Keeping Secrets in Seattle (8 page)

“Hunt? You mean, with a gun?” I stared at the flames, picturing a gaggle of children running through the woods, rifles in hand.

When Landon chuckled, his chest bounced. “That’s generally how it happens, yes. Unless we hunt with bows and arrows.”

I fiddled with the collar of his shirt. “Something tells me that you know how to do that, too.”

He pressed a kiss against my messy hair. “Yup. My dad taught me.”

I looked up at him. “Wow…interesting.”

“You seem a bit freaked out.” He brushed a thumb along my cheekbone. “Not much of an outdoorsy girl, are you?”

“Oh, I love the outdoors.” My voice came out squeaky. “I like going to outdoor concerts in Gasworks Park or going to Alki Beach.” I listed off some of Seattle’s outdoor sites, hoping I would sound way more well-rounded than I actually was.

“Those are a far cry from out here. This is the Pacific rainforest, Violet.” The cry of a coyote punctuated Landon’s sentence, and I hunkered down under the blanket a bit more.

“Are we safe out here?” I winced as soon as the words left my mouth. Take me to any neighborhood in downtown Seattle, and I walked around like I was the founder, but stick me in the woods with trees and wild animals and I was skittish as hell.

He pulled me closer. “Of course we are. Coyotes won’t come close to this place, especially with a fire going. Bears are a different story, though. Last year, my dad shot one right off the back porch.”

I tugged the blanket tighter. “Not helping.”

Landon released another deep laugh. “Such a city girl. Don’t worry. We’re just fine. You’d better get used to it out here, though.”

I looked up at him. “Why’s that?”

He squeezed me. “Can’t imagine not sitting next to a campfire with you again.”

It was easy to get caught up in the fairy tale. Landon was
talented, rugged, and hella sexy, especially while cooking steak and potatoes on an open fire like some sort of tattooed cowboy. But still…an avid hunter? And the rugged lifestyle of future cabin living?

I gulped. I
was
a city girl. There was something comforting about the fact that I was able to run down to the corner market at three
a.m.
for tampons and a jumbo fountain pop if I needed them. I always envisioned raising my children where we would be surrounded by galleries and museums, and they would hear street musicians playing for tips on the corners.

Landon wanted to raise his kids in the woods…with guns.

That being said, I also always envisioned my future with Gabe. And it was painfully clear now that that was a pipe dream that would never, ever come true. Especially with Gabe back in Seattle at that very moment, doing God knows what with…her. Maybe it was time for a new dream?

“I’ll take you backpacking up at the summit of the Cascade pass this summer. We can stop at this amazing cliff, and I’ll cook some trout on the fire.” Landon beamed at me. “Do you like trout? And backpacking?”

I shook my head, overwhelmed. “I…um…yes?”

“Great!” His fingers raised the back of my shirts, finding skin underneath, and began tracing those figure eights on my back. A shockwave shot straight to my belly, igniting a fire that rivaled the one warming us. “We can also do some camping in Oregon. Do you like Oregon?”

I nodded. “Yeah. I’m thinking about applying for some stylist positions at a few salons in Portland.”

Landon’s posture stiffened. “Why would you do that?”

“Well…” I didn’t want to explain that until recently I’d been harboring feelings for my ex-boyfriend-slash-best friend, and that moving away from the city where they would be living in marital bliss seemed like the best thing to do. Instead, I went with this: “I’ve got a chance to be lead stylist in Portland. The business is saturated in Seattle. It’s a good opportunity.”

“What would happen with us?” he asked. His eyes were wide and concerned, and my insides squeezed.

“We’ve only been dating a month,” I said weakly, my resolve starting to melt into pudding under his heavy gaze.

“I guess I’ll have to convince you to stay.” The corner of Landon’s mouth tugged upward. His eyes were really quite lovely in the firelight.

“Oh, you will, will you?”

“Yeah.” He looped his arm around my waist, gasping me firmly against his body. The cold metal of his belt bit at my hip, and I shuddered. “Listen, I know it’s only been a few weeks. And I know I’m breaking all the rules right now, but…”

He wasn’t really going to go
there
already, was he? I looked up at him despite the nervous roil in my stomach and licked my lips. He really was begging to be kissed, with his mussed hair and crinkled eyes.

“I’m really falling for you, Violet.”

Yup, he went there.

“I…” …was unsure what to say next. This was moving so fast. But damn it all to hell if I wasn’t falling for him, too. His warm eyes, his happy-go-lucky nature—cripes, even his fondness for the backwoods of Washington state—all added up to this incredible man lying next to me under a star-filled sky. It was too picturesque not to get caught up in the moment.

“It’s okay.” Landon hooked his hand behind my knee and brought it up over his hip. “You don’t have to say anything back right now. As long as you know where I stand. I…I think I love you.”

This is getting heavy!
my mind screamed. But my body said otherwise.
Go with it, go with it…

“But I don’t want you to say it back until you’re ready.” His hand glided along my thigh, coming to rest on my backside.

I swallowed. Hard.

I wanted to say “I love you” back. Really, I did. He looked so earnest, lying there next to the fire with me, his eyes wide. The flames licking upward, warming us despite the late winter chill in the air. My head was buzzing, and I wasn’t sure if it was because Landon’s touch was so intoxicating, or if it was because of the wine I’d drank. I didn’t even care.

I was there with Landon, and he’d just pledged his love to me. He’d driven me to a beautiful cabin in the woods, cooked me dinner over an open fire, and even placed lanterns along a path so I wouldn’t trip. He’d gone above and beyond to make Valentine’s Day amazing for me. Most women would be willing to forfeit their left arm for such treatment.

I propped myself up on my elbow and kissed Landon with all of the fervor and passion I could muster, winding my hands into his hair and tugging it slightly. The couple of men I’d slept with since high school had never taken the time to treat me with such care, such consideration. It chipped away at my hard-candy-shell exterior. He cupped my face as I was leaning over him, placing row after row of kisses along his prickly jawline, then down along his neck.

Landon groaned and raised his head off the blanket, looking at me with thirsty eyes. “Do you want to go inside?”

I shook my head and bit my lip. “Nope.”

I leaned back to admire the collage of pictures and words decorating his chest and arms. Landon really was beautiful, with the bleached tips of his hair standing on end, and his fingers grazing my skin, the cool metal of his rings sending a tickle up my back.

“Are you cold?” he whispered into my hair, his warm breath tickling the sensitive skin just below my ear.

“A little.”

“I’ll warm you up.” His lips moved against my skin.

…

A few hours later I was in the kitchen, wrapped up in the very blanket we’d been tangled up in earlier. Somewhere during our interlude in front of the fire, I managed to misplace every article of my clothing. I stared at my bra, which was strewn on the back steps and appeared to have started frosting, and contemplated whether or not I wanted to risk the cold to retrieve it.

I giggled excitedly as I stared through the kitchen window at my frozen underwear. Landon loved me, and he’d shown me exactly how much. Twice. He was incredible. He wanted a future with me. He wanted to travel, try new foods, get a dog, and build a cabin in the woods with
me
. Well, I still needed to think the cabin thing over…

He also wanted me to meet his folks. That was important. Most guys avoided that step. But not Landon. He was close to his mom, and proud to be with me. Things were moving fast, but dear God, it all felt so good.

I heard something shift in the other room and peeked around the corner to see Landon asleep on the couch where I left him, the corner of a blanket barely covering him as he slumbered. I gazed at him, reading the words written in Gaelic across his shoulder blades, and my skin prickled at the sight of his smooth arms cradling the pillow the same way he’d held me just an hour before.

I crept over to the back door and opened it, stepping outside into the frosty mountain air.

“Shit,” I hissed, pulling the blanket tighter around my bare body as I tiptoed across the deck to retrieve my clothes. “Who has sex outside in the middle of February?”

I scooped up my clothes and darted for the house as soundlessly as possible. I shoved my hand into the pocket of my jeans and sighed in the darkness as soon as I found the cold, smooth plastic of my cell phone. I hadn’t checked for messages in hours. I pressed the button, illuminating it to see that I’d received an e-mail from none other than Gabe. The overexcited herd of pterodactyls in my gut returned, and I took flight right off the carpeted floor.

“Hey, Vi…

It’s probably too late, but I never did get to wish you a Happy Valentine’s Day. Was just thinking about you. Hope you’re thinking about me.

Later, G.”

“Whatcha doing?” Landon’s deep voice rumbled from behind me.

“Oh, hi.” I whirled around right as he came into the room with nothing but his boxer briefs on. I fumbled to keep my blanket up as he approached.

Landon released a deep laugh that closed the space between us. He looked at me with a raised eyebrow. “You’re shy now? You didn’t seem to need that blanket an hour ago.”

My face went scarlet, and Landon put his arms underneath the patchwork quilt. As soon as his face was buried in my shoulder, I dropped my BlackBerry onto a nearby chair and returned his embrace.

I didn’t want to think about Gabe again tonight….

Chapter Ten

November 12, 2003

The last few weeks have been the worst in my life. Gabe has stopped acknowledging my presence altogether. Nora came over to my house every day last week asking what was wrong, but I couldn’t tell her. When I came down here to Utah, my mother reminded me that it was all for the best. But I don’t know if living with my dad and his idiot kids and crank wife is helping at all.

Flopping down on my bed the day after Valentine’s Day, I began to count the cracks in the ceiling spackle as I dialed Gabe’s number. My heart soared as soon as he picked up the phone. “Hey, Vi.”

“Gabe. Long time no talk. How’s it going?”

“Good. Just busy with work, and…you know.”

“Wedding planning?”

“Ugh, yes. If I see one more centerpiece, I’m going to punch something.”

“Wow. Sensing some aggression. So how was your Valentine’s Day?”

“Good. I made dinner for Alicia, and then we just hung out.”

“Yeah, right. Alicia isn’t the hangin’ out type.”

“She hangs out.”

“Sure, she does.”

“What about you and What’s-His-Name? Bikes and tattoos? Beer bongs and a rousing game of quarters?”

“Ha, ha. Shut up. Landon took me to his parents’ place in the mountains and cooked dinner over a fire. It was very romantic.”

“Nice. Did you get lucky?”

“Stop.”

“What?”

“I’m not discussing it with you.”

“I’ll take that as a no.”

“That’s not what I said.”

“So you
did
sleep with him?”

“Knock it off, Gabe.”

“Okay, okay. So what did you need to speak to me about, Vi?”

“Well, I…”

“Were Alicia’s friends nice? They can be sort of intense.”

“Well, not really.”

“Dammit. I told Alicia that they’d better be nice. Sorry.”

“That’s not what I was texting you about.”

“Well, what was it then?”

“It’s just that…well, I…you see, when I was leaving, I…”

“Spit it out.”

“Something came up as I was leaving, and I was surprised to hear that Alicia knew about it.”

“What came up?”

“Well…actually, Cameron Hakes came up.”

Silence.

“Gabe?”

“Alicia brought up Cameron?”

“Yeah.”

Silence, again.

“Gabe?”

“So why do you need to talk to me about it?”

“Well, for starters, why did you tell Alicia about that?”

“Listen, I’m on my way into a meeting, and I’ve got to get my presentation together. Can we talk about this tomorrow?”

“Fine. Whatever. When works best for you?”

“I can meet you before work tomorrow morning.”

“Great. Where?”

“My place. Six-thirty.”

“Six-thirty in the morning?”

“I’ve got a seven-thirty meeting.”

“Okay. I’ll be there.”

“See you then. And, hey…”

“Yeah?”

“I, uh…never mind. See you then, Vi.”

…

The next day, I knocked on Gabe’s apartment door. My palms were sweating, my knees were knocking, and it felt like oxygen was low in his high-rise building. There wasn’t enough coffee in Seattle to prepare me for this conversation.

“Hi.” Gabe grinned and held out a mug of steaming goodness when I walked through his door. He looked bushy-tailed as ever—he’d always been a morning person, the complete opposite of me—and already wearing one of his tailor-made suits and a charcoal gray button-down shirt. The aroma of shaving cream lingered like an invisible cloud, and he’d nicked himself just below his jawline. I bit my lip to keep from pressing a kiss against it.

“Hi.” I gazed up at my best friend, and my eyes filled with unexpected tears. I’d missed this. I’d missed Gabe. Before Alicia came along, we’d met for coffee and doughnuts before work at least once a week. I hadn’t seen him since he’d come over to ask me to be in his wedding.

He squeezed my arms. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

I shook my head and forced a little laugh as Gabe led me into his apartment. He’d hired my mom to decorate it for him after he bought it, and it was done in what I liked to call “minimalist yuppie.” Glass tables, clean lines, and black, white, and gray furniture that was all positioned to face his extensive high-definition entertainment system that got channels from as far away as Mars. A far cry from the flea market delight of my own apartment.

We sat at his glass-topped dining room table, and I fiddled with my rainbow-colored gloves for a few minutes before looking up and into Gabe’s concerned eyes. “Nothing’s wrong. I…had a really good time downtown the other day. I’ve just missed hanging out with you.”

His face relaxed a bit. “Me, too. You sure that’s it? Did you and What’s-His-Name have a fight?”

“His name is Landon.” I glanced at him sternly. “And no, we’re doing fine.”

“Sorry. So do you want some coffee?”

I shook my head. “No, thank you. I’ve already had three cups.”

“Three? Geez, Vi.” He looked away, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Gabe’s eyes were my weakness.

I drew a long breath and set my shoulders back, feigning strength. “I want to talk about that night.”

Silence. We sat in our seats, just breathing in the coffee-scented air. Gabe and I both knew what I was referring to.

“All right,” he finally said, his jaw clenched.

I looked out the window. “I want to tell you the truth about what happened between Cameron and me.”

That name tasted rotten on my tongue, and I had to swallow the bile that rose in the back of my throat. This conversation was going to be about as pleasant as smashing my fingers with a hammer, but I had to do it. No way I was going to get through this wedding if I had to stand next to Cameron. Gabe had to decide which one of us he wanted in the wedding party more—Cameron or me.

“First off,” I said, “when were you planning on telling me that Cameron is in your wedding?”

Gabe’s eyes met mine. “I was going to, but Alicia beat me to it.”

I looked up at him, opening my mouth to explain what was troubling me, but every word that came to the top of my throat just toppled back down. Over Gabe’s shoulder, I noticed that there were a handful of black picture frames that my mother had picked to go on his dining room buffet. I’d been bugging him to get pictures into those frames for the past year.

Three of the six frames were filled. One was of Gabe and me at his twelfth birthday party, our heads thrown back, laughing hysterically. One was of Gabe and Alicia, shortly after he’d proposed. Her eyes were bright with tears, and she looked unbelievably happy, as did he. And the last was of Gabe and Cameron Hakes, their arms thrown over each other’s shoulders, both of them sweaty, a basketball under Gabe’s muscular arm.

The chair beneath me suddenly swayed, and I felt sick.

Gabe frowned at me. “Hey, what’s going on? Are you all right?”

I stood, nearly knocking my chair over, and stomped over to the picture. After flipping it facedown, I turned to face Gabe, my arms wrapped around my middle. “I just want to know why Alicia brought Cameron up in front of everyone at brunch.”

Gabe’s eyes flashed. “She brought it up at brunch?”

“Of course she did.”

He groaned. “I guess she thought it was better to get it out in the open. So you’d know that Cam was in the wedding, too.”

“How can you still be friends with him after everything that happened?”

“The same way I’m able to be friends with you, I suppose.” He looked at me with pain-filled eyes. “Vi, why are we discussing this?”

I dragged a hand through my hair. “You need to understand what went on that night. Just because we never, ever talk about it doesn’t mean it never happened.”

Gabe’s eyes pointed down at the table. “I thought I did know what happened?”

My hand came down on the tabletop loudly, sloshing some of his coffee onto the glass. “No, you don’t.”

“You slept with someone at a party while I was upstairs.” His voice was low and metered, but I saw his hand trembling as he fiddled with his mug. “I thought we were exclusive, but we weren’t. It was only our first date, and I was just a stupid, lovesick kid. I didn’t know that you liked Cameron.”

“I didn’t.” My eyes filled again. “We
were
exclusive.”

“Then why?”

“I should have explained all of this so long ago,” I whispered.

Gabe raked a hand across the top of his head. “Explained what? That you drank too much and had sex with my friend? Vi, I’ve had a long time to get over this. I’m okay now. I wish you could be as well.”

My knuckles were white against the tabletop. “Gabe, that’s not what happened.”

He leaned forward. “Then what
did
happen?”

I mustered up every ounce of strength I could find and drew a deep breath. “I only wanted to embarrass him. He was always so mean to me. So I flirted with him. I didn’t know that…” My voice trailed off as I glanced at the tipped frame. I was choked on the overabundance of words in my throat, and my eyes blurred as I looked at Gabe. I wanted to tell him. Really, I did. But I knew deep down that the moment my secret came out into the open, everything Gabe and I had worked so hard to rebuild after I came home from Utah would be smashed into a million pieces.

He shook his head. “Talk to me. What’s wrong?”

The buzzing in my head was almost louder than his voice. “This is just bringing up a lot of old feelings. That was a really rough time for me.”

He sighed. “It was a rough time for all.”

I gripped the table edge. “Gabe, that night…with Cameron…I—”

The shrill ring of Gabe’s cell phone sounded, and I released an aggravated moan. Ten steps forward, eight steps back.

He took the call and spoke to the person on the other end tensely. “Uh-huh, okay…yes, I’ll be right there. I’m about thirty minutes away.” He pulled his suit jacket off the back of his chair and slid it on. “See you soon.”

He ended the call and grimaced. “That was my boss. I’m so sorry, but I really have to go. Um…can we finish this conversation later?”

My shoulders drooped. This secret was burning a hole in my brain, and I had to get it out. But every time we got close to the truth, one or both of us toppled backward. Instead of helping Gabe see that Cameron had no place in his wedding, much less his life, I was bickering with him. We’d been sitting here for ten minutes, and I was going to be the stupid best man standing next to the devil incarnate.

“Gabe, it was a miracle you made any time for me this morning,” I told him through clenched teeth. “You say we’ll finish this later, but will we?”

He reached for my hand again. “Please don’t be mad. I’ll call you tonight, and we’ll set up a time to finish.”

I nodded, just once. Every muscle in my body was too tense to offer more than that.

The corners of his mouth tugged downward. “I know I’ve been unavailable lately, and I’m sorry.”

Damn my stupid chest for tightening every time he looked at me that way. “We used to be together all the time. Everything’s changing. We never see each other, we never talk. I miss you.”

He came closer to me, rested his keys on top of the table, and sat in a chair next to me. I suppressed a shudder when his hands enveloped mine. “I miss you, too, Vi.”

“I always knew that someday you’d be getting married, but I always thought it would be…” I bit my tongue.

He nodded, and brought my fingers up to his mouth. “I know. Me, too.”

His chair squeaked as he stood next to me. “Listen, I’ll make sure that we talk soon. And I promise that we won’t be interrupted.”

We were just a few inches apart, and I could smell his shaving cream again. I took a deep breath. “Agreed.”

We walked toward his door.

“Promise me that you’re okay?”

I took a long, deep breath. Was I okay? My health was good. I still had a pulse. My secret was burning a hole in the back of my brain. I was going to have to find some super-human strength from somewhere if I was going to get through this wedding.

“I will be once we talk again. Uninterrupted.” I pulled the door open.

He scooped me into a stifling hug. “Whatever’s going on with you, I…I miss you. Okay?” He spoke into my hair, his breath against my scalp. The inappropriateness of the way he gripped me sank down into my core as his fingers spread against my lower back, holding me against his body tightly.

Muttering my good-bye, I pulled away briskly and made a straight shot for the stairs. I couldn’t handle being that close to Gabe anymore. That was going to have to stop if I ever wanted to be able to move on.