A second chance? At what? He was in love with Bliss. He wasn’t looking for someone else. “What were you hoping for exactly?”
He stared out at the water and gave a small lift of his shoulders. They were nice shoulders. Broad muscular shoulders. I was sure he got plenty of female attention. I was one of many. “I’d sworn off women for a while. Needed a break to clear my head. I was doing good too. I was focused. Getting things done. Running more. But then you walked in. I had been midsentence arguing over beer with my friends and I wasn’t able to look away. That hasn’t happened to me . . . in a long time.”
That almost eased the sting from him forgetting we’d had sex. Almost. It did help.
“I leave here soon. Probably tomorrow. At the latest Monday.”
He didn’t look pleased about that. “I know. You’ve got that adventure to experience. But while you’re here I’d like to be part of that adventure again. Maybe on your way back you might stop by and tell me how it all went. I just, I’d like to get to know you.”
There were a lot of things I could say here. But the only thing that came out of my mouth was “Okay.” I surprised myself with it.
The smile that crossed his chiseled face was nothing less than beautiful. He wasn’t hard on the eyes that was for sure. And he may be in love with an almost married woman, but he was kind. He’d drunk too much, that didn’t make him a jerk. I might have gotten completely drunk too if I loved someone who wouldn’t ever feel the same way about me.
“What are your plans the rest of the evening?” he asked hopefully.
“I was going to decide my route, but that’s it. I haven’t spoken to Bliss and Nate. I don’t know what they were planning on doing.”
“It’s Saturday night. Come back to Live Bay with me. I’d like to enjoy dancing with you sober. Then we can take a walk I do remember. I’ll even buy you some bar food that you can eat with flatware. It’ll amuse my friends and possibly charm them the way it did me.”
He was very good with words. I was smiling despite everything else. “If Nate and Bliss don’t have plans where I am involved, that would be nice. Let me check with them first.”
He nodded to the notebook in my lap. “Is that your adventure?”
“Yes,” I replied feeling a little embarrassed.
“Where is the next stop?”
“Nashville or New Orleans,” I told him.
His eyebrows shot up. “New Orleans is dangerous for a girl traveling alone.”
I’d already considered that. “I know. But what is an adventure without danger?”
“You want to live to tell about it.”
I did. “I’m just thinking about it. The idea for this trip was to take off and not have a plan. But I like to know where I’m headed.”
“I’m glad this was your first stop.”
Maybe I was too.
Eli Hardy
LILA TEXTED ME two hours later to tell me she was free tonight. I told her I’d pick her up at six and feed her, and then we’d go dancing. The front part of Live Bay was an actual restaurant with good food.
When I knocked on Bliss’s door, it was the first time I didn’t have a knot of regret or sorrow in my stomach. I’d never been honest with her about my feelings, but now it was too late. She was happy and in love. She’d never looked at me the way she did Nate.
Bliss opened the door and gave me her usual bright smile. “I was just about to call you. Come in. I need to talk to you about something.”
She wasn’t aware I was here to pick up Lila apparently. It was normal for me to stop by. Although not this frequently. “Okay,” I said walking inside the door and scanning for any sign of Lila.
“I’ve been battling something,” she laughed then. “Nate said I can do what I want. It’s our wedding, and we don’t believe in rules. I like that idea. No rules. Do it our way. You know?”
Bliss wanted to talk about her wedding? Seriously? I just nodded.
“Do you want a drink? I’ve got bottled water in the fridge,” she said sounding nervous.
“No. I’m good. Thanks,” I replied studying her. She was fidgeting. Like she was worried about what she had to tell me.
“Okay, well, you want to sit? We don’t have to stand here. I was just so anxious to talk to you after making my decision. Then you showed up, and I knew it was right.”
She had no idea I was here to pick up Lila. I glanced around again to see if Lila had heard us, but she was nowhere in sight.
“We can stand. I’m not here to stay awhile,” I told her.
She nodded. “Okay. Right. Okay,” she was babbling now like she only did when she was nervous. What the hell was wrong with her? How could anything having to do with her wedding affect me?
“I want you to be my best man,” she blurted.
“What?” came out of my mouth before I could stop myself.
“My best man. I don’t need a maid of honor. Who would that be anyway? You’re my best friend. So I should have a best man beside me. Not a maid of honor. You can’t very well wear a dress,” she laughed and then continued. “And you can’t stand on Nate’s side. You’re my friend. His dad is going to be his best man. I just . . . I want you to be a part of my big day. You’ve been a part of all my big events in life. This should be no different. I won’t have bridesmaids. We just decided on both having a best man. Then Jilly will be the flower girl of course. It sounds crazy, but it really isn’t. It makes sense. You know?”
As much as I understood what she was saying I didn’t think I could answer her. How was I supposed to stand up there and watch the girl I’d imagined I’d marry all my life marry someone else? When she had been sick, and I wasn’t sure if she’d survive, I’d feared we’d never get a chance to live a life together. Getting married. Having kids. But she had beat cancer. And she was going to get married. Just not to me. But she wanted me to watch it up close and personal.
Motherfucker.
“Please, think about it. This will make my day complete. Having you up there just sounds right.”
I had arrived without the knot in my stomach, but it was back now. Stronger than ever. “Yeah, okay, sure. I can do that.”
I don’t know how I managed to get the words out.
Bliss broke into a huge grin. “Thank you! This means the world to me.”
It meant a form of hell for me. But I didn’t say that. “Thanks for asking me.”
“I need to tell Nate.” She reached to pull her phone out, then her head snapped back up to look at me. “Wait, you came to see me. I took over the conversation. Were you just here to visit or did you need something?”
“Lila. I’m here to get Lila,” I replied still reeling from what I’d been asked.
That brought back her smile. “So you’re her plans for tonight. That’s wonderful.” And she meant it. Bliss wanted me to date someone. Find someone like she had. “Well, I’ll just go on up to my room and read until Nate gets home. Y’all have fun,” she said then gave me a quick hug. “Thanks again.”
I didn’t turn to watch her leave. I just stood there staring straight ahead. Letting this all sink in. I was so lost in my thoughts I didn’t hear the footsteps until Lila had walked right past me and toward the liquor cabinet. I watched as she opened it, then glanced back at me over her shoulder. “Vodka or tequila?”
“Vodka,” I replied.
“Good,” she said as she grabbed the bottle of Grey Goose and turned back to me. “Come on.” It sounded a lot like a command. I wasn’t sure what she was doing, but I followed her out the door and down to the beach. She kept walking once we hit the sand. My longer strides caught up to her.
“What are we doing?” I finally asked.
“Walking until we’re out of the view of the house,” was her response. The vodka bottle still in her hand.
“Okay,” that wasn’t exactly an explanation, but I kept walking with her. Another quarter of a mile and we reached a large log that had long since washed up. It was sitting up high and
away from the water.
She went to sit down, and I took the spot beside her. She opened the vodka and then took a long swig before handing it to me. “Here you need it more than I do,” she said.
I took it and drank because she was right. I did. But she didn’t know why.
“How long you been in love with her? Your whole life? Since you were kids or once you got older?”
Damn. “Is it that obvious?”
She shrugged. “No and yes. You look at her the way a man in love looks at a woman. But you don’t do it all the time. You’re careful. I just paid attention.”
I handed the bottle back to her. She took it and sighed. “That’s why I left,” she said as took another drink. I was impressed. I didn’t imagine Lila could drink straight vodka from the bottle. That didn’t fit her at all. But she wasn’t even wincing. I wondered if she would have been able to do the same with tequila. I realized what she said then. “You left because someone asked you to be in their wedding or because you love someone that doesn’t feel the same?”
“I grew up with him. Been thrown together since we were kids. I always thought he was exciting and fun. He always made me laugh. And then one day he kissed me. I knew I was in love with him. But he didn’t feel the same way.”
Shit. “Nate?” I asked thinking I might just hate him after all.
She jerked her head to look at me, and then let out a loud laugh. “God no! That’d be like incest. I mean we aren’t actually related, but it feels like it. Always has. Our dads were step brothers when they were younger. Their parents didn’t work out because Nate’s grandmother is a psycho. Anyway, they remained best friends even after their parents divorced.”
She handed the vodka back to me. “I get the unrequited love thing. I’m not in love with him anymore, though. What fragile feelings I had left after years of hardly speaking to him, he decided to stomp on by saying hurtful things when he was drunk. They were true though. At least some of them were.”
I couldn’t imagine anything that could be said about her that would be negative. “He’s a dick,” I replied without even hearing what he’d said about her. Then I took a drink.
“Yes, he is.”
We sat there a few minutes passing the vodka back and forth in silence. Thinking. Finally, I answered her question. “I think I realized I loved her when we were six. She had made a crown out of daisy’s and put it on her head then danced around the yard. I watched her a long time wondering if anyone was as pretty as her. She finally saw me, stopped twirling, gave me a big smile and then held out her hand to me. She said she was the queen of the fairies and I could be her king. It’s a silly memory, but it stuck with me.”
I took a drink then. “Thanks for the vodka. It’s helping.” I passed it back to her.
“Yeah. We may not be able to walk back to the house, but you won’t be hurting, and I won’t be terrified of my adventure.”
“Terrified? I thought you wanted this adventure.”
She shrugged. “I wanted to be someone else. Do something completely unlike me. To get away. The reality of it scares me though.”
“Then don’t go.”
A sad smile touched her face. “I have to. I need to.”
“Because of him?” I asked.
“No,” she shook her head. “Because of Lila. I need to do this for Lila. And I’ve had too much to drink on an empty stomach. I’m talking about myself in third person.”
I laughed, and she joined me. It felt right sitting out here laughing being completely honest with each other.
Lila Kate
LIVE BAY WASN’T a long walk from Nate and Bliss’s house. Which was a good thing because neither of us needed to be driving. The walk helped sober us up somewhat but not completely. It was a nice relaxed feeling. By the time we finished eating at the restaurant in front of Live Bay’s bar, my head was much clearer. My concerns and fears were returning.
“I don’t know if I’m up for dancing tonight,” I told him.
“I don’t think I’m up for the crowd there,” he agreed.
At least he wasn’t going to try and talk me into staying. But returning to Nate’s where I would just sit and worry alone didn’t seem appealing either.
“Let’s get my truck and then go to my apartment. We can watch a movie. I have vodka. I also have some peanut butter ice cream in my freezer that needs to be eaten. It’ll be quiet there.”
That was better. “Okay. Yes, that sounds good. Especially the ice cream.”
He smirked. “And I thought it would be my perfect personality that would win you over.”
“That is just a plus. The ice cream definitely is the ultimate draw.”
The server came, and Eli took the bill for our dinner and paid for it. This had been a date. A real one. Even after our drunken admissions on the beach. We talked about Sea Breeze and his childhood there on our way back to the truck. He had good memories of the place and a lot of friends who sounded a lot more colorful than the ones I had back home.
We didn’t go inside or say anything to Bliss and Nate. Instead, we got in his truck and headed to his apartment which was more of a condo on the beach. Bliss had lived there with him before she got together with Nate. I wondered if he had bought a two bedroom just for that reason—for her.
But I didn’t want to talk about that anymore, so I didn’t ask.
“This is it. Movies are in that cabinet if you want to look through what I have. Or we can rent something from iTunes. Your choice.”
It was a nice. You could tell a female had lived here once. There was a feminine touch that most guys didn’t know how to pull off when they decorated. Or they didn’t care to.
“I’ll see what selection you have first,” I told him walking over to the cabinet.
He left me in there. I opened the cabinet and saw the DVDs were in alphabetical order. He had a great selection. I found Top Gun toward the end and picked it up. I had seen this once when I was younger. It was a classic even back then.
Eli walked back into the room carrying a bottle of vodka, two glasses, and some cranberry juice. “I assume you don’t always drink vodka straight out of the bottle,” he said with a mischievous grin.
“You’d be correct. That was actually a first for me.”
“Figured.”
I handed him the DVD, and he nodded. “Nice choice,” he agreed then set the glasses on the coffee table and the vodka and cranberry juice behind them. “Help yourself. Want me to get the ice cream now? Or later?”
I wasn’t hungry yet. I was still full from the fried crab claws and fries I had eaten. “I’m good with the vodka right now.”
He sat down on the sofa then and waved his arm out beside him. “Then let’s drink. I’ve sobered up, and I prefer the numbness that came with the vodka earlier.”
“It definitely makes you brave. Which isn’t necessarily a good thing,” I said thinking about myself.
He handed me a glass with ice. “Fix it the way you like it. I have club soda too if you prefer that.”
“Cranberry works just fine.”
I poured what I thought was a shot of vodka then filled the rest of the glass with the juice. “We aren’t very good influences on each other, are we?” I asked.
He chuckled. “Why? Because we keep drinking?”
I nodded.
“It’s just the timing isn’t that great for either of us.”
I leaned back and crossed my legs to get comfortable before taking a drink. “No, I guess it’s not.”
He poured at least half a glass of the vodka and added just a splash of juice. Then he stood up and went over to the DVD player to put in the movie. Again, this was comfortable. It was easy to trust Eli.
The movie started, and we drank as we watched it. An hour into the movie, he stood up and went to get the ice cream. I still wasn’t hungry, but I ate it. Another drink appeared in my hand and with it came the smooth, easy feeling. I enjoyed it and let him refill me again.
“Lila?”
“Yes?”
“What happened for real last night?”
I thought for a moment then figured there was no reason not to be honest with him. “We had sex on the beach. You used a condom.”
He sat up straight and I let out a giggle. It was funny now. Or the vodka made me think it was.
“Was . . . was I any good?” he asked and that made me laugh harder. Of all the things for him to be worried about that wasn’t what I thought it would be.
“Yes. You do fine under intoxication. But then I don’t know what you’re like sober.”
His smile was dark and sexy. “We could find out.”
I shook my head. “No, we can’t.”
He sighed and leaned back against the sofa. “Damn.”