“That’s not gonna work for me,” he said. “I need a clean break.”
“Sure.” Her tanned face blanched, but she straightened and gave a curt nod like they’d just closed a business deal. And to think Luke had thought his sister was damaged and vulnerable. “If that’s what you want, then I won’t—”
“Right now. It won’t be any easier in the morning.” He stood and walked to the front door numbly. As much as his body begged him to make love to Bobbi one last time, as desperately as he craved her touch, he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t give any more of himself to her, or he’d be left with nothing.
She took the hint and found her handbag. But just as Trey remembered she’d parked in the garage, not on the street, someone from outside pounded on the door, startling them both.
Trey squinted one eye and checked the peephole. It was Luke, and he looked madder than a cut snake. “Shit.”
“I know she’s in there!” Luke yelled from the front stoop, alerting half the neighborhood. “Open the damn door!”
Trey hung his head and sighed. What the hell, he might as well get it over with. At least this night couldn’t get any worse. Opening the door, he faced his furious best friend. At once, Luke’s eyes found Bobbi, who stood by Trey’s side. She was clothed, but her rumpled blouse and frazzled hair showed what they’d been up to a few minutes earlier. As the saying went, the jig was up.
“Come out here,” Luke said to Trey. “So I can kick your ass.”
Bobbi pushed herself between them in a Hail Mary attempt to diffuse the situation. “Don’t be an idiot! There’s nothing going on between us. And even if there was, it’d be none of your—”
“
Nothing
going
on?
” Luke screamed, raking one hand through his hair and setting it on end. “Do you know what I just saw?” He scrubbed his face and shook his head as if desperate to clear it. “My computer crashed, so I borrowed your laptop—”
Bobbi interrupted him with a loud gasp. “Oh no!”
“Oh yes!” Luke held a pair of imaginary knives and made stabbing motions toward his own eyeballs. “Christ, Bo, I can’t un-see that! I’ll never be the same!”
Trey scrunched his forehead in confusion, but then understanding penetrated his foggy brain, and his stomach settled somewhere in the vicinity of his crotch. Bobbi hadn’t deleted the dirty video they’d made. And, sweet Jesus, Luke had seen it?
Trey spun on her. “You put it on your laptop?” Why would she do that? “Please tell me it’s not on the Internet!”
“Of course I didn’t put it online! That was just for me!”
“Get your ass out here, Trey!” Luke backed up into the lawn and started flexing his fingers, gearing up for a fight. “Or I’ll come in there and drag you out.”
Damn it. Trey knew two things about his oldest friend—one, he didn’t back down from a fight, and two, he had a left hook like a bazooka. But Trey would take the punishment. It was probably no less than he deserved.
“Fine.” Trey jogged down the four front steps leading to his lawn. He pointed to his jaw and approached Luke. “I’m not gonna fight you, but I’ll give you one free shot.”
He’d expected Luke to balk and tell him that shit was for pansies, but instead, the man he’d considered a brother drew back and delivered a blow to Trey’s cheek that had stars exploding behind his eyelids. He reeled backward, flailing to remain upright, while white-hot lightning bolts singed his nerves. Once he’d steadied himself, he worked his throbbing jaw back and forth, trying to determine whether it was broken. A persistent popping noise told him he’d at least dislocated it.
“Son of a bitch!” Luke cradled his fingers against his chest. “You broke my hand!”
“Well, I hope you’re not looking for an apology, you jackass! I think you broke my face!”
One of Trey’s neighbors, old Mrs. Denton across the street, stood on her front stoop, shaking her cordless telephone in the air. “I’m callin’ the law!”
“That’s not necessary, ma’am,” Trey called out. “But thanks all the same.”
“One thing!” Luke said, still protecting his hand. “I asked you for one thing—don’t bang my sister—and you couldn’t handle that.”
“Hey!” Bobbi stormed outside, pointing her black handbag at her brother. “I’m a grown woman, and who I bang is none of your business. We didn’t do anything wrong!”
With his good hand, Luke pointed to the house. “Just get your shit and go home. This is between me and him.”
Bobbi made one of those furious girly noises, part growl, part squeal, and even in the moon’s dim glow, Trey noticed an eerie redness creep from her neck to her hairline. “Get my shit and go home? Who the hell do you think you are?” Without giving her brother a chance to respond, she declared, “I will go home. To Inglewood. And it’ll be a cold day in hell before I come back here.” She bolted inside, and seconds later, the garage door opened, revealing her purple hatchback. She backed into the street and sped away without a backward glance.
This wasn’t how he’d envisioned their last good-bye.
“Just great,” Luke said. “Now look what you’ve done.” He stomped across the yard to where he’d parked his black F-250, half on the curb, half in the grass. He lumbered into the cab, and moments later, he was gone too. Just like that.
Trey’s jaw pulsed in time with his bruised heart. He sank onto the front steps, weighed down by the heavy ache in his chest—Bobbi’s parting gift. He still couldn’t believe it had ended this way. Just five minutes ago, he’d held her warm, responsive body in his arms, kissed her lush mouth…
“Stop,” he told himself. He needed to quit wallowing and figure out what to do next. Not only had he lost Bobbi, but his best friend too—the reason he’d settled in Sultry Springs to begin with. What kind of life awaited him here two years in the future? An awkward acquaintance with Luke? A handful of excruciating encounters when Bobbi came to visit, which she surely would.
Screw it. If Sultry Springs didn’t feel like home anymore, he’d settle elsewhere. Maybe if he called his realtor now, there’d be time to get the house listed before he left for Dubai in the morning.
An image of Carlo’s face flashed in Trey’s mind, and his already aching gut twisted with guilt. He’d told the boy he was coming back, but kids were resilient, right? In two years, Carlo would’ve forgotten Trey even existed. But still, maybe he could use some of his housing profits to add a teen room onto the community center. Start a small scholarship fund too. The money would help Carlo a hell of a lot more than Trey’s presence. What did he know about kids, anyway?
The cell phone clipped to Trey’s belt interrupted his pity party. He glanced at the incoming number and debated letting it go to voice mail. He was in no mood for his father’s horseshit, but in the end, he answered the call. The night couldn’t possibly get any worse, right?
“Colonel,” Trey said flatly.
“I didn’t want to do this.” The old man sounded pissed, as usual. “But you just wouldn’t leave it alone.”
“Yeah,” Trey said. “Talkin’ to you isn’t too high on my wish list either.”
“You ever wonder why you’re an only child?”
Trey drew back, surprised at the abrupt change in subject. “You achieved perfection on the first try?”
“No, wiseass. Because I’m sterile.”
That was more information than he wanted to know about the old man’s junk, but whatever. “Okay. When did that happen?” Probably radiation exposure, or some injury he sustained during one of his tours.
“It didn’t happen. I was born like this.”
The message sank in slowly, then, like floodwaters breaking a levy wall, the truth slammed him and swept him under. Trey’s fingers went slack, and he nearly dropped his phone. If his father had always shot blanks, that meant…
“You’re not my son.” To give the Colonel credit, he didn’t seem to take pleasure in dropping the bomb. His voice softened. “The year before you were born, I came home from a six-month deployment and found out your mother was four months pregnant.”
Trey shook his head. Was he dreaming? Had this whole, awful day been a nightmare? He sure as hell hoped so, because this was too much.
“I agreed to raise you as mine,” his dad said, “but as far as I was concerned, the marriage was over.”
“This is insane.”
“I wanted a kid,” the old man explained. “I promised I’d never tell you, but I won’t have you vilify me while you crusade for that woman like she’s some kind of saint.”
“So, who’s my—” real father. Trey couldn’t complete the sentence, still didn’t believe it.
“From what I hear, it’s a toss-up between a handful of MPs on post.”
A handful? Of military police?
His
mother knocking boots with enlisted men? The same woman who refused to make eye contact with anyone making less than six figures a year? Her choice of bed partners came as a greater shock than his questionable paternity.
“For what it’s worth,” the Colonel said, “I don’t regret my choice. But now, I’ve found someone who makes me happy, and I’m done playing house with that whore.”
“Careful!” Whore or not, she was still his mother.
“Look, I laid some heavy shit on you. Take some time to let it sink in.”
Sure, like that was gonna happen.
Before disconnecting, Trey’s “father” left him with one final bit of advice. “Only a fool says no to a second chance. I’ve got mine. Now go get yours. Call me when you clear that record.” Then the line went dead.
Trey stared into the darkness. Well, goddamn. In the last five minutes, he’d lost his best friend, the love of his life, and his father to boot. At least this day couldn’t get any—
No, he’d better not think it. Shit could always get worse. He’d learned that lesson tonight.
“Sucks that we can’t use this,” Weezus said, wrapping his index finger around one blue dreadlock. He used his free hand to gesture toward the forty-inch flat-screen monitor affixed to the Goldblatt studio wall, where Colton streaked the mayor’s inauguration wearing nothing but a
Nacho
Libre
mask.
Bong leaned forward in his rolling chair, studying Colt’s bare bottom. “Is it just me, or does that look like a butterfly tattoo?”
“It’s just you,” Bobbi said from her chair beside him.
While Weezus paused the footage and zoomed in on the tattoo—a pair of angel wings, not a butterfly—Bobbi drummed her nails on the black, lacquered computer console and visited her happy place, envisioning life’s obstacles as dozens of tiny Tetris shapes falling into perfect order. It calmed her frayed nerves, but reminded her of Trey, so she blocked the puzzle and focused on the nude subject in front of her. Nice ass. But not as nice as Trey’s.
“Any chance he’ll change his mind?” Bong asked.
“No.” She’d tried for weeks, but Colton wouldn’t budge. “He’s not taking my calls anymore.”
“Think your brother can soften him up?”
She shook her head. “Not for lack of trying.” Luke had felt so badly about his reaction at Trey’s house that final night, he’d pestered Colt each day on her behalf. But no dice. And if Colt had truly turned over a new leaf and wanted to start fresh, who was she to interfere with that? But now she needed to make Garry understand why the project he’d financed was a total loss.
“Then there’s only one option,” Weezus said.
Bobbi snorted. “Beg Garry not to break my kneecaps?”
“You’re so negative,” her cameraman chided. “It’s blocking the universe from giving you what you want.”
“You know I love you,” she said, patting his forearm, “but you’re such a hippie.”
“He’s right.” Bong wheeled his chair closer until their armrests bumped. “You don’t trust yourself, and that holds you back.”
“Trust myself to do what?” she asked. “Slip a roofie in Colt’s apple juice and force him to sign the waiver?”
“Check this out.” Weezus tapped the electrical panel, skipping through the summer’s footage until images from the church barbeque played on screen. “Look what you’re missing.”
Leaning back in her seat, Bobbi crossed her legs and regarded the big-screen monitor, where she stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Trey, watching Pru accept Judge Bea’s proposal. She recognized this scene—her misogynistic freelancer had shot it—and she didn’t like it any more now than she had then. The longing in her face was easier to read than a neon billboard.
She didn’t see Weezus’s point. “What am I missing? That I’m pathetic?”
“There you go with the negativity again,” he scolded. “Look at this frame.” He turned a dial to decrease the playback speed, so she and Trey turned to glance at each other in slow motion. Then Weezus froze the scene. “Right there!”
Bobbi’s heavy heart sank an inch. She understood what Weezus had noticed—even the most blackened cynic couldn’t deny the light in Trey’s Technicolor-blue eyes when they met hers. He’d loved her even then, though he probably hadn’t known it yet. These daily reminders of him—the humor in his deep voice, his winking dimples—were like paper cuts, a thousand shallow gashes that burned worse each day. Whoever said time healed all wounds had obviously never lost the lid to his pot.
“I know it’s not what Garry wanted,” Weezus said, “but there’s a love story here.”
Bobbi rotated her chair toward him, knocking Bong’s armrest in the tight space. “You can’t be serious.” Switch the focus of the documentary from Colton to her and Trey? It was out of the question. Career suicide.
“Keep an open mind,” Weezus advised.
“Yeah.” Bong grabbed her seat back and swiveled her to face him. “There’s more than enough footage of you and him together, and it’s kind of cool to see your feelings change over the months.”
“Dude,” Weezus said, “it’s not just cool. It’s beautiful.”
“True ’dat,” Bong agreed, scratching his scruffy chin. His mouth curved into a dreamy smile. “Like a double rainbow.”
“Oh my god.” She rolled her eyes. “Hippies.”
“Don’t you love him?” Bong asked.
Her first instinct was to say no, to guard her feelings, but then she remembered his words at Trey’s farewell party.
It
kinda
hurts
when
you
freeze
me
out
like
this
. Bong had said she didn’t trust easily, and he was probably right. But she didn’t want to be an emotional weakling anymore, so she met his bloodshot gaze, slowly gathering the courage to say, “Yes.”
“And he’s into you, right?”
“He
was
.” Until she broke his heart. And, indirectly, his jaw. “But that doesn’t matter. I’m not telling the whole world I had an affair with one of my subjects. Nobody’ll take me seriously again.”
“Who cares?” Bong demanded. “If you produce quality work, nobody’s going to give a damn about your private life. Heck, being eccentric is a job requirement around here.”
“I care, and I’m not eccentric. I’m a professional.” She didn’t want people gossiping about her, whispering behind their hands like children in the school yard. She’d had enough of that as a kid, and she wasn’t that dirty, helpless, hot mess anymore.
Weezus posed a serious question. “Do you really think Goldblatt’s going to give you a second chance?”
“
Third
chance,” Bong clarified, “if you count the Smyth thing.”
“Right,” Weezus said. “Garry handed you a small fortune, and you’re giving him nothing. At best, he’ll fire you. At worst, he’ll sue you.” Weezus leaned forward, resting his long arms on his knees. “I get that you don’t want to share something so personal with the world, but I don’t see any other choice.”
Bobbi chewed the tip of her tongue. The word “lawsuit” practically gave her hives, but so did the idea of airing her scandalous summer lovin’ to an audience of millions. “I’ll think of something.”
“It better be good.”
Bobbi checked her watch and wiggled her rolling chair backward from between the crew so she could stand. “I’ve got to run. Be back in an hour or so, and then we can keep brainstorming.”
“Where’re you going?” Bong asked over his shoulder.
“Lunch date.” She rubbed her nose and hoped he didn’t ask—
“With who?”
Damn it. “Uh…” Her gaze wandered around the small, boxy studio, settling on a hairline crack near the ceiling. Trey could fix that. No! Stop thinking about Trey! She squeezed her eyes shut, but his stunning face was still there, smiling teasingly as if to say,
Lighten
up, Bo Peep
.
“Who’re you meeting?” Weezus pressed.
She drew a breath. “Just an old friend.”
Weezus narrowed his eyes. “Liar.”
“Okay, okay.” This trust and honesty business wasn’t so easy. “It’s Derek.”
“Derek
Spaulding?
” Bong jumped out of his seat and cracked his head against a low-hanging speaker.
“Oh, hell no!” Weezus added, shaking his finger like a teenage girl with an attitude.
Bobbi held up one palm. “Chill. He’s back from sabbatical, and he wants to apologize.”
“That better be
all
he wants!” The rare anger in Bong’s eyes warmed her heart. He must’ve known how deeply Derek had hurt her last year, though she’d tried not to show it.
“Hey,” she told them sweetly, “I thought forgiveness was good for the soul.” There. She’d appealed to their flower-power senses. They couldn’t give her a hard time now.
“He’s toxic,” Weezus said. “And your soul’s fine the way it is.”
A giggle bubbled up from her throat, the first one in weeks. It felt good to laugh again. “I promise I won’t let him suck me in. One free lunch and a quick act of forgiveness, and then I’m out of there.”
“Order the most expensive thing on the menu,” Bong demanded, folding his arms.
“It’s a deal.”
Twenty minutes and two bus transfers later, she stood outside one of LA’s trendiest restaurants and smoothed the wrinkles from her zebra-print skirt, uncertain her churning stomach would hold down a meal. Her palms were sweaty, her heart racing. She hadn’t seen Derek in almost a year, and she hated the power he still held over her.
But he didn’t need to know that.
Time to find some courage. Raising her chin, she summoned an unaffected mask and pushed open the front door. A cool burst of air conditioning frosted her cheeks, and she inhaled deeply through her nose for a little extra fortification as she clicked briskly to the host station. The maître d’, a middle-aged man with a gentle smile, stepped from behind the desk to greet her. His warm brown eyes reminded her of Pastor McMahon, and her tummy gave a little tug.
“Table for one?” he asked.
“No, I’m—”
“The lady’s with me,” said a familiar voice.
Bobbi spun around and locked eyes with Derek.
“Hey, beautiful,” he said, shoving his hands into his pockets and curving his lips in a hesitant grin. He made no move to embrace her, only studied her face as if gauging her reaction before risking anything more.
A quick scan of his lanky form revealed he’d lost a few pounds, but otherwise he looked exactly the same—chestnut hair tousled in waves, straight, aristocratic nose, and hazel eyes fringed by thick, dark lashes any woman would kill for. Funny, the mere sight of him used to send her stomach into somersaults, but now she felt nothing. Not even a quiver.
With each passing second, his shoulders tensed, and when he began chewing his lower lip, Bobbi decided to put him out of his misery. After all, she’d come here to forgive him. She faked a wide smile and held out her arms for a hug.
He closed the distance between them and embraced her loosely, not the kind of hearty bear hugs she’d grown to appreciate in Sultry Springs. She pulled in his scent, which had once seemed so intoxicating. Instead of sandalwood, Derek smelled of fruity hair products and expensive cologne. He smelled like a girl. Dressed like one too, at least compared to the rough-and-tumble men she’d spent the summer filming. Derek’s designer jeans were meticulously torn and frayed by their manufacturer, not by hard work, and though his black T-shirt epitomized simplicity, she knew it had cost him more than what most people made in a week.
“It’s great to see you,” he said, pulling back.
“You too,” she lied. She nodded toward the dining room, eager to get this over with and return to the studio. “Ready?”
They strolled past the other diners and settled at a quiet table in the corner. The savory scent of gourmet pasta sauce watered her mouth, but only because she’d skipped breakfast. What she really craved was one of Pru’s famous chicken biscuits.
When the waiter asked for their drink order, Bobbi replied without thinking, “Sangria,” but instantly changed her mind. It wouldn’t compare to June’s recipe. “No. Make that a vodka tonic.”
Derek leaned forward, whispering, “At noon?”
“Yep. Vodka can’t tell time.”
His already stiff smile faltered. “I’ll have a raspberry-ginger iced tea, sweetened with honey. Lemon wedge on the side.”
Oh brother. He even drank like a girl.
The waiter tipped his head and retreated to the bar, leaving Bobbi and Derek to face each other in awkward silence. She unfolded her linen napkin and placed it across her lap, waiting for him to apologize, but empty seconds continued to tick by. He fidgeted with his silverware, his gaze flicking up and down at her in clear discomfort.
Derek was a bit of a chickenshit, wasn’t he? What had she ever seen in him?
“How was your sabbatical?” she finally asked.
He released a shaky breath. “Wonderful. Just what the doctor ordered.”
“That’s great.”
Glad
you
enjoyed
your
vacation
while
I
stayed
behind
to
account
for
all
your
lies
. “Where’d you go?”
“Mykonos. My family has a house there.”
“Oh, the Greek isles.” She hoped he couldn’t hear the jealousy in her voice. “Lovely.”
Derek pulled his fingers through his hair and withdrew them quickly, probably afraid of mussing his meticulously styled waves. “Listen, Beebs, this isn’t easy.”
Beebs. She’d forgotten his nickname for her, and it sounded foreign to her ears now. “It’s okay. You don’t have to do this.” And she’d told him so on the phone last night.
“I have to.” Then he said something that revealed his true nature. “For me.”
She nodded for him to continue. Weezus was right—the bastard really was toxic.
“I’m sorry for the…uh…Smyth misunderstanding. I want to make it up to you.”
Misunderstanding her ass. Bobbi wanted to offer her full forgiveness, but he wasn’t making it easy. “Well, unless you can turn back time…” she trailed off and bit her tongue.
In a bold move, especially for him, he reached across the table and took her hand. Bobbi gasped, shocked by the sensation of his baby-soft fingers curled around hers. She’d come to expect a man’s hands to feel like the fine-grit side of a nail file. Derek’s touch felt all wrong, as if she’d opened her mouth for a bite of apple, and received a chunk of onion instead.
She freed her hand and rested it in her lap. “What did you have in mind?”
He dipped his chin, giving her a pointed look. “The opportunity of a lifetime. A dream job.” When she widened her eyes in surprise, he continued. “I convinced my dad to finance a documentary on the corruption and greed within military contracting. You know, paying crooks a hundred dollars an hour to drive supply trucks and billing the taxpayers for it.”
Bobbi straightened. “There’s a reason they’re paid so much.” She’d seen pictures of servicemen and women—both civilian and active duty—recovering in burn wards. They earned extra pay for navigating land mine-filled roads because nobody else wanted the task. And Trey. They hadn’t discussed his salary, but she hoped he was being well-compensated for risking his life in Dubai.