When our meals are brought to the table, he finally moves his arm from behind me and we all eat in relative silence except for their occasional chatter about his store or something that happened in her classroom; otherwise, they don’t try talking to me and I say a prayer of thanks. It is Sunday after all.
“Well, I’m finished. I need to get back to the store,” I say, getting a twenty out of my purse and tossing it on the table.
“Tonight?” Cassie asks.
I bug my eyes out at her again in a, You’re gonna blow it! way. “I’ll call you.” Then I look at Kade. “Would you mind letting me out?”
I’ve got to get away from him. My emotions have been flipping out since the moment I saw him Friday, and the I’m-really-sorry-I-left-your-gorgeous-ass-at-the-altar-five-years-ago-I-don’t-know-what-else-to-do-but-apologize-but-now-you’ve-killed-me-by-buying-the-house-I-loved-which-makes-me-want-to-stab-you-repeatedly-but-would-you-mind-so-much-if-I-fuck-you-first-before-murdering-you thing I’ve got going is wearing me out.
He gets out of the booth and stands, pulling his wallet out and throwing some bills on the table.
“I’ll talk to you later,” I tell Cassie.
“Don’t forget about lunch at one,” she says with a snort.
I give her a snippy look, which makes her grin (demented, all of them) then I walk to the front, retrieving my coat off the rack.
“Come back and see us soon, Amelia!” Mags calls from behind the counter.
I turn to say goodbye to her and run smack dab into Kade. “Oh!” I say, looking up at him with a scowl then step around him and say, “I will, Mags! Thank you! It was delicious as always!” I turn and go out the door, quickly walking back to the garage trying to get away from all the crazy that I just encountered. But as I walk, I sense that Kade’s right behind me. I roll my eyes and stop, turning and looking up at him. “What?”
“We need to talk, Mill.”
“About?” I snap, knowing I’m being a bitch but I’ve got shit to do. I think.
“Inside,” he answers and starts walking toward the garage and I follow, having a tough time keeping up with his long strides as he crosses the street.
He’s already got the door unlocked when I get there and I look at him incredulously as he holds up the key. “Mike,” he explains.
I swipe a hand out to grab it but he holds it up too high so I can’t reach it. Whatever. I’m not going to play his game. I’ll just change the friggin’ locks. I go inside and walk over to lean my hip against the counter, crossing my arms over my chest, waiting for him to talk.
“Can we go upstairs?” he asks.
Uh, hell no. There’s a bed up there and I don’t trust him one bit. Sad thing is, I trust myself even less.
“No. You can say what you need to say here,” I answer snottily. Wow. I’ll seriously need to perform a hundred Random Acts of Kindness before the month’s over because I’m being such an ass to him and he hasn’t been anything but nice, despite the house situation, and I know I’m going to hell unless I offset my hatefulness with some sweetness.
I see the muscles in his jaw jumping because he doesn’t like what I’ve said then he sighs resignedly. “All right. We’ll talk here.” He walks to the counter and stands about a foot away from me, leaning his hip into it and facing me, mirroring me by crossing his arms over his chest too. “The house isn’t what you think, Mill.”
I huff out a laugh. I can’t help it. “What else can it be but a big ‘Fuck you’ to me, Kade? Just a big, fat symbolic finger flipping me the bird?”
His lips curve up a little on the sides as he looks at the floor, shaking his head. “You don’t get it.”
“No, I think it’d be safe to say I get it all too well,” I answer in a clipped voice. He looks up at me now, his lips still tipped up as if he’s trying not to smile. Ugh! What’s so damned funny? I take a deep breath and blow it out before continuing. “I left you, and to pay me back, you bought the house so you could shove it in my face. Well, you know what? It worked. You must be very proud of yourself. According to Brody, I broke your heart and now you’ve broken mine. We’re even. Happy?” I glare at him the entire time I’m speaking which doesn’t seem to faze him at all.
He takes a step toward me and rests his hand on the countertop, leaning into me a little, his stone gray eyes glittering, all humor now gone from his face. “Bought it with you in mind.”
I jerk my head back and frown, narrowing my eyes at him. “What?”
“You heard me.”
“You bought it with me in mind.”
Talk about your ambiguous sentences. I don’t know if he means he bought it with me in mind because he wanted to stick it to me, which he so did, or if he bought it with me in mind meaning when he bought it he thought of me, which I still don’t know what it means.
He stands at his full height now, crossing his arms over his chest once again. “Yes.”
I have no clue what’s going on, no idea what he’s talking about, and this is going to take a little more explaining on his part to make me understand everything, so I make a quick decision. “Let’s go upstairs where we can sit and talk.”
He nods and I see his jaw muscles popping again as he steps back letting me go first. When we get upstairs, I can tell he notices my new things although he doesn’t say anything, but he seems pleased for some reason.
“Do you want something to drink?” I ask.
“Scotch would be good,” he replies.
I give him a look. “It’s just after nine in the morning.”
“Way things have been going this morning, think I might need it.” There’s the smirk again and I can’t decide whether I want to kiss the hell out of him or slap the shit out of him. What a conundrum.
“I’ll put some coffee on,” I suggest, even though I pretty much agree with him about the morning being shit, and at his nod I take off my coat and hang it on a hook by the door then go into the little kitchen and fire up the coffeemaker telling him to have a seat.
He sits in my new chair, and although it seems to swallow me when I’m in it (which is one thing I love about it), he makes it look normal-sized when he folds his large frame into it. The coffee brews quickly and I grab mugs from the cabinet, pouring for both of us. I add sugar and cream to mine leaving his black, because that’s how I know he takes it, then carry the mugs into the small living space, handing him his before I sit on my newly slip-covered loveseat.
“So…” I begin.
After taking a drink, he sets his cup on one of my new end tables and I notice how cute all my new additions look in here. The place looks homey now and the weird thing is that he fits right into it all.
Resting his elbows on the armrests, he steeples his hands in front of him and looks at me. “So.”
I know he’s a man of action and words a lot of the time take a backseat, so I’m only agitated a little when he echoes me.
“Kade,” I say, giving him a gimlet eye.
He takes a breath and blows it out. “Bought the house with you in mind, Mill.”
“You already said that,” I say quietly waiting for him to continue.
He stands suddenly and starts walking around the apartment, picking up trinkets and examining them before moving on to the next and I can tell he’s struggling with what he’s trying to say.
“Had a lot of time to think. I understand now.” He picks up a paperweight off the old roll top desk, twisting it around in his hands. “Was just pleased that you wanted a life with me, but knew you had every right to leave.” He turns and looks at me. “Just wish you’d have spared us the theatrics.”
Whoa. Now wait a minute here. “There wasn’t anything theatrical about what I did,” I say indignantly, my brow coming down as I look at him.
“There was,” he says, once again looking amused.
“I know I waited until the last second to do anything, but I—I just couldn’t go through with it. Not with year
s of loneliness facing me.” I bite the inside of my cheek and look down at the floor.
“You say that like marrying me would’ve been a prison sentence.”
I look up at him in time to catch the hurt in his eyes before he covers it up. God. “That’s what it felt like at the time,” I whisper knowing I’m hurting his feelings but wanting to be honest with him.
He turns away and goes back to perusing the various objects on the shelves Papaw had built into the wall before he speaks again. “Had a plan for a long time. First step was rectifying things with the house.”
I’m not sure what he’s getting at but I’m also not going to fill in the blanks for him, so I sit and watch as his powerful body moves with ease to an old curio cabinet.
“Thought maybe if I fixed it, it’d fix other things.” He picks up a small, antique oil can that sits on top of the cabinet, clicking the bottom of it with his thumb. “Thought maybe…”
“Hello?” I hear a woman calling from downstairs.
I look at Kade and his face has suddenly gone hard.
“Better go see who it is,” I say and get up going to the stairs.
I find that I’m a little excited thinking it might be someone inquiring about a job, but as I hit the ground floor and come around the corner, my excitement keels over and with a flop dies right there on the floor when I see who’s standing just inside the door looking angry, arms crossed over her chest, her eyes glaring daggers at me.
“Oh, hey, Peyton,” I say, not even bothering to hide the disappointment in my voice.
Chapter 8
If I’d known it was Peyton, I would’ve come down tucking in my shirt and smoothing my hair as if Kade and I had been fooling around just to mess with her. Damn it.
Kade comes in behind me and her glare turns even more sinister, her eyes about to burn a hole right through me. When I turn to look at him, he does not have that look on his face that men do when they see the woman they love. No, this look is dark, his slate eyes almost expressionless except for a hint of apathy behind them as he looks at her. Whoa.
“Kade?” she peers back at him in question and I can tell she’s hurt that he’s here which almost makes me feel bad for her.
“What do you want, Peyton?” he says, his voice clipped.
Her head jerks back in surprise at his tone and she blinks several times. “I, uh, well, you were going to come out to Daddy’s today and show Toby how to saddle a horse and Sadie wants you to help her with the barrels…”
“Said I would, and I will. Now, what do you want?”
I hear a little gasp come out of her, I guess because he’s being so cold toward her, looking at her so cruelly, which makes me remember one of the reasons I never came to him and apologized about leaving because, I’m telling you, when Kade gives you The Look it makes you want to shrivel up inside yourself and disappear. The one and only time I got a sample of it was when he was questioning me about Jackson Reeves when I tried borrowing his dad’s Firebird for Prom, and I never wanted him to look at me that way again as long as I lived, so after I was gone, I stayed gone.
“Oh, well, I just wanted to make sure you remembered,” she replies forcing a smile.
“You know anything about a brick being thrown through Amelia’s window last night?” he asks.
And there it is. I see her falter for a second before she recovers, and I know she had something to do with it. Bitch!
“No! Is that what happened here?” she replies innocently, flipping her hand palm up at the window.
I can tell he’s not falling for her act either. “You know I’ve got cameras set up outside the store. I can look on the tape and see who it was.”
I look at him in surprise. He does? Well, why didn’t he tell me? Or Dwight for that matter?
And the real Peyton is back as she gets her trademark snobby look on her face with an attitude to match. “Well, why don’t you just do that and find out who it was?”
“Plan to. That all?”
My head’s been going back and forth between them like I’m watching a tennis match, and now I see that she’s on the verge of throwing a tantrum, her face flushed, hands fisted down at her sides and I swear she’s shaking with anger at the way he’s treating her.
“Yeah, that’s all,” she snaps. “So, what’s going on here?” she asks motioning a finger between Kade and me now. “Reliving old times?” She looks at me, her face pinched as if she’s sucked on a lemon. “You gonna skip town again and disappear for another five years? I hope so,” she snips.
Oh, now it’s on.
“I wonder.” I look at her and tap my chin in thought. “If I threw a glass of water on you, would you melt?” I counter, tilting my head to the side.
Kade snorts and she shoots him a look that kills. Then her green eyes are dark with anger are back on me with a hateful squint and I’m sure more trouble’s on its way for me and the station. Great.
“I’ll be out there in a bit… for Toby and Sadie,” he says with a nod toward the door, clearly implying that he wants her to leave.
She looks at him for a second then her eyes slice to me again, her glower making me raise an eyebrow indifferently at her, not letting her intimidate me. At that, she turns and stomps out of the store with a flip of her now bottle-blond hair and a huge huff of breath. If the door didn’t have one of those pneumatic closer thingies on it, she’d have slammed it shut for effect I’m sure.
“Well, that was fun,” I state after she’s gone and look at Kade with a wry face. I still can’t believe he’s dating her. Then I remember and ask, “Do you really have cameras outside your business?”
“No. But I know it was her. Just thought I could scare her into confessing.”
Well, crap. I now take a breath and have to ask. “So, you and Peyton?” My stomach dips at just the thought of them together.
“Not what you think,” he responds with a sigh.
“She’s your girlfriend. What’s there to think about?” I mean, what else can I think? Although Brody said Kade’s not in love with her, he’s still sleeping with her, which means they have a relationship.
He breathes in deep through his nose and lets it out, hands on his hips, then puts his head back and looks at the ceiling for several seconds before bringing it forward and looking at me. “She’s not my girlfriend.”
“But you’re sleeping with her,” I say.
His jaw muscles are popping again. “I’m not sleeping with her.”
“But you have slept with her.”
“Jesus. What is this, the Inquisition? No, I have not slept with her. You think I’m crazy?” he bites out giving me a trace of his scary look. Ack!
“But—” I start.
“Got shit to do. Need to get out to the house. You coming to lunch at Mom and Dad’s?” Guess he’s tired of this line of questioning and we’re changing subjects now.
Crap. Lunch. “Uh…”
“Mom would love seeing you again, Mill,” he says as he steps into me, brushing his fingers over my cheek, his almost-scary look gone as his face softens. Now what’s that all about? He’s driving me crazy with these mood swings.
“I’m, um, I don’t know, Kade.” I bite my lip in indecision. I’d love to see Carolina too but I don’t know if I can deal right now with the emotions I’m sure will be displayed by both us.
“Gimme your phone,” he says and holds out his hand.
I hesitate, not sure if I want to do this, but I go ahead anyway because he’s giving me the amused look again which is very persuasive… and very hot… and very confusing… so I hand my phone over. He punches on the keys for a few seconds then hits one last button. A second later, a ringtone sounds and he pulls his phone from his shirt pocket, clicking it to make it stop ringing then he hands me back mine.
“Now you got my number, I got yours. You decide you wanna go, call and I’ll come get you. Fancy car of yours won’t do on the roads to the house.”
His eyes stay on me for a few seconds more like he’s memorizing my face. “Was adrift…” he mumbles cryptically reaching a hand out to cup my jaw. When I draw my brows down as I look up at him, he continues. “Every night, babe, closed my eyes, saw your face. Things are gonna change.” He watches as he slowly runs his thumb across my bottom lip then he turns and leaves.
I’m left standing there staring at the door through which he just exited not knowing what he meant by that or how I feel about any of what he’s said. I guess I don’t know him as well as I thought because everything he’s been saying is just puzzling to me, and I don’t know if I’ll be around long enough to figure out what he’s trying to tell me.
~~~
I now sit on my bed staring at my phone as if Siri’s going to speak up and tell me what to do. But she’s no fun, either telling me she doesn’t know, she’ll search the web for everything I ask her or that the Genius Bar folks can help. It’s twelve-thirty, lunch is at one at the Kelly’s and I still haven’t decided what to do. Do I go face Carolina and Lucas and explain to them why I left their son or do I play it safe and stay here. Total dilemma. Then I start thinking of everything they did for me over the years, which was basically welcoming me into their family with open arms, treating me like one of their own and supporting me in every way they could and I realize I owe them a lot.
And how did I repay them for it? By walking away.
I flop back on the bed in a dramatic fashion even throwing my forearm across my eyes like some damsel in distress.
“Why am I so stupid?” I mutter with a kick of my feet.
“Oh, I wouldn’t go that far,” I hear someone say and with a start, I sit up quickly.
“Brody! You scared the shit outta me!” I squeak then get off the bed and go over to smack him on the chest.
“Ouch! Hey, damn, chill, woman!” he says with a chuckle, covering himself with his arms to keep me from hitting him again.
“What is it with you Kelly men thinking you can just waltz right into my station? God!”
Bigger Than the Sky (Serenity Point) Page 7