Watch Me Fall

by Cherrie Lynn

  “Don’t say anything else. Take a few days and think about it. I won’t accept ‘no’ today. I just won’t.”

  “And Candace is okay with this?”

  “Candace was more upset that you feel like you have to quit than anything else.”

  To her supreme embarrassment, Starla felt tears fill her eyes. Again. Hadn’t she depleted her supply by now? “I love her so much. I hope she knows that.”

  “She knows. She loves you too. We both do.”

  “I want you to know I am so sorry that…about what happened. It’s my fault and—”

  “Stop. The only one at fault is the fucker who did this to me.”

  “But if not for me—”

  “If not for you, it would have been someone else eventually. He’s off the streets now, and he won’t hurt anybody. I’m just glad he didn’t hurt you too. If I had to take this so you didn’t, that’s fine with me.”

  Now she was a blubbering mess again, hiding her face behind a swath of her hair so he wouldn’t have to see her trying to get a grip on the fat, ugly tears falling freely from her eyes. He was a husband, a father, and still willing to lay down his life for her. How did she get so lucky, to have such wonderful friends? No…family. These people were her family. Her own had never been there for her, never understood her, judged her, tried to change her. These people accepted her for who she was, fuckups and all, and loved her anyway, crazy-ass mess that she was. She didn’t deserve it, but she would damn sure start appreciating it more.

  “Yes,” she said, lifting her teary gaze back to his. “I accept your offer. I will work my ass off for you. I will do everything I can to make sure that you don’t regret this. I’ll start proving it to you right now, today.”

  “You don’t have to prove anything to me,” he said gently. “And I’m done lecturing you. I’m sorry for all that shit I said. It wasn’t right.”

  “No, I pretty much needed to hear all of it, even if I didn’t want to listen.”

  “So…I didn’t want to ask, but Candace told me you were here with Jared Stanton when everything first went down, and he helped Ghost track down Max. How is that going?”

  Starla swiped both index fingers under her eyes, hoping to repair any wayward eyeliner. “Oh, horribly, as usual. I blew it. He helped me through this whole thing. He’s been there since the night Max kicked me out of the car—he’s the one who took me home. I didn’t want to tell anyone about it in case it turned into another disaster, and look at me now. The first really good, decent guy I actually had a chance to have a solid future with, and I got pissed and let my mouth get away from me and treated him like shit. So, this job? Change of scenery, like you said—new town and everything—yeah, it’s good for me.”

  “Girl, I’ve seen you chase after some sorry motherfuckers since I’ve known you. They could treat you like shit, ignore you for weeks, cheat, whatever the hell else…and you still wouldn’t write them off. I know thirty seconds ago I said I was done lecturing you, but I have to ask. What in the fuck could be so wrong with this guy that you wouldn’t go after him if he’s as good as you say?”

  Starla’s chin trembled as sick shame churned in her stomach. Everything he’d said was true. How could she? How could she give all those other idiots the time of day and not afford the same consideration to the man who’d done so much for her? How could she let him go without a fight? “I think I love him.”

  There it was. So simple. So easy. It just came out.

  “And that scares the hell out of you,” Brian finished for her. In the past, she might have expected him to scoff, toss a “whatever” at her, not take her seriously at all. Whether it was the circumstances or something he heard in her voice or saw in her face, he didn’t do any of that. He only nodded, his mouth set in a grim line. “Been there. You know I have. I think you also know what my advice would be.”

  Starla’s gaze drifted to the hospital door through which Candace had exited earlier. “I’m pretty sure I do.”

  Chapter Twenty-six

  “Daddy, is Starla coming to our game?”

  “No.”

  “Why not? She didn’t come to the last one either.”

  Dammit. When would they give it up?

  Sighing, Jared hit the blinker to turn into the softball field parking lot. He didn’t know what to tell his two eager little girls. Crush their spirits with the fact that Starla probably wouldn’t ever come to one of their games again? Or keep giving them false hope and wait for them to eventually forget about it?

  No such luck with these two.

  “Do you not like her anymore?” Mia asked, meeting his gaze directly in the rearview mirror. Looking so much like her mom when she was sad, with her big brown doe eyes peering at him from underneath her headband. He wanted to give her everything she wanted in life, but he couldn’t give her this.

  “I do like her.”

  “Did you have a fight?”

  “Something like that.”

  “Tell her you’re sorry,” Ashley said.

  “Send her flowers,” was Mia’s advice.

  Ah, the innocence of youth. If only things could be that easy.

  He thought about her often enough. Shit, that was putting it lightly. Whenever he looked at his couch, he saw Starla sitting there. Felt her phantom at his side every time he slid into bed. He should never have allowed her in there with him, should have kept her at arm’s length, kept the pace between them slow. He should have been stronger. For her, if not for himself.

  “Dad, just tell her you love her.”

  Jared could almost laugh at Mia’s exasperation, but her words cut him to the bone. He considered and rejected about a dozen responses, finally settling on sullen silence. By the time they parked, the girls had moved on to a different topic.

  Shelly told him they needed him on the field again tonight, which was the last place he should be given how scrambled his thoughts were. He tried to keep his head in the game, but his gaze kept straying to the bleachers where Starla had sat. Her voice had no doubt carried across all three fields when she’d yelled at that umpire. Hell, they needed her out here.

  They lost the game, their first loss this season. All the girls on the team had pretty much played like he felt. Shelly handed out consolatory high fives in the dugout, but after receiving theirs, Ash and Mia plopped down on the bench and pouted.

  “Can’t win ’em all, kiddo,” he said, lightly prodding Mia’s Nike with his much larger boot. In seasons past, she’d always taken the losses harder than her sister, and it appeared nothing had changed.

  Ashley looked up at Shelly, her eyes alight with a sudden idea. “Can you and Dad take us for pizza?”

  Shelly shifted uncomfortably. Jared, who had begun packing the girls’ gear away, paused and glanced at her. They had made plans to swap the girls after the game, so he would leave it up to her, though it was the last damn thing on this earth he wanted to sit through. They tried to do things like this occasionally, but tonight was not the night. “Baby, I have a lot of stuff to do at the house,” Shelly told her. “You both still have homework. Some other time, okay?”

  Mia chimed in. “Please?”

  “Mimi, listen to your mom.” He hitched their bags over his shoulder. “Let’s go.”

  Within a minute, the girls had run ahead to join a group of their friends on the way toward the parking lot. Feeling awkward as hell, Jared fell into step beside his ex-wife, both of them strolling a few paces behind the group of giggling girls.

  “Sorry,” Shelly muttered. “Just not in the mood.”

  “Me either.”

  “How are things?”

  He shrugged. “Fine. You?”

  “Fine. I figured you might have plans with the girlfriend.”

  “She’s not my girlfriend.”

  “Trouble already?” Suddenly, she waved a hand in front of her face as if to slap that thought aside. “None of my business. Never mind.”

  “Sure it is. I just don’t think she and I a
re right for each other.” Though it damn sure felt like it at the time.

  “I heard they caught that guy.”

  “Yeah.” That was one good thing that had come out of the last couple of weeks. Max had confessed. The police had confronted him with the most incriminating evidence of all, a drop of his blood at the scene of Brian’s attack. His pitiful, black-eyed mug shot had been all over the local news, turning Jared’s stomach daily. He almost regretted not adding to the damage on the guy’s face, but at least Brian had gotten his shot in. That was all that mattered. And Brian was going to be fine. Last Jared had heard, he was out of the hospital.

  “So…what, you’re done with us damsels in distress? Too much work for you?” Shelly teased. They were both getting a few curious glances from passersby, fuel for the gossipmongering.

  He had to chuckle. “That’s not it.”

  “She was cute. Not what I expected for you, of course, but cute. The girls still talk about her.”

  She was beautiful. He missed her throaty chuckle. He missed watching his fingers stroke her colorful skin. He missed her dirty mouth and her peachy scent; he missed teasing her clit piercing until she came apart against his mouth…

  “Jared, you’ve been like a ghost lately. Mimi has even said you’re acting weird. Not to sound presumptuous, but look, if you’re worried what I think given some of the stuff I said, it’s okay. All right? I’m good.”

  He turned that over in his mind and decided that Shelly’s opinion had held more weight than he would’ve liked it to. She was the mother of his children, after all, and she deserved that respect. Still, she didn’t know all the lurid details.

  “I appreciate it.”

  “And I’m sorry. I came into our marriage knowing I was living in someone else’s shadow, and even though you were never anything but good to me, I let that consume me. It was a hard place to be in, though, you have to understand.”

  He stopped to look at her. “You were my wife. I gave you everything I could.”

  “Which was everything but your heart. No, don’t deny it,” she added quickly when he opened his mouth. “We’ll just have to agree to disagree if you do. Let me say this. I think you carry a lot of guilt when you shouldn’t. At least some of it belongs to me. I didn’t let you…I don’t know, I didn’t let you try.”

  He cast a glance around. The girls were waiting for them beside their mom’s car, both of them occupied for the moment by a teammate. “What do you mean?”

  She took a shuddery breath, and he worried she might start to cry here in front of a good portion of the town. Her pretty dark eyes glistened, but any tears that might be coming forth stayed put. “I know you wanted things to work for us. You worked hard for things to work. I didn’t help. I freaked out. I felt like a failure. I’m only saying… I don’t know what I’m saying. Just that you deserve to be happy. You deserve someone who’ll help you work toward being happy, and not throw it in your face if you’re not.”

  “You deserve to be happy too, Shell. You deserve it with someone who doesn’t have to try, or work for it. I want that for you.”

  “Yeah.” A breeze blew a strand of hair across her face. Not long ago, he would have swiped it away for her. She tucked it behind her ear instead. “I do too.”

  He found himself driving by Dermamania even though it wasn’t on his way home. It looked busy and Ghost’s car was there, but Starla’s wasn’t. Even if it had been, what would he have done? Nothing. She probably wouldn’t even want to talk to him. But if she was there, at work with her friends, he would know she was okay. That she wasn’t working when the place looked wrapped up with clients disturbed him.

  Still, he drove home, where the only company he had was his animals outside. He ran his horses for a while, but all too soon the sun went down, and he was forced to face the empty house alone. Eating alone. Netflix alone. Empty bed. This house had never been so empty, not even after Shelly left. Starla’s presence was just so bright and vibrant. It felt as if a light had gone out.

  He flung his remote control aside and tossed over onto his back, cramming the heels of both hands into his eyes. Dammit.

  He couldn’t go through this again.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  “I love it, girl. Love it.”

  Grinning, Starla popped off the top of a beer. “Sorry I don’t have any furniture but my bed.”

  Janelle chuckled, taking a sip from her own bottle. “Hey, what else do you need?”

  The apartment was small and the walls were bare, but it was hers. A space all her own. Her own kitchen. Her own wonderfully functional oven. Her own living room. No deadbeat brothers loitering on her (at the moment nonexistent) couch, or generally stinking up the place. So she’d be living solely in the bedroom for a little while until she could furnish the rest of it, but that shouldn’t take much longer. The rent wasn’t going to break her, especially with the higher commission Brian had given her. She’d been working in the newly opened shop for two weeks now, and every night she wanted to weep from sheer happiness. They were starting small with two other artists for now, but they were already busy, and a few of her South clients actually lived here in her new town, so they’d been happy not to have to make the thirty-mile trip over to Dermamania to see her.

  It was Sunday night, and Janelle had driven over to see the new apartment and have a beer, though Starla hadn’t been able to resist whipping up a batch of cookies for her first official guest. They were standing at the bar that separated the living room from the kitchen, devouring the entire plate.

  “You look happier than I’ve ever seen you,” Janelle observed.

  Starla sighed, breaking a warm cookie in half and watching the chocolate string decadently between the two pieces. “Stands to reason that when one area of life falls into place, another one falls spectacularly to pieces, doesn’t it?”

  “Jared?”

  She didn’t really want to think about it, so she popped the cookie into her mouth. She didn’t want to cast a shadow on how fortunate she’d been with this new gig. But she’d had to pause while mixing the batter earlier so that a teardrop didn’t fall into it. Fuck. Would she never be able to make cookies again without thinking of two little girls and their gorgeous dad? “Oh, just the latest in my never-ending stream of fuckups. I’m used to them by now.”

  “I think this one has hit you harder than most. You fled town, babe.”

  “I would have done that anyway. This move has been awesome for me. I love it here. I would’ve been stupid not to take this chance, right? Just once, though…” She trailed off, startled by the warmth gathering behind her eyes, remembering Brian’s words. “I’ve seen you chase after some sorry motherfuckers since I’ve known you.” She held her next words captive until she was quite sure they wouldn’t erupt with blubbering sobs. “Just once I want someone to chase after me. And not in the psychotic-stalker sense of the word.”

  Janelle clinked her bottle with Starla’s and took a swig. “I hear that.”

  “So I’ll take my time and be alone for a while. It’ll be good for me, I think. I find I kind of enjoy it.” The words rang hollow even to her.

  “After Julie and Doug, I’m sure you do.”

  “I do miss Jared, though.” So much. Sometimes it was hard to breathe. She didn’t understand. She’d cared much less about men she’d spent much, much more time with—and spent much more time chasing. None of them had ever made her feel this empty when they weren’t with her. Hell, she had to face it: she’d mostly been after a piece of ass back then. Not that she didn’t miss fucking Jared; she’d already burned the motor out of one vibrator thinking about that last night she had with him.

  But those orgasms were empty, pathetic shadows, and somehow she knew letting any other man help her out with her nocturnal cravings would produce the same result.

  Two nights ago, she’d had a shot at proving it to herself. A smooth-talking, well-muscled, smoky-eyed client of hers had made advances when they ran into each other
at a liquor store. She’d been wearing her shortest shorts and carrying wine and a six-pack of the bottles she and Jan were drinking from right now. He’d asked if she needed any help putting those away. Promise had practically oozed from the words, but the “No, I got it” had sprung from her lips before she even considered. The temptation hadn’t been there, not for a second. A few months ago, that dude might have become her latest mistake.

  “Well, I’m proud of you,” Jan said. “Everyone is. We miss you, but we’re proud. Especially Brian. You’ve taken a load off his shoulders, you know.”

  Starla smiled, her heart warming. She, along with countless others, had told Brian to keep his ass at home and heal with his loving wife and baby and, for once, he was listening to them. But she knew he couldn’t wait to get back to work. Candace had spent some time at the new shop with her going over the accounting software. Sometimes she brought Lyric, whom Starla had taken to calling Lyr-Jet. She’d even become rather adept at diaper changes herself. More amazingly, Lyric seemed to like her. He would flash his daddy’s dimples at her and sometimes fall asleep in her arms after his bottle, his tufts of black hair spiked in a tiny Mohawk.

  “Ovaries quivering yet?” Candace had asked her.

  Starla had cocked an eyebrow at her. “Dude, I have ovaries of motherfucking steel.”

  But she did love cuddling that baby. He was so sweet and smelled so good. Thinking of how close he’d come to losing his daddy never failed to take her breath away. The entire Dermamania crew confessed to still having nightmares about that night, but they were slowly getting better, all of them thankful they still had their friend here. That Candace still had her husband, and Lyric his father.

  All was definitely as it should be. If Jared had only been a stepping stone to reach this pleasant height in her life, she supposed she would have to accept that. Enjoy the view she had, and not the one she wished she had, with him at her side.

  Things could always be worse.