Without Hesitation

by CJ Azevedo

  My cousin Talon met this amazing woman, Bailey, and fell head over heels for her, which we can’t fault him for because we all kind of did the same thing when she came out to California to sign my brother on as her client. She’s a publicist in New York but is originally from out here in California and I don’t think I can refuse the little piece of country heaven she’s offering.

  I’ve never met Blaine before, but I do love Bailey and my brother trusts her with his whole career, so I think I can trust her on her judgment of friends.

  “That, Dad, sounds perfect. I’ll call Bailey in the morning and I’ll start looking tonight for someone to look after things for me.”

  Greyden

  My head wasn’t in the game tonight. As soon as I realized I didn’t have my phone with me halfway through dinner, I was so anxious to get out of there I have no idea what else we even covered. Most of the time it’s not very important, more of an appearance type of thing anyway, so I hope nobody addressed anything out of the norm.

  I’m tired and not in the greatest of moods when I pull up to Macie’s, so when I see her dad’s car parked out front, it takes a lot of energy to control the irrational irritation I feel. I had no qualms with parking in the garage next to her car like I had been the last couple of weeks or letting myself in the house without knocking, as if I live there too. I practically do. If Mark has an issue with it he’s just going to have to get over it.

  Mark and Macie are having a conversation at the kitchen island. They both stop talking when I walk in, but neither seems to be bothered that I’m here.

  “Mark, how’s it going?” I ask as I walk over and shake his hand. I lean down and kiss the side of Macie’s head like I do every morning and every night; it’s the only place she doesn’t put a stop to and I take it. “Hey there, Butterfly. I won’t interrupt, I’m just going to go grab a shower. It’s been a long a day.”

  Macie grabs my hand as I start to back away and shakes her head with a small smile. She’s off tonight. She’s been off, hasn’t gotten back to herself yet, but I can tell that whatever they were discussing is bothering her. She’s more tense than usual and there’s a shadow in her eyes that I hate to see. “You’re not interrupting, Grey. Did you get enough to eat at dinner or do you want me to heat you up some pasta?”

  I smile down at her as it hits me like it does every night: I’ve truly found my place in this in world. I’ve found my happy like she told me to. I come home to her. “No, I’m good, sweetheart, thank you.” She continues to stare up at me and I stare back down at her, forgetting the fact that her dad is sitting there watching us. But it doesn’t matter to me, because I feel like something is happening, like she’s figuring something out, and I’m praying to God that it’s in my favor.

  “Greyden, grab something to drink and have a seat, son,” Mark says flatly, breaking the trance Macie and I found ourselves in.

  I reach up and let the backs of my fingers trail down her cheek before getting a beer from the fridge. That shadow that had been hovering in her eyes, the one of doubt and worry that I hate, lightened with my touch and eased my worry a little bit, but by the time I got back from the fridge, timid Macie was back.

  I sat next to her and watched as she folded into herself, looking down at the counter. I really didn’t like that; she was just looking at me with so much love shining in her eyes and now she won’t look at me at all. I reach over and squeeze her knee as I take a long pull from my beer. I watch her from the corner of my eye, but she doesn’t turn to me.

  “Greyden, Macie needs a vacation. Tonight we decided that she needs a little getaway in order for her to find herself again. We need our girl back and I think the only way that’s going to happen is for her to get out of this house and away from this town for a little while.”

  I hate that idea.

  I also think it may be exactly what she needs. For some pathetic reason, the local newspaper and bloggers find the Macie and Mitchell breakup newsworthy. I know she gets online and I’m pretty sure it bothers her.

  I’m more than happy to take her anywhere in the world, but I’m pretty sure that’s not what Mark’s suggesting.

  “I think that’s a good idea. I can keep an eye on your job sites while you’re gone,” I offer. “They’re all up to speed so there shouldn’t be any issues with that. Do you know where you want to go?”

  As soon as the first sentence came out of my mouth, Macie’s head whipped around, her eyes shooting so many questions at me. She wasn’t expecting me to be on board with this and I’m not sure if that worked out well for me or not.

  She still didn’t say anything, but Mark answered me. “She’s going to go stay with one of Bailey’s friends down in Gilroy. We just decided this evening that she’ll hire an assistant before she goes. And it appears she let her business die down in order to cater to Mitch, so she’ll need someone to help her build it back up when she returns. Maybe you can help her with the hiring process?”

  I blow out air and let my head fall back. The more time passes, the more Mitch damage we uncover. I hate myself more each time I learn something else; he never should have gotten so close to her. I pull Macie’s barstool closer to me and wrap my arm around her shoulders. “Yeah, we’ll find her somebody and get her business back to where it belongs before she gets back home.”

  Seeming pleased enough, Mark goes home, leaving Macie and I alone and silent in the foyer. I’m not sure where to start. Until Macie breaks down crying.

  “I don’t know what happened!” she wails. “I don’t know where it all went wrong and I don’t know where to begin to fix this, Grey.”

  Cradling her to my body, I carry her to bed, laying her down beside me while she continues to cry. I brush her hair back from her face and kiss her forehead.

  “I literally feel broken inside, like I’m not working right anymore.” She sniffles, hiding her face.

  “You’re not broken, Butterfly, maybe just misfiring a little. We’ll get you back in working order, I promise.”

  “That’s the problem, though, I don’t know how or where to start. I used to have it all figured out, ya know?” She takes a shuddering breath. “We were so young, but we knew what we wanted. Before. I was certain that you were all I needed. If I had you and we had our family like we talked about.” She laughs through her tears; it hurts my heart. “All the time, I thought that was all that mattered, that nothing could touch us.” I’m at a loss for words as she wipes her face off and gets a little more comfortable. “I mean, what eleven year old knows what boy she wants to marry and actually gets him for a good amount of time before she does something stupid and throws it all away?”

  I get up off the bed and pace. She’s going to take our whole history, blame herself for it, and then blame it as the cause for where she is currently. Not happening. I swallow hard as I try to focus on the main priority here, getting Macie to a place where she can get back to her normal.

  “Butterfly, you need to start by realizing that when we went wrong, it was only because it wasn’t our time to be right. That’s it. Nothing more, nothing less. There’s no telling what would have happened if you would’ve stuck around, so there’s no use in playing the ‘what if’ game with it. Okay?”

  “I don’t know, Grey, it just seems like that’s the answer and it would have been so simple. I did it for years, why not a couple more? What was I in such a rush for? Mitch? Well, that backfired, didn’t it?”

  She’s coming out of her sadness now. We haven’t been talking about these things since I’ve been here, but I know we need to. I didn’t want to rock her boat, upset her about Mitch, or make her make me leave. I’ve just insisted on staying and helping her out any way I can and also make sure she doesn’t fall too far into depression. But now we’re getting somewhere and I don’t think I’ll push her. She needs to go on that vacation and figure this all out on her own. Right now, after what she just said, I think she’ll come back home to me.

  I don’t know what I’ll do if sh
e doesn’t.

  “That’s life, sweetheart. Life sucks sometimes,” I walk back over to her and trail my fingers around her face and cup her jaw, “and sometimes life is beautiful. You just have to take it as it comes and look forward to the times it makes you happy. But always know, whether it’s a time that it’s making you happy or a time that sucks so bad you can barely breathe, you have me to come to. I’m always here, Butterfly. Always.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  March 22, 2011

  Reality Hits Macie in the Face

  Declan’s house was finished. It was beyond beautiful and Macie didn’t want to let the guys move into it and make it not beautiful. She was proud. She worked tirelessly to get it back to perfection and it was…perfect. Putting this house in her portfolio was going to do wonders for her career. She was so excited. She wanted to throw a lavish dinner party to show off her work, a party deserving of the house, but it wasn’t her house.

  It was her brother’s house.

  He had other ideas.

  He was throwing a house party.

  A house party in her gorgeous, pristine masterpiece. Absolutely insane.

  She had become obsessed with decorating it after all the structural and cosmetic changes were complete. It was a home she should move into, not her brother and Greyden, but it was an investment property he would be putting on the market within the next year, so she convinced him to design it as the family home it was meant to be and not the bachelor pad the guys wanted it to be. The only exception she caved on was Declan’s bedroom. He had full rein with it and surprisingly, it didn’t turn out to be quite the mess she’d expected.

  This particular day had been declared her last day allowed in the house as a designer. From this day on, she was only allowed over as Declan’s sister. She had been there since six in the morning applying all the final touches and readjusting everything that was already perfect. She knew that nobody there that night would ever notice the tiny blue jay with sparkling wings sitting at just the perfect angle in the plant she had placed on the side table, but she knew he was there and he was perfect. Or that the table was set to a Queen’s standards, the toilet paper rolls were all folded over the top and to a point, the blinds were shut to the exact same point throughout the house, and there wasn’t a smudge on any piece of glass or mirror to be seen. Nobody would notice or care but her.

  Macie finished taking her two thousand pictures around ten o’clock at night, knowing the party would be arriving any minute. She lit the tiki torches and switched on the pool lights out back, then made sure the front walk was lit up so nobody trampled the new landscaping.

  She was excited to have some wine and party with the guys. She had been so busy she hadn’t done that in a real long time. She hadn’t even seen Greyden alone in what seemed like forever. They still talked at least once a week on the phone and texted regularly, but they hadn’t gone out or been together in a few months. She was really looking forward to seeing him and hopefully sneaking off early. They hadn’t told anyone that they had still been sort of seeing each other over the last few years; it wasn’t their business and Greyden didn’t want anyone to see Macie in that light.

  She was pouring herself a glass of wine when the front door and garage doors both opened at the same time and the quiet house filled with loud voices and laughter.

  Declan came through first with a girl hanging onto the back of his shirt, already stumbling over her heels. She was wearing next to nothing, a very tiny skirt with a tube top. Macie was immediately reminded why she never went to his parties.

  “Mace! You’re still here. Are you staying and partying tonight?” Declan asked, sounding hopeful. They still got along great and he tried to get her to party with them frequently now that she was older.

  “Yeah, somebody needs to make sure you don’t totally screw up my house.” She smiled the whole time and Declan laughed, but the girl hanging on him frowned.

  “I thought you said this was your house.” She was instantly irritated, letting go of him as if the idea of him not owning the big, beautiful home made her lose all interest in him. She just lost any possible respect from Macie, that was for sure. Not that there was much there to begin with.

  Macie shook her head and turned around to refill her glass. Just as she set the bottle back on the counter, she was swooped up into strong arms, the smell of cologne and beer overpowering her.

  “Ahhh, lookie what we have here. Do I get to get my beautiful girl drunk tonight?” Keegan asked as he cradled Macie in his arms like a baby and kissed her on the forehead.

  Macie snickered and wrapped her arms around his neck. “I think you might. I’m going to need it to be able to hang around with your groupies.” She didn’t whisper. She didn’t care that she was being rude and Declan’s date could hear her or that there was another girl standing next to Keegan giving her a death stare. Those girls weren’t aware yet that these guys belonged to her, but they would know soon enough.

  “Yeeaahh! Let’s do this! Shots. We’re doing shots, baby.” He set her down and she grabbed her wine glass while he went for the bar to grab shot glasses. Dec laughed but grabbed the tequila.

  Luca walked in from the front room with a group of guys and a couple girls, his face lighting up when he noticed Macie. He headed straight for her. “Hey, sweetheart. The place looks amazing.” He kissed her cheek then gave her a hug, squeezing her tightly.

  “Thanks, Luca.” She couldn’t keep the pride out of her voice. She wasn’t surprised that Luca was the one to mention the house. It wasn’t because he had a thing for interior design, but because he was nice enough to care that she did.

  Keegan lined up about ten shot glasses on the island and poured them in his usual “fancy bartender style”—all at once. Only Keegan isn’t a fancy bartender and he left more tequila on the countertop than in the glasses. Macie scowled at him. As soon as he finished and everyone noticed the mess he made, they all started cracking up, leaving Luca, Declan, and Keegan staring at Macie with large eyes and pathetic attempts at not laughing. They all knew he was in trouble for the mess and she was going to be pissed.

  “Seriously, Keeg?” Her shoulders dropped. She knew this was just the start of it, but she wasn’t quite ready to let it go yet.

  He slid two shot glasses towards her. “Drink these. It’ll make everything prettier and you happier.” He gave her the smile that got him out of all kinds of trouble.

  The guys laughed and the other girls scoffed in irritation at the lack of attention they were receiving. Macie laughed and shot the two glasses of tequila. A loud round of whoops followed and she stomped her bare foot on the hardwood floor at the bite of the alcohol.

  “All right, now everybody get outside. My heart can’t handle anymore party fouls in here.”

  Most of the crowd started for the door as she reached for the cleaning spray and sponge under the sink.

  “It won’t hurt it to leave it until the morning. C’mon, let’s relax and party tonight,” Dec insisted with a very serious expression. He had been worried about how much she had been working but she kept brushing him off. She was fine.

  “This will drive me insane, Dec. I’ll be out in two minutes,” she assured him with a smile, then went about wetting her sponge at the sink.

  Declan assessed her for another second before nodding and walking to the back. Keegan was collecting the shot glasses when she turned around. He walked past her and dropped them unceremoniously in the sink. Propping himself up against the counter, he watched as she began wiping up the mess.

  After a couple minutes of her cleaning and him watching, her face broke into a smile. She couldn’t help it; it was weird. “Need something, Keeg?”

  “When did you get so hot, Mace?” He sounded truly confused.

  Macie laughed loudly, tossing her head back and making the assumption that Keegan had been drinking for awhile. “I’ve always this been hot. You were just too overprotective to notice.” Still smiling, she finished with the cou
nter and went to the sink next to Keegan to rinse out the sponge. He didn’t move out of her way. He just stood there and watched her.

  He turned around so he trapped her body against the counter, his front flush against her back. She froze. He bent his head to her ear and whispered, “I’m noticing now and I’m thinking skinny dipping is a must.”

  She caught her breath and her wits, but they went right out the window the moment he pressed himself to her back again. “And I’m thinking you have a death wish if you’re thinking that’s going to fly.”

  Keegan squeezed her shoulders and kissed the back of her head, then went out back without saying another word. Macie was left standing there feeling like she was in an alternate universe.

  She went to her wine like it was her lifeline and downed another. Two glasses of wine and two shots of tequila down already—she was definitely doing more partying than she had in some time. She took a long sip of her third glass and decided to text Sam to see if she could come over to give her reinforcement with the groupies and apparently with Keegan as well.

  Macie was reading Sam’s text, which said she was out on a date and couldn’t come, when the door to the garage opened. The wine glass, which was suspended in the air and against her lips, continued to hover there as she watched Greyden back into the house, holding on to a girl. She was giggling, her hands wrapped around his neck, her lips sometimes hitting his jaw, sometimes not; her head was like a bobblehead, it was bouncing around so much. One of his hands was down on her ass, the other up on her arm, and he was laughing and whispering something that Macie couldn’t hear.

  Years. Macie had been casually sleeping with this guy for years knowing that he wasn’t exclusive with her and somehow had avoided this exact moment…for years. She didn’t know what to do. Surprisingly enough, she didn’t want to cry. She always assumed that when this time came, she would cry for a year, but that’s not the emotion she was feeling. Puke? Yes, she did sort of want to do that.