Pretend Daddy

by Amy Brent

  Her body felt so warm against my skin, and yet I still had to hold back tears.

  Amber deserved better than this. She deserved better than what her family was giving her. My mind was still reeling with everything she had told me yesterday. The mere fact that her family had a private investigator on tap for their every whim made me feel weird. That shit just wasn’t normal, and they had some serious issues they needed to talk over with a professional. I didn’t know what promise Amber had made them when she was younger, but it probably had something to do with her schooling and running the company.

  What really got me though was Luke. Her relationship with her brother was probably shattered. I saw how close the two of them were before all this careened out of control. I saw how he stepped up and defended her when he needed to with his parents. I saw how supportive he wanted to be about her dreams, right down to her damn Christmas gift. Sure, he might’ve been protective as fuck about her, but he loved his sister.

  And I felt like I’d ruined that.

  Amber’s breaths fell lightly onto the crook of my neck. Her breasts fell off to the sides, spilling onto the bed while my fingertips glazed along her soft skin. My mind began to whirl about how I could fix this. Who I could talk to and what I could say that could possibly mend the relationship she had with her family. It was Christmas, for fuck’s sake. It was supposed to be a holiday you celebrated with family. I never got to celebrate Christmas with mine. My parents were too busy drinking the money for presents away before they fell asleep after vomiting in the toilet.

  The only Christmas present I ever got as a child was a booze bottle my mother had washed out and decorated for me. She called it a piggy bank and told me I could start saving. Then, the first time I’d ever filled it up, she smashed it open and took the money to go buy more fucking booze.

  I knew from experience what it was like to do holidays without family. I remembered ordering a pizza on Thanksgiving and getting a pitiful look from the delivery driver. I knew exactly what it felt like to never celebrate my birthday unless I went out and bought my own cake. At the end of each year, I knew what it felt like to fall asleep and never usher in a new year with a kiss or a hug from someone I loved.

  And I sure as hell knew what it was like to wake up Christmas morning and have it feel like any other damn day.

  I wasn’t going to allow that to happen to Amber. She was better than that. She deserved more than that from her life. I slowly pulled myself away from her body, shivering at the loss of contact. I replaced my body with a pillow so she wouldn’t wake up, and I slowly put my clothes back on. I had to go talk to someone, but I needed her to know that I hadn’t left her.

  I needed her to know I was coming back to her.

  I scribbled a note and left it on her bedside table before I headed out the door. This entire family was fighting because of me, and I wouldn’t let that happen anymore. If there was one Christmas gift I could give Amber, it was the gift of mending this bullshit with her family so she could have her holiday back. I didn’t care if they wanted me around for it or not. I didn’t care if she celebrated with them and then came back to me. I didn’t care if all of them wanted to run me out of town and never see me again.

  All I knew was that I wanted to fix this.

  For Amber.

  I hopped into my rental car and headed to Luke’s house. The very first person I had to talk to was him, no matter how this panned out. I didn’t expect our business to be fixed or for us to still be friends, but I was hoping I could talk some sense into him about how he was treating his sister. Maybe if I could repair their relationship, he could help mend her relationship with their parents.

  Because I had a feeling their parents wouldn’t listen to a damn word anyone else had to say about anything.

  I knocked on the door and heard shuffling behind it. Whoever it was had probably just gotten out bed, and the moment the door whipped open my suspicions were confirmed. Luke’s eyes were bloodshot, and his hair was disheveled. He was in the same clothes I’d last seen him in when he came to the new office space. He looked at me with this blank stare on his face, and I stepped through the threshold of his home without him even fighting me.

  This was eating him alive.

  “Luke,” I said.

  “Tyler.”

  “We need to talk, man,” I said.

  “Sure,” he grunted. “Want to sit?”

  “Nah, I’m good. Look, if you want me to stay away from Amber, I will. I didn’t think anyone around here would be crazy enough to do to her what your parents have done, and she’s going to need someone in her corner to navigate all this with,” I said.

  “What my parents did?” he asked.

  “You don’t know?” I asked.

  “Know what?”

  “They fucking cut her off, dude. She registered a business name, and apparently, your parents had a private investigator following her. They found out and cut her off from everything. No phone, no credit cards, no nothing.”

  In an instant, I saw him perk up. I watched the clouded stare quickly bury itself behind the fire in his eyes I was so used to seeing. His back straightened up, and he ran his hands through his hair. The Luke I knew was coming, and he was coming to the defense of his sister just like I knew he would.

  “They fucking did what?” he asked.

  “If you’ve been trying to call her, that’s why she hasn’t been picking up. The only reason I knew was because I caught her at a gas station while I was filling up my car.”

  “Your car?” he asked.

  “Yeah. Planned on skipping out. Starting a new life after this fucking train of crazy town started raging out of control,” I said.

  “Can I get in that car with you?” he asked.

  “I’ll strap you to the roof,” I said, grinning.

  “Is she alright?”

  “Why are you assuming I know?” I asked.

  “Because you just said you saw her at a gas station and you have a fucking hickey on your neck. Is she alright?” I could feel his eyes lingering on my neck as his face began to flush with anger again. I was going to tackle this head on, whether he liked it or not. I was going to say what I came here to say, and then I’d leave the rest of this fuckery up to him.

  “She’s trying to distract herself, but she doesn't seem deterred from her business. Worried about where she’ll live, and she’s actually spouting off some bullshit about living in her car,” I said.

  “Oh, hell no. That’s not happening. Not on my watch,” he said.

  “Good. Now, I’m about to say here what I came to say. I’ll stay away from Amber if you really want me to, but you have to realize she’s an adult. With dreams and aspirations. She can make her own decisions. And if she decides to fuck your friends, then you’re going to have to grow up and deal with it. You were fucking hers, so that pretty much makes the two of you even,” I said.

  “Shit, I totally forgot about Kelly,” he said.

  “And that’s the difference,” I said. “I haven’t forgotten about Amber. That girl you saw me with back in New York, that shit didn’t mean anything. That was a one-and-done scenario I no longer wanted to touch because, well, your sister kept popping up.”

  “What?” he asked.

  “Look. She spun my head in college, and she turns my head now. Only this time, I don’t want to leave. The only reason I planned to was I thought she had ditched me. But I figured out she wasn’t taking my calls because your parents took her phone. I care about your sister, dude. A lot. But, if you keep treating her like a child and trying to keep making her decisions for her like your parents are doing, she’s going to rebel harder and cut you off altogether.”

  “How the hell did this careen so far out of control?” he asked.

  “Because everyone, for whatever reason, wants to control Amber. Maybe because she’s the baby of the family or maybe it is because of a stupid little promise.”

  “Are you serious? That’s what my parents are holding o
ver her head?”

  “You know what the promise was?” I asked.

  “That was around the time we had just started planning the business. I came to Mom and Dad for that little loan we had? Remember? The ten-thousand-dollar loan?”

  “Oh shit, that was Ron and Darlene?” I asked.

  “Yeah. They gave me the loan, then Dad turned to Amber and told her she would have to do something substantial with her education if she was going to have to take over the company. She said she didn’t want to, that she wanted to major in dance, and he said if she was going to major in something frivolous that she’d have to work her education off at the company for half-pay until she paid it off.”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” I asked.

  “Dude, I didn’t think they’d actually hold that shit over her head. Amber was only seventeen. Did you say something about a damn PI?”

  “See what happens when you treat her like a child? She’s got no intentions to come groveling to your parents? She’d rather live in a ditch her entire life than be around those two. And with the way you’ve been forcing her into a corner about me, you’re heading down that exact road.”

  “I was just trying to protect her,” he said.

  “And I get that. But, I’m not blowing Amber off. That woman means the world to me. She’s incredible, and sassy, and passionate about her dance studio. I want to help her with that. And I know you do, too. What you’ve seen me do to women, I’m not doing that to Amber.”

  “You’ve technically already done it to her once, if you left her back at college to go to New York City with me,” he said.

  “But, I’m not leaving now. Instead, I’m over here groveling on her behalf to try and fix you two’s relationship, and hopefully, mend her relationship with your parents in the process. I can’t do that shit alone, and I want to do it because.”

  “Say it,” Luke said.

  I sighed and took a step back before I closed my eyes. The moment I said it sober, it would be real. The moment I said it, I would be at the mercy of whatever Luke said. No one was ripping Amber away from me, that much was for certain. But, admitting something like this could be the difference between me rifting this further and me repairing this relationship.

  “Because I love her, dude,” I said.

  A smile crossed Luke’s face before he pulled me into an embrace. I was rooted with shock, but I mustered the strength to pat his back.

  “You hurt my sister, I’ll kill you,” he said.

  “Help me fix this shit between her and Ron and Darlene,” I asked.

  “You had me at ‘private investigator.’ That shit’s ridiculous,” he said.

  Chapter 26

  Amber

  I stretched my limbs that morning while the sunlight cascaded across my limbs. My body ached from the rounds we took last night, and I knew my bathroom would still be partially flooded. I smiled as my thought back to last night and all the ways Tyler had taken me, and a thought crossed my mind.

  I could wake him up with a blowjob.

  I rolled over to try and find his body, but instead, all I saw was an empty space. In that very moment, my heart sank. I felt my world slowly slip from between my fingers and my head began to swirl. Did I do something wrong? Was I just another glorified fuck? Did I expect too much from him? Did I read too much into what last night meant?

  I felt tears crest my eyes as I pulled my comforter over my body. Tears dripped onto my pillow as I reached for my phone, and that’s when I realized the reality of my situation. I didn’t have a phone to call Tyler with because my parents had cut me off. I didn’t have the money for gas to ride around and try to find him because my parents had disconnected my credit cards. I didn’t have the energy to expend rolling out of bed to try and walk around and look for him because what energy I didn’t spend fighting with them I spent giving myself wholly to him last night.

  But, when my hand descended onto the place where my phone should’ve been, I felt the crinkle of paper underneath my fingers instead.

  I grasped it and brought it to my face before I read it, and I realized it was a note Tyler had left me. He told me he had some talking he had to do with someone, and he would be back soon. He promised and told me to stay put, and he wished he could be here to watch me wake up with the light of the morning in my eyes.

  But, there was a part of me that didn’t believe him.

  There was a part of me that couldn’t blame him if he didn’t come back. My life had crumbled the lowest it was ever going to get. I couldn’t expect a man as wild and vivacious at Tyler Raymond to stick around with a girl who would be homeless in three weeks and had no phone. I couldn’t expect someone like Tyler Raymond, who had a business he needed to grow and connections he needed to make, to help me out of the slump I was in.

  I was going to have to do that on my own, which meant a great deal of research had to be done before my internet was inevitably disconnected.

  I felt my heart drop to my toes. Christmas was in a week, and it would be the first time I didn’t spend it with my family. It would be the first time I woke up without a tree or lights blinking in the background. It would be the first time I never opened a present or had one of my mother’s homemade cinnamon rolls. I would be the first time I wouldn’t enjoy an evening cup of coffee with my father while he bored me with the details of his business even while he was on vacation.

  It would be the first time Luke and I wouldn’t secretly exchange gifts late at night, so Mom and Dad wouldn’t be there to see the support he was providing for my dance studio.

  Every single year he got me a gift card to a dance consignment shop, and every year I would go shopping and store the things I bought. At first, I thought about getting a storage unit and putting everything there, but Luke convinced me to keep the items in one of his storage units he had back in New York. He would give me the gift card before he took me shopping, then he’d fly back with those items and store them for me so they would be in pristine condition for when I opened my shop.

  And in return, I would buy him these rather expensive bowties with matching cufflinks. My father thought matching cufflinks were tacky, but Luke absolutely loved them. The brighter, the better, so that was always his Christmas gift. We would trade them under the light of the Christmas tree after Mom and Dad stumbled upstairs and went to bed.

  But that wouldn’t happen this year, and it brought tears to my eyes.

  I knew I needed to start researching, but I needed to talk with someone first. I needed my best friend. She needed to know I didn’t have my phone in case she was getting angry if she was trying to call. Now that my new business was on the fast track, I needed her help getting all this research done, finalizing my business plan and figuring out what loans I would be eligible for. We could have fun looking for places to open my dance studio. I’d need help setting up the consignment shop. And all these things Kelly was so much better at than I was.

  I needed to go see Kelly before Tyler got back.

  If he was coming back.

  I got up and got dressed and headed to my car. I cranked up the car and cringed at the gas I was using, but I still made my way to her apartment. The entire time I drove there, all I could think about was my night with Tyler. I wanted to believe he would come back, I really did. Hopefully, when I returned to the apartment he would be there. But, we only fucked. We didn’t talk anything out or come to any conclusions. I didn’t know if he was staying or still leaving or where he would be going if he was leaving. We didn’t talk about what this meant for me or where I would be going from here.

  We didn’t answer any of the questions we needed to. We simply lost ourselves in each other’s bodies.

  And yes, it was a wonderful distraction. And yes, it felt fucking fabulous. But, this was real, and this was happening, and it impacted us in ways I don’t think either of us realized. I cared about him greatly. That much was certain when I opened my eyes and felt like crying when I saw he wasn’t there.

&nb
sp; But, how did he feel about me?

  Was I acting like a stupid little girl?

  I got to Kelly’s house and didn’t even have to knock on the door before she threw it open. She wrapped me in her arms and yanked me into her apartment, and I laid my head on her shoulder while her lips ran away with her mind.

  “Holy fuck, where have you been? I’ve been trying to call you, and you haven’t been picking up. Are you alright? Did something happen with Tyler? Luke hasn’t been answering my calls either and I was so worried.”