Rushing Amy: A Love and Football Novel (29 page)

Sometimes the shortest distance between two places is a straight line. She tried to find another breath.

Brandon warned her that Matt would “find a way around her.” She blew him off. She should have listened.

It was crystal clear: Matt lied to her. There was no way in hell Matt was going to let this happen without his interference; he’d funded Clint’s “investment,” and she’d better figure out some way to calmly confront Matt on this fact.

She could hear him rattling around in the kitchen. “Fifi,” he called out. “You almost done in there? The concert starts in an hour and a half.” His voice was getting closer. “You’ll like these guys. Plus, there’s dancing. I can’t wait to see you on a dance floor. This will be epic. I should bring the video camera.”

“Hey, Matt,” she called out, in the most casual tone of voice she could muster. “Would you come in here for a minute?”

“The laptop should be on. I just used it fifteen minutes ago. We’d better get on the road.” Matt blew through the doorway into his office. “Do you need something else?”

Amy got to her feet.
Stay calm
, she told herself.
Breathe
. “Maybe you could explain what this is.” She tapped the check with her index finger.

“It’s nothing.” He glanced at the desktop and back to her. “You ready? Let’s go.”

She glanced up at him. “So, that’s your entire explanation? ‘It’s nothing’?”

Matt snatched the check up from the blotter. “Let’s see here. It looks like a check. It’s printed on lined green paper. It’s made out to a friend. What else do you need to know?”

Matt was going to BS his way through this. She saw the guilt in his eyes, the way they didn’t quite meet hers. She just shook her head.

“You just happen to have a check for twenty-five thousand dollars written to a guy who invested in my business at your suggestion. This is after you tried to talk me into taking twenty-five thousand dollars from you, and I told you no. Wouldn’t you agree that’s somewhat odd?”

He stared at her for a moment. He folded his arms over his chest.

“Hey, money’s money. The stuff in my office really isn’t your business, Amy.”

She closed her eyes. Matt wasn’t going to admit to it, and he’d busted out the “Amy” when he’d normally call her “Fifi.” Any hope that she had of an innocent explanation, some kind of mistake or misunderstanding, was over. He’d lied to her. Plus, now she was in a position she couldn’t get out of as a result. The cold, clammy, sick feeling that rushed over her might drown her.

He watched her as she struggled for words.

“Did you fund Clint’s loan to me, and lie about it?”

“I wanted you to have the money, and I couldn’t think of another way to get you to take it.”

She felt like someone had slugged her in the stomach.

“I told you how important this was to me. I
told
you that I wanted to do this myself. It’s my business. You went behind my back, after I told you no. How could you do this?”

She didn’t think it was possible, but he appeared even more frustrated and guilty. His voice dropped again.

“Amy, I want your business to be successful, too. It’s just money, and the problem was solved. I didn’t want to think about your driving the van into a tree from exhaustion or worry, and you could concentrate on other things, like the additional business. I didn’t expect you to sign a thing. When anyone I care about has problems, I want to help. It’s who I am. Why are you acting like this is a crime?”

“But you lied to me about it.” Amy was gasping for breath. She pounded one finger into his desktop. “What else have you lied to me about besides this?”

“I didn’t lie. I asked someone else to write a check, so you’d take the money. Why can’t you understand that I can’t stand to see you struggle? I watched what my mom went through.”

“I know you did. I really like your mom, Matt. But I’m not her, and you can’t fix everything for someone else. I feel like you didn’t think I could handle it on my own, so you thought you should take care of it instead.” The belief that he thought her inept and incapable hurt more than anything else, even more than the fact he lied to her. She hauled breath into her lungs. “I needed to do it myself, and now you’ve taken that away from me.” Amy pushed off from his desk and moved around it toward the door. “I’ll get your money back to you as soon as I can.”

“No,” he said. “That’s not why I did this.”

She moved out from behind the desk. It felt like she was walking through wet concrete. Hurt and anger were melting her bones. “I have to leave.”

He caught her arm as she walked past. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“I don’t know.” She had to get out of here before she started screaming. “Let go of me.”

Matt dropped her arm like it was on fire. She ran down the hallway, snatched her purse and keys off the hall table, and wrenched the front door open. Matt grabbed the door.

“Fifi. Let’s talk about this.” He reached out to stroke her cheek with one hand. “Can’t we even talk about this?”

Her head bobbed back and forth like one of those dog figurines people used to put in the back window of their cars. “No, I can’t. You don’t believe you did anything wrong. I can’t be here, and I can’t be with you.” She forced herself to jerk away from him, ran down the front steps to her van, and threw herself into the driver’s seat.

He was right on her heels. “That’s it? You’re just going to leave. You’re not even going to listen to what I have to say?”

“I’ve heard what you’ve had to say. You don’t listen to what I have to say. After all, it’s all about what you want, or how you think it’s going to go. Not this time.”

She grabbed the steering wheel till her knuckles showed white.

He gripped the window frame. “Fifi. Please. Don’t go.”

She jammed the key in the ignition, started the van, and slammed the door.

“Bye, Matt.”

He grabbed for the door handle, but she’d locked it. She stepped on the gas and drove away from him. She didn’t look back.

Chapter Twenty-Three

T
HREE DAYS LATER,
Amy dragged herself to the shop after a night of tossing and turning. She wished she had someone to talk to about it. She could call her sister, but she knew Emily would side with Brandon, who sided with Matt. Her mother would tell her to sell the business and go back to being an accountant. Her girlfriends would think she was insane to refuse Matt’s money. Even more, she couldn’t explain to anyone else why the thought that Matt had lied to her about anything shook her even worse than his arranging her “loan.”

Today went somewhat smoothly. She was happy to get an order from yet another Sharks player with an angry girlfriend. Five dozen roses and a rapidly obtained teddy bear later, the guy tipped her a hundred bucks and walked out with a handful of her business cards for his buddies. She could close in an hour. She could go home then and try to sleep.

The bell on the front door of the shop jingled, and Estelle called out, “Hey, Samantha. How are you doing?”

Samantha’s response was unintelligible. Amy moved further into the walk-in. She knew Samantha wasn’t visiting just for the fun of it, and Amy knew she wasn’t up to this today.

“Hey, boss.” Estelle tugged on her shirttail. “You have a visitor. Want me to take over on the arrangement?”

Amy heaved a sigh. “Tell her I’m busy.”

Two seconds later, she heard footsteps behind her, and Samantha’s voice.

“I’m staying till you talk to me.”

“This really isn’t a great day for a chit-chat.” Amy didn’t even turn around.

Samantha cut Amy off, just like her dad. It must have been genetic.

“I’m waiting. Hey, Estelle, want a coffee?”

“No,” Estelle told her, “but I’ll bet you want a Diet Coke, don’t you?”

Amy pulled another bucket of Gerbera daisies out of the walk-in as Estelle handed Samantha a soda.

“Estelle, if you could trim those roses and make sure they’re ready to go, I’ll finish it later. Thanks.”

Estelle gave Amy an abbreviated wink, and moved further into the workroom.

Amy gestured toward the little table and chairs in the front of her store. Samantha took the seat across from her.

Amy fiddled with flower arrangement photo books, straightened order forms, corralled pens in a holder, and did whatever she could to make sure she wasted a few minutes. Samantha popped the top on her soda, took a sip, and tapped one toe.

Amy wasn’t big on Samantha’s behavior right about then. She had a feeling Matt would have sent his daughter to her room for being rude, and rightly so.

“So, what’s up?” Amy finally asked her.

“What’s going on with you and Matt?”

Amy rested her elbows on the table and rubbed her hands over her face. She should just stop wearing makeup. She wiped it off every day anyway.

“You know, Samantha, I don’t think it’s appropriate to discuss this with you. It’s an adult thing.”

“That’s what my mom said, but I want to know.” Samantha took another sip of soda, and regarded Amy over the rim of the can.

“Your mom is right—”

The pop can hit the table with a bang.

“Come on, Amy. You’ve always been really honest with me. Why won’t you talk about this?”

“It’s hard to explain adult relationship issues to a teenager. Plus, he’s your dad.”

Samantha’s eyes narrowed. “Try me.”

Amy knew what Samantha was up to. Even with the teenage behavior, she was hard to ignore. It was an inappropriate discussion, but Amy was going to have to tell her something.

Amy thought for a few moments. The shop phone rang, and she heard the murmur of Estelle’s voice in the workroom as she spoke to whoever was on the other end. Samantha’s behavior was masking her anxiety, or so she believed. She twisted her fingers together in her lap, when she wasn’t folding her arms across her chest.

“Samantha, your dad and I have a disagreement over his involvement in my business. That’s what happened.”

“That’s
it
?”

“That’s what I’m willing to tell you.”

Samantha slumped in her chair and gave Amy a mutinous look. “He’s been really cranky.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Amy murmured diplomatically.

“He misses you,” she insisted.

“Not really,” Amy burst out, and immediately regretted it. Samantha seized on this.

“Yes, he does. Your picture is still on his desk. I think he loves you. I know it.”

Amy shoved back from the table and pulled herself to her feet. This conversation needed to be over ten minutes ago.

“Samantha, I love it when you come to visit me and I enjoy talking to you, but this is something we’re not discussing. It’s not appropriate.”

To Amy’s shock, tears rose in Samantha’s eyes.

“You don’t get it. I want—I want a little brother or a sister,” she blurted out. “My mom isn’t dating anyone, and you are the only person my dad’s ever gone out with that I even like! He’s not going to meet anyone else like you. Can’t you work it out?”

Amy laid a comforting hand on Samantha’s shoulder.

“I know this is really disappointing.”

“No, you don’t.” Samantha jumped up from her chair. “Can’t you even
try
? I always thought that once you fell in love, you were always in love. Isn’t that true? My mom says she still loves my dad, just in a different way.”

Amy grabbed her head in both hands. She didn’t have the first idea of how to comfort Samantha when she couldn’t even explain any of this herself. She had no idea what to say to Matt’s daughter. After all, love confused her, too. Her anger at his lie was confused with the fact she missed him so much already. It was obvious she wasn’t great at romance, either. And right now, meeting someone else was out of the question. She certainly wasn’t telling Samantha she loved Matt.

God, what a day.

Samantha was digging through her handbag for something, and Amy saw tears fall onto the leather.

“Hey, sweetie. Don’t cry.” Amy grabbed a few tissues out of the box sitting on the table and reached out to embrace a now-sobbing Samantha.

Between the sniffles and sobs, she heard a plaintive, “Don’t you love my dad?”

Social security number, number of guys she played Spin the Bottle with in high school, amount of money she made each month: Amy would have answered any other question than that one. Her stomach made a perfect square knot. She hoped the ground would open and swallow her whole, but so far, no luck. She hadn’t told Matt those three little words yet, but she knew she loved him.

Samantha was rubbing her eyes, smearing an amazing amount of Kohl pencil from eyelid to cheekbones.

“Your eye makeup might need a little attention right now.”

Amy tried to steer her toward the bathroom. Samantha didn’t move. The only sounds out of her were sniffles, and that hiccupping thing all females did after they cried. Reddened, tear-filled eyes met Amy’s.

Amy would have to answer her.

“Okay, Samantha, you’re right.” Amy folded her arms across her chest. “I’m in love with your dad, but it’s not going to work.”

Samantha started shaking her head before Amy was even done speaking. “How can love not work? If you love someone enough, don’t you want to work it out?”

There was no possible good way to explain this. Amy knew what happened between Samantha’s parents. Samantha had the sanitized version. She would never understand that by this age, maybe it wasn’t the other person involved. Maybe it was you. Maybe it was something you could never, ever fix, no matter how badly you wanted to, because justifying the reason why Amy was shoving away the best thing that ever happened to her with both hands was more important than opening herself up to even more emotional pain.

Amy dragged air into her lungs.

“Sometimes even if you love the other person, and they care for you, too, you can’t overcome your differences. I wish I had a better answer, but it’s true. It doesn’t make you bad, or wrong. It just means you can’t fix it.”

Samantha thought about this awhile. The shop phone rang again; Estelle was handling things. Amy knew she needed to get back to work, but right now there was a fourteen-year-old in her shop who was making her skin crawl. She could hide in the walk-in, but Samantha would follow her, and there would be more questions.