TWENTY-EIGHT #2
“Some say superior.” A fact she couldn’t argue. “Now you’re through with Spurn, you’re back living with your folks? Word was you’d stay here; that Roxie made an offer.”
“Roxie is amazingly generous, Zairn too.”
“They don’t say it if they don’t mean it.”
“It’s such a glamorous life.” That wouldn’t fit unglamorous, non-dynamic her. “Why stay here?” she asked with a defeated shrug. “This isn’t me. I have no job, no purpose. What am I supposed to do? Move into Crimson and party every night?”
“Works for the rest of us,” he said without offense. “The alternative is going back to your parents and… sitting home every night? Is that the life you want?”
Her gaze sank to her reflection in her wine. “I can’t have the life I want.”
“Sure you can and Rox’ll tell you the same.”
“Oh, God.” Guilt slammed her. “We left Roxie downstairs alone.”
“Roxanna Kyst-Lomond? Alone? Shit, not in the last two years.”
“She’s been so good to me and—”
“Trust me, Roxie wants you to have what you need.” Even if that wasn’t dancing in the dark. “You have people, a circle. We help each other out around here. With enough work, you can accomplish anything. According to my dad anyway. I haven’t tested the theory, but I’m told he’s pretty smart.”
Another laugh. His charm disarmed and consoled at the same time. Direction, that was one thing she didn’t have. How come she hadn’t noticed that until this moment?
“What do you want out of life?” she asked.
“Wow, you really turn it on with this interrogations stuff.” No doubt he was used to the questions going the other way. “I’m a simple guy. Happy with a beer in my hand…”
“And a woman on your lap?”
“Steady diet, everything in moderation. Simple guy, simple pleasures. What do you want? Or what do you think you can’t have?”
A choice? Clam up or surrender to the safe circle?
“It’s men,” she said, landing her glass on the table behind the couch. “You do this—how do you—you screw with our minds.”
“Yeah, that can go both ways.”
Surging to her feet, she couldn’t quell her unsated energy. “You hide and don’t tell us—how can everything be completely fine one minute and completely over the next? How do you do that? Switch things like—how do you do that?”
“Brog had his reasons.”
“And why couldn’t he share them, huh? Why couldn’t he tell me the truth? Maybe we could’ve figured out what…” She exhaled some of that agitation. “We could’ve figured it out together.”
“Sometimes there’s nothing to figure out.”
Truth. What was she expecting? If he was done, he was done. And they’d been close to their end date anyway. Did it really matter he’d pulled the trigger a couple of weeks early? What difference did it make? None, that’s what. To him anyway. To her…
“Being with Brogan showed me a different way. I felt like part of something important. He gave me choice and security…” Until he took it away. “At home I…” She came to slump back on the sofa. “It’s so stupid.”
“It’s not stupid. If it’s the truth, if it’s honest, it’s not stupid.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“I’m a Breckenridge. We’re all about support, not judgment. We make a point of looking out for each other. There are a lot of us, so we’ve seen it all, a whole lot of all.”
“Does it stifle you?”
His eyebrows rose. “Being a Breckenridge? Hell, no. We’re different, all of us, and are never made to apologize for that. Each individual is taken as they are. And if we tried to play anyone else, Mom would notice and Dad would end that shit fast.”
“You’re lucky.”
“I know it’s not that way for everyone. Without it, if it was taken away from me, from any of us…”
“There are a lot of Breckenridges.” And somehow they all loved each other. “Do you get along? Honestly get along?”
“Not just for appearances?” he asked. “We disagree sometimes, don’t always share the same opinions but… It’s corny, but my mom’s all about communication. Doesn’t matter if we’re in agreement so long as we’re showing respect.”
She could have this conversation all night. It was fascinating to learn about a family so foreign to hers.
“That’s a good rule.”
“Doesn’t matter what’s said, I’d do anything for my brothers. Any of them. Any minute.” From what she knew, Tripp would be there for anyone in need. “Even Brant.”
“You listen to each other. You care.”
“Breckenridges show up for each other. It’s just… the way it is.”
Nothing like the Sear family. Tough luck, that was her lot. Family was family. No, that wasn’t fair. She shouldn’t be so hasty. Her father’s olive branch could lead to change. It could be a sign of a different future.
“I think, maybe, my family are adjusting.”
“Yeah?”
Wishful thinking?
“I’ve got to give them a chance, right?” A slow blink was his only reaction. A man of few words or one afraid to laugh in her face. “You’d give your family a chance, wouldn’t you?”
“I’d never give up on my family.”
Except she sort of had by going to Brogan in the first place. “You’re an easy man to trust.”
And she might say too much with the liquor lubricating her words.
“Which means you want to say something else.” Tripp stayed loose. “You don’t have to hold back. I’ve got a perfect record of discretion.”
Most guys might sound like they were puffing themselves up. Not Tripp. His life didn’t change one way or the other regardless of what she revealed.
Sharing a couch, face-to-face, this felt like a last gasp, the final chance, the only opportunity to let it all out before she returned to the previous life of Gianna Sear.
“There was never any future,” she said. “With me and Brogan.”
“Because of the Jarrod for Gault deal?
Her mouth fell open. “No one was supposed to know about that.”
No apology or explanation. “I’m Tripp Breckenridge.”
That said it all.
“Yeah, but… Brogan told you?”
Her statement that there was no future could’ve been taken as them being a fling or keeping things casual, it wasn’t a prelude to revealing the truth. Turned out there was no need to be discreet about the whys and ifs, Tripp knew everything, somehow.
Still, if he knew, he knew.
That actually made this easier. “I didn’t go into it thinking… I don’t know what I was thinking, beyond helping Shanna.”
“That’s noble.”
“It became an excuse,” she admitted. “Brogan did the right thing, ending it if—we never talked about it, but he must’ve known…”
How could he know they were on a crash course when she hadn’t? Experience? Maybe he was just smarter than her. No, he was smarter, no question. If he didn’t feel anything for her, then he didn’t, and if he saw there was a chance of her catching feelings…
Smarter. All the way.
“It’s not always easy to let go.”
“I’m adjusting,” she said. “It’s harder than I want to admit.”
Something so brief, yet it had become integral to her world view. If this was what experience gave her, she wasn’t sure she wanted it.
“Walking away?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“So don’t.”
And she smiled. “I thought you knew Brogan Spurn. When he says stop, it stops.” The wine was welcome. Yes, wine, more wine. “It just happened faster than I thought.”
“Sunday night, right?”
She could feel heat rise in her cheeks. “Yeah, but I… Tuesday was our date night, we always went to dinner and…”
“And you thought he’d honor it.”
With an exhale, her hand went to her hair. “How did I become this person?”
“Don’t worry,” he said, brushing the back of his finger across her cheek. “That’s what we’re going to figure out.”
“My dad wants me to go to Gault’s with them. I don’t even know the guy.”
“That’s something we can change,” Tripp said. “I know everyone, including Everett Gault.”
“Are you going to the—”
“He called me.”
Course he did. “You’re friends?”
“He’s a good guy,” Tripp said with a semi-shrug. “Kinda. Likes them young, but he isn’t pushy.”
Whatever that meant.
“The Breckenridges want to take over—”
“God, no. My dad wouldn’t answer the phone to Everett Gault, even to prank him.”
She frowned. “I thought Breckenridges loved everyone.”
“My dad’s… got his own rules.”
Breckenridge men were no more straightforward than Brogan Spurn. What was it with them all? Was messing with women really that much fun?