Live for You (9 page)

He pauses, looking over his
shoulder. “Would that stop you?”

I’ve been doing as I please
since the age of ten. Then again, my parents aren’t his and could
give two shits about me. Still, I won’t lie to him. “Hell,
no.”

Chapter Nine

Violet

I’m sitting on the couch,
computer in my lap while I go through my email. My inbox has almost
a thousand unanswered messages, most of them from “friends”, my
agent, my handlers and my publicists. I don’t answer those. I do,
however, answer the ones from my fans that my publicists forward to
me from my official Violet Lynn website.

They don’t deserve to be
punished for my lack of enthusiasm over my career. Plus, I’m pretty
darn grateful I still have fans. And if I have to admit it, I’m
grateful to have publicists as well, since they sort through all
those emails: the good, the bad and the supremely ugly.

There is a knock on the
door as I hit send on the last one. Closing my laptop, I place it
beside me and uncross my legs, heading to the foyer.

I open the door, not
surprised to find Lacey Evans standing on the other side. She fits
the description that Nana gave me before she “conveniently” had to
go run some errands. Lacey is very pretty with auburn hair, heavy
bangs over brown eyes and freckles that dust her nose and
cheeks.

“
Hi,” I say, holding up my
hand. “You must be Lacey.”

She stares at me, her eyes
widening a little before a shy smile graces her face. “You must be
Violet Rae, Miss Violet’s granddaughter. I’ve heard at lot about
you.”

“
Call me Rae.” I open the
screen door, gesturing for her to come inside. “I’ll think I’m in
trouble if you don’t.”

She laughs nervously,
following me to the living room, but saying absolutely
nothing.
Great
. I
can’t even make small talk. Maybe if I texted her…

I grab the brown paper
grocery bag from beside the recliner and hand it to Lacey. She
takes it with another shy smile and stand there, looking at me.
“So…”

Nodding my head and
smiling, I say, “Yeah…”

“
Guess I’ll go.” She heads
back to the front of the house and this time I follow
her.

I should say something.
Maybe invite her to…Oh, I don’t know: go shopping or get our nails
done. Take a chance, I tell myself.

“
Wait!”I cry out. She
freezes and I ram into her back. “Oompf.”

A distressed sound echoes
as she falls to her knees, clothing spilling out of the
bag.

“
Oh God. I’m so sorry,
Lacey.”

Her long hair touches the
floor, but she remains unmoving as I gather everything. “It’s
okay,” she says in a whisper thin voice. “Didn’t know I needed to
wear my knee and elbow pads in the house.”

I grin at her joke. “Yeah,
well, the next time you come over, wear a helmet.”

“
It’s outside, on the
porch.” Slowly she stands, a few inches taller than me and pushes
her hair out of her face. She’s not smiling, but she doesn’t look
mad either. Just resigned and a little sad. I refrain from hugging
her.

“
Funny,” I say, shoving
the clothes back in the bag. “Let’s try this again,
okay?”

“
Okay.”

“
So, um, I was wondering,
if you’d like to go do something sometime?” I shift my weight from
one side to the other. “I haven’t been the most social person
lately and my nana wants me to make friends.” I poke her in the
arm. “Tag. You’re it.” I did not just say or do that. Any of
it.

Then again, can anyone who
wears a t-shirt with the slogan:
Keep Calm
and Hit Like a Girl
, be all that
snobby?

Lacey digs into the pocket
of her loose jeans and pulls out a piece of folded paper. “I’m
doing a rally this Saturday, if you want to come. We usually go for
dinner afterwards.”

Opening the paper, I
quickly read all the pertinent information, then glance up at her.
“You’re a Roller Derby girl?” This is so amazingly cool.

Her chin tips up.
“Co-captain this year.”

“
I’m so in.” I pull my
phone out of my back pocket and enter the information into my
calendar. “Do you have a car? I‘m not allowed to drive.”

“
I’ll have one that
night.” She pushes the screen door open and walks outside, then
sits on the first step and puts on a pair of old school roller
skates. “Be ready at five.”

“
You skated
here?”

“
It’s only five
miles.”

My jaw hits the porch.
“Only five miles? I ran
half
a mile yesterday and nearly passed
out.”

She shrugs, then blows her
bangs out of her eyes. “Endurance training.”

“
Thanks for inviting
me.”

Next are her elbow pads,
knee pads
and helmet
. My eyes widen. Oh crap. Lacey wasn’t joking.

“
See ya later.”

“
Later.” I watch as she
carefully makes her way down the stairs and the gravel driveway.
Once on the road, she waves, then sets off.

It’s not until she
disappears around a curve in the road that I check my phone again.
10:15. Forty-five minutes, until I see Cole. Anticipation curls
through me, warming everything inside and making me forget all
about the fool I’d just made of myself.

I head back inside, locking
the door behind me. A quick shower and I’m standing in front of my
closet, deliberating what to wear. Running clothes says: Hey Guy,
I’m just here to work out and thought I’d take a break.

I frown. Not sure if that’s
message I want to send.

Pulling out a strapless
sundress, I bite my lip. This one says: Hey Guy, I’m just traipsing
through the forest and talking to my bird peeps. Picnic
lunch?

I hang it back up, close
the door and look at myself in the mirror.

My extremely short hair is
smoothed down on one side, the purple tips giving it an odd
patterned look that I’ve grown to love. The towel around my nude
body falls to the floor. In the past I’d had moments of thinking
I’m too fat or too skinny, like any other girl, only my moments of
doubt usually preceded television appearances, magazine shoots or
awards shows. Sometimes the pressure of being perfect, of looking
perfect and acting perfect had made me either want to starve myself
or gorge on junk food.

But that jagged scar. I
press my fingertips to my stomach, then trace the line. It’s thin
and faded, with a little help from a plastic surgeon. My parents
had insisted; I hadn’t given a damn. A part of me is glad that Dr.
Fitzgerald couldn’t magically make it disappear.

On my hip, I had a bluebird
tattooed as soon as I wasn’t under house arrest anymore. My
permanent reminder.

Some things should be
carried into the future, with the woman I’m trying to discover how
to be.

“
I love you,” Jaxon
whispers, his hands tangling in my hair before his mouth lowers to
mine. “It’s me and you forever.”

And some things should be
left with the girl I used to know.

Chapter Ten

Violet

When Cole arrives, he’s
alone. I was ready to take a chance on him, but his sister’s
presence was my safety net. Now there’s nothing between us and God
only knows what I could allow to happen between us.

Something in my face must
have given me away, because he says, “Kelly’s in
school.”

“
Oh. I’d forgotten school
had started. Sorry,” I say straightening the blanket I’d laid on
the ground. Only moments before Cole arrived I had thought it to be
cute and perfect, but now as he stares at me, then the plaid
material, all I can think is this is an invitation for
seduction.

“
Why are you
sorry?”

“
Because I don’t want
Kelly to feel left out.”

A look of appreciation
crosses his face before he sits down beside me and stretches out
his long legs. “I didn’t tell her about your…
workout
schedule.” Today he’s
wearing worn-out jeans and a dark green t-shirt that somehow makes
his eyes bluer. “Never seen anyone exercise wearing
that.”

My face heats and I glance
down at what I’m wearing. A denim skirt and soft yellow peasant
top. “I run every other day.” Not a complete lie in light of the
fact that I will go running tomorrow just so that I’m not telling a
lie. Now I really know why lies are exhausting to keep up
with.

“
Rae?”

I glance up at him. He’s
leaning into me and I shift forward the tiniest bit.
“Yes?”

“
I have to know
something,” he says, his voice all husky. Up close like this his
eyes are impossibly blue and I’m impossibly turned on by him. I’m
possibly the dumbest girl alive for feeling like this about a guy I
barely know. “But I don’t want to hurt your feelings or make you
uncomfortable.”

Cole knows. He broke his
promise and looked me up. And now he wants all the dirty
details.

I swallow the regret and
anger, sharp and cutting my throat as they go, replacing it with
the acid of resignation. It’s not like what happened wasn’t public.
It’s not like everyone in the damn world found out about the crash
within minutes, thanks to Twitter. It’s not like I wasn’t bombarded
with questions and accusations for weeks after the
incident.

So, why should he be any
different?

What I did was wrong and
reckless. It doesn’t matter that I can’t remember driving my car or
that the bouncers at Club Blue don’t even remember me leaving in my
car. None of that matters, because I was the only one lying in a
field, surrounded by glass and steel. Broken and bleeding out with
every beat of my heart.

“
Okay,” I say, mentally
bracing myself.

His arm goes around me,
grazing my waist, then he pulls it back and hold up a slice of cake
wrapped in cellophane. “Did you make this or Miss Violet? I’m
really hoping it’s you, because…
dayum
girl, you make a mean apology
cake.”

The breath I’d been holding
rushes out and it’s all I can do not to cry in relief. Or hug him
in thanks. He didn’t break his promise. “We both did.”

He grins, not even remotely
aware what he’s doing to me. Betrayal has been my constant
companion for so long that I’m not sure what to do without her.
“Guess I’ll have to be satisfied with that.”

“
Doesn’t take much to
satisfy you.” I blink at my blatant flirting.
Ugh.
Bad flirting. Maybe he didn’t
notice.

“
Now that’s where you’re
wrong. It entirely depends on the one doing the satisfying,” he
says, smirking. Oh God. He noticed.

I scoot away from him,
digging through the picnic basket and talking a mile a minute.
“Hungry? There’s all sorts of things Nana packed for us. She said a
grown man like you would want to eat more than just some pitiful
sandwiches. Her words not mine. I like sandwiches. Okay, so
crackers, sliced cheese…Do you like cheese? Oh gosh, are you
lactose intolerant? Ugh. I can’t believe I didn’t check with you
first. Of course there’s nuts in here too and you—”

The touch of his hand on my
arm stops my words and compresses my chest. Slowly, I turn to look
at him. “Calm down and take a deep breath, Rae.”

“
I’m trying,” I confess,
but breathing’s not easy when you feel as though you’re
drowning.

“
I won’t hurt you.” He
says those four words with such conviction that I’m tempted to
believe him. But I’ve been fooled before and I don’t trust myself,
much less some guy I only met three days ago. It doesn’t matter
that my own grandmother says he’s a nice young man. That
description does nothing for me, but leave the taste of ash in my
mouth. “Besides, you have your phone and Miss Violet knows we’re
together.”

He’s either the real deal
or my ex’s twin in disguise. And I hate myself for even comparing
Cole to that asshole. But what else can I think? Jaxon is my
entire
experience with
the opposite sex. “Look.” I bite my lip. “I’m nervous.”

“
About lunch?” he asks,
one dark eye brow rising. “It’s just good food and good
company.”

I turn his words over in my
mind, examining them from every angle, but I can’t come up with
anything to discredit him. “You’re right.”

“
Of course I am.” He
unwraps the slice of cake and takes a bite, his eyes temporarily
closing with delight. “So good.” When they open, amusement dances
in them and the pent up tension leaves my body. “Want
some?”

“
I’ll let you have that.”
I dig into the homemade chicken salad, slathering globs of it onto
a cracker.

“
Knew I liked you,” he
says around another bite.

“
Ha! You just like getting
your way.”