Arrogant Bastard

by Jennifer Dawson

  “When you’re all sassy and want to bait me.” I step a little closer, and my shadow casts her in dim gray. “Almost like you’re angling for a spanking.”

  Instead of catching her breath or flushing, she rolls her eyes. “Give me a break.”

  I laugh.

  She shakes her head. “That’s just my personality.”

  “Is it?”

  “Yep.” She picks up another travel mug from the flatbed. “Coffee?”

  When I take it from her, I get that little jolt of electricity that lets me know sex between us will be explosive if we get that far. “Thanks, honey.”

  She grabs the handles of a cloth bag. “I brought snacks, and Jackson made bread, so I snagged it. You ready?”

  “Ready as I’ll ever be.” I jangle my keys, not sure if I’m looking forward to this or not. We slide into the seats, and the engine catches a bit at the start before roaring to life.

  With nothing else to do, no way to forestall the inevitable, I pull out of the spot and start the trek down the driveway.

  She tucks a lock of hair behind her ear. “Are you nervous?”

  My fingers tighten on the steering wheel. “That’s not the right word.”

  “Then what is?”

  “Trepidation.” I shrug. “Dementia is not kind, and I don’t want to subject you to that.”

  She waves a hand. “I can handle it; you forget I have a niece with a disability.”

  “Natalie is a lovely child, though, with a killer personality.” No, she can’t walk, and her body tilts at an awkward angle, and sometimes she has seizures, but she’s the kind of kid that makes the room light up just because she’s in it.

  My mom is not in that kind of shape.

  “True,” Cat says, interrupting my train of thought. “But if I didn’t go, you’d put it off… So here we are.”

  “You think you know me, huh?” I make sure the words are light, teasing even, but I’m surprised by her accuracy.

  “Am I wrong?”

  “I’d have gotten there eventually.”

  “Well, my way you won’t be too late.”

  I cast a sidelong glance in her direction. She’s staring out the window, watching the trees go past.

  “Too late for what?”

  She shoots me a look before turning back to study the road. “You never really know when it will be the last time you see someone, you know?”

  “True. Was your mom sick a long time?”

  “Long enough to make it painful. Long enough to wish she’d find peace.”

  We turn onto the highway, and the signs for New Orleans are like an omen for what’s ahead.

  “When you need a break, pull over and we can have a little picnic,” she says.

  I shake my head.

  “What?” she asks.

  “You.”

  “What about me?”

  “Last thing I expected that first day in your office, with you glaring at me like you were willing daggers to fly from your eyes, was to be having a picnic with you and going to visit my mother.”

  “Life’s funny that way.”

  We fall silent, and I flip on the radio, letting some sad country song fill the cabin.

  We go about fifty miles that way before she points to a sign that signals a lake up ahead. “Let’s stop there.”

  I don’t argue with her. The closer we get, the more I want to prolong the part before I have to walk into the nursing home. I follow the road signs and pull into the lot. We busy ourselves with getting out of the car and finding a picnic table that overlooks the small lake before she starts taking stuff out of her bag: a fresh baguette wrapped in paper, a jar of something that’s white at the bottom and red at the top, a container filled with cut-up cheese, and another filled with fruit, bottles of water.

  I stare down at the spread, a little disbelieving. “I’d never have thought to put this together.”

  She takes napkins out of the bag, which finally seems to be empty. “My brother is a chef. Food’s kinda a big deal.”

  “But still.” I turn to face her, hooking a finger into her jeans and tugging her close.

  She looks up at me, skeptical, her steely eyes wary.

  I don’t understand the look. I lean in closer. “It’s been a long time since anyone’s done anything thoughtful for me. Thank you.”

  Her gaze darts away. “You’re welcome. It was nothing. I just grabbed a bunch of stuff. It’s not a big deal. Jackson did the hard part.”

  I grip her chin and lift, forcing her to look at me. “Why do you do that?”

  Her fingers wrap around my wrist, as though she wants to push me away. “Do what?”

  I’m not quite sure yet. There’s just the thread of an idea, but not fully formed. I don’t know her well enough to understand what she’s hiding. I’m only certain of the notion that she is hiding something.

  And aren’t we all?

  I tighten my hold on her, peering down, attempting to glean the truth that lurks somewhere inside her.

  I shake my head. “I don’t know exactly. Minimize.”

  “I merely assembled what was already in front of me. I thought we’d be hungry, and Jackson made bread, which he’s awesome at, so I pulled it together. It’s not a big deal.”

  There’s something there, right in front of me, but I can’t put my finger on it. So instead, I lean down and brush my mouth over hers. “It’s a big deal to me.”

  I feel her swallow under my hands. “I didn’t want you to face something hard on an empty stomach.”

  I want to taste her lips again, just for a second, just to feel her under me—to prove to myself she’s real. A quick taste to remember. I step closer, slide my hand around her neck, lean down, and brush over her lips again.

  Her hand comes to rest on my biceps.

  On my next pass, her lips part, and she rises to her tiptoes.

  I capture her mouth, sinking into her.

  She presses flush against me, my tongue tangling with hers.

  Her fingers clutch the fabric of my T-shirt.

  I wrap my arms around her.

  And then I get lost.

  In the feel of her softness against my hard muscles.

  In her clean scent.

  The way her mouth fuses to mine.

  She lets out a small moan.

  In all my interactions with her, I’ve held myself in check, not trusting myself. But that moan is almost my undoing.

  It puts me so close, so on edge, it forces sanity to snap into focus, and I pull away.

  She chases my mouth, but I grip her hair, holding her back.

  I shake my head. “Now’s not a good time.”

  As soon as she stiffens, I know that wasn’t the right thing to say, but I can’t take it back. It’s out there, and the only thing I can do is recover the best I can.

  I clasp her waist. “Cat.”

  She moves away, pushing my arm so my hand falls from her body. She flashes me a brilliant smile, but her eyes are stormy. “It’s not. Let’s eat so we can get back on the road.”

  “Cat. Wait.”

  “Can’t we just eat? Without making it a thing?” She sits down and grabs the bread, tearing off a hunk and putting it on a paper plate in front of her. “It’s getting late, and we want to spend plenty of time with your mom.”

  I sigh. She’s upset that I stopped, but what was I supposed to do? This is the time for restraint.

  I sit down next to her. “I don’t want to fuck you against a tree. Is that so terrible?”

  Her head snaps toward me, and she shakes her head, holding up her hands. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. It was a kiss. It happens. Nobody said anything about sex.”

  I open my mouth to speak, but she cuts me off. “Why are you making such a big deal about this? We shared a nice kiss. Now we’re going to eat lunch. It’s a pretty day. The sky is bright, the weather warm. Why can’t you just enjoy it instead of questioning and making everything awkward?”

  B
ecause she has thoughts—I don’t know what they are, but I know they’re wrong. Because she went from liquid to tense in an instant, and I don’t really understand why. Because she’s trying too fucking hard to be cheerful and pretend she’s casual when she’s anything but.

  I can tell by the mulish set of her jaw that if I go on, everything will turn to shit, and that’s not what I want.

  So I nod. “Sorry. Let’s eat.”

  “Nothing to be sorry about.” She points to the bread. “Dig in.”

  I guess that’s the end of that.

  Cat

  * * *

  As I chew, the fluffy, delicious bread is like a rock in my mouth. I try to tell myself to calm down, that I’m being too telling, too obvious, and downright silly. I know Caden notices, and as much as I tell myself to stop it, I can’t seem to figure out how to be natural.

  Because I’m upset for the most ridiculous reason.

  To his point, he’s being a gentleman. What do I think? That we should have sex against the tree? Like a couple of wild animals?

  I frown down at my plate.

  Yeah, that’s exactly what I wanted.

  Over the years, I’ve trained myself to be contained, and Caden’s the first man I’ve come in contact with that threatens that. Whenever he touches me, I want to go wild. I want to forget everything and go crazy. I want to remember what it’s like to shuck off restraint, forget everything, and just feel.

  I can’t get over the feeling that while he clearly wants me, and is attracted to me, he doesn’t feel that passion for me. If he did, how could he just stop, over and over again with so little effort?

  It frustrates me. I want us to be even.

  While I want to throw away the civility between us, he wants to embrace it.

  I want him to want to throw me up against the first available flat surface and be unable to help himself.

  I shake my head.

  Maybe I’ve been around Gwen and Jackson too long, caught them too many times when they were clearly desperate and out of control for each other.

  I didn’t think I wanted that, but I see now I’ve been fooling myself.

  I do. I’m jealous of it. And the only man to come along and strike that match in me works for me, has a self-destructive streak, has no direction in life, will probably hightail it out of town at the first sign of trouble, and is content to just kiss me.

  With restraint.

  I really know how to pick ’em, don’t I?

  “I can feel all your furious thinking.” He sits across from me, watching me.

  I have zero interest in traveling down this conversational road, so I point to the mason jar. “You have to try this. It’s so good you’ll feel you’ve died and gone to heaven.”

  His eyes narrow.

  I tense, waiting to see if he’ll let it go.

  His attention drops to the jar between us. “What is it?”

  My shoulders relax, but I can’t help feeling disappointed. What in the world is wrong with me? I’ll have to figure it out later, because now’s not the time.

  “It’s whipped ricotta and this, like, huckleberry balsamic jam thingy.”

  He cocks a grin at me. “Sounds like city food.”

  I shrug. “It’s Jackson and Gwen food.”

  He wraps his fingers around his bottle. “What’s Cat food?”

  I don’t understand the question. I frown, my forehead pulling as I try to decipher what he means. I wave the plastic knife in my hand. “I’m not picky. I’ll eat up whatever is laid down in front of me.”

  “But you must have preferences?” He takes a long pull off his water.

  “What about you?”

  He raises a brow. “It’s a simple question, Cat. It shouldn’t be hard to answer.”

  “It’s not.” The words are too quick, although I don’t know why. It is just food. But it’s reminding me of something else…like how I’ve been picking up whatever’s put in front of me for so long I can’t remember any other way. “You know what I like? A really good doughnut.”

  He laughs. “Fair enough. We’ll have to get some then, won’t we?”

  “If we see something on the way, I wouldn’t object.”

  His gaze narrows, his head tilting the slightest bit, as though he’s scenting something on the air.

  I don’t want him thinking too hard about me, so I crumple my napkin. “Are you ready to go see your mom?”

  “Not particularly.” He smooths his hand over the label of the bottle. “I’d rather stay here with you all day.”

  “You’ll feel better once it’s over.”

  “You’re probably right.”

  He looks over my shoulder, staring into the trees behind me. “It’s hard, you know, when the person in front of you no longer matches the image in your head.”

  “It is. I remember that with my mom. Toward the end, all her pretty hair was gone, and her face was swollen from meds, her body decayed.”

  I still feel guilty about the last time I saw her alive. She scared me. It wasn’t my mother laying there but an alien, her skin like paper, still except for her eyes. When she looked at me, it seemed like she was trapped, her mind still vital and firing, but unable to escape the prison of her body.

  I glance at Caden to find him watching me. “I just wanted her to be free.”

  “Exactly.” He blows out a breath. “She’s not going to know who I am when I go there.”

  “That’s okay.” I lift my lips in a smile. “Maybe you can make her happy by being who she needs you to be, instead of who you are.”

  He looks beyond me and shakes his head before blowing out a breath. “I guess we’d better get this over with.”

  “It will be okay,” I promise, even though I can’t really know.

  I can only hope.

  About a lot of things, even things I have no right to.

  13

  Caden

  It’s worse than I thought.

  I’d been prepared for what happened the last time I saw my mom, when she’d been angry and frightened of me. I’d believed that was the worst that could happen.

  I was wrong.

  I stayed away too long, and now it’s too late.

  The woman sitting in the wheelchair in front of me is broken and blank. She won’t remember me, angry or otherwise, because there’s nothing there. Her shoulders are hunched, her head resting at an awkward angle, her hands curled and shaking.

  The nurse gives me a sympathetic smile. “I’m afraid she’s not having the best day.”

  I nod, sitting down on the bed. I feel impotent and uncomfortable, and I wish I was alone instead of with Cat.

  Cat doesn’t appear to suffer from the same affliction I do, because she takes my mom’s hand, grasps it loosely, and leans down to look her in the eye. “It’s so nice to meet you, Mrs. Landry. How are you doing today?”

  When there’s no response, Cat, squeezes her frail fingers. “I brought Caden with me.” She beams at my mom. “Isn’t he handsome?”

  Cat releases her hand and pats the back of it before moving around the room. “Well, this place is far too dark.” She sets about opening the curtains. “There. That’s better.”

  She walks across the room to a dresser and picks up a brush. “Can I brush your hair, Mrs. Landry?”

  When there’s no answer, she gently runs the brush through my mother’s thin, white hair. I try to envision a future where I’m her—old and gray and wrinkled, my mind and body broken—but I find it impossible. In some ways, my dad had it better—just a massive hit to the heart and he was gone.

  Cat sets down the brush and goes into the bathroom, coming out a few moments later with a washcloth. I watch her, the stark contrast of all her life and vitality and youth against my mother’s withered fragility.

  It seems easier to talk to Cat than to think of something to say to the shell in front of me. “You’re good at that.”

  She smiles. “It’s not as hard as you think. Just speak and act as y
ou would normally.”

  “But this isn’t normal.”

  She looks at me, her steely gaze uncanny. “Who says? It’s her normal. It’s life. All we can do is make the best of it.”

  She swipes a cloth over my mom’s face. “Isn’t that right?”

  My mother’s eyes flicker, but other than that, there’s nothing.

  Cat straightens. “You learn a lot about life, living with a disabled child.”

  I think of her niece, with her golden hair, sparkling eyes, and rigid body. “I hadn’t thought of it that way.”

  “Neither had I until Nat came into our lives and we were all forced to adapt.” Cat walks back into the bathroom and returns with a towel, which she uses to wipe the dampness away. “You’d be surprised how many people treat Natalie like she can’t understand the basics, like she needs to be talked to as if she’s three because she’s stuck in that chair. She hates it. It’s the kind of thing you don’t think of until you live with it—how condescending it is. How in trying to make yourself comfortable, you ruin it for the other person.”

  Cat looks down at my mom. “Now that you’re all gussied up, how about a walk?”

  When there’s no response, Cat smiles at me. “Ready?”

  I shake my head. “You’re amazing.”

  She laughs. “Not really.”

  She’s wrong. She really is. But for some reason, she doesn’t see it.

  I wonder if maybe that’s something I can do for her, something I can give her.

  It’s a worthy goal—something I haven’t had in a long time.

  I take a cue from her and lean down, kissing my mom on the cheek before staring into her eyes. “It’s good to see you, Momma.”

  I think I spot a flicker of recognition, but then it’s gone.

  I straighten and shove my hands into my pockets. “I waited too long.”

  “But at least you’re not too late.”

  “Thanks to you.”

  “I just prodded you in the right direction. You’d have gotten here eventually.”

  I take Cat’s hand and raise it to my lips. “Will you go to dinner with me tonight?”

  Her lashes flutter. “In New Orleans?”