Sunset Thunder (14 page)

She excused herself, retiring to her room.

Before she left she said, “Ryder, was Violet at the meeting last week? The morning you were fishing with your dad?”

Why?
Ryder didn’t ask. “She is the wedding coordinator at the Caliendo Resort.”

“So, that’s a yes. It explains that glow you came back with.”

“I do not have a glow,” he grumbled, beyond finished with this conversation.

“Okay. Sure. No glow, my mistake. Goodnight.”

Glow.
Ryder had no such thing.

Ryder didn’t need to date and he certainly didn’t need to date someone who didn’t trust him. He had a hard enough time trusting women after finding Courtney in bed with another man. In
their
bed. Then, as if the woman he’d chosen to spend the rest of his life with hadn’t shattered his heart and soul, to listen to all the reasons why Ryder wasn’t good enough. He wasn’t prepared to go down that road again. Violet was already putting him down, there was no way in hell he was going to tolerate it.

VIOLET DROVE STRAIGHT home. She didn’t let Ryder’s warning sink in until she parked the car in front of the resort and turned off the engine. Silence enveloped her while her mind went wild with questions.

What was Ryder saying? That he wasn’t a playboy? Or he wasn’t using her? Or was he saying neither because he was both and trying to confuse her? 

Mission accomplished. Violet was confused. Her mind had never been such a mass of disorder, bouncing around in no solid direction, and leaving her without a clue how to put it in the right order.

A knock on her car window made Violet jump. Marc smiled through the glass with a little wave, still dressed in his charcoal slacks, however his shirt was un-tucked and the three top buttons were undone and his tie was missing. She hadn’t seen him come around her vehicle, which wasn’t surprising since all her mind was concentrating on was Ryder.

Violet climbed out of the car and asked in a low whisper so she didn’t wake the kids, “What are you doing? You scared the devil out of me.” 

“Sorry, Vi.” He looked empathetic, but with a small smirk of entertainment. “No one has heard from you all day. We were worried. I was worried.”

That was careless of her. Her family was close-knit and staying away all day and into the night without sending a text was abnormal...and would make them worry. Violet should have asked Ryder to use his cell phone and gave at least one of her family members a heads up on her whereabouts. The forgetfulness was just another thoughtless moment in the presence of Ryder Carlex.
Ryder Carlex.
She had to stop doing that, saying his full name in her head, exactly the condescending way he said her name.

“I’m sorry,” she apologized to Marc. “I was rushed out by Parker and left my phone beside the pool.”

Along with my wine and the novel I had fully intended on escaping all thoughts of Ryder...not planning on going out with him and making them ten times worse
. And they
were
ten times worse.

“Joel was late picking the kids up. He was supposed to drop them off at Ryder’s house for a day on the boat and asked if I could take them to Ryder’s lake house.”

Marc listened, quietly observing. He had been that way from a young age, in a quiet, kind of geeky boy way, watching everything around him with eagle eyes, taking it in, and remembering.

Right now, Violet knew Marc had already noticed she disappeared inside Ryder’s big and baggy sweater with only her bare legs peeking out the bottom, on top of the face she’d been sitting in the car for who knew how long
thinking
about Ryder. The knowledge left her feeling rushed to explain where she had been and why she was in a man’s sweater. 

“Joel didn’t show up at Ryder’s house and cancelled while the kids were on the boat waiting for him. Ryder was all packed to go, so he kindly extended the invite to take the three of us fishing, regardless of Joel’s absence. Parker and Sophia have been looking forward to this all week so we spent the day on Ryder’s boat.”

And I spent the day trying to figure out my feelings and Ryder’s feelings, only to run away when Ryder offered a date...a real date. That was terrifying.

A date made it real. A date made it no longer a fantasy playing in her head and that scared the hell out of Violet. At the moment, worse than that, was having Marc watching her so closely and likely judging her for going out with her ex-husband’s best friend, the player...even if the pretense was that it was for the children.  

“Did you have fun?” Marc asked.

Not them...not Sophia and Parker, but her.

That wasn’t the question Violet had been expecting from her bother.

Why would she agree to go out with Ryder Carlex?
That was what she’d been ready to defend, not answer if she’d had fun.

It threw the preparation to defend her decision to get on Ryder’s boat for a little loop, leaving her baffled...again. Honest, this bafflement stuff was annoying. How did people go around life not knowing what was around the next corner? It was exhausting. It was scary. It was driving her mind wild. 

“Yes,” she answered honestly. 

Marc smiled. “Good. I will grab Sophia.” And just like that and without another word, he moved around to the other side of the vehicle to fetch her daughter.  

Once the kids were in their bedrooms, tucked in like sleeping angels...even Parker with his innocent face...Violet shut the doors and slipped into her bedroom.

She peeled the bathing suit off her body, sighing a huge thank you, as the constricting material fell to the floor. Pulling on a pair of yoga pants and matching black t-shirt, she stopped at the edge of her bed where Ryder’s sweater lay. 

Ryder Carlex? Ryder Carlex.

She hated to admit it, but before she concluded Ryder had tag teamed with Joel to make a fool of Violet, she had met a completely different man than Joel had always referred to during their marriage. Today, she’d met a family man whose mother’s death still touched his heart. A generous man, who gave up his whole day to keep the disappointment of Joel’s cancellation from her kids. More so, she discovered a man who wanted to touch her, kiss her...go on a date with her.
Her.
 

But did he? Or was it a ruse developed between him and Joel?

Violet couldn’t chance it, not when her children were involved. She wasn’t the young girl rebelling against her father anymore, choosing to date Joel out of pure disobedience. That had backfired badly. If she hadn’t been so angry with Robert at the time, if she hadn’t been going against every word he spoke, her life could have been so different, uncomplicated, and maybe she would have found her happily ever after.

Walking away from Ryder tonight, felt like she’d walked away from her
happily ever after.

That was crazy.

She shook her head, pushing the thought away. She headed down the hall, but Ryder’s words played in her head, like her happily ever after screaming for her attention that had been lacking for the last ten years.

I wasn’t the only one boarding this boat with judgement.

She couldn’t deny she had created an image of Ryder on the information Joel had supplied her over the years. Even if she was wrong...and it was a big
if
...how could they go on a date? 

It was a useless battle inside her head and all the way to the kitchen where Violet found Marc boiling water in the tea kettle.
Boiling water?
For what appeared to be tea. Marc didn’t drink tea. 

“What are you doing?” she asked, climbing onto the bar stool at the high island counter and watching her brother skeptically. 

She missed the years he had been was away from home. Violet clicked with her brother differently than she did with her other siblings.

Emma and Anya had always been closer and Izzy loved and treated everyone equal, but kept her true feelings to herself, hiding behind several masks of charm, tease, and straight up wildness.

She was also a huge momma’s girl, had been her whole life, which was why Izzy still wasn’t required to work, having her mother wrapped around her little pinky finger.

The kettle whistled and Marc poured the steaming water into the mugs. He didn’t answer until he moved around the counter and sat beside her. As he handed her the mug, she knew it was lemon chamomile even before she inhaled the delicious aroma. It was the only tea flavor in her cupboard.

“Mom always prepares tea when she suspects something’s bothering one of us,” Marc answered. 

The warmth soothed her fingers which she hadn’t noticed were shaky.

“Is something bothering you?” Violet asked automatically, flexing one hand and then the other, annoyed with her tremble.

Violet kept her life to a minimum of drama, but Marc on the other hand, was digging around, with Eliza, through their father’s hidden room of files. Files that were full of broken hearts and broken families that Robert was responsible for destroying. Lives her family intended to repair. 

“No,” Marc said.

“I didn’t mean with you personally. I was referring to Dad’s errors.” Violet settled back on the stool, tightly holding the mug and sipping the hot liquid that scorched her throat.

“No.”

Hot, hot, hot! S
he set the mug on the counter.

“But something’s bothering you,” Marc said.

Violets eyes snapped up from bouncing the tea bag up and down in the water and met Marc’s supportive eyes, offering to listen to her.

How did he know about her feelings for Ryder? Was she that transparent?

They sat in silence, while Violet weighed her options.

Who else did Violet have to talk to?

Her mother would encourage her go on a date with Ryder, unrealistically living in the fantasy world about love. Violet was leery to take advice from a woman who cheated on her husband on and off with his brother for over thirty years. Violet loved her mother and could even relate to the reasons backing her mother and uncle’s connection to one another. They’d bonded while Robert pushed everyone away from him. Still, Violet wasn’t sure her mother was the one to talk to about Ryder.

Then there was Emma, and the newly developed news that Ryder had tried to get up her skirt at Violet’s wedding. Talking to Emma was out of the picture.

And Izzy...there were so many reasons why she wouldn’t talk to Izzy that Violet didn’t even have the energy to list them off in her head.

Anya, the middle child was still missing. This was the perfect opportunity to bring up Violet’s suggestion to hire a PI to Marc. But that wasn’t what Marc had asked about and right now, at the late hour, after a day in the scorching sun, and Ryder dancing around her head, she didn’t have energy to drag Anya into the conversation. Decision made, if she was going to talk to anyone about Ryder, it was Marc. 

Violet opened her mouth to tell Marc about her day with Ryder...not their morning, strip-off-our-clothes-and-make-love-in-the-lobby-washroom, but all the events at the boat, her feelings, Ryder’s feelings, and him asking her on a date. She needed to know if she overreacted. Violet’s mouth drew back together when she found herself at a loss for words.

I had sex with Ryder? I like Ryder? I think he likes me, but maybe he’s using me?

Every way she steered the events in her head, she was left feeling more idiotic, more confused and more embarrassed by all these emotions.

“I think we should hire a private investigator to find Anya,” she said instead, unleashing the worry of her sister’s whereabouts onto both of them.

Marc’s dark brown eyes shifted at the topic he hadn’t expected.

“I don’t want to confront her. Clearly, she needs space, but I would like to ensure her safety. I thought maybe you would know who Dad used to discreetly find people that were hiding from him.”

The fact people had to hide from her dad was disconcerting. 

“I can look into it. I will talk to Carl and see if he suggests anyone before I look into Robert’s PI.”

Carl, Robert, Dad, Uncle...Marc was so good at keeping them straight, where Violet still automatically considered Robert the father of all her siblings.

It was complicated. They were complicated, which shouldn’t surprise her that whatever she had with Ryder was complicated. 

For a woman who hated complication and drama, Violet sure seemed to always be in the middle of it.

They sat in silence again.

Violet’s thoughts revolving around Ryder. Maybe she had judged him poorly and he wasn’t the man Joel portrayed, but how could she know for sure? And if she went on a date with him and he was
that
guy, then she would be left feeling like a fool. But if she went on the date and he was the man Violet had seen today, then that looked like her happily ever after. But happily ever didn’t exist and it was funny because after years of the term never passing her mind except in regards to her work, all of a sudden, the term stuck beside Ryder’s name.

“Violet?” Marc’s low voice gave her a fright and her body jumped. 

She smiled at him, embarrassed for getting so lost in her thoughts, she had forgotten he was even there. “Yes?” 

“I don’t mean to pry. I know you’re private and proud when it comes to your life, but I’m your brother and I’m concerned.”

Violet didn’t say anything. She was afraid if she opened her mouth, her pride would tell him she was fine, when she was so far from okay. And she had no idea what to do, but she didn’t want to ask for help.

“Do you need Emma to step in for you with the Bensen wedding?” he asked.

The Bensen wedding? Huh? 

“She doesn’t mind. I’ve already talked to her, anticipating this might be too much for you. It’s getting close to the wedding date, which could understandably become upsetting to you and−”

Violet held up her hand to stop him.

The Bensen wedding.

She wasn’t upset about the Bensen wedding. She’d hardly had time to even think about that wedding while Ryder was enchanting her mind. Besides, she didn’t love Joel. She wasn’t in love with Joel...she never had been.