De La Porte Fashion: The Complete Box Set

by Mj Fields

  “My last name is Raynes so, no, it wouldn’t have. Also, hell no, we aren’t doing this. When I step out of this vehicle, it’s a handshake and a never again.”

  “What happened to being a woman of your word?”

  “How can you even think this could ever be something!”

  “How can you think it already isn’t?”

  “You’re showing your age. Apparently, the logical side of your brain doesn’t develop until you grow hair on your balls.”

  “That was funny, and I could point out that neither of us actually have hair, and possibly that only one of us is acting with any logic at all right now.”

  I have no desire to argue anymore. This is impossible. So, I keep my head buried and try not to inhale the fucking scent of him...and fail miserably.

  When he slows down and turns on his signal light, I look up to see we are pulling onto the beach access road.

  “This is not the cottage.”

  “You really want to go back there right now looking like that?”

  “Why the hell not? It’s not like I’m not going to be this year’s whispered about ‘Winner of the Hamptons Weekend Biggest Whore’ award in the office on Tuesday morning.” I turn and point at him. “Because of you.”

  He throws the vehicle in park and turns toward me.

  “Cut the shit.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Cut. The. Shit. You wanna continue to throw accusations and be disrespectful to us, keep playing a victim, then woman up and over-discuss all your emotions, or come up with an amicable decision on how to proceed with this.”

  “I don’t think you understand that there is no us. There is no proceeding.”

  He rolls his eyes and sighs exaggeratedly like he’s dealing with a child.

  “How did you expect I would react to this?” I snap.

  “When I found out, I googled you.”

  Oh my God, I think as mortification now leads the race of emotions fighting to rule my head too, I swear, take me out once and for all.

  “Saw all the shit, like the Baby Ruth pictures, and I will admit that it fucked me up that the woman I plan on fucking for the foreseeable future was—”

  “Gross.” I bury my head deeper.

  “—married to a major league baseball player, but I manned the fuck up. I didn’t say fuck this. I didn’t let my emotional cargo-fucking-ship-sized baggage or others influence what I want with you. Even after I was told by my old man today that I’m a half-ass lacrosse player at college level, not professional like your ex, I still wanted you. I still want us.”

  “He’s such a dick.” I rub under my nose with the shirt sleeve.

  “Corner a snake and they strike, Autumn. It’s something I have to deal with, but it will never come back to you, to us.”

  The softness in his eyes and, if I wasn’t so beside myself, the gentleness in his way of...dealing with me, this...would ease all the worries away, but not with baby EJ...not even now that he’s Prince Eric.

  “We can be friends.”

  “Friends?”

  “Eric, I can’t do this.”

  He nods once. “Autumn of Queens, I’m not sure you can deny what’s destined.”

  I look out the window, emotionally and physically exhausted.

  He exhales a deep breath. “Let me tell you about the stars.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Eric

  Waking up alone on the beach, I nearly panicked when she wasn’t there. She had been a mess, and I get it; it was fucked up. But until I woke up alone, I thought she was just being overly emotional.

  Then I went there, too.

  I was pissed off enough that I got my Rover stuck and had to call a buddy to help me pull it out. The reason I got stuck? I didn’t let any air out of my fucking tires before driving onto the sand, because I was too damn worried about getting her somewhere calming.

  But she didn’t calm down. She exhausted herself to the point that she passed out.

  I track her ass on Snap maps and see that she is already heading back to the city, so I head home to change, pack a bag, shower, and go after her.

  When I walk into the pool house, Shelby is sputtering, cursing, and pacing back and forth.

  “Shells, language,” I say loud enough that it will be heard over her own voice.

  “You left.” She points at me.

  “Yeah, but I’m back now.” Thank fuck I came back. I would have been pissed at myself had I not kept my promise to her.

  “I wanna go back to Moms. I hate that woman. Hate her.”

  I don’t even have to ask who, knowing it’s Suzy.

  “Okay, but you know you can’t. You know we have a few things to get squared away before you can go back; electricity and food being two of those things.”

  “Shelby, you and I need to talk.”

  I look toward the open doorway as Father walks in with her bag. Then I look at her and see her face is turning bright red and she stiffens. I know immediately that there is shit in the bag that shouldn’t be.

  Her stiff back is toward him when she whispers, “This is your fault.”

  I look up at him. “That’s mine.”

  “This purple backpack is yours?” He gives me an exasperated look.

  I nod. “It is.” I look at Shelby. “I’ll catch up with you later.”

  “Now you wait just a minute,” he says to me, not her.

  I don’t reply to him. “Go pack your shit in your room. You can hang out there.”

  “Eric, you are overstepping, son.”

  Shelby’s eyes fill with tears as she looks at me.

  I ignore him and tell her, “Go. We have plans for the day.”

  “You’re leaving.”

  “No, Shells, not until we get things square. I’m a man of my word.”

  And a fucking adult.

  As soon as she leaves, I turn on him, take one step, and point a finger in his face. “You need to get this house straight for her, for the others.”

  He points back at me. “My house is straight. Her mother—”

  “No, fuck that. She’s your daughter. She’s—”

  “Stealing from Suzy’s jewelry chest.”

  “Well, maybe if Suzy had less jewelry, Shelby would have electricity and fucking food. And that, old man, is on you.”

  “That, son, is on her mother. That bitch has had ample time to get her shit straight. We’ve been divorced for ten fucking years and—”

  “Her mother had a child by you. Got pregnant when my mother was still alive. That child is screaming for help that you aren’t giving her. She didn’t ask for this shit, and she sure as fuck didn’t ask to live in squalor while you live high off the hog. You’re failing her, just like you have me.”

  “Listen, you self-righteous little shit, when you have kids someday—”

  “Apparently, I have one. Now get the fuck out of here, put that bitch on a leash, and leave Shelby the fuck alone. I’ll handle it. And don’t you think while I’m cleaning up the mess you’ve made for her that I have forgotten that you and I have some shit to settle. I want full access to anything my goddamn name is attached to so I can’t straighten out my house.”

  “Your shit will be straight as soon as this board meeting happens tomorrow morning and I get my fucking bonus and, God willing, the position I deserve.” He clutches his chest. “You need to relax. I’ve had your ass covered for twenty-one years. You damn sure owe me a week.”

  When he storms out, I grab my phone from my pocket and hit Autumn up on Snap for the twentieth time in the three hours and twenty-seven minutes I’ve been awake.

  StixandStars1: I know I said I was coming for you, but instead, I’m dealing with an asshole and a rebellious teen. Not something a boy would do, Autumn. You feel me?

  I watch the screen change to read and give her a second.

  StixandStars1: Dammit, Autumn, I need to know you’re okay.

  I watch the screen. Her bitmoji pops up, then the three blinking
dots in the cloud say she’s typing, and then...she disappears.

  StixandStars1: I know you have a meeting tomorrow.

  Again, I watch the screen. It says she’s typing then...nothing.

  I toss the phone on my bed and head into the bathroom.

  I’m exhausted and sick to my fucking stomach after dropping off a cooler full of food to the shit show that Kimmi has Shelby living in, and even more pissed at my father for allowing it.

  Shelby doesn’t want to go back to Father’s. I told her she would be doing me a favor if she did.

  For whatever reason, it works.

  We have dinner and a nice, long chat about not taking shit that doesn’t belong to you. I tell her that I understand the reasoning behind it, but now she has options. She has me.

  Thank God that I have a credit card that Father doesn’t know about, or I wouldn’t be able to do shit for her.

  We discuss her staying with Father until her mom, my step-monster number one, Kimmi, gets her shit together.

  She is adamantly against it.

  “Not your job to take care of her, Shells.”

  “I’m not,” she lies. Not sure if it’s to me or if she truly believes it, making that lie to herself.

  “Can’t live like that, Shells,” I tell her.

  The place wasn’t actually that bad in the grand scheme of things. The fact that it was a third-floor walkup worried me for Shelby, who seems to be running amuck without proper supervision. Hell, she doesn’t even have someone there who gives a fuck, to ask her about her day, to make sure she is fed. She has the opposite, and not even lights or AC. Aside from that, the furnishings are sparse, but at least she has a bed.

  The location is what had me tripping. One foot over the invisible line between lower-middle-class to the hood.

  It needs to be rectified. And it needs to be done quickly.

  “Can’t live with him either.”

  This is the part where you should tell a kid that her father loves her; he just doesn’t know how to show it. And I do so...while bile rises in my throat.

  “Until the lights are back on, you stay in the pool house.”

  She glares at me and crosses her arms. “She needs me.”

  “She has food, and she’s the fucking adult, Shells. There isn’t anything I can do about the lights on a holiday weekend, so you stay in the pool house until I figure it out.”

  She is as apprehensive as I am about her staying here without me, but she really doesn’t have a choice, and I promised I would be back for the weekend.

  She has cab money to get back and forth to school if she can’t make nice with Father for a ride, and if she does, she can use that money for necessities only, or save it for food when she goes back, which I hope she won’t. Not until I figure this shit out.

  When we get home, I make a big show about moving her belongings, which are few and far between. I suspect she’s been selling her stuff from here, too.

  Getting her settled in, she looks exhausted.

  “You know none of this is normal, Shells.”

  “Not everyone has a father who collects wives and kids then throws them away? Not everyone has a mother who is addicted to attention from the opposite sex and pills? You don’t say.”

  My fucking heart aches for her, but it’s not something that’s going to go away. So, I give her a dose of the truth through the eyes of someone who’s been right there, too, yet knows it can be better.

  Autumn.

  “Well, statistically speaking, it’s not as rare as you would think. But, lucky for us, we have front row seats to what the future can be, and you have me to prove to you it doesn’t have to be that way.”

  “Yeah, a brother who’s in college and lives a million miles away.” She flops down on the overstuffed leather couch.

  I should say fuck it, move back here, kick his ass out, and take care of the house that he lorded over on heartbreak, doing what I can to mend it...for them...for me.

  “Don’t,” she says, pulling me from my thoughts.

  “Don’t what?”

  “Look like you’re ready to put on a mask and save the day like Batman or something.”

  “I’m more a Peter Parker kind of guy.”

  She laughs. “Yeah right. With Dad, you act like the Hulk.”

  “That’s because some people need Hulking.”

  She looks at me like maybe she can trust me, and then she pulls the throw blanket off the back of the couch and covers herself while she yawns.

  “Shelby, the bed is yours.”

  “Not when you’re here.”

  “If you think I’m sleeping in a purple bed, you’re crazy.”

  “You think I wanna sleep in that color bed with stupid unicorn sheets?”

  “I think you loved purple most of your life and probably asked for that.”

  “I’m not a baby anymore.”

  “You’re still my little sister and—”

  “I was never your little sister. I was an annoyance.”

  “If I made you feel that way, I apologize. I was just trying to find where I belonged. I know where that is now. And Shells, you belong here, too, and that’s not going to change.”

  She shakes her head, fighting a smile as she looks down.

  “Now go get in that bed so I can catch a few hours’ sleep before I head out.”

  Catching sleep is like catching a Leprechaun.

  Impossible.

  Doesn’t happen.

  What does happen is I send another dozen snaps to Autumn.

  I lose my shit, telling her things about Shelby because it feels good to get it off my fucking chest.

  I hope she gets how fucking honest I am about my feelings for my father and feels less...emotional about it.

  But then I see her little bitmoji pop up. Sometimes, I see the dots, like she’s replying. Then she pops back down like a groundhog going back in its hole.

  By Tuesday night, I am crawling out of my fucking skin, feeling angry that she hasn’t replied and a little fucking embarrassed by the fact that I’m acting like a level ten stalker, but fuck it.

  She gave me her word.

  I know that in today’s day and age that means shit, but it did when she agreed. It wasn’t just words; it was a feeling, a feeling I saw in her eyes, felt to my core.

  I’ve been at the gym for two hours now, trying to exhaust myself to no avail, when I get a tap on my shoulder.

  I pull my earbud from my ear. “What’s up, Shooter?”

  “We have that photo shoot for the fundraiser calendar in half an hour.”

  “The what?”

  “Annual man meat shoot for whatever charity that Coach came up with. I’m hoping it’s a Save the Titties campaign.” He winks.

  “Not interested.” I start to put my earbud back in.

  “You weren’t last year, either. And just like last year, it’s not an option, Cartwright. Coach wants to sell more than the other men’s sports teams, and we do what Coach asks, or we sit. Let’s jet.”

  “I need to finish my training.”

  He throws his head back and laughs. “You still won’t beat me for the cover pic.”

  Once back at my condo and after my shower, I look at my phone for the hundredth time when it rings in my hand.

  I hit accept. “Hey, Shelby, everything good?”

  “Uh, Fendi, Gucci, Thrasher? Seriously, you were all about generic brand foods and paper products when we went grocery shopping and then this?”

  “What?”

  “I’m not huge into accessories, but I love the Gucci bag and Fendi wallet. And shoes? Damn, EJ, you went all out. The jeans and vintage tees, though? Where did you find them?”

  “Shelby—”

  “Some of this stuff is not really my style, so I need to know how much you spent so I can get your money back and see if I can make a few bucks myself.”

  “Shelby, don’t sell any of those items or I will ground you.”

  “Newsflash, you’re not my da
d. And please, how do you ground a girl whose feet never stay in the same place for more than a few minutes?”

  “I’m a resourceful individual. Don’t push or you’ll find out.”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah, but seriously, thank you.”

  “I’ll pass the thank you to the rightful recipient of it.”

  She laughs. “I didn’t think you’d find all this cool stuff, not in that short of time anyway.”

  “Yeah, well, send me a pic of you and the box—”

  “Boxes,” she corrects.

  “—so I can pass it on with a thank you.”

  “She must really like you.” I hear the smile in her voice.

  “She does. She just doesn’t know how much yet.”

  “Don’t play her like all the others. This was seriously the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me—I mean, you. This and the food for my mom.”

  “Lights should be on in a couple days, too. But I’m coming back Thursday night, late, so I’d like to hang out with you for a while.”

  “I do have friends and a life, you know.”

  “And a brother. Don’t forget that.”

  “Fine, I’ll do my best.”

  “Good.”

  As soon as I get the picture, I download it and snap it to Autumn.

  StixandStars1: Do you know anything about this?

  She reads it immediately, begins typing, then groundhog Autumn pops back underground.

  StixandStars1: Fine. Whatever, Autumn. Just trying to find out who to thank and scold at the same time. It was seriously too much. And newsflash, I didn’t tell anyone else. Shouldn’t have told you. So fuck you very much.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Eric

  Leg day. The very thought of it usually makes me nauseous because I know I’m going to be hobbling around with legs that feel like Jell-O after it’s been run over by a Mac truck by the end of this. Oddly, I welcome the pain. It keeps me busy and away from that fucking phone. Plus, it’s a necessary evil. Gotta keep them strong so I can keep being a halfass lacrosse player. And even though I may be a half-ass lacrosse player, I should win Olympic gold in restraint for not sending a snap today.