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Authors: Susanna Carr

Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #Contemporary

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BOOK: The Year of Living Shamelessly
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“Like my sweater?” Darwin asked, placing his fists on his hips and thrusting out his bony chest.
 
Katie didn’t have the heart to tell him what she really thought. She decided to avoid an answer altogether. “I’ve never seen anything quite like it.”
 
“It’s one of a kind,” he said proudly.
 
Thank God.
“Where did you get it?”
 
“The sex shop.”
 
She knew he was talking about the small store just outside the city limits. “They sell sweaters?”
 
“They sell everything. You’ve never been there?” Darwin’s wide blue eyes lit up and he curled his arm around her shoulders. “I would be happy to give you the guided tour.”
 
“No, thank you,” she replied. She always tried to be gentle with Darwin, sensing the vulnerabilities underneath his carefully crafted image. But nothing could ever provoke her into going out with him, even for a shopping expedition.
 
“You’re sure? I know the owner. He’ll let you use my frequent shopper discount.” He gave her shoulder a squeeze.
 
“Gee, what an offer, but I have to refuse.” She gradually unhooked his arm from her shoulders. “If you will excuse me, I need to speak to Ryder.”
 
“Ryder?” He jerked his hand away from her and looked cautiously over his shoulder. “Oh, wow. I just saw someone I need to talk to.”
 
Katie nodded. “I understand.” And she really did. Darwin’s self-preservation instinct was kicking in. He was afraid of Ryder. Which was really not necessary because Ryder didn’t even acknowledge Darwin’s existence.
 
Katie watched Darwin scurry away and then looked around for Ryder. She needed to find out what was going on, even though she knew she wasn’t going to like the answer. Katie slowly made it through the crowd toward where she had last seen Ryder.
 
When she made it to the bar, she saw Ryder and Tatum together. Ryder was sitting on a bar stool and the buxom blonde was draped all over him, obviously begging for forgiveness for her impromptu announcement.
 
Katie looked away as jealousy streaked through her. She couldn’t stand watching Tatum touch Ryder. Actually, she couldn’t stand Tatum. She was just like all of Ryder’s other women. Fortunately, Ryder didn’t have a long string of ex-girlfriends. They were something of an exclusive club, but they all were brazen, sexy and possessed a dangerous edge. Simply put, Darwin wouldn’t have the guts to flirt with any of Ryder’s exes.
 
Katie never felt comfortable around those women, either, but then again, she had nothing in common with them. They were gorgeous blondes with street smarts. They could get any man they wanted, and they could get anything they wanted from those men.
 
What made her think she could break into that exclusive club? No,
transcend
it. Why did she think she could have been the exception to the rule? Because she practically grew up with Ryder? They’d drifted so much since their teenage years that that hardly seemed to make a difference anymore. Now they rarely talked about anything meaningful. His work, life, girlfriends, all seemed more important to him than hanging out with Katie.
 
And here she thought she could get Ryder simply because she wanted him so much. Katie trudged forward, contemplating the depths of her delusions. She knew the world didn’t work that way, but that hadn’t stopped her. She had always thought that eventually Ryder would be hers, ever since that fateful night when she was ten years old. She had climbed a tree to spy on Jake and Ryder while they T.P.-ed a house. Jake had thrown a roll of toilet paper up in the tree to decorate it. It hit Katie and she had fallen out of the tree and broken her ankle. Ryder had carried her all the way home, with Jake at his side lecturing her. Katie hadn’t listened to a word her brother said. All she knew was that Ryder was the man she wanted. Now she had to face the fact that her dream might never become a reality.
 
“Katie?” Tatum’s little-girl voice broke into Katie’s musings. She looked up and saw she was standing right next to Tatum and Ryder. “What are you doing here?”
 
Right. Like Katie was the intruder. “I was going to ask you the same thing,” she said with a tight smile. “I work at the college. Why are you here?”
 
Tatum leaned forward and Katie was immediately enveloped in a spicy, exotic perfume. “I’m here with Ryder,” she divulged with a catty smile.
 
Oooh. Katie tensed, bracing herself, as that information hit like a sucker punch. She hadn’t expected that. Ryder brought Tatum here? As his date? Terrific. This just proved how far she and Ryder had grown apart—he hadn’t even told her that he and Tatum were a couple again. How was she supposed to seduce the guy when he was with Bimbo Barbie?
 
She looked at Ryder and their gazes clashed. She paused, waiting to see if he had something to say, like an excuse or an apology. He said nothing.
 
“Congratulations on the move, Ryder.” There. She said it. It didn’t hurt. Much.
 
“Thanks.”
 
“You didn’t know?” Tatum asked with delight. She snuggled a little closer to Ryder, as if staking her territory.
 
Katie wasn’t going to answer Tatum’s question. She didn’t even trust herself to look at the other woman. If she did, she would ruin her manicure clawing at Tatum’s smile. And why wasn’t Ryder shaking Tatum off?
 
Katie kept her gaze on Ryder, who was looking back intently, as if trying to predict her next move. Did he think she was going to make a scene? Considering how volatile her emotions were, it was a possibility.
 
“I guess Crystal Bend got too small for you,” she said, hating the little hitch in her voice.
 
His expression was unreadable. “Something like that.”
 
Katie felt Tatum’s smugness and keen interest. It was seriously getting on her nerves. She needed to speak to Ryder privately.
 
“Ryder, let’s dance.” She reached out for him, and then froze. If he refused, she wouldn’t be able to handle that kind of rejection, especially in front of Tatum.
 
He hesitated, and she felt the tears burn in the back of her eyes. Her heart pressed against her ribs as she waited. It was only at this moment when she realized Ryder had never directly refused her anything. Was he going to start now?
 
“Sure,” he said and stood up, disentangling himself from Tatum.
 
Ignoring the blonde’s huff of protest, he didn’t take Katie’s hand, but grasped her elbow. It was an oddly gentlemanly gesture from him.
 
Ryder guided her to the dance floor, turned, and loosely held one of her hands as he placed his other hand firmly on her waist. The excitement fizzing in her veins went suddenly flat when she noticed that he was dictating how close they stood together—and they couldn’t get much farther apart. She could get a whole conga line between them and still have room.
 
She wasn’t going to push it, Katie decided as she placed her hand on his shoulder. For now, it was fine. She had other things on her mind.
 
The jazzy Christmas tune should have been soothing and romantic, but she was nervous. She had never danced with Ryder. Years ago, when he’d taken Tatum to the prom, she’d cried herself to sleep imagining the two of them holding each other on the dance floor. She had dreamed of being swept off her feet in Ryder’s arms.
 
But this dance wasn’t the stuff of her dreams. Ryder wasn’t gathering her close and whispering softly in her ear. Instead, he felt stiff and tense.
He
couldn’t be nervous. Was he wishing he was with Tatum instead?
 
“One dance,” Katie promised, hating how her mouth trembled as she held back her emotions, “and I’ll get you back to your date safe and sound.”
 
“Tatum is not my date.”
 
The relief rolled through Katie so violently that she wanted to sag against him. Instead she gave a quick look at where Tatum stood. The blonde glared at her before ordering another drink. Katie looked back at Ryder. “But she said she was here with you.”
 
“She’s crashing the party and walked in the same time I did. We’re not dating, Katie. We’re just friends.”
 
Yeah, right. And how convenient. Tatum was probably hiding in the shrubbery until Ryder showed up. Was it evil to hope that Tatum had waited for hours and suffered frostbite? “Crashing this party? Now there’s someone desperate for entertainment.”
 
The edge of his mouth twitched in a smile. “Crystal Bend doesn’t have a whole lot to offer.”
 
Her stomach took another sickening dip. Was that why Ryder was leaving? There was nothing here to keep him? She wished she were enough. Katie lowered her eyes, shielding her hurt. “I didn’t catch the whole announcement. Where are you moving to?”
 
There was an infinitesimal pause. “Dubai.”
 
She jerked her head up and stared at him. “Dubai? As in . . . the other side of the world?”
 
“I have a friend there. He says the real estate market is booming and they could always use more carpenters.”
 
Katie continued to stare at him. “Dubai?”
 
“It’s in the U.A.E.” He watched her, probably waiting for the comprehension to hit. “It’s right next to Saudi Arabia. It’ll be an adventure.”
 
“I know where Dubai is,” Katie claimed. Well, she had a vague idea where it was located. “When were you going to tell me? Were you planning to sneak out?”
 
Ryder frowned and a muscle bunched in his cheek. “No.”
 
His gruff tone clearly indicated he didn’t like her wording, but in Katie’s view he was doing exactly that. “Then what?”
 
Ryder gave a long-suffering sigh. “I was going to tell everyone later this week, but Tatum overheard Jake saying something about it.”
 
“Later this week?” He only had eight days before he left. Unless . . . Katie narrowed her eyes in suspicion. “Like the
day before
you left?”
 
Ryder shrugged. “I just didn’t want to make a big deal out of it. I hate good-byes.”
 
Her heart galloped, as if she had dodged a bullet. As much as it pained her, she was thankful for Tatum’s big mouth. Otherwise she wouldn’t have found out until it was too late.
 
“How long are you going to be there?”
 
“I don’t know. The way my friend talks about Dubai, I may never want to leave. He says the beaches are beautiful and parties there are out of this world.”
 
He didn’t think he was coming back? That idea shook her to the core. “So let me see if I’ve got this straight. You decided that you want to move to the other side of the world. For the
beaches
and the
parties
. And you might never come back? And this decision was all so sudden that you didn’t have time to tell anyone. You’re just leaving. What prompted all this?”
 
He looked straight at her. It was just a glance, but she got the feeling that there was a lot more behind his decision to move than he was telling her.
 
“The timing is right,” he said in a low, rough voice. “That’s all.” That’s all. She exhaled sharply. It wasn’t about her. That was wishful thinking on her part.
 
“Jake’s going to miss you.”
 
“He’ll be fine.”
 
So that plan of attack wasn’t going to work. Katie tried again. “What about my mom and dad? They adore you.”
 
She saw Ryder’s expression tighten and knew her point made a direct hit.
 
“You’re not going to wait until they get back?” she asked.
 
“Your parents are on a sabbatical in the middle of Africa,” Ryder said. “They’re not getting back until the end of the school year.”
 
“They’re going to be hurt to find you suddenly gone without any warning.” Katie almost pouted her lips, but decided that might be overkill. “Can’t you push back your move until June?”
 
“I’m not their son,” he said gruffly.
 
“Come on”—Katie made a face at that argument—“you are just as much a Kramer as Jake and me.”
 
Ryder ducked his head, and if she wasn’t mistaken, that comment pleased him. Was he blushing? Ryder Scott blushing?
 
If being a part of the Kramer family was so important to him, why was he walking away from it all? When Ryder’s own mother seemed disinterested in taking care of him, he became an unofficial member of the Kramer family. Ryder always had a place setting at the table during his teen years and was at Katie’s house more often than his own. He and Jake were like brothers.
BOOK: The Year of Living Shamelessly
3.74Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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