By way of explanation, she said to Cal in a monotone, “I was watching something on a celebrity tonight who said that she had two cell phones – one for personal and one for business. That got me thinking about what I knew about Carter, and I wondered if he might have done the same thing – gotten a throwaway phone for... well, not for business.
“Carter was gay, Cal. I could have told you that when he died,” she said, beginning to answer one of his questions without having been asked, “but I didn’t have any proof at that point and I knew you wouldn’t have believed me. You’d’ve thought I was just trying to weasel out from under the blame.”
Cal’s head snapped up to look at her, and she was surprised to see not anger, not accusation, but understanding dawning on his face. He desperately wished he could’ve refused her allegation about what he would have assumed she was doing, but she wasn’t wrong.
She wasn’t wrong. Never had been.
He opened the phone. Ellie had already been through it – she knew what was on there.
There was no mistaking that it was Carter’s phone – the picture on the home screen was of the two of them when they were babies.
But the rest of what was on there was a side of Carter he’d never seen – the other pics, the texts were quite explicit. He’d been using this phone for hookups and porn.
He wished she’d never told him – not because he thought any less of his brother – he didn’t. He thought less of himself. He didn’t know why Carter thought he couldn’t tell him – except that he knew from what she’d said to him the night Carter had died that he was depressed and that he felt as if he hadn’t measured up to Cal.
No wonder he was depressed – he was living a double life, when there was absolutely no reason for him to.
Ellie rose, carefully keeping her robe – or any other part of her from touching him. She walked to her door and simply held it open to stand pointedly next to it.
He wanted to yell. He wanted to scream. He wanted to clutch her to him and never, ever let her go.
But he didn’t have the right to do that any longer. He’d blown it eight years ago – thrown it clean away – he’d destroyed it with his stupid, unfounded jealousy and his pain at losing his brother. And then he’d compounded his astounding stupidity by treating her the way he had at his party. But he still had the unmitigated gall to show up on her doorstep, practically demanding sex, which he still couldn’t believe that she’d given him.
He was of a mind to stay – to try to fight for her, somehow. She was still everything he wanted in a woman, and their brief time together a week ago had only brought that home to him more so than anything else could have.
But the bald truth was that he knew he didn’t deserve her.
So Cal rose and went to stand in her doorway. She was staring down at her feet.
He wanted to tip her chin up to look in her eyes one more time, but he knew he didn’t have the right to touch her any longer.
Hell, he wasn’t good enough to stand in her shadow – to stand anywhere near her. “For what it’s worth, I am very, very sorry.”
“Now you’re sorry, now that I’ve proven to you that you were wrong, that I didn’t have any part in Carter’s death, that I was spending all that time with him trying to get him to tell you what he couldn’t, in the end.
“And then there’s Cruz.” Her voice was so flat, so emotionless, he could barely believe it was hers.
“I’ll never stop saying it to you. I’m very, very sorry.”
“Yes, you will, because you’re never going to see me again.”
As much remorse as he felt, that telltale muscle jumped in his jaw again, but he knew there was nothing he could do.
So he turned and walked out of her life.
Chapter 9
It was Ashley’s wedding, and, as much as she loved her friend, Ellie just couldn’t believe that she’d hooked one – and a big one at that. It was the congressman’s son that she’d gotten together with at Cal’s party the year before last, and, unfortunately for her, Brad was best friends with Cal.
Cal was Brad’s best man.
Ellie was Ash’s maid of honor.
They’d been thrown together by fate, nearly eighteen months after she’d literally shown him the door. They didn’t normally travel in the same social circles, so it had been relatively easy for her to avoid him – until now, when she’d been pressed into all of those social obligations that a wedding caused.
She’d had to attend their whirlwind engagement party – although that hadn’t been too bad – she’d just skirted away from him every time he’d so much as looked at her.
But he was harder to avoid during the days immediately prior to the destination wedding, which was conducted on Aruba. Everyone in the bridal party had arrived several days earlier, but it was crunch time now – the rehearsal for tomorrow’s big day, and she actually had to stand next to him and touch him. And she wasn’t feeling anywhere near as much loathing as she wanted to, no matter how many times she forced herself to run through the horrible things he’d said and the horrible scenes he’d caused in her life.
To make things worse, he’d been looking down at her the entire time while they were waiting to get the signal to begin their trip down the aisle, and, just seconds before, he’d reached down to take her hand in his and tuck it into his elbow. It didn’t help that he wasn’t wearing a suit. Since the rehearsal dinner was a less than formal affair, he was in a blue golf shirt and shorts and she touched his bare skin.
Cal noticed – as he’d expected – that her fingers were frozen and he’d patted them gently. They made it down the aisle – just barely, and she’d separated from him at the earliest possible moment to wait for the other eight members of the bridal party to join them, then everyone turned to watch the bride pretend to walk down the aisle.
Everyone turned, that was, except for Cal, whose eyes stayed glued on her, not that she noticed.
Although she’d always be beautiful to him, she didn’t look good. She was pale and thin, and the sight of her aroused every protective bone in his body – some more than others, some much less protective, such that he had to fold his hands in front of his junk in order to maintain the smallest level of decorum.
Seeing her again made his heart ache, made him want to bang his head against the nearest rock. She was so close and yet so far, and he didn’t know how he was going to survive the next day. Let alone, watching her walk out of his life to go home, where he was ashamed to admit he took entirely too much interest in what she was doing, who she was seeing; driving by her house, frequenting the restaurant he knew she favored when she was there, knowing exactly how pathetic that made him, but resigned to being so in favor of seeing her.
Hell, he’d even run for and been elected to the school board so that he could see her at their once a year dinner with the teachers. He was trying to get their salaries bumped up, too, but wasn’t having much luck.
In the aftermath of what he’d done to her – and to Carter by apathy – he’d tried to do things to honor his brother. He’d not only joined PFLAG, he’d donated generously to them, as well as creating a scholarship in Carter’s name at his alma mater specifically for LGBT students, and donating a wing to the regional hospital, also in his name.
He didn’t have any illusions that any of the things he or his family had done would make up for Carter’s unhappy life and the mess he’d made of his relationship with Ellie, but he was trying to do what was right.
And he knew, deep down, that what was right was to let Ellie go, to let her be happy with someone else. Even if it killed him, and it appeared – especially this weekend, when she was so close and yet so far – that it was definitely going to do that.
She was on his arm again for the return trip back down the aisle and he let his hand cover her freezing one again, but she had yet to even look at him and again skittered away from him at the first opportunity.
Not that he could blame her in the least.
Still, he let his eyes feast on her, knowing he was making her uncomfortable but entirely unable to control himself.
He didn’t see her again until the rehearsal dinner, where she looked, to his eyes, a bit gaunt but ravishing in a figure hugging red dress. He resigned himself to spending the evening with his hands primly folded over himself when he wasn’t sitting.
There was a short cocktail hour, during which she seemed a bit of a lost soul. He was surprised she wasn’t a part of the laughing, giggling clique of bridesmaids, but she seemed to be somehow separate from that group.
His feet brought him to her against his mind’s wishes, although he was careful not to crowd her. Cal noticed that she didn’t have a drink.
Although the dinner was on the bride’s parents, they did not offer an open bar – Ashley’s family did not come from money, and Cal knew that, although Brad’s parents could certainly afford it, they hadn’t wanted to step on her parents to pay for one.
So he wondered if she wanted a drink, but couldn’t afford it. He couldn’t imagine what getting to this place had cost her, not to mention clothes, her maid of honor dress... she was probably out of pocket quite a bit.
“Can I get you something from the bar?” He wanted to beg her to let him do something – anything – for her, but managed to restrain himself from doing so.
“No, thank you.”
She still hadn’t looked at him.
He forced himself to take a few steps back from her, his mind berating him with the fact that he’d put her through enough misery already, and that he had no right to subject her to any more.
They were seated next to each other at the dinner, however, and although he knew he was in for a night of pure torture, he said a prayer of heartfelt thanks to whatever gods controlled that kind of thing, for giving him an excuse to touch her occasionally, if ‘accidentally’, to be so close to her and smell that familiar, heart stopping perfume that was his Elise.
Champagne flowed and toasts abounded, one rather eloquent one given by him and one much shorter, more perfunctory by her.
His toast had touched her, as much as she hadn’t wanted it to. He’d mentioned how wonderful it was that, in a world of however many billions of people, that Brad and Ashley had met their soul mates, how precious that was and how it would have to be carefully nurtured like a delicate flower.
Instead of stomped into the ground as he’d done to her, her mind said.
But her body was on full alert. Even just the slightest whiff of his aftershave was more than enough to get her to dampen her panties – even when she smelled it on someone else, to her great shame. Now, sitting next to him, his elbow rubbing hers occasionally as they ate, their hands colliding as they reached for their champagne flutes for another toast, the sheer, vital male warmth that always radiated from him...
She knew there was going to be a puddle left on her seat when she rose. He’d done that old world thing when they’d all sat down, pulling her chair out for her and seating her, and had done it every time she’d gotten up, too, even though she’d told him he didn’t have to bother – he was the only man doing that for any woman at the table.
Brad had leaned across the table and teased him, “Cut that out, man! You’re making the rest of us look bad.”
“I can’t help it if none of you cavemen recognize that a lady should be treated as such.”
Everyone ahhed at him, and then the mother of the bride, who she really only knew in passing, and who’d had entirely too much to drink, asked innocently, “Is there something going on between you two? Can we all expect to be here again next year, maybe?”
Ellie blushed and shook her head. “No, definitely not.”
Cal, however, had gotten a wild hair up his butt and had reached over to take her freezing hand in his, kissing the back of it and winking at her so that everyone could see. “I could never hope that she would consider that I was worthy of such an honor,” he said wistfully, and got another chorus of ahhs.
Ellie wanted to snatch her hand away from him, but he held onto just the tips of her fingers while everyone else’s attention had gone on to the food that was just arriving. “I meant every word I said, Elise,” he leaned down and whispered to her, then kissed her fingers and let go.
She didn’t know what to do, so she, too, concentrated on the food, although when it arrived she didn’t eat much of it; and he noticed, although he refrained from commenting. Desserts were individual, light pavlovas with fresh strawberries and whipped cream. She took a few bites from it but no more.
Cal couldn’t help but be concerned with her weight loss and her seeming lack of appetite. Where was the woman with the gorgeous, generous behind and a hankering for steak? Was she sick? His mind filled with worry that he had to shove to one side.
When – what was for Ellie an interminable meal – it finally ended, the wedding party rose to hit the bar together.
Ash stopped by her chair. “You’re coming, aren’t you?” Her gaze flickered over Cal then back to Ellie. “The both of you?”
Ellie’s smile didn’t reach her eyes, but Cal was the only one who noticed. “Yes, I’ll be there.” As bad as she felt being near the source of her misery – as bad as she thought she should feel, anyway – she didn’t want to be a wet blanket.
Cal went, too, but she had an idea that it was just because she’d gone. She didn’t end up doing much – dancing a bit with the group of them, but spending most of the evening alone nursing one drink.
At least he had the grace not to hang all over her, but he was doing much the same as she was, only the other bridesmaids were all hitting on him, trying to tug him out onto the dance floor, although he politely begged off each time. Even Brad tried to get him to join in more, inclining his head towards the other side of the room where she sat. “You and she should get together.”
Cal raised his eyebrow tellingly. “Yeah, no.”
Brad had a feeling there was a lot going on beneath the surface, and he knew he should be a good friend and ask, but he was way too polluted to do so, so he just danced away – right over to Ellie’s table, extending his hand to her and not taking no for an answer as he guided her out onto the dance floor.
“C’mon. It’s my last night as a free man who can dance with anyone he wants to. And I pick you.”
Although her heart wasn’t in it, she danced through several songs with him, and when she finally begged off, her eyes flitted – of their own volition – to the table in the corner of the room opposite hers, and it was empty.
She didn’t want to consider why that made her even more unhappy. She should have been elated that her big, hulking shadow was gone.
Feeling depressed, she made her excuses to the soon to be newlyweds and made her way to her bungalow, crawling into bed and dissolving into tears, feeling sadder, lonelier and emptier than she had in a very long while. And that was saying something.
The next day was a blur. She didn’t even really have time to dread the fact that they were going to have to walk down the aisle together, she was too busy trying to keep Ashley from changing her mind entirely about wanting to marry Brad, to say nothing of all the other crap she had to keep track of as the maid of honor.
She didn’t really begin feeling worried until long past the ceremony, when dinner was over, too, and they were about to begin dancing. Ellie threw back the rest of her champagne as well as the rest of the flutes around her, hoping no one noticed, because the worst part of the whole thing – for her – was about to begin.
Ashley had decided that, for the first dance, instead of them being on the floor alone, she wanted to be surrounded by her friends and family – starting with the maid of honor and the best man.
When the lights dimmed and the DJ began to play “Marry Me” by Train, Cal, who had been seated next to Brad on the other side of the table, got up and extended his hand to Ellie, leading her out onto the dance floor to take her into his arms. The other bridal party couples joined them, but h
e was all Ellie could see.
She was looking at him – really looking at him – for the first time in a very long time, and Cal wanted this moment to go on forever. He wanted to drop to one knee and echo the words of Patrick Monahan, but he knew what her answer would be.
What he deserved her answer to be.
Besides he didn’t have a ring, and if – when – he corrected himself, he got her to forgive him and then fuck him and then marry him – he didn’t much care in what order – he was going to give her a ginormous diamond so big she could barely lift her hand.
Whether she wanted one or not.
Ellie’s mind was off on much less romantic pursuits, as much as she tried to reel it in. It felt so good to be in his arms like this, with him holding her against him. She could feel that he was aroused. It seemed he’d been living in that condition at least the entire time they’d been on the island. Not that she cared – she wanted to care, she should have cared... but she couldn’t bring herself to feel anything except an answering desire that had her damp panties clinging to the area on her body that she most wanted him to touch, to probe, to taste...
Every once in a while she’d succeed in reeling her libido in, but those times were getting fewer and further between, until she finally gave up the exhaustive fight against her lesser nature and surrendered.
Cal knew the moment she’d done it; how she felt in his arms had changed. She was no longer stiff and trying to lean as far away from him as she could. Instead her body molded, melted itself against him.
He didn’t know what had happened, but he would be forever grateful for whatever it was, and smiled down at her softly. Without even knowing it, he began to sing along to the song.
To Love a Man Page 10