Last Kiss

by Laurelin Paige

  It was another truth I hadn’t wanted to face. Even now I had to hear her say it before I could accept it. So I shook my head and stayed silent.

  She heaved a sigh. “Because you wanted to leave and I was holding you back.”

  I let my mind go back to that time, trying to see it from her point of view. I’d been pregnant. I’d gone to stay with her until I got on my feet. I’d been planning to get a job and take care of myself.

  “No.” I shook my head more vigorously. “You weren’t holding me back at all.”

  “How can you say that? If you hadn’t come to stay with me, Bridge would never…” She let her sentence trail away. Let the silence give us time to fill in the awful conclusion. He would never have raped me. He would never have put scissors inside me. He would never have caused my miscarriage.

  “You can’t blame yourself for that.” My declaration felt weak. How many times had I blamed myself? “You helped me. You were there when I needed someone.”

  “And you couldn’t see that I was in no shape to be the strong one. You wanted me to save you. Me. A coked-out party girl who’d hooked up with a violent asshole. You thought I was the person to lean on?” Her tone was bitter and compassionate all at once.

  She took a breath and her next words were softer. “You had enough money to set yourself up. You would have gotten a job in modeling and you would have had your baby.” Her voice lilted up with emotion. “You would have been better off. You were better off.”

  “I wasn’t better off. I was half a person. I was miserable.” Every day without her had been a battle. Even when I’d gotten my life together, I’d been empty. I’d been alone.

  She scoffed. “Well, you made out pretty swell for someone who was miserable.”

  I threw my head back and closed my eyes. All the horrible things I’d imagined about myself because she’d cut me off came flooding back. I’d told myself she couldn’t handle my addiction to men who were bad for me. I’d convinced myself that my sexual proclivities were so terrible that she’d decided I wasn’t worth the trouble.

  “I’d thought I’d become a burden to you,” I said, straightening to look at her. “So many times before you could have settled and been happy if it hadn’t been for me.”

  She gave a brusque laugh. “That’s not me, Emily. I’m not someone who wants to settle.” She let a beat pass. “At least, I wasn’t back then. When Reeve proposed, for the first time, the idea sounded kind of nice. I was just too scared to accept it.”

  Her words were knives, slicing at me and the visions I’d had of a future with Reeve. Wounding any chance of repairing our friendship. What I wanted warred with what was best and every option in front of me led down a road I had no desire to go down.

  But there had been so much honesty in the air already. The floodgates were open, and truth flowed off my tongue, without me even feeling like I’d chosen it. “Amber, I seduced him.” There it was – the worst truth of it all.

  And wasn’t ironic? For years, believing she’d blamed me for taking her man. My vow to never let it happen again. Me, forced to do the thing that had torn us apart so that I could get her back. Now I learned that she’d never thought that about me at all.

  It felt like a catch-22. Like I’d never had a choice but to become the person she’d led me to believe I was. I didn’t even get to enjoy the release of guilt before I had to admit that, even though I didn’t deserve the blame she’d put on me then, I did deserve it now.

  My excuses held no water, but, with my head hung, I made them anyway. “I had to. To get to you. To try to find you, I seduced him.”

  “I know.” Her voice was steady yet soft. “I already know.”

  My head flew up in surprise. “You do?”

  “Well, yeah,” she said, as if it had been obvious. “You couldn’t have gotten past that front gate any other way.”

  Exactly. Which was why I’d done it. And yet I still felt so terrible about it. “I’m sorry.”

  “Why?” Her expression was incredulous. “For doing what you had to in order to find me? I’m grateful! No one has ever done anything like that for me before. It’s only because of you that I’m still standing here. I know Micha didn’t hurt me enough to kill me that last time, but if I hadn’t gotten out, he would have eventually. It’s only because of you that I’m here.” She corrected herself. “Well, and Joe, but he told me you’d hired him to find me so that still counts as you.”

  Now I knew what she meant about feeling unqualified to be a savior. Because I’d given up my search. I’d told Joe to stop investigating. He’d gone to Vilanakis on his own. “No,” I protested. “It wasn’t me.”

  Again, she ignored me. “And imagine what a total asshole I feel like. Because I made you be that person again. I made you return to the very thing I wanted you away from. Trust me when I say it’s the last thing I wanted. I’m drowning under that guilt.”

  “Stop it,” I said, standing, needing to meet her eye-to-eye. “Don’t you dare feel guilty. You came after me so many times. Saved my ass. Got me on my feet again. I owed you.”

  She rolled her eyes so vehemently that her entire head swept with them. “You didn’t owe me shit. We were even and now I owe you.” She took one step toward me, taking a determined stance. “I’m going to pay you back, eventually. Someday. Somehow.”

  “You don’t owe me.” I still couldn’t figure out how she’d thought we’d been even before. “There’s nothing to —”

  “There is and I will.” Her tone said there would be no more arguing about it.

  “Then pay me back by saving yourself, for once!” I snapped. “Stop with the bullshit life. Grow up! Think about your future. Make some goddamned plans.”

  Her expression said she was stunned, and frankly, I was as well. I’d never talked to her like that. Never tried to suggest I knew what was best for her. Never realized how fiercely I resented the lifestyle we’d both once called our own.

  But a dam had broken inside of me, and I couldn’t hold any of it back if I wanted to. She thought about killing herself? It broke my heart – it did. But if her life was so miserable, then why was she still repeating the same mistakes over and over? Why didn’t she at least try to get out? It wasn’t fair for her to talk to me about being scared of happiness, about being indebted to other people, as if she were the only person in the world who’d felt those things. As if she were the only one of the two of us that had it hard.

  But I was a hypocrite.

  Because even after I’d changed my circumstances, I’d still felt insecure and empty. So who was I to tell Amber about progress?

  “I’m sorry.” I turned away from her, not wanting her to see from my expression how much of a sham my life was. “It’s not my place to lecture you.”

  “No. You’re right.” Her tone had an edge to it that wasn’t there before, an edge that could simply be attributed to the rawness of her admission. Or maybe it was a sign that she was just as resentful of me as I feared she was.

  Behind me, I heard her take a step, felt her moving closer toward me. Goose bumps rose along my arms and my neck tingled as I realized how near the edge I was. How easy it would be for her to push me off, if she wanted to. If she were that resentful.

  It was a lunatic idea and I didn’t really think she had any intention of harming me, but because the thought crossed my mind, I jumped when I felt her hand land on my shoulder.

  I giggled nervously and pivoted toward her, wishing I had something solid to lean up against for no other reason but to steady the dizzy buzz of adrenaline.

  “You’re right,” she repeated, her expression kind despite the hardness in her eyes. “And I’ve already come to the same conclusion. I have to be true to myself, once and for all. No more running away, no matter how scared I am. Time to ‘grow up,’ as you said. Time to be strong.”

  Her speech gathered conviction as it went on, each new phrase sounding more resilient than the one before. I wanted to be proud and assured with her,
but the more her confidence grew, the more dread seeped into my veins, and I wasn’t sure if it was me being silly or insightful so I tried not to jump to conclusions.

  Then she landed at her finale. “Which means I’ve got to fight for what I want.”

  With those words, I didn’t have to jump; I just had to take the next step. “And you want Reeve.” It wasn’t a question. I knew the answer as sure as I knew anything.

  “I do,” she affirmed. “Maybe there’s no future for us.” No future for us. It echoed in my head. “We have our issues – I won’t lie about that. You’ve heard some of it. He’s nearly impossible. Well, you know him now. He’s controlling and obstinate and difficult.”

  “Yeah. He’s all those things, all right.” My words sounded clipped, purposefully so. I had to draw back. Had to close myself off. Had to put up my guard. Because there was no way I’d be able to take her on if I let myself be compassionate.

  And I would take her on. I was already preparing my attack. My only hesitation was in trying to figure out – did she really not know that I belonged to him? Or was her ignorance an act? If it was an act, did she think her hold on me was so strong that I’d quietly step out of the way just because she’d asked?

  If she did believe that, I couldn’t blame her. She was almost right. She did own me like that. Just, he owned me like that now, too.

  “I love him,” she said, sounding like she was a million miles away despite her bold declaration. “Love counts for something, doesn’t it?”

  “I wouldn’t be here if it didn’t.” My smile was genuine. “You know that’s why I came for you, right? Because I love you?” I hoped she truly believed that before I told her the rest – that I loved Reeve too. That he loved me as well.

  “Yes. I do.” She paused, and I was about to give my thoughts on the subject when she continued. “Reeve told me he still loves me, too, you know. So I think we might have a real chance.”

  I hadn’t heard her right. I couldn’t have. “He told you he still loves you?”

  “Yes. Last night.” In that angel-like way of hers, she beamed.

  She might as well have pushed me off the edge because I began to free-fall. Emotionally, anyway. I was still standing in the same place, my feet planted solidly on the roof, but inside, my heart sank like it was on an elevator, descending slowly and steadily, falling with no end in sight.

  “What else did he say?” I didn’t know how I’d managed the question, but I heard it, the words circling back to my ears, detached as if someone else had asked it, and I thought briefly how fitting it was that my voice had survived this crash. It was the most recognizable part of me, anyway. I could return to LA, to my life, to my job, and, as long as I could still say my voice-over lines on the set of my show, no one would ever know how completely I’d been destroyed.

  This. This was why I never let myself trust.

  “He didn’t say a lot.” Amber’s image blurred in front of me. “Just, he apologized. And said he’d changed – which is probably a good thing. Maybe he won’t try to keep me locked up this time.” She laughed.

  When I didn’t join her in her amusement, she sobered. “Anyway. That’s when he said he still loved me. I know love isn’t everything, but it’s more than I’ve tried to build a life on before. So I’m hopeful. It’s the first time I’ve been hopeful in a really long time.”

  “That makes me really happy for you, Amber.” It wasn’t a lie, exactly. I did feel happy for her in some strange part of me that could separate us. Separate her man from mine. That part of me was as hopeful as she was. That part of me was so excited and touched that it didn’t seem odd that my eyes were watering.

  Even though it wasn’t that part of me that had the tears.

  “You deserve it.” I forced a smile.

  She met it with a modest smile of her own. “I don’t know that I’d go that far.”

  “No. You do. Everyone deserves to have hope.” Even me.

  And right now, my hope was that Amber was lying.

  CHAPTER 12

  After helping Amber back inside and down from the attic, I made some vague excuse to leave her and search for Reeve.

  “He’s out with the Callahans,” Parker, the stable manager, told me when I found him out in the shed, putting gas in an ATV. “They’re branding the calves up at the cowshed in the east pasture.”

  The doors of the shed were propped open so I squinted out over the property and pointed toward one of the trails. “That one? The one on the north side of the house?”

  “Yep.”

  I was already heading out when he shouted after me, “It’s a little more than a mile out there. If you want to give me fifteen or so to finish up, I can drive you.”

  “In fifteen minutes I’ll already be there.” I didn’t wait for his response, half afraid he’d try to talk me out of going alone. It was already a bad idea to talk to Reeve about this while he was trying to work. At least, I could keep Parker out of it.

  And maybe the walk would cool my head a bit.

  It didn’t. In fact, if anything, it stirred me up more. There were too many layers of emotions within me, and when I was able to come to terms with one, I’d lift it up to find another, more complicated layer in its place. And there didn’t seem any way to organize them all.

  If I started at the beginning, it would be with Amber. After all these years, there was still a bond between her and me. For that reason, I wanted to be able to give her what she wanted. But did that have to be Reeve? She’d left him. She’d said good-bye, and it didn’t matter if she’d gone because she was wrong for him or because she was scared or if she regretted it. She was gone when I’d found him. He was fair game. What’s more, he’d chosen me, and even though I was frightened, too, I was ready to be his.

  Unless he’d lied to me. Unless he’d led me on.

  Unless he’d chosen Amber, too.

  He hadn’t ever told me what he’d said to her at dinner. Only what he would have said had I stayed. Had he dodged because he hadn’t wanted me to know what had really occurred? Could he have told her he still loved her – because he didn’t want to hurt her or because he meant it – and then spent the night in my bed?

  However hard I tried to stay away from that possibility, it kept circling back to face me. It bullied and chased all other conclusions until it was the only one in my head, and by the time I’d made the mile trek to the east pasture, it inhabited me so completely that I felt like a stranger in my skin. A stranger filled with rage.

  I’d only been to the east part of the ranch once before. Reeve had taken me on a horseback ride that had led past the cowshed and the grassy fields that surrounded it. The pasture had been quiet that day, the air filled with the pleasant aroma of wildflowers, with only a few cattle moseying around.

  Today it was filled with commotion and cowboys, and the scent of smoke and burning hide was so strong it made my eyes water. The cattle had been gathered into the corral, where they bellowed and snorted as men on horseback rode through the herd, disrupting their formation to round up the calves. Outside the pen, a fire blazed in a large pit. Surrounding the pit were several branding stations, each made up of a dozen or so men and women.

  As I pushed through the crowd looking for Reeve, a woman opened up the gate and a horseback rider emerged, dragging a calf behind him with a rope. He pulled the animal toward me and I scurried backward trying to get out of his way, but crashed into a woman who gave me a spiteful look before brushing past me. I stepped to the side and bumped into someone’s elbow so forcefully it knocked the air from my lungs and sent me tripping into the circle of ranch hands that had gathered to pin the animal down. I pitched forward, tumbling toward the end of a hot iron when two strong hands dug into my upper arms and pulled me back.

  “Jesus, Emily,” Reeve said, after he’d tugged me a safe distance from the branding station. “What the fuck are you doing out here? Are you trying to get yourself seriously hurt?”

  I blinked, too stunn
ed to speak.

  Reeve didn’t wait for an answer, clutching me to his chest. “It’s okay,” he said, and it sounded like he was trying to calm himself as much as me. “Just… breathe. Take a few deep breaths. You’re okay.”

  I did as he said, staring transfixed at the scene Reeve had rescued me from. One woman used a piercing gun to tag the calf’s ear while another man brought his knife toward the animal’s scrotum. Then came the iron. I closed my eyes tightly, not wanting to see any more, but on the back of my lids I saw the red blaze of the brand coming toward me and the fiery end was a V instead of a K and even though I knew that Amber’s tattoo hadn’t been applied in that manner, it seemed just as vile.

  I turned my head into Reeve, as if that would chase the frightening image away.

  “Blue Eyes.” He smoothed his hand over my hair, attempting to soothe me.

  But the sound of his voice brought me back to reality, and with a jolt I remembered why I’d come out here in the first place.

  I pushed away abruptly and hugged my arms around myself.

  “What’s wrong?” His voice was edged with concern that was probably left over from the near accident he’d rescued me from.

  My adrenaline was still spiked as well, and so instead of starting the conversation in a rational manner like I should have, I pounced. “Do you still love Amber?”

  “Excuse me?”

  He’d heard me. I was sure of it.

  We were face-to-face, far enough away from everyone else that it was unlikely that anything more than a few snatches of conversation could be overheard, and yet we were not at all in private. His warning was silent, conveyed simply in the arch of his brow, the reminder that there were rules and regulations I was meant to adhere to. Picking a fight in public was definitely not on the approved list of behaviors.

  And I didn’t give a flying fuck.

  I repeated my question, speaking each word slowly and succinctly. “Do you still love Amber?”

  “Do you?” His words were filled with as much accusation as mine had been.