by Stacey Lynn
And on his arm is the tattoo he showed me last night. Be You. Be True.
I flinch at the tattoo and open the fridge, my shoulders shaking while I pretend just seeing that ink doesn’t make me cry.
He was telling me about coming out to his parents, how they’re in absolute denial and are certain a girlfriend—or a wife who happens to be pregnant already, even better—is certain to change his mind and like me, he’s simply going through some spoiled rich child, millennial phase of growth.
But we’d gone to that bar to listen to live jazz music where I’d sipped sparkling water and he’d begged me for more details on Braxton. Mostly what he did and what he looked like.
As I told him, his eyes popped wide and he’d begun rolling up the sleeve of his dress shirt. “Got this done two months ago, gave me the courage to come out to my parents. Went to MadInk because I heard it’s the best. Braxton did this.”
Written in an Old English–type scroll, I’d skimmed my fingers over the ink of his arm, smiling, thinking of Braxton. I was thinking of Jimmy wanting me to live my life, Braxton giving me the keys to do so, Graham having the strength and being connected to both of us in some way without even knowing it.
I love it, I’d told Graham.
He’d smiled down at me. You love him.
My smile had gone wonky. Yeah.
And somehow, in all of that, someone who knew me, knew my connection to Braxton or maybe Braxton himself, had taken a photo.
Using the moment I realized I really truly loved him, to destroy it.
What a freaking mess.
I grab a raspberry Greek yogurt from the fridge and slam the door so hard the entire appliance shakes.
“Easy, killer,” Graham says. He’s laughing but there’s still concern in his voice. “Don’t take this out on Frigidaire.”
“You’re so weird,” I mutter. I grab a spoon and plop down on the stool, tear off the wrapper of the yogurt and dig in.
“You going to be okay today? I can take the day off studying. Not like I’ll pass anyway.”
That explains why he’s dressed casually. He’s still studying for the bar and I know he does all his studying at the Portland Central Library where it’s quiet and he can hide and pull his hair and groan his frustration without anyone hearing.
“I can help you. Don’t know how a law student dropout can help, but I can try.”
“Nah. You’ve got other things to worry about.”
Yeah. Like calling Jenna. Somehow getting all my crap out of Braxton’s and back into my studio.
I’m going to miss my painting room.
Not as much as I’m going to miss Lucy, though.
Or Braxton.
I sniff and dip my head.
“Hey.” Graham walks to me and presses his finger to my chin, forcing me to look at him. “You’re going to be okay, right? Talk to him. Clear this up.”
I shake my head, but he has such a firm pinch on my chin, I can’t move much. “You didn’t hear the things he said to me.”
“No. And they’re shitty, and trust me, I want to punch him in the face for saying that to you, but it also sounds like there was a lot in his head. Listen to him, you at least have to figure out a way to move past this for your child’s sake.”
He’s right. I know he is.
That doesn’t mean I’m making the first move though. No way in hell.
“I need to call Jenna.”
“Yes, you do. But when he calls you, don’t avoid him.”
He lets my chin go and I shove a spoonful of yogurt into my mouth, not answering.
Leaning forward, Graham rests his elbows on the other side of the counter. “Love you, Cara. You need anything from me, any help or anything, you know you can always come to me, right? And you can stay here as long you want too.”
“I know. I really missed you, Graham.”
“Good. I missed you too. Next time you decide to be your own person and not your parents’ puppet, don’t forget there are people in that life who still love you and I’m one of them.”
He points to his chest and I nod.
“Speaking of puppets…”
“Don’t start.” He rolls his eyes and pushes off the counter. “I want to be a lawyer. Just because I want the same things he pushes down my throat doesn’t mean I am him.”
“Thank God,” I mutter again.
He laughs and ruffles my already-messed-up mane. “I’ve got to go study, but I’ll be back around five. You going to be here?”
“Don’t know.” I shrug. I plan on calling Luca and telling him I’m not coming in, and I have to call Jenna, but if she and Dan can move my stuff out and back to my apartment, that won’t happen until after she gets off work. I say all this to Graham, more thinking out loud than anything, and he kisses my cheek.
“No problem. Call me and let me know. You’re here, I’ll bring home dinner. You’re not, we’ll talk soon.”
“Thanks, Graham.” My chin wobbles. “I’ll let you know.”
He gives me a quick hug, grabs his laptop bag and backpack, and heads out with another shout that I can stay if I want.
He’s been so good to me. Last night when I left Braxton’s, I gave the taxi the address of Graham’s place, quickly crossing off Jenna as an option. She’d go ballistic, Dan would probably be pissed but maybe he wouldn’t, and it was that uncertainty, not knowing where Dan would fall, that held me back.
Braxton might be a dick, but I don’t need to ruffle their friendship any.
God. How am I going to keep being friends with them if Braxton and I don’t work out?
“What a mess.”
I drop my head on the counter and cry.
Chapter 27
Braxton
I’m a dick. There is absolutely no fucking excuse for the way I behaved last night and I’ve had all night and most of the morning, barely sleeping at all, drunk and sitting on my couch in the dark after Cara stormed out, to think of a million reasons I can give her to explain why I lost my shit.
I’m a dick.
So far, that’s all I’ve got. I can’t call her and try to fix this shit if I don’t know why I lost my mind so badly. So I’m sitting in my office after canceling all my appointments for the day because a hangover and a tattoo gun is fucking stupid, trying to sort through bills and invoices and organize my disaster of a place, when there’s a knock on my door.
“Yeah?” I call out, shuffling a pile of designs I occasionally create when the day is slow and I’m feeling creative.
Stella pops in her head, a plastic bag from the sub shop down the road dangling in her hand in the narrow doorway. “You need something to eat.”
She’s giving me a wide berth and I’m alert enough to know that this sandwich is her way of trying to get on my good side. Last night when she showed me those photos, I absorbed all the shit she’d already said to me, that Cara and I don’t belong together. I took in her almost satisfied expression that she was able to show me the truth to spare me the hurt of falling in love with a woman who would take off on me or would realize she’s too damn good for me. I didn’t even fucking question why or how, after just warning me that Cara and I didn’t belong together, how she found her with another guy, why she took the photo, and why she was so intent and focused on showing them to me.
But today, after spending hours replaying last night in my head over and over and over again until I was dizzy, I started seeing things a bit differently, and if Stella hadn’t put those ideas in my head earlier last night, I doubt any of this shit would have happened.
Not that that excuses me being a dick to Cara.
“Not hungry.”
“Braxton—” The door squeaks as she walks in and sets the sandwich bag down on my desk.
>
“Don’t want to talk about it, Stella.”
Like usual, when Stella wants something, she doesn’t give up. She takes a seat on the chair across from my desk, crosses one leg over her knee, and taps the back of my desk with the toe of her black heels.
Click.
Click.
Click.
Fucking hell, she’s stubborn and a pain in my ass.
I throw down the papers I haven’t been paying the least bit attention to and glare at her. “What do you want?”
“So…how did last night go?”
“You shitting me?”
She twists her eyebrow piercing and shrugs. “I’m curious is all.”
Fuck it. It’s not her fault I lost my shit, even if it is her fault I lost my shit, so if she wants to be stubborn and a pain in my ass, she can have all of it.
I lean back in my chair and throw my hands in the air. “Let’s see, Stella. I went home, was so pissed I got shit-faced drunk, Cara came home and I didn’t even let her get a word in. I essentially called her a cheating, lying bitch, which pissed her off. Then she told me she was falling in love with me, that I was a dickhead, and the guy she was with is gay. So, I pretty much fucked up because I’m not falling in love with her, I’m already fucking there, and she walked out of my place with an overnight bag telling me she wants nothing to do with me except for our baby—” The devastated look in her eyes hits my memory and I flinch. God, what a fuckup I am. “That what you wanted to hear?”
“She didn’t cheat on you?”
So help me God. I’ve never wanted to strangle Stella more than right now as she stands in front of me processing last night’s bullshit in condensed form.
“She’s in love with you?” Her fingers at her piercing fall into her lap and her voice softens. Stella’s voice never softens. Ever.
“Yup.”
I’m glad I realized you’re the asshole you are when I’m only starting to fall in love with you.
Starting to fall in love with me. She’s falling in love with me. I took a fucking sword and might as well have slashed her heart right open, right there, in the middle of my damn living room.
What in the hell is my problem?
Moments pass where Stella stares at me, the clicking of her shoe making me want to rip them both off her feet and toss them into the hallway. “And the guy she was with is gay?”
“That’s what she said right before she slammed the door in my face.”
Several more moments. The clicking of Stella’s damn shoe on my desk is now accompanied with the matching tick-tock of my clock on my wall and all of it is making me feel like I’m a captured soldier being tortured.
“Maybe I messed up,” Stella says, and her voice is a little bit soft, and mostly scared.
“Jesus. You think?” I swipe a hand across my forehead. “It’s not even your fault, it’s mine because I was the asshole who didn’t just go home, wait for her, and say, ‘How was dinner?’ you know, and give her a minute to explain anything.”
“Yeah. That probably wasn’t good either.”
Is she fucking kidding me? “Stella.” It comes out as a growl.
“Well, what was I supposed to think when I saw her with some guy and all over him? It looked bad! And he’s the kind of guy she should be with anyway.”
“Thanks. Now I’m not a dick, I’m a loser dick.”
“That’s not what I mean, Braxton.”
“Then what is it, Stella, because I gotta tell you, I’m really fucking tired of hearing you say she’s too damn good for me.”
She is, though. But she’s not either. We’re both the same, working our ass off to follow our dreams, just because she had an easier life in getting there doesn’t mean shit. I at least had people at my back supporting me and encouraging me. Cara comes from a life of money. I come from a life of people who care, so frankly, I think I had the better life.
“Why do you hate her, Stella? I never took you for being so judgmental but this she’s-better-or-I’m-better isn’t you. You don’t even know her.”
She scrapes her teeth over her lip piercing and her chin trembles.
The hell?
“Whose fault is it that I don’t know her, Braxton? She shows up, tells you she’s pregnant, and suddenly you’re hanging out with Cara and Dan and Jenna all the time, you haven’t even let me try to get to know her.”
I jerk in my chair and fall forward, my elbows landing on my desk. “The hell? What are you talking about?”
“When’s the last time you saw Bonnie or Asher, Braxton? You haven’t been to our place since Cara waltzed in here that first day. You think I don’t know you’ve already changed enough since you moved into that condo and then some rich chick shimmies her way into your life and suddenly you’re too good for me? It’s always supposed to be us.”
My head is spinning from her accusations, but it’s the wobble in her voice and the tears filling her eyes that stun me more than what she said. Stella crying?
I’ve seen it once. The day we buried Irvin.
“Stella—” I say, gentling my voice, but she lifts a hand to stop me.
“And yeah, maybe I’m being stupid. But I didn’t think she loved you. Or that you loved her. I assumed you were only with her because of the baby. You pissed me off and then she came in here, all rich and shit like she has any idea what it’s like for us, or for Robbie and I who skimp and save every damn dollar and it’s still barely enough, and you don’t even see my kids anymore. Like you think we’re not good enough to be around her or something. They miss you, Braxton. I miss you.”
“So you fucked up my life because you’re jealous?”
I don’t know whether to throttle her or hug her. Or kick her ass. Or shake her until her common sense returns. “You have Robbie, Stella. You’re married. You have kids. Don’t I get that too? Don’t I get the chance and time to have a relationship?”
“Well, yeah.” She swipes a finger beneath her eye. “But I didn’t think you’d ignore me when it happened either, or forget you’ve already got two kids in your life who are crazy about you.”
I don’t want to admit it, but she has a point. I don’t remember the last time I saw her hellions and I used to be over there almost every week for dinner or to take Asher to the park and throw a ball around with him. And fuck me, I haven’t even thought of them, I’ve been so wrapped up in Cara and our baby and her puking and trying to get her to care about me…
Shit.
I really am a dick.
I drop my head into my hands and sigh. Who knew in trying to get everything I wanted in life, I’d push aside all the friendships with people who have always been there for me. If it wasn’t for Stella investing her share of Irvin’s inheritance into MadInk I’d never have gotten it started in the first place.
I push off my desk chair and move around, lifting Stella, who’s sniffling and crying out of her chair, and I pull her into my arms.
“You’re a fucking pain in my ass, Stell.” I hold her to me while she cries. “And I’m really fucking pissed off at you for being such a bitch. You could have just told me, asked us over for dinner too, you know. But I should have made that effort too, and introduced Cara to you guys. That’s my fault, honey.”
“Well, this looks cozy,” a man says, and I lift my head to find a guy in the doorway, sneer twisting his lips, shoulder resting on the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest. He’s dressed in jeans and a slightly wrinkled gray polo shirt, but I know exactly who he is. He’s the guy in the photos. “Should I take a picture, send it to Cara, see what she thinks about it?”
Fuck.
Stella sniffs one more time and pushes against me. My hands fall to my hips as she steps back.
“You must be Cara’s friend,” I say lamely. He o
bviously knows me.
“Yup. Graham. And you’re Braxton. Came to talk to you.”
Awesome. Because the day hasn’t been shitty enough yet.
“Sorry,” Stella says, and I don’t know who she’s talking to because she doesn’t look at either of us. “I’m really sorry,” she mutters. “I’ll go up front while you two talk.”
She turns from me and Graham shoves off the doorway as she walks by. She mutters another apology as she passes him, but Graham doesn’t move his steely gaze from mine.
“Stella,” I call out to her when she’s passed Graham and he’s still glaring at me like he wants my head on a pike.
“Yeah?”
“No worries. It’ll all work out.”
Because I’m going to make it so, I just have no clue how to do it yet.
She gives me a sad smile and heads down the hallway.
Graham steps further into my office and shuts the door. “I thought, since you were too big of an ass last night to get the story from Cara, that I’d stop by here today, tell you what happened, because I’m really not too fucking happy Cara showed up at my house last night, after spending hours telling me how awesome you are, only to be such a damn wreck she was almost as upset as she was the day Jimmy died. She’s been my friend a long time, and I get you two are connected now, and always will be, and I don’t really care if you’re pissed I’m here, but I need to clear this shit up so you two can move on.”
Goddamn it. “How is she?”
“Broken, is how she referred to herself this morning.”
Jesus. My chest burns. He’s not pulling any punches and I respect the hell out of him for it. “Want a seat?”
“Not really. I don’t have a lot of time, so I’ll just get right to the point. Last night, Cara’s parents, who are even bigger assholes than my parents, maneuvered a situation where both of our families figured they could get everything they wanted. I came out to my folks a few months back and we can just say that they’re less than pleased at the idea. So, unfortunately, they told Cara’s parents. Cara’s parents had already met you and my folks might be pissed that I’m not the perfect kid they want, but Cara’s are worse. They got together, figured both of us had had enough time to have our tantrums, and we needed to grow up.”