by Mia Ashlinn
“Aw,” Ella said on a sigh. “That is a sweet story.”
“Sweet?” Katie-Anne queried. “I just said that my elopement blew up in my face, and I almost ended up a miserable, annulled maiden.”
“Maiden, my ass,” Jaycee mumbled with just enough volume that Katie-Anne could hear.
Childishly, Katie-Anne stuck her tongue out at Jaycee who snickered.
“But you worked it out so it doesn’t matter,” Ella murmured with a careless shrug, breaking up the teasing between Katie-Anne and Jaycee. “Love conquered all. And all that good stuff.”
Katie-Anne smiled. Her friend was right. They’d worked it out, and that was what mattered. All of the pain and suffering had not been for naught. And it wasn’t like she hadn’t learned from the experience. Actually, she’d learned a lot of lessons about herself as well as everyone around her during the past few months, lessons that made her stronger and lessons that made her better. At least she hoped they did. Time will tell.
“I wish you would have shared all of this with us before now,” Shannon murmured softly, a distinct catch in her sultry voice. “I would have loved to be with you at your wedding. I would have wanted to be by your side when your heart was breaking. I love you, Katie-Anne, and it hurts that I wasn’t there for you.”
God. Katie-Anne felt horrible, selfish, and downright mean—all rolled into one. She’d known it would be hard for her friends to accept, but she hadn’t expected the pain in their eyes, especially Jaycee and Shannon. When it came down to it, she’d blocked her two closest friends out of the most special day of her life. And she’d done it without even really considering their feelings. I’m an evil bitch.
“I’m sorry, Shan,” Katie-Anne croaked, speaking around the thick lump in her throat. “I should have told you about the wedding before now. Hell, I should have told you about our plans before we left for Tennessee. But, I didn’t, and I can’t change it—even though I would give just about anything to go back in time so you guys were by my side. As far as you not being there during the aftermath, that is complete and utter bullshit. You were there for me every step of the way. You all were.”
Predictably, Katie-Anne got choked up, moisture leaking from the corners of her eyes. “That is one of the many beautiful things about you guys. I don’t have to tell you the reason I’m upset. You just know that I am, and you take care of me. You deal with my inner bitch, and you soothe my sad soul.” Without wasting the time to dab at the tears, she took a breath and pushed out the rest of the sappy words. “I love that about our friendship. Whenever I need you, I know you’re there.”
“Well, what’s a friendship ménage without love and commitment?” Jaycee inquired teasingly. Yet, with the tears trickling down her face, her joke came off as highly emotional and not amusing at all. “It would be more like a dreary old gangbang, and we wouldn’t want that would we?”
Nodding, Katie-Anne half-laughed. “No, not really. ‘Wham, bam, thank you ma’am’ times five or ten isn’t my kind of thing.”
“Me either,” Shannon said, wiping the moisture from her own eyes. “I might have three men, but I don’t do gangbangs.”
Sarah groaned as she blotted her cheeks with a napkin she’d picked up. “We have conversational ADD. Seriously, we need help. We start with closet artists and secret marriages then we wind up talking about gangbangs. What’s next?”
Ella snorted, appearing to be only non-weepy mess at the table. “There isn’t a damn person in the world who could help us.” With a grin, she added, “And do you really want to know where we are going to go next? You’ll probably run like the wind, sweet Sarah.”
“I say our conversational ADD is a part of our charm,” Shannon said. “If people don’t like it, they can fuck the hell off.”
“Don’t hold back, Shan,” Jaycee muttered. “We want to know exactly how you feel.”
Dragging in a long breath, Katie-Anne held it in until her lungs burned. The time had come to tell them her deepest, darkest secret. She couldn’t wait any longer, or she wouldn’t get it out at all. With her emotions still off-kilter, she would prefer to just get up and leave. But she wasn’t going to be a pussy. No, I’m going to tell my friends the truth. They should have heard it a long time ago.
Pulling in every ounce of courage she had and releasing her breath with a hiss, Katie-Anne whispered, “My mom abused me.”
Four shocked eyes flew to her face then four curses split the air. A “shit” from Jaycee, a “motherfucker” from Shannon, a “bitch” from Ella, and a “H.E. double hockey sticks” from Sarah filled the booth. Then all of them reached for her, putting their hands wherever they had room to touch her.
Draping an arm around Katie-Anne’s shoulder, Shannon said one comforting word after another as she pulled her into the softness of her side. Across from Katie-Anne, Sarah touched her arm gently while Jaycee and Ella took one hand apiece.
They all murmured to her, their soothing, loving words touching her down to the depth of her soul. However, none of them pushed her for any details, and Katie-Anne was grateful. She needed a moment to catch her breath. After all the revelations in the past twenty-four hours, her stress and chaotic emotions seemed to be taking a toll on her.
Tears ran down Katie-Anne’s cheeks unchecked, and she sucked in air through her teeth. Willing away the sobs, she focused on the here and now. And she thought about the people around her and the men in her life.
Finally getting herself back under control, she explained the whole story to them, from the first incident to the last. When she was done, all four women seemed drawn, their emotions winding them tight. Each woman had a different look, ranging from perplexed to appalled to angry and even agonized.
Pausing, Katie-Anne let everything sink in and waited for them to say something. Only they didn’t. None of them spoke. They just sat with her in stony silence, obviously unsure of how to respond. After several eternities, or what felt like it, Shannon announced, “Well, we all knew your mother was a sick bitch, Katie-Anne. But those weren’t the act of a bitch. That woman was a goddamn monster.”
A visibly shaken Jaycee asked, “Why didn’t you say anything to us? Or Gray? Or, hell, anyone?”
“Because,” Katie-Anne said but broke off, unsure of how to justify her actions. “I don’t know. I just couldn’t say it. I was ashamed and scared of what she would do to me afterward. But, mostly, I didn’t want to tell anyone because I kept thinking that, with time, I could make her love me. If I told someone, then there was no way in the world she would ever love me.”
Rubbing her temples, Katie-Anne sighed. “It’s funny how, as a child, all I wanted was for my mother—I mean Isabella—to love me. Yet no matter what I did, she didn’t love me. Not when I was born and not any day afterward. Up until the day she died, Isabella used me, and she hated me. I couldn’t do anything right. Or say anything right. I was never good enough or pretty enough or smart enough. Do you know what that is like?”
Katie-Anne closed her eyes. “There were days that I hated myself. There were days I wanted to crawl in a hole and die. She did that to me. She made me believe that I wasn’t loveable. My own mother convinced me that I was worthless. And, even though deep down I knew I wasn’t a bad person, I couldn’t manage to get past it. I just kept thinking that if she didn’t love me, no one would.”
Shannon opened her mouth, but Katie-Anne cut her off. “I know what you are going to say, Shan,” she said. “You two love me, but it is different. When a mother doesn’t love her child, it does something to them. Or, at least, it did to me.”
“I wasn’t going to say that,” Shannon told her. “Although, it’s true. But I was going to say that your mother did love you.”
“Huh?” Katie-Anne inquired. “I’m confused.”
“Your mother was Caroline,” Shannon proclaimed, “not Isabella. And she loved you to death. I remember how she used to send me letters and little bird knick-knacks to give to you. And I remember how she snuck around to see
you whenever she could. Hell, she didn’t live here, but she came to visit you practically every weekend.”
“Yeah,” Jaycee agreed. “She told Gray and your Dad, didn’t she? It might have taken her awhile to get around to it, but she did. Even though Isabella had threatened you and her, Caroline tried to help you. She gave up her life to get you away from that psychotic bitch.”
“I’m willing to bet that she had a plan beyond just ratting out the bitch you called a mother,” Shannon said. “If she told your Dad and Gray, she probably planned to get you out of the situation—one way or another. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have risked it because she wouldn’t have risked you. Trust me, Katie-Anne, I remember her, and she wouldn’t have given a damn that she died to save you. All she cared about was you. And you alone. So don’t you dare let what Isabella Blakemore said or did to you poison that mind of yours because your real mother loved you. She adored you, and she would want you to feel loved and be happy.”
Katie-Anne felt like laughing. In all these years, she’d never thought about it that way. If her biological mother loved her, what did it matter that Isabella hadn’t? Everyone knew that Isabella hadn’t given a fuck about anyone except herself. And, shit, it wasn’t like Isabella knew a damn thing about Katie-Anne. She’d reserved a big part of herself for Caroline because, deep down, she’d always seen her as her mother.
Katie-Anne gasped. “Oh my God. How did I not realize that? How did I not see that my real mother loved me? I knew that she loved me, but it was always as an aunt or a friend. It was like my mind couldn’t connect that she was my mother, even though I technically knew. It was like I didn’t understand it,” she rambled.
“You were a child,” Shannon said defensively in her typical mama bear tone. “And that wasn’t something that would be easy to comprehend at such a young age.”
“I was sixteen when they all died,” Katie-Anne reminded them. “That is hardly a child.”
“And so?” Ella asked, jumping in. “I wasn’t around you guys as much back then as I am now, and my opinion may not matter much since I wasn’t. But I know one thing. Any sixteen-year-old would have a hard time dealing with that kind of situation. Hell, I’m twenty-eight, and I would have had a hell of a time wrapping my mind around it and living through it.”
“You need to give yourself a little credit,” Sarah said. “You’re a really strong woman. I cannot imagine how anyone would have survived a life like that completely intact. So I personally think you are on the right track to healing.”
“I don’t know how to give myself credit,” Katie-Anne replied with an honesty that astounded her.
“That’s why you’ve got us around,” Sarah informed her. “We can remind you when you need us to.”
“And we can kick you in the ass when you need us to,” Shannon said irreverently.
“Sadist,” Katie-Anne accused jokingly.
“You know it,” Shannon quipped. “Besides, it takes one to know one, my friend.”
Reappearing with a tray full of food, Nikki smiled and placed the five plates on the table. As soon as the intoxicating smell of hamburgers and french fries hit Katie-Anne’s nose, her stomach rumbled. Thanking Nikki, she and all of the girls dug in, chowing down on the delicious grub Lou had cooked up. And none of them said a word until every last morsel had been inhaled.
Sitting back and dramatically patting her belly, Katie-Anne muttered, “I think it’s about time for me to unbuckle my belt. My stomach can’t take another bite of food.”
“Yeah,” Shannon agreed as she pushed her plate away. “Stick a fork in me. I’m done.”
Jaycee giggled. “Not me, I am in the mood for something sweet.”
“Aren’t you always?” Katie-Anne asked.
“I have no control,” Jaycee conceded with a self-deprecating smile, “when it comes to sex and sweets.”
Sarah choked on her tea. “You have no control when it comes to anything, Jaycee.”
Shrugging, Jaycee went along with Sarah. “Eh, this is true.”
“So,” Shannon drawled as she turned her attention back to Katie-Anne, “we seem to have gotten away from our topic again. I want to know more about you, girlie.” She arched her eyebrow. “What exactly are your plans now? Are you going to keep up the ruse about your art and designs? Or are you just going to give it up? And what about your husbands? Where do you go from here with them?”
Katie-Anne chuckled. Typical Shannon—curious as a cat and nosy as hell. “Well, I am going to keep painting and designing with Maddie for the time being,” she answered. “Eventually I will probably come out—”
“You make that sound like you’re coming out of the closet or something,” Jaycee interjected with a saucy smile. “Do you need to share something else with us?”
Katie-Anne felt like giggling. Her friend had no clue how close to home she was hitting with the ‘needing to share something else.’ But, rather than being a blabbermouth about Kane, she replied, “Honey, if I were a lesbian, I would have hooked up with you and Shan a long time ago. Fuck the friendship ménage thing.”
Sarah spewed her soda out, spraying Shannon with her drink. “Oh no,” she screeched. Snatching up napkins, she handed them to Shannon who was laughing. And she wasn’t the only one. Every woman at the table, excluding the red-faced Sarah, was in complete hysterics, their boisterous laugh bouncing off the walls.
Apologizing over and over, Sarah covered her face which increased the merriment of everyone else. As she peeked through her fingers, she asked, “Are you okay, Shannon?”
“Oh, sweet Sarah,” Shannon replied. “A little soda never hurt a person. I’m fine.”
“Good,” Sarah said, reappearing as she dropped her hands to the table. “Now can we pretend that never happened and get back to Katie-Anne’s plans?”
Shannon tapped her finger against her chin as though she were thinking hard about Sarah’s request. “Hmm. I wouldn’t normally agree to ignore something as funny as that, but I am just dying to know what our girl here has planned for those husbands of hers.”
Rubbing her hands together, Jaycee grinned maniacally. “Me too. Let’s get down to the good stuff. Have you fucked them since you got back? Or are you going to make them sweat it out for a little while?”
Completely unsurprised by her best friend’s questions, Katie-Anne laughed and rolled her eyes. “I haven’t fucked them since our wedding night, Jaycee, but I’m going to tonight. We have a date, and I need the help of my four dearest friends. Are you guys in?”
All of the girls turned and looked at each other then smiled at Katie-Anne. “We’re in.”
Chapter 22
Hours later, Katie-Anne found herself on Shane and Landon’s doorstep for the second time that day, nervously waiting for them to let her into their apartment. Glancing anxiously up and down the dimly lit hallway, she wished there were people nearby to distract her from the jitters inundating her. But, there was nothing. No people, no noise. Just silence swirling around her, pressing into her chest and stifling her.
Katie-Anne rubbed her sweaty palms down the front of her homemade peasant skirt, choosing to focus on the day she’d spent with the girls rather than the two men she was waiting for.
What had started out as lunch with Jaycee, Shannon, Sarah, and Ella had turned into an all-afternoon girl-fest. After asking for their help, she’d confessed that she wanted to shake up her uppity rich-bitch look, but she had no idea what to do or how to do it. After years of contemplating and dreaming, she was at a complete loss.
Of course, Sarah was the first one to jump on that because they’d discussed makeovers many times over the past few months. So she’d dragged all of the girls straight to her salon, Sassy, and given Katie-Anne a wicked new hairstyle that she’d been too chicken to get done after she’d spotted it in a magazine three months ago. That had led to a wardrobe change, so they’d wound up driving sixty-nine miles to an eclectic clothing store in Luscious where Katie-Anne had traded an armful of designer
duds for store credit.
Damn, that had taken hours. She’d tried on one thing after another until she’d found clothes she could work with. Once they’d finished there, Katie-Anne still had things to do. So, with her friends, she’d made a trip to Jaycee’s to alter Katie-Anne’s new clothes to her taste.
Lots of snipping and sewing had happened. And it was worth every second. She was in love with her new look, and she prayed that her men loved it, too. It was important to her that they did.
Now, here she was after an emotionally trying morning and a girly afternoon, waiting for her men with her heart about to jump out of her chest and her stomach ready to reject all of the food she’d eaten. I can do this. I can.
Taking a deep breath, she reached up to knock again. But she stopped when the door opened and revealed not one but both of her men. Their eyes widened as they absorbed her new look, and she felt vomit crawling up into her throat. Swallowing twice, she forced it back down. I can do this. Damn it.
“Shit,” Shane cursed, and she wanted to hide, her inner self-hating voice speaking up again. I told you so. I told you so. I told you so. She could practically envision the evil dance it must be doing.
“Good God,” Landon gasped.
Yep, I need a fucking hole. She turned to walk away, keeping her head held high and fighting her tears, despite the need to cry. Before she’d made it a single step, four hands grabbed her and pulled her between them. Two bodies surrounded her, and she ended up engulfed in a giant, sandwich-like hug.
“No you don’t,” Shane said, sounding harsh and soft all rolled into one. “You just surprised us. We didn’t mean for you to think we didn’t like it. You’re fucking hot.”
What? Surprised, Katie-Anne blinked then blinked three more times. Shane’s declaration didn’t seem to make sense to her brain. No matter how many times his words replayed in her mind, it managed to shock the fucking hell out of her all over again. She’d expected a lot of things, but hot was not one of them.
