Chapter 18
She lied.
Not outright, not with words. But I saw it in her eyes. The way she shifted, dodged, spun herself in circles trying to say everything except what she was actually feeling.
Something was wrong.
She was too quiet, too tense, and when Travis asked her straight up what happened, she gave him a tired smile and a half-assed excuse about work and kids.
“I just need a win today,” She sighed, grabbing me and pulling me closer.
Travis didn’t let up right away, but when she looked over her shoulder and kissed him, slow and deep, fingers tangling in his shirt, he caved. We both did.
Because we were starving for her.
Maybe it was easier to fuck through the questions than force answers out of her that she wasn’t ready to give us. Maybe we hadn’t earned them from her yet.
But later, as she drove away into the night toward her house and there was nothing but that quiet still darkness surrounding us, Travis turned to me and said exactly what I’d been thinking all night.
“She’s hiding something.”
I nodded, tossing my duffel into the back seat of my truck. “You felt it too.”
“Yeah, and it wasn’t just stress and kid chaos.”
“She was different tonight. Guarded.”
“Afraid.” He looked over at me, his expression sharp. “You think it has anything to do with why she left town back then?”
That hit me like a punch to the chest.
Because the truth was, none of us ever really knew why Frankie Blake left town in the first place. One day she was the fierce, sarcastic girl with wild eyes and more bite than bark. Then, she was gone.
No goodbyes.
No explanations.
Just gone.
“I think it might have more to do with why she came back.” I said with a sigh, staring off where her taillights had disappeared.
“She acts like she’s been surviving a war no one else can see.
Like she’s been carrying shit alone for years, and now someone’s offering to carry it for her, and she doesn’t know how to let us. ”
Travis exhaled hard. “You think someone hurt her?”
I didn’t answer right away.
Because, yeah, I did. I’d seen it in the way she flinched around loud noises when she thought no one was looking. In the way her eyes tracked every exit. In how she laughed only in tough situations, using it to change subjects too fast.
She was soft with us, but not safe.
“If someone did—” I said slowly, feeling something coil around my stomach, “then we find out who. And we make sure they don’t ever come close again.”
Travis nodded once, jaw ticking. “I want her to trust us. Enough to tell us at least.”
“She will.”
“When?”
I looked down at my boot and shrugged, “When she stops waiting for the other shoe to drop.”
He grunted, “Then maybe it’s time we showed her we’re not going anywhere. And that this is more than just a nighttime thing.”
We didn’t tell her we were coming.
Travis called me first thing in the morning and said, “You busy?”
“Why?”
I wasn’t, but I never volunteered for his shenanigans without giving him a hard time first.
“Frankie’s house needs shit.”
That was it. That was the whole plan.
He picked me up with his truck bed full of tools and an energy drink already in hand for me. I didn’t ask how he knew what size lightbulbs to buy, or why he had new hinges without ever stepping foot in her house to know what was wrong with it.
Truth was, houses were his love language, and working on them with his bare hands was his passion.
And she deserved a house that didn’t reflect how hard life had turned out for her.
Mrs. Blake gave us a spare key the second I flashed her a smile and told her what we were up to.
At first, she glared at me like she’d heard rumors about what we were doing with her precious daughter in the dark of night.
But then she relaxed her shoulders and gave me one of her warm, affectionate gazes.
She supported the idea of us in her daughter’s life, even if she didn’t understand the dynamic exactly.
We let ourselves into Frankie’s quaint little rental house next door to her mom’s through the back, and we both took it all in, seeing her place on the inside for the first time.
The kids were at school; the place was silent. Frankie was starting a shift at the rink cafe.
And the house? Yeah, it needed us.
The back doorknob spun in my hand like a roulette wheel.
Half the lights in the kitchen had burned out, some could be easily fixed by replacing the bulbs, while behind the box, some had fried electrical wires.
The bathroom towel rack fell off the second Travis leaned on it. He caught it midair and glared at me with an I told you so look.
“Add it to the list,” I offered, taking a mental inventory of what needed to get done and in what order.
“Nah,” He said, tossing me screws as he pulled his drill out like a weapon, “We’ll do it. All of it.”
And we did.
We moved through her house as if we belonged there, tightening screws, swapping bulbs, testing windows, patching the loose step at the bottom of the stairs before it could send one of the kids flying.
Even through all the repairs and the obvious things that were broken, the thing I saw the most inside her four walls was love. There was so much damn warmth and love, literally beaming off every wall and surface in the photos, kids' art, and homemade trinkets.
Frankie loved her kids and gave them the very best she could, which was more than enough in reality. But Frankie herself deserved more.
And that was where we were going to take over.
We didn’t talk while we worked, but it wasn’t quiet either. There was a rhythm to it, something easy between two best friends with decades of history. It felt like we weren’t just fixing her house, but we were staking our claim.
Hours later, the front door opened, and Frankie walked in with a scowl on her face. We sat at her dining room table, both sweaty and satisfied, holding court like kings. She froze in the front foyer, staring at us.
Travis cut her off as she opened her mouth, no doubt to yell at us, and beat her to it. “Nice of you to join us.”
“What are you doing here?” She asked, dropping her bag and crossing her arms over her chest. Damn that delicious chest. She looked good in a white Budweiser shirt over a black thermal, dark jeans and a tan beanie on her head with her dark locks framing her face beneath.
“Being manly,” I said, standing up and wiping my hands on the rag over my shoulder, “Your place was crying for help.”
“You—” she turned on her heel, looking around her space with fresh eyes. “You fixed my door?”
“And the porch step, and the towel rack, and the drawer.” I said.
“Drawers.” Travis said with a pointed stare, “Almost every single one of them. In every room.”
Her mouth dropped open slightly. “You two broke into my house to—do maintenance?” She stumbled over the thought, “Wait, did you use my spare key?”
“No,” I watched her closely as her face gave something away I couldn’t quite place. “Your mom lent us hers.” I closed the distance and stared down at her with a smirk. “You know I’m a big softy for Mrs. Blake.”
She looked around again, over at Travis, with a slow, quiet appraisal. Like she didn’t know what to say.
Then she swallowed hard and met my gaze. “No one has ever done that for me.”
I brushed a lock of hair behind her ear, “Get used to it. Because your mom is onto us, and I’m afraid if we walked away now, I’d break her heart. And I can’t stomach the thought.”
She poked her knuckles into my stomach and let me pull her in close. But I didn’t miss the sudden gloss in her eyes, as she tried to blink it away before burying her face in my shirt.
Travis joined us, coming up behind her and kissing the top of her head, before adding, “Next time we’ll start upstairs.”
She laughed just a little, and I kissed her lips, feeling her melt into me. Because I couldn’t not. Not when her heart was soft like clay and I wanted nothing more than to leave my fingerprints on every piece of it.
Frankie melted between us like butter on warm skin. One moment she was standing there, still stunned from the repairs, heart cracked wide open and eyes blinking like she didn’t think we could see her tears.
And then the next, she was under me on her couch.
She giggled when I pinned her down, and Travis locked the front door. “How long until the kids get home?”
“Uh,” she licked her lips as I pushed her shirt up over her head, revealing a black lace bralette thing that made my mouth water. “Um.”
“Frankie.” Travis said dominantly from behind the couch, undoing the buttons on his flannel. “What time do they get home, baby?”
“Fuck,” She cursed and moaned when I bit her nipple through the lace. “What day of the week is it? Thursday?” She panted, “Five. They go to after-school art camp on Thursdays until five. A friend drives them home.”
“Mmh,” I groaned, glancing at the clock over the television. “You mean we get you all alone for hours? Damn, the things I can do to this sexy little body in that time.”
“God,” She arched her back, feeding her lush tits into my hungry mouth and reached for Travis’s belt over the back of the couch. “This was not how I was planning to spend my afternoon.”
I chuckled, kissing my way down her stomach, spending time at each mark left in her skin from growing her babies until I got to the button of her jeans, and flicking it open. “Is this an okay alternative?” I asked, laying a wet kiss at the top of her panties.
She nodded, breathless, “Yes.”
But that wasn’t enough. I looked up at her, green eyes burning, flushed cheeks, wild hair falling over her shoulders. “I need to hear it, sweetheart.”
Her eyes locked on mine, fierce and tender. “I can’t imagine a better way to spend an afternoon,” She traced her fingers over my cheek before turning her attention up to Travis as he pulled his shirt off. “I regretted leaving you two behind last night.”