned before giving me that same look my mother gave me. Yeah, I was an idiot.
Kissing her because I didn’t know what else to do, I wrapped my arms around her. “Please don’t stop.”
“Never.”
I didn’t even try to hide my relief, which made her giggle. “I have to leave for school in a couple of months.”
“Philly isn’t that far away,” she assured me, even though she looked sad to see me go. “Promise to visit every weekend?”
“Now that’s an idea… or you could just come with me.”
“Go… Go with you?” She was so shocked I could tell the thought had never occurred to her. “Jamie, I can’t do that.”
“Why? What’s keeping you here?” I challenged.
“Nothing, but you don’t actually expect me to live with you in your dorm, do you? Is that even allowed?”
“I’ve got an apartment. You can decorate.” She punched me in the chest, making me laugh, and then I kissed her senseless.
“Don’t you think it’s too soon?”
“We lost five years, Bette. I’m not losing another day.” My hand started creeping up the red tank she wore. I was pleased to find she’d skipped a bra today. Her nipples had been beckoning me from the moment she caught me stalking her. “Besides, there’s no one who knows you better.” I swept my thumb back and forth over her hard right bud as I waited for her answer.
“I know what you’re doing.”
I bit my bottom lip to keep from smiling. “Is it working?”
“Yes,” she whined. “You’re not playing fair.”
Deciding on mercy, I let my hand slide to her waist. I wanted her as clearheaded as possible when she made this forever decision because that’s what Bee and I were. Forever.
“I want to fight with you over leaving the toilet seat up and forgetting to take out the trash. I want to see your smile when I tell you the new curtains are nice even if they’re ugly as fuck. I want to hold you when you fall asleep every night and kiss you awake in the morning. I won’t be able to concentrate when I’m away, knowing you’re home waiting for me, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.” My grip tightened on her before I said, “I also want to know that in the next place you call home, you’re safe. I can’t promise that we’ll always get it right, but I want nothing less than my world revolving around you.” I took her hands in mine and kissed each palm. “Tell me what you want.” I stood there pretending my heart didn’t drop to my stomach when she pulled her hands from mine.
She dug her hand inside my vest before pulling out my lighter. The moment I saw writing on the side, I plucked it from her fingers.
…was to be bad with you.
The confused frown I wore disappeared when I remembered the poem.
All I ever wanted…
All I ever wanted was to be bad with you.
The kiss I pressed to her lips was hard enough to make her cry out. “You’ve fucking got it, kitten.” I softened the kiss before pulling away and getting lost in her blue eyes. “You know what today is, don’t you?”
“No,” she answered as she tried to catch her breath. “What?”
“It’s the day we met. First time I saw your boobs, too.” Slowly, I started pushing up the hem of her tank top. “It was in these very woods where you flashed me, so in celebration of our sixth anniversary, I’m down if you want to repeat history.”
“It didn’t happen then, and it’s not going to happen now.” She stood on her tiptoes, and her top fell back into place as she kissed me. “But if you take me inside, I’ll give you all the second-base action you can handle.”
I started to deepen the kiss when I heard the snap of a twig. Turning my head, I spotted Adan and Adara’s nosy asses peeking at us from behind a tree fifteen feet away.
“You call that hiding?” I yelled at them.
They glanced at each other before turning back and singing, “Jamie and Bee, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!”
Chuckling, I stepped back as I met Bee’s amused gaze. “You go left, and I go right?”
Her evil grin was her only response before we took off after the squealing twins.
Six Months Later
“ELLIOT MONTGOMERY, THE FORMER CHIEF Executive Officer of MontGlobal, and Chief Financial Officer, Charles Dennis, have been indicted on charges of fraud and the embezzlement of over two hundred million dollars…”
I stared at the haggard appearance of my father as he was led from a building in handcuffs. It was an old clip but one I never got tired of seeing. The first time I saw it, I reached out to my mother immediately after, but she’d made it clear that she wanted nothing to do with me. I could remember her parting words just before she hung up on me.
“You ruined us, Barbette. I have no daughter.”
Shutting off the TV, I got busy putting up, or rather hiding, my camera and makeup. Jamie would be home soon, and I wasn’t quite ready for him to know what I’d been up to the last couple of months. There was a chance it could go nowhere, and I just… I wasn’t sure if I could handle that. Or what I would do if it did. I got the idea from Tyra when I did hers and Four’s Halloween makeup. Jamie had insisted on driving the six hours to check on Tyra after a few weeks of her not answering our calls.
Our summer had certainly been one for the drama books, starting with my father getting arrested, which was actually a cause for celebration, and ending with Vaughn cheating on Tyra. Needless to say, they’d broken up. Or whatever it’s called when your relationship goes from ‘it’s complicated’ to ‘no longer exists.’
Tyra had gotten into Harvard, freaking Harvard, and was now living in Cambridge, which was only ten minutes from Jamie’s old stomping grounds. Ever was halfway to Canada and was the furthest away from home. He tried to take Four with him like Jamie had done me, but she wasn’t ready to be so far away from her mom, who was now in psychiatric care. Vaughn, who’d had several offers from colleges to play football, had rejected them all to work for his father instead. Worry roiled in my gut. Even though no one knows what his father does, everyone back home keeps a wide
berth of Franklin Rees. Whatever it was, it wasn’t legal.
Tyra was determined to push us away, but for every shove, we pulled twice as hard. She wasn’t getting away from us that easy.
Vaughn… he hasn’t been so easy to convince.
No one had laid eyes on him in months. Our only option was to storm that castle he was forced to call home, but it was pretty hard to go against the armed men with guns who’d mysteriously appeared, making sure no one came in or out.
I’d just finished putting everything back in its hiding spot when I heard the front door open. Jamie and I lived in a three-bedroom townhome not far from Penn’s campus. So far, every one of Jamie’s wishes had come true. I was constantly getting an ass full of toilet water and hauling the trash to the road when he forgot, which was often. He was also constantly drinking straight from the milk and juice cartons and leaving toothpaste smudges all over our bathroom sink. And he never ever ever took the time to put a new roll of toilet paper on the damn handle.
He made it all worth it every night and each morning, though. During the day, Jamie would find the time—even if just a few minutes—to assure himself that I wanted for nothing. In the early days, while he was busy with orientation and preparing for his first week of school, I kept busy making our apartment comfortable for us. After countless runs and too much money spent at Target, I was pretty proud of what I’d done with the place. There was one thing Jamie got wrong, though. I hadn’t bothered to ask his opinion on any of the decoration choices I’d made, but he never once complained. In fact, the only reaction he’d given was to our dining room table. We’d christened it thoroughly less than an hour after it was delivered.
I rushed downstairs in time to see Jamie closing the door. Snowflakes sprinkled his gray hooded parka, but he seemed oblivious to all the snow he was tracking on my freshly swept floor as he stared at his phone. Sensing me, he looked up, and I wondered at his curious gaze.
“Hey, baby,” I greeted nervously since he was still eyeing me. “How did it go?”
He took his time kissing me while I pushed his coat from his muscular shoulders before answering. “Statistics was kicking my ass for a little bit, but I’m Jamie fucking Buchanan. Of course, I aced it.”
“Uh-huh… and it wouldn’t have anything to do with me agreeing to make a home video with you if you aced all of your final exams?”
“Does it matter?” he retorted, grinning. “A deal’s a deal.”
I grabbed his hand when he reached for the hem of my oversized Christmas sweater. It was the only thing I wore besides the white thick slouchy socks. “Hold your horses, mister. You don’t have those scores back yet.”
With a cocky smile, he ignored me as he gripped my ass and yanked me into him. “Where are your panties?” he asked the moment he felt my bare skin.
“I don’t know,” I flirted, playing coy. “I guess I lost them.”
“Where?” he growled.
I peeked up at him. “Under your pillow.”
Rather than go for them as I’d expected, he pulled me into the living room. After sitting down on our large black sectional, he sat me on his lap.
“Care to explain this?” Showing me his phone screen, the back of my neck grew hot when I saw the video I’d posted on YouTube a couple of weeks ago. The caption read “Holiday Glam,” and it had over ten thousand views. That was nothing compared to the more established beauty gurus, but it was more than I could hope for. Even though my mother had forced me to master the art, I chose not to run from my demons and embraced them instead. If I could somehow turn my negative experience into a positive experience for girls and women everywhere, then that was something, right?
“It’s… it’s a makeup tutorial.”
“I see that,” he said as he caressed my back. I wondered if he could sense my nervousness. “What I don’t understand is why you didn’t you tell me you were doing this?”
I shrugged, keeping my gaze pinned to the floor.
Gripping my chin, he turned my head until our eyes met. “Talk to me, Bette. There’s no one here but me and you.”
“I… I just wanted to make sure I could do this before I told anyone.”
He frowned, clearly not liking my answer. “Since when am I just anyone?”
“You’re not, but you’re also the only person I’m afraid of disappointing.”
“You could never disappoint me.”
“Jamie, I—” Tears suddenly pricked my eyes, but as soon as they fell, Jamie wiped them away. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. I see you leave every day for school and apprentice for your uncle. You have such a bright future while I… I never had the chance to dream. What if it’s too late?”
He pulled me down until our foreheads touched. “It’s never too late. Don’t you see where we are? This is the endgame, Bette. Even if it takes forever, I’ll make damn sure all your dreams come true.”
“Good, because I really want to do this,” I admitted.
“Then we will.”
I sat up in surprise. “We?”
“You’ve stayed up with me every night for two weeks, helping me study for exams. I want to be there for you like you are there for me.”
“How?”
He grinned. “Well…to start, I’ve got some ideas for your channel.”
I stared down at him warily. “Like what?”
“You’ll see.”
He flashed me a devious grin, and my stomach flipped not only because he was gorgeous as hell but because I had a very valid reason for being nervous. Wisely, I had the urge to say no. Jamie was mischievous when he was good and downright wicked when he was bad, which was often.
But…
How could I resist this boy who brazenly wore his heart on his sleeve so that everyone could see it beat only for me?
He pressed his lips against mine, stealing away the last of my doubt. “I’ve got some ideas for us, too,” he said after he finished kissing me senseless.
“Oh?”
“You’re a Montgomery, but Barbette Elizabeth Buchanan has a better ring to it, don’t you think?”
My heart skipped a beat.
Was Jamie proposing? Was I ready for that? I’d spent the last five years thinking that being someone’s wife was all I could hope for, and now I knew better. I knew in my heart that I’d marry no one else but Jameson Buchanan, but for now, I wanted to spend some time rediscovering myself. There was no one standing over me anymore telling me who to be, and Jamie… he was ready to love me no matter what.
“All you have to do,” he added, sensing my hesitation and, as always, knowing exactly what I needed, “is say yes when I ask someday. Deal?”
He held up his pinky with a challenge in his eyes. I never could back down from one, and Jameson damn well knew it.
Holding his daring gaze, I hooked my pinky with his.
“Deal.” Just as he leaned in to kiss me, I shot from his lap, causing his eyebrow to perk as he glared. “Sorry, but we have to start packing if we’re going to make our flight in the morning.” Jamie and I were heading to Ireland to spend Christmas with his mom and twin siblings. He also said he wanted me to meet his grandparents before they finally kicked the bucket. His words, not mine.
“Fine.” Huffing, he unfolded his long body from the couch. “But you’re going to make it up to me later.”
“How about I make it up to you right now?” With a lascivious smile, he eagerly reached for my sweater, but I quickly dodged his hands. “You know that’s not what I meant,” I said before turning away. Silently, he stalked me as I rushed for the small laundry room. I quickly removed what I needed from its hiding place and spun to face Jamie who was practically breathing down my neck. He had a hard time concealing his surprise when I held out a small, narrow box wrapped with shiny, red paper and tied with a black bow.
“What is it?” he asked, and I giggled at the wary look in his eyes.
“An early Christmas present.”
He flashed me a crooked smil
e as he accepted the box. “But I thought you’d put that under my pillow already.” Biting my lip, I didn’t say anything as he pulled the bow free and tore into the wrapping. When he lifted the top, I watched his Adam’s apple bob as he stared at what lay inside.
“You came back for me just like you promised,” I whispered, feeling unsure since he hadn’t spoken.
With nimble fingers, he plucked his father’s harmonica from the box and closed his tatted fist around it. “And you kept this safe just like you promised,” he mumbled.
Through all the years, the distance, the hurt, and the hate, we’d kept our promises to each other even when we didn’t want to. If I didn’t already know that Jamie and I belonged together, there’d be no denying it now. I didn’t get the chance to tell him so before he dropped the box and rushed me.
Lifting me onto the washing machine, he stole my lips in a kiss that was both brutal and beautiful. “I can’t wait to make more music with you, Bette. I missed your terrible poetry.”
Stroking my fingers across his cheek, I lost myself in his brown eyes. “And I love your clumsy notes.”
Stay tuned for The Prince and the Pawn!
Vaughn tells his story in the fourth and final novel in the When Rivals Play series.
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Broken Love Series
Fear Me
Fear You
Fear Us
Breaking Love
Fearless
Stolen Duet
The Bandit
The Knight
When Rivals Play Series
The Peer and the Puppet
The Moth and the Flame
Evermore (novella)
The Punk and the Plaything
