Riptide Affair, page 9
I'm glad he can because, right now, I definitely can't.
He kisses me one last time, but it's a quick press of his lips to my knuckles, drawing another awww from the crowd.
“Talk to you tomorrow?”
I nod, looking forward to it more than anything else. “Definitely.”
The wistful sigh that escapes when I catch sight of Jared's ass disappearing into his Jeep is downright comical, and like the lust-struck fool I am, I watch until his tail lights disappear down the road. Then, I turn to my friends. I'd murderize them right here and now if the security cameras wouldn't catch it.
“So,” Harper chirps. “How'd it go?”
“Swell.” They're not getting details that easy. “What are you guys still doing here?”
Jeb jerks a thumb over his shoulder. “Had to clean the fish tank,” he explains. “Girls offered to help.”
“Uh huh.”
I stare them down, waiting for someone to crack. It's a load of bull and we all know it, but they all take a sudden interest in the sky, the ground, their phones—anything to keep from making eye contact.
“You filthy bunch of liars!”
Laura's the first to burst out laughing and the others quickly follow. “Goodnight...Merrin...” she says, doing a piss-poor impression of Jared's deep voice.
“Goodnight...Jared...” Harper croons in a high-pitched voice that sounds nothing like mine.
She grabs Laura's waist and Laura grabs her head and I'm forced to watch them loll their tongues out of their mouths and make inappropriate noises that echo through the parking lot. By the time they get around to dry humping one another, I'm clutching my sides and laughing so hard I can't see through the tears.
I love these bitches.
If I could have found them the day I moved to Blackjack, my senior year wouldn't have been quite so horrific. As it is, all three of them grew up miles down the road in South Cedar, but I have them now, and I thank God for that every single day.
Kate, being the mama bear she is, slaps Laura's hip, putting an end to the show. “Quit it.” Then she turns a smirk my way. “Your place. Ten minutes.”
I nod, knowing a girls' night is about to commence, and even though their blatant disregard for my privacy irks me most days, I appreciate the support. Even though I lost everything in the span of a year, I somehow found something to fill the gaping hole that loss left in my chest.
A family.
These women are my family.
The restaurant is closed, but the jukebox and ecstatic male cheers reach us from within the bar, and I know we need to leave before it gets too crazy. Time to gush with my tribe is exactly what I need to decompress, relax, and over-analyze everything like I normally do. Some women might not be the kiss-and-tell type...but I am.
Half-an-hour later, we're knee-deep into the details of my date, lounging on my living room floor eating leftover Chinese food. Five Lime-a-ritas are dripping condensation on my glass coffee table, virtually untouched. We all have an early day tomorrow and we're old and wise enough to pace ourselves.
“So, wait...you didn't do it?”
Laura seems personally offended when I tell her that Jared and I did not 'hump like bunnies'.
“Where the hell would we have had sex?” I ask. “In the back of his Jeep?”
“YES!” she screeches, hands raised. “If a backseat is good enough for high school virgins on prom night, dammit it's good enough for you!”
“She's not sixteen,” Kate points out. “Plus, doing it in the back of a car is just tacky.”
“So is doing it in a public elevator,” Harper points out, popping a cashew in her mouth, “but that didn't stop her.”
I raise a finger in protest. “That was different.”
“Yeah, you were scared and worried and all horned up after your visit with the libido fairy,” Laura says. “We know.”
Kate nudges me with her knee. “When are you seeing him again?”
Drumming fingers along the arm of my chair, I stare down at my phone. Jared's texted me no less than five times since we parted ways. “I don't know...I think I might cook him dinner this weekend. That could be fun.”
“Cook him dinner?” Harper asks, eyes wide. “As in, inviting him here? To your house? That's a pretty big step.”
Laura raises her hand to speak. “No! She has to do it at his house. That way if she wants to leave, she can. It'll save her the trouble of finding a polite way to kick him out if things go south.”
“Ever the optimist,” Kate sighs.
I shrug. “It's not a bad idea. It's way easier to remove yourself from a situation than it is to remove someone else, but I think I'll feel better and less anxious in familiar territory.”
“Fine,” Laura groans, “but eventually I wanna hear all about his bedroom décor.” She waggles her brows, incorrigible as always, but in the sweetest of ways.
“I'm not sleeping with him,” I insist. “Not yet anyway.”
“Why?” Laura snorts. “So you can become a thirty-two year old virgin?”
I can't help it. Even I laugh at that one.
CHAPTER NINE
Jared
“I thought you said you had a date.” Rhett glares up at me from his spot on the couch, clearly unimpressed. Being an investment banking analyst with one eye on a senior VP position, he's usually at work ninety-five percent of the time, but not tonight. Tonight, he's sitting in my spot, remote in one hand, a Corona in the other, watching the 119th U.S. Open.
“I do have a date.”
He takes in my clothes again and shakes his head. “Jeans and a wrinkled t-shirt? Where you taking her, Chuck E. Cheese?”
“She's cooking me dinner, asshole.” I glance down at my favorite Aerosmith t-shirt. “And it's not wrinkled.”
Rhett grunts out his disapproval. We may be identical twins, but physical similarities are as far as it goes. In every other way—all the ways that matter—we're polar opposites. He graduated a year early and received a full scholarship to his first choice college. I partied my way through senior year and barely had enough credits to walk across the stage at the end of the year. Rhett owns stocks. I thought Dow Jones was a person until a year ago. His closet is color-coded and arranged by season. My clothes live on a chair in the corner of my room.
“Whatever,” Rhett grumbles. “But if you're planning on getting laid, I'd try a little harder.”
I'm not planning anything. Okay, yeah, I slipped a Trojan in my wallet earlier, but that doesn't mean I'm going to use it. It's just a precautionary measure.
“It's just dinner,” I point out. “And since when do you dole out relationship advice, Mr. I'm Too Busy To Even Look At Women?”
He cuts his eyes to the side. “Since your girlfriend assaulted me in public. I'm allowed.”
“She did not assault you.”
“My balls beg to differ.”
“That's the most action your balls have seen in years. You should be grateful. At least this way they got a little attention.”
Rhett cracks a smile. A rare and phenomenal occurrence. “Whatever. Get out of here. Go. Charm. Score.”
I grab my keys and head for the door. “You'd make a terrible cheerleader.”
Trying like hell to squelch my laughter, I watch Merrin through the screen door as she races around like a madwoman. The main door is wide open, so I have a front row seat—or front porch seat, rather—to the show. I care very little about the positioning of her Home Is Where the Heart Is and All You Need is Love throw pillows, but I get it. She's a woman. Her home is a point of pride for her. Still, the fact that she's flustered over our dinner date has my chest swelling with hope. Merrin's truly the whole package.
Containing my smile, I ring the doorbell and it chimes out a merry tune, causing Merrin to freeze where she stands, putting an end to the madness.
“Just a sec!” she calls over her shoulder, giving her living room one final examination. When she seems happy with the result, she turns, and my playful smile vanishes.
Tonight, she's wearing a navy dress with straps so thin the first thing my eyes devour is her freckled shoulders. The material clings to her chest, her stomach, offering glimpses of feminine curves beneath, then flares out and almost touches the ground. Beneath the hem, her bare feet peek out as she walks, the skirt swishing easily with every stride, telling me it's likely very soft. Cotton maybe. A weak, easily torn fabric...
Merrin opens the door, out of breath but smiling brightly. “Hey!” When her eyes dart down to the bouquet of purple and white flowers in my hand, her face transforms and I wish I could pull my cell out and snap a picture. Jaw slack, eyes glistening, she juts out a finger toward the flowers, asking a question without words.
“Yes. These are for you.” I hand them over, my smile growing to match hers.
“They're beautiful.” Her voice is filled with a reverence I don't understand but appreciate all the same. “Thank you. Come on in.” She steps to the side like the world's most gracious hostess, waving me in with her free hand. “You find the place okay?”
“Yup. Sure did.”
The inside of Merrin's house is exactly as I imagined it would be. Walls painted a light shade of green that remind me of springtime, plush sofas, too many throw pillows to count (most of them embroidered with positive affirmations), a bookshelf weighed down with books of all sizes, and every wall is covered with framed photographs of her and the girls, as well as a few starring her in her younger years, surrounded by people I assume are her family.
One photo in particular stands out to me and I go straight to it, bowing down a little since it's hung lower than the others.
“These your folks?” I ask, pointing to the frozen faces of a man and woman. The man I recognize as Jack Johnson—a football legend in Blackjack, but I've never seen the woman before. She's the spitting image of Merrin. They're both holding onto Merrin's shoulders, beaming.
“Yeah,” she says softly from my side. “Jack and Suelynn. She died at the end of my junior year. Dad died the beginning of my senior.”
When I force myself to look at Merrin, I expect her face to be etched with the lines of a thousand painful memories, but she doesn't look sad at all. In fact, she's staring at the photo with a quiet fondness I find endearing. Lord knows if I lost my parents—or God forbid, one of my dickwad brothers—I'd be fucking miserable every time some jackass reminded me of my misfortune.
“I'm sorry, Merrin.”
She shakes her head, still not peeling her eyes from the faces of her parents. “It's fine. That's life, right? Bad shit happens all the time to really good people.”
She sighs, and that's when I see she's hugging the bouquet of flowers to her chest like it's the only thing keeping her upright. If she'd let me, I'd ground her. I'd bear some of the weight of her devastation. But we're not there yet. Far from it, actually. And the fact that I'm even thinking about becoming such a prominent fixture in her life tells me I'm way in over my head, or I've lost my damn mind. Either way, I'm in trouble.
“They were the best,” she continues wistfully. “This is the house my dad grew up in, actually, and he left it to me. My mom immigrated here from Japan when she was barely a teenager and she met Dad when he was touring colleges up north. They always said it was love at first sight. A few months later he packed everything and left Blackjack. For her.”
So that's why Jack Johnson disappeared after graduation. He fell in love.
Reading between the lines, I hear what Merrin's not saying. She misses her parents. She misses belonging to people. The house is empty apart from her. But, from what I saw earlier this week, her work family love her just as fiercely as if she were blood. That's something not everyone has. Still, there's a longing I see in her eyes that can't be hidden or disguised. She's lonely.
“That must be hard. Missing them.”
She spins on her heel and walks away, effectively putting an end to the conversation.
“I hope you like chicken casserole,” she says, perking up. “I had a little freak out while I was cooking. Not knowing if you liked chicken or if you had any food allergies.”
Following her into the kitchen, I let her ramble on, recognizing it as her attempt to regain some semblance of control after I dredged up so many dark memories. She talks without ever really saying anything as I look around, taking in the dated appliances and freshly-mopped black and white tile. Close to twenty magnets litter the front of her refrigerator, but out of all the multicolored baubles, what draws my eye is one holding up a Polaroid flipped backward. I'm a nosy bastard, so while Merrin is busy at the stove I pull the photo off the fridge.
It's one of her and the girls, and they're all gathered around a hospital bed. They look much younger, and it strikes me as odd that one of the girls—Harper, I think her name is—is sitting up in the bed, her thin arms cradling a sleeping baby to her chest as she stares at the camera with cold, lifeless eyes.
I hold the photo between two fingers and turn to Merrin. “Harper has a kid?”
She grimaces. “Uh...kind of.”
I shake my head. “How do you kind of have a kid?”
“It's complicated.” Two steps and she's beside me, carefully taking the photo from my hand and replacing it on the fridge, face down, as it was. “Harper was sixteen,” she explains softly. “Her parents weren't happy when she told them she was pregnant. Her dad went nuclear. The day Harper delivered, we were all huddled in the corner of her room, trying not to take up space, and her father stood at the foot of her bed, looked her straight in the eye, and called her a whore. He talked about that beautiful baby—London—like she was a problem to be fixed, and that broke Harper in a lot of different ways. A day after this photo was taken, we showed up to the hospital and London was gone. Those assholes booked a flight and took the baby with them back to Georgia to “raise her right, so she wouldn't end up like Harper” and we haven't seen her since.”
“Jesus,” I hiss. The short, tragic story has me instantly on edge, clenching my hands at my side. I can't even imagine what that would be like, and I don't even want to try. “That's kidnapping.”
Merrin shakes her head, a sad smile playing on full lips. “She was too traumatized to fight them on it at the time. They pushed her to sign temporary guardianship over to her father and she did, and then she kissed London goodbye.”
“And this picture is hidden why?” I ask, wishing I would stop asking stupid questions that make Merrin emotional. I'm the worst date ever.
“That's Harper's doing.” She runs a knuckle lovingly over the back of the photo before hanging her head and returning to the stove. “It's the only picture she has of London, and she refuses to keep it at her house, so it stays here. Hidden. But I think it makes her feel better knowing it's here. She sneaks peeks of it every now and again when she's feeling particularly brave. Usually happens when she's drunk, and always on London's birthday.”
“How old's the kid now?” I ask, my heart aching for this woman I barely know.
“She'll be two at the end of July.”
Two whole years and hundreds of miles separating them. That's shit. People are shit.
“Another ten minutes should do,” Merrin says, effectively changing the subject. Again. “Go ahead and have a seat. You want a beer? Some wine?”
I catch sight of the flowers resting on the counter and ignore her entirely, choosing instead to go about opening and closing every cabinet door in the kitchen, scanning the contents one by one. My snooping, although rude, serves a purpose.
“Looking for something?” she asks, cautious mirth filling her voice.
“Okay, I give up.” I turn to find her staring at me with crossed arms and an amused smile. “Where do you keep your vases?”
Her cheeks flare red. “Oh, uh...no vases,” she shrugs. “I mean—I have some, but they were my mothers and I think they're in the attic.”
“Seriously? You have throw pillows and doilies,” I laugh. “Surely you have a vase around here somewhere.”
Her eyes fall. The blush intensifies. “I don't get a whole lot of flowers.”
My God. Men are stupid. Every single dick-owning human being between here and Texas should be trying to woo a creature like Merrin with flowers and chocolates and fucking carriage rides, but no one's bothered to grab her a rose from the supermarket? How is that possible?
Oh well. Their loss is my gain.
Spotting something over Merrin's shoulder, I point to the counter and claim victory. It's just a glass container with the word Sugar etched across the side, but it's empty and it'll do. “I'm commandeering that.”
A single giggle escapes her. “By all means, go for it.”
I do. And while I try (in vain, might I add) to artfully position the flowers, Merrin serves up two plates of something that has me swallowing profusely to keep from drooling on the counter.
I plunk the makeshift vase in the kitchen window and turn back to my date. “Need any help?”
She points to the lemonade chilling on the counter and the empty glasses, so I fill both. There's a brief silence as we go about working around one another in the kitchen, moving back and forth from the table, but it's not awkward. It's not loaded.
It's comfortable.
“This looks amazing,” I say as we take our seats, my eyes laser focused on the steaming plate before me. “Smells great too.”
Merrin masks a proud smile with her lemonade glass, but I see it. It's beautiful. She's beautiful.
I load up my fork, slide it into my mouth, start chewing and—
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
Merrin laughs, somehow knowing exactly why I'm cursing with my mouth full.
“What the hell are you doing waiting tables?” I pause only long enough to swallow so I don't spit chicken at her. “You should be in the kitchen.”
She cocks her head to the side, one brow raised, and it only takes me a second to realize how I just sounded.
“I didn't mean it like that.”
“Uh huh,” she says. “I'm sure you didn't.”
“I meant like a five-star, Michelin-rated kitchen.” I raise my hands in surrender. “I swear. I'm not one of those guys that think a woman's place is barefoot in the kitchen.”
