by Kait Nolan
His expression grew grimmer with every word. “I’m so sorry, Abbey.”
“Oh! And let’s not forget that word of our alleged engagement has already reached Crystal down at the diner, which I found out when I went to pick up our lunch order. Meaning basically everybody knows, and I couldn’t even walk down the street to my car for people stopping me to offer congratulations and ask why it had been such a secret.”
“What did you say?” There was a tension in his shoulders as he waited for her answer. Wondering whether she’d made the whole situation worse? Tried to tell the truth?
“The theme of the day was, ‘No comment.’ There was no sense in trying to correct Crystal in the moment. The explanation would’ve taken longer, and I didn’t know who might be listening.”
He seemed to relax at that. At the idea that there were fewer versions of the story to try to combat?
“That’s probably best until we sort out how to handle this.”
She didn’t like it, but even she understood that the fewer people who knew, the better. But she couldn’t fathom having to put this much thought into everything, all the time. “How the hell do you deal with this? With the invasion of your privacy? With people’s entitlement, thinking they have any right to know about the intimate details of your life? After everything that happened around the trial, I never imagined you’d tolerate this at all.”
He turned away and gave the red beans and rice a stir. “I don’t love it, but it’s part and parcel of the business. Although they tend to be a little more respectful of me directly. My publicist has coached me on how to handle the media. Not that she ever had something like this in mind.”
“Well, you’re going to have to do something about this. The insanity has to stop. I can’t live like this, and it’s sure as hell not fair to your sisters and the business we’ve built.”
At the thump, thump, thump on the front porch, they both moved in that direction. Of course, Granddaddy wouldn’t do as asked and stay put.
Kyle kept his voice low. “I’ve got some ideas about that we can discuss after Granddaddy goes to bed. Let’s just get through dinner and after. I’ll go put the tools away.”
She could wait that long.
Chapter 6
As he waited for Abbey to get Granddaddy settled for the night, Kyle poked around the living room cabinets, hunting for the small-batch apple brandy they’d sometimes nipped from in high school. He figured they could both use something to take the edge off for this conversation.
The last thing he’d ever wanted to do was make her life harder. He’d known the press would follow up and be interested in her, but he’d underestimated how much and how fast they’d interfere. She’d looked so frazzled and tired when she got home. And it had only been a day. A part of him wondered if he should try to do as she’d asked and issue a retraction. He’d look like a fool at best, but in the grand scheme of things, what did that matter?
Still, a bigger part wanted to take this risk, make this pitch to her. It was a lunatic idea. Granddaddy’s idea. One predicated on her not understanding the realities of his world or thinking too hard about it. The logic was less than sound, but he’d always loved a good Hail Mary. If she said no, that was it. This unexpected opportunity to make amends would disappear like so much smoke. He could always shoot for a retraction then. But for now, he had to try.
“He’s finally down. You wore him out.”
“I’m sorry. I tried not to let him overdo—”
“No, that wasn’t a criticism. It’s good. He’ll sleep better this way.” Abbey curled onto one end of the sofa.
Kyle crossed to her, offering a glass. “Found the apple brandy. Figured you could use some after the day you had.”
Gratitude flashed across her face as she took it. “Thanks.” She closed her eyes as she sipped, savoring the flavor. The hint of a smile curved her lips as she dropped her head back. “I’ll never forget that time we got caught filching some our junior year. Daddy was so mad, and you took all the heat, even though it was my idea.”
Because her tone was fond, Kyle took the risk and eased onto the opposite end of the couch, rolling his own glass between his palms. “What was he gonna do to me? I’d had worse from my own parents almost every day growing up.”
Her eyes cracked open, went serious. “You disappointed him. That was worse on you than if he’d raised a hand to you.”
Uncomfortable with the truth of it, he twitched his shoulders and sipped. “I was surprised he didn’t forbid you from hanging out with me.”
“I was afraid he would, so I came clean after you left that night.”
He stared at her. “You never told me that.”
She shrugged, dropping her gaze and taking another drink. “I knew what our family was to you. I wasn’t going to take that away.”
There was something in her tone, some thrum of pain he didn’t understand. But before he could follow up on it, she’d blanked her face again. “So, what are your ideas on how to fix this?”
Showtime.
“I think I know a way to make this go away. But you’re not going to like it.” With another sip for courage, he launched in. “You’re gonna need some help with Granddaddy beyond a day or two. I can stay and do that. In the meantime, we maintain the engagement, do a few public appearances so that we can control the narrative of the media. We make them love us as an us, fall in love with you, and then you can publicly throw me over in whatever way you want so that the world knows we’re over and it’s my fault. It’ll throw all the attention back on me as the bad guy, and you should be able to get back your peace and quiet.”
Abbey stared at him. “You actually expect me to play along with this? Pretend to be in love with you in front of cameras and the world… my friends, my family, my town?”
The incredulity in her voice stung. “Once upon a time, you wouldn’t have had to pretend.”
The neutral mask cracked. “Don’t you dare throw that in my face after what you did.” The raw hurt in her eyes cut deep, and he didn’t have the first clue how to apologize.
“Abbey, I’m sorry. I know it’s too little, too late, and doesn’t begin to make up for—”
“You’re right, it doesn’t. I’m not discussing that, Kyle.”
He’d thought he understood, but seeing the pain in her face, fresh as if it happened yesterday, he knew this ran so much deeper than he’d ever suspected. And what he’d imagined had been untenable. Maybe he was fooling himself that she’d ever forgive him. Maybe he didn’t deserve it.
“Okay. I want to be clear that the offer of help with Granddaddy has nothing to do with the rest of this. It’s not contingent. Your family was always good to me, and I want to help.”
There was that flash of… something again. He almost thought it was insult. But what sense did that make?
She looked away, her jaw working. “You think this is the only way to make this go away?”
Knowing it probably made him the worst kind of asshole, Kyle doubled down. “It’s the best I’ve got without cluing my PR manager into the truth.”
“And how long do you think this charade would need to go on?”
“I don’t know. Until some fresh scandal or happening distracts them from us.” Until you soften enough to hear me.
Abbey stayed quiet for several long moments. Then she tipped back her glass and drained the last of the apple brandy. “Fine. I’ll do the dog and pony show. I’ll play nice. And we get this over with as soon as possible.”
Not exactly a ringing endorsement of his questionable plan, but it felt like getting a stay of execution. He’d have his chance. He sure as hell didn’t plan to waste it.
“Okay. I’ll touch base with Deanna—my publicist. See what she recommends.”
“You’re going to have to have a family meeting. Your sisters are perfectly well aware we haven’t been talking for years, and I already told them the truth, so if you want to pull this off, they’re all going to have to be on board
.”
Joy. He could imagine how well that was going to go over. Abbey wasn’t the only one he’d left behind, and he’d have to reckon for that too. “Okay. Do they know about—”
“No. I wasn’t eager to share that particular humiliation.”
Shoving to her feet, she strode toward the stairs.
It wasn’t because I didn’t love you. I was a dumbass. The words log-jammed in his throat. She didn’t want to hear any of that. She probably never would. But at some point, before all of this was over, he was going to say it, going to explain it, if for no other reason than hoping it dimmed some of the pain he’d caused her.
At the foot of the stairs she paused, without looking back. “Thank you for helping with Granddaddy.”
Knowing there was nothing more for him to say, he kept his mouth shut, listening as she climbed to the second floor. For a long time after, he sat alone with his thoughts and his many, many regrets. Then he carried his guitar out to the front porch. The music had been calling him, as this place had been calling. At least if everything with Abbey went to hell, he’d have most of a new album.
As he began to pick out the melody in his brain, he wished that were more of a comfort.
“You’re an eejit.”
The flat pronouncement, delivered in Pru’s husband’s Irish brogue, was almost enough to make Abbey snort with laughter. It was so very obvious the rest of the family agreed with his assessment of the plan Kyle had laid out for them.
Kyle just crossed his arms and knit his brow, looking askance in Flynn’s direction. “Didn’t you and Pru have that whole fake engagement because of a social worker?”
“To be sure,” Flynn conceded. “But we were already half in love with each other. I have grave concerns you’ll be able to convince anyone of the truth of this.”
A chorus of agreement rose up from the gathered siblings and their spouses. It was a fair concern. Abbey got prickly and angry every time anyone brought Kyle up in front of her. She shut down any conversations, as much out of fear that they’d keep prying to find out what really happened as because thinking of him simply hurt.
Kyle spread his hands. “If any of you have other ideas, I’d love to entertain them, but this is what we’ve got right now.”
This was her opportunity to get out of this lunatic scheme. They had told no one else. There was still time to do something else.
“How about you fixing your own shit and leaving Abbey out of it?” Xander suggested. When Kennedy popped her husband’s arm, he shrugged. “What? Somebody had to say it.”
The protectiveness of her friends warmed something in Abbey’s heart, even if they didn’t know what they were protecting her from.
If the front united solidly on her side bothered Kyle, he didn’t show it. “It’s a fair question. If I thought a simple retraction would get the paparazzi off Abbey’s back, I’d have done it already. But you’ll find they’re seldom interested in the truth. They only care about what sells.”
“That’s true enough,” Athena agreed. As an award-winning chef with some notoriety, Kyle’s youngest sister had faced her own battles with bad publicity. “So give them something more interesting. Go out with Mercy Lee.”
His expression flattened, conciliatory attitude gone in a blink. “Absolutely not. I’m not going anywhere near that woman.”
“Someone else then,” Maggie suggested.
Kyle snorted. “Contrary to what you may think, I don’t exactly have a digital Rolodex of the famous in my phone.”
“Anything has to be better than you using Abbey,” Pru insisted.
The warm fuzzies slid into discomfort. Angry as she was at Kyle, she didn’t like seeing the people he counted as family—or had—piling on him like this. He needed them as a source of support, and it was as much her fault as his that he’d lost that.
“He’s not using me if I agree to it. Which I did.”
Abbey didn’t miss the look of distress in Pru’s eyes. “What do you get out of this?”
She’d thought about this a lot last night after she’d gone up to bed and begun second-guessing her decision. But his lunatic scheme gave her the chance at the one thing she hadn’t had in a decade. “Closure.”
None of them could argue with that. She’d been a walking case of unfinished business all these years, and they all knew it. Maybe she wouldn’t have chosen this, and maybe she would’ve preferred to never lay eyes on him again, but she couldn’t deny the appeal of finally, permanently resolving things.
Maggie’s husband, Porter, a foster brother himself, broke the tense silence. “Even if you agree with this, I’m with Flynn. I don’t see how anyone’s going to believe it. You’re a cactus any time he comes up. And you’re supposed to act in love with each other in the public eye?”
Abbey swallowed. Because she’d thought of that, too. “I can sell it.”
She just had to pretend they were still twenty-one. That the last several years hadn’t happened. That Kyle was still the boy who’d dreamed with her under the stars, in a treehouse on the edge of her family’s apple orchard.
That he hadn’t left her at the altar.
Every face in the room showed skepticism and concern. Abbey ignored the clearly telegraphed “just because you can, doesn’t mean you should” she was getting from Pru.
Closing her eyes for a moment, she brought back the boy in her mind, pulling up that memory of heady young love she’d shoved deep into mental mothballs and letting it flow through her. She felt her face and posture soften, and when she opened her eyes to look at Kyle, she saw the him he used to be. And letting the fantasy she’d clung to for years rule her—that he’d actually come when she’d suggested changing things between them—she rose to her toes and kissed him.
It was different coming to this with intent, with lifelong affection and a clear head. There was heat underneath. But it wasn’t like the storm of a kiss from when he’d burst in on her at the spa. This was slow and sweet, full of all the years of yearning. He wrapped around her, and when he would have taken them deeper, she eased back. In his deep blue eyes she saw... or thought she saw… everything she’d wanted to see all those years ago. Which just proved he was a better actor than she’d thought.
“Well, that’s… convincing.”
She didn’t know who’d spoken. Didn’t care.
Yeah, she could sell the idea that she was in love with him because she wasn’t having to act at all. Damn it. But he’d already broken her heart. How much worse could this be?
Feeling self-conscious, Abbey stepped back.
“Okay, maybe this is an obvious question, but why didn’t y’all ever get together for real?” Of course Pru’s teenage daughter, Ari—the resident romantic—would ask that.
Abbey didn’t at all want to talk about this, but she was legitimately curious what Kyle would say. Arching a brow, she punted the question to him.
“She was always way too good for me.” He answered Ari, but his eyes stayed on Abbey. It was so very clear he stilled believed it. That he was still letting his parents and the damage they’d done to him run his life.
It infuriated and saddened her all over again. “You were the only one who thought that.”
“No, I wasn’t.”
Temper ignited, as it often did when anything about his parents came up. “Oh, bullshit. After all these years, you’re still letting their opinions dictate your behavior and your life. What is it going to take to get through that thick skull of yours? The only opinions that matter are those of the people who love you. The only thing you’re responsible for are your words and actions. You weren’t the one tried and found guilty, so stop acting like it’s on you to make reparations. It’s not. It never was.”
Kyle stared at her, throat working for several long moments. “It’s been a long, long time since anybody’s defended me to me. Nobody ever did it quite like you.”
The idea that no one in his life would or could call him on this shit broke her heart. He had so th
oroughly cut himself off from home and his past, other than a handful of his foster siblings, that he’d essentially cut himself off from support. From the people who would tell him what he needed to hear instead of what he wanted. Was it any wonder that the life he’d led had changed him?
With a sinking feeling, she realized she’d had a role in that. She’d excised him from her life. She’d had to for her own survival. But she was stronger now, and they were in this strange situation for however long it lasted. She could do that for him again. Be that for him. Maybe he’d be the better for it.
With far more nonchalance than she felt, she fisted her hands on her hips. “Then you’d best clean your ears out. I’ve apparently got years of bullshit to call you on.”
He actually grinned at that. “Can’t wait.”
“So, you’re really going through with this?” Pru asked.
Kyle finally swung toward his family again. “Look, I know y’all are angry with me, and I’ve got a lot to make up for. That’s justified. But I’d appreciate your support in this.”
“We’d appreciate it,” Abbey added, knowing they were following her lead.
His sisters exchanged serious looks with their spouses. In the end, Kennedy spoke for all of them. “All right. If that’s really what you want.”
Kyle sighed in relief. “Thank you. There’s one more thing. I’ll do what I can to steer the press away from the Ridge, but there are no guarantees. I don’t want my local history brought up. I don’t want people talking about my time with Joan because that will come back to my parents, and I’ve done everything possible to distance myself from them.”
Of course he had. That had started well before he’d left Eden’s Ridge. He was ashamed of his past and always had been. She needed to remember that and remember that this whole thing was just for show, no matter how he was acting now.
