“Fuck,” I muttered.
“My sentiments exactly.”
Damn, why couldn’t the party be the next day? It was going to be a long ass week.
Chapter 24
Anthony
It was a long ass fucking week. I’d been a bundle of nerves waiting to take Marcus home to meet my mother, and even though I’d hoped it’d go well, it was hard telling when it came to that woman. But it had gone over better than I expected. Jackson and Marcus had both won her over, and I could tell she loved them just as much as I… well, as much as I liked them.
Marcus seemed to understand the gravity of meeting my mom, and I could tell that he felt bad that he couldn’t reciprocate. But as he explained to me one night when I was over for dinner, his parents were barely around, and Rebecca’s cut off all forms of communication once the divorce was final. In fact, her entire family did. So needless to say, Marcus was literally all the family Jackson had. And that information was added to my Bitchy Rebecca Bank of reasons why I hated her. So it thrilled my heart to know that my mom was able to be some sort of substitute… something to Jackson, whether it was grandma or whatever he preferred.
But finally it was the night of Marcus’s work party. Since he had to get Jackson settled over at Quincy’s and help oversee the setup of the party, it was decided that I’d just meet him there when it was time. So I took the time to shower, trim up my beard, and dress in my freshly pressed black pinstriped suit. It was the only one I had, and I usually saved it for weddings, but for some reason putting it on tonight night felt different. I felt different in it. And I knew it was because I was anxious to see Marcus’s reaction when I walked in. So after putting on my dress shoes, and spraying myself with the cologne that Marcus had confessed was his favorite, I was ready to go.
I was also anxious for what was to come after the party. It had been a while since I was able to get Marcus alone again so we could further explore each other’s bodies. That one time just wasn’t enough for me, even though I knew Marcus believed otherwise. The truth was, and I had made sure to let Marcus know since he had insecurities, I had never dated someone with a kid before. And the thought of having sex with his dad, while he was asleep down the hall, really freaking unnerved me. What if he woke up in the middle of the night to pee and heard us? I couldn’t handle that. And I knew the longer we dated, I’d eventually have to get over it. But for the time being, I just couldn’t. And thankfully, Marcus understood that once I laid it all out for him. Actually, he laughed at me first, but then he understood. But tonight, after the party knowing that Jackson was over at a friend’s house? All bets were off and Marcus’s ass was mine. Or maybe mine would be his? The possibilities were endless.
The party was held in the banquet room of The Roux. It was the new upscale restaurant in the heart of downtown Middlebury. The place had only been opened for a year, but had nothing but rave reviews. The wait list was for months out but, because Marcus had personally overseen the owner’s ad campaign, he got the room easily. The owners, a husband and wife, went to culinary school abroad in France, and came back to open the restaurant. Their menu consisted of mostly French cuisine, but they also threw in some American favorites along with a kid-friendly menu. Needless to say, I was ecstatic to try it.
I pulled up to the front of the restaurant and handed my keys off to the valet in the swanky black jacket. Soft music drifted outside from some hidden speaker, and when I pulled open the heavy glass door, I was awestruck with what I saw inside. Fancy crystal chandeliers were hung l with beautiful precision across the ceiling. The walls were painted white with beautiful gold, ornate murals and the booths and chairs were covered with fine black leather. And the tables were made from painted black wood. The china was stark white with polished silver utensils placed delicately beside it, on white linen napkins, of course, and crystal wine goblets and water glasses finished it off. I think I even saw a plate for the dinner rolls. In the center of the tables were beautiful orchids, and the light reflected from the chandeliers to create the perfect ambiance. The place was gorgeous and obviously very expensive. I just hoped they served food I could pronounce. I’d probably have to order off the kids menu.
When I walked in, a hostess wearing a black vest with a white collared shirt took my name. When I told her I was there for the party, she smiled and ushered me back to the room. Pulling the heavy oak door open, I was greeted instantly by Sheila. She beamed at me and pulled me in for a tight hug before placing a glass of champagne in my hand.
“I am so glad you showed up!” she yelled in my ear to be heard over the din of people. Frazier Advertising might have been a small firm, but the people who worked there were loud and knew how to party—as well as their guests.
“Me too!” I told her. “Where is Marcus?”
She smiled and pointed to my man who was standing in the middle of a group of people. Almost as if sensing my presence, his eyes looked in my direction and locked on mine. Fuck, he was gorgeous, and he was all mine. He was wearing a dark navy suit with a stark white shirt and crimson colored tie. It was actually a suit I’d never seen him in before, and he looked pretty fucking delicious. I wondered if he was on the menu for the night. I watched as he excused himself and then stalked over in my direction.
“Oh, he looks hungry.” Sheila wolf whistled before she walked away. But she was right. He looked as ravenous as I felt, and I didn’t mind one bit. I’d gladly offer myself to him on a platter.
“You made it,” he said as he stopped in front of me.
“I did,” I replied awkwardly. “You look great.” I didn’t know what to do. Was I allowed to touch him or kiss him? Sure everyone at the office had seen us kiss, and those who hadn’t were probably told about it.
“So do you,” he said before he leaned over and kissed me. Well, he just answered those questions for me. “And you smell good too.”
“It’s your favorite,” I reminded him with a smirk.
“I’m aware,” he groaned before he grabbed my hand. “Come on let me properly introduce you to some people.”
The party was great. His coworkers were amazing and weren’t the least bit surprised when Marcus introduced me to them as his boyfriend. Instead, a few made jokes asking how I could put up with him, while others thanked me for finally getting him out of his foul mood. Though, one woman from accounting named Jenna had the nerve to proposition me in front of Marcus. That didn’t go over to well with the boss, and I watched Sheila smile in glee over the entire exchange. Later Sheila informed me that she hated Jenna since day one, and had high hopes that she would get fired someday. And after the way Marcus demanded that Jenna meet with him in his office on Monday, well, I was sure that time could be coming soon.
“Hey, babe, want to accompany me to the bar so we can get some more drinks in here?” Marcus asked me after we’d been there for about an hour. The dinner was going to be served shortly, and then it would be time to hand out the staff gifts.
“Sure,” I said and excused myself from one of Marcus’s employees. He was one of the top advertising executives, and his son was actually an old student of mine from two years prior. As soon as Marcus told the man, Paul, and his wife my name, both sets of eyes lit up in recognition, and they just had to talk to me. Apparently I had made quite an impact on their son, Zain, and they wanted to personally thank me. Well, that made me want to puff out my chest and walk with my head just a bit higher.
“I can see your head getting bigger by the second,” Marcus quipped as we walked out of the banquet room.
“Shut up, you weren’t complaining about my big head the other night,” I reminded him in a husky whisper.
I could feel Marcus shudder against me as he placed his hand on the small of my back.
“And I can’t wait to feel it again.”
We walked up closer to the bar, and Marcus spoke to the bartender. He kept his hand on my back, and I leaned closer to his side.
“Perhaps, maybe this time around, I can feel
yours instead,” I whispered in his ear.
Marcus whipped his head over to look at me and opened his mouth to reply. But the reply never came. Nope, instead we heard a voice that sounded like nails on a chalkboard, and something from my worst nightmares.
“Marcus? Is that you?” the annoying female voice asked. Fuck, it grated my nerves.
Marcus physically tensed up beside me, and the hand on my back tightened. I knew I’d have bruises from his fingertips—and not in a good way.
Marcus’s eyes hardened, and the pure rage in them would have terrified me had it been directed at me. But it wasn’t. Instead it was directed at the bitch of a woman who decided to walk closer to us. A woman with dark hair like Jackson’s and green eyes.
“Rebecca,” Marcus said sharply. “What the hell do you want? And better yet, why in the hell are you even here?”
Chapter 25
Marcus
I couldn’t have been that drunk, could I? That’s the only reasonable explanation I could come up with. Or maybe I was in a disturbing nightmare. Because nightmares were the only place that voice belonged. There was no logical answer. Why else would my fucking ex-wife be standing right there in front of me?
“Marcus. I-it’s good to see you,” Rebecca had the nerve to say to me.
“I don’t even wish to say the same,” I replied curtly. “Why are you here?”
“I’m having dinner with my brother and sister-in-law,” she said hesitantly and gestured toward a table where her dinner party didn’t even hide that they were watching us.
“I don’t give a shit about that. I mean why are you here in Middlebury? I thought you moved to Albuquerque with William,” I reminded her bitterly.
She reached up and rubbed her throat as she swallowed. “We didn’t work out.”
“Imagine that,” I hissed at her. “Do you want me to tell you how sorry I am that it didn’t work out with the man you left your husband and child for?”
Rebecca’s eyes flicked toward Anthony and then back to me. They were filled with hope, and almost like she was begging me to forgive her. Yeah, so not happening.
“I’m just going to go back to the party so you two can talk in private,” Anthony told us and started to pull away from me. Where did he think he was going?
I tightened my hold on his waist so he couldn’t move. “Stay,” I pleaded with him. Then I leaned closer to whisper in his ear, “I can’t face her alone. I need you here with me.”
Anthony nodded and stepped even closer to me. He wrapped his arm around my waist, and Rebecca regarded us with surprise. “Marcus, who’s this?”
I rolled my eyes at the use of my first name. She spoke it with such familiarity, like she had a right to know about a damn thing in my life, when she didn’t. She lost that right the minute she left Jackson and me. But when I opened my mouth to tell her that, Anthony cut me off.
“I’m Anthony. I’m Marcus’s partner.” Anthony said it so smugly I couldn’t help but smile at him, regardless of the shitty situation. “And you are?” he added as if he didn’t already know who she was.
“I’m Rebecca. I’m Marcus’s ex-wife,” she introduced herself after a moment’s hesitation. “Marcus, can we talk, please?”
“I don’t know what we have to talk about, and now really isn’t the time. I’m here for my company’s holiday party,” I replied coldly.
“It’ll be just a few moments,” she pleaded and reached out to touch my arm.
I hissed and abruptly pulled away. She had no right to touch me. And from the way Anthony’s fingers dug into my waist, I knew he felt exactly the same way. “Don’t touch me,” I growled at her.
“I’m sorry. It was a reflex reaction,” she explained and clenched her fingers into a fist at her side.
“I would say it was nice meeting you, but that’d be a lie,” Anthony said. “But we really need to get back to our guests.”
I shook my head at Rebecca in disgust and started to turn around. But what Rebecca said next stopped me in my tracks. “How is he?”
“Excuse me?” I asked her.
“How is he? I need to know he’s okay,” she said.
“You mean Jackson? Your son. For Christ’s sake, you can’t even say his damn name!” It was the calming touch of Anthony’s hand on my back that kept me from lashing out at her.
“Don’t do this here,” Anthony murmured to me.
I nodded and glared at Rebecca, who had the gall to continue to stand in front of me. “Come with me.”
I dropped my hand from around Anthony and latched on to his hand. I pulled him down a hall I was familiar with and knew that Rebecca was following. Thankfully, since I personally saw to the account of The Roux, I was familiar with the entire layout. Down the hall was a smaller banquet room that was in the middle of a renovation so it wasn’t open to the public. And it was unlocked.
I opened the door and flicked on the light. Once we were shut inside, I turned toward Rebecca and shot her a filthy look. “I’m not playing any fucking games with you, Rebecca. I played them enough for over a decade. So, just quit dicking around and tell me what you fucking want.”
“I just told you. I want to know how,” she stopped talking and took a deep breath. “I want to know how Jackson is doing. I think about him often and I realize now, after seeing you, that I made a huge mistake.”
“Oh yeah? And what mistake might that be? Abandoning your son or fucking up your family?” I threw the words harshly at her since we were no longer in the middle of the restaurant.
“All of it,” she rasped out.
I felt Anthony tense up beside me, and his hand clamped down hard around mine. “I, uh, I should probably let you two hash this out,” he stammered before he let my hand go.
“Anthony, don’t go,” I begged him as he walked away from me.
Anthony turned and faced me with a sad smile that didn’t quite meet his eyes. I could see a certain emotion cross his face before he fixed his expression to show only coolness. What the hell was he thinking? Just from his tense posture and rigid shoulders, I knew it wasn’t anything good.
“Go ahead and talk to,” he glared at Rebecca, “her. I’ll let your guests know that you got held up and will be back shortly,” he said and exited the room. What just happened?
“Fucking perfect,” I snapped at her. “Not only did you fuck up our marriage, but you probably just fucked up the best relationship I’ve ever had.”
Rebecca flinched as if I had slapped her. “Since when are you gay?”
I grit my teeth. “That’s none of your fucking business. What do you want?”
“I want to see my son,” she finally said, and I was furious at her choice of words.
It took me a minute to gather myself so I could speak in a somewhat civilized manner. I’d learned the hard way that yelling didn’t work when trying to speak to the unreasonable woman standing in front of me.
“How dare you?” I finally said to her. “You abandoned Jackson. You left me. For another man. For three years you have been completely absent from his life. And now you just show up and demand to see him? I don’t fucking think so. You lost that right to even call him your son the minute you signed him over to me for full custody. In three years you’ve missed out on so many fucking milestones that kid has reached, it’s unbelievable.”
As if on cue, the fucking waterworks started and tears started to stream down her face. Someone give the bitch an Oscar. “Does he even ask about me? I think about him often.”
I scoffed at her. “Often?” I repeated. “You think about him often? What fucking kind of mother are you? You should have thought about him every minute of every day. And no, he doesn’t ask about you. He asks about Anthony. Fuck, Anthony has been more of a parent to him in six weeks than you were in nine years.” I wasn’t thinking when those words flew out of my mouth, but the minute I said them, I realized how true they were. In six weeks, Anthony and Jackson had forged a bond. They had nicknames for each other. They went
camping, and out to eat, and the zoo, and played video games. Things Rebecca never did with Jackson.
“That’s irrelevant. I’m his mother and I have a right to see him!” she yelled at me.
“Giving birth to him doesn’t make you his mom!” I shouted back at her. “Why did you even bother coming back?” I asked her. Fuck manners.
Rebecca shrugged and crossed her arms defensively over her chest. “When William and I ended, I knew I needed to come home.”
I rolled my eyes at that statement. “The home you had got sold to a nice retired couple. Go back to Albuquerque. You have no business being here. This is where Jackson and I live, and we don’t need you to make things uncomfortable for us.”
“Why are you being so harsh to me? I meant home, as in here in Middlebury.”
“Did you seriously just ask me that? I was having a lovely time with my boyfriend, celebrating at my annual holiday party with my business. And you had to fucking ruin it by being here. Why did you even talk to me? Did you honestly think I’d be open to speaking to you?”
Rebecca shrugged. “I didn’t think you’d react this rude.” I laughed humorlessly at her statement. “Are you going to let me see my son, or not?”
I inhaled sharply at her question. “Not at the moment. I will ask my son if he wants to see you. He’s twelve, so I believe the choice is up to him.” She opened her mouth, as if to argue with me, and I held up my hand to stop her. “The choice is his. But I will tell you this much, should he decide to see you, do not string that child along. And do not fuck with his emotions. Jackson has been through enough without you adding any more to it than you already have. I have to get back to my guests.”
With that I brushed past her and walked out of the room. I caught up with Anthony who was waiting for me at the bar. His expression was closed off as he quickly downed what looked like a shot of tequila.
“That fucking sucked,” I said as I sidled up beside him. I was still shaking with rage and I took a deep breath to try and calm down.
Teaching Tenderness Page 13