Chapter 8
[Cadence]
The man was like a bolang gu, a Chinese pellet drum on a stick with balls on string attached to the side. The faster you spun the stick, the harder the balls bang the drum. And Ford was that flip-flip motion.
Bang. One second sweet. Boom. One second closed off.
I wasn’t certain what happened between teasing nibbles against his youngest’s cheek and my joking suggestion to remove his pants, but Ford went into that stiff jerk phase, like he’d been this morning in his brother’s bakery. Distant. Aloof. Uptight.
I’d have offered to take his daughter so he could treat his suit pants that probably cost him a pretty penny and happened to be the exact same shade of blue as his eyes.
However, he was suddenly looking at me like I might kidnap his kid or steal his soul.
I did not need that kind of glare in my life.
Thankfully, I was saved by the sudden appearance of my sister at my side. Enya is beautiful in a brown-eyed girl way wearing a white dress to signify she’s the bride, something we all know.
While Ford exits the dining room with June on his hip, my sister draws my attention to her with a light grip on my upper arm. “I heard Dad got to you. Are you okay?”
While I had been the wild one, acting like I had second-child syndrome, I was actually the third in our clan.
Our older brother had been the troublemaker, putting Enya in the middle, but somehow, she ended up with attributes often seen in the first kid.
She’d been the perfect child growing up.
Not until she was thirty-eight did she have a streak of rebellion, and then she absolutely glowed.
She got pregnant without giving anyone a hint of who the father might be.
Our parents went ballistic, so Enya is aware of our parents unwavering opinions.
She also knows they hold a long list of dissatisfaction in me.
“And hello to you, too, bride-to-be. You look radiant as always,” I tease, trying to lessen the concern on her pretty face.
“You look radiant as well,” she grouses, but deep down she means the compliment. My sister and I adore one another. Her sternness comes with concern. “Now cut the shit and tell me what he said.”
“You seem to already know Dad approached me.”
“Judd told me, but Dad’s stiff upper lip confirms he said something.”
“Which one is Judd again?” I glance around Enya’s shoulder as if I can distinguish anyone behind her.
The Sylvers are quite a brood of lookers.
Stone and Clay are silver-haired, having gone gray relatively young.
Knox has silver at his temples. Sebastian has small speckles within his dark locks, prominent mostly when his beard grows out.
Ford’s hair is still solidly deep brown while Vale, the only sister, has cornstalk-colored blond waves.
That leaves Judd, who I don’t recall meeting.
“He’s right there.” Enya turns to her side and inconspicuously points toward another good-looking future brother-in-law in a crisp white shirt, sleeves rolled to his elbows, wearing a long, slender black tie and thick glasses on his nose.
“I thought that guy was the bartender.” I giggle.
“Bartender?” Enya laughs. “No, he’s an accountant.”
Right. Enya told me how she met Judd when she came to Sterling Falls to audit their family business, Sylver Seed & Soil.
He could be the reason she fell in love with this town and decided to purchase the worst house on a big piece of land because she met him before Sebastian.
However, anyone looking at Enya and Sebastian knows my sister only ever had eyes for one of the Sylver siblings.
“I can’t keep up.”
Enya sternly scowls back at me. “Quit trying to distract me. What happened with Dad?” Her brows pinch. “Judd said something about you getting pregnant by Ford.”
“And that’s how rumors get started,” I jest, knowing well how quickly and easily gossip grows. Sometimes, it holds hints of truth. Mostly, it is hyperbole that hurts.
“Cadence,” Enya impatiently groans.
“Fine. Dad walked up to me, wanted to be introduced to Ford, and then accused me of sleeping with him when Ford said we met last night.”
The comment came out salacious and a bit humorous, as if Ford and I shared a private joke, but my dad wouldn’t have ever interpreted the situation that way. Nope. He had to jump to conclusions.
“You met Ford last night?”
Oops. “Yeah, well . . .” I pause, caught in a trap of my own making. “I planned to surprise you by being early for once in my life and show up here yesterday. But I stopped at Randy’s Bar outside town to take a call.” Then I went inside for a drink.
Enya watches me, not doubting my story. “Who called you?” New concern fills her voice.
“My lawyer.”
After Evan, Enya encouraged me to contact a lawyer as a means to protect myself. I hadn’t called Maggie for Evan reasons, though. I had bigger issues that I needed resolved.
Not asking for further information about my call with my attorney, Enya questions, “So, how were you with Ford?”
My sister isn’t accusing me of anything.
Nothing she hasn’t heard me admit to doing say a hundred or so times.
One-night stands. Reckless relationships.
The truth is that rebellious streak had died down a long time ago, but Cadence has a reputation to uphold.
The unobtainable woman. The one who won’t settle for anything less than what she deserves—the best. Which is why the Evan situation was all the more confusing.
“We only slept together,” I tease, turning toward the extensive display of food on the dining room table and reaching for a plate.
“You slept with Ford?” Enya speaks a little too loud and a little too harshly in her need for clarification.
Quickly I glance around us. Eyes motionless, fake smile in place, I respond. “Will you keep it down. We didn’t sleep together, like sleep together . . . ” I use tongs to scoop up some salad and drop it on my plate. “We slept.”
Enya leans against the table, waiting for more details.
“I went into Randy’s to use the bathroom after the call and had a drink.
” To settle my nerves. “And some woman was trying to get Ford’s attention.
I recognized a guy who didn’t want to be noticed.
When the bartender said his name, I simply put two and two together as to who he was.
As in your future brother-in-law, not just the hot center fielder for the Chicago Anchors, and I didn’t think he’d want the trouble that woman was offering, so I intervened. ”
“What did you do?” Enya whispers, following me as I circle the table, eyeing each bowl and tray for something my personal trainer would allow me to eat.
“I bought him a drink and pretended he was mine.”
Maybe Ford doesn’t remember but that’s how things played out.
I acted like he was my guy, and that other woman could fuck right off.
Just for a little while, I pretended he belonged with me, as we shot the breeze and a couple tequilas.
After swearing on my life I’d never tell a soul anything about him, I learned some dark truths about Ford.
As I had my own secrets to keep, his were safe with me.
Still, Enya eyes me suspiciously. “Tell me nothing happened.”
“Nothing happened,” I mischievously repeat.
“Now say it like you mean it.”
When I look at my sister, her anxious expression tightens. She lowers her voice and says, “He’s married.”
I could tell her the truth, but Ford’s story isn’t mine to share. Plus, his secrets are under lock and key with mine. So, I can’t argue with her on a valid point of concern.
“Nothing. Happened.” I stress each syllable because nothing did. “I took him to a motel because he didn’t want to come here. I didn’t know he had kids. Maybe he didn’t want them to see him shit-faced. I tucked him in, laid down beside him to make sure he didn’t vomit on himself, and drifted off.”
I’m so tired lately.
And my sister knew better than to accuse me of being with a married man.
“I’m sorry,” she quickly states watching me, sensing my suddenly irritated disposition. “It’s just . . . I don’t want another Evan situation for you.”
“Evan situation,” I snark, setting my plate on the table with a little more force than necessary.
“You know what I mean,” she quickly amends.
I did know. The shame. The guilt. How could I have been so stupid? How could I have believed his lies? How could he have done such a thing to me? To her?
Standing taller, I stare back at my sister. “I need some air.”
“Cadence,” she whispers, more motherly than my own mother has ever been.
Enya and I are opposites in many ways, but there was one thing I could count on with her—she wouldn’t pass judgment on me. Still. I felt judged and juried on the Evan situation.
Without a glance back at my sister, I turn and my gaze snares on Ford. From just inside the kitchen, he’s watching me with that clenched jaw I’m growing to both like and loathe. The last thing I need is him questioning my intentions with him.
I helped him out last night, and that was that.
I didn’t need him to like me or appreciate me.
I have hundreds of thousands of adoring fans to rev my boss-lady engine.
Straightening my shoulders, I head for the front door and step out onto the large wrap-around porch, inhaling the crisp fall air with a hint of rain in the forecast. Breathing deeply, I close my eyes, and wish away my guilt.
No one judges me harsher than I judge myself.
A crackle of thunder booms off in the distance and I slowly open my eyes. I’m not a fan of thunderstorms. Never have been although I can’t explain why. There’s something so powerful about them, an out-of-control energy, like chaos personified. I should feel right at home among a storm, but I don’t.
As I also want everything to be perfect for my sister’s wedding, I don’t want it to rain. She deserves the happily ever after she’s about to receive, not the disorder of a sudden downpour. I don’t want anything to mess up her day, including me.
With that thought, I step down the porch and walk around the house, stopping when I hear two men arguing in the dark yard behind the house.