Nothing But Trouble (26 page)

"All right, smart ass. Why don't you go
next?"

Rebecca lifted a shoulder in a nonchalant
shrug. "That's easy, I've never done it anywhere crazy."

"Oh, come on," Lacy whined "I told you about
conceiving in a dressing room. There's no holding back here."

"I'm honestly not holding back," she urged.
If only her sex life had been that exciting. Until recently. "A bed
is the only place I've done it."

Rebecca looked around as all the women in the
room stared at her in disbelief. Why was that so hard to
believe?

"What?" she asked.

"That can't be true," Avery announced.

"Not even the shower or a kitchen counter?"
Elisa asked.

Rebecca shook her head. "No."

Avery sipped the last of her drink. "Okay, at
least tell us who your first was."

No way. She'd rather bathe in sewage.

"Is it someone we know?" Lacy asked.

"Nope," she answered quickly.

"Let's move on," Avery said in a bored voice.
Just as she looked at Megan, Courtney spoke up.

"I know who her first was."

Rebecca shot her friend a startled look, who
was looking back at her over the rim of her wine glass. She took a
deep swallow of the Chardonnay, then gazed at Rebecca with a poker
face.

What was she talking about? How could
Courtney have possibly known about that? Unless R.J. had told her.
But why would he do that?

"Tell us," Avery urged. "Is it someone we
know?"

Rebecca shook her head, even as anxiety
coursed through her blood. "No. Court's just had too much to
drink."

"Don't play dumb, Rebecca." Courtney waved a
hand in the air. "Your conditioner has a very distinctive
smell."

"What?" she squeaked out.

"It was all over him the next morning,"
Courtney said, matter-of-fact, as though she hadn't just outed
Rebecca's darkest secret to half the family.

"What are they talking about?" Megan
whispered to Lacy.

Lacy shook her head. "I don't know, but I―"
Her attention shot to Rebecca and she gasped. With wide eyes, she
placed a hand over her mouth. "No way," she said in astonishment.
"You're not talking about R.J., are you?" she asked Courtney.

"Who else would I be talking about?"
Rebecca's traitorous friend countered.

"Wait a minute," Avery said with a raised
hand. She pinned Rebecca with a confused look. "You slept with
R.J.? When?"

"I don't know why everyone is so shocked,"
Courtney said casually.

"I'm actually not that surprised," Lacy
quipped. "I'm only surprised we didn't know about it sooner."

Rebecca tapped down her annoyance and
reminded herself these were her friends. They didn't mean anything
by it,
and
had alcohol in their systems. Which meant all
bets were off. And Courtney was a loud mouth on her calmest day.
What annoyed her was that the encounter and been let out before she
was ready to talk about it.

Then again, would she ever really be
ready?

Maybe this was the best way to exorcise R.J.
from her system.

She shook her head and stared down into her
drink. "It happened nine years ago. It was just a one-time
thing."

They all stared at her, waiting for juicy
details. They weren't going to get them.

"And?" Elisa prompted.

"And nothing."

Avery rolled her eyes. "That can't be
it."

"Sorry, but it is," Rebecca said, because she
wasn't willing to discuss it any further. They knew. End of
discussion.

Lacy watched Rebecca, then graced her with a
tiny smile. "Let's move on," she suggested.

****

"Sorry for letting your secret out like
that," Courtney whispered. "That's what happens when I drink too
much."

Rebecca and Courtney were lying on their
sides, facing each other on the living room floor. It was sometime
around two a.m. and Lacy and Avery had claimed the only two couches
in the room. Megan had forgotten to pack an overnight bag so Elisa
had driven her home around midnight.

Sleep hadn't come easy. Rebecca had tossed
and turned for a couple of hours, then woke to find that Courtney
too hadn't been able to sleep. They'd been talking for the last
couple minutes, while trying not to wake the other two women.

"It's okay," Rebecca said. She picked at a
stray thread on the area rug and glanced at her friend. "I can't
believe you've known all this time. Why didn't you ever say
anything?"

Courtney shrugged. "I figured if you wanted
me to know, you would have told me."

She was right. Rebecca hadn't wanted anybody
to know, which was actually pretty stupid. At the young age of
nineteen, she'd been incredibly naïve and vulnerable. Her worst
fear was for people to see through her to the deep love she had for
R.J. Courtney would have picked up on it in a second. Just as she
had picked up on Rebecca and R.J. spending the night together.

"We've known each other a long time," her
friend continued. "And you've always opened up to me about
everything. Except my brother. You always clam up about him. Plus,
I saw how it changed your relationship with him."

"How do you mean?" Even though she knew what
Courtney meant. R.J. had never treated her the same after that
night. She'd always assumed she'd been the only one to notice.

"I don't know exactly," she whispered. "It
was a subtle shift, but enough for me to notice." Courtney's thin
brows pulled together. "Almost like he became afraid of you."

Rebecca doubted that. She shook her head.
"There's no way R.J.'s afraid of me. You'd have to notice a person
to be afraid of them."

"Is that what you've always thought?"
Courtney asked with her head tilted. "It's not the way he looks at
you, Rebecca. It's the way he
doesn't
."

Which made absolutely no sense.

Courtney sighed and shifted her position on
the floor. "I know you don't know much about my father, but the way
he treated my mother had a huge impact on R.J."

R.J. hardly ever spoke about his father. But
Courtney had told Rebecca that their father had repeatedly cheated
on their mother, until she drew up the courage to divorce him.
Carol had walked away from the marriage scarred and insecure.

"Anyway," her friend continued. "When our dad
left, R.J. swore he would never be like the man. That's why he's
never been in a committed relationship; he's so afraid of history
repeating itself. He doesn't want to be the same disrespectful
bastard my father was who hurt women over and over again." Courtney
paused as though trying to gather her thoughts. "But something
about you triggered something inside him. You mean more to him than
all those other women." A half laugh popped out of her. "He thinks
I don't know any of this; that I don't see right through him.
Everyone thinks I'm the airheaded younger sister."

Rebecca placed a hand on her friend's arm. "I
don't think that."

"That's because you're a good friend."

"We really know how to put ourselves in an
impossible relationship," Rebecca commented.

Courtney's smile didn't quite reach her eyes.
"R.J. would never do to you what Grant did to me. He has too much
respect for you."

Rebecca studied her friend and saw the old
hurt darkening the depths of her eyes. An old hurt that still
lingered three years later. It was obvious Courtney had strong
feelings for Grant, and probably still did. The whole family had
been blindsided by the fact that they'd been engaged. Courtney had
always been very secretive of the relationship. And years later,
she still hadn't given anyone the full story of what had
happened.

"What happened with Grant?" Rebecca
asked.

Courtney averted her gaze and stared down at
the threadbare area rug. "I don't want to talk about him."

"Court, come on," she urged her friend. "It
might do you some good to get it out." When Courtney remained
silent, Rebecca added, "How about I spill another secret
first."

"It depends on how juicy it is," she said
with a half-smile.

Rebecca licked her suddenly dry lips. Why did
she always get anxious whenever she talked about R.J.? "There was
more than that one night nine years ago." Rebecca paused to allow
the words to sink in. "You don't look surprised," she commented
when Courtney just stared at her.

"I'm not. You think the fact that you and my
brother have gotten naked together twice is shocking to me?" she
asked when Rebecca rolled her eyes.

"You act like we're doing it all the time,"
she countered.

Courtney patted her arm. "Just give it time.
You'll get there."

Why did she agree to open up this subject
with her friend? Courtney was blunt to a fault, but it was one of
the things Rebecca loved most about her.

"Okay, your turn."

"I changed my mind, I don't want to do this,"
Court muttered.

"I just told you two things I never wanted
anyone to know. Come on, it'll do you good to get it out because I
can tell it's been eating you up."

When Courtney only stared at the floor and
ran the tip of her finger along the edge of the rug, Rebecca urged
her on. She scooted closer to her friend and lowered her voice.
"You said Grant lied to you and cheated on you. What happened?"

Courtney licked her lips and tucked a strand
of hair behind her ear. "I met Grant about six months before things
ended. We'd only been engaged for about a month."

Rebecca waited in silence while Courtney
sorted through the story in her head.

"Anyway, the night of my accident I'd gone
over to his condo because he was supposed to cook me dinner. But I
was running late," she grinned. "You know me. Could never keep
track of time."

"So what happened when you got there?" Even
though Rebecca knew this story wasn't going to end well. She
already had a feeling what was going to happen next.

"Grant lived in one of those buildings where
all the entrances to the condos were in indoor hallways. And the
door to his unit was open and I could hear voices coming from
inside. His and a woman's."

Just as she suspected. "What were they
saying?"

Courtney swallowed, then said in a low voice.
"I heard Grant apologize. But it wasn't the sorry itself that made
me stop. It was the tone of his voice. Like he really was sorry."
She looked at Rebecca. "There was genuine regret in his voice. And
I stopped just outside his door because I had this horrible feeling
in the pit of my stomach.

"Then I heard the woman say, 'You promised
me, Grant. Pretty soon the money you're sending isn't going to be
enough. Money doesn't take the place of a father.'"

Rebecca's eyes widened as she listened to the
pain in her friend's voice; listened to her retell the story that
had caused her so much despair.

Courtney licked her lips and inhaled a deep
breath. "Then Grant said, 'I don't know what you want from me,
Melissa. I've paid for all your medical expenses and prenatal care.
Right now, that's all I can give you.'"

"Oh, Court."

There was a slight tremor in her voice when
she spoke next. "And the woman said," Courtney closed her eyes and
cleared her throat. "She said, 'When I first told you I was
pregnant, you told me you'd take care of me, that we'd be a family.
You need to break things off with this woman you're engaged to and
handle your responsibilities.'"

Rebecca's heart cracked open for her friend.
But she didn't interrupt the story. Courtney had bottled it in for
too long and needed to get it out.

"After that, I couldn't stand to hear
anymore. I walked into the condo because I needed some kind of
explanation from Grant. I found him in the living room with a very
pregnant woman." Courtney shook her head as a small smile graced
her sad face. "She took one look at me and stormed out the
door."

Behind them, one of the women stirred.
Rebecca glanced over her shoulder to see Lacy turning over on the
couch.

When she looked back at Courtney, there was a
single tear running down her cheek.

"Court, you don't have to keep telling me
this."

She shook her head. "It's okay," she
whispered.

"So, did you question Grant about it?"
Rebecca wanted to know.

"You really think I would have backed down
from that confrontation?" Courtney asked with a smile that didn't
reach her eyes. "His explanation was that she was an ex-girlfriend
whom he'd ended things with a few months before he met me. Right
after we started dating, Melissa told him she was pregnant. He told
me he didn't want to be with her, but he'd been giving her
financial support and checking in with her to make sure the
pregnancy was progressing smoothly."

"And he never told you any of this?" Rebecca
asked, wondering how anyone could keep a secret like that.

"No. He said when he found out, we'd hadn't
been together long and he didn't want to scare me away. Then more
time went by, and he'd started to develop serious feelings for me.
He just kept saying that he never knew how to tell me."

Rebecca narrowed her eyes. "Didn't he know
that you'd eventually find out?"

"That's what I asked him. All he said was
that he was sorry. Over and over again he kept apologizing, saying
how much he loved me and asking me to forgive him." Courtney's eyes
dropped closed and she inhaled a deep breath. "I mean, how could he
keep something like that from me? And how could I forgive him after
lying to me like that?"

The pain in her friend's voice broke
Rebecca's heart. No wonder Courtney had never wanted to talk about
it. Having your heart broken by the man you loved could take a
person years to get over. And some people never fully healed from
something like that. Courtney had dealt with it the best way she
knew how, and she'd gone through it alone. Had grieved for the loss
of the relationship alone.