Blue Colla Make Ya Holla (71 page)

Adam crosses his arms over his chest, mocking me. “I didn’t fuckin’ stutter, princess.” Turning around, he starts back up the dock away from me. “Now that you’re back, just stay out of my way,” he tosses over his shoulder and I lose it. “You don’t belong down here,” he says, not facing me, but pointing down the beach. “You belong up there, always did.”

“Fuck you, Adam!” I shout, burning up the distance between us. “You have no right to call the shots here. You. Broke. Me!” I scream shoving him. “I have been alone all this time because I couldn’t stay here after what happened between us and you tell me to stay out of your way? You selfish, heartless, bastard! I’m not asking for your approval, or your permission for shit.”

The minute he turns to face me, my palm cracks across his face. Hard. The shock on his face is quickly replaced with anger. His nostrils flare and his entire face hardens as he glares at me, rage bursting from behind his eyes. The top of my head barely comes to his shoulders, but that doesn’t stop me from wanting to slap him again. My chest is heaving and my mind whirling with everything I want to say to him, but I can’t focus on just one thing. I want to make him hurt as badly as I do, but all I can do is shake with fury.

“Don’t throw your pity party at me, Ainsley. I fucking loved you. If you think I’m the heartless one then you better go look in the mirror, baby, because you made me that way,” he grounds out, grabbing my wrists to keep me from taking another swing at him.

“Let me go, Adam,” I snap, attempting to pull away. He laughs, pulling me so that I am flush against his chest. His lips hover over mine and my breath hitches. Even now, after everything, I can feel a spark of what was once between us, the embers still smoldering somewhere beneath the ashes of what is left of me. He must feel it too, because he licks his lips. Adam tilts his head down. His eyes fill with heat, making my stomach flip, my heart beating rapidly and I welcome it.

I want him to kiss me.

Adam knows it too. Leaning down, he brushes his lips over mine slowly. “You want me, Ainsley. I know you do,” he purrs arrogantly. “Too bad I can’t be bought with Daddy’s money.”

His words break the moment, causing me to fight him again. “Let me go you son of a bitch!” I shout, trying to yank free of his hold on my wrists.

“I fuckin’ wish I could.” I barely hear the words coming from his lips before he is releasing me and leaves me standing there alone.

Adam

‡

M
aking my way
up to the parking lot, I throw my leg over my bike and start the engine. I twist the throttle harshly, the engine revving beneath me as the road calls my name. I roll out, leaning heavily into the curve as I pull away from my past, wanting nothing more than to put as much distance between Ainsley and me as possible.

Call me an asshole all you want, but I have waited to catch her alone again. Yeah, I’m a sick bastard, glutton for punishment, whatever, but part of me needed to know she still wanted me. That I could hurt her, even a little, because just looking at her fucking kills me. After days of her not showing up here, I nearly gave up. She went there every night as a kid; actually, that’s where I kissed her for the first time. She was staring down over the side and her glasses fell right off her face into the harbor. Her beautiful face was tear streaked from crying because she didn’t know how to explain it to her parents without telling them where she had been.

I dove in deep that night, not just into the water for her glasses, but into her life. There was something about her that drew me in like a beacon. She was so different from what everyone else said.

I was a fucking idiot. I still am, because part of me didn’t want to let her go just now. I wanted to kiss her and I almost did. For a split second we were Adam and Ainsley again, just on the docks, and I wanted to forget everything that happened and just get lost in her.

But that can’t happen.

Roaring into the parking lot of ‘On the Rox’, I prepare to drink her out of my system before I do something stupid, like ask her to explain how she could hurt me the way she did. How she could be so selfish? “Look who decided not to be a pussy tonight,” Sebastio calls from the front door, waving me inside. “Get in here and buy me a beer.”

Walking inside, I bypass my co-workers who stand around shootin’ the shit and head straight for the bar. “Yo, Roxy!” Turning around to face me, she laughs. Shoving her phone down into the front of her low cut, black shirt, she walks over. “Beer and a shot, Adam?”

“Make that shot a double,” I correct her, leaning against the bar.

“You got it,” she replies, sliding the extra-large shot glass full of amber liquid down the bar into my palm.

Downing it in one swallow I slide it back to her. “Another.”

“Next time, I can just hook the bottle straight to a vein.”

“Cut him some slack Roxy, he’s got blue balls and a bad case of the ‘don’t give a fucks’,” Sebastio says, clapping me on the back.

“Ainsley?” Roxy asks knowingly, and I groan. “Someone said she’s dating Elliot Becker. She’s home with her eyes set on that ring, I bet. Hmm, it’s a shame, I liked her. She wasn’t too good to come in here and drink beer like normal people,” she shrugs, putting the bottle behind the bar. “I always thought Elliot was gay. Guess I was wrong for trying to fix him up with my cousin Noah on New Year’s.”

“I thought they woulda made a cute couple,” Sebastio agrees, sitting at the bar. “They both loved my version of ‘The Love Boat’ after the Christmas Parade.”

“Again, why do we allow you in public?” I ask, but get no answer because Sebastio is climbing over the bar telling Roxy all about a movie he saw on cable and how she should throw whiskey bottles and dance naked on the bar.

“Why did you and Ainsley ever break up in the first place?” Roxy asks, handing me my beer.

Shaking my head, I attempt to force the pain back, but the thought of her final blow to destroy our relationship still fucking hurts worse than anything I have ever felt. Taking a breath, I say the words that I’ve never been able to say out loud. “She used her family’s money to kill our baby. Anthony Carter, himself, hand delivered the paperwork, because she was too much of a coward to tell me herself. The smug bastard even offered to pay me off for my trouble so I’d keep quiet.” Slumping to the stool, I grab my beer and slap a fifty on the bar. “Line up the shots, Roxy. I have a feelin’ I’ll feel better once I see the bottom of that bottle.”

Slamming back another shot, I laugh to myself as the burn begins to take over and I replay the words she said to me on the dock. Ainsley said that I broke her, but she did that damage all on her own.

Ainsley

Wiping the tears
from my eyes, I fix my make-up for the third time. After my run-in with Adam on the docks, I am a basket case of emotion. The things he said still echoing in my head. The minute I come downstairs and step into the foyer the door opens with my father stepping inside, followed by Elliot.

“Good evening, Ainsley,” my father says evenly, setting his briefcase on table beside the front door. “Sorry I am late, we closed on the old movie theatre property today and my presence was necessary.”

“Good evening, and congratulations,” my reply is robotic, but required nonetheless.

“Don’t you look stunning!” Stepping around my father, Elliot eyes my blue knee length halter dress and gray peep toe heels before staring down at his own dark blue suit. “Don’t we make a pair?” Wrapping an arm around my waist, Elliot pulls me against him to face my father.

“Reminds me so much of us at that age,” my mother says, while coming down the stairs, her words already slurring horribly. “Except, at their age we were already married, weren’t we, Anthony?”

“Yes,” my father nods his head in agreement, before starting for the stairs to take my mother’s hand. “Enjoy this part you two. This time next year, you’ll be an old married couple like us.”

“Yeah, can’t wait for that. Elliot, you ready to go?” My outburst stops the conversation and everyone’s eyes are on me. My emotions are all over the place still and the last thing I want to talk about is how excited they are to dress me up and send me down the aisle to end up just like them.

Just as I knew he would, Elliot nods and leads me out the door to his car. I have to bite back a laugh when he opens the door and all the plastic is still covering the radio and dashboard. Slipping into the driver’s seat, Elliot pushes the plastic covered button on the dashboard, making the ridiculously expensive sports car roar to life.

“I was hoping your head would be on straight once you had been settled in a few days,” Elliot says, navigating the long, winding driveway. “Care to tell me what has your knickers in a twist?”

“I’m not marrying you, Elliot. A few days, a few years, nothing is going to change the fact that I don’t love you.” Turning in my seat, I look at him, but his eyes never leave the road. He navigates the curves past the docks that head up the hill to the country club.

The club overlooks the ocean, bypassing the harbor completely. Most of the members don’t even live in town. Choosing, instead, to make the drive up from the bigger cities on the weekends, which means lots of business for the beachfront inns and condos, all owned by Elliot’s father and mine. In the last few years, they have successfully bought up every available piece of real estate and are buying more and more every day.

“Listen,” Elliot says as we pull into the club and wait for a valet. “Of course you aren’t my first pick either, you know?” Meeting my eyes, he arches a brow at me. “You’re mouthy, and ridiculously in need of lessons in proper etiquette.”

The door opens and I take the valet’s extended hand to step from the car. “Well, if we’re sharing,” I start once he stands and hands the keys to the valet and he steps toward me, taking my arm to lead me inside. “You’re a pompous ass, and in serious need of the corncob being removed from your snooty ass.”

“Your parents made a serious mistake sending you off to school,” Elliot snaps through gritted teeth. Grabbing my elbow, he guides me through the front doors of the club into the foyer before settling us into a corner away from nosy eyes and ears. “What they should have done was put their foot down years ago, then you wouldn’t have been whoring around with white trash and shaming your family.”

“Fuck you, Elliot!” I shout, slapping him so hard across the face it echoes throughout the room. “I was never his whore, and I won’t be yours either.” Shoving around him, I stomp away, my heels clicking furiously across the Italian marble.

“Ainsley!” Elliot shouts after me, as I storm for the doorway, desperate to get the hell out of here. “Wait. Ainsley, I didn’t mean it.”

“Where on earth are you going?” My mother asks when I reach the front doors as they enter, blocking my path.

I am fuming. Everything in my head, not just today, but years and years of shit I have wanted to say build up in my chest. I can’t force it back down. I won’t.

“I’m leaving.”

My mother steps closer to me while my father turns to speak to a man in a suit. “No, you’re going back in there with us to have dinner.” Gripping my arm tightly, she leans in to my ear. “Do not a make scene, Ainsley Michelle. You’ve put this family through enough with your dramatics.”

Yanking my arm free, I tumble back into Elliot as he reaches us. “I’m sorry, Ainsley. Let’s just go eat,” Elliot says, steadying me on my feet.

Stepping away from them both, I right my dress, and blow out a breath. Looking at my mother, halfway to plastered before dark all while pretending to be the perfect wife and mother, I laugh at the ridiculous façade they are so desperate to hold onto as it begins to crumble openly around them. Wrapping my arms around my middle, I bend over and laugh so hard tears are streaming down my face.

“Ainsley have you gone completely mad?” Elliot asks when I slump back against a wall.

“What the hell is going on here?” My father booms loudly.

Looking up at him, I wipe the remains of my laughing fit from my face. Looking between them all, I shake my head. “I just realized that there is nothing you can offer me to make me stay here and be any part of this life. I can’t be bought.”

“Young lady, watch your tone and remember who it is you’re speaking to.” My father’s tone is harsh. He is clearly warning me to stop, but I’m too far gone now.

“I am not marrying Elliot. I don’t fucking like Elliot!” Looking to my father, I hold up both hands, hoping that he will just listen for once. “I won’t live this life, not anymore. I don’t want the expectations and the resentment. I won’t be the woman drowning myself in booze all day, while I hide in my room, because I hate my husband and my child. I refuse to hate my life.”

My mother’s jaw drops, her eyes hardening in anger as she quickly scans the room to see who is watching this play out. I could care less, I should have done this years ago. Maybe I wouldn’t have wasted so much time feeling sorry for myself.

“You’ve been home a week and already you’re causing trouble,” my mother says between gritted teeth. “You should be ashamed of yourself.”