Vote Then Read: Volume I

by Carly Phillips

  Jesus, he needed to do a better job of hiding that. It didn’t matter what else was going on around him, Jeaniene was still Daisy’s mom, and he needed to keep from being an ass about it.

  He kissed the top of her head so he could gather his thoughts. “Your mom might be staying in Japan for longer than we planned.” Why he’d said we then he didn’t know. There had been no planning when it came to what Jeaniene had done for her job. And he’d had no say when it came to how everything was handled. And now he was going to have to figure out how not to break his daughter’s spirit even as he raised her to be a strong, independent woman. Being a single father wasn’t easy at the best of times, it wasn’t going to get any easier now.

  “How long?”

  “I don’t know, baby. I really don’t. But no matter what, it’s you and me. We’re going to be okay. This is going to be your home from now on, sort of just like we talked about when you first came. You’re still going to the same school, and you’ll still have the same friends, but you can stay with me for a lot longer. I love you, Daisy, and I love that you’re here with me. But it’s just the two of us. I know your mommy loves you, but right now she has some adult things for work to do, and that means you and I get more time together.”

  He knew he was just blowing smoke now, but his daughter wasn’t old enough to understand exactly what was going on, and frankly, he wasn’t exactly sure himself. How was he supposed to explain the intricacies of whatever the hell was going on in his ex’s mind when he had no idea how to even put it into words? He hoped he was doing enough, but in the end, he wouldn’t know until something was wrong, and that thought worried him more than he cared to admit.

  “I want Mommy. Just the two of us? What about Aunt Addi? Is she going away to Japan, too? Because I don’t want to miss her like I miss Mommy. I like her. And she makes you smile so you like her, too. Don’t let her go to Japan with Mommy. Okay? I want Mommy.”

  Tears fell down her cheeks, and her little body shook as she broke into sobs. He hated himself, and he hated Jeaniene for what she was doing to their daughter. But there was nothing he could do except hold Daisy close and let the sobs finish rocking her body. She was so tiny to have so much within her.

  But while all of that was churning, Mace knew he’d made a mistake. Not a little one that could be easily rectified, one that had thrown off the balance of everything that he’d tried to make work. Sorrow filled his gut, but he ignored what he would have to do and hugged Daisy to his chest.

  “Just the two of us, baby,” he lied hoping he could find the strength to make it true. “Addi is my best friend, so she will always be around, but she’s not going to Japan like Mommy. She’s not Mommy.”

  “Okay.” And with the resiliency of a child who didn’t quite comprehend the delicate emotions running through the air, Daisy went back to her room and turned on her music again.

  And Mace quietly broke inside, knowing he was going to have to do the one thing he’d promised he wouldn’t do.

  Break his best friend’s heart. Because he had seen the start of love in her eyes and felt the same thing running through him. But he couldn’t risk Daisy. He couldn’t risk hurting her again. Because once the reality of the situation with her mom fully hit her, he was going to have to find some way to help her heal. Whether it was through professional help or just with his family. But he couldn’t do anything to make things worse and make Daisy think that Addi was a replacement for Jeaniene. It wasn’t fair to any of them.

  Dammit.

  Mace dropped off Daisy at his parents’ house later since it was the weekend and she didn’t have school. He went to work and tried to act as if everything was normal and his whole center of being hadn’t changed monumentally. Shep would be into work for closing that night since it was his turn, and Ryan had an appointment he couldn’t miss, so he’d left as soon as Mace walked in. That left him and Adrienne working side by side as they had countless times before at MIT and their prior shop, as well. She’d given him a weird look when she asked him what was wrong, and he’d lied and said everything was fine, but she didn’t question him. Thankfully, they were beyond busy with appointments and walk-ins. It made him think that maybe all of the issues surrounding them hadn’t hurt the shop as much as they had thought. But even those worries were in the back of his mind because he was trying to figure out how to let one of the brightest parts of his life go.

  He was such an asshole, yet in order to be the father he needed to be, he had to be an even bigger asshole than he already was.

  Adrienne would hate him. He knew it. Her family would probably hate him, too. It was going to make working with her and the rest of them almost impossible, yet he would just have to deal with it unless it hurt her too much. Because this was the bed he’d made, and now he had to lay in it. This was why he had tried not to do what they were doing to begin with. He had known that everything was too tangled and complicated, yet he had gone forward anyway, thinking that they could handle anything. He was wrong. So damn wrong. And he needed to figure out a way to make it work again. Because in the end, he had to put Daisy first. She deserved to be first in someone’s life. Her mother had already put work and her own personal dreams ahead of what Daisy wanted and needed to survive.

  So now, he found himself at home with his best friend standing in his living room, staring at him because he’d been unable to tell her why he’d asked her over while Daisy was still at his parents’. Adrienne had to know that something was off, but he had to do this for Daisy. She was the only thing that could matter, even though so many other things mattered to him, as well. But his daughter had to come first.

  “Just tell me, Mace,” Adrienne said quickly. “What’s wrong?”

  “I think it’s time we go back to being just friends before we hurt any chances of getting back there,” he blurted, his hands fisted at his sides.

  Her eyes widened, and she took a step back. “Just like that? No explanations? No, I deserve better than that, Mace. We both do. I know it was a risk when we started down this path, but what changed?”

  He needed to be open and honest, and because of that, he told her the truth. Maybe if she saw the whys of it, it wouldn’t hurt as bad in the end.

  “Jeaniene gave up full custody. Not only is she staying in Japan for longer for her job, she also gave up full parental rights. So it’s not just custody and visitation. She signed over Daisy to me as if she weren’t part of the beginning of our daughter’s life at all.”

  “Are you serious? How could she do that to Daisy? That little girl is like the best little girl ever, and I say that having a niece and cousins who have many amazing babies of their own. What the hell is that woman thinking that she could just walk out of Daisy’s life as if these past four years were nothing?”

  Some part deep inside of him relished the fact that the first thing that came to Addi’s mind was about his daughter’s welfare and not the fact that he had just said that things needed to go back to the way they were. But he needed to do what she was doing and focus on Daisy first, and then he would make sure that Adrienne understood what he needed to feel for her—or not feel for her.

  “I need to make sure that no matter what happens, I’m not going to throw off Daisy’s equilibrium any more than it already is.”

  “And I’m a hindrance to that.” She folded her hands over her stomach that hadn’t quite hunched in on itself as she spoke. She was such a strong and independent woman, he hated that he was doing this to her. But they had to make this work. He had to find a way to not hurt the two most important females in his life, but he was afraid that each decision he made was just making things worse and worse. He was just grasping at straws at this point, but he needed to make sure that he didn’t screw everything up more than it already was.

  She didn’t pose her last statement as a question, but he answered her anyway.

  “I’m not saying that. Not really. She asked if you were going to go away with her mom to Japan, Addi. I can’t stand b
ack and watch my daughter go through such turmoil again because she’s afraid of losing someone else in her life. She should’ve been able to trust her mom, but she couldn’t. And now I have to hope she can trust me, and because of that, I don’t know if I can let her start seeing you as someone other than just a friend in her life. I can’t watch my little girl cry again because an adult in her life leaves. I can’t put you in that role.”

  “I was never in that role. I know who I am when it comes to Daisy. And the fact that you don’t trust me to be a better person than Jeaniene when it comes to that little girl’s heart says more about you than it does me. I’m going to let the knowledge that everything in your life has changed so much in the last few weeks help me and let what you said slide. Because that is what you do when you love someone. And, yes, I love you. I didn’t mean for it to happen, not like this, but I do. And the fact that you think I could hurt your daughter makes me feel like I don’t even know you.”

  “Addi.”

  She held up her hand, her shoulders going back, and her gaze meeting his. “Fine. Sign your papers. Sign anything you need. Take your breather and try to get your head on straight as you work on figuring out exactly what your next step will be. When you’re done with that, we can talk. Because you don’t get to do this. You don’t get to throw everything we have away because you’re scared. You know as well as I do that there’s no way we can go back to the way we were. We’re well beyond going back to acting as if our relationship hasn’t been changed monumentally. I love you, damn it. And not just as my best friend. Get yourself together, Knight. Because you’re better than this. We are better than this.”

  And with that, she walked out of his house and slammed the door behind her. He’d always loved when she was angry because she never held back, and it was sexy as hell. But he knew the anger this time was hiding her pain. Pain he had put her through because he was trying to handle everything the best way he knew how. But he was going about it all wrong. He knew that, and he wasn’t sure how to fix it.

  He wasn’t sure if he could fix it.

  And he’d just watched his best friend walk out of his house—possibly his life—for the last time.

  15

  Her mother had always told her that not only did Santa never come to a dirty house, but the new year also couldn’t start without a clean home. So when you needed to work through the feelings and thoughts running through your head, cleaning until there wasn’t a speck of dust left in your house was the only way to do it.

  Adrienne was just about out of cleaning products and elbow grease, and sadly, nowhere near where she needed to be mentally to see Mace again the next morning at work.

  Damn it all to hell.

  Tears burned the backs of her eyes, and she let them fall, knowing no one was around to see her look weak and feel. She could have called her sisters, and had already dodged one call from Thea, but she needed time to think and just be alone for a while.

  She’d let herself be happy.

  She’d let herself hope.

  And look where it had gotten her. Elbow-deep in a toilet with dust and dirt between her boobs. This was not the life she’d signed up for, but it seemed it was the only life fate deemed her worthy of.

  She used the back of her arm—the only part not covered in dirt or cleaning products at the moment—to wipe her face so she could see properly. Mace hadn’t done this to her, their circumstances had. And she kept reminding herself of that because he was her best friend, damn it, and had been the best lover she’d ever had. She’d thought maybe they would be able to make a go of it. It had felt right when it was the three of them in his house, making dinner and laughing at movies. She’d thought she and Daisy were getting along great, and though she knew she never wanted to replace Daisy’s mother, she’d thought they had begun to form their own kind of bond on top of the small one they already had. She’d been in Daisy’s life since the beginning and now she was afraid she might lose what she had.

  She was already losing what she had with Mace, breath by breath, day by day.

  She set down the toilet brush and sucked in her lip.

  How had she let this happen? Had she truly been so hard-up for sex, for feelings, that she’d risked everything she had with him? Because that’s what it felt like. That she’d thought she was so damn smart that she wouldn’t hurt what they had, even though she’d been scared all the time.

  But even though he’d broken a part of her, she knew she wouldn’t shatter. She hadn’t done so when everything happened at her shop, had she? She’d faltered, sure, but anyone would have with all the crap piling on.

  But she hadn’t shattered.

  And she wouldn’t break now, even though everything inside her was ready to do so. She’d been strong in front of Mace. Had been honest with him. She knew he was scared of hurting Daisy and had to be pissed as hell for what Jeaniene had done. What Adrienne was not happy about, though, was the fact that she had a feeling he was taking his hurt and confusion out on her. Oh, he might not know he was doing it, but that didn’t change the result, did it?

  He was so afraid of what might happen to his daughter that he was pushing away anything that could possibly disrupt her well-being even without intending to. And while Adrienne understood—she truly did—she was just so damn angry that he gave up without a fight. She hadn’t, though. She might have walked out of his house the day before because she needed to break down in private, but she’d left him with a promise. Once he got his head out of his ass, she’d be there to watch him grovel.

  Not that she needed a big grovel. She just needed her best friend back, damn it.

  She sniffed another sob, annoyed with herself. What she really needed was a shower and clothes that didn’t have bleach stains on them. Of course, that meant dirtying up one of her newly pristine showers, and she wasn’t sure she really wanted to do that right then. That was the problem with doing a deep clean. It got you filthy in the process, and then you didn’t want to wash off your grime because you didn’t want to dirty the tile.

  She was officially a nutcase, and probably needed a glass of wine to make herself feel better. Then she’d call her sisters so she could vent and try to figure out the next steps. Because it wasn’t like she was out of Mace’s life altogether. He might have said he wanted them to be just friends, but she wasn’t so sure that could happen now. However, the two of them worked together, and there was no avoiding him.

  And she didn’t want to avoid him.

  She just wanted him to get his act together so they could figure out what they really wanted rather than what they thought they needed to want.

  And that was enough of that line of thoughts. Annoyed with herself once again, she put her cleaning supplies away and finished her list of which ones she needed to replenish since this particular emotional cleaning-fest had depleted most of her stock. Then she preheated her oven so she could make a batch of cookies as soon as she took a shower. Might as well throw flour around her newly sanitized kitchen before she called her sisters and begged them to come over.

  Thea and Roxie were her rocks, same as Shep. But she wasn’t about to invite her brother over since he’d probably go over to Mace’s and punch him or something along those lines. She loved her brother, but he tended to act like a big brother who growled at anyone who dared to hurt his precious baby sisters.

  Dating or marrying into the Montgomery clan wasn’t easy, and so far, only Shea and Carter had figured it out. In the back of her mind, she’d thought maybe Mace would be one of the lucky few to pass the Montgomery family entrance test, but perhaps she’d been wrong. Maybe they were better off as friends, and as soon as she licked her wounds, she’d figure that out. At least, she hoped.

  Thoughts of Mace and what she might’ve lost kept spiraling in her mind, but she did her best not to let those thoughts wander or fester because if she repressed it too much, she’d end up paying for it later. She was never one to hide her feelings when it came to most things in her life. T
hat while she had tried to be open with Mace, she’d also been falling in love with him without meaning to, told her that those feelings might have been the most important of all. She wasn’t going to give up on him, but she also wasn’t going to stand there and let herself be hurt. So whatever came next, it was his turn. His choice. But she wouldn’t stand by and let herself be hurt as she waited for an absolution that may never come.

  Knowing that she needed to just breathe and let her thoughts wander some more, she set aside the butter sticks to soften and headed into her master bathroom so she could take a quick shower. Of course, she couldn’t help but look at where she’d first kissed Mace and where he’d taken her on top of the counter. Her toes curled even as her heart ached, remembering how careful he had been. Mace was always cautious, and perhaps that was their downfall. Because for all of their talk of risk, falling in love and finding a future wasn’t safe. Having those feelings wrapped around you, knowing that you could perhaps find safety with another wasn’t without risk.

  Adrienne had just stripped off her shirt when her phone buzzed on the bathroom counter. Frowning because she recognized the name on the screen and wondered why Mace’s sister Violet would be calling her, she answered while standing in her bra and sweatpants in her bathroom. She was still covered in gunk and dirt, but at least she had the smell of bleach away from her face because she had spilled a large drop on her shoulder earlier.

  “Hey, Violet? How are you?” She did her best to make her voice sound normal and as if she hadn’t been crying most of the day off and on. Like she wasn’t desperately in love with Violet’s brother even though he had just pushed her away because his ex-girlfriend was a horrible person who apparently only cared about herself.

  “Thank God you answered, Adrienne. I called Sienna, and she didn’t. Then I called my parents and remembered at the last moment that they were out of town for the weekend. And I can’t get ahold of Mace. But he said that might be the case since he was in his lawyer’s office all day.”