Homecoming (Speakeasy)

by Rebecca Norinne

  “Come in,” I called out.

  Kaitlyn, the part-time hostess who’d welcomed me the day I’d stopped in to apply for the bartending job, popped her head inside. “You have a visitor.”

  Thinking Preston had gotten back early, I pushed out my chair, ready to launch myself into his arms.

  When I stood, Kaitlyn’s gaze fell to my left hand. “He said he’s your husband?” Her eyes traveled from my ringless finger up to my face, her eyes questioning and confused.

  So definitely not Preston, I thought, dropping back down into my chair with a beleaguered sigh.

  “Ex-husband,” I told her loud enough that I hoped Blake could hear me.

  “Do you want me to go get Ty or Matteo?” she asked, chewing on her lip.

  “No, it’s okay. He won’t be staying long.”

  She paused briefly, before giving me a nod. “If you need me, I’ll be at the front,” she said, moving aside and casting Blake a dirty look as she swept past.

  “To what do I owe the displeasure?” I asked, my voice shaking, as he unbuttoned his suit jacket and dropped down into a chair across from me.

  “Hello to you, too, dear,” he said, eyeing my office with open disdain. “What a charming little space you have here. It’s not our gallery, of course, but what is?” His eyes narrowed. “Is that your work?”

  “Yes.”

  “How quaint,” he sniffed.

  Classic. Thankfully, his snide comments and not-so-thinly veiled insults no longer had the power to cause me pain.

  “Why are you here, Blake?” Nevermind what he was doing in my office. What in god’s name was he doing in Vermont?

  “I was meeting with a sculptor who recently moved from the Bay Area to Burlington to be closer to his parents. Since I was in the state, I thought I’d swing by and see how you’re doing.”

  I peered at him dubiously. I didn’t know if there was a sculptor in Burlington or not, but his little fairy tale about wanting to check in on me was the biggest crock I’d heard in quite some time.

  “You can call him if you don’t believe me. His number’s five-one-oh—”

  “Fine. You’re in Vermont on business,” I interrupted. “But what are you doing here? At Speakeasy.”

  “I was curious about where you worked. Why else would I be here?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, trying to figure out what his angle was. There was no way in hell he’d popped in for simple curiosity’s sake. He wanted something … I just didn’t know what it was.

  “I figured Preston would have told you I was in town,” he said, his tone nonchalant.

  “Preston?” I squeaked.

  “He didn’t mention that I stopped by the other day?” He adjusted his posture, adopting a relaxed pose as he rested his elbow on the chair back next to him and propped his head up on the points of his fingers.

  Preston had not mentioned speaking with Blake. Which made zero sense. What was going on here?

  “What day was that again?” I asked, hoping I didn’t sound as shocked as I felt. I didn’t want him to know he’d just thrown me for a complete loop.

  When he smirked, I knew I’d failed. “Wednesday. But maybe it slipped his mind. He did say something about needing to speak with his father immediately.”

  “What do you know about that?” My spidey senses were definitely pinging. Why did Blake know Preston had gone to see his family?

  Rather than answering my question, he continued his little game of cat and mouse. “How do you like dear old dad, by the way? You must have been thrilled when you found out he was a billionaire. I know how much you love rich men.”

  “Fuck you,” I whispered, my voice quavering. How dare he insinuate I was only with Preston for his money. Sure, I’d been surprised when he told me about his family’s vast wealth, but I hadn’t cared. Unlike Margaux, I was in love with him, not his money or connections. Frankly, it meant nothing to me. Further, it seemed to mean very little to Preston as well.

  But what hurt even worse than Blake essentially calling me a gold-digging whore, was learning that the man I loved had lied to me. For all Preston’s talk of wanting to keep me safe and protected, he’d had failed to warn me when the only man who had the power to hurt me had literally shown up on my doorstep. More than that, he’d run off and left me to deal with the fallout on my own.

  That’s what you told him you wanted, my subconscious sneered. How often have you told him you could handle things yourself?

  While that was true, I hadn’t meant it literally. Yes, I wanted to deal with Blake my own way, but I hated feeling abandoned. That simply wasn’t something a man who claimed to love you would do, was it? No. There had to be some other explanation. I just couldn’t wrap my head around what it might be.

  “I’m going to assume,” Blake continued unbothered, “he also didn’t tell you that he offered me half a million dollars to disappear.”

  I slammed my hands down on the calendar that covered my desk. “He what?”

  He reached into his inner jacket pocket and pulled out his phone. Swiping his thumb over the glass for a few seconds, he smirked and then passed me the device.

  I glanced down at the screen, seeing an exchange between him and Preston. The evidence was pretty damning. Warily, I passed him back his phone.

  “I’ve got to hand it to you, Rose. I didn’t think you had it in you.”

  “Had what in me?” I asked lamely, my mind a hurricane of negative thoughts.

  I was just so disappointed. And so fucking tired. For years, I’d let Blake control what I wore, where I went, and who I was friends with. I’d genuinely believed that Preston was different, but it turned out he didn’t have any more faith in me than Blake ever had.

  What was with the men in my life thinking they knew better than I did what was best for me?

  “I know how much you enjoy the finer things in life, all evidence to the contrary.” He gestured vaguely around my office. “That’s why I was so surprised when Preston introduced himself. How can you stand it?”

  “Stand what?” I asked numbly, no longer reacting to whatever nonsense he was spouting. I was drained beyond caring.

  “Fucking him, of course. I mean, really. That beard? He looks like a savage.” He shuddered exaggeratedly before tilting his head to the side like he’d just thought of something important. “Then again, you always did like it rough. Was that our problem, darling? Was I supposed to snarl and grunt and act like a caveman with you? Or are you a frigid little bitch with him, too?”

  Okay, so maybe I wasn’t totally beyond caring. Because as his words registered, I saw literal red. Blake knew precisely why I’d stopped sleeping with him, and her name was Monica. And Sherise. And Philomena. And who knew how many others. When he’d started sticking his cock in other women, I’d stopped letting him stick it into me.

  I sat up straight in my chair and pushed my shoulders back. I was done being his figurative punching bag. He wanted nasty? He was about to get a heaping dose of it. “No, Blake. The reason I stopped fucking you is because you have a tiny little dick, and I was tired of faking my orgasms. Now get out of my office and don’t ever come back.”

  His face turned red with indignation and he sputtered. “You bitch.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Yes, I know. I’m frigid. I’m a bitch. I’m a gold digger. Blah, blah, blah.” I picked up my phone. “Do I need to have you escorted out?”

  “You’re making a huge mistake.”

  “My only mistake was staying married to you as long as I did. I don’t care about the condo or the gallery. You can keep everything. I just want you out of my life.”

  “You’re going to regret this.” Angrily, he pushed his chair out, knocking it over in the process, and threw open the door to my office. Storming out, he blew past Kaitlyn.

  “Watch where you’re going!” she hollered after him. Then, turning to me, she asked, “Are you okay?”

  “I will be.” The trick was believing it.

  31


  Preston

  The entire drive back to Colebury, I wrestled with my conscience. I’d once told Rosalie that I valued honesty above all in a relationship, but I’d just spent the last three days lying to her about the reason for my trip. At the time, my only thought had been to protect the woman I loved. It wasn’t until last night as I lay in bed in my hotel room, staring up at the ceiling, that I realized how badly I’d fucked up. I hadn’t been protecting her. I’d been lying to her. All I could do now was apologize and hope she forgave me.

  Given that we’d promised never to lie to one another, I didn’t have high hopes.

  When I heard the sound of her car coming down the driveway, I threw on my jacket and stepped out onto the porch to meet her. I’d spent the last hour practicing my speech: first confessing where I’d been and why and then begging for forgiveness. I’d worked my stomach into knots imagining all the ways this conversation might play out.

  Slamming on her brakes, Rosalie practically jumped out of her Volvo. She looped her purse over her shoulder and marched toward me, eyes flashing with anger. “What was your family emergency?” she demanded, stalking up the steps to meet me on the porch. She crossed her arms and tapped the toe of her shiny black high heel loudly against the wood slats. “And don’t you dare lie to me.”

  My carefully-planned explanation died on my lips. For all the scenarios I’d imagined, I hadn’t counted on whatever was happening now. “Let’s go inside.”

  “I’m fine right where I am, thank you very much.”

  “It’s freezing, Rosalie. Come inside.”

  Her head swung rapidly back and forth. “No. Tell me where you were and what you were doing.”

  “Fine, have it your way,” I said, shrugging out of my jacket. “But at least put this on.” I held my coat out to her. After a few seconds her hand shot out and grabbed for it. Quickly, she pushed her arms through the too-long sleeves and zipped it up to her chin.

  I blew into my cold hands. “I was in Boston, and I was with my family. But no, there wasn’t a family emergency.” I used my fingers to make air quotes. “That was just the quickest, most believable excuse I could come up with to explain my sudden disappearance.”

  She glowered at me but remained silent. I took it as a cue to continue.

  “The truth is, I went to ask my dad to give me access to my trust fund.”

  She shook her head as her lips formed words I couldn’t make out even though we were only a couple of feet apart. I thought it might have been something like, “You’ve got to be kidding me.” She turned her face away, leaving me to stare at her profile. Her chin jutted out defiantly.

  “What’d you whisper just now?” I crossed my arms over my chest and shoved my hands up under my armpits to try and keep them warm.

  “Why?”

  “Because I want to know.”

  “No.” She shook her head. “That’s not what I meant. Why did you need access to your trust fund?”

  Panic flared in my gut as something about her tone made me realize her question was a test, one she wasn’t confident I’d actually pass. But I had no intention of lying to her ever again. These past few days had practically given me an ulcer. “Blake was here,” I told her, my breath forming clouds in the frigid night air. “I caught him trying to break into your house on Wednesday afternoon.”

  Her face swung back around to mine, her mouth agape. “What?” she shrieked.

  For the next half an hour, I recounted my run-in with him, eliminating the parts where he’d called her a whore who’d seduced both of us for our money. I didn’t think leaving out the nastier things he’d said went against my vow to tell her the truth from now on.

  “The second he realized I’m in love with you, his whole demeanor changed. He went from trying to provoke me to outright extortion. When he said he had proof that you’d started the fire at the gallery, I lost my fucking mind. I should have come to you immediately, but I panicked. That caveman part of my brain that sometimes takes over where you’re concerned could only think about how I was willing to do anything to protect you.”

  “Of course I didn’t start that fire!” she snapped, pressing the heels of her palms against her forehead, her fingers digging into the loose waves at her crown. Clenching her hair in her fists, she growled. “What were you thinking, Preston? We talked about this. I don’t need you to protect me.”

  “And I know that. Really, I swear.”

  “Do you?” she barked doubtfully.

  “Yes,” I responded, my teeth chattering. “And if you’ll just let us go inside where it’s not so goddamn cold, I’ll prove it to you.” We’d been standing out here long enough that I could no longer keep my shivering at bay.

  “Oh my god!” she exclaimed, her eyes going wide as she finally noticed my body literally vibrating from the cold. “Yes, of course.” She stepped forward and pulled open my front door.

  When she stepped aside, I bolted through it, making a bee-line toward the Franklin stove in the far corner of my living room. I’d lit a fire when I’d first come home, and it was in full blaze. I held my hands out in front of me to absorb some of its heat into my skin.

  Rosalie came up behind me and wrapped her arms around my waist, resting her cheek against my back. “Just so you know, I’m still angry with you,” she whispered, “but I feel so bad for making you practically freeze to death.”

  The fact that we were in the midst of a significant argument that might end our relationship but she’d chosen to comfort me anyhow caused a thick lump to form in my throat. I set one of my hands atop hers. “I’m sorry I lied to you about what I was doing in Boston,” I said, my voice low.

  “I know,” she sighed. “What I don’t understand is why you lied.”

  I spun in the circle of her arms to face her, a thought suddenly forming. “How did you know? Did my dad contact you?” I couldn’t figure out how he would have. I’d used Rosalie’s first name when speaking to him, but not her last.

  She dropped her arms from around me and took a step backward. “Blake stopped by Speakeasy today.” Her voice was flat.

  “He did what?” My legs started moving of their own accord as I stalked a path back and forth across the living room, my blood suddenly boiling with anger. The only upside to my rage was that I wasn’t cold anymore. “Why didn’t you tell me?” It sounded ridiculous even as I said it.

  Rosalie raised a sardonic eyebrow. “I’m telling you now.”

  Right. Given all the secrets I’d kept recently, I had no right to question her. And it wasn’t as though she’d held onto the knowledge for three days and a secret trip to Boston, or anything.

  “I didn’t pay him, Rosalie, and I promise you, none of this was my idea. Here, let me show you.” I marched across the room to grab my laptop out of the leather satchel sitting on the counter of my kitchen’s peninsula. I opened the screen and pulled up the letter I’d received that morning from the law firm that handled all my dad’s business, then walked back across the room and passed the computer to her so she could read it herself.

  “What’s this?” she asked, her eyes rapidly scanning the document.

  It was a few pages of mostly legalese, but what it boiled down to was that my dad had had to name me the trustee in order for me to gain early access to the funds. And in my case, “early” wouldn’t have been fast enough to meet Blake’s demands. It would be at least another week before the money was transferred into a separate account I’d had to set up specifically to house a sum that large.

  “It turns out you don’t just wake up one day and decide to empty out a trust fund,” I explained. “Initially, Blake gave me seventy-two hours to pay up, but given all the hoops I had to jump through just to get that document, that was never going to happen.” I sat down on the edge of the coffee table. Swiping my suddenly sweaty palms over my jean-clad thighs, I looked up at her. “But even if there hadn’t been miles of bureaucratic red tape to cut through, I’d decided not to pay him after all.”
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  Her brows dipped into a deep vee of confusion as she closed the lid of my laptop and passed it silently back to me. I twisted, setting it behind me as she dropped down onto the sofa with an oof. “But he showed me the text where you told him the money would be hitting his account tomorrow?” It came out sounding more like a question than a statement of fact.

  “I don’t know what you saw, but it wasn’t from me.” I leaned to the side, fishing my phone out of my back pocket to pull up our actual exchange. Once I found it, I passed her my phone so she could see for my texts to Blake for herself.

  Eventually, she raised her eyes back up to mine. “I’m so confused right now.”

  I took my phone from her loose grip, sliding it back into my pocket. Tentatively, I reached forward again to circle her small, delicate hands in mine. “Even if I’d been able to get my hands on the money in time, I knew I couldn’t pay Blake. He’ll never be satisfied. There would always be demands for more. I didn’t want to give him that sort of power over me. Over us.”

  She blew out a long breath and cast her eyes to the ceiling. “I know how difficult this all must be for you,” she said, dropping her gaze back down to meet mine. “But to go behind my back to try and handle things yourself felt like such a betrayal. Like you’d just swooped in and taken away all the autonomy I’ve worked so hard to carve out for myself. It was such a … such a Blake thing to do.” Her words were spoken bitterly.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said, suddenly realizing that while I’d explained my behavior, I hadn’t actually apologized until now. “And I promise you, I get why you’re pissed. Honestly, I do. I lied to you about where I was and what I was doing, all so I could ride in like some white knight and save the day. It might have taken me a couple of days to get it right, but I know you’re not some damsel in distress that needs me to rescue you.”

  “No, I’m not,” she said, tears shimmering in her eyes.