Always the One, page 25
part #1 of Always and Forever Series
“Huh. Oh, Shayla, Evan isn’t really innocent with his intentions, but that’s beside the point. Yes, Trey shouldn’t act like you’re his property; you’re fucking Dad’s and mine, duh. Anyway, he didn’t go there with the intention to hit him. He wanted to tell him to keep it professional, and avoid any situation where you would feel uncomfortable. What else transpired I can’t say, but you need to talk to him about that shit.” Now I’m curious to know if there’s more than what Trey let on. “Besides, you know our boy, he had a fucked-up past, the one woman genetically fucking programmed to love him, left. Cut him some slack.”
Oh for Pete’s sake, that doesn’t work for every freaking time he messes up.
“That’s not a valid excuse with me, Kings. I’m not his mom, and I’m sick of him not trusting me and thrusting her shortcoming onto me. The way we laugh and play together or touch and talk, that can never mean what it does to me with anyone else. He’s my other half. I don’t care if we’ve been together a couple of weeks. That’s the man I want to marry. I want to bear his children for heaven’s sake. Why would I let some other guy come take me away from the greatest person I’ve ever known?” I’m not sure where I’m going with this or where the strength is coming from to admit these pretty substantial confessions, I just need someone to know how I feel and right now Kings is my sounding board.
“Baby?” My heart stops in my chest, hearing Trey’s voice come through the line—has he been there the whole time?
“Trey?”
“I’m here, baby, I heard everything. I’m coming sweetie, I need to get to you.”
“No, I need some time to get things together in my head.” I miss him, and I want to work this out, but for now I choose to be alone with my thoughts.
“Shayla, it’s me, your best friend, don’t push me away, let me get to you and fix us, let me explain this shit.”
“I have to go, I can’t talk right now.” I hang up the phone, not ready to hear his begging. My dad exhales loudly next to me, just as confused about what just happened between Trey and me.
“I better start explaining.” I attempt to find Zen before I even begin to repeat the events that transpired today. He agrees with the lift of his chin, signaling me to come back and sit down in the living room.
“You know how Lana and I got an investor to help open up another location here in Portland?” Nodding his head, he encourages me to continue. “Well, his name is Evan and he’s been amazing at helping us. Well today, before everything hit the fan, we were going to sign on a new location. Then to my surprise, he showed up with black eyes and a broken nose. Dad.” I break from conversation for a minute to collect myself, I’m sick of crying today. “Trey went to Evan’s office and broke his nose. For what purpose I don’t know, but I don’t think there needs to be one. It shouldn’t have happened at all.” Saying it only makes it more real. My gut is turning, making me nauseated; this almost feels like a nightmare.
“I’m trying to build my relationship with Trey, exploring this new part of who we are, all while building my career.” I pause, biting my lip, then push forward. “Right now I feel like both the things I love are clashing and trying to destroy each other. He’s so jealous because of things that have nothing to do with me or my actions, it’s his mother. She destroyed him, Dad, and I’m sensitive to that, I am. But I’m not her!” I’m shouting by the time I finish and he’s just sitting back, stunned silent in his chair, absorbing every word I’m saying.
“Geez, I thought dating back in my day was difficult, boy was I wrong.” He runs a hand through his brown hair. My dad is a handsome man, I got most of my looks from my mom, but Kingston is a spitting image of our father. My father has brown hair with scattered strands of gray. He has brown eyes to complement his round shaped face and his smile is accented with dimples. I love my dad.
“All right, start with Evan. What did he say in the message?” Surprisingly, I can’t remember, I didn’t pay close enough attention when I received it.
“I don’t remember exactly.” I pull my phone out from the pocket of my blazer and turn it on. Waiting for it to start up, I tell him a little bit more of what’s going on in my head and just like earlier, he listens to every word until I’m finished. When my phone powers up it goes crazy with notifications from both Kings and Trey. I dismiss them and open my recent text to Evan. Scrolling down, I find the incriminating text and read it out loud.
“Here it is.” I read it out loud, “Hey, gorgeous. I hope you’re having fun in Park City, not missing me too much I hope! Anyway, I just spoke to the board and the photo shoot was a hit! They are going to offer us $500,000 to open two new locations. We did it! We’re a great team, beautiful! Dinner on me when you get back.” Shit, that does sound bad. How in all that’s holy did I not catch that? I feel like a naïve moron now. Seriously, how did that slip by me?
“Doesn’t sound innocent to me, princess. If I were with a woman and some other guy was sending her those messages, I wouldn’t take kindly to it.” He’s right; I should have read the text before running off like a coward to Portland. I still feel like this message didn’t warrant that type of reaction. I mean a broken nose? I have to be missing something. God, tell me I’m missing something.
“I think you’re both right and wrong in this situation. You didn’t catch the comments earlier, because like you said, you don’t view Evan that way and you’re faithful to Trey. But you have a responsibility to the man you’re with to not let others come in and try to sabotage that. Don’t you agree?”
“Yes, but he was the one who treated me like property, not telling me those messages bothered him. Instead, he went all caveman on me and beat the shit out of Evan.” I’m standing my ground on this one, I know my dad’s right, but Trey also needs to be held accountable for his extreme behavior.
“Agreed, and that’s where his faults lie. He needs to communicate his insecurities and dislikes to you, in order to avoid this kind of thing.” Dad speaks volumes with his words; we both need to work out our crap.
I’m starting to learn a lot about who I am in this relationship. I’m a runner, I don’t stick it out when things get tough, and worst of all, I don’t think about both parties involved. I should have stopped and asked Trey what was said during their altercation instead of jumping down his throat. I’ve also learned my brother and father are wicked good with advice—sound advice is food for the soul.
But, I’ve also learned I’m a strong individual, my heart is a fragile thing that I need to protect. My life and my aspirations shouldn’t be jeopardized by someone’s lack of self-control. Evan hit on me and I turned him down. Sure, his joke was uncomfortable and the execution of it was terrible, but he has been pretty normal since then.
Calling me beautiful was not okay, that I can agree with. But how does that justify a broken nose? What the hell am I missing?
“Did I miss the old and wise gene in the family? Seriously, why are you and Kings the best at giving me advice?” He’s perched on the arm of the couch next to me.
“Don’t feel bad, you’ll get smart one day, you need to eat your veggies, like I always told you.” I pinch the arm he has positioned around my shoulder, causing him to flinch and jump to his feet. “Ouch, you little turd.” My dad rubs at the spot, attempting to soothe the ache.
“Do you want some lunch?”
“I’m exhausted from the drive and my emotions are all jacked. Probably not. Can I stay in the guesthouse tonight? I need to get some sleep before I head out tomorrow.” I stand and make my way to the back door that leads to the guesthouse. When we moved him in, I left a few outfits and necessities so I wouldn’t be without what I needed in case I decided to stay and avoid the three-hour drive back to Seattle. We tried convincing him that moving to the city would be better, but he hates the city, and when I say hate I mean hate with a capital H.
“Of course, go take a nap, and I’ll take you to dinner tonight. How’s that sound? A date with your old man?” I laugh when he flexes his arm at me. Kingston and my dad used to be workout buddies back in Utah, and to the looks of it, my dad has been keeping up with it on his own. This brings me back to my thought from earlier—I need to come see my dad more often. I mean he moved here to be close to Kingston and me and he’s out here all alone. No kids and no wife, I wonder if he’ll ever date again… I decide quickly to save that conversation for another rainy day.
“Okay, Rocky, sounds like a plan,” I mock him and head to the guesthouse.
Approaching the cottage-styled, two-bedroom guesthouse, I use the extra key my dad gave me and let myself in. Immediately, I go to the windows that take up most of the wall space in each room and open them. No one has stayed here in awhile so the dust and musty smell needs to be ventilated.
Everything is white—the couches, the cupboards, the curtains. The light breeze from the open windows cause the sheer curtains to ripple gently, creating a calm mood to settle over my tense self. The accent furniture is dark wood and plush pink pillows are neatly placed on the sectional, giving the guesthouse a homely feeling. I walk the short distance down the hallway to the master suite and take in the room.
Gosh, I missed this beautiful place.
The sliding glass doors are adjacent to the bed, where the view hits the open field of my dad’s property. There are beautiful Catalpa trees with their fallen heart-shaped leaves surrounding the ground below it. With winter being here, the white flowers that usually sprout from the branches during summer have died. The grass is covered in a light smatter of snow from the occasional snowfall they had this year.
The bed is covered in a plush white comforter and it’s screaming my name, I need a damn nap. This is the first real deep breath I’ve taken today, and all I want to do is sleep and prepare to face all the troubles that await tomorrow.
Tomorrow.
My mind is so loud; the thoughts running rampant like a circus easily drag me into a deep slumber.
“Wake up, beautiful.” The voice in my dreams is calling to me in reality, and I slowly come to. My eyes squint at the setting sun that’s coming through the glass doors, reflecting on the white walls. I must have only slept a few short, extremely needed, hours. I see the most beautiful blue eyes looking into mine. His smell fills my lungs when I breathe in, helping me wake even more. He’s sitting on the bed next to me, his sunglasses pushing his longer hair out of his face. Wearing my favorite leather jacket and jeans, the same ones he wore on our first date, he runs his hands softly across my warm cheek. Wow, he looks like a dream.
“Hey,” I greet him, still unsure of what I’m feeling.
“Hey.” He waits a minute, letting me adjust from slumber to coherency.
“I’m sorry, baby, can we please talk about it?” he pleads softly.
“Do I have a choice? You kinda came out here despite me telling you I needed some space,” I remind him, my voice stern. I sit up and place a pillow on my lap.
“I know, but we don’t fight. Ever. This isn’t who we are.”
“Actually, we had a beautiful friendship, Trey. A perfect one, and ever since we became a couple we find ourselves going through the cycle. Happy to fighting. Fighting to happy. You push your insecurities on me and totally disregard my wants. This is becoming a habit and I can’t stand bad habits.” I’m being icy, my cold shoulder game strong. But I’m not okay with this—at all.
“I deserve that. I deserve worse, if I’m being honest.” I about choke on a ridiculous chuckle. He really wants to talk about honesty?
“Are you? You know, being honest?”
“Same goes to you,” he fires back, his eyes narrowing on me.
“You didn’t tell me you went to see him and then you used our sex as a weapon—to keep me from getting mad. You brought something so vile to our most intimate act.” I shake my head, dropping it in my hands. I feel so dang defenseless, I feel like I’m losing the ground under me.
“And you didn’t tell me he hit on you.”
Touché. I take it Evan told him. Because only Evan and I know about that little exchange.
I lift my head from my hands. “Because—and listen close, Trey, I’m only gonna say this once—it was nothing to me.” I span out my sentence, dragging it out.
“It was something to me,” he retorts on a hasty snap.
“Yeah, well, looks like we are both at a standstill then,” I hiss, leaning against the headboard. We don’t move, we just sit for a minute or two. He breaks first, ending our standoff.
“Okay. I read that text and tried to ignore it. I thought this guy had to be out of his mind to think that it’s appropriate to call a taken woman ‘beautiful’ and all the other things he said.” Trey clears his throat and continues, “Turns out I’m not that strong. I can’t just sit back and let a guy get away with little things like this. Because sometimes, men miss the obvious signs of disinterest and it can turn into something more. So, I went to his office.” Before he continues, he takes my hands in his warm ones. Even though his hands are warm they’re shaking, giving him at least an inch, I squeeze them for reassurance. He’s communicating, that’s the first step in fixing this, assuming I am even ready to fix this.
“I didn’t intend to hit him or start any physical altercation. I told him that he needs to keep it professional and stop sending you messages that indicate a little more than business. He didn’t like that and he threw my dad’s wealth in my face, telling me I couldn’t provide for my woman and so on.” He stops abruptly then looks to me.
It feels like there’s more to this story than he’s letting on, or maybe it’s just my paranoia.
“I can’t believe he would say something like that to you. You know that’s not true, right?” I’m not saying it’s okay by any means, Evan shouldn’t have said such a dick thing. I’ll bring this up to him if we’re going to continue working together, because I will always defend Trey if someone’s acting out of line.
Trey’s eyes tell me everything I need to know, he trusts me. It’s not about me, it’s about the other evils in this world and the people who want to destroy our happiness. Little does he know, he is part of that small group that threatens to destroy what we have.
“Yeah, I know. But that doesn’t make it okay, and I lost it. I’m sorry that I did this and if I screwed anything up.” He pulls our joined hands to his lips and peppers mine in soft kisses. The gesture is sweet and understated.
“It scares me,” I say above a whisper, my eyes fixated on our joined hands.
“What does?”
“Your actions, Trey. You do some scary things and at this point your mother isn’t the problem. You are.” I know my words aren’t an easy pill to swallow, but I have to tell him.
“I know. I am the problem. I went too far, no matter what he said in that room, I should have walked away and come to you. Talked to you and told you everything—told you what I was feeling.”
“I am not the woman, I think you think I am. Trey, I may be shy and a little more reserved, but I am headstrong and I am a fighter. I protect what’s mine and I love what’s mine. Alpha doesn’t mean that you have to be this macho guy with no control over his jealousy. Being Alpha means being strong, being a man, being unashamed of who you are and never letting anyone make you feel less than.” I let his hand play with my palm, while he stares directly at me, leaning on the edge of every word I’m saying.
“I trust you and you are the one with a rocky past. Women—a lot of them,” I remind him. “But I am far from insecure or worried that you would ever leave or cheat. Why can’t you give me the same respect?” I question, searching his face.
“I am your protector, I’m your lover, but most of all, I’m your best friend. Everything I do comes from a good place, I just might have a problem expressing it or handling it properly. What can I do to flip this night around and show you that I can be better?” He cradles my face and wipes the one lone tear cascading down my face. I so badly just want to throw in the towel. But I can’t, I can’t stop loving him, and something that I fear more than losing my dream is losing him. I don’t know if I can live in a world where Trey doesn’t exist.
“You could stop breaking your promises and stop hurting me,” I simply state. There is no hidden answer, no gray area, just the easy truth.
“I can do that.” He looks hopeful, so I make a bargain with him.
“I love you, Trey. I will talk to Evan about this tomorrow and if he still wants to work with me, I will make sure he keeps it professional. If he steps out of line again, after knowing where I stand, I will cut the deal and tell you. Sound fair?”
“Yes.” He nods his head excitedly, and I stop him. I’m not done.
“This is the last time I will let your jealousy in our relationship.”
“I got it, I promise, Shay,” he promises, leaning in to kiss my cheek. I close my eyes and let his lips warm my cheek. Promises are only meaningful if they’re actually followed through on.
“Under one circumstance,” he says, moving his body back from me a little more, propping one knee on the bed between us.
“What?” He thinks now is a good time to negotiate, really?
“You can’t be alone with him. You can work with him, but where you go with him, someone else goes with you.”
I don’t like this; I can take care of myself.
“Trey, I’m not a child, I can take care of myself. Please don’t ask me to do this. I feel like it still falls under the category of you being jealous.” He doesn’t break eye contact with me and his facial expression doesn’t change. He won’t cave on this. We are both so dang stubborn. I hate it.
“I’m not going to be okay with you working together if you’re planning on ever being alone with him. Lana should be everywhere with you two anyway, so it shouldn’t be that hard. I trust you, baby, I do. He, however, isn’t trustworthy. I’m compromising here, please cut me some kind of deal.” There is reservation in his voice and I can’t pinpoint what it is. He still seems off…almost scared. Geez, what the actual hell?
