A deep groan rumbles from somewhere near my stopped heart.
Knowing I’m the luckiest guy alive, I want nothing more than to step into the car, sink to my knees, and set my mouth to giving Laine Malone something she’ll never forget.
But I can’t. And worse, that utterly gorgeous smile she’s giving me is about to be wiped clean away.
Damn it, I don’t want to do this.
“Laine, you take my breath away. But we need to talk a minute.”
The wanton look is gone in a blink, and she’s transformed into the controlled creature who’s made a career of handling whatever emergencies are thrown her way.
“What?” she asks, slipping back into her dress. The dress I sent her to replace the one we ruined with cake. She looks gorgeous in it.
God, I don’t want to tell her, but she needs to know. “It’s the groom.”
She blanches. “What? He’s nervous, he’s missing, he’s got cold feet… I can handle anything short of him being dead. Oh my God, he isn’t dead?”
“No, nothing like that—”
“Okay then,” she says with a faltering smile that guts me. “He’s getting married today, I’ll make it work. There isn’t another woman. This guy is solid. You can see the affection between this couple. They laugh like they’re best friends, and in the year we’ve been planning this, I’ve never seen him so much as glance at another woman. Heck, he barely even looks at me when I’m talking to him. I know—”
“It’s not another woman. It’s another man.”
Laine’s eyes close for a long moment, and the breath leaks out of her in a slow hiss. “Are you sure? He has a lot of really close guy friends.”
“Dil saw him. He was checking if they’d left enough room for the bars after putting up the tables in the ballroom. When he walked in, he saw them—you know how he is with faces—and I guess it was pretty passionate.” Taking her hand in mine, I give it a gentle squeeze. “I’m sorry, Laine.”
Connie is going to lose her shit. I know about her bullshit three-strikes policy, but there’s no way she’d let Laine go over something like this. Blissful Brides would be nothing without my girl.
Maybe I ought to call. Exert a little pressure and remind Connie about our contract. It doesn’t specify that she can’t let Laine go, but it makes a pretty significant statement about her value.
“So no one knows?” Laine asks, her eyes shell-shocked and wide. “Denise, the bride, she doesn’t know?”
I blink, surprised that’s her first question. But I guess it makes sense. She needs to know who to talk to and in what order. “Not yet. You’re the first. It’s up to you how we break it to the girl. I’ll do it, if you’d rather not have her associate the news with Blissful Brides.”
“No.” She sighs heavily, her eyes focused on some distant point in space. “Whatever needs to be done, I’ll handle it. But I’ve got to talk to Connie first. Policy.”
Policy. The tension between my shoulder blades eases and I take a deep breath.
It’s not a question of whether she will tell the bride, just a matter of how.
Laine moves deeper into the living room, sinking into the cushions of my couch as she stares at her phone. She looks small, vulnerable, with her knees pressed together and her ankles apart, and it’s physically painful to watch and not be able to do anything to make it better.
“You want some privacy?”
She takes a breath, giving me an appreciative nod.
“I’ll get you a coffee.”
In the kitchen, I dig out a dark roast K-Cup and pop it into the machine. Through the archway to the main living room, I can see the strain in Laine’s face, the way her hand is open wide as if frozen mid-gesture. I’m not trying to listen, but bits and pieces come through each time she raises her voice.
“Connie, I get that… No, she doesn’t know…” Her eyes flash to mine, then quickly away. Rising off the couch, she walks to the window. “Yes, I value my position with Blissful… I understand… but she needs to know.”
I should have known Connie wouldn’t want to tell the bride about the groom’s secret.
Jesus. Everyone knows Connie’s coldhearted, but how she can work Laine over about a ding to the BB reputation when there’s a woman about to walk down the aisle and vow to love and cherish this one man for the rest of her life—a man who probably spent the night before in the arms of another man—I can’t even fathom it.
But Laine will do the right thing.
I know her.
I add some cream to the mug, no sugar, and start back to the living room. I want to put my arms around her and tell her it’s going to be okay. She doesn’t need Connie; she can work for the Henley. But she’s standing by the elevator doors and they’ve just opened.
Body language suggesting defeat, Laine steps into the car and covers the receiver. “Connie’s on her way over. I’m sorry about the coffee, but I need to go meet with her. I’ll talk to you later.”
I nod, hating the hollow look in her eyes. Hating that the meeting I have in forty-five minutes is one that has taken me years to get and I can’t put off.
“No worries. Call me if you need anything.”
Laine
“Some girls don’t want to know.”
Connie’s last words eat at my gut as I pace the eighth floor, trying to summon the courage to face memories I’ve been trying to put behind me for ten years.
My hands shake and my belly roils as I stare at the contact pulled up on my phone. But I can’t put it off.
I hit send and wait through four rings before the line connects.
“Gail? It’s Laine. Please don’t hang up.”
A long silence follows. I stop pacing, stop breathing, and wait.
“Laine, are you okay?”
Closing my eyes, I nod, trying to push sound through a throat seized with emotion. How many years since I’ve heard my sister’s voice, since she said my name? “Yes, sort of,” I finally manage. “I’m sorry, but I need to talk to you.”
There’s a hesitant pause. “Okay… What is it?”
“After all these years, do you still feel like I shouldn’t have told you? I mean, do you believe you would have been happier if I hadn’t told you about Gerry?”
A cool hiss of breath comes through the line, and I think she’s about to hang up. Maybe I even hope she will. But then Gail answers, her voice slow, reflective.
“Oh Laine, I don’t know. It’s possible things would have been different in our marriage if I hadn’t known. But probably not. Or maybe if I’d found out for myself what he was like, instead of being so wrapped up in blaming someone else—you—and trying to prove everyone wrong, I might have left him before getting pregnant. But then I wouldn’t have my girls. And Gerry is, for the most part, a decent man. I guess I could have done worse. I don’t know.”
I bow my head, my heart aching for the both of us. “How are the girls? The pictures at Mom’s are beautiful.”
Gail’s voice brightens, bringing me with her. “The girls are wonderful. So smart and funny.” She laughs. “Becky’s three and quiet like Dad. Trina is five, and she reminds me of you the most. Makes me laugh all the time.”
Somehow it makes a difference to know that even though my sister hasn’t spoken to me, she at least thought of me sometimes. That’s something.
“Laine, I still wish you hadn’t told me what Gerry did before the wedding, but not because you were wrong to do it. I wish you hadn’t told me because I’ve missed you. I was wrong and pig-headed. And then I was embarrassed. It wasn’t your fault, and I’ve known it for a long time. I just had too many problems to face up to fixing this one. Honey, I love you and I’m sorry.”
Choking back a sob, I wipe a tear from my cheek. “I love you too.”
Chapter 8
Jason
Walking up to Dolce’s lively storefront is familiar and unpleasant. A quick glance through the glass confirms that Tony and Carmen are still running the place and it’s do
ing a strong business. Despite everything, I’m glad for them.
Moving to the nondescript door to the right, I press the bell and check out the neighborhood. Not much has changed in the years since I was here.
The door opens, and I’m confronted by the woman who damn near ruined my life. She’s still beautiful, fit, and lean in her narrow slate dress, with wide-set burnished curls resting around her shoulders, but the look of youthful innocence is gone. Or maybe I’ve just lost the blinders.
Sofia stands back from the door, one eye squinting slightly as she pulls on her imported cigarette. “Fine. Let’s get this over with,” she says in her lilting English.
My sentiments exactly. I need to get back to Laine.
I follow her through a small living room with worn carpet and mismatched recliners that were well past their prime six years ago, and into a kitchen with a tiny little table that seats three. I wait for her to sit, not that she deserves the courtesy, but it’s hard to undo a lifetime of manners for the benefit of spiting one woman. Especially one as vindictive as Sophia.
Once we’re both seated, I pull a thick envelope from my suit pocket.
Sophia leans forward, greed in her eyes. It’s what I banked on. “Give me my mother’s ring, and the money is yours.”
Sorting through the bills, she piles them up, fanning one bundle with her thumb. “You’re a fool, Jason. You always have been. You were a lovesick puppy six years ago and looking at you now, I’m guessing you’re lovesick for someone new. This ring isn’t worth half what you’re paying me, but you want to see it on someone else’s finger so badly, you’ll do anything.”
The ring that was my mother’s and my grandmother’s and her mother’s before that rattles across the table and back into the Henley line. For nearly two years I’ve been trying to get this ring back, and now that Sophia has her money, she tosses it across the table like discarded trash.
Her painted lips twist into a sneer. “But are you sure you know this new love any better than you knew me?”
What a bitch.
I am. I know Laine. I love her. But Sophia is right about one thing. I do want my mother’s ring on Laine’s finger.
Only before I can go, there’s one more thing I need.
Pulling a second envelope from my pocket as thick with hundreds as the first, I tap it against the tabletop. Sophia’s brows knit together. “What’s this?”
“The baby.” Jesus, even after all these years I can barely choke out the words. “I want the truth.”
I need to know what happened to the baby she’d been carrying when I’d broken off the engagement. The one I hadn’t known about until she’d thrown it in my face as blackmail to go through with the wedding.
I’d refused, telling her I’d marry her if testing confirmed the baby was mine. Two days later, she’d sent me a text on her way to Europe, telling me she’d had it terminated. Then nine months later, another text with a single word: Congratulations.
I’d hired an investigator and begged her parents. I’d spent three months abroad trying to locate her myself. But nothing ever turned up. And when she came back, she refused to discuss it with me.
Even now, I can’t quite keep my breathing steady.
She sits back in her chair, tapping one gleaming dagger of a nail over the scarred tabletop. She’s working out whether there’s an angle here.
Finally, she realizes there isn’t.
With one last drag, she stubs out her cigarette and sighs.
“There was no child. No pregnancy.” Looking up at the ceiling, she waves her hand dismissively. “I was angry, and I knew the guilt would drive you mad.”
I feel like throwing up. It should be the answer I needed. It is. But after all the years of holding on to the grief and weight of that consequence, it also feels like a loss. “Just take your money, Sophia.”
Her lips curve. “Gladly.”
And that’s it. I walk out, ready to leave Sophia and all her poisonous, manipulative bullshit behind. But like the parasite she is, she stays with me. She’s in the car as I take Fullerton out to the Drive, asking me if I really know Laine as well as I think I do.
In the parking garage, I can’t stop seeing that carelessly dismissive wave as she tells me the baby I’ve spent the last six years alternately blaming myself for losing and agonizing over wondering if it was still out there—had been nothing more than a vindictive fabrication.
What kind of monster does that?
What kind of person is so damn blind they don’t recognize the monster they’re with?
I feel sick.
Punching the call button for the elevator, I pull a deep breath through my nose.
It’s all behind me. When I get off this elevator, there will be no more looking back. Only forward. With another cancelled wedding, Laine is going to have a lot on her hands. And I don’t even want to think about how Connie might try to work her over. I want to be there for her. In every way.
The elevator stops at the lobby and the doors glide open to a cacophony of cheers from the wedding party as Laine’s bride and groom pose together on the sweeping staircase. My gut turns to lead seeing the ecstatic grins on their faces and faces of the family and friends in attendance.
No nervous smiles. No shadowed eyes or stiff postures.
Laine didn’t tell the bride.
How could she? For a fucking job? When I’ve made it more than clear she could have one with me?
Are you sure you know her?
Damn it. I don’t want Sophia to be right. She’s supposed to be behind me.
The crowd parts, and I catch sight of Laine tucked into an out-of-the-way corner. Anger hardens inside me seeing her placid smile as she watches the “happy” couple from a distance. Does she have any idea what that woman will have to face when the truth comes out? And eventually it will.
But Laine won’t have to deal with the messy aftermath, so what does she care?
I can’t watch. The elevator is waiting when I reach it. Turning around, I spot Laine walking briskly toward me, one hand raised. Our eyes meet and whatever she sees stops her dead in her tracks.
Arms crossed, I try to block the noise from my head. The noise that sounds a lot like Sophia’s careless laughter.
Laine watches as the doors glide closed, a sad smile breaking across her face. And then the only thing in front of me is the door I didn’t even try to stop from closing and my distorted reflection staring back at me.
Jesus Christ, what am I doing?
In my mind’s eye, I see Laine staring up at me with cake smeared in her hair, looking more beautiful than I’ve ever seen her. I see her from that first meeting two years ago, talking about romance, love, and marriage with the kind of light in her eyes that said she was a true believer.
There’s a lurching feeling inside me that has nothing to do with the elevator ride and everything to do with the sickening certainty this is a fuck-up on a monumental scale. There’s got to be an explanation, but I didn’t let her have the chance to give it to me.
I punch the “door open” button, starting to sweat, but the car’s already heading up.
The round trip couldn’t have taken more than a minute, but when I shove out into the lobby, Laine is already gone. I scan the thinning crowd from the wedding party. She’s not there, but Dil is.
I mouth her name and he frowns at me from where he’s loitering around the front desk, pointing toward the main doors.
I dart out front, blinking at the empty sidewalk and gardens in confusion. There isn’t anyone from the wedding party out here, and Laine’s still got the reception… except there’s a cab at the end of the loop, waiting for the line of cars ahead to move.
She’s leaving?
“Laine!” I shout, cutting in front of a limo and then running through the manicured garden trying to get to the cab before it turns onto the main street. The car ahead of the cab starts to turn the corner, but I’m already there, slapping my palm on the trunk and holding a hand up
to the car behind.
The rear window is half open, and Laine is huddled against the padded bench, her eyes filled with unspent tears that completely gut me.
“Tell me what happened.”
She won’t look at me, and that feeling of dread gets worse. “Now you want to talk to me?”
“I’m sorry,” I choke out, hating what a douche I was jumping to conclusions. “I should have waited. I should have found you and asked and— Christ, can you just get out of the cab and talk to me? Make me understand, because I don’t. I don’t know how you could have had even a second of indecision, but you—”
A horn blares from two cars back and the cabby snaps at Laine, telling her to stay or go because he has to move.
Finally, she turns to me, those soft brown eyes I’m always getting lost in shutting me out completely. “But I did. I hesitated. There is no single answer that is right for every question. Sometimes you question your instincts. I— Never mind. It doesn’t matter what happened.” She turns to the cabby. “You can go. We’re done here.”
Backing away from the cab, I rake my fingers through my hair as I watch her pull away without an explanation, without a backward glance.
Chapter 9
Tuesday, July 7th
Laine
“Seriously, the Chunky Monkey will make you feel better. Just take a bite.”
Nikki pokes the side of my mouth with a spoonful of comfort, and I let out a weary laugh before accepting the bite.
She snuggles deeper under the blanket with me on the couch in her apartment where we’ve camped out for the day. We’ve got the place to ourselves since Matt is meeting his brother Jack after work. “See? Isn’t that better?”
Chewing, I nod, because she’s trying so hard, and I don’t want her to feel like a failure. The truth is, nothing is going to make me feel better. It’s been three days since I left Jason standing on the street outside the Henley, since the blow-up with Connie, since my life went into a tailspin. Three days since I went more than three hours without giving in to a bout of tears.
All In: A Moira McTark Re-release (Coming Around Again Book 2) Page 7