by Willa Okati
“In his own words? I don’t ‘let’ him do anything. He’s a big boy.”
“Fine. No way he’d have done that when he knows you love it long.”
Okay, Tuck had to concede her that point. Even if it made him uncomfortable to guess she probably knew exactly why he liked Cade with enough hair to grab on to.
She dropped everything and dragged a hand backward through her hair, elbow resting on the table and her face hidden. Her tone flat. He knew that particular pitch. That was the one a person hid the big hurts behind. “I never thought you would lie to us, Tuck. Not you.”
Tuck took the blow as best as he could, breathed through it, and let it out. “I meant well.”
She scoffed and curled in tighter on herself, so stiff she’d break if he poked her with one fingertip.
“I couldn’t tell the truth,” Tuck said, feeling helpless as the kids she and Megan had been, once upon a time. “This, right here? This is why I did what I did. I take care of my own. I have to. That’s who I am. If I’d sent back the invitation with ‘sorry, haven’t seen the man I love in months. Sucks to be me, right?’ that would have started your married life off real good, wouldn’t it?”
She did him the courtesy of looking him in the eye. “It wouldn’t have been the worst thing that ever happened to us.”
“Not that I guess this helps.”
“It really doesn’t.” She took a deep breath and tried to square her shoulders. “So that is it. The end.”
“Maybe.” Tuck rubbed his forehead. “I don’t know anymore. Hell, I still don’t have a clue what this is, and I never really have. It just happened, and Cade would never…” He gestured uselessly. “We never stopped. And now here we are.”
“You guys have fought before.”
“Sure we have. Now ask me what makes this different and see if you get a better answer. Dare you.” Tuck wished to God he had something to drink. Preferably whisky. “I’d fix it if I could. He won’t let me.”
She looked at him, lost little-girl eyes in a grown woman’s face that’d been rosy and happy just last night. “Is that a lie too?”
No thought, just reflex in his answer: “No.”
Hannah sighed. He could see the anger drain out of her like air from a popped balloon. “I should hate you for this.”
“God. Don’t, baby girl. Please don’t.”
She scoffed and rubbed her face. When she came up, she looked as tired as he felt. “Cade, he’s—”
Movement in the corridor just outside the kitchen startled Tuck and Hannah. He waved her silent and stood, moving slightly in front of her. Automatic shielding. “Who the fuck—shit.”
Thomas blocked the doorway, wiping clean hands on a clean towel. Tuck guessed he’d been doing regular old yard work like a good little boy. “Everything okay?”
Hell. How much had Thomas heard?
As if in direct answer, Thomas slipped Tuck one flat stare. Fuck. He’d heard it all.
“Don’t you have some vines to yank?” Tuck demanded. “This is private. Fuck off.”
Hannah slapped his hand; thank God she hit the one he hadn’t hammered. “Tuck. He is my guest. So are you. Both of you behave or I will send you home, and don’t think for a second I won’t.”
Thomas shrugged as easily as if it didn’t matter a bit to him. “No problem. I’m here if you need anything.”
Like he’d been there before, far more than Tuck had. Or Cade. That new-old hurt seared under Tuck’s skin. He glared at Thomas on his way out, ambling and casual.
A short encounter, but it did nothing for his temper. Tuck thumped back into his seat and stopped Hannah before she could scold again. “Leave it alone. I’m sorry about the bad blood, I am, but that’s between me and him. I’m asking you to let it go.”
“Right. Because you’re doing a great job of that yourself.” She drew in a long breath and said, sounding like a woman far older than her true age, “What do we do now?”
“I don’t know, baby girl.”
“Not good enough.” She took his injured hand, but gently. Just like him. Never could stay mad. Sometimes Tuck thought that was as much a curse as a blessing.
He figured he was probably right about that one.
She dabbed ointment on Tuck’s cut and asked, “You do know when you talk about loving Cade, you’re using the present tense, right?”
Tuck nodded in silence.
She pushed the point. “Then you still love him.”
“What kind of question is that? Of course I do. I love, therefore I am. And he still loves me. He’s said so.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“Answer that for me and you’ll solve all my problems in one fell swoop. You know him, Hannah. He’s so fucking stubborn.” Tuck pinched his nose. “I keep asking myself and asking myself some more: what am I supposed to do? What can I do when he won’t even let me try?”
She looked helpless, at a loss for words. “What do you want to do?”
I don’t want to wake up alone when that’s not the way it’s supposed to be, forever and ever amen, was what Tuck thought.
“I think that depends on Cade,” was what Tuck said. “I think the same thing as I always did. He’s mine, and I’m his. I feel him like a phantom limb when he’s not around.” He watched her fix him up on the outside, still tired and feeing that odd salty-sandy-dry of sunburn he hadn’t noticed until now, in the cool of the old house. “I don’t want him and me to be over.”
“That’s all?”
“That isn’t enough?”
Tuck watched Hannah gather her strength. She stood and offered him a hand up. Her fingers were wiry and her wrist strong. Tougher than she looked, yeah, that was his girl. She had to tilt her head back to meet his gaze now, but she did it. “If you don’t want it to be over, don’t let it be over.”
Tuck hated like hell to ask, but he had to. “And Megan?”
“Oh God. I don’t know.” Hannah shook her hair forward to hide her face. “I have to think about that. I don’t want to lie to her.”
“Don’t. Don’t you start off your life together with lies.”
“Then you want me to tell her the truth?”
“I—” Tuck stopped, at a total loss. “Man. When I fuck up, I do it right, huh?” He had to ask, no matter how much he wished it were otherwise. “Do you hate me for this?”
“I couldn’t hate you,” she said. “I wonder if that’s Cade’s problem too.”
Impulse overcame Tuck; that and the need to make things right. To stop the hurting for everyone he’d meant only the best for. He took Hannah by the shoulders in a one-armed hug, even if he didn’t kiss her head or cheek. “I’ll fix it. Somehow.”
“You’d better.” Hannah brushed at her cheek. Oh no. He’d made her cry. Fuck me for being such a…
Tuck turned her about and held her as carefully as he could by her slim arms, just beneath her shoulders. “I will fix it. Or die trying.”
“I believe the ‘trying’ part, at least.”
Was that a joke? She’d smiled anyway, even if she shook her head in seeming resignation.
“You know what your problem is, Tuck?” she asked, looking not at him but out the window. “Your heart is bigger than your head sometimes. His head is too tied up to pay attention to his heart.”
Tuck frowned. She wasn’t just looking; she was watching. Big difference between the two. He followed her line of sight and swore inside his head.
Thomas had moved into the empty space Tuck left behind. Swoop. Like he belonged there. And be damned if Cade wasn’t—well, not glad, not relieved, but somehow breathing easier in his presence.
“I think I’m starting to understand some things,” Hannah said.
Tuck swallowed down enough pride to answer. He owed her that. “Yeah.”
Hannah socked him one in his arm. Not as hard as she could have. “Like I said. You’re a dumb-ass.”
“You think?” Tuck brushed off the pseudo-insult; truth be t
old, he barely heard her. From where he stood, he had a perfectly framed view of Cade through the kitchen window. Cade—and Thomas—talking quietly together. They knelt on the grass, Suzie-Q running in circles around them, far enough away to be out of earshot of quiet voices from the house. That was good.
Yeah. That was the only good damn thing about it.
The bad thing? As Tuck watched him, he saw Cade listening to what Thomas had to say. Looking thoughtful about it, and uncertain, but paying attention and taking in those words inaudible to Tuck from inside the house. The uncertainty and tension Tuck had seen in Cade when Thomas made his first appearance began to melt. Disappeared like frost on glass at dawn. You could track it, but if you blinked, you’d miss the moment when the one became the other.
When Cade smiled at Thomas, even if it was hesitantly, Tuck came this close to snapping.
Thomas said something Tuck couldn’t hear and couldn’t read off his lips. Cade blushed. He shrugged, tossing the words off; that told Tuck they’d been a compliment. That was his look. That was what he got from Cade. No one else owned that.
Fucking Thomas. Did he think he could take Tuck’s place or what? Sure seemed like it, the way he slipped in everywhere he could.
Hannah watched them too. “Thomas has been a good friend of ours,” she said. “He’s been there when we needed him.”
Tuck bit down on the jagged pill. “I know.”
“He’s a good man.”
The question jumped out of Tuck, the words scraping his throat painfully raw. “Better for Cade than me, you mean?”
Hannah shot him a glare over her shoulder that would have scalded leather and that indicated she wasn’t going to dignify his question with any other answer.
She did lean out the open screen door and shout, “Cade! Come inside. I need your help.”
Cade squinted at her, shading his eyes against the sun. “What’s up?”
“I need your help,” Hannah said. “Inside. Now.”
Cade shared shrugs with Thomas. “If he can handle this.”
“In my sleep,” Thomas said. He knuckled the back of Cade’s head. “Go on.” Like Thomas had nothing to worry about. Nothing to lose.
Maybe he didn’t, Tuck thought, abruptly cold with fear. They looked happy together. They fit, side by side. Easy. No worries, no shit fits, no fighting. Just peace.
“Tuck?” Hannah jostled him out of his fugue by letting the door slam to with a bang, and took him by the ear. He swore aloud, slapping at her hand. She evaded him with ease. “Don’t,” she whispered. “I’m giving you a chance. Take it. Do we understand each other?”
“About what?” Cade asked, standing at the open screen door.
Tuck thought fast. Starting off with a lie? Bad idea. But his mouth moved before the rest of him, and what could he do then? Take it back?
Especially when part of it wasn’t a lie.
Wedding jitters, he mouthed to Cade. Bridezilla time.
Cade’s eyebrow rose, but after a quick look at Hannah with her lips pursed in a scowl, he seemed to accept that. Dubiously, but still.
Tuck breathed a sigh of relief. Small blessings; he’d take ’em.
Cade looked from Tuck to Hannah and back again. “What’s going on?”
Then again, Tuck would take some large blessings and a few breaks cut his way too.
Hannah faced the pair of them down, her hands squarely on her hips. “You promised me a first dance,” she said directly to Tuck, eye square to eye. “You both need practice. I cleared out one of the rooms we don’t use for you two. Go, and before I turn into Bridezilla, would you?”
Sharp cookie. Tuck had to admire her savvy even as he winced over the subtle jab at him and at the proof she’d caught that little exchange.
He gave in. Might as well, when things were inevitable. “Which room and how do we find it? It’s like a maze in there.”
* * *
“Good God,” Cade said from above him, just taller enough to see over Tuck’s head.
“Amen,” Tuck muttered. If this was the parlor, he’d stand by his idea of a wedding pavilion as about a hundred times preferable. The cold of the room made the hair on his arms rise, propelled by goose bumps. He shook it off. “So. Feel like dancing in a grave, not on one?”
“Now I feel so much more comfortable. Thanks.” Cade nudged him. Hey, what did you know? That went a good ways toward dispelling the chill, and in a room like this one, cavernous and unwelcoming, there was a hell of a lot of chill to disperse.
The parlor stood empty, or as good as. Both of the girls—or probably just Hannah, all things and theses considered—had scooted bulky settees and ottomans and lamps against the walls on all sides. A thick carpet had been rolled and propped up behind the door.
Tuck prowled inside, cold forgotten for the sake of fascination. “Do you believe this place?”
Cade tested his strength on one of the couches. He winced at the screech it made, its bulk and the marble floor both complaining loudly at his undignified maltreatment. “How could we not hear her doing this?”
“We were sort of distracted.”
Cade arched an eyebrow at Tuck. “I don’t think anyone could be that distracted.”
“You wound me. Best guess?” Tuck rubbed the back of his neck, sure his guess was as close to the truth as made no difference. “She did it before we even showed.”
Cade traced the dustless glass of a giant grandfather clock that ticked quietly. “You really think she was so sure we’d come?”
“I think she believed in us.” Tuck paced to the middle of the room, as best as he could figure it, and struck what he thought might be close to an old-world pose with leg forward, foot pointed, and arms flung out wide. What the hell, right? Cade didn’t seem inclined to argue.
It was probably Thomas who’d cooled his temper. That made Tuck want to clench his teeth. Maybe he’d have said something…if he hadn’t heard Hannah’s warning again in his mind’s ear.
He balanced himself inside and out and bowed a little deeper to his partner. “Shall we begin?”
Cade’s hoot of laughter pulled out of him. “God, you keep making me… Not yet. We need music. Do you think she remembered to put something in here?”
“This is Hannah we’re talking about. Definitely.” Tuck had started to wobble. “Either come over here and prop me up or be prepared to scrape me up if I tip over.”
Cade tilted his head with an odd sort of frown. “You wouldn’t move to catch yourself first?”
“Maybe. Seeing how long I can hang tough is mostly the point.”
“A man in that kind of pose has no business talking about hanging tough,” Cade said drily, making Tuck suspect he looked way less like a European aristocrat than he’d hoped and probably more like a court jester.
Eh, whatever. Anything for a laugh. A chance.
Tuck made “come on” curly fingers at Cade. “Bring it, already. May I have this dance?”
“If I can’t find the music, I can’t teach you right.” Cade stood still, visibly searching. “I feel like I should be hunting for a Victrola or a phonograph. Is what I’m looking for right in front of my face?”
Tuck would have let him find it for himself, to allow him his pride, but since he’d asked… “CD player tucked inside that big cubbyhole on the desk with the roll lid. I think.”
Cade grimaced as he approached it. “At least it’s not an MP3 player. The old school hangs on as long as it can.”
Tuck winced. “Jeez. CDs are old-school? Now I’m feeling ancient.”
“I told you, you have a gray hair,” Cade said, absorbed in figuring out how the player worked. “I miss CDs. Do you remember…”
“The Discman you had back at St. Pius’s?” Hell yes, Tuck did. Thumping out that tinny, forbidden beat, forgotten except as background noise, the first night he’d sneaked into Cade’s room and from there, into his bed…
“I loved that thing.” Cade pushed a button and popped the catch on the CD p
layer. He snorted and held the disc up for Tuck to see the lack of label and a feminine scrawl in Sharpie. “She burned it from MP3s.”
Tuck couldn’t help laughing. “So much for old-school, huh?” He reconsidered. “Or maybe it’s more like ‘then’ and ‘now’ collided. Boom.”
“Uh-huh.” Cade moved as swiftly and economically as ever, too quick for Tuck to follow, barely knowing what he was up to before something complicated and classical sang its way through more speakers than had to belong to one boom box. Impressive, and Cade didn’t fail to notice. He looked up and around. “When this room is lived in, it must be set up for perfect acoustics.”
“It’s not that bad now.” Tuck gave up on the pose and stood naturally, arm extended, waiting for Cade to join him. “She went to all this trouble. Come over here, and let’s do right by her.”
Now Cade bit his lip and hesitated.
“We’ve come this far. Don’t puss out on me now.” Tuck waited. He’d wait all day if he had to. “It’s just a dance.”
“It’s never just anything with you,” Cade said.
Tuck couldn’t argue his point.
He put that aside for the moment, because Cade did as he’d been asked. Businesslike, professional, as if Tuck was paying by the hour for the privilege, but still. “Waltzes are composed in three-quarter time. If this is the music she wants, this is the dance you need to learn.”
“Oh, fuck me.”
“Not in front of the guests.”
Tuck stared at him.
He didn’t think he imagined the ghost of Cade’s smile. But before he could ask, Cade took Tuck’s right hand and placed his left at Tuck’s waist. “It helps if you imagine you’re stepping around a four-cornered box.”
“Yes, Mr. Fosse,” Tuck grumbled. “Hang on.” He kicked off his sneakers and sent them tumbling into a corner. “I have a feeling you’ll thank me for that later. And if you would be so kind, sir?”
“Don’t call me sir.”
“No, sir.”
“Don’t be a dick either.” Cade pinched Tuck’s hip. “Step. Slide. Step. Three-quarter time. I know you’re not as clumsy as you’re pretending to be. Just—follow my lead, would you? Or at least try. That’d do.”