Stone Cold, page 9
“What?” he asks, tipping the bottle against his lips. “You think she’s sitting at home, waiting for me to call her and apologize?”
I don’t know what she’s doing tonight. I just know our place feels a little less alive without her in it. There’s no music, no flickering candles, no fluffed throw pillows. This morning I found a pair of Jude’s dirty boxers on the bathroom floor as well as a glob of toothpaste hardening in the sink. He hardly qualifies as a neat freak, but at least he was a little less of a slob when she was around.
“Mm kay.” He places his empty beer bottle on our table and pushes himself off the stool. “Wish me luck. I’m going in.”
I grab the back of his shirt in my fist and reel him in.
“Sit your ass back down before you do something you’re going to regret,” I say.
He tries to stand again, but I keep my grip on him.
“At least let me order another round,” he slurs.
By my count, he’s on his eighth beer. I should’ve cut him off a while ago. It’s a miracle he’s upright and conscious.
“I think we better pack it up.” I toss back the rest of my drink. “Wait here. I’m going to go close out my tab.”
When I return a few minutes later, Jude is gone …
And so is the redhead.
Chapter Twenty
Jovie
* * *
“You have arrived at your destination,” my GPS announces over my car speakers. “Route guidance is now finished.”
I pull up to a row of three-story brownstones in the West End, just outside of downtown, and find a parking spot. Climbing out, I grab Domino’s things from my trunk before helping him out of the backseat. He stops to sniff a patch of nearby grass, his eyes alert and his ears perked. I can’t imagine what’s going through his little mind right now, but at least Ida will be home in a few days. All of this relocating business will be over for him soon enough.
I locate house number thirty-seven and steady my bags in my arms before knocking on its glossy black door. This is exactly the kind of place I’d imagine a lawyer living. Everything is neat and manicured, yet the classic colonial architecture lends a feeling of prestige, history, law, and order.
The door opens a second later and Stone’s commanding presence fills the doorway. He leans against the jamb, his white dress shirt unbuttoned at the top and his tie hanging loose around his shoulders.
“Good timing,” he says. “I just got home a few minutes ago. Come on in.”
I take a step across the threshold, only Domino doesn’t follow.
“Come on, buddy,” I say in my most reassuring tone.
He looks to me and then to Stone before sitting on the concrete stoop.
“He’s not used to being around men,” I say. “Maybe he’s intimidated by you? Crouch down a little.”
Stone drags in a loud breath, like he’s inconvenienced by having to stoop down to a dog’s level, but he’ll get over it.
“Now pat the tops of your thighs,” I say. “And smile.”
He shoots me a look.
“Just do it.” I hand him the leash before fishing out a piece of steak from one of the Tupperware containers I packed. “Here, offer him this.”
Stone takes the tender bit of beef and holds it out.
“What’s his name again?” he asks.
“Domino.”
“Here, Domino,” he says, monotoned.
“Maybe … try to sound … more upbeat?” I give a gentle suggestion. “Like a kindergarten teacher.”
“What does a kindergarten teacher even sound like?”
“I don’t know … like a Disney princess,” I say. “Happy and chipper.”
His lips press flat and he turns to face Domino again.
“Domino … come here, boy.” His voice is so gentle I fight the urge to chuckle. This is the first I’ve experienced the softer side of Stone.
Rising from the front stoop with his tail tucked, Domino makes his way into the house, sniffing the bit of steak Stone is offering him before taking a bite.
“See, that wasn’t so hard,” I say before closing the front door. Bending down, I scratch the underside of Domino’s chin. “You’re going to be fine, buddy.”
Domino nudges Stone’s hand when he finishes his treat.
“What’s he want?” Stone asks.
“Either he wants you to pet him or he wants more steak. Probably the latter.” I hand Stone another piece to feed him. “I brought all of this things … his dog bed, his kibble, his food and water dishes, his toys. Oh, and I brought this for you.”
I pull a bottle of Malbec from one of the bags.
“It’s a small token of my appreciation for opening your home to this little guy.” I hand it to him.
“You didn’t have to,” he says, accepting it anyway.
I wave my hand. “Not a big deal. Oh, I also brought a couple of fresh steaks in case he still refuses to eat his kibble.”
He unhooks Domino’s leash, hangs it on the coat rack in the corner, and gathers all of the dog miscellany I’ve dumped at my feet. I follow him to the kitchen and help him sort everything out.
“Are we still on for our phone call tonight?” I ask.
He checks his watch. “You’re not going to let this go, are you?”
I pull up a chair at his kitchen island and rest my chin on the top of my hand.
“It’s something that always bothered me,” I say. “Not knowing if you liked me or if I annoyed you.”
“Seems like such a trivial thing to care about.”
“Trivial to you, maybe.”
He retrieves a corkscrew from a nearby drawer and reaches for the Malbec. Next he takes two stemless wineglasses from a cupboard.
“Drinking alone has never been my thing.” He pours the first one and slides it my way before filling the second.
I take a sip, both surprised and amused by his hospitality.
“There’s power in not caring what people think about you,” he says.
“I don’t care what people think about me,” I say, “but I always cared what you thought. You’re not people. I can’t lump you in with everyone else.”
“And why not?”
Shrugging, I try to explain the very thing I don’t fully understand myself. Maybe it was the fact that you always want what you don’t have, and in this case, it was Stone’s approval. It’s ridiculous, I know. But for whatever reason, the more distant and cold he was, the more I thought I could melt his iciness with my warmth. I always hoped that one day I’d have a breakthrough; that I’d penetrate his permafrost and meet the real Stone—not his frozen façade.
But that day never came.
“I don’t know,” I say. “Maybe because with everyone else, it’s obvious where they stand. But with you, it’s always been this giant question mark. And I don’t do well with question marks. I’m curious. I’m a writer. I’m obsessed with the human experience. I crave facts and details. I love understanding why people do what they do; all of their goals and motivations and conflicts. Everyone is complex to a degree. But you? You were an enigma I could never solve.”
“I’m not a character in one of your books.” He lifts his glass to his lips, pausing to peer at me over the rim.
That may be true, but he’s still a character in the story of my life.
Domino makes his way from my side of the island to Stone’s, and he lets out a faint whimper before sitting.
“What’s he doing?” he asks when Domino lifts a paw.
“I think he’s begging for a treat.” I grab the container of steak, pop the lid, and slide across the island. “He’s been with me over a week and not once has he asked me for anything. He must feel comfortable around you. I think he likes you.”
“Or maybe he just doesn’t like you.” Stone keeps a straight face but shoots me a wink.
“You two have something in common already.”
Stone slips Domino a few bites and almost loses a finger in the process.
“Looks like someone got their appetite back,” I say, making a mental note to text Ida when I leave. “So, anyway.” I swirl my wine. “Back to the topic at hand. Were we or weren’t we friends back in the day? And be honest. Sometimes I look back at my time with Jude and my failed relationships and my dumpster fire of a marriage and I wonder if I’m the common denominator. Is it something I’m doing? Am I off-putting?”
I always thought I had a fair amount of self-awareness, but then again, doesn’t everyone?
“Nah,” he says. “Maybe you just have shitty taste in men.”
I lift my brows and straighten my spine. “Damn. Don’t let Jude hear you say that.”
“Jude knows how I feel about how things went down.”
“Really?” I rest my chin on my hand again, leaning closer. “You stood up for me?”
“It was less about standing up for you and more about pointing out what an idiot he was being, but sure. You can call it that.”
Jude broke up with me the same day he got back from Tulum. Never mind a week of boozing and partying followed by a day of international travel, he couldn’t dump me fast enough. By that point in time, I’d already graduated and was living back at home with my parents for the summer while I searched for a job. Our original plan was that whoever found a job first, the other one would follow. At that point, we were both jobless, and while our careers were uncertain, I’d never worried about our future together.
The whole thing blindsided me.
I never saw or spoke to Stone again after that—until recently. I always considered him a casualty of the breakup. He was always Jude’s friend and that’s where his loyalty belonged. It never felt right to reach out to him for any reason, though I thought of him often.
“Did you ever find someone?” I ask.
“What do you mean?”
“Romantically. A girlfriend or whatever. You were always so secretive about your dating life,” I say. “I remember being so worried about you because it was like you were living in Jude’s shadow.”
Stone sniffs, his gaze flicking to the side and back. “I never lived in his shadow.”
“You did though. You let him have all the fun and do all the living and you sat back like some loyal henchman.”
“We’re all entitled to our opinions.” He tops off his wine.
“From an outsider’s perspective, that’s what I saw. And that’s what I was when it came to you two … an outsider.”
He tosses back a generous mouthful. “You were about as inside as it gets.”
“It never felt that way to me.”
“You can’t be serious. You were with him damn near twenty-four-seven. You came on every road trip. You slept over every weekend when we lived in the dorms and then you lived with us senior year. For three straight years, I couldn’t eat, sleep, or breathe without you being in a ten-foot radius of me. You were everywhere, all the time.”
“So it did bother you,” I say. “You were just tolerating me all that time.”
His intense gaze catches onto mine, holding it captive for an endless moment.
“It bothered me.” He exhales, his cool blue gaze studying mine. “But not for the reasons you think.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Stone
* * *
Age 21
* * *
“What the hell?” I ask Jude when he creeps through the apartment door Sunday morning.
He fumbles through the dark, kicking off his shoes and nearly tripping over a kitchen bar stool before attempting to sit down.
“I fucked up.” He buries his face in his hands, rubbing his eyes. Though I don’t think he’s crying. Jude never cries. I think he’s probably hung over and exhausted as shit.
“You went home with that redhead, didn’t you?”
His silence makes my stomach sink, despite the fact that deep down I already knew. I knew the second I turned around last night and he was gone. I knew with every step I took back home to an empty dorm.
Jude exhales, and the stench of stale alcohol and cheap perfume fills the kitchen.
“Jovie texted me last night around 3 AM,” I say. “She couldn’t get a hold of you.”
My jaw clenches when I think of him shoving his dick inside some random chick when Jovie was sitting at her parents’ home, worried about him.
“I know,” he says. “She wanted to FaceTime me, but … I couldn’t.”
“Because you were fucking someone.”
Sitting up, he tilts his head back with a groan, staring at the ceiling. “What am I supposed to do?”
“Own it,” I say. “Tell her. Come clean, otherwise it’ll be hanging over your head every time you look at her.”
“She’s going to end it if I tell her.”
“Do you even love her anymore?” For the past year, the intensity of their relationship has gone from scorching hot to a notch above simmering. I’m sure part of it had to do with the newness wearing off, but every once in a while Jude would make a comment that would have me questioning whether or not he was serious about Jovie anymore.
“Of course I do.” He shoots me a dirty look before his eyes return to the pitiful shit brown they were before. I can love this guy like a brother, but I don’t have to love everything he does. “I can’t tell her. I don’t want to lose her.”
“You do realize how your actions last night contradict what you’re telling me right now …”
“I was blitzed. You know that. Wasn’t thinking straight.” He sniffs. “Whose side are you on anyway?”
“It’s not about picking sides.”
His phone vibrates in his pocket before I can elaborate.
“Shit. It’s her,” he says when he checks it. Tapping the green button, he answers, “Hey, babe …”
His voice is sweet and sleepy—which tells me he intends to act like he simply slept through the missed calls.
“Yeah, sorry,” he says in the same tone he used to use when he’d play hooky from the golf course he worked at back in high school. “Jude and I went out last night and then I ended up crashing as soon as we got home.”
My throat tightens with every lie he feeds her, and I take a good, hard look at my best friend. From the moment we met in kindergarten, we were as thick as thieves. We’ve always had each other’s backs, always covered for each other without question. What one of us lacked, the other never failed to make up for it. His extroversion cancelled out my introversion. My good grades made up for his mediocre ones.
But today I’m seeing him a new light.
With his hair disheveled, the stench of bad dec,isions wafting off of him, and that fake-ass voice he’s using, there’s nothing admirable about him now. He’s nothing but a sorry man trying not to lose a girl he shouldn’t have had in the first place.
“Yeah, I’m sorry too,” he says. “I hate when we fight … I know … I’m going to grab a shower … love you too …”
He ends the call and releases a hard breath. “Jesus. That was the most terrifying forty-eight seconds of my life.”
I’d speak, but my jaw is clenched too tight.
“She’s on her way home now,” he says. “I doubt she’ll ask, but just in case she does … you’ll cover for me right? You know I’d do the same thing for you.”
Grabbing my phone and keys and stepping into my sneakers, I head to the door. I need air, space, and copious amounts of distance from this entire situation. But before I leave, I turn back and look him dead in the eye.
“I would never ask you to do the same thing for me,” I say, “because I’d never put myself—or anyone I love—in that position in the first place.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Stone
* * *
“So what were your reasons then?” Jovie’s eyes glint from the other side of the island, her head cocked sideways.
“My reasons were congruent with those of an immature twenty-two-year-old who thought he knew everything about everything.”
She rolls her eyes. “That’s such a Stone thing to say. Try again.”
“Does it matter what my reasons were?”
“It matters to me,” she says. “If you weren’t bothered by my constant, twenty-four-seven presence, as you put it … what were you bothered by?”
I swallow a mouthful of wine to buy some time. No good can come of being honest. It wouldn’t have made her mine back then, and it won’t make her mine now. Jude was far from perfect and maybe he didn’t deserve her, but he doesn’t deserve to be stabbed in the back by his best friend for it.
“I thought we were supposed to be talking about whether or not I’ve ever been in love,” I change the subject. “Wasn’t that the original question at hand?”
“That was the original original question. The question we were going to discuss tonight was what you really thought of me back in the day,” she says.
She got me with that one.
“You must be one hell of a lawyer.” She tilts her wineglass toward me. “The way you tap dance around questions so effortlessly.” Leaning forward, she drinks me in. “That head of yours has always fascinated me.” Jovie’s full lips tug up at the side. “I never had to wonder what Jude was thinking—he wore all of his emotions on his sleeve. What I saw was what I got with him. But with you …” her voice trails and her eyes grow distant. “I probably thought about you way more than I had any business thinking about my boyfriend’s best friend.”
My stomach flips.
“What do you mean?” I can’t help but ask that question because I may not ever get the chance again.
“Didn’t you ever wonder?” Her eyes flick to mine. “I just … I met you before him—even though you claim you don’t remember—and I’ve always wondered what if I never would’ve met him that night?”
“You’ve … always … wondered that?”
