by Nicole Helm
It was a shame for Tori that she had shitty taste in men.
“Good morning,” Tori offered cheerfully.
He knew not to trust that cheerfulness because Tori was never cheerful except when she was about to kill you.
“Morning.”
“Sleep well?” she continued in that syrupy sweet voice.
“Like the dead,” he replied, because he felt like the dead. Gritty-eyed and numb and as though nothing but blackness lay before him.
“Isn’t that nice? Wish I could say the same. I was too busy thinking about all the hours I put into planning how I was going to tell you I loved—”
“You can’t make me do this,” he growled. She couldn’t force him to relive it. She couldn’t.
She smiled at him, sharp and dangerous, that smile he’d always admired because it had never been aimed at him. Now it was on him, and he knew a weapon when he saw one.
“Can’t I?”
A sense of foreboding stole through him because last night he’d been certain that all it would take was a few well-placed words and to walk away, and she wouldn’t push this. Who would want to push this?
But he should’ve known better because Tori was the woman who’d set this horrible thing between them in motion in the first place, and she was not a woman who let things go. Who sulked away, who played the coward.
Which was why, he realized with a clarity he didn’t want, he’d been so mad when he’d come back to Boulder after he’d married Courtney and she’d been gone. It was why he’d been so livid that she’d reappeared seven years later as if nothing had happened.
Because it wasn’t Tori to be a coward, to run away. It wasn’t Tori to give up the fight.
Now she wanted to rewrite the ending? Come back into his life? Face all those old things he’d cut out of himself?
The itch in his gut got stronger, more of a searing, boiling thing. But if he didn’t name it, everything would be fine.
For Brandon, and for Lilly, and for Mile High, Gracely, and the Evans name, he could not give in to this ugly thing inside of him.
Which meant he had to fight, for once in his life, he had to fight.
* * *
There was something passing over Will’s face Tori didn’t recognize. It reminded her a little bit of when she’d first seen him at Mile High on the day of Brandon’s wedding. He’d been so . . . angry, and while she’d imagined their reuniting in a lot of different ways, blind fury on his part had never been one of them.
Everything about his expression was hard, and it made him look older somehow. Older and dangerous, and though Will had always been a danger to her heart, he’d never appeared dangerous.
Unease shivered down her spine, and that was certainly new and different. She’d been so certain she had everything right, and that she was going to win this fight.
For the first time possibly ever, she wasn’t so sure she would. Not against this man she didn’t recognize.
But he didn’t say anything, and eventually he stopped staring at her like he thought he could dismantle her piece by piece. She was a little shaky at that because her saving grace had always been that he didn’t think he could win against her. If he ever thought he had power over her control, she’d be toast. Because it was true. He absolutely had all those things—power and control. It would only take a few little words for him to dismantle her completely. He’d just never known it.
Ignoring the way her stomach curdled and her chest got too tight, she forced her body to relax. “I’ve always wondered what it was,” she said conversationally, “because even if you didn’t have feelings for me back when we were friends, why did you have to—”
“Yeah, we were friends. That was it,” he interrupted gruffly, a steely, furious note to his voice she thought maybe he was trying to hide. “Should I remind you that you ran away a lot faster than I did?”
It was the flat-out lie that unwound some of her control. “Bullshit. You disappeared. I stayed in Boulder. I . . .”
He stepped toward her and even though she wanted to be strong and formidable, her words trailed off. Because he looked dangerous and intimidating, and he’d never been those things. Even that night when he’d flat-out told her that there would never be anything between them, he hadn’t been aggressive.
“What is it you’re trying to accomplish?” he asked, his voice threaded with that same deadly calm it’d had when he’d told her love was never going to be a thing they experienced together.
That question made her hesitate. The answer gave away too much. How would she survive being here, having come here basically homeless and penniless and on her knees, if he knew so many of those old hurts still thrived inside of her? Like he was some sort of disease, one that lived in her blood no matter how many years and treatments she’d employed to get rid of it. A cancer that was never truly eradicated.
“I want to erase it,” she said, more than ashamed when her voice wasn’t the sturdy, determined thing she wanted it to be.
“I guess that’s the difference between you and me, Tori. I erased it a long damn time ago.”
It hurt. She knew he wanted it to hurt. He was good at that, finding the thing to push the dagger deeper.
But beyond her hurt, beyond her anger, she saw something else. Older and wiser and used to the hurt, she couldn’t help but wonder if Will was hurting her on purpose. Not because he was mean-spirited or awful, but because when you hurt someone else it sometimes felt like you were protecting yourself.
Because why would he have been angry when she first arrived if he’d erased it so effectively?
It was a lie, and that stirred her anger all over again. Will had always been adept at pretending, but he’d never lied to her face.
“You’ve already erased it and me,” she said, pretending to ruminate over his words. Putting a few new ones in his mouth because it would piss him off. “And yet here I am. Here we are. But I’m not going anywhere this time, and I don’t think you are either.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Then I guess we’ll just see how erased it is for you.” Because she wouldn’t let him have his lie. She’d poke at him until he broke, and then maybe she’d finally have the truth, and some closure. A foundation to build her new life on.
Because damn right she wasn’t going anywhere, and neither was he.
Chapter Seven
Will stared blearily at the computer screen. Brandon said he’d make it in this afternoon, and Will wanted to double-check and make sure he’d done everything right in Brandon’s absence. He wanted to be certain, absolutely certain, he hadn’t fucked things up.
It was a nagging worry, and he wished he could blame that on why he hadn’t slept for two nights, but even in his best denial shape he couldn’t make himself believe it.
No sleeping was all Tori. The subtle threat she’d left him with the other day, and the gnawing worry she had something up her sleeve.
But he hadn’t seen much of her that day, and she’d spent the day after on an excursion kayaking with Sam. Yesterday she’d taken the day off due to a few deliveries at her new house.
In that break from having Tori in his space, he’d dreamed of that night every time he’d fallen asleep. It never quite went the same as the reality had, but in every version of the dream she was wearing that flowery sundress she’d been wearing, and her thick blond hair had been down at her shoulders, and she’d said those damaging words.
I love you.
Will scrubbed his hands across his face. This was his penance for lying, he supposed. He’d told her he’d erased it, so now he was going to relive it till he went insane. Seemed apt, all in all.
A mug of steaming hot coffee appeared at his elbow and Will glanced up to find Skeet hovering over him. The gnarled old man acted as Mile High’s secretary, refused to use computers, grunted more than he spoke actual words, and never, ever made drink deliveries—except to Lilly. Skeet did have a soft spot for Lilly.
Will must have been
in worse shape than he’d thought to have earned Skeet’s rare caregiving tendencies.
“Thanks,” he offered wearily.
Skeet shrugged looking around the office, his bleary blue eyes taking in the rumpled twin bed shoved in the corner.
“You been looking for another place?” Skeet asked in his age-graveled voice.
“No,” Will returned, keeping his attention on the computer screen.
“Has it occurred to you it might be a good idea?”
“Nope.”
“You can’t spend the rest of your life living out of the office, boy.”
Will grunted. Instead of arguing further, Skeet thankfully disappeared. Living in the office was fine for now. Surely with twins on the way, Lilly and Brandon would want a bigger house. What was the point in finding a place if he was only going to be moving back into the cabin eventually?
The cabin Brandon had designed, and had built, and you had no say in?
He pushed the thought away because he hadn’t wanted a say. He didn’t care where he lived. He could live any damn where.
Skeet reappeared, holding a jar in front of him, and Will groaned.
“You can’t be serious,” Will said, eyeing the jar and Skeet’s beady-eyed glare.
Skeet held the big plastic jar Lilly had made months ago when she’d been irritated with their preference to grunt rather than actually answer a question. Whenever one of them grunted at her, she made them put a dollar in it.
“Promised Lilly,” Skeet said easily. “Now pay up.”
Will muttered curses under his breath as he grabbed his wallet from the corner of the desk. He pulled out a one and shoved it into the jar. He opened his mouth to say something obnoxious, but a bark stopped him.
Sarge bounded into the office and skidded to a stop, tongue lolling to one side.
“There’s a boy,” Skeet said, not needing to lean down to pet the dog’s head. Sarge sat dutifully as Skeet scratched behind his ears.
“Sarge!” Tori called from what Will assumed was the main area up front.
“Like her,” Skeet said in his usual gruff way, before giving the dog one last pat and disappearing.
Sarge stayed where he was, panting seemingly happily up at Will. It twisted in his heart that the damn dog might recognize him.
“Come here, boy,” Will said softly, patting his knees. With a little yip, Sarge jumped up and put his paws on Will’s knees, just like he used to. Will rubbed his hands over Sarge’s head and down his neck.
Sarge offered a rough, sloppy lick in return.
“Well, that’s about as much action as I’ve gotten for . . .” He trailed off because he heard Tori’s heavy footsteps in the doorway. For a little thing she sure could make a lot of noise.
He glanced up at her meeting her gaze. He was immediately wary because she had that warrior stance about her. She was here to do battle. It wasn’t a shock. God, he was just tired. He didn’t want to fight today. He just wanted . . .
What the hell do you want?
Whatever the answer was, today wasn’t the day to figure it out.
“Isn’t it funny how he hasn’t seen you for seven years, but knows exactly who you are?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest.
It reminded him too much of Brandon’s wedding day, when seeing her had been like a sledgehammer to the chest, and she’d had the nerve to look pissed off and ready for a fight while he was still reeling from the blow.
“Yeah. Funny,” he intoned, because until he had a better option the whole pretending-like-he-didn’t-give-a-shit routine he usually used was going to have to work. “You’re taking the Solace Falls hike today, right? With Hayley?”
“Actually, Hayley has family in town unexpectedly, I guess. So I was thinking I could take the hike by myself. It’s the easy one. Shouldn’t be too much of a problem.”
Will frowned at that. It was an easy hike, and he wasn’t worried about her hiking it in the least. But leading people in a hike was a whole other thing, and it was the point of their business. They hadn’t let Hayley take a hike of her own until Sam had observed her through one.
“Of course, you’re welcome to come with.” She smiled and it was not a nice smile. No, this was the smile of a woman who was going to twist the knife as deep as she possibly could.
He couldn’t even blame her. No matter how angry and frustrated he got with her—being here, pushing at him— eventually he’d cool off and remember she had nowhere else to go. She was fighting because she didn’t have a choice.
It was the fundamental difference between them—that she’d always had to, and he never had.
He patted Sarge’s head, finding some comfort in that. Going with her was what Brandon would do. So it’s what he would do no matter how much he didn’t want to.
“All right. I’ll go with you. You’ll lead it, and I’ll just be there to observe. If everything goes well, then you’ll be cleared to at least lead that excursion on your own from here on out.”
“Fantastic. You know, I was just thinking about that hike we took in Estes Park that one summer. You remember that?”
He wasn’t quite sure what her endgame was now. If she had brought up that fateful night, he would have known exactly what she was trying to do. What the hell was she after, bringing up old good memories? From before everything got broken and splintered apart.
“Estes Park. Yeah, when we saw the moose?” he asked warily.
“Exactly.” She smiled brightly. “You told me about your father and why Brandon had to rush back to Gracely.”
Will stilled, keeping his expression neutral, his eyes glued to the dog. He still didn’t know where she was going, but he realized she was definitely going somewhere.
“I felt so sorry for you. To find out that your father was doing terrible things and to have to deal with it. Of course, you weren’t the one who had to deal with it, were you?”
“You have a point to all this?” he ground out.
She shrugged, easy as you please. “Just trying to figure out a puzzle, if you will. When I try to put all those pieces together, they don’t make any sense.”
“Pieces of what?”
“You.”
A simple word, amazing it could land like a punch. Or maybe a stab. He didn’t want her figuring him out, and he had a bad feeling she was one of the few people who could.
“What’s the whole story on Hayley? I haven’t quite figured out how that works.”
Gently he nudged Sarge off his legs and stood. Because he could take a lot of bullshit poking at him, but he wouldn’t let her bring Hayley into it.
“I’d watch where you step,” he said with as much menace as he could muster, meeting her sharp gaze for the first time.
She widened her eyes, all fake innocence. “What do you mean?”
“Come at me all you want. You start messing with the people I love, I’ll poke right back.”
Her eyebrows drew together and she cocked her head, studying him in a way he didn’t even begin to understand.
“Don’t you get it? That’s exactly what I want you to do.”
“I remember that day in Estes as well as you do. You told me something about your family that you weren’t particularly fond of talking about.”
Her expression didn’t change, but he could tell simply by the way she held her body a little differently that he’d hit his mark.
“Something about your brother? And why you had to run away from home.”
“You’ll notice there’s a little bit of a difference there.” She paused. “My brother threatened me. You just didn’t help your brother clean up a mess.”
“Oh, honey, if you want to make this a contest about who is best than you should know you’ve already won. Congratulations. I know what I am. You pointing it out to me doesn’t hurt.”
This time her eyebrows drew together with something other than confusion, fake or otherwise. It was a softness he didn’t want to recognize but did. Tori had always felt sorry fo
r him. Even when he hadn’t wanted her to. But he remembered all too clearly a time when she’d been a soft place to go when he was feeling particularly self-pitying.
She’d never made him feel like crap for it. Which he’d never understood. She was such a hard, uncompromising person, but she’d been understanding with him. When Brandon hadn’t. When Sam hadn’t. When his family hadn’t. Tori had always given him the benefit of the doubt.
He’d forgotten that about her. It hurt to remember it.
But the softness disappeared almost as quickly as it had appeared. Her gaze sharpened and everything about her hardened against him. “I felt sorry for you then,” she said as if reading his thoughts. “Now? You are too old to still believe this self-defeating shit. You get to choose. The life you want. The life you lead. Acting like it’s different is pathetic.” With that, she turned on a heel and walked away.
He tried to breathe through this new anger she pulled out of him. He didn’t know how to reset or pretend it away. He didn’t know how to smile through it. He’d been through a million hurtful and terrible things, and he’d always known how to do that, without poking back, without giving away how it cut him.
But he didn’t know how to do it with Tori, and he wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep his reactions on a leash.
* * *
Poke, anger, and retreat. That was Tori’s current strategy. She knew it would work. If it didn’t kill her first.
It was awful to poke and feel that pain and be surprised at the ways he could hurt her right back. It sucked to run away when she knew that what they really needed was to face this thing.
But she had to maneuver him there. So no matter how it sucked, she had to keep at it. No matter how much she wanted to scream in frustration, she had to tamp down her temper and keep at it. Like a general leading her troops.
She watched Will engage with the group of men and women who would be taking the Solace Falls hike today. It was quite the conglomeration of people. Two older married couples who were taking their first summer of retirement very seriously and touring all of Colorado. Three younger women who laughed too hard at Will’s paltry jokes. Two bearded guys Tori was pretty sure were high.