January (Calendar Girl #1) Anthology Anthology (58 page)

He nodded. “I don’t like where she lives, especially there all alone. When she didn’t have a car, I about lost my mind knowing she was walking through that neighborhood at night. Then you got her the car, and that was great, but your father isn’t there, Mia. And
you’re
not there.” That last sentence hit me like a frying pan to the face. Matt’s face turned hard, almost cold, his tone gravelly. “She’s alone, unprotected.” He shook his head. “Unacceptable.” Matt finished with a huff as if he was a grown-ass man and not a twenty-year-old wannabe man.

My shoulders drooped, defeat filling the edges of reality. He had a point. A very good point. I didn’t like Maddy being alone any more than he did. I loathed it. It had been a constant source of stress these past few months. It was the same reason I had Ginelle drive by the house on her way home from work every night to make sure everything looked okay.

Breathing in slowly through my nose, I let it out even slower. “You’re right. It is unsafe.” Matt nodded but kept silent. I respected him for letting me have my say, giving me the time to express my concerns. This is Vegas. They could have just run off and hit one of the million chapels on the strip if they were determined. Gripping the railing, I dug my nails into the white wood and looked out over the desert. “I just don’t want her to make a mistake. You guys are so young.”

“And we’re going to take it slow. Live together first, see how that goes. Support one another through school and get our bachelor’s together. We both have two more years after this one.”

I jumped on that because it wasn’t exactly true anymore. Maddy was going to be a doctor. The first in our family. “And Maddy wants to go for her Masters and PhD. What then? You gonna support her through that as her husband?”

Matt nodded frantically. “Absolutely. It was my idea! She’s top of her class, much higher than even me, and I work my ass off. Her natural talent and brains are un-paralleled in the program. She’s going to be an amazing scientist, and I get to be the guy that rests his hand on her back when she accepts those awards and makes those speeches she will undoubtedly be asked to do in the future. I get to stand by her side and cheer her on, as she will for me.” Matt placed his hand on my arm and forced me to look him in the eyes. “We’re not taking this lightly, and we’re not stupid. But we are in love, and I don’t want to risk losing her for anything.” Matt’s blue eyes held such a strong conviction, I couldn’t be angry any longer. It all seeped out like water swirling and flowing down the drain during a shower. It left me feeling wrung out and defeated.

“Is it okay to come out now?” Maddy’s voice sounded small through the screen door.

“Yeah, baby girl, come on out. Let’s see the ring.” I shot playful daggers at Matt trying to make a little bit light of the situation. “There better be a ring!” A scowl slipped across my face, but I couldn’t hold it when Maddy came hopping out of the house with her left hand out.

The ring wasn’t huge, but it wasn’t small either. It looked antique. “It was my grandmother’s. Mom gave it to me the first day I brought Madison over for dinner.” He laughed.

“It’s lovely.” I looked up at my baby sister, who seemed incredibly nervous and unsure of herself. Man, I hoped Matt taught my girl some confidence. If he could go up against a bat-shit crazy sister who has the helicopter-mom syndrome on lockdown, he could teach my sis how to be more certain of herself.

Tears dropped down Maddy’s cheek. “I’m so happy, Mia. Please be happy for me. I can’t handle you being disappointed.”

Ever since she was little, and especially after our mom left, I was her only female influence. Over the years, she couldn’t handle thinking she’d let me down or hurt me in anyway. That girl would rather walk across a stretch of hot coals than hear I was disappointed in her decisions.

“Oh you sweet, silly girl. Come here,” I pulled her into my arms. She cried softly into my neck, sobbing, letting her nerves and fear go while I petted her hair and hummed her song.
Three Little Birds
by Bob Marley was the song I’d learned off a CD Dad listened to after Mom left. Mostly he listened to
No Woman No Cry
over and over again in a drunken haze while I took care of Maddy and me. But that one song made me believe that things would be all right… eventually.

Maddy pulled her face up and I wiped away her tears with my thumbs. “I’m sorry I reacted the way I did.” I hedged a glance at Matt. “Your parents probably think I’m a fruitcake.”

He chuckled. “No, I think they probably can relate to impulsivity and the response from the family. They met and got married within three months of knowing one another. To them, I’m just following in their spontaneous footsteps. I promise you though, Mia, this is not spontaneous. We’re going to finish school first, I just want my ring on her finger and her safe in my apartment directly across the street from the school.”

“You live across the street from the school?” That motherly side of me that only came out when it came to my baby sis, started flashing brightly like a lighthouse beam to a boat lost in a dark ocean.

He smiled wide and nodded pulling Maddy into his arms. “You okay, sunshine?” he whispered in her ear, but loud enough for me to hear.

I focused on the care and concern with which he touched my girl. He was a good guy. Probably a true angel in a sea of sinners here in Vegas.

“As long as Mia’s okay with all this I am.” Her eyes flashed to mine.

I groaned. “Fine, I give my blessing.” That got a reaction. A jumping, squealing, teenaged reaction to be exact.

After a few more lectures from me, we went back into the house. Tiffany and Trent Rains were waiting patiently in the living room.

“My boy will take excellent care of your sister, I can promise you that,” Mr. Rains beamed with pride. “He’s got his head on straight, but you can’t deny a man in love. When the Rains men fall, they fall hard and fast, and for life.” He looped an arm over his wife’s shoulder. “And that’s a fact,” he said with gusto.

I sat down and looked at the happy couple. “Maddy and I didn’t have it easy growing up. We’ve only ever been able to count on one another. So hearing that my baby sister was going to marry your son, at the young age of nineteen, something inside me just snapped. I didn’t handle that well, and I apologize.”

Tiffany stood up and sat next to me in the love seat. “No worries. It was a bit of a shock when Matt mentioned his intention to us earlier this week. I mean, I knew he loved her. They haven’t been away from one another for the better part of two months.”

Two months. They’ve been together two months and are engaged. I couldn’t wrap my head around it.

“It seems awfully fast…”

“Things like that happen in the Rains family,” Tiffany grinned while looking at her husband. Love, adoration, and loyalty filled her brown eyes. I wanted my sister to have that, and maybe by marrying into this family, it would be hers one day. Please God, just let it truly be after she gets her degree.

Tiffany ran her hand up and down my back in a soothing, motherly gesture I hadn’t received in more years than I could remember. “It will be okay. They’ll finish their bachelor’s and then we’ll plan a wedding! We’ve got time.”

Time.

Seemed these days that was the last thing I had a lot of.

***

The rest of my stay in Vegas was a complete whirlwind. Gin, of course, thought that Maddy getting engaged was absolutely hilarious. That skanky ho knew exactly how to push my buttons and kept at it the rest of my visit. Making comments about how Matt and Maddy would run off and get married on the strip, or end up pregnant in a few months. That little joke had me giving Maddy a sit down and chat about the importance of never missing a birth control pill. She swore she’d never miss a day and took it right before bed each night. After that embarrassing conversation—for her, not me—I made her pinky promise that she would not get married without me. That was the only recourse I had to ensure things would stay as planned. In her nineteen years of life we have never, not once, broken a pinky promise to one another. It was sacred and I believed her when she kissed my pinky, and I kissed hers, that she wouldn’t let me down.

As I sat on the plane, I thought about how defensive and upset I got when I heard the announcement that the teens were engaged. Was my sis was getting her happily ever after before I did the problem? That’s what Gin joked. But no, that wasn’t it. I never wanted the things she did. If I really dug deep the answer was simple.

I couldn’t lose her.

I’d been responsible for Maddy for as long as I could remember. Her living with a man, leaning on him for support would be only the first loss. His family informed me that they paid for their son’s apartment and that the only thing Maddy would need was spending money. They were happy to contribute extra to their son’s food bill for his fiancée because they already thought of her as family. Simple as that. They now had my sister as
their
family and were supporting her.

Putting a roof over her head, feeding her, those things were
my
job and had been for almost fifteen years. I didn’t know how to handle that. For one, I knew that I’d keep up the rent at my Dad’s place, and I’d send her several hundred bucks a month for incidentals and supplies for her coursework as well as for her to play with. She deserved that. My sister worked her bum off, and I didn’t want that to change by her attempting to get a job. I wanted her to stay on that fast track to future success. Now, I just had to accept that Matt Rains was going to be holding her opposite hand through this journey.

Well, at least nothing changed about the Hawaii trip. Matt seemed crushed when she told him, which made me secretly thrilled. Yep, bona fide bitch here, and I was not sorry about it. According to Maddy, he understood the need for “girl time” and that the news they’d shared was a bit shocking. At the end of the discussion, the sweet bastard was congratulating me on the idea and giving
his
blessings. Like I needed it. Funny boy, he would learn real quick who was boss. I just hoped in the end, it would still be me.

Chapter 3

Black tribal tattoos. Drool worthy, thick, corded muscles wrapped in intricate weaving designs, cascaded all over tanned, toned, male skin. From the top of his left shoulder, down his bulging bicep, over his ribcage, waist, dipped into the sarong that covered his male essence and beyond. The black ropes of ink then scaled down from his tree-trunk sized thigh, along a tight, carved out calf, to stop bluntly at the ankle. I could barely feel the sand burning the soles of my feet as I stood there in awe of the magnificent creature before me. He turned sideways, giving me a lickable view of a strong, well-formed back, one that could easily lift me and two friends and toss us into the ocean just beyond where he stood. A camera clicked repeatedly, and then he looked at me. No, he didn’t look at me. His eyes sought mine across the thirty-foot expanse between us. Brown eyes, the color of the deepest, darkest cocoa bean sizzled as they took in every ounce of my form.

The stranger’s gaze slid over me like a burning caress, so heated I fanned my face trying to remove the searing feeling that encapsulated my skin. An Italian accented voice called out some commands, and finally, Mr. Tattoo looked away, releasing the hold he had over me. I was freed but felt an odd, niggling sense of loss instead. The way this man looked at me was a calling, a beacon of desire needling at my psyche. One I was all too familiar with, as the space between my thighs swelled and softened. I stood and watched as the man behind the camera took a dozen more photos then abruptly made a slashing gesture with his hand.

“
Finito
!” he said, followed by a, “
Perfetto
.”

Ripping my eyes away from the overly delicious male, I watched as the photographer twisted around, his face turned toward me. He had on a woven, brown fedora style sun hat, cargo shorts, and a white linen shirt that was held together by a single button that did nothing to hide the svelte body underneath it. He smiled wide and trudged over to me, sand kicking up with each step. I stood stock-still where the limo driver had suggested when he parked and pointed at the tent on the beach. He said my boss was behind the camera. I hadn’t anticipated my client would also be the man taking the pictures for the campaign. Either way, it didn’t matter much to me. Work was work, and as long as it came with a hundred thousand dollar check, I was all in.

As he came closer up the beach, I could see a soft smile, white teeth, and small wrinkles at the edges of his kind blue eyes and more around his mouth. His handsome face showed he’d aged well, and his salt and pepper hair spiked out from under the fedora.

“
Bella donna
,” he said grasping my shoulders in a warm embrace then leaning forward and air kissing both cheeks. “I am Angel D’Amico, and you are more beautiful than I anticipated when my wife said we must have you for our campaign.”

At the mention of his wife, a statuesque Latina exited a white tent, her brown skin glimmering in the sunlight. A fiery red sarong-style halter dress wrapped around her curvaceous form and flapped in the breeze. Her dark hair was long and whisked out as if she had a personal fan blowing directly on her to accentuate her features. Talk about beauty. This woman had loads of it. Angel clapped his hands as the woman headed our way. “Ah, my wife. Takes away breath, yes?” His Italian accent was more prevalent. I nodded because she had stolen my breath; she was that stunning.

A huge smile graced her lips. “Mia, it is so lovely to have you as part of our project.” She also leaned forward and air kissed both of my cheeks. Now that she was close, I could see she had also been kissed by age, but it did not take away from her beauty. Aunt Millie told me that the designer and his wife were around fifty. These two could easily pass for early forties. “I am Rosa, Angel’s wife. We are excited to have you here.”

I tugged my bag up my shoulder and pushed my hair off my forehead. “I’m happy to be here. The island, well, what I’ve seen of it coming from the airport is beautiful.”