Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
August
A s I sat down on the weight bench, weight in hand, I stared at my brothers.
We had all come over to Luca’s house to work out, but then we had gotten distracted by a golden retriever who Luca was taking care of for the evening, and the fact that the golden retriever didn’t quite like Luca’s cat. But now the two were becoming fast friends, and we were late on our workouts. Their wives and children were over at Paisley’s house for a girls’ evening, so we guys were just hanging out, while Greer was over with her husbands.
It was nice, having this time together, even though I was still a little confused as to what the hell I was supposed to be doing with my life.
I hadn’t planned on this. I hadn’t planned on any of this. But now I needed to figure out what I was going to do with Paisley.
“You have your thinking face on, and it honestly looks a little painful.”
I flipped Heath off. “Fuck you.”
“No, thanks. Seriously though, that thinking face looks like it hurts.”
“I have the same damn face as you. I don’t know why you think you’re funny.”
“Because I’m freaking hilarious.”
Luca just shook his head at us.
“So, why the thinking face? Hard chemistry problem? Like what happens to oxygen once it leaves hydrogen peroxide?” Luca asked, and I snorted.
“I can tell you the answer if you want.”
“I want to know,” Heath asked, and Luca snorted.
“You should know the answer. I know the answer.”
“Because you are the wunderkind who is a veterinarian and should know the answer.” I winked at him, then glared over at Heath. “Hydrogen peroxide is just H2O2. It literally has this little oxygen-oxygen single bond and then once it hits light, it decomposes and you have water and O2. Get it? H2O and O2?”
“Really? That’s it.”
“Yes. Basic chemistry can be fun.”
“I’m literally yawning deep inside. I cannot believe you just said that.”
“I’m just saying, it’s why they come in the little dark bottles.”
“You’re ridiculous. And now that we’ve had our chemistry lesson for the day, please, enlighten me on why you had that annoying face on.”
“Again, it’s your face,” I growled. I did another rep and sighed. “I slept with Paisley.”
“We know that. We heard that,” Luca said with an obvious shudder.
“No. We slept together again.” I paused as they both stared at me wide-eyed. “In her office. On her desk. We might have broken a lamp. I’m not sure. But yeah, we had sex. Twice. In her office. And I don’t think there’s enough Clorox to take away everything.”
“My wife works in that office,” Heath snapped.
“So does mine,” Luca put in.
“Seriously?” both said at the same time, and I set down the weight before pinching the bridge of my nose.
“I realize that we shouldn’t have. I realize it was very inappropriate, but it just happened.”
“You just fell into her vagina?” Heath asked, and Luca let out a groan.
“Really? That’s what you’re going to say?”
“What else am I supposed to say? When he says that he sleeps with his ex-wife, not once, but a second time and says it’s an accident? I worry about this man.”
“The first kiss was an accident, and I told myself it was a mistake, and then I kept going. I like having sex with Paisley. That was never our problem. She has forever been the best thing I’ve ever had.”
However I knew as I said that, I wasn’t talking about sex in that instant. Because she had been the best thing I had ever had. And I had walked away from it.
“What the hell had you been thinking when you left her?” Heath asked softly.
“I want to say I hadn’t been thinking, but I thought too much all those years ago.”
“What happened all those years ago, man?” Heath asked, as both of my brothers set down the workout equipment to stare at me.
“It wasn’t the right time for us.”
“Bullshit,” Luca burst out, surprising all of us, considering Luca was the calm one of us.
“Bullshit,” Luca repeated. “I remember the way you two were. Yes, you fought, but in that playful way that you two sometimes do now. You two were fucking amazing together. And then suddenly you’re finishing up college and you’re ready to start your new phases, and you’re alone, and she isn’t coming by anymore. It’s just over and you’re not telling us what happened. Did you fucking cheat on her? Did she cheat on you?”
I didn’t even realize I was in Luca’s face before Heath was pulling us apart.
“Don’t you ever fucking say that again. I would have never touched another woman.”
“Then what happened?”
“She didn’t cheat on me. It wasn’t anything like that. I walked away because I had to.”
“Why? What was so important that you couldn’t be with the woman that made you happy? Then again, I don’t even know why our parents can never seem to love each other. So at the time, I figured it was just something our family did. But I see the way that I’m with Addison, and Heath is with Devney. And the way that you look at Paisley when she’s not looking. What the hell, August?”
I glared at my brother, trying to suck in breath, before I looked over at Heath who just waved at me.
“Well? Talk to us. What happened?”
“Have you seen Paisley?” I burst out.
“What?” Luca snapped.
“Have you seen her? And not just how beautiful she is, because she’s the most absolute beautiful woman I’ve ever met in my life. But she’s caring, and yet prideful. She raises her chin when she’s scared and she’s trying to hide it. And she is brilliant. She is a multimillionaire who is poised to take over the world. She was always good with money, and might have come from some of it, but what she has now? It makes everything else pale in comparison. She had everything going for her, and she was married to a future high school chemistry teacher .” I didn’t mean to put such anger in the title, but there it was, out, and there was nothing else I could do.
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” Heath growled. “Don’t tell me you broke up with her for her own good. Because I’m going to beat the shit out of you for even saying it.”
“She kept canceling things to stay with me. Because I only had certain weekends off during my internship. She was afraid to travel without me because my schedule didn’t work. It wasn’t like I could take PTO in order to go with her to some of these conferences. So she was alone so much, even when she was working even more hours than me, our schedules didn’t mesh, our lives didn’t mesh. She was exceptionalism personified, and I was the guy with a family who couldn’t stay together, and a job that I loved, but didn’t fit with hers.”
My heart raced as I said the words, even as I realized that it didn’t make any sense. And yet, there were more reasons. More reasons that made bile rise in my throat.
“You dumped her because she was too successful?” Luca asked, each word a staccato beat.
“I walked away so she could bloom. So she could thrive. And if I hadn’t, her mother—” I cut myself off before I could say anything else, and then Heath was in my face, Luca right beside him.
“What the hell did that bitch do?” Heath asked, his voice low.
Well, it seemed that Heath remembered Paisley’s mother from the wedding, or perhaps had met her along the way with Devney’s job.
“Her mother had plans for Paisley.”
“And you just let it happen? Her mom had plans with Paisley’s ex-husband as well, and we see how that turned out.”
“It wasn’t just that. There was a big deal at the start of Paisley’s company that she needed to focus on, and her mother wanted that deal to happen more than anything but swore to me if I held her daughter back…” My voice trailed off as I swallowed that bile once again, my hands shaking.
“What did her mother say she’d do? That she’d ruin the deal? The deal that she wanted her daughter to have?” Luca asked. “I don’t buy it.”
“Her mother tried to sell her to the highest bidder right out of college,” I growled. “It didn’t matter that we were engaged at the time. She kept introducing her to these older men who wanted younger wives with money. The same way that she sold off Paisley in the beauty circuit, and all through school with all those championships that she won. Paisley always had to be perfect. And I was the stain on that perfection.”
“But not in Paisley’s eyes. In her mother’s. What the hell were you thinking?”
“If I had stayed, Paisley would have lost everything. She would have lost the business. She would have lost the proposal she needed that’s launched her into the success she is now. I don’t know what the plan was after I left, but that was what was going to happen. Paisley was going to lose everything if I stayed. And she wouldn’t have been able to grow with me. So I left. It was the best thing I could do for her.”
“You’re lucky I don’t beat the shit out of you right now,” Heath whispered, before he stepped away, shaking his head.
“And Paisley has no idea this happened.”
“No. I just filed for divorce and walked away. But look at her now. Look at everything she’s done. She keeps your wives employed.”
“Fuck that. They would have found other companies where they had other jobs. And even then, Paisley could have built something else from the ground up. Have you seen that woman work? She is a fucking savant at this shit,” Luca said. “And you took that choice away from her. For her to fight for herself. Instead you had to be the sacrificial knight.”
“Her mother is already trying to sell her off to Jacob again, so I don’t know what would have happened back then. All I know is if I had stayed, she would have lost everything. And she wouldn’t have been able to grow.”
“It sounds to me you were embarrassed about our family. And hell, I was embarrassed too.” Heath let out a breath. “Embarrassed about our parents. About the fact that we didn’t even know our baby sister. So yeah, I get that. But you are an amazing teacher. You need to remember that. Hell, you still teach me things every day. And we’re fucking twins. I thought we were supposed to have twin minds and all that,” Heath said, scoffing at his poor execution of a joke.
“I did what I thought was best at the time. I don’t even think my frontal lobe was fully developed.”
“Are we sure it is now?” Luca asked, concern in his gaze. “What are you going to do about this? You need to tell her.”
I shook my head. “If I tell her, she’ll hate me.”
“I’m pretty sure she already hated you for leaving in the first place,” Heath put in.
“But what good would it do if I told her? I’m not going to be our parents. I’m not going to marry the same woman again.”
“How the hell does that make you our parents? Other than the actual causality here. It’s just a comparison. And I’m not saying that you should marry her, but maybe you should have a damn conversation,” Luca snapped.
“If I tell her, it will hurt her. And I’ve already done that enough.”
“Keeping her in the dark is hurting her too. And I cannot believe I’m the one having this conversation because you know I hate talking about my fucking feelings,” Heath roared.
My lips twitched despite the subject, and I sighed.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen between Paisley and me. Because if we do something, and it falls apart, she’s not going to have anyone. You’re her family.”
“Then figure it out so no one gets hurt,” Luca said simply even though there was nothing simple about it. “Because you deserve happiness too.”
I sighed, before I picked up my water bottle and walked toward the door.
“I’m going to make my way home. Don’t feel like finishing working out.”
“Think about it. Talk to her. She deserves to know.” I nodded at Heath’s words, then headed out to my car.
I knew that the guys wouldn’t tell Paisley, but they might tell their wives. And they should. Because there shouldn’t be secrets.
And how rich was that coming from me.
I got on the highway, but instead of taking my exit, I took hers. I wasn’t quite sure what I was supposed to say to her, or even if it would be tonight. But maybe I would figure out something.
So when I found myself in front of her door, the driveway empty, telling me that the girls had left, I let out a breath, and was grateful when she opened the door.
She had a glass of wine in her hand, with just leggings on, and her sports bra.
I raised a brow. “You’re working out?”
“I was going to get into some yoga with some wine after the girls left. I’m all edgy. What’s wrong, August?” she asked as she took a step back. I moved inside and noticed that she had on hot-pink toenail polish.
Why the hell was that sexy?
“Come with me to the wedding,” I blurted. I hadn’t even realized I was going to say the words at all. But they were out there now, and I wanted to say them.
She stared at me, then gestured with the wine glass toward the rest of the bottle on the counter.
“Do you want to pour yourself a glass of wine and repeat that?”
I laughed, then sighed and walked to the counter, and did indeed pour myself a glass. “Come with me to the wedding. I feel like I’m going to punch someone when I’m there.”
“And you want to take me with you for that?” she said dryly.
My eyes widened and I turned to her. “No. I want someone I know that’s going to be there.” I winced. “I want you there, Paisley. And I don’t know what this means, and I know we should talk about it, but hell, you should be there for the show.”
She sighed, then pulled on my shirt so I moved forward.
“Okay.”
“Yeah?”
“Okay. I want to see the show.”
I leaned down and brushed my lips against hers. “Thank you, Paise.”
“No problem, Augie.”
“You know I hate that name.”
“True. Do you want to stay?” she asked, her voice soft, and my shoulders relaxed. I hadn’t even realized I had been tense since I had walked out of that office.
“Yeah?”
It was a question, not a statement, and she smiled.
“Yeah. Stay the night. And then I’ll go with you to that wedding. And I’ll look fabulous.”
“I think that won’t be too difficult.”
“Look at you, with all the compliments.”
“I try.”
She studied my face, and I knew there were questions there, with answers that I was afraid to give.
But she didn’t ask them, and I didn’t ask her anything either. Instead, I let her drag me down the hall, and I went easily.
Greedily.
I didn’t know when I would tell her the truth. Or what good it would do.
All I knew was that I wanted to be with her tonight.
And she had asked me to stay.