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  “Great.” Taryn sounded anything but as she crushed the cigarette out on the step and tossed the butt in the bushes. “I’ll find you.”

  She retreated indoors, leaving Jay alone with his morose thoughts. He realized then that not even five minutes after pouring his heart out to Kimber, he accepted a date with a woman who may or may not still be in a serious relationship. He unlocked and climbed into the Monte Carlo, where he rested his head against the steering wheel and tried to remember when he’d become such a terrible person.

  Chapter Seven

  “Oh my God!” Ferney’s eyes went so wide Kimber could see the whites all around the cool gray irises. “Your mystery lover was Jay? The whole time?”

  “Apparently.” Kimber’s voice broke on the word. She hated to admit it, hated the pain and nausea it caused to do so, hated thinking about the truth, remembering how libertine and wanton she’d been. She’d put herself in a vulnerable position and it made her sick to think the person she’d trusted most took advantage of that.

  “I’m aghast. Aghast.” Ferney sloshed the rest of the bottle of pinot noir into two glasses, pouring most of it on the breakfast nook’s table, and pushed one toward Kimber. “I can’t believe sweet, worshipful Jay would do something so manipulative and conniving. The guy’s about as devious as a Care Bear. Since when did he start being such a guy and thinking with his dick?”

  “Who knows.” Kimber picked up the glass, her fingers shaking, and took a greedy gulp.

  “Talk about an opportunist.”

  “Mmm.” The wine was tasteless on Kimber’s tongue.

  “However…” Ferney paused, drumming her manicured nails. “It sounds pretty hot, too.”

  Kimber nearly choked on the wine. “What?”

  “Don’t ‘what’ me. Weren’t you raving about the whole thing a week or so ago?”

  “I said all that about someone who I thought wasn’t a fucking liar.” Kimber’s face flamed as the trembling moved from her fingers to the rest of her body, and she tore a hand through her bedraggled, unwashed blonde hair. “It makes me physically ill, thinking about the things I did with Jay. I put myself on the line, assuming that I could. I thought I was with someone I could trust, not someone who would take advantage of me like this. It was degrading.”

  “I’m sure Jay didn’t see it that way. Degrading you was likely the last thing on his mind, considering you were fulfilling his dreams. So.” Ferney leaned forward, her eyes gleaming. “You said the sex was amazing?”

  “Ferney!”

  “You’re right, how dumb of me to ask. Of course it was amazing. You kept going back for more, after all.”

  Kimber swallowed back a rush of nausea, her sister’s voice the equivalent of an air horn being blasted in her ear. “Please. Focus.”

  “I am. I’m very focused. I’m focused on what you can’t focus on.”

  Tears pricked Kimber’s eyes and she blinked them away. “All I can focus on is that I trusted Jay, and he betrayed me.”

  “You also trusted who you thought was a total stranger with your heart and body. That stranger just so happened to be someone who’s worshipped you for years and would never intentionally hurt you. Considering all the different people it could’ve been, this may have actually been the best of all possible scenarios.”

  “Are you seriously kidding me? This is the worst thing that could’ve happened.”

  Ferney shrugged, her mouth twisting in sympathy. “Maybe so, maybe not.” She wrapped an arm around her sister’s neck, less of a hug and more like a lazy stranglehold. “I’m not saying that Jay didn’t do a disgusting, awful, unforgivable thing, but you know you guys were good together. And now you’ve had the best sex of your life with someone you really like. So disgusting, awful, unforgivable thing aside, how does that make you feel?”

  “I don’t know.” Kimber’s gaze dropped to the table as she scratched at a dried patch of sauce clinging to the surface. “I haven’t thought about it.”

  “Then think about it.”

  Kimber froze and gaped at her sister. “Are you suggesting I forgive him?”

  “No, just suggesting you think about it, that’s all. Hole yourself up tonight and do some serious soul-searching about the whole thing.”

  “I can’t.” Kimber crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m meeting up with Dane.”

  “Dane?” Ferney recoiled in horror. “Gross! Why?”

  “Why not?” Her sister’s vehement opposition to the idea only inspired Kimber’s innate urge to defend it.

  “Because you’re all wrong for each other, and by now you can surely see that, especially with Jay in the picture.”

  “Jay is not in the picture.”

  Ferney snorted. “I always knew you were delusional, but not this bad.”

  Before Kimber could reply, her phone chirped in her bag, and she fished it out and checked the screen. “It’s Dane.”

  “Ugh.” Ferney sat back in her seat and polished off her wine with a theatrical head toss. “The madness begins. Again.”

  Kimber flipped her sister the bird as she retreated into the bedroom that used to be hers, where she would fall asleep waiting in vain for Dane to call her. Now that he finally had, she couldn’t help but see it as an annoyance. “Hello?”

  “Hi.” His voice held that innocent note it always did right before he intended to disappoint her. “Just wanted to see what’s up.”

  Part of her wanted to scream and demand why he couldn’t have bothered to find out what was up when they were still together, but she didn’t have the energy. She sank onto the edge of the guest bed Ferney and Paul had wasted no time purchasing after she’d moved out. “Not a lot. You?”

  “The same, the same.”

  A long pause followed, one Kimber didn’t feel inspired to break. Had Dane always been so boring? What an irritating waste of time this conversation was turning out to be.

  He cleared his throat. “Actually, I’m also calling because I have some bad news.”

  No kidding. There it was-that familiar instinctual bristle as she braced herself to be pissed off at him. Apparently some things never changed. “What?”

  “Alex just reminded me Aural Stimulation is playing tonight at Bellringer’s, which means I won’t be able to meet you for a drink.”

  Kimber didn’t reply, trying to decide if she was surprised. Was she even upset?

  The worried, vaguely desperate note that crept into his voice, however, pleased her as he added, “Can we please reschedule? Or maybe you could come to the show. Then we can talk between sets.”

  She sighed, more out of boredom than anything. “I’ll let you know.”

  “Please, please, please don’t be mad at me, bables.” His whimper made her shudder, and had that nickname really once warmed her heart? “Please. I really want to be better for you, for us. I don’t want to mess up what we have anymore.”

  Be better for her? Mess up what they have? What did he think was happening here? The idea that he had the impression she wanted to get back together with him sickened her, but wanting only for the conversation to end, she didn’t bother attempting to set the record straight. “I’m not mad, I just can’t talk right now. I’ll call you later.”

  She hung up, wondering if she would, in fact, call him later. It was surprising to compare her feelings a few weeks ago to them now. She’d never imagined there would ever come a time where she’d be so ambivalent toward Dane. She didn’t think that would ever happen unless someone else-someone better-came along. Now it turned out that even the good guys were creeps. Sometimes a girl just couldn’t win.

  * * *

  Kimber returned to her apartment complex to find Taryn stretching outside their building in a black Spandex number that clung to her skin-and-bones frame. Her neighbor waved in greeting, despite that Kimber stood five feet in front of her. “Hey, Kimber. I’m just warming up for the gym. Wanna join me?”

  Warming up? Taryn was already so slick with sweat she looked like s
he’d just dove into a pool. “No, thanks. I’m pretty beat, I didn’t get much sleep last night.” That was an understatement, and Kimber realized it was also probably no excuse to energetic Taryn, who likely sprung out of bed at 4 a.m. and set to work, cooking crack on a spoon while jumping ol’ Brad of the talented tongue. “Besides, working out always makes me feel justified for eating two giant bags of M &Ms, so it’s all futile, anyway.”

  Taryn laughed. “Yeah, I hear you.” She spread her legs into a wide, upside-down V and bent forward, hinging at the hips and staring at Kimber between her spread thighs. “Hey, question for you. That guy who helped you move in-what’s his story?”

  Kimber’s heart turned over at the vague mention of Jay. “I don’t know what you mean.” Had Taryn heard them screaming at each other through the walls? How could she not have? The partition that separated the apartments might as well have been made from popsicle sticks and Scotch tape.

  Taryn straightened then propped a foot on the stair railing and reached for her toes. “I bumped into him out here after I got in a huge fight with Brad yesterday night. I’ve been doing all I can not to think about him but…” For a moment, her eyes clouded. Then she brightened. “Anyway, I saw Jay and thought, hey, the perfect diversion.”

  “Oh.” Kimber took a slow, deep breath, trying to calm down and decide for what reason she felt the need to calm down.

  “But after he said yes when I asked him out, I was like, what the hell are you doing, Taryn? You don’t know anything about this guy. And it’s not like Brad and I are big on going out on the town, so I have no idea what’s cool to do around here.”

  “Uh huh.” Jay had spent the evening screaming about being in love with her then turned around and agreed to date the neighbor as soon as he was out the door? What the hell was going on?

  “Since you and Jay are such good friends,” Taryn said, picking up the jump rope at her feet and hopping like the White Rabbit on amphetamines, “I figured you’d be the best person to ask. What do you think he’d want to do?”

  Me wearing a blindfold was the first response that came to mind. “Um, well, when are you guys going out?”

  “Tonight.” Taryn sighed. “This whole thing has been very impulsive.”

  A scheme Kimber didn’t quite comprehend took a nebulous shape in her mind. “There’s this local band he loves playing at Bellringer’s tonight. Have you ever heard of Aural Stimulation?”

  * * *

  “Bables!” Dane looked so happy to see her when she approached him at the counter of Bellringer’s in between the band’s first and second set that Kimber almost wished she still felt just an ounce of longing for him. He engulfed her in a hug, and she could feel how hot his skin was beneath his plaid button-down shirt. They swayed in a tight embrace, the kind she used to want to last forever but now seemed excruciatingly endless. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

  “Me too.” She gave his spine a soft pat and pulled away, craving the end of the uncomfortable hug.

  He released her albeit with reluctance. “You want a beer?”

  There was no way she could survive the night without one-or several. “Sure. Whatever you’re having.”

  His mouth twisted in apology. “I’m drinking straight Jack.”

  Of course he was; there was no mistaking that beautiful glitter in his blue eyes that foretold he was already wasted on hard liquor. For once it didn’t bother her. It was even somewhat comforting that he was so the same while she was the one who changed. “I’ll have that, too.”

  Dane called over the bartender while Kimber glanced around, hoping it wasn’t obvious that she sought Jay. Her body jolted with anxiety when she spied a man of a similar height and build with an arm around someone, but it was only an acne-riddled teen wearing too much eyeliner, and his companion was another boy. If Kimber had come to learn anything about Jay, it was that he definitely wasn’t gay, not even close. Her cheeks burned, recognizing that she knew this for a fact.

  “For you, my queen.” Dane pressed a glass of whiskey in her palm. “I gotta get back to the band though. Break’s almost up. You gonna be all right by yourself?”

  She nodded. That had been the situation all along when it came to the two of them.

  Relief bloomed on his face. “Good.” He brushed his knuckles across her cheek. “I’m so glad you’re here. We’ll talk more after this next set, okay?”

  Kimber bobbed her head again and Dane ambled off, his step light. She made herself comfortable in a vacant seat at the bar, hoping no one would talk to her yet hoping someone would, in the event Jay might be around and looking her way. Even though she’d just told Ferney that he wasn’t in the picture, now there was no other thought more attractive than him watching her with a lustful, deliciously tortured expression in his eyes, all the while knowing he couldn’t have her. Looking good and living well was really the best revenge.

  But she’d be lying if she said that all day long, she hadn’t been alternating between schemes of how to make him completely miserable and fantasies of him pinning her against the Monte Carlo in the parking lot and having his way with her. She took a sip of her whiskey, trying to swallow her complex feelings with it.

  Aural Stimulation took the stage, and though the bar was crowded, no one seemed to notice. Alex’s bass drum throbbed a few lazy times while the bassist, Ted, walked his fingers up and down the neck of his bass. Dane slid his Native American-patterned guitar strap over his head, played a quick albeit complicated riff, and then gave the band a nod. Alex returned the gesture and crashed his drumsticks together overhead, and the band lapsed into a cover of “Casey Jones.”

  Kimber’s legs bounced in time to the music, partially out of nervousness regarding what the evening might bring and partially because she could never stop herself from moving with the beat. Despite his flaws, Dane was a phenomenal guitar player, his heroes being Jimmy Page and Stevie Ray Vaughn, and his talent transcended dive bars in northeast Pennsylvania. Kimber watched him play his guitar, stroke the strings, and she recalled how badly she used to want him to have a similar intensity about her. She’d wanted him to love her like music and couldn’t understand why it had been so hard.

  “Thank you both, you’re too kind,” Dane quipped in a monotone as the song closed to the response of less than a quarter of the patrons half-heartedly clapping. He paused to take a swig of his whiskey, which rested in his microphone stand’s drink holder. “This next song was written about Catherine the Great’s horse.” Aural Stimulation’s rendition of “Hash Pipe” soon blasted from the amplifiers.

  Kimber downed her drink and beckoned the bartender over for another, the whiskey’s warmth spreading through her, and a lazy, lighthearted pleasure took rule of her heart. This wasn’t so bad. This was even fun. She was out on the town, getting tipsy and listening to a good cover band. She was even happy Dane was around, thankful for his reassuring predictability and that she no longer had expectations of him. It freed her to see that he wasn’t really a bad person, just someone who wasn’t right for her, and there wasn’t anything wrong with that. She was alive and doing okay, had made it past the end.

  No sooner had Kimber decided to enjoy the night, no matter what, her fitness-friendly neighbor’s sudden appearance shocked all the toasty happiness from her body.

  “Hey there!” Taryn hugged her with a fierceness their relationship hardly warranted. “I didn’t even see you come in. When did you get here?”

  “Only a little bit ago.” The now familiar unease and horror returned to Kimber as Taryn released her. “What about you?”

  “We got here about twenty minutes ago.” Taryn gestured between herself and the man beside her, ordering drinks, and it wasn’t until he looked her way that Kimber registered the man as Jay. Her heart halted like a needle scratching to a stop across a record, her mind white at his transition from her daydreams to standing right in front of her.

  To make matters worse, he tossed his chin her way. “Hey, Kim. How’s it going?”


  “Great, you?” The words left her in a rush although she couldn’t wrap her mind around their meaning, so stunned was she at Jay’s friendly ambivalence. It was like she was a stranger, like he hadn’t known her for years, like he hadn’t ever poured his heart out to her, like he’d never been inside her, making her come. She forced herself to behave the same and ignore the swell of guttural screams now looping through her head.

  Taryn’s eyes sparkled as she bobbed her head, perhaps a bit too vigorously. “Everything’s going good. Really good.”

  “Have you heard from Brad?” Kimber asked, hoping that Taryn had, that her neighbors’ love life would resolve and stop intruding on hers. Not that Jay was in her love life but-

  “No.” A dark, sad look filled Taryn’s light green eyes, and Kimber regretted saying anything at all-until Taryn beamed and patted Jay on the back. “No, I’m not going to think of him tonight.”

  Kimber forced a weak smile, keeping her gaze on Taryn’s face and refusing to let it drift in Jay’s direction.

  “Hey, we’re sitting at a table near the stage,” Taryn added. “You should definitely join us.”

  “No, that’s okay. You guys go ahead.” Kimber heard herself speak and felt her lips move, but she couldn’t comprehend the situation, which felt like an out-of-body experience. Here congregated a group of people, everyone being polite, and no one saying what was truly going on. She clasped her hands together to prevent them from shaking. “I’m waiting for the guitar player to finish up.” She nodded toward Dane, not wanting to catch Jay’s response. Suddenly, the idea of making him jealous was unattractive-especially since he didn’t seem inclined to be jealous at all.

  “Okay,” Taryn said as the bartender set two beers before Jay, who instructed they be put on his tab before picking them up and handing one to Taryn. “Well, come join us if you want. You know where to find us.”

  Jay gave her an easy smile. “If we don’t see you, have a good night.” Then he and Taryn disappeared into the crowd, back to the two-person world they’d apparently created for themselves.