Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
TRACE
I drove back to my house with a stupid grin on my face. Last night had been everything. She was everything.
This was what I wanted for my life. It had always been Delaney. Why had I ever tried to make a life without her in it?
I didn’t care what it took. I wasn’t letting her go. I was done with letting life get in between us. We’d made mistakes, but we’d been kids. We could move past it. I knew we could.
As I pulled up outside my house, my first instinct was to turn back around. And I was just about to shift the car into reverse when my eyes glanced over my rear view, and I saw Chelsea sitting in her car across the street.
Just like that, all the happiness and joy melted out of me, and I sagged in my seat.
I couldn’t do this again. It had to end.
Quickly pulling out my phone, I fired off a text to Ethan, telling him that she was here again. Then I did possibly one of the most stupid things I’d done all week. I got out of the car and headed down the driveway toward her, my phone still clasped in my hand and set to record. I wasn’t risking anything this time.
As soon as I moved in her direction, Chelsea leaped from her vehicle. I could see the determination on her face as she ran her fingers through her cherry-red hair. The black makeup around her eyes was smudged across her face, and I knew immediately that she’d been waiting outside the house all night.
“What are you doing here, Chelsea?” I snapped.
“I knew you were cheating on me with that gutter whore. That’s where you’ve been all night, isn’t it? All it took was for her to look in your direction, and you dropped to your knees to beg her for it.” The snarl on her face warned me that Chelsea was here for a fight, but for the first time in a long time, I was just about ready to give her one.
“When are you going to get it into your head, Chelsea? We. Are. Divorced. Even if I had spent the night with Delaney, it wouldn’t be me cheating on you. You and I are done. Over. You have absolutely no right to come here thinking you get a say in my life anymore. I don’t know how you keep getting the keys to my house, but this needs to stop. You need to stop coming here. You need to stop breaking in. Chels, you need help. Can’t you see that?”
I didn’t even flinch as she slapped me across the face. I was so used to it now that I barely even felt the sting because my shame still rose up to smother it.
“Hitting me isn’t going to make me be your husband again,” I told her gently. “You were always so angry. Always so intent on hurting me. Why do you want your life to be like this?”
I was so tired of this whole thing that even though I wanted to reach out and shake some sense into her, I doubted I had the strength to do it. All the fight leached out of me and a sense of pity seeped in. Chelsea was on her way to rock bottom, and I doubted she had anyone left that cared enough to pull her back up from it.
“What do you expect me to do?” she seethed. “You’re always sneaking around, pretending you’re oh so innocent. Like you ever cared about me. The only time you ever showed any emotion was if I beat it out of you. And now what? I get left with nothing, and you run away with that bitch and live out your happy little family dream like you always wanted. At least I get that satisfaction. At least I know I took that from you.”
I took a step back, relieved when Chelsea didn’t mirror the move. Instead, she started to pace back and forth, shaking her head and ranting to herself about how it had always been Delaney who stood in her way.
In a way, she was right. I didn’t ever stop loving Delaney, and maybe I had brought the ghost of our relationship into this marriage. Chelsea had deserved better than me, especially if it was my inattentiveness that had driven her to be this way.
But with how badly the court case was going, I knew this was going to be my only chance to get enough evidence for the restraining order. She couldn’t talk her way out of a recording of her own actions.
“You know what? You’re right. I was never the husband I should have been to you because I never got over Delaney. We should never have gotten married. It’s not like you really wanted to, either. We just did what everyone thought we should. But it doesn’t have to be like that anymore, Chelsea. You can have the life you want now. Why do you keep punishing yourself by going over this over and over again? Don’t you want to have a chance to be happy with someone else?”
“Happy? This isn’t about being happy , Trace. It was never about being happy. It was about having everything . It was about being the one that got picked first, the one that you looked at like I actually meant something. I was supposed to get the big house. I was supposed to be the woman who ruled over this stupid fucking town. Instead, all I got was you moping over the one you lost.”
She wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t already know. It was why I’d loved Delaney so completely. She never saw the Farrington name and the things it would get her. All she ever saw was me.
“How do you keep getting a key to my house?” I asked, wanting to end this once and for all.
Chelsea cut a glare in my direction and scoffed. “It’s not difficult to get what you want when you’re a woman.”
“I don’t—What the hell do you mean?”
It was fairly obvious, but I needed her to say it.
She laughed then. It was so malicious that it made me want to retreat even further from her. It raised the memories of every other time that she’d been in a black mood and found a way to make it my fault.
“There’s only one man in town who changes locks, and it doesn’t take much to talk him into bed. A few drinks, a few promises. He’d do just about anything for me if I asked him to. He appreciates having me in his life,” she screamed.
I glanced down the street, looking for Ethan’s patrol car. This situation was about to spiral out of control, and I needed him to step in. What I didn’t expect was to see Dex’s truck pull around the corner instead.
The sound of the engine had Chelsea glancing over her shoulder and then she laughed, turning back to me as she started to back up toward her car.
“I might not have you, Trace. But you don’t have her either. She’ll never forgive you. So, in the end, I win.”
Then she climbed into her car and drove away.
I stared at my phone, watching the timer count up on the voice recording, not really sure what the hell I was supposed to do now. As much as I wanted Chelsea as far away from me as she could get, there had also been a time when she’d been my friend. When she’d been Delaney’s friend. No matter what had happened between then and now, I almost felt like I owed it to her to get her the help she needed. She was one more thing that the Farringtons had torn apart. Another dirty piece of our family legacy that wouldn’t even be remembered by those who had hurt her the most. I wasn’t about to add myself to that list. So, as much as it pained me, I knew I had a responsibility to her that I couldn’t ignore.
Dex pulled up beside me and climbed out of his truck as I clicked off the recording and shoved the phone into my pocket.
“You okay?” he asked, rounding the hood and staring after Chelsea’s retreating car.
“Yeah, just…Chelsea.” I shrugged, not really knowing what to say or if I really wanted to get into it.
Dex was a close friend, but he wasn’t someone who knew everything that had gone on between me and my ex-wife. No one did apart from Booker and, unfortunately, my mother.
He hummed as he leaned back against the truck, his concerned eyes not leaving me. “I didn’t understand your message, but I could tell you needed someone here.”
I frowned, not sure what he was talking about.
“You sent me a text,” he said, pulling his phone out of his pocket. “Chelsea is here again,” he read aloud.
Fuck. I must have tapped on the wrong contact. Dex and Ethan were right next to each other on my phone.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to send that to you.”
“I figured,” he shrugged like it hadn’t been any bother for him to come swooping in to my aid.
Could my life get any more pitiful?
“You want a beer?” I asked, nodding toward the house, not quite ready to be alone just yet.
Dex glanced at his watch with a smirk. “Ten thirty a.m. and already hitting the beer. Now, this sounds like a story I need to hear.”
He had no idea what he was about to get himself into.
“Come on.” I turned on the spot and headed to the house, reaching for the keys in my pocket. I nearly cursed aloud as I realized that I needed to change the locks yet again, and I couldn’t exactly ask Frank to do it now that I knew he was the one supplying Chelsea with the copy.
Then I really did curse when I saw the glass littering the floor as we stepped inside, remembering that I still hadn’t been back to the house to clean up after the last time Chelsea had paid me a visit.
“What the fuck, Trace? Did someone break in?”
“Yeah,” I shrugged, heading to the pantry and grabbing the broom. “Chelsea,” I told him once I emerged.
Dex frowned, looking around the house. Thankfully, the extent of the damage was mainly isolated to the kitchen. I’d probably be finding broken glass for weeks, as was the usual case, but there was a glimmer of hope that maybe this was going to be the last time.
“I think you’ve got some explaining to do,” Dex said sternly as he took the broom from me and nodded me over to the fridge. “And I have a feeling that we’ll need that beer to get through this one.”
I didn’t fight him for the broom. Honestly, I was tired of always being the one cleaning up her mess. It was a relief to finally have someone to tell about the insanity that was happening around me.
Dex had been around since I was four years old. He met my brother, Xander, in fifth grade when he’d moved to town to live with his grandparents. He’d spent so much time at our house that he might as well have the last name of Farrington at this point. All the Farrington boys had grown close to the weedy kid from the other side of town who knew far more about real life than we’d been exposed to. In fact, if it hadn’t been for Dex, I never would have spoken with Delaney. He was the one who had befriended her first and dragged her along to a party we threw down by the old dried-up creek. Not that we were allowed to call it that. Creek was far too common a word to be allowed in our home. Brook was the only thing my mother would call it and, by extension, the rest of us. She’d married into one of the founding families, and she took that legacy seriously. Too seriously.
So, I popped the tops of two beers, taking a stool at the breakfast bar as Dex stoically swept up the remnants of every single glass from my kitchen cupboards, and I poured out all of my secrets from the past seven years. Every terrible memory. He’d long finished cleaning before I reached the end, eventually joining me at the breakfast bar and silently drinking his beer beside me.
“I wish you would have told me about this sooner,” he said as he traced his finger through the condensation the bottle had left on the counter. “You didn’t have to live like this.”
I shrugged. He was right, and yet there was a part of me that felt like I deserved it.
“I heard Delaney is back in town,” he added, almost like he knew exactly what I was thinking about.
“Yeah. We’re buying the Barrett land for the new project.”
I took a swig of the now-warm beer and winced at the sour taste. It was far too early in the morning for a second one, and I had too much to do today to sit here getting drunk instead, no matter how much I wanted to.
“So, you’ve seen her?”
“Yep.”
“And you’ve talked to her?”
“Yep.”
“And? Shit, dude, I know we’re not girls, but you’ve got to give me more than that. How did it go?”
I stared at the friend I’d long considered a brother and tried to find the words to tell him how much it had meant to me. How it felt like the first time in years that I’d finally been able to breathe. How much I wanted it to mean that this was the beginning of something I’d been dreaming of for years.
Except, I couldn’t find them.
All I could find were the fears creeping in. What did it mean? Did Delaney feel the same way that I did? Had I walked out that door this morning giving her the opportunity she needed to second guess what was happening between us?
I’d told her that I wanted her. Right? I at least had to have told her that she was everything I’d wanted for my life. But now that my mind was running back over the night, all I could remember were the desperate touches and the feverish kisses. The way she clung to me. The look on her beautiful face as the orgasm rocked through her body, almost like a little piece of her broke off and stayed with me now.
When I finally looked up and Dex saw the look on my face, he swore again. “Shit. That well?”
“I have to go see Delaney,” I gasped, leaping from the stool and spinning on the spot like I was looking for something, even though I had no idea what it could be.
I couldn’t let her think that this was a one-night thing. I didn’t want to give her even a second to doubt me. Not again. Not ever again.
If it was the last thing I did, I’d prove to Delaney Barrett just how much I loved her.
“Then go!” Dex shouted. “What the fuck are you still doing here with me?” he laughed as he saw the desperation on my face. “It’s about time the two of you finally caught a break.”
I took off for my car, not even stopping to say goodbye to Dex, let alone close up the house. Dex would probably do it, anyway. Even if he didn’t, what was the worst that would happen? Chelsea would break in? It’s not like that would be anything out of the usual.
As I climbed into my car, I started to pat myself down, looking for the keys. I almost leaped a foot in the air when the knocking on the window came. Turning, I found Dex’s grinning face as he shook the keys at me. He pulled open the door and tossed the keys at me.
“I gotta say, it’s good seeing you like this, Trace. You haven’t looked this alive in years. I was starting to think we might have lost you.”
My mouth gaped open at his casual comment. Not because it wasn’t true but because I hadn’t realized that there were people around me who had realized it, too.
“Go!” He laughed again. “We can talk about it later, after you go and get your girl back.”
I didn’t even respond, opting instead to do exactly as he instructed as I sped out of the driveway at an inappropriate speed.
I let Delaney go once, and I wasn’t going to make the same mistake again.
I should have remembered the drive more than I did, but it was just a series of turns taken far too quickly and an overwhelming need to see her again.
For a moment, I worried that I shouldn’t put all this on her when she’d just lost her dad. She was going through so much right now. But I wanted to be there to help her through it, in whatever capacity she’d let me. If she wasn’t ready for anything right now, I’d respect that, but I’d be the friend she needed to get through this process. I’d make sure she knew without a shadow of a doubt that I’d be waiting for her at the end of it whenever she was ready to finally let me in. Ready to let me prove that I could finally be the man she deserved to have by her side.
As I pulled into the driveway for the Barrett farm, the nerves started to rise. What if she didn’t want me? What if she laughed in my face and turned me away?
But then I reminded myself about last night. How we’d come together, impossible to resist the pull of the other.
No. I knew there was something there.
There had to be.
As the old familiar farmhouse came into view, I slowed the car to a stop. Because there she was. Lifting two grocery bags out of the trunk of the car.
I took in the sight of her. Committing the sight of such an everyday task to memory like it was the most precious thing I’d ever seen. I wanted to remember this moment, and I greedily soaked it in like an addict getting a hit of his favorite drug.
As I watched, a flash of dark hair registered near the doorway as a kid darted down the front porch steps. He sprinted to Delaney, wrapping his arms around her waist, and then took one of the bags from her arms. I watched in shock as she tipped back her head with a laugh that I knew the sound of without even needing to hear it. Then she ducked down, wrapping one arm around the child, and kissed his head before he happily jogged back to the house.
And my heart felt like it came to a screeching halt inside me.
Because this was a glimpse at Delaney’s every day, at the life she’d made with the family she’d built around her.
Of course, she had.
She left for a new life, and she’d found one. That was what she’d told me. I should have listened. But just like always, I was sucked back into her pull, powerless to resist the promise of a dream that would never happen.
This was just like back then.
I wasn’t the one she wanted. I was just a passing phase that she’d used to fill her time until she was ready to reach for something better.
As Delaney followed her son inside, she turned to close the front door, her eyes locking with mine through the windshield as she did. She froze, her hand clasping the door handle as the color leeched from her face.
Was her husband inside, too? There had to be a guy to go with the kid. That was why she’d left me, after all. All this time, I’d been miserable and pining for her, and she’d been building the life she always wanted. The life she left me for. The one she’d made sure to tell me had absolutely no room in it for me. I should have reminded myself of that before I got in this deep. I should have read that letter one more damn time.
It was good that I’d found out now. Better to know the truth before she could pull me in any deeper.
So, I slammed the car into reverse and tore back down the driveway without even a single regret. Well, maybe there was one, but I wasn’t in any frame of mind to think about it right now. That would come later, in the darkest hours of the night, with a whiskey in my hand and every regret I had in this life filtering through my mind.