I continued to stand in the door for several minutes after she’d disappeared into her house, piecing together what had just happened.
“Sounds like you’ve got a date tomorrow night.”
I jerked at my brother’s voice. I shut and locked the door before turning to face him.
“How’d you know that?”
“I came down and heard you asking her out.” Rick was standing in the shadows at the top of the stairs, but as he spoke, he slowly came down, stepping into the light.
“Yeah, I don’t know where I’m taking her, but I’m taking her out.”
Rich stared at me for several moments before saying, “Good. I’m glad. Now you just need to introduce us.”
I blanched at the thought. It wasn’t because I was nervous about them not liking each other. I had a feeling they’d get along great. It was more that I couldn’t remember if Britain even knew about my brother.
Had I ever told her about him?
Thinking back, I wasn’t sure I had. So, unless I laid the groundwork, Britain was going to be in for the surprise of her life, that was for sure.
“Don’t worry, little brother, I’ll give you a chance to set things up.”
I looked at Rich and caught the smirk on his face. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“That I’m your dirty little secret,” he joked as he walked toward the kitchen.
“You make our sibling relationship sound so torrid.”
Rich chuckled and opened the fridge, pulling a beer out and popping the top before turning to face me.
“Considering I don’t think you like talking about me, I’m not sure you’re far off.”
My mouth opened, but no words came out. Rich continued. “It’s cool. I get it. Mostly. You have your own demons, and my demons have made them worse. But you can’t keep denying what happened. You’ll have to face it one day.”
With that, Rich brushed past me and I listened as he tromped back up the stairs.
Well, fuck.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
BRITAIN
A DATE.
Two words. They implied something simple. But it was far from simple.
August had asked me on a date.
And I’d said yes.
The entire night after he asked me and the next day, it wasn’t far from my mind. I didn’t let it impact my work, but I couldn’t stop thinking about him asking me out and what it might mean.
Last night was the first time August, and I had talked about my career in the military without it dissolving into an argument. Every time we’d talked about it in the past, one of us would eventually get mad about the other and end up leaving.
But last night, I felt like we could push past that. I could tell he didn’t enjoy talking about it and I was nervous to discuss it with him, but I needed to talk to someone that wasn’t my parents or a best friend. Someone that wouldn’t just agree with what I wanted because they wanted me to be happy.
Someone that wanted the best for me and might not agree with me about what that was and how to achieve it.
And I’d gotten that from August the night before. Even though he was uncomfortable talking about it, he listened to me and gave me advice about what I should do, which was talk to my parents. Especially after the bombshell my dad dropped on me and my mom yesterday.
At the memory of that conversation, I stopped brushing my hair and remembered what he said.
How he was getting better. He was likely to go into remission. But it might come back with a vengeance, and quickly.
And I thought about what that might mean for me and my dreams.
I didn’t feel like I could leave my parents at this point knowing that my dad might get better shortly but get sick again. I didn’t want to be on the other side of the country or halfway around the world when that happened. I wanted to be right here in Sunnyville so I could be with both of them.
But unless I could work a miracle and find something at a base near here for an active duty slot, I didn’t see how it was possible.
So, I had to make a choice. Stay with my parents, continue with reservist duty only, and work at the vet clinic in town. Or find a full-time slot knowing it was what I wanted out of my career, but I would likely be far away from my parents.
My stomach hurt just thinking about it.
I blew out a breath and forced myself back to the here and now. August would be here any moment.
I ran my brush through my hair one more time and did a quick once over, checking that I looked as good as I could.
Tight jeans? Check.
Flattering top? Double check.
Cute, yet comfy shoes? Triple check.
I was ready. Or as ready as I could be to go on a date with an ex-boyfriend I’d only just seen again after not seeing him for a decade.
No big deal.
The doorbell rang, and I sprang into action. I’d already put my things into a small clutch earlier, so I just had to grab it and dash from my room to the stairs.
My mom was already opening the door as I descended, and she smiled at August.
“I’ll start to think you like us if you keep coming around,” she said, pulling him into a hug.
He chuckled. “I’m okay with that.”
He stepped in the door and glanced up the stairs toward me, catching me frozen about halfway down.
“Hey,” he said, his voice smooth and washing over me in a way that made me shiver.
“Hey,” I returned as I finished coming down the stairs.
“I’m so excited for the two of you!” My mom said, making me jerk. I’d forgotten she was standing there, though I didn’t know how. I’d just seen her open the door several moments before.
I cleared my throat. “I’m not sure when I’ll be back…” I started, trailing off, hoping August would fill in.
But it was my mom who said something. “Don’t worry about that. You’re an adult. I won’t be waiting up.”
I hoped the shock I felt wasn’t showing on my face because I was floored by my mom’s words. Yeah, I was an adult woman in my thirties. But I was also living with my parents. I remembered my dad’s words of My house, my rules, from when I was a teen. I’d assumed that still applied.
“I won’t keep her out too late,” August said. “Ready?”
This last part was directed at me, and I nodded. I leaned over and kissed my mom on the cheek before grabbing a cardigan from the hook by the door, just in case.
Then we were outside and August was helping me into his truck and circling the front to get in on his side.
Once he was in and had the truck started, I asked, “Where are we going?”
“That’s for me to know and you to find out.”
I blinked at him. “Okay.”
I could live with that. One thing I remembered well from our time dating was how much August liked to plan surprises for people. I’d loved when he’d surprised me with different dates and was never disappointed, even if what he picked for us to do wasn’t something I would normally enjoy.
It was always fun, though.
We rode for a little while in an easy silence, and I could almost imagine that the years between us breaking up and getting here hadn’t happened.
But they had. And we weren’t the same people we were then.
I glanced at August from the corner of my eye, his profile was half thrown in shadow because of the darkening night.
His hair was thick and I could tell he’d tried to style it somewhat by the comb marks I’d seen earlier. He was sporting some scruff currently, which was insanely hot on him. It gave him a rough-looking edge, even though I knew he was anything but.
He was wearing a button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows and a nice pair of jeans.
He looked nice. And nothing about the outfit gave me a clue of where we were going.
I looked out the front window and noticed that he was pulling into a small parking lot on the edge of downtown. “That was a quic
k ride,” I joked as he pulled into a spot and turned the truck off.
“This is just stop number one.”
I said nothing as I unbuckled and got out of the truck. Because it was so tall, I had to carefully slide down the side of the seat until my toes touched the pavement.
“I wanted you to wait for me to help you,” August said, placing his hands around my waist and holding me until I was steady on my feet.
I smiled at him. “You’re sweet, but you don’t have to help me.”
“I want to. You’re waiting next time.”
I opened my mouth to say something else but noticed the look in his eye. He was being serious, so I snapped my mouth closed and decided not to fight him.
He gave a curt nod when I remained silent, and I just barely refrained from rolling my eyes.
Men. As much as it annoyed me, he wanted to be like that… it was also kind of hot.
“Shall we?” He said, holding out his hand.
I nodded and placed my hand in his, threading our fingers together.
I couldn’t help but think about how well our hands felt pressed against each other and how well they fit. There was a pleasant tingling there.
“Here we are,” August said, breaking me from my thoughts about our perfect hands.
I looked and my brow furrowed at the name on the window, Accidental Artist, and what I could see inside.
“Is this… a paint your own pottery place?” I asked.
“Yep. I remembered you talking about going to a place when we were in college, but we never got the chance to go. So, I thought it might be fun to do it tonight.”
My heart skipped a beat at his words. He remembered something we’d talked about that long ago? I barely remembered it. It was a footnote in the realm of our past relationship, but here he was mentioning it like it was something that had stuck with him. How was I not in a puddle yet?
He led me to the door and held it open for me to go in first.
The first thing I noticed once inside was the music. It was classic rock, and I really enjoyed that. I don’t know why, but I expected something much different from this.
The second was the woman that was coming to the front to help us. There was pain spattered all over her clothing and on her skin, yet she didn’t seem to care.
“Welcome! Are you the Black party?” She asked.
“Yep.”
“Right this way.”
She led us through the tables—only half of them were full—and into a back room.
“I’ve set everything up here for you. Let me know if you have further questions or need assistance.” With that, she was gone, and I was staring after her.
“She’s not going to explain anything to us?”
August chuckled and held out a chair for me to sink into.
“I came by earlier for her to show me everything. I wanted us to have the maximum time possible here.”
“And what exactly are we doing?”
In lieu of answering, August walked over to a shelf and grabbed a few things, bringing them back over to the table. “I selected some things earlier. We’ve got a plate and bowls, plus I saw a cat figurine I thought you might like to paint. I’m doing a dog.”
I smiled at him as he set my things in front of me. He then went and retrieved the paints, brushes, and water and then handed me an apron to put on over my clothes.
I quickly tied it on and started looking at the paints I had to work with, trying to figure out what I wanted to paint on each thing.
August sat down next to me, and I noted he’d also put an apron on to cover his clothing.
I started working on my plate first, picking some of my favorite colors to do over it and not caring one bit that I had little artist ability. I could color and paint within the lines if they gave me something to follow. But come up with something on my own? Not happening.
Despite that, it was fun just doing what I wanted on each thing and making it whatever it turned out to be. I didn’t feel pressured to make it beautiful because August wasn’t much better than I was with designing something to paint.
My favorite thing to paint was the cat, though. I loved animals, cats especially, and looked forward to the day I could have one of my own. With my military career, I didn’t want a pet since I didn’t know if how often I’d deploy or how often I’d have to move. Now that I was living with my parents, they already had a dog, so adding another animal to the mix wasn’t something I was comfortable doing.
That was fine. I didn’t mind waiting. I knew I’d get my pet one day.
As August and I painted, I asked him about his job as a teacher and listened to him talk about starting out teaching in an inner-city school and moving to Sunnyville when he had the chance. He talked about his students like they were his own flesh and blood children, not the children of other people.
It was obvious how much he cared for them, and that was very attractive to me.
He asked me about working as a vet, and I told him some of the more interesting cases I’d seen over the years and what I’d had to pull out of some animals. I tried to avoid much talk of anything related to the military working dogs since I didn’t want to sour our evening, but he asked me about working with them and I told him a little about it.
By the time we finished painting and cleaning up, I was even more relaxed around August, but I was also hungry.
Before I could say anything, my stomach let out a loud growl and August laughed.
“I take it we need dinner now?”
I nodded. “You got that right.”
“Then let’s get some food in your belly.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
BRITAIN
AFTER CHECKING when our pottery would be ready, August took my hand again and led me down the sidewalk toward the chief part of downtown where several restaurants were. We passed several people, and we nodded at them, but thankfully I didn’t recognize any of them.
That was good. Seeing others while walking reminded me of the gossip mill in Sunnyville. It was inevitable we’d end up as a part of it again, but I wanted to enjoy being out with August as much as possible without other people and their thoughts interfering with it.
“You up for something simple?” He asked me as we drew up on the diner.
“Yep.”
He nodded and led me to the door, pulling it open and gently pushing me through.
Much like the other day, it wasn’t very full. We got a few looks as we stepped inside, but I didn’t feel like they were pressing in on me, so I could relax.
“Sit anywhere!” The waitress from the day before called as she hurried by.
August led us to a booth toward the back of the restaurant and stood by the table as I slid into my side. Once he was seated, the waitress dropped our menus off and asked, “Cokes?”
We both nodded, and she went off to retrieve them. I glanced at the menu, quickly deciding on one of their burgers for dinner, and looked around at the other patrons.
Since it was later in the evening, after eight, there weren’t many diners eating. There was a group of teens across the way that I was sure August knew, and a few couples scattered at the other tables. But otherwise, all was quiet.
“Here ya go. You ready to order?” The waitress asked.
We placed our orders, and I took a sip of my Coke before looking at August.
“Thank you for taking me to the pottery place. I had a lot of fun.”
He grinned at me. “You’re welcome. I’ll be honest, I didn’t even know Sunnyville had one until I was wracking my brain for what to do. Found it while searching for something and remembered our conversation and how we’d planned to go…”
He trailed off at the end and grimaced.
“What?” I asked, confused by why he did that.
“I was just remembering we’d planned to go, but it was right before we broke up that we made the plans.”
“Oh.” I blanched. I hadn’t remembered that part. That was crappy timin
g on our part then. “But we’ve made up for it now,” I said, putting a smile on my face. “We don’t need to keep dwelling on the past and what could have or did happen.”
August nodded. “I know, you’re right, it’s just hard,” he admitted. “I can’t help but remember what it was like then, how good it was. I wonder if we would have stayed together, if things would still be that good…”
He trailed off again, and I filled in the blanks. I didn’t want to fill in that particular blank, but it was hard not to when he seemed to imply things. “If I hadn’t joined the military, you mean?”
August winced. I stared at him, waiting to see what he was going to say.
He slowly nodded after a few beats. “Yeah, if you hadn’t joined the military.”
He sighed and shook his head, dropping his gaze to the table. “I’m not trying to imply that you’re the reason we broke up, because that’s not true. I had a big role to play in it as well. It’s just hard to see you now, see how we are now, and not wonder about what didn’t happen.”
I nodded. “I understand.” The problem was playing the what-if game. I’d played it more times than I could count when I was in the military, and something that always happened that made me doubt that I’d done something wrong, especially if it related to my job.
“We can’t keep dwelling on the past,” I told him. “Yeah, we have one. We’re both aware of it, but we can’t let that dictate our future. I know that I’ve had a lot of fun tonight and I’d love to see what we can do now. We’ve got a second chance, which not many people get. But we can’t let the past influence us today. We’ll just be doomed to repeat the same mistakes.”
August nodded and ran a hand over his face. “You’re right, I know it. It’s just harder than it sounds.”
I nodded and sighed. “It is. But, I think if we want to really give this a shot, we have to put it behind us.”
August sighed as well. “Yeah, we do.” He paused for a few beats before saying, “I do.”
“Right. So, we’re agreeing to move on.” I gave a nod.
“We are.”
We smiled at each other, and something eased in my chest. I hadn’t wanted to admit to myself just how much I was looking forward to being with August again, so it was important that he work with me about this.
Vetted: An Everyday Heroes World Novel (The Everyday Heroes World) Page 11