Sound Proof (Save Me #5) (17 page)

“Did you girls have a good time at the beach yesterday?” I ask, loading them onto the elevator along with our bags. They both nod before tucking themselves into my sides. Even after the full night’s sleep, they’re both exhausted.

I’m not sure where AJ is since he didn’t answer his room phone, so I text him to let him know we are downstairs checking out. I usher the girls onto a couch in the lobby before heading to the desk, finalize the paperwork, and drop down in the chair across from them. I am in no way, shape, or form, prepared for the way I feel when the elevator doors open and AJ steps off with some tiny brunette tucked under his arm. He doesn’t even see us sitting here as he heads for the front desk, kisses the girl on the top of the head, and checks out.

What the fuck
?

Finally he turns around, his eyes connecting with mine and I can see the brief moment of panic set in before he masks it. Everything we’ve talked about over the past few months slams into my chest. All the times he told me that he wasn’t going to make me feel like I did when I found out that Max was cheating on me. The times he said he was different, that he had changed. All of it comes rushing back, making me realize just how stupid I am for believing him. I should have trusted my gut when it kept telling me that dating someone with a reputation like his was a bad idea, even if it was only behind closed doors.

I try my hardest to cover what I’m feeling because I know I have to spend the next few hours with him by my side, but after that, I’m done. I just need to keep it together until we get home and then I’ll tell him it’s over. I’m not going to be made a fool of again, but I won’t to fight in front of the girls. Last night makes sense to me now. The reason he wouldn’t let me touch him, and sent me back to my room as quickly as he could get rid of me without it looking suspicious. All of it was so he could screw someone else for the night.

“Girls,” I say as AJ gets closer to us. “Let’s get going so we can get home.”

I spend the next six hours pulling away from AJ’s hand every time he tries to touch me. Willow and Sage fell asleep about an hour into the drive and the entire time we drive I can’t help wondering how I let all of this happen. Before AJ, I never would have let my life be publically displayed the way it has been. Now, every time I turn around, because I’m connected with him even just as a friend that is around a lot, my divorce and everything to do with it is up for judgment. I dealt with it because I care for him, but what happened this morning is my breaking point.

When we finally pull up to his house I couldn’t be more thankful that the girls are still out. I know how much they love AJ, but I have to be strong. Not only for myself, but for them as well. I need to show my daughters that you don’t need a man to be strong. How standing up for what you know is right for you is far more important than anyone else’s opinion of what is going on in your life.

I slide out of the Jeep, grab AJ’s bag and toss it on the porch before he even has a chance to get out. His eyebrows draw together as he watches me, but it isn’t until I try to slide into the driver’s seat without saying anything that he finally says something.

“Did I do something to piss you off in the last twelve hours?”

“I don’t want to talk about this right now, AJ,” I mutter, trying not to wake the girls up.

Grabbing my elbow gently, AJ pulls me so I’m facing him. He reaches out to touch my face but I turn away. “How the hell am I supposed to fix anything if you don’t tell me what’s wrong?”

All the anger that’s been boiling inside of me since AJ stepped foot off the elevator this morning hits me. Pushing him away from the door, I jump out and make my way up the stairs to his front door. While I wait for him to unlock, I check the back seat of the Jeep again to make sure that the girls are still asleep. There’s been too much fighting in their lives this year, they don’t need to be part of this one too.

“Tell me what’s wrong, Payton.”

Once inside the house with the door shut behind me, I let everything out.

“You told me I could trust you!” I yell, shoving my hands against his chest when he tries to get near me. “You told me that you weren’t like Max, but the second things get heavy on the beach you shut down. You pushed me away last night in the shower and then this morning you come downstairs with your arm wrapped around some tiny bitch. What part of what I said on the beach yesterday did you not understand? The fact that there are three people falling for you, or that you don’t get to pick and choose when you wanted to be part of this if you decided to stay?”

AJ’s face falls when he realizes what I’m talking about and he takes a step toward me again.

“You think that… I wouldn’t do… Did you forget that…?” He can’t seem to form a full sentence as he points between us. Closing his mouth he watches me and I can see the hurt in his eyes. I doubt it’s anywhere close to what I felt when I watched those doors open this morning.

Crossing my arms over my chest, I lean back against the wall and wait.

Taking a deep breath, AJ shakes his head and drops down in the chair next to the door. He drops his head into his hands for a second. “I didn’t push you away in the shower last night because I had someone else waiting for me. If that had been the case, I would have told you to leave instead of asking you to lay in bed with me and talk for the two hours that you were there. I didn’t fuck you in the shower, Payton, because I didn’t want you to think I was only with you for sex. Yeah, sex with you is fucking amazing, and if I had the choice I’d have my cock buried inside your pussy twenty-four hours a day, every day of the year.”

My mind whirls, I have spent the last few hours replaying every second of the last twenty-four hours over and over in my head trying to figure out where the hell things got messed up. I’ve gone through every emotion and it’s leaving me exhausted beyond words. His eyes meet mine and they aren’t defensive, they are full of concern, hurt, and something I didn’t expect to see: fear. “But what about the chick on the elevator?” I whisper, suddenly beginning to doubt everything.

“You mean the pint-sized brunette named Addison.” When I nod, he laughs but it lacks any humor. “She’s Jason’s cousin. And not only would he cut my balls off if I even thought of touching her, but I’d never think about it because she isn’t you. She rode down on the elevator with me instead of her brother because I asked her to.”

“Why?”

“Because you wanted to keep this a secret. You wanted to keep us behind closed doors. If it were up to me I’d shout the fact that I fucking love you from the rooftop of IronSound.”

“You love me?”

“Yeah, Payton, I do. I have for a long time now. You’d think the fact that I’ve been chasing you for as long as I have and telling you everything I have would have proven that. Oh, or the fact that I told you I was falling for you when I brought you to the stadium and played for you.” Standing up, AJ opens the front door and steps back without looking at me. “I fucking love you, Payton, but I refuse to be compared to Max every second of every day. I’m not him, and I’m not who I used to be. You changed me. You make me a better fucking person. Until you realize that, this isn’t going to work and I’m not going to deal with feeling like a piece of shit because you’re afraid I’m going to do the same shit he did.”

“I don’t know what to say…”

“Well,” he says sadly. “Until you figure it out, you might as well take the girls home. They don’t need to be outside while we have an argument like this since they didn’t even know we were together.”

My chest starts to ache the second Payton’s jeep starts and pulls out of my driveway. I can’t stand here and watch her drive away from me after not fighting to stay, so I head to the kitchen and grab the twelve-pack out of the fridge, popping the top off a beer on my way out of the house.

How the hell did everything get so fucked up? I don’t understand how she could think I would possibly fuck her over the way Max did when I haven’t given her a single reason to question me. She’s the one that wanted to keep our relationship a secret. She’s the one that jumped to conclusions when she saw me with Addison earlier. All she had to do was ask who she was and we could have avoided this entire fight.

I make my way out onto the patio and kick my shoes off before dropping to the edge of the pool and sliding my feet into the water. Tipping the bottle back to my lips, I fill my mouth with beer and swallow. It tastes like shit right now, but I keep drinking in hopes that it will help numb the feeling spreading through my chest.

“Ninety-nine empty bottles of beer on the wall. Ninety-nine bottles of beer. I suck one down, smash the fucker to the ground. Oh, I’m going to die alone,” I sing, losing track of how long I’ve been alone. I smash the next empty bottle against the patio and watch as the shards scatter everywhere.

“Looks more like a twelve-pack to me, man.”

I spin around on the lounger and almost fall to the ground. “Eleven if you wanna be specific.” Turning back around, I grab another beer and chuck the cap into the pool. Evan steps carefully around the glass shards and drops down in the chair next to me.

“Fight with your woman?”

“Argument with a
friend
,” I say sarcastically.

“Friend my motherfuckin’ ass. Do you think I’m a fuckin’ idiot?

I roll my head toward him and sigh. “Not an idiot, just misinformed.”

“Dude,” Evan mutters. “A friend wouldn’t sit in the car after her daughters rush into Abby’s house trying to keep herself in check so no one sees her fall apart. A friend wouldn’t finally break and be a blubbering fuckin’ mess after dropping you off from an overnight trip.”

Fuck…

“She could’ve been crying about anything. I mean, she’s had a rough year.”

Evan spins toward me, leaning his elbows against his knees, I can see the anger in his eyes and I know I’m in for a lecture. “You’re right, AJ, she has had a rough year. Everything she thought she knew came crashing down around her when she found the man that told her he loved her for years fucking another woman. Then a few months later the same guy almost killed her kids. Then this guy that she’s falling for shows up with another chick under his arm without telling her why and then suddenly tells her that he loves her. Now why the hell do you think she would jump to assumptions? AJ, you’re smarter than this. You’ve got more brains than a lot of us combined, but holy shit you’re stupid.”

“What do you mean? How the hell do you know all this?”

“Holy fuck you can’t be this stupid when you’re drunk. Right now the word love is just a word to Payton. That’s what happens when it gets used over and over again by someone that doesn’t mean it.”

“She told you what happened?” I groan, covering my face.

“You guys were trying to keep shit under wraps but I walked in on you when you were about ready to shove your dick in her twat. No one else knows so when I saw her crying, yeah, I asked what the hell was wrong and she told me. We sat outside in that fuckin’ Jeep for the past few hours and I listened to her try to work everything out in her head.”

“I told her I loved her and she just stared at me.”

“I know.”

“I’ve never said that to anyone, Evan. Not anyone that wasn’t family anyway.”

“I know,” he says again with a nod. “Heard you ran into Addi this morning.”

I scrub my hands over my face and throw the still full bottle. “Yeah, and Payton thought I was fucking her.”

Evan chuckles and I glare at him. I don’t find any part of this fucking situation funny. “When Tuesday and I first got together the same shit happened. Addi and Jason were at my house getting drawn up but she only saw Addi and thought the worst.”

“Shit, I forgot about that.”

“Mhm, and look at us now.”

“Married and dysfunctional?”

“It’s the best way to be, man.” He shrugs. “I’ve got the girl of my dreams and all the dysfunction that comes with it.” Grinning, he rubs a hand over his face. “And you know what? I wouldn’t trade one fight, or one misunderstanding, because they all lead me to here and now.”

“So what now? How the hell am I supposed to handle her just staring at me after I told her I loved her and then walking away like it meant nothing?”

“You let her apologize and try to make it up to you,” Payton sniffles from behind me.

Before I have a chance to say anything Evan stands up and pats my shoulder before walking away. Payton walks up between the loungers and sits back down where Evan just was. Her face—all red and blotchy—nearly cripples me. As much as I want to be upset that she walked away like she did, I feel the overwhelming need to pull her against me and make all that hurt go away. Not knowing what to do confuses me so I just sit and stare at her hands while she wrings them together.

“I don’t mean to compare you to Max and I’m so beyond sorry if you think I’m doing it on purpose. It’s just…”

“Just that him hurting you and the girls is hard to get over,” I finish for her.

Her eyes snap to mine in surprise. “AJ, every time you look at me it takes away any hurt Max made
me
feel. But I still feel it for the girls. I can get over him tossing me away like I meant nothing all those years, but I can’t get over what he did to them and how he made them feel. No matter what, I have to protect them above everything else.”

“And what? You’re afraid I’m going to do the same thing to them?”

“I wouldn’t let you near them if that’s what I was afraid of,” she admits. “What I’m scared of with you is that you have all these other options and I’m waiting for you to get bored with us. With me. I know that you keep telling me that you aren’t going to, but I look at myself in the mirror and then think about the girls that throw themselves at you and I worry. I don’t want the girls to get hurt. I don’t want to tell you I love you and then have you leave.”

Reaching over, I grab her hand and tug her onto my lap. She shifts, sliding around until she’s straddling my thighs with her hands pressed against my chest. All the effects of the alcohol are suddenly gone when she touches me.

“Obviously you see something different when you look in the mirror than what I see when I look at you.”