Man, Jake thought, this sucked. And it hurt like hell.
In his maudlin state of inebriation, Jake barely heard the phone ring. He heard it ring several times before he could actually focus on it, stumbling across the room to get it, stubbing his bare toe in the process. “Yeah!” he barked, holding his toe, hopping precariously on one foot.
“Jacob? What in the Sam Hill is the matter with you?”
Great. Mom. “Nothing.” He put his foot down. “What’s up? Is Cole still moping about the trip?”
“How would I know?” she said sharply. “He ain’t here to tell me.”
Jake jabbed a finger in his eye, tried to clear his murky thoughts. “What do you mean, he’s not there?”
“I mean, after you left, he didn’t come down when I called him. He’s run off again.”
Shit. “All right, all right,” Jake said, grimacing at the weight of his head. “I’ll be over soon.” He hung up before his mom could say anything like, I told you so, and headed for the shower to sober up.
When Evan arrived to pick Robin up the next morning, she was wearing her darkest Ray-Bans. As the driver took her bag, he peered at her. “Are you all right?”
She nodded, walked past him to where the driver was holding the door open for her. The truth was she wasn’t all right at all, and in fact, was suffering from a killer hangover. Not the alcohol kind, more the pity—but the dream kind.
That was because what little fits of sleep she had been able to get had been tortured by dreams of Jake, dreams of Jake leaving, of Jake hating her, of Jake running from her. All of them too vague to be remembered with any clarity, but brutal just the same. Robin had sobbed in her sleep, had wept huge, invisible tears until she could barely open her eyes this morning.
And then, because she didn’t feel sufficiently tortured, she debated calling him, had picked up the phone twice, only to put it down again. After all, what could she say? He was right, of course—she was afraid of commitment, afraid of failing, afraid of losing. Afraid to feel. Jesus, Dr. Phil would think he had died and gone to heaven with a head case like her. Maybe that wasn’t such a bad idea because Robin sure as hell couldn’t figure herself out. The only thing she knew with any certainty was that she was sick with grief.
With Evan sitting uncomfortably close, the limo pulled out onto the boulevard and headed west. Evan put his hand on her knee. “What’s wrong, Robbie? Don’t you feel well?”
“I’m okay.” Liar. Not okay, not even close to okay—too screwed up to ever be okay.
“You look pale.”
Robin looked away from Evan, stared out the window, blind to the mansions, the greenbelt, the tennis courts rolling past, blind to everything but her stupid mistake. “I’m okay. Just tired,” she lied again. God, she really had screwed this up, hadn’t she? That thing she had been searching for had been found, right there in Jake, and she had acted like it didn’t matter, wasn’t important. I wish you soft beds with clean sheets. . . .
Robin closed her eyes, squeezed back the burn in her eyes. Those heartfelt words, so simple, worth so much more than anything she could ever own. It was like opening a door to the morning sun, a sensation so beautiful that it was almost blinding at times.
“I spoke to Michael last night. He just got back from Toronto and said there was a great little Italian restaurant there with the best food he’s had in a long time. We were talking about flying up in a couple of weeks.”
Whatever.
“Think you could make it?”
God, was he insane? No, actually, he was just like she was a scant five million years ago. Robin glanced at Evan from the corner of her eye. “No. I can’t.”
Evan shrugged. “Just thought I’d ask. But I think I’ll wait until you’ve had a cup of coffee before I ask anything else.”
If he thought she would object, he was wrong. They rode in silence until they turned onto a major thoroughfare that led to Hobby Airport. “Almost there,” Evan said and patted her knee, and Robin suddenly felt like a child. He really had a knack for making her feel that way, didn’t he?
The limo came to a stop at the terminal; the driver opened Robin’s door and she made herself get out. Evan grabbed her bag before she could reach it, but Robin stubbornly took it from him. “I can do it,” she said icily and hoisted it over her shoulder. Small victories with Evan were everything.
“I know, I know,” Evan said with a smirk and a roll of his eyes, and with his hand riding possessively on the small of her back, he began to navigate their way through the crowded terminal, dodging children and grandparents and business passengers who weren’t lucky enough to have their own plane.