Giving In: The Sandy Cove Series (Book 1) (17 page)

Fuck it.

“Ok, fine. You want me to ask? I’m going to ask. What the fuck was that tonight, Harlow? That guy, Chad, the ex. Why in all things sacred and holy did you look like he just stole your favorite toy or killed your dog? Get on with it.”

She turns, surprised by my sudden outburst, and her mouth opens to speak, but her expression tells me she doesn’t want to. Her head turns back towards the water.

Another awkward display of silence.

“Jesus, Turnip. What the hell? I can’t figure you out to save my life.”

I don’t do this. I don’t spend time trying to figure chicks out, what eats at them, what crawls under their skin to make them act the way she did tonight. This is not me. That’s why I have no girls who are friends, except for my sister in law, Bella. Too much drama, too much to try to decipher. I just fuck them and leave them. That’s what I know. Not this senseless bullshit. I’m about to get my ass up, and call it a night. Whether sleep invades or not.

“Fine, you don’t want to talk. I’ll go sit in silence by myself. I’m not here to piece you, the puzzle, together.”

I get up and push back my chair a little too aggressively in the process. I decide to pause and give her one last chance to spill her guts. This woman is a tough nut to crack.

Her and those God damn glasses and… And lips and fingers in my God damn hair.

God damn it.

I realize I curse way too much, even if it’s not out loud.

“Chad and I dated from sophomore year in high school till about two years ago, give or take a month or two. He was my first boyfriend, my first… Well you know, before, well…”

Let me make this easy for her.

“Before me?”

She turns her head finally and flashes me a smile.

“Yes, before you.” She buries her face in her hands, embarrassed. I figure from the memory of us being together. She lets out a soft laugh.

“My first heartache.”

I swallow hard because her tone is mournful. Her voice small when she says the words.

“Ok, so I get you guys dated for a long time, probably compared trust funds and ate caviar and shit like that, but what I don’t get is, why did you have the reaction you did when he walked into the room? It’s like you were there one minute and then gone the next, without even moving out of your chair.”

She begins to rock a little in her chair, swaying in a way that makes her look like she’s trying to get comfortable. It’s almost as though she’s thinking of a way to escape this, but the more she does it, the more it entices me to know what happened between them and for fucks sake, I have no idea why I care to know.

“It’s complicated, Cruz. You’ve never been in a relationship. You’ve never been in love, so you don’t know what it’s like to have a broken heart.”

She’s right. Ab-so-fucking-lutely right.

“No, you’re right. I don’t know what that’s like, but I’d figure after two years, you’d let it go, move on.”

She turns completely around in her chair, a full view of her in front of my face, and she points to me with attitude. “Ah, see there’s where you’re wrong, Officer. I’ve tried, almost succeeding a few times. I am over him, believe me, but you see, we grew up in the same town, and we were raised in the same crowd. Our grandparents are old country club friends. Our dads, golf buddies. So it’s hard to shut the memories of a relationship completely out of your mind when they are constantly around.”

I knew there was more to it. You don’t look or act the way she did over some high school first love, bullshit, douche bag, rich shit head, dumb mother fucker.

See, I curse in my head way too much.

“Ok, but did he break it off with you or you him? Did he cheat on you? Hurt you?”

She pulls off her glasses swiftly, her death glare ready to strike at a moment’s notice.

“What’s this, the Spanish Inquisition? What’s with all the questions? He fucking broke up with me, ok? Got it? It was messy, deceitful, gut wrenching, and I will not go into details, so don’t ask for any more than I’m willing to say to you, ok?”

And she’s right back to being the good old Harlow. I was waiting for her to show up, and here she is. All that’s missing is a knee to my balls.

She shifts in her chair, pinching her fingers at the bridge of her nose, and I feel bad for pushing the issue.

She looks up at me with her big eyes, so full of sadness, and I feel responsible for it, even though I know I’m not the cause of it.

“I’m sorry, Cruz. It’s a very touchy subject with me. Our breakup did some major damage to me, my self-esteem, my… My whole life. I’m getting better at forgetting. Love is complicated.”

Just another reason why I don’t do it. I don’t fall in love. I don’t even think I know the meaning of the word. I never had it in my life, and it’s not like I missed out on it. You don’t miss out on something you never had in the first place. It’s not like when my bike got stolen in 5th grade, the one I rode to school every day. The only present my crack-head mother ever gave me. Granted, it was stolen by her on the way home from scoring a bag. I knew what it was like to lose something, but then after time, you forget about it and move on. I can’t imagine love being like that. I need to understand it more, from Harlow’s point of view. If I ask, will she explain it to me? Do I even dare? I go back and forth in my head, contemplating whether or not to ask her opinion, what her thoughts are on the subject. My mind wanders to what their relationship was like. How he treated her, if he cheated on her, why he broke up with her in the first place.

“Tell me, then,” I say the words and they just literally flew out of my mouth, and I immediately want to take them back. I mean, my God, have I no self-control? What the hell am I getting myself into? I bet she uses her big words, says shit I don’t understand, and I’ll be making mental notes, so I can look it up on the Internet later.

Her face scrunches up in that adorable way she does when we have one of our conversations, and she can’t believe some of the things that come out of my mouth. Like right now, for instance.

“You want to know about love? About being in love?” I nod, yes. “Oh, come on, now Cruz. Are you serious?”

“Yes, I’m serious. Since I’ve never been and will continue not to be, I’ll think of it as a lesson. You have to practice being a teacher anyway, so… Teach. I’m all ears.” I turn my chair a little closer to hers, and she does the same. I bet from where my face is angled to hers, I can count the little freckles on her tiny nose. I tuck my long legs under me and settle in for my lesson on love. Oh, and I prepare myself for the big words. Wish I had a pad of paper and a pen with me. It would make my life so much easier right now.

“Ok, here goes.” Her eyes go all dreamily, if that’s even a word. She sighs. The wind blows her hair a bit, giving me a shot at smelling her shampoo.

Damn, that smells good.

She begins her lesson.

“Love is the only thing that you can’t fake, no matter what. It’s when you look into the eyes of the person meant for you, you can see into their soul. I’m pretty sure you can’t lie when you truly look into the depths of them. There’s a resemblance there, like home, a place where you can put your trust into. Someone you can tell your deepest, darkest fears to, and no matter their opinion of them, it doesn’t matter, they will be beside you. They will watch you succeed, and they will watch you fail, but the love is so strong, they can see past it. They can see past all the bad and take a good, hard look at the good.”

Speech doesn’t exist right now for me, because this girl’s definition of love just blew me away. I remember that old movie Mask, about the kid whose face is deformed. He goes to some camp, falls in love with a blind girl, and shows her what color is for a person with sight. He uses a hot rock to describe the color red and a piece of ice to describe the color blue. What Harlow just said, the way she phrased everything, kind of made me see a little. It kind of took my blindness of the subject away. She described to me what love for her is like, what love is like in general. She remains still, just giving me a tight-lipped smile. I feel the sudden urge to know more. But I have to keep up my act of not really caring or being over interested.

I need to know, so my mind overtakes my ability to have a filter, so I ask the question, “Was that what it was like for you and Chad?”

Harlow turns her head to the side, avoiding my question momentarily, and the yearning to touch her face overwhelms my common sense.

I take my index finger, touch her chin and turn it to me. Tears have formed in her eyes.

“Turnip? Look at me.”

That face, full of sadness, and I only met him for a minute, but I hate that mother fucker for hurting her.

“I’m guessing by the look on your face that it didn’t go that route. Am I right?”

She nods. No explanation needs to be given to me. That was her perception of it, of love.

As I still touch her cheek with my finger, the thought of her kissing me tonight comes into play. She hasn’t explained to me why she did it, nor has she even attempted to tell me, so I’ll go with my theory. She wanted to make him jealous. It’s obvious. People play games. I get it. I’m not angry about it. It is what it is.

I release her chin and settle back in my chair. The sun is coming up, and I can hear the seagulls waking up in the distance. There’s still a calmness on the water. No boats going by, no people awake at this ungodly hour to disturb it. Just Harlow and me doing what we do best on this dock. I think I learned a lot tonight, not just in the last hour or so, but earlier at the bar, last week, three weeks ago. Last year in that bathroom even. Harlow gave me a lesson tonight, and for whatever reason, I think it’s one I’m not going to forget anytime soon.

CHAPTER 9

The best surprises come in all shapes, sizes, and tattoos

Harlow~

The August sun is brutal already, and we are only in the first week of it. The heat should be measured by how many sticks of deodorant I have gone through in the past week. I’m a sweater. I’ll admit it for the good of all womankind. It’s only seven a.m., and it has to be eighty degrees already. The water on the bay is so still, and the smell of fish is fermenting in the air. Not a pleasant smell, mind you.

There’s only a few weeks left of summer, and I will admit it’s been the best. Refreshing and relaxing… For the most part. I never did see Chad again, thank God. I think he knew to stay clear of me, which is unusually surprising. His relentlessness towards me when we are back in Princeton is immeasurable. Since his father and mine are golf buddies, when they all play together, he’s always approaching my father about me. When he is questioned about our breakup from my father, his response was always that we were taking a break for a while. Break, my ass. Try broken, as in what it did to me. Dr. Goldberg and I still have our weekly conversations, but the more time passes, the more I find comfort in my other form of therapy, which, in fact, is coming down the dock as we speak. Well more like sprinting.

What the hell?

“Turnip, Turnip, it’s Bella, she’s… She’s in labor.”

The look of sheer panic is displayed on Cruz’s face, so I stand up to greet him.

“Wait, what? She’s not due for another month, Cruz. What’s going on?”

He’s panting and running his fingers through his hair fiercely.

“My brother called and he said something about her bag breaking and then the water came out of it and I was like what the fuck is that, then he said she was having contradictions and shit, and oh, God, I don’t know.”

I grab his shoulders and caress them and then I run my hands down to his forearms, as I tell him to take a deep breath.

“Ok, sweetie, relax. First of all it was her water that broke. Her bag of water, not her purse or anything like that and she’s having contractions. It’s when the uterus contracts and pushes the baby down the birth canal. It happens during labor.”

When I’m telling Cruz what Bella is going through and how it’s perfectly normal, he relaxes.

“Listen to me, the baby is just a little early. That’s all and everything will be fine.”

I smile at him and stroke his cheek. He leans into my hand, and he closes his eyes.

“Are you going to go see her, be there for your brother?”

He hesitates and looks out onto the water. It appears he’s struggling with some kind of decision, and I’m not really sure so I ask. I take my hand from his cheek and use one of my fingers to bring his attention to my face.

“Hey, what’s the problem? This is a no-brainer. You need to go. You told me on more than one occasion that Bella is one of your best friends, so don’t be so hesitant about going. She needs you to be there, Cruz. They both do.”

The look in his eyes tells me he knows I’m right.

Cruz lets out a sigh, and I see his body appear to be less tense. He takes a seat on one of our chairs, clasping his hands together and resting his elbows on his knees. His head is down between his knees so I can only see the top of his brown waves.

I bend my knees and get down to his level. My hands encircling his.

“Hey pal. Look at me.” He doesn’t, so I use my teacher voice on him.

“Raphael Cruz, look at me right this instant.” He peers up at me, shocked and horrified at my tone.

“You are an Officer of the law, an ex-Marine, and my favorite man-whore in the world. If you’re afraid of what’s happening, don’t be. It’s ok to be afraid, but you are by far the strongest person I know so failure in this situation is not an option. Bella will be fine, and so will the baby.”

He looks at me with his piercing blue eyes and marvels at my words like they are scripture. He believes what I’m telling him. I like this vulnerable side of Cruz. Big, strong tattooed men don’t always need to show their rough exterior. Sometimes showing the other side is quite… Sexy.

Surprise, surprise.

“Babies come into this world early every day and medicine is so far advanced that God forbid if there is anything wrong with the baby…”

He gets a panicked look in his eyes.

“Cruz, I never said there was anything wrong with the baby, I’m just making a point that there are highly trained medical professionals who will make sure the baby will be ok.”