Chapter 18
Without the Cannons around, things were back to normal between Rori and Luke. Thank God! Rori had nearly started to believe that she’d imagined the last two weeks. But with Mike working and Kris golfing with her boyfriend, Rori and Luke had a beautiful day all to themselves.
He drove her about an hour out of town, not giving her a hint as to where they were going until the road signs made it clear that they were headed somewhere called Antelope Island. The area was green and lush, surrounded by the stinky lake the city was named for. They finally stopped in front of a horse ranch of sorts where two horses were brought out to them and they’d been left to explore the island.
Rori couldn’t have asked for a more perfect afternoon. Beautiful views, exposure to the local fauna and exotic animals, including a herd of buffalo. This was the Luke she had agreed to marry, not some guy who hid in his basement and played video games like Kris had claimed.
As they crested one of the lower ridges, Luke gestured toward the lake. “Somewhere out there is a big sculpture thing,” he said. “It’s called the Spiral Jetty. Some dude built it years ago with a tractor. It’s like a snail shell, but bigger.”
Rori hid a smile, wondering if anyone had ever described any of her work with such ineloquence.
“We could find it, if you want,” he added. “I’m sure the guys at the ranch know how to get there.”
“That would be fun,” she said, curious now. “But not if it cuts into our time here. This is beautiful, Luke.”
“I know, right?” He leaned back in his saddle, bringing his right foot up to lay across the shoulder of his horse. “Haven’t been here in a while. I used to come here with the Cannons.”
Of course he had. And while Rori was sure that he had good memories and all, she really didn’t want to talk about his neighbors.
“You handle a horse quite well,” she said, pleased to have him surprise her yet again.
He grinned her way. “Yeah. There used to be a lot of farm land around my neighborhood when I was growing up and people had horses. I didn’t ride all the time, but I learned how to take care of a horse. It was way fun.”
“Sounds like a good way to grow up,” she said, her tone diplomatic. She wasn’t ready to talk about where they would live. The day was going much too well for them to interrupt it with a disagreement. He wanted to live here. By the Cannons. Rori could feel it. She also knew that if she lived two doors down from the Cannons, she would slowly go insane.
“Totally,” he agreed, and just when she thought he might take the discussion further, he added, “We should get pizza on the way home. Best. Food. Ever. I think I could eat it for a week straight.”
“Sure,” she agreed. “I don’t know that I’ve ever had American pizza.”
“What?”
“Pizza, yes,” she amended. “But never while I was in America. I know it is certainly different in Italy, although I would guess the Pizza Hut chains are similar in Europe and I’ve had that as well.”
Luke grimaced. “Italian pizza? That’s like glorified crackers with toppings. For real pizza you need dough, sauce, and cheese upon cheese. Man, I’m totally taking you to The Pie. You need to start out with Grade-A stuff, not franchise crap. Oh, this is going to be epic!”
His enthusiasm got her smiling even as warning flags went off in the back of her mind. Here they were in a picturesque location on a perfect day, leisurely exploring on beautiful horses, and yet he wasn’t making any moves to bring them any closer. In truth, he was talking to her as if she were just another guy and they were just “hanging out,” as Americans like to put it. They were engaged. And while Rori wasn’t expecting the usual frills, she did think that they needed to talk about things a little more substantial than pizza.
Because eating pizza, despite whatever Luke might think, was not “epic.”
Keeping her tone light, Rori tried to push them into more personal territory. “For a guy who seems to like his home so much, you travel a lot. Any reason?”
He shrugged, putting his foot back in the stirrup and urging his horse forward. “I dunno. I guess since I never got to as a kid? My dad was always traveling to all these places for work, and I always wanted to see those places.”
“Did he take pictures for you?” she asked, her horse falling in step with his.
“Nah,” he said with a shrug. “He just said that he was always on site and that it wasn’t interesting, but I thought it was totally cool. He’s an engineer for oil companies, so he’d build these cities, or at least it seemed like it to me. I thought it was awesome.”
“Did he ever go to Thailand?” she asked.
“Nah, but once I started traveling, all of a sudden it became this thing, you know? Once you visit a dozen countries, all of a sudden you want to go to two dozen. And it’s not a huge leap from there to get to fifty countries.”
She nodded, understanding completely. “How many are you at now?”
“Thailand was thirty-nine.” She watched him scowl and knew that wasn’t the end of the story. “I always try to get Mike to go, you know? Him and Kris, but all they do is work. Mike wants to pay off his student loans and Kris is saving up for a down payment on a condo. Twenty percent. Once she gets that, she’ll move downtown so she can spend even more time at her office. That’s the one lame thing about those two. They always put work first. Well, family, then work.”
“Then you,” she finished for him.
His frowned deepened. “Yeah.”
Not exactly the answer Rori had been digging for, which helped explain why she had no idea what to say.
“Don’t they both live rent free?” she asked before she knew the words were even out of her mouth. Might as well finish. “Kris with her parents and Mike with you?”
He nodded.
“So shouldn’t they fine financially?” It was none of her business and completely impolite to ask, but if she and Luke were going to build a life, she needed to understand the dynamics. Mike was living off of his friend but wouldn’t take the time to take a few trips with him? It seemed a little ungrateful.
“Kris is, for sure,” Luke said. “She’s the scholarship queen and the youngest child, so her parents are all into supporting her until she gets married.”
“And Mike?”
“Well, I’m the one who talked him into coming back,” Luke said, a little proudly.
“Back from where?”
“California,” Luke said, as if it should be obvious. “After film school he was hitting some road blocks breaking into the business. Apparently it’s typical for directors to start out in porn. There are tons of producers and the work is never ending, but Mike promised his mom he wouldn’t do stuff like that, so he was a bit out of the loop. He had this plan of doing low-budget indie films to build his credibility, like Christopher Nolan, but no one would bite. Not even for ten grand. I offered to front him, but he said he didn’t want to be produced out of pity—that if no one in the industry had faith in his vision then he didn’t deserve the money, or something like that. So instead he made shorts and stuff until his loans came due and he realized he couldn’t pay up.”
“And that’s when you gave him a free place to land?” Rori filled in.
“Totally. No brainer. It was all weird with him gone. Empty, you know? Everyone missed him, and his mom had these worry lines appearing in her forehead, like her mother’s intuition was on red alert. It was hard to watch, so yeah. I gave him an offer he couldn’t refuse.”
“He takes care of your house and he gets to stay?”
“Well, yeah, and he pays the bills,” Luke added. “Had to throw him a little dignity, but it works out, really. I don’t have to worry about anything, and he gets to throw money at that mountain of debt he made learning to be the next Spielberg. It was like over a hundred grand.”
That raised Rori’s eyebrows. “For film school? He could be a doctor for that much money.”
Luke laughed. “I know, right? But how fun
would that be?”
To some? Very fun. “Is he any good?”
“Dude,” Luke said, leveling a proud gaze her way. “So good. He just needs a break is all. It’s why I forgive him for being such a perfectionist all the time. I guess that’s a quality directors need if they want to be any good.”
“Probably helps,” she said, realizing that they were talking about Mike, not Luke. Not their future. She needed to be better about focusing.
“I know one day he’s going to take off again,” Luke said, looking solemn. “Probably back to California or wherever a film takes him. Then Kris will get her lame condo and write me off.”
“Will you sell the house then?” Rori asked, hoping the question wasn’t coming too soon.
“Sell it? Why would I do that?”
Rori shrugged, keeping casual. Planting a seed. That’s all she needed to do. “Well, if they’re not there, there’s no reason for you to be there, right? You and I can live anywhere we want. In any country we want. Or in multiple countries. You hang around with me for a few years, and you’re definitely going to hit your fifty-country goal.”
To her relief Luke brightened at that. “I so can’t wait for that. It’ll be crazy fun!”
Ah, he was saying “fun” again. That was a good sign for selling the house. “Plus, then you can take the crime scene tape off of your parents’ bed and let someone use that room again.”
His nose scrunched. “You saw that?”
“Yes, I did. I know there’s a story there waiting to be told.”
He shook his head emphatically. “You don’t want to hear it. Trust me!”
“Oh, but I do,” she teased, reaching over and giving his thigh a slap.
He studied her, eyes playful. “I warn you. It ain’t pretty.”
“Most good stories aren’t,” she countered, and when he laughed she knew she had him. They’d been serious long enough. It was time to abandon her ploy for intimacy and do what Luke did best: have a little fun.
Chapter 19
Rori may not have had all the answers she wanted by the time she and Luke pulled onto his street close to eleven that night, but she had learned a couple of things she hadn’t been expecting.
First, misbehaving was as fun as it appeared to be. Second, American pizza was obscenely fattening even as it was insubstantial. You could eat a pile of it and still crave more. Third, rootbeer had its place in the world of food. At first Rori had thought it tasted like carbonated medicine when Luke made her try it. But when taken as a chaser to copious amounts of cheese and dough, rootbeer became sweet and oddly palatable.
Rori had eaten several thousand calories that night, but she couldn’t begrudge the experience. After all, she would forever associate the experience with Luke, whereas before American food always soured in her mouth as she thought of her dad. Until now, her biological father had tainted everything else American in her mind with his shadow.
No more. She had a new tour guide to America, and his name was Luke Foster—a guy who never made life hard when it could be easy. Easy come, easy go, that was how Luke lived. One moment he greedily packing up the leftovers to take home, and the next he was handing his precious pizza over to two poor college kids sitting by the entrance who only been able to afford drinks. When or how Luke had noticed their plight, Rori wasn’t sure. She only knew that their faces had lit up at the thought of eating, and somehow Luke had known they were hungry.
So, yes, they may not have discussed where they would like to live or what time of year they would like to get married, but Rori did know that she was currently attached to a fundamentally good man. Behavior like his didn’t pop up overnight once a person came into money. Kindness was bred into a person, and somewhere along the line it had been bred into Luke.
So what if he didn’t reach for her hand while they ate, or that he never asked questions about her? He was making her lead every step of the way, which she wasn’t used to, but it would certainly make things easier. It gave them less to argue about.
That’s what Rori told herself even as she sensed that something was very off. After the day they’d had, a man in Luke’s position should be trying to lure her into bed, not challenging her to a battle of Mario Cart. Apparently Luke became single minded once the sun went down, if the past two days were evidence. Darkness outside meant video games inside in his mind. And who was she to judge? Before yesterday she had never jumped on a tramp. Today she would play her first video game. It seemed unfair to judge Luke’s passion without trying it herself.
“You awake?” Luke asked, giving her arm a pat in the dark car. “We’re almost home.”
Home. She liked the sound of that, even if she didn’t like the location. “Yes, I’m awake.”
“I don’t know how your jet lag is doing, but—What the hell?” he spat, then slammed on the gas.
“Luke?” Rori asked, tensing in her seat and gripping the door. “What’s going on?”
He turned into his own driveway even as he kept his eyes on a black SUV in the Cannon’s driveway. Whoever it belonged to, Rori was sure that Luke wasn’t a fan.
“Stay here,” he snapped, and burst from the car.
Yeah, right. Like that was going to happen. This was the first time Rori had seen Luke’s temper and she needed to know what had set him off.
Luke covered the distance between the two houses with surprising speed and pushed through the Cannon’s front door before Rori was even out of his driveway. A heart beat later, she heard Luke yelling.
Luke—puppy dog, happy-go-lucky Luke—yelling.
That got her feet moving a little quicker. Even still, she wasn’t half way to the house when Mike sprinted past her and straight into his parents’ house.
“Out!” an authoritative female voice yelled. “No fighting in my house, boys.”
Rori was guessing that was Mrs. Cannon. It took only a few moments for her orders to be obeyed when a man Rori had never seen before launched out of the front door and fell back onto the lawn. Unlike anyone else Rori had met in Luke’s hometown, the man reeked of money. Lawyer money, by her guess. But if the other guy was a lawyer, Luke didn’t seem worried about litigation when he barged out of the house after him.
“You are not welcome here!” he yelled.
“Not your house, not your call,” the other guy said smugly. Luke lunged, and Mike stepped in and held him back.
“I had the same reaction at first,” Mike said to Luke as Kris came to their side in the doorway. “But Kris can date who she wants. It’s her life.”
“Date?” Luke roared. “Are you kidding me?” He turned to Kris like a Judas.
The other guy laughed. “Yeah, Kris thought it best not to tell you at your party. She thought it might put a damper on the evening.”
Luke lunged again, harder this time. Mike held on harder.
“Go ahead,” the man taunted. “Hit me, Foster. I’ll sue your ass for everything.”
Americans and their lawsuits. Rori fought the urge to roll her eyes.
Kris stepped past Mike and Luke and walked to the other man on the lawn. “Can we call it a night, Caleb? I think Luke and I need to have a little chat.”
“Yeah,” Caleb said, making a point to press himself against her as he kissed her goodnight. “You do that. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Rori watched Caleb’s arrogant stroll to the SUV and noted that it wasn’t until the car was half way down the street that Mike let go of Luke. Rori could have never imagined the level of venom in Luke’s eyes as he looked at Kris and snapped, “How long?”
“Two weeks,” she said without apology. “He’s different now, Luke. We can’t judge someone forever based on what they did when they were kids.”
“Kids?” Luke scoffed. “You say that like he wasn’t eighteen years old at the time. People don’t change that much in a few years, Kris. No way you’re dating him. Not on my watch!”
Kris kept her cool. “No offense, Luke, but it’s not your call.”
/> “Like hell it isn’t! He’s only dating you to piss me and Mike off. Banging you is the best way to add insult to years of injury, right?”
Kris’s cool disappeared in an instant. “Fuck you, Luke.”
“Yeah? Fine. And I guess I’ll leave fucking you up to Caleb,” Luke said, storming back toward his house and calling over his shoulder. “By the way, you missed a button.”
Rori glanced back at Kris before following after Luke and saw that he was right. The center button of her blouse was unbuttoned, a fact that Mike didn’t seem all that happy with. Nor did Mrs. Cannon when she appeared on the porch in her pajamas.
Rori was obviously missing the full story. The macho show she’d just witnessed had nothing to do with any jealousy Luke might have had for Kris dating someone, and everything to do with the man she was dating. There was clearly history here, and Rori was out of the loop.
But that didn’t answer the question as to why was Kris dating a guy who was very clearly a jerk.
“I need to throw something—hit something,” Luke said, charging through his front door.
“How about talking?” Rori offered. “Who is Caleb?”
He spun on her, making her flinch. “Caleb? He’s an unrepentant asshole, that’s what he is! He teased me all the way through school and made sure every other jock did the same. If it weren’t for him I would have been on the varsity basketball team, but nooo. He had to get me kicked off of every team.”
“Oh, c’mon,” Kris said, appearing in the doorway. “It’s not like you didn’t make it easy for him.”
“Not helping,” Mike warned, stepping in front of her and looking Luke in the eye. “Look, man, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you but I figured it wasn’t my place.”
Luke stabbed a finger at him. “I’ll deal with you later.”
“Excuse me?” Kris said, stepping forward. “You’re going to ‘deal’ with my brother because he respected my wishes to tell you about Caleb myself?”
Mr Imperfect Page 9