by R. K. Ryals
“Are we really doing this right now?”
“It can suddenly make the opposite sex glow like a beacon,” he continued without missing a beat. “Let’s face it. Intimacy is much better than pain. Don’t screw up. You need help, not more complications.”
My thoughts scattered, my blood heating at the memory of Tansy straddling me, her arms wrapped around my neck, her hips grinding against mine.
“We talked. That’s it. If I wasn’t here because of the courts, I’d be gone. Out of the way. But while I’m here, it’d be nice if everyone remembered I quit being the little boy Mom ran all over a long time ago.”
Pops nodded thoughtfully. “You certainly don’t let anyone forget it.”
It was Saturday. I was off today at the rescue, I wasn’t on the schedule at the gym, and I was still dealing with shit. “What do you want from me?”
“To try,” Pops replied. “That’s it.” Turning, he started down the stairs, pausing on the bottom step to look back at me. “And to dress half decent tonight. I’ve invited Hetty and her granddaughters over for dinner.”
I froze. “You what?”
“Nothing alleviates fears like facing them.”
“What the hell kind of philosophy is that?”
Ignoring my question, he marched across the lawn, his voice rising with each step. “I’m driving into the city today to meet with Lincoln about the casino. He’s up from the gulf coast with his fiancée. They’ll be joining us.”
Jonathan passed him in the yard, headed in my direction.
“He’s fucking with me right?” I asked my brother once he’d joined me on the porch.
He grinned, completely unapologetic. “He’s all about people facing their demons.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Demons, my ass.”
“Truce offering?” Jonathan asked. Punching me lightly in the arm, he danced on the balls of his feet, and gestured at his Porsche. “Come on. I’ll take you into town for cigarettes.”
“What makes you think I’m out?”
“You keep reaching into your pocket and frowning. If you don’t stop, you’re going to wear a hole in it.” His eyes searched my face, a shadow crossing his features, edging out the humor. “You really didn’t have sex with Tansy, did you?”
My glare, his face. “You little eavesdropping bastard.”
His hands flew up, surrendering. “No way, man. I listened to Pops’ conversation with the grandmother. Even one-sided, I got the gist of it.” His head tilted. “Well?”
“None of your business, bro.” I preceded him down the stairs.
Shit, I’d never had so many people interested in my sex life before. This was why I stuck with cougars—with seasoned, confident women looking for a good time and nothing beyond it. A few days talking with Tansy, and I had everyone up my ass.
“Seems a little crazy,” Jonathan mumbled, following me, “everyone caring so much about you two, you know? Even me.”
“Maybe.” Or maybe not. She was a mess, and I was a jerk. Complete recipe for disaster.
“She’s a good person. Good head on her shoulders,” Jonathan said, climbing into his car. “Can’t be easy with that sister of hers.”
Standing outside the passenger door, I stared at the empty space he’d left. Was he serious? How did he know Tansy had a good head on her shoulders? A few conversations with her, and he thought she was good? Not that she was bad, but she was definitely not okay. Everyone seemed fine blaming me. Why? Because not a single damn one of them saw the darkness lurking in Tansy, the beast itching to be set free. No one except me.
All they saw was a soft spoken, grieving girl being snared and taken advantage of by the local bad boy. I laughed, loud and bitter.
“What’s so funny?” Jonathan asked when I joined him.
My gaze slid to the window; to the picturesque orchard, and the sun shitting sun babies all over the place. “Nothing.”
I suddenly knew why Tansy intrigued me so much. Everyone was so focused on me, so convinced I needed the help, that they couldn’t see the one who really needed it.
No one needed me. Never had. But she did. She was guilt-ridden and full of anger. The latter and I were longtime acquaintances. Anger was something I knew how to channel. Anger also ate you alive, from the inside out, if you didn’t find a way to control it. Tansy needed me, and damned if that didn’t feel way better than it should.
SEVENTEEN
Tansy
My knitting needles clicked together, the yarn circling them, and I stared at it, unblinking, until the whole thing blurred into something I couldn’t see. I wasn’t even sure what I was making. I just needed to knit. Anything to keep my mind busy.
“Hey,” a quick rap on my bedroom door, “Tansy?”
My gaze didn’t rise. It remained on the needles. “I can’t today, Deena. I just can’t.”
Rather than leave, Deena remained at the door, her body throwing a shadow across the bed. Snow, who’d slept with me the night before, lifted her head, threw Deena a look, and then tucked her snout between her paws.
“So,” Deena mumbled, “did you hear about tonight?”
My body tensed. “Dinner at the Lockstons? Yeah.”
“Okay,” she replied. “Just thought I’d see.”
She didn’t leave.
My hands stilled. “Look, Deena—”
“You’re my sister,” she interrupted, “and I … care about you, you know. I just don’t think I can apologize for the things I said. At the same time, I don’t want there to be this huge … like issue between us.”
My hands dropped to my lap. “You can care about someone and still hate them.”
“I know,” she replied.
I looked at her, my dry, reddened eyes blurring her face. I’d gone way too long without blinking enough. “Maybe that’s not so bad, huh? Maybe that’s what you need.”
Deena gripped the door. “How do you figure?”
There’d been a lot of cursing my dad the night before. A lot of pain. Somewhere during all of the swearing and needles against my palms, I’d realized something. “Maybe you just need to hate me. So you can feel better about where you are now.”
My sister took a step back into the hall. “I don’t hate you.”
A small smile stole across my face. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
“You look terrible,” she muttered, changing the subject.
My skin felt tight and sore, my stomach queasy, and I winced. “Yeah, well, it’ll teach me to wear sunscreen.”
She studied me, her head down so that her hair hid her expression. “You should take something for fever. Drink lots of water. You know, like you told me to do that time I spent the day at Daisy McFlintock’s pool.”
“I will.”
My promise hung between us, awkward and heavy, and a hollow feeling invaded my gut. Homesickness. At home, I knew who I was. There I’d been Tansy Griffin, authority figure and caretaker. I’d known where everything was and where it needed to go. My room, the TV, the living room couch—where I spent every afternoon waiting for Deena to come home and Dad to call me—my knitting, my plants, and the permanent smell of burnt toast. Because no matter how often I cooked, I still managed to burn bread.
“What are you working on?” Deena asked, shaking me out of my thoughts.
I glanced at the pastel blue project in my lap. “I don’t know.” It was too large to be a scarf and too small yet to be a blanket.
“Well, I guess I’ll leave you to it.”
“Okay,” I responded, not bothering to watch her go. “A sail.” Snorting, I lifted my needles and yarn and threw Snow an incredulous look. “I think I’m making a sail.”
The dog’s head rose, a small whimper escaping.
“Not good, huh?” I asked, sighing. Shoving it aside, I grabbed my pillow, stuffed my face into the fluff, and screamed.
I screamed and screamed.
Snow jumped up, threw herself at me, and nudged me with her nose, howling softly. My
fingers found her fur, stroking gently. Soothing her.
“It’s okay,” I gasped, pulling my head out of the pillow. “Sometimes you just need to scream.”
She continued to howl, and I stroked her until she finally calmed, plopping herself down so that her head rested in my lap. My crisscrossed legs were stiff and tingly, but I didn’t move because, as much as I hated to admit it, Snow’s affection was the most love I’d felt in a long time. I soaked it in greedily, like a woman who’d been too long without water.
EIGHTEEN
Eli
That afternoon, I avoided the main house for as long as I could, my wrapped hands and boxing gloves hitting the punching bag in the cottage.
Tap, tap. Tap, tap. Tap, tap. One, two.
My eyes skirted the words scrawled in front of me, focusing on one. Tansy.
Tap, tap. Tap, tap. Tap, tap. One, two.
I wanted inside of her head, wanted to know exactly how far she’d gone in her mind to that dark place, the one that was hard as hell to come back from. I’d been there. Too often.
There’d been too many years chasing trouble, from my elementary school years forward. Too many pranks, too many friends with anger issues, and too many talented buddies with grudges on their shoulders. My first stint in juvie had followed a night of tagging neighborhoods, spray paint in hand with a group of guys who were actually good at it. My only contribution had been spray painting every vulgar word my preteen brain could come up with. The graffiti cuss word dictionary. I’d been so cool.
Later, when I’d been forced to clean the paint off of the buildings we’d tagged, I’d found myself standing outside a boxing club. My fist clenched a soapy rag, lines of crying suds leaving colored streaks down a glass window, my gaze riveted on what was happening on the other side. Men and women were dancing in a ring, fists pounding bags, jump ropes flying, and determined foreheads creased in concentration.
Something about it called to me. As if every thap, thap was really Eli, Eli.
My problems didn’t go away. My anger either, but I’d found something I was good at, something I could go to when everything else got to be too much.
I was sixteen when my trainer, Casey Horace, handed me two permanent markers, looked at me, and said, “You’ve got to quit bringing just one emotion into the ring. Anger only takes you so far. You’ve got to bring what you want into the ring, too. Not just what you want to destroy, but also what you want to save.”
Tap, tap. Tap, tap. Tap, tap. One, two.
The cottage door opened. “Eli!” my brother called. “They’re here.”
I froze, hands up. “All of them?” I called back.
“Yeah.”
My gaze flicked over the bag, over familiar words and dark emotions. “Okay, I’ll be there in a second.”
The cottage door clicked shut.
Tap, tap. Tap, tap. Tap, tap. One, two.
Breathing hard, I pulled the Velcro on the hook and loop gloves, slowly removing them, one by one before unwrapping my hands. Car doors slammed outside, and I stiffened, going on the defensive. I lived my life that way, hands up, protecting myself.
Protection was better than running. I’d tried that, too, and it seemed the harder I ran, the harder I slammed into what I was trying to leave behind.
Grabbing a T-shirt, I pulled it over my head, gave myself a cursory look in the bathroom mirror, and left the cottage. Head high. Stepping lightly.
NINETEEN
Tansy
“Was this really necessary?” I asked, staring at the colonial house looming outside the van window.
Hetty glanced at me. “Eli Lockston is working at the rescue, will be training your sister at the boxing club, and is fraternizing with my granddaughter on his off time. I say it’s necessary.”
“I’m not feeling the tension at all,” Deena groused from the back. She tapped my seat. “No worries, sis. They’ll kick us out before we make it through the meal, so eat as much as you can right off the bat.”
Hetty threw her a glare, but I’d quit listening. My eyes were on the side mirror, on the male figure slipping out of a cottage behind us. His hands were in his pockets, causing the hem of his black T-shirt to ride up on his stomach, exposing a sliver of skin.
“And you wanted us to try?” Deena asked. She was turned in her seat, her gaze on the same guy. On Eli. “He looks like he stepped out of his laundry basket.”
“I don’t have any say over what he wears,” Hetty pointed out.
She’d been worried more about Deena than me. My attire was fairly one dimensional. Lots of black, lots of earrings, and lots of color splotches. Hair dye, a purple bracelet here, and a gaudy ring there. I had managed a shower, and a decent amount of makeup despite the sunburn.
Smoothing my sweaty palms down shorts patched in checkered black and white plaid, I climbed out of the van, my gaze swinging to the house.
“It bites. Hard,” Eli assured, coming up beside me. Hetty’s door slammed, and he glanced up, nodding. “Mrs. Anderson.”
Deena jumped out, throwing him a thin grin. “Greetings, asshole.”
“Your mouth, Deena,” Hetty reprimanded.
Eli winked. “Greetings, fighter.”
Their banter was easy and light despite Deena’s I hate Eli campaign, and a wave of jealousy washed over me. He didn’t get to have that with my sister. That belonged to me.
“Hey, save the frown for dinner, okay?” Eli whispered, nudging me. “You’ll have plenty of chances to use it.”
Closer to the house, a well-dressed man climbed out of a silver Aston Martin, his head high as he walked around the car to assist his passenger. The late afternoon sun chased him, catching on perfectly pleated black slacks and a royal blue button-up shirt. A belt hugged his waist. Gelled brown hair, the same color as Eli’s, dared the wind to touch it.
A delicate, manicured hand slid into the man’s proffered palm. Black fishnet stockings and heels too high for a gravel driveway dropped into view, mascara-enhanced hazel eyes widening as a pretty young woman rose from the car, long, dark blonde hair falling over her shoulders. She was wrapped, for lack of a better word, in a deep blue dress, the fabric a second skin against pale flesh.
“Family?” I asked.
“Cousin,” Eli answered. “The guy. The girl is his fiancée.”
My gaze fell to her stomach, softly rounded beneath the dress, and my lips parted. “Oh.” Sudden understanding slammed into me, and then, “Oh!” My gaze shot to Eli’s face. “Are you shitting me? Is that—”
“My former fiancée. Yeah.”
“This is like a sad, affluent family reality show, right? Predictable. Money-grabbing men and women looking for a cut.”
Eli grunted. “You assume we’ve always been rich. It’s worse when you’re newer money. People think you’re easier to take advantage of.”
“And are you?”
He grimaced, his gaze meeting mine. “Obviously I am, if the pregnant woman with my cousin is any indication, but you haven’t met my grandfather yet.”
“Not so gullible, huh?”
“I’m not either. Anymore.”
Hetty joined us, her eyes narrowing on the space separating Eli and me, as if she were subconsciously trying to push us farther apart. As if we were a thing, a couple instead of who we really were: random roof buddies. “I met your grandfather when I moved here a few years back,” she told Eli. “He seems like a good man.”
“Depends on who you ask,” Eli replied. “That works for anyone really.”
Hetty shot him a curious look, her gaze flicking from his face to mine. “I suppose it does.”
Frowning, she sauntered to the house. Deena crossed her eyes, sent her middle finger flying at us, and followed Hetty.
“That sister of yours,” Eli chuckled. “She’s got a sparkling personality.”
I half-smiled, half-grimaced. “I think her attitude is an armor she wears. Like you with your assholery.”
Eli’s brows rose. “Assholery
? That’s new.”
“Yeah, you know, the whole jerkitude thing you’ve got going. To protect yourself. Defense mechanism. That’s what you called it, right?” I asked, turning to face him. Walking backwards, I teased, “Bask in the glory, sir asshole. It isn’t every day you inspire a new word.”
“Two of them,” he corrected, eyes crinkling. “Jerkitude and assholery.” He stalked me. “Wait for it, roof girl. My family inspires a litany of new words. All of them warm and fuzzy.”
Gravel crunched beneath our feet. A screen door creaked open, and then slammed shut, the house’s mouth swallowing people whole.
A distinguished older gentleman lingered on the porch, his stance authoritative yet somehow unassuming. The younger couple were gone, eaten by the house, leaving only Hetty and Deena undigested on the veranda. Waiting.
A smile. A handshake. Hetty’s lips moving, her discerning gaze finding me as she spoke. The man’s eyes followed hers, grazing my face before retreating. For once, Deena remained silent.
My eyes fell to the man’s left hand, to the way his fingers slid into his pocket, the thumb hooked over the edge. “He stands like you do,” I hissed.
Eli grunted, his reaction urging me forward.
“You must be Tansy,” our host greeted when we approached. “I’m Carson Lockston. Pops to most people.”
He extended his hand, and I grasped it, his larger palm consuming my smaller one. His hand was soft and warm, like a quilt in winter. Comforting despite his grip. His gaze searched mine, and I fidgeted under his stare. Like his grandson, it felt like he saw too much. As if I was suddenly naked, layers and layers of emotional skin peeled back, uncovering things I wanted to hide.
He could have said something more then—his eyes suggested he wanted to—but he didn’t.
We kept moving, a blur of motion. It was all so frustratingly typical.
The screen door creaked, banging behind us as we entered the residence. Gleaming wood impressed the eyes, polished floors stretching out before us. Within the foyer, stairs climbed to a second story, separating a pristine living area from a large dining room and kitchen.
