by Jill Shalvis
“That’s understandable. You nearly died. And several others did,” Garrett said, and paused for a long beat. “I got there just after your first surgery. You’d had some unexpected complications that demanded a second, more urgent surgery. I kissed you just before they rolled you away, do you remember?”
She nodded. It was the last thing she remembered before going under, the comfort of his solid, steady presence.
“It was so bad.” He swallowed hard and shook his head. “The doctors weren’t giving you great odds. I had no idea if I was going to get to see you again.” His voice cracked, and so did her heart.
“And in some ways,” he went on, “I didn’t. I never saw that Brooke again.”
She reached for him and he pulled her in, hugging her tight for a very long moment.
When she finally pulled back, her eyes were wet, and she thought his might have been, too. “Look at yourself now,” he said firmly. “Not only are you still here, you’re stronger than you’ve ever been. You’re not just conquering your demons, Bee, you’re stomping all over them.”
“It seems like so long ago,” she said quietly. “And yet sometimes it feels like it just happened. After, I couldn’t do my job. I had to shift to behind the scenes, in a studio.” She closed her eyes. “I still let it mess with me.”
“Anyone would,” he said quietly. “But you beat the fear today.”
The thought brought a curve to her lips as he brushed his fingers along her jaw and into her hair. “The smile looks good on you.” Their eyes met and held, and the moment extended as he slowly leaned in and brushed her mouth with his. She could feel his breath, warm on her face. She could feel the heat of his body, just barely touching hers, and she wrapped her hands around his wrists. “Thanks for today,” she whispered.
In answer, he kissed her again. Drawn to his heat, his easy strength, the allure of his touch and what she knew it could do to her, she crawled into his lap. He pulled her in tight, his hands caressing and warming her now chilled limbs. Wanting to surrender to their crazy chemistry, she whispered his name and he pulled her down with him to the wild grass, his hands sliding up her thighs. He was deliciously heavy, and she was already forgetting that they weren’t going to do this anymore and was a second away from tearing his clothes off when he pulled back.
His phone was ringing, which was a real blessing, because they were in public. Isolated, but still, anyone could have come upon them. Not that that would’ve stopped them in the old days.
Garrett answered his phone, and sitting as close to him as she was, she had no trouble hearing the person on the other end. It was an elderly female voice asking to speak to Garrett Montgomery.
“Speaking,” he said.
“Garrett, this is your aunt, Rita Montgomery.”
She felt the shock go through him at that.
“Hello?” the woman asked, sounding worried. “These newfangled phones . . . Hello?”
“I’m here,” Garrett said. “I just wasn’t aware I had an aunt.”
“Oh. Well, my goodness,” the woman said. “I’m your father’s older sister, Rita. He’s never mentioned me then?”
“He’s never mentioned much of anything at all,” Garrett said. “How did you find me?”
“He pops in and out of my life as it suits him, the shithead. He told me you were living in the house you grew up in. One of the men in my assisted living facility has a little hacking hobby. He got me your number.”
“Interesting,” Garrett said. “And illegal.”
“I’m an old lady on a fixed income,” she said dryly. “I’m not worried you’re going to sue me.”
“What are you worried about?”
“My idiot brother. There’re some things you need to know.”
“Such as?”
“Such as, he’s got cancer. I’m sorry,” she said more softly into Garrett’s stunned silence. “But you needed to know.”
Garrett’s face was carefully blank, but Brooke could see the war of emotions in his dark gaze.
“He’s on meds, and some of them can create dementia-like symptoms,” his aunt said. “He should be staying with someone.”
“Why isn’t he staying with you?” Garrett asked.
“Are you hard of hearing, boy? He’s an asshole and I don’t want him.” Then she disconnected.
Garrett pinched the bridge of his nose, like maybe he was getting a headache.
“You okay?” Brooke asked him.
“Yeah.”
But of course he wasn’t. “I’m so sorry, Garrett.”
He shook his head. “Not your problem.” Looking far more tense than he had when they’d come up here, he got to his feet. “Let’s go.”
They took the easy way down without speaking, and the silence continued until Garrett pulled over in front of Mindy and Linc’s house. She turned to face him only to find that his expression read Closed Off! Do Not Enter! “At the risk of repeating myself,” she said quietly, “do you want to talk about it?”
His smile was ironic and not super open. “I wonder how many times I’ve asked you that very question.”
She nodded, belatedly realizing she’d almost forgotten that even though there were still feelings between them—and chemistry, buckets of chemistry—they weren’t going to get a happily ever after. She probably needed to write that down somewhere until it sank in.
Chapter 16
“The apple and the tree and all that.”
Since his day was already screwed up, Garrett did what he knew he needed to. He took himself and his gut ache back to the convenience store. He also had heartache, which he knew was from letting Brooke walk away. She wasn’t good for him. She was leaving again soon, and she’d already destroyed him once.
But.
It was always the but that got him, and this was a big but.
He still loved her.
He was an idiot.
His dad’s beat-up old truck was in the store lot. As before, Snoop stuck his big old head out in greeting, mouthing not one but two tennis balls, which he managed to huff out a hello around.
Garrett ruffled his fur and drew a deep breath. When he walked into the store, his dad looked up from where he was stocking cigarettes behind the counter and blinked. And then smiled so bright it actually hurt. “Son,” he said, as if seeing Garrett again was the highlight of his day.
“What time do you get off?” Garrett asked. “We need to talk.”
A young guy walked into the shop wearing low-slung board shorts in a loud Hawaiian print, flip-flops, and a beater tank top advertising a local brewery. He had long surfer hair and a lazy smile on his face. His name was Ace, and Garrett had gone to school with his older brother, who’d died of an overdose a decade ago. Ace had given up all drugs but weed—“It’s a supplement, man”—and when his grandpa died and left him the store, he’d taken it over.
“Thanks for taking my shift for me,” Ace said to Garrett’s dad. “How did it go?”
“As you said it would—boring as hell.”
Ace grinned. “Right on.” He handed over some cash. “I know you’re looking for something more permanent, and if anything comes up, I’ll let you know.”
Garrett’s dad’s smile dimmed just a little bit. “Sure. I understand.”
They walked out of the store together, the two of them standing in the hot sun for a moment, taking in the day. Well, his dad was taking in the day. Garrett was arguing with himself. “Were you ever going to tell me that I’ve got an aunt?” he finally asked. “Or that you have cancer?”
His dad looked pained. “No.”
“Jesus, Dad. Why the hell not?”
“Because my sister hates me—for good reasons, obviously—and you didn’t need any help in that arena.”
“And the cancer?”
His dad shrugged. “If alcoholism and fast living didn’t kill me, I’ve got a hard time believing cancer will.”
Garrett ran a hand over his face, and not for the first time caught
his dad making the same gesture at the exact same time. They stared at each other.
His dad gave a very small smile. “The apple and the tree and all that.”
“You need to come stay with me.”
“That’s a very kind offer,” he said, without an ounce of sarcasm, which was more than Garrett could’ve managed. “But I can’t put you out like that.”
“The nights are still cold, Dad. You clearly need money, and watching you in that job, having to lift heavy stuff . . .” Garrett shook his head. “Just come stay for a few days until we figure something else out.”
His dad looked away, his jaw muscles working as the famous Montgomery pride battled common sense, but he eventually gave a single nod. “Okay. Thanks. But just for a few days.”
When Garrett pulled into his driveway a few minutes later, his dad’s beat-up old truck followed. They got out and Garrett looked at Snoop. He hadn’t thought this far ahead. “I’ve got Ann’s cats. They hate dogs.”
“Snoop can handle them,” his dad said.
Sitting at his dad’s feet, Snoop smiled around his tennis balls. He was game.
But Garrett shook his head. Snoop wasn’t near tough enough for this. “Let me go in first and try to corral them into the laundry room—”
“Son,” his dad said. “Trust me.”
Garrett gave him a look.
His dad nodded. “Okay, so you’re not on the trust-me train, I get that.” He put his hand on the porch railing and closed his eyes.
Garrett frowned and set a hand on his dad’s arm. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Just tired.”
“When did you eat last?”
His dad turned to Snoop. “Do you remember? It was breakfast, right? You had a leftover burger that the nice lady at the campsite gave us.”
“I mean when was the last time you ate,” Garrett said.
His dad shrugged, and Garrett shook his head. “I’ll make us something right away.” He opened the front door. “Be cool,” he told the dog. “They’re going to bitch at you, and I can’t help that. I promised Ann they’d be safe until they die, but I’m pretty sure they’re immortal.”
The so-called welcoming committee was waiting. The three of them froze in unison when they caught sight of Snoop, sending him death glares.
Snoop stayed still, panting softly due to the heat, but—and Garrett would swear this on a stack of Bibles—smiling at the cats.
The old biddies slowly came forward to inspect poor Snoop. They circled him, sniffing at him like they smelled something rotten. To his credit, Snoop just sat quietly, accepting, bowing his head to each cat so she could sniff his face. Finally, the cats got bored, turned their attention to Garrett, and demanded food.
“Are you kidding me?” Garrett asked in disbelief. “Where’s the dog hate?”
The ladies turned their expressions into mirrors of innocence.
His dad was walking through the place slowly, craning his neck to take it all in. “You’ve been renovating.”
“No. I mean, yeah, but not lately.”
“Why not?”
Garrett loved this old house, but it needed a lot of TLC, which he hadn’t devoted to it in a long time. He had more jobs than he knew what to do with, but that wasn’t what was holding him up. He figured what was the rush, when he wasn’t close to filling it with a family of his own?
“I used to take you on my jobs with me sometimes,” his dad said, running his hand along a ladder leaning against the foyer wall.
“I remember.”
His dad looked up in surprise. “You do?”
“I remember you taking me to Caro’s Café to fix some electrical problem in their kitchen. The owner, Carolyn, used to feed me. Once I dropped a plate and it broke. You told her you did it.”
His dad shook his head. “Don’t remember that. But what I do remember is Carolyn’s cooking. She’s passed now, I hear. Her daughters have taken over the café. Wonder if either of them cooks like their momma.” He nudged the toe of his boot against a metal toolbox that had seen better days. “Well, would you look at that.”
“It was Ann’s,” Garrett said. “She passed it down to me.”
His dad had an odd look on his face.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Dad, it’s something. Speak your peace.”
“Those are my tools, my toolbox. I gave them to her to give to you when you were ready for them.”
So all this time he’d been using his dad’s tools. He had no idea how to feel about that. Mad? Sad? Maybe a combination of both. There’d been a point in his life, several points, when in spite of Ann’s love, he’d felt unwanted. Unworthy. And most definitely pissed off at the world. He had plenty of anger left over for his dad, and he wondered now, if he’d known the guy had come back, seen him happy, and chosen to let him stay and continue being happy . . . would that have changed anything?
They both turned at the sound of glass breaking.
Snoop’s tail had swept a glass off the coffee table.
“Damn,” his dad said. “Sorry, son.” Moving forward, he dropped to his knees to reach for the glass shards. “Snoop’s new at this whole inside thing.”
“Don’t.” Garrett nudged his dad out of the way so he didn’t cut himself. “I’ve got it. No worries,” he said to the sheepish-looking dog. “It’s okay.” He looked at his dad. “I thought you’ve been out of prison for a year, and that you’ve had Snoop since shortly after that.”
“That’s right.”
Garrett stared at him, taking in his dad’s disheveled appearance and realizing the truth. His dad had been camping out, or living in his truck, this whole time. Maybe a combo of both. And so had Snoop. He rose with the broken glass and moved into the kitchen, not liking the ache in his chest as he tossed the glass into the trash. He opened his fridge to find them all food and saw the new six-pack of beer he’d just bought. He picked it up and shoved it into a cabinet, out of sight, so his dad wouldn’t be tempted.
“What are you doing?”
He turned to face his dad, going for nonchalance. “Nothing.”
His dad gave him a get real glance. “My vice was hard booze, not beer, but thanks for the vote of confidence.”
Garrett blew out a breath and opened his mouth, but his dad shook his head.
“Don’t bother. I get it. I’m not exactly working with a stellar track record here. But I’m not drinking again, son. Ever.”
Garrett wasn’t sure he bought that, but okay. He put the beer back and found his dad looking into the laundry room. “Do you need to do a load?”
“I go to the laundromat.”
“You don’t have to do that now.” Garrett gestured to his washer and dryer, which was open, because that’s how he did things. He managed to wash his clothes and get them into the dryer, but he rarely, if ever, remembered to retrieve and fold them. Instead, he lived out of the dryer. Today, like every day, a few items were hanging out of the machine from his morning search for fresh clothes. A pair of jeans, a T-shirt, and . . . a bra.
Brooke’s, which she’d left here the night they’d slept together. He nudged the clothes all the way into the dryer and shut the door.
“You’re seeing someone,” his dad said.
“No.”
His dad raised a brow. “So you’re one of them cross-dressers?”
“Okay, I’m seeing someone. Sort of. Maybe.” Remembering how Brooke had left his truck a little while ago thanks to his own asshole behavior, he ran his hand over his face. “I don’t know.”
His dad smiled. “She’s got you all twisted up. That’s the very best kind of woman. What is she to you?”
His first instinct was to say “everything.” She was everything to him. But in truth, that was a pipe dream, and an old one at that, so he just shook his head. “There aren’t really words.”
His dad nodded. “Yep, some women are like that.”
Wasn’t that the truth.
Chapter 17
“I came, I saw, and I forgot what I was doing.”
Over the next few days, Brooke went through the motions.
She took photos and made time early each morning to sneak out to the Playground. And if she had Garrett to thank for that, she hadn’t yet mentioned it to him.
He’d been scarce. Okay, so she’d also done a bang-up job of avoiding him. Mindy, too, though her sister seemed to be avoiding her as well. And hey, if they didn’t talk, they couldn’t fight.
Denial, she was thy queen.
Her camera had once again become an extension of her, and it was currently the one good thing in her life. She took pics of the kids, her sister, Linc . . . even Garrett. She’d gotten pictures of his dad and Snoop, too, and as she did, a little voice inside her had said that if Garrett could forgive his father, he could certainly forgive her. But the truth was both simple and hard to take: She hadn’t really forgiven herself.
Now it was late, and she was lying on the futon telling herself to get up and get ready for bed. She needed to get out of her clothes and brush her teeth, because she wouldn’t be able to fall asleep without going through her nighttime routine. But for the first time in her life, her OCD left her alone as she stared at the ceiling, wondering what Garrett was doing and if he was thinking of her. She was certainly thinking of him. What would he say to a late-night visitor?
Her phone buzzed. It was Cole and Tommy, holding her hostage in a group text.
Tommy: You ever coming back or what?
Brooke: Of course I am.
Cole: Don’t tease me.
Brooke: No, I mean it. And I want to talk to you when I get there.
Cole: Yes.
Brooke: But you don’t even know what I want to talk about.