Chapter 19
CHAPTER NINETEEN
ROB
Conversation with Sophie
Sophie? I’m sorry I’m late.
Are you still there?
You’re not at the brewery.
I’m coming over to check on you.
Dammit. Dammit .
I missed my Not-a-Date with Sophie.
I didn’t even have a good reason for it, other than that the incident at Tea of Fortune this morning had progressed into an epically bad afternoon.
My father had kept calling me, and finally I’d called him back after grabbing lunch with Travis.
He’d asked me to meet him for coffee, and I agreed. It was a highbrow place I hadn’t been to before, where all the lattes are named after political figures and cost twice what they should. Fine, he was probably trying to put me in my place by making it clear that I didn’t belong.
When I arrived, he was already there with two drinks on his two-top table, so apparently he’d already decided on my drink order.
I sat down across from him, feeling a familiar tightness in my chest. I used to want his good opinion, even though he didn’t have mine. Part of me still does. Maybe it was my lot in life to always want the things I couldn’t have. His good opinion. A successful career in music. My brother’s girl…
I’d have to tell my father it was fake. I’d say Sophie was doing me a favor, and as soon as that favor was completed, I’d come clean to Jonah. Didn’t mean I’d be doing him any more favors anytime soon, or attending a “family” dinner ever again, but at least it would guarantee my father the peace he always claimed he wanted.
“The Napoleon Bonaparte,” he said, sliding one of the cups across the table to me.
“Win some, lose some,” I told him with a shrug as I accepted the drink. I didn’t really care what it was called as long as it had caffeine.
“Clever,” he said with a nod.
“I have my moments.”
“Was one of those moments last night?” he asked, angling his head and gesturing to the flesh around his nose. As if I could somehow have missed that my skin was still tinged blue, especially around my nose.
I took a sip of the drink, which was oversweet and tasted like a stale car air freshener.
“Yeah, I think so,” I said after shoving the offensive drink a couple of inches away. “I suppose you heard that I’m dating Jonah’s ex?”
“I understand, son,” he said, surprising the hell out of me. My father had never really understood me. Not back when I’d used my trust fund to help my mom instead of going to college. Not when Jonah had blown up my life. And not now, when I was “wasting” my life playing at dead-end gigs in bars and babysitting kids.
“Oh?”
He sipped his own drink, and frowned, probably quite rightly. “Sometimes the heart wants what it shouldn’t. I can tell you’re a wreck over it. You don’t look good. I understand that too. It’s hard to disappoint people’s expectations.”
He reached out and patted my hand, his expression so fucking fatherly I wanted to punch him in the face. He was equating me standing up for Jonah’s ex-fiancée with what he’d done to my mother.
Cheating on her.
Leaving her before I was even a year old for his pregnant mistress.
Getting married the day the divorce went through.
He was using me to shed the last of his guilt—if he’d ever felt any in the first place.
“I didn’t steal her from Jonah, Dad. He lost her because he was unfaithful. If he’s upset about it, he only has himself to blame.”
“I get it,” he said again. I’d never been so infuriated over someone trying to agree with me.
“No, you don’t,” I snapped. “Jonah was cheating on her.”
He shrugged. “That’s not the story he’s telling. But what’s done is done. It’s how we move forward that’s important.” He sighed and looked up, probably trying to find inspiration from the line drawings of dictators on the walls. “Look, Rob. You’ve had your fun, and you’ve gotten back at Jonah. Cut the girl loose. She’s nothing special. God knows Patricia and I tried to tell him as much when he first brought her home.”
“Is that how you felt about my mother?” I fumed, getting to my feet. Really wanting to unload the Napoleon Bonaparte all over his expensive white shirt.
He looked alarmed. I can only assume he finally realized we were having a different conversation than he’d set out to have. I felt eyes on me, but I didn’t care.
“Your mother’s fine.”
“She is now ,” I said, withholding the no thanks to you . “But you’ll forgive me, sir , if I choose not to take relationship advice from you.”
Anger flashed in his eyes. “You’d do better if you’d take all of my advice.”
“Maybe so, but I wouldn’t be very fucking happy. And just so you know, Sophie is worth ten of Jonah. He should have gotten down on his knees and thanked a higher power that she’d agreed to marry him.”
He huffed a bitter laugh. “And how many of you is she worth? Thirty?”
“At least five. This is goodbye for now, Dad. I won’t be coming to any more family dinners.”
“You won’t be invited,” he sniped.
And then I left, having told him exactly the opposite of what I’d meant to.
So now he thinks the relationship with Sophie is real, and he’ll obviously report back to Patricia and Jonah. Fine. I’d wanted Jonah to believe the lie anyway.
After meeting with my dad, I felt worked up. I almost called Travis immediately and asked for help. I wanted to lose myself in something, and I was in the kind of mood that could lead to dark places that had no ladder.
Instead, I went home, set an alarm for when I was supposed to get Sophie, and started playing my guitar. The hours hummed by the way they do when I’m in the zone, living in the music, the time streaming as quickly as water.
Losing myself.
Losing myself so much I didn’t hear the fucking alarm go off.
Which was why I’d missed my Not-a-Date with Sophie. I hadn’t eaten either. And when I finally surfaced, I was starving for the real world—for her, for food, for something that wasn’t pretend.
I admit, I panicked. I was already late, and she wasn’t answering her phone. I rushed to the brewery, but when I got there, the place was dark inside. She’d already left. So I got right back into my car and drove toward her house.
I’m there now, feeling hyped up and worried. Needing to fix this.
Otis answers the door, looking as solemn as his nature probably allows him to. “Sophie’s pretty upset, man. She’s eating ice cream with a fork again.”
It’s a metric I haven’t heard of before, but it’s obvious it’s not good.
“I fucked up,” I admit, feeling my heart thrum in my chest. “It was unintentional, but I know that doesn’t make it okay. Can I see her?”
He scratches the back of his head, his expression conflicted. “Are you going to make it right?”
“I’d like to try.”
He considers this for a moment and then nods. “I know you’re a good guy, and it makes me sick that I missed everything at the brewery last night. But my cousin is…she’s awesome , man, and she doesn’t know it. It kills my grandmother and me, but I tell you what. I don’t want anyone messing with her. I mean, I’m not challenging you to a fight or anything. We both know I’d lose, but be cool.”
“I get it,” I say. “I respect that.”
“I’m, you know, the man of the house here. I’ve got to step up.”
I hold back a smile, because he’s totally serious.
“You’re a good cousin, Otis. I’m sure Sophie appreciates you and all you do.”
“All I do,” he says with a laugh. “Yeah, I’m a regular captain of industry, me and my Honey Do job.”
I remember what it was like to be his age, to think everything was the end of the world, that if my legacy wasn’t established by thirty, I’d be dust. So I say, “Come on. You’re doing all right. But if you’re looking for other work, you could come help Trav and me at The Missing Beat sometime. Text me.”
“Working with kids?” he asks, nodding thoughtfully.
“Yeah, it’s the best.” Even if Otis is little more than a kid himself. Maybe seeing our students find their passions will help him do the same.
“Count me in, but let me know if you ever see this bird.” He flashes me a photo on his phone. “There’s a huge reward.”
“For that?” I ask, incredulous.
“Rich people,” he deadpans. “Anyway, I’ll go get her,” he adds and then heads up the stairs and out of sight.
Sophie comes down a few minutes later, wearing pajamas: a loose Buchanan Brewery T-shirt and a pair of boxer shorts with hearts printed all over them. Her eyes are a little red, like maybe she was crying earlier, and it feels like someone’s attacking my heart with a vegetable peeler.
I’m the one who did this to her, not Jonah. I’ll have to remember she’s sensitive. Sweet. She deserves more than he was able to give her. Truthfully, she might deserve more than I could give her too, which means keeping this thing between us fake is the right play.
If Jonah believes we’re together, fantastic.
If Nelly believes? All the better.
But we should keep it at that.
Even if my impulse is to bury my hand in her hair and kiss her again. Kissing her last night had unlocked something inside of me, and I’d known instantly it was a place I wanted to explore and stay awhile. A place that would make music.
But looking at her now, all I want to do is make her feel better. “I’m sorry, Sophie,” I say. “I could make an excuse, but I’m not going to. I should have at least texted.”
“Your face…”
“Is slightly blue and moderately bruised. It’s okay. Dottie accidentally gave me blue hair dye instead of bruise cream.”
Her lips twitch slightly and then she turns serious again. “You know, I was worried about you,” she says, crossing her arms over her chest. Some fire flares back into her eyes, and relief courses through me. “I was worried something might have happened to you. Or your dad?—”
“Something did happen with him, but that’s no excuse. I screwed up. Will you come with me now?”
She smooths a hand over the shorts self-consciously. “I was wearing a blue dress earlier. It was really hot. And short.”
I hold back a groan. I would have liked to see her in that dress. To be completely honest, I would have loved to run my hands up her bare thighs under it. I’d happily forget all about my current dislike for the color blue. But I’m not knocking the view I have now. I like her like this, stripped bare of any pretense. All Sophie.
Shifting on my feet, I say, “And these make you look like you. And still hot. Let’s take a walk.”
She glances doubtfully outside. It’s pitch black aside from the pools of light from a few neighborhood streetlights.
“Or we can sit on the porch for a minute.”
“We’ll walk,” she says, then casts me a rebellious glance before slipping on a pair of Crocs that have seen better days.
“They complete the look,” I say.
That earns me a dagger-eyed stare that lifts my spirits. She’s still got her sassiness. Thank God. If I were the man who took it from her, I’d struggle to forgive myself.
She steps out into the warm night with me. The breeze plays with her hair, and I feel a pulse of longing so powerful it nearly brings me to my knees.
I’d like to be that breeze.
“What’s wrong?” she asks, frowning at me.
“Everything,” I admit as I brush my hair back from my face.
“You wanted to walk?”
No. I want to carry her upstairs so I can sink into her sweet heat and make an honest man of myself. So I can look my brother in the eye and say, Yes, I stole your fiancée, and I don’t have a single fucking regret. You’re going to spend the rest of your life knowing I have what you lost, and I hope it hurts as much as what you took from me.
But it’s a ridiculous thought, and I know it.
“Yeah, let’s walk.”
We stroll side by side on the sidewalk. After a long moment of companionable silence, she says, “Your dad upset you.”
“He always upsets me.”
She gives me a sidelong look, then shocks me by slipping her small hand into mine and squeezing. The next second, she releases me, but my hand remembers. It wants. So when her hand swings close again, fingers brushing mine, I catch it and hold on.
At her sharp inhale, I give her a pointed look. “You’re my girlfriend, right? Watching eyes.”
I know at least one person will be watching, from the little purple house we just passed. In fact, I’m pretty sure I noticed the shades moving.
I have to smile at that. Smile and move my fingers over the stone in my other pocket. Dottie told me to start carrying it again, and I’d listened.
“We should probably know a little more about each other,” Sophie says at last, her small hand still clasped in mine. “Before next Thursday. What’s your mother’s name?”
I glance at her, taking in the way the breeze is still playing with her thick hair. “Patricia.”
“Your real mom, I mean.”
I smile. “My real mom is also named Patricia. Let it never be said my father doesn’t have predictable taste.”
Her eyes widen, and she stops walking. “Are you teasing me?”
“Always. But that’s really my mother’s name. You can imagine her confusion when she heard about the other woman.”
She shakes her head, her lips tilting up at the corners like she’s not sure she should laugh. “I’m sorry. That must have been awful for her.”
“It was,” I tell her honestly. “A lot of things were. But she’s doing fine now. She remarried a really solid guy, and they’re living on a ranch with a bunch of sheep and a potbellied pig. Look, I don’t want to talk about my family right now, and I’m guessing you don’t want to talk about yours.”
“No, not really. I already told you. They don’t like me very much.”
“Otis does.” I gesture back toward the house. “He practically offered to fight me if I upset you.”
“He did?” she asks, her eyes full of warmth. “Oh, bless him.”
I grin at her. “You did good. Your little boy is growing up. Before too long, he’ll be smoking cigarettes and stealing your car.”
She shoves my arm playfully. “You’re a jerk. But I did almost walk in on him masturbating earlier. It was the cherry on my crappy sundae.”
I laugh, but I’m not willing to let this go yet. “Now, embarrassing encounters aside, why the hell would anyone in your family not like you? You’re the most likeable person I’ve ever met.”
“You didn’t used to think so,” she challenges, looking away, as if the bushes lining the sidewalk are incredibly interesting.
“I always thought you were likeable. I just don’t enjoy being told what to do.”
“I can see that,” she says, smiling softly.
There’s a pause, and for a moment I think she might spill her secrets to me on this public sidewalk, where we’ve been standing for so long the people in the house across from us probably think we’re casing the joint. We’ve only made it a few houses down from hers.
I want her to tell me. Something inside of me requires it, even though I’ve only known her, really known her, for less than a month.
But then she shakes her head softly. “They have their reasons. But Otis and Aunt Penny are exceptions to the rule, thank goodness.”
The evasion shouldn’t burn the way it does, but I want to know her. I want her to trust me enough to tell me everything.
That’s probably a big ask given I broke my word tonight.
“You know…” She pauses and takes a deep breath. “I didn’t think it was going to feel like that when you kissed me.”
If she wanted to distract me, she’s doing a good job of it. I take a slight step toward her. “Like what?”
“So good .”
I laugh despite myself. “There you go being honest again.”
A stricken look fills her eyes, and I run a finger over her soft lips. “Don’t say you’re sorry, Soph. Don’t be sorry. I want you to be honest with me, even if we have to lie to other people.”
“Did it feel good for you too?” she asks.
My blood rushes south, because this woman I’ve been thinking about for weeks is peering up at me in the dim glow of the streetlights asking if I enjoyed having my mouth on her.
“Yes,” I admit. “It felt good. It felt like bliss. I fell asleep with a smile on my face and woke up looking blue. And you want to know what? I still felt pretty good, right up until I saw my father.”
She smiles, but it falls a second later, a crease forming between her eyebrows. “Do you think it only felt so good because we were doing it in front of Jonah? Because we were getting back at him?”
“No,” I say bluntly, wrapping my hand around her hip. “But it certainly didn’t hurt.”
Lust flashes in her eyes, so blue I could drown in them. It’s a wonder I didn’t fall into them the first moment I saw her.
But I can tell she’s scared. Hell, I’m scared. It feels like we’re stepping into unchartered territory.
“I don’t bite,” I say, smiling. “Unless you want me to.”
She shoves my chest with her open palm, then leaves it there, the fingers moving gently across my shirt. They send bolts of sensation webbing through me, and then she shocks me by grabbing a handful of my shirt in her fist.
“Yes?” I ask, trying to act composed—and like I’m not suddenly imagining backing her against the lamppost and showing her that our kiss was no aberration.
She glances at her hand fisting my shirt, her eyes widening, but she doesn’t let go. “I…” She pauses. “I think the only way we can know for sure is if we kiss again, when he’s not around.”
“A sound scientific principle,” I say, backing her toward the nearby lamppost.
“We’re in public.” Her tone is slightly scandalized but also a bit husky. She likes the thought even if she thinks she shouldn’t.
“It’s just a scientific kiss,” I say, barely even paying attention to the words now, because Sophie’s still gripping my shirt, my hand wrapped around her hip like it doesn’t know how to let go. Another step brings us to the lamppost. Her back collides with it, and she releases a breathy gasp that makes my pulse pound. Even more so when she lifts her head to me, her lips parted.
They’re pale pink tonight, but they’re no less tantalizing.
“I’m wearing boxer shorts,” she comments, self-consciousness riding the remark.
“As long as they weren’t Jonah’s.”
She grimaces, and honestly, that should be enough to wake me up to some kind of sense. I’m here with my brother’s ex—Sophie, the woman he almost married. But I don’t back away. Not even the slightest part of me wants to. “I like them,” I say breathily. “I like looking at your sexy legs.”
“Then you would have really liked that dress.”
“Too bad. Maybe we could go back to your house, and you can take all of your clothes off and put it back on. I’ll watch. For scientific purposes.”
She smiles up at me, a wicked glint in her eyes, her features glowing from the streetlight. “You’re bad.”
“I warned you about that last night.” I tuck a glossy lock of hair behind her ear, soaking her in.
“Well?” she says after a second.
I laugh as I lower my head to her, my hand flexing on her hip. I’d like to lift her up so I can have her legs around me, but I don’t want to rush her. Or to take things too far in her neighborhood, where Dottie could very well be filming us for her Wise Women Group.
Our lips brush softly at first. But then she pulls me closer with that little fist tugging my shirt, standing on her tiptoes. I’m lost as her mouth moves against mine, and I push her into the lamppost so I can get closer as our tongues move together.
She’s sweet and spicy like this too, all soft lips and insistent hands. She holds me close, gripping my shirt tightly, while her other hand reaches up and burrows into my hair. Her head tips back, and I leave her mouth to kiss the column of her neck, sucking for a few seconds under her ear, which pulls a glorious sound from her that makes my dick hard. Harder, I should say, because my body responded to her the moment she brushed her fingers against my chest.
I want to leave a mark on her, I decide.
I want Jonah to see it, and to think she’s mine.
She must feel my dick, but instead of backing away, she pushes into me, and I claim her mouth again, half-crazed. Last night something sparked between us when we kissed, but it wasn’t like this. This is…
I feel like I could kiss her for hours, and it wouldn’t be enough. I’d like to kiss her until my lips stop working. Until we fall to the ground from exhaustion. The little sounds she’s making, and the sensation of her fingers in my hair, only make the desire stronger. I let my hand slip under the back of her shirt, feeling her soft skin. It sends a shudder of need through me. My other hand is still at her hip, but I dip it down to her butt, feeling the curve of her beneath those boxer shorts that don’t hide anything. And when her response is to push closer, a sense of delighted wonder courses through me. It’s?—
There’s a rustling sound behind me, and I pull away from her, feeling a surge of protectiveness, just as an apple-cheeked older man with a hound dog turns the corner.
From the way he looks at us, I suspect he’s well aware of what we were doing.
He nods at Sophie, smiling kindly. “Night, Sophie. Say hello to your cousin for me.”
She barely manages a nod back, her hair mussed, her eyes glittering. She looks slightly scandalized—by us, I’m sure.
He walks past, whistling to himself, and a few moments later turns to enter the little purple house next to Sophie’s.
“Shit,” I murmur. “Is that Dottie Hendrickson’s boyfriend?”
To my surprise, Sophie starts laughing softly, her hand gripping the lamppost. “Yes,” she says. “And we’re never going to hear the end of it.”