by Devon Hart
“What?” He’s studying me.
“Excuse me?”
“You just asked me, ‘How’s that for honesty?’”
“No I didn’t.” I thought it. I didn’t say it out loud.
“Yes you did. Are you falling apart on me, Erin?”
“No.”
He doesn’t look convinced. “We’re going to explore this a little more after dinner.” He buckles up and backs out of the driveway.
Chapter 17
Erin
If I said I didn’t miss Ocean Drive, I’d be lying. Although my parents live in a modern Mediterranean-style home with white-washed stucco walls and a tile roof, it has landmark curb appeal. The outdoor living space features a custom-built BBQ area flanked by cascading waterfalls and a wading pool. At sunset, after my father turns on the lights, it reminds me of a starry sky.
To my amazement, only fifteen guests are seated at the outdoor dining table. I’m sandwiched between Thomas and Foster, with Katie and my mom staring at me from across the way. Maybe if I slide the ridiculous centerpiece down a foot, I can hide behind it.
I’ve already endured a painfully silent first course appetizer of chickpea blini with lemon mousseline and wild salmon caviar. The caterer serves the second course, shrimp quenelles in a bouillon. I sample it delicately, savoring the flavor until Thomas addresses me.
“Meredith told me you expanded the store.”
I face him. “Last year.”
Foster laughs, and I pinch his thigh under the table.
“It’s been that long?”
“You’ve never visited my shop, Thomas.”
“Is that an invitation?”
“Everyone is welcome.”
His vacant expression is further testament as to why I can count on two fingers how many meaningful conversations we’ve shared. Speaking of hands, I snatch his left one. “Oh dear.” Slim fingers and a small wrist. Not a good sign according to Katie.
“Is something wrong?” he asks.
“Nothing,” I lie and let go.
“Erin,” Katie calls. “Not at the table.”
I smirk and taste another spoonful of cold soup. I wish my mother had been more strategic about the seating arrangement. Why didn’t she place Thomas near my father who is at the opposite end surrounded by his board of directors and personal attorney?
“So where have you been hiding, Foster?” Mother asks. “We’ve read about your latest exploits in the energy sector. I seem to recall something about signing contracts with Saudi Aramco and Sinopec to double the capacity at a refinery in Southern China?”
“Yes, ma’am.” He sips his wine. “It includes refinery upgrades.”
“Don’t the Chinese have engineers for that?”
“I’m sure they do.” Foster smiles. “But it’s a package deal. The refinery will process heavy crude, increasing overall output and boosting the market.”
“And your father?”
“He swears the earth is still round and the sky is blue.”
Mother gives a feminine laugh, covering her mouth with her linen napkin.
“What does that mean?” Thomas asks.
I shake my head, loathing the sound of his voice.
“Everything is peachy,” Foster clarifies.
Once again I move in for an under-table assault, but he catches my fingers.
“If you pinch me,” he growls near my ear, “I’ll bite your nipple.”
I nearly choke on my water. “Is that a promise?” I smile up at him, praying he’ll say yes.
“Guess we’ll find out after you tweak me again.”
“What are the two of you whispering about?” Mother asks.
“Catching up on things,” I say. “Foster and I haven’t seen each other in a long time, Mother.”
“Well, we’re happy he’s here.”
The meal progresses nicely. Servers bring slow-roasted duck with miniature watermelon cucumbers, a red grapefruit gastrique, and chickpea crepes. Once I finish eating, Thomas clears his throat and gazes at me.
“Take a walk with me, Erin.”
“Now?”
He nods.
Not wanting to cause a scene, I slide my chair back. “How long are we going to be?”
He shrugs. “Long enough to discuss some important issues.”
I cringe at the thought, but willingly follow him away from the covered patio and into the garden. I glance over my shoulder twice, afraid Foster will appear.
As shallow as my mother comes off, she’s really very talented. Her vast garden is a monument dedicated to my grandmother, who was a master gardener. The oasis is contrived for privacy, with tall shrubbery, ornamental arches, an aviary, a small fish pond, and a ring of rare fruit trees in the center. I run my fingers up a brass railing that stops underneath a gazebo. Thomas turns around, his dark eyes focused on mine.
“I’ve missed you, Erin.”
How do I respond? “We live twenty minutes apart, Thomas, so pardon me if I don’t accept your excuses that logistics prevented you from calling me or visiting my store.”
He chuckles. “I admire your spirit.”
I hope he appreciates my candor, too. “I don’t want to marry you, and I’m certain you care little about me.” Honestly, I don’t know what he thinks about this arrangement.
“I’m committed, Erin.”
“To what?”
“You.” He reaches for my face, but I back away. “Are you drunk?” I meet his gaze, embarrassed to discuss marriage with a man I hardly know. “I tolerate my mother and father’s ass-backward thinking, but what excuse do you have?”
“Didn’t your parents explain?”
“No.”
He rakes his fingers through his hair. “I suppose that’s my responsibility.”
“If you don’t start making sense, I’m going back to the party. Alone.”
“Not until you hear me out.” He blocks my route.
There’s only one way in/out of the gazebo, and if I have to use all my weight to go through him, I will. I don’t like being cornered. “Get out of my way.”
He waves his hands. “Fine.”
I take the first step.
“Your father is a pathological gambler.”
I freeze. So the bastard had a plan all along. “What?” I don’t bother facing him. If I do, I’m certain I won’t be able to keep dinner down.
“Impulse control issues, like a kleptomaniac. But never mind the cause. To be perfectly honest, he spends more time on the rough than he does the fairway, Erin. He’s a bad shot and a drinker. Add money into the mix . . .”
“Fuck you, Thomas.” I join him in the gazebo again. “Since when did you become an expert on my father? Until recently, I thought you shared a professional relationship, nothing more.”
“Maybe if you were an attentive daughter, you would have noticed.”
Rage uncoils inside me fast, and before I regain control of my emotions, I slap his face, hard enough for the impact to sting my hand. It doesn’t faze him.
“That’s a freebie, Erin. Don’t do it again.”
His voice is low and mechanical, and it frightens me for some reason. “I don’t monitor my father’s financial dealings.”
“You should, and in the future, we will.”
I laugh. “There is no we, get that through your thick head. I wouldn’t marry you if—”
“Your father’s gambling addiction doesn’t stop at the club. It includes the boardroom.”
I cross my arms over my chest. “Lies.”
“Do you think my father’s dealings end at the plumbing supply house? He has an investment portfolio that could rival Donald Trump’s. Covington Industries is a multi-million
dollar corporation, one my father was eager to invest in.”
“Only board members hold stock.”
“Not any more. Once Robert’s checks started to bounce, he began using shares in CI for collateral.”
He must be telling the truth. Tears sting my eyes, but I hold them in. I won’t let Thomas have the satisfaction of seeing me cry. “For what?”
“I’ve already explained, to gamble.”
“On what?”
“Golf games, poker, football, elections . . .”
“Elections?”
He nods.
Oh. My. God. “And this arrangement will satisfy his debt?”
“Most of it,” he says. “If you marry me, everything stays as it is. Refuse, and my family will be forced into a hostile takeover of your father’s firm.”
“That’s blackmail.”
“No,” he corrects. “It’s business.”
No wonder my mother told me not to make fun of a man’s living. If it were any other family, I wouldn’t. My head is swimming. I can’t wrap my mind around this. My church-going, frugal father is no better than a drug addict. Years of Ivy League education, training, and grooming from my grandfather, successful acquisitions and investments that nearly quadrupled his wealth, all lost on betting? It’s fantastical. “Why me?”
“I always wanted you, Erin.”
I shiver from the thought of ever sharing a bed or life with him. And the idea of reproduction, bringing little Kingsley monsters into the world, repulses me. “I hate you.”
“I accept the challenge.”
Sarcastic asshole. “Don’t you want to be loved? At least respected by the woman you marry?”
“Apples and oranges.”
“I’m leaving now.”
“Not with Foster.”
“Excuse me?”
“I accept your independence and promise I won’t alter your lifestyle too much. But appearances are important. I can’t have my fiancée running around with a prick like Foster Wagner. What would the tabloids say?”
“What if I provided full disclosure of what you just threatened me with?”
“People like winners. Even if you roused public sympathy, your father would suffer the consequences. He squandered his wealth and broke a few laws doing it.”
And offered up his daughter as payment to save his own ass. That sad reality leaves a lump in my throat. “I need time to think.”
“How long?”
“Until Halloween.”
Chapter 18
Foster
The woman sitting in my passenger seat isn’t the same Erin I drove to dinner. Something happened with Thomas, and if I find out he hurt her, I’ll destroy him. “Talk to me. What did that asshole say?”
“Nothing.”
“One-word answers aren’t convincing.” I watch her every move, an experienced judge of body language, especially with women.
She sighs and stares out the window.
Fifteen minutes later I roll into her driveway and turn the engine off. She’s too quiet. Is she asleep? I lean over and brush her hair off her shoulder. “Tired?”
She gazes at me, her big blue eyes as luminous as the full moon. “Life isn’t fair.”
“No, it’s not.” I climb out and jog around to her side of the car. “Come on, baby. Let’s have a cup of tea and some banana bread.”
She doesn’t refuse and quietly walks to the front door. Once inside, she heads to the kitchen, leaving me alone in the living room. It’s a pleasant space, with chocolate-colored walls and blue accents. And just like her bookstore, everything has its place, except for the photo albums stacked on the floor. I gaze toward the kitchen, where she’s busy boiling water probably. I grab the first album and flip it open, finding pictures from high school.
I sit on the sofa, and start thumbing through pages. There’s Frank Munoz and Terri Lambert, guys I played ball with. I smile at all the photographs of friends Erin and I had in common, realizing how close and yet how far our lives truly were. For the time we intersected, I was happy. Then I find a section filled with images of me and Erin, the weekend camping trip she asked me if I remembered, shots of us in homeroom, fishing, and laughing. There’s even a rose pressed between the pages.
On the next page I discover an illustration with our names scrolled in calligraphy, surrounded by red hearts. Erin loves Foster. It screams high school, but I like that she kept it. And then there’s a collection of notes, a half dozen I wrote to her. I hear movement and close the book, stashing it back where it belongs. I can’t believe she kept memorabilia from our childhood. I thought she hated me.
“Tea and bread.” She sets a tray on the coffee table. “I’m going to slip into something more comfortable, okay?”
“Take your time.” I flash a smile and watch her disappear around the corner.
I grab the album again, searching for a specific letter, one I hope she’d received but never knew if she did. It’s still in the envelope addressed to her parents’ house. I open it, desperate to remember one of the only times I wasn’t a selfish asshole.
My beautiful Erin,
I don’t expect you to ever read this, but if you do, I want you to know how sorry I am for what happened between us. I know it’s been months since we broke up, but after I got to school today, Lizzie told me your mother withdrew you from classes. I’m not sure I can live with that, knowing I won’t see your beautiful smile when we pass each other in the hallway, even if that smile isn’t for me. Tell me what to do, Erin, how can I get you back?
Can we be friends?
Please call me.
F.W.
She’d received it and never responded, not that I blame her.
“Foster!”
My head snaps up. Erin is standing in the archway, wearing silky black pajamas with her mouth hanging open.
“I can’t believe you snooped.” She stomps over to the sofa and snatches the paper out of my hands. “My photo albums are like a diary, not for anyone else to see.”
God she’s beautiful and fucking braless. Her pebble-hard nipples are winking at me, begging for more attention. My balls ache and I have to cross my legs to hide my erection. “Why didn’t you write back? Do you know how long I waited for an answer, how many times I checked mail or expected my mother to give me a message you called?”
“You haven’t touched your tea.” And just like that she ignores me and starts to stir sugar and cream into her cup.
I catch her hand. “One stupid choice in my youth changed the course of our lives and you won’t answer me?” Now I’m mad. “You can’t walk around in denial for the next twenty years. I’m here, the same old Foster, remember? We were happy. I wanted you. Desperately.”
She shakes her hand free. “Don’t pressure me.”
“Don’t make me.”
“After tonight, I’m afraid nothing matters, Foster.”
I stand, knowing that fucking bastard Thomas did something to her. I knew it the second she joined us at the table again. Her face was stained with fresh tears. “You’ve teased me enough, goddamnit.”
“Teased you? That’s rich. You can’t handle the truth, Foster.”
“Try me.”
She stares at me long and hard, then marches to an oak Queen Anne desk in the far corner. She opens a drawer and pulls something out. “Take this.” She tosses an envelope at me, but it falls short. “All your questions will get answered tonight.”
I scoop it up and start to tear it open.
“Not here!”
“Where then?”
“I don’t care.” She palms tears from her eyes. “As long as you aren’t here.”
My anger recedes like ocean waves, replaced by overwhelming tenderness and the insatiable de
sire to hold her. “Why are you crying, baby?” I move closer. “Tell me.”
“Leave, Foster.”
“Don’t banish me again.” Old fears start to resurface. I can’t lose her.
Our gazes fuse and she opens her mouth, but nothing comes out. Instead, she rushes down her hallway. I hear a door slam and the distinct click of a lock. Fuck me, déjà vu, but this time, it won’t end the same way.
I manage to drive three blocks before I pull over to read the letter. I honored her request to leave, but I’ll be damned if I’ll drive off this island before I speak to her again. I press the dome light on and study the envelope. It’s yellowed and the addresses are faded, but she obviously intended to mail it, there’s even a stamp.
And just as I’ve always suspected . . .
Foster,
You shouldn’t spend your life worrying about me or regretting our friendship. Everything happens for a reason.
I accept your apology, and hope you find a girl who will make you happy.
Now that I’m gone, it’s easier for me to tell you the truth about what happened at your parents’ house. I loved you, but seeing you drunk and acting so stupid hurt me. There’s nothing else to discuss, we weren’t meant to last.
Yes, Mother withdrew me from classes. I’m enrolled at a private school in San Antonio now. I need to focus on my education and can’t possibly concentrate if I stay at Carroll High School.
Sincerely,
Erin Covington
She loved me. The sweetest girl I’ve ever known loved me. I tuck the letter back inside the envelope. Funny how I internalized the loss of Erin. I forced it deeper and deeper away from my heart by fucking and scoring touchdowns. Then I went to college and immersed myself in frat life, but Erin was never out of my thoughts, and no woman, no matter how smart or sexy, could compare.