by Cherrie Lynn
Brian shoved his hands back through his hair. “What the fuck do I do, Evan?”
He blew out his breath. “Nothing now. Wait. I’m sorry I don’t have better news to tell you.”
“Goddamn it.”
Evan put a hand on his arm, glancing back at Candace. “I need to talk to you about something else. Come over here.”
He went around the corner of the building with Evan, his mind adrift in such misery that at first he didn’t even wonder what his brother might have to say. Once Evan turned to him with his brow creased and his mouth set in a tight line, he felt a tingle of unease. Maybe seeing him out here wasn’t such a good thing, after all.
“I got a call from a friend at the police department this morning. Jameson Andrews has filed an assault charge against you. You need to go in and give your statement.”
The nightmarish haze in his thoughts turned into a vicious black hole, consuming everything. “Lousy lowlife son of a motherf—”
Evan cut in, his voice firm, as Brian walked furious circles trying to contain the urge to slam his fist into the brick wall and pretend it was Jameson’s face. “If you don’t go in, Brian, there’ll be a warrant issued for your arrest.”
“I can’t leave, man, I gotta—”
“Look, I realize you’re worried about your place and getting it cleaned up, but there’s nothing else you can do here right now and I don’t want to see you hauled off in handcuffs. Candace doesn’t need to see it, either. You need to go and get this taken care of. All right? Brian? Look at me.”
“That bastard most likely did this, and now…” Brian stopped pacing, took a breath and tried to calm down. Finally he lifted his head and looked Evan in the eyes. “All right. What am I looking at?”
“It depends. It’s a class A misdemeanor, and we don’t prosecute those, the county attorney does. It could all get dropped, or you could be looking at a stint on probation. Probably not any jail time, although it’s possible.”
“That’s fucking marvelous.”
“Like I said, that’s unlikely, especially if you’re cooperative. That’s why I’m telling you to get your ass to the station now.”
“Do I need my lawyer?”
“Are you fighting it?”
“I don’t guess. I only did it in front of three other people.”
“You can call him if you want, but it’ll probably be the same outcome either way. Do you want me to go with you? I can’t do much except wait outside for you.”
For some reason, he needed that. Even if Evan wasn’t in any position to help, he’d feel better knowing he was around.
Pride didn’t go down very easily, and it tasted like shit when it did. “Yeah, if you don’t mind. I guess I can tell Candace I have to go in because of this.” He gestured to his parlor. “But I don’t want to lie to her.”
“Probably best you don’t. Does she have somewhere to go?”
“She came with me, and I don’t want her going home by herself.”
Evan reached forward and put his arm around his shoulders. “Come on, then, and let’s figure something out.”
Candace bit her lip as the men came back from the side of the building. She’d heard raised voices, but she hadn’t been able to make out the words. Both of them were wearing identical expressions, but then she’d just realized that if you took Brian, cleaned him up and stuck him in a suit and Ferragamos, you’d have Evan. The resemblance was striking.
And now, they both resembled carved granite statues. Brian motioned for her, and she left the group of his friends and employees she’d been huddled with. Her heart hadn’t quit its frantic pounding since he’d first told her what happened, and it tripled at the look on his face.
“Your brother has filed charges on me,” he said sharply.
“Oh, my God, Brian.”
“I have to go to the police department before they cart my ass off to jail, and you have a final, so—”
She tried to understand that he was extremely upset, but his tone wounded her. “If someone can take me home, I’ll be fine.”
“I don’t want you to go home.”
“I’m not going to have a nervous breakdown if I have two hours by myself,” she snapped. “My family isn’t going to kidnap me and ship me off to a convent. I’ll catch a ride home with Starla or someone, and I’ll be okay.”
“All right, fine,” he said, starting to turn away toward Evan’s truck. “I’ll call you after I’m done.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t bother.”
He froze, looking back at her. “What?”
“I’ll wait for you,” Evan muttered to him before walking away so they could talk.
Candace waited until he was out of earshot before she dared open her mouth. “It’s obvious what’s going on here. You’ll hardly look at me, you’re barking at me like I wronged you somehow, and I get it. It’s fine. If you’d never gotten mixed up with me, you’d still have your parlor, and you wouldn’t be going to the police station right now. I’m just—”
“Goddamn it, Candace, don’t do this right now. Not now. I can’t hear this from you on top of everything else.” The expression on his face would be in her nightmares tonight. “Excuse me for having my livelihood trashed all to hell and a shiny new criminal record out of the deal. I’ve got enough shit to deal with, don’t you think?”
“No one said you had to hit Jameson. I never asked you to do that. But at the same time, I didn’t have to run off on Deanne’s wedding and piss everyone off. It’s no more your fault than mine, Brian, but maybe this isn’t the best thing for us right now.”
He was still stuck on her statement about Jameson. “I wasn’t about to stand there and listen to him talk about you that way.”
“Fair enough, but that was your decision. I told you to let me handle things. And now, I’m asking you to let me handle this.” She wanted to weaken at the look on his face, but she had to stand her ground this time. “You take your time getting everything back on track. It looks like you have a lot of work ahead of you. Let me try to smooth things over with my family. Maybe once everything is settled, we can try again, if we’re inclined.”
“No,” he said, and she felt her heart shatter at the sudden pleading in his voice. His hand came up as if he meant to touch her face, but he caught himself. She really wished he hadn’t. One touch and maybe she would forget all this, forget what she had to do. “I’m sorry my head is fucked up right now, all right? I’m sorry if I made you feel like I blame you. I don’t, I swear. Can we talk about this when we’re more rational?”
She gave him a sad smile. “I’m perfectly rational right now. If you were, too, you’d realize that I’m right. It isn’t just about what they’re going to put me through. It’s what they’re going to put you through too.”
“I’m a big boy. It might not look like it right this minute, but I can take it. I think you forget where I came from. I think they do, too.”
“I don’t know if I can take it.”
“So you’re giving up. You’re going to live under their rule for the rest of your life. Marry whatever buttoned-down yuppie they throw your way and pop out a half-dozen kids.”
“And what do you have envisioned for the future?” she snapped. “I want to finish school and have a career. I would like to have a family someday. You probably think that sounds like a life of hell—”
“You’re pigeonholing me, and I don’t fucking like it. I’m doing what I love right now. Every day, I get to create works of art and help people express themselves. I watch their faces light up when they see how their new ink came out, and I see their eyes well up when it’s something that means the world to them. I never need to do anything else. I don’t want to.” He stabbed a finger toward the building. “That’s my fucking future, Candace, right there. Anyone who’s going to be a part of my life has to realize that.”
“And they’re trying to destroy it because of me. Don’t you see?”
“Listen, I have to go. But I will c
all you later, and you’ll answer, and we’ll talk about this.”
“It’s just going to make things harder—”
“I told you I wouldn’t let you get away from me the next time you run. I meant it.” His gaze continued to bore into hers, even as he walked away to Evan’s truck and popped open the door. “I meant it, Candace.”
She watched them pull away, feeling lost and alone and…a million other things, none of them good. Starla—who along with every cop milling around the place must’ve heard every word they’d flung at each other—came up and put an arm around her shoulders. “Come on, I’ll take you home.”
The ride was tense, Starla’s makeup-less face showing all the devastation she was feeling. Candace told her where to go and then didn’t know what else to say. After hearing everything that was said just now, maybe Starla blamed her too.
It wasn’t until they pulled in to the parking lot that she spoke. “Don’t leave him like this. He needs you, even if he can’t admit it. Brian is moody. Things get to him. If you leave him right now, it’ll kill him.”
“It might kill me if I stay. This weekend has been…” She drew a breath. “It’s been beautiful and amazing and the scariest thing that’s ever happened to me in my entire life.”
Starla’s brown eyes searched her face intently. “You’re in love for the first time. Of course it’s scary. But you don’t run away from it. Now is when you stand together and push through.”
“My family is going to try to make his life hell. It looks like they’re already starting to do it. He doesn’t need me.”
“Then if I were you, I’d give them hell right back.”
Chapter Twenty
Brian stared out Evan’s truck window, glaring at the world. They’d just left the police department, where he’d sat and written out everything that transpired at Candace’s apartment yesterday. He wasn’t too concerned with what was going to happen with all that. It was aggravating, but nothing compared to what was left of his parlor.
Or what was left of his relationship with her.
The police had been interested in the fact that his place had been vandalized the very night of the fight. Jameson obviously wasn’t smart at all. It was just a matter of finding someone who could place the bastard at the scene, or proof that he’d been there.
“You all right over there?” Evan asked.
“No. Pull over at the next convenience store. I need cigarettes. As soon as I get some, I’m gonna light up five of ’em simultaneously, and inhale those fuckers.”
“Had you quit or something?”
He paused, considering telling him he only hadn’t smoked one yet today, because he honestly didn’t think he was going to get through this day without nicotine. But the truth tumbled out on its own. That was happening a lot lately. “Yeah.”
“Then I’m not pulling over. Hang in there, man.” Evan chuckled. “No wonder you clocked Jameson. You must be climbing the walls.”
“That didn’t have anything to do with why I put that asshole’s lights out.”
“All right. Tell me the story.”
Brian glared over at Evan. “Are you my brother or my prosecutor right now?”
“I’m always your brother, you hotheaded little shit. But you need to exercise better judgment.”
“Really. Let me ask you something, brother. What would you have done if, the day you and Kelsey got back from Hawaii that first time, she had a brother who got in her face and called her a whore right in front of you?”
Evan blew out a whistle. “Damn. I watched her ex-husband call her a bitch the day she caught him and Courtney together. No—he told her to quit acting like a bitch. I lunged, but he jumped back and the girls got between us. Kelsey was in my face yelling at me not to throw everything away over him, because he wasn’t worth it. I thought it totally would be just to feel the bastard’s jaw connect with my fist one time.”
“It did feel pretty damn good. Not so much now, though.” He flexed his fingers, wincing as pain flared through knuckles that were still sore. “You had a hell of a lot more to lose than I did, though.”
“Sounds like you’ve got plenty to lose,” Evan said pointedly. “Don’t mess things up with her by acting like a lunatic. If you want to win her family over, decking her brother isn’t the way to go about it.”
“To hell with her brother. And her family.”
“Okay, how about this, then. I don’t think it’s a good idea to nearly break your drawing hand on a piece of trash like Jameson Andrews.”
“My hand is fine,” he snapped.
“They’re going to come at you any way they can. I don’t think I can get you out of this one.”
“I haven’t asked you to, and don’t do me any favors. I’ll suffer the consequences and like it, as long as it’s for her.” His brother digested that in silence for a while, staring straight ahead at the road. Brian watched him, thinking of a thousand things he wished he’d never done, never said. “Does it freak you out being a dad?”
Evan laughed. “You’re all over the map today, boy.”
“Does it?”
“It makes me feel about a million different things. Mostly insanely happy, but freaked out is definitely in there somewhere… Wait. Shit, Brian. Tell me Candace isn’t pregnant.”
He shrugged. “Anything’s possible.”
“Do you love this girl?” It wasn’t a gentle question. It held all the promise that if Brian gave the wrong answer, Evan was going to pull over and throw him out of the truck.
“I’m fucking crazy about her.”
“Fucking crazy I’ve gathered. But I asked if you love her. I asked if you’ll say the words. I’m talking true, enduring, unconditional, hold-her-hair-while-she’s-puking-from-morning-sickness love.”
“Hell, yes, I’ll say the words! I love her. I told her I love her. I’ll hold any frigging thing she wants me to.”
“Well, you damn sure didn’t talk to her like you loved her earlier. I thought about emasculating you right there in front of everyone.”
“You didn’t hang around long enough to see me grovel. And I appreciate your restraint. I feel emasculated enough as it is.” He reached up and rubbed his face hard. “But I do love her.”
“She’s a sweet girl. Don’t screw up anymore, Brian. And don’t get her pregnant, please? For God’s sake? You are not ready for that level of commitment and respons—”
“Don’t give me your shit, man, it’s not as if I’m trying to. You weren’t either, if I recall.”
Evan grinned. “Kelsey says we’re so in love we can’t help but bond even at the molecular level.”
“You’re not going to be one of those couples who has nineteen kids, are you?”
“Nah. We definitely want at least one more, maybe two, but not right away. Alex is a handful.”
“You know, as I was sitting in the police department earlier, I had a thought.”
“Uh-oh.”
“At this point, if it weren’t for Candace, I would have no problem moving away with you and Kelsey. Starting over somewhere else…yeah, it sounds pretty awesome right about now. You were right. But now she’s in the picture, and…” He trailed off, frustrated at his own inability to express in words what he was feeling: that no matter what she said to him, or what she did, he wasn’t going anywhere. He could keep his word on that, at least.
“You’ll get things up and going again, don’t worry. Shut down for a couple of weeks or so, get everything functional and you’ll be fine. While you were in giving your statement, I called to have your front windows replaced. They’re going to get to it as fast as they can, so at least everything will be protected from the elements.”
“Thanks, man. For everything. And I’m sorry about all— Shit. I’m just sorry.”
Evan glanced at him, then clapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t mention it.”
Brian drew a deep breath, trying to clear out all the gnawing emotion. “Does Dad know?”
“Yeah, I
called him too. He’ll help out any way he can. We all will.”
“You guys have given me too much already. I’m starting all over again.”
“Now you’re just being dramatic. Your insurance should cover criminal mischief.”
“That’s great and all, but I still feel like I’m rebuilding the place practically from the ground up, and I want that piece of crap to pay for it, because he can. This was personal, and I want it taken out of his ass.”
“Regardless, we can’t sit around and wait for that to happen. I know you’re pissed, but keep your head on straight.” When Brian didn’t reply, Evan went on. “Everyone is really proud of you, whether you see it or not. And we’re all outraged about this. The damage is definitely in the felony range. If Jameson Andrews did this, they won’t let me work the case but I’ll have a damn good time watching his ass get nailed for every penny.”
They turned onto Dermamania’s street, and Brian’s stomach pitched in sick dismay as the eyesore it now was swung into view. Dramatic, my ass, he thought. Somehow, after being away for a few hours, it looked even worse than before. “You and me both.”
Candace took the week to concentrate on her finals and unwind from the wild events of the prior weekend. Once that was over and done with—and she somehow passed all her courses—she welcomed the lazy days of summer break. She didn’t plan on having too many of them; she spent most of her time poring over want ads and turning in job applications. Even if it was something part time she could fit around her class schedule this fall, having that tiny bit of independence could only be helpful to the soul.
And thank God, she got her period. When it was a day late, she’d nearly panicked, thinking that one moment of forgetfulness might’ve had far more serious repercussions than she’d imagined possible. It might feel awesome and romantic in the moment to think about Brian’s baby growing in her belly, but for twenty-four long hours she’d done nothing but bite her nails and wonder what on God’s green earth she’d do with a kid at this point. Yeah, she’d definitely been scared straight on that one. She’d gone straight to her doctor and gotten on the Pill.
