Checking It Twice

chapter Four


Kevin gaped at Jana and Nick. It took several moments to realize his overactive imagination hadn’t conjured the fantasy that’d tormented him for the past few days.

“Kev?”

Nick’s baritone broke through Kevin’s trance. They locked gazes, and he read the wary uncertainty in Nick’s eyes. A lifetime ticked by. Every tense word they’d exchanged five years ago echoed inside his head with excruciating clarity. Countless times since then he’d wished for an opportunity to take them back, but now that he and Nick were standing face-to-face, the words refused to budge loose.

A distressed noise slipped from Jana as she dropped her hand. He noticed her rosy, kiss-swollen lips, the visual of Nick’s tongue in her mouth playing like a hypnotic reel through his memory. The sight of them kissing had hit him harder than a fist to his gut, even while his cock swelled to life. He didn’t know which of the two sensations disturbed him more.

“Do…do you two know each other?” Jana demanded. Her voice hitched with a shaky thread of bewilderment.

“Yeah, we do,” Nick replied, beating him to the punch. Shoving his hands in the pockets of his coat, Nick stepped forward, his expression still bearing that hint of trepidation while he focused on Kevin. “Good to see you.”

“Is it?” The question blurted free before he could stop it. A taunting barrage of those long-ago, not-so-forgotten angry words he and Nick hurtled at each other once again shouted inside his brain.

A flicker of some dark emotion skated across Nick’s features. The ghosts were there for him too. “Yeah, it is.” Somberness had replaced Nick’s typical grin, but his gruff sincerity left no doubt that he meant it.

A fraction of the tension eased from Kevin. At least until he glanced back at Jana. Then it returned with a vengeance.

What the hell was Nick doing here? And why had he been kissing Jana? Okay, that wasn’t too difficult to figure out. What red-blooded male wouldn’t kiss Jana if the opportunity presented itself?

Nick dragged a hand across his jaw, drawing Kevin’s attention to the five o’clock scruff growing there. That was new—Nick going for anything other than the suave, Greek-playboy look. The shadows under his eyes were new too. As were the haggard lines etched into his forehead. “This isn’t exactly how I pictured our reunion going, but I guess beggars can’t be choosers, eh?”

He blinked at Nick’s matter-of-fact tone. “Did you come here looking for me?”

“Amongst other things.” Nick’s attention drifted in Jana’s direction. A flare of heat simmered in his eyes before he carefully banked it. A blush crept across Jana’s cheeks as she tore her gaze from Nick’s.

The opposing tugs of envy and arousal competing for supremacy within Kevin made his teeth grind. He’d been the one to push her away. He had no right to these pangs of jealousy. Clearing his throat, he took a surreptitious step toward the exit. “Obviously I’m interrupting something here.” He forced himself to look Jana in the eye. “I’ll call you later.”

Ignoring the muffled curse that sprang from Nick, Kevin pivoted and strode through the doorway. He didn’t even make it to his SUV before Nick’s censorious voice hauled him short. “Still running, I see.”

His muscles tightening in preparation of the argument brewing on the horizon, he turned to face Nick. “Is that why you came looking for me? To beat a dead horse into the ground?”

“No, I came to apologize.” Nick’s fierce expression softened. “And because I miss my best friend.”

A familiar pain pinched his heart. Nick was the brother he’d wished for during those loneliest periods of his childhood. It still shamed him the way he’d walked out on their friendship. They say you always hurt the ones you love most. He was living proof of that, time after time.

Hunching his shoulders against the bracing wind howling through the lot, Nick stepped down from the curb and joined him next to the driver’s side door. “We shouldn’t have left things the way we did.”

Kevin’s focus involuntarily trekked to the window of Jana’s shop. He could see her pretending to rearrange lingerie on one of the racks while she covertly watched them. The taunting image of her and Nick locked in their passionate embrace refused to give his mind a rest. He returned his scrutiny to Nick. “I take it things didn’t work out with you and Heather.”

“I told you it wouldn’t. There was nothing there between us without you. At least not for me.”

Renewed shame cycloned in his gut. It was bad enough he’d hurt Heather on his own. If he’d never introduced her to Nick, she wouldn’t have suffered through two heartbreaks. He couldn’t fault Nick for bowing out of the relationship after he left. Nick had never been anything but honest about his feelings for Heather. Hell, he’d reiterated during their fight five years ago that he didn’t have it in him to return Heather’s love, but Kevin had been too haunted by his own demons at the time to accept that truth.

Nick glanced over his shoulder toward the shop. “You’re doing it all over again, aren’t you? Running from someone who’s getting too close.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Drop the bullshit act. I f*cking know you better than you know yourself.” Lines of frustration bracketed Nick’s mouth. “Jana’s in love with you. You know that, right?”

The queasiness in his stomach intensified.

Nick blew out a heavy breath. “Of course you do. Which explains why you’re pushing her away.”

“I’m not discussing this with you.”

Nick continued to wear his bulldog expression. “You’ve fallen for her, and it scares the shit out of you.”

“Goddamn it, I told you I’m not doing this.” He reached for the Navigator’s door handle.

“She’s not Heather. Or Madison.”

The mention of that last name delivered a more biting slap than the subzero windchill. He kept his focus pinned to the cold metal handle within his grip and willed the taunting whispers of his inner demons into submission. The bitter residue of his tainted past was a rancid taste in the back of his throat. “I know that.”

“Do you? For shit’s sake, man. When are you going to stop letting that bitch destroy your happiness?”

Without saying a word, he yanked open the door and climbed inside his vehicle. Nick grabbed the edge of the door before Kevin could slam it shut. “I didn’t come here to fight with you. Or talk about Madison.”

Clenching his keys in his fist, Kevin tore his attention from the windshield and glared at Nick. “Good. Because I don’t want to hear her name pass your lips again. Ever.” He’d never been sorrier about revealing his painful secret to Nick in a moment of drunken weakness back when they were in college. He knew Nick didn’t judge him for what had happened with Madison. If anything, Nick saw Kevin as the victim. But Nick also insisted that Kevin needed to exorcise the ugly demons of his past in order to heal. Kevin just wanted to forget.

Stubbornness furrowed Nick’s brow, but he didn’t argue. “I’m staying at the Townsend. I’d like it if we could get together before I head back to Chicago.”

Kevin frowned. “When did you move there?”

“Two years ago. There was nothing left for me in California, so I saw no point in staying.”

He glanced away from the accusation in Nick’s eyes. “I have tomorrow night off. We can meet then.”

A fraction of the mulishness eased from Nick’s features. He pulled his wallet from his coat pocket and removed a glossy business card. “My cell is the top number. Give me a call, and I’ll come pick you up from work.” After handing over the card, Nick released the doorframe, but not before delivering a final parting shot. “You’re crazy if you walk away from Jana.”

Setting his jaw, Kevin swung the door shut and keyed the ignition. Against his better judgment, his gaze sought out Jana. She still stood by the racks of lingerie, but she’d given up all pretenses of working and was instead staring at him with a mix of wistfulness and forlorn dejection.

A knife twisting in his chest, he backed out of the parking spot and beelined for the exit.