Caleb: Because I’m going to rip it off.
Then …
Caleb: I’m supposed to go into a meeting in five minutes and I’m hard thinking about tonight.
A thrill of lust shot through me.
See you tonight.
Caleb: I hope you don’t have any plans tomorrow.
Why?
Caleb: Because I’m not letting you out of my bed for the next 48 hours.
Desire consumed me, making my cheeks hot.
Then I guess I do have plans. Very sexy plans with a hot Scot.
Caleb: Good. See you soon.
However, when Caleb’s apartment door opened later that evening, I wasn’t greeted by the hot Scot I was most looking forward to greeting.
Jamie let me into the apartment, giving me an apologetic smile. “Caleb’s running late. I said I’d wait around tae let you into the apartment.”
His usual uniform of T-shirt and jeans had been replaced by a dark navy shirt and suit trousers. I gave myself permission to acknowledge that Jamie was sexy as hell.
“Hot date?” I asked, following him into the living room.
He shrugged. “Just some bird I met at the gym. Said I’d meet her for drinks.”
Bird? Charming.
It almost made me not want to thank him, but he ultimately deserved my gratitude. “I don’t know if I said this before, but thank you for your help last weekend.”
Jamie grabbed his watch off the coffee table, and as he put it on he studied me beneath his lashes. When the watch was on, he straightened, sliding his hands into his trouser pockets and cocking his head in contemplation. “You thanked me already. You know … I misjudged you, Ava. I’m sorry.”
Remembering our first meeting, I nodded and crossed my arms in an unconscious defensive maneuver. “Why did you get all judgy with me when we met?”
“Because you reminded me of Carissa. Caleb’s ex-fiancée was just like you. Or so I thought. Well put together. Designer clothes. Into her looks and material shit that doesn’t matter. Everyone could see it but Caleb. He thought she had hidden depths, but the woman was a bloody kiddie pool.”
There was no way to describe what I felt in that moment. “Stunned” didn’t quite cut it. Neither did “hurt.” Or “angry” or “bitter.” I was all those things as Jamie continued talking as if he hadn’t delivered the epic, discombobulating news that Caleb Scott had once been engaged to be married.
“Carrie messed Caleb up. She really did. And there is something about you that reminds me of her.”
“Gee. Thanks.”
He held his hands up in defense. “I dinnae mean—Look, you just have that same quality about your physical appearance. But that’s where the similarities end. I saw that for real on Saturday night. You really care about your friend. And I think you really care about Caleb too. I dinnae think Carrie ever cared about anyone but herself.”
Ex-fiancée.
Carissa.
Carrie.
WHAT?!
“Anyway, I best get going. Make yourself at home. Caleb shouldn’t be long.”
I was barely aware of him leaving, my mind in chaos over the information bomb that had just exploded about my supposedly commitment-phobic friend with benefits.
Not even ten seconds after Jamie departed, the door opened again. I marched across the living room into sight of the door as Caleb shut it behind him and threw his keys into a bowl at the end of the kitchen counter. His lips started to turn up at the corners at the sight of me.
Then he saw my expression.
Caleb drew to an abrupt halt. “What’s happened now?”
I glared at him even as I was desperate for some explanation that would mean that the only man who I’d trusted to be completely honest with me hadn’t goddamn lied to me this whole time! “Carissa.” The name was supposed to come out in an angry huff. But I just sounded sad and confused.
His eyes flattened, his features slackened, and he gave me that blank look I hated as he began to loosen his tie. “What about her?”
Indignation fired through me. “What about her? What about her?! How about the fact that she was your fiancée, Caleb? Mr. I’ve Never Been in a Serious Relationship with Anyone. You lied to me!”
Whipping the tie off, he kept his blank expression all of five seconds. Caleb started toward me, a flush of anger in his cheeks, his eyes intimidatingly cold. “I didn’t lie.”
“You told me you’d never been serious with anyone before,” I retorted as he strode right by me and into his bedroom.
I followed, ignoring the fact that he was shrugging out of his suit jacket. “Well?”
“I never said that,” he bit out. “I said I didn’t do serious relationships, not that I never had.”
Furious that he was trying to get out of this on a technicality, I yelled, “You implied otherwise!”
“Do you want tae keep your voice down,” he growled at me as he marched by me in just his shirtsleeves and trousers.
Where the hell was he going now?
The thought was answered instantly as he delved into the liquor cabinet in his kitchen and poured himself a whiskey. I wanted to throw it in his face! “You said you would never lie to me. And I stupidly trusted you.”
Caleb turned to face me. “I didn’t lie tae you, Ava.”
How could he be so calm? “Yeah? It was a lie by omission.”
“I’m not talking about this. You can either march that sweet arse back into the bedroom and take off your clothes or you can get out.”
I flinched like he’d slapped me. I was barely aware of the instant remorse in his eyes as I grabbed my purse and began to make my way to the door.
His strong hand circled my left bicep and jerked me around with enough force to bring me colliding against his chest. Once there, Caleb wrapped his arms around me, trapping me. “I’m sorry for saying that,” he apologized, his voice hoarse. “But I’m not a liar, Ava, and I won’t let you say I am.”
“We’re supposed to be friends,” I whispered, letting my feelings show in my gaze as I looked up into his. “You know everything about me. You know about my parents, about Nick and Gem. And now I realize I don’t know anything about you.”
“That’s not true.” He gave me a little shake, his gaze accusatory. “You know more than most.”
I immediately thought of Quinn. Confiding in me about his brother’s death couldn’t have been easy and I felt ashamed for momentarily forgetting that he had. Still, it didn’t erase my anger. “Then why didn’t you tell me about Carissa?”
Like I’d suddenly turned scorching hot in his arms, he pushed me away and turned around. I watched in confusion as he walked into the living room, running a hand through his hair in seeming frustration.
“I dinnae want tae talk about her.”
“Well, I do!”
He spun around and yelled, “Tough shit!”
I winced, frozen to the spot, because he was more than a little intimidating. I’d never seen him so furious and I began to dread knowing the truth about his ex-fiancée. It cut me deeply that she could elicit this kind of emotion from him. “Caleb … you’re still in love with her, aren’t you?”
Instantly, his features arranged themselves into a harsh mask of revulsion. “I hate the bitch.”
Shock parted my lips at the dark vitriol in his words. Now I really wanted to know. “Tell me what she did.”
“Why?” He strode toward me, his chest heaving with emotion. “Why are you doing this tae me?”
As I saw the desperation in him, my motivations changed in an instant. It was no longer about me and my feelings, but about him. For as long as we’d known each other, there had been this quiet anger simmering within him. I hadn’t acknowledged it before, always putting it down to whatever was happening in the moment. But it didn’t just surface in moments of frustration like our first meeting or my announcement that I was going on a date with someone else. It was always there. “Because whatever happened to you is slowly eating you up inside.”
He stopped, his body inches from mine, and stared at me with such pain I wanted to reach out and soothe him. What had she done to him?
“Ava …” My name sounded like it had been dragged out of him. It was a plea.
“You told me that Harper needed to talk about what happened to her. It’s time to take your own advice.”
Caleb exhaled a shuddering breath, and to my horror I watched his eyes fill with tears. “She killed my baby, Ava. She killed my baby.”
Just the sight of him, this big, strong man who made me feel so safe, in tears, in agony, so vulnerable, was enough to bring tears to my own eyes. And his words caused a sharp streak of pain through my chest. “Caleb.”
His whole body seemed to sag and he stumbled back toward the couch and dropped into it. Resting his arms on his knees, he bowed his head, breaking eye contact. “Carrie … We dated four years ago. We were together a year when she fell pregnant.” His voice was so hoarse, the words like sandpaper against rock. “I was happy. Thought she was. I proposed even though my family told me they had doubts about her. She was twelve weeks pregnant, and a day after saying yes tae marrying me, she went behind my back and had an abortion. I was dreaming of holding that wee person in my arms one day, of watching him or her grow up, being part of a big family like I had been. And she decided she didn’t want tae be a mum.”
He looked up at me now and the tears he’d been holding at bay spilled down his cheeks. “The worst part? She said she’d lost the baby when she was out shopping with a friend. She pretended tae be devastated for about two weeks, until her friend decided I had the right tae know the truth. When I confronted her, Carrie tried tae deny it at first … until she couldn’t keep the lie up any longer. I asked her why. Why did she do it behind my back? And she told me it was because she was afraid of what it would do tae her physically and emotionally. She said she still wanted tae have kids but later, when we were older, and even then she wanted tae get a surrogate and employ a nanny. Have you ever heard anything like it? That someone could be so vain, so selfish, so cowardly, she’d kill the life inside of her without talking tae me about her fears. She would take my child from me, knowing I’d already lost my wee brother, she would add tae my grief. And then think I’d still want her. How the hell did I not see it?”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered as I approached him. I kneeled at his feet and grabbed his hands in mine, needing to touch him. Suddenly I understood that the bitter grief I saw in the back of Caleb’s eyes sometimes wasn’t just about losing Quinn. It was about losing his child. “I’m so sorry.”
His pain was unbearable and in that moment I felt every stab of it myself. I felt like my heart was breaking. I wanted to hunt his ex down and destroy her for what she’d done to him.
“Wee yin,” he whispered, letting go of one of my hands to brush his thumb down my cheek. “Dinnae cry.”
I stiffened because I hadn’t realize I was, but at his words I felt the wetness on my cheeks.
And it hit me like a hammer to my chest.
I loved him.
His pain was my pain.
I was in love with him.
“How could she do that?” I wondered out loud. “How could she?”
Caleb didn’t answer. He stared at me, the tears having dried on his cheeks. He looked calmer. Finally he asked contemplatively, “Did you ever think about having kids? Before Nick and Gemma …”
This time the tears that spilled down my cheek were for me, because I’d let Nick and Gem take so much and now here I was, in love with a man who was afraid to love anyone. “I gave up on that dream a while ago.”
“Aye,” he whispered, holding on to my hands tightly. “Me too.”
Twenty-seven
There are many different kinds of love in this world. I knew that. Silly me, however, to think I could control my complex heart by telling it what kind of love it was allowed to feel.
You’re not allowed to love a man romantically, I told it.
I’ll do what I want, it eventually replied.
Reeling by how heartbroken I felt for Caleb and the obvious conclusion that I had fallen in love with him, I was the perfect companion for him that evening. Lost in the emotions I’d forced him to face, we sat together with the TV on but neither of us really watched the movie. We were handling our own feelings but with a reassuring presence beside us.
Moreover, he didn’t ask me to leave and I didn’t tell him I was going to. Instead we got into bed together and for the first time we just held each other until we fell asleep.
I thought it was beautiful.
The beginning of something.
Little did I know it was the biggest mistake I’d made with Caleb thus far.
When I woke up in his bed the next morning, I was alone. I quickly washed in the bathroom and put on the wrinkled clothes I’d worn yesterday. I wandered out into the apartment only to be greeted by a pajama-clad Jamie eating a bowl of cereal. He swallowed his food at the sight of me.
“Morning, Ava.”
“Good morning.” I searched the apartment but there was absolutely no sign of Caleb. “Where’s your brother?”
Jamie frowned and stared determinedly ahead at the television as he replied, “Oh, he asked me tae tell you that he got called into the office. Some emergency.”
There was something off about the way he said it, but I didn’t know him well enough to know if he was lying. Still, my heart began to pound and a queasy, uneasy feeling began to roil in my stomach. “Will he be gone all morning?”
“All day.”
“Oh.” What the hell was going on? “Right. I’ll get going. See you later.”
“Bye, Ava.”
There was something in his tone that made me look back at him. As if he was really saying good-bye. But he was still watching the TV like nothing out of the ordinary was happening, so I shoved away the thought, assuming I was paranoid.
As it turned out … I was not at all paranoid.
SATURDAY, JUNE 2, 4:43 P.M.
Ava: Hope everything is okay at work? Are you free tonight?
Caleb: In middle of crisis. Looks like I’ll be working well into the night to fix it.
Ava: Okay. I could swing by the office with food and coffee if you need it?
Caleb: No, we’re fine.
SUNDAY, JUNE 3, 2:23 P.M.
Ava: Crisis averted?
Caleb: Getting there.
Ava: Call me when you’re free.
TUESDAY, JUNE 5, 7:36 A.M.
Ava: Free for lunch?
Caleb: Not today.
FRIDAY, JUNE 8, 9:32 P.M.
Ava: I’m at the bar at Canterbury, hanging with Harper. Come meet us.
Caleb: Busy. Sorry.
Ava: We need to talk.
Caleb: I’ll call you tomorrow.
SUNDAY, JUNE 10, 10:01 A.M.
Ava: You didn’t call.
Caleb: Busy week. I’ll call you later.
I stared at my phone, my friend’s chatter with the real estate agent background noise to my growing anger and frustration. That was putting it mildly. The last week of Caleb avoiding me had filled me with such anxiety and outrage it was a wonder I was able to focus on work at all. He made me feel like a clingy girlfriend.
I just wanted him to be honest, even if that honesty was going to break my heart.
The studio apartment we were standing in was the one in Caleb’s building. It was on the second floor, had a view of the water from the windows in the kitchen/ living room/ bedroom, and the entire thing could probably fit into Caleb’s living room on the sixteenth floor.
For its steep rental price, it was a tiny 460 square feet, but it was thirteen hundred dollars a month cheaper than my rent and it came with security personnel and access to an indoor and outdoor pool, sauna, and gym.
“I’d feel safe here,” Harper said, spinning slowly around in the space.
It was our third viewing of the apartment, and because I sensed Harper was on the verge of choosin
g this place I decided I needed to fess up to her.
“Could you give us a minute?” I asked the real estate agent.
He nodded. “I’ll be outside.”
I waited until the apartment door closed behind him and turned to an expectant Harper.
“What’s up?”
Although her wrist was still in a cast and her ribs still hurt, she was looking a million times better. I was glad. It was hard to look at her all bruised and battered and not want to kill someone. “Confession time.”
She frowned. “Okay?”
“Caleb lives in this building. His brother Jamie is staying with him indefinitely too.”
“Why didn’t you say anything before?”
“I didn’t want it to affect your decision and I liked how secure this place was. But it’s not up to me and you should know that you’ll probably see them around if you rent this place.”
Harper nodded, the excitement dimming from her eyes as she surveyed the space again. I waited as she walked slowly over to the window and stared out across the water at Boston Harbor. “What must they think of me?”
“Not at all what you’re thinking they think,” I said instantly. “They were angry for you, Harper, not at you.”
“Then I shouldn’t be afraid to face them.” Her shoulders straightened and she turned to me, looking determined. “I can’t let other people’s opinions sway my decisions. And I can’t let Vince win that way, you know. Time to be brave.”
I nodded in agreement.
“I feel safe here. I’m taking it.”
“I’m glad.” I gave her a relieved smile.
“And you”—she stepped toward me, her expression sober—“you need to be brave too, Ava. No more letting Nick win. Because that’s what you’ll be doing if you don’t tell Caleb the truth. You need to tell him that you love him.”
I couldn’t even pretend to be surprised that she’d worked it out, probably long before I did. “How did you know?”
“The way you talk about him. Especially now, after how he was with me that night … it changed things for you. You love him. And I know not seeing him all week has you paranoid and upset. Go work it out.”
Fight or Flight Page 28
