And let me tell you, I don’t feel any better when Josie comes running out of the house and throws her arms around me like a long lost child.
“Where have you been?” she demands before I can so much as say hi. “Where have you been?”
“We were worried about you,” Beau says dryly, coming up to stand behind her.
“I’m sorry,” I say, hugging Josie back, though without near as much ferocity. “I didn’t mean to worry you. I should’ve texted. But I got a late start coming back from Tennessee and I was more worried about getting here.”
I expect a “that’s okay,” but Josie pulls back from me, her eyes full of tears. “You’ve never been late before! Never! You should have called us. Let us know you were okay!”
“I’m so sorry,” I say again, feeling really bad now. “Josie, believe me, I didn’t mean to worry you.”
“You didn’t worry me,” she practically shouts. “You scared me!”
“I’m sorry I scared you,” I say, shaking my head.
“You scared me shitless!!”
This makes Beau’s head swivel from me to Josie’s direction. She rarely curses, and even if he can’t see the tears in her eyes or the way she’s clutching at my arms, like a worried mother reunited with her lost child, her cussing is enough to tell him something isn’t right.
“Josie,” he says. “She apologized. Why are you still so upset?”
Josie swipes at her tears. “You don’t understand. Anything could have happened to her.”
But maybe Beau does understand, because his forehead furrows. “Anything could’ve happened to her like what?”
Josie doesn’t answer.
And Beau says, “Josie, tell me what’s going on.”
Josie looks at me, and though I’m nobody to be advising anybody else on telling the truth, I say to her, “I think you better tell him. Or else you’re going to scare him like I scared you.”
Josie shakes her head. “Beau, it’s nothing. It’s just we’ve been having some problems with Mike Lancer.”
Beau tilts his head to the side. “Mike Lancer? Mike Lancer who used to play high school football with me? That Mike Lancer?”
“Yeah, your old best friend,” Josie mumbles.
Beau flinches like she’s just accused him of kicking a puppy. “When I was young and dumb maybe, but I haven’t talked to that guy in years.”
Josie makes a real deep study of the ground as she says, “Well, I have. Kind of… his wife came to the shelter. And we helped her. And now he’s mad… and he’s been doing some pretty awful things—nothing we can prove, but—”
“Did he threaten you?” Beau’s gone completely still, and though his voice is calm, I can see he’s barely keeping it together.
“No, he’s never come after me directly,” Josie answers quickly, her voice as reassuring as can be. “It’s more like sending city inspectors over and trying to mess with our license. Real pesky stuff like that.”
But Beau’s not buying her lightweight explanation of what’s been going on with Mike for a second. “If it’s so ‘pesky,’ why didn’t you tell me about any of it, like you did Kyra?”
“Well, I kind of had to tell Kyra…” Josie says, looking away from him. “She had a run-in with Mike at the grocery store, and he threatened her...”
“He’s threatening our help!?” Beau thunders.
Being called the help while I’m standing right there, and by Beau of all people, makes me wince. Though he’s right. That’s what I am to him. All I’ll ever be to him.
“You should have told me!” he says to Josie.
“Beau…” Josie starts, and she’s rubbing her temple above her glasses like the world’s biggest headache just came over her.
“Why didn’t you let me protect you?” he asks her.
“It’s not about protecting me, Beau!” Josie answers, her voice shrill with barely contained emotion.
Her answer goes off like a bomb between them. And for a few moments, all I can hear are lawn mowers in the distance and the birds in the trees.
Then Beau says, “Oh, I get it. It’s about protecting me. You were trying to protect your poor, blind fiancé.”
“No, it wasn’t like that,” Josie insists.
Over the next fifteen minutes, I come to plainly understand why Josie was so reluctant to tell Beau about the Mike Lancer situation. He does not take any of it well, and the more Josie tries to explain, the more pissed off he gets.
I watch them argue, telling myself to stay out of it. But I can’t help myself. I jump in, even though this whole matter ranks pretty damn high on the list of things that ain’t my business.
I put my hands on both of Beau’s thick arms, taking his attention away from laying into Josie.
“Listen, Beau, I’m not saying Josie was right about keeping this from you. But the fact is whatever she did, she did because she loves you. She loves you so much. So much…”
My heart aches with the unspoken part of the rest of that statement. And so do I. But instead, I press on. “That’s all that matters. The love. The rest of it is bad, yeah, but we can figure it out. Let’s just go into the house—”
Beau surprises the hell out of me when he actually leans in, sniffing the air around me.
“What are you doing?” I ask, trying to step away.
But he catches me by both arms and sniffs some more, before lifting both his eyebrows. “Something you want to tell us, Kyra, about why you’re late?”
“I told you I got a late start.”
“Did you get a late start because somebody kept you up late? Somebody with real good taste in cologne?”
I freeze.
And Beau smirks. “Josie, I think Kyra’s gone and gotten herself a boyfriend.”
“Colin Fairgood,” I hear Josie say behind me.
And my heart catches. How did she know?
I whip around to ask her, only to find she isn’t talking about me, but to me. A familiar black vintage truck is coming down the circular driveway, one I immediately recognize even before it comes to a stop right behind my car.
This time, my heart doesn’t just hiccup, it stops beating all together as I watch Colin Fairgood step out of his truck in paralyzed horror. When he sees me, standing there with Beau, whose hands are still curled around my upper arms, Colin freezes, too. At first he looks confused, like somebody who thinks he’s got the wrong address.
But then his whole face hardens, his eyes becoming two rocks of blue ice.
33
“What. The. Hell. Is. Going. On?” Colin asks us between clenched teeth.
Honestly, my first instinct is to run. I actually look toward my car and think of jumping into it. Peeling out of the driveway and speeding away, not stopping until I'm somewhere safe. And far, far away from here.
Except Colin's car is now blocking mine. And his blue gaze keeps me pinned to the spot, unable to move, unable to answer, even.
“What are you doing here, Colin?” Josie asks. Her worried eyes land on Beau and me, but for much different reasons than the ones that have Colin staring us down.
“I got your wedding invitation in the mail.” Colin answers but his eyes stay riveted on me. “Thought I'd stop by, try to bury the hatchet since I'm in the neighborhood seeing about my mama's house.”
Too late, I remember his mother doesn't just have the one house where she died up in Tennessee. She has two. The one in Brentwood. And the colonial up the street, where she lived for years before Colin moved her up to Tennessee.
Colin looks from me to Beau then back to me again. The same question Josie just asked him clear on his face but directed at me. He wants to know why I'm here. In Alabama. At the house of a man he hates and the woman he at one time claimed to be in love with.
I step away from Beau and turn to face Colin. Not because I'm brave, but because I can't see any other way out of this.
“I… um… I took a job working with Josie and Beau after we met in Birmingham. They're the generous
employers I told you about.”
Colin goes very, very still. And it doesn't seem like his mouth is hardly moving at all when he answers, “You mean the employers you didn't tell me anything about. Because you knew I wouldn't have taken any of your calls if I knew you were working for him.”
Josie, bless her heart, steps in then, getting between Colin and me.
“Colin… I know this looks bad. But you can't blame this on Kyra. She's a good person, a very sweet soul, and she didn't tell you she was working for us because…” she shoots an apologetic look at Beau, before confessing, “because I told her not to.”
“What?” both Colin and Beau say together.
And Josie holds up her hands. “Just let me explain,” she says, looking between both of them before deciding to direct her words at Colin. “I knew Kyra was right about you needing a friend after your mama's passing… but I also knew there wasn't any way you'd accept Kyra's friendship if you knew it was coming through me.”
“So you sicced her on me?” Colin nearly yells.
Before she can answer, Beau says. “Josie, what the hell is going on here!? Why is Fairgood in my driveway talking about you siccin' Kyra on him?”
“I was only trying to help him, Beau!” Josie insists. “He used to be my best friend and he was hurting and he didn't have anyone left to talk to. What kind of person would I be if I didn't try to help him? I know paying Kyra a little extra to check in on him wasn't exactly the most upstanding thing to do in the world. But that's what I do when I see people who need help. I try to help them.”
Colin's eyes narrow on Josie now. “Let me get this straight. You paid Kyra to be my friend? Like that was part of her job description? To do whatever she does for Beau and be my friend?”
I cringe, because that had been our deal exactly. After talking for a little bit outside Colin's hotel room, she'd called me up the next day to ask if I'd be interested in becoming Beau's live-in aide, since his old one was preparing to move on to another client now that Beau had met his rehabilitation goals. When Josie described my duties, I explained it was too little work for me to charge her my regular rate. She'd gone quiet for a second, then come back with a new deal: my regular rate to do a much easier job than I was used to, plus keeping in touch with Colin to provide the support Josie could no longer give him. And I'd taken it. Because at the time, I didn't think Colin would actually talk to me. I still remember thinking I'd need to figure out something else to justify my regular rate once it was clear Colin refused to talk to me.
But then he hadn't refused to talk to me. And things had gone on from there, getting out of hand, real quick. Now I was here in Beau and Josie's driveway, unable to even say something cliché like, “Let me explain,” because really, there was nothing to explain. Colin had nailed it.
But Josie, saint that she is, tries to take all the blame.
“Yes, that's what I did, and you have every right to be angry. But not at Kyra. It wasn't her idea, and I honestly don't think she would have kept calling if she didn't think she was helping you by providing an ear.”
Colin goes silent for a second, obviously digesting all that. Then he says, “So you paid her to be my friend. Did you also pay her to fuck me?”
Josie's eyes go wide, and now I have two people looking at me like they didn't know me at all.
“No,” I say, into the heavy silence that follows Colin's question. “That was more like a bonus.”
Colin shakes his head at me. “So you told Josie about our history. About all that stuff between you and Lancer, and then you decided to go along with her plan to dupe me?”
“No, it wasn't like that!” I start, grateful that for once he hadn't gotten the situation exactly right.
But then Josie says, “Lancer? Is he talking about Mike Lancer?”
I clamp my lips together. “Yes… um… I wasn't completely truthful before,” I admit to her. “I have a little bit of history with Mike Lancer. A summer fling that didn't mean anything. It was a long time ago. And that's actually how I first met Colin. I didn't think he'd remember me, but he did.”
“Why didn't you tell me?” Josie asks, her pretty brown eyes wide with shock.
“For a lot of reasons,” I answer. “Starting with it's super embarrassing I ever had anything to do with a guy who turned out to be an abusive psycho.”
Josie's face melts into a sympathetic expression. “Well, that I can understand.” She turns to explain to Colin, “You see we've been having a lot of problems with Mike, ever since I helped his wife escape their abusive marriage. He's been harassing us at the shelter, and he even threatened Kyra while she was at the grocery store. I can see why she'd be embarrassed to admit she was ever… involved with him.”
“Seriously, Jo-Jo? You understand why she bold-faced lied to you?” Colin asks, cutting her off. “Because from where I'm standing, Mike Lancer ain't the only psycho you're dealing with. She didn't tell you and Beau about her history with me or Mike. And she didn't tell me she was working for you two. I'm assuming she also didn't tell you two she was planning to quit this job and move in with me.”
“What?” Josie says. “You're quitting? Why?”
Colin answers before I can, “I'm guessing because this situation wasn't cushy enough for her anymore. She found another sucker to feed off of like a tick, so she was going to dump you.”
He cuts himself off with a curse. “Dammit, I knew I should have had you vetted. With any other girl, I would have.” He jams a finger into his temple. “But you got into my head. All that pretending to not want anything to do with me after our first time at the cabin-that was brilliant. I had no idea I was walking straight into your long con.”
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “That's not how it was. Not at all. I was thinking about quitting even before I got involved with you. And I know I would have before the baby came.”
Josie hands go to her stomach, as if covering the eyes of the life housed within it. “What does our baby have to do with this?” she asks me.
I shake my head. I don't answer. I can't answer. I've spent near my whole life acting like the answer to that question doesn't exist.
And in the ugly silence that follows her question, Beau says, “Josie, honey, you're a good person, so you don't have any experience with this kind of thing. But Colin and I know how bad these obsessed fans can get. So I need you to go inside and let us handle this.”
Now my eyes widen bigger than Josie's. “No, that's not it! I'd never do anything to hurt Josie, or you, or the baby! Please, you have to believe me.”
“Why should I believe anything you say?” Beau asks me. “From what I've heard, all you've done is lie to me. To all of us.”
“Yes, but…” Helpless tears spring to my eyes. “I had my reasons. I couldn't tell the truth.”
“Josie get inside, call the police, and start working on one of those restraining orders you do so well,” Beau says, like my explanation is certain proof he's called it right. Then he says to me, “You packin', sweetheart?”
“No!” Things are spiraling so fast. I can barely get one defense together before they're throwing another accusation at me.
“Tell me now,” Beau says, his face harder than I've ever seen it. “I won't let you hurt Josie.”
“I'm not packing a gun and I'm not what you think I am.”
Now Beau's expression goes tight with skepticism. “So you're saying you haven't watched every one of my pro games then?”
I stop, my heart freezing inside my chest. “Y-yes, actually I have but-”
“And if I went upstairs and opened up your laptop, you're telling me I wouldn't find a bunch of files on me and Colin?” he asks.
My bottom lip trembles with the effort to keep it together, but somehow I once again bring myself to tell him the truth.
“There's not one on Colin. Just on you.”
A beat of shocked silence. Then Beau says, “Well, Fairgood, I guess it's two to three now. Can't say I'm particularly happy to
have won this particular contest.”
It takes me a second to get his meaning, and then I remember the girlfriend Colin stole from Beau in high school. What he's trying to say is Colin got that girl, and Beau got two. One he wanted… and one who'd weaseled her way into his life. He couldn't have insulted me more if he wanted to.
“No,” I say. “I never set my sights on you, Beau. Josie offered me this job and I took it. But that's it.”
“So that's your story?” Beau asks, his voice flat with disbelief. “You were just some innocent, crazy stalker fan who just so happened to fall into a job helping out the object of your obsession.”
“No, that's not my story,” I answer, my face twisting up with defensive anger. “I'm not obsessed with you. I don't like even like football!”
Colin shakes his head. “So what then? You thought you were in love with Beau because he's good lookin', and you said you were in love with me because you finally figured out you didn't have a chance with him?”
“What? Ew, no! I'm not in love with Beau. Not like that. Ew!” I say it again, because the unnecessary image Colin puts in my head completely turns my stomach.
“Then what is it?” Josie demands. “I suggest you start talking now, because you owe all of us an explanation. I trusted you…”
I know she did, and I feel terrible that I've betrayed her trust. I don't want her thinking even for a moment that I ever had any designs on Beau. She's right. I have to tell them the truth. I owe them all the truth.
I address Josie, because she was the last one to speak, and if I'm being honest, the easiest one to look in the eye. The truth, as it turns out, isn't that complicated. It's just three words I've never said out loud.
“Beau's my brother.”
Silence.
And I continue on, “I'm his sister. His half-sister. My mother and his father had an affair when she was the live-in servant here, and my mother got pregnant. With me. That's why they fired her. But my father-Mr. Prescott-he set us up in an apartment, gave my mother a monthly allowance, and that allowed her not to work while she pursued her singing career. So I guess that was something.”
His Pretend Baby Page 52
