by Kira Graham
Grooooss.
“Pfft. I bet she went home that night and self-flagellated for hours after she sobered up. That chick’s all kindsa nutty, Tee. All kindsa nutty. But enough about that. Tell me, what’s up with you? Not that I want to pry,” she says, softly and so innocently that I applaud and laugh loudly.
“Are you trying to win an Oscar, Cleo? Because we all know that you’d use the Jaws of Life to pry secrets out of people. You’re almost as nosy as Adonis.”
“You take that back! I caught that man hiding in a closet at his mama’s house and listening in on his dad’s conversation with Chilli just after he and Alex had gotten together. I swear, he should have been a spy. I’ll bet that he’d even have outdone that Craig guy walking out of the ocean in European-fit swim trunks,” she sighs, her mind wandering off when it starts thinking about her man.
“First of all, the only reason that you caught that man in the closet, which sounds awfully bad, by the way, is that you were looking for a place to eavesdrop yourself. Second, ‘European swim trunks’ is just another name for skin-tight sausage wrappings. Real men wear loose shorts that don’t showcase their unstimulated…trunks,” I say seriously, having a flashback of this guy I once dated who had a liking for tighter trunks.
It can sometimes look great, but mostly it doesn’t, and nothing is more unattractive than a penis that’s not inflated. At least, in my opinion.
“Adonis wears those tighter, smaller ones, and it makes me so hot that one time, I almost had an O all by myself just from looking at him. But that’s not what we were talking about. I was politely asking you, and trying not to be too pushy, about why you left. Look, Tee, I’m trying to play along and give you space and stuff, and I haven’t even told anyone about you calling, so the least you can do is tell me what’s going on,” she says, for once leaving out all jokes and amusing side stories.
I know that when Cleo gets this way, she’s not budging, and I groan silently, wondering if I can just lie. I’ve lied before, and, unlike Sin, I don’t see anything wrong with it. If it gets me what I want, I have no shame in doing it. Hell, sometimes I lie just to see the mess it’ll stir up. But Cleo, she’s no dummy, and more often than not, she’s got the nose of a bloodhound. Besides, maybe talking to someone will help me, though God knows that I would never tell her or Adonis any of my secrets. That would just be stupid. It’d be in the papers by morning.
“I just needed some time away. I don’t know if you guys realize this, but our family is a lot to handle sometimes. There are just too many people all up in everyone else’s business.”
“So? Wasn’t it you who read Sin’s diary?” she asks, scoffing when I don’t answer. “So, what happened? You got a little freaked out about everything and ran away? Because of Ares?”
“Hell, no. That two-timing snake can kiss my awesome ass, Cleo. If this perfect ladybug isn’t enough, then as far as I’m concerned, he can screw whoever he wants and get dick warts. I wonder if he’d be so holier-than-thou with his man-trunk oozing. But no. This isn’t about him,” I say softly, only lying a little. “This is about me being afraid of my own shadow and hating the feeling. I’m going to fix myself.”
I hear her laugh, the disbelieving giggle so insulting that I find myself gritting my teeth and resisting the urge to curse at her. She’s the only friend I’ve got right now, so alienating her isn’t a good idea. God, I wish I hadn’t made such a mess of things, though, because I really miss Sin. She’d laugh about whatever I told her and then find a way for me to lie long enough to fix shit. Of course, she’d also kill me deader than dead if she ever found out that I’d screwed her over.
Sigh.
“You’re not broken, Tee.”
“I am. I keep getting scared,” I grate into the phone, hating how conflicted I feel.
I’m usually not into guilt or shame, and if people laugh at me, then I normally spit in their eye and own my actions proudly, but this—this—is something that I’m not good at feeling. Not because it’s embarrassing so much as it makes me feel helpless, and I don’t like the feeling.
“I hate to break this to you, but that’s normal, Nefertiti. You think that I don’t get scared?” she asks softly, scoffing when I snort. “I do. I lie awake at night sometimes, watching the bedroom door because I get this feeling…” she murmurs, her words dying out as if she’s too afraid to voice her feelings.
And I get it. Cleo is like…those divining rods that people used to use to find water. She’s got some special, unearthly ability to just…well, I can’t call it a knowing, really, but if Cleo gets a feeling about something, then it usually means that something is going to happen. Mostly, it’s something bad.
“You get scared?”
“Of course I do. I’m not some military commando with more muscle than brains, Tee. And neither are you. Even that evil-eyed Rosetta gets scared sometimes, though I have to admit that that’s only because she’s pregnant right now. But, it’s normal, okay? You shouldn’t feel shame for being afraid. You have every right to feel scared with that Barbie psycho out on the loose,” she whispers, and for once, I’m not hearing bravado from Cleo, but honest emotion.
“I thought you were all like, ‘I still love Mindy.’”
“Well, I am. I do love her, Tee. In the last few months, she became a part of our family. She can’t help that she’s a crackerjack, coco-pop loop-dee-loop.”
“Oh my God, what the hell does that even mean?” I snigger, giggling when she cackles.
“It means that her bean soup ain’t got no beans in it. But that being said, she’s still dangerous. I’ve been giving a lot of thought to why Mindy is doing these things, and at one point, I felt a whole lot of guilt when it occurred to me that maybe we weren’t always the nicest to her—or to others. I mean, we were always together, the five of us, insulated against the world and safe because we were a pack. I wonder if perhaps that pack mentality made us bullies—”
“Bullshit. I may not always be the nicest person, Cleo, but I have never in my life bullied another human being. And neither did the other girls. And most definitely not you. You were always so nice and sweet, and you let Mindy tag around with you until you found out that she and her mother had called you a slut to the others at church. I remember how pissed Honey was, and how she threatened to beat them all senseless. So no, I don’t for a second believe that Mindy Marcy was bullied, and that that’s why she’s doing this. She’s not stable, Cleo. That’s the beginning and the end of it, and while I feel sorry for her, I won’t forget that she’s dangerous. How she gets men to do what she wants is beyond me, but it seems that she can, and that means that we won’t ever be safe until she’s locked away—or dead,” I say, finally voicing the words that I haven’t wanted to say out loud.
I hear Cleo sigh and know that she agrees, before she moves on to start discussing me again. Me and my damnable problems, half of which she doesn’t even know.
“Come home, Tee. We can work all of this out together,” she says softly.
“Can’t. I need to take some time to think about things.”
Mainly about how I’m going to deal with the huge problem that I created and can’t tell anyone else about. God, I must be a total idiot to have jeopardized my cousin’s happiness for a few quick orgasms with a man that I know doesn’t even like me that much. We’re too different, though at the moment, I’d have to say that I’m more of a pansy than he was when we met.
“What things? Ares is an asshole, but he isn’t with that Taylor chick.”
“What?”
“Yeah…I, uh, may have made a huge mistake there when I started rambling about my suspicions. It seems that they’re just barely friends, and to hear her tell it, she’s still trying to decide whether or not to kill him. Adonis told me that the relationship didn’t end very well for them, either. It seems that Beau Taylor is a little temperamental, and Ares wasn’t into that, so they broke things off. So, uh…yeah, I was totally wrong about them, and, uh…he was not two-ti
ming you,” she rambles while I blink, gulp, and try not to do something awful.
Like scream like a little girl and jump up and down with glee. The impulse has me going stock-still, and I feel horror filling me at the thought that I just…got happy because that rat bastard isn’t cheating on me! Oh, God. Oh, my God. This can’t be happening, I think, panicking when I try to think things through, but only one thing blazes forth in my mind, completely nullifying everything else.
I love Ares Hart.
Like…love Ares Hart, a man who looks at me most days like I’m a bug under his shoe, because…he doesn’t think that I’m a good person. The realization hits me with the force of a sledgehammer to the gut, leaving me gasping and stunned as a small, distant part of me continues listening to Cleo jabber on about Beau Taylor and Heath and a whole bunch of other stuff that I couldn’t give two shits about.
I’m in love, for like the first time ever, and…
“So I said to Honey, ‘This is enough. Your food is dropping the security teams like flies, and those men are so leery of hurting your feelings that they won’t refuse your slop,’” Cleo jabbers on, wringing a small smile from me with that one. “Well, you can imagine what happened then, because, well, Honey is Honey, and Jack is Jack. She started making it seem as if she has feelings, and Daddy started crying, and then he got mad, and Jack mad and crying is a sight to behold! Then Adonis, that asshole, started feeling guilty, and he tried to make me apologize!” she hisses, all while I’m still trying to roll my tongue back into my mouth and convince my chest that it shouldn’t be aching like crazy.
“Um.”
“So I hit him! I mean, it’s not like I had much choice. Honey was giving me one of those sneaky ‘I won’ looks, and Adonis was going on and on about how I was being mean to my mama, and Jack was segueing from sniffles to outright sobs…Tee! Are ya listening to a word I’m saying?”
“I…”
Am so screwed, I think, hysteria and a healthy dose of denial trying to wing its way through me. I’m not like the other Sweets, though, and maybe it’s my different DNA or the fact that I pity those poor crazy fools, but I don’t do denial, or hysterics—except that one time that I walked in on my mom and dad boning. That’s something that I can’t ever unsee.
“Tee?” Cleo says softly, her voice sucking me out of my dazed musings so suddenly that I do something stupid—something so dumb that I should be strung up and whipped.
“I think…that I may possibly be in love,” I whisper.
Chapter Twelve
Ares
I’m not impressed as I slam my foot down and force my Porsche to climb the mountain road, sweat and Adonis’s words still clinging to me as I rush towards the one woman on God’s green Earth who annoys me more than anyone else I’ve ever met.
Oh, she loves me, does she? What game is she playing now? I ask myself, seething so violently that I feel my teeth protest when I grind my jaw down hard. I’ve been at the receiving end of more than one of her stunts before, but this is the end of all stunts, as far as I’m concerned. I should have listened to my head and stayed away from her the moment my dick got hard, but did I listen to myself?
“You’re not walking in there with that face,” Nate warns me from the passenger seat, the narrow slits of his eyes telling me clearly that he’ll mess my shit up if I hurt precious Tee’s feelings.
“My own brother took a swing at me!” I yell, still smarting because I didn’t react fast enough, my reflexes slow because I never expected Adonis to come at me.
We messed my office up but good, and by the time that I was heaving over him and ready to drop, it hit me that this is all her fault. She’s screwed up every single part of my life from the minute she came into it. Gone is my cool; gone is the ability that I once had to just sit back and steer things the way they needed to go. I’m a fucking mess of a man, thanks to her, and the worst part is, I was happier that I found out where she was, than angry that she had sicced my brothers on my ass.
“Your brother lost his temper when you said what you said. You know, for a man who thrives on mediation and peaceful resolution, you sure have picked up a knack for saying the exact wrong thing at the worst possible time,” Nate muses, his expression going from threatening to mocking.
My temper, that alien beast now writhing just under my skin, goes volcanic at the reminder, and once again, I ask myself why I can’t just keep my mouth shut. I’ve never been the kind of man who just blurts out anything he wants. I’m even-tempered, for God’s sake! I am. So why, every time Tee gets involved, do I find myself not only putting my foot in my mouth, but also shoving it so deeply that it should be coming out the other end?
“I was annoyed, okay? I had to listen to my ma cussing me out for nearly twenty minutes, and then Sin called and threatened to hurt me, which is no threat, because as much as I love that girl, I know she’d do it. And then Adonis storms in, thinking that he can throw orders at me,” I hiss, cursing when we round a curve, and a house comes into view.
This isn’t a cabin, like I was expecting, and the moment that I cut the engine and step out, I know that I’m not going to get the result I want here. There will be no stomping in, throwing her over my shoulder, and taking her back to town like I was planning. And I know this because when I finally look to the left, where a wall of windows covers the left section of the house, I find Tee standing there, glaring at me.
And God almighty, that stubborn mouth is set, while her nose is up in the air, her eyes narrowed, and her arms folded across her chest.
“Fuuuuck,” I grumble, ignoring Nate’s amusement when I have to reach down and shift my dick, the heat of the day making my jacket a no-go for covering it up.
“You know, she looks a lot less harried than she did a week ago. Maybe the mountain air and stress-free environment have settled her some,” he says mockingly, his snort of laughter following my own growl of disbelief.
Nefertiti Sweet is the least relaxed woman that I have ever met, and, God help us all, I think that I’m beginning to like it.
“I should tan her ass for putting herself in danger,” I grunt, stalking purposefully up to the porch, only to come to a dead stop when she doesn’t so much as move or bat an eyelash.
She just keeps staring at me with her lips thinned, as if I’m the asshole in this story.
“I’d pay good money to see you try,” Nate crows, laughing when I turn to glare at him and bare my teeth in a hiss.
“Goddammit! Nefertiti, open the damn door,” I yell, my temper getting worse when she doesn’t budge, just keeps staring at us silently.
“Tee! Honey, I’m roasting alive out here, I need to piss, and then I need at least a gallon of water before I dehydrate,” Nate tries, his wheedling tone turning into a curse of his own when she sidles over to the door and stands there, looking at us through the window, but doesn’t open it.
“I shoulda known that that no-good yellowbelly would rat me out,” she mutters, her eyes burning like two blazing gems when she glares at me and sniffs, her lip curled. “I don’t want you here, Hart. I’m on a vacation from life.”
“Vacation from life!” I bark, disbelief slamming into me when she suddenly smiles and turns to saunter off, her ass swaying seductively in a pair of cropped white shorts and a loose pink tee that’s knotted at her hip.
It’s only when I peer through the side window that I see her opening the sliding door in the back so that the traitor known as Nate can slip in.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake! How the hell did you get to the back so fast?” I yell, a bark of annoyance leaving me when Nate hustles upstairs without answering, leaving me to stare at a grinning Tee, who ambles over to the couch and flops down, ignoring me completely. “Nefertiti! Goddammit, open the door and let me in so that we can talk.”
“About what, Hart? About the fact that you told your brother that I’m a clingy, pain-in-the-ass nutcase who’s throwing around the L word just to make you suffer?” she asks.
Christ.
I am going to kill Adonis.
“I didn’t mean it! I was annoyed. Look, you know that you and I don’t do love,” I remind her, my stomach going hollow when she rears back up on the couch, stiffens, and then flops back down again. “Tee—”
“You know what really gets me about you, Hart? You always seem to know everything, so much so that you seem to think that you know how everyone else feels. For your information, I did fall for you.”
The words hit me like a hole to the heart, but, being stubborn, I scoff as loudly as I can, hoping to irritate the shit out of her. See? This is what I’m talking about. I can’t spend two damn minutes with this woman without wanting to goad her!
“Yeah, right! You probably just enjoy getting my ass beat by my brothers. You weren’t singing this tune three weeks ago, when I asked you out on that date,” I remind her, my pride still stinging because the woman said no.
No. She yelled no and then disappeared for four hours, until Grange called and told me that she was with Cleo, eating chocolate, of all things. She’s driving me crazy. I’m losing my goddamn mind, but instead of staying away, here I am again, looking for an argument.
She’s broken me—
“Oh, that was a date? Well, excuse the shit outta me for thinking that it wasn’t, seeing as how you said, and I quote, ‘You may as well just come to the dinner with me, seeing as how you’ll be stuck alone at the apartment with only the new security guys.’ That doesn’t sound like a date, asshole; that sounds like you just barely tolerating my presence—which, by the way, hurt my feelings.”
“You don’t have feelings,” I yell, my fist hitting the door with a crack. “You told me that you didn’t care.”
“I lied. A girl’s allowed to lie to save face and spare her feelings.”
“Tee—dammit, let me in so that we can talk.”
“I don’t wanna. You’re just here to ruin my vacation and lecture me to death. I should have just taken Zeus up on his offer and gone to his island. Damn Cleo and her big mouth,” she grumbles, giving Nate a glorious smile when he finally stumbles down the stairs and makes a beeline for her.
