Leave the Night On

by Laura Trentham

  “Alone?” Bree’s voice was small and thin and contained none of the confidence she had honed over the years.

  Maybe Sutton was weak or just plain dumb as she’d told Wyatt, but she loosened her hand from his and turned to catch his eye. “Go on. I’ll be okay.”

  Wyatt gave her waist an answering squeeze. The gesture from a man she’d not particularly liked when they were young, yet who had her back—literally—lent everything an unreal cast. Add to the fact the girl she’d known all her life was spouting hate toward her, and the universe’s fundamental laws seemed topsy-turvy.

  Wyatt retreated into the house. Waiting until he was out of sight, Sutton stepped out onto the porch and leaned against the metal railing.

  Bree nudged her chin toward the door. “Andrew thinks you lied about him.”

  “Is that what you came over to talk about?”

  Bree smoothed her hair, but it was a lost cause without a straightening iron. “It wasn’t planned, you know. Andrew and me. It just happened.”

  Sutton’s hum was dry and ironic, but she wanted to believe Bree. Wanted to believe it was a crime of passion.

  “I dropped some files off late, and we ordered a pizza and talked about the case and then about the engagement and other stuff. We have a lot in common. He made me laugh and feel.” Bree tilted her face to the sky and shook her head, but not before Sutton noticed her brimming tears, “important and smart and desirable. It didn’t start as sex. That’s what I wanted you to know.”

  A branch from a burning bush curved over the porch rail. She needed to trim it. The mundane thought filtered through the clamor of painful realizations. It was a thousand times worse to know their affair hadn’t started with simple sex. Bree and Andrew had discussed her and found her lacking. She fingered the fiery red leaves, plucking them off one by one. They hit the white porch flooring like drops of blood.

  But another fact emerged from the stew of betrayal and humiliation. Losing Andrew would require a Band-Aid; losing Bree would require a heart transplant. Would all her memories of Bree be tainted? Besides her family, Bree was the one constant in her life. Now that constant was gone, and the equation had to be rebalanced.

  After denuding the branch as far as she could reach, Sutton crossed her arms and stared at the trail of blood-colored leaves. “What do you want from me? My blessing? Fine. You have it. Ride off into the sunset with your Prince Charming.”

  “Oh God.” The anguish in Bree’s voice drew Sutton’s gaze up. Bree was fisting her hair and rocking slightly on her feet. “He ended it with me tonight. Told me he’s going to win you back.”

  “But I thought the two of you were in love?” Her words hit their target, and the petty, humiliated part of her celebrated with jazz hands and high kicks.

  “He still loves me,” Bree said with a conviction not reflected in her body language. A tear slipped down Bree’s cheek, and she sniffled.

  “Is this your way of apologizing? Because this is seriously the worst apology ever.”

  “I’m sorry. I really am.” Bree wiped her cheek with the palm of her hand like a little kid. “I want you to promise not to take him back.”

  Any bloom of sympathy wilted under a bleak sadness. When had their friendship taken a detour? Nothing Andrew could do would persuade her to take him back, but she didn’t say that aloud.

  Bree chewed on her bottom lip, worrying a red place that was sure to get bigger. “You’ll forgive me, right? You always do.”

  Sutton didn’t merit a heartfelt show of anything from Bree. God, she really was a pushover. Too easy-going. Well, no more. Things were going change starting now. “Are you out of your ever-loving mind? This isn’t like the time you ripped my ’N Sync T-shirt in fifth grade. Don’t text me. Don’t call me. Don’t stop by. I don’t want to see you.”

  “For how long?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe forever.” While she wished the sentiment could come to pass, practically speaking, they would run across each other. Cottonbloom was hardly a metropolis. At the very least, unless one of them skipped it, they would all be at the gala ignoring whispers and dodging awkward conversations.

  “I know you don’t mean that. Listen, I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?” Bree backed down the steps holding Sutton’s gaze.

  “Whatever,” Sutton said under her breath. The role of forgiving nice girl who never rocked the boat would have to go to her understudy tonight. Not only was she going to rock the boat, she planned to blow the mother-flipping thing to smithereens.

  As Bree’s taillights disappeared, Wyatt stepped out. “Nice.”

  She bristled. The innocuous word took on shades of a four-letter epitaph. “You think I was too nice? You think I should have shoved her down the porch steps? Were you hoping to see a girl fight?”

  He didn’t smile but humor seemed to emanate from him like a natural scent. “I’m not condoning assault and battery in any form. I meant nice job of not caving.”

  Sutton let her balled-up hands fall from her hips to the rail behind her. He was right; for once, she hadn’t caved. “I’ve always been the peacemaker. The compromiser. Now I see what that really means.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “It means I’m weak. And stupid.”

  “That’s not true,” he said gently but with a firmness that eased her self-castigation.

  “Maybe not stupid, but way too fu-u-u”—she stumbled over the word she really wanted to say and threw her hands in the air—“frigging nice. See, I can’t even make myself say the f-word.”

  His lips twitched once, but then his eyes narrowed and pinned her with an unexpected intensity. “I’m curious, and you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to, or haven’t decided, but will you take him back?”

  “Not if hell freezes over. Not if it snows in Mississippi in July. Not even if a wizard gifted him a heart.”

  “So that’s a hard pass?”

  Somehow she found her lips curling into a smile to match his. “Hard as the diamond I’m going to throw in his face.”

  Headlights flashed as a dark car turned onto her street. She squinted her eyes. “Nuts. It’s Andrew.”

  Wyatt didn’t even glance over his shoulder. “You want to rub it in his face?”

  “Rub what?”

  “We’re supposed to be seeing each other, right?” He stepped forward, wrapped an arm around her waist, and hauled her up against his body. “Kiss me.”

  “Wh-what?” She lay her hands flat on his chest, thinking she should push him away, but not actually doing it.

  “You want to gig Tarwater? Kiss me.”

  She dropped her gaze from his hypnotic eyes to his expressive lips. Neither smiling nor frowning, but parted, the invitation clear. She dabbed her tongue on her bottom lip.

  A kiss right here, right now would be on the edge of wild and reckless. Hadn’t she lamented the fact she was too nice and normal and … beige. Yep, that’s what she was. Or even worse, maybe taupe.

  Wyatt was all color. His energy, his laughter, his impetuousness. She craved color in her life. In an attempt to muffle her inner monologue, she relaxed against him and ran her hands up his chest to link around his neck, his hair tickling her fingers.

  She was attracted to him. She’d recognized the pull that morning even as she’d denied and squashed the urge. Now she gave herself over to the feeling, fisting her hands in the soft strands and fitting her body close.

  A flare of amusement had his lips quirking, but she didn’t sense he was laughing at her expense. A car door slammed, but Sutton couldn’t tear her gaze away from his face. His eyes were gray, but in the shadows they appeared as black as the night sky, deep and limitless.

  Without letting sensibility overrule her burst of recklessness, she popped up on her toes and mashed her lips to his, cursing her lack of finesse. Before embarrassment seized hold, he took control, easing the pressure enough so he could take her bottom lip between his teeth and run his tongue along it. She gasped, her nerve endi
ngs firing like she’d stuck her finger in a socket.

  Everything turned vague and fuzzy except for Wyatt himself. She became hyper-aware of everything about him. The ends of his hair curled around her fingers. His chest was hard and his arms even harder. He dominated her, but instead of trepidation, a warmth spread from her stomach outward. Car tires squealed but registered in a different dimension.

  One of Wyatt’s hands smoothed down her back and cupped her bottom. She arched into his touch and snaked a leg around his calf. All the while, his lips and tongue worked an alchemy that incited both lassitude and desperation. She could remain in the sphere they’d created together for the rest of the night.

  Wyatt lifted his head. A mewl of protest came from something inside of her he’d awakened, and she coasted her lips along the stubble of his cheek, searching for his mouth. Searching for more. She found what she sought and pressed closer to him, dropping her hands from his hair to run along his shoulders and back.

  With a rumble that made the place between her legs quake, he dropped both hands to her bottom and maneuvered her around until her back was against the brick side of her house, his weight pressing into her from shoulders to hips. She could feel him, all of him, against her. He wanted her. This wasn’t a pity kiss. Or at least not just a pity kiss. She wasn’t so taupey beige boring that she couldn’t arouse him.

  A honking car alarm a few houses down burst the spell. His hands jerked and fell away from her butt. He put a few inches between their torsos, although his hips still pressed into hers. She squirmed against him, her body not ready to cede control to the growing part of her that was more than slightly aghast at their public display.

  He studied her, his eyes unreadable in the dark, his usual good humor not present. Her jangling nerves sent words tripping out of her mouth. “I think he saw us.”

  “Doubt he could have missed that.” Still, he didn’t release her.

  She was thankful for the bulk of the house at her back. Her knees were as wobbly as if they’d been shot with Novocain. “We put on a good show, huh?”

  “Was that what it was then? A show for your ex?” He took a step back but kept her caged in by his arms on the side of the house.

  A glance to her left showed his right forearm, dotted with dark hair, and muscled. The urge to lean into it and run her lips along the length was strong. He raised an eyebrow as if expecting an answer to his question. She’d hoped it was rhetorical.

  “Wasn’t it? Something for him to think about?” Although they were a repeat of his words from earlier, undercurrents of anger wavered from him. The people pleaser inside of her reared, and the two words popped out before she even had a chance to consider why. “I’m sorry.”

  “For what? Are you sorry we kissed?”

  Her thoughts scattered as she tried to get a read on him, but his expression remained a mystery. Ironic considering how jokey and transparent he normally seemed. Was there more to him than the annoying kid she remembered or the laid-back party boy people talked about?

  She tried to locate an innocuous reply, but only the truth resided in the mish-mash of desires in her heart. “No, I’m not sorry we kissed. Are you?”

  * * *

  Her voice sounded raw with a wealth of uncertainty from her recent rejection. What could Wyatt say? He was sorry. Sorry he’d opened the Pandora’s Box that was Sutton Mize. Their blazing, unexpected kiss had unleashed something he wasn’t sure could be contained. He wanted her. Badly. And, based on her response, she wanted him too.

  Yet she was in a terrible place. Betrayed by both her fiancé and her best friend. How long did it take to recover from something like that? Days? Months? Years? Fate had dropped him into her life at the worst possible time—or best, depending on your outlook. She was ripe for a rebound.

  Even through all the crap that had been dumped on her over the course of a day, her spirit shined through like the first rays of sun after a storm. Which was why he refused be that guy. The one who made her forget for a little while only to leave her more broken in the morning.

  “You want to come back inside?” The invitation was muddied by the confusion in her voice.

  He backed away until the back of his thighs hit the porch rail, and he grabbed hold of the rough metal to keep from grabbing her. “I’m working tomorrow. Got to get up early.”

  A few years ago, he might have talked himself into staying and justifying his actions by saying they were both consenting adults. But he’d changed and couldn’t pinpoint when. Even before his pop had died, the parties, the drinking, the supposedly good times had worn him down. Friends of his that he’d once pitied, after they’d gotten married and tied down, incited a sharp pang in his chest when he saw them out and about. His pop might have smiled and told him he was growing up. Finally.

  It was a damn shame too, because he would have loved to discover all the places Sutton’s blushes flared and wake to her tousled hair and sleepy eyes. Eyes that would turn mortified by morning. She would end up hating herself and even worse, hating him. He couldn’t bear the thought of taking advantage of her vulnerability. She deserved better than Tarwater and better than a one-night rebound.

  He shuffled toward the porch stairs. “I’ll be around. You call or text if something changes or you need to talk or whatever. I’m serious.”

  She stepped forward as he stepped back. “Could I ask a favor?”

  He planted his feet even as his body leaned toward her, dreading and anticipating her request. If she asked him outright to take her to bed, he wasn’t sure his gentlemanly impulses would withstand the direct assault. “Shoot.”

  “I’ve made a mess of things. Until I figure out how to handle it, could you not deny anything is going on? I know it’s a lot to ask.”

  Disappointment and relief mixed like a science experiment gone bad. “Sure. We don’t get many gossips at the garage, believe it or not. Except for my aunts.” He wouldn’t be surprised to see his aunts Hyacinth and Hazel first thing, and outright lying to them was not an option.

  “I set myself up for the humiliation of two public rejections in less than twenty-four hours. I mean, who does that?” A dry self-deprecating humor bubbled up. Maybe it was her coping mechanism or maybe her natural optimism, but either way, her attitude made him want to kiss her again.

  One kiss he could recover from. Eventually, he’d forget about the way she felt in his arms—soft and needy and pliant—and move on. Two kisses might be his tipping point.

  “Bye, Sutton.” He continued a backward shuffle toward his car.

  She stood framed by the light of her door. Raising her ring-less left hand, she gave him a little wave and disappeared. He banged his forehead against the steering wheel a couple of times before heading over the river and to his empty bed. Doing the right thing was the worst.

  Chapter Six

  Wyatt heard his aunt Hyacinth before he caught sight of her. She was gregarious and funny and well-liked. No doubt, Hazel was somewhere, taking everything in with her silences that said more than any lecture. The sisters were a little too much like him and Jackson for comfort.

  Hyacinth rounded the corner in an Adidas tracksuit, still spry at sixty-something. Neither of his aunts encouraged birthday celebrations, so it was difficult to nail down their exact age. Probably something to do with the way they were raised, the oldest of six and raised marsh-mud poor. His pop had been the youngest, but ironically, the aunts were the last of the siblings left on this side of the graveyard.

  Wyatt hauled himself out of the pit to give her a hug, taking care not to smear her with grease or dent the helmet of nut-brown hair she had done once a week at the beauty salon. With a broad face, prominent nose, and too-wide mouth, she’d never qualified as a great beauty like Hazel, yet something about her was distinctly appealing, and she’d turned down a number of marriage proposals.

  He’d asked her once if she regretted not saying ‘yes,’ and she’d smiled and told him marriage wasn’t her destiny. The twin curse struc
k again.

  “You having trouble with the Crown Vic again?” he asked.

  “Do I have to wait until I have car trouble to see my favorite nephew?”

  He was immune to her buttering-up smile. The brothers took turns holding the favored spot depending on what she was after. “Of course you don’t.”

  The aunts had answered the call of duty after his mother had left but Wyatt had never felt like a burden. He counted himself lucky to be part of a family that took care of its own. Not everyone could say the same.

  His mind drifted to Sutton. She had seemed so alone. Lonely. Had he done more damage walking away like he did? His thoughts took a turn. That kiss … it had been—

  “Wyatt.” His aunt snapped so close to his face, her hand was blurry.

  “What?” He refocused on her.

  She propped her hand on her hip, her gaze pointed and one corner of her mouth drawn back. “I said, people are whispering about you.”

  At least Sutton had given him a fair heads up. His reputation was tarnished enough not to show any additional mudslinging. “Don’t tell me some silly rumors brought you down to the shop.”

  “Silly? I heard you broke old Judge Mize’s daughter and that Tarwater boy up? True or not?”

  Sutton needed time to do damage control, but evasion was easier said than done when faced with his aunt. He turned to the car and applied the socket wrench to an already-tightened bolt. “You know how it is.”

  “Not so much. Why don’t you enlighten me, young man?”

  Lord help him. “Young man” was one step away from the use of his full name. He didn’t see any way out of this but to tell at least the partial truth. Not without drawing her wrath down on his head which meant no casseroles or cobblers dropped off for weeks. And peaches were at their peak. Jackson and Mack would put his balls in a vise.

  He scratched his twitching eyebrow. It was his tell, and she knew it. “It’s complicated.”

  “Wyatt Jedidiah Abbott.”