by Addison Fox
“You are still you.” Grier squeezed her hand. “But the transformation is on the inside, as you learn to work with the person you love. Learn to create a life with them and a system for being together. For understanding each other. For making a life with one another. But no, there’s not some grand transformation that suddenly makes you a different person.”
“If you had a problem before, you’ll have it after,” Avery added.
“And if something’s missing in your life, it’s still up to you to work on finding it.” Sloan extended her arms, a smile spreading across her face. “Even if you have to come four thousand miles to find it.”
“I’ve really messed this up.” Kate brushed at her tears with a fresh tissue. “But I think I can still fix it.”
“You will fix it.” Grier’s immediate defense was heartening. “We can’t be right all the time.”
“Of course not.” Avery snagged a fresh bottle off the coffee table along with the corkscrew. “If we were right all the time, there’d be no reason to have a bitch fest. And if we didn’t get to have bitch fest, we wouldn’t have an excuse to drink all these lovely fermented grapes.”
“Don’t forget the pizza and Double Stuf Oreos,” Grier chimed in.
“We could still drink,” Sloan argued. “Wine’s the perfect accompaniment to any meal or activity.”
“Yes, but then people would just call us lushes.”
Kate couldn’t hold back the smile as she held up her empty glass for a refill. “So you mean I’ve really done my civic duty to all womankind?”
Grier winked at her. “You bet your ass.”
• • •
Despite working for a company that had his last name on the door, Jason had only been inside the inner sanctum of his father’s office for meetings. As he gazed around, all the words he wanted to say heavy on his tongue, he realized he’d never just stopped in for a chat.
No time like the present, his conscience whispered as he waited for his father to arrive.
Jason had a large paper cup of coffee waiting for him but he knew damn well the milky confection—his father’s morning indulgence—wasn’t going to ease the blow or make the conversation go any smoother.
“June said you were in here.” His father strolled in, his black suit and strong red tie like a uniform. “What’s prompted the unexpected visit?”
Jason gestured toward the cup of coffee. “Can’t I have coffee with my father?”
“You can, but since we never do, why don’t we cut to the chase.”
“Fine. I’m resigning, effective immediately.”
If the entire situation wasn’t so damned frustrating, Jason might have laughed at the look on his father’s face. His jaw quivered and the deep grooves around his eyes narrowed along with his gaze. “It’s about that woman, isn’t it?”
“Surprisingly, it’s been about a lot of women. Mom. Grier. Kate. They’ve all helped me see what a mistake I’ve made by staying here. By continuing to work toward what you want instead of what I want.”
His father waved a hand as he settled back in his chair. “It’s the same damn thing.”
“No, actually, it’s not.”
“What does your mother have to do with this?”
“She was the first link. I’ve watched what you’ve done to her over the years. The lying and cheating. She smiles and goes on with her life, but I have to imagine it’s like a daily sort of disappointment, waking up with you.”
“She never looks disappointed when I give her a new piece of jewelry or she’s redecorating one of the houses.”
“No, I suppose not, and that’s on her.”
And it was, Jason acknowledged. Whatever limited sympathy he felt for his mother ended with the fact that she’d chosen her life and continued to choose her life, despite the not so discrete evidence of his father’s transgressions.
“Well, don’t keep me in suspense. What about Grier?”
“She wasn’t going to put up with that sort of life. Wasn’t going to sit back and accept a marriage that was based on anything but love.”
“And gave up a fine career in the process. She was one of our best associates and would have made partner herself. Instead, she got a sentimental streak and expected you to fall in line with her whims.”
“An expectation of love and respect from your husband isn’t that tall an order.”
Tom waved a hand. “All that emotional bullshit people get so wrapped up in. It has no place in the boardroom.”
“Apparently, neither do I.” Jason stood, the evidence that the conversation was rapidly deteriorating a fine incentive to get going. “I’ll have my things out of my office by the end of the day.”
“You’re not going anywhere.”
“What have you missed in the last few minutes?”
His father stood up and slammed his hand down on his desk. “All evidence of your spine. You think these women matter? You think they’re worth throwing away your career for? And that one you’ve got now. You really think she’s an executive’s wife?”
“I think she’s all that and more. I think she’s whatever she wants to be. I just hope she wants to be with me.”
Jason ran his hand over the butterfly pendant in his pocket as he stood and headed for the door.
“You do this and you’re not coming back.”
He turned at the door to stare at his father, ensconced behind the large desk that dominated the end of the room in front of a world-class view of lower Manhattan and the harbor.
“I don’t want to come back.”
Chapter Nine
Kate smiled from her perch on the old wooden desk at the front of the room as the sophomore class worked through The Taming of the Shrew. She’d been back in Indigo a week and when the principal heard she was home she’d called and asked her to come in to substitute for a few days.
Kate figured it was a good plan in the event she needed to come back full time. A bit of goodwill, as it were.
Even as somewhere deep inside she was determined to fix things with Jason so she wouldn’t have to stay.
She flirted with the idea—nearly every other minute or so—of calling Jason and saying she was sorry and that she wanted to come home. And then just as quickly pulled back from the idea because going back to New York wasn’t going to solve their underlying problem.
She had to find just the right way to approach things and she hadn’t figured out the perfect approach quite yet. But she would, of that Kate had no doubt.
“Miss Winston.”
Macy, the student reading Katerina’s part, caught her attention. “Yes?”
“I’m sorry, Miss Winston, but this is just stupid. I know it’s Shakespeare and all, but this guy is a jerk and the woman just seems to be taking it.”
“Yes, she is.” Kate heard the murmured whispers start up. “What do you think of that?”
“It’s bullshit.”
“Maybe we can tone that down a bit, Macy?”
The girl blushed slightly, her classroom rebellion rapidly giving way toward genuine anger at the play. “He’s really mistreating her, though. Telling her to think like he does, telling her anything she does isn’t good enough. It’s a bad play.”
“What do you think, Zach?”
Their Petruchio had been quiet up to now and she was curious to get his reaction. “It’s not a good play. I liked some of the other stuff we’ve read this year a lot better.”
“Why don’t you like it?”
“Because I’m a jerk!” At the laughter around the room, he mumbled, “The guy I’m playing is a jerk. You don’t treat girls like that.”
“Could there be any other reason Shakespeare is writing this?”
She let them think on that for a few minutes as various students raised their hands. And although she suspected some Shakespeare scholars would have issues with the room’s rapid dismissal of the play’s value, she couldn’t hide the lightness that filled her chest at their astute assessment of the st
ory. It was heartening to see them so offended by the overt misogyny inherent in the tale and she suspected their papers due at the end of the following week would touch on that in some form or fashion.
A light knock at the door interrupted their discussion and had them all turning in that direction. The feet she had dangling over the edge of the desk fell to the floor with a thud as she realized Jason stood on the other side.
The same murmur that greeted Macy’s proclamation only moments before grew louder, curiosity high at their visitor and obvious outsider. Kate crossed to the door and stepped into the hall.
“What are you doing here?”
“I need a few classes.”
“What?”
“You see, I figure I need a few classes, a refresher as it were. For all the lessons I still don’t have through my thick skull.”
She shook her head, the sheer confusion of having him here, in Indigo, warring with the heady need to touch him.
Just once.
Lightly, at that strong spot where his neck curved into his shoulder and the hard line of his collarbone felt like it could hold the weight of the world.
Dragging herself back, she pointed toward the door and the increasing noise coming from the other side. “I’ve got a class.”
“I’ll watch.”
“You can’t do that.”
“Sure I can.” He held up a laminated pass that looked like it had been created somewhere around 1982. “I’ve got a hall pass.”
She shrugged but didn’t miss the bright, mischievous blue glint in his eyes as he followed her into the classroom.
Jason took the empty seat next to Macy and pointed toward her open book. “What are we discussing?”
“The Taming of the Shrew.”
“An oldie but goodie.”
“Actually, we were just discussing how it sucked.”
Jason cocked his head at that and Kate didn’t miss the light flush that crept up Macy’s neck at the scrutiny. “What don’t you like about it?”
“We were just telling Miss Winston what a jerk Petruchio is and how he doesn’t treat her right or deserve her.”
“He doesn’t.”
“You agree?”
Jason clutched at his chest and Kate nearly laughed at the melodrama. “Hey, I’m a modern guy. I totally agree.”
“Even in Shakespeare’s time, this had to be fake.” Chad, one of her quieter students, piped up from the back. “Who’d act like this?”
“Come on, we all know men can be sort of jerky sometimes,” one student shouted.
“Hell, yeah,” a girl in the back affirmed the assessment.
Jason smiled slightly at the affirmation, but pointed at the book again. “Maybe the whole play is about how the joke’s on Petruchio.”
Macy waved the book, and Kate was pleased to see her ire rising. She expected a rather fiery paper from the girl when they turned in everything next week. “What do you mean? He’s all up in everyone’s business at the end about how he tamed her and everything.”
“And it’s his loss. The woman he wanted to marry isn’t the woman he got. He ruined her.”
The room quieted and Kate could see the students were processing Jason’s assessment. Chad was the first to finally speak up. “Why do you think that?”
“Because she was this great girl, all full of personality and ideas and a bit of spit and vinegar. And the woman he ended up with was an empty shell. It’s his loss, as far as I’m concerned.”
“But that part’s not on the page. How do you know that?”
“Because that’s how I interpreted the play. When I think of Petruchio, I think of a guy who got to be right, but never ended up being happy.”
Various heads bobbed around the room, an equal mix of the young men and women in her classroom. It wasn’t until Jason was on his feet and almost standing in front of her that she’d even keyed in on the fact that he’d moved.
“Petruchio was an ass, and I’ve been one, too.” She watched in breathless awe as Jason got down on one knee before her. “But I’m not content to keep making the same mistake.”
“Jason—” She broke off, well-aware of the audience he had at his back. “Not here.”
He turned to look over his shoulder and she didn’t miss the exaggerated wink he tossed the class before he turned back toward her. “A good man knows how to tell a good woman how he feels. Understands that he’s stronger with her, than without her. Knows and values her thoughts and opinions and her input.”
She laid a hand on his shoulder. “And a good woman knows how to do the same.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t confide in you. I should have trusted enough in us to believe you’d understand.”
“And I’m sorry I expected you to fix all the things in my life that didn’t make me happy.”
Jason reached into his pocket and came out with the butterfly pendant. “This was a gift. For you. For always. Because I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
Abstractly, Kate heard the light sighs in the room as she dipped her head to allow him to put the pendant around her neck. Somewhere in the back of her mind, a light warning went off that she probably wasn’t setting the best example to get hired on the following year.
“Kiss her!”
The class murmur ratcheted up until Jason turned back toward the kids, waving his hand for silence.
“From this moment on, Miss Winston, will you be mine?”
“Yes.”
“Then kiss me, Kate.”
Kate figured it was the fact that she’d shown the film in advance of starting the play that had the kids laughing at Jason’s joke, but she didn’t care.
She leaned in and pressed her lips to his. And in that moment, with wolf whistles and cheers buzzing in her ears, Kate knew she’d found her forever.
Continue reading for a preview of the next book
in the Alaskan Nights series,
JUST IN TIME
Coming out in August wherever books and ebooks are sold.
Weddings were a big fat pain in the ass.
If she didn’t enjoy them so much—or love the couple who’d be standing at the end of the aisle even more—Avery Marks knew she’d have taken the weekend off and run for the hills.
“Did the champagne arrive?” Sloan McKinley, the bride-to-be and one of Avery’s closest friends, asked as upswept, oversized blond ringlets bounced with every movement of her head.
“It arrived last week.” Avery barely looked up from where she made a last-minute adjustment to a slight rip in the underskirt of her bridesmaid dress as she sat on the end of her bed.
“And the bouquets?”
“This morning, right on schedule. Mick picked them up himself on his morning run to Anchorage.”
Avery hesitated to add she’d already confirmed this three times already. A bride was entitled to a bit of the crazies, especially with her walk down the aisle less than an hour away.
“My mother’s driving me bat-shit.” Sloan sat down with a hard thump in a small wingback chair Avery kept in her room. The minuscule, stiff-backed torture device was too impractical to be good for much, but Sloan seemed unaware as half her frame got lost in a sea of crinoline.
Avery did look up at that as she cut off the dangling thread from her repair. “Doesn’t she always? Even about the littlest things?”
“Well, yeah.”
“So today isn’t exactly the definition of a little thing.”
“Right again.”
A long sigh floated toward Avery, and she couldn’t help but smile at the melodrama. Boy, had she missed this. She’d loved her four glorious months in Ireland on a professional exchange program, but she couldn’t deny how much she’d missed her friends.
“Besides, focus on the outcome. Marriage to Walker and two weeks in Fiji.”
The lines of frustration smoothed out across Sloan’s face, replaced with a bright glow and a warm, distant smile. “There is that.”
“And lo
ts of sex,” Avery added with a philosophical nod before standing to hold her dress out before her. “The tropical kind.”
“You have a one-track mind.”
“Pretty close.” Avery stood before her dresser mirror. “And as your designated friend who’s not getting any, I have to say quit your bitching.”
Sloan laughed as she stood up in her frothy bundle of underskirt. “Here. Let me help you get into that.”
Avery dragged off her shorts and button-down shirt—a nod to the mass of hair that was currently arranged atop her head like a well-poufed bird’s nest—and stepped into the thin silk garment Sloan held out in a circle.
“Aren’t I supposed to be helping you?” Avery took the dress from Sloan and shimmied it up her body. The dark red silk was particularly flattering and she settled the beaded fabric against her torso.
The bright smile faded quickly as tears welled in Sloan’s perfectly made-up eyes.
“Oh, oh.” Avery reached for a tissue on the dresser as she held the front of the dress against her chest. “No tears.”
Sloan clutched the tissue. “I’m sorry. I can’t seem to stop doing that.”
“Come on, don’t cry. Save that for the ceremony.”
“They just won’t stop. Every time I think I have a handle on it, I think about how different my life is from a year ago and how happy I am and I can’t stop them.”
Avery pulled Sloan in for a hug, mashing her dress and Sloan’s underskirt between them. “I know.”
“And it’s wonderful.”
“It is.” She ran her hand in large circles over Sloan’s back before stepping away. “Which is why you’re going to quit blubbering like you just failed ninth-grade English and help me into this.”
“You are such a slave-driver.”
“And you’ve got a hot man waiting at the end of a long white aisle.” She swatted in the general direction of Sloan’s ass—it was hard to tell through the layers of material—and turned back toward the mirror. “Let’s get cracking.”