Love Unclaimed (21 page)

“I’m a hot mess.” They both chuckled.

“Men will do that.” Marissa squeezed her shoulders again. “They are thoughtless and selfish and sweet and kind and loving.” She smiled.

“When they aren’t being asshats.”

“Brooks told me what happened.” Marissa shook her head.

“That he needed to get his little brother out of a marriage arranged by their insane father?” She shrugged when Marissa looked down at her with a smile. “I know why he did it; he just picked the stupidest of ways to do it.”

“Jumping before he looked,” they both laughed.

***

“I totally ruined everything.” Gavin sat on the couch in Clint’s house where he had been staying for the last week. It had been almost a month since Audree had thrown him out of her house, and they hadn’t seen or spoken to each other at all.

It had taken Travis almost a week to get Gavin to stop drinking and out of Audree’s house. Gavin refused to leave, begging Travis to bring Audree back to him. He took to sleeping in her bed just to be near her. He had even stopped eating the first two days until Travis called Talia for help and she forced him to get out of bed and eat.

“Yeah, ya did. Your first fuck up was not staying away from my sister.” Clint handed Gavin a beer and plopped down on the couch next to him. “The second fuck up was not telling me that you had been hooking up with my sister and your third was the shit with Trudy.” He took a pull from his bottle.

“Don’t mention that name to me,” Gavin sighed.

“But you agree with the rest of what I said?” Clint laughed.

“I fucked up by not telling you and the last part yeah, but being with Audree…that was not a fuck up, the way I handled it was.” Gavin shook his head and took a pull of his own beer. “You were the one that made it so difficult by saying she was off limits to me.” He raised an eyebrow and looked over at his best friend.

“Dude, no one would be good enough for my sister. I wasn’t dealing with a teenage girl’s broken heart drama and losing my best friend in the process. Don’t think I didn’t see how you looked at each other. It was so annoying to be around the two of you sometimes and, once we got older, the sexual tension was nauseating and disturbing; you are like a brother and she
is my
sister.”

“Your sister, not my sister.” He laughed.

“Well, now that I’m over being pissed off about being lied to, what are you going to do about getting my sister back and treating her the way she deserves and not like your whore?”

“Don’t ever.” Gavin’s hand tightened around his beer bottle.

“I know you love her, man, but coming into town to …. Ugh.  I don’t even want to think about the two of you…. Ugh.”

“I came back to see her and be near her, not just…” he stopped when Clint put his hand up to stop him.

“No details, please. I’m sure you had women dropping to their knees to be with you, why …” Clint tapered off, unable to fully voice the question.

“I love that everyone thinks I had this fuck’em and leave‘em life, but it has been only Audree for the past two years. My last quasi- relationship was when Audree was dating the peckerwood. Eva was like two and some guy asked her out. That lasted, what, a year or two. Then there was that one other guy.” He rubbed his brow with his fingers. “I can’t even remember his name. I didn’t think we could ever really have anything. I figured, sooner or later, she and Brooks would figure out how to make it work and be together for Eva.”

“Brooks is great, but you can’t give someone all of you in a relationship if part of you is with someone else,” Clint said, staring off into space.

“Dude, you just went all Oprah on me there.” Gavin laughed a full-hearted laugh he hadn’t done in weeks.

“Whatever. Asshat! So what are you going to do to get my sister back?”

“Anything and everything she wants or needs me to do.” Clint turned to look at him. “Except live without her. Every time I’ve left her in the past, it has killed me a little bit more each time, but this time? This time, I was done with the leaving,” Gavin paused shaking his head. “I’ll do whatever it takes.”

“Well, moving back here might help with some of that. Have you spoken to your father at all?”

“Yeah, he begged and pleaded with Travis to help him out. Trav told him he was done being his stomping stone, so he came to me, and you know I have no problem telling that son of a bitch off, which is exactly what I did.”

“How much did you give him?”

“Too much, but it was worth every penny. I even got him to put it in writing that he will disappear and there will be no further contact or he will have to pay every penny back by working the farm, which he has no intention of ever doing.”

“I still cannot get over the fact that he -really did took Trudy with him.” Clint shook his head in disbelief. “That is pretty gross, man.”

“That it is.” Gavin laughed. “I think she is under the impression that she will get any money he has left when he dies.” He shrugged. “That is what happens when you marry a greedy, sneaky bastard like my father and I know didn’t tell her that the money comes back to us.” Gavin laughed even harder. “You’d think she would have wondered why there was no pre-nup, but hey, let them suffer with each other.”

Audree returned home after two weeks of hiding out at Brooks’ house. She had spent the first week curled up in a ball in the guest room crying, sleeping and crying some more. Even though Brooks and Marissa finally got Audree out of bed, she still refused to leave the house when Brooks and Marissa took Eva out on day trips. She had turned her cell phone off after seeing several missed voice mail and text messages from Gavin, Travis, and Ruby. Audree’s mother called Brooks and assured him that Gavin had, in fact, left Audree’s house. She told him that after four days of solitude, locked up in Audree’s house on his own, he had gone home. Talia also told him to let Audree know that the house had been cleaned and all evidence of Gavin was gone and that she should come home. Toward the end of the second week in California, Travis and Ruby went and got her.

“Audree, you cannot hide here forever. You have a ranch to take care of, people who work for you, and kids that need you there,” Ruby pleaded.

“Just the thought of walking into that house…” Audree shivered.

“Your mom had a cleaning crew come into
your
house and scrub the walls, floor, and carpet. The sheets have all been changed…”

“Sheets? What sheets? What the hell did
he
do to the sheets?” Audree gasped, noticing the glance between Travis and Ruby. “What?”

“He kind of curled up in your bed for four days and refused to leave your room,” Travis said as he dropped his head.

“Great! Just great! So now I can’t look at my entryway wall anymore, and he was in my room, too.” She stomped across the room and started picking at invisible flakes of dust. “How am I supposed to sleep in my own damn bed now?” she sighed, holding back tears at the thought of Gavin having finally slept in her bed and she wasn’t even there.

“We can buy you a new damn bed.” Ruby jumped up. “But you have to come home.”

“That son of a bitch; he never slept in my bed when I was there and now he decides to do it after he…”

“Sweetie, he is totally destroyed by…” Travis started, but stopped when Audree held up her hand.

“I really don’t want to hear how hurt he is.”

“Well, he is gone and we have to get ready for your brother‘s return.” Ruby rubbed Audree’s shoulder.

“How did you…”

“Clint called while you were…” Ruby looked around the room. “While you were visiting Brooks and said that his plans changed, they are sending him home the end of the month. You have two weeks; he will be home just before Eva comes home. So we have lots to keep us busy for the next couple of weeks.”

“Mom doesn’t know, does she?”

“No, I grabbed the call. Clint said he tried your cell and Gavin’s but no one was answering so he called me to find out what was going on.” Travis ducked his head, stood, and walked to the window.

“Travis?” Audree looked at him. “Travis, you didn’t tell him anything about this, did you?” She knew as soon as he turned around and gave her a look full of puppy dog eyes. “What the fuck, Travis! Why did you tell him?” She squinted her eyes at him. “How much did you tell him?” Audree jumped at him, but Ruby moved between them.

“He told him everything.” Ruby held up her hand to stop Audree from going after Travis.

“Oh my God! Why would you do that?” Audree shrieked.

“I am tired of the bullshit!” he exhaled. “I’m tired of my best friend and my brother hurting each other. We have been watching it for years and enough is enough. Look what happened. Did you really think that Clint wouldn’t notice when he got here? There has always been enough sexual tension between you and Gavin to light up a fucking neighborhood for a month; do you think he doesn’t know? And that he wouldn’t notice a change when he got back.” He looked up at her. “There would be a change, right? I mean… unless… unless you still want him…” He knew the answer as soon as she dropped to the couch.

“Clint knows about me and… ugh.” Audree dropped her head into her hands.

“He was pissed off at first, said he would talk to you when he got home, but he wasn’t really surprised. I think he was more surprised that the two of you hadn’t actually just made it permanent already.”

“What?”

“Oh, he is still going to kick Gavin’s ass, which I’m not warning him about,” Travis chuckled, “but he doesn’t seem to have a problem with the two of you. He does want the sneaking around crap to stop and he wants you guys to commit to each other already, but he seemed okay with it.”

“Holy shit! All this time, Gav…, your brother has kept me at arm’s length because of how he thought Clint would feel about it. All because he wouldn’t just tell him.” She shook her head.

“So you still want to be with Gav… him?” Ruby asked, rubbing Audree’s back.

“I don’t know if I can be. Every time I close my eyes and think about him, I see him pressed up against that wall with …with her.” She looked at Travis. “I’m really sorry about that whole thing, Trav.” She stood up and walked toward him with her arms out for a hug; he flinched at first, thinking she was going to hit him.

“Aw Audree, she was a bitch anyway.” He chuckled. “I know it wrecked things for you and my brother, but it was for the best. Hell, I’d be getting married in a couple of weeks, to a woman who really wanted my brother.” He hugged her tight. “And if it hadn’t happened now, who knows, it would have happened later. She admitted to me, when we talked, that she had always really wanted Gavin.” He felt Audree’s body tense. “I’m sorry about all of this, Audree.”

“Promise,” Travis stood up and took one of Audree’s hands and one of Ruby’s hands so they were standing facing each other. “Promise me we will say whatever the fuck needs to be said, no matter what, from now on. This shit doesn’t happen again between us.” He nodded at both women and they nodded at him and then hugged. “Okay, okay.” He shook his body as if getting rid of a chill. “Enough with this girly shit. Audree, get your crap, say goodbye to your daughter, your baby daddy, his girlfriend, and let’s get you home to fix the rest of this mess.”

“Travis…”

“Now!” Travis looked straight at Audree, before they all broke out laughing. “Oh, and since we are being all open and honest here, Gavin didn’t fuck around with Trudy. He didn’t even kiss her.” He smiled, satisfied when Audree’s jaw dropped. “Yeah, he told me the next morning, robbing me of the chance to get a couple of good hits in before he sobered up completely.”

“Wait, what?”

“He didn’t know who she was when he saw her. He was drunk off his ass. She got all excited when he said he was staying at your place. Seems she wanted to rub it in your face that she had finally got her hands on him. Hence the ‘brothers’ comment. They had some drunk from the bar drive their stupid asses to your house. Gavin figured he could bring her in and expose her cheating with some douche canoe who she promised a blow job if he drove them to ‘her friend’s’ house. He brought Trudy in first and, when we walked in, he was trying to hold her drunken ass up and keep his own balance because she was all over him.”

“So he didn’t?”

“Nope. Apparently, Trudy shoved her ti… her breasts,” he looked over at Ruby who stuck her tongue out at him, “her breasts in Scotty’s face and offered her services when he drove her home that night.”

“Why didn’t he…”

“You didn’t trust him.”

“This is all my…”

“No, it is both of your faults and now you have the chance to fix it.” Ruby hugged her shoulders.

“Now get your ass in gear,” he sighed. “We’ve got some miles to cover.” Travis hugged Audree when she started to cry.

***

Of course, Audree was hesitant about going home, but she was assured that Gavin was not at her house and that he had returned to the east coast. She had, however, been very aware that he would be coming back to celebrate Clint’s homecoming, but she would think about that then. When she first got home, she slept in Eva’s room, until Travis and Ruby yelled at her to get over herself and go back to her own room. Ruby spent the first two nights in her room with her while she cried herself to sleep. Travis stayed with her the next three nights—after Audree had climbed into his bed, and he’d taken her back to her room.