Brynn and Sebastian Hate Each Other, page 22
“Sing ‘Rhinestone Cowboy’!” three of them shouted in unison in the sort of orchestrated way that made it obvious they had conspired together to make sure they were heard.
The 8-track was already in his hand—this was his greatest hit, after all—and he flipped it in the air with a flourish before pushing the cartridge into the slot with his index finger. Everyone began cheering so loudly he had to lean in closer to the speaker to make sure he could hear his musical cues. Not that it would matter. They couldn’t hear any more than he could. But he wanted to earn those tips.
It was about the time he got to the second chorus, just as he was tossing the microphone from one hand to the other with the aplomb of Elvis performing in Vegas in 1969, that in his peripheral vision he saw two more patrons enter. That wasn’t unusual. The PTA ladies came and went throughout the night, depending on how wild they were feeling, and of course they were open for dinner as usual. He turned to greet the new audience members with a welcoming smile, but the smile—and, briefly, the showmanship—faded when he spotted Brynn Cornell staring at him with eyes the size of Graceland, lashes blinking at a furious rate, and her mouth twitching in amusement.
Well, great.
Any other night. Any other night he would stop the music, step aside, and return to his spot behind the bar. He’d offer her a drink and charge her double the price. (She was used to Manhattan prices. She wouldn’t even flinch.) Then he’d stay busy and never give her the opportunity to make any of the snide remarks she would undoubtedly want to make. But this was PTA Night. And PTA Night wasn’t just about food, drinks, and fun. Oh no. PTA Night was an experience, and he wouldn’t allow these ladies to be robbed of that.
Sebastian doubled down and hopped from his stool, eyebrow cocked in Brynn’s direction. He walked to the edge of the stage—which was only about two feet off the ground—and stepped down to walk among his adoring fans. They were respectful—but just barely—as they grabbed the waist of his jeans and pulled on his T-shirt. He looped the twenty-five-foot microphone cord around his arm and made his way toward Laila, who had jumped right into work. Good thing, too, since Sebastian and Cole had been covering her since five o’clock, when she was supposed to be there. Okay, Cole was covering her. Sebastian was, well . . . doing this.
And doing it darn well, if he did say so himself.
Laila kept her head down, picking up empty dishes, but peered up at him and shook her head in a way that clearly said, “Stay away from me. I’m busy, and I will not be part of this ridiculous thing you’re doing.” Yeah. Good luck with that, Laila Olivet.
The grin spread across her face and color rose in her cheeks as he put his scruffy cheek against her smooth one and held the microphone in front of them, just in time for her to join him on the final chorus—which of course she did. Laila could always be counted on to keep the good times rolling.
The song ended, and he returned his microphone to its stand and headed back behind the bar after promising to take requests later—as long as those requests were songs by Glen Campbell or John Denver, since those were pretty much the only ones they had. Or, of course, he always had “Delta Dawn” at the ready.
Brynn didn’t join him at the bar as he had expected her to but instead sat at a two-top on the far side of the stage.
“What’s that about?” Sebastian asked as Laila sidled up to the bar with drink orders.
She turned her head to follow his eyes. “We had the best day, Seb. It was . . .” She closed her eyes and clutched her tray to her chest as she breathed in through her teeth. “It was so good. Such a long time coming. She was honest and real and humble and—”
“Seems to be a lot of that going around.”
“What do you mean?”
He finished shaking the martini and poured it into a glass. “I don’t know if you heard about—”
“The tree?” She nodded. “Of course I did.”
“Honest, real, humble.” He paused and considered the words. He also couldn’t help but spend a moment considering the way Brynn had held on to his arms at the end there, after the danger was behind them, as if he were still her only hope for rescue. “Yeah. That’s kind of what I saw too. But be careful, Laila. She’s still working an angle.”
“You’re just determined to see the worst in her, aren’t you?”
“No, I’m really not.” Or maybe he was. But even he would have to admit it was getting increasingly difficult, no matter how determined he may have been. “It’s just that for all the good I’ve seen today, I’ve also seen her turn on the ‘Brynn Cornell, live from the Sunup couch’ persona when it will help her get ahead. All I’m saying is it probably wouldn’t be that difficult for her to manipulate the emotions of someone who is really wanting to see the best in her.”
Laila set down her tray and put her hands on her hips. “Sometimes when you look for the best in people, you actually find it.”
He knew he would never win this argument with her. All he was going to do was make her angry with him, and that was the last thing he wanted. “Forget I said anything.” He loaded up her tray and smiled at her. “I wish I was as trusting as you. I do. I mean that.”
Her icy demeanor—at least icy by Laila’s standards—melted in a flash, and the smile returned to her face. “I know you and Cole think I’m naive—”
“I don’t think you’re naive. I don’t.”
“I know her, Seb.”
“You knew her.”
Laila shrugged. “Okay, sure. I knew her. But you didn’t. So maybe, just for a minute, trust that I have a little bit of expertise here that you don’t.” She squeezed his hand and winked. “I know that’s hard to imagine.”
She sauntered away, expertly balancing her tray and greeting each person along the way. Sebastian’s eyes followed her until she stopped at one of the wilder of the PTA tables, and all the women there began tittering and blowing kisses in his direction, as if it had been them he’d been eyeing with affection and admiration. He smiled and waved indulgently and then pulled his focus to Brynn’s table. She was sipping the water Laila had dropped off for her and perusing the menu, and every now and then raising her eyes to look around and examine every corner of the room.
“Only one way to find out,” he muttered to himself, then threw the dish towel over his shoulder and hurried over to her. Around the perimeter, of course. If he tried to walk through the throng, he might never get there. He came up behind her and said, “Hi.”
She jumped in her seat a bit and looked over her shoulder. “Oh. It’s you.”
“Sorry to disappoint.” He circled the table to the empty seat across from her. “May I?”
She gestured to the chair with an open hand. “Sorry. I’m just . . . Well, I haven’t seen Cole yet.”
“No Orly tonight?”
She shook her head and laughed softly. “I’m not doing a very good job, am I? I mean, if the goal is to get a lot of great footage of me reuniting with people . . . I sort of suck at this.”
Sebastian had just sat down, but as the silence permeated—he knew it was his turn to talk, but for the life of him he couldn’t think of what to say—he pushed his chair back away from the table and began to stand. He couldn’t help but notice how red and puffy her eyes were from all the tears, and how beautiful it was that, though she had clearly taken the time to change out of her running gear, she hadn’t made any attempts with makeup to cover the humanity etched all over her face. What was he supposed to say to that? “Well, I should get back—”
“No way. Not yet.” She pointed her left index finger down toward the chair, signaling him to sit. He wasn’t quite sure why he did it, but he did. “You don’t get to leave until we talk about your little stint as the Wichita Lineman.”
“Rhinestone Cowboy.”
“Whatever.”
She stared at him, amusement written across her face, and he stared back. “What can I say? I try to give the people what they want.”
Her head bobbed up and down and she laughed softly. “Seems like you do it well. There’s no denying you have a very satisfied clientele.”
“Well . . .” He pulled his eyes away as the sensation of heat spreading up his neck took him by surprise. He was going to say something about how he hadn’t gotten any complaints, but the good-natured feel of their banter suddenly felt a little too flirty. And sure, he knew that was rich after having to remind himself more than once, when they were in a tree together, to stay focused on the task at hand rather than the task his hands wanted to focus on. But he’d meant what he’d said to Andi. Maybe his self-control was getting a workout for the first time in a while, but he could resist Brynn Cornell, no matter how beautiful she was.
It was the conversations that were going to get him in trouble.
He stood up and pushed the chair back to the table. “Need anything else to drink, or are you good with just water?”
The humor left her eyes. “Water’s fine, thanks.” She seemed to be biting the inside of her cheek, and her eyes focused on the table, her phone, out the window—suddenly anywhere but on him. “Um . . .” She cleared away the frog in her throat and still refused to look at him. “Thanks again for earlier.”
“Like I said, no problem.”
“I don’t just mean the tree, Sebastian. I mean, obviously the tree. But . . . yeah . . . thanks.”
He swallowed the forming lump and leaned one hand on the table as he said quietly, “Don’t forget I still have about four minutes and forty seconds on my tab.”
She tilted her chin and met his eyes. “I think you earned the right to make fun of me however you want.”
He’d been going for lighthearted, but in an instant, his heart was broken by her. For her. “I won’t,” he whispered and then swallowed hard. “Hold back on the ‘Rhinestone Cowboy’ jokes, and we’ll consider that debt paid in full.”
“Deal.”
Their eyes stayed in lockstep with each other until she abruptly declared, “I’m going to go get a little fresh air.” She turned her head and downed what was left of her water and then set the glass down a little too hard, which made her chuckle to herself. As if Sebastian was owed an explanation, she looked up at him and said, “I need to be careful. I already have a glassware tab at this place.”
In response, Sebastian smiled at her. Why did he smile at her? What in the world was she even talking about?
He watched her walk away and tried to piece together as many context clues about her—about who she really was—as he could. Nothing about what he’d seen from her today matched with her Sunup persona. This Brynn Cornell looked and talked nothing like the network-crafted America’s Sweetheart or Girl Next Door or Heidi the Happy Helium Balloon or whatever her nickname was. This girl almost seemed like she belonged in Adelaide Springs. He’d climb trees with this woman any day—at least he would if she wrangled up some clothes appropriate for the occasion. Her socks were probably from the Louis Vuitton As-Casual-As-We’re-Willing-to-Go winter line. But even that wasn’t seeming like enough of a deterrent right then, as an image of her with her hair pulled up in a ponytail and wearing his baggy purple Northwestern Wildcats hoodie barged into his brain and began assaulting his senses.
“Do you mind if I go with you?” he asked, but thankfully she was already gone. How long had she been gone? One second he’d been looking at her, and then for the next however many he’d been staring at that unwelcome fantasy version of her in his head. It was that version he’d asked to accompany outside. And that version didn’t exist.
He shook it off and headed back behind the bar. Six different PTA ladies were waiting on him when he got there. Two of them wanted margaritas, three wanted wine, and if he’d understood the drunken slurs properly, the sixth wanted him to join her in Tampa for the annual homeschool parent conference.
He had learned how to tend a mean bar. He would even pull out a little “One Way or Another” and do his best Coyote Ugly on the bar if it pleased the crowd. Two notes to self, Sebastian: (1) We don’t have “One Way or Another” on 8-track. (2) Cole must never know that you even mentally, to yourself, referenced Coyote Ugly. But he absolutely drew the line at whatever sort of American Gigolo insanity happened at homeschool conferences.
Laila came out of the kitchen carrying a tray full of entrees, and Cole stepped out right behind her. He untied the strings from around his waist and slung his apron over Sebastian’s shoulder.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Sebastian asked. “I’ve got to get back onstage in a minute. There’s a cassette of ‘Sunshine on My Shoulders’ over there calling my name.”
“I need to go talk to Brynn.” He looked around the room and landed on the now empty table with a menu and water glass on it in the corner. “Where’d she go?”
“She wanted some air.” Sebastian motioned toward the front door. Cole began walking that way. “Is everything okay?”
Cole turned back to him, and there was emotion in his eyes that Sebastian was pretty sure he’d never seen there before in the six years he’d known him. “Laila says she’s back.”
He’d always considered himself a proficient and reliable judge of character. He’d known when military generals were lying to him. He’d known when presidents and dictators were keeping something from him. What was it about a beautiful, complicated, intelligent woman that clouded his judgment and made him question what was real and what wasn’t?
“Look, Cole, I just don’t want to see you guys get hurt. She’s not back . . . you know? At the end of the week she’s going to go back to her life and—”
Cole held up his hand to stop him. “Thanks for your concern, Seb. Really. I understand where you’re coming from, and I appreciate it. But . . .” He looked down at his feet and then back at Sebastian, and the emotion had only compounded. “Brynn’s our family. You don’t refuse to take a chance on the people you love just because there might be some pain involved.”
Whatever words or arguments Sebastian may have attempted to bring forth got caught in his throat. He nodded once and slugged Cole on the arm as he walked past toward the door. Then he took a few steps to the right and angled himself so he could see outside. The lights on the porch caught Brynn’s silhouette as she turned to the sound of the screen door opening. She had her arms wrapped around herself, and Sebastian quickly darted his eyes to the back table, where her puffy, white three-quarter-length coat was folded over the back of her chair. He contemplated grabbing it and running it out to her—or asking Laila to, since she would certainly be a much more welcome intruder—but as soon as the gesture entered his mind, it was deemed unnecessary.
The shadows flickered, pulling back his gaze just in time to see Cole wrap his arms around Brynn’s shoulders and pull her against his chest. Her arms encircled his torso, and the tears streaming down her cheeks glinted in the harsh yellow light shining down on them. Cole kissed the top of her head and seemed to say something into her hair that made her laugh. She pulled back and looked up at him, and with their faces just inches from each other, they laughed in a way that was far too intimate and comfortable considering they were, by all accounts, strangers now.
Laila walked behind the bar and followed his gaze. Sebastian knew he should pull away now that he’d been caught spying—ideally he would have pulled away just before that point—but he couldn’t. And as Laila joined him, linking her arms with his, which were folded across his chest, and resting her head on his bicep, he felt like maybe it was okay to keep spying. Good thing.
“They dated, you know.”
Well, okay. That got him to tear his eyes away. He looked down at the blond locks against his arm, but she kept watching the patio. “Cole and Brynn?” She nodded—not that she could have possibly been talking about anyone else. “No, I didn’t know that.”
“I think they actually would have been perfect together, if they didn’t love each other so much.”
Sebastian chuckled and let his eyes return to the patio. They were still standing with their arms wrapped around each other, chatting, laughing, and crying. Something about the intimacy of the scene made him feel cold and isolated. He uncrossed his arms and threw his right arm around Laila’s shoulder. She effortlessly slipped against his side, generously sharing her warmth with him. It felt like as good a time as any to ask the question that, in six years, he’d never been brave enough to ask—although it was always right there. Front of mind and on the tip of his tongue.
“Why didn’t you and Cole ever get together? You love each other too much?”
She didn’t look at him in surprise or pull back, or even take in a deep breath. Nothing changed. She just calmly replied, “Nah. We love each other just the right amount.”
He wasn’t sure what that meant, exactly, but he knew he didn’t need to. Laila seemed to understand it perfectly.
Her left hand squeezed against his belt, and then she pulled away and picked up her tray from the bar. “I think you’re due for another song.”
He suddenly felt so tired. He was no longer interested in distracting himself from the things he didn’t want to think about, and the adrenaline that had been fueling the distraction had all been spent anyway. But as the food on their tables ran out, and with the chef MIA, he knew he only had two options to appease the ladies of the Adelaide Springs Parent Teacher Association. He could slip a little melatonin into their drinks and drive them all safely home, or he could once again cover the figurative eyes of his Pulitzers so they wouldn’t think less of him and pour his heart into his next performance.
With a sacrificial sigh he yelled out over his shoulder, “Are we ready for more?” His call to action was met by the return of thunderous hoots and hollers as well as amused smiles from the porch as Cole and Brynn turned and caught his eye through the door. Cole seemed to be filling Brynn in on what that was all about, and with each word her smile grew bigger. And the longer Sebastian stood looking at her, and her back at him, the more he questioned his usually astute instincts. He had no idea what to make of her. All he knew right then was that his instincts were telling him to try to look cool by hopping over the bar like Patrick Swayze in Road House or something. Proof positive that his instincts misled him on occasion.
