29. Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Thea
I look down at my phone for what feels like the seven-hundred-and-sixty-fifth time today; Cary hasn’t texted me in over twenty-four hours now. It shouldn’t bother me. He texted me daily for almost two weeks straight, and I never once answered. Him going radio silent for one day should be no problem. Especially after the email I sent him. He probably needs some time to process the letter just like Brooks and I did.
Or at least, I assume that’s what Brooks is doing, I haven’t heard from him since we found the letters. I texted him this morning to check in, but he didn’t reply. I shouldn’t be surprised. I’m more than used to his disappearing act. I decided I’ll just let Cary handle it once he’s back in town. Which is supposedly happening in three days.
He promised he’d be back on Sunday, the fifteenth. I don’t one-hundred percent believe him, but part of me turning over a new leaf with him is believing he was—and still is—telling me the truth. So, he’ll be here. He’s probably just packing and settling things in Seattle.
I huff as I chuck my phone on the counter, frustration coursing through me.
Ripley rifles around behind the bar, and I suddenly hear “Hate To Say I Told You So” by The Hives start playing throughout RED’s empty dining room.
He stands up sporting a Cheshire Cat smile. “Hardy har har,” I deadpan with an eye roll. He flicks his eyebrows up with that usual smug face I’d like to slap off him one day. In a loving way, of course.
“I know, okay? I know I shouldn’t have frozen him out like that,” I whine. “But what do I do now? Do you think he’s pissed? And if you think he’s pissed, do you think he’s pissed at me? Or just because of the letter in general? If you think he’s pissed at me, do you think it’s because I haven’t answered him? Do you think he might have gone back to Iris? What kind of fucking name is Care Bear anyway? Fuck, I should have listened to you and answered him. Should I call him now? I should ca—”
“Okay, first—stop talking,” Ripley cuts me off. “Second, Care Bear is a stupid fucking name, and I will be calling him that every chance I get. Third, drink this.” He slides a shot glass filled to the brim with clear liquid toward me.
“Is that tequila or vodka?” I ask.
“It’s a surprise,” he says, his lips quirked in a smirk.
“No, a surprise is finding a five-dollar bill on the sidewalk. This is a fifty-fifty chance we’ll be picked up by the sheriff’s deputy skinny dipping off the dock.”
“That happened once! And I still think someone slipped something into our margaritas that night,” Ripley replies, affronted.
“Yeah, tequila…” I say with an eye roll.
“Regardless, old Brucey’s probably really bored this time of year, it’ll make his night,” he says as he walks around the bar until he’s beside me. He grabs my hands which have made their way to my lap, spinning the rings on my fingers without me even realizing.
“Listen, you know I’m just giving you a hard time. It’s my love language, babe. It’s entirely possible Cary’s just busy. It’s only been a day, let’s table this for tonight, and if he hasn’t reached out by morning, I give you full reign to freak the fuck out,” he says as he pulls me into a hug. I nod into his chest, not knowing what else I could say. “Let’s get drunk on this here tequila.”
I take a deep breath just as Ripley’s suggestion reaches my ears causing a strangled sounding laugh to escape me. “That seems like a terrible idea,” I say as I pull away from him.
He shrugs. “I didn’t say it was a good idea. But it’ll at least distract you for a bit.” His smile isn’t one that reaches his eyes. That realization makes me want to ask why, but he’s already pulling away to grab the drinks from the bar. Before I know it, there’s a shot in one of my hands and a lime wedge in the other. “Drink up, babe. And then we dance.”
The last few days have been a blur. I’ve tried to keep busy and not think about why Cary isn’t reaching out to me. Part of me is screaming ‘I told you so’ to myself while the other part is begging for me to give him more time to prove me wrong. The problem is, I know how it feels to be loved by Carrington Grant. I know what the sliver of hope feels like thinking he could be mine. And I know he wanted me enough once to buy a ring, I just didn’t stay long enough for it to land on my finger.
I’m reminded of the first time he ever told me he wanted to marry me. It was such a mundane moment, one where things felt more up in the air than settled. We’d just moved into our first apartment together.
13 Years Ago
(18 years old)
I’m watching him from the kitchen bar where I’m standing, not sitting on a barstool, since the consignment store we planned on going to was unexpectedly closed today. Because of that, we are now living in an empty place until Monday.
Weekends usually go by fast, but I have a feeling this one won’t. I’ve been bummed and so stressed about moving into an empty space that Cary decided a gourmet meal was in order. It’s his fix to every problem in life. Sad? Eat some amazing food. Mad? Let this French inspired dish settle your anger. I can’t even fault him for it since it usually works.
The thought brings a smile to my face at the same moment he decides to turn around, his eyes coming off of the dish in front of him for the first time since he started cooking.
“Oh, she’s smiling now! I told you this would help,” he mocks.
I put the glass of water in front of me, letting it rest on my bottom lip for a fraction of a second before tilting it into my mouth. As I set the glass back down, I swipe my tongue across my bottom lip into my mouth to catch the residual liquid away, never letting my gaze waver from him. “Or is it the view?” I joke, a smile pulling at the sides of my mouth as my gaze flits to his ass.
“Oh, I’m sure getting to stare at my ass uninterrupted… helps some. I won’t deny that. But the food is going to make you forget all about your worries,” he promises with a wink.
“I should probably go find the plates before I get too carried away with my thoughts of said ass.”
He points the spoon he’s been using to stir the sauce at me. “Yes! Good idea.” Sauce drips from the spoon, and his eyes jerk down to the floor. “Shit. I’ll clean that up, go, go,” he says, shooing me away in the direction of the boxes.
I take one more sip of my water as I laugh, before I start toward the boxes that line our otherwise empty living room. We have two unopened boxes labeled ‘kitchen’ that could contain the plates. We’d opened the other two to find the pans and cooking utensils he needed to start dinner. I open the first one and shuffle through it quickly but come up empty handed. After having the same luck with the second box, I huff a breath in exasperation. Once I check the others we’d already been through to make sure they weren’t missed, I decide today just isn’t my day.
I pad back over to the kitchen, my annoyance obvious on my face.
“What?” Cary questions.
“Can’t find the plates,” I state plainly.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean… I looked through both remaining boxes and no plates. Not a plate in sight.”
His face scrunches into confusion. “But those are the only two kitchen boxes left.”
I nod. “Mhm, they are.”
He squints his eyes at me. “You’re being way too calm about this.”
“Oh, I’m freaking out, I’m just trying to keep it in so I don’t scream.” That makes him laugh. “Nothing about this is funny, Cary,” I say with a pout.
He turns off the burners then steps toward me. “You’re cute when you’re frustrated,” he says as he wraps his arms around me.
“Why is nothing going right?” I whine into his neck, my voice slightly muffled. “This was supposed to be our perfect new start.”
“Because life is like that sometimes, but it’s okay. Want to know why?” I nod my head in response. “Because we have each other, and that’s all I really need to be okay.”
I chuckle then pull away from him to look him in the eyes. “‘All you really need?’” I parrot back at him.
“Well, yeah. You and delicious food. My two favorite things,” he says resolutely.
“Even if there are no plates to eat the delicious food off of?”
He shrugs. “Eh. We have paper plates, it’s fine.”
I move my hands up to his neck, cupping his nape as I play with the hair there. “So we’re going to eat the gourmet meal you just cooked on paper plates with our hands while… sitting on the floor?”
He leans in but stops as his lips hover right over mine. “Will it make you feel better if I eat my dessert splayed out on the living room floor as well?”
My cheeks heat at the insinuation as he closes the small distance between us, his tongue immediately dancing with my own. The kiss ends as quickly as it began, but he presses a peck to my nose before pulling away completely, his arms still wrapped tight around me. “I want to do everything with you in this apartment, Thea. All the big things and all the small things. I want to fuck you in every single room. I want to put a ring on your finger one day. I want to drink coffee with you on Sunday mornings in front of that window. I want to watch you grow our children in that beautiful body of yours. I want to do all the mundane things in between. I want everything. Plates and furniture mean nothing as long as I have you and this life we’re building.”
The tears welling behind my eyes threaten to fall at his words. He always knows what to say to calm me down or put things into perspective. “You want to marry me?” My voice comes out as almost a whisper.
“Does that surprise you?”
I shrug and turn my face away, but he grabs my chin and pulls my gaze back to his own.
“Everything, Thea. I want everything with you. Please don’t ever forget that.”
Present
I had forgotten. I’d let that moment slip from me, and I’d gotten too caught up in all of life’s problems. I don’t want to make the same mistake twice, but I’m scared I’ve missed my second chance. I pull my phone from my pocket, deciding to text him. If I open the line of communication, he’ll know I’m not giving up on us. As I find his name in my messaging app, Travis knocks on my open office door.
“Hey, sorry to interrupt,” he says.
“No, no, it’s fine. Come in,” I reply as I place my phone screen down on my desk in front of me. My office is small, but there’s one chair on the opposite side. It’s mainly used for Ripley to annoy me while I’m supposed to be working or for interview purposes. Travis sits down, and I can already tell he’s nervous, maybe even shaken, which in turn makes me nervous. “What’s up? You seem… not yourself.”
A half-huff, half-chuckle escapes him. “Yeah, I… uh, well, I need to talk to you.”
The tone in his voice makes my back stiffen, alarms going off in my head. “Okay…”
It takes him another moment to start speaking again, his eyes avert to his hands, and every second only heightens my onset of panic.
“I think I have to leave Indigo Hill.” He finally looks up and meets my gaze. I can’t help whatever shocked expression is surely written all over my face. I’m not sure what I expected him to say, but it wasn’t that.
“Wh—what? Why?” The questions leave my mouth before I even really process what’s happening.
He shakes his head then looks back down to his hands in his lap. “I… fuck. I didn’t expect this to be so hard.” He opens his phone and scrolls through until he finds what he’s looking for then sets it in front of me. It’s a picture of a car parked across a residential street. “This is a picture one of my sitters took. They said the car sat there all day, and they felt like they were being watched, so they took a picture of it.” He pulls the phone back, closing out of the photo. “Turns out, it was Maureen.” An audible gasp slips through my lips.
Travis has only told me minimal details about his ex, Maureen. I know she had issues with drug use, and they divorced soon after Melody was born. She signed away her parental rights shortly after. That was eight years ago now. I never asked too many questions for fear of being too nosy.
He’s still pacing the small room as I’m piecing it all together. “Wait. Why does this mean you have to move? Just get a restraining order.”
He sits back down in the seat, placing his elbow on the desk and his head in his hand. “She was basically in my yard today. Talking to Melody.”
“What? How?” My questions come out harsher than I intend from sheer shock.
“I stepped inside to grab us some drinks and a snack. The fence is locked and it’s not like there are strangers in this town. But when I came back outside, I heard Melody talking to someone. I assumed it was a toy, but when I came around the corner, she was saying ‘bye, Mommy,’ and I saw Maureen walking to her car. The same car the sitter saw.”
My hand flies to my mouth, but I don’t know what to say. I can’t imagine how scary that must have been for Travis to walk in on.
“I rushed Melody to my parents, dropped her off, and came straight here to talk to you. I can’t… fuck, Thea. I can’t have her coming around Melody like that. I don’t even want to be in this town anymore if she’s back. Maureen is volatile and unpredictable, and if she’s using again, I’m afraid of what she’ll do.”
I instinctively bite the inside of my cheek, not knowing what to say or how to make this better. I’m not sure there’s anything I can say, so I nod my head in understanding. He’s scared, his distress stifling the air around us.
“I’m going to stay with my parents for the next few weeks while I try to find somewhere else to go. I’ll help you find someone, train them, do whatever it is you need me to do, but… I can’t stay. I’m so fucking sorry,” he pleads. His voice is dripping with sorrow. I know he doesn’t want to leave, but Melody comes before anything else, just as she should. I reach over and place my hand on his arm, urging him to look at me.
“It’s okay, Travis. I—I understand. I’m sad, obviously, but I understand, okay? Just… do what’s best for your family.”
His eyes linger on my hand on his arm for a moment longer before he looks back up at me, placing his other hand on top of mine. “Thank you, Thea. Thank you so much for understanding. I’ll never find another boss as great as you.”
An awkward laugh fills the air around us as I try to bypass the compliment. “And I’ll never find a chef as great as you. But we’ll both be okay.”
I hope we will at least. Once again, my plans are crumbling around me.