by S. L. Scott
“I could have sworn there were more. Guess I need to stop telling that story.”
His mom walks inside. “Probably best. I’m going to get home, but I’ll see you two tomorrow night?” She swings her purse straps onto her shoulder again.
“I look forward to it and meeting the family,” I say. Escaping Harrison’s side, I go to her and give her a hug. Her embrace matches her personality—warm and inviting. “It was so nice to meet you and spend that time together.”
“I agree. You were a lovely highlight of my day.”
When she leaves, Harrison’s staring at me like he doesn’t recognize me. “What?” I ask, throwing my arms out and letting them fall to my sides again.
“Nothing.”
“It’s something, so just say it.”
He comes to me and brings me into his arms again. With a kiss to my forehead, he whispers, “California sure does look good on you.”
29
Harrison
I shouldn’t have brought her here.
In a house buried in The Hills at an Oscar-winners property, some D-grade producer has been chatting Tatum up while I’ve been stuck discussing a house in Brentwood coming on the market soon and needing an agent. There are strings attached. There always are. These attachments come in the form of the owner wanting to seal the deal with sex in the jacuzzi while her husband watches.
No fucking thanks.
I don’t have to play nice. My portfolio speaks for itself. “You either hire the best or you go find some fucker down in the OC wanting to make a splash here in LA. Literally speaking. You have my secretary’s number.”
Cutting through the crowd, I have my eyes set on my girl, excited that it’s me she’ll be leaving with. Leaving is the goal, too. These Hollywood parties don’t hold the same thrill that they used to.
Since getting out of LA, I’ve had my eyes opened. Maybe that’s all it took for me to see the bigger picture of what my life could be.
Tatum’s confidence exudes in New York, so I’m not sure why she’s shrinking under the Hollywood lights. Only a few more feet until I reach her, but I’m jerked to the side and under a bellowing greeting, an ex squeals when she sees me. “Harrison Decker, where the fuck have you been?” She jumps me—literally—a crab claw-like hold around me and she hugs me tight.
Trying to peel her off me is a feat unto itself. Gemma Maze, former model turned serious actress, hails from the UK, and accepted the Golden Globe last year for her performance as a pig in mud in some psychological thriller. I didn’t see it, not ever wanting to see her again, in real life or on the big screen. She loves her drugs. Some things never change . . .
I put her on her feet again and quickly glance to find Tatum. Hoping she would have missed this scene, that hope is shredded under the glare she’s giving me. I push through the crowd to reach her. “I didn’t—”
“I know, but I don’t like it here.”
“Let’s leave then.” I take her hand and start for the door. The scene is familiar to most who are here. I look like her bodyguard trying to get her out from the hoard of fans and paparazzi spotlight. I’ll play that role for her if it gets her safely out of here.
When valet pulls my M2 around, we get in so I can get us the fuck out. It’s a few streets covered before I ask, “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” she snaps, staring out her window.
Yikes. Not fine at all. “I didn’t know she’d be there.”
“You dated Gemma Maze? I don’t know how I feel about that, Decker. I thought you had better taste than that.”
Reaching over, I try to lighten her mood. “My taste improved with age.”
“It sure as shit did.” The edge to her tone could slice through any tension if the tension was rolling off of her to begin with.
“I’m sorry for bringing you here. You like to party, and you always seem up for a good time. So, I thought—”
“That wasn’t a good time. That was me watching you get lady-handled by cougars and coke heads.” She cracks her window and inhales a deep breath. I stop at a stop sign and look over when she turns toward me. “I can’t drink and I’m pregnant. I feel bloated and I’m not even showing yet. What’s it going to be like when I’m nine months pregnant?” Her voice keeps rising. “I’m going to be sitting home in Manhattan while you’re out “closing deals” at parties in LA? That’s not how I saw things going.”
I hate fighting in a car, the confinement is too limiting in thought and space. “Can we please talk about this when we get home?”
“Home? There you go again,” she says, sounding like she’s given up. “This isn’t my home, Harrison. And as much as you hate it, this baby goes where I go.”
She’s getting close to those lines, if crossed it can be hard to undo the damage already done. “Tatum,” I warn, getting her attention. “I don’t hate that you’re having my baby—whether that be in LA, New York, or Nova Scotia—don’t turn me into the bad guy for something I never said or even inferred. I’m going to say this again. We’ll talk about it when we get home. I’m not doing it in the car.”
“Maybe you don’t get that choice. I don’t have a say? God, I thought you were different. Sure, you have an arrogant side, but it wasn’t jerk macho.”
I grip the steering wheel, my anger starting to boil. “That’s a lot of fucking accusations in a four-block radius. Keep going, Tatum, and we’ll fucking do this and get it out of the way.”
“I don’t want to get it out of the way. I want it resolved. You have me living in a purgatory not knowing if I’m going to heaven or hell.”
“Hell, being LA? Wow,” I say, shaking my head.
“To me, it is. Watching you at that party wasn’t what I expected to see. You know I get jealous and although I’m working on that, I don’t like women shoved in my face.”
“You’re confusing what you think happened and reality.”
She scoffs so loud and then laughs deliriously that I glance over at her. “Me confusing reality. That’s rich. And while we’re at this, why are you driving your pregnant girlfriend when you’ve been drinking?”
She backs her bark with her bite, cutting her teeth deep. I need to take a breath, take a walk, put some space between us. I pull into my garage and cut the engine, ready to face her head on with this since that’s the road she’s choosing to travel tonight.
She gets out so fast that I don’t even have time to help her. I follow her inside the house. She takes off her heels and then storms down the hall. “This was supposed to be my birthday present, not Decker’s back in party mode weekend.”
I expect the sound of a door slamming. I don’t get that, though. Walking slowly toward the bedroom, my frame fills the doorway. I don’t breach the entrance, giving her all the space she fucking needs to cool down. When she comes out of the closet with her suitcase in hand and dumps it on the bed, I ask, “What are you doing?”
“I’m leaving.”
“It’s eleven o’clock at night. Where are you going?”
“I’m sure there’s a redeye I can catch,” she replies with her back to me.
My eyes practically bulge out of my head. “You’re flying home?”
Whipping back, she says, “Yes. Exactly. Home.”
Now I’m pissed. “That’s it. That’s fucking it.” I walk into the bedroom and shut the damn suitcase to the sound of her gasp. “You’re not running away from this, away from me. This isn’t what you do anymore. You have to break the pattern, Tatum.”
“Every time I stay, I’m the one who gets screwed.” The anger has left her shoulders sagging. Defeat rings through her tone, but I’m not sure what she thinks she’s lost. An argument? Me? What she thought her life would be?
I’m lost in her hurricane as it destroys everything in her path. Am I next? No. I refuse to be. More than I did before, I get why she’s defensive. Her parents suck. But I’m not like them. I desperately want her in my life. I love her, for fuck’s sake. Now calls for being honest wi
th that love though. “The second we touch on something too close for comfort, you barricade yourself behind walls too thick to break through.”
Her arms cross over her chest in indignation. I’ve seen it too many times to play naïve. Her chin is raised as she mentally gathers her weapons together. I try to end this deadlock we find ourselves in, not wanting to fight with her about things that keep resurfacing. “You only get mad when you feel attacked. We may not know every little fucking thing about each other, but I’ve seen you for who you are, and you’ve seen me. I’m not a fucking stranger, Tatum—”
Her gaze hits me in the chest, slicing me up the center until she reaches my eyes. Fires shine so bright that she could light up the universe with her anger. It takes her a few seconds to come to me, the woman I know so well inside the walls of her apartment. Vulnerability douses the flames, and she says, “I’m lost in your world, Harrison, an outsider that feels misplaced.”
“We’re together, so why would you feel that way?”
“Because I’m standing in the middle of a party of strangers being hit on while you schmoozed. Why bother taking me at all?” She does have a point. I hated that too.
“I’m sorry for leaving you. I guess I always saw you as more of a party girl or socialite and would like to be there.”
A humorless laugh rattles her chest as she looks down at the suitcase on the bed. “I used to revel in those titles, feeling I had earned them after endless partying for years.” She looks up at me, and says, “I’ve never felt ashamed of being either. Until now.” She moves toward the bathroom and with her back to me, she adds, “You’re right. It’s too late for me to figure out how to fly home right now. I’m tired, so I’m going to bed.”
“It’s probably best if we both get some rest, so we can figure this out tomorrow.” I walk to the door to give her privacy. I didn’t have a drink earlier, but I’m damn well having one now.
Before I leave, I say, “For the record, I didn’t have anything except Perrier to drink because the things that I thought mattered when I was living in LA full-time don’t anymore. Only you and that baby do.”
She sucks in a staggered breath, and then I hear her start crying. I go to her, rubbing her shoulders, and kiss the back of her head. “It’s going to be okay, Tate.”
Turning in my hold, she hugs me so tight that I can’t see her face. “Promise me. Promise me that you’ll always be there for the baby, even if you can’t be there for me.”
“I’m going to be there for both of you. I love you, Tate.”
Tilting her head, the tears glisten making her eyes look like precious gemstones. “Promise me, Harrison.”
It’s an easy promise for me to keep, so I reply, “I promise.”
I come to bed just over an hour later. An hour of staring at the glittering city of LA had me wanting to make this right with her. She wants security. A place to call home for a family. She wants New York.
Although I want LA, I don’t want to lose her. We have a lot to work through, the details of how our relationship will move forward. But it will be best discussed in the daylight and on full stomachs.
I climb into bed next to her sleeping body. She didn’t tell me she was going to sleep but I understand we were standing our grounds in separate parts of the house. The pregnancy is taking a toll on her already and I know she needs more sleep.
Though her back is to me, I slide around her, wanting our bodies to mold together like they do at her apartment. Maybe then she’ll feel what she can’t see—that it doesn’t matter where we live as long as we’re together.
My mind is too busy for sleep and one of the memories that flashes is when I went to go pick up my clothes from the drycleaners after returning from Catalina . . .
I hang the hanger on the hook in my car. It’s weeks overdue, but with my sister being in the accident and niece still in the hospital, my laundry from Catalina wasn’t a priority. My mom dropped it off though and I was down to my last day before they donated them. I don’t mind the donation, but I was partial to the shirt I was wearing with Tatum.
She liked it.
That meant I would keep it in hopes of wearing it for her again. I made a promise to her, made her my mission, and unlike her pact, I intended to keep it.
Once I get home, I carry the plastic-wrapped clothes into my closet and rip off the packaging. A Ziploc dangles from the neck of the hanger. I open it to pull out a white piece of paper.
Probably one of the women working at the cleaners slipping me her number. It happens at businesses quite a bit.
I unfold it and read:
Tatum
Her number written just below.
Standing there smiling like a goofball, I add the number to my phone. “She broke her own pact. For me.”
Once Madison and my niece are home, settled, I’ll plan my quest to win Tatum over.
When the dust settles.
The sun hasn’t risen, but I need to hit the water to clear my head before tackling the day. I slip out of bed and find my trunks. I pull them on hopping on one foot and then the other down the hall. I shove a banana in my mouth and grab a bottle of water as I head for the back door.
It takes me a minute to scroll the surf report to figure out the conditions before I decide which board I want to ride. With my board in the back of my old pickup truck, I text a good friend who’s in town for a few days from Hawaii: Sorry I missed yesterday. You out in the water this morning? I’m heading over.
When I see the three dots on the screen, I laugh. He’s always up early for a surf. The message reads: Evan Ashford - Down at the usual. Just arrived.
He generally surfs in the same place, so I drive my truck down to meet him.
Easy to spot, he’s built for the sport, has that Hawaiian tan, and a million-dollar grin. He comes toward me. “Good to see you, brother.”
“You too, man.” I reach in and dig my board from the back. “How goes it?”
“You know, busy. Wife, family. Business.”
“You’re still managing to squeeze some surfing in?”
“Trust me, Mallory would make me. I’m a bear of irritability if I don’t kneel to the ocean altar at least two times a week. I miss the days when I could surf all day. But I won’t complain. Life is good. What’s going on in yours?”
We head over to the sand and rub wax all over the boards. I’ve known Evan a few years, not before he settled down, but I’ve heard some stories.
I say, “I’m out in New York with my license to get some business. Your old stomping grounds, right?”
He looks out at the water as the sun rises. “High school days. It’s been a long time since I called that place home.”
“I’m with a girl out there.”
“Yeah? You thinking about growing some roots in the city?”
“She’s the first one who ever made me consider it and now I want that.”
We bump fists and then stand, tossing the wax with some of his stuff. Just before we drop our boards in the water, Evan says, “I talk a lot of shit about missing the surf, but I’d miss my girl more. Seems like a good trade off and you coming out ahead if she’s worth the sacrifice.”
“She is.”
“Glad to hear it. I get first wave.”
“Naturally.” We both start paddling out.
Evan’s words stay with me—“I’d miss my girl more”—as I burn out my muscles on wave after wave. Now that I have Tatum in my life, I’d miss her more than anything else as well. When it’s good, it’s fan-fucking-tastic.
Now we have to work on those bad times.
Before I back out the truck, Evan calls, “Come see me in Hawaii sometime and bring your girl. It’s paradise out there.”
With my arm hanging out the window, I laugh. “I just might take you up on that offer.”
“Hope you do.”
When I get back to the house, it’s just gone nine. I’m later than I wanted to be, but glad that it appears she’s still in bed. I walk lightly
down the hall, not wanting to wake her. I’ll take a quick shower and then make her breakfast. We can sit on the deck and I know she’ll start coming around to maybe splitting our time if that’s even possible.
We just need to get the conversation going so we can plan our lives because her walls don’t scare me.
And I intend to comfort her from fears. I’m not leaving this home permanently. We will be able to afford both places. The party life of LA can go, but this place . . . this place I chose for a family. Even if we’re only here part-time, it will be worth it. Hoping Tatum can see that too. Eventually.
When I enter my room, the covers are rumpled, and the bed is empty. “Tatum?” I look to the bathroom, but the door is wide open and she’s not in there. “Tatum?”
I know.
Deep down, my heart already knows.
But I do it because I need to prove it to my brain. I open the closet door to verify her suitcase is missing.
Just like she is.
Fuck.
Tatum is gone.
30
Tatum
What have I done?
My shell is so hard it’s become a detriment. Harrison Decker loves me. And I love him. “I love him so much that it hurts, Natalie. Like physical pain. So much that he makes me feel out of control.”
“That’s not him . . .” Her head wobbles in debate. “It might be him as well, but it’s definitely your hormones. You’re pregnant. All kinds of changes are happening in there. Do you know how many fights I’ve picked with Nick in the past few months over the stupidest stuff?”
“A lot,” Nick says from the couch. His eyes are fixed on the TV, but clearly, his ears are eavesdropping.
She rolls her eyes, but then says, “You guys moved so fast, and now you’re having a baby. So many emotions are involved in this that I don’t want you to act rash. Granted, you left, and that’s rash.”
