by Ann Garner
I try to push the thought of the two of them and what they’re doing out of my head as I move through my morning routine, getting ready for what I have determined is going to be an incredibly lazy Saturday. At least until it’s time to get ready for my date.
If I don’t cancel.
Stepping out of the shower, the steam is like a thick cloud in the bathroom. I wrap a towel around my body before I reach over and wipe my hand along the mirror, shoving condensation aside so I can see my reflection.
Thanks to the shower there is no evidence of the tears I’d cried overnight. But I know they’re there, locked away inside of me, and they’ll come again. It seems they always come again. Even though I don’t want them to. Especially because I don’t want them to.
It’s going to get better one day. Right? Because I’m not sure how much longer I can take this moping, lifeless version of myself. I think four months is long enough.
“Suck it up, Grace.” I tell my reflection. “It’s time to get your shit together.”
By the time I’m dressed and heading out of the bedroom the music in the apartment has stopped. I can hear someone fumbling around in the kitchen, so I head in that direction to find Cole making coffee. He glances up with a smile on his face when I walk into the room.
“Good morning, Gracie Lou.”
Making a face I move past him to get a coffee cup out of the cabinet. “You seriously need to stop calling me that. I’m not five anymore.” I pour myself a cup of coffee, dropping way more sugar and milk in the cup then I probably should.
“But you’ll always be my baby sister.” He’s ruffling my hair and I can’t help but laugh as I try and smack his hands away. “I think you’re the one that is five.” I mutter, shuffling back out of his reach. “Where’s Delaney? I want to go get pancakes.”
“She should be out in a minute.”
I take a sip of my coffee as I maneuver around the kitchen counter, sliding onto one of the low stools we’d placed there. I lean my elbows on the counter, watching as Cole moves around the kitchen as he makes his own cup.
“How’s she doing?”
Cole leans back against the counter directly opposite of where I’m sitting. He takes a small sip of his coffee. “With what?”
“Next month is coming up fast. Have you talked to her about it?”
“I’ve tried. She changes the subject. Or leaves the room.”
I wrap my hands around my cup of coffee, letting the warmth seep into my suddenly cold hands. “You’ve told her she’s not going to be alone this year though, right?”
“Again, I’ve tried. I can’t push her, Grace, she’ll shut me out entirely.”
“She needs to talk to someone.”
“I know.” He looks pained.
“I mean someone professional. Not you or me.”
“I know that, Grace. Jesus.”
I take another drink of my coffee as I continue to watch him. Last year I’d watched him fall apart after things with Delaney had abruptly ended. Cole had had his heart broken before, his last serious girlfriend had cheated on him the moment he had left for college, but he’d completely shut down with Delaney.
When none of us had been able to get ahold of her for a couple of days, he’d raced out of the house and driven the three hours back to campus to make sure she was all right.
He never really talked about what happened while he was there. But he hadn’t come home the same. He had shut all of us out, and though I wasn’t disillusioned enough to believe my brother had never been drunk before, it was the first time that I could recall seeing him that way. And staying that way for several days running.
Every second that I watched him suffer had fueled an anger towards Delaney. By the time I made it back to campus after Thanksgiving break, the fury had settled so deep inside of me that I couldn’t see beyond it.
There had been signs that she was hiding something. Comments she had made that caused me to wonder what had happened in her past that had made her the way she was. But the one time I had asked she had told me nothing had happened, and even though I wanted to, I hadn’t pushed.
After she moved out I Googled her name.
I hadn’t been even remotely close to prepared for what I had found.
I can remember the nausea rolling inside of my stomach when I had clicked on the first link and was immediately taken to a full-page picture of a much younger Delaney lying in a dumpster covered in blood and bruises. The article that had followed detailed three days of pure hell that now I understood Delaney would never be able to escape.
Then I had reacted like a pansy ass and in some misguided attempt to not hurt my brother even more, I had kept the knowledge of Delaney and her past to myself. Okay, mostly to myself. I had told Grant and Robby and swore them both to secrecy.
To make the entire situation even worse I’d talked myself into being pissed at her for not thinking she could tell me the truth.
Thus, the reason I won the suckiest best friend of the year, perhaps even the century, award. And Delaney hadn’t held a bit of it against me when I had offered her a lame ass apology several weeks after she and Cole had gotten back together and the truth had come out.
“So what are we going to do?” I finally ask him.
“This morning we’re going to go get pancakes, and I’m going to give her one more day of normal. We’ll deal with the rest later.”
I keep watching him for a moment longer before saying, “You’re a pretty good guy, Cole.”
“You don’t have to look so surprised.” He says on a laugh.
Delaney swings into the room. “What’s surprising?”
“Cole has agreed to buy us breakfast.”
Cole chokes on his next sip of coffee as Delaney says, “Really?”
“Yes,” Cole shoots me a wicked glare. “But only because Grace agreed to personally call and invite Holden and Ally to join us.”
“Bastard.” I mutter, but I reach over and grab my phone off the charger on the counter and shoot a quick text to Holden. It takes just seconds for him to answer, and within twenty minutes I’m sitting across from Holden, waiting on Ally to arrive after the end of her shift so we can order.
Everyone is getting along just fine, even though I catch both Holden and Cole cutting sentences in half with a grimace because they don’t want to mention Grant’s name in front of me. I don’t tell them to stop, because honestly I don’t want to hear stories about him.
Ally slides into the booth next to Holden, giving him a smacking kiss on his cheek. She’s still in her scrubs and carries the faintest scent of antiseptic with her as she move past me. Before she can even open her mouth I glare at her. “No war stories.” I say firmly. “I plan to enjoy these pancakes and I can’t do that if you start talking about what gross and disgusting things you did at work last night.”
Ally shoots me a quick grin. “Fine. But you’re taking away all my fun.”
“You’ll survive.” I say dryly before taking a drink of my water.
Raising an eyebrow she says, “Okay then. No work war stories.” She gives me a wicked smile. “So tell me about Jacob.”
I squint my eyes at her in a glare. “You are such a bitch.” I mutter, taking another drink to keep from having to answer her. Holden actually stiffens in the booth next to her. Like visibly stiffened. And Cole is having a hard time not laughing.
“What?” She says in all innocence. “Is this something else we shouldn’t talk about? I just want to know what’s going on between the two of you.”
“Bitch, bitch, bitch.” I growl at her. “Jacob and I are just friends.”
“That’s not what I heard.” Ally says with a singsong voice.
“Well you heard wrong.”
Holden leans forward. “It’s what everyone has heard, Grace.”
I shift my gaze to him with a glare. “Well everyone heard wrong, Holden.” I snap.
“You looked pretty cozy the other night. Are you sure they’re wrong?”
>
“Yes.” I snap again, turning my head to Ally. “I’m sure they’re wrong. Jacob and I are not now, nor have we ever, fucked.”
I hear Cole make a choking sound deep in his throat. “Jesus, Grace.”
“What?” I turn my glare on him. “That’s what he’s insinuating.” I turn back to Holden. “Is that what you want to hear, Holden? That I haven’t slept with Jacob. Because I haven’t.” I cross my arms over my chest, leaning back in the booth. “But the day is young and I do have a date with him tonight.” Shoving at Cole who is sitting next to me in the booth I tell him, “Move. Move, Cole. I’m not going to sit here and get the third degree because you choose to believe the entire damn campus over your own sister.”
“Calm down, Grace, nobody’s saying we don’t believe you.”
“Just that you don’t trust me to make good decisions.” Cole is unmovable and I slam back against the booth with a muttered curse after shoving against his shoulder to no avail. The waitress comes back to drop off our breakfast and the entire table sits in a tense silence while she doles out plates. I cross my arms over my chest, no doubt looking like an insolent child as I glare across the table. Holden has me so pissed I’m not even hungry any more.
Dammit. What a waste of pancakes.
“You need to trust me to make my own decisions.” I say the second the waitress walks away. “I’m not six anymore, Holden.” I turn back to Cole. “Can I please get out for a moment? I need some air.”
“Grace,” Holden says with a sigh. “Sit down and stop being a baby.”
I stab my pancakes with my fork since obviously I’m not getting out of this stupid booth anytime soon. “Seriously?” I snap. “You’re all pissy because I’m moving on after I got dumped and I’m the one acting like a baby.” With jerky movements I use my knife to cut my pancake into small pieces. “Maybe you missed the memo, but Grant dumped me. Not the other way around. You don’t get to be mad at me. I haven’t done anything wrong.”
“He’s hurting too, Grace.”
I snort, reaching over to grab the syrup so I can drown my pancakes. “He sure as hell has a funny way of showing it.”
“Don’t discount his feelings.”
“Why not? You’re discounting mine.”
“That’s not true.” I glare at him. “It’s not, Grace.” He insists. “I’m pissed because you’ve all of sudden become this person that I don’t know. Because the Grace I know would never get drunk and spend the night at a frat house with a guy she doesn’t know from a hole in the wall, and not bother to call and tell anyone where she’s going to be.”
A hole in the wall? What in the hell is he talking about?
“Do you have any idea what could have happened to you?”
“I was fine. It was no big deal.”
“You’re right, you were fine. This time. But Grace, anything could have happened and no one knew where you were or who you were with and you didn’t take your cell phone with you so there was no way we could get a hold of you.”
And just like that it clicks for me. Holden doesn’t give a shit what I’ve done or not done with Jacob, at least no more than he ever did about what I was doing while I was with Grant.
“Oh, Holden.” I murmur. “You can’t think like that. It’ll drive you crazy.”
“Oh, he’s already there.” Ally says. “He freaks if I don’t call or text him every couple of hours when we aren’t together.”
I take a bite of my pancakes, which are boarding on inedible since I have thoroughly soaked them in syrup. I wash them down with some water. “What happened to Delaney was a horrible thing.” A quick glance to Delaney out of the corner of my eye shows that her head is bowed forward slightly, her hair creating a curtain that hides her face.
“I didn’t worry about you when you were with Grant. I trusted him to take care of you. I don’t know Jacob Ross.”
“But you know me. You need to trust me to take care of me Ally reaches over and grabs Holden’s cup of coffee. “Somebody needs to be worried about Grant.” She sets the cup back down before reaching for a slice of bacon. “He showed up at the ER at three o’clock this morning needing fifteen stitches to close the cut over his eye.”
“What?” Holden’s head whips around. “What happened?”
Ally shrugs. “He just mumbled something about falling down, which was obvious bullshit, but that was all I could get out of him.” She pops the final bite of bacon into her mouth.
“What do you think happened?” I ask, watching Holden dig his cell phone out of his pocket. I’m sure he’s going to try and get in touch with Grant.
“I think he got the shit beat out of him.” She says matter-of-factly. “He was moving slow, favoring his left side a bit, but he refused to be checked out any further. He got the stitches and left.”
Holden drops his phone on the table. “He isn’t answering.” He focuses his gaze on Cole. “You didn’t see him this morning?”
“I stayed with Del last night.” His gaze flickers to me then away again. “He said he had a date last night.”
Rolling my eyes, I shove away my half eaten plate of food. “Obviously it went well.”
Chapter Eight
“I gotta say, you sure know how to show a girl a good time.” I take another bite of my slightly overcooked hot dog. I’d smothered it in mustard and ketchup in the hopes of overpowering the burnt taste. It was only marginally helping so I was following each bite with a large drink of diet coke.
“What can I say, it’s a gift.” Jacob cracks another peanut, dropping the shell so that it falls between the bleachers we’re sitting on. He holds the peanuts out to me in the palm of his hand. When my fingers brush against his skin, I feel the awareness that has been simmering all night ignite into flames.
It’s all I can do not to snatch my hand back like I’ve been burned. That’s what I felt like, and it isn’t an altogether unpleasant feeling.
In fact, I sort of want to touch him again to see if I can get the heat to kick up another notch.
“When you said to dress warm and comfortable I have to admit that this,” I wave my hand out toward the field in front of us that had been cleaned out, and in a few short minutes would host a demolition derby. “wasn’t even in the top fifty things that I thought we might be doing tonight.”
“You thought of fifty? That’s quite a list. Maybe we should review it so I have some ideas for next time.”
“Who said there’s going to be a next time?” I lick a bit of ketchup off my thumb, watching in amusement as his eyes follow the movement. Good to know I wasn’t the only one feeling the heat.
“There will be.” He jerks his eyes away from my mouth, and he cracks another peanut a little harder than necessary. He didn’t offer this batch to me, popping them into his own mouth instead. Now I was the one staring like a creeper. I clear my throat, “Awfully sure of yourself.”
“Confidence is sexy.”
I choke on a laugh, “Yes it is.” I agree. He wears it well. I take another bite of hot dog, looking out to the field where the ugliest, most beat-up cars I’ve ever seen are slowly entering the ring. Earlier we had watched the dirt get watered down with several water hoses. I’m not sure what the purpose was, since none of the cars currently entering look like they have four-wheel drive and would more than likely get stuck in the mud.
“So tell me what you know about demolition derbies.”
I glance over to Jacob again. “Umm…that would be nothing.” I say with a smile. “Obviously my education is severely lacking.”
“Severely.” He holds out more peanuts and I carefully take them, trying to touch him as little as possible. I’m pretty sure if I touch him too much more tonight I’m going to end up grabbing him and kissing him. I’m more than positive he wouldn’t object, but if just touching him sets me off I’m afraid of what kissing him is going to do.
So I probably shouldn’t be in a public place the first time we kiss.
“Are you paying attentio
n to me, Pix?”
Blinking, I look over to him. “Uh, no.”
The way he studies me with those intense ice blue eyes tells me that he doesn’t think I’m thinking about what I’m actually thinking about. I’m pretty sure he thinks I’m thinking about Grant. I’m actually surprised that I’m not thinking about Grant. That I haven’t thought about him once since Jacob picked me up over an hour ago. I want to reassure him, but I’m not sure how I can without bringing up Grant and I’m afraid doing that is going to ruin what I think is going to be a pretty amazing first date.
So instead I say, “Wow me with your knowledge on demolition derbies.”
“They basically ram into each other until their cars stop working. Last man standing wins.”
“Wow.” I say slowly, drawing out the word.
“Your sarcasm is duly noted.”
“That’s good. I’m glad you didn’t miss it. Would you like a bite of my very disgusting hot dog?”
One brow arches. “It must be horrible if you’re offering to share food. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that happen.”
“It’s a rare occurrence. Like sightings of Big Foot or the Loch Ness Monster.” I take the last bite of the hot dog, licking more ketchup off my fingers. His pupils dilate, narrowing as they zero in on my mouth again. Huh. This is pretty fun. I swipe my tongue across my bottom lip and watch his entire body tense. Awareness swirls around us so thick and heavy I feel like I could reach out and touch it.
It would take no effort to lean forward and touch my lips to his. My earlier conviction about doing this in public for the first time fades as I feel my body lean toward his and anticipation makes my skin tingle. He hasn’t moved at all but I’ve inadvertently closed the distance between us to the point that I can feel the warmth of his breath blowing across my lips. I drop one hand down on his thigh, my fingers flexing into the muscle there as I tilt my head to the side, just a little. Just enough.
