Fated (3 page)

Chapter Three

The week came and went faster than I wanted it to and it was Saturday
, the dreaded, fifteenth before I know it. I am again laying in my chair looking out the window out onto the beautiful ocean that sat in my horizon. It is calming. I hear a light tapping on my door and it opens. I look up to see Marsi standing in the dark looking at me with a sullen face.

“Hey, Soph,” she says looking down at her hands, “How are you doing?”

I don’t answer her but simply look to the window and shrug my shoulders.

“Alright,” she says silently and turns on her heal to walk out of the bedroom back out into the light of the hallway. I didn’t see the need with turning on my light today. I think that befor
e she leaves I hear her mumble , “I’m so sorry, Soph.”

I am sitting on my balcony a few hours later, still not a light on in my entire room, when I hear my door open again and I look over to the direction that Mar is in, “Get up,” she says slightly smiling.

“What?” I ask almost confused by her change in attitude.

“Get up, we’re going out.” She demands, staring at me and I can see that she isn’t going to back down.

“I do-don’t want to.” I tell her quietly.

“You are not sitting in here, wallowing in your own self-pity. You are going to get up, put on the sexiest thing that you can find in your ridiculously expensive wardrobe, and we are going to go out and have fun.” I walk over to my bed and sit down.

“Mar, I’m really not feeling up to this,” I look down at m
y feet, “Can’t I just stay here?”

“No, now get up, we are going to go meet a few of my friends out in town and have fun. MOVE IT!” she turns and before she leaves the room she adds, “You are not going to let fucking Joe ruin one more day of your life. We are young, we are going to act like it,” she finishes and walks out of my room slamming the door.

I begrudgingly get up off of the bed and head for the shower. I am supposed to dress sexy. I’m not even sure if I remember what that looks like.

I pull myself out of the shower, blow drying my hair, and straightening it, so that it falls straight down my back. I walk into my closet with my towel pulled tightly around my body. I pull out of the mess of clothing that I have managed to get
around to putting up this week, a short white BCBG dress that hugs my body just right, and then I pull out a pair of hot pink heels. I walk out of my bedroom well after the sun has set and Marsi looks over to me and smiles.

“Perfect,” she stands up and she looks simply stunning as well. I love how she likes to mock my wardrobe, but yet I’m pretty sure that her outfit is more expensive than
mine. We pull up to a club and I watch at Mar gets out and then motions for me to follow. I worry that we won’t be able to get in, but she bypasses the line and walks right up to the bouncer. He is one of the tallest and most muscular men that I have ever met. His biceps are probably the size of my head –not exaggerating- and I am slightly terrified of him.

“Marsi,” I hear him say as he reaches down to hug h
er instantly washing away any fear that I may have had for him.

“Hi, Daryl, this is my sister, Sophie.” I smile politely at him.

“Oh, Sophie, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you.” I am completely take a back when he hugs me and Mar just looks to me, smiles, and shrugs.

“Nice to meet you too,” I struggle back to say to him. Daryl lets us into the club a second later and I lean over to Mar, “How do you know him?” and she laughs.

“His brother had to get surgery last year, he was impressed with me, I guess, and told me to come by here, I did and I have been coming here ever since,” I laugh about this, my sister, the club hopper. I look down, “Come on,” she says to me, “Let’s go dance.”

“Aren’t your friends coming?” I ask her.

“Yeah, but they won’t be here for a little while.” She pulls me to the dance floor.

We danced for half an hour before Mar
sees her friends walk in and she goes over to them. I stay on the dance floor for another ten minutes, releasing every bit of built up tension that I have in my body; releasing Joe from me. I am actually glad that Mar forced me to come out. When I finally stop I walk over to the bar for another drink. I motion for a round and the guy smiles to me, he is cute but seems too sweet, maybe I could get a bartending job… no, I won’t like to work in a place that I could be having fun at.

“You know, you clean up really nice,” I hear in my ear and even though it has been two weeks since I have heard that voice, and I have only ever heard it that one night, I know who it is. I turn slowly and look up at
Austin, the man that I met at the restaurant in Savannah, “I almost didn’t recognize you in that dress, you know without the oversized sweater.” I am blown away, is he hitting on me? “But I couldn’t help but watch you out there.” He says nodding his head behind him to the dance floor.

“Are you stalking me,” I smirk back to him as my drinks are sat down on the bar and I throw a shot of tequila back. He laughs a little and rubs his hand across the back of his neck.

“No, I should be asking you that thought since I’m the one that lives here.” He smiles at me, oh that smile. I was already a sucker for it and I didn’t even know this man.

“Well, I do too
, now. Remember I was moving.” He grins a little and I notice his head cocks to the side and his face falls a bit.

“It’s the fifteenth, isn’t it?” I nod my head in a response to him, taking the biggest sip from my straw
completely blown away that he remembered what the fifteenth was, as I see Mar walking over to me. Mid-sip I watch her as she walks to my side.

“Soph, there you are… OH,
I see that you have met Austin, he’s the lawyer that I was telling you about.” Which causes me to spit out my drink which manages to land on him, of course he’s the womanizer.

“You’re Sophie.” I nod my head and he shakes his
head and wipes off bits of my drink/saliva mix, “Of course you’re Sophie.” I’m not sure what that is supposed to mean but he gets up, walking away, and Mar locks her arm in mine and motions us back to the table, helping with my drinks as we walk over.

“Of course he would seek you out here.” I want to tell her that we met before this, “Don’t worry though I told him that you’re off limits.”

“Why?” I ask her quietly.

“Because you’re my sister, and he’s never going to change his ways,” she says and I sigh a little, “Oh, Soph
, I know he is incredibly gorgeous, but he’s terrible for every woman that comes into his life. He has had his car windshield smashed on more than one occasion.” I’m not sure now if she’s keeping him away from me or me away from him knowing that I would lose my shit and smash in his windshield also. We sit down at the table and I see Austin talking to everyone as Mar introduces me. It’s a small group two other women and three men, I say hi to everyone; Sarah, Becka, Matt, Toby, and Aaron. I notice how Mar looks at Toby as she introduces him. I smile and sit down with them for a short amount of time I start to see the looks of pity as everyone tries to include me into the conversation, and then I get up to go back to dance, and forget about all of them, especially Austin. I love the D.J. tonight. Not slowing the pace at all. I feel hands on me as the first slow song of the night comes on and I sigh about to walk back to the table. “Shh,” I look up to Austin’s deep blue eyes, “Dance with me.” He smiles and I nod my head. And I let my body rest close to his.

“I’m sorry,” he says completely apologetic, “I didn’t realize that you were Mar’s sister, although I should have, you two resemble one another-,” I cut him off.

“Well we should, she is my twin sister.” And he laughs looking down at me.

“You’re right.” he pulls me closer as we sway with the music.

“So, my sister is pretty adamant, huh?”

“Yeah,” he smiles down to me, “It’s a shame too.”

“A shame for you,” I tell him, I feel him laugh as we dance close to one another until it is over and he pulls away from me and smiles a bit, leaning down and kissing me. He leaves me standing on the dance floor alone; breathless. He intrigues me which cannot be a good thing.

We leave the bar and I’m certain that I can see the sun begin to rise and I know that I watched Austin for a bit as he was making out with a girl in the corner of the bar.

I wake at noon and walk downstairs to find that Mar had to leave for work. I’m not sure how she can work after a night like that. I sigh and open the backdoors to start on my morning run that I have planned on doing every morning
, but I know that I won’t stick to it. As I am running I look over and see Austin standing at the backdoor looking out of one of the houses as I hear tires squealing from the street, and he sees me and opens the door.

“Hey
, Soph,” I hear him say and I wave back trying to make it so he doesn’t feel the need to come over to me and I quicken my pace. I also know that the squealing tires was most likely coming from the girl that he had taken home last night, I’m not sure why I feel slightly jealous over it.

I walk back into the
house an hour later gasping for breath. I am a little out of shape; yes I will admit that I, Sophie Tice, have been eating my feelings. I shower quickly and change into a simple tank top and a pair of shorts then walks back downstairs when I hear a tapping coming from the backdoor and I see Austin standing waiting for me. He smiles at me and waves; I simply smile back as I approach the door and open it stepping out onto the patio.

“Hey,” he says.
I can’t help but stare at him in his khaki shorts and White button down shirt with the first three buttons unbuttoned showing off his sculpted pecks.

“Hi,” I reply looking up to him strange.

“So, did you have fun last night?”

“Yeah,” I want to add
not as much as you
, but I decide to take the higher road, plus I’m not sure why I care.

“That’s good, I’m glad Soph.” I sigh, sitting down at the table and looking to him; he sits down next to me which causes my pulse to quicken a bit. “Look, I’m sorry about last night. Sometimes I can’t turn it off.”

“Turn what off?” I ask him.

“The asshole,” I can’t help but laugh.

“You know, you do choose to be him.” I smile at him and he shrugs.

“Sometimes you don’t have a choice over who you become.”

“If that’s what you think.” I tell him. “But I believe that you always have a choice.”

“It is,
what I believe,” he smiles, “You know though, for you and Mar being twins you don’t look exactly the same.”

“Well, that’s because we are not identical, and I get a little excited with black dye.” He laughs.

“I like it, there’s something different between you two.”

“Yes, if only my parents approved of it,” he smiles to me again.

“Well, why don’t you come by my office tomorrow around eleven, we can start going over the case.”

“Alright, that sounds good. I’ll just ask Mar for the address.” He nods and then walks away. I can’t help but watch him as he walks back down the beach and look at his back as the muscles move with every move that he takes. He suddenly stops and turns to look at me like he is going to say something, but when he sees me, watching him
, it falls from his face. I let my eyes fall suddenly, pulling my lip in with my teeth, knowing that he is watching me I get up from the table and walk back through the doors, I turn to shut them and see him still standing there, watching me. One corner of his mouth pulls up and he smirks to me, and my pulse starts racing.

Chapter Four

I am not ready for this on a Monday morning. I am walking up the steps in my blue Mouret dress with blue Jimmy Choos and my thick frame glasses. I had pulled up my hair in a twist which I then pushed some chop sticks through, sometimes I like to coordinate my outfits for the occasion, and I figured that since today was a business meeting I wanted to look as professional as possible. I stop at the receptionist desk telling her that I had an eleven with Austin, whom I not sure what his last name was and she smiled pointing me down the large marble hallway. I am already freaking out because I have been lost today, and I was almost late. I knock on the large oak doors as I hear shuffling and then I watch a woman with ruffled clothing comes scurrying out and I walk inside looking to him, pointing in the direction of the door, and say, “Really?”

“Sorry,” he mutters sitting down at his large desk, he has yet to look up to me and when he does I am walking over to his desk and I do take notice that his eyes slightly widen. I smile to him as I take a seat in front of him; looking over and seeing the name plate that sits on his desk
,
Austin Calloway.
He stares at me intently for moments that turn into minutes before stumbling over his words and then taking a deep breath, looking down to his desk, shuffling through the papers, and looking back up to me smiling.

“Well, Soph, when you said that you lost it I had no idea it would be this.” I frown and look down at the ground, fidgeting my fingers. He gets up from his desk and walks around to kneel in front of me. “I’m sorry, Soph; I was only joking with you.” I sigh deeply, look up to him, and say.

“It’s bad, isn’t it?”

“I’m not going to lie, it isn’t good, but maybe it won’t be as bad as you think. We will just take it one step at a time,” he says placing his hands on my shoulders and I look up to him. He looks sincere and I wonder if he is like this with all of his clients. He stands
abruptly and walks back behind his large des. “So, since you haven’t been arrested before-,” and I have to stop him.

“I have-,” I say in the smallest voice that I can find.

“What?” he sounds confused and slightly frustrated.

“I have been arrested before,”
I repeat.

“But Mar told me that you haven’t.”

“I never told her.” I admit.

“Well, what is it?”
He asks and I wonder if he is slightly irritated.

“It was almost three years ago, my business was doing really well, and I let the money go to my head, I mean
, I guess I never really stopped letting it, but I found a more constructive way of spending it.”

“Drugs?” he asks me already knowing.

“Yeah, but I never got into trouble for that, but I was pulled over for driving under the influence, but I never got sentenced with anything.” He laughs, he actually laughs about it.

“Please explain to me how you got away with that one.” I surprise myself when I laugh as well.

“Well, I was pulled over driving and when I went to court the arresting officer ended up not being in the court room that day.”

“So they dismissed it.”

“Yeah,” I respond.

“Wow, you must be one lucky woman.” He says
, smiling over to me.

“I’m not sure that lucky is something that I would classify myself as right now, maybe back then, but not now.”

“Did Joe know about the drug problem?”

“No, he actually never really noticed anything about me that I didn’t want him to, which makes sense now,” I pause, “But I did managed to get myself clean before I was forced to move in with him.”

“Forced to move in with him?”

“Yeah, a few weeks before I had to close the business I couldn’t afford my big lavish apart, and luckily the lease was up, and I had to move in with him.”

“You had to move into Joe’s apartment?” he asks me again, with a smirk on his face and I am not sure what it is about. I can tell that I look at him with a confused face when he grins, “Singing cockroaches and all?” I surprise myself when it makes me laugh. “Great movie” it all he says afterwards.

“I don’t know if I would call it great, but it was something.” He laughs at me again. He looks down looking to the clock and I know that he means that the time is almost up. “Soph, you want to go get lunch with me?” I turn my head slightly shooting him a concerned look, “Nothing like that, just friends, getting lunch.”

I surprise myself when I agree. He smiles to me as he stands up and then motions for me to walk out of his office with him, then down the long hallway, and into the elevator taking it down to the bottom floor, then stepping out I see the reception area to the building and I see the girl that came out of his office looking over to us, he doesn’t even pay her any attention.

“Really?”
I ask him as we walk by.

“What?”
Is all he says.

“I mean she
works in the same building as you do.” He just shrugs.

“It’s not like she really cares.”

“What do you mean?”

“Look, she knows, as do most of every other woman, how I am,” he stops as we get to the door and looks directly at me, his intense stare causes my stomach to tighten, “If the right girl decides that I am worthy of her, I promise that I’ll stop, but until then what is it hurting anyone?” and he turns around and walks out of the door causing me to run behind after him. I think about his choice of words he didn’t say
when the right girl comes along
or
when I find the right girl
but he said if she decides that he is worthy. I’m not even sure what that exactly means. He is standing on the sidewalk waiting for me as I emerge from the doorway. Boy, does he know how to make an exit.

“Dramatic much?”
I ask him and he smiles to me. He holds out his arm and I hook my arm around his as we walk down the busy street. The plaque on the building that holds the names of the businesses catch my eye as I see it,
Calloway & Pierce Attorneys at Law
.

“Austin, the company?”
I pause pointing at the wall.

“It’s my dad’s. I got hired on right after I finished law school.” I nod my head and we continue to walk towards the restaurant. We are seated and I look over to him and he smiles; he’s always smiling at me.

“Austin, how old are you?”

“27,” I nod.

“How did you and my sister become friends?”

“Seriously, Soph, she lives like three houses down from me,” I nod realizing that it was a dumb question.

“Yeah, sorry that was a dumb question. So you never tried to sleep with her?” the question comes out before I even realize that I was thinking it, or that the topic seems to matter to me.

“No,” he says it so matter of fact that it takes me back a bit.

“Why not?” it comes out defensive but I don’t care. If he doesn’t like the way that she looks than I know that he doesn’t like the way I look, wait… do I care?

“Because she isn’t the type of girl that I try to sleep with; she’s smarty, witty, caring.” He pauses I can see in his eyes that he legitimately cares for my sister, but more like he would his own sister than anything else, “You know you seem like you are a lot like her, but there’s something different, something rough, and
edgy…” I cut him off.

“Yeah, she was always the good twin.” He laughs for a moment and then adds.

“What do you mean?”

“Growing up, we w
ere both smart, but she focused on school while I well… let’s just say I was a little rough,” he smirks, “Well that’s just how it had been our whole life, I mean look I had to move across the eastern seaboard to move in with her because I royally fucked up my life.” He looks to me and lowers his eyes staring into my soul.

“You know, Soph, rough it’s a bad thing,” he pauses lowering his voice to match his eyes, “In fact, I actually prefer rough.” I feel my cheeks heat up while he lets out a laugh that brings attention to us from around the entire room. I can tell that he likes making me feel uneasy.

“So, tell me when you were arrested what happened?” he quickly changes the subject.

“Well since I couldn’t remember what happened they brought in a shrink, that explained that with everything going on in my life, that I had a mental breakdown, that hearing what was going on behind my back that it made me snap.”

“Soph, I think if we can find any sort of evidence that we could actually have a case again him.” I shake my head and he looks to me as if I am insane.

“I just want
this to be over with. I don’t want him in my life longer than what he has to be. He really hurt me; broke my heart even and I just can’t put myself through that.”

“I’m sorry, Soph,” he says letting his hand fall on top of mine. I want to pull it away, but I don’t. “But the mental breakdown I can work with.” He smiles, sadly at me.

“Mar, told me that you are the best,” I tell him and smiles at me.

“Well that was very gracious of her, but I’m alright.”

“Then why would she call you the best?” I ask because I know that he is just being modest.

“Because I haven’t lost a case, and I haven’t had the best of clients.”

“That’s amazing,” I tell him but he just shrugs, “What is it?”

“Honestly, I’m
good, but I’ve never wanted to do this; I only did it because my dad paid for college.”

“Well then what do you want to do?”

“Play music.”

“Like an instrument?”

“Yeah, I play guitar.”

“Really,” I nearly squeal and he take
s notice, laughing. “Will you play for me sometimes?” I ask him and he rubs his hand along his neck.

“I don’t know, Soph,” he pauses looking down at the table and for once he looks younger than I have ever seen him before, and then I figure it out.

“Oh god, that’s your move isn’t it?” I whisper across the table, smirking at myself, and trying not to laugh.

“What?” he tries to play innocent.

“Your move, you pick the girl, bring her back to your place, and break out some cheesy acoustic ballad.” He looks down and I think I see a little pink to his cheeks. “Oh, my god, I’m right… I knew it.” he looks around nervously.

“Yeah,” he says, embarrassed.

“Oh, it’s alright. But I don’t want you to play your sex ballad to me; I want you to play what you really like to play.” He looks back up to me smiling.

“Alright.”

“Really?” I can’t help but grin.

“Sure, if yo
u really want to hear it.” I nod my head quickly as he laughs at me.

“So tell me, why were you in Savannah?”
I ask.

“I had a court case.”

“That you won of course.” I think I roll my eyes a bit. He laughs and rubs his hand on the back of his neck. I am starting to realize that he does this when he is nervous or being modest. “So, can I ask a question?”

“You just did, but go ahead.” He grins at me.

“Aha,” I add dryly, “So, the note, why did you leave it on my door?” his face falls and I watch his hand begin to make its way but up the back of his back when the waitress comes up and places the food in front of us. My eyes grow wider as I look to the food sitting in front of us; I think that I hear him sigh loudly, and I forget about what we were talking about.