Bent Not Broken (A Cedar Creek #1) (31 page)

I didn’t need anyone else.

All I needed was me.

Being lonely was better than hurting like this.

On the way back to Cedar Creek, I called Betty and asked her to pick up Tommy from school. I could tell she knew something was wrong—as would anybody, seeing as my voice even to my own ears sounded completely dead—but I cut her off and hung up.

I dropped Macy off at her house and grabbed my puppy, not looking at or talking to anyone, though I could see Larry’s questioning eyes on me. I just didn’t have it in me to talk. Then I went straight to Cal’s house, again not looking at anything, trying not to see anything in an effort to control the pain, packed up all my and Stella’s stuff, left the garage door opener that he had given me last week on the kitchen counter, and drove home.

Unable to shut down my brain, my thoughts were assaulting me.

Why? Why had he worked so hard to get in there? To get me to open up, to trust him, when he was just going to take it away from me as soon as he got what he wanted?

Why?

Thoughts of how I was played in high school, of how embarrassed and completely devastated I had been when I had found out I had been played, and the whole school had been in on it. That had been awful, but it was nothing compared to this. The feelings of humiliation and devastation were similar, but were multiplied by a million.

I was completely shredded.

Cal had deliberately lied to me. Lied to me about being in back to back meetings all day. Instead, he was getting cozy over coffee with his ex. What else had he lied about? It was probably all lies. Every fucking thing that had come out of his mouth had been lies.

My phone started ringing. I didn’t answer. The alert told me that someone left a voice message. Then texts started coming in. One after the other. I didn’t look at those either. Not even to see whom they were from. I snatched my phone from my purse, powered it down, and threw it on the passenger seat. No way was I answering any of that.

I was done.

*****

Two hours later I was sitting on my side porch. Stella had settled in. I had prepped an area in the kitchen for her to stay in while she was being house trained. When we got home, she had immediately settled down and was now sleeping soundly. The kids had powered her out. It sucked that she would always be a reminder of Cal, but I guess that was something I would have to get over. Tonight, I would research the cost of purebred chocolate lab puppies and then would write Cal a cheque for the amount and mail it to him first thing in the morning. Then Stella would be mine and I wouldn't owe that jerk a single thing.

I was sitting in my chair in complete silence, beer in hand, thinking, contemplating, trying to rebuild my walls, but not being very successful in that endeavor. Neither my mind nor my heart would listen to me. Now that they had been set free, put at ease, they refused to be locked up again.

Shit! Fucking shit!

Silent tears were running down my cheeks as I took another pull of my beer. It was too early to drink really, but I didn’t care. Right now, that was the only thing I could think of to dull the pain even a little bit. I wiped the tears away with an angry jerk of my hand and gave myself a pep talk.

Get your shit together, Ivey! You’ll be fine. You have survived worse things than being played by a man. Do not give that asshole any more of your tears. That lying, betraying scum doesn’t deserve your tears.

I went back to staring out into the forest and sipping my beer. Seeing and hearing nothing. Absolutely nothing, but the never ending loop of thoughts and images in my head.

Cal

Cal was just leaving the coffee shop, pretty fucking happy about how his meeting with Stacy had gone, when his phone rang. He checked the display and saw that it was his mom.

“Mom,” he answered.

“What happened? What did you do?” His mom sounded annoyed and angry. Cal was confused. He had no idea what she was talking about. Nothing happened.

“What do you mean what happened? What’s going on?”

“Ivey called me to ask if I could pick up Tommy from school today. Said she had something come up. And son, let me tell you, she did not sound like Ivey.” Cal’s gut clenched with dread.

“Explain,” he growled at his mother when she stopped speaking. He started jogging down the block to get to his truck.

“She didn’t sound right as in her voice was dead, Calvin.
Dead
. So I’m asking you what you did to her to make her sound like that, then I’m gonna yell at you for bein’ an idiot, and then you’re gonna go and fix it.”

“Mom, I have no fucking clue what you’re on about. And I’ve got no time to figure it out. I’m in Boulder, but I am heading back as we speak. Gonna hang up now, so I can call my woman.” Without saying goodbye he did just that. The call went straight to voice mail. He left a message. The feeling of dread spread in his gut. Her voice sounded dead, his mom said. That couldn’t be possible. What the fuck happened? Last thing he knew was she was shopping with Macy.

Macy.

He reached for his phone again to call Ivey’s best friend. She answered in the middle of the first ring as if she’d been waiting for his call.

“You are such an idiot, Calvin Bennett! What the fuck were you thinking?” Macy screeched in his ear. His gut clenched further.

“What the fuck are you talking about? What the fuck happened? Ivey isn’t answering her phone,” he growled down the line.

“Of course she isn’t, you moron! You wanna know why?” Cal was losing his patience.

“Yes, I wanna know why, Macy! Spit it out!”

“You know Ivey and I went shopping today?” She asked him, her voice full of accusation. Cal was losing his patience.

“Yes, she told me this morning,” he ground out, hanging onto his control by a thread.

“You know where we went shopping, Cal?”

“Macy—”

“In Boulder, Cal! We went shopping in Boulder!”

Shit! Fuck! Shit!

“And guess who we saw cozying it up at a coffee shop? That’s right, Cal. You! You and your ex! She was touching you. You were smiling at her. She was smiling back at you. And I repeat, she was touching you and you were smiling at her! What the hell, Cal! She a new client? Since that’s what you told Ivey why you couldn’t meet her for lunch. ‘Cause you had client meetings all day. Remember?”

“Fucking shit!” He exploded.

He hadn’t told Ivey he was meeting Tommy’s mom, because he hadn’t been sure it was important enough to tell her. Being in client meetings all day hadn’t been a lie. When he had called Ivey, he hadn’t known he’d be meeting his ex that day. Stacy had called him out of the blue later that morning, and he had agreed to meet her for Tommy’s sake. Not trusting her and not knowing what she wanted he had decided to wait to tell Ivey until he knew what was going on. Now he saw that not telling her had been a fatal mistake.

Shit! Shit! Shit!

“How bad is it, Macy? How bad is she?” He had to know what he was dealing with.

Silence.

“Macy!” He shouted, desperate to know how his woman was, but already knowing that it was bad.

“Before I tell you that, I want to know what the fuck happened, Cal.” She had stopped shouting, her voice now deadly serious. “When all this started, I kept pushing her in your direction, Cal, helped you “run into her”. I don’t want to believe you would do this to her, sneaking around behind her back, lying to her to do it.” She took a deep breath before she continued. And what she said next made his chest pound with elation and guilt. “You know what she said to me this morning, Cal? She said she wanted her happily ever after. Have a man at her side and give him children. I don’t know how much she’s told you about her past, but that was huge, Cal. And she wants that with
you
.”

She was right.

That was huge.

Ivey hadn’t told him yet about her miscarriage, but he was confident she would. She trusted him and yesterday afternoon he had seen love in her eyes directed at him, so he knew she would eventually give that to him.

Not only wanting a future with him, but admitting to it, a future that included babies, was a major breakthrough. He just hoped as fuck that his stupid error in judgment today hadn’t screwed that up for them.

“You make her happy, Cal, but if you screwed her over, I swear to God I will rip off your dick and shove it down your throat. And that’s before I’ll sic Larry on you.”

Shit. He needed to keep in mind not to piss Macy off. She was hell on wheels when riled up. He was glad Ivey had a friend like that looking out for her, but in this particular moment, he had no time or patience for it. Still, he knew he had to give it to Macy if he wanted to know anything.

“I didn’t lie to her, Macy. When I called her, I didn’t know I was gonna meet Stacy. She called me later and I agreed to meet her for Tommy’s sake. Said she wanted to make amends and asked for permission to build a relationship with her son. I couldn’t say no to that, Macy. He’s her son and he needs his mom.”

“I agree, Cal. Though I’m not sure if leaving your son for nine years is a forgivable act, but that’s up to you and Tommy to decide. What I don’t understand is, why you didn’t tell Ivey you were gonna meet you ex.”

“I was gonna talk to her tonight when I knew what Stacy was up to. I’m not the asshole you think I am. Now, tell me how bad she is.” Her long sigh at the other end of the line again challenged his patience, but he grit his teeth and waited. Finally, she gave it to him.

“It’s not good, Cal. She’s retreated, shut down. Shut down on me before we even made it back to the car. She didn’t talk the whole drive home other than to make arrangements for Tommy getting picked up by your mom. I tried to talk to her but she wouldn’t listen. It’s bad, Cal. Really fucking bad. I’ve never seen her like this.”

“Shit!” Cal swore. He had to get to her, but he was still almost an hour out of Cedar Creek.

“When did you get home? How much time has she had to crawl back into that head of hers?”

“We got back about an hour ago. Where are you now?”

“On my way back from Boulder, about an hour out.”

Silence again.

Then, “So you sat and chatted with your ex for over an hour and you didn’t think that’s something your girlfriend would want to know about? God! Men are so stupid!”

Yes, Cal would agree. He was a total fucking idiot. But he had no time to discuss all the reasons why with Macy. He had to get to his woman to fix his royal fuckup.

Ivey

I heard a truck come up my drive and knew it was Cal. I had expected this, had expected him to come and lie to me some more when I didn't answer his call. Though why he would keep up the charade, I had no idea. He got what he wanted. Took on the challenge, won, and seized his prize. The game was over.

Keeping my face cold and impassive, I watched his truck as he parked it close to my front steps, but I didn’t get up. Instead, I kept watching as he got out and only turned my head away from him and took another swig of my beer when he had made it to the stairs.

“Go away. There is no need for this,” my voice was cold.

No, not cold.

Dead.

I kept my eyes to the view, but knew that he was approaching.

“Ivey—” his voice was consoling, but it didn’t reach me.

“Save it and go.”

“I won’t. Not until you hear me out.” I shook my head, disbelieving and not understanding why he was doing this.

“Fucking go, Cal,” my voice was low now, almost a whisper. My throat was closing up again, so that was all that came out.

“Baby,” he whispered a tortured whisper. Pain seared through me again at hearing that endearment, and my head snapped around to face him when I hissed, “Don’t you fucking call me that.”

Cal’s head snapped back as if I had slapped him and he flinched.

God, he was a good actor.

I hated him. Hated him for making me feel this way.

Instead of leaving, he kept up the charade and came closer. I glared at him and he stopped.

“Let me—”

“Saw you today.” He wanted to do this? Fine, they would do this. “Saw you with her. You looked good together. Familiar. Comfortable with each other. Intimate. She is gorgeous, of course.”

“Baby, let me explain—”

“I don’t fucking want your explanation, Cal, since it will all be lies.”

“I didn’t fucking lie to you, Ivey. You’ve got the wrong end of the stick. There is an explanation, and you’ll fucking well listen to it while I give it to you.”

He did not just fucking say that.

I opened my mouth to reply, but snapped it shut when Cal continued on a low angry growl.

“I didn’t lie to you when I said I had meetings all day. My project manager was out, so I had to take on his meetings as well. Stacy called me for the first time in almost nine years.
After
I had called you. Shocked the shit outta me. Didn’t want to take the call when I saw her name on the display, but took it, because of Tommy. That’s the only reason I took that call, Ivey. She wanted to meet, said she had things she needed to say, things she needed to talk to me about. Important things that she wanted to talk to me about in person. About Tommy.”