A whimpering noise beside me distracted me from my dark thoughts, and I looked over to see a wet nose pressed against the cage door of the small kennel resting on Hayden’s lap. Dark, sad eyes looked back at me from behind the bars, and a mass of black and white fur shivered nonstop.
“We’re almost there, sweetie,” I cooed at the puppy, trying to reassure her. Casting a quick glance at Hayden, I said with a frown, “I really think you should just hold her. She wouldn’t be as scared in your arms.” I knew that worked on me.
“She’s safer in the carrier,” he answered, his expression completely serious.
His comment made me smile; Hayden caring about safety was pretty humorous, considering all he’d done in his life. He’d come a long way from the first time we’d met. At least, I hoped he had.
A few minutes later we were pulling into the parking lot of Izzy and Antonia’s apartment building. I parked my truck close to Izzy’s door, and Hayden hopped out. His smile was a mile wide; he was so excited to finally fulfill his promise to Antonia. Izzy was less excited, but she had no intention of telling her daughter she couldn’t have a companion.
Pet carrier safely tucked under his arm, Hayden strolled up to the door and rapped on it with his knuckles. Izzy answered immediately. Her grin was bright at seeing us, but then her gaze shifted to what Hayden was holding. She sighed as she opened the door wider for us. “Come on in, she’s just finishing dinner.”
Hayden’s playful grin grew as he stepped through the door. He’d been wanting to do this for months, but Keith had been keeping him so busy, this was his first real chance. That, and it had taken him forever to find Antonia’s “perfect” dog.
I gave Izzy a hug as I stepped through the door, and she sighed again; I patted her back in commiseration. Having something you didn’t want thrust upon you was never easy.
“Hey, Bookworm,” Hayden called, stepping into the living room. “I got something for you.”
I instantly heard a chair scraping, a fork dropping, and feet pounding toward us. Antonia practically skipped out from around the corner leading to the kitchen. She was pale, but her cheeks were bright with spots of color. Her feeding tube had been gone for a while, and she was much healthier looking. Even her hair was coming in nicely; you wouldn’t know what she was going through by looking at her.
Antonia’s eyes instantly locked onto the pet carrier Hayden was setting on the floor. “Oh my gosh, is that my puppy?”
Instead of answering, Hayden sank to his knees, opened the kennel door, and pulled out the shivering bundle. Antonia squealed when she saw the Shih Tzu puppy in his arms. Izzy groaned. “Hayden…those dogs are little hairballs.”
Hayden’s grin was a mile wide as he handed the puppy to Antonia. “Then Bookworm will have to get really good at brushing her. Right, kiddo?”
Antonia was nodding enthusiastically as she hugged the puppy to her chest. “I’ll take great care of her, Mom. I promise.”
There was so much hope and joy in her eyes, that Izzy finally smiled. “I know you will, honey,” she whispered. She looked over at me, then over at Hayden, and a sudden seriousness blanketed the room. Hopefully she would have a really long time of taking care of her dog ahead of her.
Clearing her throat, Izzy said, “What do you tell Uncle Hayden?”
Antonia instantly wrapped one of her arms around his neck. “Thank you! This is even better than the American Girl doll that you get for me every year.” Pulling back, her expression grew serious. “I’d still like to keep getting the dolls though. I love them.”
Hayden laughed. “We’ll see, kiddo. We’ll see.” From his expression though, it was obvious he’d be getting dolls for her until the end of time. It warmed my heart to see how much he loved that little girl, and for a moment, I forgot that things between us weren’t exactly perfect.
I remembered later that night, when we got back to my house and Hayden excused himself for a “party” with Keith. Maybe it was stupid of me to assume that we’d get to spend the entire evening together, but I really thought I’d get to have him all night long; I was so sick of him leaving all the time. “Again? Just how many sponsors is Keith trying to take on?” I snapped.
Hayden paused in grabbing his jacket. Straightening, he walked over to me and wrapped his arms around my waist. “I know it sucks, but it’s something I’ve got to do. I’m free tomorrow night though? All night, no interruptions. We could go to the track? Break in the break room,” he said with a suggestive wriggle of his eyebrows.
God, all that sounded amazing, but I wanted it now. I didn’t want to have to wait twenty-four hours to spend some quality time with him. I was tired of waiting. “Why do you have to go? You don’t owe Keith all your personal time. He’s got other riders to win sponsors for him.”
Hayden’s hands started running up and down my back in a soothing pattern, and while his face didn’t show any sort of turmoil, I got the feeling he was stalling for time. “I know you don’t like Keith,” he finally said. “And I know you don’t trust him, but…I’m trying to fix things by doing this.”
His answer surprised me so much, I felt my eyes bulge. “Fix things? What things?”
Hayden sighed, then shifted his gaze to the floor. When he raised them to meet mine again, they were shining with sincerity. “I’m trying to get your job back. I’m trying to convince Keith to…” Closing his eyes, he shook his head. Reopening them, he whispered, “You belong on a bike, and I’ll stop at nothing to get you there.”
There was heat and determination in his tone that sent shivers up my arms. That was why he was going to all these parties? To woo Keith into letting me ride? While it was a sweet thought, I had to wonder…what would Keith have him do in exchange for helping me? What wouldn’t Keith have him do? Fuck, I did not like this.
“I’ve never asked for you to do anything to get my job back,” I told him. “I’ll get it back on my own.” Somehow. And I’d do it cleanly, without making a pact with the devil.
Hayden gave me a sad, lopsided smile. “You’ve tried everything you can, Kenzie. Your father’s influence has blocked you at every turn. Your only chance to race…is leaving me. And I hope you can see why I’d do anything to avoid that.”
I could, and I hated that I could, because it gave justification to his actions. Whatever he was doing, he was doing it for me…and that only made it worse. Goddamn it. Why couldn’t there be a simple solution to this problem? Why couldn’t my dad let me make my own decisions? Why couldn’t he just be happy that I was happy? Or I had been happy, at any rate.
Shaking my head, I told him, “I hate this. I hate all of this.” Felicia, Keith, my job, my family…it all sucked.
With a heavy exhale, Hayden rested his forehead against mine. “I know. I hate it too. But I will fix this, Kenzie. You have my word.” Before I could ask him what his masterplan was, he kissed my forehead, grabbed his coat, and walked out the front door. As the heavy wood shut behind him, an ominous tremor rang through my body. It felt like something had been cut with him walking away without an explanation, I just wasn’t sure what.
I couldn’t get my heart to calm down after he left; it was like the stupid organ was trying to break free from my body. The walls around me were suddenly so confining, I knew I’d suffocate if I stayed here any longer. Grabbing my phone, I texted Nikki. ‘You home? I’m coming over.’
Her response didn’t take long. ‘Yeah, no prob. Everything okay?’
No, yes…I don’t know.
‘Just going stir crazy,’ I answered. Hopefully she didn’t ask where Hayden was, and why he wasn’t occupying my time; I didn’t feel like explaining it in a text message.
In true Nikki fashion, she didn’t ask, she just accepted. ‘I’ll open some wine.’
Smiling, I grabbed my jacket and the key to my bike. I sped on my way over to Nikki’s apartment. I couldn’t help it. Hayden and I hadn’t gone midnight racing in forever, and his tease of possibly doing it soon had me itching; I needed r
elief. I managed to keep it under 80mph though, and that took an extreme amount of willpower.
When I knocked on Nikki’s door, she opened it with a bottle of wine in her hand. “You sounded like you needed this.”
I smirked at her, but I took the bottle. As soon as I got into the house, I flopped onto Nikki’s couch. Somehow being here, where the doubt and mystery surrounding Hayden hadn’t seeped into every floorboard, made it easier to breathe. Nikki handed me a large wineglass and I filled it nearly to the brim. Her eyes were as big as saucers when she took the bottle and poured herself a glass about half the size. Sitting beside me, she took a dainty sip. Mine wasn’t so dignified.
“So…” she slowly began. “What’s up?”
Laying my head back on the couch cushion, I stared at her ceiling and debated what to tell her. “I don’t know. I think everything is just starting to get to me.” Rolling my head over to the side to look at her, I said, “I miss my life.” And truly, that was the crux of my problems. I was in mourning. Still.
Nikki carefully wrapped her arm around me, drawing me in for a quick hug. “I know you do. But…it’s temporary. You’ll get it all back.” Her words were hopeful, but her tone said she didn’t entirely believe it. We both knew how stubborn Jordan Cox could be.
I gave her a smile anyway, and she brightened at seeing it. “And you have Hayden to get you through it in the meantime.” There was something in her voice that made her sentence more of a question than a statement. She was probing.
With a sigh, I stared into my massive glass of wine. Might as well tell her. “Yeah…thing is…I’m not so sure I do have him anymore.” I felt something crack inside me after I said it out loud. I’d been hiding behind denial for so long now, actually admitting that something was wrong was torturous.
Nikki’s face was full of concern when I glanced up at her, but not surprise. “What do you mean? What happened?”
A small laugh escaped me as I shook my head. “That’s just it…nothing has happened really. But…” I felt my face hardening as I thought of his many disappearing acts. “He leaves all the time, and I really have no idea where he goes. He’s says he’s doing stuff for Keith, and Keith confirmed that, but…” My chest tightened as anxiety trickled through every inch of me. What the hell was he really doing? “I know relationships are all about trust, but something’s off…I know it.”
My eyes watered, and I quickly blinked back the tears. Nikki’s face morphed from concern to anger. “Maybe he’s with her…” she murmured, almost too low for me to hear.
I did hear her though. “Her who?” I asked, fear raising the hairs on my arms. “Felicia? Why would you say that?”
“Nothing, no reason,” she quickly answered.
Bull. She was lying, I knew it. “That wasn’t a nothing comment, that was definitely something. Spill it, Ramirez.” Before my heart leaps out of my throat.
Nikki shook her head, regret clear on her face. “No, I just… I don’t know… It was…wine,” she finished, lifting her glass and pointing at it.
Taking the glass from her, I set it on the table. “No, it wasn’t wine that made you say that. You said it for a reason, and I want to know exactly what that reason is.”
Looking around the room, like she was searching for an escape route, she groaned, “It’s nothing, Kenzie. I just…I overheard him and Felicia one day, and…I guess she texts him.” Locking gazes with me, she shook her head. “After what you said, I was just making a bitchy conclusion and assuming they were sleeping together. But they’re not…I’m sure they’re not. Shit.”
“Jesus, Nikki. Why didn’t you say anything?” And God…was he meeting up with her?
Nikki seemed nervous, which did not make me feel any better. Finally, she raised her hands and said, “I would have told you ages ago, but Hayden said he was going to tell you. He said it had to come from him or you’d freak out…and I thought he was right, so I didn’t say anything. I like you and Hayden together. I didn’t want it to be anything, so I didn’t press him. I just sort of left it alone. And then it got to be so far after the fact that I just assumed you knew and didn’t want to talk about it. And I couldn’t bring it up, in case you didn’t know, because then you’d wonder why I hadn’t told you, and… God, I suck.”
Heat flooded my cheeks as anger mixed with terror. “So, you think he’s going off to be with her? You think he’s sleeping with her?”
She shook her head. “No, I don’t. Not really. It was just the first thing that popped into my head when you said he was disappearing all the time. Jesus, Kenzie. I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I shouldn’t have said anything. They’re not sleeping together. There’s no way he would do that to you. He loves you. Like, deep-down, soulmate type love.”
Setting my wine on the coffee table, I stood up. “He loved her too.” And he still might. And even if he wasn’t sleeping with her, he’d promised me he wouldn’t talk to her, wouldn’t rebuild that bridge. Either way, he’d lied to me. He was lying to me. And it only made sense that she was the one he was meeting with all the time, not Keith. He could be with her right now.
Nikki sighed as she looked up at me. “What are you going to do?” she asked.
Considering the rage that was beginning to burn away the fear and panic inside me, my voice was surprisingly calm when I answered. “I’m going to Hayden’s to wait for him to come home.” Or I’m going to scour the streets, looking for him all night.
Standing up, Nikki put her hand on my arm. “Please don’t kill him. You’re too young to spend your life in prison.” I smiled at her joke, but there was no humor on my face. With how I was feeling right now, I couldn’t promise her anything.
I blew past the 80mph mark on the way to Hayden’s. I thought the speed might help me calm down, but it really didn’t. How could he lie to me? And how long had he been lying to me? Nikki had implied that it had been going on for some time. Had he been talking to Felicia for months? Slowly building reconnections that he’d promised he’d let die? Had he taken it to the next level? Was he screwing her, at this very moment? That son of a bitch! I’d given up everything for him! He was doing this to help me, my ass! He was helping himself.
By the time I got to his place, I was steaming. No…I’d left steaming behind ages ago. I was Mount Vesuvius, about to erupt all over his ass. His lights were on when I got there, which pissed me off even more. He’s still home? He’d left my house almost an hour ago. What time was this supposed party?
Not able to hold back the inferno inside me, I banged on his door with all my strength; the heel of my hand stung a little when I was finished. Hayden opened the door a few seconds later, confusion and irritation on his face. His eyes shifted to surprise when he saw me. “Kenzie? What are you doing here?”
“What are you doing here?” I countered. “I thought you had a party to go to?”
He ran a hand through his dirty-blond hair as he drew his lower lip into his mouth. “It got rescheduled. I was just debating if I should call you, or let you sleep.”
Right.
Hayden smiled and reached out for me, but I stepped back. His grin fell with his hand. “What’s wrong?”
In my anger, my response was blunt. And vague. “She texts you?”
Hayden’s brows drew together, and he started to ask who, but then understanding filled his face and he let out a long sigh. “I think you should come in,” he said, turning sideways so I could enter his apartment.
He knew what I was talking about. That meant he really was texting her. I hadn’t doubted Nikki, but I’d been hoping… Fuck.
I brushed past him, knocking his shoulder in the process. I kind of wanted to tackle him, but I knew that was excessive; I loved him, so I needed to calm down and hear him out. Although, I couldn’t possibly think of an excuse that would make his lying okay.
Hayden sighed again as he closed the door; it was heavy with guilt. He turned around to face me slowly, reluctantly. “Look, I—”
&n
bsp; I didn’t even let him begin his explanation. Storming forward, I shoved my finger into his chest. “She texts you and you text her! You swore up and down that you didn’t want to hear a single word she said, then you go behind my back and have conversations with her like it’s nothing? What the hell, Hayden?”
He grabbed my hand to stop me from poking him, then he tried interlacing our fingers; I pulled my hand back before he could. Frown on his face, he said, “She texts me. I can’t stop her from doing that. And I don’t have conversations with her. Sometimes she pushes my buttons and I…inadvertently respond. That’s it.”
“And I should believe that?” I asked, shifting my hands to my hips. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I snapped. “You didn’t think your ex texting you was worth mentioning?”
“So you could react like this?” he said, indicating my stance. “I was trying to avoid this.”
“Maybe if you had told me instead of Nikki, I wouldn’t be reacting like this. Did you ever think of that?” I asked, staring him down.
He closed his eyes and clamped his jaw shut; I could almost see him counting to ten in his mind. When he finally reopened his eyes, he said, “Yes. That’s why I asked her not to tell you. I was trying to figure out how to talk to you…without pissing you off.”
Folding my arms over my chest, I told him, “Well, you failed.”
“I can see that,” he said, lips pursed.
Annoyed by this entire conversation, I tossed my hands into the air. “How did she even get your number, Hayden? Did you give it to her?” If he did, that made his defense one gigantic lie.
His face hardened. “No, Keith did. He gave it to her so she could ‘pass on messages’ for him,” he said, using air quotes. He rolled his eyes. “Like he can’t talk to me directly or something. He’s meddling in shit he shouldn’t be meddling in.”