Brooke & Ben: Before Fate Interrupted

by Kaitlyn Cross

“It will without your help, because we’re doing this with or without you!” She turned from the window and took a calming breath. “I need you on this, Ev. You taught me how to bake almost everything I know. Everyone always comments on how I’m such a good cook but really I just copied you.”

  Evy exhaled into the phone. “You better stop or you’re going to ruin my mascara.”

  The light brightened at the end of the tunnel and Brooke kept digging. “You know we would have so much fun! It’d be just like when we lived at home but we’d be getting paid for baking this time.” She bit on her pinkie and softened her tone. “There are great things waiting for you here, Evy. Great – things.”

  “Yeah?”

  Brooke took a sip of the red wine she had commandeered from the hotel bar downstairs and kicked off her heels. “My gut is never wrong.” She set the glass on the desk and spun the pen again. “Besides…what’s the worst that could happen?”

  The end

  Find out what happens next in Fate Interrupted 1 (now available along with Fate Interrupted 2): http://www.amazon.com/Fate-Interrupted-Book-ebook/dp/B00AIF3QD0/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1369860789&sr=8-2&keywords=fate+interrupted+2

  About Kaitlyn Cross:

  When not scoring great deals on purses and shoes, I enjoy drinking red wine, spending way too much time on Pinterest, and denying that I watch The Vampire Diaries religiously. For future release dates and secret recipes (stolen from Pinterest), like my Facebook page at: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Author-Kaitlyn-Cross/176038785868539?ref=hl

  Thank you so much for reading Brooke & Ben: Before Fate Interrupted!

  Coming this winter: Fate Interrupted 3.

  Life is short, buy the shoes!

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Tasha sipped on her iced mocha while bursts of laughter peppered the sun splashed patio around them.

  Brooke’s eye flickered over to Matthew and bounced back to Tasha, unable to read their sunglass covered eyes. “Why are you shaking your head?”

  “I can’t believe you’re leaving me.”

  “I’m not leaving you, Tash.”

  Tasha crinkled her nose in disgust. “Milwaukee? That’s like a million miles away!”

  “Actually, it’s not a bad little road trip,” Matthew said, cradling a sweaty cup of Mountain Dew in his chubby pink fingers. “My brother did a radio show there for a few years.” He turned to Brooke. “You’re going to love Miller Park. It’s like something out of a Transformers movie. I heard that sometimes it comes to life at night and steps on cars and shit.” He chuckled, his blond curls bouncing with the motion.

  They stared dully at him, smooth jazz washing over them like the day’s gentle breeze.

  He raised his eyebrows. “And it’s got a Friday’s inside!”

  “The point is,” Tasha continued, tucking a loose strand of blond hair behind an ear, “who’m I supposed to talk to about…” she trailed off and glanced at Matthew, “girl stuff?”

  Matthew followed her gaze to Brooke and reversed it. “You can talk to me about your periods, babe. I don’t mind.”

  Tasha turned to him in slow motion, repulsion warping her face. “Don’t you need some more pop or something?”

  He sucked on the straw and drained it before leaning back and rubbing his generous beer belly. “No, I’m trying to take off a little of the weight.”

  Brooke leaned across the table and took Tasha’s hand, refraining from looking at Matthew. With all of the wonderful changes going on in her life, the only thing she could think about was what in the hell Tasha saw in this guy. It consumed her, eating away at her high spirits like an infectious disease. “You know you can always call me, Tash, day or night.”

  “It’s not the same and you know it. We’re going to grow apart, just like when Jessica moved to Los Angeles.”

  “I won’t let that happen, and you always have Mandy right down the street.”

  Tasha’s forlorn gaze lowered to the barely touched Bacon Turkey Bravo sandwich on the circular tray in front of her.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Well, nothing’s wrong.”

  “But?”

  Tasha looked up. “Buuuut, Mandy and I…had an encounter.”

  Matthew’s jaw hit the patio table. The umbrella flapped in the wind above them.

  Brooke cocked an eyebrow. “Encounter?”

  Tasha nodded grimly, unable to meet her eyes.

  Matthew swallowed hard. “Alien encounter?”

  “Sort of.”

  Brooke inhaled sharply and covered her mouth, breasts swelling over her orange tank top with the extraneous lungful of air. “You didn’t!”

  “Didn’t what?”

  Tasha ignored him and buried her face in her hands, hiding behind her red painted nails. “We had been drinking.” She paused for a moment. “Heavily.”

  “I don’t believe it,” Brooke said into her hand.

  “I didn’t either until I found myself in Mandy’s bed the next morning, naked and covered in Hershey’s syrup.”

  “Oh my God,” Matthew whispered, a light bulb finally going off behind his shades. “This is the sweetest story I’ve ever heard.”

  “The whole thing wasn’t for me, and now things are super awkward between Mandy and I. I can’t talk to her about anything and it’s all your fault!”

  Brooke set her Panera cup down on the table. “What? How is it my fault?”

  “Because your husband turned Mandy into a lesbian.”

  Brooke tipped her head back and laughed.

  “She was never the same after him and you know it.” Tasha drained some more of her drink. “So you have to take me with you.”

  “To Milwaukee?”

  “Yep.”

  “Would you really come?”

  Tasha replied with an indifferent shrug. “Maybe.”

  “Well, I’m hoping that by this time next year we’ll be able to afford some extra help. If things go as planned, I would hire you in a heartbeat.”

  The pencil thin blond leaned back in the metal chair and brushed crumbs from her skin tight jeans. “Oh, but you can give Evy a job right out of the gate, huh? I see how you are.”

  Brooke flattened her lips. “You don’t bake like she does.”

  “So?”

  “We don’t even know if we can afford her,” Brooke said, exchanging a glance with Matthew that gave her the creeps. “Hopefully, this place will take off right out of the gate.”

  Tasha squeezed Brooke’s hand. “You guys are going to do great. I know you will.”

  “Thank you, sweetie, and you can come visit anytime you want.”

  “Are you done packing yet?”

  “Almost. Ben took a break to take a nap. He’s been going nonstop for the last month.”

  Tasha turned to Matthew and let out a reflective sigh. “Two more weeks and you’re going to be my new best friend.”

  A smile pulled into his dimpled cheeks. “I can do that.”

  Tasha uncrossed her legs and stood up, adjusting her yellow top. “I have to use the restroom. Keep your hands off my man.” She shot Brooke a wink that made Brooke’s stomach roll.

  “Oh hey, can you hit me up with a refill, babe?”

  She took Matthew’s cup and exchanged a quick look with Brooke before clicking her black heels across the brick floor. At the glass door, she turned back to them, the wind blowing her hair over a bare shoulder kissed by the sun. A subtle smirk curled one corner of her lips, and then was gone.

  Matthew stared after her over the top of his sunglasses. “Holy shit, I am going to destroy that tonight.”

  Brooke’s face slumped. “Excuse me?”

  He turned back around and pushed his shades up. “She looks like she just stepped out of a magazine! This is the greatest year of my life.”

  Brooke was about to say something to the contrary but crossed her legs and sipped on her Smurf blue Powerade instead.

  He sensed her discomfort and leaned in closer. “Look, I know she�
�s your friend and everything but I have to talk to someone about this or I’m going to explode. This is completely insane.”

  “You think?” She checked her watch, leg swinging a million miles an hour over her knee.

  Matthew rubbed the gut stretching a faded Polo shirt like an alien in a Sigourney Weaver movie. “I mean, a girl like that letting a guy like me put his dick in her is like winning the Powerball, dude!”

  “Oh my God,” Brooke muttered, hitting him with an icy glare. “Do not call me dude.”

  “I’m sorry, but I have to tell somebody how I feel.”

  “Well, don’t tell me, you idiot! Try telling – oh, I don’t know – maybe a friend!”

  “That’s the problem.” Matthew dropped her piercing glare and bowed his head, picking at his cup. “I don’t have any friends.”

  “How about a Facebook friend? Surely, you have at least one of those.”

  “They think everything I post is photo shopped.”

  Brooke opened her mouth, pausing to tighten her gaze. “Wait, you posted pictures of Tasha on Facebook?”

  “Nothing bad,” he said. “I’d go to jail if I posted the bad shit.”

  “What!”

  He grinned at her. “Hey, girl likes to get her weird on, yo.”

  Brooke shot a hand up. “Okay, stop. Just…stop talking. I’m not your friend.” The hand slid down her tired face, the frantic pace of work and packing and trying to see everyone before leaving town beginning to take its toll. “Did you guys meet at Buffalo Wild Wings?”

  “Huh? No, we met at Radio Shack.”

  “Radio shack?”

  He nodded proudly, rattling the ice cubes in his cup. “I work there. Why? You need some batteries?”

  “Batteries?”

  “Tasha goes through a lot of batteries. That’s how we met.”

  Brooke furrowed her brow, her purple heel bouncing through the air. “Batteries for what?”

  “Ya know.”

  “No, I don’t know.”

  He leaned in closer, his belly hanging over the table. “Vibrators and stuff,” he whispered, bobbing a pair of bushy eyebrows two times.

  “I don’t believe this.”

  Matthew leaned back and studied Brooke through knowing eyes.

  His heavy gaze made her feel like taking another shower. “What?” she asked.

  “I know about the curse. Tasha told me all about it.”

  “What curse?”

  “Don’t play dumb, Brooke.”

  She dismissed him with a wave of the hand. “Oh please, even my playing dumb would seem like rocket science to you, sugar.”

  “All I’m saying is that if anyone tries to break the curse, I will destroy them.”

  Brooke craned her neck to see past a table of young girls wearing matching soccer uniforms. “Well, it certainly was nice meeting you,” she said, rounding up her cell phone and car keys.

  Matthew rested his elbows on the table, making it rock “I’m just kidding.”

  Brooke steadied her drink, shooting daggers at him through her sunglasses.

  He took off his shades and hit her with puppy dog eyes. “I just don’t want this to end.”

  “Well, that makes one of us.” She got up and shot him a fake smile. “Enjoy your trip back to earth, sweetie. It’s going to be a bumpy ride.” The puzzled creases carving through his brow produced an authentic smile on her lips. By the time he replied, Brooke was already weaving through the spattering of tables blanketing the patio.

  “I love her!”

  She acted like she didn’t hear his stupid remark and pulled the glass door back. Its heavy weight slowed her exit, pissing her off even more. Finally, she was back inside the eatery. The air-conditioning felt good and so did being away from him.

  “Hey, what’re you doing?”

  Brooke turned to her right. Tasha stood holding Matthew’s drink in one hand and a double fudge brownie in the other.

  “I have to go.” She jerked her chin to the brownie. “You’re still hungry?”

  “No,” she said, blushing a little. “It’s for Matthew. If he doesn’t get his dessert right after a meal he gets cranky. Even at breakfast.”

  Brooke let out a pent-up breath, upbeat conversations from the tables and booths swirling around them. “Listen, Tash, I don’t want to tell you what to do, but you have to dump this guy immediately. He’s a total douche.”

  Tasha’s expression turned morose. She looked out a window overlooking the patio. Matthew sat with his back to them, head down, thumbs tapping away at his phone. “He’s not that bad,” she said unconvincingly.

  “Tasha, he’s a fat slob. You are so much better than this. I don’t understand what you are doing.”

  Her gaze snapped back to Brooke and hardened. “He’s the only guy who can get it up for me. I don’t get what you don’t understand about…”

  “Will you please stop talking about that stupid curse? Curses do not exist! It’s all in your head, dammit!”

  The excited murmur around them lowered with Brooke’s outburst but she didn’t care. She took Tasha by her elbow and ushered her toward the front doors.

  “Once we get settled in Milwaukee, you can come and visit and we’ll find you the perfect guy. I promise.”

  Tasha studied her through uncertain eyes, dodging new patrons as they entered the Panera. “Guy?”

  “Okay, Guys,” Brooke clarified, stepping through the glass door an older gentleman was kindly holding open for them. She smiled at him, the parking lot finally within reach. “Thank you.”

  “You promise?”

  She turned back to Tasha and kept moving. “I promise. Now, as soon as we get in my car I want you to break up with him via text message or I swear to God I’m never talking to you again.”

  Tasha squinted in the sunlight, her shades still planted on the top of her head. “You wouldn’t?”

  Brooke frog marched her to the car. “I might even slap you across the face if you don’t snap out of it. You’re like one of those people in The Crazies.”

  Tasha sighed, her shoulders lowering with her resistance. “You’re right. You’re absolutely right. I just…panicked!”

  Brooke stopped at the driver’s side door and caught Tasha looking over her shoulder. “Get in.”

  Tasha dropped her head and opened the door.

  They both climbed inside the hot box and shut their doors. The quiet felt good, making it easier to think.

  Tasha rolled her window down and cocked back the soda-pop.

  “Wait! What’re you doing?”

  “I’m throwing this out.”

  “Please don’t litter out of my car, or anyone’s car for that matter.” She started the engine and backed up, hitting the brakes to allow an ambling older couple to pass by, grumbling beneath her breath as they took their sweet time crossing the parking lot.

  When it was clear, Brooke swung out of the spot and shifted into drive. She and Tasha screamed at the same time when Matthew’s red face filled Tasha’s open window.

  “Where’re you going?” he panted, fingers curling around the edge of the door.

  “Home,” Brooke responded, giving it some gas.

  He hung on and followed.

  “Shit,” Brooke hissed as a black Nissan Rogue cut her off, forcing her to stop again.

  “You’re just going to leave without me?”

  “Yep,” Brooke replied, gripping the wheel so tightly her knuckles turned white. “Don’t ever call her again or I will cut your balls off.”

  “Here,” Tasha said weakly, handing him the fountain drink and brownie.

  The Rogue finally got the hell out of the way and Brooke snatched the brownie before he could lay a finger on it. “I’ll take that!” She buried the gas pedal, shaking Matthew loose and leaving him standing in the dust holding his drink.

  Tasha stared at the brownie in Brooke’s hand.

  “It’s for Ben,” she explained, setting the box in the console. “Guy is putting a
serious drain on my sugar and flour reserves.”

  Tasha cooed out loud and covered her heart. “That is so sweet! You’re like a desperate housewife now.”

  Brooke laughed and got into the gas, heading for a change on the horizon with the wind at their back and a sparkle in her eye.