Sweet Cheeks

  I stare at her. The memories clear as day. Ryder and I running and her chasing. The two of us tricking her and then sometimes letting her hang with us. Because sometimes she was cool. For a girl.

  “You’re looking at me like that again,” she warns.

  “You haven’t changed, have you? Still bossy.” I’m baiting her. Figure if I get that temper going, she’ll yell at me, and I can figure out what the hell she was trying to do tonight in the club. The extra swing to her hips and the added taunt in her smile wasn’t for nothing.

  “Neither have you. Still causing trouble everywhere you go. I figured Hollywood would’ve tamed that side of you, and yet the National Enquirer seems to love you these days.”

  I take her dig for what it is. Understand she’s trying to hurt me any little way she can. Shit, she has every right to. My ego likes knowing she’s followed me. My pride hates that she’s noticed the bad press that’s always blown way the fuck out of proportion.

  I bite the rebuke on my tongue. Fight the want for her to know I’m not that guy and confess the truth behind the bullshit rumors. And yet, I can’t. I may be having a good time, trying to help her out, and yet she’s a part of my past, and the rumors are trying to protect my present.

  “Don’t always believe what you read about me.”

  “No worries. I don’t ever read anything about you.” A hint of hurt. A trace of spite.

  “I deserve that.” She’s lying. The finger twirling in the hair at her neck tells me so. I fight a smile at seeing the simple tell she still has.

  “No, you don’t deserve shit from me.” And here comes the temper.

  “Good thing I don’t want anything from you then.” Why does it feel like I’m the one telling a lie now?

  “Then why are you here, Hayes? Why? Not the ‘in town for the funeral’ part but rather I’m talking about tonight. Why come to the club and more so, why are we here right now? If you want nothing from me, then why’d you bring me to the tree house?”

  What the fuck am I supposed to say to that when I don’t know the answer myself?

  “I was at the club because Ryder invited me, and I wanted to catch up. I didn’t expect you to be there. Thought you’d be out with your fiancé. What’s his name? Mitch something-or-other?” Layton. I know the last name all right. Remember him to be a pompous prick when I played baseball against him in high school.

  But let’s see if she takes the bait. Finishes the question. Gives me an in to open the door and start the conversation we need to have.

  “Mmm.” That’s all she says in response.

  I study her reaction. Notice the purse of her lips. The hair wrapped around her finger again. The sudden shifting of her legs as she fidgets.

  I could press her right now. Push those buttons of hers. But there’s something beneath the surface I can’t quite peg. So instead, I opt to finish answering her question. Try to gain her trust so she stops hating me.

  “And we’re here . . . we’re here because it’s kind of fitting. After the other day at the bakery and then tonight at the club, I don’t know . . . I needed to apologize to you. Explain why I . . .” I blow out a sigh and run my fingers through my hair unsure myself what I’m going to say. “This was where we always came when we needed to talk.”

  “It’s in the past,” she whispers, eyes angled back up to the sky but the contempt in her voice has been replaced by guarded hurt.

  It’s not in the past. Not for her. And that’s the bitch of it, isn’t it? Knowing someone so well for so long, even though time’s passed, you still know them. Can read their body language and infer from their tone so you can’t escape the fallout of your actions.

  “You don’t owe me anything. No apology. No anything. It wouldn’t matter if you gave me one anyway,” she replies as she lowers her face from the sky so she can meet my eyes. The defiance I see in them wars against my guilty conscience. “It’s a whole lot too late.”

  I nod my head in understanding. The split-second decision I had to make back then seemed so simple, but now owns my thoughts as I look at Saylor in the moonlight across this old tree house.

  “Saylor.” Her name is part sigh, part apology on my part.

  “Just don’t. Save it.” She shifts abruptly, effectively ending the topic by scooting to the floor and lying on her back.

  Anything to avoid meeting my eyes.

  She’s not going to make this easy on me, is she?

  I stare at her. Hair fanned on the floor and eyes toward the sky, irritated as fuck with me, and I’m reminded of that night when things first started between us.

  What did I expect when I brought her here? That the memories were going to soften her and not affect me?

  I should just take her home. Pick up the phone and call Ryder to apologize that I can’t return the favor this time around. Lie that the studio has called, needs me back to reshoot a few scenes before moving to the next location. Get the fuck out of here before shit gets complicated. Because looking at her, being reminded of before, is stirring up way more than I expected. Shit I don’t need in my already complicated life. Something I definitely can’t start without walking away and repeating history with her I don’t want to repeat. Can’t repeat.

  I’m not that much of an asshole.

  Goddamn memories, man. They’re fucking with my head.

  So I sigh and do the only thing I can do—try to make this right. I shift onto my knees, cross the space between us, and unfold my legs until I’m lying beside her, just like I did that night. Her body stills and her breath hitches as our arms touch, but she doesn’t pull away.

  We lie there for some time staring at the stars that light up the night sky despite the full moon. Crickets chirp around us but there’s not a word spoken between us.

  Seconds turn to minutes. Her perfume hits my nose. Our history owns my thoughts. My mind veers to shit I shouldn’t be thinking. Hands off, Whitley. Much easier said than done when I’m lying in the dark with a gorgeous woman.

  And she is just that, gorgeous. And all woman. Yet, despite the years that have passed, this feels normal. The being here with her. The feeling that she still knows me better than anyone else when that can’t be possible.

  She did back then though. She could finish my sentences. Had loved me unconditionally. Had encouraged me to chase my dreams despite my doubts.

  Until I allowed my dreams to consume me. Rip us apart. Leave her.

  Leave us.

  “Look!” She saves me from my thoughts when she points to a shooting star as it streaks across the sky.

  “Make a wish,” we both say in unison and laugh. A throwback to another night, another time, and I feel her body tense the minute she says it. As if she realizes she accidentally let her guard down, but the small moment is enough to break up the tension filling the space around us. Giving me an in.

  “I made mine,” she whispers after a few seconds and has me immediately wondering what her wish was. Ten years ago I would have known the answer without question. But not now. Not with the grown woman, so very different but all the same, beside me.

  “Me too,” I finally say but know my dreams have already come true—I’m a lucky son of a bitch—so I throw my extra wish her way. Use the lapse in her guard to my advantage. “See that constellation? The one right there?” I point to the sky, to a trio of stars that I make my own pattern out of.

  “Like you really know astronomy,” she scoffs, remembering how much it bored me when we were in school.

  “No seriously. I do. I had to learn it for a role I played.”

  “Is that so?” The exasperated tone is back in her voice and I’m glad to hear it. Annoyed I can deal with much better than sadness. “If that’s the case, then what is that one right there?” I follow her finger as she points to what looks like someone shook a salt shaker filled with glitter to the sky . . . little flecks of bright lights everywhere.

  I smile wide knowing exactly what I need to do. I lift my finger and point. “That rig
ht there is the constellation named ‘I’m Sorry.’”

  Her sigh fills the tree house. “Oh, please.”

  “No. Wait. I get the one named ‘I Was a Dick’ confused with the one ‘I’m Sorry’ so give me a minute. Nope. I’m right. That’s definitely, ‘I’m Sorry.’”

  “That’s very convenient.”

  “First rule of acting is learning how to improvise.” Her laugh fills the night and I might have gotten my foot in the door.

  “Seems you’ve got that down pat.”

  “I mean it, Saylor. I’m sorry.” The explanations I had worked out in my head die on my lips because they’d just sound like bullshit excuses. I can see that now, so I leave it at that. I hope she hears the apology and knows how much I mean it.

  But she doesn’t say anything for a while. Just stares quietly at the stars while I try and figure out what to do next. In reality, I’m perfectly comfortable on this hard wooden floor with my legs folded like a pretzel so I can fit in this small space beside her.

  “Mitch’s last name is Layton.” Saylor’s sudden comment surprises me.

  “I think I remember him.” How could I not? The popped collar, egotistical, trust fund baby. Even in high school he thought he was better than everyone else. I can’t imagine how he is now. I tread carefully. “How’s he doing?” Feign interest. Pretend I care.

  She laughs but the sound isn’t lighthearted. “He’s getting married.” I hesitate in response because I haven’t thought this through far enough ahead, and I’m not sure if I should play that I know this yet or act like I don’t. “And not to me.”

  “Oh.” My response is as much shock that she’s just confessed, as it is an act. And I decide to keep quiet. To let her take this conversation where she wants to ease my guilt over lying to her once again.

  “Yep.” Her laugh holds no humor at all. “I just couldn’t do it. Couldn’t marry him. Over six years, Hayes. Six years down the fricking drain and all because I looked at him and . . . I don’t know.”

  “You looked at him and what?” I can’t help it. I have to ask. Have to pry. Have to find out why it sounds like she still loves the prick when she’s the one who broke things off.

  That much I do know from Ryder. He had sounded proud as hell of Say when he told me she dumped the sorry ass.

  She turns her head to face me, the heat of her breath hitting the side of my cheek as I keep my eyes trained on the sky, because fuck if I trust myself right now to not take advantage of a situation I shouldn’t even be in.

  “I looked at him and realized he didn’t make me feel how yo . . . Nothing. Never mind. It just wasn’t right.” She laughs again. Nerves tinge the edges. “Can you believe he had the audacity to invite me to the wedding? To my wedding?”

  “Your wedding?” She can’t be that drunk she’s mixing things up, can she?

  “Yep. My wedding. All my planning. All the stupid hours I spent perfecting every detail. All he did was change the date and the bride. Who does that?”

  “Wait a minute. They’re copying your plans?”

  “Yep. From what I can tell it seems so. Same paradise location. Same ceremony time. Even the damn invitations. What kind of woman gets married to a man and keeps all of the ex’s wedding plans? Well, good thing she has the same initial in her first name so they could save all the monogrammed crap his mom bought.”

  I laugh. Can’t help it. Ryder never told me this part of the story. “Maybe his mother talked her into it.”

  She snorts again. “Uptight Ursula.”

  I laugh. She sounds like the freckled face girl from before. “That’s her name?”

  “No. But that’s what I call her. And you’re probably right about her talking the new girlfriend into it. She was such a controlling bitch. And to think she was going to be my mother-in-law.”

  I feel her shiver beside me in mock disgust. Maybe she doesn’t still love him.

  “Do they actually think you’re going to hop on a plane and show up?” Shit. Let’s hope she’s had enough to drink that she doesn’t realize I knew she’d have to fly to get there.

  “That’s the thing—Whoa!” she says as she sits up quickly and then puts her hand down on my upper thigh to steady herself.

  “You okay?” I ask as she giggles.

  “I haven’t gone out drinking like this in quite a while, wow . . . this feels funny.” She sounds embarrassed.

  I clear my throat. Try to concentrate on the conversation instead of her hand on my thigh where her fingers are dangerously close to my dick. Focus on anything but that.

  “You okay?”

  She looks down at me: lips parted, eyes wide, and fuck if the look on her face—innocent, complicated, pure Saylor—doesn’t make me think of the pressure of her fingers again. “Yeah.” She swallows and nods. “I’m fine. Just caught me off guard.”

  “Okay.” I shift up. Figure that’s the best way to get her hand off my thigh. Try to be the good guy here. And the minute I move, she immediately jerks her hand back as if she didn’t realize it was there. Good thing her hand’s not on my thigh now. Bad thing? Bad thing is her lips are inches from mine.

  I smell her perfume. See the moonlight in her hair. Hear her draw in a breath. And hell if I don’t need a distraction from stepping over a line I can’t cross.

  The sway of her ass tonight at the club.

  The sound of her laugh as she climbed the steps up here.

  The way she went from fiery to cute in a goddamn second.

  Step back, Whitley. Way the fuck back.

  “You were saying something about being invited, Saylor?” Distraction. Get the conversation back on track. And my thoughts off of her lips.

  “Uh. Yeah.” She shakes her head as if to clear the moment we just had and reaches forward to pick up nothing in particular to have a reason to shift away from me. “Ryder’s lost his mind.”

  “And that’s something new?”

  I get the smile I was working for but this time it’s more shy than confident. She plucks at the legs of her pants with her fingers. I wait.

  “We both agree that Mitch sent the invitation as a kind of fuck you to me, but Ryder thinks I should play him at his own game. That I should accept the invitation and show up at the wedding. He believes the Laytons are badmouthing the bakery and that’s why it’s not doing too well. That they have enough pull with the people in this town, so now I’m like a pariah or something. I don’t know.” She shrugs and chews the inside of her cheek as she pauses for a moment. I can tell she’s hurt by the possibility that her brother’s assumption is true. The girl without a mean bone in her body. “He thinks if I were to stride into the wedding I walked away from and exude absolute confidence, like I knew for a fact that I had made the best decision ever by not marrying Mitch, it wouldn’t go unnoticed. In fact, he thinks that since it’s likely most of the guests have been told horrible things about me, seeing me so unaffected would make them curious. They’d wonder what I know about Mitch that they don’t, and curiosity might lead them to check out the bakery and—”

  “And curious people will come to the store and possibly generate business.”

  She looks at me, surprised I’ve come to the same conclusion as Ryder, and I cringe inwardly in case I’ve revealed too much.

  “So you think he’s right?”

  “I think there’s some merit to it,” I muse.

  “Why?”

  I think of Jenna. Of the burden I’m bearing to play a similar game all for image’s sake. And know if I am doing it for her, and how it could affect my career, I sure as shit will help Saylor if she asks. Now I just need to convince her of that.

  “Because I see it every day. Take an actress who breaks up with an A-Lister. There are rumors as to why but no one knows the truth and neither of them comment publicly about their split. All of a sudden, the press wants nothing to do with her. She’s overlooked for parts. Not invited to any parties. She might even be snubbed by their friends if they run in the same circles b
ecause it sucks, but people don’t want to piss off the one who has the most power in the relationship.”

  “Because that’s fair. Sheesh.”

  “Yeah, but she gets the last laugh. She somehow gets her foot in the door somewhere. Shows up looking ten times better than she did before with some star or director or mogul more powerful than her ex on her arm, and it’s amazing how suddenly the people who wanted nothing to do with her are now knocking down her door to be her best friend.”

  “Shallow assholes,” she mutters, and I’m pretty sure she’s ticking off names in her head of who that criticism matches.

  “Very. But that’s life.”

  “In your Hollywood bubble, maybe. Not mine,” she grumbles as if she’s seeing this through different eyes for the first time and is begrudgingly accepting it.

  “Not my bubble at all.” I laugh with a shake of my head, needing her to know I’m not like that in the least. She glares at me and I’m not sure why. Is she putting two and two together?

  “So what? I’m just supposed to fly there and show up at the wedding? Twiddle my thumbs while acting confidently, and then that’s all it will take? The tide will turn?”

  “No.”

  “No? Ah yes, I forgot. In order to appear self-assured, I apparently need to have a big, powerful, strapping man at my side because that’s the only way a woman can be confident, right?” Bitterness.

  Can’t say I blame her.

  “Not in my eyes, but in theirs? Possibly.” My comment settles between us. She rolls her shoulders. Her only physical tell of how pissed she is over this.

  “So what? I’m just supposed to say, ‘Hey Hayes, wanna ditch your filming schedule and glamorous life and go on a ridiculous trip with me to my wedding that’s no longer my wedding?’” I hate the part of me that loves I’m the one she thinks of when she needs a man to accompany her. “Like you’d really fly to some island with me, so we can show my ex-fiancé and his family and uptight friends that I’m better off without him, because I’m “fake” dating you instead. A man who is so much bigger and better and more successful and handsome than he is? Like that’s going to happen.”