Complicate Me (The Good Ol' Boys #1) (21 page)

I beamed. I couldn’t help it.

“You know the first thing I’m going to do when I see you?”

“Flirt with me?” I sassed.

“That’s the second. The first is to pull you up into my arms and spin you around until you tell me to stop. Will you tell me to stop, Alexandra?” he rasped.

My heart pounded in my chest with heavy thumps, and I rolled onto my back in some awkward position. My eyes landing on his, sitting right on my nightstand, wrapped in a black frame. The photo of Lucas and I stared me right in the face.

“What time do you land?” I asked, changing the subject. I had to.

“Two in the afternoon and you already know that,” he paused as he debated on what to say. If there was one thing I knew about Cole, it was that he always spoke his mind, no matter what.

“What took away my happiness, Darlin’? I can hear it in your voice.”

Sometimes I hated that he was so perceptive.

“Is it Lucas?”

Over the past few months, I started opening up to him. I told him as much as I could about Lucas and I. He always listened, never saying anything bad about him. I wouldn’t let him if he tried.

“Something like that,” I simply replied. “I’m fine.”

“Now that I’m aware of.”

I giggled. I loved the ability of being able to go from a serious conversation to a light one with him. It was never like that with Lucas.

“I’m really glad I met you, Cole.”

“Good, so I’ll see you tomorrow?”

I nodded even though he couldn’t see me. “You land at two o’clock, and I will see you at two forty-five at the lighthouse. I’m bringing lunch and a smile.”

“Promise?”

“Cross my heart.”

“Sweet dreams, Darlin’, and by that I mean me.”

“Goodnight, Cole,” I chuckled.

I instinctively grabbed the picture of Lucas and me from my nightstand as I hung up. We talked when we were around the boys. And he said hello when he passed me in the halls at school. But that pretty much summed up our relationship. School had been over for two weeks now and nothing really changed between us.

I hated it. I hated it so much. The worst part was that there was nothing I could do to fix us. His extra-curricular activities seemed to die down or maybe he hid it from me. I silently hoped it had something to do with me, and what I had said to him.

That maybe I made a difference in how he acted. I wasn’t giving up hope, but I wasn’t going to hold my breath either. At times, I swore I could feel his eyes on me or maybe it was just wishful thinking. I would be lying if I said it wasn’t easier to distract myself with Cole. Everything with him came easy. I truly loved that about him. Cole was a nice change in pace from the hurricane that constantly surrounded Lucas.

I wish I could tell you that my feelings for him went away, that I woke up one morning and they had vanished. Gone like the wind. They didn’t. I started to wonder if they ever would, and to be honest I wasn’t prepared for them to leave me anyway. It had become a part of me. He was ingrained. Etched somewhere deep in my heart. Every day it got a little easier not having him around me, but then there would be times like this where my heart physically ached for him in ways that made it hard to breathe.

I hit send on my phone before I even realized it, and then I heard his voice.

“Alexandra?” he answered. It only added salt to my open wounds when he addressed me by my full name. Which was the complete opposite feeling when Cole called me that. I loved it.

“Hey,” I breathed out.

“Are you okay?”

Silence.

“You haven’t called me in a long time,” he added, his voice breaking.

More silence.

“Are you there?”

“Yeah…” I started to panic. I wasn’t prepared for whatever attitude he would throw toward me. I didn’t know what to say. “I’m sorry I called. I’m sorry for bothering you.” I was about to click end.

“I’m not,” he stated, making me hover my finger over the button.

“Do you want to hang out tomorrow? I miss you,” he paused, letting his words sink in. “I miss us,” he coaxed, catching me completely off guard.

“I could pick you up. Our abandoned house probably misses us,” he chuckled, trying to break the tension. Though I could hear the strain in his tone. “I could pick you up around two.”

My heart dropped.

“Half-Pint…”

It now shattered, along with my hope for things to change.

“Please. I’m sorry for everything. You know that, right?”

“Wednesday,” I blurted with my heart in my throat. “You could pick me up from work.”

I immediately noticed that his breathing became heavier, deeper. He hesitated for a few seconds. Talking to Cole on the phone for months made me realize how much you could learn about a person just by being on the phone with them.

“Why not tomorrow?”

“Bo,” I pleaded. I didn’t want to tell him.

“Why. Not. Tomorrow?” he demanded, stressing every word.

“Cole gets into town tomorrow and I promised him—”

He scoffed in disgust, cutting me off. “Is that right? Well then by all means,
Alexandra
, I wouldn’t want you to keep Cole waiting or anything. Seeing as he’s so important to you.”

“That’s not—”

“
I…
haven’t spent time with you in months. Months. Fuck,” he seethed. “You know what? Fuck it. Have a great time.”

“Bo—” The call ended.

And for the first time I felt like it mimicked our friendship.

When I saw her name come up on my phone, I thought that maybe something would give and we could find our way back to each other.

I’m a fucking idiot.

Cole.

It was always fucking Cole.

I wasn’t first in her life anymore, and she couldn’t spell it out for me any clearer if she tried. It was evident.

“Are you alright?” Stacey asked, pulling me away from my thoughts and walking toward me.

I smiled and pulled her closer. “I am now.”

After Aubrey had confronted me that afternoon, I decided to change my ways. At least around Alex I would. I didn’t flaunt my conquests in front of her. I also didn’t parade all the pussy that was thrown at me. I didn’t even try to get laid as often. If it happened, it happened. I didn’t go looking for it like I did before. Girls would still talk about me, but at least she didn’t have to be as exposed to it like before.

As more time went by our drift became bigger. I didn’t know who she was anymore, and I had no one to blame but myself.

We tend to hurt the ones we love.

I had to learn that the hard way.

Cole was officially coming back to town for the summer. I would see them together everywhere. The only way to prevent it, was to lock myself in my bedroom for the whole summer. I thought about doing it once or twice, I’m not going to lie. This next year would be my last summer before college. I applied to several out of state schools and had already heard back from a few with “Congratulations, you’ve been accepted” letters. But, I didn’t commit to any of them yet.

I told everyone I hadn’t chosen one because there was so many to choose from. In reality, it all came back to her. Every time I thought about not seeing her, it was hard to breathe. It was easy to contemplate leaving, pulling the trigger, though that was a whole different story.

“What are you thinkin’ about over there?” Stacey rasped against my neck with her hand moving to my cock. We were sitting on the bed of my truck at a party in the woods. Anyone who was anyone was there, including the boys. Alex never came to these things even though the boys begged her to tag along. She would reply with “Nah, that’s not really my thing.”

She was a good girl, always had been. I prayed she always would be.

That was one of the things I loved most about her.

I pulled away from Stacey, needing some space from the daunting thoughts that plagued my mind.

“What? Am I not good enough for you? Huh? Now that you have half the school fawning over you?” she spewed.

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever. I don’t have time for this shit.” I jumped off the bed of my truck.

“Lucas! What the fuck?”

I stepped toward her, my mouth close to hers. “Don’t,” I warned.

She spitefully narrowed her eyes at me. “Going to see,
Half-Pint
?” she mocked in a condescending tone. “Oh yeah, she has better things to do now and they don’t include you. Why would they? When she has someone who looks like Cole by her side.” Her eyebrow arched when she realized her words were getting to me, even though I tried to hide it. I couldn’t, I never could when it came to Alex.

“Maybe I should go play with Cole. If he’s good enough for her, then he damn well would be good enough for me.”

I maliciously smiled. “Well God knows if I had to choose between you and Alex, there wouldn’t be a choice.”

She laughed viscously, a cackling sound I felt deep in my bones. Nothing could have prepared me for her next words.

“You’re a fucking idiot. What do you think you’ve been doing all these years,” she paused to let her words linger, “
Bo
?”

I jerked back like she had just punched me. The truth of her words just about knocked the wind right out of me.

“What? You think you haven’t? You’re a fucking fool. Sorry to break it to you, but, Lucas, you have been choosing me over Alex for years. Fuck,” she sneered. “And this last year, you’ve been choosing every other girl, but her. So get off your high horse, suga’, the only one that’s been hurting her is you.”

I stood there in a trance-like state. “That’s not true,” I muttered through my teeth, barely believing it myself.

She let out a loud laugh with her head falling back. She laughed at me because she knew as much as I did that my words were nothing but lies.

“I’m not the villain in this story, Lucas. You are.”

I instinctively stepped back to catch my bearings, but it was too late. The quicksand of her words took me under. I gripped the side of my truck to steady my composure. It didn’t help. Stacey’s words caused a domino effect of memories and mistakes hitting me like a thunderbolt.

Every time I left with her.

Every time she saw me with her.

Every time I told her she was just a girl.

Every excuse. Every explanation. Every lie.

It engulfed me, hurting me in ways that I assumed I hurt her.  I found it hard to move.

For the first time…

I was slapped in the face with my own hurricane. The winds turned against me and I didn’t even fight it. I let it take hold. I deserved it all.

“She’d be stupid to choose you over Cole.”

I peered up at her through my lashes. “Get the fuck away from me,” I ordered with my head cocked and heated eyes.

She smiled, big and high. “Truth hurts, doesn’t it?” And with that she turned and left.

I don’t know how long I stood there replaying everything she said. All of it just sort of mixed together, causing a typhoon of regret. Before I knew it I was at our abandoned house, staring at the hole in the wall that I had caused. I hadn’t been back there since that night. I pushed her away like I did my feelings.

At the end of the day, I was left infinitely and utterly alone and I had no one to blame but myself.

Summer was in full swing. I couldn’t believe we were already halfway through it. It seemed like it was just yesterday that we walked out the doors of school and into summer break. As always, the restaurant was packed and I worked all the time. There were only two months out of the year that Oak Island had a high season for tourism. Cole spent most of the time surfing while I worked, along with the boys. Lucas also hung around a lot more than he used to.

It was like having the old Bo again. I got so used to seeing him surf with the boys that I started putting in his order for lunch without him having to ask me. He always met my eyes when he came in.  Lucas tried to talk to me at least a few times a day, asking me how I was, how my day went if I needed anything. I don’t know what caused the 180-degree change in his attitude toward me, but I appreciated it nonetheless.

Girls still flocked to him, he was a magnet to the opposite sex, but he didn’t pay them any mind. I hadn’t seen him hanging out with anyone other than the boys. Sometimes I would catch him talking to Aubrey, it always seemed as if they were in some deep conversation, but never around the boys. It only happened when it was just the two of them. There were several times that I wanted to ask Aubrey about it, but I decided against it at the last second. I didn’t want to rock the boat.

We weren’t Half-Pint and Bo anymore, but at least he was cordial now.

“Hey,” Lucas greeted, nudging me with his shoulder and pulling me away from my thoughts.

I nudged him back. “I didn’t see you standing there.”

We stood in the sand where I watched them surf all the time. Cole wasn’t as good as Lucas, but he wasn’t that far behind either. Lucas was always the best surfer among the boys, and they knew it too.

“Do you have time to sit for a bit?”

I glanced over at him, smiling. “I do.”

He returned my smile and nodded toward the sand before sitting down. I followed suit. We both sat with our knees up and our arms lying across them, side-by-side. Our shoulders touched and I immediately felt his warmth roll down my body.

“How’s your day going?” he asked, looking at the ocean. I wondered if he watched Cole.

“Good. Busy.”

“You like busy, though.”

I softly chuckled, “I do. How’s your summer going?”

“Nothing too exciting going on.”

“I know, you’re here every day,” I blurted, my cheeks reddening the second the last word came out of my mouth.

Looking at me with a fascinated regard, he grinned and nodded. “That I am,” he simply stated.

“So, are you excited about turning eighteen soon?” I questioned, changing the subject.

“I guess. You excited about turning sixteen soon?” he answered, throwing my question back at me.

“I’m excited to drive. It would be nice not to rely on someone to get everywhere. I’m kinda over my bike.”

“I could… I mean… I… umm…” he mumbled.

“You could what?” I was never one for patience.

“I could drive you to and from work? You know, the way I used to.”

“Why? Why now?”

He sighed, defeated. “And we’re back to this again.”

I shook my head, dumbfounded. “What do you expect from me? I wish I could just let things go and we could magically go back to what we used to be, but I’m not made like that, Lucas. You know that. I need to know why now? I don’t understand how you can go from ignoring my existence, to offering me rides, and not expect me to question your timing.”

He kicked the sand around below his feet. He did this when he was nervous. “I don’t know what you want me to say, Alexandra. I really don’t.”

I ignored how normal my full name sounded from his lips. I ignored the way it made me feel because if I didn’t, I wouldn’t have been able to go on with this conversation. It would end how they always had. Bad.

“Tell me the truth,” was all I replied.

He gazed out at the ocean again, as if it pained him to look at me and tell me what he had been trying to hide for so long.

“Everything got so confusing. One day I woke up and I wasn’t a kid anymore, but you were. I know we’re only two years apart, but that’s a long gap when you’re that young. You may not be able to understand that, but that’s how it felt.”

“I’m not a kid anymore.”

He grimaced, his shoulders slumping forward. His eyes shut and he sucked in a deep breath, collecting his thoughts of what he wanted to say to me. “I know. I missed you growing up. Or maybe I didn’t. I saw it happening and it didn’t matter because I couldn’t handle it. You wanted what we all did, to have
experiences
. I’ve known you your entire life and it was hard for me to see you as anything other than my brown eyed girl.”