Reading Tara (Growing Up Ashton Book 1)

by Kathryn Hewitt

  Instead, I punched him in the arm. Lightly of course, but I loved to tease him as much as he loved to tease me. He rubbed his arm, pretending to be mad and fake scowling. It was so cute, I did laugh. This was why I liked Zach. He and I were always so easy going around each other, constantly goofing off. We could always crack each other up. I worried I might be more like Will than I realized, since we both got along with Zach so well.

  I offered him some water, which he accepted, so I went and got him a bottle. Thinking I was hilarious, I unscrewed the cap and then placed it back on, barely, laughing to myself as I walked back into the living room and handed him the bottle. Totally immature, but whatever.

  Zach took the bottle and it totally spilled everywhere. Unfortunately, the joke was on me because the majority went on the couch and the coffee table. Damn, I’d be cleaning that up. Regardless, I started laughing hysterically. Not only was it funny to watch, but the look on Zach’s face when it happened was priceless.

  “So you think that was funny, Princess?” Zach asked, his tone accusatory but his blue eyes dancing. I knew he thought it was funny. He was probably only annoyed that he hadn’t done it to me first. I nodded, trying to stifle my giggle. “Well lets see what else is funny,” he went on, his eyes taking on an evil glint. His arms snaked out and I was suddenly on the couch, being tickled to death. Damn Zach for knowing how ticklish I was! I was writhing around, laughing my ass off, gasping for breath, but he wouldn’t let up.

  “No… Zach! You’re killing me,” each word punctuated with hysterical laughter. Can you really suffer from death by tickling? Because it seemed like that was going to happen. Before I could finish the thought, Zach had grabbed me and suddenly I was sitting on his lap and he was kissing me. Like kissing me. I was so shocked that I just sat there. Then I realized that this was actually happening. Zach and I were kissing. My mind finally wrapped around that fact and I pulled away gasping. I vaguely acknowledged that I’d not been quick enough to pull away, but I was in such shock that I could barely think. I jumped off of his lap and stood up, stepping a good foot away.

  He smiled at me like he’d won the lottery. But whatever was on my face must not have been what he was hoping for, because his smile quickly faded. “Tara.” It was all he could say because he was as breathless as I was. Granted, I’d been being attacked by the tickle monster before it happened so I’d already been breathless. Wow. Did I have that affect on him? For a split second, I pictured myself giving myself a high five. Then I came crashing back to reality.

  Zach had kissed me. Like, on purpose. Like he would have kept doing, had I not leapt up. Why? It was Zach. And Me. My head was buzzing. We were buds, not kissers. I was one of the guys with Zach. A voice in my head whispered, Apparently Not. I needed to handle this situation. Maybe it had been an accident. Didn’t seem like and accident. OK, I had to stop this conversation that I was having with myself.

  “Zachy…” I realized that I had no idea what to say. Play it off or pretend it hadn’t happened? Joke? Be serious and address what had just transpired? He certainly couldn’t think it could happen again. Based on the look on his face, he hoped it would happen again. Shit. “You know I love you,” I smiled sweetly at him. Before I could continue letting him down easily, he jumped in.

  “Tara, I know I shouldn’t have done that, but I had to try. We get along so great…and well, I just like you so much…” he trailed off. He did? How long had this been going on? Then it dawned on me. This must have been going on for a long time. This whole time that I thought Zach and I were just close, he wanted to be closer. Wow. Will’s comment about Zach when he was trying to explain why he hadn’t wanted me with Calen suddenly made sense. It didn’t make me feel as weird as I would have thought it would, but it made my stomach hurt a little. I was going to have to break it to Zach, to the brother I actually liked, that I didn’t feel the same way about him as he did me.

  This was going to suck.

  I sat down next to him and looked up as I grabbed his hand and took a deep breath. “Zach, I love you, but we can’t be like that with each other.”

  “We haven’t yet. But we could try,” he looked at me hopefully. Like I said, this sucked. I just shook my head.

  “You’re Will’s best friend and we have grown up together. You’re like my other brother. You’ve always been there for me, but I’m sorry.” He looked so crestfallen. “And I would never want to mess with the awesome friendship that we have. I would truly hate myself if we lost what you and I share. It’s too special to risk.”

  “But it could become more special.” He wasn’t giving up. I finally turned to the elephant in the room.

  “But what about Calen?” I asked.

  “Calen?” Zach asked. He looked confused. Then understanding seemed to creep over him. Understanding then flooded me. Zach didn’t know about Calen and me. Will hadn’t told him, probably in some misguided attempt to protect him. Will really needed to reevaluate his decision making skills. “Oh,” Zach said softly, looking away. I knew he was embarrassed. He looked back at me, his neck red. “How long?”

  I’d assumed that by now, everyone knew about us. We practically undressed each other with our eyes, or so the girls informed me. Embarrassing. But hot. It was my turn to look away.

  All I said was, “A little while.” I didn’t want to say how long, it would make Zach feel bad. He cleared his throat and stood up.

  “Um, tell Will I stopped by.” He walked away and out the front door, never once looking at me. Still, I couldn’t miss the heartache that was painted across his face. I felt horrible. I would never want to hurt Zach. But what could I do? I couldn’t be with him. I was with Calen, and besides, I didn’t reciprocate Zach’s feelings. I put my face in my hands.

  After sitting like that for a few minutes, I got up and went upstairs to Will’s room and knocked. It sounded like he threw a baseball at the door. I knocked again. Finally he yelled, “What?” so I opened the door and looked in. Thankfully, no Sam. I’d seen too much of her at this point. Literally. I was always scared to enter his room so I just stood in the doorway.

  “In or out: you’re letting out the heat,” he said. Personally, I thought I was letting out the stench, but whatever. I came in and closed the door.

  Then I just blurted it out.

  “Zach just kissed me.” I couldn’t believe I was confiding in my brother! But he should know, and maybe he could comfort Zach. Or give him a charley horse, or whatever it was that guys did to show they cared.

  Will sat down on his bed and put his head in his hands. I heard a muffled, “Damn,” as he rubbed his face. He seemed surprisingly upset. Not upset like he’d been about Calen, but more just bummed. Then he looked at me. “What did you do?” It was an honest question.

  “I told him I love him but that that wasn’t how our relationship was.” Will nodded.

  “What did he say?” I realized how much he cared about Zach, and that he was genuinely worried about him.

  “He tried to convince me a little, but not embarrassingly so. Then he left.” Zach’s hurt expression flashed in my mind.

  “Did you tell him about Calen?” I nodded. Will seemed to slump even more.

  “Will, he needed to know.”

  “I know.” He was quiet for a while. Then he said, “Zach was the main reason that I was so upset when I found out about Calen. I knew it would kill him.” Who knew my brother was compassionate?

  “Will, how long has this been going on?” I suspected, but I was also curious about how long my brother had known that his best friend had a crush on his sister.

  “Forever.” Wow. And Will had kept Zach’s secret, never betraying his trust. My brother was turning out to be a lot more complex than I had ever realized. “I never really minded. I mean, I socked him the first time I figured it out, but after that, I didn’t mind. I figured he’d never act on it. I also hoped that if he ever did, you’d turn out to feel the same about him. I knew he’d always be good to you if you ever
got together. Besides, as my best friend, I could keep an eye on him.” He laughed mirthlessly.

  “I’m sorry Will. I honestly never knew…and you know I would never want to hurt Zach.”

  “How you never knew is beyond me. It was always so obvious.” I guess it must have been. I mean, Calen picked up on it, although apparently he had his own secret arsenal. But I really never did. “I’ll wait until later and then I’ll call him. Gotta give the man a little time to preserve his dignity.” I wasn’t sure if Will was talking to me, or himself.

  “Sorry. This bums me out.” I turned to leave and heard Will let out a little chuckle. I looked at him. He had a smirk on his face. “What?”

  “Man, this is going to be hilarious. You and he are going to be SO awkward around each other for a while. I’m just going to sit back and enjoy the show.”

  The Will I knew, was back.

  ꧁25꧂

  “He did What?!”

  I was at Calen’s that night. I had asked to come over, needing to get out of the house and he seemed more than willing to oblige. His grandfather was milling around, but we’d gotten pretty good at stealing up the stairs when he wasn’t in the room. Not that I ever got the impression that our being alone together was what bothered him. No, the more time I spent around Calen’s grandfather, the clearer it became that it was just me that bothered him. He was never outright rude; he just had this air about him and a tone he would get when talking to me or about me to Calen. It often made me wonder how his grandson was so polite and sweet.

  I was sitting on Calen’s bed and he was standing. Well, technically, he was pacing. And his fists kept clenching and then unclenching, and his body seemed to be oozing power. He reminded me of caged lion, pacing the length of his cell. Yeah, Calen could be scary. Not to me, but I’d never want to be someone who was going up against him. It kind of made Will sort of brave.

  He exhaled harshly through his nose.

  “It wasn’t a big deal.” I tried to keep my voice calm. Calen shot me an incredulous look.

  “Not a big deal?” He all but growled. “One of my best friends kissed you? He kissed my girlfriend?” Anger was rolling off of him. Crap. This was not going well.

  “Well, like I said, he didn’t know about us.” Poor Zach. “And it was a really fast kiss.” Sort of. Calen cut me a look. Jeez. I hadn’t like, kissed him back. In fact, I’d been so confused and frozen, I kind of worried that Zach thought I was a bad kisser. Shit. Why did I just think that? Calen’s eyes narrowed.

  “Like I said,” rushing on “not a big deal. I told him I didn’t feel the same and he left.” Crushed. Calen snorted. I knew it was inappropriate, but there was something kind of hot about how Calen was taking the news. Jealous Calen was sexy. One of his eyebrows suddenly shot up.

  “I knew there was something up with him. The day I showed up and he had his arm around you…” His jaw clenched.

  “Well, it’s not going to happen again. So don’t worry.” I was still trying to keep my voice calm.

  “Damn right it’s not going to happen again.” Wait, what? Uh oh.

  “You had better not say anything to him, Calen. I can fight my own battles.” As it was, I was fighting to stop my voice from escalating.

  “Oh, I don’t see what’s so wrong with Zach and I having a little heart to heart.” His voice had gotten strangely controlled.

  “Stop this right now! It was nothing. I stopped it. And he didn’t know about us, so it’s not like he was doing it on purpose, or trying to get between us. Calm. Down.” Calen took a deep breath.

  “I know you care about him, Tara, but I’m not going to pretend like I’m ok with this. The only person who should be kissing you is Me.” As if to prove his point, he came up to me, pulled me up onto my knees, and kissed me with so much passion that I momentarily forgot what we’d been talking about. I was wearing a jean skirt, with tights for warmth, and he ran his hands up my legs, the skirt riding up a bit. A soft moan escaped me and suddenly we were lying on his bed, with me on my back. His hands spanned my thighs, the thin material of the tights barely separating us. I could feel the heat of his hands, and then they were at my hips, tugging me toward him as he pressed down on me, his lips exploring.

  I surprised him, and myself, by wrapping my legs around him. Calen groaned. All the while he kissed me, my lips, my cheeks, my throat. I gasped. I curled my hands in his hair and returned his hungry exploration. Calen rolled us and suddenly I was on top, straddling him. We were still fully clothed, but there was an intimacy about this that I had never shared with anyone before. We were both gasping. Reaching up, he tugged my hair out of its bun and it tumbled down around us as he glided his fingers through the curtain of waves. His eyes were like pools, gorgeous green, pulling me in. I ran my hand along the waistband of his jeans, curling my fingers over so that the tips slid along his abdomen, his skin quivering under my touch. I closed my eyes at this contrast in textures, satin skin over the hardness of muscle.

  Right then there was a knock at the door. We froze. I prayed that whoever it was, although clearly we knew, seeing as only one other person lived here, would leave. There was another knock. I rolled off and tried to get a hold of myself, my chest rising and falling rapidly. I think Calen was doing the same thing. I pulled down my skirt, then touched my hair in hopes that it wasn’t as wild as it felt. He closed his eyes, exhaled, and got up. Before he opened the door, he looked me over, as if to make sure I was clothed, then opened it.

  “If I may have a word with you, Calen?” His grandfather usually saved that tone for me, so I was a little surprised.

  “Of course,” Calen responded and stepped out of the room, closing the door behind him.

  Oh my god. What had just gotten into us? We had never been that frenzied. Our kisses were on fire. I half wondered what would have happened if we hadn’t been interrupted. Maybe it was better that we had been. Wow. One thing was for sure, that was hot.

  When Calen came back, I had finally cooled off. He entered the room a little stiffly, sitting down next to me on the bed. He smiled at me, but he seemed different from the Calen who I had just been rolling around with. My brow furrowed.

  “What did he want to talk to you about?” I asked.

  “Oh, nothing.” Really.

  “I thought he didn’t come up here much?”

  “He doesn’t.” Was I imagining it or was Calen being weird? “Tara, I think you should probably head home now. It’s pretty late.” Ouch. “And who knows what kind of trouble we’ll get into if we start up where we left off.” He gave me a sexy smile. Ok, there was the Calen I knew and…I cut off my brain.

  “Ok, I guess.” I pretended to pout. He knew me well enough that he only laughed and I finally smiled as he took my hand. Walking me downstairs and out to my car, he gave me a sweet kiss and I drove off. Once in bed, my phone went off.

  Sweet dreams, Tara.

  I smiled and fell asleep with the memory of his lips on mine.

  ***

  It was Christmas.

  …Not that anyone in my house seemed to notice. Whatever. I had made the decision that I was not going to cook. This was hard, but it seemed like no one cared anyway. Millions of people were celebrating with their families and it was just another day in the Ashton house. Like I often did, I wondered what my dad was doing.

  As the day passed uneventfully, I realized that I was going to need to get over Dad’s leaving and move on, soon. I was definitely past the acceptable period of time for feeling sorry for oneself. He was gone. He wasn’t coming back. Maybe later on in my life, I’d hire a private investigator to find out where he was.

  Probably not.

  I was watching TV in the living room when Richard and Beth left. They were going to Dick’s parents’ house for dinner. Apparently they weren’t as stupid as I thought and they knew where they could find a hot meal. At least they took the baby with them, probably just trying to make it look like they took care of their own kid.

  Clear
ly, I was in a stellar mood.

  Finally, I went upstairs. Reaching under my bed, I pulled out a present I’d wrapped yesterday. Gripping it tightly in sweaty hands, I went next door and knocked on Will’s door. Holding it behind my back, I suddenly felt a little dumb. Too late now.

  He opened the door and looked at me like he’d been about to sign a World Peace Treaty and I had interrupted just before he could bring the pen to the paper. He was such a buttface. Instead of letting it get to me, I just shoved him in the chest and he stepped back. Taking advantage of the loss of yardage, I barged in. His room was as big of a disaster as always, his clothes flung everywhere, boxers littering the floor. It smelled of Nag Champa, which was a relief compared to its usual ‘organic’ aroma. So focused on what I was about to do, I tripped on a discarded athletic shoe, swearing as I regained my balance. Will snorted. Pressing forward, I pulled the present from behind my back. Well, technically it was presents, but I’d wrapped them together.

  “Merry Christmas!” I suddenly felt a little shy as he looked so confused. Then Will smiled. It was his real smile, not the jerky fake smile he usual gave me, or the prick smile he often wore around his friends. It was the smile I’d grown up with, when he’d been too young to think that he had to hide his emotions from the world. I missed it.

  “And you thought Santa forgot you this year,” I teased. Will actually laughed. Then he put it on the bed and started tearing open the paper. Again, I had a flash back to when we were young. He might think he was a man now, but there was still a lot of the little boy that he’d been, left inside. The memories warmed me, but it was bittersweet. I must have worn a weird expression because he stopped, midway through tearing opening his present.