Need You Now (Love in Unknown) (26 page)

“You were gone for three weeks. Three weeks of pure hell for me.” She stared straight ahead, doing her best to avoid looking at him.

Caine came to lean against the wall in front of her. “Okay. What happened while I was in the Caribbean?”

It would be so easy to just grab her stuff and run. She doubted she would make it far, but she could try. If she slammed a door or two, she might slow him down enough to make a get away. But she knew that was only putting off the inevitable. She’d never planned to tell him this. Now, not only did she have to tell him, she had to use it to hurt him. Closing her eyes, she took a deep, shaky breath. “Two days after you left, I was packing up my dorm room. Going through my bathroom stuff, I found an unopened box of tampons and I realized I was over a week late.”

“Late as in…” Mel watched the words sink in and Caine’s eyes widen. “Jesus, you were pregnant?”

She ignored him, plowing on. “My dad showed up in the middle of my freak out. I was sitting in my dorm room crying and just having a complete melt down. Dad being Dad, he just took charge of the situation. He helped me get everything packed up and drove through the night to get me home.”

“You told him everything?”

“Yeah.” Mel nodded, tears burning to break free.”God, I’ve never seen him so mad before.”

Caine crossed his arms over his chest. “Mad at you? Did he expect you to live like a nun all your life?”

“I’m sure he would have preferred that.” Mel wrapped her arms around herself. “No, he was mad at you, actually. For leaving me alone to deal with that, for getting involved with me in the first place. I honestly thought he hated you for a while there.”

“I didn’t know.” Mel had seen him with that shell-shocked look one time before— when he’d fallen out of the tree house as a kid. “Jesus, Mel. How could you not tell me you were pregnant?”

She groaned. “Because I wasn’t. But I had to wait over two weeks before I could take a pregnancy test. Two weeks scared out of my mind. I was eighteen years old and possibly knocked up by a rich, playboy who was off playing on a tropical island with his rich, spoiled friends while I sat around with my dad, waiting to find out if my life was thrown off course for good.”

“You could have called me.” Tension radiated off of his body. He was pissed. She knew that much. Any other time, he’d probably have blown a gasket by now. “I would have been here in a second if I’d known what was going on. I would have -“

“Bullshit.” Mel stood up, needing to be on his level in some way. “Even if you hadn’t been on a private island with no cell signal, you wouldn’t have been here. You would have run for the hills. Responsibility scared you shitless back then. All you gave a damn about was what made you feel good. Booze, parties, casual sex with me. The second things got complicated or permanent? The last thing I would have seen was the taillights of that ridiculous sports car you drove back then.”

Caine straightened, his gaze shuttered. He was holding back. A lot. “That’s what you think of me, isn’t it? No matter what I do, you’ll always see me as that guy I was in college.”

No,
she wanted to blurt out.
No, I don’t see you like that.
Instead she stayed silent, closing herself off.

He grabbed a book off of the beside table and threw it on the floor in frustration. She winced at the sound of hardcover meeting wood floor. He never would have thrown a book in front of her unless she’d pushed him to the edge. The pain in his eyes flayed her resistance. She'd succeeded. She'd wounded him, cut to the bone. "Damn it, Melody. Don't you know I would do anything for you? Give up everything just to have you in my life?"

“I don’t think I’ll ever be able to trust what we have. Every time I start to believe that we have a chance, I remember how I felt during those weeks on my own. I don’t ever want to feel that alone again.” The ache in her chest stole her breath. Oh, God, she loved this man. She had to stay strong. To get out now. "Goodbye, Caine. I'm sorry. I hope you'll understand in time."

To her profound relief, he didn't try to stop her as she picked up her bag and left. In truth, she almost ran out of his house. She couldn't let him see her cry, no matter what. She stayed strong until she got outside the gates. Then tears began to trickle down her cheeks. By the time she let herself into her apartment, sobs wracked her body.

Unable to go any further, Mel slid down the door and let the pain take over. No way around it. She just had to fight her way through it. She'd done what was best for him in the long run, and that's all that could matter right now.

Chapter 17

Caine let the whisky burn down his throat in one fast bolt.

He stared at the bottle in front of him. Three nights ago the large bottle had been completely full. Now less than a quarter of the amber colored liquid remained. A half dozen empty beer bottles kept the whisky bottle company on the coffee table. He wished he had ten more of each.

Three night ago his world came crashing down around his ears. He’d come to expect a lot of things in his life. He expected his parents to be judgmental. He expected Gage to show up when he needed him. He expected the town to gossip. Never in a million years did he expect Mel to tell him that.

The alcohol took the edge off of the anger, but it didn’t stop him from playing every second over and over in his mind.
Pregnant
. It roared through his head louder than the crowd at a Rangers’ home game. Over the years, he’d come up with a lot of explanations for what ended up being the straw to break the camel’s back. That never entered his radar. In those few minutes before she told him it was a false alarm, his mind had gone to a million places. The thought of Mel alone and pregnant scared the shit out of him. He’d been so careful every time they were together, but nothing was a guarantee. Had she thought about having an abortion? Giving the baby up for adoption? Damn it, how the hell could she keep something like that from him?

For months, he’d been working his ass off to earn her trust. Wooing her for, fucksake! He’d done everything but grovel to get her to take him back and she kept something this big a secret. Didn’t matter that it turned out to be a false alarm. She should have called him and told him to come home. He’d have been there in a second if she’d asked.

He poured himself a shot of whisky and tossed it back. Behind him, he heard the front door open and slam shut. A brief flash of hope that it was Mel disappeared when he heard heavier footsteps on the tiles. A few seconds later his brother flopped onto the couch beside him.

“Seriously, man? How much of that shit have you had?” Gage snatched the whisky bottle up and placed it on the far side of the coffee table.

“Mind your own damn business, little brother,” Caine growled, keeping his eyes straight ahead.

Gage sighed. “Not gonna happen.”

Caine leaned his head back against the couch cushions. "You talked to Mel lately?"

“Since she broke up with you? Not really. She texted me to tell me the news, then said not to call because she didn't want me to be caught in the middle. Which is complete and total bullshit, because I was caught in the middle the day she agreed to go out with you. The first time."

“I know, and I'm sorry." Caine felt like someone had attached weights to every joint in his body. As much as he hated being apart from Mel, he hated that his brother had ended up torn between two people he cared about even more. HIs blood ran cold. Had Gage known about the pregnancy scare?

Gage’s voice was soft with sympathy. “What happened?”

Caine gritted his teeth, refusing to say anything.

“She told you about Andrew, didn't she?"

Caine narrowed his eyes. "She told me a while back. Of course, you already knew about him. What'd she tell you?"

“It's not so much what she told me as what she didn't tell me. I also heard some stuff from Micah. My professional opinion? Guy was an emotionally abusive jackass who needed a good thrashing."

“She tell you why she ended things between us back in college?” Caine couldn’t keep the accusatory note out of his voice.

Gage sent him a sharp look. “Not really. Just that she got some perspective while you were gone and figured out she had to end things. Why?”

Caine opened his mouth to tell him everything. To let it all spew out. But something stopped him. He couldn’t do that to Gage. He and Mel had been best friends for too long. Telling Gage that Mel kept something from him would only make things worse. “She brought it up again and said she couldn’t get past it. That she couldn’t rely on me. Can you believe that shit?”

The silence from his brother was deafening. Caine glared at Gage, reaching for a bottle of beer he’d started earlier.

“Say what you’re thinking. Not like you can piss me off anymore than I already am.”

Gage sat for another few minutes before replying. “Would you have relied on you back then? Admit it, Caine. You were a selfish jackass in college.”

Caine pinched the bridge of his nose. He hadn’t been that bad. Yeah, he’d had fun and enjoyed himself. That’s what college was for. Maybe he drank too much and slept around until he hooked up with Mel. Big deal. If she called him and told him she thought she was pregnant, he would have come home to be with her, wouldn’t he? She’d mattered. He’d come over that day to make things permanent with her. Still…Tossing a pregnancy scare into the mix would have spooked anybody, but he’d have handled it. He’d have been there for her, to hell with his friends.

“I never gave her any reason to think that I wouldn’t be there for her when she needed me,” Caine said. “Just because I enjoyed myself in college doesn’t give her any reason to act like I’m no better than Andrew the Rat Bastard.”

“I don’t know what’s going on between you two, but if Mel broke up with you. She’s got a reason.” Gage propped his feet up on the coffee table, looking so relaxed Caine had to fight the urge to punch him. “The real question is: are you going to fight for her?”

He didn’t know the answer. Okay, deep down he did. But that part of him was drowned out right now by the wounded, betrayed caveman side that was mad as hell at Mel for doubting him. He did know that, if he were being honest with himself, he’d probably admit that he would have run like hell if she’d even said the word pregnancy to him ten years ago. None of that changed the fact that she kept a huge secret from him, then used it to hurt him.

“Do you think that Andrew guy could be the one behind all the vandalism?” He needed to think about something other than licking his wounds.

Gage hesitated, his mouth pulling in a flat line. He grabbed a throw pillow from behind his back and idly tossed it back and forth from one hand to the other. His brother couldn’t stay still to save his life. "Not sure yet. I've been trying to track him down, but no luck. Last thing I found was his fiancée dumped his cheating ass. I'm still digging. Without evidence, there's only so much I can look into."

Caine sighed. “Can you keep an eye on Mel for me? She's not going to let me protect her now, and I know she's in the line of fire." If the stupid town wasn't so full of gossips, he'd sleep outside her apartment to keep her safe if he had to. He loved her. He might hate her a little right now, but seeing her hurt was not an option. In fact, he was pretty sure Ethan Carr would come back to life just to kick his ass if he let that happen.

Gage caught the pillow after flipping it in the air. “You know I will. Micah and I are going to talk to her, see if she'll agree to go stay with her mom until this all blows over. At least that way she'll have Micah close and they can ride into town together."

Caine stood, rolling his head from side to side, fighting the knots in his shoulders that refused to go away. HIs head swam a little from the alcohol and lack of food. “Thanks. Someone needs to watch out for her stubborn ass.”

“You love her, don't you?" Gage's voice held a note of empathy. Caine knew his brother had some skeletons in his romantic closet, but he never talked about them. He knew enough to recognize someone who'd been burned pretty bad.

“Hard to stop.”

Gage got to his feet and put a hand on his shoulder, the warmth of brotherly support easing a little of the tension that had a hold of Caine. "Don't give up on her. It might take time, but she'll let you in."

#

“Melody, I don't give a damn what you want," Micah said, pulling her suitcases out of her closet. "Either you can pack your bags or I will.

Mel glared at her brother. Blood throbbed a painful tattoo in her forehead. Eight days. Eight days since she’d walked out of Caine's house. She’d gotten maybe four hours of sleep last night and even less the night before. All she did was toss and turn and talk circles around her decision. The first night she’d thrown off the covers and started to drive back to Fortune Hill at least five times. The second night, it was only four. Last night she got it down to an impressive two. Needless to say, having her brother and Gage barge into her apartment was not something she wanted to deal with at seven in the morning.

Letting Caine go sucked, but she’d done what she had to do. Maybe once they’d gotten rid of whoever was stalking her, she would explain everything to him. She wouldn’t blame him if he hated her forever though. The look of betrayal on his face before she left just about killed her. She saw it in her sleep every night and every time she felt like someone was stabbing her in the chest and carving out her heart.

All she wanted to do now was sleep and work. Compartmentalize. Be alone. She did her best on her own. Sure, she enjoyed being around people, having friends, but at heart she was an introvert. When she had wounds to lick like the gaping hole that had taken up residence in her chest, she didn’t want anyone else around her.

The men in her life didn’t want to hear that.

She yanked the bags away from her brother and tossed them back in the closet. “I’m not moving in with you and Mama. Not gonna happen. Move on.”

“Yes, you are.” Micah took the bags and threw them on her bed. When he started toward her dresser, she ran to stand in front of it so he couldn’t open any of the drawers. “It’s for your own good, little sister.”