The Avoiding Series Boxset

by K. A. Linde

  Lexi looked up when her father’s hospital door opened again, and Parker exited. Instead of turning away, Parker walked down to where Lexi was sitting, crying. “Hey, let’s go get some coffee,” she said lowering her voice comfortingly.

  Lexi wiped at both of her cheeks and stood slowly. “Don’t you have to get back to work?” Lexi asked, grateful for the offer.

  Parker shrugged. “I’m in need of a break. They can run without me for awhile.”

  “Sure,” Lexi said following her down the hall and into the coffee shop. “I didn’t know you worked for the ER.” She ordered a large black coffee. The caffeine was exactly what she needed right now.

  “They have me in the ER right while since another doctor called out. I’m usually in surgery,” she told her. Parker ordered a small coffee and doused cream and sugar in it as soon as it was pushed across the counter. The two found a vacant table and slid into their seats. “I’m sorry about your dad,” she spoke softly.

  “Me too,” Lexi murmured.

  “I think he’s going to be okay now though. Your mom will keep a close watch on him, and I prescribed some blood thinners,” she told her reassuringly. “He’ll only have to be in the ICU for a day or two.”

  “Thanks,” Lexi said forgetting she was talking to a woman that she had so many reservations about. “I really…just thanks for everything you did.”

  Parker blushed at the words. “It’s my job,” she said dismissively.

  “Yes, well, it’s admirable. I mean, I’m just a blood sucking attorney,” Lexi said with a chortle at the end that she really wasn’t feeling.

  “I’m sure you do good work too,” Parker responded quickly.

  Lexi shrugged noncommittally. She wasn’t sure what to say. Instead, she took another long sip of her coffee and let the caffeine fight her ailments. If someone had told her a few days ago that she would be having coffee with Parker or that her father was going to have a heart attack, she wouldn’t have believed them. But here she was at the hospital and both things were true.

  “Lexi?” Parker asked hesitantly looking down into her coffee cup. “Can I be honest with you?”

  Lexi looked up from her own coffee and stared at Parker speculatively. She wasn’t sure she wanted to have this conversation…whatever it was. “About what?”

  Parker bit down on her bottom lip. She released a long sigh before meeting Lexi’s gaze. “About Ramsey,” she said barely louder than a whisper.

  Lexi’s stomach dropped. Here it was. Everything she had been waiting for. Everything she had suspected. She had known all along deep down that there was more to the story. She had always wanted to believe what Ramsey had told her about his relationship with Parker. She wasn’t sure what it was about it, but the story had never settled right with her. Maybe it was the way that Jessie had talked about them the first time Lexi had met Parker over spring break. Maybe it was the looks had passed so easily between them. Maybe it was just jealousy after everything she had dealt with in her life. But whatever it was, she was about to find out.

  Lexi gulped hard. “What about Ramsey?” she asked her hands shaking.

  “I just…I…Lexi, you have to know I don’t like to lie. It’s not in me to lie,” she said trembling. “I didn’t want to hold back everything from you.” Lexi felt a numbness fall over her. Lies. Hidden information. None of this could be good. “I don’t really talk about what happened, but I didn’t think it was fair for you not to know. I can tell that y’all are getting serious, and I…” she faltered pushing her hand up through her hair before continuing, “well, I would want to know if the roles were reversed.”

  “Know what?” Lexi asked leaning forward in anxiety.

  Parker shook her head forcefully and pushed herself back against the chair. “I’m sorry. I can’t talk about this.” She stood abruptly scraping her chair against the tiled floor.

  “What?” Lexi gasped louder than expected. “You say all of that and then refuse to explain?”

  “I’m sorry. You don’t understand what I went through with him,” she told her trying desperately to keep her voice even.

  “What did you go through with him?” Lexi asked frantically, unsure she would ever get the truth out of anyone if Parker didn’t confide in her right now.

  Parker glanced around the busy coffee shop realizing that she was drawing attention to herself. A few of her colleagues were looking at her sudden outburst curiously. She smiled reassuringly in their direction and took her seat again. “I wish he had just told you,” she whispered resting her elbow on the table and sinking her chin into her hand.

  “He told me that you guys were old family friends and like…friends with benefits,” Lexi told her hoping to get some kind of confirmation on the story.

  “Friends with benefits?” she gasped lightly. “He actually said that?” The hurt was evident in her voice. It was so apparent that Lexi immediately knew that the statement was false. There had been much more to their relationship. No one could fake pain like Lexi had just seen in Parker’s eyes. Lexi hated confirming what she had told Parker. She seemed to be in a trance when she spoke next.

  “We were inseparable,” she said the words as if they were more than a fact, as if the words were etched in stone. “Bekah and I were best friends growing up. I had a crush on him when I was younger. It was easy to have a crush on him when he was two years older. I never expected him to ever see me as anything more than his little sister’s friend,” she told her as if she had transported through time. “We started dating my sophomore year of high school. He was a junior. Even though I was two years younger than him, I’d be graduating only a year behind him since I was a year ahead of everyone in my grade. He always told me the age difference didn’t matter. That we’d be together in the end.

  “He settled on Tech to stay in the city…to be close to me. His parents wanted him to go to a private school: Princeton, Yale, Brown, or Duke, but he swore he wouldn’t leave me.” Her hand dropped from her chin, and she stared down into her coffee. “He was only there for a year before he transferred to Duke, when I started my first year. His parents were proud. They were already…planning our marriage. I had always been the perfect influence on their rebellious son.”

  Lexi shook her head in disbelief at this tall tale. This was about as far from Ramsey’s story as Parker could possibly get. He had claimed never to have had a girlfriend. He had never been in love. Her insides were icing over. No. He had never had any of these things before her. Now she was finding out that not only had he had a girlfriend, but his parents had been planning for them to get married since childhood.

  “But it all went wrong,” Parker gasped grasping her cup firmly with both hands as she tried to hold back the tears that were clouding her eyes.

  “What happened?” Lexi asked surprised she even had a voice. She felt like she was living someone else’s life right now. She couldn’t believe that these things had actually happened. She was having delusions. Her fears were catching up with her. She had gotten stuck in a soap opera where everyone lied, everyone hid information, everyone was deceitful.

  “Oh God, it all happened so quick. I’d been feeling sick for about a week. It was during finals,” she told the story as if she had gone back in time and was still there. It was clear that she was trapped in her memories. “I’d asked for an extension because of the sickness. I couldn’t stop throwing up.

  “I was finally able to hold down a meal, and I raced over to Ramsey’s. I hadn’t seen him since falling ill, because we didn’t live together. Our parents would never have allowed it of course,” she said swiping the tears from her blood shot eyes. “He was drunk…terribly drunk. I’d never seen him so drunk. His roommates were there with four or five mostly naked girls. I looked like hell and worse I felt like it, and there he was having a raving good time with some girls that would have sucked his dick at a snap of his fingers.” The vulgarity surprised Lexi almost as much as the situation and her mouth fell open. Lexi gulped hard h
er coffee long forgotten.

  “I lost it. I just snapped. I screamed at him, yelled at him, called him every dirty thing that I could think of. It made me sick to my stomach, and I had to rush to the bathroom. He was just as vulgar. I remember him telling me that all I cared about were my studies, that I’d changed, that he couldn’t even see the old me anymore. He said more things that I hate to even imagine, but he was so drunk, he couldn’t stop himself.

  “I remember telling him he was a spoiled rich brat who would only ever amount to as much as Daddy’s money allowed. Then I left, and as he slammed the door behind me, he told me never to come back,” she said a tear falling slowly down her right cheek.

  Lexi covered her hand with her mouth as she imagined the scene before her. How could he have done it? “Is that how it ended?” she couldn’t help asking.

  “I wish,” she said meeting Lexi’s chocolate brown eyes. Lexi couldn’t imagine it getting any worse. “If only I’d known then what I know now,” she said forlornly. “I was pregnant.”

  Lexi gasped her chest beating frantically as the pieces fell together. Of course, she had been sick, throwing up, her emotions rampant. It all made sense. He hadn’t known. How could he have known? “Did you tell him?”

  “It is my greatest regret that I did not,” she stated sadly licking her dry lips. “I was angry. I couldn’t forgive the things he had said to me. I was only nineteen after all…still too young…for everything.”

  Lexi stilled as the realization hit her. Ramsey could have a child with the woman sitting in front of her. “He has a baby?” she asked.

  Tears really did spill forth from Parker’s eyes at that statement. “No,” she breathed. “I finished my exams, transferred back home to Emory. By then I knew for certain and even if I tried to hide it, the baby was alive inside of me and growing every day. The last thing I wanted was for him to know. I hid it from everyone. I only left the house to go to classes and even then I resorted to wearing sweats everywhere. I didn’t even risk seeing a doctor, because I was so ashamed. My parents were terrified and wanted me to see a shrink. They thought I was depressed,” she said with a sharp laugh. Lexi didn’t think anyone could blame her for being depressed under the circumstances.

  “But one day Bekah showed up at my apartment.” Lexi cringed away at the name. “I didn’t want to let her in, but she insisted and pushed past me. Well, of course, she could tell that something was different…that I was bigger. I’ll spare you the details of the following days with her holed up in my apartment with me. Suffice it to say that I ended up miscarrying.”

  “Oh, no,” Lexi breathed the sorrow of the story beginning to overwhelm her.

  “Bekah convinced me to tell him. When I finally went there, it was another bad night. It was storming the entire drive up to Durham. He was alone, but drunk again. I don’t know why I expected any less. I hadn’t seen or heard from him since I’d left his place that night I’d walked out on him. When I got up the courage to tell him, he called me a liar. He’d gotten it into his head that everything was my fault that night…” She paused unable to go on as she clutched her chest. Finally she worked up the nerve and continued.

  “Well, when Bekah finally got to him, she made him feel like a worthless piece of shit. He called and visited and tried to repair everything we had had but I couldn’t do it. There was too much hurt, and though he didn’t give up for quite some time, I could never really get over what had happened to me. It’s the reason I pushed through to medicine,” she said sadly slumping back in her chair as if to show that was the end of her tale.

  Lexi couldn’t believe it. How could this be the same Ramsey that she knew now? How could any of this be true with what she knew about the man she had fallen in love with? It didn’t add up. It didn’t make sense. He wasn’t this person. He was so much more than that.

  Why would he lie? It was such an elaborate story though. She had to admit it did all fit together, but still it didn’t make sense. He had no reason to tell Lexi that he’d never dated, loved, or that Parker was nothing more than someone he had fucked and left… like all the other girls.

  She stood up abruptly, the weight of the story heavy on her shoulders. “Don’t come near me, my parents, or Ramsey,” she said pointing her finger at Parker menacingly. She couldn’t believe it. The story was too much.

  “Lexi,” Parker pleaded looking up at her through pained eyes.

  She had gone through too much in one day. Her brain couldn’t process any of it. She couldn’t think of what all of this would mean if it were true. She couldn’t think of shattering the one perfect picture she had of an individual. And so she stumbled away from the coffee shop and back up to her father’s bedside to wait out the agony of the day.

  PRESENT

  Lexi walked into the empty restaurant with Ramsey at her side. Her hand was tucked neatly into the crook of his elbow, the other hung limp at her side. Her hair had been pulled high on top of her head into a tight twist revealing her slender neck. Her make-up appeared light though she had taken the time to conceal herself from the awaiting crowd. A slim-cut polyester dress in the palest of purples shrouded her body. Her calves, thighs, and buttocks were accentuated in her nude pointy-toed mules. She had taken unusual care in her outfit knowing she would hardly be exempt from judgment on a night like tonight.

  Ramsey was as gorgeous and perfect as ever. His suit fit to perfection, tailored specifically for the evening. His golden hair, so fitting for the Golden Boy of the Bridges Empire, was shinning in the setting sun, and his green eyes glittered splendidly in the shining light.

  A collection of round tables was placed around the back room. A long rectangular table sat at the front of the room. A large projection screen had been fitted on the wall behind the table. The screen was white with navy blue lettering displaying:

  REHEARSAL DINNER

  IN HONOR OF THE UNION BETWEEN

  JACK HARRISON HOWARD

  &

  REBEKAH CAROLINE BRIDGES

  SATURDAY, AUGUST 8TH

  Somehow, seeing those words together made it all seem much more real. She had never witnessed their names joined together in such a ceremonial fashion.

  “Are you ready?” Ramsey whispered, his lips barely moving as he stared down upon her. Lexi gave a slight nod and allowed Ramsey to continue forward to their assigned seats. Each table was intricately detailed with tiny silver plaques engraved with the guests name in scrawling calligraphy.

  Lexi’s chair rested next to Ramsey’s near the front of the room. She didn’t fail to notice that she had been stuffed into a corner, that Parker’s name was scribbled on the nameplate on the other side of Ramsey, or that the next closest person to her was an old relative on the bride’s side who appeared to be senile.

  “I’m going to go check on my sister,” Ramsey said brushing the top of her hand before departing the room. He had effectively deposited her at her seat and disappeared. Great.

  Lexi sat in her corner as the room filled with friends and relatives of the couple. She was happy to supervise and people watch what was going on before her. The meeting of the families and friends seemed practically humorous, especially to someone who knew the couple as well as she did. Or perhaps she saw what she expected to see.

  Jack’s family wasn’t poor by anyone’s standards, but they clearly didn’t have Bridges’ money. His family simply wasn’t as polished as Bekah’s family. Her parents were still happily married. Well, happily was a matter of opinion.

  Jack’s parents, on the other hand, had long since divorce. He had two older brothers—ten and fifteen years older than him. Both were from a previous marriage on his father’s side, and both were married with several rambunctious children running around the room in circles—screaming.

  Seth and Sandy’s entrance was the first thing that pulled Lexi out of her trance. She couldn’t exactly deny that seeing the two of them made her happy. Seth was Jack’s best man and lifelong best friend. They had grown up together l
ong before they had been college roommates. And Lexi had known the best man longer than even his wife had.

  Lexi’s appearance at the rehearsal dinner didn’t seem to faze Seth as he strode across the room to greet her. She didn’t know whether or not he had been warned of her presence or could simply pick her out of a crowd, but his stride was undeterred. “Lexi, love,” he crowed, arms outstretched as he swaggered toward her.

  She scooted her chair back and stood. The appearance of Jack’s oldest friend made her smile blossom as visions of his beach house burst into her mind. “Seth,” she murmured against his chest as she leaned into his hug, “it’s so good to see you again.”

  “You look fucking gorgeous,” he said with a low whistle, pulling back to examine her body.

  She smiled coyly as if she hadn’t put in the effort to get ready. “Thanks,” she replied though her eyes remained guarded.

  “You know I’d love to be the one tearing that dress off of you later,” he said nudging her shoulder.

  Lexi rolled her eyes, realizing how little men actually changed. “Tell that to your wife.”

  “You know that I do,” he said his eyes finding Sandy in the crowd. She seemed to realize he was watching her and glanced his direction. Lexi’s cheeks flushed at the intensity of their stare.

  Lexi sighed pulling her own eyes away from the couple radiating with a passion and love that she could only attribute to newlyweds. “How are you and Sandy?” she asked though she could see with her own eyes that things were going well.

  Seth, who had never been guarded a day in his life, shined like a beacon of light from the top of a lighthouse. His eyes, which broke contact with his wife across the room, turned to Lexi. His smile was radiant and his eyes glowed with pleasure. “Now, don’t go spreading it around,” he said with barely contained excitement, “but we’ve just found out. We’re having a baby.”