Break (Lakefield Book 3)

by Jennifer Vester

  He growled, took one last look at her from head to toe and stalked into the crowd.

  Liv and Julia burst out laughing. They leaned into each other and laughed in unison. Liv snorted, Julia’s voice reached new octaves.

  Andi shrugged. “What? He’s a menace. Where does he get off? He’s got a nice ass, but shit, you don’t just grab people like that. He needs a lesson in restraint.”

  Liv and Julia’s laughter started again.

  I giggled and looked at Andi. “He’s just flirtatious. He’s a nice guy though.”

  Liv snorted and lifted her glass of water. “To Kate, because we love you! And to Andi, because you are one badass woman!”

  We all clinked glasses.

  I took a sip of my drink. It was cold and exactly the flavor I was looking for. I tipped it back and downed the entire thing.

  I set the glass back down and smiled. “I think I’ll have another.”

  Julia eyed my glass. “You don’t drink much. Maybe we should get some food.”

  I shook my head. “Eating is overrated!”

  “Did you drive here?” Andi asked.

  “Yeah, I can take a cab home. Life is good and so are drinks. Too bad Brock left, he could have been our drink boy.”

  Andi wouldn’t let me out of the booth to fetch another drink. “We’ll get one in a minute.”

  We chatted while the alcohol hit my system. I could feel a light tingling sensation in my head. They were being ridiculous.

  As soon as Andi moved I was out of my seat and headed to the bar. I weaved once again in and out of the crowd. I got to the bar and set down some money.

  The blonde behind the counter took my order and less than a minute later I had my second drink in front of me. I put it back like the other one and gave the glass back to her.

  She smiled. “Another one?”

  “No, she’s had enough I think,” said a deep familiar voice behind me. Two hands appeared on the counter on either side of me.

  My heart sank.

  I ignored it and told the woman. “Ignore him, yes, I’d like another.”

  The bartender eyed the man standing behind me and moved down the bar.

  I turned around, a little dizzy, and backed up to the counter as far as I could. Logan’s blue eyes met mine. He was close and boxing me in.

  He was wearing a black dress shirt rolled up at the sleeves. The two top buttons were undone and I tried not to look at the skin so elusively peeking out. His jeans seemed to know where to hug him.

  In my semi-tipsy mind, I didn’t feel like I had just given him the once over with my eyes, but when I looked back at his face I noticed the hint of a smirk.

  He silently looked down the entire length of my body, not caring that I was watching. His eyes stopped on the short hem of my dress and I fidgeted for a moment.

  Frowning, he stepped closer. One of his hands slid down my side to the bottom of my dress and started tugging it down.

  I tried not to react but it was like being hit with a jolt of electricity when his hand touched my thigh.

  “Don’t ever fucking wear this dress again,” he mumbled.

  Looking away from him, I took in a huge breath of air and moved his hand away from my thigh. The loss of his touch was annoying. I hated that I wanted it there.

  He clenched his jaw and stepped back a little. “What are you doing Kaitlyn?”

  I pointed at his face, my finger swaying a little unsteadily. “I’m having a good time and I don’t want to see you. Please move out of my way. I need to go back to my table.”

  His eyes looked glazed for a moment and he shook his head. There was something weird about it. He looked like he’d been drinking, but I couldn’t smell alcohol on him. Only the musky scent of his body.

  He looked at my mouth for a moment. No doubt checking to see if the redness from my burn was still there. But there was that small flare of heat again behind his eyes that I couldn’t define or understand. Just like the small look he had given me earlier in the day in the breakroom.

  Brock approached from my right and put a hand on Logan’s shoulder. “Hey man, heard you were here. The guys are in the back, let’s go talk.”

  Logan’s eyes didn’t leave my face.

  Brock looked between us. “Kate, are you okay to get home? Just go hang with the girls.”

  I turned my head and looked at him. The alcohol was doing a number on my system and having Logan so close was even worse. It felt like my heart was clenched up. It was like the alcohol just made things ten times worse.

  I smiled. “I’m good. Cab. Going to head back over to the table.”

  Logan growled and crossed his arms over his chest. He seemed to loom over me suddenly with his height.

  “You shouldn’t even be out,” he said sternly.

  A burst of anger hit me. I was rarely angry, but I was tired of feeling miserable around him. Where did he get off?

  I put a hand to his chest and shoved him as much as I could. He didn’t move.

  “Don’t tell me what to do Logan! I’m not a child and you have no right!”

  Brock stepped in and forcibly turned Logan his way. “She’s right. Quit fucking with her head.”

  Logan looked him up and down. “What? You think you can take me? None of you ever had the balls. You’re always hitting on every single woman you see. Stay the fuck away from Kate.”

  “You’re fucked up Logan. Kate’s a friend. Let’s go see Aiden in the office and let Kate hang out with the girls. She’ll be okay there. Let her have some fun for once.”

  Logan’s eyes swept down my body again. “Go home Kaitlyn. Now. Right now.”

  I huffed and turned away. I wasn’t sure what all that was about. Clearly Logan was being an asshole to everyone, even his friends. I was done with it. I stumbled a few times through the jostling crowd but didn’t go back to the table.

  I went outside and the cooler night air hit my face. I was sober enough to drive the ten minutes it took to get to my house.

  Dealing with this was exhausting. All I wanted to do was sleep it off.

  Chapter Three

  The next morning I was dealing with a slight hangover. It wasn’t as bad as I was expecting. There was just a slow and methodical little throb in the side of my head. Bells was licking my face and I opened my eyes to a mid-morning sunlit room.

  I scratched her behind her ears. “Thanks, Bells. It was time to get up, wasn’t it?”

  She meowed at me and started swishing her tail.

  My stomach growled. Yeah. Must eat.

  I sat up in bed slowly and looked around. I remembered getting home just fine and drinking a lot of water before bed. My clothes had ended up over a small chair in the corner. I was in just a pair of my panties without anything else. It wasn’t my normal attire, but it had actually felt really good overnight. I might skip the t-shirt routine from now on.

  Standing on two sleepy legs I moved through the room, headed to the bathroom. The picture frames I had all over the walls twinkled at me.

  To some, it might seem like overkill with the number of pictures I had hung, but to me it was like living in one gigantic painting. There wasn’t much space now between each frame. One of my other rooms had an insect theme. My room had flowers, pressed between frames or pictures of them. They were everywhere.

  I did my thing in the bathroom, got dressed and headed to the kitchen for a cup of tea. Bells followed me the entire way, watching my movements. I made myself some toast and gave her some cat food. She looked at it and then back at me. She didn’t seem to be eating much either lately. An internet search recently told me that she might have been picking up on my melancholic mood and was feeling a little down as well.

  I was determined not to let it get me down anymore though. Last night had been my last day of feeling like that. With my bad luck revolving around Logan, all I had to do was cut that out of my life and things would go back to normal.

  I picked my phone up off the counter when it beeped. T
here were four missed messages and six new calls.

  Julia: Call me. Hope you took a cab!

  Andi: You drove home? WTF? I could have driven you. Call me!

  Andi: Can you at least let me know if you’re still alive???

  Brock: Logan is an ass. Sorry about last night. Do you have Andi’s number?

  I rolled my eyes.

  I checked my missed calls. Two were from Andi. The rest were from an unknown number. The same number I had been getting hang up calls from all summer. They never left a message and when I answered, the line would pause, then go dead. Why I would get that many overnight was beyond me.

  I called Andi.

  “Helooo,” she answered.

  “Hey just checking in.”

  “Are you okay? Why did you leave? I could have driven you home.”

  I smiled. “I know, silly. Just didn’t want to hang around. I ran into Logan at the bar. He was fighting with Brock.”

  “Eh, Brock. They were fighting?” she asked.

  “Yeah, long story but you would have been proud of me. I stood up to Logan and told him to leave me alone. Kind of.”

  She laughed and I had to pull the phone away from my ear before she made my headache worse.

  “I’m not sure that’s going to help. I am proud of you though, no matter what.”

  I grinned. “Uhm, Brock wants your number. I’m surprised he’s asking. Liv and Jules seem to think he has a line on everyone.”

  “Well, he can’t have it. If he’s not smart enough to figure out how to get it, then that’s his fault. Hey, I gotta go. I’m at work today. Yay. Talk later?”

  “For sure. Have fun!”

  “Bye!” she said, then hung up.

  I texted Julia.

  Kate: Hey I’m good! Just wasn’t feeling well and left early.

  Julia: Anything to do with the doc?

  Kate: Screw him.

  Julia: Ha! That’s my girl. I wouldn’t stress about it. Want me to take a cannon to his house and knock out one of his trees or something?

  Kate: You don’t have your father-in-law’s cannon down here. Otherwise I would say yes.

  Julia: Ha! Talk later. Holden just woke up. *wink

  Julia and Holden were quite the couple. Ever since he had gotten injured by one of her stalker fans a few months back, they were constantly all over each other. If she went out on a girl’s night, he would typically show up and drag her out somewhere. It was really cute and really kind of made me jealous.

  I texted Brock.

  Kate: Thanks for helping last night. I’m great. Andi says you’re an idiot if you can’t figure out how to get it.

  Brock: Ha- we’ll see about that. I was trying to be nice. Hey something is going on with Logan. He’s just not himself. Don’t give up.

  Kate: Already done. Finished. I’m going to start applying for some other jobs. I have to go. Be happy!

  I turned off my phone. Time for some laundry, maybe a book, and a pint of ice-cream. One nice thing about living alone was not having to share the ice-cream.

  I looked at Bells who had her head tilted to the side gazing at me. “I’m done Bells. I’m not arguing with you, so get that look off your face. I’m not going to do this anymore.”

  She swished her tail at me, hopped off the counter, and sauntered out of the kitchen.

  Stupid cat.

  The doorbell rang.

  Ugh. What now?

  I opened the door and faced my uncle. He was about my height with ginger red hair and always had a grumpy look on his face. There was a huge moving truck in my driveway behind him. Five men were milling around like they were waiting on something.

  “Richard?” I said.

  He stepped into the house without being invited in.

  “Kate. Good to see you. It’s been about a year I think.” He started looking around at everything in the house while scowling.

  Richard and I were the only living relatives left of my family. My parents had died in a car wreck when I was seven. Because they hadn’t made provisions for my custody before their death, I had been put in a couple of homes until my grandmother had been allowed to adopt me. Richard and I had never been very close, if ever, because he had never been around while my grandmother had been living. A couple of years ago when she had died, he hadn’t even shown for the funeral. He was a late baby several years younger than my mother. We had only seen each other a handful of times over the years. My impression then was that he was a perpetually unhappy person. It looked like he hadn’t changed much.

  Trying to broach the awkward silence, I asked, “Would you like some tea? It’s good to see you as well.”

  His eyes swung back to me. “No, I’m actually here with some bad news and I’m going to need your cooperation.”

  My heart started to race and I felt nervous.

  He swept his hand around the room. “We need to pack up all of this today and get it into a storage unit. My mother’s will stipulated that I inherit this house. I agreed to letting you stay for a while, but unfortunately some things have changed my financial circumstances and I’m liquidating my assets.”

  My mouth hung open and I froze. “You what?”

  He wandered around the living room, not looking in my direction. “I’ve been selling my properties lately. This is really the last one to go. I’ve been planning my retirement lately and my advisor said to get rid of some items. This house is one of the items. I’ve already contacted a realtor but I had a hard time flying in and arranging movers. Everything has to go today.”

  “But—”

  He interrupted. “Look, I own it and I need you out. I think I’ve been more than generous about it up to this point. Mom left you a cabin in Colorado. I’m sure you’re aware of it.”

  I shook my head and frowned. I hadn’t been aware of it.

  My heart was starting to ache.

  He frowned at me. “Well, yes. I have all the papers with me. I don’t remember seeing you at the reading of the will. I guess the attorney didn’t contact you afterward. He should have informed you but he’s always been worthless.”

  If the attorney had contacted me, I couldn’t remember. I had been in the middle of a deep funk and had been dealing with a lot of other things at the time. My mind had let a lot of things slip during that month.

  He cleared his throat. “Anyway, I took it upon myself to turn on some of the utilities up there for you last week. I also had the place checked out. It will need some work, but everything is still functional. Apparently one of her neighbors was looking after it for a while.”

  A tear slid down my face. “So, you’re saying that I should just move to Colorado?!”

  He turned to me with an unsympathetic stare. “Don’t be so dramatic. You can move there or not. After I had the utilities turned on, I transferred them to your name. They’re paid up for the next three months. Do whatever you want with it. I would sell it personally, but from what I hear you won’t get much for it. It’s not that big.”

  I sat down in one of my chairs and tried to process what he was telling me.

  “You said you had the papers?”

  “Yeah,” he said and pulled a manila envelope out of his suit jacket. “It’s in your name. Bought and paid for a long time ago and willed to you.”

  I nodded and opened the envelope. I slid the first sheet out and blindly skimmed it. My name was printed on it and it had my grandmother’s signature. She had never mentioned a cabin before.

  I stuffed it back in the envelope and set it on my lap. My mind couldn’t handle looking through it right now. It would have to wait. I wished I had been paying more attention to the details when she had died but I hadn’t been in the right frame of mind.

  He stepped toward the door. “I would suggest packing most of your clothes in some suitcases for the time being. These guys will label everything and take care of things. I know most of this shit was mother’s stuff. If you want me to sell it, then leave it behind. They’ll be delivering it to a sto
rage unit and they have all the sets of keys to it.”

  I felt numb as I looked at my hands. How was this even possible? Bells and I didn’t have anywhere to go. Maybe a hotel but for how long with a cat? It was going to cost me a fortune to stay long term. I would ask Andi but she lived in a two bedroom with her younger brother and had enough to deal with. Maybe one of the other girls at work was looking for a roommate.

  My eyes drifted toward the backdoor. I would miss my garden. It was a small one when my grandmother had died and I had built it up to be a much larger one since her death. She had loved flowers and plants. In a way, it was like a memorial to her.

  My stomach clenched. Bells must have sensed something was wrong because she was rubbing my leg over and over again like she was agitated.

  Colorado? I had never even been there. I wasn’t even sure my car would make it. It needed some major work right now.

  The front door opened and closed. Several people were talking about what should be packed up. They were building boxes. I could hear the rolls of tape being applied repetitively. I walked to my room and got my suitcases down out of the closet.

  I was just going through the motions like a robot on autopilot. I couldn’t seem to think of anything. If I could get enough money together to save on car repairs I could make it up there.

  Then what?

  Find a job in the next three months doing something. I could do that. First housing. I would pack up all my essentials in my car and head by the clinic. If worse came to worse, I supposed I could crash on someone’s couch for a night or two until I could figure it out. I needed to ask my boss for another day off. It was going to be a sticky conversation since I had just taken two days off the week prior when I had to go to a couple of routine doctor visits. I would need to pay rent to someone. Payday wasn’t until Friday though. Two days.

  I spent an hour trying to decide what to temporarily take with me.

  Bells jumped on the bed when I had everything together. I grabbed her crate out of the closet. She didn’t like it much, but I needed to get her secured and in the car.

  The items from my bedroom were able to be packed into the backseat. I went back in several times for different things and filled my trunk. My poor car probably wouldn’t make it down the block.