Dirty Thoughts

by Megan Erickson

  And he really wanted to burn these clothes.

  Footsteps sounded in the hallway, and Cal looked up, expecting a doctor or nurse, but instead it was Brent. Cal frowned. “How’d you get here?”

  Brent held two cups of coffee and two muffins. He handed one of each to Cal. “I drove.” He sank down on the bench beside Cal and took a sip of his coffee.

  “I mean how’d you find out about Asher?”

  “Gabe called me. Said he thought you looked homicidal.”

  “I’m not homicidal.”

  “Well, he said you needed me, so here I am.” You needed me. Cal filed those words away to deal with later. “Doctors say he’ll be okay?” Brent asked.

  “He’ll be okay.” Cal rotated the cup of coffee in his hands and watched the tendrils of steam lick the air. He told himself to keep his mouth shut, but Brent’s quiet presence beside him loosened his tongue. “I feel like I failed him.”

  “Who? Asher?”

  “I told him he’d be safe here and—”

  “Don’t be stupid.”

  Cal glared.

  “No, seriously. You’re pulling that martyr shit again, and I’m not listening to it. It was an accident, Cal. Both Gabe and Asher knew better than to ride that shitty motorcycle around their house.”

  “I should have remembered to fix Gabe’s bike. I shouldn’t have put Asher off and taken him for a ride already. I told him I’d take him tomorrow, and so I know he was excited—”

  “Right. Asher was excited. And he’s a teenager and made a shitty decision. Gabe’s just an idiot all the time.”

  Cal snorted.

  Brent leaned down so he caught Cal’s eyes. “Don’t do this. You’ve done so much for that kid.”

  “I’m worried he’ll blame me.” Would he even want to stay here after this?

  “He’s not going to blame you.”

  Cal fell silent. He stood up and peeked through the window of Asher’s door to see large round eyes in a pale face staring at him.

  “He’s awake.” Cal pushed the door open, with Brent following at his heels. Cal went right to the bed, peering down at Asher’s dark hair flopped on the white sheet. “How ya feeling?”

  Asher’s stared at him for a minute, and then his lower lip trembled. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Hey, no need to cry.”

  Small sob sounds spilled from Asher’s chapped lips. “I’m so sorry, Cal!”

  “Whoa, whoa!” Cal pressed on Asher’s shoulders, stilling him, because the kid was squirming and probably making his head and arm ache more. “It’s okay. Don’t get yourself worked up.”

  “I shouldn’t have gotten on the back of Gabe’s bike, but he said he wouldn’t tell anyone and that he wouldn’t go fast. And then the bike jerked, and I wasn’t holding on tight enough, and—”

  “Kid, take a fucking breath,” Brent said in exasperation from the other side of the bed.

  Asher stopped talking, but his eyes were wet, with small tears trickling from the corners.

  Cal sank down into a chair beside the bed. Asher’s eyes followed his every movement. Cal gripped Asher’s good arm. “Take it easy. I’m disappointed you got on that bike, yeah. And I’m going to fucking kill Gabe. But you know it wasn’t the right thing to do. So I’m not going to nail ya for it. Lying in a hospital bed is punishment enough, yeah?”

  Asher nodded, and color returned to his face. “Yeah.” He turned his head to Brent and then back to Cal. He licked his lips and tried for a small smile. “Thanks for being here.”

  “ ’Course,” Cal said.

  “I hope I didn’t make you leave the party early.”

  Cal snorted. “Nah, you didn’t.”

  “Really?” Brent asked.

  Cal waved an arm at him. “I’ll tell you later.” To Asher, he said, “Look, I called your mom so the hospital has your insurance information. She wants you to call her.”

  Asher swallowed. “She’s not coming, then, I guess?”

  Cal gritted his teeth. “Don’t think so, buddy.”

  Asher shrugged, but it was forced.

  Cal stood up. “Brent and I’ll wait out in the hallway. Why don’t you give her a call?”

  After placing Asher’s phone in his hand, Cal followed Brent outside of the room, and then Cal proceeded to tell him everything about the fight with Dylan.

  Brent’s eyes were huge. “So he’s just jealous of his sister?”

  Cal ran his tongue over his teeth. “I think . . . it’s a lot about his pride. And that, for a man like him, is something he can’t get over.”

  “That is fucking crazy.”

  “Yep.”

  “He actually smashed his own face against the door.”

  “Yep.”

  Brent started laughing.

  “It’s not funny, Brent.”

  His brother was doubled over, hands on his knees. He raised a finger as another gasp of laughter overtook him.

  Cal crossed his arms and glared. Brent finally raised his head with watery eyes. “He smashed his own face! What fucking lunatic does that?”

  “Can you stop swearing? We’re in a fucking hospital!”

  And that sent Brent into a whole other gale of laughter. When Cal realized what he’d said, he began laughing too. Although he sobered quickly when he remembered Jenna scolding him for swearing in the grocery store.

  When Brent caught his breath, he said, “What did Jenna do?”

  That sobered Cal up quickly. “Believed him, I guess. I don’t give a shit.”

  Brent frowned.

  “It’s my word against Dylan’s, and it was in front of her whole company. What choice does she have?” His heart felt like it was being tugged out of his body, piece by fucking piece. He’d had her for a whole month. A month that had been the best of his life since she’d left him the first time. He wished he could go back to that time on the dance floor, when he told her he loved her, when he’d handed her his entire heart. “If she still thinks I’m just like that eighteen-year-old kid, then what the hell are we even doing being together, you know? Maybe I should have just punched him.”

  “You think he’ll press charges?”

  Cal ran his hands through his hair. “Shit, didn’t even think about that. I won’t let her bail me out this time. I can afford to defend myself.”

  “Don’t worry about that now. Let’s get Asher taken care of, first.”

  Cal pushed the MacMillans to the corner of his mind, back to where he couldn’t see them and where they couldn’t affect him, and he opened the door to visit his brother in the hospital bed.

  JENNA’S WHOLE BODY felt numb.

  Dylan was whimpering about how Cal had punched him in the nose. Her mother was fanning herself on a chair someone had brought over as she twisted her necklace nervously, eyes skittering around the room like a hunted deer. Her father was comforting Dylan, checking his eyes, nose, and teeth like her brother was a stud horse.

  The employees who had heard the commotion were standing around talking in hushed whispers, trying to hide their pointed fingers and accusing looks.

  This party had been perfect. It’d been the culmination of hard work and perfect planning and in one fell swoop, the walls had crashed down around her.

  The country club employees were ushering people back into the main room, and Jenna could only hope that most of them had imbibed enough for this whole thing to be a little fuzzy.

  She swallowed, took a deep breath, and walked toward her brother.

  Her mother’s feeble voice called her name, but Jenna ignored her, her eyes on the two men in her life who screwed everything up once, but over her dead fucking body would they do it again.

  She’d seen the blood smear on the bathroom door, but she wasn’t sure if her father had seen it or had chosen to ignore it.

  She’d also seen the look in Cal’s eyes. The flare of defiance before a grim acceptance.

  What she didn’t see were cut knuckles. What she didn’t see was the look of a Cal wh
o’d lost his temper. Cal had changed. He wasn’t the same man he’d been back when he’d broken Dylan’s nose. He was passionate without the anger. He had more control. She had to believe that, because if not, they didn’t have much of a future.

  And dammit, Cal loved her. He loved her. She clung to that like a life preserver.

  Then there was the mystery of how her brother had a bloody face. Cal, she believed in. Her brother, she did not.

  Dylan must have heard the click of her heels, because he raised his head and narrowed his eyes above his swollen nose. “Look what your white-trash boyfriend—”

  She slapped him. Right across the face, his skin blooming white at the impact.

  Her palm stung, and she shook it before wiping it on the side of her dress.

  “Jenna!” her father said, a hand on Dylan’s shoulder but eyes blazing at her. “What on earth—”

  “What really happened, Dylan?” She refused to look away from her brother, wanting to be witness to the guilt washing over his face.

  “I told you, he—”

  “See, no. I don’t think Cal had anything to do with what happened to your face.”

  “He punched me before. You think he wouldn’t punch me again?”

  “Tell me why there’s a smear of blood on the bathroom door.”

  Her father strained his neck to look at the door behind him, but Dylan kept his eyes locked on hers. “What are you, CSI?”

  “Dylan.”

  “Well, he shoved me—”

  “You said he punched you.”

  “H-he did both.”

  The fire in her belly was starting to rise up her throat. “Try that lie again without stuttering.”

  Dylan’s eyes clouded. “You think I—”

  “I’m not sure what to think. What’s going on in my mind is pretty disgusting. So how about you tell the truth?”

  Dylan stayed mute.

  Her father turned to his son with a furrowed brow. “What’s going on?”

  “Tell me how your nose got bloody. Tell me, Dylan. Because I don’t think Cal did it.”

  Dylan opened his mouth but then shut it again.

  Her father dropped his hand from Dylan’s shoulder and stepped back, eyes wide. “Tell your sister the truth.”

  “I’m going to ask one more time,” Jenna said. “Did Cal hit you?”

  Dylan swallowed. She expected him to start up the accusations again, but something flickered in his eyes, a little bit of regret mixed with embarrassment. And then, he shook his head, just once, confirming what she already knew.

  “Dylan!” her father said sharply.

  “Did you injure yourself?” Jenna asked.

  Dylan clenched his jaw. “The truth doesn’t matter. Everyone thinks he did it, and that’s what matters. Now everyone sees you’re not so perfect.”

  He hissed the last word, and it made Jenna want to rip her last name up into tiny shreds between them like bathroom tissue. “You did this whole thing just to make me look bad? You’re a grown man, and all you did was make yourself look like an idiot. You want me to believe he did it so I’ll dump him, because I’d have no other choice. I couldn’t work at MacMillan and stay with the guy who punched my brother at a company party.” She took a step away from them. “Well, this time, you’re wrong. Because if that’s my choice, I quit. Find something else to focus your energy on rather than competing with me, because I’m done.”

  She turned away from her gasping brother and father, past her mother’s soft protests, and walked back out into the ballroom. She held her head high, despite the whispers. Because she’d done nothing wrong. Cal had done nothing wrong. But at the moment, she didn’t care one bit about the rumors. All she cared about was getting to Cal.

  After grabbing her purse, she ran outside, pausing to take off her shoes, not caring about the stones in the parking lot.

  But Cal’s truck wasn’t there, and she could see the marks of his tires, showing he’d taken off like a bat out of hell.

  She called his phone, but it went right to voicemail. She texted him: Call me.

  Her phone stayed silent. So she called Delilah, who’d left the party early, hoping her friend could pick up her stranded butt from the country club.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  CAL CALLED JILL again the next morning to tell her Asher was being discharged.

  He held the hospital phone to his ear while Asher was in the bathroom. “What did you say?”

  Her voice trembled. “I left my husband.”

  Cal swallowed, and he stared at his boots. “Okay.”

  “I guess it was the news that Asher was hurt that made me think . . . that made me realize what was happening, letting his father put him at risk. I don’t want my son hurt.”

  Cal clenched his jaw and rubbed his forehead. Asher hurt. Like he had been under Cal’s watch. “Glad to hear that.”

  “Don’t tell Asher yet, though, please. I need to get some things sorted here, and then I’ll be in touch, all right?”

  To take him home. Where he belonged. Which wasn’t with Cal. “Yeah, okay.”

  “I’ll call soon.”

  Cal hung up the phone. So that was it. This fantasy family was vaporizing in front of his eyes. Wasn’t this what he wanted? To be alone again?

  And if so, why did this hurt so much?

  ASHER WAS STILL a little pale as Cal helped him into his truck. The kid had been discharged earlier that morning after a night in the hospital. He was now the owner of a bright, lime green cast and a fresh set of stitches on his scalp. They were on the shaved side of his head, which irked Cal because he had to see them.

  Asher was smiling, albeit weakly, and said he just wanted to get home and play video games. Apparently the non-high-definition television in the hospital room wasn’t to his liking.

  Cal glanced at his phone in the center console of his truck. He’d left it off overnight and hadn’t bothered to turn it on. It all could . . . wait. Yeah, just wait.

  Asher turned to him when they were halfway home. “I’m sorry.”

  “You already said that. And it’s okay.”

  “Yeah, but I don’t think it is. I just . . . you said you’d take me for a ride soon, that I’d earned it, so I didn’t think anything of letting Gabe drive me around for a little . . . ”

  “So what exactly happened?”

  Asher sighed. “Gabe said his bike had been acting up, so he got some shop to fix it. It’s a couple of towns over, because there’s no one in town that’s certified to fix bikes.”

  That stung, because Cal could have fixed it if he’d remembered. Instead, Gabe had gone to someone else, who might not have known what he was doing. Fuck.

  “So,” Asher continued, “he said he wanted to test it out.”

  “At night?”

  Asher bit his lip. “It was just around the house.”

  The stupidity of the whole situation was incredible. “Go on.”

  “So he was going slow, and I wasn’t holding on really tight. Over the driveway, he gunned it a little, and . . . I don’t know, something happened. It didn’t sound right. And next thing I knew, I was in the air and landing on the ground.” Asher put a knee to the bench and turned to look at Cal. “I feel like I really messed things up between us.”

  Things were messed up, but it wasn’t Asher’s fault. “You didn’t.”

  “You sure?”

  The kid would be relieved when he found out his mother had made the right decision and he could go back home. For now, though, he had to heal. The rest would all come later. “Positive.”

  Once they were parked in Cal’s driveway, he helped Asher out of the truck and then grabbed the kid’s bag of clothes out of the back that Brent had brought to the hospital.

  He was halfway to the open door when he heard Ash yell, “Jenna!”

  Cal froze. He heard her voice from inside the house, talking to Asher, and the boy’s excited tone, laced with tears.

  Part of him wanted to get back i
n the truck and drive away. Far, far away. The other part of him wanted to tell Jenna to go the hell home.

  And the other part . . . the one he didn’t want to acknowledge . . . wanted to rush inside and wrap her in his arms and tuck his nose into her neck, breathing in her scent and feeling her hands massage his back.

  His feet carried him to the door, and he stood in the entrance, watching a fresh-faced Jenna fawn over Asher. She was wearing a pair of jean shorts and oversized T-shirt.

  Asher was on the couch now, a pillow under his head, the video game controller in his hands. He was smiling up at Jenna like she . . . like she was the sun. And Cal’s heart sank down into the toe of his boots.

  She was here for Asher. She must be. The girl had a huge heart. She cared about the kid as much as Cal did.

  When the sound of yelling and swords clanging came from the TV and the fast clicking of buttons from the controller, Jenna straightened up, blowing a stray lock of brown hair out of her face that had slipped from her ponytail.

  They stared at each other. Cal hadn’t moved from the doorway. He was still wearing the clothes he’d worn last night. He was sure he looked like hell. Because he felt like hell.

  She motioned toward the kitchen with her head. He dropped Asher’s bag on the floor, shut the door behind him, and followed her.

  “What’re you doing here?” His voice was harsh from the stale air of the hospital.

  She had a sponge in her hand and was scrubbing the sink. Scrubbing the sink?

  “I’m cleaning.”

  He leaned against the counter beside her and crossed his arms over his chest. “You’re cleaning.”

  “Yes. Why don’t you go take a shower? And maybe a nap?”

  She was telling him what to do now? “How did you get in here?”

  The look she shot him could freeze hell. “You gave me a key.” She said it slowly, like he was an idiot.

  That didn’t explain what she was doing. “I don’t—”

  She sighed, really heavily, like every muscle in her body hurt. “Cal, please. Just go take a shower and lie down. I’ll bring you some food.” She paused and bit her lip. “Then we’ll talk.”

  He bristled. “Not sure—”