Chapter 29 #2
I eye my brothers, who are still at the table and doing nothing to help me out of this situation. They jerk their heads at me, clearly telling me to get the fuck away from her. I’m trying, damn it!
“Where did you hear that?” I shove a frustrated hand through my hair.
“Oh . . . around town. And Judy confirmed it of course.”
“What are you even doing in town?” I can’t help but ask.
Her shoulders lift. “Just had some meetings in Boulder. So? Married?” She shoots me a toothy smile that doesn’t feel genuine.
I roll my eyes and shake my head. “Yeah, I’m married. Take care, Robyn.”
I move to walk away from her, but her next words stop me dead in my tracks. “You married the daughter of John Monroe, right?
Addison, is it?”
I turn slowly on my heel to eye the woman from my past who honestly never asks just an innocent question. My teeth clench
as I tilt my head and shake a silent no at her. “Don’t speak her name,” I warn, my tone guttural.
“Testy, testy.” Her tongue darts out to swipe across her ruby lips as her nose wrinkles. “It’s interesting how protective
you are of her considering the marriage is a total sham.”
My jaw cracks as I clench my teeth so hard, my jaw aches. “What are you talking about?”
“Matt and I do business with John and had lunch with him yesterday. He told us this marriage you’re in with his daughter isn’t
real. It’s just so she can fulfill the trust requirement and the minute I laid eyes on her tonight, I knew he was telling
the truth. She is so not your type.”
“You don’t even fucking know me anymore,” I growl, my body vibrating with protectiveness over this woman I hate talking about
the woman I love.
“Oh, I think I know you a little.” Her gaze flashes down to my dick, causing me to jerk away from her. She snickers and I feel strangely violated.
“You don’t know shit about me, Robyn. I’m a different man today than I was ten years ago. I’ve grown. You clearly haven’t.”
She loses all humor on her face and pins me with a curious look. “Come on, Lukey.” She reaches out and drags her hand down
my chest, causing my body to recoil. “Don’t be like that. I’ve missed you the most. I know things got messy, but what you
and I had was always different than what I had with Calder and Wyatt.”
“What are you even saying to me right now?” I hook my thumb behind me. “You’re here with your fucking husband.”
“I know, but we’re in an open marriage.” She glances back to the table that her husband, Matt, is sitting at, and he’s observing
her like a goddamn cuckhold. “I like to play, and he likes to watch, and I’d really like to play with you again, Luke. You look so good.”
“He’s not interested,” a shrill voice cuts in and I swerve my head to see my tiny wife standing near me with fire blazing
in her eyes. She steps forward, backing Robyn into the wall, not even glancing at me as she adds, “Luke doesn’t play, and
he never will, so you can take your fucking toys, and your box-dyed hair, and get the fuck out of Jamestown, or I will go
up that mountain and start an avalanche to bury your ass here.”
Robyn looks mildly afraid before she sputters out a laugh. “Your wife must be a real firecracker in bed, Lukey.”
“Leave, Robyn,” I grind out through clenched teeth.
She wrinkles her nose as she looks down to Addison. “Does it bother you?”
“Does what bother me?” Addison asks, her eyes turn to slits as her jaw goes taut.
Robyn leans forward and whispers in her ear, “Does it bother you to know I had him first?”
A strange noise echoes from the woman beside me and before I realize it, Addison’s hands are on Robyn’s shirt, and she’s yanked
her down to the floor and is straddling her while she grips Robyn by the hair and yanks her around like a rag doll.
The sound of chairs scraping echoes in the room as Wyatt, Calder, and Max appear beside me watching the fight take place in
complete awe.
“Should I stop it?” I ask, my heart racing at the sight of Addison going completely feral on a woman from my past.
“No!” Dakota and Trista both say in unison, appearing out of nowhere.
“Addison is killing her!” Dakota adds with a gleeful smile as Robyn grips Addison’s wrists, screaming out for her to let go
of her hair.
“What the hell?” Matt yells from across the bar and comes tearing over. The minute he presses his hand to Addison’s shoulder
and shoves her onto her back, I see red.
“Get your fucking hands off my wife!” I roar, lunging for him.
I grab him by the collar of his suit coat and haul his ass away from the two women on the floor. My body trembles with rage
as I nearly lift him up off the ground and march him halfway across the room, his toes racing to keep up with my clipped pace.
“Touch her again and I will break both of your fucking arms,” I grind, dropping him to his feet and pulling him close to my
face so he can see how serious I am.
“She was attacking my wife!” Matt shouts back at me, his eyes wide with fear as I tower over him by several inches.
“Your wife started it,” I grind out before launching him away from me, desperate to get some space between us before I pull
my fist back and punch him like I’ve always wanted to.
He crashes into the barstools, falling on his ass in the process, which feels almost as good as a punch.
This man has been a fucker ever since him and my dad were bidding on the same project years ago until we beat his price and won the job.
We had no idea Robyn was married to him until everything blew up, and the fact that these two slimeballs are still together, existing and causing chaos, makes me fucking see red.
“Out!” Judy barks, standing in front of me, her bony finger pointing toward the door.
“Judy,” I begin to argue, trying to soften my tone as I address her.
“Leave now!” she growls back and then points to something behind me. “And take her with you.”
I look back and see Addison standing there, panting heavily. Her hair is a tousled mess and her chest heaves with labored
breaths. With a curse, I close the distance between us, frantically inspecting her face and hands to make sure she’s okay,
but she refuses to look at me, jerking her hands from mine. My heart lurches when I see that her eyes are red-rimmed, and
her chin is trembling. She’s not just angry. She’s hurt.
Fuck.
“You guys know the rules,” Judy continues, clapping her hands and gesturing to the door. “No fighting, damn it. It will kill
me if I have to permanently ban you all.”
“She started it,” Addison bites, her tone visceral.
“And I’m ending it,” Judy snaps back. “Go outside and cool down.”
I crack my neck and glance over to see Robyn crying while she picks her hair extensions up off the bar floor. With a heavy
sigh, I wrap my arm around Addison to pull her toward the door with me. She shudders under my touch and jerks away to walk
herself out of the bar.
As we reach the doorway, Robyn’s voice screams out to us, “White trash cunt.”
And in a flash, Addison turns on her heel and lunges back in Robyn’s direction, but I manage to catch her at the waist, yanking her back against me as she fights with everything she has.
“Come outside with me,” Addison screams, still lunging for Robyn.
“Cool it,” I growl, grunting when her leg connects with my balls as she continues to try to squirm free. When she refuses
to stop, I yank her around and bend over to toss her up over my shoulder as she’s kicking and screaming the whole way.
The harsh December air is cold and biting as I crunch my boots over the snow to carry my flailing wife deep into the parking
lot. The quietness of the outdoors must bring some semblance of reason back into her mind as she finally stops beating on
my back. I lower her to the ground and shove my hair back out of my face to look at her.
“Are you okay, babe?”
“Don’t you babe me!” Roe says, pressing the heels of her hand to my chest and giving me a hearty push. “Don’t you dare babe
me. Not now. Not ever after that.”
“What are you so mad about?” I ask, glancing over my shoulder when I hear footsteps. Thankfully it’s just my family all coming
out to witness the shit show taking place.
“What am I so mad about?” Addison’s eyes are wide as she barks out a hyenic laugh, looking damn near feral under the parking
lot light. She glances around and notices we have an audience and hesitates before she replies, because this is an audience
who doesn’t know about our secret. An audience who thinks, by all account, this is my real wife.
Her face twists in pain and she begins walking backward away from me, pushing her hair out of her face as she goes.
I move toward her, holding my hand out. “Come on . . . let’s get in the truck and we can talk about this at home.”
“No,” she croaks, a puff of cold air floating around her lips as her voice betrays her. It guts me to see her like this. She inhales deeply through her nose, her nostrils flaring with determination as she says, “I’m walking.”
My jaw drops. “It’s over two miles up the mountain. You’re not fucking walking.”
“I’m walking!” she screams, turning her back on me and making her way toward the highway, pausing as a semi goes squealing
by.
“Damn it, Roe,” I growl, wishing I had my hat on so I could rip it off and chuck it to the ground.
My brothers, Dakota, Trista, and Cozy all stare at her stocky frame as she jogs across the blacktop and turns onto the gravel
lane that winds up the mountain toward our cabins.
Dakota hands me Roe’s coat while Calder rests his hand on my shoulder. “Looks like you’re walking, bro.”
I sigh heavily and without a word, run across the highway to catch up to my wife.
Addison
My pulse rushes between my ears as I march up the snowy tire-worn path of Fletcher Mountain, the cold air biting the exposed
flesh on my legs and my belly. My heart feels like it’s going to beat out of my chest and my lungs burn as I pant out a puff
of air in front of me.
Walk it off, Addison. You just need to walk it off.
But an evil voice echoes in my mind as I recall the way that woman looked at Luke. She looked at him like she could eat him
alive. She looked at him like he belonged to her.
And the way he looked back at her? What the actual fuck? We’re supposed to be exclusive through this arrangement. He shouldn’t
have been looking at her at all!
Footsteps crunch behind me as Luke calls my name, but I refuse to turn around. I’m too angry to look at him. He’s going to hit me with that innocent puppy dog face that I will want to punch.
He finally catches up to me and drapes my coat over my shoulders. If I wasn’t freezing my ass off, I would chuck it the ground
and make him pick it up. But goddamn it, it’s too cold for even my pride.
“Who the hell is Robyn?” I bite, my hands shaking with rage.
Luke makes a weird noise before replying, “She’s no one.”
“Bullshit no one,” I spit, a white cloud of mist dancing on my lips. “You’ve obviously fucked her.”
“So what,” Luke huffs, stomping in stride beside me. “I don’t know everyone that you’ve fucked.”
“Do you want to know?”
“Fuck no.”
“Good for you . . . but I want to know.”
“Why?”
I stop in my track and thrust my finger at my friend. “Because when a woman has her claws all over you like you’re open territory,
it pisses me the fuck off. We’re married, Luke.” I flash my ring to him as proof. The ring that I love more than I can even admit to myself.
“I know that.” He frowns back at me, his eyes looking soft and tender.
“So why lie to me?”
“Because I didn’t want you to know about this part of my life,” he roars, throwing his hands out wide. His face is stricken
with fear and shame as his heavy exhales release plumes of vapor in front of him. His cheeks are red from the cold, and likely
stress, as he grips the back of his neck and looks down at his feet. “Because it’s embarrassing and fucked on so many twisted
levels. And because it would kill me if you ever thought less of me.”
“I wouldn’t think less of you for that,” I scoff, crossing my arms over my chest and shivering against the cold. “I’d think less of you for not being open with me though.”
“That’s rich coming from you.” Luke shakes his head, his entire body radiating defensiveness.
“What does that mean?”
“You keep me at arm’s length, Roe,” he cries, the veins in his neck bulging as he hits me with an intense look that takes
my breath away. “You let me in but not all the way. I don’t feel safe with you because I don’t ever know that you’re not going
to bolt. I mean, hell, I kissed you and you didn’t look at me for two weeks. You’re paying rent at your apartment in Boulder
still because you need to make sure if you want to get away from me, you can. It’s plain as fucking day that if I make one
wrong move . . . we’re done.”
“That’s how you see me?”
“Yes!” he roars, tossing his hands out wide, the snowy scenic background at odds with his tortured stance. “I’m fucking terrified
of losing you all the time.”
“But this is all fake,” I exclaim and the devastated look on his face cuts straight through me.
His head drops and he begins walking up the hill again, trying to get away from me.
“Luke,” I cry and run up to grab his arm.
He yanks it out of my hand. “Don’t touch me.”
“Why?”
“Because when you touch me, I can’t think straight.” His voice cracks as he stops in his tracks. “And it’s not fair.”
“What’s not fair?”
“It’s not fair that you get to touch me and hug me and kiss me in the bar and rock my whole fucking world and just continue
living your life like—”
“Like what?”
“Like I mean nothing,” he cries, his voice distraught. “Like it’s just another day. Like I’m forgettable and meaningless and just a friend and that our marriage isn’t fucking real.”
My eyes swim with tears as I look up at him. There is so much to unpack in what he just said. He thinks he’s forgettable?
Meaningless? He told me I’m his everything. But what sticks the most is what he said about our marriage. He’s angry our marriage isn’t real? My voice is raw when I ask
the question I’m terrified of hearing the answer to. “Do you want our marriage to be real?”
His lips thin and his nostrils flare as he glowers down at me. “The fact that you even have to ask just proves how big of
a fucking wall you still have up between us.”
Headlights suddenly illuminate the two of us and I spot Wyatt’s truck pulling up. He comes to a stop beside us, his window
down, everyone inside the car staring at us.
But Luke won’t take his eyes off me. “Take Addison. I’ll walk,” he says softly and, without another word, he pushes past me,
up the hill, and I stare at the back of him while Trista wraps her hands around me and ushers me into the back seat.
Squished into the vehicle, surrounded by Luke’s family, I burst into tears and thank God for the Fletchers because they all
say absolutely nothing.