Every Time He Leaves (The Raeven Sisters Book 1)

by Karington, Anna

  “Not your type?” I shout back as I miss the ball. I chase after it as it rolls against the fence.

  “Not their type. I would throw myself under of any of those hard-bodied gods.” I grab the ball and whirl back around. She's checking her phone. “God, I should've stopped us sooner,” she says. “I thought we'd said eight.”

  “What?”

  “I'm supposed to meet Jarek at seven-thirty for dinner.”

  “Jarek?”

  She approaches the net. “Yeah. Didn't I mention we were getting together later?”

  “You mentioned plans, but you didn't specify.” I can't help but feel like I'm in competition with her, even though we've never been in competition over any man.

  It was just one night. He can hurry off and fuck her all he wants. Not my business. Isn't it, though? Don't I have a right to tell him, “Hands off my sis!”? Shouldn't I at least warn Kelsey about him—tell her how he left me and he could easily do the same with her? Of course, maybe he wouldn't leave her. Maybe I'm the only one he'd leave.

  “That's okay with you, isn't it?” she asks.

  I can tell by the look in her eyes that she doesn't care if I approve. “Why wouldn't it be?”

  “I just remember how you two used to get on, and I didn't know if there might be something still...lingering.” I scoff to demonstrate how that isn't the case at all, but my performance is obvious. If she knew me as well as Janet, she would know I'm full of shit, but she doesn't, so I doubt she'll catch my lie.

  “No,” I say. “It's fine. He's...he's nothing like he was back then.”

  “I know, right? Can you believe it? Did you ever think a guy like that would end up making so much money?”

  “I never thought he needed to make money.”

  “Lana, don't be silly. You know what I mean. Don't make this about something ridiculous. He's just so different—so much more ambitious...and charming.” She doesn't realize she's basically saying rich over and over again.

  “You think he's boyfriend material?” I ask.

  “Absolutely!”

  “He doesn't even live here. If you hook up with him, you know he'll fly back to California and not give you another thought?” I'm probably projecting here.

  She eyes me curiously. “Will I be the first girl to have a good time?”

  “Do whatever you want. I'm just saying if you're looking for something serious, I'd consider someone else. There's a reason he's still single.”

  “I'm playing it by ear, you know?”

  I imagine Jarek putting the same moves on her, caressing her the way as he caressed me the night before last, and it bothers me. But it shouldn't. I don't care about him. Although, if he ends up being my brother-in-law, I'll wind up in a straitjacket. That would be too much to handle.

  “Be safe and have fun,” I say, attempting to shield my true feelings.

  Even though Kelsey is the last person who would understand my feelings around this.

  Chapter Four

  I stop by Mom's to drop off some of the dishes I cleaned at my place after the party. As I set them in the kitchen, I see her through the window over the sink, tending to her garden. I put the dishes up and head outside.

  This is when I prefer to deal with Mom, when she's one with the earth. It's when she's happiest, when I know I won't badger so much. “How's it going?” I ask as I approach her.

  Her hair is hidden beneath a shiny white hat that hardly matches the dirt-covered gloves and boots she wears. She tears through the ground with a shovel as she lays seed, then moves on to the next spot and goes through the same motions. “Geoffrey got snippy with me today,” she says. Geoffrey Handler is the executor of Daddy's will. One of Daddy's buddies in college, he was never Mom's biggest fan.

  “Oh, really?” I ask.

  “I was trying to pull from that trust...just a little more to buy a little something.”

  “Why would you need to pull from it?”

  “A little facelift that I was hoping—”

  “A facelift?”

  “Lana, I don't like how it all looks. It's been bothering me for a while, and I want to get a little nip/tuck. Is that so awful?” She grabs the skin beneath her chin and wiggles it back and forth. “Look at this. Just look at it. I have to take my anxiety medication every time I look in the mirror.” This won't be her first facelift, but considering her last was three years ago, I feel this might be premature.

  “I guess not,” I say. “But why do you need to pull from the trust?”

  “It's our money, isn't it? We shouldn't have to rely on Mike's lack of foresight about the economy to make our financial decisions.”

  When Daddy passed, he'd given so much of his money to charities there wasn't much left. We made it for a few more years, but we knew the money was dwindling until Geoffrey discovered, through some of Daddy's paperwork, a Swiss account that held a substantial amount of money. Geoffrey explained Daddy had created this account as a sort of nest egg, and it's whereabouts had only been uncovered when he found the paperwork in an old lot box Geoffrey had neglected to check after Daddy's passing. With these documents were instructions from Daddy that each of us be granted a monthly allowance. While the amount was more than generous, Mom never liked the limitation. She insisted we contest the will, a prospect Janet and I fought violently against. We saw it as a sort of affront to our deceased father—an insult to argue with a man who could no longer justify his actions, ones he certainly didn't need to justify since the account provided us with more than enough to live on.

  “Can't you save up when you get your monthly stipend?” I ask.

  She groans and wipes her arm across her forehead. “I knew you wouldn't understand. I don't know why I even talk to you about these things. Your sister never has a problem understanding why I need these things.”

  “Because she'd probably do the same thing. I'm not Kelsey, though. And I'm sure Janet would see it the same way I do.”

  “If your father were alive, he'd be fine with me having my little tuck and nip or clip and whatever else I wanted. He'd want me to be happy. God knows if he'd wanted something, he wouldn't have hesitated to nab it. If he'd been better with money those last few years, we'd be set for two lifetimes each. Now we might as well be standing in line at the food bank.”

  “That's a bit of an exaggeration.”

  “You don't remember how much there was to begin with—how much he blew through. It'd kill you if you knew how much of our money that man wasted.” I want to explain that it was his money to do what he wanted with, but this is one of those times where it's best to bite my tongue. “I know, I know,” she continues. “Defend him all you want. I understand why you love him. You and everyone else did.”

  “And you,” I stress, reminding her that we're talking about her deceased husband and my father.

  “Of course, but I saw his faults. Most didn't. He had a way with people that you don't see in too many. He could flash a smile, and you just felt like everything was going to be all right. It was so disarming.”

  I remember when he would come home wearing that smile and wrap his arms around me and tell me that he was going to take us out to get ice cream. Funny how the prospect of such a simple outing made me the happiest girl in the world. Seems like it should have taken more to excite me, but just receiving that loving gaze and the simplest of treats was all it took. Daddy knew how to make all of us smile, even Mom. Though she held onto her moods frequently, he knew how to crack her. I always thought that was why they ended up together, because she needed him for those moments of release, and he must've enjoyed seeing her light up when she finally caved.

  “I guess all things must come to an end,” she says as she uproots a long vine that's in the way of her new seedling hole. She tosses it aside. It's sad hearing Mom say that about Daddy, and the apparent symbolism of her tossing the weed aside disturbs me. Surely it was unintentional, but it bothers me to think she could so easily discard her recollection of my father and trade it
in for a new face.

  The week passes quickly.

  I'm still scrambling around the office. And while everyone prepares for this internal audit, there are moments where I feel like I'm the only one doing anything. Derren sits, playing some app version of Scrabble—one he's always talking about. He's not even trying to hide it. Every time he amasses more points, he proudly announces it, ignoring my repeated reminders about the various tasks I need him to perform.

  Seeing that he won't be working today, I've started handling the tasks I passed along to him, despite my efforts to catch up with the scanning Stephanie should have completed months ago. But I can't be that mad at Stephanie today, because she's running around, too, though hers is because she's trying to cover her bases and appear as if she hasn't neglected a major account.

  I finish some emails, playing catch up with my regular routine— those responsibilities I have to complete while simultaneously prepping for this audit, including preparations for the fundraiser I'm supposed to have totally organized in two weeks.

  I check the time on the computer. 2:35 PM. One thing I'm sure of is that I will take a break. I won't spend the entire day working my ass off and neglecting it the way I usually do. Even if I just take thirty minutes, I'm getting out of this office. If Derren can sit on his ass and not give a shit for the whole day, I certainly deserve an hour.

  Once I've finished checking my emails, I start down the stairs. On my way out of the office, I run into anyone and everyone who could have something for me—some task or responsibility they want to add to my already drawn out to-do list. They hand me paperwork and tell me about emails I'm still working on addressing. Days like these, I feel as if I need a Xanax. Knowing how easy it would be to ask Mom for one, it's always tempting, but I've never caved to the temptation—if only because I don't want to her to get excited that I may have inherited her anxiety.

  As I round the corner at the main entrance, feeling as if I'm finally too far for anyone to accost me, I see...No. It can't be!

  Jarek stands on the other side of the glass wall before the lobby. He leans against the reception desk, gazing down at Victoria, a dark-haired, blue-eyed angel whose eyes are lit up, suggesting she's submitted to his magnanimous presence.

  I'm too stressed to deal with this at the moment. I start to turn back around when his gaze catches mine. I make like I just saw him, fake a smile, and do an awkward wave that I try to take back, but it just turns into this weird half-wave, half-muscle-spasm-looking-thing that I regret.

  He laughs, surely enjoying what an idiot I've made of myself. I make a goofy face, the way I used to when we were kids and he caught me in some precarious situation. His smile settles and he gazes at me softly so that I feel the heat rush to my face. Once again, my body betraying me. I can't blame Victoria for how she's fallen for him in their brief exchange. It's just his way. But what is he doing here?

  I open the glass door to the lobby. “Hey,” I say as casually as possible as I approach him. “What brings you here today?”

  “I thought I'd stop by to see if you wanted to go to lunch.” He looks just as stunning as he did the other night, in a striking gray suit with a navy blue tie. His hair is gelled up in the front, fashionably tousled in a way I imagine he learned from a hair stylist. It seems too meticulous for Jarek.

  “I'm actually running an errand,” I say. “And my lunch isn't for another hour. My boss is on lunch right now.” I’m such a liar.

  “Stephanie got back twenty minutes ago,” Victoria says. “If you want, I can check to make sure she's fine with you leaving.”

  Her intervention puts me in an awkward position, so I go with it. “That'd be perfect. Thank you so much.”

  She calls and Stephanie is, of course, fine with me going on lunch, so Jarek and I head across the street to a diner where I frequently grab lunch. I create my lettuce heaven at the salad bar and meet him in a booth he's found for us. He has a full plate with a burger and fries, which seems unfair considering I couldn't eat like that without serious physical consequences. Obviously, his abs aren't the product of a carefully managed diet. Just another reason I hate him.

  “I see you can still eat anything you want,” I say bitterly, as I used to when I was sixteen and saw him devour pasta while flaunting those flawless six-pack abs, the very ones I'd tried to convince myself for some time I wasn't at all attracted to.

  “Yeah...guess you've acquired a rabbit's taste buds.”

  “Unfortunately not, but the metabolism's the same as ever, so I do what I must.” He chuckles, and the friendly exchange lightens my tension about this lunch. “What brings you out here today?” I ask, more than a little curious. I don't imagine he was right next to my building.

  “I had a meeting at the W, and I was thinking that since I was so close, I'd drop in. That so weird?”

  “I guess not.” Maybe a little, but if any other friend had done that, I wouldn't really question it. However, he isn't a friend. He's someone I hooked up with the other night. Considering our history, he's more than that, and had I actually expressed how furious I really was with him, he'd know why this is totally inappropriate. However, since I didn't, I'm stuck having to act like I'm not still reeling from the emotions of that day.

  “How was your date with Kelsey?” I ask. I want it to come across as nonchalant, but I'm not that good at hiding how I feel, and I can feel the jealousy slip past my lips. It's too late to take it back, though. I hope he didn't catch it, or didn't take it as seriously as I feel I delivered it.

  He smirks. “I don't know if I'd call that a date.”

  “Oh, just trying to tend to all the Raeven girls’ needs while you're in town?” Another dig. This one feels warranted, considering he plowed both me and my sister. While I wish I could act totally cool about it, if he says he did something with her, I'm liable to leap across the table and stab him in the jugular with my fork.

  His smirk expands. “Jealous much?” Since he didn't outright say no or laugh at my suggestion, I assume he's playing coy.

  “There's nothing to be jealous of. It's your life and you can choose to see whomever you want. Even my sister.” I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!

  “You can say you're not jealous all you want, but I've known you since you were fourteen, and I know when you're annoyed.”

  “It's been a long time, Jarek. I'm not sure you know me as well as you think.” Like you clearly don't know how fucking mad I am at you for what you did!

  “Oh, really? Is that a challenge? Let's see if I can have a crack at it. You're not eating that much because you still feel like a chubby girl next to Kelsey. You dye your hair a shade darker than it really is because you think it doesn't make you look as plain as you think you normally look. You don't wear designer clothes because you don't like people who try to act better than they are. Yet you don't dress like a frumpy convenience store clerk because you know you have to do a little something to get by in this world. Your favorite food isn't salad. It's a grilled cheese sandwich, and if you were given the choice between that and strawberry shake, which you also love, you'd take the sandwich. And I bet you probably still sit around on Friday nights watching black-and-white slapstick comedies that you've seen a hundred times.”

  I don't know how to play cool when I feel like I've just been insulted with a dose of the truth. He doesn't deserve the victory. “I don't watch those movies anymore,” I say.

  He eyes me skeptically, and he has a good reason to, since I'm a liar. “Oh, really?”

  “Not even one.”

  “So all those VHSs on your bookshelf are just...keepsakes?”

  I nod repeatedly like a crazy person, trying to stifle every impulse that urges me to lash out at him. If he wants to pick at me, there are a few things I want to pick at him about.

  “Two can play at this game,” I say. “You wear your designer suits because you despise where you came from, which is delinquency. You got your fancy job because you grew accustomed to the lifestyle my fathe
r enabled you to become accustomed to. You probably wouldn't be the one to fix your car even in a life-or-death situation because it'd be so beneath you now. And I'm guessing that your last major relationship was with a girl named Tiffany or Jessica or some equally generic name.” His expression transforms from skepticism to hurt, and as cruel as some of my jabs were, I can't say I feel all that bad about it, since it's the truth.

  “Is that how you think of me now?” He sets his burger down and rises from the booth. He's only taken one bite out of his burger.

  “Am I wrong?”

  He stands there for a moment, as if trying to think of what to say. “I guess I was,” he says finally.

  “Was what?”

  “Wrong about you. Thanks for having lunch with me, Lana. It was nice seeing you again.”

  “You too,” I say curtly. He turns and leaves, and though it isn't easy, because it feels so similar to the last time this happened, it feels better knowing I did something to make it happen, that he left because I was a jerk to him.

  Does he think he has a right to be mad at me? After what he did, he doesn't have a right to be mad. He never has a right to be mad, though the longer I sit here with his hardly touched tray of food, the guiltier I feel about the severity of my attack. But what was I supposed to say after he assaulted me with all those things he didn't deserve to know about me? Was I even that far off about who he's become?

  I doubt it. If he can't take it, he shouldn't dish it out.

  Chapter Five

  Friday night, Kelsey texts to see if I want to meet her at a bar in Buckhead. Considering the week I've had, Jarek's visit included, I'm eager for an escape. I need a drink—a few, even. I just want to forget that Jarek even came to town...that I ever set eyes on him again.