I’m still in a state of shock at having been in the same room with him, breathing the same air, so close that I could see the small scar by his right eye that I used to run my finger over. I honestly never thought I’d see him again. When he left, it was like he had died. One day he was here and we were planning our future and the next, he was gone. All of his things had been removed from our house while I was at work, and it was like he had never even been there to begin with. I felt like the military wife who got that dreaded visit from the chaplain notifying me my man was missing in action. Nothing to bury, nothing to mourn, just a giant, gaping hole where he used to be. Instead of accepting his absence and moving on, I let anger and confusion fester inside of me until just thinking about Cole made me want to scream.
“You know there’s one glaringly obviously suspect in all of this, right?” Parker asks, bringing me out of my thoughts. “This stinks of something the She-Devil would do.”
I shake my head in disagreement. “Cole’s mother would never do something like this. She made it quite obvious that she wanted me as far away from Cole as possible, which begs the question: how in the hell did I get assigned to Cole at all? She has her hand in every single part of that family’s life. There’s no way she didn’t do her research on the temp agency and run a thorough background check on whichever nurse they told her they were sending. She would’ve put the kibosh on that as soon as she saw my name. I wouldn’t have been allowed through the gates if she knew I was the nurse assigned to him.”
Parker looks away from me and raises an eyebrow at Garrett. “What about Charles?”
“Cole’s dad?” Garrett questions. “Last I heard, he was forced into early retirement because he started making careless mistakes his wife wasn’t able to cover up anymore. The way it sounded to me, I’d guess dementia or early onset Alzheimer’s, but the press release issued by the hospital gave the standard ‘he’s ready to relax and enjoy his family.’ I don’t see him having the mental capacity to organize something like this right under his wife’s nose.”
I’d met Charles Vargas the same day I’d met his wife. He was a tall, handsome man in his early sixties with salt and pepper hair. I could easily imagine Cole looking exactly like him when he got older. While Vivien assessed me with a shrewd, cold gaze, Charles had an easy smile and was extremely polite—until his wife gave him the look, whereupon his kind eyes would immediately cloud over and his laidback nature turned stiff and detached.
In the public eye, Charles Vargas was the head of the household, but Vivien ran that family with an iron fist behind closed doors. Aside from a few offhand comments about how they never agreed with his decision to join the military, Cole didn’t speak about his parents much, but it only took one hour at the dinner table to figure out how things worked in that family.
“If anyone meddled to get you assigned to Cole, I’d say it was Caroline. She’s always been one to defy her mother and do whatever the hell she wants,” Garrett explains.
I always hoped that Caroline and I would be close. Cole’s younger sister was a little flighty and sometimes a little too dependent on Cole, but he clearly adored her and I thought maybe she could be the one person in that family who’d be on my side. For a time, she was. Cole and I made it a point to spend time with her when she was in town and she always joked about how we were so cute together she could puke and how she couldn’t wait to hold one of Cole’s babies.
I feel the pain begin to roll through me and I have to change the direction of my thoughts before I break down in the middle of Parker and Garrett’s living room.
It’s my own fault that Caroline and I didn’t keep in touch after Cole left. She came to visit me in the hospital and she tried in her own way to be there for me, but I didn’t want anything to do with her. Her presence was a reminder of Cole and everything I’d lost, so I pushed her away, telling her I didn’t want anything to do with her, her parents or her brother ever again. The Vargas family was to blame for the downward spiral my life took, the reason I’d lost everything, and I just didn’t have forgiveness in me at the time.
Thinking back on how overly supportive Caroline was of my relationship with Cole, I wonder if she somehow orchestrated this whole thing as a way to make up for the turmoil her family caused. Cole used to tell me stories about how Caroline wreaked havoc on her family’s good name by pulling one stunt after another and how it amused him that their mother was unable to reel her in. Caroline would almost certainly know Vivien was researching the temp agency and could easily sneak in and change things up without her mother knowing. The more I thought about it, the more the idea made perfect sense. Caroline would like nothing more than to pull the wool over her mother’s eyes and do something she knew would piss Vivien off. She got great joy out of pushing her mother’s buttons.
“It has to be Caroline,” I tell them. “Nothing else makes sense.”
Parker nods, reaching for the bottle of wine and topping off my glass. “Alright, now that we have that settled, what are you going to do?”
I don’t know how to answer that question. I’ve always believed the anger and resentment built up towards Cole would make it easy to walk away from him and never look back. Now, I’m not so sure. Seeing him again was like ripping off a Band-Aid before the cut was good and healed. Cole’s return had picked the scab off of the wound his leaving left behind. I needed to cover it back up before the blood poured out of me until there was nothing left.
Lifting my face, Garrett and I lock eyes.
“Why did he leave?” I whisper. “Why did he think he didn’t deserve what I gave him?”
Garrett leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees and clasping his hands together between them. “Hon, I can’t give you the answers you need. Even if I knew about all of the demons in that guy’s head, it’s not my story to tell. I know you didn’t want to hear this before and, believe me, I understand. You had every right to be hurt by the way he left, but I want you to listen to me right now: He had his reasons. I know they don’t make sense to you. Shit, they barely make sense to me and I’ve been where he’s been. All I’m saying is, give him a chance to explain.”
As I lie in bed later that night, a voicemail from the nursing agency left unreturned, I think about what Garrett said. I’ve been trying to let go of the anger and the resentment and finally move on, but the only way I can do that is to give Cole a chance to explain. It won’t heal the scars, but maybe it will finally stop the bleeding.
I DROVE PAST the house twice before I realized why—no more yellow door. The front porch and the shutters were still white, the siding still dark blue and the green, aluminum mailbox perched on the porch railing still had the giant dent from the time I attempted to teach Olivia how to properly swing a bat after we’d joined a softball league. She’d shuffled her feet too much when she swung and accidentally slammed the metal bat right into it, sending that damn mailbox flying ass over end into the middle of the front yard. I had never laughed so hard in my life.
“You might turn out to be our secret weapon this year. As long as the other team pitches mailboxes at you, we might actually win a few games,” I joked as Olivia came back up to the porch after retrieving the caved-in mailbox.
“Ha, ha. Very funny.”
She rested the mailbox back in its place on top of the railing and stood back, cocking her head to the side as she stared at it. “It’s not too bad. I could put a potted plant on the railing next to it and no one would even know.”
Coming up behind her, I slid my arms around her waist and rested my chin on her shoulder. “Or, I could just run to the hardware store and pick up a new one. We’ll just have to make sure batting practice takes place at least a hundred yards away from any type of solid object you could come in contact with.”
Her body shook lightly with her laughter and she turned around in my arms to face me. Sliding her hands up my chest and over my shoulders, she clasped her fingers behind my neck. “You are not replacing this mailbox. It has c
haracter now. And every time we look at it, we’ll remember this day. You’ll also be reminded to never piss me off when I have a bat in my hand.”
The bittersweet memory plays in my mind as I park at the curb and hobble up the walk on my crutches, trying not to wince in pain every time my leg is jarred. The doctor told me I shouldn’t drive for a few weeks, but it’s not like I need my bum leg to drive the car, so I assumed that was just a suggestion on his part. I’m pretty sure the warning about staying off the leg completely for a week was legit, but I can’t afford to waste any more time sitting around with my thumb up my ass. I’ve wasted enough time with Olivia as it is.
Climbing the porch steps is no easy feat, and I rest for a few seconds when I finally reach the top, leaning on my crutches to catch my breath as I stare at the front door. The bright, happy yellow has been painted over and the dark, ugly brown brings my earlier joy at finally having a plan of action down a few notches. It sounds stupid, but that yellow door represented everything about the life I was trying to lead. Every time I came home and saw that door, I forgot about the blood, the death, the rapport of assault rifles and the screams of pain. When I looked at that sunny yellow, I saw hope, happiness and a bright future. Everything I’d ever wanted and needed was behind that door.
The whole way over, I thought about my last encounter with Olivia, trying to figure out what I could do differently this time to calm her down and convince her to give me a chance to explain things. Seeing her for the first time after all those long, lonely nights, my good intentions had flown right out the damn window. I just wanted to drink in the sight of her, tell her how much I missed her and how fucking beautiful she was. After the way I abandoned her, I should have realized she’d be pissed and platitudes and bullshit excuses were the last things she’d want to hear. It’s going to take time to make her understand why I had to leave and I’m going to have to be patient. I can’t rush this.
Right now, my focus is on getting her to come back as my nurse. I need to convince her that she’s the only one who can do this job without her realizing I’m tricking her into spending more time with me. I feel slightly guilty about deceiving her, but I console myself with the knowledge that it’s for a good cause. This time, I’m playing for keeps. I will not hold anything back when it comes to my past. She’s going to see everything—the good, the bad and the really fucking ugly. Let’s just hope I have what it takes to pull a little reverse psychology on her.
Taking a few calming breaths, I put all my weight on my good leg and knock on the door. There’s no answer after a few minutes so I knock again, louder this time. I hear a muffled “The door’s open!” from inside. As I turn the handle and shove the door open wide enough to maneuver myself and the crutches through the doorway, I start to reprimand Olivia for leaving her door unlocked and for not checking to see who knocked. The words die on my lips when I see her rush down the hallway wearing nothing but a towel that barely covers her. As she busily dries her hair with a hand towel, I stare in wonder at the paths created by the droplets of water falling onto her shoulders and chest.
“Don’t kill me, Parker, I’m running late. I swear—”
She stops abruptly when she sees me, the hand towel falling to the floor.
“What the hell are you doing here?” she screeches, cinching the towel that was precariously close to falling off just a few seconds ago tighter around her body.
It takes a minute for my mangled brain to form a sentence. The only thing I see, the only thing I can think about is all the smooth skin under that towel. The upper swells of her soft, firm tits are peeking out of the top and she’s trying hard to cover them up, but every upward tug of the towel puts more bare thigh on display, so she hastily pulls at the bottom, as well. Up, down, up, down. She’s battling with the meager material to conceal her body, but it’s just making things worse.
All that damp, bare skin on display makes my hands itch to run themselves up those thighs and my mouth water at the thought of licking every inch of her tits. Nine months in the Dominican plus three months spent in and out of hospitals stateside equals one year since I’ve felt this woman beneath me. Twelve dark, lonely months spent alone with only my memories of Olivia to jerk-off to. Now she’s here, mere feet away from me, the smell of her skin billowing around me, the scent of coconut burning into my brain and acting like an accelerant for my dick. I’m so fucking hard that my dick hurts worse than my knee right now.
I shift my body as best I can on my crutches and try not to wince as my hard-on rubs up against the front of my jeans.
“You painted over the door.”
I inwardly cringe at the gruff words that come out of my mouth. Olivia is staring at me like she wants to play with my intestines and that’s the best I can come up with?
Giving up on the notion of modesty, she quits tugging at the towel and crosses her arms over her chest. “I decided yellow was an ugly color for a door.”
I watch her eyes soften the tiniest bit as some of the anger goes out of her face. I wonder if she’s remembering the day we painted the door. I’d come back early from my run on the beach because a bunch of teenagers were goofing around, lighting off fireworks. At the first sounds of the POP-POP-POP of the Cherry Bombs, my heart felt like it would explode in my chest and I dove to the sand, covering my head with my hands. It took me a few minutes to realize what the fuck was going on and, by the time I stood up and brushed the sand off of me, my adrenaline was pumping so hard I knew finishing my eight mile run wouldn’t be enough to calm my nerves. I needed Olivia. I needed her soft, reassuring voice and the heat from her body to bring me back down to earth.
“Sorry to just show up like this,” I tell her with a shrug, hopping on my good leg to try and find a more comfortable way to stand.
Her eyes widen and she takes a few steps towards me. “Shit, your knee! You’re not supposed to be standing on that thing, are you? For God’s sake, sit down on the couch or something.”
She reaches out to grab my arm, but I shoo her away with my hand. It’s bad enough standing here within touching distance of her when she’s practically naked. If she puts her hands on me, I will toss my crutches across the room and pull her into my arms, fucked up knee be damned.
“It’s fine. It looks like you’re in a hurry to go somewhere, so I won’t take up much of your time.”
A flash of guilt washes over her face and she breaks eye contact, staring down at her feet instead of me. For a minute I wonder if she’s going on a date. She obviously thought I was Parker when I knocked on the door, but what if she’s doubling with Parker and Garrett? Jealously consumes me and I clench my fists tightly on the handles of the crutches. Why in the fuck did I tell her to move on when I left? In hindsight, it clearly wasn’t the smartest move, but I honestly never thought I would make it back alive from that mission and I wanted more than anything for her to be happy. Standing here now, faced with the possibility that she took my words to heart and made good on my request, has my guts in knots and my fist itching to go through the nearest wall.
“No, it’s okay. Parker must be running late to pick me up for dinner with her and Garrett and… um, Garrett. So… yeah,” she rambles, nervously crossing and uncrossing her arms in front of her.
Fuck.
Part of me wants to come right out and ask her if she has a date, but I’ve been nothing but an asshole where she’s concerned and, as much as I hate to admit it, it’s none of my business. Not yet, at least.
“Look, things didn’t go exactly the way I planned last week when you showed up at the house. I imagined a thousand different times what I would say to you when I saw you again and I guess I was too shocked for any of it to make sense. I’m not asking for you to forgive me. I know I haven’t earned that right. You came to the house for a reason—because someone hired you to be my nurse and help me get this fucking knee back in working order. I’m not going to lie; I’m not handling being a patient very well. I’ve been through a ton of nurses because they ca
n’t handle my attitude or my temper, and the agency refuses to send anyone else. Unless I want Caroline fumbling her way through physical therapy in between shopping trips and talking my ear off about some new fucking pair of shoes that are ‘to die for,’ you’re my only hope.”
I see a ghost of a smile curl up the corners of her mouth when I finish with my spiel.
“You’re my only hope?” she repeats back, raising one eyebrow. “Did you really just quote Star Wars to me?”
I laugh when I realize she’s right. “Hey, whatever works. But I know Star Wars isn’t your thing. I could try some girly shit like Dirty Dancing or that stupid Notebook movie you made me watch a million times.”
She lifts her palm up at me with a chuckle. “Please, God, no. You are not allowed to butcher my favorite movies.”
“How about a bribe? Would a bribe work? I’ll give you a blank check,” I tease.
Her smile immediately dies and her eyes cloud over, filling with tears. She blinks them away before they fall and takes a few steps back from me. I have no idea what the hell just happened, but I immediately want to apologize.”
“Liv—”
“I’ll be at your place tomorrow at 9 am so I can get a full rundown on the damage to your knee,” she interrupts, all business now. “I’ll make an assessment on your range of motion and then draft up a therapy plan for you to approve. After that, we’ll come up with a schedule. Also, it might be a good idea for you to give Garrett a call. You know, your best friend? I’m sure he’d be happy to know that you’re alive.”
She continues to walk backwards until she’s in the entrance to the hallway.
“I have to finish getting ready. Can you lock the door behind you, please?”
With that, she turns and disappears down the hallway. I hear the slam of the bedroom door a few seconds later and I let out the breath I’d been holding.