“Where is she?” he demanded, not making eye contact with either of us, rather walking around the marble-topped bar and digging around in the cabinet. He came out with a bottle of tequila, pulled off the cap and chugged back as much as he could before his body forced him to gag.
Sam frowned. “Holland? She left with you, brother.”
“I fucking know that. Where’s Jasmine?” he growled, sucking air through his teeth before taking to the bottle again.
“Where’s Holland?” I demanded, finding my voice in my fear. He was alone and aggressive. He’d left out of his mind. What has he done to her?
“Gone,” he said, his lips wet from the speed he was drinking. “Left me. That’s why I need Jasmine.” He lifted his head and yelled at the roof. “To tell her the good news.”
“I’m guessing she knows about your flowers?” I asked.
“I showed them to her. That’s when she….” Nate paused and looked at the bottle. It was almost full when he started, and now there was only an inch of liquid left. After a moment of study, he opened his eyes wide and shook his head a little, the alcohol obviously taking hold.
“Left?” Sam finished for him.
“Bingo!” Nate pointed in Sam’s direction and winked. “Drugs were her deal-breaker. Now she knows and she’s gone.” He yelled at the ceiling again. “Jasmine should be down here celebrating with me!”
“Jasmine’s pissed at you for ruining her china.”
Nate frowned as he took another swig. “Of course she is. Stuff was always more important. That’s why we’re all fucking criminals, right? Taking is easier than earning?” He was still yelling, trying to lure Jasmine down the stairs.
Finishing the bottle, he worked his jaw, his mouth downturned as he warred with the emotions coursing through his mind and body. In his own way, he truly loved Holland. No one behaved the way he had since meeting her without that strong emotion. Losing her was destroying him—a blind person could see that. “No Jasmine? She doesn’t want to revel in the success of her plan? Let’s see if she’d start to give a fuck if I break her precious house.” On the final word, he hurled the empty bottle across the room into the glass sliding doors. They shattered into thousands of tiny pieces, then dropped to the ground both inside and out. Miraculously, the bottle was still intact.
“What the fuck is going on?” Toby demanded, hurtling down the stairs. He skidded to a stop the moment he spotted Nate and saw the glass all over the floor. He was only wearing a pair of boxers and had no shoes.
“Toby!” Nate yelled with false cheer. “I have wonderful news for you. Holland is single again. The downside is that Jasmine will never let you have her, and even if she did, you’d be nothing more than a stand-in for me, and you’d be a poor one at that.”
“You are out of line,” I yelled when Toby just clenched his jaw and stayed silent. I didn’t care how distraught Nate was, he didn’t get to treat his family like that.
“Peaches, leave it,” Sam warned, placing his hand on my arm to keep me back when I started moving forward.
“No. He doesn’t get to treat you all like shit just because he’s hurting. Your wife left you, boo-fucking-hoo. None of us made her leave. She chose that on her own because you obviously fucked up with whatever druggie bullshit you’ve gotten yourself into. Yelling at your brothers, blaming your mother—none of that is going to fix it for you because at the end of the day, growing those flowers was your decision. You fucked up, Nate. You caused all of this. Question is what are you going to do to fix it?”
The room was so silent you could hear everyone’s heartbeats. Nate just glared as we all stared. Then Sam stepped forward. “I think maybe you need to lie down, brother.”
Nate blinked twice, rocked unsteadily and then frowned. Jasmine appeared at the bottom of the stairs. “What’s with all the shouting?” she asked, still looking half-asleep. She took fairly strong sleeping pills and wasn’t easy to rouse. “Nate?” She frowned.
“Holland left,” I told her when it looked like no one else would.
She walked carefully around the glass. “Can’t say I’m surprised. She was never going to be one of us.”
“That’s your fucking problem, isn’t it?” Nate slurred. “No one’s ever good enough. Everyone is forever proving their fucking loyalty.” He stopped talking abruptly, clamping him mouth shut as a frown creased his brow.
Oh no.
Seeming to get control, Nate turned his attention back to Jasmine, shuffled slightly and then opened his mouth to speak. Except it wasn’t words that came out but a torrent of alcohol and everything he’d put in his mouth that day. Possibly the day before, also.
I clapped my hand over my mouth and dry-heaved.
“That shit is messed up,” Sam said, watching with wide eyes.
“Get him in the guest room, in the shower,” Jasmine commanded, suddenly very awake and assessing all the damage.
Sam and Toby grabbed Nate, being careful to avoid any glass as they directed him towards the right door. He refused, fighting with haphazard limbs as he said, “Need more alcohol. I just spilt all mine on the floor.”
Yeah. And it’s fucking gross.
I scrunched my nose up. “I’ll get a mop and bucket.”
Jasmine looked at all the glass. “That’s a good idea. Maybe get the bin and a broom too?”
“On it,” I said, glancing back as she went to help Toby and Sam with Nate, who was now hanging between them like a toddler who didn’t want to go home. I shook my head. Baby. What the hell did he think was going to happen? That they’d live happily ever after? The idea was preposterous, especially considering all the lies in how they’d met.
So now she’d left him. And if Jasmine was to be believed, she’d left with no consequence. That just left me here, the only real casualty in Nate and Holland’s love games. I wasn’t being let go; what I might want wasn’t even being considered. Isn’t that fucked up?
It wasn’t even that I wanted out either. Given the choice, I might actually stay. But it was the fact that giving me an out was never even considered. No one ever asked me what I wanted. They just expected me to stay, to be a good girl, to jump and hop and skip and do anything I was told to.
What the hell am I doing?
I stood in the middle of the mess, holding the mop and the broom with buckets at my feet, and looked around. I’m still doing exactly what I’m told. Inside my chest, I felt this buzzing. It grew bigger and wider with each passing second, swirling through my body until my stomach was churning and I felt sure that I might vomit too. But it wasn’t that, it was this clawing feeling scratching at my insides, wanting me to scream, or better yet, to run.
Run.
Dropping the mop and broom where I stood, I knew what I had to do. I didn’t run. I walked towards the front door, grabbed my purse and went out into the night.
Like a true Cartwright, I could take what I wanted too. And what I wanted—me, Alesha—was the freedom to choose. I wanted my fucking freedom. If Holland could have hers, then I could also have mine. If Sam wanted me so badly, he’d have to prove it. I wasn’t going to sit there pathetically waiting for him to love me anymore. Finally, I found my backbone.
It was love, or it was nothing. I wouldn’t come back for anything less.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Fight For It
The problem with being an inherently anxious person was that when you finally made a decision and stood up for it, you questioned yourself from that moment on. The hour-and-a-half drive from Torquay to Caulfield East was fraught with moments of What am I doing? Am I insane? as well as the struggle not to turn around and go back with my tail between my legs. Worse was when the phone calls started. Sam, Jasmine, even Toby. They were all trying to get in contact with me, and I had no choice but to turn my phone off to save my own sanity. I was doing this for me. For once, I was being the selfish one.
And perhaps I was doing it for Sam too. He’d never done something for himself either. In a l
ot of ways, we were the same, he and I. We both did what we were told, didn’t create waves. We slotted into the mould other people made for us. But what would we be if everything else stopped? What would we become if the only decisions we had to make and the only paths we had to take were our own? Would we walk together, or would we walk apart?
With so much external pressure, I didn’t think either of us could answer those questions the way we were. Something drastic had to happen to blow us up.
I was being the bomb.
Arriving back at my place, I entered the communal drive and sat in front of the dark building with my van still running. After all these months, returning to the tiny home I’d been so proud of was surreal, like the excitement of buying a villa off the plan had happened a lifetime ago. Back when I was another person entirely. When I didn’t believe I’d ever marry. When I didn’t believe I could possibly want children. Before I believed in anything, really.
Cutting the engine, I sighed. I was finally home.
Home. Was that still what it was to me now? I owed it to myself to find out. However, one thing stood in my way—I was without a set of keys.
I got out of the van, looking at the weeds in my garden bed and wishing I’d thought to put one of those plastic rocks in there with a key hidden inside. My spare key lived at Holland’s place and had been stolen in her first altercation with Nate. I’d never thought to replace it. Now I guess the Cartwrights had all my keys. Well, that wasn’t going to stop me from getting inside. I had skills, and I could work this out.
Switching my phone on and into airplane mode, I used the flashlight to shine on the windows. Surely I’d left one open. I hadn’t exactly left that day thinking I wouldn’t come back. The villa was only two bedrooms and tiny, so the search didn’t take long. Thankfully, I’d cracked the window in the bathroom.
Unfortunately for me, that was probably the smallest window in existence. It was high up and not much bigger than an oblong pizza box, but I was pretty sure my hips could fit through.
Holding my phone between my teeth, I dragged a potted plant off my front porch, then pulled it down the side of the house, giving myself enough height to reach the frosted window.
Popping the screen, I slid the window open as far as it would go, tucked my phone away and pulled myself up. It was a tight squeeze and involved angling my body by slipping one arm through and then twisting diagonally so my shoulders slotted through.
“OK. I can do this,” I coached myself, one arm pressed against the wall while the other touched the ceiling and my feet scraped against the brickwork, pushing myself farther inside.
“Come on,” I grunted, getting past my chest and then leaning towards the cistern, ready to catch my weight as my hips came through. Except they didn’t come through. My chest and my stomach made it, but as I tipped my weight forward, my arse and hips got wedged.
Shit. I’d tipped farther forwards than I could go back, which meant my legs were sticking straight out in the air, and my torso was upside down against the wall with the blood rushing to my head. Worse still, my phone was in my back pocket, so I couldn’t get it out to call from help. And voice commands wouldn’t work because I’d set it to airplane mode.
Just bloody brilliant.
Spreading my arms out against the wall, I kept pushing against it, trying to pull my body the rest of the way in. I tried rocking my hips, wriggling my arse, kicking my legs. None of it was working.
Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck. How was I going to get out of this one?
I lifted my head. “Help,” I called out, hoping maybe one of the neighbours would hear me. “Heeeeelp!” I tried louder, then listened to see if I could hear movement. There was nothing, but I wasn’t going to give up and become that girl who died of starvation because her arse got caught in a window frame. I kept yelling and wriggling, crying out and pulling. Then somehow, by the grace of God, someone came.
“What the hell have you done to yourself?”
Quitting my baneful cry, I lifted my head to the voice, finding Sam standing in front of me with his hands folded across his chest.
“Wait. The front door was open?”
He nodded.
“Holy fuck.” Why hadn’t I even thought to check that?
I let out my breath and held my hands out to him. “Do you think you can help a girl—owww!”
All at once, the window broke free of its fittings, sending me tumbling forward, my hand going straight into the toilet bowl before Sam caught me.
“Whoa there.” He set me on my feet and helped me remove the window accessory I was wearing around my waist. Somehow the glass had survived with only a slight crack.
“This is disgusting,” I said, shaking off my wet hand and grabbing toilet paper to dry it.
“Hey, at least you flush,” he pointed out.
I moved into the bathroom and pumped about forty spurts of hand soap into my palm, scrubbing my skin up to the elbow. When I turned on the taps, I was relieved to find warm water. Setting up a direct debit for all my bills was definitely the best thing I ever did.
“What are you doing here?” I asked as I dried off my arm and found Sam waiting in the doorway.
“I was planning on asking you the same thing.”
“I live here,” I said. “This is my home.”
“No, your home is with me. This is just a place you used to live in.”
“I didn’t agree to give up my place and live with your family. I didn’t agree to any of the things that have been decided for me.”
“Is that why you left? Because you want to make your own decisions? Have I not given you everything? What more do you want?”
“The same consideration Holland gets.”
He frowned. “Is this some pissing contest? More of your jealousy over your friend?”
“I’m not jealous of her. I just want to be as human as her.”
“You don’t feel treated like a human?” He looked as though I’d slapped him in the face.
“Why did you do it, Sam?”
“Do what?”
“Marry me. Why did you do it?”
He held his hands out to his side. “Because—”
“Because you had to, right? Not because you wanted to. Not because you were in love with me. Because your mother told you to do it. Do you even want me now, Sam? Or have you just gotten used to having me around? Did you come after me because you wanted me to, or because Jasmine said ‘go get her’? Don’t you see, we’re both the people she shaped us into. We’re playing a part, pretending everything is OK when it isn’t fucking OK. I don’t know who the fuck I am anymore. And I don’t think you know who you are either.”
With his jaw clenched tight and his shoulders set straight, he filled the entire door frame of my tiny bathroom. “I don’t know what you expect me to say or do.”
“I expect you to fight, Sam. I expect you to say what you feel, tell me what you want. I don’t give a fuck what’s expected. Just be honest. What do you want? What the fuck does Samuel Cartwright want in his life? Is it a marriage he was forced into? A job he was groomed for? A life governed by other people’s rules? What, Sam? What?”
He released his breath through his nose and closed his eyes for a moment, maintaining his control. “You’re obviously upset over tonight and this morning. Why don’t you come home and get some rest. We can talk about this properly in the morning. Maybe a surf will clear your head?”
“What?” My brow knitted so tight I felt the skin fold between my eyes. “This is my home, Sam.”
“Peaches,” he said, a hint of warning in his tone. “Please come with me.”
“Or what? Mummy will lose her shit? I won’t be allowed to have my freedoms and privileges anymore? No van, no surfing, No dessert for a week? What will happen, Sam? Why can’t I be free with no consequence too?”
“That’s what you want?” he asked, a slight shake in his voice. “You want to be free of me?”
“I don’t know!” I shrieked.
“I don’t have a fucking clue what I want, Sam. I just want to have a choice.”
His teeth ground together, and a contained rumble went through his chest. “Fine. I’ll give you a choice. Stay here and leave me, or come home, be with me.”
“That’s it? It’s that easy for you? After everything we’ve been to each other, you’re just letting me go. No fight, nothing.”
He pressed his thumb and forefinger against the bridge of his nose, closed his eyes and growled before he spoke. “What the fuck else do you want? I’m giving you exactly what you asked for!”
“Are you? Or are you saying what you think you should? Don’t give me what I want, Sam. Fight!” I shoved his chest. “Fight for what you want! I want you to be honest with me. I want you to tell me how you feel. I want you to choose me. Fight for me, Sam, because if you can’t fight or you don’t want to, then what the fuck are we doing?”
Two breaths. He took two breaths before his eyes flashed he cracked. “You want me to fight?” he yelled. “You want me to break down, confess my devotion and tell you all the secrets I’m holding deep inside me? Fuck you. I married you. I cared for you. I did everything right, everything that was asked of me. Why isn’t that enough? I’m not playing games with you. Choose me, Alesha. Choose me or fuck the hell off.”
“I want to choose you, Sam. I really do. But when your argument is that you ‘did everything right’, how can I? I’d rather be lonely without you every day than be with you, knowing you were settling for me because I was forced on you.”
His eyes flashed, and before I knew it his mouth was on mine, his tongue pushing, teeth hitting and bodies buzzing. My hands grabbed his shirt, then gripped his hair, pulling slightly. I could barely breathe, but I couldn’t stop. I wanted him to devour me, pull me inside himself.
“Does that feel like settling to you?” he demanded, his chest heaving as he pressed his face into mine, like he couldn’t get close enough.
I shook my head. “No. It felt like wanting.”
“Yes,” he whispered, kissing me again. “How many times do I have to say it before you believe it? I want you, Alesha. I need you.”
Fools Rush In Page 21
