by London James
“I wouldn’t keep this from him!”
“You would, if you thought he didn’t want it. You have a habit of thinking you know what people want, and you don’t.” She picks me up by my arm and pushes me out the bathroom door. “Grab your purse. We are going.”
“Blaire,” I whine. “I’m tired. The test can wait.”
“No. The sooner you find out, the better. You don’t want him to think you kept this from him too.”
Damn it; I really hate it when she is right.
Chapter 29
Rowan
“What do you mean they are coming here tomorrow to break ground?”
I clutch the phone in my hand until it creaks, threatening to break under my hold. “You guys aren’t supposed to be coming here at all. I’ve sent the paperwork five times. I’m married. You can’t break ground, and if you show up here, we are going to have big problems. You’ll be hearing from my lawyer.” I hang up the phone and toss it across the room.
It slams against the wall, shattering the screen into a thousand pieces. Damn it. That’s the third phone in two days.
“Okay, you keep doing that, and we are going to have to start buying bulk of those,” Gray says as he leans against the door, like he doesn’t have a care in the world.
Must be nice.
“That may not be a bad idea. Do it. Order like five hundred of them.”
“No. Learn to control your temper. I’m not spending our money on something as silly as cell phones because you are pissed off mommy took your favorite toy.”
I narrow my eyes at him and grab my envelope cutter. I shouldn’t throw this too, right? That would be bad. “Mommy didn’t take away anything.”
“Really? So, this has nothing to do with someone’s name, starting with ‘Ever’, ending in ‘ly’? Just curious.” He plops down in the leather chair sitting in front of my desk.
“What do you want?” I groan. “I have enough to worry about. Apparently, the people with the bulldozer are going to be at the estate tomorrow to tear it down. I thought everything was in order. But they are saying they don’t have that part of the contract. They had the nerve to tell me, whatever was in the will was wrong.”
“Well, could it be? How much of a trickster is your dad?”
“He wouldn’t tear that place down,” I say out of habit, but it got me wondering. I don’t live there. No one lives there anymore.
Why would he tell me to get married if the estate would be torn down anyway? I lean back in my chair, the leather creaking as I do. I twirl the pen through my fingers. My wedding ring catching the light. Damn, I miss my maddening wife. I really, really do. I’ve tried reaching out to her, forgetting Gray told me that she lost her phone and can’t afford a new one. The only time I’ve seen her is at our parents’ funeral, and I didn’t have the energy to talk to her.
I was actually coming off of a whiskey drinking spree to try and forget about her, but it didn’t work.
“I say call the lawyer, do it now. I want to be witness,” Gray says.
“That’s a great idea.” I pick up the desk phone and flip through my address book to find the lawyer my father used. I press the speaker button and wait.
“Gaulding and Associates?” the clerk answers.
“I need to speak with Ray Gaulding. Tell him it is Mr. Michaels calling.”
“One moment,” she says.
The hold doesn’t last long, and when Ray answers, he seems a little too jovial. “Gaulding here.”
“Is there something about my parents will that you didn’t tell me about?” I seethe.
“Ah, I see you have run into the problem. Yes, I wasn’t allowed to disclose that with you until after you got married. You see, it says that if you married a Ms. Everly Madison, the estate is going to get torn down regardless, but the money still goes to you. All of their material possessions of been moved to a storage unit to be sorted and sold. You can, of course, take everything you wish to keep.”
“Then why bother having me get married?”
“Let me get my glasses. He left a note.”
There is a bunch of fumbling. Something falls and shatters on the floor, and when he comes back on the phone, he is breathing hard. “Got them. Okay, he says, and I quote, ‘He has always loved that girl, and she’s always loved him. He must think I’m blind. The estate gets torn down because it is time for him to make new memories. If I didn’t threaten my hand, he would have never married her because they are both stubborn and don’t know how to forgive.’”
I tap my fingers against the desk and sigh, “Yeah, well. You can tell him he doesn’t know shit. And thank you for your time,” I say a little nicer, before slamming the phone on the receiver.
Gray lets out that long whistle he does when he can’t believe something. “Wow. Your dad is a legend.”
“Gray, do you see the problem? I’m married to a woman that wants nothing to do with me. My childhood home is getting demolished. And I have no idea where the inheritance is even going. Yeah, this is a problem. There has to be a way to stop it.”
“Why do you want to? You live in downtown Spokane. You hardly ever go there. Why keep it?”
“Because that’s my home, man.”
“No, your home is in New York City right now. Home isn’t a place. It’s a person. That estate has no people, Rowan. You need to learn to let go.”
Let go. I love it when people make it sound so easy. If I could let go, I would. I don’t want to hold onto all this pain and resentment. I want to move on with my life, with Everly. I just want to know where she is!
“Have you spoken to her?” I ask, rubbing my temples with my fingers. I feel a headache brewing.
“I have. She landed in NYC yesterday, but she is going out of town again today,” he says.
“Out of town where, Gray?”
“She asked me not to tell you.”
I slam my fist on the table. “Where is she?” I growl. “I need to talk to her.”
“She said she is going back to where it all started. I don’t know what it means after that.”
I fold my hands on my stomach and think. Going to the beginning. Just where would she go. There are a few places that start at the beginning for us. “That’s it? You don’t have anything else for me?”
“I don’t want to violate my friendship with her.”
“But you’ll violate it with me?” I deadpan.
He groans, pinching his eyes closed from not knowing what to do. “I don’t ever want to be in the middle between Mom and Dad again,” he huffs, while crossing his arms.
“Just tell me.”
“Her old house.”
“What? That thing is barely standing. She could get herself killed walking into that thing.” I push out of my chair and grab my sport coat. “This woman is taking ten years off my life every damn day.”
“Bright side, you’re going to be a really handsome corpse?” Gray chuckles, throwing my stress ball in the air.
“I’m not even going to comment on that.” I snatch the ball out of the air and run out the door, ignoring Gray’s shouts as he calls after me. I just want to get to her already. It’s been too long. I keep replaying what happened in Vegas, and for some reason, I can’t seem to get a handle of how the argument even started. I’ve been trying to place my finger on it, but there isn’t an instance.
There can be a lot of variables, but I don’t want to think about them right now. None of them matter. I just want to start over. I don’t want us to live in the past anymore. And maybe, just maybe, if we sat down and talked instead of getting pissed off at each other, maybe it will work.
I have faith that it will.
“Hey, Greg,” I call out to the bellman that answers the door at the company building. “Toss me the keys.” I go long, cupping my hands together in hopes that he doesn’t miss this time because those key fobs are really expensive to replace.
The old man tosses it to me, and it lands right in the middle of my hands. “Next
round is on me, my friend!” I shout, jumping every two steps down the staircase.
I get to the garage and click the remote start to my Ford Raptor. Sure, it isn’t a Lamborghini, but I fucking love this truck. I hop in, and the engine growls, sounding angry and menacing. The roar echoes through the garage, and I slam my foot on the gas, peeling out of the parking garage in a very dangerous manner. I don’t recommend doing this all the time.
The truck fishtails when I take a curve too sharp, and I almost hit a little Mini Cooper. My truck would have demolished that. I breathe a sigh of relief when I’m finally on the road. I put my hazards on and floor it. I drift in and out between traffic, careful not to run into anyone. When I look at my speedometer, it is saying I’m going eighty-five miles per hour. It still isn’t fast enough. I need to get to her now.
I twist the ring on my finger with my thumb, a habit I’ve formed over the last few days. I don’t know why we are acting like this. We finally have everything we want. There seem to still be unresolved issues, but that isn’t anything that can’t be fixed. And I’ll do whatever it takes to fix it with her because I am in this.
For good.
Forever.
I want her.
The road to her old house is coming up on the right, but there are a few cars ahead of me that won’t get out of my way, so I have to slow down to forty miles an hour. “Come on,” I groan and slap my steering wheel with frustration.
I turn my blinker on and turn down the dirt road. My tires kick up dust and rock as I fly through the potholes and uneven terrain. If something happens to this truck, fine. I can buy another. I can’t buy another Everly, and that house she is going in has been on the verge of collapsing now after a heavy windstorm came through and nearly demolished it, just last year.
It’s actually on my things-to-do list. I wanted to fix it up and renovate it for her, so when she did come home, she can see someone took care of it. But now, she’s going to see what a mess it is.
After driving on the dirt road for about five minutes, her house comes up on the left, but no cars are out there. She must have taken a taxi. I slam on the breaks and put the truck in park. As I look up at the house, memories of my first eighteen years assault me. The classic white paint is chipped off and peeling, the wood is rotted, the deck is gone, the front door is hanging on one hinge, but the one thing that hasn’t changed are those bright green vines that have grown up the side of the house. They scale right underneath her window, just like before.
I walk through the tall grass and test the strength of them out. I grab one, then another and pull. Still as strong as the day I discovered them. A gust of wind blows, rustling the tall grass, but it doesn’t drown out the sobs I hear coming from her bedroom.
I pull myself up along the vines, stepping on them like a rock wall. I hope she is ready because after today, she is never going anywhere again. I don’t care if we sit in front of each other and cry, scream, and yell. Just as long as at the end of it, we kiss, and I get to wrap my arms around her.
That’s when life feels right. I’ve been a stupid man, an impatient man, a too patient man, an unreasonable man, and a scared man. And that is not the kind of man I want to be. I want to be the kind she can sit down with and tell me that she wants to cry.
And I’ll listen to her problems without being a jerk and wipe her tears away. I’m letting go of all the anger because the only thing in the end I want to gain is her.
Chapter 30
Everly
I’d forgotten how run down my old childhood home is, but it doesn’t stop me from sneaking in and climbing up the stairs to my old bedroom. I just needed a change of scenery. So I came back to the place that always made me feel a little better.
My room used to be painted a light green color. I had a queen bed that laid on the floor, no bed frame, and I had bead curtains for my closet. Jonas Brothers posters used to litter this wall along with all the other boy bands. Rowan used to give me such a hard time about them, but I loved them, just like every other teenage girl in America.
Now when I look around the room, it looks dead inside. The walls are black, covered in mud and dirt and who knows what. Leaves and twigs are sprinkled along the ground, and I can see the wood that was used to build the walls since they are falling apart. The floors seem strong… dirty, but strong nonetheless.
I sit in the middle of the floor where my bed used to be and think back to all the times I had everything in the world, and I tossed it all away due to fear. I don’t want to be that person anymore. I don’t like that person, and I think that’s where all my uncertainty is coming from. How can I be certain about a lover, a husband, a best friend, when I’m not even sure about myself?
Being back home in Spokane has put things in perspective for me. When I was a kid, I acted like a kid, but now, I still think like that eighteen-year-old girl. And that needs to stop. I need to put on my big girl panties and be a wife, talk to my husband and tell him that we are pregnant, and that I can never get rid of him.
Okay, maybe I’ll rephrase that because I don’t want to come off like a psycho. No matter how much I fluff it up though, that’s what I mean. And that’s just how it is. I bring my hand to my stomach to see if I can feel the baby move yet, which is what I am going to blame my crazy on. I can’t do that, but I feel a little off-put ever since the doctor confirmed elevated levels of hCG in my blood.
Which usually means pregnancy.
I can’t believe there is a baby inside me. I still look normal, so I’m finding it hard to wrap my head around. “You know, I don’t think this will be the case, but if your daddy wants nothing to do with you, I’ll love you. I’ll always love you, but I want you to know that Rowan is a good man, and he will take care of you too. Your father and I have a way of bumping heads, but don’t worry, we will figure it out,” I say to the little bean. “Oh, and if you could try not to crave donuts and have me gain a ton of weight, that would be really fantastic.”
I sigh and rub my belly when it starts to hurt again. “And if you could stop making me sick, that would be great too. I’m not supposed to throw up until later on, but you are just wanting to break records, huh?”
I never believed that I’d be having Rowan’s baby. But here I am, married to him and pregnant, trying to figure out what I want to tell him before it’s too late. That’s another thing. I don’t want it to be too late. I don’t want it to be like before. I want it to be different this time around.
I want to believe in the love I have for him instead of turning away from it. The thought of him leaving or giving up on me when I finally know I need to get my stuff together, causes the baby hormones to make me cry.
Ah, it’s so easy to blame everything on the baby. It’s too soon for that. I need to stop. But it’s just so easy…
I sniffle, wiping my nose on my shirt when I hear something outside of the house. I snap my head up from the ground and look out the broken window. Past and present mix when I see Rowan sneaking in. The past, everything is clean and new in my room, and Rowan is young with no facial hair. Present, everything is demolished and needs a fresh start—like us, and Rowan finally grew a beard.
“What are you doing here?” I ask softly. I want to make sure I don’t come off too harsh.
“Gray told me where to find you. Don’t be mad at him. I might have threatened him with an envelope cutter.” He dusts off his hands on his trousers and comes to sit in front of me on the dirty floor.
“Damn him. He promised,” I mutter, swirling designs into the thick dust layered on the floor.
“Yeah, but he wants us to figure things out. And I want to figure things out too. I want to start by saying, I care about you, and I know you don’t think I do, but I do, Everly. Every day, even when you left me, and I felt shattered. I was broken in ways I never thought possible. You were the only woman I ever loved. It started with you. It has to end with you. Don’t you get that?” he says, twisting his wedding band on his ring finger.
&n
bsp; “I’m pregnant,” I blurt out, startling even myself. I blink a few times and shake the shock off me. “I wanted to say that in a different way, but I wanted to get it out there. I wanted to throw it in your direction and see how you felt about it.”
Rowan’s elbows are on his knees, hands dangling, and he just stares at me, unmoving, and not saying a word. I think I broke him. “Rowan?”
“What?” he manages to rasp out as he clears his throat.
“Did you hear me?”
“That you’re pregnant?” he asks. “You said you were pregnant. How do you know already?”
“I was sick, but it was too soon to tell on a home test so I went to the doctor to take a blood test. They found elevated levels of hCG in my blood, which means I’m most likely pregnant. They want to confirm it with an ultrasound in a couple of weeks. Everything is starting to make me queasy. I told you as soon as I found out. I swear, I’ve only known for like, a day. I took a flight out here right after the doctor.”
“You’re pregnant,” he repeats.
“Do you still feel that way now? Do you still want it to end with me?”
He drags himself closer to me and puts one hand on my stomach, while the other hand cups my face. “Of course, I do. I love you until the end of time and space, Everly. I can’t imagine this life with anyone else. We’re a family,” he whispers, placing his forehead against mine. “You’ve just made the happiest man in the world.”
A huge sigh escapes my lips. Relief. Excitement. Happiness. “I promise to be better for you. I’ll always try and be better. I never want to lose you again, Rowan. I love you.”
He takes my mouth in a soft kiss, but there is something else behind it. It isn’t desperation, or desire, or frenzy. It’s acceptance and love. “Let’s get out of here,” he says.
“Oh, where do you want to go?”
“I’ll show you. Just come with me?”
“I’ll go anywhere with you.” I place my hand in his. He picks me up in a wedding style hold and carries me down the steps. My arms are wrapped around his neck, and when he jumps off the floor of the house to the ground, I squeak, holding myself close to his chest.