by Nicole Helm
Maybe it could be the start of something honest and healing. Maybe if she said this, put it right out there, they could unwind the past and forge something new.
“I don’t think so little of you. I love you with all my heart, but you don’t think straight when you’re in a bad place, Leah. Your aunt was absolutely the last person you should have run to to take care of you.”
“I stayed with her because she wouldn’t take care of me. Because she let me do whatever. And I needed that space to really grow up. To figure out what I wanted to be and how I could fix myself.” She wanted to add the part about how her leaving fixed everything. Mom and Dad got back together instead of separation leading to divorce. They paid off their debts. Everything had been fixed because she’d taken herself out of the equation.
Mom shook her head. “You don’t look at the big picture. You’re like your father and put things off until it’s an even bigger problem, and with health like yours, that’s terrifying as your mother. It’s not loving you less to think you need someone to help you, to watch out for you when you hit the rough patches. That isn’t thinking little of you. It’s caring about your well-being.”
Wasn’t it both? Leah didn’t know. Maybe it wasn’t. Maybe she was wrong. All she knew was she was tired, and apparently she wasn’t getting her new beginning by being honest. So, she let out her held breath and didn’t argue.
“Don’t push Jacob away. You need him.”
Ouch. She didn’t even have Jacob. Except for all that stuff he said earlier. Yeah, she did not have the energy to figure all that out right now. “I need a boyfriend because I’m not reliable enough to take care of myself.”
“Reliable isn’t the right word.” Mom pushed away from the table, back to lining up ingredients. Ingredients she had brought. Pans and utensils she’d brought. Because Leah wouldn’t possibly have thought to have any of those things.
“So what is the right word?” She didn’t know why she was pushing or, God, hoping something would give, but she was, she did.
“Finish those potatoes so you can help me make the cannoli. Your father will simply cry if we don’t have cannoli for Christmas Eve. Though Lord knows why I go through the effort when the man can’t even stay awake for midnight mass one day out of the year.”
Leah didn’t know what else to do besides go along with it. To pretend. Help Mom with the cannoli. Watch It’s a Wonderful Life, get choked up when everyone shows up to save capable, resourceful George.
Oh, she’d get saved if she were in trouble, but would anyone just...let her save herself? Her own way?
* * *
“I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU,” Grace hissed, handing him a dripping wet plate.
Jacob took it and dried it off, setting it on the counter of his parents’ kitchen. “Would you keep it down?” Jacob glanced at Mom and Dad on the couch in the living room as he and Grace hunched over the dishes. His parents were laughing with Kyle, It’s a Wonderful Life on the TV screen in the corner.
“You kissed her,” Grace whispered, leaning in. “After everything I’ve been saying. After everything you’ve been saying. You kissed her and don’t try to bullshit me about it being for her parents.”
“Shouldn’t you be out there with your boyfriend minding your own damn business?”
“Why won’t you listen to me?”
“As I recall, you weren’t exactly listening to me when I warned you off Kyle, were you?”
“That was so incredibly different.”
“You’re right. I was trying to protect you. You could give a shit about me.”
“Is that what you really think?”
She looked so hurt he wanted to take it back, but damn it, she was pissing him off. “I think you need to take a step back and remember how happy you were with me when I was meddling with your love life.”
“First of all, you didn’t just meddle. You punched Kyle because you were being a grade-A dick. Second of all, you do not have a love life with Leah. Unacceptable.”
“Why? Why is that so unacceptable and what business is it of yours? I think she’s fully capable of determining whether she wants to have a love life with me or not and vice versa.”
“Right. You’re so capable in the love-life department.”
Jacob looked at his stack of dry dishes, ignoring that feeling that seemed to be popping up lately. Hurt? What did he care if everyone thought he was a failure in the women department? He was. But the fact his family couldn’t see...well, anything past that sometimes. That did not feel particularly good. “If it helps, she kissed me first.” A joke soothed all hurts after all.
“That makes it worse, and just like when you were trying to warn me off Kyle, you aren’t listening to what I’m actually saying. She has feelings for you. Of course she kissed you. You kissing her back...are you thinking at all?”
So much for joking. “What if I have feelings for her?”
“You don’t even know her!”
“I’ve known her longer than you. Spent more time with her than you. I damn well know her, Grace.” Only the fact that his parents were in the next room, completely viewable from his place at the sink, kept him from slamming the dishes into the cupboard. Kept him from letting the anger and frustration he felt spill out.
“You know her, huh? Okay, why does she always wear high collared shirts?”
“What?”
“Have you ever seen her expose anything below the collarbone?” Grace asked, hand fisted on a cocked hip.
Jacob stopped what he was doing. “What are you even talking about?”
“Have you ever seen this portion of Leah’s self exposed?” she demanded, gesturing wildly at the scoop neck of her own shirt.
And because he couldn’t think of a time he had, his stomach sank. Point one for Grace. “So what? She’s...modest.”
“Yeah, that red dress she wears to parties showing off a mile of leg is so modest.”
Jacob swallowed. “So, I have to understand a woman’s insecurities to know her?”
“Maybe you should understand them before you go around kissing her and confusing something that’s already confused for her.”
“So, what is it? Why doesn’t she wear anything lower cut?”
Grace turned back to the now-empty sink. “I don’t know,” she grumbled.
“Say again.”
“I said I don’t know, either, but I’ve noticed it.” She pointed a soapy finger at him. “And you haven’t. So. There.”
“You know what I think?”
“Oh, enlighten me.”
“You’re not worried about Leah, and we both know you’re not worried about me. You’re worried about you.”
“What?”
“Yeah, Leah’s your best friend these days. And you’re afraid that if anything happened with Leah and me, it would change things for you. And you’d lose your best friend to me. You might hide it all under not wanting to see Leah get hurt, but I think it’s hiding the fact you just don’t want things to change because of how that might affect you.”
“That’s...”
“It’s what?”
Grace’s eyebrows drew together and she dried her hands slowly on one of Mom’s Christmas-themed towels.
“Because tell me, Grace. Tell me really. Why would Leah and I be so bad for each other?”
“I don’t think you would be in the short term, okay? But I’m afraid you’re both too stubborn to work through the hard stuff, and I think Leah... I think she keeps parts of herself hidden from us and I don’t think you’ll take it very well when you find out what those pieces are or if she won’t let you see those parts. And I think that will hurt you both, but I think you’ll get angry and she’ll just be hurt.”
“We’re both adults. What do you care?”
“I ca
re that my brother and my best friend might not be on speaking terms and that might affect both me as a person and the business my brother and my boyfriend have built and care very deeply about. It isn’t like you to risk MC for something so...”
“Something so what?”
“You know what? You’re right. I didn’t like it when you did it to me, so I’m not going to do it to you.”
“Good.”
“But keep in mind this isn’t a joke. Leah is not some woman you can just discard when she no longer suits you.”
“Why do you think I do the discarding? Has it escaped your understanding I’m not the one doing the breaking up? It’s them.”
“But it’s a pattern and you’re the common denominator, Jacob.”
“I must be a really horrible person.”
“Being bad at relationships doesn’t make you a horrible person. I think you’d make an amazing boyfriend if you just... You’re selfish sometimes. You’re the baby, and sometimes you’re so wrapped up in you you don’t see anyone else. How long did you know Kyle without really knowing what was going on with him?”
“He didn’t want me to know. And I don’t feel like I need to push everyone into confessing every damn thing to me if they don’t want to. Maybe you’re selfish needing to know everything about everyone.”
“It’s Christmas. I don’t want to fight with you. I love you. You’re an amazing brother. I just think you need to start taking a step back from...yourself.”
“Well, thanks for the advice, sis.”
“Don’t be mad.”
He forced himself to smile. “Of course not.”
“Jacob. Listen to me. You are wonderful. You are. But you have a tendency to be a little...careless when you’re set on something, and I can’t sit by and not say anything when that carelessness might affect my best friend.”
“Yeah, no, I get it. And I’m not mad, and we should go watch the movie.”
She looked up at him plaintively, so he did his absolute best to look at ease, to reach out and squeeze her shoulder affectionately even though he didn’t feel it at all. “Really. I get it. Let’s just agree not to talk about it anymore, okay?”
“Okay. Christmas truce,” she said with a rueful smile. She turned and headed for the living room, but Jacob stayed behind. He needed a few minutes to...work on making the smile, the ease real.
He stared at the dark night outside the window in his parents’ kitchen and tried to believe Grace’s words. He could be selfish. He wouldn’t say careless, but he could get wrapped up in himself, but Grace was off base. She really was, and it wasn’t the first time someone in his family looked at him and didn’t see what was ticking underneath.
Usually he threw his restlessness, his...insecurity or whatever the hell it was, into work, but there wasn’t work to be had on Christmas Eve. There was only his family and...
Leah. There was Leah. Who understood, in a weird way, what it was like to have your family look at you without...seeing.
Grace thought he was going to hurt Leah if he pursued this. Mom thought he was selfish when it came to girlfriends. And Dad, well, he didn’t think Dad had much of an opinion on his dating life. Kyle thought he couldn’t stand to be alone, when the truth was he just knew what he wanted. A wife. Someone to be there. He wanted that next phase of his life to start. On his timetable.
And Leah had come the closest to understanding, closer than even him in his six months of no dating.
He was trying to plan it all out. Blueprint a future. And while that worked fine for him, he couldn’t do it to other people. But maybe now that he understood...
He took a deep breath and forced himself into the living room lest Grace think he was brooding or upset. He finished the movie, mimicking the favorite lines with his dad like always. He might not feel the Christmas cheer, but he could certainly fake it like nobody’s business.
So, he faked the smile and hug he gave Grace as she and Kyle headed out to spend the night in their almost-finished house down the street.
“You can go home, too, if you like,” Mom said. “I know your old bed isn’t very comfortable. We can do a late brunch instead of breakfast.” Mom smiled. “It isn’t as if we have any little ones eager for Santa.”
“Hey, make those comments around Grace. She’s the one with the steady boyfriend. In fact, make those comments around Kyle. I’d love to see his face.”
Mom’s smile was thin, and Jacob noticed not for the first time she looked tired. “You okay?”
“Oh, that stupid flu I had last week is lingering. I need a good night’s sleep and I’ll be fine.” She gave him a little push toward the door. “Go home. Sleep in tomorrow morning, and I’ll be sure to make the hash browns nice and crispy, just how you like.”
He leaned in and gave Mom a kiss on the cheek. “All right. Night, Mom. Merry Christmas.”
“Merry Christmas.”
And when he stepped outside, he knew he wasn’t going home. Maybe it was wrong, okay, yes, it was wrong to go back there when he was all...broody. When he was without a plan or any idea what to do about him or her or them.
But Leah understood what he was feeling. She had kissed him when she was feeling this way, so, hey, turnabout was fair play.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
WHEN LEAH STEPPED out of her bathroom, she screamed.
Jacob, sitting on her bed as if it was normal, winced. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to scare you.”
Leah pressed a hand to her heart, the hammering almost tangible underneath her long-sleeved henley. “Christ on a cracker, Jacob. What the hell are you doing here? How did you get in here?”
“You might want to go make sure you screaming didn’t wake anyone before I answer those questions.”
He was right, so she stalked over to the door and poked her head out the doorway. Down the hall, the door to her parents’ room was still closed and dark. In the opposite direction, the living room where Marc slept on the couch remained quiet and dark, as well.
Leah turned back to Jacob still sitting on her bed. “How did you get in here?” she asked, her breath still coming a little fast, the scare still pounding in her veins. If she was alone, she might take a hit of her inhaler, but she didn’t want Jacob giving her that look. She wasn’t up for that look from anyone right now.
“Well, I was going to knock, but you know, if I live here I should probably have a key. You weren’t answering your phone, so I remembered you left a key for Grace in the old mailbox a few months ago and, shock, it was still there.”
She blinked at him, trying to make sense out of any of it. “But...why? It’s Christmas Eve. You’re supposed to be with your parents. Why did you...? Why are you...?” She fisted her hands on her hips, trying to be stern. Trying to...ignore the fact he was on her bed. And they’d...done stuff this morning that could lead to...bed stuff.
Dear Brain, NOPE.
“Why are you here?”
He shrugged, idly tracing the pattern on her comforter. “Well, Mom wasn’t feeling well, so she sent me home, so to speak.”
“This isn’t your home.”
He met her gaze. “Yeah, I know.”
“So...”
“So, Grace and Kyle went to spend the night in their new house, and I didn’t feel much like spending the night at MC alone, but your bed is a hell of a lot more comfortable than my old mattress that hasn’t been replaced in twenty years at my parents’ house.”
She relaxed her stance because even though him being here seemed...dangerous for her sanity, she felt sorry for him. He looked lonely, she realized. Lonely and restless, and the normally cheerful, affable Jacob being melancholy always got to her. It was rare, and she was a sap.
When it comes to him.
Oh, shut up, self.
“Okay, so, you came
here.”
He nodded, fixing his gaze on her. Not her face this time, but her chest. She flushed and crossed her hands over her breasts. Since she hadn’t been expecting him and had been planning to go right to sleep, she’d taken off her bra.
She intensely regretted that decision. In fact, she might never take off her bra again. Just to avoid another moment like this.
“Why do you wear high collared shirts?” he asked, still staring despite her crossed arms.
“Huh?”
“Even your pajamas in this hot-as-hell room are all the way up to your neck.”
“I...I get cold easily.” She wrinkled her nose at him. “What do you care about my fashion choices?”
“So, you cover up to your neck even when it’s July and 100 degrees out? Because I’ve seen you sweat your ass off in a room with no AC, decidedly not cold, and still never seen you wear anything less than fabric all the way up to your neck.” He gestured to his collarbone.
“Why are you...?” She swallowed, feeling panic squeeze her heart. “What made you even think of that?”
“Grace noticed. She noticed you do that and she asked me why. Because she says I don’t know you, and maybe she’s right.”
That explained some of his restlessness, she supposed. Kyle must have spilled the kissing beans to Grace and Grace had lectured Jacob, and here he was. On her bed, on Christmas Eve, feeling alone and as if he didn’t know her.
Since she’d been on the receiving end of her own version of a shitty lecture, she felt sorry for him. But more than that, she didn’t like him thinking he didn’t know her. Even if things were getting weird with them, he was still her friend. And for all her secrets, he and the whole MC crew knew her. The her she’d built. The her she actually liked.
“You know me,” Leah said firmly. “You know the now me, who is the me I want to be. So you and Grace and Kelly and Susan and even Kyle to an extent, you know me. I hate to disagree with one of my best friends, but she is wrong in this case.”
“Then why don’t I know this? Why didn’t I even notice this?” He stood, frowning at her. “I hate thinking she’s right.”