I didn’t fight my smile. This was rare Kenny. Rambling, flustered, and a little pissed off. “So high on home repairs, you turned the water off again under the sink, only it started leaking?”
She brushed the back of her wrist across her forehead. “That’s about right. I noticed a small drip after I turned it back on last weekend, but I watched a video and it said to just tighten it. That worked, or so I thought.”
“Sounds like you need to repair the stem.”
“I haven’t watched those videos yet.” She crossed her arms. “I suppose that’s another trip to the hardware store.”
A tiny tendril of guilt snaked through my mind. I’d been sulking because she was being superwoman or some shit. Yet I was still the first one she ran to—because we were friends. I was wasting what time I had left in Coal Haven avoiding her. “I can run and get them. Then I’ll walk you through rebuilding the shut-off valve.”
“Where are the boys?”
“Grandma Gin took them to the park. I think she feels bad for being sick so long, like she has to earn her money.”
“That sounds like her.”
“Hey, uh…” My throat worked over my question. Why was it hard to ask her? A part of my brain suggested this was the reason I hadn’t come to see Kenny. “I’ve been messaging Laney since I’ve been back. Any chance you can babysit tomorrow night?”
She blinked at me, her normally expressive dark brown eyes unreadable.
“I’ll pay,” I rushed to add. Was the awkwardness my imagination? Was it that I was meeting Laney and neither Kenny nor I knew what to think of that? Or was it that I didn’t want to date anyone and I didn’t want to uncover the reason why? I was a single twenty-seven-year-old man. I should be wanting to get laid as much as possible, by as many women as possible. Yet, there was only one woman on my mind.
“No. Oh, no. Yeah, I can do it. I can even stay overnight, you know, so you don’t have to worry about curfew like when you were a teen.” She leaned in, her smile not like her normal ones that brightened the whole room. “And you don’t need to pay me.”
“Yeah. Okay. I don’t think I’ll be overnighting anywhere, but it’d be nice not to watch the clock.” She nodded like it made sense. I nodded like it made sense. Nothing about her watching my kids while I was out with another woman made sense. “Well, I’ll go grab the stem kits. We might as well replace both.”
Her smile was stuck in place. “Sure. I’ll keep sopping up water.” She rolled her eyes. “It actually wasn’t that bad. I panicked, sorry.”
“Don’t be. Happy to help.” Happy to be here. With her.
“I’m happy you’re helping too.”
I was happy to forget the stilted babysitting talk. I fled the bathroom. I waited until I was parked in front of the hardware store to let Laney know we were on for tomorrow night. My fingers stalled over the buttons, and I swallowed hard.
I messaged Grandma Gin first to let her know that I wasn’t home and why. Then I tapped out Tomorrow night, Rattler’s? to Laney and hit send.
I stared at our message history for a moment before I tucked the phone away as if the last few minutes had never happened and climbed out of the truck. I didn’t know what would come from going out with Laney. What was she looking for? Was I only looking to gauge her interest in my grandparents’ place?
Right now, I wanted to prove that the erection I’d fought away in Kenny’s bathroom was only because I hadn’t gotten laid in a while and not because I found my best friend’s widow incredibly sexy.
Chapter 6
Kennedy
* * *
I dug through my purse, looking for a stray Tums. I’d never needed them before, but I’d picked them up this morning to fight the random stomachaches I’d been getting the last twenty-four hours.
Was I suddenly allergic to dairy or wheat? Was something about Lyme disease still affecting me? Was it stress? I started my new job in a little over a week. I was at the same school, but my role would be different. The kids would know me even if I’d never worked with them in their classrooms before.
That must be it. The summer job and how critical it would be to getting a full-time spot.
Liam’s house loomed over me. He was in there. Waiting for me so he could go on a date. With Laney Granger.
Did she know I was watching his kids so she could go out with him?
Did it matter?
I got out, hitched my overnight bag over my shoulder, and went inside. Eli was racing a fire truck against Owen’s police car across the floor. Nimbly stepping over the imaginary racetrack after getting hugs from them, I went to the living room. I was deciding between sitting on the couch or hovering like this was my first time at the house when Liam emerged from the hallway.
My breath whooshed out. His jeans were nicer than what he usually wore. Expertly faded in all the right spots. His long-sleeved dark blue shirt hugged his body and made his shoulders look wider. He’d styled his hair so most of it was brushed off his forehead except for one stubborn lock. And he smelled good. Like sunshine breaking through a dark forest.
“Kenny.” His arms hung loosely at his sides, like he was facing a reckoning. “Thanks. You know. For coming.”
I forced a bright smile, like I had yesterday when he’d asked about tonight. “Of course. What are friends for?”
He was my friend, but that didn’t mean I was the only person in his life. I couldn’t be the girl he helped all the time while sacrificing his own dating life.
I also had to remind myself to breathe again. Air in. Air out. He just…looked really good. He’d been in a tux at my wedding as Derek’s best man, but other than joking that I’d done the impossible and gotten Liam into a tux, I hadn’t dwelled on it.
I was dwelling now.
Liam nodded. I nodded.
He went to run a hand through his hair and stopped. He dropped his arm. “You sure it’s okay that I don’t know how long I’ll be out?”
Neither of us mentioned Laney’s reputation after Derek had broken up with her. She’d chewed through guys, making sure she’d earned all the small-town gossip. I had no idea what she was like now. All I knew was that if I were on a date with Liam tonight, I wouldn’t want to be home by eleven.
“It’s fine.” I lifted my gym bag that had never seen the inside of a gym. “I’m prepared.”
“Okay. I’ll say good night to the boys.” His expression flickered, but before it settled on an emotion I could identify, he disappeared into the kitchen.
I stood in my spot as he gave the kids hugs and went out the door. I gazed out the window as he drove away.
Owen popped his head into the living room. “Can I have a snack?”
His question got me to move my legs. “Yes. Then you two can help me make muffins for breakfast.”
“You’re staying over again?”
Activity in the kitchen stopped and then Eli appeared next to Owen. “Is Dad going to Williston?”
It took me a moment to understand what he asked. “No. He’s…out. Didn’t he tell you?”
Owen shrugged. Liam could’ve told them twenty times, but they were five and hadn’t cared until now.
But an explanation didn’t easily come to my lips. “I said I wanted to stay over again. Your dad is going out with…a friend.” I winced, grateful for no other witnesses.
“Holden?” Owen asked.
“No,” I said grimly, wanting this discussion over. It wasn’t my place to talk to them about Liam’s dating life. “What do you have for snacks?”
I shamelessly distracted them with food, baking, and bath time. But when those activities were done, I was again bombarded with the reality of why Liam wasn’t home yet.
After the first two years of their lives, when Payton had moved them all over Williston, leaving them with friends and acquaintances, they thrived on a predictable routine.
Eli melted down at the bottom of the stairs. I’d been trying to herd them up the stairs for an hour. Owen ran through
the house like I’d given him 5 Hour Energy instead of milk for supper.
Something was going on. I had slept over before, but that was when Liam was working. Their dad was home, but he wasn’t home. “Would you feel better if you slept in your dad’s bed tonight?”
Eli sniffled and rubbed his eyes. Both boys nodded.
“I’ll lie with you until you go to sleep.”
It didn’t take more than one story before both kids were asleep. I lay in the dark and stared at the ceiling. I was on top of the comforter, a boy on each side under the blankets, but Liam’s scent surrounded me. It was more delicate than his freshly showered smell, but it soaked into my clothes.
What was he doing right now?
Had he and Laney kissed yet?
Heat blazed in my belly. Jealousy?
No. I was lonely.
I rolled up so abruptly, I worried I’d awakened the kids. They shifted but stayed asleep.
I crawled off the end, wishing Liam’s scent stayed in the bed. In the guest room, I undressed down to my underwear and threw on my nightshirt. I kept a pair of sweats on the nightstand in case the kids woke up in the night.
I got between the covers, which smelled less of Liam and his aftershave. I closed my eyes, but they popped back open. I flipped to my back. Restless. Unsatisfied. Needy.
Questions about Liam’s night tried to rise in my mind, but I quashed them. They were replaced with the comment my sister had made about dating.
I had told her I wasn’t ready. But I was in bed wishing I was on a date instead. My mind rebelled, but my body thought it was a fine idea. Heat pooled between my legs like it’d been doing so often lately. The more active I was, the more my body continued to remind me that I was a mature woman who got turned on. Who thought about sex. Who wondered what it would be like to sleep with someone other than—
I chewed on my lip. The first time I’d thought that, it’d felt scandalous. Sacrilegious. Like I was a cheater. Each time after only made it easier to ponder.
I shook my head, my hair brushing against the pillow. I could dwell on sex as much as I wanted in my own house. This was not the place.
But somehow it was easier here. I wasn’t in my own bed. I wasn’t in the home I’d shared with my husband. Here it was easier to think about what I felt and what it meant—and not have the answers. For once the answers didn’t depend on someone else. They depended on me.
Liam
* * *
Laney’s bare leg brushed mine again as she tilted on her barstool, closer to me. “And then Papa says that he went and called them. Canceled everything without consulting me.” She rolled her eyes and took a pull of her White Claw.
“Pissed you off?”
“Fuck, yeah. Partnering with a genetics company for our seed bulls would ease a lot of expenses, and we could charge so much more a head.”
Well, that finally answered my question. If she was worried about the finances of her family’s ranch, then she wasn’t looking to buy more land or land and a house.
We’d been here for hours. I didn’t think I could feel my ass anymore, but I couldn’t bring myself to get up. Then we’d have to decide. Did I cut Laney loose and explain to her, and somehow to myself, that even though I hadn’t been laid in months, jacking off in the shower like it was part of my routine after shaving, I wasn’t interested in doing anything more than knuckle bumping her and going our separate ways?
The first part of the night had been safe territory. My story after graduation. She’d heard it differently from her parents, which was probably how the rumors blew through Coal Haven. I’d knocked Payton up, fucked my way through Williston while she was pregnant, and then she got sick of my shit and dumped the kids on my doorstep. Accurate, except for reversing our roles up to the part where she couldn’t relinquish her rights fast enough once she’d realized I wasn’t her free ride.
Laney said she’d moved to Texas and gone to college for marketing. She didn’t say that she moved nearly as far away from her family as she could without jumping oceans. She also didn’t comment on what she’d done after school. And there was one glaring detail I’d noticed about her, but if she wasn’t bringing it up, neither was I.
She actually didn’t talk about herself that much. She was a good listener, and that wasn’t a trait I’d remembered.
She rested her elbow on the table, her body angled toward mine. “Sorry to hear about your grandpa.”
“Didn’t think I’d hear a Granger say that.”
She flashed a grin. “Ma isn’t nice to anyone. Don’t take it personally. They’ve tried to hire on help, but she’s not the type to be patient and teach someone how to do things her way. She just unleashes hell and storms away.” Her mouth flattened. “Yet she’s surprised at what happened. Go figure.”
“How’s Kane doing?” I asked about her brother with as much sincerity as possible. Kane was a couple years older than me. Good at everything. Football. Women. Ranching. The whole town had been stunned to learn that he’d shot himself. Laney’s parents would’ve preferred no one had learned what had happened, but between the ambulance, a small-town ER, and the Life Flight helicopter landing in the middle of the highway, it would’ve been impossible to keep it a secret.
“He’s alive. Beyond that, anything else is a bonus, I guess, right?” She couldn’t hide the stress wavering under her expression. “I mean, it was a miracle the bullet didn’t penetrate his skull, but I guess it happens. Low caliber whatever. Anyway, he’s got lingering…issues. He wants to do something besides ranching. I’ll see to it he gets where he needs to be.”
“How are you doing?”
Her quiet chuckle was full of scorn and resignation. “I’ll tell you a secret.” She tapped the bar between us. “And I’m only telling you because you and Derek were ride or die and he trusted you with everything.” When I nodded, she licked her lips and glanced around. “If my life had been twenty-four-karat gold in Texas, I wouldn’t have come home. But when Ma called to tell me about Kane, I dropped everything. It was then that I realized how little I really had. Ugh.” She flicked the tab on her can. “I wish this was stronger than pond water.”
“I’m sorry.” The leg brush, the way she was sitting…I had worried she was hitting on me. But they hadn’t been practiced calls for attention. She sounded like she wanted someone to talk to. I had Kenny. Who did she have?
“Well, I brought it on myself, so…”
“You know, when you first asked me out, I wasn’t sure why. You were usually irritated that I took your time with Derek.”
She put her head in her hand and swiveled close to me. “You thought I wanted to fuck you?”
Her purr should’ve gone straight to my groin. She was in tight white bottoms that stopped below her knees to show off defined calves. Her pink top fit her slender body and accentuated her breasts without showing one inch of cleavage.
“Honestly? I am quite a catch.” I cocked a brow. She laughed, an easy sound that reassured me that she had been looking to mine an old acquaintance for more, but not to the point where clothes came off. “But I think you and I both want an ally in a town that seems to judge us harder than anyone else.”
She snorted softly and straightened on her stool. “You win the lottery for being my only friend. Ever think that would’ve happened?”
She didn’t clarify that I was her only friend in town. What had happened to her in Texas? Or had she been surrounded by fake people, and, when tragedy struck, they’d scattered?
“A lot has happened since we graduated that I wouldn’t have imagined.”
“Yeah,” she said quietly. “You and me both.”
Our hands weren’t close together, but I stretched a pinky out and aimed it toward her left ring finger. A fading tan line circled the digit. “That bad?”
She held her hand out as if the ring were on it. She closed it into a fist and glanced around, like she was worried someone had noticed. “It wasn’t as good as I thought.”
&nb
sp; Or she wouldn’t be here alone.
Beckoning the bartender, she asked, “You want to stay and talk and have another? I really don’t want to go home yet.”
I wanted to go home. Kenny was there. The kids were probably in bed. We could actually talk without being interrupted with arguments or show-and-tells.
“I’ll have one more.” Then I was leaving. Would Kenny still sleep over or head home? It’d be fun to have her there in the morning. Chat while I was making breakfast. Play with the kids together. Try out the chalk paint and see if I could get more items together for the farmers market.
“Is your sitter old enough to drive, or is your grandma watching them?”
“Kenny’s staying over.”
Laney stared at me. “Kennedy?”
I nodded.
“Staying at your house?”
I nodded again.
“Does she know you’re out with me?”
“Why would she care?” I was asking more to see what Laney thought about Kenny all these years later.
“Because I dumped my soda all over her new winter jacket, which was actually an accident, but no one believed it. I backpack whacked her at least once; that wasn’t completely an accident. And I told her that Derek likes girls with brains, not girls who can’t decide which shoe to tie first without a man to tell them.”
“Shit, Laney. You said that?” Kenny hadn’t said a thing, but that was so her. Derek hadn’t hated Laney, and Kenny wouldn’t interfere with that. I hated that she might not have mentioned it because she believed what was said.
She cocked her head. “That was probably the tamest. I was seventeen and had just been dumped by the guy I’d been dating since before I got my period. Think I was a little pissed?” A new White Claw was delivered. She spun the can in a slow circle. “How’s she doing?”
“Better.”
“Papa said she fell off the face of the earth for a while. Must’ve been hard.”
I couldn’t get past my protectiveness toward Kenny. I wouldn’t be the one spilling her business. “Well, I think she starts with tying her right shoe now, so…”
Make Me Whole: Oil Barrons, Book 1 Page 8