by K. M. Scott
“He’s had a hard time. He didn’t have the mother you have.”
“It seems like he’s got that too these days,” Stefan said quietly. “The guy’s got everyone thinking he’s something special.”
I had no idea why Stefan resented Kane so much, but I had a feeling it had to do with Shay now. For me, it hurt too much to think of how she’d been able to help him see something I hadn’t been able to, so I quietly excused myself and walked up to my room. The nurses had said I’d tire quickly, but it wasn’t that. I just didn’t want to think about Kane or Shay or whatever may have happened between them now.
*
Every day, Stefan drove me to the hospital to see Annalea, waiting for me outside the NICU like a guard in charge of my safety. Kane arrived every day just before I left her side, and each day he tried to talk to me. I ignored him for the first week, although it may have been the hardest thing I’d ever done in my life because there was so much I wanted to talk to him about. I wanted to ask about his visits with our daughter. I wanted to ask how he was feeling now. I wanted him to take me in his arms and hold me as he said the words I needed to hear about Annalea going to be okay someday soon.
But I didn’t do any of those because a tiny part of me still hurt from all those months he’d left me alone.
Every day, he followed me out into the hallway and asked the same question as he stared down at me with those beautiful dark blue eyes so full of hope.
“Can I give you a ride home?”
And every day I just shook my head and walked away. He didn’t know how much I wanted to say yes and sit in the passenger seat of his Mustang like that first night when he took me out of that awful club. He couldn’t know how much I missed him.
But he asked again the next day and the next and the next until finally one day in mid-November, even though I still wouldn’t go with him, I said, “No, but thank you,” and walked away to join Stefan. I didn’t know how long Kane stayed at the hospital each day or what he did with the rest of his time until I saw him the next day, but I saw in his eyes when I finally spoke to him that he missed me too.
We were a long way from being together again, but that first step had been taken.
Stefan parked the car and turned to look at me. “You okay?”
“Yeah. Annalea looked great today. She’s gaining and getting more beautiful every day. Want to see the picture I took of her today? She made a funny face I wanted to show your mother.”
“Sure,” he said in a chipper voice as I dug my phone out of my bag. “I just noticed you finally spoke to him this morning.”
I scrolled through the dozens of pictures I’d taken of the baby and got to the most recent one. Turning the phone toward Stefan, I pointed at how Annalea had scrunched up her face when I spoke to her about how much fun we’d have going to the beach when she got bigger. “Maybe she’s not a beach girl,” I joked as I held the picture for him to see.
“Nice. Tell her to keep that face handy for when the boys come around,” he said with a chuckle but then fell silent as he waited for me to answer about finally talking to Kane.
I didn’t know what to say. All I knew was that as I looked up into his eyes that morning I wanted to speak to him. I was still far from ready to go back, but I was ready to talk.
At least a few words.
“I thought it would be polite to at least say no this time.”
Stefan looked at me for a long moment and then smiled. “I guess that’s a way of looking at it. Yeah. So are you two going to be rushing back into the whole couple thing now?”
I put my phone back in my purse and laughed at his attempt to lighten my mood. “No, but I will have to decide what I want to do about him someday soon. Just like you have to decide what to do about Shay soon, Stefan. You’ve been here for almost a month. I don’t know what she did, but maybe it’s time to forgive her?”
Shaking his head, he opened his car door and got out without answering my question. By the time I caught up with him inside, he’d shed the look of pain that had crossed his face when I suggested forgiving her and was back to being his usual fun self.
But like me, he couldn’t continue on like this.
*
Alexandria joined us for Thanksgiving dinner and as the three of us held hands to give thanks, she said, “Lord, we want to give thanks for those in our family who have gone before and those who can’t be here with us today. Give them peace and we hope they know they’re loved, whether they’re here with us or far away.”
“Pass the gravy, mom. I’m starving here,” Stefan joked as he handed me the platter of turkey.
“I was trying to have a moment, my dear son. I like to remember your father on Thanksgiving since it was his favorite holiday.”
Stefan chuckled. “Mom, he owned restaurants. He loved Thanksgiving because it was a huge moneymaking day.”
Refusing to admit that might be the reason Cassian March III loved the holiday, she shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. I like to remember him on this day. You know that.”
“I do, and I’m sorry for being impatient.” Serious for just a moment, Stefan quickly turned on his natural charm. “This is a great meal you guys made, although I have a feeling the pecan pie for dessert might be the best part of it,” he said with a twinkle in his eye.
“That’s because you made it,” I said, poking him in the arm.
Alexandria poked him in the other arm and teased, “Leave it to you to think the dessert is the best part of the meal. You always were that kind of boy.”
“No fair attacking the dessert chef, ladies! I’ll take my delicious pecan pie and be on my way.”
“No way,” I said, dying for a piece of that pie already. “It looks great, so you’re not going anywhere.”
We ate dinner and talked about Annalea and how fast she was growing, along with Cash and Olivia and their trying to have a baby without any luck yet. Conspicuously absent from our conversation were the names Kane and Shay, though. I knew Kane was at his rooms at the club because when he’d wished me Happy Thanksgiving that morning as I left Annalea he told me he’d be home all day if I wanted to talk. But Stefan hadn’t mentioned Shay’s name since I’d said it in the car that day, and Alexandria had secretly told me she thought it had been a while since they’d even spoken.
The pecan pie turned out to be even more delicious than Stefan had bragged, and by the time we were all finished with our Thanksgiving meal, I wondered if I could ever eat again I was so stuffed. It had been a long time since I’d enjoyed a holiday like this, and even though Alexandria and Stefan weren’t really my family, they felt like they were.
When she left to go home, she kissed me goodnight like she always did and whispered in my ear, “See if you can get him to talk about her. He needs to move on, and he can’t do that if he doesn’t talk.”
“Okay. I’ll try.”
I walked out onto the back porch where he sat watching someone across the way shoot off fireworks and sat down next to him, unsure of how I should approach what she wanted me to say. The red, white, and blue colors exploded in the night air above us, and for a long time I just watched them with him. I was probably the last person who should have been talking to him about Shay. Even saying her name still stung, like a twinge in my chest, but Alexandria was right. He needed to begin to move on, with or without her.
As the last of the fireworks faded out across the sky, I said quietly, “So do you think you’ll be staying here through the holidays?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. I like it here.”
“It’s been nice having you here, Stefan. I just wonder if there’s somewhere else you should be.”
The corners of his mouth hitched up slightly and he turned to look at me. “Are you trying to get rid of me, Abbi?”
“No. I just wondered.”
He closed his eyes and leaned back in the chair, and I sensed our conversation had ended and I hadn’t achieved what Alexandria had asked me to. Resigned to having to
tell her I hadn’t done what she wanted, I let myself enjoy sitting there with him. We weren’t lovers and we weren’t technically family, but he’d been there for me all this time since Annalea’s birth and I wished I could be there for him too.
“I don’t think they ever did anything, you know? I just don’t. But it still hurts that she didn’t come to me and went to him when she needed to talk.”
Stefan’s words full of pain echoed around me. So that’s what had happened.
“Why does it bother you so much that she wanted to talk to him? They’re just friends.”
“Because he never thought I was good enough for her, and for her to go to him about our problems just hurts.”
I looked at him as he sat there frowning and understood. It did hurt that no matter how much you said to someone you loved, they didn’t hear you until someone else said the same thing. “That’s why I told Kane I didn’t want to see him ever again. That morning he came to the hospital and all I wanted to hear was that he finally saw how much he loved me. But then he said it had been Shay who finally set him straight, and it hurt so much to think that for months I’d been pleading with him to see me and all it took was her saying something to him.”
Stefan nodded. “I know. I hated the two of them that day I walked in and saw them standing there in his apartment like everything was perfectly okay. Like you weren’t waiting all those months for him to talk to you and I hadn’t been trying for what seemed like forever to get her to open up about what was wrong. I hated them.”
Taking his hand, I held it and said what I knew the two of us needed to hear. “Whatever happens, we need to forgive them. I don’t know if that means you and Shay will get back together, but you have to forgive her, Stefan.”
He took a deep breath and shuddered. “Can you forgive him?”
“I already have. Today when your mother said grace I couldn’t stop thinking about him alone in those rooms over at Club X and how much I wished he was there at the table with us. So yes, I’ve forgiven him.”
“So that’s it? All is forgiven? I guess you won’t need your driver anymore then.”
I knew what he was asking, but I didn’t know if all was forgiven. I just knew I didn’t want to live without Kane anymore.
“When Annalea gets older, I’m going to tell her about her Uncle Stefan and how every day he drove her mommy to the hospital to see her in those weeks right after she was born. And when she asks why he did that, I’ll tell her the truth. Because I needed him to and that’s the kind of guy her uncle is.”
He gave me one of his typical broad Stefan smiles and nodded. “I guess that’s my cue to leave then. You tell that brother of mine to keep his shit straight or the next time I’m going to do what I should have done all these months and kick his ass for you. Okay?”
I looked into his warm brown eyes and saw behind his bravado lay uncertainty about his leaving. “Okay. I hope everything turns out the way you want it to with Shay, Stefan. You deserve to be happy. Beneath all that frat boy is a great guy, and if she’s not able to see that, then I hope you can.”
Stefan took me in his arms and hugged me tight. “I hope so too, Abbi. I do.”
Chapter Sixteen
Stefan
Riding over the streets of Tampa, I knew where I had to go, even if I wasn’t sure I’d stayed away long enough. I could possibly get a hotel room for the night and head back to my condo in the morning, but maybe Abbi was right.
Maybe it was time I faced Shay.
I stepped off the elevator onto my floor and all the old feelings rushed back. Stopping in front of my door, I took a deep breath and tried to keep it together. I hadn’t expected to feel much of anything since I’d worked hard not to for weeks, but merely knowing she might be just inside the apartment set everything in motion.
The door opened, and suddenly she was standing there staring at me as I stared back at her. It felt like we were strangers and long lost friends all at the same time. I walked in and set my duffel bag down on the floor, unsure what to say or if I should say anything at all.
“I didn’t realize you were coming back tonight,” Shay said softly, her green eyes focused on me as I sat down on the couch.
“Yeah, I didn’t think you’d be here. You know, since it’s Thanksgiving.”
She shifted her weight from one foot to the other and looked down at the floor. “I went to my parents’ house for dinner, but I just got back. I can go if you’d prefer. You know because you just got home and I’m sure you want to relax. I can just go.”
This was going to be much harder than I thought. I needed a drink. Standing, I made a beeline to the whisky still left from when I’d last been there and poured myself a glass on the rocks. Downing a gulp of it for courage, I turned around and saw her waiting for me to say something.
“You don’t have to,” I mumbled. “It’s late.”
I didn’t mean to discount my offer to let her stay that way. Fuck. Old wounds still stung and my defensiveness hadn’t vanished. Maybe this was a mistake. If I was the same person I’d been when I left weeks ago, what was to say she wasn’t too?
Heading to the bedroom before I said something that would ruin any chance we had to even try to talk, I sat down on the edge of the bed and tried to clear my head of leftover anger and resentment that seemed to find its way back as soon as I walked through the front door. I didn’t want this to just be a repeat of every other fight we’d ever had.
Shay tentatively stood in the doorway and said, “I’m thinking I should go, Stefan. It was good to see you again. Happy Thanksgiving.”
The sadness in her voice bit at my heart, and as she turned to walk away, I said, “Don’t go. You don’t have to go, Shay.”
“Really?”
Nodding, I smiled. “No, you can stay. We can talk.”
She walked over to the bed and sat down next to me, self-consciously folding her hands in her lap. “I’d like that a lot.”
We sat there silent and then both of us began to speak at the same time. Uneasy and unsure, we were in uncharted waters, but it didn’t feel like they were dangerous waters. Chuckling, I said, “You go first.”
She sighed and then cleared her throat nervously before she said in a voice barely above a whisper, “I missed you. It felt so strange being here every night in your place without you.”
“I did a lot of thinking out at the Anna Maria Island house, Shay. It seemed like I needed it.”
I heard her sharp intake of breath and then she said, “Oh. Was your mother there?”
“I wanted to be alone to think and that couldn’t include being around my mother.”
“Oh, I see,” Shay said quietly.
The question she wanted to ask silently hung in the air, so I just answered it. Better to get it out of the way. “Abbi came back after the hospital and stayed there too.”
Shay looked away and nodded. “I know. Kane came by here that night and told me what happened between them. I never meant for any of that to happen, Stefan. I didn’t mean to hurt you, and I didn’t mean to cause any problems between them. I swear when I told him what I thought I was only trying to help them get back together.”
“I guess I know that.”
“Are they back together now?”
“No, but they’re on their way. She’s forgiven him, so now all he has to do is not fuck it up. I hope he doesn’t. She’s too nice, too kind to deserve that.”
We sat there silently staring forward for a long time, but silence wasn’t going to solve our issues. We needed to talk for real.
I turned toward her and for the first time ever in my life, I told someone the complete truth about how I felt about my brother. Taking her hands in mine, I brought them to my lips and kissed them, loving the feel of her skin after the long weeks apart. “I hated that you went to him. For so long, he’s been there like some fucking shadow that I couldn’t shake, and then you turned to him and everything I’d ever hated about Kane rose up to the surface.”
“I thought so too. When he was happy with Abbi and you and I were happy, I didn’t resent him, but then he began walking around like he was some kind of fucking victim and everyone needed to feel sorry for him and all those feelings of jealousy came back and I hated him. I hated him, Shay, and I couldn’t bear the idea that the woman I loved so much had gone to him instead of me.”
She slid her hands over my cheeks and cradled my face. “Why do you hate him so much? Is it because he didn’t think we’d ever stay together? I thought that was just brotherly ribbing like you guys always do.”
I shook my head, relieved to finally confess the truth. “It’s never been friendly for me. Maybe for him, but not me. I spent my entire life being second place to Cash, hoping someday when I got old enough that my father would see me as something other than a spare. And what did he do? He fucking died before I had the chance to show him I was just as good as his namesake. And then even in death he showed me how unimportant I always was to him by including Kane in his will.”
“Oh, baby, I had no idea. I didn’t know about any of this.”
“I remember the day I sat in that lawyer’s office and he walked in. He belonged there as much as I did, according to my father, yet I was his son like Cash and I’d never belonged. I looked at Kane and all I saw was my father. He’s the spitting image of him, even more than Cash, and I couldn’t help but see once again that I was the spare. The one who was unneeded.”
A tear ran down Shay’s cheek, and she hugged me to her. “I’m so sorry, Stefan. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have made the mistake. Kane never said anything, and you didn’t, so…”