2. Chapter 2
Chapter two
Aiden
I laid the last line of caulk where the backsplash met the counter and stood back to admire my work. The shape and shading of the blue tiles in the backsplash gave a 3-D illusion that would look great in small spaces but felt too busy in my oversized farmhouse kitchen. The beechwood cabinets were the lightest I’d ever used and my favorite so far. They made the entire space feel brighter, almost welcoming. I ran my hand across the smooth wood the color of sand before I took a crowbar and yanked a cabinet from the wall.
Once it hit the floor, I grabbed a sledgehammer and started swinging. As splinters filled the air around me, the white-hot anger burning in my chest cooled to blue. I stopped when my shoulder throbbed.
I wanted to smash everything to bits, but my foreman, Sam, was redoing his grandmother’s kitchen and asked me to keep an eye out for second-hand cabinets. Usually, I salvaged the cabinets for my kitchen from job sites, but I’d seen these and thought they’d look nice in Mrs. Sanchez’s house.
After I busted the one cabinet, I used my electric screwdriver to remove the rest, which should be more than enough for Sam’s project. But I was beating the shit out of the tiles. No surprise I’d found those heavily discounted.
As usual, I’d left the beige Formica counters and stained porcelain sink alone. Not that I needed either. I lived on takeout and mooching meals off my mom and sisters. But sinks and counters were too expensive to destroy every couple months.
Once I placed the cabinets on a drop cloth in the relative safety of the dining room, I started chiseling the tiles from the wall. Each time one smashed on the floor, my anger cooled a degree. When my shoulder tightened enough to make me groan, I put the chisel down and looked out the window over the sink.
Across my back field, which should come out of winter dormancy any day now, and beyond the pitted dirt road, sat an old barn framed by a copse of trees. At this distance, it looked tiny, insignificant. It was neither.
“At least I only destroyed one cabinet this time, Logan.”
I didn’t talk to him often, and never when anyone could hear me. But every time I tore apart something that had taken me days to build, I indulged in a little one-sided conversation.
I imagined him giving me shit for wasting so much time and materials but stopped short of admitting, even to myself, that he’d have been pissed that I’d aggravated my shoulder. Logan had protected my ass on the field and off, which was the only reason I was alive enough to tear apart my kitchen, and why he wasn’t here to stop me.
“I’m trying. We all are. It’s just taking me longer than Cal and Theo.”
I really had tried to get it together. I’d moved next door to the barn where Logan spent his last hours and then bought it. I’d forced Theo and Cal to go there with me because none of us had worked through losing Logan enough to live our lives.
It didn’t take a shrink to know spending hours and a sickening amount of cash to remodel a house only for the satisfaction of tearing it down was seriously fucked up. Not as fucked up as Theo and his self-harm tendencies, which had thankfully abated since he committed to therapy and Poppy, but fucked up nonetheless. Add to that the fact I kept all the destruction a secret, and I was neck and neck with Theo for being the most mental in our trio. Cal had simply buried himself in school, then work, and ignored his grief and every other intense feeling until he fell for Rowan and had to pull through to be with her. Theo had taken longer, keeping Poppy in the friend zone for over a year before he sorted his shit.
“Good job, by the way, with those Stevens sisters. Maybe you need to send me a woman too.”
I laughed, the sound hollow and pathetic in the still kitchen. I might be a jaded asshole, but I honestly believed Logan had somehow orchestrated Rowan and Poppy Stevens into Cal’s and Theo’s lives. They were doing well now. Better than well. Which meant I was the only one who hadn’t yet pulled my head out of my ass, despite being the one who’d pushed my friends out of their grief. Logan would have wanted me to help them, and I owed him that much, but that didn’t mean I was ready to move on.
“I’ll leave you alone now,” I said, picking up my chisel. “There’s only so much crazy I’ll allow myself and these tiles need breaking.”
I’d just finished scrapping the last of the tiles onto the covered countertop when my doorbell rang. I froze. Living this far out of town, I rarely had solicitors. I wasn’t expecting a delivery. I certainly wasn’t expecting visitors. I hadn’t allowed anyone in the house since I moved in two years ago. How else could I hide five kitchen remodels and half a dozen bathroom updates?
The doorbell rang again, followed by someone pounding on the heavy oak door. I crept into the center hall and peered through the peephole.
“Open up, asshole,” Cal yelled. He was still in his scrubs, his brown hair standing on end like he’d yanked it the entire ride over.
Theo smacked Cal’s arm before saying, “We just want to talk, Aiden. Stop pretending you’re not here. We can see your truck.”
Well, fuck.
I unlocked the door and opened it a crack. “Ever heard of texting?”
“Ever heard of texting back?” Cal snapped. “Or picking up the phone when someone calls you?”
“Yeah, even I don’t do that,” Theo said with a smirk.
OK, so Cal was pissed, and Theo was trying to calm his ass down because he thought Cal was overacting. If I’d upset Poppy, they’d both be mad, since Theo was dating her and Cal was marrying her sister. Theo hadn’t been with Poppy long enough to think of Rowan as family, so I figured I’d ticked off Cal’s pint-sized redhead, not Theo’s goth pixie.
I blew out a breath and rubbed my forehead. If sweet Rowan wanted my balls, I’d royally screwed up. And I could only think of one reason. It was the same reason I’d turned my phone off before demoing my kitchen.
I squeezed through the front door and pulled it shut behind me. Theo took a step back and leaned against the railing, giving me space on the narrow porch. Cal didn’t budge and looked ready to take a swing.
“I need Wyatt,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest and tucking my hands under my pits. Slowing my block time would make Cal think twice about hitting me, and I didn’t feel like bruising his pretty-boy face right before we left for a four-night trip together with the Stevens sisters, who would no doubt inflict revenge on my ass in some creative and terrifying way for upsetting Lauren. “I’ll have three job sites going when we get back from St. John, one of which is a massive housing development on a tight deadline.”
Cal rubbed his forehead, his anger deflating a little with my very rational explanation. “And you couldn’t hire anyone else?”
“Wyatt’s a hard worker, a fast learner, and bilingual.”
“And the only full-time employee at Karma,” Cal said.
“You and I both know Lauren can teach someone to steam milk faster than I can teach carpentry skills.”
“Not someone she trusts,” Theo said, quietly.
I leaned against the door while a heavy knot of guilt slammed into my stomach. “Not my problem.”
Cal narrowed his eyes at me like he believed my bullshit, but Theo stood there reading every damn emotion I had like a tattooed Dr. Phil.
“It’s your problem now,” Cal said. “Lauren can’t go on the trip because she needs to find a replacement for Wyatt. So Rowan’s upset, which means I’m pissed.”
I didn’t want to think about Lauren, let alone talk about her. “Lauren’s being difficult. Four days won’t make a difference. She can put the ad online and set up zoom interviews from the island if she’s in that much of a hurry.”
Which was exactly what I’d texted her in reply to her six texts—all in caps—before I turned off my phone.
“Would you hire someone you’ve never met in person?” Cal asked.
“For a trial period, sure,” I said, shoving my hands in my pockets and telling my feet not to shift. The last thing I needed was Theo picking up on how much the conversation agitated me. “Why not? So what if someone spills coffee or snaps at a customer? Big deal. She can fire the rude klutz and move on.”
“He has a point,” Theo mumbled.
“If she wanted to keep Wyatt, she could pay him what I offered.” Doubtful. I paid my crews well above market rates, and construction workers typically made more than baristas.
Cal nodded. I’m pretty sure he’d upped Cammie’s pay significantly when he bought his physical therapy practice from his boss, not that his office manager wasn’t worth every penny. Truth be told, I’d like her to run my construction company, but I wasn’t about to get into a pay pissing match with Cal for his pseudo sister. How he landed on that relationship with the hot blonde before he started dating Rowan was beyond me.
“Did you have to steal him the day before we leave?” Cal asked.
“No, but then Lauren wouldn’t have a reason to stay behind,” Theo said.
I jabbed my finger at him. “I told you I needed Wyatt as soon as we got back. At least this way Lauren has some notice.”
“So she could stay behind and find a replacement,” Theo said.
“He’s right, isn’t he?” Cal said, glaring at me. “You did this on purpose because you don’t want her on the trip. What could you possibly have against Lauren?”
Plenty. Besides, I needed another full timer, and Wyatt had been working for me part time on a project-by-project basis. It made sense. Pissing off Lauren was a bonus, but did I want to avoid seeing her stretched out on a beach in a bikini, her perfect curves taunting me for days? No. Yes. Maybe.
Just thinking about her filled me with the usual combination of lust, longing, and a hefty dose of self-doubt. Sex with Lauren was unlike anything I’d experienced before or since, but if we’d just shared a bed for a night, I wouldn’t still be fighting the simultaneous urges to avoid her and be with her as much as I could without looking like a damn stalker. Cal and Theo stared at me, waiting for an answer, so I blurted out what I’d been too embarrassed to tell them for eight years. “I slept with her.”
Neither of them looked surprised. “Recently?” Theo asked.
“When you were away.” I never used the word prison. I wasn’t sure if that was for my benefit or Theo’s since I’m the reason he went.
“How is that a problem?” Cal asked. “No offense, but you and Lauren are Peace Falls’s king and queen of one-night stands. It’s inevitable you’d sleep together at some point. What’s the big deal?”
“Fuck, brother, you’re dense,” Theo said, laughing.
As usual, the nickname felt like a tiny pinprick. Theo and Cal had called each other brother long before Logan died. It’d never bothered me then because, despite how close we were as a group of four, Logan and I had the same tight relationship Cal and Theo had. We might not have called ourselves brothers, but that’s what we were. We grew up next door to each other. I slept at his house as often as I did my own and vice versa.
“What am I missing?” Cal asked Theo. For all his book smarts, Dr. Cardoso really was a dumbass sometimes.
Theo ignored him. “Did she want more or did you?”
I rubbed my forehead. Might as well lay all my pathetic cards on the table now that I’d started. “I did.”
“Oh shit,” Cal said, finally getting a clue. “That’s why you’re always ripping up napkins whenever she’s around. You still like her.”
I shrugged because I didn’t want to say it out loud. What’s the point? I wasn’t good enough for Saint Lauren and never would be. Maybe if I’d gone to college or joined the league, she’d have wanted more than a single, unbelievable night. But I wasn’t an NFL star or even a college grad, just a contractor with a bum shoulder and anger issues.
“It’s not about you,” Cal said, surprising both me and Theo. “She’s scared.”
Once the asshole got a clue, he focused his big brain on an issue like a pig sniffing truffles. Theo nodded like Cal’s idiotic statement made sense. Lauren was a lot of things: irritatingly beautiful, kind, fucking sunshine and rainbows to everyone except me. She wasn’t a badass like Poppy, who didn’t give a shit what anyone thought about her, but Lauren didn’t strike me as scared. Not like Cammie, who avoided men whenever she could, which I guess went a long way toward Cal stepping into an overprotective brother role.
Lauren wasn’t afraid of men at all. In the years since we’d slept together, she’d continued having hookups at a pace similar to mine. Some of those lucky bastards bragged about it, others seemed as hurt as I was by her ride-and-ditch act.
“Makes sense,” Theo said. “It’s the same reason she hasn’t hired more staff at Karma. She doesn’t trust anyone.”
“Bullshit,” I said, getting angry. “She’s the Pollyanna of Peace Falls. She sees the best in everything and everyone.”
“Except you, apparently,” Cal said with a chuckle.
“Or only him,” Theo said. “Which would explain why he rattles her so much.”
“She’s rattled because I rattle her every chance I get,” I snapped. I wasn’t about to consider the possibility that Lauren was like some ten-year-old boy pulling my hair because she had feelings she didn’t know how to handle.
“So, you’re scared of her,” Cal said. “Got it. Now I have something to tell my fiancée that might earn you a smidge of sympathy.”
“I’m not scared of anything,” I yelled.
“Great, so you won’t mind if we tour your house?” Theo shot forward like he was about to physically move me from the door but stopped when he saw my face. “Whenever you’re ready, A,” he said, gripping my shoulder.
At the rate I was going, that’d be never.