Worth the Fight (Accidentally on Purpose) (20 page)

“Luke,” Lena said my name softly. “You can’t go out there and drag her back here by her hair. You need to trust her.”

“I want to trust her,” I said.

“Did Emmy tell you herself that she saw Kyle?”

“Yes,” I said and quickly explained to her what Emmy had told me.

“So…she could have said nothing. She could have let you find out on your own. Maybe she thought she was doing the right thing by telling you about it. Maybe she’s really trying to gain your trust.”

“Doing the right thing would have been to stay away from him, Lena!” I snapped.

“Take a minute and remove yourself from the situation.”

“But I -”

“Take a minute and remove yourself from the situation!” she yelled.

“I don’t know how to do that,” I argued.

“Try seeing through her eyes and feeling what she feels.”

“I can’t,” I gritted.

“Yes, you can,” she insisted. “You can because you’ve been there before. You’ve been in her shoes before. Emmy hurt you, Luke. She hurt you bad. You haven’t forgotten how that felt, and I’m sure you haven’t forgotten the things you’ve done…”

Selective memory comes in handy when you want to pretend that you handled life’s bullshit better than you actually did.

The last weekend of September, only a few weeks after I left the east coast, I broke down and got on an early flight to Philly. I hadn’t slept more than a couple of hours a night since the last day I saw Emmy. I had lost weight because I all but stopped eating, and I couldn’t focus on anything. I was su
pposed to be a support, a rock for my sister Lena who was fighting breast cancer. I should have been a rock for the rest of my family that was watching her fight breast cancer, but I was nothing they needed. Because I didn’t have what I needed. And what I needed was in New Jersey.

I had checked the Sterling building first. I was very cla
ndestine when I went in, keeping a ball cap pulled low on my head and the collar of my jacket up to partially cover my face. I used my badge that had still not been deactivated to get through the building. I only spoke to a couple of people and was confident that they would keep my presence quiet. I was hoping that Kyle would be there and try to interfere so I could beat his face in, but when I got to the office I discovered that Emmy had left for an appointment and Kyle had been gone since earlier in the day also.

I used my rental to drive to Kyle’s place. When Emmy went with him on a ‘business trip’ to California, I had gone out of my way to find out where the guy lived. I didn’t know what I would do with such information at the time, but it made me feel a little better knowing I had it. As I drove over there, I decided I would kick his ass in his own home if I found Emmy there, but when I got there, Kyle wasn’t home.

I took off for Emmy’s next, deciding that I’d use the key hidden under a bush and wait for her inside if I had to. I pulled over several houses back on the other side of the road. If she was home, her car was in the garage and not parked in the circular driveway. My hand was on the door. I was about to go find out if she was home or not, and if she was I was going to take her back. She was mine and not his. I just began to lift the handle to get out when a black Lexus pulled into the driveway. I knew instantly it was Kyle, and that was confirmed when he stepped out of the car. Emmy’s front door opened and she came out carrying a small suitcase and a small duffel bag. She met Kyle at the back of his car where he popped the trunk and helped her put her bags inside. He closed the trunk and then pulled her into his arms. I saw the frown on her face, but she let him kiss her. She didn’t look any happier after he released her, but she held onto the lapels of his jacket and rested her head on his chest.

To this day I don’t know why that small action changed my course. I didn’t get out and claim my woman. I didn’t beat Kyle’s ass. But I sat there in the car, dying inside. Dying ou
tside. Just dying as I watched them drive away. I’m not a crying kind of man. I didn’t cry when my sister got cancer. I didn’t cry when my dad died. But Emmy, Emmy had a way of fucking me up. I sat there in the car like a weak, defeated man and fought back my tears as the only woman I ever really, truly wanted and loved was whisked away by Kyle Fucking Sterling.

I became very bitter after that. I began to train my heart and mind to only hate Emmy, but even with that hatred brewing inside, whenever Sam visited my family in Chicago, I couldn’t stop myself from asking about Emmy. I never wanted too many details, and Sam never offered up too many. I often found m
yself searching Emmy out on social media networks, never finding her, and even Googling her home and looking at the house from a satellite view. I had gone back to Jersey twice more, once for a wedding and again to help a friend with a legal issue. During both visits I had driven by her house several times, telling myself that I hated her and if I saw her I’d tell her so. One time my own curiosity got the best of me and I stopped in her driveway and got out of the car and knocked on her door. When no one answered, I wondered if she had seen me through a window and just refused to answer. The idea pissed me off. I found the hidden key and let myself in. It was only a week after New Year’s. The house was dark with the exception of some soft lights that were on timers, and though everything on the first floor looked the same as it did the last time I saw it, it felt different. It felt so empty that I didn’t even have to look upstairs to know that she wasn’t there.

“You know how it feels to want someone who will only cause you more pain,” Lena said in the present. “You knew that you would probably just get hurt even more when you flew out there back then, but you did it anyway. You can’t say you can blame Emmy for talking to Kyle, even though she knows it might not end well. You tried to do it, too. After almost two years, she hasn’t contacted him,” she pointed out. “And if we’re going to be specific, it was Kyle that made first contact.”

I sighed and sat down on the edge of the bed.

“So, what am I supposed to do, Lena? I don’t want him around Lucas and quite frankly I don’t want him around Emmy. I just want my family back here.”

“You’re not going to get her back by caging her up, Luke. The whole time she’s been out here she hasn’t even gone to Louisiana. She hasn’t gone anywhere, and you know Emmy’s been all over the damn world. You can’t make her come back here like that. It’s only going to backfire.”

“What if I ask her?” I asked through gritted teeth.

“Then she’s going to feel obligated and have the same result. You’re going to have to trust her on this one, Luke. I know after the past it’s hard for you to trust her where Kyle is involved, but you have to let her work this out herself.”

I dragged a hand over my face. “What if she doesn’t want to come back, Lena?”

“Honestly? I don’t think that’s going to happen. There’s so much more to lose besides…well besides you. Sorry, but that’s true. I think she needs to get some closure and she’ll be okay.”

“What if you’re wrong?” I asked tightly.

“I’m not wrong.”

“What if you are?”

“But I’m not.”

“Lena!” I roared. “This is fucking serious!”

“I know it is,” she said soothingly. “And I am serious. I don’t think I am wrong, but in the event that I am, we’ll worry about that then.”

“So, what the hell am I supposed to do until then?”

“Not get arrested for one,” she muttered. “Go on with your life.”

“Emmy and Lucas
are
my life. I can’t just lie down and die and not fight for them.”

“I’m not telling you not to fight, Luke,” she said in exa
speration. “I just want you to fight smarter.”

Only because my sister rarely led me wrong did I not get on the next plane to Philly to drag Emmy back, but I wasn’t sure how long my patience would hold out.

Chapter Nineteen

“Are you sorry for calling me a heart eating bitch?” Viv
ian asked me. Craig and I were walking into the courthouse Thursday morning when she walked up beside me as if she belonged with us.

“Are you sorry for slapping me?” I asked and sipped on my cup of coffee.

“No,” she laughed and looked at me incredulously.

“Then you are what you are,” I said and tipped my cup towards her as if to toast to her heart eating bitchy ways.

“I’m going to take that as a compliment, Luke Kessler,” she said and then snatched my coffee away from me. “Thanks for the coffee.”

She walked ahead of me, drinking my coffee as if it were made just for her.

“Wow,” Craig said, watching her walk away. “If I was straight, that could have given me a hard on. For a woman who eats other attorneys for breakfast, she’s kind of hot.”

“She took my coffee,” I complained.

“Forget your coffee. You better have a good apology for the judge and you better put on your A game because Deluca looks ravenous.”

I nodded in agreement and started to get my head toget
her. My fight with Emmy was still fresh, but I needed to focus. With some effort, I was able to push her out of my mind and prepare myself for battle with Vivian.

“I hope you are in a better state of mind today, Mr. Kes
sler,” Judge Marsen said a half hour later.

“I am. I apologize for my behavior, your Honor,” I said sincerely, and then added. “Bad hair day.”

A few snickers arose from the few people seated behind me, but the judge was not amused and neither was her bailiff.

I made it through the day without having another temper tantrum. I also made it through the day without checking my phone ten thousand times to see if Emmy called or texted. The only time she had called me since that phone call about Kyle was the night I was in jail. Even then, Lucas left a message for me on voicemail and she had said nothing. Maybe she was a
ngry and hurt, too, not like she had any right to be.

Despite my original plan to drag her caveman style back to Chicago, I was still too angry to talk to her. I talked to Lucas every evening for a couple of minutes, and Emmy made sure that we Skyped every few days and I was thankful for that. I didn’t talk to her, but she was always there in the background holding Lucas. I couldn’t get a read on how she was feeling or what she was thinking, and I had no idea what she was doing or who she was doing it with. Many times I picked up my phone to call her. I wanted to hear her voice. I wanted to hear her rea
ssure me that she wasn’t with Kyle. Hell, I wanted her to forget about the damn piece of shit bar and the beach and to come home.

But I always put my phone back down; stubbornness a
lways won.

Fortunately, I was extremely busy at the firm with an u
pcoming mega case and I wasn’t left with a lot of free time to harp on the whole situation. My staff and I were working late into every night, and the days I wasn’t in court I was up to my ears in paperwork, studying and researching and organizing to fortify my case. We had our biggest client yet. A win would not only bring millions to the firm, but open up so many more doors to add to the ones Emmy had opened for us.

We were all feeling the pressure and stress with this case. The holiday weekend was coming up and Steve and I wanted everyone to actually enjoy it and not work. The trial was set to start the Tuesday after Labor Day, so in the days leading up to the weekend, everyone was snippy. Emmy had finally decided to try to speak to me again and asked me about my Labor Day plans, but I was truly distracted by the work on my desk and gave her a simple one word answer. A part of me was relieved that she still wanted me, but another part of me was still bitter and angry and stubborn. I should have said more, but I didn’t, but it really had less to do with her than with unbelievable amount of work I had to do.

“If you're going to be like this again, I may as well not come back,” she snapped. “Lucas and I can settle down somewhere else.”

What. The. Fuck. Threatening to take my son away from me was the worst move she could have possibly made.

“I can't come out there, Emmy!” I yelled. “I'm busy! Don't you understand that?”

She of all people should have understood. She was wor
king the day I acquired the case and she was working the day we got the court date. Maybe she had forgotten, but she should have known that I wanted nothing more than to spend my days on the beach with Lucas and to not have to wake up every morning wondering if Emmy fucked Kyle yet.

“The only thing I am understanding is your bad attitude,” she had hissed and then hung up on me.

Cursing, I called her back but was immediately greeted by her voicemail. I put both hands in my hair and swallowed back a roar of exasperation. The past few weeks have felt like fucking junior high school with Emmy. Instead of talking like the grown ass adults we were, we were playing childish games like
Silent Treatment
and
Say Something Juvenile and Hang Up
. What was next? Were we going to start in on the
Yo Momma
insults?

It started deep in my gut and burst its way up and out of my mouth. I hadn’t laughed in so long, truly laughed, and now I couldn’t stop. I sat back in my chair laughing my ass off so hard that my sides began to ache. Minutes later when I was breathless and still snickering, I picked up the framed picture of Emmy and Lucas on my desk.

“Oh, you sure do make life interesting, Esmeralda Grayne,” I chuckled as I ran my thumb over her smiling face.

All of my anger and bitterness and distrust spilled out of me with my laughter. My epic temper tantrum was over.

My anger was gone, but Emmy was still pissed off. I didn’t blame her. I had been a royal jackass. I still got to speak to Lucas every day, and I spoke to Emmy briefly when she informed me that she and Lucas would be going to Louisiana. That leg of her trip was unexpected, but it had been a long time since she had gone, and even as much as she dislikes Sam, I imagined that sometimes a girl just needed her mom. I also had a feeling she wanted a little bit more time to get her head together before returning to Chicago. I wasn’t sure if she saw Kyle again or what it had done to her, and I very much wanted to know, but I didn’t ask. I let her do what she needed to do, even if it meant virtually ignoring me for a while longer.

More than a week after I put on my big boy pants, I was sitting in my office, preparing to meet a client. After all our prepping for trial, three days into it, the defendant wanted to settle, and their offer was more generous than we could have expected. Now I was back in my office, with a little less stress on my shoulders. The phone rang. I almost let it go to my voicemail, but changed my mind at the last second.

“Luke Kessler,” I answered absently.

“We need a house, with a yard, so you can play catch with Lucas,” Emmy said on the other line.

I smiled as my whole body relaxed at the sound of her voice. My chest felt so much lighter as relief washed over me.

“That's random,” I said.

“Sometimes I'm random.”

“Sometimes?”

There was a brief silence and then a very quiet sigh.

“Are we still fighting?” she asked, sounding defeated.

“Depends,” I said carefully. “Do I have to fight anyone for you?”

“You would fight for me?” she asked in a small and quiet voice.

“To the death,” I said firmly and clearly.

I could almost hear her smiling.

“I'm sorry I was being an ass,” I apologized sincerely.

“I'm sorry for giving you a reason to be an ass.” Her apology was just as sincere.

“You don't have to apologize, Emmy. I've been trying to get you to open up to me for months and I blew it the first time that you said something I didn't like.” Shame tingled up my spine as I thought about my behavior.

“Well, I didn't exactly make you feel secure in our rel
ationship.”

“If I'm insecure, it's my own fault. I trust you, one hu
ndred percent,” I said as Kacey stepped in and indicated my client had arrived. “Listen, I have to go. I have a client waiting for me. I'll call you tonight.”

“Okay. I love you,” she said, her voice high with hope.

My heart expanded and nearly choked me with emotion.

“I love you, too, babe,” I managed.