ARROGANT BRIT (A BRITISH BAD BOY ROMANCE) (17 page)

Dalton’s eyes hardened.

“If you, I mean, don’t mind me asking…” I
realized with some shame that I’d probably jerked him away from some pleasant
memories of her.

“Car accident,” he answered bitterly. “A
drunk driver rammed her car in the driver’s side. There wasn’t anything the
paramedics could do to save her. Pronounced dead at the scene.”

“Oh god,” I whispered. “I’m so sorry.”

“Yeah, well… she was their favorite, you
know? Gloria was not only the firstborn, but she was the doting, loving
daughter who lived up to their high expectations. She was brilliant, polite,
very well spoken, and fell in line with their demands.”

“And your father wasn’t?”

“What you’ve got to remember about Dad is
that he grew up in the Seventies, and he was the younger child. Gloria
developed maturity and grace quickly – enough so that she overrode their
initial qualms about her gender. Probably never occurred to them that a
daughter could redeem the family name. But as for their son… Dad never really
wanted any part of their world. He didn’t sit well with endless etiquette
classes, primers on court manners, and classical piano lessons. Rebellion and
escapism are probably why he developed his drug addiction.”

“Drug addiction?”

“Oh yeah,” Dalton continued. “That’s why Dad
and I aren’t positively
loaded
right
now. You see, love, it started with pot. After a while, he moved on up to
heroin. Wasn’t too long before Dad was in and out of rehab centers, sullying the
good family name. Don’t get me wrong, he cleaned himself up and never looked
back. He even got himself into a good engineering school, but by then his
relationship with them was damaged beyond repair. I know that my grandmother
forgave him, but her husband always had a stiff upper lip…”

“I would have never guessed,” I thought to
myself. “He seems so kind and well-adjusted.”

Privately, I wondered if Will still suffered.
Did he feel those compulsions anymore? Would that ever truly leave his heart?

“So, he wrapped up his degree just in time to
be cut off from the family money. At least he could support himself then. He
turned to a life of meaningless sex, and I was the eventual end result there.”

“Do you know anything about your mother?” I
asked him, curiously.

“Never met her. Don’t know a single thing
about her, other than she was a beautiful and talented hairdresser. Tried to
put me up for adoption but Dad took me instead.”

“Explains why you’re so presentable,” I
chuckled. “But you’ve never wanted to find out about her?”

“Nope. If she’s willing to throw me away, I
don’t need her,” he shrugged. “But anyway. That’s enough about the past. I’m
more interested in the future now.”

“The future?” My breath sucked back between
my lips, and I felt a telling patter in my chest.

“The future,” Dalton repeated firmly, his
eyes searching mine. “Tell me about yours. What do you want most in this world,
love?

I thought on this a moment.

A smile smile crossed my lips.

“You.”

Chapter 16

The day that my world came crashing down
began just like any other.

It was Friday morning. Clara and I sat
together in psychology class. She’d gone ahead and bought herself a psychology
textbook, but we still read along together and compared notes as Professor Pritchard
gave his lectures.

Our parents were going to be coming back into
town from their honeymoon this afternoon. Clara and I had already made plans to
pick them up from the airport and bring them back to their place. That’s why
we’d wound up riding together in her car to school.

If only we could tell them,
I wistfully thought. But no… that
would have been a complete disaster. Neither of us were particularly close to
our parents, but we didn’t need to antagonize what tenuous relationships we had
with them over this… not
yet
, at any
rate.

I walked Clara to her next class afterwards,
and she planted a quick kiss on my cheek. “See you after school,” she grinned.
“You coming over after we grab the honeymooners?”

“Of course,” I replied, giving her ass a
quick little squeeze. “I’ll knock out that psych assignment in the student
union while I wait for you to wrap up, and then we’ll drive down and get them
together.”

“So diligent,” she mocked me flirtatiously.
“Okay, I’ll text you when I’m done with my last class.”

The school day was a breeze, just like all
the others, but something was slightly wrong in the air. I wasn’t sure what had
me uneasy, but whatever it was… I didn’t like it.

The feeling only got worse throughout the
day. The closer it came to time to leave for the airport, the more agitated I
became.

I was so pissed off at the end of the day
that I skipped my last class, resigning myself to failing whatever weekend
homework I was getting assigned.

“Are you okay?” Clara asked as we climbed
into her car together. “You look like you’re on edge.”

“I’m not really sure,” I conceded with a
shrug. “Something’s got me kind of bothered… not really sure what.”

“Is it because of our parents?” She asked,
tilting her head. “I mean, I’ve been kind of thinking about that all day…”

“What do you mean?”

She turned the engine on and pulled towards
the main campus road. “Well, it’s just that we’ve been able to sort of pretend
that they weren’t a problem, right? Neither of them were too important to our
lives before the wedding, and they’ve been gone since then on this honeymoon of
theirs… but now they're coming back.”

“Well, there
is
that,” I agreed.

“Listen, Dalton,” Clara turned to me as we
pulled up to a red light. “I know I had my own…
misgivings
over this union of ours… but I've made my choice. I’m
here. You and I, we’re in this together, okay? And I’ll face down whatever
troubles come our way, because we’ll always be together.”

I was taken aback by her confidence.

“That’s the most conviction I’ve heard out of
you
ever
,” I observed.

“Yeah, well,” Clara grinned, pulling us
forward after the light turned green, “like I said: I’ve had a lot of time to
think about it today.”

We played music most of the way there,
lightening the mood up with some contemporary pop. I didn’t really care for the
radio all that much, especially since the hot singles were almost entirely
electronic music, but I noticed one particular rock song that came on.

“Wait, what’s this?”

“Oh, this? It’s this rock band that’s been
dominating the radio waves these days,” she chuckled. “
Trent Masters and the Whiplash
. You like it?”

“Sure. Turn that up.”

We listened to the rest of the song, and a
smile crossed my face. “Yeah, that harkens back to the shit I listened to when
I was growing up. All that late-nineties grunge music… it’s obvious who their
influences are.”

“Yeah. It’s funny, that Trent guy can come
off as a real prick in the interviews, but he writes all of his own lyrics… and
they can be quite deep, actually. He seems like a total misogynistic ass-hat,
but there’s a rumor that he’s dating some mystery bartender chick…”

I noticed her tone. “Sad that the big
rockstar asshole is off the field?”

“Nah,” Clara giggled. “I’m more into the
military types myself. Bonus points if they’re foreign. She can keep him. Maybe
that chick will even level him out a little.”

“You don’t say.”

Another electronic piece came on, and the
topic subsided.

It wasn’t much longer before we were pulling
into the arrival terminals for the airport. Dad and Sarah were waving at us
from the curb, their suitcases stacked to the side.

Clara turned to me with exasperation.

“Well… you ready for this trainwreck?”

I faked an overly dramatic sigh. “Let’s just
get this over with…”

Our parents seemed surprised that we were
picking them up together, although it meant that they could continue sitting in
the back together without leaving the passenger seat conspicuously empty.

“So, how was it?” I asked as we hopped back
on the road and headed for the interstate. “Did you enjoy Hawaii?”

“Oh, it was
fantastic,
” Sarah cooed.

“Nice and bright. Warm. Very pleasing,” my
father added. “Wish you could have seen it.”

“Well, maybe I will someday,” I replied
wistfully, thinking of my intentions to travel the world. “It sure seems bloody
nice.”

“How’s school going?” Sarah asked quickly.

“Oh, it’s fine. Just stressful,” Clara
answered, keeping her eyes on the road. “As I told you before, I scheduled a
ton of really tough classes this semester… the next one should be a damned
sight easier…”

“And you, Dalton?” Father asked.

“Much easier that hers,” I answered him
dutifully. “We even have a class together, incidentally.”

Clara flashed me a quick look, and I realized
that I’d spoken a little too enthusiastically.

“Picking your parents up together… going to
school together… you
know
what’s
going on here, don’t you, Will?” Sarah asked, a haughty tone entering her
voice. “My god, I should have seen this coming before… it was inevitable
with these two, with their ages…”

Panic gripped at my throat. I turned to
Clara, who swiftly shot me a look that told me everything I needed to know
about her emotional well-being:
FUCK FUCK
FUCK FUCK…

“That’s right,” Father answered.

I braced myself for it…

“They’re just
perfect
for each other!” Sarah chuckled. “We should have seen this
coming, really. What a pair they make.”

Wait.

What?

“That’s right,” Father nodded.

Clara and I shared a bemused glance. Our eyes
communicated a flurry of thoughts back and forth, completely taken by surprise
that this was happening… and going so well.

“Would you care to elaborate?” I asked.

“Well, it’s pretty obvious, isn’t it?” Sarah
snootily chuckled. “You two are
excellent
together. And here we were, afraid that you wouldn’t get along…”

Father chimed in again. “We were afraid that
you’d clash, or just grow to hate each other. But I’m glad that you’re
apparently getting along. We’d hate for you two siblings to be at each other’s
throats, or just ignore each other…”

Right,
it dawned on me.
Siblings.

“Wait, what are you–?” Clara began.

“They’re happy that we’ve accepted each other
as
part of the family,
” I hinted.

Realization crossed Clara’s face. “Oh, right.
That’s right,
big brother.
”

When she followed that up with a nervous
chuckle, I spotted our parents glancing at each other strangely. I decided to
quickly avert the topic.

“So, what are you doing first, now that
you’re back?” I asked.

“Oh, well,” Sarah answered for them, “William
is going to move into the house… we’re hiring some movers to pack up and shift
everything over. The essentials, at least.”

“That’s right,” he agreed. “I’m going to keep
an office in the spare bedroom, but there’s not much point in me continuing to
pay that expensive lease. I’ve already spoken with the owner, and we’ve come to
an agreement…”

I let them prattle on about the future while
Clara stayed focused on the road. She
 
wasn’t really paying attention to their conversation, and it was obvious
that she had been slightly rattled by the exchange earlier.

The car ride seemed like it dragged on for
ages.
However, after an hour and a half
(dragged out by rush-hour traffic), we were dropping them off at Sarah’s house.
I gave them a quick hand with the bags before jumping back into the car and
getting rid of them again.

“What a nightmare,” I shook my head.

“Yeah, tell me about it,” Clara quietly
added.

I turned to her, afraid that she had been
shaken by the conversational mix-up earlier but, to my surprise, she was
giggling instead.

“What is it?”

Clara began laughing in earnest. “How stupid
was
that?
We thought that they were
saying they wanted us together? God, it was so
ambiguous!
I could die
,
right
here and now!”

We shared a hearty laugh.

“Yeah, that was
awful,
” I replied as we headed back towards the interstate. “But at
least it’s over now…”

The feeling of crushing tension seemed to
have mostly dissipated, although I felt it linger just a little. To my
satisfaction, though, Clara seemed well adjusted after the car ride. In fact,
she seemed to shrug off the weirdness of it altogether – something that
probably would have rattled her and come between us before.

A few hours later, after a hearty session of
sex in her bedroom, we were curled up together and everything was right with
the world once more. I thought perhaps that it was time for a real
heart-to-heart, given what we had been able to laugh off during the afternoon.

“What are your goals?” I asked her, stroking
her hair lightly as she lay against my chest. “I don’t know what your plans
are, or what you want from life… why don’t you tell me?”

I felt Clara smile against my skin.

“You mean, like, for the future?” Clara
asked. “I already answered that. I want a future with
you.
” She planted a quick kiss against my shoulder.