Something to Talk About (21 page)

Yet, it hurt.

But you have no right to hurt. We’ve gone over this. You have no claims to Jax other than the right to say you made him your boy toy.

Gareth tightened his hold on her arm, letting his head graze her shoulder. “I’m glad I have you for my mommy. I don’t want to be like Maizy.”

Em’s heart shifted in her chest. “You do know daddies can be good mommies, too, right? I think Jax is a pretty good daddy.” A pretty good everything. Especially good at not texting her when she was desperate to hear from him.

“Nuh-uh. He’s nowhere near as good as you. He makes dee-sgusting fish sticks.”

But amazing conversation... Em wrinkled her nose and giggled with him. “How do you know?”

“Maizy said so.”

“You and Maizy are becoming real friends, huh?”

“She’s funny.”

Clifton Junior stomping down the stairs interrupted their conversation. When the light from the stairway hit his face, Em’s eyes flew open. “Clifton! What happened to your face?”

“Nothing,” he replied, ducking his head and heading for the kitchen.

Em set Gareth aside and ran after him, grabbing him by the arm to spin him around. “Oh, honey! How did this happen?” How had she missed a lump the size of Ukraine on his forehead? His hat. He’d worn his ballcap all through dinner and right up until he’d gone to take a shower.

“Get off! It’s no big deal.” He pulled away from her, hard enough to make tears sting her eyes.

“Clifton, this is a big deal. What happened? You have to tell me so I can decide whether we need to see a doctor.”

“It’s just a bump. No big deal.”

Gareth wrapped his arms around her thigh. “Jared Carpenter beated him up today. After school. Because Clifton called him a bad word after he called Daddy a girl.”

Clifton whipped around, his face red, his eyes bulging at Gareth. “Shut up, Gareth! I told you not to tell anyone!”

Em pushed Gareth behind her. “Do not speak to your brother like that, Clifton. I won’t have it. He’s only telling me to protect you. Now tell me what happened. This instant!”

“Or what?” His eyes grew round with defiance, his small body rigid with more anger than she’d ever witnessed from him.

“Or I’m going to take away all of your privileges. TV, Xbox, all of it, and we’re going straight to the school tomorrow to have a chat with Principal Crawford—that’s what!”

“Good. Then I’ll be a snitch, too!”

Em softened. She remembered this rock and a hard place well. If you tattled on the person who’d picked on you, you were labeled a snitch. If you didn’t, you were subject to more torture. She wouldn’t have this for her boys. “Clifton, I know how hard this has been. I know what it feels like to be teased and picked on. I want to help if you’ll just let me. Please, let me help you.”

Violence was in the mix now. It was one thing to call names, but it was quite another to use your fists. This would end. She’d see to it.

“Just leave me alone! This is all your fault anyway!” he screamed, making Gareth cling to her leg and cry. “If you were a good wife, Daddy wouldn’t have left to live with Gina! I heard Grandma Clora say it!”

The wind soared right out of Em’s lungs and left her with a stinging pain, so sharp, so real, it was like someone had jammed a flaming knife into her back.

Clifton raced up the stairs, and she let him. She was too hot with anger—too incensed with her mother to speak to him.

Gareth tugged on her skirt with a sob. Em scooped him up in her arms and rocked him. “I hate Clifton!”

Tears stung the corner of her eyes. “Never, ever say that, Gareth. Not ever. Clifton’s having a bad time of it right now, but he loves you. He’s saying things out of anger.”

“I shouldn’t have telled you what happened.”

Em sat him on her hip, thumbing away his tears. “Yes. Yes, you should have, Gareth. You were right to tell Mommy. No one is ever to lay their hands on either of you, understand? You must always tell an adult.”

He snuggled down on her shoulder and closed his eyes, his sobs easing to soft hiccups then to a light snore.

But she couldn’t let him go just yet. She had to hold on to something to keep her from getting in her car, driving to her mother’s and screaming her rage like she was off her rocker. It was enough that she’d dealt with her mother’s anger all her life, but she wouldn’t have it infiltrating her children.

Settling into the couch, she held Gareth close and eyed the ugly envelope with the fake birth certificate. It had to be a fake.

She hadn’t given it much thought after opening it and getting past the initial shock of just how far people would go to get rid of them. Obviously, shame the head Call Girl in charge was the latest tactic.

But she knew the Mags and just how far they’d go to get what they wanted. They wanted to embarrass her—humiliate her into leaving her job at Call Girls because it would surely stir trouble between her and Dixie if something like that were true.

It was creative; she’d give ’em that. Instead of paying it much mind, Em had made several copies of it to keep on hand for Call Girls’ prank files and kept the original.

It was clearly someone’s idea of yet another cruel joke. It wasn’t the first, and it wouldn’t be the last. This one was more thought out than the typical, “Dear Emmaline, The devil is saving you a seat next to him” or “You’ve paved the road to Perdition for Plum Orchard” letters she got as GM, but it was also ridiculous. Fun, easygoing Ethan Davis and her staid, purse-lipped, disapproving mother?

Never.

She and Dixie would laugh about it just like they laughed about all the crazy letters and angry email they got from all sorts of people in town and from all over the world, in fact. What they should have done was change the name of her mother. That she might have fallen for. She was nothing like Clora, and when she got her hands on her...

Em took a deep breath and reached for the second envelope. It was thicker and much heavier than her fake birth certificate.

Tucking Gareth next to her and covering him with a throw, she sat back and ripped open the envelope.

The first thing she saw was the legal header—something she was familiar with as Hank’s former secretary.

And then she saw Clifton Senior’s signature.

The breath left her lungs.

She’d thought he’d just been spitting in the wind. Throwing threats around because that’s what Clifton did when he was frustrated and angry.

But this sealed the deal.

Clifton really was suing her for custody of the boys.

Eighteen

“H
ey!” Caine yelled to Jax, running to catch up to him as he left Madge’s. “Where you off to, brother?”

To meet the woman who could potentially ruin my life.
“Nowhere special. How’s things?”

Caine smiled, clapping him on the back. “How’s anything where Dixie’s involved? Crazy, as always.”

Now Jax smiled. He liked seeing his friend so damn happy. It gave him hope. “But you love it, and you know it.”

He threw up his hands with a bark of laughter. “Fine. I love the chaos. She makes mayhem like no other, but I love it. So listen, been meaning to talk to you since yesterday, just wasn’t sure how to approach it.”

Instantly, his mind went to the software he was developing. “Everything okay with the security program? It’s got glitches, but it’s early yet. I’ll work ’em out.”

“Everything’s cool with that. It’s something else. Wasn’t sure if I should tell you or not. Haven’t told anyone in fact because at first I thought I was seeing things.”

His gut tightened. “Sounds ominous. So, shoot.”

“That woman you dated back after college. You know, the one who worked in the coffee shop under Jay? Reece, was it?”

Fuck. Now what? How long had she been skulking around? “What about her?”

Caine was measuring his words. Jax heard it in his pause, saw it in his eyes. “I saw her the other day. I’d swear my left arm on it. Can’t miss that red hair, you know? Just wondered what she’d be doing here in Plum Orchard. I thought...well, you know, with all the shit that went down with Jake...I dunno. I’m just looking out for you.”

All the shit that had gone down with Jake. Yeah. There’d been plenty of that. “Where’d you see her?”

“Right here in the square. I think.” He scrubbed his jaw. “Shit, I could be wrong.”

Jax’s jaw tightened. “You’re not wrong.”

Caine tried to hide his surprise, but it was pointless. Of course he’d be surprised Reece was here. They’d kept in loose touch since their college years. Caine knew what had gone down with Jake and Reece. “Why the hell would she be
here
after...”

“After she ditched me and got knocked up by Jake?” Damn, hearing himself say that was like a punch in the kidney. It sounded goddamn ugly. “Sorry. That was shitty. Jake was your friend, too.”

Caine shook his head in understanding. “Hold on. You’re saying Jake knocked up Reece?
Jake?
”

“Jake.”

“Well, it’s not like I was that tight with him, but he was like your brother. I had no idea. Does that mean...”

“Maizy is Jake’s. Jake and Reece’s.”

* * *

“Clifton?”

“Go away.”

“No. I will not go away. I’m your mother whether you like it or not and I will not be spoken to in that tone. Now, sit up on your bed and you give me your full attention. Understand?” Em pushed his door open, crossing the room to perch on the edge of his bed.

He scooted to the other side like she had the plague, and that was just fine. He could be as angry as he liked, but he would hear her. “Why didn’t you tell me about this fight?”

“Because it’s no big deal.”

“It absolutely is a big deal when you come home with an egg the size of the ones Miss Prissy’s prized chicken lays.”

Stony silence.

“I won’t allow anyone to lay their hands on you, Clifton. It’s unacceptable, you hear me? You could have been seriously hurt, and nothing—
nothing
about that is okay with me. What kind of mother would I be if I let someone hurt you just because you don’t want to be a snitch? I’m going to Principal Crawford this morning, and we’ll see to makin’ sure no one puts another hand on you.”

He pressed himself against the wall and shrugged a shoulder. “I said it’s no big deal, Mom.”

Em tugged on the leg of his jeans. “If it’s not such a big deal, why did you call your daddy and tell him you wanted to come live with him?”

“I don’t know.”

“Clifton, I want you to know something, and I want you to really hear me when I tell you, I love you and your brother more than I’ve ever loved anythin’ else. If you’re really unhappy with me, then we’ll talk about where you should live. Maybe we can find a way for you to see your dad more. I don’t ever want you to be unhappy, son. I surely don’t want you beat up. I know what happened with... Your dad is—”

“He wears girls’ clothes.”

Em nodded, her expression grim. “He does, but I’ll defend his right to do so with my last breath. Know why?”

“Why?”

“Because hidin’ who you are inside hurts. Your dad wasn’t happy pretending to be someone he wasn’t. But he pretended because that’s what everyone said he should do. Because that’s what all his friends said he should do—it’s what society says you should do. I don’t want your dad to hurt. But I don’t want you to hurt, either, and if living with your father makes you hurt less, then...” She fought the hitch in her words. She needed to stay strong when she did this. “Then we’ll talk about it. I don’t want to, but I will. We’ll figure something out. Work out some new rules for more visitation.”

His silence sat in her heart like a heavy stone. Em rose to leave, pausing for a moment. She couldn’t bear how conflicted Clifton was. Couldn’t bear this lost, angry boy, a mere ghost of the child he’d been just a few months ago. That was when she knew what she had to do. “Clifton?”

“What?”

“I need you to remember something for me, okay?”

“What?”

“No matter where you live. No matter how near or far you are from me, no matter how angry you are with me, I’ll always be here. There’ll never be a day your mama won’t be here. And I love you. So, so much.”

She padded silently out of his room, heading down the stairs to devise the beginnings of the plan that had kept her up all night. She was going to put her life back on track and focus on what was next. Keeping the boys with her. If that meant rearranging her entire life to do it—then that’s what she’d do.

Part of that began with Jax. Em picked up her cell phone, her throat tight, her eyes stinging with tears, and she texted him.

“Done.”

* * *

Jax sat in his truck on the bridge, waiting for Reece to arrive with his stomach on full tilt, his fingers like ice. He’d been texting Em all day with no luck. She didn’t answer her office phone, and he didn’t want to rouse suspicion by calling Dixie and asking her about it.

But he had to see her. He needed her to know that this was no longer a fun, sexy game for him. This was real. They could be real. Damn the people who’d talk—he’d handle it. Damn everything but him, and Em, and their kids. Together.

Somehow, he had to make her see that it didn’t have to be like it was with her ex. She didn’t have to give up anything for him. She could have whatever color she damn well pleased on the walls, for some towels, wherever. The only thing she had to give him was her heart. Her trust that he wouldn’t discard it...dismiss it.

He just had to do this one thing, and he wanted to do it right.

Checking his phone again, he scowled. Where was she? He lobbed the phone on the passenger seat, running a hand over his jaw when he glanced at the digital clock on his dash.

Where was the one thing he had to take care of? Leave it to Reece to be late. When had she ever cared about inconveniencing anyone? Reece lived by her own rules—her own timetable. She was whimsical and flighty, and he’d known it from the moment he’d fallen in love with her.

Thinking about Reece never failed to bring up Jake. His face, his laughter, his determination to be something. Memories of his dead best friend crowded Jax’s head, shoving their way in after keeping them out for so long, making it throb.

Jake Landry had been his best friend since eighth grade. They’d bonded over Cheez Doodles at lunch on Jake’s first day of school, and it stayed that way right up until Reece.

The Jays—that’s what everyone called them back then. Wherever there was a Jax, there was a Jake, was the joke. He’d loved Jake—considered him a Hawthorne through and through. A brother. That’s what Jake had been. No different than Tag or Gage in his mind.

They’d played football together in high school, chased cheerleaders, drank their first illegal six-pack together. Jake had worked his ass off to get a scholarship to the same college as Jax just so they could keep Team Jay alive.

He was Jake’s lifeline—his link to healthy, normal relationships when his home life was so shitty. Raised by an alcoholic father, Jake was a welfare check—a six-pack of beer and cable TV for his dad after his mother left when he was just five.

It was a miracle none of it rubbed off on Jake. He attributed that to Jax and his family—pushing him to keep his grades up, inviting him into their tight circle, supporting him the way they’d supported their own sons.

First chance Jake got after he graduated, he got the hell out and never looked back, and Jax helped him, throwing his shoddy duffel bag in the back of the used truck they’d both worked to buy.

After college, they’d begun their own software development company.
Jay.
He wrote the code; Jake, and all his varied charms, marketed and designed it.

After four years of struggling to pay their rent, their big break came in the way of a top-secret defense contract with the government. After five years, they met Reece, who worked in the coffee shop just below their newly purchased warehouse space for Jay.

Jax fell in love with her, and then Jake slept with her.

Stole her right out from under his nose, and when Jax found out—he never spoke to Jake again. He’d never forget the second he realized Reece and Jake had betrayed him. Sitting across from them at the pub they frequented, offering up their bullshit, cliché excuses about how them falling into bed with one another had “just happened.”

He’d never forget how he couldn’t catch his breath. He’d never forget how in five minutes, everything he’d loved, his company, Jake, Reece, was all just gone. Done. Over.

He’d never forget how losing Jake was like losing a limb. There was the phantom pain of it—Jake, so much a part of his life, suddenly gone, but still there every time he did something they used to do. Yet, it was only Jake’s memory there, and that hurt like hell. There was the physical pain of it—every time he saw Jake pick Reece up from his office window. Every time he ran into him at the gym. Every time, it felt like his guts were being ripped from his stomach.

When Jax cut him off, refused to speak to him, wouldn’t take calls from him, shunned him like he’d never existed, Jake finally offered to sell his shares in Jay to Jax, and they cut all ties.

He’d run off to live happily ever after with Reece, and the next time Jax saw him was in his coffin.

He’d fed off his anger for a long time after that, letting it rule every decision he made, holding on to it, always with the skewed thought, somewhere far in the back of his mind, that someday, he’d have Jake back in his life again. Maybe it would just be to tell him to go the fuck to hell, maybe it would be when he and Reece broke up, but Jake would always be “around.”

Until he wasn’t. Until he damn well got himself killed in a car accident, and there was no Jake. There was no Jake to persecute. To slaughter him with his words, to rage at how soul crushing his betrayal had been, to get it all out. There was no physical Jake to yell his anger at. There was just a shell of Jake, pale and still in a suit he’d never have worn, in a coffin Jax wanted to haul him out of and hold him close until he breathed again.

Until Jax could tell him that no matter how much he’d hurt him with Reece—Jake was still his brother.

And now, he was about to meet with the woman who’d helped take everything he’d loved away—only to throw it all away.

I helped her, Jax. She didn’t do it alone.

A knock on his window startled him. Reece gazed into his truck, just as beautiful as she’d always been. He turned the ignition off and popped open the door, tucking his chin into the collar of his jacket and nodding in her direction. “Reece.”

Her hair flew around her in familiar shocks of red. Hair she claimed she hated, but he’d once loved. “So we finally meet.”

Though he regretted like hell not speaking to Jake, lived with the guilt of that every day, he’d never regret cutting Reece out of his life. “What’s your game here, Reece? You’ve been hanging around here for a month, not returning my calls, yanking my chain, showing up at Maizy’s school. Cut to the chase.”

If she was offended by his harsh tone, she didn’t react. Reece was clearly on a mission and when that happened, she was unshakable. “I was sorry to hear about Harper. There’s been so much death in the past few years, hasn’t there? So many important people in our lives gone.”

Jax’s lips went flat. Harper had been the only one who’d liked Reece when he’d dated her. He didn’t want to remember that. She didn’t deserve that. “Look, let’s cut to the chase. Why are you here and what the hell do you want?”

She let her eyes fall to the ground, but it wasn’t that coy, innocent gaze she’d always used when she wanted something. It was almost haunted. “I just had to see her. She’s perfect. So perfect.”

Alarm bells began their distant ringing. She wanted Maizy. Goddamn it, it wasn’t bad enough she’d taken Jake, but she wanted Maizy after all this time? Never gonna happen.

He checked himself. Forced himself to remain calm. “So what is it? Do you want to meet her, Reece? Talk to her, get to know her?”

Reece paused for a long moment, staring off into the distance, and he wasn’t sure if he saw regret or relief when she answered. “I know this will make you hate me even more than you already do, but no. I don’t want to get to know her. She’s better off not knowing me.”

Fuck. He had to hope she wasn’t going to play the martyr here. That wasn’t gonna fly.
Jake wouldn’t want this, buddy. Do the right thing.
He made you promise in his will you’d let Maizy see her.
Damn it. “Look, aside from everything’s that’s happened between us, she’s your daughter. Yours and Jake’s. Jake loved you, Reece. He loved Maizy. He wanted her to know you. He said as much in his will. I had to promise I’d let you see her before I was granted custody of her.”