“I’m sorry?”
“I’m seeing someone,” she said bluntly, holding the coffee back out to him. “And you showing up like this doesn’t feel like wanting to catch up. It feels like something different, so I’m telling you now. I’m not single anymore.”
Her ears were throbbing. Never in her life had she been this straightforward. Ever. She’d been taught to protect other people’s feelings, even at the sake of her own. She was a polite girl. A girl who always charmed, even while letting down softly.
There was a quick flash of irritation in Guy’s eyes. He was a wealthy, powerful investor. Obviously used to getting his way. He’d been like this in high school, too. He’d wanted the best, the most desirable, and Francie guessed that’s what she’d been. On the surface, at least. To people like him who didn’t bother to look any deeper.
“Oh, yeah?” he finally said, taking the coffee back. “And who’s that?”
She didn’t have to tell him. She didn’t have to explain anything. But all of a sudden, the memories came rushing back like a bitter flood—Guy taunting Tanner, Guy laughing at him behind his back. Suddenly, she wanted him to know who her heart belonged to. She wanted him to know that being the most powerful didn’t always mean you won in the end. Sometimes it just meant you were an asshole.
Pushing her shoulders back, she raised her chin. “Tanner Harlow.”
Guy stared at her for a long, gut-wrenching moment. Then his lips stretched into a thin smile and he laughed. The sound set her teeth on edge, made her see a red so vibrant, it threatened to blind her where she stood.
“Tanner Harlow? Fran, come on. You’re dating that guy?”
She reached over and yanked the door open. “You bet your ass.”
“Honey, I’m sorry for laughing, I am. But he’s a nobody. He’s always been a nobody.”
Her eyes stung. She didn’t think she’d ever been so livid in her life. “Excuse me?”
He stepped forward, right into her space. God, she was sick of that. His cologne was too much. It made her want to throw up.
“Remember,” he said, his voice thick with animosity, “C-c-catcher in the Rye?”
Her eyes flew open and she froze solid, unable to believe what she’d just heard. “What did you just say?”
“You’re trying to tell me the guy’s got his shit all worked out? Just because he grew doesn’t mean he can think straight. He’s a fucking yard guy for Christ’s sake.” He shook his head. “Wow. You’re really shooting for the stars.”
Her hand trembled at her side. She’d never slapped anyone before. Never even considered it. But she was considering it now.
“I’m ashamed I was ever with you, Guy. The fact that I let you touch me makes me physically sick. I guess I always wanted to see the best in you in high school, but we’re not kids anymore. You don’t get to stand here in my house and call me honey. And you definitely don’t get to say one word about Tanner. You don’t know him, you never did. He was more of a man at fifteen than you’ll ever be. Ever.”
His lips hardened, as his face turned red. Then a deeper red. Then faintly purple. For the first time, it occurred to her that maybe she wasn’t safe with him in her house. She’d hit a chord. A deep, sensitive chord. For whatever reason, the comparison to Tanner enraged him.
“You never stood up for me like this, did you?” His voice was barely a whisper.
“You were never worth it.”
She’d said it before she could think twice. But the truth always found its way out, even so many years later. Even when it had been buried for so long. She’d chosen to look the other way as a girl. And now she had to own that. But it wasn’t too late to start again. To be the woman she’d always wanted to be, but never had the guts to embrace.
“You two deserve each other,” he said softly. “The little piece of ass, and the white trash from the shitty part of town.”
She stood rooted in place. She could feel his breath on her face, sour and warm. “Get out.”
He smiled again, but this time there was no semblance of humor there. Only bitterness. He watched her steadily with his small eyes, a fat vein bulging in his forehead.
Francie’s heart beat like a rabbit’s behind her breastbone. And then, finally, he set the coffee cup down on the end table and turned to go without another word.
She watched him walk out the door and down the steps into the morning sun, his thick shoulders moving underneath his shirt like an animal’s. That’s what he reminded her of right then. A bull. Only acting on instinct. No warmth or empathy at all, which shouldn’t have surprised her.
With shaking hands, she closed the door. And locked it for good measure.
She needed an aspirin.
Chapter Seventeen
“No,” Maddie said with a laugh, leaning against the open window. “That’s her old album. And there was never a song in there about him, either.”
Tanner smiled, keeping his eyes on the road. The sun was bright this morning, the air buffeting his arms already warm. It was going to be hot later, and he had probably ten hours of work ahead of him. But he felt more alive than he had in a long time. The governor’s assistant had called and left a message on his voicemail. They wanted him as soon as he could make room in his schedule. It’d be at least a week’s job and he’d need to hire someone, which he didn’t want to rush. Quaking Aspen was finally taking off, something that filled him with pride and an overwhelming sense of accomplishment. But that wasn’t why he felt the way he did this morning. That had everything to do with the woman he couldn’t get out of his head, no matter how hard he tried.
She was changing things for him. The way he looked at people, the way he approached life in general. He felt the outer walls around his heart beginning to crumble, and it was an experience that he found he wanted to savor. Like an expensive steak or a tall glass of porter after a long day in the sun. She had that effect. All this was so new, that sometimes he had to stop and remind himself that just a few months ago if someone had asked him what being in love felt like, he honestly wouldn’t have known how to answer.
He turned his big truck onto Bramble Lane and lowered the sun visor. Neighborhood kids were out in droves this morning, sprinklers were on, and people were walking their dogs. Marietta was a good place to live. A good place to raise a family. Tanner wondered if that was in the cards for him. For Maddie. Or would she grow up in Hawaii, estranged from three brothers she’d only really known as a kid?
Pushing a hand through his hair, he narrowed his eyes at the car parked around the corner from Francie’s house. Black. Something that looked fast and douchey. And vaguely familiar.
He gripped the steering wheel harder. It could be anyone. There were lots of nice cars around here. But something tickled his subconscious like a feather anyway.
Maddie was yammering on about the difference between being a Taylor Swift fan and a Swifty. Apparently there was enough of one that it needed explanation.
He nodded, but kept his gaze trained on the car.
And then, as he pulled up to the curb, he saw him. Guy fucking Davis. Walking down Francie’s front steps, with that familiar asshole swagger.
A slow, hot pulse built at his temples as he put the truck in Park. As he reminded himself that Francie was her own woman—he didn’t own her. They weren’t married, and even if they were, a classmate on her doorstep didn’t necessarily mean jack shit.
That’s what he told himself. But deep down, he knew better. Guy being there meant nothing good. Nothing good at all.
“Who’s that?” Maddie asked, looking from Tanner to Guy, and back again.
He swallowed, which wasn’t easy. His tongue felt twice its normal size. “An old friend of Francie’s.”
“That’s a nice car.”
“Stay here, okay?”
“But—”
He opened the door and turned to give her a look. “Stay here, Maddie.”
Normally she’d argue with that—lately she’d insisted on
sticking to him like glue. But his expression must’ve conveyed more than he thought, because she snapped her mouth shut and sat back obediently in the seat.
Stepping out onto the street, he closed the door. Guy hadn’t seen him yet, and Tanner hooked his thumbs in his pockets and walked around the front of the truck.
The other man stopped on the walkway, turned toward Francie’s window, and cupped a hand around his mouth. “Thanks for the coffee, honey!”
A feeling that Tanner couldn’t really identify crawled through his chest then. It wasn’t anger. It wasn’t quite jealously, either, although he’d be lying if he said he didn’t feel a little of both. But at the forefront was a unique kind of disappointment that he’d never experienced before, and never wanted to again, if he could help it.
He knew it wasn’t fair to jump to conclusions, that Francie deserved better than that. But at the same time, he wanted to take her by the shoulders and demand why in the world she’d do this. After everything he’d told her and after she’d convinced him that she’d grown. Inviting this prick into her house sure didn’t seem like growth. It seemed like exactly the opposite.
Guy turned and finally saw him. There was a shocked look on his ruddy face. And then the shock settled into something else. Something Tanner recognized from their adolescence.
Tanner kept his thumbs in his pockets and leaned casually against the grill of his truck. “How’s it going?”
The other man smiled thinly. “Harlow. Long time, no see.”
“Yeah. Nice morning.”
“Sure is.” He nodded toward Tanner’s truck, where Maddie sat watching. “See you finally started your own lawn-mowing business, huh?”
Tanner’s shoulders tensed, and he felt a distinctive heat making its way up his neck. But he gave him an easy smile. “I leave the lawn mowing to the kid down the street. Good kid. Could teach you a thing or two about an honest day’s work.”
Guy clenched his jaw. Tanner could see the meaty muscles working from where he stood. They watched each other, a primitive energy crackling between them.
The other man took a step forward and pulled his keys from his pocket, jingling them obnoxiously. “I don’t know that you should be lecturing me about work, Harlow. One of us has people kissing his ass on the job. The other is just a blue-collar grunt. Not knocking it, though. It’s a way to pay the bills.”
Fury curled inside Tanner’s chest. Still, he looked down at his boots and scuffed at the cement, aware that Maddie hung on every word.
“Haven’t changed much, have you, Guy? Still a total dickhead.”
The other man laughed, but it was strained. “You were a pretty easy target, you have to admit.”
Tanner pictured the kid he’d been, skinny, small, trying to string two sentences together without tripping over the words. In front of everyone. In front of the girl he’d adored. Nobody, unless they’d lived through it, would ever know how hard it was to be the subject of ridicule and blind contempt by someone who thought they were better, simply by being bigger.
Guy still thought he was bigger. Bigger life, more expensive car, more powerful job. He was a sorry excuse for a man, and everything Tanner wanted to protect Maddie from at that moment.
They were only a few feet away from each other now, the space between them not nearly big enough for how Tanner was feeling. Twitchy, unpredictable. He struggled to keep leaning indifferently against his truck, when all he wanted was to take the other man by the throat.
“Why don’t you get in your car,” Tanner said, “and go back to where you came from? You and I, we’ve got nothing else to say to each other.”
Guy took another step forward. He was thick, but Tanner dwarfed him. It didn’t matter though, because he knew Tanner would take the goddamn high road. And a man like Guy would always take advantage of that until the day he died.
“Francie’s pretty sweet, isn’t she?” Guy muttered, his expression mildly disgusting.
Tanner stared at him, his pulse humming in his ears.
“Almost like honey,” he continued, shaking his head. “She tastes just like it.”
His vision, which had been narrowing before, faded to black. He could hear his own shallow breaths, one after the other.
Guy reached out and tapped his chest. “Hey, enjoy my seconds, man.”
A lightning bolt exploded behind Tanner’s eyes. He grabbed the other man by the shirt and hauled him up until he balanced on the toes of his loafers.
“I’m going to break your fucking face if you don’t get the hell out of here,” Tanner said. Then let go and shoved him hard.
Guy stumbled back, his eyes wide. He stood there for a second, as if deciding whether or not to fight. Finally, he bent to pick up his keys from the cement. “Go to hell, Harlow.”
“You first.”
“She wanted me here.”
Maybe. Maybe not. That was something Tanner was going to have to come to terms with later. Right now he just needed to get Maddie out of there. She’d gotten out of the truck and was standing on the sidewalk looking like she was about to cry. Perfect.
“Maddie, we’re leaving.”
“But—”
“I’m taking you home,” he growled. “Get in the truck.”
Biting her lip, she did as she was told.
Guy headed to his car, glancing back a few times to make sure Tanner wasn’t following.
“Tanner?”
He looked up to see Francie on her front porch, staring at Guy.
“What happened?”
He didn’t know how to answer that. Right then, he was still too pissed, too worked up to say much of anything. He’d let this happen. He’d let his guard down and look where it had gotten him. Right back to high school.
All he knew was that he’d managed to show Maddie nothing more than what she’d seen from every other man in her life. She’d needed him to be different. So much for taking the high road.
“I’ll call you later,” he said.
And climbed into his truck, forcing himself not to give her another look.
Chapter Eighteen
Francie pulled up to Tanner’s house with her heart twisting.
She’d only caught the tail end of it—Guy tripping backward, Tanner looking more furious than she’d ever seen him, and Maddie hugging herself on the sidewalk. God.
Parking the car, she glanced at the house. He hadn’t answered his phone when she’d called on the way over. And the way he’d looked when he’d driven off… His expression had left her cold and a little scared. She’d thought about him holding her the other night after she’d told him she loved him. He hadn’t said it back. And that was okay. It was. She could live with that for a while, because right now she could love him enough for the both of them. But what she couldn’t live with would be his shutting her out.
She pulled in a deep breath and got out of the car, closing the door behind her. She walked up the steps with her pulse tapping behind her ear, then stood outside his door, gathering herself. The morning had gotten hot, and she felt a trickle of sweat between her breasts. Her hair was heavy on the back of her neck, and for the first time in her life, she pictured cutting it. Her mother would have a coronary. But maybe it was time Loretta Tate started learning to accept a few things about her daughter. Like whom she loved and wanted to be with.
Finally, she raised her fist and knocked. From inside Charlotte barked a few times, but then fell silent. There were no footsteps headed toward the door, no shout from inside that he’d be right there.
She waited, forcing herself to keep breathing. He was definitely home. His truck was parked out front. He took Charlotte everywhere with him. Which meant, he didn’t want to see her.
She stared at the door, her instincts screaming at her to leave. To protect herself from this pain while she still could. Tanner was more intricate than any man she’d ever been with. He was like a painting that you stared at, trying to understand the choice behind the brush strokes. Deep down, she kn
ew that standing her ground meant the possibility of rejection. That’s what she feared the most. And the deeper in love she fell, the more real that fear became.
She recognized right then that he was going to do his best to push her away. Maybe because he didn’t trust her. Maybe because he was terrified of being anything other than numb. Or maybe just because Tanner Harlow, the man who towered over her, was really just the same little boy he’d been all those years ago. Because he’d never come to terms with his parents, with his own pain, enough to negotiate his life without being defensive as a stone wall.
Licking her lips, she squared her shoulders. She didn’t feel big enough to take him on. She didn’t feel strong enough. But she was going to try. And if he broke her into a thousand little pieces in the process, then so be it. At least she’d know for once in her life that she stood up for something real.
She raised her fist and knocked again. This time, harder.
And this time she heard footsteps coming from inside. Heavy, purposeful.
The door opened, and there he was. Handsome, and as dark as an impending summer storm. He didn’t smile, just stood there looking down at her with his jaw working.
Her heart pounded from nerves, lust, longing, fear. Anything and everything all wrapped together in a tidy little bow. She swallowed hard, forcing herself to look right back.
“You weren’t going to answer the door?”
He watched her, as if deciding how to answer that. Then shrugged in the most infuriating way. “Maybe.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “Are you going to let me in?”
“I’m kind of busy. Have to get back to work.”
“Tanner.”
“What?”
“We need to talk.”
“I don’t know that I want to talk.”
She glared up at him. “Okay. So we’re going to pretend you didn’t just have it out with Guy on my walkway?”
“Was that your walkway? Hadn’t noticed.”
“Now you’re being ridiculous.”
His jaw bunched.
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