Whisper of Love

by Melanie Shawn

  KJ proudly introduced him to Kade and the two men wasted no time before they started talking shop. Ali took her place with the other parents. She searched the room and found Ricky on the far side in a solo chair, reading.

  Since losing her brother she’d read a ton of grief-management books. Some of them were total crap but most of them had at least one or two nuggets of information or inspiration that she’d clung to. And one thing she’d learned was that grief was as individual and personal as a fingerprint. No two people’s experience was the same. There was no timeframe, formula, or template to follow. Sure, there were stages and general similarities but each person had to go through and work out their own emotions for themselves. She hoped that was what Ricky was doing. That he was escaping into other worlds as a form of therapy. She just wished she knew whether or not that was the case.

  Kade’s voice caught her attention and when she looked back on the mats she saw that he was running drills beside Coach Mills.

  The two men were about the same height and build. Both had dark hair and five o’clock shadows covering strong jaws. Both were good looking and had the same Alpha vibe. But there was just something about Kade. Something extra. Something intangible that pulled Allison in like a magnet.

  The murmurs in the crowd told her that her attention wasn’t the only one being pulled in Kade’s direction. She didn’t catch what everyone was saying but she heard the keywords “Kade” and “hot” a lot.

  She was still trying to wrap her brain around the fact that he was actually here.

  This morning had started out like any other. She hit her snooze button two too many times, making her just late enough to panic her and throw off any semblance of a routine. She fought with KJ, dropped the boys off at school and got to the office ten minutes late. She got home from work expecting it to be another predictable evening of dinner, dropping KJ off at class, coming home and watching Ellen (which she DVR’d every day), cleaning, picking KJ up, coming home, and going to bed.

  Then he showed up.

  Feeling a sudden bout of overwhelming anxiety from the surreal-ness of the day, she decided it was time to send out the bat signal. Jess would be just finishing up at her salon, The Mane Attraction, and the gym was on her way home. She needed her bestie to come and save her.

  She sent the text and then sat back and waited for backup.

  After a few minutes of observing the class, she was starting to feel a little bit calmer until the unthinkable happened. Ricky set his book down and joined his brother on the mat. Ali’s jaw dropped as she watched the twins start running drills with Kade. KJ was smiling from ear to ear as he rolled on the mat with Ricky. He’d wanted Ricky to take classes with him but he’d never been interested.

  A sick feeling sank in Ali’s stomach like a bag of rocks in a lake. This was bad. Really bad. KJ was smiling and Ricky had put his book down. Both boys were mesmerized by Kade, totally and completely under his spell and she couldn’t blame them. He was charisma personified. But what was she going to do when Hurricane Charisma got bored and bounced, leaving two devastated boys in his wake?

  The twins had always loved Kade, but they’d never needed him before. They’d had their dad. But Patrick was gone now and as hard as she’d tried Kade had accomplished more in a few hours than she had in the past eighteen months. This was one day. What if he stayed a week? Or two? How much more attached would they be?

  She was so lost in thought she didn’t even see Jess come in and she jumped when she heard her oldest friend’s whisper.

  “What did that little fucker do now?”

  “Ehem.” Chrissy Caldwell cleared her throat as her eyes widened down to ten-year-old Connor, and eight-year-old Cassidy. “Little ears.”

  There was a reason she’d been nicknamed Prissy Chrissy.

  “Sorry Prissy…I mean Chrissy.” Jess apologized…sort of, before returning her attention to Ali and speaking even quieter, “I got your text. What did KJ do…whoa?” Jess’s electric blue eyes widened as she stared at her friend. “What’s wrong? You look like you just saw a ghost.”

  Ali tilted her head toward the mat.

  Without saying a word, Jess turned her head to where Kade was holding court.

  “Holy shi—”

  Chrissy’s face turned back in horror.

  “—take mushroom,” Jess finished. “Holy shitake mushroom!”

  “What is he doing here?” Jess said the word as if she were referring to Satan himself. Ali was relieved her bestie hadn’t also fallen under the Kade McKnight spell.

  “KJ wanted him to come to his class. I think he was excited for him to meet Keaton.”

  Jess’s brow furrowed. “No. I mean what is he doing in Whisper Lake?”

  “He came to see the boys.”

  “Did you know he was coming?”

  “Nope. I was doing laundry, making dinner, and got a knock on the door.”

  “After all this time?! He just shows up?!”

  “Yep.”

  Kade’s ears must’ve been burning because he chose that moment to look over in their direction. When he saw them he smiled and lifted his hand in a wave. Jess returned his greeting by flipping him the bird, which caused Chrissy to gasp in horror.

  “Where is tall man?” Jess began to sing as she flipped him the bird with her other hand as well. “Where is tall man?”

  Chrissy turned back around unamused but Ali couldn’t help but chuckle. “Nice save.”

  Jess grinned before shaking her head. “So he just shows up and now he’s what…running the class?”

  “Apparently.”

  “Where the hell has he been?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Jess’s face registered disbelief. “You didn’t ask him?”

  “I asked him.”

  “What did he say?”

  “When he started to answer I told him I didn’t want to hear it,” Ali admitted. Sitting here now, she wished she’d handled that interaction differently.

  “How long is he staying?”

  “No idea. Not long, I’m sure.”

  “Where’s he going to stay while he’s seeing the boys?”

  “With us.”

  “Do you want to stay at my house while he’s here?” she offered like the amazing best friend she was.

  “No. I don’t want to disrupt the boys’ schedule.”

  Jess hooked her arm through Ali’s and laid her head on her shoulder. “I’m not worried about the boys.”

  For the first time in eighteen months, neither was Ali.

  CHAPTER 5

  “Watch out!” KJ yelled, snapping Kade back into his present mission of fighting off killer zombies.

  He returned his attention to the screen just in time to watch Player 2 get his head blown off.

  “Wow. You suck at this game,” KJ accurately assessed as he picked his soda can up off the coffee table and downed its contents.

  “So how’s your aunt been doing?”

  Kade still hadn’t been able to talk to her. She was avoiding him. They’d returned home from the gym an hour ago. Ali had been quiet on the ride back to the house and as soon as they hit the door, she’d mumbled something about work and headed upstairs. Ricky had gone up to his room as well to finish homework and KJ had asked Kade to play video games. Kade had been so preoccupied he’d died at least a dozen times.

  “She’s cool.” KJ burped as he tossed the empty container across the room and sank it into the recycling.

  “So, what’s the deal with you not wanting her to go to your classes?” Kade was fairly certain the reason had something to do with the way Keaton Mill’s face had lit up like Times Square when Ali walked in. And he’d caught Mills staring at her at least a dozen times during the ninety minutes they were there.

  KJ’s only response was an indistinguishable sound as he shrugged his shoulders.

  “Your coach seems like a good guy.” Other than his obvious crush on Ali, the man did seem like a great guy.

  A
fter a short conversation it was clear to Kade that Mills knew what he was doing. He’d studied under the Gracie family and was accomplished in his own right. The kids all seemed to respect him, which wasn’t an easy accomplishment when talking about pre-teens and teens these days. Not one of them pulled out their phones the entire hour and a half which was a testament to how he ran his gym.

  “He’s cool,” KJ stated flatly.

  Kade realized he wasn’t getting anywhere with this line of questioning so he figured he’d drop it for now.

  “I really am sorry I missed your guys’ birthday.”

  “It’s cool.”

  Ali was cool. The coach was cool. Kade missing his birthday was cool. He had a feeling this was the teen equivalent of a woman saying, I’m fine.

  “What did you guys do?” Kade followed both boys on Instagram and Snapchat, but their social media had been suspiciously quiet the weekend they became teenagers.

  “Nothing.” KJ shrugged again. “Aunt Ali wanted to have a barbeque or go take out our dirt bikes, but I didn’t want to.”

  From the time the boys were old enough to balance on a dirt bike, Patrick had taken them off-roading every chance he got. Since he ran the shop, his weekends were usually spent working, but he would sometimes let the boys skip school to take them out for the day.

  “Why not?” It didn’t take a genius to guess the answer, but Kade wanted to give KJ the chance to talk about it.

  “What’s the point? It’s a stupid birthday. It doesn’t matter. Nothing does.” KJ stared at the television and destroyed at least a dozen zombies that were trying to infiltrate the abandoned building that they were holed up in.

  “KJ!” Ali’s voice rang out from the top of the stairs. “It’s almost eleven. Turn it off.”

  “Ten more minutes!” KJ countered.

  “No.” Ali held her ground but Kade could hear how worn down she sounded. “You still have to take a shower.”

  “I’ll take one in the morning.”

  “No. You won’t. You always say that and then you never get up. Turn it off. Now. Shower. Bed.” The door shut and he could hear Ali’s footsteps walking across the kitchen above them.

  Kade wasn’t sure when bedtime had become a conversation. In his house, if his dad had to repeat himself, there was hell to pay. Granted, George McKnight’s parenting was nothing to emulate but Kade couldn’t remember the boys ever talking back to Patrick like it seemed KJ did to Ali every chance he got.

  From the moment the boys were born, Kade had been in awe of his best friend. Patrick was only twenty-one at the time, an age when most guys were partying and living it up. But not Patrick. He was running the business that had been passed down from their grandfather, raising his little sister, and then becoming an amazing dad of twin boys.

  Kade would never fill his shoes, he knew that. But he was sure as hell going to do his best to do right by the boys and Ali.

  Starting now. Getting up, Kade clicked the power button on the console and the screen went black.

  “What the fu—”

  “Let’s go,” Kade cut off his exclamation. He didn’t give a shit if the boys cussed but he had no idea what Ali’s rule for it was.

  You don’t know what Ali’s rule is for anything, his inner voice pointed out.

  It was true. He didn’t. But he’d learn.

  Beside him, he could see KJ was fuming and entertaining the idea of talking back to Kade, but the kid decided against it and opted instead to throw his remote control on the floor as he stood up and stomped away. Kade’s first instinct was to tell him that if that was how he was going to treat the present he wasn’t going to be allowed to play it, but he decided to let it slide.

  There was going to be plenty of time to figure out his role in the boys’ lives. He didn’t need to suddenly become an authority figure.

  Like Ali had, he thought.

  Kade knew she’d always helped out with the boys when Patrick needed an extra hand, but his friend had talked to him about wanting Ali to have a “normal” life, something that Patrick had forfeited thanks to an alcoholic mother. He’d been responsible for Ali long before he actually became her legal guardian. Even in second grade, Patrick would rush home to check on Ali after school. He would even miss school sometimes when his mom was too wasted to take care of her.

  The basement door slammed and he scrubbed his hand over his face. He sighed as he walked over to the trophies that were collecting dust on the bookshelf that ran along the far wall. Some were Patrick’s and Ali’s and some were the boys’. He traced his finger over Patrick’s name on a most valuable player trophy he’d earned their senior year.

  Kade couldn’t believe that he was really gone. He’d thought that he’d accepted it but being here, in his house, was different. He kept expecting him to walk in at any moment.

  But that wasn’t going to happen. He wasn’t coming back. Part of what Kade had learned over the past year was to try and accept the things that he couldn’t change, have the courage to change the things he could, and the wisdom to know the difference. He knew that he couldn’t change Patrick’s death. He would give anything, including his own life, to have Patrick back. It should’ve been him, not his best friend.

  A loud crash from upstairs snapped him out of his thoughts. He took the steps two at a time and found Ali on the floor in the kitchen, surrounded by Legos.

  “No, no, no, no, no,” she whispered again and again as her wild eyes scanned the floor.

  “What is…what happened?” Kade bent to help her clean up.

  “Don’t.” Her arm flew out, blocking him from picking anything up. “Don’t touch anything.”

  Kade lifted his hands as if he were being robbed. “Okay.”

  Sheer panic was written all over her pretty face as her breathing grew faster and shallower. “I have to…I need to…I can’t…”

  “Slow down. Breathe. It’s okay.”

  “Don’t.” Her head spun Exorcist-style toward him and there was venom in her caramel colored eyes as she let out a long breath before speaking in a dead calm. “Do not patronize me.”

  “Sorry.” The corners of his lips twitched despite his best efforts not to smile. He couldn’t help it. Ali getting all fired up had always been damn cute. And he was a little relieved that her irritation at him had blocked her impending hyperventilation. “What can I do to help?”

  “Nothing.” Her head shook as she looked back at the colorful plastic scattered all over the black and white checkerboard tile of the kitchen floor. “Just leave me alone.”

  “Not gonna happen.” He’d done that and he wasn’t sure he’d ever forgive himself for it. “Want to tell me why you karate chopped my arm to keep me from cleaning up this mess?”

  “It’s not a mess and I need to put it back together. I don’t want you to make it worse.”

  “What is it?” He’d wanted to ask what it was supposed to be but he decided against it.

  “It’s Ricky’s science project.”

  “It is?” Kade had never heard of a science project that used Lego’s but he’d also never attended a science fair, so he wasn’t exactly an expert.

  “Yes. He did it on engineering a skyscraper and tested his theories for the best designs by using Legos to create the buildings. See?” She pointed to a trifold poster board that was on its side halfway across the room.

  He tilted his head and saw pictures of three separate towers on the board.

  “Oh shit,” he breathed as the scope of what was going on sank in. There had to be thousands of pieces on the ground.

  “Yeah. Oh shit is right. I was finishing the laundry and I almost knocked it over so I thought I would bring it to the dining room table but I tripped over KJ’s stupid shoes that I keep telling him to pick up.” Tears were filling her eyes as her voice tinged with panic. “It’s due tomorrow and he worked so hard on it. It took him weeks to design and build. He has straight A’s and Mr. Truman is not going to care that I broke it.”

&n
bsp; Kade cringed as he hissed through his teeth. “He’s got Truman?”

  “Yes.” Despair radiated off of Ali.

  “I’m guessing the old man hasn’t mellowed with age?”

  “No.” She let out a forced laugh. “He’s gotten worse.”

  Kade leaned forward, careful not to disturb any of the Legos strewn about and grabbed the poster board that was haphazardly leaning against the cabinets. He set back on his heels and scanned the detailed architectural plans for each building that Ricky had outlined. It wasn’t going to be easy, but he was pretty sure that they could follow them.

  “Okay. I understand your instinct to try and salvage what is still intact, but that’s not going to get the job done. We need to disassemble before we can reassemble.”

  She eyed him with suspicion. “I don’t know. Maybe I should just go get Ricky…”

  Kade didn’t want to wake up the kid to do work he’d already done and he also liked the idea of him and Ali working on a project together. It was an excuse to force her to spend time with him.

  “Trust me, we can do this.”

  She let out a sound that clearly communicated what a ridiculous idea she thought that was.

  “Give me an hour,” he bargained. “If I don’t have things under control by then, you can wake up the kid.”

  After a few moments of hesitation, she conceded. “Fine.”

  Wasting no time, the two gathered each one of the pieces and carried them to the dining room table. Within no time, they’d separated the pieces and sorted them. From there it was just a matter of following Ricky’s plans.

  They worked together in comfortable silence like a well-oiled machine. He’d had plenty he wanted to say but he was worried about ruining the tentative truce they’d forged. He did, however, take the opportunity to sneak glances at her every chance he got. It was adorable how she’d bite her lip and scrunch her nose while she concentrated. He loved watching her mouth words while she read silently. Being near her was his favorite place to be.