Bliss Brothers (Complete Series), page 25
Across the table from me, Roman waits for my answer.
* * *
BEAU
I don’t know what to pack.
Maybe I shouldn’t pack anything. Maybe I should pull a Driver and leave in the middle of the night. Who would need my forwarding address? Nobody at this godforsaken place.
This place that’s been my livelihood and my home for most of my life.
I feel like shit, and my brain doesn’t work. I’d chalk it up to the hangover, only I also quit my job in the early hours of the morning. Roman dropped me off at my house, I fell into bed, and I woke up to a text message from him.
Roman: Nothing you said last night is set in stone. We can move past the beach party. Take a few days off and let me know.
Beau: I don’t need a few days off. I’m not coming back.
And that was that.
I slept for another few hours, showered, and pulled out a big duffel bag from my closet.
The only problem now is that I have no idea what to put in it.
I’ve lived in this house since I graduated from college. I’ve purged my stuff at least twice a year. I paint every couple of years. I feel like I should take all of it, and none of it. I’m in uncharted territory.
A knock at the door breaks me out of my thoughts.
“Go away,” I shout down the stairs. The house is small enough that it’s reasonable to do that. Maybe, when I get to where I’m going, I’ll rent a bigger house. Or buy one. Or live on a boat. The options are endless.
All that endlessness makes me feel vaguely ill.
The door opens.
“I said go away.”
“You can’t make me,” Charlie says, his voice a singsong taunt when he appears at the top of the stairs. “What are you doing?”
“Packing.”
He crosses his arms over his chest. “You were going to leave without even saying goodbye?”
“I’d have texted you.”
Charlie leans against the doorframe, studying me. I go to the dresser and open the top drawer, then shove some boxers into the duffel bag for good measure. “Is this one of your grand escapes?”
“Please. I’ve never had a grand escape before.”
“Except your escape into fantasyland.”
“What are you talking about?” I put a book from my bedside table into the duffel bag, too.
“Look, I never said anything all this time because I figured you wanted people to think you were...I don’t know, heavily into being drunk all the time. I didn’t know it was getting to you that way.”
I scoff at him. “People want me to be that drunk all the time. I’m supposed to be fun, twenty-four hours a day, no downtime. Just like Walgreens.”
“Walgreens sucks. And people don’t want you to be drunk. They want you to be happy.”
“Oh? That’s news to me. Who wants me to be happy more than they want the resort to succeed?”
Charlie laughs. “Don’t be an idiot, Beau. Everybody wants the resort to succeed and we also want you to be happy. You can want two things at once.”
“I only want one thing.” The honesty, for all I played it up on the beach with Claire, leaves a bitter aftertaste.
“What is it?”
Charlie’s watching me shove random crap into a duffel bag and if he’s judging me for it, he’s not saying anything. He’s not going to judge me for the truth. At least not out loud.
“I wanted to be with Claire.”
“So be with her. You can do that and have events at the resort.”
“She doesn’t want that from me.”
“Bullshit. That woman is scared to death, and it has nothing to do with you.”
I blink at him. “How do you know that?”
“Because the other day, I was out for a walk and I heard her on the phone with a friend. I’d bet you a thousand dollars that her mother gave her a complex about perfection, and you, my friend, are not perfect. You call other people to not be perfect in the name of having a good time. That’s what everybody loves about you. You’re not a judgmental asshole, and you know how to have fun.”
“Yeah, see?” I shake my head. “Everybody thinks that’s all I’m good for. Loud music and free drinks.”
“That’s not what I said. You let people have fun. You let people set aside their inhibitions. If some of them have some drinks, then that’s a bonus. But it’s not about the alcohol, Beau. It’s about being the kind of person people want to be around.” Hurt flashes through Charlie’s eyes. “If I could buy that skill set, I’d do it in a heartbeat.”
“People want to be around you.”
“Don’t flatter me. You’re too hungover for that.” He adjusts his glasses. We’re identical twins, but he could always pull them off better than I could. “I know Roman will let you come back to your job, if that’s what you want.”
“That’s not what I want.”
“Okay.”
“It’s not.” I pick up the duffel bag and put it back down. “I want to do something different. I just don’t know what that is.”
“Okay.”
“Stop saying that.”
“Okay.” He can’t hide his grin. “But don’t give up on Claire. She’s into you.”
“There’s no way you know that from overhearing one phone conversation. Unless you’re a ghost, and you went into her brain and—”
Charlie’s footsteps clatter down the stairs. “You need her,” he calls back up to me.
“I don’t.”
The front door shuts, and I’m alone in my house again.
You need her.
Out the bedroom window, I watch Charlie walk easily down the slope toward the resort. Oh, to be that carefree.
The sun goes behind a cloud.
It looks like rain.
I should get back to packing.
19
Claire
How many thunderstorms does one week need?
The moment I walked out of the main building at the resort, feeling light as a bird and terrified out of my mind at the same time, I saw the clouds.
The road to the club side beckons. I could also take my car, but that would mean going back inside and through the building to the parking lot. My heart flaps anxiously, like a caged bird. There’s no time for that. I wore flats. I’ll walk.
I set off at a brisk pace as the wind whips up. It’s romantic, in a way. This is exactly how it would play out if I was in one of those movies where the heroine chases the hero into an airport. Or—I guess not, because I would be in an airport, and not risking a lightning strike to the head.
It seems closer, with legs I can actually use, but it’s still not close. The sky darkens, the clouds overtaking the summer sun.
Maybe I should have brought the car.
The thunder is distant, out over the lake, when the rain begins.
I’m nowhere near Beau’s house.
But this can be a kind of penance. So far, it’s not the furious rain of the storm at its peak. This is a hint of what’s to come. The fact that it’s a hint doesn’t make the rain any less wet, and it’s cold on my bare arms.
It turns out I don’t accept penance very gracefully, because I last all of ten steps before I break into a run.
The flats aren’t made for the rain and they soak through in two steps, the hard soles slapping against the ground and the cloth fabric squishing with every movement of my feet. I take the hill like I’m on an exercise run and push into the turn. These clothes aren’t made for the soggy weather, either. What I’d give for a pair of running capris. What I would give.
It’s a right turn, and three houses down, I see the walk up to Beau’s house. I missed his driveway before—it blends in. He must have a garage in the back to keep his car, if he even has one. It occurs to me that I’ve never seen him driving anywhere. He walks all over the resort, covering it on foot. He is in it.
My purse is wet, my clothes are wet, everything is wet by the time I turn onto the brickwork path and slow to a walk.
It’s one thing to run up a street. It’s another to run up onto a man’s porch and beg him.
Beg him? No. I’m not going to do any begging. I’m going to do some confessing.
A horrible thought crosses my mind—what if there’s no car in the driveway because he’s gone? If he quit his job, he could have left town. There’s nothing stopping him from buying a ticket at the airport in the next big city down the road and flying out. I’m sure the Bliss family also has access to a private plane out of the local airport, too.
In light of this possibility, I speed up.
The water from my shoes leaves puddles on the porch as I cross it, then raise my hand and pound on the door before I can lose my nerve.
There’s a muffled shout from inside. Thank God.
I knock again.
Grumbling, paired with thundering footsteps, approaches the door, and then it swings open. “—just left. Don’t you have any shred of human decency? I—Claire.” Beau’s eyes light up, but then his forehead wrinkles. “What are you—you’re all wet.”
My teeth rattle against one another. It’s probably from the rain and nerves, fifty-fifty. “Can I come in?”
“Yeah. Yeah, come in.” Beau steps back, beckoning me inside, then goes further into the house, reappearing a moment later with a towel. “Did you walk here in the rain?”
“I ran most of the way.” I take the towel and rub it over my hair, but it’s useless against the blazer, so I have to strip it off.
“You ran?” He arches one eyebrow, incredulous.
“Yeah. I ran here.”
“Is something on fire?”
“Only my heart.” It’s a joke, and I feel awkward and rusty making jokes, but Beau laughs nonetheless.
His laugh is gone as quickly as it started, and a frown settles back over his face. “Claire...what can I do for you?”
“Nothing. This time, I did something for you. Because I like you. I, like, really like you. I might even love you, which is the craziest thing I’ve ever said to someone like you.”
His face brightens, like the sky growing lighter after a storm. “That’s nice to hear, but you didn’t have to do anything.”
“That’s the thing.” I let the blazer fall to the floor with a wet slap and I pull the towel tightly around my shoulders. It’s the only armor I’m going to allow myself in this moment. “I’ve been a total ass.”
“That’s what people normally say about me.”
“Can you just—can you shut up and listen? For one second?”
There’s that grin. “Yeah.” He presses his lips together.
“I’ve been an ass, because I’ve been trying to live up to what my mother wanted from me. All my life, I did that. And the thing is, she’s...she’s kind of a bitch. She’s a hypocrite, and she’s unhappy, and she has impossible standards for everybody else, and I have been living under that for so long that when she called the other day, she got to me. And we’ve been estranged for—”
“Hold on. Estranged? We never got to this the other day.”
“Yeah. Estranged. I stopped talking to her after she drove my last boyfriend away. And he was—he was great, Beau, but he was nothing compared to you. I never should have said that stuff about being successful. I should have said I want to be successful with you, and nobody else, because I’ve known you a week and I never want to go another day without knowing you again. Not that I can stop knowing you. But you know what I mean.”
He rubs at his chin, palm scratching over the stubble that drives me wild. “I have an answer to that.”
One step, then another. The towel falls. And Beau’s lips are back on mine, exactly where they belong.
* * *
BEAU
When we finally come up for air, Claire is giggling. Giggling. It’s a foreign sound, coming from her. “Are you okay?”
“I’m more than okay. I’m kind of—” She shakes her hands, and I try to ignore the effect this has on her breasts, which are still, unfortunately, encased in a bra beneath a cream-colored shell that has been rendered useless by the rain. “I’m rattled. Because I came here to tell you how much I like you, and I’ve fallen in love with you, and I had to have something to prove it.”
I pull her closer to feel her body against mine. “Say that again.”
“I had to have something to prove it.”
“No, the first part.”
“I’m in love with you.”
I put my fingers beneath her chin and raise her face so I can look into her eyes. “I’m in love with you. I love you. Maybe that’s absurd, and maybe you don’t believe it, but I do. You kept coming to the table, even when you thought I was a worthless drunk.”
“I never thought you were worthless.” She says it in her Office-Claire voice. I want to laugh forever, but I settle for a long minute. “Fine,” she says, after I’m done. “I did think you were worthless at the beginning. But now I see that we have...complementary skill sets. And if you ever want me to jump back in and help you with anything, you can always call me.”
“Call you?” I bend down and kiss the side of her neck, a freakishly potent excitement coursing through my veins. “Call you—I don’t want to call you. I want you by my side, always. Or at least as long as you’ll put up with me.”
Claire frowns. “But I can’t be by your side. I have to go back to work. I have to go back to my job, since I turned down the offer from Roman.”
I swear I hear a record scratch, and I’ve never owned a record in my life.
“What offer from Roman?”
She takes a deep breath, her eyes searching mine. “He emailed me this morning to come in early. And when I got there, he offered me your job. He said you...you quit, and there was no convincing you to come back.” A proud smile lights up her face. “But I knew I couldn’t do that to you. Take your job? You love creating those events for people. What kind of person would I be, to love you and take your job at the same time? So I turned down the longer contract. It’s going to mean a couple rocky months while I finish the repairs on my house, but—”
“Hold on. Repairs? I know about the house. I don’t know about the repairs.”
“Oh, yeah.” Claire brushes a loose strand of hair away from her face. “The pipes have to be completely replaced. It’s a big job, and super expensive, but I’ll just—I’ll forge ahead with finding new clients. I’d rather do that than take your job from you. You should go back, Beau. It’s where you belong.”
“No.” I take her hand in mine. “Here is where I belong.” A storm of emotions is threatening to burst out of my chest like a baby alien. “Claire—you didn’t need to do that. You should go back and tell Roman you’ll take the job. How long have you even been living at that hotel? You made it seem like it was a weekend or two.”
She bites her lip. “Three months.”
“What? You’ve been living in a roadside motel for three months?”
“It’s a cute motel,” she says. “It’s clean, and—”
“And you had a shot to repair your house and then some and you turned it down for me?”
“Yeah. I did.”
I sweep her up into my arms. “That is the best fucking thing anyone’s ever done for me.” I kiss her like I mean it, because I do. I mean it more than anything. “But it’s crazy. It’s crazy, Claire.”
“It’s only crazy because I’m crazy about you.” Her eyes trail down to my lips like she could spend the next eternity kissing me.
I know exactly how she feels.
“I mean, crazy, Beau. Crazy. It keeps me up at night. And I didn’t want anything to stand in the way of seeing where this goes.”
“Not even succeeding as a professional?”
“That’s the thing. Why did I ever think that? It’s so dumb. And even if I can’t, even if I can only be with you, then I know which thing is worth more.”
“Money,” I say. “Having money to do house repairs, and, you know, live—that’s more important than wasting your time on a guy like me.”
“A guy like you. Somebody sweet and funny and romantic. Somebody who didn’t give up on me because I was frozen inside a shell of ridiculous expectations. Someone who swam me to the shore when my legs cramped and then carried me to the house.” Tears, real tears, come to her eyes. “You’re everything, Beau.”
“You’re everything.”
Claire tilts her face up and kisses me again, and my whole body reacts—every muscle, every nerve, every emotion. When she draws away again it’s like she’s leaving town for good. A shudder moves down my spine. I pull her closer.
“There’s just one thing,” she whispers.
“What’s that?”
“I’m all wet. And I could really use some help getting out of these clothes.”
20
Claire
“You are so tense. Relax your shoulders before they get stuck up by your ears.” Beau kneads his fingers into my shoulders, and what do you know? It works. I don’t know if he’s an expert at massage or I’m just obsessed with his touch. Probably both.
“It would help if I didn’t have this blindfold on.”
“I don’t know. I think you should keep it on for the rest of the evening. And the night.”
I try to slap him playfully on the arm, but he’s behind me and I’m blindfolded.
“Swing and a miss, sweetheart.” He kisses the side of my neck and a trail of goosebumps runs down to my fingertips.
“How much longer are we going to stand out here?”
That’s all I know about our location—we’re outside. The summer breeze ruffles my hair and the hem of my dress, and Beau stands close behind me, his hands on my arms.
“Until you’re ready.”
I straighten my back, then realize I’ve overdone it and relax. “I’m ready now. Nothing could possibly scare me with you by my side.”
“Right,” Beau says with a laugh. “I believe that.”
One week. It’s been one week. I finished out my original contract with Roman, then signed on to a new one lasting one year. At the end of that year, all parties involved can renegotiate. I can’t see myself wanting to do anything else, but never say never. Now that I’ve vanquished the demons of perfection, the doors to the world are wide open.
