by Abby Brooks
“I kind of did.” I indicate the gorgeous blonde sitting at a table with two other women. “I know that chick. The gorgeous blonde sitting with Michelle and Bailey?”
David follows my gaze, smiling when he sees his wife. “You mean Lexi?”
Her name reverberates through my mind. I knew her as Alexa—a name I haven’t forgotten over the years. “That’s the one.”
Colton bobs his head. “She’s sweet, that one. You remember her from school? She went to Brookside with us, but she’s a few years younger.”
I stare at the woman across the room as she talks with her friends. “No. I mean, yes. I mean, I know we both grew up here, but I didn’t know her back then. We met, once, maybe five years ago?” I stare into my drink, trying to do a quick calculation. “Six years ago. Almost seven. Wow.” Has it really been that long? “I had just come back from a tour and needed to chill, so I went down to Key West for a few days and ran into her. We figured out we grew up in the same town but never met before then and the rest is history. We spent one beautiful day together and then I got a call from the base commander in the middle of the night telling me to get my ass back home pronto. I left her a note professing my undying love, and I haven’t seen her since.” I stare her way again. “I wonder if she remembers me.”
Colton guffaws. “Right. Because one random day with you is enough to stick with a woman for almost seven years.”
“Exactly.” I hold up my glass in a mock salute and then take a drink.
He rolls his eyes and shakes his head. “Shit, man. I didn’t think you could get more full of yourself, but congratulations on exceeding expectations.”
“I know my strengths, that’s all.” I shrug, laughing. “And getting under a woman’s skin just happens to be one of them.”
David and Colton talk about life in Brookside but I couldn’t care less about what they’re saying. I smile and nod my way through it just so I’m not too much of a dick to my friends, but I’m caught up in my head something awful. My mystery woman is here. Sitting no more than twenty feet away from me.
How many times have I fantasized about running into her? How many times have I replayed the day we spent together? How many harrowing, gunfire filled missions has she gotten me through? When shit went sideways or things got hard, I focused on her. I don’t know why. Maybe she was my happy place. Maybe she was something beautiful in the middle of a shit ton of ugly. Whatever the reason, it worked and I swear, the only reason I’m sane is because of her and all the imaginary conversations she and I had over the years. I poured my heart out to her, over in Afghanistan, night after night, telling her more than I’ve ever told anyone. Sure, it was an imaginary her, bikini clad and smelling of coconut and seawater, but it helped. A lot. And now here she is, just across the room, and I can finally talk to her face to face.
“I’m going over there.” I interrupt whatever Colton is talking about because it’s obviously irrelevant.
He gives me a wounded look. “Why do you always do that to me?”
“Do what to you?”
“Just talk over whatever it is I’m saying.”
“Because I learned a long time ago that whatever it is you’re saying is complete and utter bullshit.”
“Dude. Wow. That hurts.” Colton puts a hand to his heart as David laughs.
“He’s right you know.” David rakes a hand through his hair. “We can tune into every fourth word and still get bored.”
“You’re both assholes,” Colton says and then turns to me. “So, are you going to go talk to her or just sit here and rip on me all night?”
“Believe me, I’m sure I’ll be able to pull off both.” I glance back at Alexa—Lexi—and find her looking right at me. I flash to the way she looked the first time I saw her.
The moment I saw her on the beach, stretched out in a lounge chair, looking out towards the ocean, I knew I had to talk to her. Her blonde hair was piled high on her head and her legs were long and tan. She had dug her feet into the sand and was drinking some kind of fruity, island drink, her cherry-red lips wrapped around the straw. When she looked at me, I could see myself reflected in her sunglasses.
“Well, hello beautiful,” I said, a simple enough line that I meant with all my heart. She was stunning and I was awe-struck in her presence.
Her face has barely changed, although she’s dropped the red lipstick in favor of something more muted. I wish she hadn’t.
“You guys coming with?” I ask.
David grabs my arm. “Why don’t you take a minute and think through what you’re about to do here, Ty. You slept with this woman once and then disappeared. You knew her well enough to find out she lived in Brookside, the town where you grew up and your sister still lives, but then didn’t bother to contact her even once in the last seven years?”
I wrote her letters. Many, many letters. I poured my heart and soul out onto those papers and then never sent them.
But David doesn’t need to know that.
She doesn’t need to know that.
I grin at my friend. “You need to have more faith, my friend. This is me we’re talking about. She’ll take one look at me and it’ll be just like old times before you know it.”
David stares at me thoughtfully, tapping his finger to his chin. “I’m trying to understand what it’s like in that head of yours. Is it just a steady stream of hoo-rahs and Ty is awesome or do you break it up with thoughts of women fawning all over you as you flex your biceps?”
Colton laughs. “Dude.” He points a finger at his brother. “You totally nailed it.”
I sip my drink. “Yeah, well, we can’t all be super stars, now can we?” I ask and then head her way without waiting to see if David and Colton follow.
TY
Considering Alexa is my dream girl, the only woman to get under my skin and stay there, you’d think I’d be terrified walking up to her after so many years. But after the shit I’ve been through overseas, this is nothing. Besides, this is her. My Alexa. It took me all of one day to know she was different than the entire rest of the world. That whatever it was that made me me and her her, it was the same stuff. We’re twin souls, she and I.
She looks up when the three of us arrive at her table, terror streaking across her face as her eyes meet mine. Michelle sighs deeply, her mouth set in a grim line and Bailey sits back, folding her arms across her chest. I feel less than welcome which sets my teeth on edge.
David sits next to his wife. “Hello, darlin’.” He wraps an arm around her shoulder and presses a kiss onto the top of her head. “How’s you?”
She returns the greeting but I don’t hear it. My gaze is locked on Lexi. She’s everything I remember and more. The real woman puts the one in my fantasies to shame.
“Well, hel-lo beautiful.” I smile as I pull out the chair next to her and take a seat. “This is a pleasant surprise, isn’t it?”
“Is that what this is?” Her pupils dilate and her chest heaves—she’s attracted to me, no doubt—but her voice is cold as sin.
I flash her my warmest smile. “It’s very pleasant for me.”
“Well that makes one of us.”
Somewhere, I’m aware of Colton snickering and Michelle whispering something to David, but none of that matters. Not with her this close to me. “Tyler Reed,” I say, putting a hand to my chest. “We met—”
“In Key West.” Lexi bobs her head. “I remember you.”
I never expected her to be so cold. I look back on that day with her so fondly, how is it she isn’t as thrilled as I am to be accidentally reunited? Sure, it’s been a long time, and sure, I didn’t get a chance to talk to her before I had to disappear—not like I would have been able to tell her much if I’d gotten the chance, but I explained in the note that I had to get my ass back home as per very specific instructions from my commanding officer—but surely, now that we’re in the same room again, she has to feel the attraction, too. Our bodies are like magnets and the space between us is almost painful.<
br />
Nothing I want to say makes sense, not with a table full of people surrounding us. For the first time in my life, I’m speechless. I take another sip of my drink and pray for divine inspiration because every sentence starter I come up with sounds hopelessly lame. Someone takes a seat beside me and I turn to find Liam, Bailey’s new husband.
“Look at this,” he says. “All of my favorite people gathered in one place.” He notices me and extends a hand. “Liam McGuire.” His grip is strong and I get a glimpse of the tattoos peeking out from under his sleeve.
Thank you, God, for a little divine intervention. “You’re the singer, right?” I ask.
“That would be me.” Liam gives a little bow of his head.
“David told me everything that happened that lead up to you two getting married. I can’t believe you gave up fame and fortune to come live here in Brookside, Ohio. I bolted the second I had the chance.”
“You must not have bolted to Los Angeles then, because you would have ran your happy ass right back home again. Brookside stole my heart.”
Bailey slaps her husband’s arm. “Hey! I thought that was me!” She drops her head on his shoulder and smiles up at him.
“Hell yeah, it was you. Brookside stole my heart because it had you in it, Mrs. McGuire.”
Bailey beams and sits up. “Oh my God! That’s me.” She claps her hands together and presses them to her lips. “I’m Mrs. McGuire,” she says, her eyes twinkling with happiness.
The happy couple chatters away but I tune them out. I can’t concentrate with Lexi right beside me. I still remember the way she looked sprawled out underneath me, the way her body moved with mine, the way she called out my name as we drove each other crazy. I need to find my fucking balls, get my shit together, and show this woman who I really am. I can understand why she might be cool right now—I mean, my head understands it but my soul flat out rejects it. But if I can get her to talk to me, like really talk, there’s no way she can continue to ignore whatever this is between us.
I turn to her and my God, her eyes. They’re amazing. She’s amazing. “I’ve thought about you a lot.” I keep the words quiet, personal, just between us.
She blinks in surprise and then furrows her brow. “Have you?”
It looks like she wants to say something, but a kid appears out of nowhere and hops into her lap. Well fuck me. Sexy Lexi is a mom.
An older woman comes huffing and puffing behind him, a baby in her arms and a little girl holding her hand. “Sorry about that, Lex. You know how he is. He gets his mind made up and there’s no way but his after that. He wanted to come check on you.”
The little boy stares up at Lexi, his blond hair oddly familiar. “You okay, Mom?” He puts his hand on her cheek. “You’re not sad?”
“Sad?” Lexi smiles a little too wide. “Why would I be sad?”
“I don’t know. Sometimes you get sad.”
My Lexi gets sad? Not anymore. Not if I can help it.
The table has gone utterly quiet and I feel like I’ve stepped into the middle of something awkward, like I’m the butt of some joke I don’t understand. Everyone is either staring at me or staring at their hands and it has me feeling itchy. Just when I’m about to say something about it, the little boy turns around. His eyes meet mine and he smiles, this gigantic thing that reaches down my throat, grabs my heart, and squeezes it tight.
“I’m Gabe,” he says. “I don’t know you, yet.”
It’s an odd thing for a kid to say, full of confidence and I swear, if I didn’t know better, a sense of protectiveness towards his mom. Except I do know better because I’m the same way. In fact, I’m sure, when I was about this kid’s age, I would have said almost the same thing if I’d come running back to the table to find some man sitting too close to my mom.
Looking at this kid is like going back in time to look in a mirror. The color of his hair. The quirk to his lip. The color of his skin.
“Hi, Gabe,” I respond, offering him my hand. “My name is Ty and I don’t know you yet, either.”
Except I do. I know him very well.
Too well. Everything about him reminds me of me.
Gabe smiles broadly as he shakes my hand. “Oh, cool! Like, Ty as in Tyler? Because that’s my middle name.”
His statement solidifies what I already know to be true. There’s no doubt in my mind that I’m looking at my son.
LEXI
The look on Tyler’s face tells me that he sees himself in Gabe’s features as clearly as I do. “We should talk,” I say.
“You think?” His eyes lock on mine, seething with outrage. “Seems to me we should have talked, oh, I don’t know, five to six years ago?”
Gabe shifts in my lap, aware of the sudden tension and desperate as always to make me feel better. I smile sweetly at Tyler in an attempt to ease Gabe’s mind. “Probably. But you were gone. So, we didn’t.”
Tyler’s gaze flits to Gabe and now he’s smiling just as sweetly as I am. “Right. Gone. You mean that time I got sent to Afghanistan to defend life and liberty for the people of this country.” The contrast between his words and the look on his face is frightening.
Michelle stands quickly. “Okay, then. Gabe? Do you want to come with me and Claire and Granny Carmichael? I think there’s a game we all wanted to play together. Right David? Colton? Liam?” She widens her eyes at the people gathered at the table until they understand what she’s getting at.
There’s a flurry of activity as people stand in confusion, muttering lame excuses, eager to be anywhere but here as soon as they can. When the chairs are empty and the table is covered with discarded glasses, napkins, and champagne flutes, Tyler lets out a long breath.
“I have a son?” His voice cracks and his face breaks under the weight of more emotions than I can name.
I nod. “You have a son.”
Tyler blinks several times, rapidly. His breath quickens. He starts to say something and then stops. He lifts his hands, as if in a question and then drops them to his lap. “I have a son?” His words are quiet and desperate.
“His name is Gabe. Gabriel Tyler Stills.” I’m afraid Gabe’s middle name is a flashing sign that puts my infatuation with Ty out on display. Somewhere deeper in the reception hall, someone laughs too loudly and a new song blasts over the speakers.
Ty covers his face with his hands and then runs them up into his close-cropped hair, looking up at me through his eyebrows. He shakes his head and closes his eyes, licking his lips as he drops his hands into his lap. “Don’t you think this is something I should know about by now?” he asks, echoing Bailey’s sentiment from earlier.
“Do you mind if we go somewhere more private, please?” I start to reach for him but let my hand drop to my lap, unsure if he wants me to touch him or not. “I really want to talk about this with you but I think it would be easier if we didn’t have to shout to be heard.”
“Sure. Of course.” Sarcasm drips from his words. He stands and gestures towards the exit. “Please. By all means. After you. I wouldn’t dare inconvenience you by making you discuss something this important and life-changing in front of a bunch of people who have no goddamned right to be part of the conversation.” He bites off the end of the sentence before his lips form a tight line and his eyes go hard, glittering in the low light.
I recoil as if he slapped me as guilt twists in my stomach. Of all the ways he could have found out about Gabe, doing it at a table surrounded by people—some of them near strangers—is one of the worst. Tyler lifts his chin and does a neat about face before he strides away, his shoulders square and his back straight. I lurch out of my chair and follow him, struggling to keep up in my tight dress and high heels.
He strikes the front door with both hands, it flies open, and he marches outside. By the time I make it out into the warm June night, he’s pacing and muttering to himself. I stop a few feet away and eye him, uncertain how to best proceed. He stops and looks at me so intently, with so much passion and ferocity and h
urt in his gaze, I feel like I’m in freefall.
“Your lipstick is different,” he says. The rage that simmered in his voice just a few moments ago is gone.
“What?” I take a step closer.
He gestures towards me. “Your lipstick. It was cherry-red the day I met you.”
“You remember that?”
“I remember everything.”
His words take my breath away and suddenly, I’m the one pacing. “Do you know how many Tyler Reeds there are in the world? There are three within a fifty-mile radius of Brookside. I didn’t know anything about you other than your name, the fact that you grew up here, and how you made me feel that day. How was I supposed to find you when you disappeared?”
“My sister still lives here. She could have told you where I was.”
“And how was I supposed to know you had a sister? How was I supposed to know anything? All I knew was that when I woke up that morning, after a day of what felt like something real, something important, you were gone. If you weren’t interested in sticking around for me, then why in hell would you want to stick around for a baby you probably didn’t even want?”
He steps towards me. “Alexa—”
“Lexi.”
“Right. Sorry. You’ve been Alexa in my head all these years.” He turns away. “I’m a Marine. I got word I was being mobilized. Got the orders that night and needed to be on the next plane out of Florida. I couldn’t tell you anything about where I was going and I didn’t want to wake you. I explained that in the note—”
“The note? There wasn’t a note. And believe me, I looked.” I lower my voice as a couple lurches through the front doors. She wobbles on her heels and clutches his arm for support while he staggers a few steps off the edge of the sidewalk.
Of course Ty is going to try and make himself look decent with a bullshit story about a note that wasn’t there. I was so distraught that morning; I tore my hotel room to shreds, looking for anything that might explain where he went. I couldn’t believe he would just leave without saying anything. Couldn’t process the fact that I was the only one feeling the connection all day. I felt like a fool, realizing that the chemistry was one-sided and while I thought I was falling into something magical, he was busy playing the poor dumb girl he found alone on the beach.
