CHAPTER 22 BEN
“Shit,” I murmur. The sun’s out, which means Kaylee should’ve snuck back to her room last night.
She didn’t.
She’s still naked in my bed…exactly like I want her.
It was dangerous to fall asleep naked, but it’s hard to care as I find myself warm and comfortable. She’s sleeping peacefully, my arms around her as she breathes evenly.
It’s perfect. It’s just as it should be. She’s gorgeous beside me, and I want her right here forever.
But it isn’t what she wants right now, and I have to respect that.
Holding her in my arms seems to be the only thing that calms the swirling thoughts in my brain.
The only time I feel any sense of peace lately is when I’m breathing in her sunshine.
It isn’t the first time I’ve felt like just being with her calms me, but it feels like it’s becoming more and more significant, particularly in the wake of what happened at my mother’s wedding—getting kicked out by the bride after a decade-long secret was revealed, ruining friendships, and potentially destroying the marriage that was only minutes-old on top of whatever threat Tatum is leveling against me now mixed with Kitty’s lies.
It feels like a hefty mountain in front of me, and the only possible way I’d ever be able to climb it is with Kaylee’s hand planted firmly in mine.
Nothing’s perfect in this life, though, so I’ll take her however I can get her.
I sigh with regret before I shake her awake.
Her eyes flutter slowly open, and when she focuses in on me, they widen. “Oh shit. It’s bright in here. Shit, shit, shit.”
I chuckle. “We’ll sneak you out, Peaches. It’ll be fine.”
Only it’s not fine. She scrambles to get dressed, and I take my time since remaining calm is the best bet right now.
She isn’t remaining calm, though. She isn’t taking my cues or mirroring me in any way. Instead, she’s in a rush to get the hell out of my room. I’m about to tell her to wait for me to open the door so I can double check that the coast is clear, but in her rush to leave, I’m too late.
As she opens the door to peek out into the hallway, she finds herself face-to-face with Jack.
Yep…the guy who warned her off me yesterday.
Her eyes widen as she slams the door, but it’s too late. He most definitely saw her standing in my room in all her disheveled morning glory.
“Fuck!” she hisses.
I open the door this time, keeping it only open wide enough for him to see me and not his sister standing behind me. “’Sup, JD?”
His eyes narrow in anger. “What the fuck is my sister doing in your bedroom at seven in the morning?”
“She, uh, had a question about the water heater. Did you take one of your famous long, hot showers this morning? You’ve got like thirteen other people to share the hot water with, man.” I go for a light, teasing tone rather than one of defense, but I’m pretty sure I fail epically.
Jack raises a brow at me then pushes on the door a little. “What are you really doing in here?”
Kaylee’s face is pale, and I can tell she’s scrambling to come up with some lie as to why she’s here.
Her wide eyes fall to mine, and I nod a little encouragingly. She closes her eyes and nods, too, as if she’s finally realized she can’t lie about this forever.
It’s time.
Something in my chest gives way at that, and maybe I’m not as scared as I was before.
Kaylee draws in a deep breath, and then she blurts the words. “We’re together. Like, for real.”
Jack’s jaw clenches. I open the door all the way to invite him in before closing it behind him out of respect for Kaylee so the whole house doesn’t hear this conversation.
“I’m in love with him,” she says, moving toward me.
“And I’m in love with her,” I say, drawing an arm around her shoulder to pull her closer.
I press a soft kiss to her temple to try to help calm her warring emotions, and just like waking up with her in my arms this morning helped calm my own storms, it seems like when I pull her closer to me, she calms, too.
Jack looks like he’s about to bust a vein in his forehead.
“It’s okay, Jack,” Kaylee says, her voice even as she tries to convince him that this is right for us. “We’ve talked our way around the future, and Ben is it for me. He’s everything I ever dreamed.”
Well, not everything, I suppose. But good enough, maybe.
“But you’ve always wanted kids. A big family…” Jack says. He raises a brow at me. “And you…you don’t.”
Kaylee shakes her head. “I have a huge extended family that’s growing by two more in January. I’m surrounded by love. I realized that dreams change as life is thrown at us, and my dream now is to be with Ben.”
I shrug as I drop my arm from around her. I don’t want to push Jack too hard too soon when he’s just finding out, and out of all the people staying in my house right now, it had to be him…the guy we were both most hesitant to tell about our relationship.
“And my dream is to be with her,” I say. “I’m sorry you found out this way. We kept looking for a good time to tell everyone, but that good time doesn’t actually seem to exist. First it was the pregnancy announcements—”
“And then you warned me off him just yesterday—” Kaylee adds, finishing my sentence for me.
“And we just didn’t want to deal with the expectations and pressures that come from everybody knowing,” I say. And the secret sex has been fun, though I don’t voice those words.
Jack stares at me for a few beats, and I can’t tell if he’s calming down or if he’s about to explode at us. His nostrils flare a little, and his eyes are sort of flashing as he looks between us.
I’ve got about an inch on him plus maybe twenty pounds, not that it matters. He can look at me with the same intimidation techniques he uses on everybody else, but I’ve known the guy a long time. He doesn’t scare me.
Much.
“How long has this been going on?” he asks, his voice calm even though I still can’t quite get a read on him.
Kaylee and I exchange a glance. “A couple months,” I admit.
“It started right around the time you convinced him to take me as his date to his mom’s wedding,” Kaylee says.
“A couple months?” Jack’s nose wrinkles in disgust for a beat as he levels a gaze at me. “Those scratches on your arms when I was jabbing you that it was from some chick…”
I laugh at the look on his face that tells me he’s starting to move toward acceptance, and Kaylee’s cheeks turn red as her eyes widen and she basically looks like she wants to die.
“Yeah, that was all her.” I lean in a little closer. I’m sure I’m just poking an already angry bear, but I can’t seem to help myself. I lower my voice as I pretend I’m telling a secret. “She really isn’t the sweet, innocent little girl you make her out to be.”
Jack clenches his jaw and his fists at the same time.
Kaylee gives me a warning look before she smacks me in the arm—yep, right where I banged it up after falling off a horse over the weekend. I wince. She rolls her eyes when I grab the spot of the offense.
“Knock it off.” She turns to Jack. “I’m sorry,” she says quietly. “I know you just warned me yesterday about being careful, but it’s too late. I recklessly fell for him when I was least expecting to.”
Jack’s quiet a beat as he looks between the two of us, and finally, he seems to relent. He sighs and shakes his head. “Wait a minute…that phone call after the coach’s meeting—” His face turns a little greenish at the thought.
Kaylee jumps in on that one as I think back to the night I was on the phone with Jack while her mouth was all over my monster and then she let me come on her tits. Ahh…memories.
“Let’s maybe not discuss all the details,” she says.
Jack sighs. “Right. Listen, Ben. If you ever, ever hurt her, you will answer to me.”
I want to drop a line like Chandler did when Ross warned him about hurting Monica before they got married, but he doesn’t seem to be in the mood for jokes.
“And same to you,” he says, his eyes moving to his sister. “Ben’s a good guy. One of the best. He’s been hurt before, and you better be careful with him.”
“I know,” she says, reaching over to squeeze my hand. “And I will.”
“Unpopular opinion,” I say.
Jack looks at me in confusion. “What is?”
“That Ben’s a good guy. The media is tearing me up after Kitty’s lies.”
“Oh! That’s right. Forgot to mention it after finding out you’re banging my little sister, but I took care of that for you,” Jack says, his tone a little flippant considering the huge bomb he just dropped.
“You what?” Kaylee and I say at the same time, and Jack laughs.
“I took care of it,” he says, enunciating each word like we’re stupid.
“How?” I ask.
“I got in touch with Eric Scott. I told him I knew everything, and I’d make sure he never played anywhere ever again if he didn’t get Kitty to retract her lies.”
“How’d you get in touch with him?” I ask, my tone incredulous as I try to piece together what he’s so casually telling me like he didn’t just deliver a total mindfuck.
He brushes his knuckles on his shoulder with exactly zero modesty. “When one of the greatest quarterbacks to ever play the game rings your line, you pick it the fuck up.”
“The ego on this guy,” Kaylee says to me, rolling her eyes.
Jack shrugs. “Ellie told Kate about what she heard when you called Eric. There’s no way in fuck I was going to let him get away with it—and I have no idea how he thought he would.
Got hit too many times in the head, I guess, but he’s Calvin’s problem now.
I spoke with him late last night and Kitty issued a statement this morning that she was blackmailed into lying about you.
Unpopular opinion reversed, my friend,” he says, clapping me on the shoulder.
“I think your friend Billy Peters covered the story if you’re interested in learning more. ”
I just stare at him in awe for a beat. Is there anything this guy can’t do? “Thanks, man,” I finally say, unsure how to express my gratitude. He’s so easy and breezy about it as if Kitty and Eric weren’t out to destroy my entire fucking life.
“Hey, what are friends for?” Jack glances at Kaylee and back at me. “You know, aside from staying away from their siblings…”
I laugh and sling my arm around Kaylee’s shoulders again. “Sorry.”
“When it’s right, it’s just right,” Kaylee says.
He stares at us a beat, and then he shrugs as if he doesn’t have the energy to fight it when he can see just by looking between the two of us that this is real.
“So how does your wedding coming up this weekend work into this whole thing?” he asks, motioning between the two of us. “Especially now that Kitty came clean?”
Kaylee and I exchange another glance, and she fields this one. “Since you know now, we may as well tell everyone and answer all the questions at once.”
“Can we at least make it fun?” Jack asks.
Kaylee narrows her eyes at him. “What exactly do you mean by fun?”
He wiggles his eyebrows, and then he lets us in on his idea.