“Not. Going. To. Happen,” Quinn said softly, echoing her words from before. Kara shut her eyes. That was a mistake.
Her world narrowed down to Ben’s warm hand resting on her leg. She could feel the heat, the heart, the man himself through the silk of her hose. She must have stayed in that position for a while because her arm began to tremble with the effort of being held out for so long. She didn’t care. She had decided to just wait for Jesenia. Quinn’s touch was soft as he cupped her hand and gently closed it and placed it back onto her lap. She felt him sit down next to her. She jumped when he placed his hand on other her leg.
“Shhh, it’s going to be okay, Kara. You’re in control.” She settled down and relaxed, her eyes not quite as tightly closed. Both men began to trace circles on her legs with their thumbs, easing just slightly past the top of her stocking. She heard Ben’s breath hiss inward the first time he touched the skin of her thigh.
“Will you talk to us, Kachawli?” Ben finally asked.
“I’m not your sweetheart, Ben. I’m not your anything. I’m not anybody’s anything,” she said sadly, thinking about the fiasco with Jim. She was relieved when he said nothing to dispute her. She was too damned tired for a fight.
“We’re not going to chase you out of your home,” Quinn said in a quiet voice. “Let us drive you home. You need to rest. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
Kara opened her eyes and looked at Ben first. She knew he needed the connection the most. “Jesenia will be here in a couple of minutes. I’m going to her house.” Ben gave her a warm look and tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear.
“She sounds like a good friend, Kara. I’m glad you have her.” She searched his face and found nothing but sincerity. She turned to Quinn.
“Please, take the key. I need some time with my friend, and I’d appreciate if you could feed the dogs.” She couldn’t quite meet his eyes, so she spoke to the pulse in his neck.
“You’re wrong, you know,” he said in his raspy voice. She waited. “You are something. You mean the world to us, Kara.” She watched as he swallowed, and his pulse sped up. God, she was tired.
“Will you take the key?” His hand covered hers, and she transferred it to him, careful not to look anyplace but his neck. She didn’t need the visuals. “Thank you.”
“Kara?” Kara looked up at her friend’s voice.
“Hi, Jess, I didn’t hear you drive up.” Jessenia looked at both men, and then back at Kara and held out her hand.
“Come on, Kara, let’s get you to my house, okay?” she asked, sounding a little like Kara’s mother.
“Yeah, that sounds really good,” Kara said in a tired and dazed voice. She started to get off the bench and stumbled a bit on one of her heels. Both men stood with her and easily steadied her.
“My car’s over here,” Jesenia said, indicating an SUV with a nursery logo on it. When Kara continued to stand on the sidewalk just staring at the vehicle, Quinn bent and picked her up and carried her to the passenger door. When Jesenia hit the key fob to unlock the door, he placed Kara inside.
“I can walk, Quinn.”
“I know.”
Kara looked out the windshield and saw Ben talking to Jess. Then Jess got in the car and started to drive to her house.
“So, the show went great, but life sucks, huh?” Jess supplied, making Kara laugh.
“I love you, Jess.”
“Yeah, but you would have called Josie first if she didn’t have a baby, because she would have fed you cinnamon rolls.” Kara laughed again. She really liked the friends she had chosen.
“So what were you and Ben talking about?”
“You kicked him to the curb, and that man is fine. Maybe I was asking him out.”
Kara bit back a gasp and wanted to kick herself. What the hell? She knew her friend was teasing her, but for a millisecond she was sickened at the very thought. She gave herself a mental shake. She took a deep breath and smiled. “Seriously, Jess, what was that about?”
“They’re going to follow us back to my house. Just to make sure we get in okay. No biggie.” That made Kara chuckle. Jess had a little bit of her parent’s Middle Eastern accent, so to hear her say ‘no biggie’ was funny. “I’m glad you’re laughing about them following us, I thought you might be mad.”
“Not mad, resigned.” Kara dropped her head against the seat rest and closed her eyes. “I’m tired. I’m just going to rest my eyes for a second.”
“No problem, Kara. It sounds like it’s been a bitch of a night.” Kara let the country music station roll over her, not even noticing when the vehicle stopped and her car door opened.
“Quinn, I told you I can walk.” Kara heard her voice, but it seemed to come from somewhere outside of her head. She looked up and saw beautiful, caramel-colored eyes looking down at her, and she sighed in relief. Quinn. She wrapped her arms around his neck and breathed in his scent. The collar of his shirt was stiff, and it didn’t feel good. “Hurts,” she muttered.
“What hurts, sweetheart?”
“Your shirt,” she whispered into his neck, enjoying the feeling of being carried. She heard the door being opened and smelled ginger and paprika and knew she must be in Jess’ house.
“In here,” called Jess’ voice. Kara felt herself being laid down on a soft bed. She knew it was Quinn who kissed her forehead. Then she felt the soft brush of Ben’s lips on hers.
“Sleep well, my Kachawli.”
Chapter 11
They both eyed the couch sourly. There was no way either of them would fit comfortably on it. “Rock, paper, scissors?” Quinn asked. Ben nodded, and didn’t protest when his brother won. He went over to the hall closet and pulled out the linens that Kara had told them about. He threw them on the floor. The floor was going to be more comfortable than trying to fold in half on a couch that looked like a loveseat. He thought longingly of Kara’s bed, not because it would be comfortable, but because it would smell like her and it would be one way to feel close to her. But he had lost that privilege. Or, maybe she was right. It would be a more accurate statement to say that he had thrown away that privilege.
Ben stripped out of the suit, taking care to put it back into the garment bag in the hope that he might have another reason to need it this trip. Then he threw on jeans and a sweatshirt to go feed and play with the dogs. Sundance was mostly white and had grown up larger than Butch, but Butch was definitely more dominant. Must be the name, Ben thought with a grin. He’d seen two soup bones in the fridge, but before he resorted to bribery, he wanted to see how he would fare with the dogs on his own. He needn’t have worried. They treated him like an old friend. Apparently, the bonding they had done when they were pups had held true.
“Come on, guys, why don’t we take a run?” Ben started sprinting around the perimeter of the property, enjoying the feel of the earth giving beneath his shoes, and the crisp, black, diamond-studded sky above him. He needed to clear his head. Sundance ran at his side while Butch raced ahead, occasionally looking back as if to urge him on. By the third time around, Ben was finally beginning to feel a definite ache in his side, which he relished. It went along with the ache in his heart.
He dropped down onto the loamy grass near an evergreen tree, and the dogs immediately rushed him, trying to lure him into wrestling matches. He made some halfhearted attempts but soon stopped. After a while, the dogs decided to lie down and rest with him. Soon they were dozing and he was looking up at the night sky, reliving the events of the night. Seeing her for the first time in over a year and a half almost brought him to his knees. He felt like he was seeing his own personal view of heaven, the woman he loved. And since it was just him and the dogs, he would admit that his view of heaven was made a whole lot better when he got a view of Kara’s newly formed butt. It was fantastic. The woman had put on some weight, and it had gone to all the right places. He couldn’t wait to get his hands on that heart-shaped ass!
The worst had to be finding Kara sitting alone on the bench on Main S
treet, well past midnight. What kind of asshole would leave a woman abandoned like that? Having her dismiss them at the gallery had been expected, but to find her looking so sad and alone almost broke his heart, at least when he wasn’t focusing on the fucker who had left her there.
Then there had been the meltdown—okay, a mild meltdown. Come to think of it, in all the time he had known her, he had only seen her drink one beer or one glass of wine, and tonight he saw her drink two glasses of champagne rather quickly. Then there was the shock of seeing them. Something big had gone down between her and the perfect surgeon boyfriend. She seemed to almost be in shock. It was the only way she would have let Quinn carry her around like that. She had been too pissed earlier that evening.
Part of him wanted to respect her wishes and be gone by the time she came home tomorrow, but he knew they wouldn’t be. They had to find out where they stood. Ben knew it was bad. Quinn didn’t, but Ben did. He needed to know how bad. At least he knew the boyfriend was out of the picture, but he never thought that was going to be the real issue. The problem was always going to be their betrayal of her, the way they hadn’t listened to Kara. Fuck, this was a fucking mess. He deserved the teeny tiny couch.
* * * *
It was two days later, and Kara called them inside. The dogs ran to the door, thinking they were going to be let into the house, too. It was one of their biggest treats.
“Butch. Sundance. Stay.” She hated letting them down. She would have preferred letting the two men down. But they kept showing up, and until they had this out, they would keep showing up, so she didn’t have a choice. At least they weren’t smiling. They understood she was doing this under duress. Good.
The morning Jess dropped her off, she managed to get them to leave with her icy demeanor, but they had shown up the next morning with a pink box. Apparently, her Achilles heel was well known. She had still gotten them to leave. But this morning, she heard them when she woke up, playing with the dogs, and realized that they weren’t going to take no for an answer.
She’d showered, blown and brushed her hair dry, and put on some makeup, all forms of armor. She was going to need all of the protection she could get. She turned around and walked back through the kitchen into the living room, knowing they were following her. She heard them close the door to the back porch. She turned around in front of the fireplace and crossed her arms. She just stood there looking at them, willing them to start the conversation. She knew she’d be the one to finish it. Finish this whole goddamn mess.
“You probably guessed that we got here on the night of your show because your brothers called,” Quinn started, and she just stared at him. “What you don’t know is that we were going to be here within the next six weeks, regardless of your brothers’ call.” She didn’t believe him. It must have shown.
“Kara, really we were. We have been in talks to buy Kuba Charters. The financing is almost done.” She knew Kuba. It was a good recreational charter business here in Fate Harbor. She didn’t believe them. This was something they had just hurriedly concocted when the boys had told them about Jim. They just didn’t want somebody else playing with something they considered theirs, even if they had decided not to play with it themselves.
“We sold most of the interest in the boats to Randy and Kyle. Kyle got married to Christine, remember her?” Kara couldn’t help flinching. Kyle had just started dating her the last time Ben and Quinn had told her to leave.
“Will Kyle and Randy be out on the boats, even though they’re married?” Kara kept her tone mild. She smiled as she saw she wasn’t the only one who could flinch.
“Sometimes,” Quinn answered. Ben just looked ill. Join the club, she thought. “Kara, this wasn’t something that we just did on the fly. We’ve been working toward it since you left. We just needed some time to pull it together.” Kara hated that tiny little bit of her heart that fluttered at what he was saying, and she ruthlessly pushed it down. It really didn’t matter. What mattered is what they had done. They didn’t trust her to be their partner. They didn’t care about her feelings. They had treated her like so much garbage again and again. Nobody who really loved someone could do that. What was love without respect, communication, and basic fucking caring? She wanted what her parents had. Hell, despite everything, Jim had treated her better. He had been fucking nice to her.
They had to leave. She was getting close to feeling again. She had spent months closed up in this house, telling everyone that she had an artistic epiphany that she was working on for an upcoming show and she couldn’t be disturbed. They’d believed her, thinking she had just gotten back from New Mexico after having taught a class. Instead she just curled up and died a little more each day. She had to get rid of them before the same thing happened to her again.
“You need to leave.”
“Didn’t you hear us? We’ve been working on this since almost the day you left, sweetheart,” Quinn walked over to her and stood a foot in front of her. “It was always our plan for us to be together.”
“Then you should have let me stay,” she said in a clipped tone. “Now leave.” Quinn reached out for her, and she side stepped him. “Please, don’t touch me.”
“Kara, you aren’t listening—”
“No! You aren’t listening, Quinn! I asked you to leave. I told you that we’re through. I explained why.”
“But, baby, you haven’t.” The man was clearly bewildered. Jesus, he couldn’t even buy a clue. She looked over at Ben and saw that he understood it all. But she had strongly suspected he had understood even while it was happening, which made everything even worse. It was like she was being beaten, while he just looked on.
“I asked to stay. I was an adult. I knew the risks that you lived with. I told you I could handle them. I told you that even if I left I would still love you and worry about you, but I just wouldn’t get to be with, live with you, love you. You sent me away despite my wishes. You threw me away, Quinn.” She bit out the last words, working so hard to keep her voice emotionless, yet still explaining things to him.
“But we had a plan.” His voice sounded weaker. He looked at her, really looked at her, like he was beginning to comprehend what she was saying.
“Your plan didn’t matter. What you did mattered. Now you understand. This time, you understand. This time you need to leave.” She strode to the front door and flung it open. Quinn followed and grabbed her arm.
“You can’t actually mean to throw us away, throw everything we mean to each other away, now can you?” There were the words. How could he have possibly used those words?
“Throw us away? I’m not throwing us away! You threw me away like garbage! I begged to stay, Quinn. I begged and I cried. I actually begged and cried. And you told me it was for the best. You treated me like I didn’t matter. You were so mean to me. I’ve never had someone be so mean to me in my life, and the fact that it was the man I loved?” She was yelling now, but then came the tears.
“No, Kara, you couldn’t believe that.”
“Leave. Are you actually going to make me beg you to leave my own damn house?” she asked incredulously. She stood there quivering, tears falling down her face.
“Sweetheart, I swear to the Creator you are the last person on this earth that I would ever want to be mean to.” She saw the dumbfounded look on Quinn’s face. She really couldn’t handle it. It was all too much. It had been too much when he had made her leave. Too much when she was actually throwing up in the plane’s tiny little bathroom on the way home.
“I know what I know. I know that you couldn’t have hurt me more if you had actually beaten me.” Her voice was quiet, but filled with utter conviction. She wasn’t looking at him, but she heard a sound between a gasp and a groan. Quinn attempted to pull her into his strong arms, but she wrenched free and fell to her knees on the floor, holding her arms around herself. “Now, I’m begging, please, leave! Quinn, please.” The sobs had started. She felt the snot coming out of her nose and she so didn’t care. She ju
st wanted Quinn and Ben to get out of her house and out of her life, forever.
When Quinn tried to wrap his arms around her again, she dropped down further, lying on the floor, daring him to find a way to hug her while she was wrapped up in a ball. But she had underestimated him. He simply picked her up, took her over to the couch, and gently placed her onto it. She couldn’t stop crying.
* * * *
He’d been working for two straight days to get her to show some sort of emotion, anything, anything at all, to prove that they hadn’t lost her forever. But nothing had prepared him for this. Watching this strong woman inwardly collapse in grief was worse than the day his dad had died.
“Kara.” He got down on his knees to wrap her in his arms, and she yanked away from him so hard she stuffed her face into the back of the couch, sobbing. Again, he reached out.
“No!” she screamed. “Don’t touch me!” He could barely make out the last three words, but her meaning was clear. He looked up helplessly at Ben. He sat down beside her, his hand hovering over her head, afraid to touch her, afraid to make things even worse.
Ben sat down on the floor with his back against the couch, his head between his arms resting on his knees slumped down. They both just waited. After an interminable amount of time, her sobs changed to hiccups and she pushed herself up, wiping her eyes on the cuffs of her sweatshirt.
“Are you satisfied now, Quinn?” Her voice a hoarse whisper. “You were right. I do feel something after all. I feel pain, a whole hell of a lot of pain. You said you were hoping for hate, because there is a thin line between love and hate. What’s on the other side of the pain line? There’s a fine line between pain and—what?”
“Pleasure, Kara,” Ben answered quietly. He continued to look at the floor.
“Kara, you know we love you. You know that’s why we’re here. We want to make a life with you.”
“For the moment you do. Go back to your hotel, or I’m going back to Jess. I can’t do this right now.”
Claiming Kara [Fate Harbor 3] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) Page 17