“Cookies, cupcakes, whatever you want.” She leaned back and blew an air kiss before jumping off the counter. “Jeez, KC, I know you needed help taste testing and all—what, with your lovely faces you make—but you’ve really got to stop keeping me from opening the store. You’re bad for my hips and business.”
“My faces when I eat sweets are a secret, Lee! Only you know about them!”
With a wink and a saucy smile, she was gone.
Well, she was the only one in Oregon who knew about them. I was teased relentlessly in pastry school for the faces I’d make whenever we tried our dishes, and Barb used to give a big belly laugh every time as well. Charles wouldn’t let me eat sweets in public because of those expressions, but he sure seemed to like them when we were alone. I shivered thinking about Charles and was glad that for eight months now I hadn’t had to pretend to not be swallowing back bile every time he kissed or touched me. I took a quick glance at the front of my bakery and smiled to myself before going to the back. For the first time in my life, I was exactly where I wanted to be.
Brody—May 4, 2015
“OLIVIA!” What the fuck is all this?
“Hmm?”
“Liv, come here.”
“What?” she snapped when she got into the living room.
I took a deep, calming breath and planted a smile on my face. “What’s all this?”
“It’s called furniture, Brody.” Her eyebrows rose. “You know, you sit on the couches, put drinks on the coffee table, put your feet up on the ottoman . . .”
“Cute, Liv, real cute. Where did it come from?”
“The furniture store,” she said slowly like she was talking to a child.
I huffed and gritted my teeth. “Olivia, where did you get the furniture and how much did it cost?”
“Do you not like it?”
“That’s not what I said, please answer my question.” Oh my God, I could only play this game with her so many times before I snapped. And I only had about another two minutes before I lost my calm tone.
“How could you not like it?” Tears instantly fell to her cheeks and I bit back a groan. “I bought them for you, it was only seven grand.”
Seven—seven grand. Only seven grand. “Olivia, where did you get seven grand?” Please God, please say from your father.
She sniffed and swiped at her eyes. “You just had five thousand sitting in the savings account, I had to do something with it!”
“Olivia! Are you—are you—damn it! You pulled this shit again?”
Her tears kept falling but she stopped sniffling. “How dare you! I did this for you!”
“Every time, Liv, every time I start saving money you go and blow it on something we don’t need! And now this time you spent an extra two thousand? I have to pay the mortgage in a week.”
“It was a gift, you could at least say thank you! Every time I buy something you get upset, at least I’m giving you something, all you’ve ever done is take from me.”
With that, she turned and stormed down the hall to her bedroom, leaving me crushed, aching, and once again so damn tired of this. I rubbed my chest where the constant dull ache was now stabbing and fell into one of the kitchen table chairs.
Not more than ten minutes later she was back and bouncing through the kitchen. “Hey, babe! What do you want for dinner?”
I wasn’t even surprised by this anymore; I’d just been waiting until she came back. “It’s after midnight, Liv, I’m not really hungry.”
“Did you already eat dinner? I’ll heat some of this up,” she murmured the last part to herself as she continued to pull take-out boxes out of the fridge.
“Yeah, earlier tonight.”
“Oh.” She slammed the fridge door shut and turned to look at me. “All right, I get it. I can’t have kids so I’m not good enough to heat up food for you. Yeah, fine, Brody. Feed your damn self.”
And here she goes again.
My wife hadn’t always been like this—and despite how it seems, she’s not crazy—and our relationship hadn’t been like this either. We’d been high-school sweethearts, and then I’d left for the army right after we graduated, and everything changed. I came back home to visit after a deployment, and though we had stayed together, Liv and I weren’t close anymore. I knew why she’d stayed with me, but I hadn’t cared either way: She was someone to come back to when I visited my family.
Her parents hated me, and they let me know it every time they saw me. I wasn’t good enough for their daughter because I wasn’t going to college and didn’t come from money like they had. My family wasn’t poor by any means; we’d grown up in a great house in a great neighborhood. But we weren’t dripping with money and we didn’t belong to the country club that Liv’s parents did. So apparently that meant we were trash. Olivia loved that her parents didn’t accept me, and I knew that was the only reason we’d stayed together as long as we had. But like I said, I didn’t mind.
I had had a year left in the army when my world changed. She’d called me crying, saying she was pregnant. I’d requested emergency leave as soon as we got off the phone and married her the minute I got home. Her parents were furious—hell, so were mine—but no way in hell was I going to let her go through that alone. I couldn’t take care of her like her parents did, but I’d take care of them the best I could.
It took a lot of people high up pulling strings, but I’d been able to get us a house on base for as soon as I had to get back. Only thing was, she’d refused to go to base with me. Basically said thanks for marrying her and she was going to stay with her parents until I decided I was done “playing navy.” Shit you not. And I wasn’t even in the navy.
I couldn’t get leave often, but even when I did, she still didn’t see me. Didn’t even try. When I asked her, she’d said, “What’s the point? We’re already married.”
Yeah. Married and I haven’t seen you since two days after the fact.
The only thing she had included me in was the baby. After every appointment she’d sent pictures of the ultrasound, and she’d let me help her pick out a name. I’d gotten the message the minute she went into labor, and received more pictures after he was delivered. The next time I got leave, she’d still refused to see me and wouldn’t let me see our son. Instead, I’d stood outside her parents’ house and called her only to find out that if I wanted to see either of them, I wouldn’t re-enlist and I’d move back to Jeston.
So that’s what I did: When it came time to re-enlist, I declined and moved back. Bought us a house, it wasn’t much and her dad let me know that all the time, but I’d bought it and that’s all that mattered. Once I had it furnished, I called her and she finally let me meet my son for the first time.
“Brody!” Olivia snapped, and I blinked away the memory of best day of my life. She held up her hand momentarily to show she was on the phone before continuing. “Daddy said he’d pay you back for the couches, since obviously with your pay you can’t afford what I need to be happy.”
My eyes narrowed. It was almost twelve thirty in the morning, and she was calling her dad to talk to him about the damn couches? I rubbed the sharp pain in my chest and pushed away from the table before standing up. “He can keep his money, I don’t want it. Good night, Olivia.”
“BABY, ARE YOU awake?”
I sat up in my bed less than an hour later and rubbed a hand over my face. “Uh, yeah. What’s up, Liv?”
“I’m so sorry!” She burst into tears and crumpled to the floor.
Aw hell. I hopped out of my bed and went over to her. Sliding down until I was sitting up against the wall, I pulled her onto my lap. “It’s okay, you just have to stop spending our money like that.”
“B-but the c-couch we had w-was three years old!”
“I know, and it was still a perfectly good couch,” I crooned softly. “Jus
t because your parents can refurnish their entire house every few years, doesn’t mean we can, all right?”
She nodded vigorously. “I just—I just needed something to do.”
I took a deep breath in and scrunched my face together as I prepared for what might happen next. I knew this could turn out bad again, but I had to try. “Maybe we should get a dog.”
“A dog? A damn dog? No! You can’t just give me a dog and make it all better, Brody!” She scrambled off my lap and sprinted down the hall, heading for her side of the house.
Yes, I said her side of the house. I normally don’t even see her because she prefers to spend her days at her parents’ house unless she’s in a mood like the one tonight. It usually lasts a week, as this one has, and we go through every emotion possible about fifteen times a day. I try to be patient with her because I know I’m the reason she’s like this, but after four and a half years of this constant happy-depressed-flirty-pissed-horny-sweet-flat-out-bitch roller coaster, I feel like I’m losing my damn mind. And what’s worse? As soon as we’re in public she’s normal Liv—not the Liv I fell in love with in high school, but the one who’s confident in herself and her parents’ money, and the one who will eat you alive if you cross her.
Her door slammed shut and I stood to stumble over to my bed, thankful again that I was able to buy a big enough house that we could have our own spaces. We’d been married for almost six years, and I could count on one hand the number of times we’d had sex in those years. We hadn’t even slept in the same bed since a month after I got back from the army.
As I tried to get comfortable enough to go back to sleep, I rubbed at the ache in my chest and prayed the nightmares stayed away.
Want more?
Read on for a peek at Molly McAdams’s
New York Times Bestseller
FORGIVING LIES
Chapter One
Rachel
“CANDICE, YOU NEED to focus. You have got to pass this final or they aren’t going to let you coach this summer.”
She snorted and her eyes went wide as she leaned even closer to the mirror and tried to re-create her snort. “Oh my God! Why didn’t you tell me how ugly I look when I do that!?”
I face-planted into the pillow and mumbled, “Oh dear Lord, this isn’t happening.” Lifting my head, I sent her a weak glare. “Snorts aren’t meant to be cute. Otherwise they wouldn’t be called something as awkward as ‘snort.’ ”
“But my—”
“Final, Candice. You need to study for your final.”
“I’m waiting on you,” she said in a singsong voice. “You’re supposed to be quizzing me.”
I loved Candice. I really did. Even though I currently wanted to wring her neck. She wasn’t just my best friend; she was like a sister to me and was the closest thing to family I had left. On the first day of kindergarten, a boy with glasses pushed me down on the playground. While he was still laughing at me, Candice grabbed his glasses and smashed them on the ground. That’s playground love. And since then we’ve never spent more than a handful of days apart.
By the time we started thinking about college, it was just assumed we would go away together. But then my parents died right before my senior year of high school started, and nothing seemed to matter anymore. They had gone on a weekend getaway with two partners from my dad’s law firm and their wives and were on their way home when the company jet’s engine failed and went down near Shaver Lake.
Candice’s family took me in without a second thought since the only relatives I had lived across the country and I hardly knew them; if it weren’t for them I don’t know how I would have made it through that time. They made sure I continued going to school, kept my grades up, and attempted to live as normal a life as possible. I no longer cared about graduating or going away to college, but because of them, I followed through with my plans of getting away and making my own life. I would forever be grateful to the Jenkins family.
I applied to every college Candice did and let her decide where we were going. She’d been a cheerleader for as long as I could remember, so it shouldn’t have surprised me when she decided on a university based on the football team and school spirit. And granted, she was given an amazing scholarship. But Texas? Really? She chose the University of Texas at Austin and started buying everything she found in that god-awful burnt-orange color. I wasn’t exactly thrilled to be a “Longhorn,” but whatever got me away from my hometown was fine by me . . . and I guess the University of Texas accomplished that.
When we first arrived I remember it felt like walking into a sauna, it was so hot and humid; of course the first thing Candice said was, “What am I going to do with my hair?!” Her hair had already begun frizzing, and not more than five minutes later she was rocking a fro. We got used to the humidity and crazy weather changes soon enough though, and to my surprise, I loved Texas. I had been expecting dirt roads, tumbleweeds, and cowboys—let me tell you, I had never been so happy to be wrong. Downtown Austin’s buildings reminded me of Los Angeles, and the city was unbelievably green everywhere and had lakes and rivers perfect for hanging out with friends. Oh, and I’d only seen a couple of cowboys in the almost three years we’d been there, not that I was complaining when I did. I had also worried when we arrived that with Candice’s new burnt-orange fetish, people were going to be able to spot us like Asian tourists at Disneyland. Thankfully, the majority of Austin was packed with UT Longhorn gear, and it was common to see a burnt-orange truck on the road.
Now we were a little less than two weeks away from finishing our junior year and I couldn’t wait for the time off. Normally we went to California to see Candice’s family during the winter and summer breaks, but she was working at a cheer camp for elementary-school girls that summer, so we were getting an apartment that we planned to keep as we finished our senior year.
That is, if we ever got Candice to pass this damn final.
Before I could even ask my first question, Candice gasped loudly. “Oh my God, the pores on my nose are huge.”
Grabbing the pillow under me, I launched it at her and failed miserably at hitting anything, including her. At least it got her attention. Her mouth snapped shut, she turned to look at the pillow lying a few feet from her, then she turned around with a huff to walk back to her desk.
Finally. “Okay, what is—”
“So are you ever going to go on a date with Blake?”
“Candice!”
“What?” She shot me an innocent look. “He’s been asking you out for a year!”
“This—you need—forget it.” I slammed the book shut and rolled off my bed, stretching quickly before going to drop the heavy book on my desk. “Forget it, we’ll just see if we can get our deposit on the apartment back. I swear to God, it’s like trying to study with a five-year-old.”
“You never answered my question.”
“What question?”
“Are you going to go on a date with Blake?”
I sighed and fell into the chair at my desk. “One, he’s your cousin. Two, he works for UT now; that’s just . . . kinda weird. Three, no.”
“It’s not like he’s your professor! He isn’t even a professor, period. And do you realize that if you marry him, we’ll actually be family?”
“Marry? Candice— Wait . . . how do you even jump from me going on a date with him to marrying him? I’m not going to marry your cousin; sorry. And I don’t care if he’s a professor or not, it doesn’t change the fact that he works for the school. Besides, he’s not even my type.”
“Not your type?” she said, deadpan, and one perfect blond eyebrow shot straight up. “I seem to remember you having the biggest crush on him when we were growing up. And I know he’s family, but I can still say that he’s gorgeous. I’m pretty sure he’s everyone’s type.”
I had to agree with her on
that. Blake West was tall, blond, and blue eyed and had a body like a god’s. One of these days he was going to show up on a Calvin Klein billboard. “I had a crush on him when we were thirteen. That was eight years ago.”
“But you had a crush on him for years. Years. You were devastated when he moved away.”
“And like I said, I was thirteen. I was ridiculous.”
Blake was five years older than Candice and me, but even so, all of my childhood memories included him. He was always at Candice’s house to hang out with her older brother, Eli, and we followed them everywhere. I’d viewed both Eli and Blake as awesome older brothers until the day Blake saved my life.
Okay, that’s a little dramatic. He didn’t actually save my life.
I was nine at the time; we’d been playing on a rope swing and jumping into a little lake not far from our houses. When I’d gone to jump, my foot slipped into the foot hole and I ended up swinging back toward land headfirst, screaming the whole way. Blake was standing on the bank and caught me, swinging me into his arms before I could make the trip back toward the water.
In that moment, he became my hero, and I fell in love. Or at least my nine-year-old version of love. My infatuation with him grew over the next few years, but he never saw me as anything other than his “little cousin’s best friend.” I’m sure if I’d been older, that would have been a blow to my ego, but I just kept following him around like I’d always done. When he graduated from high school, he immediately joined the air force and moved away from me. I remember throwing a few “my life is over” fits to Candice, but then I got boobs and hips and the other boys my age started noticing me. And then it was something along the lines of, “Blake who?”
He’d been out of the air force for four years now and had pretty much been off the grid until last fall, when he’d moved to Austin and started working at UT. Candice had flipped out over having her cousin near her again. And I’d just straight flipped out. But then I saw him. He looked like freakin’ Adonis standing there in his godlike, too-beautiful-for-his-own-good glory. Every straight female within a mile radius seemed to flock to him, and he loved every second of it.