Brazing (Forged in Fire #2)

by Lila Felix

  What happened to this guy?

  When we were kids, he used to have the most infectious laugh. Even when he made fun of me, I couldn’t help but laugh too just because of the sound of his deep chuckle. And when he would smile, I always found myself smiling back. I couldn’t help it. His eyes twinkled, his dimples came out to wink at me, and his whole body would glow with bright happiness.

  But now he looked at me and flinched. It was almost like… like he was afraid of me.

  Which didn’t make sense. For as clumsy and loud as I could be, I was actually very gentle. Completely harmless. He didn’t need to be scared of me. I wasn’t planning on biting him.

  Unless, maybe he asked. Because the one thing that had changed about Bridger for the better was that he was now a man. And not just the grown-up version of his childhood body, but like a manly-man. Even through his long-sleeved Henley, I could see how ripped his torso was. Muscle popped from neck to the very waistline of his jeans. His bulking arms were flexed tightly as he tensed with anxiety. His jaw had firmed up and the squareness to it made his face a work of chiseled art. His lips were too full for a boy, but they worked so well on him and the pout he seemed to constantly keep. His deep green eyes were as dark and volatile as the surface of a lake during a thunderstorm, but they were compelling… hypnotizing even.

  But so sad.

  I wanted to make him smile. I wanted to lift the secret burden he carried for just a moment. I wanted him to look at me and see me, remember me… laugh with me.

  “I have a lot of homework to do,” he answered quickly.

  I moved over to the table that had said homework spread out all over the glossy wooden surface. I propped my butt against it and then anchored my arms so that when I jumped, they helped propel me the last couple inches. My bum landed on top of all that obnoxious busywork with a satisfying whoosh of scattered papers. The corner of one of his textbooks dug into the side of my thigh and I swear I snapped a pencil in half, such was the destructive force of my ass.

  His mouth dropped open and he blinked quickly as if he couldn’t get my behavior to process correctly in his head.

  “Homework is stupid.” I pressed my lips together to suppress my smile.

  He shook his head out. I thought he might have been hoping that I would disappear if he shook hard enough, but I wasn’t going to make this that easy for him.

  “Um…”

  “I’m going out with some friends, so it won’t be just the two of us.” I threw that in for his benefit. I assumed the thought of the two of us alone probably had his knees knocking together and his lunch threatening to resurface. I would get to the bottom of his fear of me. “It will be fun! You do know what fun is, don’t you?”

  His eyebrows snapped together and some heat lit those stormy eyes. “I know how to have fun, Tate. I just prefer my homework’s finished beforehand.”

  “So rigid,” I taunted. Mischief ran like fire through my blood. I loved a challenge and the Bridger I remembered did, too. It was one of the reasons he was such a black mark on my childhood. He hated the idea of me beating him in anything. Our competitions used to be legendary around town. People knew to stay clear of us whenever we really started going after each other.

  “I’m not rigid,” he argued.

  I gave a pointed look at his strewn homework and then at the fists clenched at his sides. When I lifted my gaze back to his, I couldn’t help the triumphant glow that lit my face. “Right,” I drawled. “How about this, I promise that your homework will still be here in the morning. It’s not like it’s going to go out, get drunk and go home with a random.”

  “Is that what you’re planning on doing?” His voice sounded so strained that I wondered if he was in physical pain.

  “I don’t think so,” I shrugged. “I was thinking something much more trashy.”

  “Like what?” he nearly shrieked. I waited for the five or six “Shh’s” that I knew were coming.

  Once our angry library audience had settled, I revealed my big secret, “Like karaoke.”

  His lips twitched in the corners and then suddenly there was the briefest grin as he relaxed. He ran another hand through that dark hair and met my eyes again. “I can’t sing for shit.”

  A burst of laughter bubbled up out of me and I immediately clamped my hand over my mouth while I rode out another wave of hushes from the surrounding students. “Me either,” I whispered dramatically. “But we don’t have to sing. We could just make fun of all the other idiots that can’t sing either.”

  His smile disappeared, but his eyes still burned. And I liked that burn. I wanted to watch it singe the air around him. I wanted to feel the heat of it on my skin and the embers sizzle in my blood.

  Wait. No.

  This was for him, not for me. I didn’t want anything for Bridger. I just wanted to see him not so sad. That was all.

  “What time?” he asked with that frown firmly back in place.

  “Eight,” I told him. “At Captain’s.” That was a local bar close to campus he should know and love. If not, I would seriously have him sent to a retirement center where he belonged.

  Whew. He nodded. He knew what I was talking about. “Okay.” He drew out the word as long as he could. “I might stop by.”

  My smile stretched from ear to ear and I threw my hands up in the air. My hair bounced around my shoulders and I tried to stop acting like a dork. I dropped my hands to my lap and winked at him. “I might be happy about that.”

  His cheeks turned pink again and I tried not to sigh. I reached behind me and picked up his phone before he could stop me. I quickly slid my finger across the screen and shook my head when there was no password protection. Didn’t he know to guard his identity? Oh, this boy needed so much help.

  Good thing he had me now.

  “What are you doing?” He sounded a little panicked, so I swatted away his hand.

  “Just…” I turned around and hunched over his phone. I quickly punched my number in and pressed call.

  My phone buzzed in my pocket not two seconds later and I held up his so he could see what I did. “Now we have each other’s numbers. Do you want me to add my name? Or do you think you can remember it?”

  He huffed, “Well, I don’t think there’s any forgetting it.”

  That made me laugh. I didn’t remember him being this funny before. Okay, I knew he wasn’t trying to be funny… but he was still cracking me up.

  I hopped off the table and created another flurry of paperwork and writing utensils. “Don’t stand me up, Bridger Wright, or I’ll send Granddaddy after you on Potluck Sunday and we both know you don’t want that.” He paled a little, but I didn’t really feel the message was received until I warned, “Plus, if you don’t show up, I’ll be forced to call you nonstop until you do. And I’m pretty sure you underestimate how determined I can be.”

  He got that blank look again, the one where his brain clearly struggled to accept me as his new reality. Probably, I should go now.

  I walked by him, patting his shoulder as I went. “See you soon, Bridge.”

  He didn’t say anything back but that was okay. I hadn’t exactly helped him through a breakthrough, but he had smiled at me. And I hadn’t seen him smile once in the few weeks he’d popped back into my life.

  A smile was a victory.

  A smile was hope.

  And for some reason, when it came to Bridger, that hope meant more to me than anything else had in a very, very long time.

  Karaoke was destined to be a disaster. That was a given. But maybe there would be another smile in it for me.

  At the very least, there would be more Bridger.

  The stupid smile that I couldn’t wipe off my face said it all. I could barely tolerate childhood Bridger. But manly-man Bridger was someone I was very excited to tolerate. Even if he was the grumpiest man alive.

  Chapter Five

  Bridger

  My brother’s laugh was that of a badger on bath salts.

  �
�She called me Bridge,” I huffed at West who was getting way too big of a kick out of my library visit. “It makes my name go from completely manly and utterly rugged to some old, worn out, forgotten method of transporting goods over a river. It’s the place that houses trolls for the love of Pete.”

  “Shut up,” he chucked a chip in my direction. “Your name wasn’t all that manly in the first place. It sounds like someone who followed Lewis and Clarke on the expedition. Don’t get your testicles in a knot. Isn’t that a girl thing, making up cutesy names to demasculate us? Take it as a compliment.”

  West always frat-housed things up.

  This school’s first case of fratricide was about to go down.

  He needed a dictionary.

  “Demasculate? That’s not even a word, college boy. It’s emasculate. And shit if I know. Jesse didn’t really call me by loving names while she was screwing me over.”

  “You mean screwing other people over.”

  That’s it. I’m gonna beat his ass.

  Casually strolling over towards him, pretending to reach for a chip, I grabbed the binder sitting behind him and proceeded to plunder him over the head with it.

  “Ow! Okay. Bridger is so sexy and Jesse is a whore. Okay?” He made the statement with a Mariah Carey high pitched voice and a little flick of the wrist to match. My brother was a diva.

  Not okay.

  “She was just young. She made a mistake—a few of them. Don’t call women names—even if they’re not here.”

  West sobered. He hated “Yeah, okay, whatever.”

  Cocky little sap sucker.

  Plopping down on my bed, the cheap, worn out springs of a dorm room bed protested the weight of me. She’d called me on ignoring her all the time. I hadn’t expected that. Truth was, I didn’t know what to expect. Her physical appearance was in stark opposition to what she looked like when she was younger—but that flame inside was just the same. I knew it as soon as she spoke. And when she hopped up on that table, planting her firm ass on my books like it belonged there.

  It made me want to—well, it made me not want to continue studying anything but her.

  Wild—that’s what her name should be.

  I kicked one of my ten pound textbooks inch by inch until it fell from the edge of the bed onto the floor. I was quitting after this semester was over with, right? I studied my ass off all the time, never taking breaks for anything, but family events and church—because West made me go to church—because Cami made Stockton force West to make me go to church.

  Cami ruled our roost now—which was completely fine by the rest of us.

  “Don’t overthink it Bridge. Go over there, make fun of the people who can’t sing, buy the girl a beer. She’s just asking to catch up—she’s not asking for a ring or a cup full of your baby juice.”

  There was something very wrong with Weston Wright. I think my mom dropped him in a pile of sheep shit when he was little. He always said the most inappropriate things at the most inopportune times. Like right now—while I was in arm’s length.

  “Maybe I’ll come with you,” he shrugged. As if I would invite him. The boy had real issues.

  “No you won’t. Hell, I’m not even going to go. A girl like that? I couldn’t even keep Jesse entertained. Anyway, you’d do something stupid.”

  “No one can keep Jesse entertained, Bridger. That girl gets around more than the flu.”

  I laid back on the bed and threw my arm over my eyes pretending to get some shut eye so West would shut up. Why karaoke? What was wrong with coffee? I knew the girl drank coffee. Every damned time I went to get coffee there she was taking up all the coffee and sugar and tables.

  It’s not that small of a school.

  Despite my efforts to pretend to be asleep, West cranked up his heavy metal. I had two choices. Either I could lay there and listen to all the killing and stabbing or I could go to the gym. I hadn’t gotten any studying done at the library. Every time I touched a book or a pencil, I was reminded that Tate’s ass had been on it. She completely made and ruined the library for me—forever.

  Not to mention, that skirt.

  Skirts like that would make her preacher grandfather mortified.

  Sounded like excellent blackmail to me.

  I jolted up, ignoring the headbanging of West, grabbed my bag and a pair of shoes, and headed to the student gym. Before Stockton came into all his money, I used the student gym because it was free for all full-time students. It was a perk. Now I used it to avoid all the pseudo-athletes and their never-been-washed, brand new workout gear. I never understood why grown men and women got dressed up to work out. Yes, the women looked good in their little outfits. But it was flat out weird when the men came in with shoes that looked like they’d never hit the pavement much less the gym.

  It embarrassed me for them.

  Scuff the bastards in the parking lot and throw some sand on them. Make it look like they’ve been used once.

  A few blocks later, I walked into the sweat-smelling place and grabbed the first weight machine not being used. Lifting always made me think clearly. It took the edge off of the thinking part of me. I did that. I thought about things too much. I analyze and play things over and over in my head until I don’t know where to turn or what to do. Usually I just let Stockton tell me what to do.

  I know, it’s horrible and immature. But Stockton always has his head on straight. And I can’t figure people out in general. I must’ve read into every single word Jesse uttered the second time we were together. I thought that if I paid more attention—if I showered her with affection that maybe she wouldn’t have a reason to cheat again. The only blame to be placed was on me. There was something I wasn’t doing—something I’d fallen short on.

  It wasn’t going to happen again—that much I knew.

  But if it was—Tate could really break me. There was something so carefree about her—I’d never be able to contain that or even be a part of that whirlwind. I had a feeling it was either be free with her or be left behind.

  I couldn’t get over the change in Tate. My mind kept coming back to it over and over again. But even though most of the changes were drastic, some things remained the same. Her eyes were that same brilliant gray. They reminded me of smoke emerging from a chimney.

  And where there was smoke, there was fire.

  The creek was one place we went on a regular basis as children. When you lived in the country, the deep country like we did, life was what you made of it. We woke up with the sun, completed our chores, and then we were free. There were creeks to discover and frogs to catch. The creek was where I’d first seen her. She didn’t have a pink frilly suit like the rest of the girls so she just stood in the water, enjoying as much of the cool liquid as she could through her toes. I went home and told Mama about Tate and her lack of swimming attire.

  My dear mom bought Tate a suit the next day at a thrift store and left it on the porch while we all were at school. She swore me to secrecy. That was one of many lessons I learned from her about the honor in helping people without telling everyone in town what you’d done.

  The next time we were at the creek Tate was able to swim and from a distance, I was able to watch her bright smile and, for once, fitting in with the rest.

  Tate had been the focus of all my childhood crushes. I’d beat her in races just to see her cheeks flame red in anger. I’d put salamanders in her grandma dress’ pockets just knowing that later on she would discover the slimy reptiles and scream. I wrote her a note once and then buried it in an old homemade wine bottle near her farm. To what end, I didn’t know.

  I would’ve been the first to admit, I had no idea how to flirt with a girl like that. Hell, I had no clue how to flirt in general. But then Jesse happened.

  I didn’t have to flirt with Jesse.

  And in all those childhood crushes, Jesse hadn’t starred in any of them. I hadn’t planned on her. She barreled in, guns blazing, when I was a punk kid, ruled by my hormones instead of my brain
. She wasn’t my first kiss, but she was my first date, my first make-out session.

  My first heartbreak.

  The first time I’d purposefully sought out alcohol as salve for my wound.

  She was also the second of all those things.

  But there would never ever be a third. I may have been naïve and under experienced then, but that was a long time ago.

  I supposed one day I would have to put myself out there again.

  But in my mind it would be with someone humble, loyal and maybe a bit overly pious.

  Yes, pious girls didn’t go cheat on your with your best friend—twice.

  Images of coppery curls invaded those thoughts.

  I worked through three sets on each machine I could get on before deciding I’d had enough. The showers in the gym weren’t the best, but they were more private and cleaner than the ones in the dorm, so I made quick use of them and headed back to the dorms.

  West was gone when I returned. Glancing at my watch, I cringed. It was almost seven. The decision whether or not to go knocked at my door.

  Karaoke to me was akin to bending over in a worn pair of jeans and having them rip open in a packed room of silent people. It ripped, it was uncomfortable and it would make me feel all—exposed.

  The real question was, was it worth it?

  Was it worth all the discomfort and sheer embarrassment to get another taste of the new Tate?

  There was another level to karaoke, other than the singing that I just couldn’t tolerate. It was on television. Willa and Cami loved those damned shows. All action, speech and breathing had to cease in the Wright household when those shows came on. There was just something about them that embarrassed me to no end.

  I just couldn’t take it.

  The same cringing sensation flowed through me when I saw someone sing in public whether they were talented or not made no difference—the whole thing was too much to handle.