29. Parker
29
PARKER
I ’d gone over to Archer House because I was mad at Hope for ghosting me. Because I was worried about her and wanted to make sure she was okay. Because I missed her. Because I still fucking craved her.
I’d gone over because I couldn’t stay away.
But this shit she’d stirred up in me was worse than I thought.
After merely looking at her across the kitchen, I felt as if my feet had been kicked out from under me all over again, like the moment I’d woken in the hotel room and knew she was gone.
I needed to regroup.
Knowing I couldn’t do it alone, I called Thane.
“Hey,” he greeted as if he were actually pleased to hear from me.
After the ass I’d been during our last talk, I’d kind of wondered if he’d want to avoid me for the rest of forever.
But then he added, “I was just about to call you.”
“Really? What’s up?”
“I was going to head over to my parents’ place and bring them some supper to celebrate Mom’s birthday. You want to come? I’ll have Christine with me.”
My eyebrows lifted in surprise. “You will?”
“Yep.” He seemed pleased with himself. “I figured if I was going to start introducing her to the crew, I wanted you to be the first to meet her.”
He was extending an olive branch. But instead of taking his intentions as the compliment I knew he meant for them to be, I furrowed my brow and wondered, “Have Pastor Zeke and Mama Chaunce met her yet?”
A slight pause later, he cleared his throat. “Uh, yeah. A couple of months ago.”
“Really?”
“Parker,” he started, sounding regretful, but I broke in quickly.
“No, yeah. I’ll be there. Definitely,” I answered. “What can I bring?”
I’d already ordered a new robot vacuum for Mama Chaunce and had it delivered to her house, but I always wished I could do more. It felt as if I could never do enough for the couple who’d taken me in, even though they balked every time I tried. You should’ve seen the fit they’d thrown when I’d paid off all their home and car loans.
“Nothing, man,” Thane told me. “We’ve got it taken care of. Just show up at seven.”
“Will do,” I said.
After we hung up, I continued driving home.
At the gate, I punched in my code and waited to be let in before driving down a winding street and pulling into the circle drive that wrapped around a stone fountain.
Bill was in the front yard, pruning bushes. I parked in the drive and killed the engine causing him to glance over.
Pausing his work, he started my way, wiping sweat from his eyes as he came. “Looks like your tree out back has some magnolia scale on it.”
“Oh yeah?” I asked, squinting at him through the hot evening sunlight and ignoring the disappointment that all he wanted to do was talk about work with me. “What’s magnolia scale?”
“Nasty little critters,” he explained with a grimace. “They suck the sap right out of the tree and can kill it if you don’t act soon enough. I pulled as many off by hand as I could find and pruned the smaller branches back, but there’s this insecticide I’d like to try.”
I nodded. “Then go ahead. Just charge my account at the store.”
“Yes, sir,” he started to back away immediately. “Thank you, sir.”
As he turned and left again, I sighed. He and Sharon were definitely not going to be like family to me any time soon.
I had thought I could belong to the Eisner family once, too, since they’d taken me in after my parents died, raised me right, loved me. Shit, they still invited me to holiday and family events. But just as the Porters thought of themselves as my charity case, I saw myself as Zeke and Chauncy’s charity case. I had no more equal footing with them than I did the Porters. I was still the odd man out with nowhere to truly belong.
Wiping a hand over my face, I continued to the pool house, where I changed into something respectable that Mama Chaunce would approve of, and then I decided to take the Mustang. It’d be easier to park something smaller and compact in their neighborhood.
Thane was already there when I pulled up to the curb. I stopped behind his Equinox, then fiddled with my collar, folding it flat before I reached for the flowers I had in the passenger seat and climbed from the car.
At the front door, I paused to knock. I’d lived here for six years of my life and still had a key to the place, but after moving out when I was eighteen, I never knew if I should just walk in or not.
I heard someone call, “I’ll get it,” from inside before the storm door opened and a woman in her early twenties with her hair pulled back severely peered out at me.
Eyes narrowing with distrust, she said, “Can I help you?”
She was like the antithesis of Nova. It actually kind of threw me for a second. Like a kid whose newly-single parent had started dating again, my knee-jerk reaction was: You’re not my mom —or in this case, my best friend’s other half.
But I schooled my expression into a smile as I held up one of the bouquets I had in my arms. “You must be Christine.”
She looked at the wildflowers that were tied together with a yellow ribbon, then raked her gaze over my Patek Philippe watch, Ralph Lauren shirt, Armani slacks, and Gucci shoes before lifting her gaze my way to silently accuse: Wildflowers? Really? Rich boy like you could only spring for wildflowers ?
Wildflowers were Chauncy’s favorite, though, so when I’d gotten her a bunch, I’d decided to try to suck up to the new girlfriend as well.
But I think I was going to have to chalk this one up to a fail.
“Hey, hon,” I heard Thane’s voice as someone came up to her from behind. “Who’s—oh! Hey, Parker.”
He was the one who reached out and opened the screen door for me to enter.
His girlfriend shuffled back to let me in, blinking between the two of us before pointing. “ This is Parker? The best friend you took in after he became an orphan?”
Thane and I paused together with lifted eyebrows before we turned in unison to study each other. I had no idea if it was because he was the honest, high school counselor type while I was the rich asshole type. Or if it was because he was Black and I was white. Or because he was short and I was tall. Or who the fuck knew. But she didn’t seem to buy our friendship.
Too bad. It was the truth. Nathaniel Eisner was my person.
“Yep. This is my best friend,” he announced proudly as he bumped his arm into mine. “Parker Ohrley, meet Christine Geer. Chris, Parker.”
She said nothing, just looked at me as if I were slime, so I thrust one of the bouquets forward again in a last-ditch effort to charm her. “Hey. Thanks for having pity on this loser and?—”
Yeah, that was not the best joke to crack to warm her heart apparently.
As her eyes narrowed, I gulped and lamely finished with, “—Throwing him a lifeline.”
God, if only someone could throw me a lifeline right about now.
Thane glanced at me with a silent what the hell , and my eyes flared right back with an I don’t know, man . But I was bombing this. Badly.
He offered his girl a hopeful, encouraging smile, and she finally took the flowers from me. Carefully, though, as if she thought they were infected.
“Thanks,” she managed to say, but it sounded like a struggle.
Thane and I shared another glance, and he was clearly as confused as I was. But we didn’t have to suffer through any more awkwardness for long.
Mama Chaunce bustled into the living room, calling, “Is that my Parker I hear?”
A grin spread broadly across my face because no one could make me genuinely smile like Thane’s mother.
“Yes, ma’am,” I informed her, already opening my arms for one of her big, pillowy hugs. This woman had to be the best hugger in all of Texas, I kid you not.
“There’s my boy,” she murmured, resting her cheek on my chest as she gathered me into her arms. When I kissed her on top of the head, she chuckled her deep laugh and pulled back, saying, “Remember when I was taller than you and used to be the one kissing the top of your head?”
I winked. “Why do you think I always return the favor now?”
Handing over her wildflowers, I finally got the response I’d been looking for.
“Oh… you ,” she scolded with delight as she swatted my arm. “You already got me a gift, you scoundrel.” Gathering the bouquet to her chest as if they were precious to her, she told Christine, “Wildflowers are my absolute favorite. And lookie there. You got you some too. Isn’t Parker just the sweetest? I’m telling you…” Nudging my arm, she added, “He never forgets a birthday or anniversary.”
Chauncy was the only person allowed to call me sweet. Then again, she was possibly the only person who thought of me as sweet. But that might be because I had never been disrespectful or rude or sarcastically mouthy to either of Thane’s parents. Not when I owed them everything.
As Thane’s mom waxed poetic about me to Christine, Thane snorted under his breath and muttered, “Sweetest my ass,” out of the side of his mouth.
I refused to engage, other than to tuck my left hand under my right elbow and flash him the middle finger so only he could see it.
He elbowed my bird in retaliation.
“Boys,” Chauncy said sharply without even glancing at us, and both Thane and I cleared our throats as we took a respectful step away from each other.
A new laugh filled the room. “Parker must be in the house if my wife is saying boys in that tone,” Thane’s dad announced as he entered the front room from a back hallway.
“Sir,” I greeted, going to him for a hug as well.
As Zeke teased me about staying out of trouble—and, no, the irony was not lost on me about how deeply I’d been in Trouble lately—Thane’s girlfriend finally seemed to warm up to me. She even managed to aim a somewhat believable smile my way as the elder Eisners led her toward the kitchen.
I moved to follow until Thane gripped my elbow and yanked me back to his side. “What the hell, man?” he hissed. “Did you sleep with my girlfriend in the past or something?”
“ What ?” I spat incredulously. “No.” Then I tipped my face and winced. “I mean, I don’t think so.” I glanced toward the entrance of the kitchen in the hopes of getting another look at her. “I’d remember that ice.”
“But that’s the thing,” Thane told me, shaking his head. “She’s not icy. She’s never been icy. So what the fuck did you do to her?’
“Bro.” I lifted my hands helplessly. “I have no idea. I just fucking met her.”
“Did you sleep with one of her friends?” he pressed.
“That’s completely possible,” I allowed. “But I’ve still never met her before.”
“Huh.” Frowning because he couldn’t figure the mystery out, he glanced toward the kitchen.
“Speaking of sleeping with people, though,” I said, lowering my voice and rushing to slot this in while I had his sole attention. “I did kind of fuck someone I really wasn’t supposed to.”
His dark brown eyes veered back to me in surprise. “Who?”
When I didn’t answer, his eyes narrowed.
“Okay then. Let’s try this question instead. Why shouldn’t you have slept with this woman?” When I didn’t immediately answer, he winced. “Shit, Parker. Please don’t tell me she’s already married.”
I exhaled, refusing to answer, and he took that to mean an affirmative.
“Jesus, man,” he groaned, running both hands over his face. “This isn’t good. This is not good.”
I watched his reaction, feeling slightly sick to my stomach. “So what do I do?”
He dropped his hands and gaped at me. “What do you mean, what do you do? Nothing! It’s already done. Just… Go forth and never do something stupid like that again.”
“But—” When he furrowed his brow into a deep scowl, I faltered, only to rush my words a moment later. “I can’t stop thinking about her. I’m seriously not sure if I can stay away much longer.”
His lips parted as he stared at me, clearly unable to believe what he was hearing.
Then he shut his mouth before biting out, “Then try harder.”
“Eisner,” I pleaded, shaking my head. “You don’t understand.”
“Oh, I understand plenty.” He narrowed his eyes in frank disapproval. “It felt thrilling and naughty and exciting to do something forbidden and wrong. So you built the whole memory up in your head that she was just this amazing lay. Except she wasn’t. She’s only one more woman you’ve slept with. Like all the rest of them.”
“But what if she wasn’t?” I tried.
Thane snorted. “Believe me, she was.”
When I just looked at him, unable to buy that, he gripped my arm. “Hey, as soon as you sleep with someone else, you’ll realize I’m right, okay?”
I shook my head. “That’s not how you got over Nova.”
Eyes widening in warning, he lifted a finger to hush me before he glanced toward the opening of the kitchen. “First of all, shut up ,” he hissed. “And secondly, of course, it’s not. But I’m not you. Sex is serious for me. It’s affection and relationships and monogamy. For you, it’s just some casual exchange with a near stranger whose body you borrowed for a few minutes. It’s meaningless .”
I bristled. Not because he was wrong—meaningless was usually exactly what sex was for me—but because being with Hope had been anything but minor.
So when I merely scowled at him with my hands fisted at my sides, trying with everything I had not to attack him for degrading her, he read my expression and sighed. “Will you just trust me on this? Find someone else, sleep with her , and this will all be out of your system.”
My jaw tightened, not warming to the idea.
“Jesus, Ohrley,” he muttered. “The girl is off -limits. Move on and forget about her.”
I still didn’t answer because I wanted Hope again. I craved a repeat of our weekend more than I could remember craving anything.
And Thane could read the yearning on my face.
With a whispered curse, he shook his head. “You’re not listening to a damn thing I’m saying right now, are you?”
“I’m trying to! But she?—”
She was Hope.
“Just—” He lifted a hand to block my stubbornness, but he didn’t get to continue his lecture.
His dad popped his head into the room, calling, “Hey, you two, gossip later. The ladies in here are gettin’ hungry.”
And that was as close as I could come to confessing what I’d done.
From there on out, the evening progressed with all its focus on Christine and the Eisners.
Only once did I let my mind stray toward Hope when I was checking a message from a client. My thumb swiped into my app to see where my Lucid Air was out of habit before I pocketed the phone again.
But when I saw that she was at my restaurant, I smirked in pleasure. I only wished I could’ve been there to see her face when she learned I’d put her on my VIP list.
“So, Parker,” Christine said smoothly, gaining my attention as she set down her glass of water. “What do you do for a living?”