“You know what, just…”
I groaned.
“Just fucking make it happen, OK? Can we try?”
I would have said, “We will make it happen.” I was used to getting my way. Even if it took some time to unfold, I usually made shit happen how I wanted it to.
That was, until Tara Rogers.
I got back down to scrubbing and thought about Brock. I didn’t know what he saw in Tara. Didn’t he fucking realize it wouldn’t work out? Didn’t he realize he had done me a favor, even if it had taken me some cooling down to realize it? I’d always believed Tara and I were destined to be happily ever after, but now, I knew the truth.
Women didn’t love.
They may nurture. They may kiss. They may feed you and quench your thirst. The ones your age may even have great sex with you.
But love?
No, they didn’t love. At most, they gave the appearance of love so they could pat themselves on the back for fulfilling their societal role. This was true.
I don’t even know what love is. I’m not sure I’d recognize it if I saw it. It’s not like I’ve ever…
“You know what, no, no asking; let’s fucking make it happen,” I said. “Twenty minutes to get this place as cleaned up as possible.”
I ignored the groans around me. I was vice president. My word was ironclad when Brock wasn’t here. If I wanted something, if I requested something, it damn well happened.Except for with women, apparently.
I had hoped that scrubbing, sweeping, and disposing would get my mind off the Rogers girls. But the silence, the isolation to a single office building, and the knowledge that things had not gone according to plan were throwing everything for a fucking loop. And now Elizabeth was asking me to be a plus one?
She’d always looked at me with a level of curiosity, like I was the exotic animal at the zoo she wasn’t allowed to touch. If I were honest, I’d always found Elizabeth to be the more physically attractive of the two. I’d made the mistake of admitting to Tara that Elizabeth was more my body type early in our relationship, and it was only after a hard slap to the face I learned I couldn’t always speak the blunt truth.
However, Elizabeth being the more physically attractive of the two was a far fucking cry from saying she was the more attractive overall.
Too queasy. Too whiny. Too much of a daddy’s girl, even more so than Tara. Too…too herself. Too feminine. Too…something.
And once Tara and I had been serious for about three months—longer than any relationship I’d ever had up to that point—I’d always known she would be the one. Not believed. Not thought.Known.
It was an absolute knowledge that dissolved only when Cole demanded Brock and I make peace. Letting go of that was much, much easier said than done. Even our breakup had not shattered that thought so much as it had made me create a new, inevitable story for the future.
Tara was supposed to be the exception to the rule. Instead, she was just the most prominent example of the rule.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. I looked down at it and felt a sinking feeling in my stomach. It was one I knew all too well.
“Whether or not we’re done in twenty minutes, I have to bounce,” I said. “So let’s get this shit done, shall we?”
I couldn’t even express how “grateful” I was to have this distraction. Nothing like some family issues to distract you from the fact that your best friend was dating the woman of your dreams and that her sister, the one that repulsed you more than anyone, was interested in you.
I’d say fuck me, but I didn’t want to give Elizabeth any ideas. That was one future I would guarantee would not happen.
* * *
Elizabeth Rogers
My phone, which Tara had requested I put in the back seat, dinged with a bell sound.
“Elizabeth, come on—”
I ignored my sister’s requests as I reached back and unlocked the phone, which doubled both as a work phone and as my personal phone. I had a new email from my father, which mandated that I respond to it immediately. I opened the NME Services app on my phone and waited for it to load.
“You said you wouldn’t check your email while we were out today.”
