On The Ropes Series Box Set

by Aly Martinez

  “Jeez. Last night.”

  “Damn,” Eliza groaned. “Not one of my days.”

  “Mine either,” Ash replied. “Shit…looks like Sarah won.”

  I cocked my head in question. “My mom?”

  “Yep,” Ash confirmed, dropping her phone back to the island. “The pot has to be at least a grand by now. I’ll have to ask Flint to check the books. Not too shabby though.”

  “What pot? What the hell are you talking about?” I glanced from Ash, who looked proud, to Eliza, who appeared slightly ashamed.

  “Well…” Eliza started. “About a year ago, we started a small betting pool for when you and Quarry would finally hook up.”

  My jaw fell open in horror. “You were betting on when we would have sex?”

  Eliza knotted her hands uncomfortably. “It was just for fun. Nothing crazy or anything.”

  “The pot was a grand and my mother won. How exactly is that not crazy?”

  Ash chimed in. “Your mom is actually very competitive. She’s going to be pumped to find out she won.”

  I slapped my hand on the countertop and spat, “You are not allowed to tell my mother I had sex with Quarry. Ever. Never. Ever. Ever.”

  Ash laughed, throwing her hands up in surrender.

  Eliza smiled tightly. “If it makes you feel any better, your dad refused to buy in. Slate too—but only because Erica bought so many days there wasn’t any left.”

  Folding forward, I rested my face on the cool granite. “Oh my God. This is not happening.”

  Her hand soothingly landed on my back. “Quit freaking. One thing at a time. Okay, so you slept with Quarry. That’s good, right?”

  “You guys were supposed to be surprised,” I told the table.

  “The only surprise is that it took this long,” Ash said, hopping up on the counter and propping her neon Converse in the chair beside me.

  I rolled my eyes and then sat up. “This is officially the worst day of my life.”

  “The sex was that bad, huh?” Ash asked before looking toward Eliza, who was shooting her a death glare. “What? It’s a valid question.”

  I groaned. “No. The sex was…incredible. I just don’t think I can give him what he wants.”

  Ash nodded in understanding. “Ah…he’s kinky? I can see that.”

  “Don’t answer that!” Eliza yelled and plugged her ears. “For God’s sake, Ash.”

  I pulled Eliza’s hands away from her ears. “He’s not kinky.”

  “Shame,” Ash mumbled.

  I ignored her. “I’m scared,” I whispered.

  Eliza settled on the stool beside me. “Of what? That things will change between you two? Because when Till and I—”

  I interrupted her. “I’m scared that I’ll never be her.”

  They both sighed, and a pair of arms folded around me in a tight hug.

  They weren’t Eliza’s.

  It was Ash.

  “Don’t say that. When Flint and I—”

  But that wasn’t even the half of it.

  “Mia loved him so much. I can’t stop feeling like we’re having some sort of torrid affair behind her back.”

  Ash squeezed tighter.

  I kept going. “And then there’s the fact that I’m a terrible excuse for a friend. Because I’ve been in love with him for a really long time.” I lifted my gaze to Eliza’s, ready for the disgust I deserved when I confessed, “Even when Mia was alive.”

  Her lips thinned in a sympathetic smile.

  Ash squeezed me again.

  Tears filled my eyes as I swallowed hard. “And the absolute, most horrifying part of all of it is that there are so many reasons why we shouldn’t be together. But I still can’t seem to stop hoping that maybe we can.” I sniffed back the tears I refused to shed.

  “Okay. It’s nine a.m. Wine is out. But I’ll get the Baileys for your coffee,” Eliza announced.

  “I’ll call Flint to pick up the boys.”

  “No. It’s fine. Don’t do that,” I insisted.

  “Too late. Let me get Blakely and Till moved to her room, and we’ll reconvene in Chick Central in ten minutes.”

  “Eliza, stop! You have enough to deal with with Blakely right now. You don’t need me moping and crying all day too. Besides, I have a class at the community center this afternoon and a million things to do for Quarry. I can’t be drunk.”

  “Stop worrying. Blakely will probably dub you as her favorite aunt if she finds out you delayed me telling her dad about her period.”

  “Hey!” Ash objected.

  Eliza lifted a hand to hush her. “And for the rest of it. Fine, no Baileys. But Quarry can answer his own e-mails today. This is more important. And I think he’d agree.”

  She had a point. He definitely would agree with her. And I desperately needed to talk all of this stuff through with someone who wasn’t him.

  “Yeah. Okay,” I relented.

  * * *

  An hour later, the three of us were sprawled out in Eliza’s art room. I had just filled them in on the last month of my life—starting with the night of the Gala and ending this morning, when I’d snuck out from under Quarry’s arm draped possessively across my hips.

  “Wow,” Eliza said then looked at Ash. “Well, do you want to start or should I?”

  “I’ve got this.” Ash dramatically cleared her throat then offered me a healthy dose of pity by way of a tight smile. “You’re fucked.”

  I ignored her and turned my attention to Eliza only to find her nodding.

  “Well. Awesome. That clears it all up,” I smarted, pushing to my feet.

  “Sit down!” Ash called. “I was just getting started.”

  I crossed my arms over my chest and gave her my full attention for what I was positive was going to be a waste of time. “Go on.”

  “I never understood why he was with Mia.”

  I flinched. Never would I have expected those to be her first words.

  “It’s harsh, but true,” she continued. “You’ve heard about when Quarry was fourteen and his mom tried to regain custody, right?”

  I nodded, settling back down on the futon.

  “Then I’m sure you also know that she was married to my dad and that Quarry lived with me for about a month. Well, every night, we would stay awake until the early morning, talking. I was mostly pumping him for information about Flint, but he filled my ears with you.”

  “Seriously?” I blinked in shock.

  Those were the years Quarry and I hadn’t been speaking. The years when I’d had my head low, pretending I hated him for having locked me in the closet when, really, I’d just hated him for having proved me right—I couldn’t trust anyone.

  “Yep. I knew all about Liv James,” Ash assured me. “The little Hispanic angel who used to bury her face in his back. The one he vowed to protect from the silence. The one who he regretted failing more than anyone else in his entire life.”

  I sucked in a sharp breath. “He…told you about that?”

  “He wouldn’t tell me why you were afraid or why he was so attached to you, but yeah…he told me all of that. Multiple times.”

  My eyes flashed between the two of them. We were tight, but I never would have revealed Quarry’s secrets to them. Even if he was telling mine.

  “Did he tell you why we stopped speaking for those years?”

  “No.” Eliza jumped in before Ash had a chance. “Your dad told us about the closet. Quarry has never once spoken about it, not even when I cornered him after I’d heard what he’d done.”

  I glanced at the floor and lied, “It wasn’t as bad as it sounds.”

  “It was to him,” Eliza said. “He was a mess. After Vegas, Quarry was never the same. He didn’t come out of his room for weeks. He started skipping school and getting into fights. He eventually got kicked out of school, and then he quit boxing.”

  “What?” I gasped. “He quit boxing?”

  “Yep. You have no idea how bad things got with him. Back then, w
e were so focused on Flint, but what we failed to see was that Quarry was equally as injured. His wounds just weren’t on the surface.”

  I swallowed around the lump in my throat. Mine weren’t on the surface, either, and I knew firsthand that that was exactly what made them lethal.

  “Neither Till nor Slate could get through to him. We tried counseling, but he refused to go, and the harder we pushed, the harder he fought us. The thing was that we all assumed he was torn up over what had happened with Flint and me, but it wasn’t until he talked to your dad one night that things started to turn around.”

  “My dad?” I breathed. “What…what did he say to him?”

  Eliza shrugged. “No clue. Till just said Quarry came out of Slate’s office almost in tears and Leo looked murderous.”

  Well, that wasn’t all that shocking. My dad wasn’t exactly a teddy bear, especially when it came to me. But one thing stuck out to me.

  “And things got better after that? I mean…with Quarry?”

  “Yep. He started going to the gym again the very next day. No more fights at school. He started laughing again. Hanging out with his brothers. It was like he just reappeared.”

  “Wow. I didn’t figure my dad for the inspirational-speech kind of guy.”

  “Flint looked for me for three years,” Ash announced randomly. “We had only been together for a month and he ripped up the weeds from his old apartment and planted them at his house just to take a piece of me with him when he moved.”

  Eliza picked up with more randomness. “Till climbed through windows for eight years. He was so afraid to step out of his fantasy world because he couldn’t bear the thought of it changing us. But, when he finally walked through my door, things went from zero to married in a year.”

  “Okay?” I drawled.

  “So you’re fucked,” Ash repeated.

  “Totally,” Eliza agreed.

  Ash stood and moved beside me on the futon. “Way I see it, Quarry has been sitting on some serious feelings for you since he was a kid, and a few weeks ago, he woke up and realized that those feelings were still there. And, if I had to guess, they’re probably stronger than ever. You think a man like him—a Page man—is just going to walk away from that? And, more so, do you think you could handle it if he did?”

  My pulse spiked. “I won’t lose him. We could stay friends.”

  “The friend thing doesn’t work when you’re in love, Liv. It will destroy you faster than anything else. Longing and love turns to bitterness and anger.” Eliza smiled. “Trust me. I’ve been there.”

  I shook my head adamantly. “No. Quarry and I are…different.” Panic began to build in my chest. As sad as it may sound, Quarry was my life. Without him, it would just be me and the silence. “N-nothing changes. He…told me so.”

  “Simmer down.” Ash’s hand gently landed on my back. “You look like you’re about to pass out or puke.”

  I was about to do both.

  It was all too overwhelming.

  The idea of losing him.

  The idea of being with him.

  The idea of trusting him.

  The idea of him leaving me when I couldn’t give him that trust.

  The idea of just being friends after the way it’d felt to wake up in his arms.

  The idea of never having him inside me again.

  The idea of…Mia.

  Then the idea of having him inside me again.

  Too much. All of it.

  “Hey…you want to breathe?” Ash hit me on the back like I was choking.

  A rush of breath I hadn’t known I’d been holding flew from my mouth.

  “I can’t do this.” I jumped to my feet and began pacing the room. “Help me think of a way to get out of this date with him tonight.”

  “You’re in love with him. Do you think dodging a date will make that disappear?” Eliza asked.

  “No! But I think it will give him more time to realize how fucked up this whole thing is. He wasn’t supposed to develop feelings for me. And, now that I know he has, I can’t seem to keep mine shut down anymore.” I groaned. “No. This isn’t happening. He loves Mia. I can’t fill those shoes. He needs to get over this…so I can too. End of story.”

  Ash’s eyes lifted to Eliza then back to me. “Love is different. It’s not a one-size-fits-all. And it’s definitely not universal or transferable. There are no shoes to fill. Whatever you and Quarry have is unique to the two of you. It’s not what he had with Mia—and I mean that for better or worse. You can’t compare his feelings. If Quarry is risking what you two have to take it to the next level, then you have to assume they are pretty freaking strong.”

  She drew in a deep breath and lowered her voice as if she were going impart some serious wisdom. “If you hear nothing else I say today, please hear this. It took me a long time to realize this, and I don’t want to see you make the same mistakes. So listen up.” She leaned toward me, her eyes imploring. “There are no shoes to fill, Liv. And the way I know this is because, if there were, Mia would have been filling yours for years.”

  My heart stopped. “You…you don’t know what you’re talking about. Quarry loved Mia.”

  Eliza nodded. “He did. Very much. But he loved you first.”

  I shot to my feet. “You don’t know that.”

  “We all know that! Everyone who has ever seen you two together knows that! It’s not a competition between you and Mia, Liv. It’s not an affair. It’s not some dirty little secret. It’s life. So cut yourself some slack. Go on a date with the guy you’ve always wanted, talk to him, and then figure out how to start the real relationship you both so obviously want.” Ash threw her arms out to the sides in frustration and then turned to Eliza. “Christ! Please tell me I wasn’t this stubborn.”

  Eliza giggled. “Worse.”

  I stood frozen.

  Could it be that easy?

  I had to admit flighty-and-crazy Ash wasn’t too shabby at advice.

  While the chat about Mia did make me feel marginally better, the biggest problem I saw with all of this was that, in order to be with Quarry, I was going to have to find a way to trust him.

  It was impossible.

  “He loved you first.”

  “I don’t know how to do this,” I admitted.

  “Well, that’s better than the ‘I can’t do this’ you were claiming a few minutes ago.” Ash smiled and tossed my cell phone into my lap. “Start there.”

  * * *

  Me: I’m going to the community center and setting up some stuff for Don so he can handle my tutoring appointments for tonight. What time should I be ready for our date?

  Quarry: Actually, I’m busy tonight. Can we do something tomorrow?

  Me: That’s better for me anyway. The male revue is in town for tonight only.

  Quarry: Jesus. I was kidding. You aren’t going to a fucking male revue.

  Me: I was kidding too…kinda.

  Quarry: I’ll pick you up at seven. Dress warm.

  Me: Are you sure about this? I mean…this is weird.

  Quarry: I’ll pick you up at seven. Be naked. Better?

  Me: Aaaaaaaanddddd…I’ll dress warm. K. Thanks.

  Chapter Twenty

  Quarry

  I SPENT THE DAY RUNNING around to get everything ready for my date for Liv. She was going to absolutely hate every single minute of it. Which was precisely why I was so excited. I hadn’t been lying—I did have somewhere special to take her, but I had a sneaking suspicion it was only going to be special for me. I could live with that though.

  With my hand poised in the air, I stared at the second hand on my watch until it clicked to seven o’clock. After knocking, I nervously shoved my free hand in the pocket of my slacks.

  “What are you doing?” she asked when she pulled the door open. “Did you lose your key?”

  I smiled wide as I took her in. Liv was beautiful. I was well aware of that. But, that night, knowing she’d gotten dressed just for me, I felt things I hadn’t exp
ected.

  “What the hell, Liv!” I growled, extending the bouquet of white roses her way.

  “Um…thanks?” she replied, hesitantly taking them from my hand.

  “I’m offended!” I tugged at the collar of my dress shirt and then straightened the lapels on my suit coat.

  She bit her lip to stifle a laugh. “It’s the jacket. You know how it cuts off the oxygen to your brain and all.” She giggled, but I found not one thing funny.

  “You’re wearing jeans and a sweater.” I made a show of raking my eyes from her head to her toes and back again.

  Liv looked undeniably gorgeous. The dark skinny jeans were tight, and the tall, black heels elongated her already-long legs. Her pale-purple sweater hugged her tits perfectly. I was sure it would have given a spectacular show when we walked into the cool October night air. However, the fact still remained that she was wearing jeans and a sweater.

  She lifted the roses to her nose, hiding the wide smile she was sporting. “You didn’t tell me I needed to dress up. You just said dress warm.”

  “Douchebag Boatshoes got a dress,” I stated simply.

  “Douchebag Boatshoes didn’t tell me to dress warm.” She twisted away from me, her ass swaying seductively as she made her way to the kitchen.

  Maybe those jeans hadn’t been a bad choice after all.

  “I’m in a suit,” I announced as if she hadn’t noticed.

  “Congratulations!” she shouted over the running water as she filled a vase.

  I scratched the back of my head. “I’m not sure they’ll let you in the restaurant in jeans. I guess I could always call to check.”

  Her eyes perked. “Really?”

  “Yeah, really. I’m worth millions, Liv. You think I’m taking you to a drive-thru?”

  “Ah,” she replied in understanding. “My best friend once told me about douchebags like you. I’m not particularly interested in money. I siphon enough off my boss to keep me set for years.”

  “Your boss should fire you. But your best friend sounds brilliant.”

  “Meh. He’s okay,” she teased. “So, where are we going?”

  With a proud smirk, I joined her in the kitchen.

  She stared up at me nervously as I wrapped my arms around her waist and tugged her against me. Her breathing sped when I nuzzled my cheek against hers. Switching to the other side, I nipped playfully at her neck. A breathy moan encouraged me further, so I raked my teeth against her flesh before pulling away.