Not Your Fault (6 page)

What do I want? It isn’t Kris. Because fuck him. But I know it isn’t Nathan either. I will have to tell him this and end things so he can look for his real soul mate. I’m only hurting both of us by staying in this relationship.

“I love you so much,” Nathan whispers into my ear. “I could never live without you.”

A knot twists in my stomach. Yeah, I need to tell him someday. But, not today.

My phone rings from the coffee table in the center of the room. A glance at the screen shows me it’s a number that isn’t saved in my phone. Nathan releases me so I can grab it, and I’m so grateful for the distraction from Nathan’s declarations of love, that I won’t even mind if it’s a bill collector or telemarketer.

“Hello?” I ask, thinking that on second thought, a call from a bill collector would actually suck.

“Am I speaking with Delaney?” a man’s voice asks. I mumble an acknowledgement into the receiver, hoping to god that the voice I hear on the other line is just shockingly similar to who I think it is.

“Hey, it’s Kris. Sorry for the late notice, but we’re having an employee’s only team building event at the Fun Max House on the north side of town tonight. Can you make it?”

My vision blurs and I use all of my brainpower to keep my face emotionless in front of Nathan. He would die if he knew I was talking to Kris. Hell, I could die from knowing that I’m talking to Kris.

“You there?” he says. “Again, sorry you weren’t informed earlier. It was a mistake on my part.”

“Um,” I say, smiling to Nathan and mouthing the words
It’s my
Mom
with a roll of my eyes. “Sure, I can join you. It’s no problem.”

Chapter 9

A wave of anxiety makes me lightheaded as I walk past a woman struggling to keep her five kids together in the busy parking lot of Fun Max House. I’ve never been here but I’ve seen the commercials enough times to know that Fun Max House is a giant warehouse with mini golf, laser tag, arcade games and tons of junk food. They even made it a place for adults to enjoy by serving alcohol in the special adults’ only section with pool tables and bowling.

I’m not sure there’s enough alcohol in the world to calm my nerves right now. As I walk through the parking lot, each step closer to the fun house makes me feel like it’s one step closer to my own demise. What if Kris lied about the team-building thing and what if he only invited me? The whole thing could be a lie to get me alone so he can…what? I shake my head. It’s not as if he would want to do anything to me. I’m not the killer here. I’m not the person who abandoned the other one.

But I’m on the verge of a freaking panic attack at the ridiculous idea that this is all a setup to get me alone. Maybe I should have brought my sister.

The scent of wine and cherry blossom body spray crushes into me as Susan appears out of nowhere and wraps her drunken arm around my shoulder. “Do we have the best boss ever, or what?” she says, nodding her head in an answer to her own question. She reaches into the pocket of her velour track pants and tosses golden coins into the air. “Open bar and as many tokens as we want.”

I steady my arm around her waist in an attempt to keep her drunk walk from pulling both of us to the ground. I guess I was wrong about the Kris only inviting me thing. Of course he wouldn’t do that. He probably tried not to invite me at all. Up ahead, Koby holds open the door for us. He’s the part time high school kid we hired to wipe down the machines and take out the trash every day.

“How many drinks has she had?” I ask him as he leads us inside the crowded warehouse full of lights and noises and people. And somewhere, Kris Payne.

“Not many,” he says, leading the way to the adult section in the back. “But I think she may have arrived a little tipsy,” he whispers into my ear.

“I heard that!” Susan punches him playfully in the arm. Some of my anxiety melts away. I can handle being around Kris when I’m also with Susan and the rest of my coworkers. It’s not as if anyone here is a mind reader and knows about the thoughts I had while lying naked with my boyfriend just an hour ago.

A waitress in black pants and a purple cleavage-baring tank top with the Fun Max House logo across the chest hands me an ice-cold beer from the tray in her hand. I thank her and drink half the bottle in one gulp. I’m going to be just fine. Kris Payne can suck it.

The two-day shift workers, Jennifer and Geoff, play a game of pool so poorly that it looks like both of them are losing. They’re both college-dropouts who met each other at the gym, fell in love at the gym, got jobs and the gym, and then were married last spring. Thankfully, the wedding wasn’t in the gym. I’m doing a pretty good job of small talking with them about their shitty pool game, the glorious weather, and other pointless topics when a figure walks toward us from the pizza buffet.

It feels like a rock hits my chest and got gets between my ribcage. The weight crushes my lungs and makes it hard to breathe. And all he’s doing is walking with a plate of pepperoni pizza slices stacked into a pyramid in one hand and a beer in the other.

He wears black board shorts and a black T-shirt that fits over his chest as if it were tailor made for him. His five o’clock shadow makes me wonder what it’d feel like having it brush across my cheek. My knees go weak and I grab onto the side of the pool table.

Yeah, okay…what did I say about him needing to suck it? I need to remember that.
He abandoned me in high school. He means nothing to me. He can suck it.

Gripping my own beer tightly in my hand, I repeat these words in my mind, all while keeping a smile on my face. No one needs to know that I’ve fallen off the deep end here, especially Kris. Jessica sinks the number eight ball and then throws a fit, arguing that she didn’t know that ball was an instant game-ending ball.

“I think there’s a dirty joke somewhere in there,” Geoff says after his wife finishes her rant about sinking balls in the corner hole. Kris lets out a laugh and fist-bumps Geoff.

“There definitely is,” Kris says, his eyes glancing over the group. “But I’m not gonna say any of them.” When his eyes meet mine, his smile falters for an instant and then he looks away. Just like that. A glance at me and a glance away. He didn’t let his eyes linger on the tight-as-hell black dress I chose from the this-is-too-sexy-to-actually-wear side of my closet. He didn’t notice my strappy sandals and forty dollar pedicure or how fucking amazing my makeup looks because I re-did it twice before I came up here. After all of my hard work, all he gave me was a glance. I don’t mean anything to him.

I am an idiot.

Turning my back to the group of my coworkers, I lean my butt on the pool table and watch the people playing pool at other tables as I sip my beer. Geoff convinces Jennifer to let someone else play him in the next game. With a huff of indignation, she sweeps past them, grabbing my now empty beer bottle in the process. I start to object and she wiggles it, emphasizing its emptiness. “I’ll get you another one,” she says as she shimmies through the crowd toward the open bar.

“Hey boss,” Geoff asks as he reaches over me to grab the blue chalk thing. “If the whole gang is here tonight, who’s at the gym?”

I turn around to hear the answer and I want to kick myself because the whole point of keeping my back to the pool table was to avoid looking at Kris. But now I see him in all his gorgeous glory, as he takes the chalk from Geoff and twists it over the end of his pool stick.
I will not focus on how sexy his fingers look.

“The gym is closed for the next forty-eight hours,” Kris says, stepping around the corner of the table to place the chalk back exactly where it was when Geoff grabbed it. His forearm gets so close to touching me, the hairs on my arms stand on end. I wonder if he did that on purpose. I wonder if he knows I’m lusting after him, like a fucking idiot, and he’s getting close to me just to screw with my emotions.

After what he did ten years ago, I can’t put anything past him.

I bet he dates super models. Not girls from small towns with boring jobs.

I shouldn’t be thinking any of this.

Susan and Geoff simultaneously ask him why we’re closing down for two days, and I’m just as curious as they are. In my five years of working at Carson’s, we’ve never been closed except for on Christmas.

“I’m doing a bit of remodeling,” he says, waiting for Geoff to rack the balls and remove the triangle. “Well, not so much remodeling the building as having all that old equipment moved out. I ordered all new cardio machines, three squat racks and benches,” he says as he leans over the edge of the table to line up his first shot. He keeps talking, listing all the things he bought for the gym. I don’t hear any of it because I’m focusing on the veins in his forearm as intently as if I’m going to be quizzed on them later.

God Delaney! Get a hold of yourself. What is wrong with you? You cannot lust after the guy who killed Tyler.

I swallow. My mental chiding went too far this time. I don’t normally think of Tyler like this. I only think of the happy memories—that is the promise I had made myself all those years ago. I will think of happy things and nothing else. He deserves as much.

“You feeling okay?”

The voice comes from my right and it pulls me out of my thoughts, but not enough to look up from the green felt of the pool table. “Delaney?” This time I look up. Because this time Kris said my name.

“Yeah?” my own voice sounds foreign to me. Kris steps closer to me and his hand touches my shoulder, as soft as if I’ll break.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost…or something.” He has to lower his head to look into my eyes, or to attempt to look into them. I stare at his Adam’s apple for just enough time to remember why I can’t look at him in the first place. Then I look away and see Susan and Geoff watching me as if I’d just had a seizure or something. For all I know, maybe I did.

“I’m fine,” I say, instincts taking over, making me pull away from Kris’s unwanted hand on my back. “I just zoned out for a minute. I’m fine.” I say the second part more to myself. He nods and lifts his pool stick, going back to the game.

Jennifer arrives with two ice-cold beers in her hands and I’ve never been happier to see her. “Refills!” she singsongs as she hands me one of the drinks. I take it and tell her thanks in an equally lame singsong voice. I don’t feel as cheery as I sound, but I know damned well how to fake it in front of Kris.

With Jennifer back, some of the tension is gone, and I try to participate with the laughter and jokes and I feel like I’m doing an awesome job. Kris doesn’t talk to me for the next three pool games, and I’m not upset or offended—I’m grateful.

One more beer and a shot of Patron later, I’m standing a little lopsided, using my pool stick for balance as Geoff sinks one, two, and three striped balls in a row, beating me. “You cheater,” I say, pointing my finger at him. He sweeps his arm out and takes a bow. “I’m not a cheater, m’lady. You just suck at pool.”

“Don’t we all,” Jennifer says, raising her glass in a toast.

Susan finishes the last of the cheese fries and jumps up from the barstool on the sidelines. “My turn!”

I hand her my pool stick and walk toward the table with everyone’s empty beer bottles and what used to be a plate of cheese fries but is now a sad empty dish. Right about now, the amount of alcohol in my stomach decides to tell my brain that I’m drunk. I take a deep breath and fumble for the barstool. I could have sworn it was behind me somewhere…

“Whoa,” Kris’s deep voice crushes through the sounds of arcade games and drunken laughter. “Unless you’re magic, you can’t float in the air.”

“I’m sitting on the stool,” I mumble, reaching behind me for that damned barstool, but feeling nothing. I’m vaguely aware of his hands gripping my elbows, until I take a deep breath and smell his cologne. Then I’m very, very, horribly aware of his hands touching me. He’s holding me up, preventing me from drunkenly stumbling to the floor in search of a barstool that is not there.

My hands grab his biceps as I let him steady me, bringing me back into a standing position. I look into his eyes. They’re blurry. “I think you want this,” he says, nodding to an area about three feet away, where that traitorous piece of furniture sits, mocking me.

I think I say thanks, but I’m not sure. When I look in his face, I see a grown man with chiseled features and a five o’clock shadow; a man who is a stranger to me. But when I slip up and look into his eyes, I see Kris. The boy I grew up with…the boy I loved. Beautiful auburn eyes don’t change with age—they stay just the same as you remember them, filled with memories of things that used to be.

His voice lowers until I’m certain only I can hear him. “Let’s take a walk.”

I nod.

Chapter 10

I shouldn’t have glanced back when Kris led me out of the adults’ only section and into the arcade room. Then I wouldn’t have seen the curious look of jealousy on Susan’s face and the smug look on Koby’s face as he nudged Geoff and pointed in our direction. Now everyone no doubt thinks I’m trying to bang the new boss, and they couldn’t be further from the truth. I don’t even know why I’m walking with him.

We come to a stop in front of these brightly colored ATM type things that dispense cards instead of cash. Kris loads up a card with one hundred virtual tokens and holds it up, wiggling it between his index and middle finger. “Skeeball?”

Okay maybe it’s just the alcohol—no wait, it’s definitely the alcohol—because I’m kind of sort of thinking that maybe Kris and I can be friends. You know, in a strictly professional boss-employee type of friendship. The alcohol also makes me smile, yank the card out of his hand and say, “Can’t believe you remembered that Skeeball is my specialty.”

I run the card through the slot on two Skeeball machines and Kris and I play against each other. We don’t talk. And that’s fine with me. This is, after all, earth-shatteringly awkward. I mean, I hate Kris. The sober Delaney hates him with all of her being. But the drunk Delaney is just going with it. We play a dozen games of Skeeball and by the end of them, I’m telling myself the only reason I’m laughing and smiling with this asshole is because subconsciously I want him to feel guilty. I want him to know that I don’t care that he left and I don’t care that he came back.