by Anita DeVito
Anderson dropped into the empty chair and took her hands in his. “I needed to talk to you. I’ve needed to talk to you for months.”
She shook her head. “We said everything we needed to say—”
“You did. I didn’t. You need to hear me out.”
She shook her head again in denial that this was happening. So many times since that night, she had fantasized about Anderson realizing he was a complete douche and begging for her forgiveness. In those dreams, she made him suffer and sweat, but she always, always took him back.
It was Anderson’s turn to shake his head. “This is about you and me. You were right about me being my mother’s pet and not having the guts to stand up to her. It was never about you, though. What happened was about me and my character. It took a pretty hard knock for me to see the truth.”
She stood, breaking the contact with him. Every neuron in her body was firing, every nerve ending pulsing. Her flight-or-fight instinct was kicking in. She had run from him once. It looked like this time she was going to fight. She stilled her hands and lifted her chin. “You’ve come all this way to apologize. I won’t lie and say I’m not surprised. I didn’t think that I mattered enough to you.”
Anderson stepped close enough that she felt the heat of his body. The smile on his face was gentle, as was his touch when he ran his fingers down her cheek. “You matter. You are the only one that matters. I hate that it took a kick in the teeth—you leaving—to get me to see that.”
She clenched her jaw, ordered the heart beating out of control to remember what he did, how he made her feel. “I left three weeks ago.”
Anderson lifted her hand and kissed the white-clenched knuckles. “I didn’t know. I thought you were still at the apartment, working freelance. You didn’t have to quit, you know.”
She snapped her hand back. “Of course I had to quit. Sometimes, you don’t live in the real world.” She let out a deep sigh and then shook her head. “I don’t want to fight. I really don’t.”
Anderson’s face lit up. “Good. Because neither do I.”
“Then I guess you can go.”
“I came here to do something, and I’m not leaving until it’s done.” Anderson dropped to his knee. “Esmeralda Morales. I always knew that you were an intelligent, strong woman with an incredible body. I thought there was only sex between us, but when you left, I realized that you are the color in my world. Save me from a beige life. Be my wife?”
From that cashmere pocket came a ring that put the moon to shame. It was four carats in a modern setting of sleek platinum that was radiant in the artificial porch light. Anderson took her hand and slid the ring into place.
“A perfect fit,” he said in a whisper.
She stopped breathing. As soon as he had dropped to his knee, her lungs stopped working, her heart seized up, and her brain took a hiatus. “This is…”
“Amazing. I know.” Anderson stood and brushed her hair off her face. “You are going to make a beautiful bride.”
Something with sense kicked in, and she started back pedaling. Anderson was quickly on his feet, taking hold of her arms to keep her in place. He bent his head and kissed her soft lips.
“This isn’t right. This isn’t right, Anderson,” she said, looking at the stone on her finger.
“Of course it is.” When Peach shook her head, Anderson wrapped an arm around her back, pulled her to him, and kissed her long and hard. It was a kiss to remind her of everything they had together. Of what marrying him would bring—money, prestige, travel and, of course, sex.
She had once thought she wanted that, but now…now was different. Now she wanted to sip hot chocolate and count the stars, to laugh through dinner, to have make-up sex on the poker table. The window at the other end of the porch was filled with faces, beautiful, nosey faces, but none of them were Tom’s. She wanted to talk to him. To find out if he wanted her the way she wanted him. “This is too fast,” she said, pulling the ring from her finger. “I’m not the same person I was four months ago.”
“And I’m not the same man. Whoever we are now, we still work.” Anderson pulled her against his body and kissed her again. “I have a room in Nashville. Come with me, and we’ll talk.”
“Alone. I need to be alone.”
Anderson tipped her chin until she was looking at him. He brushed her lips with his and then invaded her mouth. Claiming her. “I’ll be back. Tomorrow.” Then he took the ring, slid it back on her finger and kissed it before walking into the night.
Friday, April 14 ten-thirty p.m.
Tom stood behind the bar, looking out the small window, down the length of the porch to where Peach sat with the intruder. She looked at him like a love-starved puppy. Her eyes were too big. He blindly grabbed a bottle out of the rack with one hand and a heavy rocks glass with the other. He unscrewed the top, poured, and swallowed. The scotch hit his stomach hard, matching the blow the rest of his body was getting. His breath caught when she popped to her feet, walking away from the bastard, shaking her head. “That’s right, honey. You tell him to hit the road.” He threw back another two fingers.
A low growl filled the air when the bastard put hands on Peach. He looked around for Taylor, but the dog was cleaning up crumbs under the poker table. It was him; he was the animal growling. He poured and drained another.
Then the bastard dropped to one knee.
“Son of a bitch!” He spun and sent the glass flying into the brick of the fireplace. The crystal exploded and rained down like diamonds onto the carpet. He took the bottle and stalked out of the room, determined to find someplace on these goddamn three hundred acres he could be alone. From behind him, his name was called. He answered with his middle finger.
Katie’s voice came next. Her jarring words told him she was trying to follow him. He stopped at the garage because, empty as he was, he remembered he loved her. “Go back in the house.”
“Where are you going?”
“I need to be alone.”
“You need to talk to Peach.”
“Goddamn it! What is with you people and talking?” He turned in a slow circle, hands to his head, scotch down his neck. He ripped the bottle away and put where it could do some good. He swallowed hard, feeling the burn. Embracing it. “Go back to Butch,” he said, his voice low, calm. “Let him take care of you and the baby.”
In the barn, he found what he was looking for. Nothing and nobody. He squinted, trying to see something in the pitch dark. A small light glowed on the workbench, acted as a beacon. Soon he had the light of a battery-operated lantern to see by. The floor ahead of him illuminated as he made his way to the back and onto the stacked bales of hay. He suckled from the bottle, waiting for the spirits to carry him away.
“I never was a fan of scotch.” The woman’s voice was as smooth as the nectar in the bottle.
He should have known she would come. She made an appearance at every worst moment in his life. “What the hell are you doing here?”
She leaned against the straw, a gorgeous blonde in a short red dress. Amber eyes bathed in black eye shadow looked directly into his soul. “I’m here for you,” she said. “I’m always here for you.”
“I don’t need you, Stella.” He snarled, showing the white of his teeth, and pushed her away. Her kind of evil touched but couldn’t be touched. His hand passed through her, leaving him scrambling for balance.
“Of course you do, baby. You always have.” She uncrossed and re-crossed the bare legs that were finished in blood-red stilettos.
“What do you want?” She always wanted the same thing. A pound of his flesh.
“You know what I am.” Her voice was husky and called to his sluggish body.
“My worse nightmare.”
Her blood-red lips curved up. “In the flesh, so to speak. I’m the one woman who resisted the charms of Thomas Riley.” She rolled her chin toward the window to the porch. “Well, the first woman. That still makes me your favorite nightmare.”
“I hate
you,” Tom said without bite.
“Oh, baby,” she pouted. “Don’t be like that. You know I didn’t mean to grind your heart into sausage. We were just having fun. I had no idea you were a virgin—”
“I wasn’t a virgin,” he snapped.
She shrugged. “Maybe not physically but emotionally. After all this time, you can’t be mad at me.” She began gesturing grandly. “I made you into what you are today. If it wasn’t for me, you’d be a potbellied, brow-beaten, pussy-whipped bastard with two point four kids and a mortgage you couldn’t afford. Bye-bye, PhD. Bye-bye, Riley Engineers and Architects. Bye-bye, sex life.”
“Riley Architects and Engineers. Get it right.” He sucked down the last inch of scotch.
“Whatever.” Abruptly, her tone changed. Her face went tight. “I was worried about you. This one nearly caught you with your pants down.” She looked at the bottle. “You need a fresh one. Then we’ll make sense of everything.”
Peach stayed on the porch after Anderson left, the gate closing behind him. The ring in her pocket weighed heavily on her. She’d tried to give it back, but Anderson was so damn sure that with a little time, she’d get over being mad at him. She snorted, as if that would ever happen—except she wasn’t mad. He had given her a gift, something more precious than diamonds. He gave her back her confidence to love.
She replayed that moment and didn’t cringe at the cutting words. Instead, she cheered herself on, wishing she hadn’t shown restraint and just thrown the wine. She had fit herself into a mold that wasn’t made for her. Of course, it hadn’t worked. She’d been lucky she found out before the “I dos.” If Anderson had asked her four months ago, she would have said yes, signing up for a lifetime of conforming. At least up until the divorce.
Her thoughts of Anderson softened. He had found her just to get her back. It was the stuff of romances…just not hers. She hoped he found the right woman and that he found love.
The way she did.
Her stomach cartwheeled at the thought. The excuses to be together were gone. Decision time: make the commitment or break up. She was going to throw herself on the sword and tell Tom that she loved him. It didn’t matter that they had only known each other a short time.
She. Loved. Him.
She had no idea what his response would be. That scared her when little else did. There were moments in the last few days where she thought she saw something more in his gaze. The last time they made love, only hours ago, they had made love. She couldn’t have imagined it. But then other moments, he was so distant. There was only one way to know what was going on in his brilliant head.
She ran back into the playroom before her nerves won out. Only Butch was there, cleaning up. “Where’s Tom?” He stood slowly, sizing her up. A sloth couldn’t move any slower. “Seriously, Butch. Where is Tom?”
“You gonna marry him?” He rolled up the open bags of chips.
“Yeah, if he’s willing.” Her mouth got ahead of her brain, but now that she said it, she knew it was right.
“Surprised you didn’t leave with him.” He raked in the scattered poker chips. “Came all this way just to sweep you off your feet.”
Now the sloth was talking jibberish. “Why would I leave with Anderson when I love Tom?”
Butch froze, then slowly turned, a cheesy grin on his face. “You love Tom?”
She waved her hand in front of his face. “How much have you had to drink? You just asked me if I was gonna marry him.”
“You’re gonna marry Tom?” He got a goofy smile on his face. “Does he know that?”
She took the poker chips and slapped them into their box. “Butch, I think your brain stopped working. Tell your wife you love her and go to bed. First, do you know where Tom is?” She enunciated the last words distinctly.
The door to the courtyard opened, and Tom staggered in. Straw in his hair, shirt half tucked him, he was the most beautiful mess she’d ever seen. Butch left them, closing the door behind him.
Tears welled in her eyes as she stepped toward him. “I’ve been looking for you.”
“Well, looked what the cat dragged in,” Stella said in Tom’s ear. “The slut finished off her first guy, and she’s coming around for seconds. You’re not going to let her play us this way, are you?”
He pushed her away, but she didn’t move. Damn illusions. He looked at Peach, another damn illusion. She’d left with her fucking fiancé. Whiskey. That’s what he needed.
Peach stood next to the poker table, as beautiful as any nightmare could be. “You’ve been drinking. A lot.”
He slammed the bottle down, but the table disappeared, and the bottle hit his foot. It hurt from a mile away. Peach’s form elongated, twisted, and then reformed. A tear fell as he squinted at the face of a …“Ssslut.”
“You tell her,” Stella said, propping Tom up from behind. “This gravy train is over.”
“Over!” He swayed on his feet, running into the table that reappeared. “Get off my train. Get out of my house.”
Peach held out a hand as big as a frying pan. “We need to talk.”
He squeezed his eyes tight and covered his ears.
One of his hands was pulled away. “I love you.”
Stella whispered in his ear. “She’s lying. Why would she ever love you? She has the tall, rich bastard. She just used you to fill the time.”
“Liar! You used me,” he screamed.
“I didn’t,” she shouted back.
“I was never anything but a tool to get him to marry you,” he said with lips that wouldn’t cooperate. “And you were nothing to me but a good fucking screw.”
Peach shoved past him, putting her shoulder to his body. The world tipped, he landed on the poker table, then even that abandoned him, and he dropped to the floor. He landed in a knot; his arms were going north and south, his legs east and west. His head was under a table and, when his eyes focused, she was gone.
Stella crawled over him, her long hair brushing his chest. “That’s the way to take charge. I’m proud of you, baby.”
“Why can’t you go away, too?”
Her shellacked lips pouted. “Then where would you be? Let’s get you up to bed.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Saturday, April 15 six-thirty a.m.
The crisp, cool morning air welcomed the first splash of pink across the midnight blue horizon. Peach sat curled on a chaise lounge, a blanket from the family room wrapped around her body. She watched with detached awareness the first colors dawn. A door closed. There was the jingle of bells, and then the full weight of an oversize puppy landed next to her.
“Good morning. You’re up early,” Katie called in a subdued voice as she crossed the courtyard. “Or should I say you’re up late?”
Peach dug her fingers into the thick, warm coat of the black lab.
“I tried to wait up, but I have no stamina these days. So dish. Are you going to marry him?”
She shook her head. She had to swallow a few times to find her voice. “He doesn’t love me. He never did.”
“Oh, good.” Katie let out the breath she was holding and smiled. Then frowned. “I mean not good—”
“I’m leaving today. Are you going into Nashville? I need to get to the airport.”
Katie’s smile fell, and she sat on the end of the chaise. “You don’t have to go, Peach. Stay here with us.”
She pressed her head against the dog’s thick flank. “Can’t. Can Poppy stay for another day or two? I need to get the house ready.”
“Are you sure it’s safe? Those losers still know where you live. You know Tom—”
“He doesn’t want me here.” She shook her head violently. “He—he doesn’t want me. I was just another naïve notch on his bed post.”
Katie rested her hand on Peach’s knee. “You love him. Does he know?”
She nodded. “I feel…like my heart was ripped out and tossed to the dogs. No offense, Taylor.” The dog wagged his tail and licked her chin to nose. She hugged
the dog, tears falling on his shoulder.
Katie gave the dog’s flank a hearty thump. “The great irony of love. When you find it, it really is like walking on sunshine. Nobody tells you that you have to go through hell, high water, a minefield, and a steeplechase to get there. Come inside. I’ll make coffee, and we’ll figure out how to get you home.”
Taylor followed Katie; Peach followed Taylor. Moving was harder than she expected, her legs rebelling against motion. The warmth inside the house seeped into Peach, making her realize how cold the night had been.
“It will just be a few minutes,” Katie said as the coffeemaker began to gurgle. She turned on her tablet and went to a travel website. “Here’s a direct flight. Leaves at ten. Are you sure you want to do this?”
Peach raked her hair back from her face, surprised at Katie’s cooperation. “You understand, right? I have to go?”
“Yeah, I do. I don’t like it, but I do. And so you understand, I am going to kick Tom’s ass and send him after you. You belong here. We all know it. Don’t write him off completely yet.”
“I can’t live that way. Not again. I should have written Anderson off a long time ago. I hung on, waiting for him to see I belonged. Tom told me straight up to get out.” Her voice cracked. “I would be…you name it…ridiculous, stupid, irrational to hold out hope that a man who called me a slut and threw me out of his house would want me back.” She heard what she said. “Fuck that. I would be ridiculous, stupid, and irrational to want that man. I’m out.”
“I’m texting Carolina. She’d never forgive either of us if you left without saying good-bye. Have you packed yet?”
“No. And I need to talk to Poppy.” She shivered as her body warmed, her confidence growing.
Katie bit her fingernails. “Do you want help?”
“No. I’m not a coward.”
Katie pulled the coffee pot away and filled Peach a cup directly from the machine. “Here. Go on and pack. We’ll leave in a half hour.”
Firmly believing in getting the nasty jobs done first, she strode into Tom’s bedroom to pack. She looked at the bed, surprised to find it still made with no sign of the jerk. He’d been drinking, and she expected to find him sleeping it off here.