Why Now? (21 page)

“Given the current comps and the work that you’ve done. Yes, I do,” he replies.

At that amount, I could pay of the mortgage, and cover the closing costs.

“Do it.”

If he’s right and it sells, I will finally be free of the debt that’s been ruling my life.

“There’re some forms you’ll need to sign.”

I laugh. “Just give me a pen.”

After I finish signing, I call Kacey.

“Hey,” she answers and just the sound of her voice turns me on.

I want her. God, I want her so badly I can hardly think straight around her. For her sake, I’m taking it slow with her. She falls asleep in my arms every night but other than some intense making out, we haven’t done anything else.

She’s freaked that I need to go back to the rig to work out my notice and train the roustabout they’re promoting to replace me.

“How’s your day going?” I reply.

“Busy, but that’s better than slow. How are you? Have you met with Rich already?” She asks.

“Are you too busy to talk?” Last thing I want to do is get her in trouble at work.

“I have a little bit of time. I’ll let you know when I have to go.”

“Okay, baby. Rich is here right now taking new pictures. He’s going to list the place today and if it sells for asking I’ll be good.”

“Oh, Jake. That’s great news,” she replies.

At her urging, I came completely clean with Reilly about Gram and Gramp’s debt. They both know the breakeven number on the house.

“I know. Now we wait.”

“Are you going back tomorrow?” She asks.

“Sooner I go, the sooner I’m back, right?”

She doesn’t reply.

“Kacey?”

“I’m here.”

I open the back door and sit on the patio steps, the same ones I sat with her on almost two weeks ago. “Are you okay?”

“I’m going to miss you,” she sighs.

“You know I’m going to miss you too, Kace. You’ll be in that big bed without me while I’ll be on a twin four feet away from a giant snoring Dane.”

That makes her giggle.

There’s a pause and then she says, “I have to get back.”

“Okay, I’ll be at your place when you get home.”

“You need to start calling it our place,” she replies, which makes me smile.

“Alright, our place.”

“See you there.”

“Bye, baby.”

“Bye.”

I’m standing there, staring at my phone with a stupid grin when Rich comes to find me to let me know he’s done. He looks out into the backyard and coughs as I shove my phone in my pocket. We walk out together and shake hands at his car.

Reilly caught a ride to the station with a coworker so I could borrow her car. Now I’m headed back to our place. My current homelessness and Kacey’s insistence made me agree to move in with Reilly and her.

There’s talk around town about how fast we’re moving. It’s a small town so it’s no surprise people are gossiping about us. It helps that Kacey is used to her name being connected to mine. In the past, it was to belittle her. Now it’s to judge her for leaving Heath for me.

They’ll talk until someone else catches their attention. I hope it doesn’t bother her because it sure as fuck doesn’t bother me. They can think whatever they want. As far as I’m concerned, we’ve been twenty years in the making.

If you look at it that way, we’ve had the longest relationship ever. When I leave the rig for good, I’ll have some money in my account, but I don’t want to waste it on renting and furnishing my own place since I plan on sleeping in Kacey’s bed every night. The rent wasn’t steep between the two of them and with me paying a third it’ll drop even more.

Jimmy has more work than he can handle and wants to know if I’ll go into business with him. He’s willing to wait for me to finish out my notice on the rig first. It’s good to have one thing settled. The pay will be a lot less than what I made on the rig, but the pros, mainly Kacey, far outweigh the cons.

So what if people think we’re moving fast. They’re not in our bedroom. The only person whose thoughts I care about are Kacey’s. She is full speed ahead. In fact, it’s me, not her that’s taking things slow in the bedroom.

She could test the virtue of a saint. Hell, I’m surprised she hasn’t crawled into bed naked yet. I’m not sure I could hold myself back from taking her if she did that. It’s a good thing she doesn’t know that.

I let myself into their . . . our apartment. A shower is my first priority. Before Rich came by the house, I had to finish the second coat of paint in both bathrooms. Both Kacey and Reilly will appreciate me not sitting on their couch in sweaty clothes.

After my shower, I grab one of Kacey’s non-special occasion beers. She’s already made it clear we’re drinking her other Black Friday beer once I’m back for good from the rig.

My ass is on the couch, feet up on the coffee table, a game on TV and a beer in my hand when Reilly walks in. After dropping her purse and keys on the table by the door she mumbles “hello,” and moves from window to window closing all of the blinds.

“What’s up with avoiding sunlight? You turn in to a vampire since the last time I saw you?”

She slumps into the armchair next to the couch and covers her face with her hands. “I tripped stepping onto a curb and fell flat on my face during a live feed.”

Sitting up, I say, “Please tell me there’s video of that.”

She doesn’t move her hands. “I hate you.”

“Don’t lie; you know you’d watch a video of me busting my ass.”

Her lack of a response is answer enough.

Taking pity on her, I ask, “Want me to get you a drink? There’s an open bottle of wine in the fridge.”

“Yes, but don’t bother with a glass. Just bring the bottle,” she replies, lowering her hands.

It’s then I see the Band-Aid on her chin. “How bad is your chin?”

She lifts her hands and I see her palms are covered with Band-Aids. “My hands took the brunt of my fall.”

“What were you doing a report on?” I ask, getting up.

“Promise you won’t laugh?” she sighs.

Raising my brows, I shake my head and she huffs.

“It was a segment on the dangers of walking and messing with a cell phone.”

“How is that funny?” I ask.

She rolls her eyes. “It isn’t that funny because people have died walking out in front of cars, but the clip that ran at the segment introduction was a kid on his phone falling into one of the indoor ponds at the mall. I didn’t even have the excuse of a phone distracting me.”

“Don’t beat yourself up. People fall. It’s not the end of the world.”

She lowers her eyes from the ceiling. “That advice would be easier to swallow if I could wash it down with some wine.”

Kacey walks in as I’m getting the bottle of wine. When I walk back into the living room, she’s there, kneeling next to Reilly, hugging her.

“How’d you hear?” I ask, crossing the room to pass Reilly the bottle.

Kacey stands so I can give her a hello hug and kiss. “Reilly texted me after it happened.”

Glancing down at Reilly, I joke, “Hopefully you weren’t texting and walking at the same time.”

“Jake!” Kacey gasps as Reilly kicks me in the shin.

“Too soon?” I ask, rubbing my shin while they both glare at me. “I get you’re embarrassed about what happened but you can’t hide. Laugh it off and people will forget about it.”

Reilly shakes her head. “Do you know there are videos dedicated to on-air screw ups all over the Internet? They even make compilations of the best ones. There’s a decent chance that my video is going viral as we speak. I’d look but I’d rather not know.”

Kacey reaches down to rub her shoulder. “What’s your schedule look like for the rest of the week?”

“Sadly, if I want to remain employed I have to go in tomorrow.”

“Will you cheer up if I treat us to delivery from the pizza place?” I ask.

She takes a swig from the bottle. “Does that offer include bread sticks?”

My sister is a fruit. “Sure.”

Glumly, she nods. “Yes, please.”

“Want me to call it in?” Kacey asks, looking up at me.

“Sounds good. Want a beer?”

“I can get it,” she argues.

Brushing my lips over hers I reply, “I got it.”

She reaches for her phone and places our order while I get her drink. When she hangs up she motions for me to follow her into her . . . our room.

“Did you see the video?” She asks, as I pass her drink to her.

“No.” I shake my head and then ask, “Have you?”

She sets her drink on her dresser. “After Reilly texted me I looked to see if it was online.”

“And?” I prompt when she goes quiet.

“There were already one hundred thousand views on it and that was at least an hour ago.”

“Shit,” I murmur.

This is not the way Reilly wanted to make her mark as a journalist. Kacey rummages through her dresser drawers and, with some clothes in her hands, goes to her bathroom to change out of her scrubs.

It’s cute that she isn’t ready to undress in front of me. Another sign that I need to take it slow with her. She comes out a minute later in a long tee and some leggings.

“Should I tell Reilly how many views there were?” She asks.

“I wouldn’t. Let her drink that wine and eat bread sticks. She’ll find out soon enough.”

“Do you know where her phone is?”

“I haven’t seen her mess with it since she’s been home.”

Kacey comes to stand in front of me, reaching up to wrap her arms around my neck. “What time are you leaving tomorrow?”

Leaning down, I kiss her neck. “Early. I want to catch the eight a.m. train to Santa Barbara.”

She presses deeper into me. “Can I drive you to the train station?”

“Only if you promise not to cry,” I reply.

She sniffles and I lift my head so I can see her face. She tries to turn away but she can’t hide the wetness in her eyes.

“Hey, don’t cry,” I murmur, cupping her face and moving so I can look in her eyes.

She blinks, nods, and sniffles again.

“I’m coming back. It’s only for a month.”

“I know,” she croaks and pushes forward to faceplant into my chest.

Wrapping my arms around her, I hold her tightly. This sucks. It kills me that she’s this sad. Jesus, I’m going to miss her, too, but we have to focus on the end game.

What sucks more than anything else is that I won’t be able to talk to her for the most part while I’m gone. It’s not like there’s cell service out there. For me, it will suck, but I’m used to it and working twelve-hour days.

It’s her I’m worried about. This is still new, and she worries that once I’m gone I’ll change my mind about her.

There’s nothing I can say that will convince her otherwise, I’ve tried. The only thing that will do it is my coming home for good. In thirty days, that’s exactly what I’ll be doing. Pressing my nose into her hair, I inhale her scent and try to imprint it into my memory.

Tomorrow I’m going to let her drive me to the train station, even though I know she’ll cry. As much as it will hurt to see her like that, I want to stay with her as long as I can. They’ll be dragging my ass onto the train.

The sound of a knock on their . . . our front door has me lifting my head. “Pizza’s here.”

She stays where we stood, wiping her eyes as I head through her . . . our door and then into the living room to the front door so I can pay.

When I open the door, it’s Heath, not a pizza place delivery person standing there.

“Can I come in?” He asks.

Behind him, a teenage kid carrying our pizza order approaches. Not about to have words with Heath in the doorway of the apartment, I make room for him to step inside. Then I turn back, pulling my wallet from my back pocket so I can pay the delivery kid.

Once that’s done, I close the door and carry our food into the kitchen, not saying a word to Heath when I pass him. Kacey comes out of her . . . our room. With her pale skin, it’s plain to see she was crying.

“What’d he do?” Heath demands as soon as he sees her.

“Are you fucking serious with this shit?” I ask walking back into the living room.

He gestures towards her face. “She’s been crying.”

“Why were you crying?” Reilly asks, squinting up at Kacey.

“She’s sad I’m leaving tomorrow,” I reply. “Not that it’s any of your business.” I direct toward Heath.

“I fucking knew you were going to take off,” he accuses, shaking his head in disgust.

My eyes widen then narrow on him. “Wishful thinking, asshole. I gave notice on the rig. I’m only going back to train my replacement. I’ll be back in a month. For good.”

He opens his mouth but I cut him off. “It’s nice to know what you think of me. Other than being pissed at me because Kace picked me over you, I somehow thought you would still be my friend once the dust settled. Guess I was fucking wrong on that score.”

Heath hangs his head, reaching up to drag his hand over his face. “Fuck. When you said you were going, I jumped to conclusions.”

“Obviously,” I snapped. “Now, why are you here?”

“I saw the video and wanted to check on Reilly.”

At this, Reilly stands, wine bottle in hand. “Did you see the live feed or was it a video online?” She asks.

Heath blinks, unaware that he’s about to step on a land mine. “It was online.”

Reilly lifts the bottle in some sort of mock salute. “Well that’s just fucking peachy. Did you happen to see how many views the video had?”

“Don’t answer that,” I murmur and Heath’s eyes widen.

Reilly’s mouth tightens before she pauses to take a long swig from her bottle. “I’d really like a bread stick right about now.”

Kacey is the first to move, skirting Heath to make a plate for Reilly.

“Want some pizza?” I ask Heath.

He looks surprised. Honestly, I have bigger shit to worry about so I’m over being pissed at him. Tomorrow, I’m leaving for a month. My little sister may or may not be a laughing stock on the World Wide Web, and I need someone to keep an eye on Kacey for me while I’m gone.

It might sound crazy to trust Heath to do that since he wanted to marry her. That doesn’t mean he isn’t a good guy, and since he cares about her he’d be the last person that would want anything to hurt her. His braving my wrath to come check on Reilly is evidence of that.