by Ava Grace
He was actually quite gracious about my suggestion.
I wouldn’t go as far as to say he was thrilled with the idea of getting out there and socializing again, but he wasn’t opposed to it either, so, on one of my nights off from The Shack, I proposed that we go out to a restaurant to eat dinner instead of staying home to cook.
Surprisingly, Mason agreed and an hour later we were taking our seats at Buck’s Steakhouse.
After Mason had gotten dressed, he’d come up to my house to wait for me to get ready and he’d sat patiently as I tried on outfit after outfit. He gave me the thumbs up for each of them, but the only thing he showed any real enthusiasm for was a pair of skinny jeans and a white, long-sleeved tee with a low round neck that I hadn’t worn in forever. I’d hoped it might cover most of the scars on my chest if not my neck, but it didn’t.
They were on full display.
Mason grabbed my hand then pulled me into his lap, kissing me soundly.
“That’s the one. Dear God no more outfit changes, please.”
I leaned my head back and met his gaze. “This one? But you can see my scars.”
He shrugged. “So? You’re not ashamed of them, are you?”
I averted my gaze. “Well, now that you mention it…”
A low growl rumbled in his throat and when I met his gaze again, his eyes had narrowed. He gripped my face then leaned in close.
“I don’t really give a shit what top you wear because you’ve looked beautiful in all of them, but this one? This one makes you look sexy as hell. You know why? It’s because it shows your scars.
“You see, when you put them on display like this, it shows people that you don’t care about them, that you’re not bothered by them. It says that what some people may perceive as imperfections, you wear like they were a piece of precious jewelry. You own them. That tells people that you have confidence and confidence is sexy, baby.
“Your scars are a part of you and whether you believe it or not, they’re beautiful too because they show the world how strong you are. They show the world that you’re a survivor.
“They tell people that even though you’ve been so close to death that you didn’t die. You’re alive and you’re going to live each moment as if it was your last.”
I opened my mouth to say something but he wasn’t done.
“It also says that a sexy, confident woman like you has got a man on your arm and in your bed who is pretty fucking crazy about you.”
My mouth fell open in surprise. “This top says all that?”
When he looked down at it again, his expression filled with desire. “It says all that and more.”
“I guess I’m wearing this top,” I mumbled then I pressed my lips to his for one last, lingering kiss before we headed out to Mason’s car to make our way to the restaurant.
Despite the fact that we’d been sleeping together for several weeks, this was our first official date. And, if I was being honest, I was kind of nervous about it—not because I wasn’t comfortable around Mason or because I worried about how we would get along when we weren’t jumping each other’s bones, but because this was the first time that people would see us together as an actual couple.
If people had talked about us before, after seeing us out in a restaurant eating dinner together it would be ten times worse.
Mason, however, didn’t seem to care about that.
“Let them talk,” he told me on the drive to the restaurant. “We haven’t got anything to hide. Besides, I’d be proud to have people call you my girlfriend.”
I couldn’t say anything after that because I got another darn lump in my throat, but his words got rid of any residual doubt I felt about us being seen out on the town.
A couple of weeks ago, Mason had accompanied me to Dottie’s funeral back in Denver. It had felt strange going back to the city. I’d expected the panic attacks to rear their ugly head again, but they never came.
I had Mason to thank for that.
He held my hand nearly the entire time we were there and squeezed it reassuringly throughout the service. His presence had a calming effect on me. Every time I felt my pulse start to quicken or my breathing get shallow, I would look at him and relax. I would know that I was safe.
“You decide what you want to eat yet?” Mason asked, pulling me back to the present.
After a quick scan of the menu, we both ordered steak, but Mason opted for fries with his and I went with a baked potato. When the waitress left to fill our order, Mason raised his beer bottle in a toast and I clinked my own bottle against it.
When I caught the sparkle that twinkled in his eyes, a wide smile spread across my lips.
“What are we toasting?”
He thought for a moment then beamed back at me. “How about—to us and to new beginnings.”
I couldn’t think of anything more fitting.
“To us,” I repeated. “And to new beginnings.”
As Mason took a drink from the beer bottle, I took the opportunity to watch him. His Adam’s apple bobbed beneath the thick covering of stubble on his neck and the muscle in his arm bulged. He was an incredible example of a strong, virile man and just watching him do something as mundane as taking a drink from a bottle, got me all hot and bothered.
I cleared my throat and tried to think non-erotic thoughts. I could do this. I just needed to focus.
“So, you finally finished working on that deck of yours then?” I said between sips of beer.
Mason nodded. “Yeah, finally. It’s taken forever to finish, but I think it was worth it. I like how it turned out.”
I nodded in agreement. “Heck yeah, it was worth it. That deck is awesome. The view is to die for and can you imagine the parties you can hold out there? You’ve got room for a swing, a table and chairs, even a barbecue.”
Mason averted his gaze then let out a sigh. “Who would I invite to a barbecue? I don’t’ have any family left. I shut myself off from everyone after Caroline was killed and I don’t have many people left in the way of friends. It would be the most pitiful damn barbecue ever.”
I huffed out a laugh. “Oh please, you’d be surprised at how many people would turn up with the promise of free food and drink. You’d be turning them away at the door.”
Mason laughed along with me. “Yeah, you’re probably right about that.”
“Besides,” I said. “You’ve got me. We can have our own barbecue. We don’t need anyone else there. I might even make a rule that clothing is not allowed for said occasion.”
Mason’s snort turned into a coughing fit and he looked around the room to see who was watching. I pretended that there was nothing unusual at all with my proposition.
After his coughing had subsided, he threw his head back and laughed.
“A naked barbecue. And just who the hell is going to be cooking because my dangly bits are getting nowhere near a hot grill.”
“We’ll toss for it,” I deadpanned.
That last comment won me a roll of the eyes, not that I could blame him. It was pretty bad.
I shook my head then took a sip of beer.
“You don’t talk about her much,” I noted. “Caroline, I mean. You mentioned her just now, but you don’t do that often.”
He pursed his lips. “I guess there’s not much to say.”
He must have noted my raised eyebrows because he amended what he’d said.
“Yeah, okay. There’s a story there, naturally. But I spent so long avoiding the topic that it’s become second nature to do so. Honestly, I don’t know what to say. We were high school sweethearts and I loved her. Of course, I wasn’t the only one…”
I nodded. “I know that Coop was in love with her too.”
A dark shadow crossed over Mason’s face and I wished I hadn’t broached the topic because I wanted to see him smile again.
“Yeah, he did. You know, you can say what you will about Coop and God knows I’ve said a few choice things about him myself over the years, but there c
an be no doubt that he was in love with her, every bit as much as I was.”
“That must have been difficult on your friendship.”
Mason smiled regretfully. “You have no idea. I hated him for it at first. I saw it as a personal slight—as if he only went after her to get at me, but deep down I knew that wasn’t true because ultimately, it was hard not to love Caroline.”
The admission caused a tug in my chest which I chose to ignore. It would have been stupid to be jealous of a ghost, however much she’d meant to him when she was alive. I knew I could never compete with her and I didn’t want to try. But hearing him speak that way about another woman was a difficult thing to hear.
“Did she love him too?” I asked, suspecting I already knew the answer.
Mason sighed. “Yeah, I’m sure she did. You see, Caroline never had much growing up. Her mom did the best she could, but she was a single parent who worked all the hours she could just to put food on the table.
“As a result, Caroline often went without the things she wanted—things that other kids had.”
I nodded in understanding, drawing on my own childhood in the foster care system. There were times I went without, too.
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m not looking for a way to justify the things that she did, but rather to clarify the way that she thought. She explained it to me once. You see, when you’re told that you can’t have something, you want it all the more.
“Caroline got told that a lot and it made her go after things in life with reckless abandon. If she wanted something, she wouldn’t stop until she got it.”
“So you think that because she knew she couldn’t have Coop, because it was wrong to want two people at the same time, it made him all the more desirable to her?”
Mason thought about it for a moment then nodded. “Yeah, I think that it did.” He waited a beat then blew out an uneasy breath. “No, as much as it pains me to say it, maybe that’s not being entirely fair on Coop.
“I wasn’t trying to suggest that Caroline wouldn’t have fallen for him anyway, but she’d always had this way about her, like the grass was always greener or something bigger and better was waiting for her just around the corner.
“When she was with me, she wanted to be with him and when she was with him—“
“She wanted you,” I finished for him.
“Yeah. Yeah, that about sums it up. I guess what it boiled down to was that she wanted us both, but she knew that neither one of us was the type to share and she hated that she had to choose.”
“And on the night that she was killed, she and Coop were together?”
I realized that I was prying, but I was so interested in hearing about Mason’s history that the question had rolled off my tongue without thought.
He got a faraway look on his face before shaking his head as if to clear it.
He met my gaze.
“Yeah. They were together. My relationship with Caroline had always been volatile. I mean, I loved her, but we always seemed to rub each other the wrong way. We argued a lot.
“That time was no exception. We’d fallen out about something so inconsequential that I can’t even remember what it had been about. But every time we argued, she threatened to go back to Coop.”
“I’m sorry, Mason,” I said, my heart heavy. I hated that he’d been subjected to such harsh, emotional blackmail from someone he loved.
He shrugged. “It wasn’t anything new. She always threatened to leave me for Coop when she didn’t get her way about something.”
God.
That must have been awful for him.
Didn’t she realize that she was hurting him or did she simply not care?
“So she left,” I prompted.
“Yeah. She left. And she was gone for months before she called to say that she wanted to come back.” He sighed. “You must be wondering why in God’s name I kept taking her back.”
“Not really,” I replied. “Because when we love someone, we tend to overlook their flaws and forgive the things they do.”
Mason blew out a laugh. “Yeah, well I certainly forgave Caroline for a hell of a lot of things. She had this kind of childlike way about her. She would look at me with these big mournful eyes or use this small, sweet voice that plucked on my heartstrings every damn time.
“So anyway, a few months after she left, she called and told me she was sorry. She begged me to forgive her and said she loved me and couldn’t live without me.
“I suppose deep down I knew that she and Coop had probably just argued about something or she couldn’t get her own way so she thought she might try her luck with me again.
“I ignored that voice in my head that told me not to give in to her and I agreed to come and pick her up and bring her back to town.”
We’d arrived at the part in the story where Caroline had been killed. I thought I’d wanted to hear it, but now that Mason relating it, I wasn’t so sure.
I put my hand over his. “It’s okay, Mason, you don’t have to talk about it anymore if you don’t want to.”
“I’ve never talked about it,” he said quietly. “Not with anyone. But, perhaps I need to. I want to talk about it to you if you’ll let me.”
I held my breath and nodded for him to go on. “Okay. Then tell me. Tell me everything.”
He sucked in a deep breath that I was fairly sure had been to calm his nerves then he began. “When she got back with Coop that time, they left town together.
“Coop told me later that he had convinced Caroline that a fresh start would be better for all of us—that it would be easier on me if I didn’t have to see them together all the time.
“He admitted afterward that his real reason was far more selfish—it was because he hoped it might be a case of ‘out of sight, out of mind’—that if she didn’t see me every day, she wouldn’t miss me and regret leaving.
“That sounds like wishful thinking.”
“Yeah, it does. They had been staying in the city. At that time, Coop and I owned The Shack together among other things, but he left me to manage the businesses on my own.
“A few months had passed by the time I got the call from Caroline and when I agreed to go and get her, we arranged to meet at a gas station in a town not too far from here.
“When I got there, they had just arrived themselves. Caroline went inside to use the restroom and right after she left, Coop and I got into a fight. I railed at him for shirking his responsibilities at the bar and he had a go at me for giving in to Caroline and agreeing to take her back again.
“Coop said that they would have worked it out if I’d left them alone and who knows? Perhaps they would have.
“God knows I’ve spent countless nights, lying awake in the dark, thinking about the fact that if I hadn’t given in to her so easily and if I hadn’t gone there to pick her up, she would still be alive today.”
“No, Mason. You can’t blame yourself for what happened. You were just following your heart. There was no way you could have known what was ahead.”
He nodded. “I know that now—it took me a while to accept it though. Anyway, Coop and I were out front, giving each other shit when we heard a gunshot. The next thing we knew, two men with guns came sprinting out of the gas station.
“They got into their pickup then drove off like a bat out of hell. Coop and I ran inside but it was too late.”
I tried to swallow around the lump in my throat but failed.
“Caroline had been shot in the chest and was lying on the floor in a pool of her own blood. The gas station attendant was busy calling nine one one. He told us later that the men had been trying to rob the place and he’d argued with them, told them he wasn’t going to give them anything. It got heated.
“Caroline came up behind them and startled them and one of the men panicked then fired at her without thinking. The attendant said he wished he’d just given them the money, but I suppose each of us can think of things we could have done differently that night.
“I ran to her. Got down on my knees and pulled her up against my chest. I held her while we waited for the ambulance to arrive. Coop was too stunned to move. He just stood there looking stricken. I spoke to her constantly. I kept telling her it was all going to be okay, that she would get through it, but of course, she didn’t.
“I was pressing down on the wound so that she wouldn’t bleed out, but the bullet had done too much damage to her internally. I had to watch as the spark of light left her eyes right before she died in my arms. Gone.
“In the blink of an eye.”
A choked sob left my throat and a tear escaped my eye to roll down my cheek.
“I’m so sorry, Mason. I wish there was something I could say that would make it all okay.”
“I know you do, that’s one of the things I love about you.”
His words caught me off guard, but I didn’t linger on them because there were details that I still needed to know.
“Did they catch the men who did it?”
“Yeah, they got ‘em. The police caught up with them in the next town over. They’re both doing time.”
“You must miss her,” I remarked.
He nodded. “I did, at first. For months I kept waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat after having replayed it all over again in a dream. Each night when I went to bed, I hoped that the dream would have a different outcome, but it never did.
“Can you believe that? I couldn’t even save her in a damn dream. The guilt and the grief kept pressing down on my chest so that I could hardly breathe through it.
“About two years ago, I was pretty much at rock bottom. I was hardly functioning. Coop was running The Shack so I didn’t have any responsibilities. I was hardly eating. I was afraid to go to sleep because of that damn dream. I was a mess.”
Despite the tears I’d allowed to fall, a fresh lump formed in my throat.
“What changed?”
A smile ghosted over Mason’s lips. “I got Duke. Or rather, Coop gave me Duke to look after.”
