He’d brought her to his home. He wanted her to see it. When he stepped off the bike and helped her, he didn’t meet her eyes, and she understood he was a little nervous to show her. She laid a hand on his forearm. “I like your house.”
He squinted at it, like he was trying to picture it through her eyes. “Yeah, me too. It needs work, but it’s private, and it’s better than the apartment I shared with Brent.”
He took her hand led her inside. The place looked utterly masculine, with beige walls and neutral furniture, but there were a lot of touches that were uniquely Cal—a series of family photographs in the hall, a cluster of vintage motorcycle prints along the wall in the living room. Cal explained to her that upstairs was his bedroom, a bathroom, and a spare bedroom.
When he was finished telling her about the house, he held out his arms. “I wanted you to see it.”
“I wanted to see it,” she said.
“You want a drink?”
“Water would be nice.”
“Yeah, that’s a good idea.”
He rummaged in the fridge, and she heard the clinking of beer bottles before he pulled out two bottles of water. He gestured toward the back door. “We can sit on the deck unless you want to enjoy the air conditioning.”
“Deck’s fine,” she said, accepting the bottle he handed to her. On the deck, she sank down on a glider and took in Cal’s backyard. It was well kept, leading to a tree line that surrounded Cal’s property. “How big is your property?”
“About an acre,” he said, sitting beside her. He stretched out his legs and gently rocked the glider. His arm curled around her shoulders, and she rested her head against him.
She watched two squirrels chase each other, their tails fluttering wildly.
“You don’t have to say it,” he said quietly.
“Don’t have to say what?”
“You know, ‘Hey Cal, this could be us if you’d stop being stubborn.’ ”
She straightened. “That’s what you think I want to say?”
He squinted at her. “Isn’t it?”
“Maybe I’m thinking it, but I don’t want to say it. I don’t want to have to convince you to be with me. To want a family. I’m not going to pressure you into doing something you don’t want and then have you resent me for it.”
He was silent for a while as he mulled over her words. “You’re probably right about that.”
“But I do think you’re stubborn. I think today was one of the best days either of us has had for a while.” And if today proved anything to Jenna, it was that while she’d fallen hard for the eighteen-year-old Cal, if she let herself do the same thing for the thirty-year-old Cal, she’d never recover from it. The Cal of today was dangerous for her heart.
She glanced at her watch, saw it was close to dinnertime, and prepared to do what she’d been avoiding thinking about all day. “You should probably take me home now.”
He whipped his head toward her. “But the day isn’t over.”
She sighed. “I know, but it’s close, and . . . I’m thinking maybe we should end this now. Before something triggers one of us, and we fight or get angry. I don’t want to get angry, Cal. I want to leave here happy.”
His face was stricken, every emotion clear as day. He wasn’t even bothering to try to hide it. “But—”
She stood up. “I’ll meet you in the house.”
Five minutes later, she was standing by the front door when he joined her. He smelled like smoke. “Those’ll kill you, you know.”
His jaw tensed, his eyes flashed, and she wondered how she thought they’d ever be able to leave this whole situation intact. “I’m not your responsibility to worry about.”
“Well, I’m sorry for caring.”
He rubbed his hands over his face vigorously, like he was trying to scrub off his emotions, and then he lashed out an arm, curling it around her shoulders so she crashed into his body. She wrapped her arms around him, nestling her head against the soft fabric of his T-shirt, feeling the hard muscles underneath, as he buried his face in her neck.
“Sunshine?” His voice was muffled against her skin.
“Yeah?”
His fist tightened in her hair, his lips opened up on her neck, and he said everything with his body that he couldn’t say in words. This was an embrace that wasn’t meant to lead to anything else; this was meant to tell her something, that they’d always have this. It would never go away, and somehow, someway, they’d move on.
They’d get through it.
Even if they were breaking the same hearts, ripping open those same wounds that they’d worked so hard to heal for ten years.
And it hurt; it hurt like a knife to her chest.
She opened her mouth to do what she promised herself she wouldn’t do, to beg for more time, to ask him to reconsider. But before any words came out, the doorbell rang.
And they both froze.
Locked in the embrace with Cal, Jenna worked on breathing steadily, because she was sure it wouldn’t be anyone other than Brent.
And that was really the last thing they needed, because both of them were raw, flayed, and Brent would be like a dog with a bone, wanting to know why she was there.
Cal must have been thinking the same thing, because when she leaned back, his eyes were closed. “Come in,” he growled in the direction of the front door.
Jenna braced herself.
But the doorknob didn’t turn. A joking Brent didn’t burst through the door with a wisecrack on his tongue.
Cal lifted his head and stared at the door. A tentative knock sounded.
With a jolt, he strode toward the door. “Jesus-fucking-Christ, Brent.” He turned the doorknob and flung the door open. “Any other day, you—” His voice cut off. Just dropped off like someone had muted him.
Jenna slowly turned her head, wondering if this was going to get even more awkward because an old flame of Cal’s was on his doorstep. But when she peered under the arm Cal had braced on the doorframe, her breath caught.
Because it wasn’t Brent on that doorstep. It wasn’t a woman. It was a kid. A teenage boy. He had a crazy haircut. The sides were shaved, but it was long on top, with the front combed forward so a lock of brown hair hung down his forehead, touching his eyelashes. He wore a pair of skinny jeans and a blue V-neck T-shirt. He was a little shorter than Cal. And he had a huge duffel bag thrown over his shoulder. And there was something familiar about him that Jenna couldn’t put her finger on.
The kid was trying for bravado, Jenna could tell, but was having a hard time standing up Cal’s scrutiny.
He had large brown eyes that stared up into Cal’s face. The kid licked his lips. “A-Are you Cal Payton?”
Cal seemed frozen. Jenna wondered if she should speak, but then Cal’s voice cracked on a “Yup.”
The kid’s eyes changed, getting even bigger and a little wet. He sniffed once, wrinkling his nose, and then he wiped his hand on his pants and stuck it out. “I’m Asher Weyland. I’m, uh, your half-brother, I guess. And I really need some help.”
Jenna gasped. She couldn’t help it. She clapped her hand over her mouth, but Asher’s eyes darted to her anyway. He shifted on his feet. “Is that your wife?”
Cal ignored the question. “What are you doing here?”
Asher’s eyes darted back to Cal. “I know this is kinda surprising and all, but—”
“Look, kid, I don’t know who you are, but this isn’t fucking funny. So I’ll give you thirty seconds to get off my porch before I remove you.”
The kid’s face paled. “What?”
“I’m gonna start counting. Warning: sometimes I skip some numbers.”
Asher looked physically ill. Jenna could see his fists clenched at his sides, and his slender shoulders began to tremble. She didn’t know what was going on. She hadn’t known Cal had any more siblings, and apparently, he didn’t either, by the looks of it. But there was no way this kid was lying. He looked scared out of his mind.
“
Cal—” she started, but the kid cut her off.
“Mom always told me you were her little man,” Asher said.
And if possible, Cal’s body turned to stone. But he wasn’t playing now, like they had been in bed this morning.
The kid’s eyes were huge, and he wrapped his arms around himself, as if it wasn’t seventy degrees outside. “She said,” he continued, “that she knew you picked up the slack when she left.”
Cal didn’t move. He didn’t even blink.
“She talks about all of you. She’s still not so good at the mom thing, but she didn’t leave this time.” He looked down and brushed a leaf on the porch with the toe of his Converse shoes. “I was the one who left.”
“Your mom is Jill Payton.” Cal’s voice sounded like he hadn’t used it for a century.
Asher bit his lip. “Yeah. Well, Jill Weyland. My dad’s Bill Weyland.”
Something clicked in Jenna’s brain. His eyes. He had Max’s eyes. Jill’s eyes. And she was sure Cal noticed, because he hadn’t taken his gaze off that kid’s face. “What’re doing here?” he asked quietly.
“I need a place to stay.”
“You came all the way here from California?”
He shook his head. “We live in Virginia now. I took a bus.”
Jenna’s head felt like it was going to split open. This was no joke.
Cal swallowed, his posture not quite as defensive. “And why are you here?”
Asher gathered himself again, straightening his back and lifting his chin. “I need a place to stay. If you say no, I guess I’ll go somewhere else. But we just moved. I have no friends. I have nowhere to go. I dug out your address from my mom’s address book, and here I am.”
Cal stared at him. “Why do you need a place to stay?”
That chin lifted higher, like the kid needed more courage to say what he was going to say next. “Dad’s drunk a lot, and Mom’s always making excuses for him. For a while, it was better, but since we moved to Virginia, he’s gotten so much worse. He comes home at odd hours. He’s driven drunk with me in the car, but this last time . . . he picked me up from the mall and almost ran off the road because he was plastered. I don’t”—he swallowed and blinked rapidly—“feel safe with them anymore. I try to refuse to get in the car, but then he gets angry. So angry. And . . . I . . . I’m scared.”
Jenna wanted to run to this kid and gather him in her arms. Get him a slushy and curl up with junk food on the couch, watching silly movies. No kid should feel unsafe with his own parents.
Cal hadn’t moved, but the tenseness had returned to his shoulders. His fists were clenched. And Jenna knew him well enough by now to know he was pissed.
And then the kid threw his knockout punch. “Mom always said you were probably a better parent to your brothers than she could have been.”
Jenna felt the tears. They were hot and they were prickly, and shoot, she was going to start bawling.
Because Cal still had that soft inside he always had. He hid it so well with his gruffness and his stares and scowls. But he’d shown her his belly this weekend. It was still there, just a little more scarred.
And that kid had gone right for it. Freaking little genius, Jenna thought.
“And you came here thinking . . . what? That I’d take you in? Be your parent?” Cal’s words were harsh, but his tone was soft.
Asher blinked at him, and then his lip started trembling. But Jenna knew by the slump of Cal’s shoulders that the kid had won this round.
“How old are you?” Cal asked.
“Sixteen.” Asher wiped his nose with the back of his hand and sniffed again. “I just need a place to stay until I can figure out what to do.” Jenna began to see some resemblance in the shape of their faces. Asher’s body was more like Brent’s—on the lean side—but those eyes were all Max and that face was Cal’s. Unmistakably Cal’s.
Cal jerked his chin toward the bag. “That all ya have?”
“Yeah.”
He stepped away from the door. “Come in, then. Take off your shoes, because I don’t want you tracking dirt in my house.”
Chapter Fourteen
JACK PAYTON WAS going to have a heart attack. Because standing in the foyer of Cal’s house, in a pair of faded Converses and a beat-up duffel bag, was a teenager staring back at Cal with Max’s eyes.
With Jill’s eyes.
Cal didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
How his sorry excuse for a mother hadn’t informed her other three children that she’d had another child was a mystery. But yet, here he was, nervously licking his lips, looking like a mash-up of Max, Brent, and a third guy who must be his father.
Cal knew what it was like to be let down by someone he thought he could depend on. He wanted to drive to Virginia and beat the shit out of this kid’s dad, but what good would that do? He thought the best thing to do would be to send the kid home. Asher wasn’t his responsibility, but by the time he found the bus schedule and got the kid to the bus station, it’d be dark. And Cal couldn’t bring himself to drop off a scared teenager at a bus stop to travel to Virginia at night.
He’d have to give the kid a place to sleep tonight, and then he’d call Jill in the morning to arrange a way to get the kid home. But it niggled in the back of his mind that it must be pretty bad at home for this kid to leave and show up on a stranger’s doorstep.
Cal looked pointedly at the kid’s shoes, and Asher hurriedly toed them off. He stood and looked around awkwardly. “Um, I like your place.”
Cal didn’t respond.
Jenna stepped forward. “Hi, I’m Jenna.”
Asher eyed her. “I didn’t know Cal was married.”
“Oh, he’s not. I’m just a friend.”
Asher raised his eyebrows, like he didn’t really believe that.
Cal ignored Asher’s interest in Jenna. “You need food? Shower? A bed? Because I got all three, but I’ll tell you right now—I’m not your servant. You’ll clean up after yourself, or I’ll shave off that ugly haircut in your sleep.”
Asher’s head jerked up. “What’s wrong with my hair?”
“What isn’t wrong with it?”
The kid’s eyes narrowed. “This haircut cost me eighty dollars.”
“Mine cost me ten minutes and a number-three attachment on my razor.”
“Wow, you’re a total dude.”
“Last time I checked. You need food?”
Asher pressed his lips together. “I could eat.”
Jenna stepped forward. “You said there’s a spare bedroom upstairs, right? I’ll go get it together. Why don’t you two head into the kitchen and get something to drink?” She held her fingers out for Asher’s bag. Cal looked at her for the first time since Asher showed up.
This was a lot for Cal to handle, this knowledge of a blood relative, this sudden responsibility, even if it was for the night. She offered him a smile, a reassuring one, and he clung to it like a raft in a storm. Thank God she was here, with her presence and her light. He could fall apart later, but for now, he could do this.
Asher handed Jenna his bag, and Cal cleared his throat. “Thanks, Jenna.”
He led Asher into the kitchen and handed him a water bottle, keeping one for himself. Asher sat down at the kitchen table, rolling the bottle between his hands, while Cal leaned against the counter. The kid was jiggling his leg. Cal could see it from the corner of his eye.
“So,” Asher said. “I can stay? I told my mom I was staying with a friend overnight.”
“Thought you didn’t have any friends?” Cal had barely glanced at the card his mom had sent, so he’d missed her change in address. It wasn’t like he ever sent anything back to her.
“I don’t. I made one up.”
“And she didn’t call the parent of this ‘friend’ to check before you spent the night?”
Asher shook his head.
Cal clamped down the anger and wiped his hand over his mouth. “You can stay tonight. I’m not putting you on a bus back h
ome now. We’ll call your mother tomorrow and figure it out then.”
Asher’s head was down, and he was making circles on the table with his index finger. Cal waited him out, until the kid looked up at him with those big Max-like eyes. “Okay, thank you.”
“Plus, I think you’re going to want to meet your other brothers. I’ll call them tomorrow.”
Asher looked like he was trying to hide his excitement. “Are they like you?”
“Like me, how?”
“Um, like, all . . . ” Asher puffed out his chest and held his arms out from his body like his biceps were huge. “Don’t dirty my house,” he said in a false low voice. “Do what I say. Grrrr.”
A laugh burst out of Cal before he could rein it in. “That’s what I sound like, huh? Maybe punk kids who make fun of me get put back on a bus.”
Asher held out his hands in alarm. “No, no, no! I’m sorry!” He grimaced. “Shit,” he said under his breath.
Cal smiled. “Hey, I’m just kidding. Brent is, uh, a jokester. He’ll tease you a lot and give you a hard time. Max will be your buddy. He’s good at making friends.”
Asher relaxed a little as Jenna came into the kitchen. She had her hair pulled up onto the top of her head in a messy knot, and everything about her posture showed purpose. “Okay, Asher? I got you set up in the spare bedroom. Your bed is made, and I put away your clothes.”
Asher was in midsip of water and choked. “You put away my—”
“I put all your toiletries in the bathroom, and fresh towels are out,” Jenna said.
Cal leaned back, watching her take charge. His woman sure knew how to get shit done.
And as soon as that thought went through his head, he wanted to kick himself. His woman. He’d always called her his girl in high school. Because that’s what she’d been. But now? She was all woman now, and fuck it if his brain hadn’t just skipped forward, still attaching that goddamn pronoun. That’s what this weekend had done. She was no longer the girl he’d loved in high school. She was the beautiful, independent, smart woman that he could see himself falling for all over again. Shit.
Asher was blinking at her. “Thank you?”
Dirty Thoughts Page 11