by T. L. Haddix
When Sawyer had called him on the flirting, Sydney had wanted to cheer. And when he left after their meeting without stopping to try to pick her up again, she almost got out of her chair and danced.
Discovering that the charming, black-haired Lee was her aunt’s new neighbor had thrilled her. He seemed to be a bit quirky, even for someone in law enforcement, and he took the news of Rachel’s age in stride. But hearing Sawyer sing Rachel’s praises had been unpleasant to say the least.
The unhappy realization that she was jealous of her aunt was something Sydney had to deal with as she ate lunch, or rather as she picked at her food. Danny had been trying to set her up with a friend, someone he’d met through work, and so far, she’d refused. But she was getting pathetic as it pertained to Sawyer, and the last thing she wanted was to turn into a moping, lovesick caricature.
“I’ll call him tonight,” she promised herself as she threw away the remnants of her meal. “Get it over with. Or maybe I’ll just wait until dinner Friday.” She really didn’t want to have to put herself through the ordeal of joining the dating pool again.
When she went back to work after lunch, Sawyer was leaving. “I’ll be out for the rest of the day,” he said. “I’ll have my phone on, so call if you need anything.”
“Okay.” As much as she hated to admit it, she was glad he was gone. She wasn’t in any mood to deal with Sawyer, his attitude, or his admiration of Rachel anymore this afternoon.
Thursday morning was a little better. He seemed less touchy, even unbending enough to joke around with her. But when he stepped out for lunch, trouble stepped into the office in the form of Myrtle Grimes.
“So you’re Sawyer’s new girl,” she rasped in a voice that sounded like she’d smoked two packs of cigarettes a day since she was born. “And lawd, if you don’t look just like your mama. I’m Myrtle from downstairs.”
“I’m Sydney. How do you do?”
Myrtle laughed. “So polite and professional. You’re nothing like his usual type, that’s for sure.”
Sydney tried to take the reality of the woman in. Big bleached blond and red hair, bigger boobs that were outlined in a skin-tight shirt that said “Real Boobs Rock,” and jeans that Sydney feared might literally split if the woman bent over. She’d clearly had work done on her face, and there was an edginess about her that made Sydney wonder if she was here for reconnaissance or to issue a warning.
“You’re never going to catch his attention if you keep wearing clothes like that.” She gestured to the red silk wrap-style blouse and grey skirt Sydney wore. “Most girls your age dress like little tramps. You’ve gone the other way, dressing like a damned nun. Sawyer prefers women who aren’t afraid to show off their assets.”
“Excuse me?” Sydney doubted her hearing even as she knew she hadn’t misunderstood.
Myrtle didn’t wait for an invitation, just sat down in front of Sydney’s desk. She picked up one of the pictures beside the computer monitor and looked at it. “Brothers?”
Sydney stood and reached across, snapping the frame from her hands. “Yes. Is there something I can help you with?”
Myrtle raised a perfectly sketched-on brow. “No need to get snippy. Guess you’ve not done him yet, not with that attitude. That isn’t a surprise, I reckon, given how you dress. Bet you’re locked up like Fort Knox.”
“I beg your pardon?” The fuse to her temper was lit, icy hot. “If you’ve not come up here to conduct business, I have work to do. Thanks for stopping by.”
The woman didn’t budge, just pulled a cigarette out of her cleavage—her cleavage!—and held it without lighting it while she gave Sydney a once-over.
“Are you a lesbian dyke or something?”
“That does it. You need to leave,” Sydney ground out. “I don’t know who the hell you think you are, but my life is none of your business.”
“Hoo, boy, that hit a nerve.” Myrtle leaned to the side and pulled a lighter from her pocket. “Got anything I can use as an ashtray?”
Sydney picked up the thirty-two ounce fast food soft-drink cup she’d picked up on the way in that morning. She’d refilled it with ice water an hour ago. Taking the lid off, she held the cup back.
“So help me if you light that thing, you’re going to swim back downstairs,” she gritted out between her clenched teeth. “Now git.”
“What the hell is going on here?” Sawyer stepped inside. “Sydney?”
She’d been so intent on Myrtle she hadn’t heard him come up the steps. She put the lid back on the drink with a growl. “My dressing habits, sexual preference, and life in general are none of her business. She doesn’t seem to understand the concept of polite behavior. I’m more than happy to teach her a lesson or two if she persists.”
“Honey, this girl needs to ride a pole or three and chill the hell out,” Myrtle told him, finally getting to her feet. She stopped beside Sawyer to trail a hand over his arm. “Surely you can find one of your old buddies that would be willing to break her in. I can’t imagine how unpleasant it has to be for you, up here having to work with her every day.”
“Leave now. Don’t come back,” Sawyer said. His eyes were cold, his face like stone as he glared at Myrtle. “And leave Sydney alone. You understand me?”
Myrtle looked from him to Sydney, then shrugged. “Whatever floats your boat. You know where to find me when you get tired of poking the dried-up prude over there.”
There was dead silence in the office for a couple of seconds, and then Sydney let out an outraged screech. Sawyer had to stop her from going after Myrtle, who’d taken one look at her furious face and hauled ass down the steps.
“Easy, now. Let it go. She’s not worth it.”
Sydney’s face felt so hot she thought she could fry an egg on it, and she was perilously close to tears as she struggled a little against his arms. “Nasty shitheaded bleached-blond bitch. You should have let me take her.”
His lips twitched. “You know I couldn’t do that. Sydney, I had no idea she would… I’m sorry.”
Swallowing hard, praying she wouldn’t embarrass herself further, she backed up. “No. Not your fault. But I am going to go now, get some fresh air.” She went to the desk and grabbed her phone and her purse.
“Okay.”
Sawyer didn’t try to stop her again, but she could feel the weight of his gaze as she left. Walking fast, she headed to her car, to the privacy it would afford her. Once there, she tried to figure out where to go. She had an hour, and the way she was feeling, it might take that long to calm down.
“I can’t believe I lost my temper like that. I guess I might as well go home.” But she didn’t want to be cooped up. She needed to move. Making a decision, she pulled out. She’d go to the local park and walk or simply sit and watch the river go by.
Nearly forty minutes later, she’d finally started to calm down when her phone rang. Looking at the display, she groaned. Helen. Normally Sydney didn’t mind talking to her former mother-in-law, but today wasn’t one of those days. Deciding to put the conversation off, she sent the call to voice mail. She took a few more minutes to get a good grasp on her temper and her ego, and then she headed back to work.
Sawyer kept a solicitous eye on her the rest of the day, going out of his way not to cause ripples. By the time four thirty rolled around, she was more than ready to go home.
“I’m not glass, you know. And I appreciate your being careful with me, but I’m a big girl, Sawyer. My ego got dented, that’s all,” she told him before she left. “Still, thank you for not asking me to talk about it. And for backing me up. I’m sorry for the drama.”
He sat back in his chair, steepling his hands together. “You don’t have a thing to apologize for. I’m stunned she came up here and acted like that. I’m sorry—if there was any way I could go back and erase that little epi
sode, I would.”
“It’s over, it’s done, and there’s nothing to do now but move on. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She changed into a soft tank top and pajama bottoms when she got home, then headed for the kitchen. Thanks to skipping lunch, she was starving. In a few minutes, she’d heated up the leftover marinara and made some fresh pasta to put it on. With a couple of slices of garlic toast and a tall, frosty beer, she was set.
Once she’d eaten, she went to the screened-in back porch and stretched out on the swing. Comfortable, she returned Helen’s call.
“Hey, you. I’m sorry I missed you earlier. Are you busy?”
“Not at all. How are you? Liking the new job?” As warm as her tone was, Helen’s voice was strained.
“It’s fun most days. Today? Not so much. Is everything okay?”
There was a pause, then Helen expelled a tight breath. “I have some news. I’m afraid it might upset you, but I thought you had the right to know. Adam’s getting married.”
“Oh. Well, that’s… I can’t say it’s entirely unexpected. I figured he would someday.”
“Sydney… There’s no easy way to say this. She’s pregnant.”
All the breath in her body vanished, the punch was so unexpected. For what felt like forever, she couldn’t seem to get her lungs to work. When she finally did, she gasped.
“She’s what?”
“I’m so sorry, honey. I debated on whether to tell you or not, but I know you still have friends up here. I didn’t want you to hear about it from someone else.”
Sydney hated her reaction, hated the pain and betrayal she felt. “But he had a vasectomy. She can’t be pregnant. Who is she?”
“A co-worker. And they’ve been seeing each other for a while now. He had a reversal.”
“I see.”
She couldn’t say anything else. She literally couldn’t form the words, not even in her mind. All she could do was hurt.
“Anyhow, like I said, I thought you had the right to know. And I know there are people out there who might try to use the information to hurt you. I’m sorry, Sydney.”
Taking in a deep breath, Sydney forced herself to pull it together long enough to finish the conversation. “I know. And I appreciate you telling me, I really do. I should probably go.”
“Will you call me sometime? Once you’ve had time to… once you’ve had time?” Helen asked.
“I will. Bye for now.”
Sydney ended the call, tossing the phone down onto the swing by her hip. She wrapped her arms tightly around her body, cold anger freezing her from the inside out.
When she’d married Adam, she’d been barely twenty years old. They’d met the fall after her disastrous kiss with Sawyer, and Adam had swept her off her feet. Married that following spring, they’d only ever talked about children in the most general terms. She had school to finish, and he was establishing himself at his father’s company.
After she graduated, though, she’d started thinking about kids. She’d known she hadn’t wanted to work but instead was ready to start their family. At first, Adam had put her off.
“I’m too busy right now for kids. Don’t you want it to just be us for a few years first?”
“We’ve had three years of just us. I want babies, Adam,” she’d said. “I want a little boy who looks like his daddy.”
She’d not told him that to placate his ego. She’d genuinely wanted that child. Looking back, she knew that part of her desire for children stemmed from not wanting to see the holes that existed in her marriage. But at that time, all she knew was that she wanted to be pregnant more than anything in the world.
After her admission, Adam had been more open to the idea, but he’d still put her off. “Give me a year to get used to the idea. Twelve months.”
Sydney’d caved. And eleven months later, she’d walked in on him boning the maid.
“Don’t get me pregnant,” the woman had gasped. “Pull out.”
“I got snipped years ago,” he’d said. “I can come inside you all day, sugar.”
Sydney hadn’t had any idea. None. He’d had the surgery before they even met. He’d never intended to have children, not ever. So in addition to having her heart ripped out by his infidelity, she had to deal with the betrayal stemming from his deception. That, more than anything, had been the hardest part to deal with. That she’d trusted him with her heart and had chosen poorly.
After she caught him, after she’d fled their townhouse, he’d given her a few days to “cool down” before he’d come after her. Sydney had holed up in a hotel, too ashamed to go home, too torn apart to know what else to do. When he’d found her, the truth about their marriage had come out.
“I never wanted to have kids with you or anyone else. I just wanted to have fun. You caught me at a weak moment and I proposed. I wish to God I hadn’t. By the time the wedding was planned, I was ready to back out. But if I had, my mother would have killed me. So I went through with it.”
“So all these years when you’ve told me you loved me? The nights we’ve spent together in bed, making love? The life we’ve built together? All that was a lie?”
He wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I care for you, Syd. But I don’t love you. I want a divorce.”
“I’ve already filed,” she had the satisfaction of telling him. “How many other women have there been, just out of curiosity?”
“I don’t know. Ten? Twelve?”
She’d tried to kill him when he made that confession. She’d literally picked up a vase from the table beside her and gone after him. He’d barely made it out of the hotel room without serious injury. She’d called Emma, who’d immediately flown out. Together, they’d retrieved Sydney’s belongings and prepared to move her back to Kentucky while Adam’s parents pushed his attorney for a large, hasty settlement. They’d been as angry as Emma on Sydney’s behalf, especially his father, who’d had the misfortune to be present when she’d discovered Adam’s infidelity.
Two days later, she’d gone in to see her gynecologist. As devastated as she was, Sydney wasn’t stupid. If Adam hadn’t used a condom with the maid, chances were excellent he hadn’t used any with his other affairs. Sure enough, he’d given Sydney gonorrhea. She knew she should be thankful that was all he’d given her. But the humiliation was almost more than she could bear.
She didn’t remember much about the next few weeks, not the move back to Kentucky, not the treatment for the STD, not the final paperwork for the divorce. She’d stayed locked away with her parents and at the farm with her grandparents for close to six months.
When she finally started coming out of her stupor, she’d lost a lot of faith in the world around her. She didn’t look at love and marriage the same way she had before. Her perspective was so skewed and negative, it started to affect her relationships with her family and friends. The job in Savannah had come open, and desperately needing a new start, Sydney had jumped at the chance to start over.
It had taken her two good years before she was able to look at the people around her and see them as they really were. Not the rose-colored glasses view she’d had before, not the scarred and jaded vision, either. But real people with human fallacies and flaws who loved each other and were determined, no matter what the obstacles, to stick together no matter what life threw at them.
The lessons Adam had taught her went deep. Even though she was able to finally stop thinking of love as a four-letter and dirty word, she was a long way away from being able to trust anyone enough to date them seriously or let them near her body, much less her heart. It didn’t matter how lonely she got, she couldn’t trust another man not to hurt her the way Adam had.
That was one of the reasons she’d come home. She knew she wanted a family someday, and she figured her best bet at finding someone to have that with wou
ld be to come back home, to be someplace where the people around her were looking out for her. To be in a place where anyone she dated would come under close scrutiny, and she wouldn’t have to rely solely on her own judgment, which she no longer trusted.
Learning that Adam was getting married again truly didn’t surprise her, and aside from a little ping of hurt, it didn’t bother her. She didn’t want him back, hadn’t loved him for a long time now.
But knowing he’d found someone he loved enough to have a child with? That turned her inside out. She was hard pressed to explain even to herself why that was the case. It wasn’t like she was pining away from unrequited love for the man. If she had the opportunity right this moment to snap her fingers and become pregnant with his child, she’d pass.
“I guess it’s because he’s moving on, building what I wanted, and I’m still alone,” she whispered. “It isn’t fair that he should be rewarded with something he didn’t even want.”
She’d learned a long time ago that life wasn’t fair, that bad things happened to good people just as much as good things happened to bad. There wasn’t always balance in the world. Knowing that didn’t make the news easier to take, though. Not by a long shot.
Chapter Twenty-One
Something was wrong with Sydney. Sawyer knew that as much as he knew his own name. He knew yesterday’s debacle with Myrtle had thrown her for a loop, but he felt like it was more than that. She was sad in a way he’d not seen before.
