Page 5

Chapter Four

She’d left the table wide open, and I’d finished the game in two shots.

“Dammit, Maddie! Do you know how much money I just lost?” Louie cried out.

“That’s on you,” Ruby shouted back at the man.

I gently took the pool cue out of Maddie’s hand and put hers and mine up in the cue rack on the wall.

“It’s early, only eight o’clock,” I said to her softly. “Your house or mine?”

She bit her lip, and I could almost see what was going through her mind. She was debating whether she wanted home field advantage. I would want that, so I couldn’t quite figure out why she would consider going to my house.

“Your house,” she said, surprising me.

I shrugged. “Okay. Are you actually going to follow me, or are you going to ditch me?”

“I’ll follow you. Unlike some people I know, I’m trustworthy.”

My gut clenched as her verbal blow landed hard.

Little did she know she was right, because there wasn’t a chance in hell that I would have stopped calling if she’d won the game. But I couldn’t say that I wasn’t fucking pleased that she’d lost.

I drove slowly to make extra sure that she wouldn’t lose me. Not that it was necessary; it was my old house where she had spent half her childhood. When I pulled into my carport, she was right behind me. We turned off our engines at the same time, and she was out of her Jeep before I had a chance to open her door for her.

“Nice landscaping,” she noted.

“Since I’ve been renting this out, Bernie’s arranged landscaping to be done, so that the renters didn’t need to be responsible.”

“Makes sense.”

She stood well behind me as I unlocked the door, but I held it open for her, forcing her to precede me into the house.

“Jeez, Beau, this place has really changed.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “I’d tell Harvey want I wanted done, and he made sure it got done.”

She nodded. “Yeah, Harvey and his company do good work. It’s hard to believe this is the same house I used to come and play pinochle at.”

I took a deep breath. I hadn’t thought of that card game since I joined the Marines. Mom got such a kick teaching Maddie and me that game, and we’d play for hours when Mom was in a good mental place.

“Come see the kitchen.”

“Okay.”

I went to put my hand at the bottom of Maddie’s back to guide her to the kitchen, and hesitated. She was wearing that crop top that had been driving me insane all evening. If I rested my hand where I intended, I’d be touching her smooth, bare skin.

Fuck it .

As soon as I touched her, she jerked, and I felt a jolt go through me like I had been too close to a mortar when it exploded. But I didn’t move my hand. She felt too good.

She slid away from me and walked quickly to the kitchen on her own.

“This is amazing, Beau,” she called out.

She was right about that.

She was opening the big stainless-steel fridge when I entered the kitchen. “This thing is huge. Do you rent to families?”

“Sometimes.”

She shut the door and peered over at me. “And you have a double oven. Was that Harvey’s idea, or yours?”

“Mine,” I admitted.

Her smile fell. “Oh.”

“Yeah. Mom always wanted one of those.”

“I don’t see any pictures of her.”

“I rent this place, Maddie. Of course there’s no personal stuff. I have that shit stored in a box in the attic.”

She gave a slow nod and leaned back against the quartz countertop and studied me. I could feel something big coming. I prayed she would not ask me why I hadn’t kept in touch while I was in the Marines. I wanted to keep us in shallow water for now. But I knew it would not be my choice.

“You want to explain to me why I had to hear via the town grapevine that you were back again? Want to explain why you didn’t pick up a phone and call me?”

Maddie had changed. A lot. She had a poker face now that could win her a lot of money. I couldn’t tell if she was angry, sad, or just curious. Before I left, I could read her like an open book.

“I wanted to,” I told her.

Shit, that sounded lame.

She lifted her right eyebrow. How many times had she done that same thing when I’d said something stupid?

I tried again. “I was caught up with spending time with Brady. I mean Kai.”

She slowly nodded. It was regal, as if she were a queen and I was one of her peasants. “I see.”

“No, you don’t see. You can’t see. Because I don’t even understand it, Maddie.” I rubbed the back of my neck.

“I call bullshit.”

I looked at her again. She still looked like a queen, but a queen with a poker face. I was so fucked. And she was right. I was spouting bullshit. Kind of.

I considered her for a long time, trying to think of the right thing to say. She pushed off the counter. “I’m outta here.”

“Wait.”

“No. I’m done. You’re the one who wanted to talk. Apparently, you can’t. So, I’m done. Don’t bother calling again.” She started to charge past me, and I reached out and grabbed her wrist. Not too hard, just with enough strength to halt her.

“What?” she snarled.

“I can explain.”

She yanked her wrist out of my grip, but she stayed put. “You’re doing a shit job of it.”

“It wasn’t bullshit. The first time I came back… Some months ago.”

“ Eight months ago.”

I winced. “Yeah, eight months ago. I was in shock.” I rubbed the back of my neck and looked down, then back up into eyes that used to be able to soothe my soul. Now they were shards of ice that cut. “Maddie, seeing Brady… Finding out he was alive… It didn’t gut me, it turned my world upside down. I can’t even begin to explain it. It was like everything I’d assumed, everything I’d ever known, was wrong, but everything I’d ever hoped for was there in front of me and I…”

She took one step forward and her eyes softened. “It’s okay, Beau. You can say it. You can say anything. I promise.”

“For a moment I felt joy. A blinding moment of connection. But then a level of fear descended on me like a thunderbolt. I’d never felt anything like it, and I’ve been in life-and-death situations more times than I can count. Somehow, in my mind, I knew that having Brady back wouldn’t last.” I laughed. It sounded like nails on a chalkboard, and I saw Maddie cringe. “Yeah. Pretty fucked up, huh?”

She took two more steps and touched my hand. “Not fucked up. Real. It sounds real, Beau.”

I smirked. “Yeah, really fucked up.”

“You say potato, I say po-tah-toe.”

I laughed. This time it sounded right.

“So how long did that last?” she asked.

“Who says I still don’t feel like that?” I sighed.

“You must be feeling a little more put together if you’re comfortable becoming my stalker.”

“I’m not, though. I’m still fucked in the head. Eight months ago, everything was spinning. I did want to reach out to you, but for all the wrong reasons.”

She frowned.

“I needed a safe place to land. Here I was, falling apart. Ten times worse than when I was dealing with the mom shit, and all I wanted to do was use you after fifteen years of no contact. That’s the kind of bastard I was thinking about being.”

“So why didn’t you?”

Damn it. She was no longer angry, she looked hurt.

I grabbed both of her hands, my thumbs circling her palms. “Because then I would have been my mom. If I was going to come back to you, I was going to come back to you a whole person, not some needy bastard.”

“And now?” she asked quietly.

“Now I believe in Brady. I mean, Kai. I figured out that life can just be shitty, and then it can be absolutely wonderful. And I can believe in it. Trust in it. It took the last eight months for that to become clear.”

She nodded and pulled her hands out of mine. “I need to go.” She started past me.

My heart jolted. “Hey, wait a minute. Why are you going?”

“You’ve explained things to me. I have my answers. I have my closure. So, thank you.”

She was halfway to the front door before I had enough sense to get in front of her.

“Get out of my way, Beau.”

“No. I want to know why you’re leaving. I told you why I didn’t contact you eight months ago. Why are you leaving?”

“Yeah. You explained what was going on eight months ago. Then you said you wanted to come back to me as a whole person. But for eleven days, you didn’t call me. Not one word, Beau. You’re either a liar or you need to see a psychiatrist. Either way, I’m not interested.”

Panic slammed into me. Shit, she was right. Why hadn’t I contacted her? Why wasn’t she the first call I’d made? What the fuck was my problem?

“Don’t leave, Maddie. I’m begging you.”

“Beau, eleven days.”

“Does it count that I spent those eleven days finding out everything about you? I spent that time finding out everything you’ve been doing? What your job was? Whether you were in a relationship? Whether you had a pet? What books you checked out from the library? By the way, I think it is cool that you do so many do-it-yourself projects.”

Oh fuck, I could see her cheeks turning red, and her eyes turning black. She was about to go ballistic on my ass.

“Eleven! Fucking! Days! Beaumont!” she screamed in my face. “Then you make me come to you! You are so out of your goddamn mind.”

“Maddie, please.”

“Don’t you Maddie please me,” she yelled.

Yelling was better than screaming.

“Don’t you dare get me to almost cry for you about finding Brady, and how twisted up you were, and how you want to come to me whole, and then not… not… not… call me for eleven days!”

Oh shit, she was going to start crying. There was nothing worse than Maddie crying mad. Nothing.

“Oh, Baby, please, please, don’t cry.”

“I’m not fucking crying over you, Grady Beaumont.”

Aw fuck, she was calling me Grady.

“Let me hold you, Maddie.”

“No,” she said as I pulled her into my arms.

“And you never returned my letters. And when I tried to call you after you left, you never returned my calls.”

She was sobbing into my t-shirt. I choked up as I soaked up all the pain that I had caused my best friend. The best woman. The best person I have ever had in my life.

“I’m so sorry, Maddie. I know I didn’t write to you. I know I didn’t return your calls. Can you blame me for being scared to call you when I came back? It was better remembering us how we were than to have you reject me,” I whispered into her hair.

She continued to cry for long minutes. Finally, she whispered “If that’s your logic, then you really do need a psychiatrist.”