"I can walk, Quinn."
"I know."
Kara looked out the windshield and saw Ben talking to Jess. Then Jess got in the car and started to drive to her house.
"So, the show went great, but life sucks, huh?" Jess supplied, making Kara laugh.
"I love you, Jess."
"Yeah, but you would have called Josie first if she didn't have a baby, because she would have fed you cinnamon rolls." Kara laughed again. She really liked the friends she had chosen.
"So what were you and Ben talking about?"
"You kicked him to the curb, and that man is fine. Maybe I was asking him out."
Kara bit back a gasp and wanted to kick herself. What the hell? She knew her friend was teasing her, but for a millisecond she was sickened at the very thought. She gave herself a mental shake. She took a deep breath and smiled. "Seriously, Jess, what was that about?"
"They're going to follow us back to my house. Just to make sure we get in okay. No biggie." That made Kara chuckle. Jess had a little bit of her parent's Middle Eastern accent, so to hear her say ‘no biggie' was funny. "I'm glad you're laughing about them following us, I thought you might be mad."
"Not mad, resigned." Kara dropped her head against the seat rest and closed her eyes. "I'm tired. I'm just going to rest my eyes for a second."
"No problem, Kara. It sounds like it's been a bitch of a night." Kara let the country music station roll over her, not even noticing when the vehicle stopped and her car door opened.
"Quinn, I told you I can walk." Kara heard her voice, but it seemed to come from somewhere outside of her head. She looked up and saw beautiful, caramel-colored eyes looking down at her, and she sighed in relief. Quinn. She wrapped her arms around his neck and breathed in his scent. The collar of his shirt was stiff, and it didn't feel good. "Hurts," she muttered.
"What hurts, sweetheart?"
"Your shirt," she whispered into his neck, enjoying the feeling of being carried. She heard the door being opened and smelled ginger and paprika and knew she must be in Jess' house.
"In here," called Jess' voice. Kara felt herself being laid down on a soft bed. She knew it was Quinn who kissed her forehead. Then she felt the soft brush of Ben's lips on hers.
"Sleep well, my Kachawli."
Chapter 11
They both eyed the couch sourly. There was no way either of them would fit comfortably on it. "Rock, paper, scissors?" Quinn asked. Ben nodded, and didn't protest when his brother won. He went over to the hall closet and pulled out the linens that Kara had told them about. He threw them on the floor. The floor was going to be more comfortable than trying to fold in half on a couch that looked like a loveseat. He thought longingly of Kara's bed, not because it would be comfortable, but because it would smell like her and it would be one way to feel close to her. But he had lost that privilege. Or, maybe she was right. It would be a more accurate statement to say that he had thrown away that privilege.
Ben stripped out of the suit, taking care to put it back into the garment bag in the hope that he might have another reason to need it this trip. Then he threw on jeans and a sweatshirt to go feed and play with the dogs. Sundance was mostly white and had grown up larger than Butch, but Butch was definitely more dominant. Must be the name, Ben thought with a grin. He'd seen two soup bones in the fridge, but before he resorted to bribery, he wanted to see how he would fare with the dogs on his own. He needn't have worried. They treated him like an old friend. Apparently, the bonding they had done when they were pups had held true.
"Come on, guys, why don't we take a run?" Ben started sprinting around the perimeter of the property, enjoying the feel of the earth giving beneath his shoes, and the crisp, black, diamond-studded sky above him. He needed to clear his head. Sundance ran at his side while Butch raced ahead, occasionally looking back as if to urge him on. By the third time around, Ben was finally beginning to feel a definite ache in his side, which he relished. It went along with the ache in his heart.
He dropped down onto the loamy grass near an evergreen tree, and the dogs immediately rushed him, trying to lure him into wrestling matches. He made some halfhearted attempts but soon stopped. After a while, the dogs decided to lie down and rest with him. Soon they were dozing and he was looking up at the night sky, reliving the events of the night. Seeing her for the first time in over a year and a half almost brought him to his knees. He felt like he was seeing his own personal view of heaven, the woman he loved. And since it was just him and the dogs, he would admit that his view of heaven was made a whole lot better when he got a view of Kara's newly formed butt. It was fantastic. The woman had put on some weight, and it had gone to all the right places. He couldn't wait to get his hands on that heart-shaped ass!
The worst had to be finding Kara sitting alone on the bench on Main Street, well past midnight. What kind of asshole would leave a woman abandoned like that? Having her dismiss them at the gallery had been expected, but to find her looking so sad and alone almost broke his heart, at least when he wasn't focusing on the fucker who had left her there.
Then there had been the meltdown-okay, a mild meltdown. Come to think of it, in all the time he had known her, he had only seen her drink one beer or one glass of wine, and tonight he saw her drink two glasses of champagne rather quickly. Then there was the shock of seeing them. Something big had gone down between her and the perfect surgeon boyfriend. She seemed to almost be in shock. It was the only way she would have let Quinn carry her around like that. She had been too pissed earlier that evening.
Part of him wanted to respect her wishes and be gone by the time she came home tomorrow, but he knew they wouldn't be. They had to find out where they stood. Ben knew it was bad. Quinn didn't, but Ben did. He needed to know how bad. At least he knew the boyfriend was out of the picture, but he never thought that was going to be the real issue. The problem was always going to be their betrayal of her, the way they hadn't listened to Kara. Fuck, this was a fucking mess. He deserved the teeny tiny couch.
* * * *
It was two days later, and Kara called them inside. The dogs ran to the door, thinking they were going to be let into the house, too. It was one of their biggest treats.
"Butch. Sundance. Stay." She hated letting them down. She would have preferred letting the two men down. But they kept showing up, and until they had this out, they would keep showing up, so she didn't have a choice. At least they weren't smiling. They understood she was doing this under duress. Good.
The morning Jess dropped her off, she managed to get them to leave with her icy demeanor, but they had shown up the next morning with a pink box. Apparently, her Achilles heel was well known. She had still gotten them to leave. But this morning, she heard them when she woke up, playing with the dogs, and realized that they weren't going to take no for an answer.
She'd showered, blown and brushed her hair dry, and put on some makeup, all forms of armor. She was going to need all of the protection she could get. She turned around and walked back through the kitchen into the living room, knowing they were following her. She heard them close the door to the back porch. She turned around in front of the fireplace and crossed her arms. She just stood there looking at them, willing them to start the conversation. She knew she'd be the one to finish it. Finish this whole goddamn mess.
"You probably guessed that we got here on the night of your show because your brothers called," Quinn started, and she just stared at him. "What you don't know is that we were going to be here within the next six weeks, regardless of your brothers' call." She didn't believe him. It must have shown.
"Kara, really we were. We have been in talks to buy Kuba Charters. The financing is almost done." She knew Kuba. It was a good recreational charter business here in Fate Harbor. She didn't believe them. This was something they had just hurriedly concocted when the boys had told them about Jim. They just didn't want somebody else playing with something they considered theirs, even if they had decided not to play with it themselves.
"We sold most of the interest in the boats to Randy and Kyle. Kyle got married to Christine, remember her?" Kara couldn't help flinching. Kyle had just started dating her the last time Ben and Quinn had told her to leave.
"Will Kyle and Randy be out on the boats, even though they're married?" Kara kept her tone mild. She smiled as she saw she wasn't the only one who could flinch.