Better Than Before (RightMatch.com Trilogy) (29 page)

Images of Hope and Alex filled his head. At one time, he thought they might be in his life for good. His children of sorts. “No.”

Jacob leaned back in his chair. “I know this pregnancy and now the birth has interfered with our business. Frankly, I’m surprised you didn’t cut us loose when we missed those initial visits.”

“Frankly, so am I.”

“Why didn’t you?”

Because of Annie. “The reason doesn’t exist anymore. But I’m happy our deal worked out.” Jacob glanced toward the door again and Spence said, “You want to go be with them, don’t you?”

“Nah, I’ll stay and celebrate with you.”

“Tell you what. We’ll have the champagne corked. Take it to the hospital. Celebrate there.”

“You sure?”

“Uh-huh. That’s more important than business.” He didn’t mean that, but he didn’t want to spoil this special occasion for the Hendersons.

After Jacob left, Spence ordered a Manhattan, sipped it and studied the crowd, trying to blank his mind, trying to ease the lump in his throat. But he couldn’t help thinking about the grand event that was about to occur, and he couldn’t help acknowledging what he was missing in life.

o0o

Again, Annie sat in the assistant principal’s office with Keith at her side, staring over at Judith Lang. But this time her son was with them. Her son, who had a purple bruise around his eye. A big fat shiner.

“Thanks for coming in,” Judith said.

Keith moved to the edge of his seat. “What happened?”

Judith addressed Alex. “Would you like to tell them?”

Alex didn’t seem as upset as he should be. Contrary to Annie, who’d gotten his call and practically fallen apart. “I got in a fight.”

“He left out one important fact.” Judith’s voice was somber. “Alex
started
a fight. He threw the first punch.”

“Did you really?” Annie couldn’t believe her pacifist son had instigated all this.

But he nodded his admission of guilt.

“He won’t tell us why,” Judith continued.

“Young man,” Keith said sharply, “we want the whole story.”

Which, of course, he’d been refusing to tell them since March. The only inkling of admission had come when he’d told Spence learning to box might help him. She should have done more to get Alex to open up to her. And prayed her split with Spence hadn’t caused her son to act out. He’d asked repeatedly, as Hope had, why Spence wasn’t coming around anymore. She’d given them some wimpy, “He’s away on business” answer, which neither believed.

Judith broke the silence. “He’ll have to be suspended, regardless of the cause. We have a zero-tolerance policy on fighting. Sometimes we even call the police, but because of your suspicions about bullying, I held off on that.”

“Alex, please tell us the truth,” Annie begged. “We can’t help you if you don’t.”

Her son lifted his chin and he seemed…proud? Something had changed with Alex in the last few weeks, some imperceptible aura about him that she’d noticed but hadn’t been able to pinpoint. “I hit Marcus Jenkins first.”

“Why?” Annie asked.

“Because he started picking on Louie Myers.” The learning-disabled boy on their street. Her son’s features grew taut. “Marcus is gonna do to him what he did to me.”

“Tell us what he did to you, Alex.” Judith again.

“He stuffed me in a locker, Mrs. Lang. He tripped me in the hall. He got his buddies to dump my books whenever I went by them. I got banged up a lot.” The boy shook his head. “And he had a whole group online dissing me for being a sissy.”

“The cameras never picked up on their activities in school.”

“They know how to get around the cameras.” To Annie, he said, “I finally stood up to them, Mom. I told them I wasn’t scared of them anymore. That I had my own posse and we weren’t gonna be pushed around by his.”

“Without fighting, you did this?”

“Yeah, I knew I could now. But then I see them picking on a kid who can’t fight back, so I punched Marcus out.” His chest puffed out a bit. “I got a strong left hook.”

“Excuse me?” Annie said.

Now, he did blush. “Ed down at Nemo’s gym says I got a strong left hook.”

“I don’t understand,” Keith said to Annie. “Did you sign him up at a gym?”

Alex answered for her. “No. I went there weeks ago with Spence. Mom isn’t seeing him anymore and won’t say why. But I been going down after school on my own and paying the people for boxing lessons from my birthday money. I had six of them.”

Annie was openmouthed. She had no idea Alex was boxing. He’d told her he’d joined an end-of-the-year student council planning group which met after school and that he was getting a ride home with one of the other kids. But in reality, he’d taken the matter of protecting himself into his own hands. After Spence had started the ball rolling.

“It appears he’s conquered his own bully problem,” Judith commented. “He’ll still have to be suspended, but for one day, not six. And he won’t miss any exams.”

“What are you gonna do about Marcus?” Alex asked.

“I promise you, Alex, I’ll put a stop to his and his friends’ actions. Louie Myers will be safe, even if you’re not here to run interference for him.”

When they left the office, Keith told Alex to get in his car, that he’d take him home, then walked Annie over to her own. “What in hell did you let that man do with our son?”

“Apparently, Keith, I let him give Alex the tools to stand up for himself. Something, by the way, that neither of us could do for him.”

And all she’d done was criticize him for it. As she walked away from Keith, the realization made Annie want to cry.

o0o

Sunday had turned out bright and beautiful in the Matheson’s backyard, but Spence acted as if they’d had a snow storm in June. He sat away from everybody, on the picnic table under a tree, sipping a beer, morose and, because Joey recognized the signs, frustrated as hell.

From their own picnic table, where he and Cole were playing cards, Joe said to his younger brother, “I think we got our wish.” Joe’s kids had given their uncle a break from watching Ellie. Kara, his oldest, had the eight-month-old on a blanket in the shade and Kaelyn was entertaining her.

“What wish?”

“That night in the bar. We said we wished Spence would fall madly in love and have to grovel to get his girl.”

Snorting, Cole laid down cards. “Gin. He doesn’t look much like he’s groveling.”

“You know what’s going on?”

“Nope. I tried to talk to him, but he told me to do something anatomically impossible. I do know he’s not seeing Annie anymore.”

“What a shame. She was good for him.”

He could feel Cole’s eyes on him. “Still online with Dana?”

“Yeah. I asked her to meet, but she said she wasn’t ready yet.”

“Go for Mindy, then.”

Joe shook his head. “Dana and I shared some heavy stuff, Cole.” He stared over his brother’s shoulder. “I told her about football, my knee. She knew exactly how I felt. Had a similar thing in her life.”

“What happened to her?”

“She won’t tell me the details. But her description of how she felt about her experience was almost exactly like my reaction.”

“One thing we’ve learned from Spence is that keeping secrets is deadly. You should cut your losses. There’s so many available women on the site.…”

“Maybe.” He glanced over at Spence. “Let’s see if we can do something about
his
situation.”

They stood and crossed to their brother.

Cole sat down on the tabletop next to him. “Hey, buddy.”

“Hi, guys.” Spence’s pathetic attempts at sounding normal had been going on for weeks. His face was ragged, with lines of fatigue around his mouth and eyes. “What’s up?”

Joe put on a dogged face. “I gotta tell you something and I don’t know how.”

“Are you in trouble?”

“No, but you are.”

Spence set down his bottle with a thud. “Listen, I know you both mean well, but I don’t want any more harassment about Annie Hopkins. Our relationship is over.”

Joe propped a foot up on the picnic table bench. “She must think so, too.”

That got his brother’s attention. “What do you mean?”

“I thought you didn’t want to talk about her.”

“Joe, I’m warning you.…”

“Annie’s back on RightMatch.”

Cole frowned but Joey nudged his knee. Spence didn’t notice.

“I saw her profile was up again. A slew of men are winking at her.”

Spence’s jaw literally dropped. “Annie’s back in the dating circuit?”

“Looks like she is.”

Joey almost felt sorry for his brother. But the guy was so stubborn, drastic measures were necessary. Spence stood abruptly. “If you’ll excuse me…” He stalked away.

Cole’s eyes narrowed on Joe and he crossed his arms over his chest. “I didn’t see that Annie had come back online.”

Joe’s lips curved. “Really? I could have sworn I did.”

“You are so full of bullshit. He’s probably checking now.”

“He won’t check. He’s too stubborn.”

“He’s going to kill you when he finds out you lied to him.”

“Maybe,” Joey said staring after his brother. “And maybe not.”

o0o

A few days after summer vacation began, Annie walked into what would be her classroom in the fall and felt a sense of well-being, greater because she’d been so miserable lately.

The principal accompanied her. “It’s a warm room, Annie. Lots of southern exposure.”

“I’m so thrilled to have this job and have a room of my own.”

“We’re the lucky ones. Your résumé is terrific and your recommendations glowing. But it was the lesson you taught that cinched it. You had five adults dying to see what was next.”

That boosted her ego, which needed shoring up these days. She’d been assaulted by second thoughts and recriminations about the failure of her relationship with Spence. Most of the time, she blamed herself, her rigidity, her unwillingness, as Keith had said, to compromise. But it was over now. And she had to get used to it.

“I’ll leave you to get acclimated. Feel free to do whatever you want to the room.”

When the principal left, Annie sat down at her desk.
Her
desk.
Her
classroom. She sniffed. The scents of chalk, paint and crayons were still familiar from years ago, and she hadn’t realized how much she missed her job. Finally, she was going to get to do the work she loved again.

And have nobody to share it with.

Now that wasn’t true, she told herself. She’d asked Lauren to come to help out, precisely so she wouldn’t wish Spence could be a part of this. Because she missed him with an intensity she could barely tolerate. She was lonelier than ever, now that she’d found out the ramifications of what he’d done for Alex.

Shaking off the sadness, she got to work, which would distract her until Lauren arrived. She’d cataloged the books on the shelves by the time her friend came to the door. “Wow, a real classroom.”

“Yeah, it’s the best, isn’t it?”

Lauren came inside. “Then why do you look like doomsday’s coming?” She waved to encompass the room. “This is exactly what you’ve wanted for years.”

“I know. But…” She shook her head. “Never mind.”

Dropping down at one of the tables, Lauren studied her, probably seeing the gauntness of her cheeks, the hollowness of her eyes, which Annie was confronted with every morning now. “You’re exhausted, honey. You should quit your other jobs. Rest. Enjoy yourself this summer.”

“I need the money.”

“Like hell. Let Keith pay for all the kids’ clothes and activities. He owes you.”

“No, he doesn’t.”

“Then think about this. Julia and I both hire more help so we can cut back on the hours we put in at the restaurant and spa. All of us could spend a lot of time with the kids lounging in our pool.”

Free time was not what Annie wanted. “I can’t afford to.”

“I told you—”

“No, not monetarily. Emotionally.” She glanced down and saw her hands were shaking. “When I stop, all I do is think about Spence.”

“That’s because you’re in love with him. Of course you think about him. What you’re not doing is going after what you want. Like you did with getting this job, by the way.”

 “Oh, Lauren, I’m so confused. He was so much of the other Spence toward the end. It scared me.”

“He was a combination of the man you met online and the man he was before he met you. So he didn’t change as much as you wanted him to? Maybe you didn’t, either.”

“That’s true. I know I let him down.” When she allowed herself, she could still see the bleak expression in his eyes when she couldn’t accept all of him.

“Nothing’s perfect, Annie. Relationships are hard. You’ve got to accept each other’s faults.”

“Are you talking about me or Nick?”

“Nick and I are making it. Not easily, but we’re still trying. I’m talking about you and Spence, and you and Keith, too.”

“You agree with Keith that I didn’t compromise enough?”

Lauren studied her. “In some ways, I do. You let your insecurities about yourself push you into being stubborn. But, honey, Keith didn’t behave well, either. He wanted too much from you and you didn’t give in enough.”

Defensiveness rose up. “Why didn’t you tell me this then?”

“I did, before the divorce.”

“I don’t remember.”

“Because you didn’t want to hear it. Then he cheated on you, and it didn’t matter anymore.”

“What if I can’t live with a man like Spence, Lauren? With his decisions and his lifestyle?”

“Then you can’t have him. But he’s different since he met you, Annie.”

“Why are you so sure about that?”

Lauren fished some papers out of her purse. “I downloaded these from the internet. Like Julia did, only they show the other side of the story.”

 Annie took the articles from Lauren, her hands still trembling. The headline of the top page read, “Local VC firm reinvests in the environment, helping to create green economy.”o0o

Gentle waves rocked the boat and the sun shone brightly, but Spence didn’t want to spend Monday on a yacht with people from Global Industries. He preferred to lose himself in work. However, Harold’s retirement party had been planned weeks ago and there was no way he could get out of it. So he chewed emotional nails with a group of his colleagues, drinking at noon, enjoying their women, leaving all their stress in the office.