by Ash Harlow
I pulled all the shot glasses from the cupboard, lining them up along the counter. Five glasses. I stood in front of the liquor cabinet for a while, twirling bottles around, checking labels, and recalling the events responsible for lowering the contents. Fuck, I’d done some crazy shit. I pulled a bunch of them from the cabinet and went back to the line of glasses, waiting like parade soldiers ready to do battle with me.
Tequila, a very special Gin with a skull and crossbones etched into the squat bottle, and a Pappy Van Winkle’s Family Reserve Whiskey that someone had jokingly given me to ‘toast the new baby’ when I was going through a drama with a girl who claimed I’d gotten her pregnant.
I hadn’t.
From the freezer, I grabbed the Grey Goose vodka, which was always a favorite. Then I had one more choice. I went for the Dragon’s Breath, a chili schnapps that should top off the first round of shots with some eye-watering zing.
I poured the shots, at the last minute switching the order of the Grey Goose with the Dragon’s Breath, deciding the icy vodka after the fiery schnapps would be the bar-room equivalent of a polar plunge after a sauna. Something to slam into my heart.
“Watch carefully, Buster, as the master has his fun.”
Buster whacked me on the knee with the tug toy he was optimistically following me about with.
The tequila, quite frankly, made me shudder. It was some cheap stuff left behind after a party. The gin was top shelf, and I was sober enough to enjoy the aromatics that lingered once I swallowed.
Pappy Van Winkle’s was almost worth having a baby for. Pappy was a whiskey craftsman.
Then came the schnapps. Holy shit, that stuff burned on the way down and left me gasping long after I’d swallowed. The vodka was relief for the short time it stayed in my mouth, then the burn roared back like an inferno.
“Stick to beer, and stay away from women,” I told Buster as I wiped the tears from my eyes. My lips had gone numb, but the start of a buzz in my brain felt good.
“You win, Pappy,” I said, lifting the bottle, where Van Winkle grinned back at me from the label. I took the bottle back to the liquor cabinet, found a deserving whiskey glass, and half-filled the tumbler. Or was it half-empty?
I spun the bottle around so that Pappy would stop watching me. The guy unnerved me now, making me think about toasting a baby. Just like back in Newport, I couldn’t get the image of Katrina, swollen with my baby, out of my head.
I wished Poppins was here, getting drunk with me late in the afternoon. No, I didn’t. If she were here, I wouldn’t be behaving like this. I finished the whiskey, ticking off all the reasons asking Katrina to stay would be a bad idea.
We’d turn out like Mom and Dad. Except we wouldn’t, because Katrina would be incapable of behaving the way my mother did. So, I guess we’d be half like that.
But, what if we weren’t? What if Katrina found something in me I’d been too afraid to nurture, instead putting up this barrier of being a loathsome jerk just to put the women off expecting anything more from me than my cock?
And what if that goodness truly wasn’t there, and I simply used Katrina to prove what I’d always feared? But what if I was wrong? Or right? I laughed because I was half-pissed and I couldn’t even assemble my thoughts properly.
Katrina would be here soon. I couldn’t let her see me like this, but I could see her...if I climbed onto the roof. I’d be able to watch her come down the road. I took Pappy with me, but I left the glass behind.
“Stay here and guard the house, Buster, and whatever you do, don’t let that gorgeous girl inside. It’ll just make both of us sad when she leaves.”
I went to the tower, out the window, and climbed along the peak of the roof, settling in against the chimney. In minutes, Katrina came out of the Myers’ house and made her way along the road, towing her wheelie bag. She looked like a sad kid running away from home, dragging her favorite toy behind her.
My heart surged, and happy hormones flooded my system. All of me wanted her and none of me could have her. She faltered at the edge of my driveway, glancing around. My heart galloped faster with every step she took along the drive until she disappeared beneath me, onto the porch.
I wanted to slide down the roof and drop to the ground beside her. Instead, I took another swig of whiskey. I guessed she was returning the keys and whatever else she might have, and pretty soon, she’d realize she’d have to leave them on the porch and be on her way.
Her front door key wouldn’t work. I’d changed the locks.
Right now, I regretted that decision to the depth of my soul. I wanted to be in the house with her in my arms. Instead, I was half-drunk on the roof, hiding like some fucking schoolboy.
I closed my eyes and leaned against the chimney. Buster was going off his head because his precious Katrina, our precious Katrina, stood outside the door and we couldn’t have her.
Soon, Buster. Soon, all the temptation will be gone.
25
Katrina
It didn’t hit me until I’d had some sleep. I was book-weary and exhausted after Steele and Mary’s emotional ride. It had been a satisfying read, but draining.
I woke around ten after only a few hours’ sleep. As I showered, I came to understand what I hadn’t seen before bed.
Mary.
Mary Poppins.
That was me in the story, and Steele was Stone.
For two weeks, Stone had poured his heart onto the page, and what had I done? Nothing. I hadn’t been brave enough to reach out to him, acknowledge his note, or see if he needed any help. Instead, I’d shut down the things I’d felt and tried to move on. Sure, I hadn’t been successful, but I’d started that journey and put in some distance.
Stone had written the book he didn’t want to write so that I could have the chance to secure a job at CJM, and I hadn’t even thanked him.
Mason offered to drive me to the station, but I said I needed to drop something off to Stone and that the walk would do me good. He said we could stop at Stone’s on the way, but June growled at him.
When he frowned, she rolled her eyes.
“If Katrina needs a ride to the station from Stone’s house, she’ll call.”
I thanked them profusely, told them what a sanctuary the cottage had been for me, and hugged them both goodbye. I left with their offer of using the cottage any time I wanted.
“Hopefully, that won’t be necessary,” June said, giving me a wink.
The fact that Stone had felt driven to change the locks almost stopped me, but the thought of Mary and Steele fortified me. I could hear Buster in the house, barking and scratching frantically at the door, and it gave me an awful feeling that something was wrong. I went around the back and discovered the patio door was unlocked. With a thumping heart I entered the house.
Buster hurled himself at me, licking my hands and clawing his way up my legs. Then he ran off, barking again. He bounded halfway up the stairs to the tower, then back down, his barking and whining relentless.
I followed him, and this time, he shot up the stairs with me on his heels. One of the tower windows was completely off the latch, banging against the side of the house.
Oh, God.
Surely, Stone hadn’t...I couldn’t even finish the thought as I treaded carefully to the open window and peered out.
The height was dizzying, and there was no sign of him, so I stepped back. But Buster rushed to the window and continued to whine. I pushed the chair closer, climbed up, and looked along the roofline. There was Stone, sitting with his back against the chimney.
“Are you insane?” I called out.
“Poppins, you came.”
My chest tightened as he wobbled to his feet, a bottle of whiskey in one hand. He weaved dangerously, a leg out one side, his arm in a drunken counterbalance in the opposite direction.
“Sit down. You’re going to fall.”
“Come and have a dance with me, Poppins. Bring your umbrella, and we’ll float off on the wind.” He launc
hed into a song about being a chimney sweep.
“Please, Stone. Please, come back into the house.”
“Come out here with me. Have a drink. The view’s quite amazing. Not as pretty as you, but still, it’s a fine view.”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“I’m scared,” I told him truthfully.
“I’m scared too, Poppins. Tell me what you’re scared of, and I’ll tell you what I’m scared of, then all our worries will go away. Or something like that.”
“I’m scared of heights. You know that.”
“Ah, now that’s just not true. I recall you going hot air ballooning.”
“And I was scared.” He was weaving again. “Stone, sit down.”
“Not until you come out here and sit with me.”
“That’s blackmail.”
“I knew you cared.”
“Stone—”
“Come on, Poppins, show me you’re not scared. Prove to me you can do this. I’ll keep you safe. Come on out here. Be with me.”
His words struck something inside me. They’d been written in the story when Mary hadn’t been able to allow herself to trust Steele. She’d pushed for him to believe in himself, but when the crunch came, she feared that making a commitment to him would mean she’d have her heart broken. She resisted for a while, then she took that leap of faith.
I tried not to look down, my sweating palms slipping against the window frame as I pulled myself up to stand on the sill. “Stone, my legs have gone numb.”
“Wait there. I’ll come and get you.”
This was foolish. He was drunk, his balance wavering, and my legs refused to cooperate. Gingerly, I lowered myself so that I was sitting on the sill, my legs dangling outside. That felt daring enough for me.
Stone made his last few steps at a run and sat beside me. He sighed, then nudged me. “I missed you, Poppins.”
“I missed Buster,” I teased. I think it was the relief at not having to walk out onto the roof.
“He missed you, too. I could see it in his eyes. He wanted to cry, except, you know, dogs don’t do that...not tears. But his heart was crying.”
“You really are attributing a lot of human emotions to that dog.”
“Are you still scared?”
I nodded. “I’m scared of how much this hurts, and that tomorrow, I’m going to wake up in my apartment and want to be back here with you. I didn’t mean to fall so hard for you, Stone. I’m not very experienced at this sort of thing, but I wanted you to know that you mean a lot to me.”
“Did you read the book?”
“I did. I think deep down, you wanted me to do that. Otherwise, you’d have sent it directly to Sarah.”
He stared off into the distance for a long time. “When’s your train?” He finally asked.
Right there, the hope that he’d ask me to stay was dashed. Was he going to tell me I needed to be on my way? I checked my watch. “Twenty minutes. I’ll call Mason and ask him to give me a ride to the station.”
“Don’t go.”
“What?”
“Don’t go, Poppins. You scare the shit out of me, and I care for you so much. I didn’t want to break you, so I did stupid shit like changing the locks so I wouldn’t have to see you...because if I saw you again, I wouldn’t be able to let you go. But I’m fucking terrified that if we’re together, we’ll end up like my parents, and you’re too good for that. You deserve better. Then I finished that book, and I’m not going to lie, you were in it from the start. I thought it would be fun to write a character like you...a real person, not some pumped-up club bimbo.
“Then in these last two weeks, as I gave you your happily ever after, I wanted to be Steele. I dug deep in that story because Steele was such an ass. But the deeper I went with Steele, in order to make him worthy of Mary, the deeper I had to go inside myself. If I were capable of creating my own misery, then surely I was capable of creating my own happiness, too. I realized I don’t have to follow the blueprint my parents set out for me. I can simply say that within me is the ability to be someone different, and I believe I can do that with you at my side. For you. Because I don’t want to go through another day feeling the way I felt for the past two weeks. You make me whole, Poppins. I looked inside and found the real me, and that person is capable of loving you and promises to do that until...forever. I love you, Poppins. Please stay.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. My heart swelled, and my eyes burned with tears at Stone’s honest, if not slightly drunken, declaration.
“I wanted to say...” I stopped, digging for a tissue in my pocket. I took a deep breath. “Okay. I wanted to say sorry for not checking up on you. I really wanted to, but I’m also glad we had this time apart because I went out and did things I wanted to do instead of just wishing. You taught me how to live, Stone. And I enjoyed doing that, although it would have been much better to do with you by my side.”
I turned to face him, and he brushed my tears away and licked his thumb. “Everything about you is delicious. Even your tears, because right now, I’m telling myself these are happy tears. And if you ever have sad tears, I’ll kiss those away and make it all better.”
I laughed. “You’re crazy, you know that? Don’t ever change your craziness because it makes me brave.”
“Didn’t make you brave enough to come out onto the roof with me. Let’s do that now.”
“You’re drunk, Stone. I’ve got a better idea. Let’s go downstairs and get you a lot of water. Then let’s take Buster for a walk, because he’s kind of missing out here, and once you’re sober, we’ll have this conversation properly.”
“Just tell me you’re staying.”
My heart was in danger of cracking my ribs. “I’m staying.”
“And tell me the other thing that you feel in here.”
He placed his hand over my thundering heart. I looked into his gray eyes and saw something bright and new. I covered his hand with mine. “In here, Stone Logan, all I feel is love for you.”
“I feel it too,” he said quietly.
Stone attempted to swing his legs through the window, but he finished up on the floor with Buster leaping all over him and licking his face. He grabbed the dog by the shoulders, holding him off. “I’d rather this were you licking my face, not the dog.”
I eased myself from the window frame and offered a hand to Stone. He tugged me down on top of him, then rolled us until I was on my back.
“You do feel good, trapped beneath me.”
“Feels good to be here,” I whispered.
Stone lowered his mouth to mine. His kiss was tinged with whiskey, long and gentle.
“That was number thirty-six, Poppins. The list I’ve made goes on for pages, and I’ll keep adding to it, even when we’re old and decrepit in our dual wheelchair in the nursing home.”
Epilogue
Stone
“Once upon a time—” The wedding guests groaned.
“What? So I write stories, and now I want to tell you one. Once upon a time, there was this guy who was a bad boy. He messed around...a lot. Girls, booze, crazy stuff, and he was lucky enough to build a world from all that insanity and write about it. He thought he had it all, and even through the times when he could see something was missing, he still talked himself out of that because the bad boy was capable of deluding himself.
“His life spiraled out of control. He wrote more books, became more famous, made more money...and he made sure he lived the dream. Everyone wanted a piece of him, but the time came when he thought he couldn’t do it anymore. The thrill had gone, and so had his inspiration. So his agent gave him an assistant. A shy, brave, honest young woman who believed in him, even when he didn’t. He thought he could have some fun with her, boasting, showing her a slice of his crazy life, and in turn, drive her away because somehow, she’d forced him to look in the mirror and face the person behind the reflection. He didn’t like what he saw. But it didn’t matter how badly he be
haved, because it didn’t turn her away. Instead, she stepped up and embraced some of the crazy and flat-out had nothing to do with the stupid, self-indulgent stuff. She saw something in him beyond the good-time bad boy.
“Every time this girl walked into the room, his heart went crazy, his mouth dry, his feelings for her so deep and immense, he thought she must have bewitched him because he no longer wanted the clubs and the excitement, and he sure didn’t miss the hangovers. But he didn’t believe he was capable of love, didn’t really think it even existed. And he was scared. Scared of this way she had cracked him open, and even more scared that if he stayed with her, he’d hurt her. He realized that she was too precious to damage, so he sent her away.”
I looked around the room. The place was silent. June had her handkerchief out, dabbing her eyes.
“He was broken without her, so he wrote her a story, put himself in it, and wrote the ending he really wanted. It was his explanation and his apology. He sent it to the girl and told her not to read it. You see, despite her being near-perfect, she could be stubborn at times. He knew the best way to get her to read it was to ask her not to. By the way, that’s book seven in the Steele Heart series, available at all retailers or in the lobby.”
Most of them laughed, but Katrina rolled her eyes.
“She read it, and she came to me and forgave me for being a dick, and today, I’m overjoyed to say that Katrina and I finally have our own happily ever after.”
I turned to my beautiful, blushing, bride. “Thanks, Poppins. I’ll love you forever.”
Rip stood, holding his glass aloft. “Let’s raise our glasses to Katrina, and to Stone, who probably doesn’t deserve her.”
“My God, Stone. This place. Have you seen the color of the water?”
Katrina stood on the deck of our bure built over the lagoon. We had our own jetty and complete privacy, the perfect honeymoon spot. She wore her bikini with a sarong wrapped around her. I tugged at the knot and tossed it onto one of the outdoor chairs.
