by Leddy Harper
Her bottom lip trembled with emotion, and all I wanted to do was kiss her.
But I had to get through this first.
“The first night you stayed at my house, when you came out of the bathroom in one of my old shirts and then fell asleep in my arms, I knew, without a doubt, that I more than liked you, but my past had messed me up too badly to move beyond that. After my last relationship fell apart, I’d convinced myself that I was incapable of loving someone. I had deep-seated trust issues that prevented me from letting anyone get too close, and honestly, I thought that was something I would always have to deal with. I didn’t see the light at the end of that tunnel. Until you.”
I had to take a deep breath before I lost my composure.
“Because of you, I was able to deal with those issues, and for the first time in my life, I’m ready to give something my all. In fact, I want to put a hundred and ten percent of myself into a relationship with you…if that’s what you want.” I held my breath and waited for her response, but just as she opened her mouth to speak, I realized that I had forgotten one important piece. “What I’m trying to say is…I red heart you, Tasha.”
A tear slipped down her cheek before getting lost in the smile that curled her lips. “Really? You’re sure about this? You love me?”
“Without a doubt. I knew the hearts in my eyes were red as soon as I discovered that you were gone. The thought of you not being there crushed my soul; the distance between us wrapped around my neck and choked me. I know it’s real because I’ve never felt that way about anyone.”
Her smile grew impossibly wider just before she whispered, “I love you, too.”
Never had a kiss felt more right, more powerful, more…everything than when my lips met hers after weeks of suffering without them. I didn’t care what the future looked like as long as I had her next to me.
Epilogue
Tasha
It was the big reveal for the arcade hall at the youth center. Dave and I had been busting our butts for the last ten months to get it done, and now it was time to celebrate. Unfortunately, rather than do so in a small setting, Adam insisted on making it a big deal.
“You should be really proud of yourself.” Jacoby came up behind me and kissed me on my cheek. Not only had he been a constant part of my support system ever since showing up on my front doorstep, but he’d also become such a major part of my entire life since then.
I smiled and returned the sentiment. “Well, I wouldn’t have been able to do it without you.”
A few days after our heart-to-heart, Jacoby had gone back to his sister’s and packed up his things—Sir Terry included. My apartment was small and barely held the three of us, but we didn’t have to deal with it for long, because a few months ago, we all moved into a bigger place. Still together, but somewhere with more room for personal space.
With the time I’d spent getting the arcade hall up and going, I hadn’t been able to get a job, but that was okay. Jacoby had managed to get a job with the landscaping company he used to work for when he lived with his ex, which was less than an hour away. That had helped us tremendously. I still had the diamond that Adam had given me as payment for my time spent portraying Tiff—which I’d discovered had a price tag upward of a cool mill. So at least I knew I’d be able to repay him when the time was right.
“I’m getting really annoyed with you giving Jacoby all the credit.” Dave playfully pouted and crossed his arms in feigned attitude. “You used to always sing my praises, and now he gets it all. What’s next, Tosh? Will you start introducing me as your roommate?”
“Oh, I’m sorry…what should I be calling you?” I didn’t bother to hide my smile.
I was in too good of a mood to pretend to be anything other than ridiculously happy.
Just then, Adam approached us, dressed in a pair of dress slacks, a white button-up shirt, and a tie decorated with Mario and Luigi. He made me laugh. I doubted he’d touched a console since the mid-2000s.
“You two have exceeded my expectations.” The excitement brightened his brown eyes and widened his smiling lips. “I can’t wait to see what you guys do next.”
Halfway through this project, Adam had come to us regarding another—bigger—proposal. This time, though, it involved Jacoby as well. He’d spent years pondering ways to give back, one idea being a scholarship program for teens, but he had never been completely sold on that concept. Once we began this project, it’d taken him less than six months to settle on the perfect solution.
Rather than create a scholarship in his name, Adam had decided to invest in youth centers all over the country. It was a brilliant idea, one we couldn’t turn down. While Dave worked with the kids, finding out what they all wanted out of the center, my job was to design the arts centers, which included the arcades. We’d agreed that every building needed an area designated for gamers. And Adam had hired Jacoby to design the lawns, thanks to his landscaping skills.
The one downfall was that it would require a bit of traveling, but we’d agreed that it didn’t matter as long as we were all together. We’d labeled ourselves the three musketeers, which was where Adam had gotten the name for his charity: The Fourth Musketeer Foundation.
Jacoby shook Adam’s hand with a smile. “We already have so many plans drawn up. I can’t wait for you to see them.”
“Well…” He slapped Jacoby on his shoulder and squeezed it for a beat. “Let’s get through this so I can take a look. After what I’ve seen, I just know the next concept will blow my mind.” Adam then turned his attention to me and lowered his voice when he added, “I saw your mom come in. Just wanted to give you a heads-up…didn’t know if you were aware that she would be here today.”
I nodded my thanks while frantically scouring the room for her face. I’d sent her an invite, but like with all things in my life, I hadn’t expected her to actually show up. I knew she’d come if she knew Adam had any part of this, so I’d purposely left his name off the card.
“Are you okay?” Jacoby and Dave asked at the same time.
Again, I could only manage to nod. Truthfully, I was terrified—not of my mother, but at the possibility that she could ruin this entire ordeal. I’d grown up in Tiff’s shadow, not because Tiff had always been so much better at everything than me, but because my mom had aimed the biggest, brightest light at my sister, creating such a large shadow. I’d always been okay with it, though, because I didn’t care to have that attention. However, for the first time in my life, I was more than proud of this accomplishment, and I wanted to show it off.
Someone came up from behind me and tapped me on the shoulder. I was too focused on looking for my mom that it startled me, causing me to gasp and turn quickly on my heel. When I spun around, I came face-to-face with a large bouquet of flowers rather than a person. Normally, this would be when most people swooned and put their noses to the blooms, thankful for the sentiment. But not me.
Rather than swoon, I gasped. Well, it was more of a half-gasp, half-shriek. And instead of pulling the arrangement to my face to smell the fragrance, I took the bouquet by the silk-wrapped stems and used it as a weapon. Luckily, I didn’t go too far before I understood that I was bashing Ty over the head with more than a dozen roses.
“Why do you always do that?” he asked while frantically fixing his hair. Not that it was messed up. That man used enough styling products that he’d be found in the aftermath of a hurricane, not a hair out of place.
“Maybe if you stopped sneaking up on me, then I wouldn’t always attack you.”
I’d heard from Ty a few times since leaving Tiff’s that day, though this was the first time I’d seen him in person. I’d never admit it, but I sort of missed the guy. I’d gotten so used to having him in my business every day that things had felt a little off for a bit.
Excited to see him, I wrapped my arms around his neck and squeezed, except it didn’t last long. After a second, my mother showed up, and let’s just say she wasn’t as happy to see Ty as I was. Apparen
tly, things between him and Tiff didn’t go so well after I’d left.
“Why would you invite him here?” Mom moaned. “After all the problems he’s caused…”
“Well, I’m not Tiff, so I didn’t see the point in not inviting him.” After I’d walked away from my role as Tiffany Lewis, my sister fired Ty. Apparently, with no one to film for her, she was pulled from the show, ruining all her plans for a bathing suit line—as well as whatever popularity she had left.
Ty, likely feeling awkward, squeezed my hand and offered a sympathetic smile before excusing himself. I didn’t want him to leave, but I also didn’t want to subject him to more of this.
“If I knew he’d be here, I wouldn’t have come.” Leave it to my mother to be melodramatic.
I so badly wanted to scream at her, shake her until she realized that I existed, too. But I didn’t. Instead, I rolled my eyes and groaned, letting my annoyance show. “He hasn’t done anything to me, so I don’t see a problem with having him here.”
“What do you mean he hasn’t done anything to you?” Her eyes widened as if this news was more shocking than Janet Jackson’s wardrobe malfunction. “If not for him, none of this would’ve ever happened.”
That was enough to earn Dave’s attention. “Excuse me? You must be confused.”
Jacoby now lent his attention to the conversation, though he wouldn’t dare speak against my mother. Regardless of how obnoxious she could be, he just didn’t have it in him to voice his opinion, so he simply stood by and took it all in.
“Surely you know the hand he played in it all…” She stared at us, dramatically flicking her gaze between Dave, Jacoby, and me. Then she proceeded to tell us the most ridiculous story I’d ever heard.
It’d taken me less than two minutes to locate Ty—he was with Adam, no surprise there. Immediately, I took his hand and dragged him to a quiet corner. “Did you seriously orchestrate the entire thing? With Tiff and me? And Serenity and Adam and Jeannine?”
He was quiet for a few moments, although that could’ve had something to do with my paranoid questioning. But then he silenced me when he confidently said, “Yes. I was behind it all.”
That was not what I had expected him to say.
“How?” It was the only question I could come up with.
“It wasn’t like I set the whole thing up. My original plan had Tiff taking the fall for it all—literally—but then she had to go get botched plastic surgery. At first, I thought I’d have to give up on the idea of making Tiffany Lewis lay in the bed she made. That thought actually saddened me. Then I remembered you, so I convinced her to let me see if you would stand in for her.”
The world spun around me, though I remained completely still, becoming dizzier the longer it dragged on. “Wait…” I held up one finger while taking a deep breath in preparation for my next question. “You mean to tell me that you had this all planned out from the very beginning? That when you knocked on my door and offered me money to pretend to be my sister, you knew then that this all would happen?”
“Yes and no.”
“I’m going to need you to elaborate, please.”
Ty signed, his shoulders drooping the slightest bit. For the first time since meeting him, he appeared to be human. If I hadn’t been in such shock, it might’ve had an impact on things, but since I was in a fog of complete disbelief, it didn’t have any effect on my feelings toward him.
He cleared his throat—a sign of discomfort—and began his sordid tale of how I’d gotten here. “Shortly after she signed the contract for the show, I found out about her and…well, others. It was the last straw for me.”
“So you decided to set her up?”
He nodded, as if the answer was so obvious that he couldn’t believe I needed to ask. “I don’t have to tell you what kind of person she was, nor do I have to tell you how great Adam is. I guess I got tired of watching her use and abuse people without consequence.”
“I take it that means Serenity was involved, too?”
“Not knowingly.” He regarded me for a moment before elaborating. “She was tipped off anonymously. There was no way for it to come back to me—I made sure of it.”
“Then how does my mom know?”
“Tiff found out—well, not exactly. She accused me of it after you left. I denied it, but she didn’t believe me. Doesn’t really matter, though. What’s done is done. She got hers, and that’s all I wanted.”
“Why are you telling me the truth?”
A small smile curled the corners of his lips. “Because you’re a good person who deserves to know. I would’ve told you sooner, but I knew that the only way for it to work was if you were completely taken by surprise.”
I nodded, absorbing all this information. “What about Adam? Does he know?”
“Yeah, I told him…along with the fact that your sister refused to pay you a cent.”
“That means he knew that I had been nothing more than a pawn in your game when he came to town for the project proposal…” I whispered to myself, although it didn’t stop anyone else from hearing.
Ty sighed and stared at his polished shoes for a moment. “I’m really sorry, Tasha. You didn’t deserve to be played like that. I’ll understand if you never forgive me, but I would appreciate it if you could at least try to see my point and motivation.”
“Oh, I totally do.” I smiled, easing some of his tension—along with Jacoby’s and Dave’s. “Tiff is my sister, so trust me…I know the good, the bad, and the ugly. And I wholeheartedly believe that she should’ve paid the price for the damage she helped create. However, that doesn’t mean I think you had any right to orchestrate it.”
Ty’s relief fell away, and with a sad grin, he said, “I agree.”
“But with that being said, if you hadn’t done what you did, I never would’ve met Jacoby.” I placed my hand on Jacoby’s forearm and met his stare. His smile brightened his eyes, lighting my world on fire. “So, I guess I can’t be too upset with you.”
Dave must’ve been bored on the sidelines, because he piped in with, “Yeah, and without Ty, you never would’ve gotten that massive rock.”
“Speaking of Tiff’s ring…what are you going to do with it?”
I wasn’t sure why Ty cared, but I answered anyway. “When the time’s right, I want to buy a house. It’s going to be a bit tricky, because I’ll need one next door for Dave. Now that Adam’s literally funding my entire dream, there’s no real point in using the money for that, and it’s not like I need a lot. So for now, I’m holding off until I have a real reason to sell it.”
Ty and Dave spent the next ten minutes offering suggestions on ways to spend the cash while Jacoby and I laughed off every last idea. Then Adam came over to inform us that it was time to cut the ribbon, so we said bye to Ty—just in case he left before we returned—and moved around to the front of the hall.
Cameras flashed while Dave, Jacoby, and I smiled, posed next to the giant red ribbon, holding a massive pair of plastic scissors. My heart pounded away in my chest, only to come to a screeching halt when Jacoby dropped to one knee.
I could see his mouth move, but the ringing in my ears kept me from hearing the words.
However, I didn’t need to hear them; I knew what they were.
The scene couldn’t have been more perfect if it had been scripted. Bulbs flickered around us, music drifted through the speakers, people gathered about, and then there was Dave, jumping around as if Jacoby had proposed to him.
I couldn’t be upset with the way things had unfolded…
Because it led me here.
Hey You!!
As always, there are a few people who have been by my side through the process of this book, and because of them, I managed to make it through without (too many) drunken nights.
Kev: You are my rock, my safe place, my sounding board, my biggest cheerleader, and everything in between. I still can’t believe you’re mine…and I’m never letting you go!
Marlo: I can’t thank
you enough for all you do. Even with your world falling apart, you still manage to find time to be my lobster! I love you, lobs!!
Mimo: You’re an angel. I think God every day for putting you and your family in my life. Here’s to much brighter days ahead!
Lisa: I feel like you’ve always been there, so it’s strange to think that you aren’t mentioned in every single one of my books. Well, from here on out you will be!!
Amanda: You’re the greatest Biffle anyone could ask for! Get ready for that sponsorship we talked about!!
Crystal: Thank you for being the first person to show me what true support is. I love you, best friend!!!
Emily: Through thick and thin, you’ve always remained by my side. I can’t thank you enough for always having my back.
Autumn: I think I’m most proud of the fact that you haven’t kicked me to the curb yet!! HAHA!
Robin: You’ve once again given my book an amazing cover! You’re the best!!!
Julie: I’ve always known you were special, but to now have you on my team in two different aspects just proves that! Thanks for your detailed eye on my baby!
Angela: I can’t thank you enough for giving me whatever time you can spare. I love you, girl!!
Sarah: You’re one of a kind!! Love you, girl!!
Jeannine: Sorry I made your husband a dick…it was kind of a last minute idea lol!! Other than that, I hope you like how I portrayed the character with your name.
Lauren: I couldn’t very well have a Jeannine without a Lauren as her bff!!
Nicole: No matter how much time has passed between conversations, always know that you’re in my thoughts, and I think the world of you!
Shari: I’m so excited to have you in this book! You rock! Love you, y0u crazy lady!!