The Palms, page 6
“I know.” He angled his body further toward her. “Just a joke.”
She lay back on the blue and purple decorative pillow wedged between her and the couch’s arm. She held her wine glass by the stem and gave what remained in it a slight swirl. “So tell me the big secret.”
Trent cleared his throat, unsure of how to start what had become the most important conversation he’d had in years. “I wouldn’t call it a big secret—”
“But it’s something no one talks about. At least not by name.” Lauren’s left hand shoved some wayward strands of her brown hair behind her ear. She kept her eyes on him, and the stare did nothing to ease Trent’s unwillingness.
“You’re right. No one talks about it.” The left corner of Trent’s mouth turned down. “My family sure doesn’t. They’d like to pretend it just never happened.”
“I asked Spen about it years ago. I know you told him, but he wouldn’t tell me anything.” She bit one side of her lower lip.
“That’s because Spencer doesn’t know.” Trent rubbed his long index finger over his top lip, under his nose. For months after Trent returned to Amherst, Spencer didn’t speak to him. “Well, he doesn’t know everything.”
Lauren scooted closer to him on the couch. Her eyes locked with his, pleading for the answers she needed. “I want to know everything, Trent. Everything.”
“Fair enough.” He looked down at the light green throw rug that complemented the dark tile floor of the condominium. “Her name was Cynthia Livingston.”
Lauren gulped, as her tongue grew thick and fat in her mouth. “Oh God, I knew it.”
He looked up, wide-eyed. “Knew what?”
“There had to have been another woman. That’s why you must have left me. I mean it was—”
“She wasn’t the other woman,” Trent interrupted. “Not like you think.”
Lauren’s face quickly reddened. She blurted out her thoughts. “Don’t lie to me. Everyone said… Spen said… Shit! I knew you were a player!” She slammed her wine glass on the coffee table.
He raised his right hand, hoping to ease her a little. “Try to calm down.”
“Try to calm down?”
“I don’t want you to jump to conclusions.” He raised his right hand again, desperate to stop her from overreacting. “Please listen to me. Please.”
“If this is about what I think it’s about—,”
“It isn’t.” Trent’s firm voice sliced through the air. In an effort to help make his point, he scooted down the sofa. “It’s about a mistake. A huge one.”
She snorted. “Aren’t they all?”
By then, Lauren had stopped listening to him. She tightened her face and closed herself off to whatever words he had coming next. Everything about her body showed the tension: her hunched shoulders, her arched position against the decorative pillow, and the small scowl on her lips.
“Lauren, I fucked up once. But I don’t want to fuck up again. Let me explain the rest.”
She didn’t say anything right away, and as he waited, he watched heavy breaths enter and exit her body. The awkward silence enveloped them like a thick blizzard. Finally, when Lauren could stand it no longer, she spoke.
“Keep talking.”
He let the breath trapped inside him leave his body. “I made a lot of mistakes when I was younger.”
She rolled her eyes. “Me too.”
“Everyone screws up when they are in college, and I did a lot. I dated many girls. A lot.”
“I know you did.” She kept her voice even. “That’s all I used to hear about when it came to you — how much of a player you were.”
“And that’s it — that’s the precise problem. ‘Reckless’ should have been my middle name.” Trent twisted his body. Feet planted on the floor, he buried his head in one hand. When he raised his head again to look at her, his eyes had widened, and the color had drained away from his tan face. “When I was at Amherst, I met a couple of girls who lived in the dorm across the quad from the one where I lived.”
Lauren’s mouth flattened into a hard line. He took her expression as a sign of disgust, and her silence as a sign that he should continue.
“I met Cynthia Livingston that spring.” He rubbed his eyes again and forced himself to keep on talking. “The spring before you and I got together for real. Before senior year.” Another deep, guttural exhale left his chest. “She showed up at an off campus party one night and we...”
“You slept with her.”
Trent leaned back in against the sofa. “Yes,” he muttered. “We slept together a few times.”
Lauren picked up her wine glass. She peered down at the filmy wine left inside it, and swallowed what remained in one gulp. His story didn’t shock her at all, and she remained in control of her emotions. Long ago, she’d suspected something akin to what he’d just told her. “So let me guess the next part.”
“Please don’t.”
Her eyes met his, and the way he gazed at her made her grow even more wary of his admonition. “Okay. Finish.”
Trent broke her stare, glanced over at his wine glass and wondered if the Crawfords stocked anything harder in the condominium. At this rate, he could use a few good shots of vodka. “It wasn’t anything memorable. It was—” He broke off again and struggled with the words. “I guess she was a nice girl.”
“Was?”
“Yes. Was.” Now he looked over at the grey and red woven afghan draped over the back of the sofa. “I thought that’s all it was — a one night stand in the middle of finals. And one more time, right before I came down here to Palm Beach for the summer.” He looked down at his hands. “She called me that morning on the beach. The morning I woke up next to you.”
Lauren cupped her chin in her hand and waited. Something told her not to interrupt him, not now. Even so, the deeper he delved into the story, the more she wanted him to stop talking so she could spend the rest of the day counting the threads in the blanket and forgetting all the pain of the past.
“You were still asleep, right there on the beach towel.” Trent smiled a little. “God, you looked so beautiful.” He shook his head. “And she had… she had news.”
Lauren raised her eyebrow, able to guess what came next. “She was pregnant?”
“Don’t sound so surprised.”
“I’m not.”
Trent grimaced. “That was about the time my life turned into one of those bad Lifetime movies my mom watched in the ‘90s.”
Lauren stood up. “I think I need more wine,” she said, sensing that Trent had much more to tell her. “Do you want some?”
“We’ve already drank half the bottle. Why not?”
Lauren walked to the kitchen, picked up the remaining bottle and returned to her place on the couch. Trent regarded her with a haggard look. “We should have brought it out here with us,” he said, and chuckled to break the tension.
“Wine always comes in handy.” Lauren poured him some and filled her own glass. “And I think I have more if we need it.”
“Are you mad?” he whispered. “I hate not knowing.”
“I want you to finish your story.”
“Cynthia was pregnant. Of course she was.” He sipped his drink. “And the thing was, I couldn’t remember much about either night she and I slept together.” He sputtered, choking a little on the wine and his emotions. “Jesus. I thought it was a regular call when I got up. And I was standing there on the beach and she sounded like she’d been crying...” He broke off as his voice cracked.
A wave of pity crashed over Lauren. She scooted close to him on the couch, her heart breaking as she watched him crumble under the weight of a story he’d carried around for ten years. Trent looked so broken, so alone. It scared her. Maybe she’d been harsh, too cold. Perhaps she should just forgive him. He didn’t have to tell her the rest of the story. She could forget what he did.
Couldn’t she?
“It happens a lot,” she said under her breath. “People make mistakes.”
Trent rubbed his face again and didn’t acknowledge her. “Not like this one. I didn’t know what to do. She said she wanted to keep the baby. She wouldn’t change her mind. I tried to reason with her, but she—”
“Did she keep it?”
“I went back to Amherst. School was about to start anyway. I went home that morning to my parents’ place and booked the first flight I could get. I thought I would convince her that we couldn’t take care of it...” He stopped his story when his voice broke again. To steel himself, he took another drink from his glass. “Cynthia wanted to keep it. She did. She insisted.”
Lauren moved a little closer to him and put her hand on his arm. “It’s okay. I wish you’d told me.”
“Things got so bad.”
Lauren tightened her grip on his shoulder. “Not so bad. I don’t think so. Sounds like a normal mistake to me.” She shrugged and patted him a couple of times, to show him she didn’t have any anger toward him. “So you have a baby with a woman you don’t love. Happens a lot.”
“But that’s just it.” Trent stiffened and looked down at the floor again. “I don’t.”
6:00 PM
hat?” Lauren’s voice echoed in her ears and she wasn’t sure she’d heard Trent right. She frowned as the twist in his story sank in all around her. “What do you mean, you don’t?”
Trent looked up and met her disbelief. This was it. Finally, she knew what he’d been hiding. “I don’t have a child.”
Lauren recoiled, dropping her hand from his arm. “Okay... why...”
“She’s dead,” he blurted out, and relief about revealing at least this part of the truth took over his whole body. “Cynthia died.”
Lauren’s mouth dropped open. “Died?”
Trent ran his hand through his hair. “Yes. She died.” He took another sip from his drink and placed it back on the coffee table coaster. “It’s hard to talk about.” He shook his head, disgusted with the memories, but comforted at the same time. She hadn’t hit him yet, screamed, or cried yet. Perhaps she’d take this better than he envisioned.
“I don’t like to remember all the details, but of course I can’t get them out of my mind.”
“But I don’t under—”
“She…” He hesitated as a familiar dread filled his body. Here came another major part of the story. “S-she got into an accident.”
“Oh my God,” Lauren whispered after a few seconds passed of silence. A chill ran through her again. “I can’t believe it. Just awful. That’s so... sad.”
“The whole thing was just…” Trent crossed his arms over his chest. He shifted his weight and studied her mixed expression. He couldn’t read it, and it bothered him. “It is sad. You’re right. Very sad. Listen, what you say we get out of here. Not that I don’t want to keep talking.” He looked around the room and pulled his shirt away from his chest. Then he tugged at the collar of his shirt, and felt the sweat that covered large sections of his body. “All of a sudden, it’s stifling in here.” He stood up and reached a clammy hand down to her. “Do you mind if we leave?”
“You’re right. Let’s get out of here.” She took his hand, stood up, and didn’t drop it. Instead, she looked down at their interlaced fingers. “I decided to hate you after that morning, and I did. I hated you. For a long time.”
“I knew you did. Even as late as yesterday.”
“It hurt, Trent.” Lauren placed a hand on his shoulder. “No, that’s not the right way to describe it. When you left me — when you stopped talking to me without another word — I could have sworn you reached inside my stomach and burned me.”
“I was such a goddamn fool.”
“But I also still wanted you,” she whispered.
“You did?” he asked, and his chest tightened as a small shred of hope he’d buried inside bloomed a little.
Her thumb traced small lines on the back of his hand. She looked up into his dark eyes. “You could have told me about all this, Trent.”
“No, I couldn’t have.” He pulled her flush against him again. Their shoes locked together and his pants brushed against her naked leg. “It would have hurt you more, Lauren. And I’d already done—”
“But maybe I would have listened. You don’t know. You didn’t even try.”
His mouth became a thin line. “I didn’t want to make you have to listen.” He reached up with his free hand and ran it underneath her hair, stopping only when his fingers grazed her earlobe. She closed her eyes as he massaged it. “My parents promised they’d never tell anyone. And they never did for all these years. In fact, we don’t talk about it much.”
“Is that why you went into the Navy?” she asked, her eyes still closed. With only an inch between them, she smelled the way his cologne mixed with the salt air of Palm Beach, and it intoxicated her further.
“I needed to grow up.”
“Did you?”
“Yeah, in a way. It helped a lot. I got away from everything. And everyone.” He pulled his hand away and she opened her eyes. He peered over at the clock on the far wall over the TV. “It’s after six PM. You hungry? Maybe?”
“No,” Lauren said. She breathed in and out, aware of every cell in her body.
“Good.”
“Good?” She raised an eyebrow at him. “Why is that good?”
“It just is,” he replied. Before she could answer, his mouth covered hers with a soft kiss. His lips pushed her mouth open wider, teasing them open while his left arm circled her body and hauled her to him. She moaned as each kiss pulsated against her mouth, and before long she was hanging onto his shirt.
“Good God,” she whispered as he broke away after a few minutes. “Don’t stop. Please.” One side of Trent’s mouth twitched upward and he answered her with another kiss. Then another. Five. Each kiss tasted sweeter and lasted longer than the last.
After a few more minutes, she was the one to break the long embrace, even though her eyes still held his.
“Is something wrong?” he asked.
“Yes.” She grinned. “We’re in the wrong room.”
6:20 PM, The Crawford Condo Bedroom
They didn’t make it to the bed. Instead, as they entered the master bedroom, he turned and slammed her against the wall. His need for her took over everything, and she allowed it.
“Lauren,” he said in her ear. “I want you.”
“And I want you,” she whispered. “Now.”
Her mouth covered his without another word, and he took control of the moment. Each kiss became a statement about the time they’d lost together. He kissed her out of hunger, longing, fear, comfort, pain, and regret. She returned each one, and they kissed until Trent’s chest pounded so hard he couldn’t breathe.
“Trent,” Lauren said as she broke away and they both gasped for air. “I never thought we’d have this again.”
“Me neither.”
“I wasn’t sure I wanted to. Or that you wanted to.” She wrapped her hand around the back of his neck, and pulled his willing head closer to her face.
“I always hoped we would someday,” he whispered against her swollen mouth. “But I never believed.”
She kissed him again and gave a sideways glance at the bed. Her eyebrow shot up and he gave it a small peck. His body held hers in place against the wall, and there he sensed so much about the two of them: his arm perpendicular to the wall, her hand tangled in his hair, his breath against her neck, and the heavy muscle of his thigh as he pinned her there.
“I never wanted anyone the way I wanted you,” she admitted. She kissed him again, and her hand traveled from his jawline to the hem of his shirt. When she tugged on it, he leaned away from her lips, reached down and pulled it over his head. A hairless, muscular chest greeted her. “Oh God,” she breathed. “This is like I remembered.”
“It’s better,” he said against her left ear. He kissed her again and his hands found the ties of her wrap dress. He knew she wouldn’t protest what he did next. Within a half second, he released the knot, and she pulled the dress off her body. After she did, she kicked off her red sandals and returned to Trent’s arms in a pale pink lace bra and matching bikini underwear.
Now, his kisses traveled from her lips down her neck. He stopped to plant them at her collarbone, the side of her shoulder, and the curve to the beginning of her arm. As he did, she raised her arms against the wall and let the moment overtake her. His kisses stopped at the top of her left breast, and when they did, he used the pause to reach around and unhook the lace. She slid the bra off her arms as he returned his mouth to hers.
She groaned against the wall once the kisses intensified. “Let’s go to the bed,” she told him.
“Just what I was thinking,” he replied.
“I can tell,” she whispered.
He lifted her up by the legs and cradled her as he took the final steps to the large king sized bed. She lay back against the pillows as he took off his pants and she watched the muscles ripple in his arms. Jesus Christ. She was a goner. He was a goner.
But maybe they both had always been.
When he joined her on the bed, she noticed a small square packet in his left hand. “Was this a forgone conclusion?” she asked, keeping her tone flirtatious and sexy.
“No,” he said as he glanced down at the condom packet. “Well, maybe so. Always be prepared.”
He kissed her and moved his body on top of hers. Only their underwear separated them now. “Something else didn’t change, Lauren.” He kissed her once more. “And that’s the way I feel about you.”
“Oh please,” she murmured. “Please don’t stop.” She reached up and connected his lips with hers as his hands trailed down her body. Every touch of his fingers electrified her skin and her mind. Trent’s left hand traveled down her neck, across her breasts, and over her stomach. When his index finger reached the elastic of her bikini underwear, he gave it a gentle tug and broke their kisses again.
“I want you so much,” he said, looking deep into her eyes.
She bucked her hips against his in reply, and ran a thumb over his lips. “Don’t wait,” she told him. “You don’t have to wait any more.”
