Page 5 of Trust Me (Rivers Edge #1)

Averu

After tucking Brooklyn into bed and reading three different princess stories, I grab my phone and head to the front porch to enjoy a little quiet and call my best friend.

I hit the best friend lottery when I met Holly Jenkins in seventh grade.

We met during volleyball after we both discovered we weren’t exactly the athletic type, and we’ve been joined at the hip ever since.

Besides my mom, she’s the only other person I confide in and truly trust.

When everything with Drake came to a head, she wiped my tears, answered her phone at all hours of the night, held my hand in the bathroom when I peed on that stick and waited for the plus sign, and held my hair back when I threw up everything I ate that first trimester.

She’s Brooklyn’s godmother, and I know she loves my little girl like she’s her own.

She’s proof blood isn’t the only thing that makes a couple of girls sisters.

I press speed dial number one and wait for her to answer.

She’s five foot four of dynamite with shoulder-length brown hair and hazel eyes.

Where I might be quieter and more reserved; Holly will tell it like it is.

Sometimes her honesty can be a hard pill to swallow, but ultimately, she’s always upfront and direct with me and has my best interest at heart. We just click.

“You’re late,” she says in way of her greeting.

“I had to read an extra princess story to the little princess tonight,” I reply, sitting down on the front porch swing with a glass of water. I love my porch swing. I would sit here year-round if I could get away with it.

“Well, I guess I’ll let it slide…this time.” I hear the humor in her voice because we both know this won’t be anywhere close to the last time I call her late.

She starts to tell me all about her shift at the ER that day.

She works days with my brother, Will, at Rivers Edge Health Center, the small hospital in town.

Will has been a paramedic for years and rotates between working the ER with Holly and working the rig.

Holly loves it, saying that every patient who comes in is different and keeps her on her toes.

She’s the best nurse I know. She was born to heal and help.

And I’m not embarrassed to admit that I’ve used her as my own personal nurse a time or two.

Our conversation progresses into Sunday family dinner night. She always asks, and I wonder if it’s because she’s genuinely curious or if it has more to do with my brother, Will. Holly knows about my ongoing childhood crush on Maddox. She’s the only one who knows, for that matter.

“Maddox was there this week,” I say after I swallow a big gulp of water.

“Really? Did you tell him you’re madly in love with him and want to have screaming sex all night long?”

“Of course not! He doesn’t like me. He looks at me like I’m his best friend’s little sister.”

“You are his best friend’s little sister,” she replies dryly.

“I know that, but I’m not a little girl anymore. He still sees me as the little girl who followed him and Jake around all the time, staring up at him with big googly eyes and a dorky brace-face smile.”

She chuckles a little at that one. “You know, if you don’t go for it with him, he’s going to find someone else to wrap those strong arms around and shower with kisses from those mouthwatering, to-die-for lips.”

“Geez, Holl. Are you sure you’re not the one with the massive crush?” I ask mostly as a joke but realize the thought of Holly crushing on Maddox isn’t that funny at all.

“Every woman in town notices that man. You should just walk up to him, throw your arms around him, and kiss him. I bet you won’t be disappointed.”

“Well, I’ll keep that in mind,” I reply, knowing good and well I won’t be doing that anytime soon.

“Hey, why don’t we go out next Saturday night? It’s been a while since we went to Jack’s for some drinks and pool. I bet your mom would keep Brookie Bean for you until Sunday dinner.”

“Okay. That does sound like fun. I’ll ask her tomorrow when I swing by the bakery.”

I proceed to tell her all about my conversation with my mom about Drake and his newest squeeze, Kelsey. “Geez, Kelsey? She sounds eighteen. Is she a cheerleader too?” Holly asks sarcastically.

“She’s a junior in college, apparently. I hope she doesn’t mind sharing her boyfriend,” I throw out there as my mind returns briefly to my own relationship with Drake.

If there’s one thing Drake can’t do, it is monogamy.

I started dating him the summer before my seventeenth birthday.

Drake was my first boyfriend; my first everything.

Well, almost first everything. He had just turned twenty when we met, and I was smitten from that first moment.

We met at the river where all the kids go for swimming, sunbathing, and to hang out with friends.

He was super tan in his board shorts that hung low on his lean hips.

He had just finished his freshman year of college, and every girl was looking at him with lust-filled eyes.

Ultimately, it was me he approached that day, and we hit it off right away.

He used his good manners and sexy smile to charm his way into my life and, eventually, my pants.

On my seventeenth birthday, he gave me a beautiful heart necklace, and in return, I gave him my virginity. I fell hard and fast for Drake Connor.

It took a while before I heard the first rumor of Drake being with another girl from a few towns over.

It was my senior year in high school, and he was away at college.

When I confronted him on it, he swore he was faithful to me, and the rumor was started by a jealous frat brother.

Of course, being the na?ve eighteen-year-old, I believed him.

In fact, the way he looked at me made me feel guilty for questioning his faithfulness and loyalty to me.

By the time I graduated from high school, I started hearing more and more rumors.

Girls I didn’t even know were coming up to me on the street and telling me he was cheating on me.

One girl in particular called me up and told me she had been with Drake multiple times.

Again, I confronted him, and he denied it.

So when she called again, I told her off.

I didn’t have time for jealous girls and their petty stupidity.

That’s when she sent me copies of their text messages back and forth.

She even had photos, lots of photos. I was sick, literally sick to my stomach at his betrayal.

Turns out it wasn’t only his betrayal making me nauseous because that’s also when I noticed my period was late.

After a brief conversation with Holly over the phone that involved a whole lot of crying, she met me at my parents’ house with a drugstore bag full of pregnancy tests.

First test came back positive right away.

So did the next four. I was nineteen, pregnant with a cheater’s baby, alone, and nursing a broken heart from the man who swore he’d always be by my side.

Even after we broke up, I assumed he’d be a part of his child’s life.

When I told him I was pregnant, his response was to tell me it wasn’t his.

Apparently, in his mind if he’s not faithful, I’m not being faithful either.

He threw me out of the apartment we just rented together.

Seriously, the ink was barely dry on the lease.

He walked away, telling me he wasn’t ruining his life by saddling himself with a baby.

Who says that anyway? I didn’t get myself pregnant, mister.

I can count on one hand how many times Drake has seen Brooklyn in the three years since her birth. Even then, he doesn’t acknowledge her as his child.

Jerk.

I wrap up my conversation with Holly with a promise to call her as soon as I confirmed my sitter situation for next Saturday night.

After our goodbyes, I sit on the swing in the crisp October air, staring into the dark of night, and recall all those nights I cried myself to sleep over Drake.

How can one person be so stupid? And not just once, but twice.

You’d think, with the Drake drama, I wouldn’t be so stupid as to put my heart out there a second time.

But no one ever said I was the brightest star in the sky.

The fact was I wanted to believe in the magic of true love.

But the one time I finally decide to open my heart again, that person rips it out and stomps on it too.

Is it so hard to find a guy who wants a relationship with you and you alone?

As I’m sitting on the swing, I see a shadow coming toward me down the sidewalk across the street. As the running figure crosses the street a few doors down and heads toward the sidewalk in front of my house, I realize I know that shadow. It’s Maddox.

As his swift, strong legs carry him along the sidewalk in front of my house, he turns his head and catches my gaze.

He stops his jog and pulls the earbuds from his ears.

His breathing is labored and his body is sweaty.

I can hear the faint music from the earbuds and can tell it’s loud and edgy. Probably AC/DC if I had to guess.

“Hey, what are you doing out here?” he asks.

“Just enjoying what’s left of the nice evening weather. Out for a jog?” I ask.

Well duh, Miss Obvious.

Idiot.

“Yeah,” he says as he approaches my steps. “Mind if I join you for a minute?”

My brain almost shuts down, and I can’t think. Maddox wants to sit with me on my front porch? Hell. He actually sits down on my porch swing with me. I can’t help but wonder if it would be inappropriate to climb onto his lap. Maybe lick his sweaty neck and rub my hands through his damp, messy hair?

So I just shake my head, nodding my approval to join me.

“Can I get you a drink of water?” I finally get out.

“No, I’m good. So what are you thinking about out here all by yourself? ”

There’s no way I can tell him what I was honestly thinking about, so I decide to go the safe route and mention my conversation with Holly about Saturday night. “It’ll be good for you to go out for a night. Of course, Jake and I will be there after we get off work to keep an eye on you,” he says.

Great. Maddox is in big brother mode.

“Well, I’m a big girl. I don’t really need you to watch out for me,” I reply, my tone kind of short.

I look over at him, and he’s staring at my chest. Not like a little glance, but full-fledged staring at my girls like he’s picturing what they look like under my shirt without my bra.

My nipples pucker under his intense watchful eyes.

He glances up and makes eye contact with me, which causes me to blush.

Not just a slight pink, but a full-blown, red-faced, “Oh my God, it’s two hundred degrees out here” kind of blush.

He gives me that crooked half smile of his, not even embarrassed I just busted him ogling my girls.

“Yeah, you’re not a little girl anymore,” he concedes after a few moments of silence.

Well, I have no reply to that. Is he actually flirting with me?

“Well, I better head back home and shower.”

And just like that—with those eight little words—I’m now picturing him in the shower.

Crap. I stare at his sweaty shirt that is clinging to his upper body and picture it being peeled off his chiseled chest and thrown on the floor.

The shower. I could definitely enjoy a shower with Maddox.

He gives me another of his slow, sexy grins, as if he can read the dirty thoughts going through my mind.

Great. It would be my luck he really can read minds.

“See you Saturday night,” he says as he puts his earbuds back in his ears and heads down my front porch steps. He turns and looks at me over his shoulder one last time before he takes off, jogging into the night back toward his house.

Hell, now I need a shower. A very cold shower. Why can’t I be attracted to a guy who is actually looking for a girlfriend, not just a quick fling? I sit for a few more moments lost in thought before heading back inside with the images of a very naked and very wet Maddox running through my mind.