Inferno Anthology (70 page)

When we walked back into Halo, Nicole was leaning against the bar in the corner while Avery made drinks for customers. As we got closer, they both gave us a questioning look.

“It’s raining outside,” I said, over the loud music.

“I can tell,” Avery replied, smiling.

“It’s getting late, and I want her to meet Cheyenne before she goes to bed. Do you mind if I take off?”

“My girl is here, too, man,” he said, motioning to Nicole.

“I need to talk to you then. Let’s go to the office.” I turned to Brooke. “Baby, have a drink, I need to sort this out with Av.”

“Okay,” she said. She pulled me down by my shirt and kissed me like we kissed in the rain. When she let me go, I looked around and all the women that I’d flirted with that night to get tips were staring.

“I see what your plan is, Baby,” I said, giving her a knowing smile. “Bethy, can you make Brooke whatever she wants to drink?”

“Sure thing. Sweetie, what will it be?”

I left, catching up with Avery, and we took the steps two at a time until we stepped into our office.

“Hear me out…” I said, raising my hands defensively.

“Nicole is here, too. We need to have a better system,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Dude, Brooke walked in and thought I was cheating on her.”

“So you decided to fight in the pouring rain?”

“She went to leave. I couldn’t let her just walk away. Also, I told her that I loved her.”

“You did? I thought you were going to wait?”

“I had to do something. I needed to tell her the truth,” I said, running my hands through my wet hair.

“I see,” Avery said with a nod and rubbed his hand over the stubble on his chin.

“So let me have tonight, and I’ll let you have next week.”

“You’ll just call in Bethy again.” He laughed.

“Fuck you. You know why I did it, and you would do the same thing.”

“Alright, get out of here, but you owe me!”

“Thank you,” I said from the hallway. As soon as he said “alright”, I was on my way.

I squeezed my way through all the bodies standing around—some dancing, some kissing—but most just talking and drinking. I saw Brooke at the bar, talking to Nicole, her hair starting to frizz. I laughed to myself, remembering how hot it was kissing her in the rain.

I came up behind Brooke and leaned down to her ear. “Ready?”

She jumped slightly, and then turned to face me. “Yep.”

She drank the rest of what looked like a vodka cranberry and then told Nicole that she would see her later—probably at Cheyenne’s game if things worked out with my girls meeting.

“Wait, my bag,” Brooke said, looking between Nicole and I.

“I’m not going out there in the rain.” Nicole shook her head.

“I’ll bring your keys back,” I said, gesturing for them.

Nicole dug in her purse for her keys and then handed them to me. I turned and gave Avery a nod as he leaned on the bar near Nicole. The rain hadn’t let up as we ran towards my BMW. I opened the door for Brooke and didn’t care that she was soaking wet when she slid onto the leather seat. All I cared about was being with my girl, and she was in my car—not thinking I was a cheating bastard.

I ran to Nicole’s car, popped the trunk and pulled out the green bag that Brooke told me was hers. I ran back to my car, threw her bag in the backseat and handed Brooke a sweatshirt that I grabbed from the back.

“Thank you,” she said.

I looked at the clock and it was past eleven. “Maybe it’s not a good idea for you to meet Cheyenne tonight.”

“Oh…” She looked disappointed. “I didn’t realize how late it was.”

“You know, I have new sheets that need christening, too,” I said, smirking at her.

“Oh, is that right?” she said, laughing making my dick instantly hard.

“Yeah, Cheyenne made me buy new ones after I told her about you. I didn’t realize that mine were so old.”

“You told her about me?”

The car had finally heated up some, I turned on the heater and put the car in reverse.

“I did. I think she’s excited.”

“Really?” she questioned.

I pulled in front of Halo, put my hazard lights on as I parked in the middle of the street. I ran to the door, handing my bouncer, Gary, Nicole’s keys and told him to bring them to the feisty blonde at the bar near Avery.

I slid back into the car and headed towards the freeway. Reaching over, I grabbed Brooke’s hand—I always wanted to touch her in some way—and proceeded to describe how I told Cheyenne about her:

“So…you want to hear about the girl I met?” I asked, taking a bite of garlic bread.

Cheyenne and I were sitting at the dining room table, having dinner after we arrived home from softball practice.

“I guess,” she shrugged and slurped a noodle into her mouth.

“Well…I met her on the cruise Uncle A and I went on.”

“So she lives in California?”

“No, she lives in Boston.”

“Oh, why was she on the cruise then?”

“Same reason Uncle A and I were.” Well technically she wasn’t on the cruise for the same reason, but I didn’t think my ten-year-old needed to know details of the cruise.

“Did he meet a girl too?”

“He did,” I nodded. “She’s actually best friends with the girl I met.”

“Oh, like me and Courtney?” she asked, continuing to slurp her noodles.

“Exactly.”

“What’s her name?”

“Brooke.”

“What’s her friends name?”

“Nicole.”

“Can I tease Uncle A about having a girlfriend?”

I laughed. “Yeah, Peanut, tease him all you want.”

“Do girls have cooties like boys?”

Oh Jesus Christ!

“Umm…well…shi,” I almost cussed in front of her. How do I answer this question? “Um…no?” I didn’t mean for it to be a question, but I wasn’t expecting this conversation to go in that direction.

“I don’t think boys have cooties either. Courtney tries to tell me that they do, but I think it’s because she likes the same boy as me.”

I dropped my fork.

“What? You like a boy?”

“Yep,” she said, taking a bite of bread like it was no big deal.

“You’re ten. How can you like a boy?”

“I don’t know, he’s cute,” she shrugged.

“Cute? No, no, no, no, no!”

“Daddy, calm down, we’ve only kissed once.”

“Oh my God, I think I’m having a heart attack,” I said, clenching my chest.

“Why? Do you kiss your girlfriend?”

“Peanut, I’m thirty-one. You’re ten.”

“So? When did you have your first girlfriend?”

Lie Easton. Lie!

“When I was sixteen, your mother and I started dating.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, you’re mother has been my only girlfriend until now.”

“Hmmm,” she sighed.

Oh dear God, I can’t handle raising a daughter on my own anymore. Brooke was right. Cheyenne needs a mother to talk to her about this. The more she talked, the more I saw red. She had already kissed a boy! Granted, I was probably six when I first kissed a girl, but this was my little girl—my Peanut.

“Let’s go back to Brooke. Maybe she can talk to you about boys.”

“When do I get to meet her?”

“I’m not sure, Peanut. Maybe in a few weeks?”

“What does she look like?”

“Here, I have a picture.” I showed her a picture that we took on the cruise of the four of us. Brooke was in her bikini on my left. We had just gotten out of the pool, my arm was draped over her shoulder, hers behind Nicole’s back and Nicole was clenched to Avery’s waist.

“She’s pretty.”

I smiled. “She is.”

“So, can you talk to her about boys?”

“I can try, but I’m kinda nervous.”

“Why are you nervous?”

“What if she doesn’t like me?”

“She will, I promise. I told her all about you and how you played softball. Right now, anyone that can help her with softball is a hero to her.”

“I can’t help now with my stupid tumor.”

“Baby, she’s ten. You have her whole life to help make her an all-star.”

We started to drive out of the city to my house. Somehow, God was looking over me because I’d washed my sheets today. I would have been mortified if Brooke had to smell my stinky man sheets—even if they were new.

“I like when you say stuff like that.” She leaned over and kissed my cheek.

“Say what?”

“Talk about us and the future.”

“Oh, well…there’s definitely an us and a future,” I said, kissing the back of her hand.

“Good.” I saw her smile glow with the light from the passing streetlights.

“So, if Avery asks, we went by my parents and all the lights were off, okay?”

“Why is that?”

“I talked him into letting me go because I wanted you to meet Cheyenne to prove that I love you.”

“I believe you love me.”

“You know what I mean. Cheyenne is the final puzzle piece.”

“That’s true, but don’t you own the bar with him?”

“Yeah, but it’s Friday and busy. Kinda putting him out with me gone. Plus, he wanted to leave too since Nicole is there.”

“Shit, now I feel bad.”

“Don’t feel bad. He can handle it. It will give him more of a push so we can hire more bartenders for the weekends so we can spend them with you and Nicole.”

“I thought you worked the weekends to make more money for Cheyenne?”

“I do. I’ll figure something out.”

“Okay well, Nicole would kill me if she knew, so your secret is safe with me.”

“Good,” I said and kissed the back of her hand again.

Brooke

I
was nervous as Easton pulled his car into his garage.
Why was I nervous? We’ve had sex a handful of times
. I followed him up two steps from his garage and into his kitchen. Dark cherry hardwood floors were throughout with white cabinets and white marble countertops. There was light green tile backsplash along the walls under the cabinets that led to a stainless steel gas stove with two ovens.

“Geez, no wonder you have to work weekends,” I said, looking around in awe.

“When Dana died, I got money from her life insurance.”

“I thought you were getting divorced, though?”

“We were, but she never changed the policy, and we were technically still married.”

“It’s beautiful,” I said. I could picture myself living in a house with that kitchen. It was breathtaking. “No wonder you like to cook.” I gave him a smile.

“‘Like’ isn’t the word I would use. I have to cook because of Cheyenne.”

“Well, I would love to cook in here,” I said, still looking around the room and running my hand along the marble.

“Are you hungry? I’m starving.”

“I am. Nicole and I came straight here. We were going to stop for food, but with the storm, we didn’t want to chance it.”

“I know just the dish to make us,” he said with a wink. “Let me throw some bacon into the oven and then
we
can shower and get into dry clothes.”

“We?” I asked, biting my lower lip.

“Yeah, to save water, of course.” He smirked.

“Of course.” I laughed. Easton was always making me laugh. I hadn’t felt happy in a really long time and after the news about the tumor, it was refreshing being in a relationship that I was happy in.

I grabbed my bag that Easton brought in and followed him to his bedroom. I tried peeking in the dark rooms, but didn’t see anything as we walked down the hall other than his living room. It was just as nice as the kitchen. The hardwood floors were still throughout, and a brown suede sectional faced a massive size flat screen TV that hung over built-in bookshelves that were painted white like the kitchen cabinets.

Easton turned on his light in the bedroom and once again, I was in awe.

“Zebra print, huh?” I said, motioning to a small ottoman between two grey chairs at the end of his king-size bed.

“Yeah…I hired a decorator.” He laughed.

“Oh, well that explains it all,” I teased.

A light grey accent wall was behind the off-white cushioned headboard of the king-size bed. White linens covered the bed with black and white accent pillows with different shapes on each. The end tables matched each other, and both had glass-faced drawers and lamps that were in the shape of a circle and were painted a medium grey with white lampshades.

His home put my tiny one-bedroom apartment to shame. Mine was so bland: white walls, beige carpet, beige linoleum, light oak cabinets and white countertops that I had no clue what they were made of—but it wasn’t marble or even granite.

And Jesus, his master bath…a large walk-in shower with a glass door sat adjacent to a large Jacuzzi style tub. The cabinets were a dark cherry wood, the countertops had his and her sinks with a darker shade of slab than the ones in the kitchen—like a light beige granite that matched the tile in the shower perfectly, even though one was granite.

“Damn, I bet the girls never want to leave this bathroom,” I said, placing my PJs on the counter.

“What girls?”

“The girls you bring home from the bar.”

“I’ve never brought any girls here—until you.”

“Really?”

“Yep,” he said, turning on the shower.

I guess it made sense that he never brought any girl home before because of Cheyenne, but I just assumed he might have since she stays at her grandparents on Friday and Saturday nights.

“Let me go put the bacon in the oven. It should be almost pre-heated. Go ahead and get in. I’ll be back in a minute.” He lightly kissed my lips.

I piled my damp clothes in the corner and stepped into the shower. The water was perfect, especially after being cold from the rain. I heard Easton enter a few minutes later and I turned to face him.