The Truth About Air & Water (Truth in Lies #2) (28 page)

“
No
. You’re not.”

“As free as I will ever be.” I study Sam. He is bold and enlightened and a grown up. And I want to be all of that. “Love isn’t everything, Sam Wilde; surely, we’ve both learned that much.”

“You need to talk to him at least one more time.”

“Why? You need guarantees, Mr. Wilde? I can’t give you those. I’m broken, remember? Besides, now there’s the six-month no-contact agreement in place. And I like it that way because I am
free
of him.” I get this defiant look.

Sam looks skeptical. “He’ll be in Fresno if the Giants send him down. You can find him there just by tracking the minor-league baseball schedule. You should go see him.”

“He’ll be in Fresno,” I echo Sam. “Which may as well be a different country. I don’t get there too often. In fact, I can easily say I’ve never been Fresno and will likely never go there.”

“I know how to track him down.”

“How? And what is it
exactly
that you do, besides tend a bar?” I ask with an exasperated sigh.

He gets this solemn look. “I can’t tell you any of that
exactly
, but I can track him down for you. I’ve got some extraordinary skills in that area.” He gets this funny look and starts to laugh at my confused expression. But then he looks a little uncertain and gets this guilty-as-charged look.

“A man of intrigue. Just what I need,” I say softly.

“A man of intrigue doesn’t begin to cover it.” He gets this tight smile and I know he’s not going to tell me anything more. “Time for bed. I’ll take the sofa. We’ll start up later today now that we’ve talked.”

“What are we starting?”

“This.” He kisses my forehead.

I regard him with a stony face laced with notable disappointment. “That’s it? That’s supposed to tide me over? Surely, you can do better than that, Sam Wilde.”

“In time, my lady.”

The Shakespeare thing is surprisingly sexy. Maybe I’m too tired to complain. He pulls me up from the sofa in one swift motion. Arm-in-arm, we walk up the stairs. My heart pounds and I begin to wonder if he’s changed his mind about the no-sex-tonight thing.
But no. He’s pulling down the covers and beckoning me to climb inside.
Alone.

“But I want you,” I say, although my words come out a little slurred, more like,
I-wanch-yew
.

“I want you too,” he says kissing my forehead once again. “Soon.”

I laugh but then start to whine, telling him that Cara will be here later today. After that, I remind him that me and him must remain a separate thing from Cara.

He gets this quizzical look and reminds me that Cara already knows him. “Bonus,” he says in this brazen way.

“We’re a separate deal. For the time being.
Separate
, Sam. That’s the way it has to be. So we won’t have another chance to be alone like this for a while,” I say in warning. “You should take a chance. On me.
With
me. You’re not afraid of me, are you?”

Even so, he remains committed to the idea of leaving me alone in this bed. I resort to begging him to stay after I glimpse his ornate tattoos across his chest and upper arms when he adjusts his shirt collar and slips from my arms one last time. He is so different from Linc, and I am intrigued with this concept and the entire idea of Sam Wilde now.

Sam Wilde is a good idea.

“Please stay. I need you,” I say.

And yet, after he’s performed the knighted duties of checking the entire house for intruders, he prepares to leave me anyway insisting the sofa will be just fine after one final kiss on my forehead again. I label him a bad boy anyway for making me wait like this. I tell him this as he stands in my bedroom doorway.

“Goodnight, Tally,” he says easily.

Too easily.

“Please stay,” I say one more time as if I haven’t said this fifteen times before in as many minutes.

“Soon, Tally,” he says a little breathless. “Let’s begin tomorrow; I mean, later today.”

“Okay. Then,” I finally say.

“Okay. Then.”

And with that simple promise, he leaves me.

And I can’t help but think,
they all do
.

Part 3 - Air & Water

“There are all kinds of love in this world but never the same love twice.”

-F. Scott Fitzgerald

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Missing You -LINC

“This was four years ago. More than that, actually. She was seventeen,” Kimberley says.

I’m staring at numerous photographs of Tally Landon similar to the one in my wallet I asked my dad about more than three months ago. The same girl who showed up in my hospital room the last night I was there.
Miss Vanilla and Cloves.
Just the thought of her amazing scent stirs up her image all over again. At least, I have that going for me. I can remember the recent past even if it’s one I’ve royally fucked-up.

“Like I told you earlier, this is
Miss Cloves and Vanilla
,” I say gloomily to Brad.

At least, the good doctor knows what that means even if Kimberley just looks at the two of us like it’s some private joke she’d rather not be privy to. Instead, she shrugs and says, “moving on.” It’s obvious she’s not in the mood for games. Kimberley is stressed out like I’ve never seen her before. “You rescued her from a car accident on the 101 where her twin sister Holly was killed. She didn’t remember you then. Ironic, right? Then you two met at a party at Charlie’s house months later. And things went from there.”

“What do you mean things went from there?” I’m wary because Kimberley looks guilty about something and anxiously looks over at Brad. He just nods and doesn’t say anything. He’s already stated more than once, he’s here as an observer only. This is Kimberley’s show, as usual.

“She was seventeen, still at Paly high school, lover boy. She wouldn’t turn eighteen for a few months, and you’d just gotten the offer with the Angels.”

“She was at Paly?
Geez.
Did I
not know
this? And I was drafted by the Angels first
before
signing with the Giants?”

Kimberley gets this vexed look and starts to chew on her lower lip. She’s nervous, but still refuses to tell me why. “Yes. Let’s focus on the Tally part of this story, shall we? It’s complicated. It gets more complicated. Maybe, that’s enough for now.”

Brad inclines his head at her. “Keep going.”

She stalls for time and sips at her beer and casually looks around with a trained PR eye at the little cafe we’ve discovered in the town of Malibu. More than half the restaurant is filled with the rich and famous all trying to go incognito and remain unrecognized. I wear my baseball cap low over my face because the last thing we need is for someone to find out I’m here and ask me about baseball or the Giants or anything to do with the incident two weeks ago in LA with that blonde.

“There’s millions on the line. If they get wind that you still can’t throw a baseball, it’s over.” It’s an ominous tone. She sighs big.

“There’s millions on the line. There’s a song lyric in there somewhere. And show me that money because right now I don’t have any of it,” I say irritably.

“I’m already fielding calls left and right from the Giants to ESPN to the LA Times. Amy Ransom wants an exclusive, and I’ve promised her one if we can figure out what you should say. The Giants are going through your contract as we speak looking for any and all loopholes. Yes, you’re on IR but if they can find a way to avoid that second year bonus, you can bet they will,” she says. “They’ll call it just business of course. I’m sorry I wish I could tell you some good news, but you touched Kryptonite, Superman, and right now we’re a little powerless to fight them. Just know, the Giants’ front office is not happy; they are worried on a multitude of fronts, including your on-the-job injury and the implications of all of that as well as the fact that they like their contract dollars to be well spent.” She mimics me from earlier and takes a deep breath and holds it.

“Slow down, Kimmy,” Brad says. “I thought we were going to focus on his past, not his contract.”

She exhales slowly. “You’re right,” she says to him then looks over at me. “But that’s why you pay your team the big bucks—me, your agent, and your lawyers; and we’ll do what we can.” She shoots me this fake smile.

“Just tell me what’s really going to happen. Don’t sugarcoat it for my benefit. Keeping me in the dark the past few months has done absolutely nothing for me. Perhaps, if someone had
bothered
to tell me about my relationship with Tally, including
Miss Cloves and Vanilla
herself, I wouldn’t have screwed this all up so badly.”

“Yo, bro, here to help. Calm down,” Kimberley whispers but looks a little guilty because some of what I’ve said applies to her, and she knows it. “You are talking way too loud. This isn’t for public consumption.” She glares at Brad. “I told you this was a bad idea. We should have just stayed at the beach house. You are trouble, Stevenson.” She points a finger at him, and he playfully bites it.

“Can we stay on track here?” I ask in frustration. Watching the two of them interact over the past several days has been its own special brand of torture. I’m in a damned-if-I-do-and-damned-if-I-don’t position when it comes to women, seeing Kimberley and Brad together isn’t helping me feel any better about my situation.

“Yes. Sorry.” Kimberley says, patting my hand. “Look, you do need to prepare yourself, Linc. I think they’ll be announcing that they’re sending you down in the next week or two. There’s too much money tied up in your contract and they want a ballplayer who can pitch.
Sorry.
That was bitchy. You know what I mean. Let’s talk about Tally. What did you call her?
Miss Cloves and Vanilla?
Cute.”

I nod, then vaguely her words register. “You think they’ll send me down?”

She looks appropriately sympathetic. “They’re tight on the forty-man roster for next season and they want to go back to the big dance.
You know this.
Let’s just see what happens, okay? Let me worry about that should it come to that. We’ll deal with it and the fallout and—”

“Linc, right now, all you need to do is focus on getting well by working with me on getting your memory back,” Brad says interrupting his wife. He smiles an apology at her and she nods and bites her lower lip. “So. Let’s talk about Tally. She’s important. An important piece of the puzzle to your past.”

“She told me she was the best one-night stand I’d ever had. That’s about all she told me,” I say quietly so we won’t be overheard. “That was the last night in the hospital. You left, and she showed up. Davis wasn’t too happy.”

“I bet not.” She shakes her head back and forth. “I guess you have to see it from her point of view at the time. Tally had a rough day if I’m putting this all together right. I don’t know maybe that’s enough for now.” Kimberley looks around the restaurant looking nervous all over again.

“Keep going,” Brad says encouragingly. “He needs to hear this in order to better understand how to cope with everything and everyone going forward. He’s rested for a few weeks now. I’m here to help him sort it out as we go along,” Brad says to her. “Keep going. I need to hear it too, so I know how to help him.”

Kimberley still looks uneasy. She holds her breath for a moment and then lets it out. “You were twenty-two; she was seventeen. I was looking at it all with your best interests from a career perspective.” She winces. “So, I told you to send her packing as soon as I found out you two had been together,” s
he finger quotes the word
together,
“and so you did.”

“I did? Just like that?”

“Like I said, she was seventeen. You were twenty-two almost twenty-three. She was still in
high school
for God’s sake. You’d just gotten the offer from the Angels—a lucrative contract and a signing bonus. It was big. She didn’t fit into those plans and I told you that and so you broke it off with her. She was on her way to New York to become big time in the dance world. But the break-up was rough on her. You two had an intense relationship from the start. Anyone could see that.”