“Geez…they’re living inside their very own soap opera. And I thought General Hospital was bad.” I can’t help but laugh at her comparison. “Seriously though, how could he do that?”
“Beats me.” I shrug. “I just feel bad for James.” I begin to yawn. “Oh man, I’m so tired. I’m going to get dressed for bed.”
“Yeah, me too.” She gets off the bed. “I’ll open a bottle of wine for us and turn on some Netflix.”
“Don’t be mad if I fall asleep. I’m pooped.”
“Then how about we just drink and talk?”
“Much better.” I smile with tired eyes. I know I won’t last too much longer. One glass will put me out like a light.
After getting dressed for bed, I grab my phone to text James, but notice he beat me to it.
James: “This maniac madman is missing those brownies very much. Crazy for you. XO.”
I so miss him.
The night I had to force Becca to leave, I couldn’t get myself to go upstairs to be with Paige. I had a lot of thinking to do, but I never planned being away from her all night. Instead of just taking a breather along the beach, I brought along a bottle of vodka and drank to my heart’s content. Not realizing how long I was out there on that beach, I came back to the house and downed more vodka, adding a bit of cranberry juice topper.
Becca’s words kept coming back to my head. She was right. I went after my best friend’s wife the second he died, and I was making things worse for myself by staying with her. What the hell was I thinking? What could I possibly get out of this relationship when I was only going to break Paige’s heart in the end? That wasn’t fair for her. She deserved so much more than another man destroying her life.
So drinking my guilt away was the only solution I could think of that night. It was the coward’s way out. If only Paige hadn’t found me passed out like a complete moron the next morning, maybe, just maybe I wouldn’t have consumed so much booze. It only made me think of my brother and his drinking problem. I didn’t want to end up like him.
Once the realization of where I was and why I never joined Paige that evening, the guilt continued. Being the wonderful woman that she is, Paige was patient with me. She gave me the time to process my thoughts before I told her everything. The words were on the tip of my tongue. I was going to break things off with the woman I fell in love with. But I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t get up the nerve to do it. She wanted to put the past behind her and to allow her dead husband to rest in peace. I thought by not telling her that Glen was unfaithful it would be selfish of me, but then it hit me: telling her would be selfish. So in the end, breaking things off with her was irrelevant. No way could I bring myself to hurt her.
Even in the beginning, when Glen was lying in that hospital bed, he spent hours telling me about Paige, her quirks, what made her special. Then in his last breath as he was dying he told me to look after his wife, to be sure she was taken care of, that she deserved more. By then I had already fallen in love with her. Of course, it was a subconscious thing, but no doubt I started feeling something before I had seen her picture. I may have despised him for his unfaithfulness, but I gave him my word. I’d look after his wife.
I’m not sure if his last words were for me to fall for Paige, but it happened. Clearly, Becca and my brother were dead set against it and brainwashed me into thinking it was wrong to meet her and to get involved with her. But they couldn’t be more wrong. I know now it was the right thing to do.
No more guilt. Glen was dead. And if I had anything to do about it, his unfaithfulness was also going to remain dead.
I’ve been in such a slump all week since Maui. Being on the island without Paige was torture, so as soon as she landed safely at home, I made arrangements to go back to Arizona. In just the short amount of time we had spent together, everything about my Maui home reminded me of her. After making love to her, I couldn’t keep my feelings hidden. Expressing my love to her felt extremely powerful, and deep down I was hoping she would say it back. But I knew it was too soon for her. It has taken her a long time to let anyone inside, and for her to allow me to be that man? I was not going take it for granted. On her own time, she’ll eventually tell me those words I longed to hear. I just had to remain patient. As long as she stays in my life and in my bed, nothing could make me happier.
I had a book to write, so all week long I have ignored all phones calls and texts from my brother. He was the last person I wanted to deal with. He knew he was in the doghouse, but played his confusions like a master. Every text and voice message he was leaving, he was getting more and more pissed off and demanded I return his calls. No way in hell. I was done with him. Telling Becca I still wanted her, he tried to ruin a good thing between Paige and me. I was not going to let that happen again. Firing him as my agent was my only option.
It’s been a hard week trying to get back into writing. All thoughts have led straight to Paige. She’s the first person I think of the second I wake up and the last person I dream about while I hit the sheets. I’ve been going stir crazy not having her in my arms, and seeing her every day. I’ve missed her like I couldn’t imagine ever missing anyone. She has consumed my every waking thought. I need and want her with me. I’m an author. I can pretty much work anywhere in the world, so I’m going to surprise Paige by going to San Diego for a visit. A week away from each other has been way too long.
It’s now Friday evening. I’ve waited long enough to get into it with Dominic. The pounding on my front door is a clear message that my brother is fed up with my ignoring him. He thought I was in Maui all this week. Anyhow, now that he knows I’m back in Arizona, he’s coming at me full force. Tentacles and all. But what he’s not aware of…is I’m am the executioner.
I may love my brother, but I don’t have to like him. And in recent events, I dislike Dom even more so.
“You haven’t returned any of my calls or messages all week. Now do you feel like talking?” Dom angrily storms past by me, along with a nice whiff of liquor, into my living room. Which is so typical of him, he begins pacing around the room, ready to give me a good lecture.
He can save his voice. It’s my turn now. I’ve decided to handle this calmly and rationally, he won’t know what hit him.
While Dom is still pacing, I sit on my couch and lean on my knees. “Sit,” I coolly tell him.
“If this is about Becca–”
“I said…sit,” I repeat a little more firmly. Once he finally takes a seat in the recliner chair across from me, I look down into my hands and ask, “Did you send Becca to Maui?”
“James–”
“Don’t lie to me.” I glare up into his eyes. If he can’t see how maddened I am right now, then he is more stupid than I thought. “Just tell me.”
Wringing his fingers together, he is now vividly aware that I’m not letting this go. “Yes.”
Although I knew he was behind the fiasco in the first place, his confession still sucks the breath right out of me. I seriously cannot believe my own brother would stoop to this new kind of low. I’m beyond livid.
He can feel my anger rising when I don’t respond. The silence is killing him. Holding out his hands, he begins to plead with me. “Look…I’m your brother–” But I will not have it.
He’s done. “Yes…you are my brother, but you’re no longer my agent.”
He slowly forms a scowl and asks, “Come again?”
“You’re fired, Dom.”
Something in his eyes shifts. There’s a darkness to them that disturbs me, but I’m too worked up, and don’t pay it any more attention. “You’re bluffing,” he lowly says.
“No…I’m not.” I get up from the couch and stuff my hands inside my pockets. “You see…in the beginning, when I first met Paige, I thought you were just being the overprotective big brother, trying to look out for my best interest, but things escalated and went too far.” I pause a second to take a breath. Remaining calm, I look down at my brother and continue. “Bringing Becca into
the mix was cold and ruthless. Telling her that I wanted to make things work, and sending her to Maui when you absolutely knew I wanted nothing more to do with her again, and how you deliberately wanted to ruin things between Paige and me. You went so below my trust, it hurts me something fierce.”
Immediately, Dominic gets up to his feet and raises his voice. “Hurting you was the last thing I wanted to do. But firing me over this, come on, James! I’m a damn good agent.”
Looking into my brother’s eyes, I can see the distress I’m causing, but there are no excuses to what he’s done to me and Paige. “And I’m going to miss you, Dom. Unfortunately, your actions have ruined our professional relationship. I can’t trust you anymore.”
“James–”
“Did you even think about what your actions would do to Becca? I may not like her, but she still has feelings. You pretty much humiliated her, knowing full on I was with another woman. How you knew Paige was with me, I don’t know and don’t care, but that isn’t the point. The point is: your loyalty to me and to anyone who’s in my life has completely vanished. I don’t know if it’s your drinking that has clouded your judgment, or you have something against Paige, but I won’t be dealing with it any longer.”
“You know why you shouldn’t be with her,” he tries to remind me. The guilt he is hovering over my head is not going to work…not this time it won’t.
“You’re wrong,” I snap at him. The bitterness in my voice and my behavior are nothing to ignore. Moving a step closer to Dom, I explain, “I should be with her, and I will be with her, because Paige will never know about Glen being my best friend. She will never know that her husband of five years was cheating on her for an entire year with another woman. She will never know that Glen and his mistress died in that car crash together the night he was going to leave her for his mistress. You know why? Because she clearly stated she wants the past to remain in the past, and you know what? I’m going to give that to her. She deserves a happy future. And that future, big brother, will be with me,” I claim pointing at my chest. “I love her and will make damn sure she gets everything she’s ever wanted. Furthermore, I will no longer think about Glen. He’s dead, and will remain dead.”
Adjusting the damn tie around his neck, then pointing a finger, he warns me, “You have made the biggest mistake of your life, for ever allowing yourself to fall in love with that woman. Things will resurface. They always do. You can’t hide the truth from her, because the longer you stay with her, she’ll eventually find out.”
“Not if you keep your mouth shut, she won’t.”
Dom laughs. “After all this time trying to keep this buried, you really believe I would say anything?”
“At this point, I really don’t know what to believe anymore.”
Like this is some kind of game to him, Dom continues to chuckle. Walking unsteadily toward my front door, I hear him muttering under his breath but can’t make out what he’s saying.
I suspiciously say, “I didn’t quite hear what you just said.”
He turns around. With a smug look on his face he says, “Nothing.” and shrugs. “You want me gone? I’m gone. But don’t say I never warned you.”
Damn, he is so lit with booze he can barely stand straight. I can’t believe he would drive under the influence. “Dom, you can’t drive in your condition. I’m going to call you a cab.”
“I have a driver out there, so no need to pretend you care.”
He has no idea how much I care. If anything ever happened to him or anyone else while he was driving drunk, it would kill me. Stopping him before he goes out the door, I place a hand on his shoulder. “You need help. Go get it. For the sake of our family, for yourself…get control of your life and go to rehab.”
“I don’t need rehab. I can stop anytime I want.” He jerks himself away from me.
I have never been more disappointed in my brother, than I am of him right now. He’s beyond helping. “Good luck with that. And good luck with finding another job. No one is going to hire someone who comes into work every day smelling like he drank an entire bottle of whiskey.”
Turning the knob, he opens the door and says one final thing before he walks out. “You’ll regret ever firing me…little brother.” He slams the door on his way out, and leaves me pondering.
The venom in his voice was unlike anything I’ve ever heard from him. Clearly, this side of Dominic is not the brother I grew up with. He was always so put together, smart and never butted into my personal life. We got along great as kids. I used to think of him more as a friend than my brother but something went wrong the second I fell in love with Paige. I wish I knew how to help him. Seeing this unrecognizable side of Dom is unsettling. For the first time in my life, I’m scared of what he might be capable of doing.
J.D. Parker - Minus
The madman spent almost a year on both women, stalking them, and obsessing over their daily routines, he couldn’t wait until his fantasy came true. And now that both women were under his wing, reality was even better.
The first gush of blood from the redhead overwhelmed him. The color was fascinating; thick, and dark red. What a sight. Containing any rational thoughts were a thing of the past. He was a true maniac, and he loved every sense of the word.
Taking a finger to the blood, he swiped it from the redhead’s stomach, and marked a long horizontal line across the entire front part of his forehead. He dipped again and then marked himself under his eyes. Following the mark from his forehead, he dragged his finger down along the bridge of his nose. He felt like a warrior battling alongside his inner demon. The Monster. He never felt more like himself than he did right there at that moment.
I was really hoping I wouldn’t turn into one of those women who couldn’t stand a few days without seeing her long distance boyfriend, you know? With Glen, I missed him every time he left, and yes, I felt lonely, but it wasn’t the aching need that I’m feeling right now with James. The ache has been so annoying. I’ve wanted to kick myself silly. The only thing that has kept me going is work, books and Lynn. Without them, I’d go stir crazy.
Not being near James is as if I’ve lost a limb. I feel him, yet he’s nowhere near me. We talk every night, text every chance we get, but it’s not the same. He’s become so important to me and I really cannot imagine my life without him. Life before him now seems like one big slow motion, sad movie, The woman who couldn’t feel happiness after the death of her husband. The woman who buried herself so deep in books she couldn’t see what was ahead. The woman who kept love inside the coffin alongside her late husband. The woman who faked a smile, even though her entire life was surrounded by the love of books, her bookstore, and her best friend.
Since James, my life has gone from a dark ocean of nothing, to the most colorful painted masterpiece I have ever seen. Life has been remarkably amazing. Love has been amazing. Being in love with James has been extraordinary.
I have yet to tell him those three loving words. It’s not easy, but it will happen. In due time, it will most definitely happen.
When I got back home from Maui, Lynn filled me in on the most qualified applicant to work for Chasing Pages. I looked over her application, had an interview with her, and hired her that very same day. Although she’s only a part time employee, I just know it’s the best thing for me and Lynn. The store is running beautifully busy and continues to get rave reviews from the customers as well as the online readers. Hiring another person adds on our flexibility and more free time to do errands and possible vacations.
As always, my day begins with a chocolate mocha coffee on the left of me, and my current thriller in my hands I know I should be helping Lynn set up the new books that we just got yesterday, but she knows my routine. A good book cannot be wasted. Plus, it’s for a new indie author that I’m reviewing and so far it’s an intense story and I really love it.
Adjusting the glasses on my face, I grab my coffee, take a drink, and never take my eyes away from my thriller, when a very sexy an
d sultry male voice asks me, “What are you reading, beautiful?”
Almost knocking over my coffee, I gasp. “James!” and squeal like a freaked out teen that’s seeing her favorite boy band in concert. Throwing my tablet and glasses onto the counter, I speed my way around to the other side and jump into his arms. “Oh my gosh, I can’t believe you’re here!” His arms immediately make their way around my body, holding me as tightly as I am with him. He smells so good and feels even better. Wow, I’m whole again.
Still holding each other close, he murmurs into my ear, “The madman in me is quite obsessed with a woman who has the most amazing set of brown eyes I have ever seen. So naturally, I couldn’t stay away.”
Swoon. He always knows how to turn me into a puddle of goo. “That madman is very smart,” I comment with a big, wide grin.
Pulling me back just a tad, so we can look into each other’s eyes, James cups my face and intently says, “I’ve missed you something awful.”
“Me too,” I breathlessly say back.
The crazed teenagers are back. We start kissing like there’s no tomorrow. To have him in my arms and on my lips again…I’m in true heaven.
“Alright you two, break it up,” Lynn teases.
For a slight moment, I had forgotten we were in my place of business. If a customer came in and caught us deep throating each other? Oh, geez Louise! The thought almost makes me burst out laughing. Right now, though, I couldn’t care less if we had an audience. I’m just too crazy, happy.
Looking over James’ shoulder, on my tippy toes,I ask Lynn, “Did you know he was coming?”
“Mmm…possibly,” she answers grinning.
James and I turn ourselves facing Lynn. Pressing my back against his front, he glides his wide set hands across my lower belly and places his chin on my shoulder. This feeling is out of this world, awesome. “How on earth were you able to keep this a secret?”
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