CHAPTER Twenty-five
“This isn’t what you think!” Kacey managed to grab a nearby towel and cover her nakedness, though it was hard to see the point of it all, considering both men had both openly gaped at her. There had to be something ethically, or at least religiously, wrong with two brothers ogling one woman’s goodies in the bathroom.
“Oh?” Jake crossed his arms. “Because you don’t want to know what I think right now. How could you!” He shoved Travis against the wall.
“How could I?” Travis roared. “What the hell kind of question is that? When you’ve been running around this weekend screwing everything with a skirt?”
“One time!” Jake shouted.
“You’re supposed to be pretending to be engaged!”
“It doesn’t even matter anymore!” Jake pushed him against the wall again, his arm coming up beneath his chin. Obviously Travis was letting him, considering Jake was younger and clearly not as strong as Travis.
“Why the hell not?” Travis voice was strained.
“Grandma didn’t say! She just wanted Kacey back! Besides, she knows we aren’t engaged, alright? I did it for my reputation. Apparently dating strippers is bad for the company. It was the board’s idea anyway. It’s a win-win! I needed to save my reputation, so we pretended to be engaged. Do you think I want to be married?”
Kacey stood there stunned. She knew the marriage wasn’t real, but for some reason his words still stung, as if he was breaking up with her all over again. And what was worse was that she was watching the entire exchange almost naked.
“What was the point of bringing her down here if it wasn’t real anyway? And why was Grandma faking a stroke!” Travis shoved Jake, causing him to fall onto the floor with a thud.
“How should I know? I was being the dutiful grandson!” Jake pointed at himself and sneered.
“Um, guys?” Kacey raised her hand.
“Not now!” they yelled in unison.
“Guys.”
They ignored her and continued to fight over whether or not Grandma was sick, Jake was lying, and why it was so important to bribe Kacey to come down to Portland. All in all, it was the worst five minutes of her life.
And then…
Bets, Wescott, and Grandma burst into the room.
Lovely.
Kacey prayed for lightning to strike.
No such luck.
“What is the meaning of this?” Wescott roared then turned a bright purple when he glanced at Kacey in the towel.
“She was naked!” Jake pointed to Kacey.
Travis rolled his eyes. “In the shower, where people usually are naked.”
Jake sneered. “And you were staring at her because you find human anatomy fascinating?”
Travis lunged for Jake’s throat, but Wescott pushed between the two. “Stop! Now I don’t know what has you boys so upset, but you’re adults. Sit down and discuss it. Don’t start throwing punches, especially when Kacey’s standing there in nothing but a towel.”
Both Travis’s and Jake’s eyes flashed to her. She wanted to die of embarrassment.
“I’ll just, um… I’ll be in my, or his…” She pointed to Travis and shook her head. “…The guest room.”
****
Travis was shaking with rage. It didn’t help that every time he closed his eyes to try to calm himself down all he saw were mental images of Kacey without any clothes, standing in his bathroom.
Jake was grumbling next to him.
“Both of you,” Wescott said, pointing. “Speak. Now.”
“At the same time?” Jake sneered.
“Smart ass,” Travis muttered.
Grandma stood behind their father, her arms folded. A tiny smile formed across her lips.
“I’ll take it from here, Wescott,” she instructed.
Their father lifted his hands in the air and walked out, pulling their mother with him.
“Listen here!” Grandma snapped, making both men jump. “I needed Kacey to come down here and that’s my business and mine alone. I told Jake to bribe her if necessary. Obviously he used my stroke as an excuse as well as money, which was fine by me, as I plan on leaving that girl an inheritance anyway. Though I’m honestly disappointed that Jake used a fake engagement to save face in front of the board. Grow a pair, son.”
Travis opened his mouth to speak.
“Don’t,” she snapped. “I’ll deal with you later, Travis, but right now my scorn is for your little brother.” He tried not to look pleased when Grandma’s eyes blazed in Jake’s direction.
“How could you! I asked one simple task of you, and you’re running around lifting skirts!”
Travis cleared his throat. “In his defense, some of the girls were wearing pants.”
Jake glared.
Grandma continued to lecture. “Now, Jake, I think it’s safe to say you’ve made a mess of things, especially in front of Kacey. I want you to pack up your things and stay the night in the condo downtown. You don’t fly out until Monday, and that will give me adequate time to do damage control with your parents. Besides, from the looks of it, the newspapers have enough photographs of you two running about that they’ll be satisfied you’re settling down.”
Travis was only half-listening. He still didn’t understand why they needed the pretense of a fake engagement. If Grandma wasn’t dying, the only people who were getting duped were his parents and Kacey. Well, them and the rest of the Twitterverse who followed Jake’s updates religiously.
Grandma said some more choice words to Jake and told him to leave.
He did, much like a dog with his tail between his legs.
“And you!” Grandma poked him in the chest. “I was counting on you!”
“Counting on me?”
“Yes, you fool! I gave you every opportunity, and you were doing so well the other night!” Grandma plopped onto the bed next to him. “Do you know how difficult it is to fake a stroke when you’re in your prime? If I have to lie down one more time…”
“Pardon?” Was she insane?
“You’ve loved her a long time, my boy.” His hands began to shake in his lap as his Grandma patted his back. “I know it was hard for you growing up, and no girl has piqued your interest since. I just thought, well… I thought having her here with your brother would make you jealous enough to finally do something about it.”
“Well, you got the jealous part right. You’re lucky I didn’t kill him the other night when I punched him.”
Grandma shook her head, and suddenly Travis felt like she was very frail. “What aren’t you telling me, Grandma?”
A little tear ran down her cheek, but she pushed it away with her wrinkled hand. “I haven’t given up on Jake, so don’t for a second think that, but you, you’re different.” She looked up, her eyes glassy. “You remind me of your grandfather so much, Travis. You need a good strong woman, a good woman by your side. I think Kacey is that woman. I’ve always thought so and now I know it. Do yourself a favor and talk to her.”
Travis laughed bitterly. “And say what exactly? That I’m in love with her and have been for as long as I can remember? Beg her to not love my brother, but love me, be with me?”
“That’s a start,” his grandma said. “Besides, there is something neither of you boys know.”
“Oh?”
“Kacey was like a granddaughter to me. I’ve kept in touch with her as much as possible over the years, though I admit I’ve been lazy in my writing. These old hands don’t work as well as they used to.” She leaned her head on his shoulder. “When her parents died… Oh Travis, it was the worst tragedy. She became a shell of the girl I once knew. I figured if I let her heal and deal with it on her own, she’d find her way back. I knew her well enough to know that if I coddled her, she’d push away. It didn’t help matters that Jake lied to all of us about how close they truly were these past four years.”
Travis’s blood ran cold. “I figured. I mean, she hinted as much earlier.”
“Oh honey, Jake and Kacey haven’t spoken in years. He kept tabs on her, but they never got together. Ever since her parents’ death she’s been nothing but a childhood friend, an acquaintance. I used to send her newspaper clippings from her parents’ business, but I don’t know if she ever truly read them or looked. It was as if she died right along with them.”
“That explains a lot.” He was suddenly sick with worry. What the hell had really happened between those two? It couldn’t have been just her parents’ death. No. There was something else, some underlying tension.
“In their will they named me her guardian.”
“I’m sorry, what?” Travis was sure he wasn’t hearing his grandmother correctly.
Grandma chuckled. “I’m her legal guardian. Naturally she’s an adult now, so it hardly matters. They drew up the papers when she was still quite small. But Kacey is just as much mine as she was theirs. I’ve always watched out for her, always wanted what was best for her, and in my mind the best was for her to be part of our family.”
“Just not by way of Jake?” Travis nudged his grandmother.
“Heavens, no.” She chuckled. “Kacey knew there was something going on, knew I wasn’t really sick. I told her to use this time to find herself, and I think she was beginning to.”
“Until I kept screwing it up?” Travis asked.
“I wouldn’t say you screwed it up, but you did make a mess of things. You’re so hot and cold around her. But I’ll tell you what, I’ll give you exactly twenty-four hours alone with the girl to figure things out.”
Travis laughed and reached behind his neck to rub a sore spot. “Yeah, and how are you going to do that?”
She rose to her full height and pulled at her tight jacket. “I’m Grandma. I can do anything I want.”
The woman had a point.
“Be happy, Travis.” She kissed his nose and walked toward the door. “Your parents and I will be gone within the hour. I hear the cottage at Seaside is lovely this time of year. I may even take pity on your brother and let him tag along rather than rot in that dratted condo downtown.”
Travis lay back against the bed and stared at the ceiling.
Manipulative little thing, his grandma. To think she went to such extremes just because she wanted him to be happy, well, him and Kacey.
He wasn’t sure how long he stared at the ceiling fan, but it was a while before he managed to jump in the shower and get ready for the day.
Travis bounded down the hall. The house was eerily quiet. He silently hoped Kacey hadn’t somehow run off, leaving him alone in the house.
He knocked on her door.
No answer.
He knocked again then pushed it open.
Her bags were still in the room but she wasn’t there. Her perfume, however, danced off the walls, filling his nose with her scent. Great, now he’d be uncomfortable for the entire search.
“Kacey?” he called as he went down the stairs. He went into the living room, the kitchen… Where was she?
The door to the patio was open. He went outside and called for her again.
“I’m in here!” she answered, then waved from the tree house.
Of course she was. If he would have been thinking rationally, he would have realized that the first place to look should have been the tree house.
Whenever she’d had a bad day at school she would rush over to their house, drop her backpack onto the kitchen counter, snatch a cookie from the jar, and climb up into the tree house.
Sometimes it was hours before she’d emerge.
But when she did, Kacey was always happier, as if the day at school no longer mattered.
He sighed and climbed slowly up the ladder until he pulled himself up into the tree house.
Kacey was sitting in the corner, her arms wrapped around her knees.
“Sorry.” She bit down on her lip and sighed. “I just needed to think, so I came out here.”
“Yeah well, that makes two of us. I don’t suppose you snatched cookies from the kitchen too?”
She reached to her side and pulled out a baggie with three chocolate chip cookies. “Of course.”
He took one from the bag and smiled. “Kace.”
She looked up.
“I had a really good speech for you. I mean, it was fantastic — something that would bring you to tears…”
“No doubt,” she agreed, taking a bite of her cookie.
“But sitting here, looking at you, all I really want to do is kiss you and make the sadness go away. I know what happened earlier was awkward, but I hope your feelings weren’t hurt. What Jake said was…”
Kacey laughed. “What Jake said was exactly what I would expect. I know he doesn’t want to get married, and we both know I’m not insane enough to want to marry him either.”
Travis exhaled in relief.
“But…” Kacey shook her head.
He didn’t like the sound of her voice.
“…But, I don’t know. It hurts all over again for some reason. Isn’t that silly?”
He knew he probably wasn’t going to get another opportunity, so he asked, “What happened between you two?”
Her face froze, and her breathing threatened to stop. “He, um…” She nervously pushed away hair from her face and bit her lip. “We… had…” A tear ran down her cheek.
Alarmed, Travis grasped her wrists and pulled her into his lap, rocking her back and forth. “What? Tell me.” He rubbed her arms with his hands.
“We slept together.”
His heart stopped. Anger and frustration as well as jealousy jerked through his body with such force he wasn’t sure if he wanted to go shoot his brother or blame himself, even though it wasn’t his fault. Still he felt responsible for Kacey. He always had.
“In college?” He was thankful he was able to ask without screaming.
She nodded in his arms. “It was horrible.”
Thank God.
“We were still so young, and it was a stupid mistake, and we both felt so bad and stupid. It was so confusing! The next morning all I wanted to do was call my best friend, but he wasn’t my best friend anymore. I didn’t know what he was, and then that next day was when your parents called to tell me that Mom and Dad had had an accident. I couldn’t tell anyone. I felt so ashamed.” She began to softly cry in his arms, as he kissed her hair and rocked her.
****
Kacey wasn’t sure why she was spilling her deepest secrets to Travis, but it seemed time to let everything out into the open. She was tired of keeping it inside, tired of trying to be strong when really she felt so scared and weak most of the time.
“I tried calling him, but he wouldn’t answer his phone. Finally someone picked up. It was a girl.”
Travis cursed under his breath.
“Nothing was the same. He hugged me and said he was sorry about my parents, and that was it. We never talked about it. We never fixed what we broke, so we just slowly grew apart as if we hadn’t caused this giant divide in what had been a lifelong friendship. He was the only tie I had to your family, so when he pushed me away, I felt… I felt like an orphan.”
She began to sob harder into his chest. He whispered encouragement into her ear. “I would have died that year without Grandma.”
“What do you mean without Grandma?”
Kacey smiled despite her tears. “Remember that summer she said she was touring the United States?”
He chuckled. “Oh yes, I received a postcard every other week.”
“Well, those postcards were bought at a bookstore, and Grandma spent the entire summer with me.”
“What?”
“Yup.” Kacey wiped more tears away and smiled. “She saved me, said she’d always be there for me and take care of me. That’s why it was so weird when she stopped writing last month, and then Jake came in with this huge story about how she was sick and dying and… well, I had to come even if it meant I was manipulating everyone to do so.”
“I understand.” Travis used his thumb to wipe an escaped tear from her cheek. Kacey’s breath hitched. Her eyes glanced at his lips then back up to his gaze.
“Kace…” His lips descended slowly, even though his body was going a hundred miles an hour. “I’m going to kiss you now.”
“Okay.”