All Fired Up (Kate Meader) (35 page)

“Nothing…I…” But the lie wouldn’t come. Lili’s sympathetic gaze only added further salt to Cara’s raw misery. She had barfed her last remaining defense and flushed it down the toilet.

“Sit down,” Lili said, the caregiver in her taking over. “Jules, get the grappa. Middle kitchen cabinet.”

“On it,” said Jules, already beelining for the booze.

Cara let Lili guide her to her white leather sofa, the pristine centerpiece of her all-white living room. Just another example of her effort to maintain control. Had she really thought she could bring a kid into this Cara-perfect world that looked more like a padded cell with every passing second?

Jules set the bottle of grappa and three glasses on the coffee table. In a mournful moment of silence, she poured and they all knocked back a shot of the potent brandy liquor. Cara took a few seconds to relish the burn on her empty stomach.

“How’s Jack doing?” she asked.

“He’s with Evan,” Jules said. “He needs some time with his favorite little man.”

“You want to tell us what happened?” Lili asked, her heart-shaped face marred with worry.

What happened?
There weren’t enough words in the dictionary to describe what had happened. The sound of her ragged breathing filled the silence while she screwed up her courage. Cara could no longer avoid her sins.

“I married Shane and I fell for him. Or maybe I fell for him and I married him. God, I don’t know.”

“What?” Lili shrieked. “Did you just say married?”

“I’m so sorry, sis. I don’t think I did it to upstage you, but maybe I did. Maybe I’m just an ice-cold bitch who can’t bear to see anyone else happy.”

Lili’s face screamed her shock. “Why are you saying that? Why would you even think that? Start from the beginning. Vegas?”

Cara nodded. “I was drunk…”

Her sister shrugged in agreement. Well, duh.

“But not that drunk. I asked him to marry me, Lili. There was something there. Some knowledge that passed between us over the shots of vodka. Something that said, this one, this time.”

Blaming Gina’s bitchiness, the roofie in Cara’s envy cocktail, had been her go-to position, but there
had
been more. She had liked how he made her feel. She had liked the person she was when she was with him. And maybe, she wanted to hold onto that feeling and see if she could scrimp and save and stretch it to another day or week or year.

Lili fed a skeptical glance to Jules, who thankfully managed to look surprised at hearing news she already knew. “But you had just met him.”

“I know, but the minute I stepped in that bar, it was like seeing hope. At first, I thought it was just my tired feet talking. Oh, look, one of Jack’s pals has some manners and is offering me his seat. But he had that cute smile and winking dimple, and he listened while I talked about Gina and how ridiculous she was. He told stories and held my hand. Four hours later we were man and wife.”

It sounded so ridiculous she would be laughing if her heart wasn’t deadweight in her gut, dragging all her organs with it. They had started this thing under the influence, in the fakest city in the world. How could she have thought it was real?

Lili shook her head with passion. “It’s just a drunken mistake. You can get an annulment.”

He already did. He annulled their marriage behind her back.

“I got the papers. I gave them to him, but then he was there, everywhere I went, and it was like a sign that he was supposed to be in my life. Listening to me. Fussing over me. Caring about me. We’ve even been looking after the stupid cat together.”

“A cat?” Jules murmured. “That’s some messed-up shit right there.”

Cara buried her face in her hands. “But it was all a lie. He used me. He only wanted Jack.” Just the same as with Mason Napier, stupid, needy Cara was merely a means to an end.

“I still can’t believe it,” Lili said. “Shane and Jack. It’s mind-boggling.”

“And weird,” Jules said. “Only a few weeks ago, I was talking about how hot he was and it turns out I was lusting after my sort-of-brother.” She shuddered.

“You’re not related. And you’re certainly not helping.” Lili squeezed Cara’s hand. “I’ve seen how he looks at you. I’ve heard how he talks about you. There’s something there just like you thought.” She didn’t sound convinced, but Cara loved her for trying all the same.

“He’s a liar, Lili. He wooed me with that stupid brogue. Well, you’d know all about that.” Her sister had a permanent lady boner for Jack’s British accent and dirty French talk. Cara slid a sidelong glance at Jules. “No offense.”

Jules waved a hand magnanimously and wisely kept her British-accented pie hole closed.

“He used all his Irish guile and charm to trap me.”

Lili opened her mouth to speak, and Cara raised a hand. Man-hating list making was in progress. Do not disturb.

“He took advantage of my insecurities. My hang-ups about food.”

Befuddlement clouded Lili’s face. “Your what now?”

“Sis.” Cara’s hands shook and she grasped Lili’s to help her to calm. Shame rose like bile in her throat but she pushed it back down. “I used to have anorexia.”

Her sister’s expression blanked to chalk. “No, you didn’t.”

Cara let the news settle, all while her heart and lungs flew apart with the pain that her sister couldn’t see. Had never seen.

“You just worry about your figure,” Lili said, the edge in her voice pronounced. “Like all women.”

“No, sis,” Cara said, every cell poised to explode. God damn it, she was the one who was supposed to be in denial. She didn’t need to hear it from her sister. “I had anorexia. I’m in recovery now but it’s been a tough road. With Shane, I felt like someone new. Not control-freak Cara who has to have everything in its proper place, who’s so self-absorbed in her strive for perfection that she can’t be of any use to her family. To you or Mom.”

Poor Lili looked like she’d been poleaxed, a little like how Cara must have looked two hours ago upon learning the man she loved had used her. And not too far off from how Shane had looked in the aftermath of Jack’s rejection. She steeled her spine. This was
her
pity party and Shane Doyle was not invited.

“But why didn’t you tell me?” Lili asked faintly.

Why didn’t you figure it out?
How could it be that after a few weeks, that rat bastard, Shane, knew her better than her own family? Every half-eaten lunch, every missed dinner, every early morning trip to the gym—surely Lili could have guessed that something was wrong. But the five years between them was a chasm that had served to keep Cara’s secret safe. Lili was battling her own demons while being bullied in high school while Cara took her shame with her to college in New York. Maybe later, Lili could have pulled her aside on one of her infrequent visits home to Chicago and asked if the Skeletor look was really in vogue in the Big Apple, but blaming her baby sister wasn’t going to help either of them through this.

“I didn’t tell anyone. A while back, I hit a point where I said no more. I realized I was missing out on so much and I wanted to be normal.” She looked around her sterile living room, mentally comparing it to the comfortable clutter of Jack and Lili’s, complete anathema to her inflexible personality. “I wanted what you and Jack have with each other. I wanted to be the one in Mom’s wedding dress with Dad walking me down the aisle. I know I’ve never fit in but maybe that would help. Make me more of a DeLuca.”

The tears started to come hot and fast, the leak unstoppable. “I’ve been so jealous of everyone. Gina, you, even Jules because of Evan. I wanted kids. Not just be the glamorous aunt, but to have something of my own, something real. A man, a family, a future.”

Her girls wrapped their bodies around her from either side.

“There, there, love,” Jules said rubbing her back. “There’s no need to be jealous of my uterus. It’s got me nothing but trouble.”

Cara managed a watery laugh-snort and Jules joined in. Lili was still reeling from Cara’s revelation, a million questions vying for voice on her face. Usually so quick to joke, she was having a hard time finding the funny in all this.

“But there’s nothing to stop you from having all those things,” Lili said, her eyes filling with tears. “You’re my amazing big sister. You can get any guy you want. You can be anything you want.”

“I’m the one stopping me, Lili.”

Lili shook her head in disbelief. “I figured something must have happened but I assumed it was a guy. I always thought you had it so perfect.”

“I did. I was Miss Perfect. These days, I’m Miss Recovering Perfect.” Despite her meltdown in the closet. That speck on her record would eat at her for a while but she would rise above it. She had already come too far.

She wiped a tear rolling down Lili’s cheek. Who would have thought she’d be the one offering comfort? “I know this sucks but I’m going to get through it. You wouldn’t believe how much I’ve toughened up in the last few months. Best of all, I won’t be married anymore and I won’t have to see him.”

Her husband’s—her soon-to-be ex-husband’s—parting gift.

Lili looked uncomfortable. “Well, I’m not sure we can guarantee that. After all, he’s family.”

Cara shot up straight, explosion imminent. “You mean Jack’s going to just let him sneak his way in? After how he tricked us?”
After how he made me think he loved me?

Her sister’s discomfort gave way to resignation and she turned to Jules.

“You know Jack,” Jules picked up. “He gets his boxers in a twist and then he calms down. He’s not going to turn Shane away, not when he has all these unanswered questions. Whatever Shane’s done, he came here with the intention of making a connection with Jack.”

Right, because he clearly hadn’t come to make a connection with Cara.

Chapter 20

With legs like sacks of flour, Shane climbed the stairs to his apartment late in the evening. His arse was numb from too many hours on the bike, his heart bloodied from the morning’s events. He had cocked up royally but then that’s what he had been doing from day one. Now he was ready to fling himself on Cara’s mercy.

On hitting the landing, his stomach dropped to the carpet. A pair of long legs encased in denim stretched across the hallway, the lower half of an unexpected sentinel.

His landlord. His boss. His brother.

Jack’s hand curled around the neck of a three-quarters-full bottle of Jameson, nestled in his lap. At Shane’s attention-grabbing cough, his eyelids fluttered open, and he drew his chin up with a squint.

“Where the hell have you been?”

“Out.”

Pulling himself upright, Jack blinked a couple of times and gave a raggedy shake of his head.

“You drunk?” Shane asked.

“Not enough to get married to a complete stranger.”

Shitski.
Jack might have come to say his piece, but right now Cara was Shane’s number-one priority.

“I need to see Cara first.”

“She’s over at my place with Lili and Jules.” Jack raised an eyebrow to let Shane know that he’d better be all right with that. “You ready to do this?”

Was he ready? He’d been ready for twelve years and now he was ready for a fight. He threw open the door and headed to the kitchen. After grabbing a couple of glasses, he turned to find Jack placing the whiskey bottle on the kitchen table like the start of a frat-boy drinking game. Only when Jack had sat did Shane sit himself.

A minute to compose was needed, for both of them, and it came in the form of Jack pouring the drinks. Shane hid his grim smile. Jameson had been their father’s tipple of choice. Just perfect. He knocked back the whiskey and his eyes smarted from the fumes. It needed water but his muscles had slumped to fill the shape of the chair. There’d be no standing for a while.

“You don’t look like him,” Jack said.

“I take after my mother.”

Thoughts raced across Jack’s face, and Shane knew exactly what he was thinking. Jack was the spitting image of John Sullivan and it pissed him off to no end.

“I’m sorry about what I said. About being glad he was dead. That was uncalled for.”

“It’s okay. He wasn’t easy to like and you didn’t owe him anything.”

Jack breathed deep. “When?”

“About a year and a half back. Alzheimer’s.”

“So just before you started looking for work at Thyme.” He studied the amber liquid in his glass. “He called me a few times and told me he was ill. I never called back.”

Shane heard his own rough intake of breath. “Nothing you could have done. It took a while to diagnose because he drank so much no one saw the difference. He went downhill very fast.”

The words Shane had thrown out back on Jack’s deck hung between them. John Sullivan had died with Jack’s name on his lips, but Shane understood his brother would need time to absorb that and what it meant. Shane hadn’t quite come to terms with it but he was getting there.

Jack strummed the table in an impatient tattoo. “I think this is the part where you explain why you kept this to yourself, Shane. How long have you known about me?”

“About twelve years. You were just getting well known. Remember those morning TV spots you did on the BBC?”

Jack’s eyes widened with the knowledge of how long Shane had kept his secret. “Three minutes to demonstrate how to make
coq au vin
. Bloody daft.”