by Kadie Scott
Ashley crossed her arms trying to hold in a panic. She was losing him before she ever really had him. “Those friends should have been happy for me and waited until the initial thrill faded.”
“Even when you promised to help one of those friends study so he wouldn’t fail, then flaked to go to Austin for a concert.”
Ashley frowned, completely lost by the turn in the conversation. “What are you talking about?”
“Algebra II. You were supposed to help me, but you never showed. I failed the test, failed the class, and had to retake it that summer.”
A vague recollection from long ago surfaced and her frown deepened. “I remember that.”
“Yeah?” Skepticism sizzled in the word.
Wow. How long had he been hanging on to this?
“Yes. Only I didn’t flake. I asked Eric to tell you in biology—I think that’s the class you shared—” She honestly couldn’t remember, “—that we needed to reschedule for either earlier or the next day. You never called, so I figured you had it covered.”
He stared at her for a long moment, hands clenching and unclenching at his sides. “I guess I got that wrong.”
She adjusted the sheet, vulnerable as all get out, sitting there naked as they argued. “I guess you did.”
Only he was still doing his immovable mountain impersonation. “I’m sorry you had to repeat the class.” God, just one more black mark against her. “I wish I could go back and fix it.” Go back and fix a lot of things. “But I can’t.”
Jennings just grunted, still going down a road she had no wish to revisit. “What about when I said you were staying together with Eric more out of comfort than true passion, you said…”
She seemed to remember her exact words were, “You’re not part of my life, so mind your own business.”
“And when you were still waiting for him to propose, and I told you that was wrong…”
She’d not-so-politely asked him to stop talking to her at all.
Apparently having made his point, Jennings nodded. “Maybe you don’t even realize you still love him. But I saw it, Ashley.”
“I wasn’t thinking about Eric. I was thinking about you, dammit.”
He just shook his head. “You can’t even admit it to yourself.”
Having this conversation was like talking to a freaking brick wall. “Agree to disagree before I hit you.”
“Fine.”
She fumed in silence for a long minute, trying to think of some way, any way, to convince him. However, the truth was, she still wasn’t sure she trusted her heart. Jennings’s reminders only confirmed she shouldn’t. Eight years with Eric was a long time to be wrong about someone. She wanted to be sure of her feelings this time.
She’d been selfish and single-minded enough for a lifetime, it appeared. Maybe she should give him time. Give herself time. Hurting Jennings again would kill her.
Based on this conversation, he wouldn’t believe her no matter what she said.
Jennings stood up and pulled a pair of well-worn jeans out of a drawer. Back to her, he pulled them on. “Don’t you see you’re setting yourself up?”
Ashley lifted her head to look at him. “No. I don’t. What’s that supposed to even mean?”
“You’re still in love with Eric. Spending time…alone together… It’s just a stupid thing to do. Tempting fate. But, like every decision you’ve had about the guy, you can’t see that.”
“I’m not in love with him,” she gritted. Was she going to have to hire a plane to write those words in the sky before Jennings believed her?
Below the anger, a bone deep hurt landed in the center of her chest. “I gave Eric and Taylor my blessing. I would never…never…do anything to hurt my sister. This is something for her. And the fact that you even think I could destroy her that way…”
Ashley wrapped her arms around her middle, shaking her head. “You may see me as a selfish bitch, but I wouldn’t do that. Even if I still had feelings for him, which I don’t.” Her hair fell forward, providing a curtain as she struggled with her emotions.
“Don’t go.” The words were an unmistakable demand couched in low words she barely caught.
She lifted her chin to stare at him. She wanted to give in, to do this for Jennings. But what happened to standing on her own two feet and trusting her gut? Worse, if they were going to have any chance together, Jennings needed to learn to trust her too. A big ask, given their past, but she saw no other way. “He’s about to be my brother, Jennings. Eric will always be part of my life. And helping him is about Taylor, not about me.”
Jennings’s jaw went rock hard. “Then I guess we have nothing else to say.”
Pain and panic sliced through her. Could a heart bleed to death without physical trauma? But what else could she say? “I guess we don’t.”
He gave an abrupt nod. “Fine.”
They stared at each other for a long, stress-filled moment.
“I’d better get you home now,” he muttered. “Get dressed. I’ll wait in the foyer.”
He snapped up his shirt as he left the room, closing the door with a soft click that echoed as loudly to her as though he’d slammed it shut.
Ashley pulled on her clothes while battling the sting of tears in her eyes, pressure wanting her to give in and have a good cry. She’d lost him. But had she ever had him?
Out in the foyer, she opened her mouth to say something, even beg, desperate to save this situation, but a glance at his hard expression told her there was no way he’d listen, not while Eric loomed between them.
Chapter Fourteen
“Eric…” Ashley paused and stared at the ribbon of road—gray in the early morning light and riddled with lines of dark tar where the county had tried to repair the cracks. The drive over to the house wouldn’t take too long, as the property Eric had bought adjoined her family’s land. The plan today was for Ashley to suggest any small tweaks or move pieces of furniture around if she thought they’d look better other places.
Ashley sat in her seat like a lump, living in a world of grays, her thoughts swirling around one man. She’d never experienced hurt like this before. Not even when she’d seen Taylor and Eric dancing and realized what that meant, watching her plans flush down the invisible drain. This time she hadn’t had plans, and losing Jennings still hurt a lot worse.
She’d spent the night in her room not sleeping and trying to convince herself she was in the right about helping Eric, and Jennings should be the one to back down. Only this didn’t feel right. This felt all kinds of wrong.
But now, here she was with Eric, still not entirely having made up her mind. Still, she’d been dying to ask him about the message he was supposed to pass on to Jennings way back when. Jennings had clearly been holding that grudge close to the vest for the last ten years.
“What?” Eric’s questioning finally intruded on her thoughts.
“Huh?”
Eric flashed her an amused grin. “You said my name, then went silent.”
“Sorry.” She shook her head. “Nothing.”
“Okay.”
She allowed a silence to fall between them again. Comfortable, as an old friend should be. Like old shoes or a favorite sweatshirt.
“Only—” She started, then stopped again.
Eric released a heavy sigh. “Just get it over with, Ash. You’ll feel better.”
Doubtful, given where things stood with Jennings, but why the heck not? “Do you remember going to Austin to see Tim McGraw when we first started dating?”
Eric didn’t even have to think. “Yeah. Your dad drove with us because I’d only just turned sixteen and he didn’t trust me.”
Ashley cracked up, then slapped a hand over her mouth, a snigger still tumbling out of her unbidden. “I’d forgotten that part.”
“I didn’t.” Eric looked and sounded so offended she giggled again.
Although it was quite possible her hilarity had an edge of hysteria. As with everything else wrong in her li
fe at the moment, she blamed a certain blue-eyed cretin who thought he could demand she not do things.
Oh, my God. I’m arguing with myself in my head. I am losing it.
“What about it?” he asked when she sobered.
“I’m sure you don’t remember… I was supposed to tutor Jennings for a math test. I asked you to pass on a message during a class you shared, biology or something, to let him know we needed to reschedule because of the concert…”
She screwed up her face as she debated an inoffensive way to word her next question.
“I didn’t tell him.” Eric beat her to the punch.
Ashley whipped her gaze his way. “You didn’t?”
Eric glanced away from the road over to her, and she could see in the flat line of his lips and his sudden harsh grip on the steering wheel that he wasn’t happy about what he was fixing to tell her.
“You have to remember I was sixteen, with an almighty crush on you, and we’d only recently started dating,” he qualified.
“Okay.”
“You had Jennings up on this pedestal, and I just couldn’t compete. You two had this history, and all these inside jokes. And…”
“And you were jealous,” she guessed as realization began to dawn.
He let out a long breath. “Yeah. It was a jerk thing to do. But you never mentioned it again. Neither did he. I figured it was no big deal. After that, he became less of a thing in your life.”
And she’d let her best friend go with hardly a qualm, blaming it on Jennings all this time, when in actual fact, she was the one to blame. She and no one else. Because she’d let it happen.
“He failed the class and had to take summer school to repeat it.” This she said softly, no remonstration in her voice, just a deep sadness that all three of them had made mistakes.
“Well…” He scraped a hand through his hair. “Hell. I’m sorry, Ash. I’ll apologize to Jennings, too, next time I see him.”
She stared at her hands, clasped in her lap, and gave a slow nod. “It was a long time ago, and we were all young and…”
“Stupid.”
“I wasn’t going to say that.”
“You didn’t have to. I already know.”
She reached over and gave his arm a squeeze. “Now we’re older and way wiser.”
He flicked her a glance, and she hoped he didn’t notice her puffy crying-all-night-long eyes. She hoped she’d done a decent job muffling her sobs in her pillow, but maybe not. “Are we wiser?” he asked.
She snorted inelegantly. “Well…we will be from now on.”
He shot her a grin. “Good plan.”
Before she could say more, her cellphone buzzed. She fished it out of her purse, and her heart contracted, stopped completely, then kicked into an elevated rate at the name on the screen.
Jennings was calling her. Was he checking up on her?
“You planning to answer that or just stare at it?” Eric teased.
“Yeah.” She pushed the button. “Hello?”
“It’s Jennings.” His voice came across the line glacial, with no thaw in sight.
“Yes.”
“My lawyer has a few questions about the fraud case. He’d like to meet with you today, if at all possible, before we go to Austin tomorrow.”
Ashley hated how her stomach dropped to the soles of her feet with the realization that he’d only called for business. “Sure. I’ll be free any time after about…”
She glanced over at Eric who shrugged. “One?” he suggested.
She nodded. “One,” she told Jennings.
A long silence greeted her time.
“You’re with Eric?” His voice had gone even more distant, if that were possible. So cold that he competed with the blustery winter weather blowing tumbleweeds across the road.
Ashley closed her eyes. “Yes.”
“Even after I asked you not to?”
“You mean ordered me not to, don’t you?” She held onto to the spark of irritation at his attitude, because being irritated was a ton better than the devastation she was battling.
Another long silence. “I’ll see you at one at Mr. Reisen’s office. It’s downtown on the square.”
“Fine.”
She hung up the phone and dropped it back into her purse.
“Jennings?” Eric asked.
She turned her face to look out the window at the passing ranch land—brown pastures dotted with cedar trees and live oak, sometimes so many they took over the land, whooshed by in a blur. “Yeah. We need to meet with his lawyer about an accounting thing I helped him with earlier this week.”
“I see.”
He was quiet a moment. “He doesn’t want you here with me, is that it?”
Ashley scowled. “Nope.”
“I see.” He was quiet a moment. “And when, exactly, did you realize that the fake relationship you’ve been touting was real for you?”
As his question sank in, she slowly swung around to face him, eyes wide.
Eric cocked his head. “I’ve known you a long time.”
“Taylor’s known me longer,” she pointed out, still avoiding the original question.
“Yeah. So…when?” There was that dog and bone show again. Stubborn man.
Ashley grimaced. “I realized it while we were on our double date, although, if I’m honest, there were signs earlier.”
Eric raised his eyebrows. “I think I’ve known since we were sixteen.”
“What?” The word squeaked out of her. No way.
“The pedestal. Remember?”
Ashley thought back to that time, and Eric was right. She had put Jennings up on a pedestal. He’d been her own personal hero in her childhood mind—always strong and brave and true. Always able to make her laugh. Maybe that was why it hurt so badly when he’d toppled off.
When you knocked him off. She added a litany of not-nice names for herself.
“Yeah,” she finally muttered to Eric. “But what if I’m wrong…”
She trailed off, not wanting to offend the man next to her.
“Again, you mean?” he supplied. “Like you were with me?”
She shook her head. “I don’t mean it like that. I don’t regret the time we had together, Eric.”
He reached across the console and squeezed her hand. “Me neither. Believe me, I know exactly what you’re thinking. I feel the same way.”
Recognition of that fact struck home—Eric was the only one who could understand. Ashley suddenly felt lighter, as if sandbags had been lifted off her and she could breathe again. “Thanks.”
He gave her hand another squeeze before returning his to the wheel. “And he doesn’t want you with me.” Not a question, now. A statement.
“No. He doesn’t trust that I’m not falling back in love with you. Or that I ever fell out of it.” Ashley shifted in her seat.
When she’d come home, she’d expected a certain amount of scrutiny and uncomfortable moments, but apparently fate had a lot more in store for her. She’d definitely never thought of a moment like this one.
Eric sighed, then slowed, pulling off to the side of the road. Ashley thought for a moment that he was going to pull over to have a serious talk, but instead, he swung the truck around and sent them back the way they’d just come.
She sat forward, stopped by her seatbelt. “What are you doing?”
“Taking you home.”
“No. I promised to help. I’m not going back on that.”
“I’ll be fine,” Eric insisted.
Ashley sat back in her seat, crossing her arms. “If he doesn’t trust me not to make a move on my sister’s fiancé—when both of you are so obviously perfect for each other and I’ve just come from his bed—then he doesn’t trust me enough for a relationship.”
Even as she said the words, she wanted to take them back. They were true, but at the same time, maybe she needed to be the one to make the big gesture. Except, wasn’t that giving in just for the sake of giving in? Trying to ea
se the way for someone she loved at the expense of others?
“First, I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that bed comment. Second, I’m not going to be the reason you two have issues this time around.” Eric’s lips pinched in the way he always did when he’d made up his mind.
Finally, the sandbags lifted from her shoulders all the way, knowing this was the right thing to do. But would Jennings even believe her now? After basically catching her red-handed?
Eric continued, unaware of her own conclusions. “Given your history, I think you should give the guy some slack. Besides…”
He paused.
Ashley angled her head to look at him, finding an amused smile tugging at his lips. “Besides what?”
“I bet you haven’t told him you love him, have you?”
She bit her lip. “I sort of did,” she confessed. Though she hadn’t said the actual words. “He didn’t believe me.”
“So…do something bigger.”
“Bigger?”
He nodded. “After you left, Taylor didn’t want to talk about us, or acknowledge things between us in any way. She felt too guilty about you.” He gave a little shrug. “So did I, but I also knew you were right, and that she was worth trying for.”
“So, you did something bigger?”
“I did lots of things that added up to bigger. I stopped trying to talk her around and started showing her. I left love notes everywhere. I did things for her, anything I could think of to make her happy. I openly made love to her with my eyes in public, which you know I hate. Basically, anything and everything I could do to woo that woman, I did.”
Ashley’d never asked Taylor about details behind her romance with Eric. At the time, it had been too awkward on both sides, so they’d let it go. “Wow. I’m impressed.”
“Show him, without words, that you love him.”
“Make a total fool of myself, you mean? What if he doesn’t love me back?”
Eric barked a laugh. “I don’t think that’s a concern. The guy is smitten.”
Ashley had her doubts, but kept them to herself. Because Eric was right. She was tumbling head over heels and only Jennings could ground her now. She loved him. And he was worth any risk.