Addison Blakely: Confessions of A PK

by Betsy St. Amant

I knew all too well how it felt.

  I stood, tossed the envelope in the trash, and hurried up the stairs to stash the card in my desk drawer with other keepsakes. It seemed wrong to throw it away after he went to so much effort. I dropped the rose on my nightstand and realized the petals had reddened my fingers. Now it was obvious I’d received it. Man, I really hated to risk losing our friendship over something like this. Luke made me laugh. Made me relax. Made me believe not all boys were scum.

  But he did it in such a brotherly kind of way.

  I stared at the rose, which seemed to be staring back at me, and groaned. Maybe I could just play it off. Take Luke’s lead at school tomorrow and see if he talked about it. If he didn’t, I would be off the hook, and we could continue as usual—joking, insulting, being friends.

  If he did, well, then to make it up to him, I’d have to start a mission to find Luke a woman more wonderful than myself. One more open to a relationship.

  I rubbed my red-tinged fingers together in a vain effort to remove the stain. One whose heart didn’t bleed hope for another.

  Enough was enough. If I didn’t get a mocha soon, I’d self-destruct. I strode inside Got Beans with my head up, my shoulders back, and my coffee money rubbing a hole in my jeans pocket, begging to be free. I’d just get it to go—that way if Wes was there, I could slip out before he saw me. If he wasn’t there, well, I knew better than to sit around and wait. Besides, Dad was at church again, and I didn’t want to remember the last time I’d run into Wes on a Wednesday night. My stomach shivered thinking about it. Black and white … rules … would it even matter…

  Bert blinked twice at me as I walked up to the counter, like I was a mirage. “About time you came back. You get lost?” He laughed at his sorry excuse for a joke as he got to work on my mocha.

  “Have you ever considered getting another employee?” My eyes strained to look toward the piano, but I refused. Besides, I didn’t hear music other than the faint strains of Aerosmith floating over the speakers, so obviously Wes wasn’t playing. “If you didn’t work so much, you wouldn’t know to miss me.”

  Bert shrugged as he heaped my mocha with a generous dollop of sprinkles. “If I didn’t work here, then I’d be stuck at home with the little lady.”

  “I heard that,” his wife bellowed from the depths of the storage room. Bert grinned and handed me my hot mocha. Itsmelled so good I tipped him an extra dollar and made my way outside.

  The stars were just beginning to prick the night sky. I took a careful sip then tilted my head back to enjoy the view as I strolled down the deserted street. At least there was one good thing about living in a small town—I didn’t have to fear walking home alone nearly as much as most girls my age would. There was hardly anyone out this time of—

  I collided hard with someone, hot mocha sloshing out of the lid onto my wrist. “Ow!”

  “Watch where you’re going!” was the angry retort. Male retort. A strong hand gripped my arm. My heart racing frantically, I reared back to launch my only weapon at my attacker—good-bye sweet liquid caffeine—when I realized the hand on my sweatshirt sleeve was attached to Wes.

  “Wes?” I lowered my coffee, and he lowered the free hand he’d thrown up for protection from my attempted scalding.

  He let go. “Coffee shouldn’t be a weapon, PK.” He adjusted the collar of his leather jacket and cracked his neck to the side. I couldn’t help but appreciate how I’d obviously caught him off guard.

  But my elation was short lived at the throbbing of my wrist. I sucked in my breath as I studied the red mark. “Wow, that hurts.”

  Wes stepped closer and angled my palm toward the streetlight to get a better view. “You need some burn cream on that, or it’ll blister up. Come on, my house is closer than yours.” He took my elbow and began tugging me down the street.

  My mouth opened. Me, in Wes’s house? I pulled back. “I’m fine, really.”

  He stopped. “You want a scar?”

  “No.”

  “Then come on.” He started walking, not touching me this time, just expecting me to follow. I hesitated. Not a good idea, Addison. Not a good idea. But the pain in my wrist was inching toward unbearable. Besides, it might be interesting to see how people lived on the dark side.

  I took a sip of mocha for fortification then hurried after Wes. The brisk walk to his house only took a few minutes, but the fiery ache on my hand made the journey feel endless. Wes didn’t say much, just unlocked the front door to a split-level house a lot like mine, and let us inside. He didn’t holler a warning to his father, and I hoped Mr. Keegan wasn’t the type who enjoyed walking around naked.

  I kept my eyes partially closed just in case as Wes led me through a living room strewn with coffee cups, paper plates, an open pizza box with half a slice left inside, and several newspapers, down a carpeted hallway and into a bathroom that was surprisingly white and clean. The faint hint of air freshener hung in the air, but this scent was pleasant, unlike Claire’s last attempt with wildflowers in the drama room. I sniffed. Vanilla. It made me remember the mocha in my hand, and I set it beside the sink.

  Wes opened the medicine cabinet. “Sit.” He pointed to the closed toilet lid.

  “A little stingy with the words tonight, aren’t we?” I couldn’t help the sarcasm; it had built in my chest with every angry throb of the burn, every memory that stoked my senses on our rushed walk to his house. His hinting about a date, his showing up with his motorcycle, leaving me in the street after I chickened out.

  “What’s there to say?” He rattled through the jars and bottles lining the shelves.

  I plopped down on the seat. “An apology, maybe?”

  “For what? Taking care of your injury?” He plucked a tube from the array of medicines.

  “You know what I mean.”

  Wes exhaled, pausing momentarily in his search to cast an impatient glance at the ceiling. “You wanted off the bike. You got off the bike. End of story.”

  Chapter one, maybe. This was far from over, and Wes knew it as much as I did. Stupid boy just didn’t want to admit it. An entire week had passed, and I’d been unable to convince myself of the same. The question was, how would it actually end?

  He shut the cabinet, annoyance creeping into his tone. “I’d have to apologize if I had ignored your endless pounding on my back and kept driving.”

  Aha. “So you admit you wanted to?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “You implied it. Like you imply a lot of things.”

  He silenced me with a look as he sat on the edge of the tub in front of me, our knees brushing. He pushed up the sleeve of my sweatshirt then wiggled the tiny tube of cream in my face. “This might hurt a little.”

  It hurt worse than he knew, but not so much my wrist. More like the potential. The almost. The what-would-have-beens—they all throbbed much worse than my burn.

  Then the reality of his touch on my injury jolted my brain, and I sucked in my breath as the medicine made contact with my jilted nerves.

  He screwed the lid back onto the cream. “Told you so.”

  Not in so many words, but yeah, he’d warned me about himself. So had my father, indirectly. Even I had known not to fall for him.

  And yet the sting continued.

  Tears welled in my eyes, and I hoped he assumed it was just from the pain on my hand. “Wes, I—”

  “Shh.” He picked up my wrist, held it up to his lips, and gently blew. The cool air immediately soothed the burn, but his proximity and compassion did little to ease the ache in my heart. I wanted angry Wes, sarcastic Wes, brooding Wes. The Wes that made me more frustrated than love struck. That Wes I could handle. This sweet guy in front of me was about to be my undoing.

  He pressed his lips against my wrist, an inch above the burn, his dark, steady gaze never leaving mine. “That better?”

  I couldn’t breathe, much less answer. I nodded, searching his expression. We stared at each other, the only sounds my ragged breathing and th
e steady drip of water in the bathroom sink.

  He abruptly released my arm and stood, raking his fingers through his hair and half pivoting away from me. “Dang it, Addison.” He turned to face me, his expression a narrow-eyed mixture of grief and surprise. “This is what I didn’t want.”

  “What? Me dumping hot coffee on myself?”

  “No.” He waved one hand in the air as if my clumsiness didn’t surprise him anymore. Too bad he hadn’t seen me fall out of my chair in English. Then he’d be convinced. “This. You.”

  “You didn’t want me?” This conversation was starting to hurt worse than my burn. “I sort of figured that out by now, Wes, but thanks for clearing things up. Here, you want to dump some salt on this while you’re at it?” I shoved my upturned wrist toward him.

  Gently, he reeled me toward him. My breath caught as he pulled me close and tilted my chin. Our gazes locked. “Exactly the opposite.” Then he leaned down and kissed me.

  My head whirled. I closed my eyes, breathing in the scent of leather and spice and vanilla air freshener. I always thought the heroines in romance novels were pretty ridiculous to have weak knees during such a moment, but I now had a completely new understanding and respect for them. In fact, I’m shocked I kept standing at all. I kissed him back, my thoughts racing almost as fast as my thumping heartbeat.

  If my first rose came in a mailbox, it sort of figured my first kiss happened in a bathroom.

  Wes pulled away first. “Go out with me.”

  “We tried that already.” I clutched his jacket sleeve with one hand, still feeling off balance. “Remember? Endless pounding?”

  “I mean on a date.”

  “You said you didn’t date.”

  Wes let me go, taking a step back and releasing a long sigh. “I know what I said, PK. This is me changing my mind.”

  He looked surprisingly vulnerable, standing by a green striped shower curtain with his hands in his pockets, his expression sincere. I tried to think logically and not factor in how my lips still tingled from his kiss. Wes. And me. On a date. A real date. I shook my head, trying to fathom the image of Wes picking me up, taking me to dinner—

  Picking me up. My dad. There’d be no way he’d agree to this. What was I supposed to say? Please, Daddy, he kisses really good? Not. Happening. Besides the fact that a date with Wes would only be a setup for more heartbreak on my part. I’d rather throw a hot mocha in my own face than have my heart stomped on by a certain pair of black boots again. Dating Wes would be a recipe for disaster, in more ways than one.

  I looked at Wes, who remained stoic, still, waiting for my response, and drew in a deep breath for courage. Then I said the only thing I could.

  “Okay.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  If I hadn’t been reliving Wes’s kiss while choosing apples at Crooked Hollow Grocery, I probably would have remembered to pick them from the top of the arrangement instead of the bottom.

  I grabbed the fruit rolling around at my feet and winced as a third apple disappeared under the cake display. Hopefully no one had noticed—but no. I looked up and saw two grandmas, a bag boy, a toddler, and my dad staring right at me, mouths agape. I considered bowing, but figured by the bag boy’s scowl that probably wasn’t a good idea. Instead I delivered the apples quickly to their now-toppled display.

  “You missed the one that dropped in the bin of potatoes.” Dad pointed, obviously feeling that standing guard next to our shopping cart was more important than helping me rescue the victimized apples. I quickly gathered the last remainders of runaway fruit and joined Dad at our cart. Hopefully the next several people that purchased apples would wash them well before eating.

  “What in the world happened there?” Dad scratched the back of his neck.

  “Avalanche?” I couldn’t exactly confess the truth. Even now my lips tingled at the memory of Wes’s kiss, and I quicklypressed them together. “Come on, let’s just keep going. Next on the list is milk.”

  My thoughts raced faster than the apples had rolled as I followed Dad away from the scene of the crime. Somehow I had to find a way to either convince my father to let me go out with Wes, or even more unlikely, convince myself not to care about blatantly breaking the rules for once in my life. One thing was certain: I refused to miss out on my date. Something—or someone—had to give.

  “Oh no, step away from the Little Debbies.” I snagged Dad’s sleeve and tugged him away from the enticing display set up at the end of the bread aisle. “This is why I knew you shouldn’t come here alone.” Though maybe I was the one who shouldn’t be allowed to come while distracted. I looked over my shoulder toward the produce section, but thankfully it appeared that business was now as usual.

  “What do you mean? I come here alone all the time.” Dad cast a longing glance at the miniature chocolate cupcakes before following me to the dairy section.

  I stopped in front of the selection of butter and milk. “Right, and the healthiest thing you come home with is a can of reduced-fat cinnamon rolls.”

  “Well regardless of how much you trust my shopping skills, at least we’re spending time together. Kind of like a father-daughter date.” Dad looked as uncomfortable saying those words as I felt hearing them. He coughed and tried to look interested in the rows of refrigerated biscuits.

  Spending time together? What was with the sudden urge to bond? Hadn’t he avoided that these past sixteen years? A little late now. I shook my head. “No, we’re grocery shopping, and I’m here so you will buy something that’s not a straight carb. Look in the buggy, Dad.” I pointed to the goods inside our cart.

  “Wonder bread. Pasta shells. Cheez-Its. You need to eat food that has color sometimes.”

  “The Cheez-Its are orange.”

  His logic and his defensive tone sounded so much like mine I just stared at him. How many fun times had we lost over the years because of living separate lives? How many grocery outings and laughs had we skipped because we always just did it by ourselves, whoever had the most time that particular week?

  How many experiences did I miss out on because he’d rather be known as Pastor than Father?

  Dad bent to restack some fallen items inside our cart. “Besides, I needed to tell you something.”

  “Right, because everyone knows there’s no better place to have a heart-to-heart than next to the dairy case, debating one percent versus two percent milk.” I snagged a gallon of one percent, biting back the bitterness creeping up my throat.

  Dad chucked a tub of butter into the cart, and I quickly traded it for a reduced-fat version of the same brand. He started pushing the cart. “It’s nothing huge. I just wanted to let you know that I’m taking Kathy on a date tomorrow night.”

  My breath stuck in my throat, and I stopped in the middle of the aisle. Now that the rumors at school had finally died down—partially thanks to my semitruce with Claire after catching her in the bathroom at school—he was going to parade their relationship throughout Crooked Hollow. That would be all the juice the gossip mill would need to run full speed again.

  “Is this going to be a problem?”

  Dad’s voice started my feet moving again, and I quickstepped to keep up with him. He shot me a sidelong glance as he navigated the cart down the row of toiletries. “You said you were supportive of the idea.”

  I also once said I’d never buy country music, yet Dierks Bentley and Carrie Underwood both lived inside my iPod. “I said I was supportive of you dating.” That was true, even though it felt like the words had shredded my lips on their way out.

  “But not about dating Kathy?” Dad stopped the cart and frowned at me. I tried to frown back, but it was hard to maintain the seriousness of the moment when Dad had stopped directly in front of the tampons.

  “Pastor Blakely!”

  My head swiveled to the left as a warm male voice called from down the aisle. Mr. Keegan smiled as he ambled toward us, a full grocery basket dangling from one hand. Uh-oh. I swallowed hard, all urges to laugh
completely erased. Did he know I’d been at his house last night? The burn on my wrist, tucked discreetly under a bandage, throbbed in sympathy. I mentally begged Mr. Keegan to keep walking, but he bent to rearrange the contents in his basket—probably adjusting the weight—then stopped directly beside our cart.

  “Good to see you.” Dad shook his hand then gestured to me. “You’ve met Addison at church, I’m sure.”

  Mr. Keegan nodded. “We certainly have.” He smiled at me, eyes slightly glazed over as if he’d stayed up late—maybe worrying about his son and me? “I wanted to thank you for taking my request seriously about getting to know Wes. He mentioned you came by the house last night. Something about a burn on your hand?”

  Dad’s eyes widened, and his face reddened. I spoke quickly. “It’s fine. Just needed some cream and a bandage.” Funny how Wes suddenly decided to get chatty with his father. Did he also tell you he kissed me beside your guest bath toilet? And oh yeah, you need a new lightbulb above the sink.

  “I’m glad it’s okay. I’m sorry I missed seeing you.” Mr.

  Keegan shifted his full grocery basket to his other arm.

  “You were at the Keegans’ last night?” Dad’s voice sounded like a cat had jumped down his throat and attempted to strangle him. “With Wes? Alone?”

  “Dad, it wasn’t like that. I went to get a mocha from Got Beans and burned my hand on my coffee. Wes happened to be outside and wanted to help—that’s all.” I could feel a flush rising up my chest and knew once the telltale red reached my cheeks, my credibility would be shot.

  Dad’s eyes went from wide to narrowed slits. “I see.”

  No, he didn’t. But that wasn’t the point at the moment. Mr. Keegan darted a look from me to Dad and back again. “Anyway, thanks again, Addison, for all your help. I know it’s not easy being a friend to Wes.”

  It was actually a lot easier than he knew. But I smiled, fighting back my blush. “No problem.”

  “See you both Sunday.” Mr. Keegan lifted his free hand in a wave and headed back the way he’d come, seemingly completely unaware of the bomb he’d just dropped at my feet.