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“Yourgirlfriendwon’t stick around, Jake. You didn’t let your need for payback die with Stanton when it could have. You won’t be able to use Rex’s advances toward Caroline as an excuse with Paisley. It won’t matter anymore that he took out the restraining order against your dad, or that Rex planted the evidence that sent your old man to prison for accepting that gun shipment. As soon as Rex Santon was six feet under, the crap you dug up on him over the years became moot.”
I know Trig is right, at the very least about Stanton. I never quite got the dirtbag where I wanted him. Any patience I had I used up biding the years, waiting to put the final nail in his coffin. I won’t use Rex’s transgressions against Cary. Not when Cary suffered at his father’s hands and if it means making Holly miserable in the process.
I actually mulled over the offer Walsh made to Trig. He could buy me out with the proceeds. But I’ve dicked my buddy around, saying that I want my investment back first. He’s got the cash. We all do. It’s never been an issue before now and Trig has every right to lose his temper with me. Yet the guy is dead calm, always. It must’ve been his tours overseas that made it so that it takes a lot to throw Trig off. He doesn’t get mad. Although I know the real reason behind the dog on his lap is that Trig suffers from PTSD. I haven’t seen a bruise on Kimber in a while. She deserves the best Trig can offer her.
And I’m standing in the way.
If Trig accepts the deal with Walsh on my terms, the money still has to get laundered through Sweet Caroline’s. He can’t do that without me.
So how long am I going to hold him over a barrel, and if the stress breaks Trig before I relent, what is the likelihood Kimber becomes the victim? He’d never do anything while he was awake. But over the years, his nightmares from stress have caused Kimber pain.
The night I bolted from the wedding, I decided I wasn’t following the path I was on any longer. But then I met Paisley and everything changed.
I don’t answer Trig’s rhetorical questions. We’re beating a dead horse and have nothing left to say to one another. He’s made his position about conning any more of Brighton’s elite, as well as his intention to take the buy-out, clear. He and his pooch leave without a backward glance. I stick my thumb and forefingers into my eye sockets, trying to relieve a tension headache.
I really hate this club, and almost every single life choice I’ve made up until this point. I’m ready to get the hell away from the club the way I used to, but Kelsey needs backup. Not being able to head for the hills whenever I want anymore makes my skin crawl. Unless Paisley is here to soothe me. At home, I sit at my drum set. Instead of my sticks flying wildly through the air, I find myself tapping out the steadier beats of old love songs.
Oneshewrote forher,and we practiced for hours until we played them by heart in front of audiences that came to hear them. Just because it happened to stroke my ego on the occasion that we massaged the perfect tune into what could’ve been a chart-topping hit, doesn’t mean a damn thing. I’ve rarely played them in a decade. The past is better left behind me, right where it belongs.
Those songs are melancholy no matter the pacing. However, the familiarity of the lyrics I hear carrying through in my mind strikes my soul differently nowadays. They’re not his loving words written about her anymore. I’m no longer focused on gaining his wife’s attention or seeing the glowing pride on her face when we exited the stage.
What I want is to see Paisley walking through the entrance of Sweet Caroline’s with that expression. The lyrics have become my poetry and the way my sticks interpret them has changed the murmured song into one I’m singing for someone else now.
Someone who is coming to mean far more to me than his wife ever did when she was alive.
A woman who, if I’m not careful, could lay waste to the rest of my life.
As if I’ve conjured her out of nowhere, my cell rings and Paisley’s number flashes across the screen. “Corazón,” I croak with a lump in my throat.
“Would you mind if I didn’t drop in at the club tonight?” I hear her reluctance to see me as loud as I heard her shallow pants from behind the foggy glass door.
She did it. Paisley used the shower massage. She let me listen to her get herself off and as a reward for exposing herself, I tossed my bathrobe over the stall. Flushed, she pulled the collar up to her chin, glancing everywhere but at my face until she saw how hard she’d made me. Shocked—I’m not sure why. Paisley knows her hot little body turns me the fuck on—that was the last time Paisley met my eyes until I kissed her goodbye. Even then, she was shier than usual.
So I’m not certain what made me conclude Pais wouldn’t try backing out of seeing me.
I made her uncomfortable. Pushed too far. She was set to marry a guy Trig called the gold standard of husbandship. A man I have to play nice with when we attend the upcoming benefit that is so important to Paisley.
And what am I to her? The shithead who doesn’t care that he insisted she do something dirty as fuck. I gripped my cock and jerked off while she touched herself, too. Hot as fuck, that level of degradation wouldn’t have crossed her ex-fiancé’s mind.
She’s never going to believe she’s anything to you but a pawn.
“It’s that Greer asked me if we could stop at Baked Beans after yoga.” Paisley snags my attention, bringing me back to the present.
“That’s fine.” I blow out a deep breath.
I don’t want Paisley’s lame excuse. This call is telltale of her priorities. Seeing her friend is more important.
Plus, I hurt her feelings. She should be able to hurt mine. That’s how this relationship works, right?
I clear my throat again.
“Hey,” she coos. “Are you feeling okay?”
“It’s spring allergies. Maybe a cold. You’re sort of a germaphobe so you can take the week off.”
“The week off of what?”
“Me.”
