Waiting had hurt. I agonized over just showing up with chocolates and flowers—a quick fix to get us back to beingCarter and Becky. But I knew in my bones that I needed to focus on being a better version of myself and taking care of her in the shadows. I let out a long sigh and hang my head as my thoughts twist around and around. Becky lost her trust in me as a person, not just as her person. So I hunkered down, and began planning. I thought that I could make some progress, but I hadn’t realized the ripple effect my actions had on her, even into her classroom. It was her reaction to the truth, the entirety of the truth, that finally made all of the pieces of what I’d done wrong,and need to do better, fall into place. I reach down and pull up a long piece of grass and start fidgeting with it.
The School Board meeting was me fixing something I broke. I had already been in contact with the families while trying to garner support for the Friday Night Music Extravaganza, so backtracking and telling them about what happened to Becky in her classroom was easy to do. Thankfully, it worked. Then last night… “Fuck.” Nope, I can’t think about last night without feeling murderous and hurt. Becky keeping that from me hurt—I lift my hand and scrub my chest where the sting still sits–and her hiding her experience with Paul barely holds a candle to what I hid from her.
Tonight was my big move. Vicky said she’d help me, and was impressed when I shared what I already had. ‘Well, maybe your head isn’t quite as far up there as I thought’was her raving review.
However, it was when I saw the look on Becky’s gorgeous face that I knew every sacrifice, every phone call, and every favor owed was more than worth it. My woman glowed.She’s already the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen on any given day, but with the radiance of joy shining through her?Breathtaking.Standing with her, holding her while listening to the music play? It was an agony I’ll face again and again if it means being near her. There have been moments in the last few days where I’ve see the familiar heat in her eyes, and it makes me so fucking hungry for her, but I don’t see the love. I see her hesitancy, her caution. As much as I want her heat, I’m dying for her heart again. Even though she no longer wants to be mine, I am hers.
I drop the thoroughly mangled grass and clasp my necklace to try and ward off the melancholy that’s followed me since the day she ripped her ring from her finger. The familiar ache settles as I glide the chain in a slow rotating circle. I don’t know if it will help or hurt, but I allow my mind to drift to what tonight would have looked like if I wasn’t such a colossal idiot.Maybe I could just go back to her and see?—
“Carter? Is that you?” Ice cold dread sinks through my skin and into my bones at the sound of her familiar, raspy voice.
“Taylor.” Her name is a weight dropped directly into the soothing silence I had been searching for, shattering it into pieces. I turn fromwhere I’m staring out toward the creek to find Taylor Harrison standing only a few feet behind me, her red hair practically glowing in the low light.
“Carter.” She rasps my name again as she comes closer. Too close. Always too close.
“Stop.” She doesn’t, of course. The viper sashays directly up to me. Hips swaying, lips blood red. The definition of seduction wrapped in a tight black skirt. She makes me feel ill.
“Oh, Carter, don’t be like that.” She raises her hand to touch me, and I flinch back.
“Seriously, Taylor, don’t touch me.” I want to violently push her away. I want to run away. I want her to go. I go instead. I try to scoot around her, to walk away back to Becky, when I feel her hands wrap around my arm. I jerk out of her hold and whip around. “What the fuck do you want, Taylor?”
She stumbles back a step at my words. I never want to speak to a woman like this, but she’s not listening, so I like to think I’d get the go-ahead from my mama.
“Why are you doing this?” Her voice sounds small, wounded, andperformative.
“Why am I doing this? Why are you doing this? I never said anything to make you think this,” I move my finger between us, “meant anything other than friendship.”
Something calculating moves across her face, twisting me up even more.I was so blind.“Carter, we both know that’s not true, and so does your ex. It was always more.” I pause at that because, yes, it did mean so much more than friendship to Becky. It meant betrayal.Because it was.She must sense my agreement, but misses the mark when she steps closer to me once again.
“Do you have any idea what she’s done to me?” Taylor whines, reaching out to me once again, but I flinch out of the way. “She’s made up some story about me and then sent it to the paper and to my father! Why does a grown woman tell my father I did something wrong instead of coming to me like an adult, huh?”
“Because if you’re going to act like a child, I’m going to treat youlike one.” I feel her heat before I see her. I look down to my side where Becky sidles up, phone raised, an arm wrapping around my side. She theatrically presses a button and looks up, gaze bouncing between us once again. She smirks. “That will be a lovely addition to the case of harassment we have building against you, don’t you think, Tay-Tay?” Becky’s leashed anger holds her rigid under my arms. Her words are languid, but she’s standing like she’s ready to pounce.
Taylor looks at the way we stand together, and her stance moves from seduction to attack in the blink of an eye. “Cute top, Spitfire.” Becky goes completely still beneath my arm. “Oh, I’m sorry, that’s probably just Carter’s cute little nickname for you.” Becky drops her arm from my side, and my stomach falls to my feet.Dammit.
“It’s funny to me, honestly. How someone so beautiful can be rotting from the inside.” Becky could always see through to the truth of a person. Instead of backing away, she moves herself to stand not-so-subtly between Taylor and me. Her voice drops to a deadly hiss. “Now, you listen to me, you fucking predator. I saw your daddy here today, and I’m more than happy to get him over here to put you in timeout.” She smirks at Taylor before taking a step closer to her and away from me. I want to move with her, but I reluctantly remain standing in place.
“Oh my God, I’m a grown ass woman. Stop threatening to tell my daddy on me. It’s pathetic.” Taylor’s words are all bravado, though. Her arms slowly wrap around herself, and her eyes start darting up toward the concert.
Becky and I both turn and look to see flashing lights from the direction of the stage appear over the top of the bathrooms, and Becky’s lips tilt up into a smirk. “Oh, don’t you worry your pretty little head. I also called the police to let them know the woman we called about harassing us was not listening to the wordno. So, predator Barbie,back the fuck offand go running to your daddy like the sad little parasite you are because—” Becky leans in closer to Taylor making me want to snatch her back. “That’s all you’ll ever be.”
Something snaps in Taylor, and she reaches out and grabs a fistful of Becky’s wild, beautiful hair and yanks her head down. “Keep yournasty-ass hands off of me, you disgusting pervert.” Becky seethes. Then, instead of trying to pull her hair free, Becky brings her closed fist swinging around and wallops Taylor directly in the nose. A sickening crunch echoes through the air, followed immediately by a loud screeching.
Taylor steps back, her hands covering her nose, only to trip on a rock behind her. We both watch in fascination as she falls, ass first, directly into the muddy creek. Her face remains hidden in her hands when she starts spouting off bullshit. “You know you just hit me with the police on the way! You’re going down for assault and battery you stupid, fat cow!”
“Shut the fu?—”
“Taylor, shut up and come with me. We’re leaving.” I’m cut off by a deep voice coming from the side of the field. We all look over to see an older man walking toward us with a scowling Jill.
“Dad.” Taylor says in a gasp.
“Thank God.” Becky voices, before I feel her reach out to me—her touch a balm against my over-stimulated skin. “Mr. Harrison,” Becky starts before he cuts her off.
“I received your package and the unspoken message that came with it. I’m here to collect my daughter. I was briefly”—he pauses before looking at his sister—“delayed by something. Do what you want with the charges, but please keep it out of the media from now on and I’ll work with you, not against you.” He takes a closer look at his daughter then Becky, eyes narrowing to where she cradles her fist. “You’re lucky I watched her start it, young lady.” Taylor makes a sound of protest, struggling to get up out of the mud, so her father sighs and walks past us to help her up.
“Dad, you saw her hit me! What are you?—”
“Shut. Up. Taylor. You’ve done enough damage.” He reaches out and tugs on her outstretched hand, a slight strain in his voice as he pulls. “It’s time that wegooo.” A disgusting squelching followed by a splash echoes when he finally, successfully, pulls his daughter out of the mud. The source of the splash is evident when he steps out of the weeds. His immaculate dress shoes are covered in mud, and his pantsare soaked to his knees. Taylor doesn’t put up anymore of a fight, not even looking back at us as she passes by. When they reach Jill, she looks back at us and shakes her head, before guiding them around the side of the park where they’re less likely to run into anyone else.
