Crazy Maybe (21 page)

LUKE

Damn, infuriating woman!  I’ve called, left voicemails, sent texts, banged on her door at all hours of the damn day and night.  No answer – not even one!  The last thing she said to me implied that I was only with her to help my dad get what he wanted.  That not only hurt, but that also infuriated and insulted me.  Then she ignores me and won’t even let me fucking respond to that fucked up statement.  What the hell?

Shane has been barely speaking to me for the past couple of weeks.  He’s known something has been really wrong.  He’s not stupid by any means.  He’s known all this shit with Andi has something to do with me.  I finally broke down and told him everything today and I swear I thought he was going to tear my head off.  I’m not afraid of any man but I know I would’ve deserved this ass-whooping.  He broke a bunch of shit in the gym to work out his anger and avoid breaking
me
. 

He did ultimately threaten to have my balls stuffed and mounted if I didn’t make everything right for Andi.  I believe he would carry out that threat.  He really does love and protect her like a brother should for his sister.  Like I should have as her friend and her lover, but when the pressure was on, I caved.  The press is getting bad around her and we’re both concerned about what kind of toll it’s taki
ng on her.  Her strength amazes me.

I’m waiting inside the club because I know she’ll be here tonight.  Shane told me he’s meeting the girls here so I am taking full advantage of it.  We were waiting here for them when her face was all over the TV screens and when I heard all the people, who don’t even know her, tearing her down, my protective instincts went into hyper drive.  Then she walked right by our table and went straight for the stage.  I’ve had to use every bit of my willpower to keep from storming the stage and carrying her off so we can be alone. 

That song she’s singing is killing me.  
Killing me
.  She’s pouring all of her pain into it and singing about what a fool she is over me – because she thinks I used her.  She thinks the reason I didn’t stand up to my dad is because I was in on his blackmail scheme.  She thinks every second I spent with her was a sham and that I’m not sitting here with my heart bleeding out inside me. 
Killing me
one damn word at a time. 

Shane
stands up and he is one pissed off brother.  He glares at me and I swear he was about to break my jaw when Katie stands up, takes his hand and leads him to the dance floor for a slow dance.  The others follow suit and leave me here to stew and wallow alone in my pitiful state.  All of my willpower drains when she finishes singing and starts dancing with some other man, who is too happy to have her in his arms.  So, I stomp towards her and demand that she come with me. 

And, of course, being as stubborn as she is, she refuses to come with me.  So, being as stubborn as I am and r
efusing to let one more day go by, I nod to my own conclusion that I will resort to kidnapping her and deal with the consequences later. 

I throw her over my shoulder and carry her off the dance floor.  People give us curious looks but no one interferes.  I guess my
don’t-even-fucking-try-it
face is on full strength tonight.

It’s only when I hear the voice that she uses with the kids who get out of line at the center that it registers I’m about to walk outside with her thrown over my shoulder, against her will, and
she’s obviously pissed off about it. 

I reconsider my kidnapping idea since there may be cameras outside that capture my crime.  The damn reporters have been following her everywhere lately.  Mitch has done a good job of keeping the fuckwads out of the club.

I put her down but I don’t let go of her.  I can still kidnap her and make it look like we’re holding hands.  Once I have her at my place, I just won’t let her go until this is resolved.  I’ll take good care of her for the next 40 or so years until she decides to forgive me.  Then we’ll live happily ever after.  She agrees to walk with me like a normal person would so I take full advantage of it by linking our fingers together and holding tight.

I lead her to my truck and help her into the passenger seat and lock her door before closing it.  I quickly round the front of the truck, climb into the driver seat and buckle her in while she looks at me like I’m crazy.  I may be a little nuts right now but it’s her fault if I am.  If she’d just answered my calls, my texts or even her fucking door, I wouldn’t have to resort to committing a felony right now.

“Luke.  What the hell do you think you’re doing?”  She asks in annoyance as I start the truck and put it in drive.

Think fast.
  “With all the press coverage, I thought it would be best to keep moving so no one films us talking and twists it for another story,” I lie.  I’m kidnapping her and the longer I can keep her from realizing it, the more likely I am to succeed.

She nods tentatively, like she’s considering my reasoning but isn’t completely sure of my sanity.  I sneak a look at her when I check the adjacent lane for traffic. 

“So, you’re just randomly driving then?  No destination in mind?” She asks calmly, but I know that tone she’s using better than she thinks I do.

Shit
.  “Yes.” 
No.
  “I’m just driving the roads I know well.  In case I need to make a sudden detour.” 
Sounds reasonable
.

“What do you want from me, Luke?”  She sounds exhausted now – weary with me.  It suddenly occurs to me that I have to somehow get her out of the truck without her throwing a fucking hissy fit on me.  That would draw way too much attention.

“I want to talk to you, Andi.  And I want you to listen to me.  And I want to help you,” I reply and even I can hear the pleading edge of my voice. 

“If I agree to this, will you leave me alone then?”

“Yes.”
No
.

She sighs heavily again, telling me she’s pissed that she’s being forced into it, but I’ll take it any way I can get it. 

“Fine.”

“Your house or my apartment?”  I say casually.  I really don’t care which one she chooses but her house would be easier because she doesn’t have close neighbors. 

“My house,” she replies without hesitation or issue. 

The kidnapping stars are aligned and winking at me tonight.

Her phone beeps and she pulls it out to check her text message.  She quickly types a response back and I mentally note that all of her fingers are, in fact, not broken, thus she could’ve answered any of the hundreds of messages I’ve sent her.

“Your friends worried about you?”  I ask with a smile, though I just really want to know if some fucker is texting her.

“Yeah, they asked if you kidnapped me,” she says pointedly.

I stifled a choke to avoid giving away my plan.  I chuckled at their joke.  “And what did you tell them?”

“I said that still remains to be seen,” she cuts her eyes at me, “but that I’m fine for the moment.”

I give her my best smile, “You know I’d never hurt you, Andi.” 
Kidnap you, yes.  Hurt you, never.

“Maybe.  But that’s not what they asked, is it now?”  She cleverly replies.  My little vixen is very shrewd.

“Here we are,” is my only response as I pull into her driveway. 

I’ve never been so glad to reach a destination in my life.  I jump out of the truck and rush to open her door and escort her inside, astutely cloaking my excitement at being at her house, with her in tow, and all without the need of chloroform to achieve any of this.  All in all, it’s a good night.

We’re inside now and she’s walking towards the chair, but I want her to sit with me so I gently steer her towards the couch.  She sits at one end and I know she expects me to sit on the other end, but when I sit I leave no space between us.  She looks a little perturbed at this but she turns slightly towards me and waits patiently.

“I’m not really good at this, Andi, so first let me say
I’m sorry
right now in case I say something wrong.”  She nods but doesn’t say anything.

“Saying I’m sorry isn’t enough, even though I mean it.  I’m infinitely sorry for what I’ve done, but there are a few things I want to explain that will hopefully help you understand me,” she looks interested in hearing what I have to say so I continue.

“Several years ago, I started seeing this girl, Megan.  We were together for a while and we were pretty serious.  Her father, Carl, owned the gym where I was working out and that’s where we met.  My father’s business was doing really good and he had a lot of high-profile development projects going on.  So, during a family get together one night, Carl mentions in casual conversation with my dad that he has some plans to revamp his gym.  They talk shop for a little while and before long, they have a verbal agreement for my dad’s men to do the work for Carl.

Turns out, it was a lot of work and it took a lot of resources away from the other projects my dad had going on.  He lost a lot of money doing work on the gym and had penalties against him for not finishing his other projects on time.  I found out way too late that Megan only wanted to date me – or Brandon – to get my dad to do the work for her dad for free.  She had been flirting with Brandon behind my back the whole time she was with me.  I walked in on them kissing one day and that was the end of us and it almost tore apart my relationship with my brother. 

It has taken a long time for me to forgive him and it was actually because of you.  He’s tried to tell me for years about that day and I wouldn’t listen to him.  I think I always knew deep down but I didn’t want to face it.  She had kissed him and he pushed her away.  But when I saw them, I didn’t see him push her away so I’ve blamed Brandon all this time.  But Brandon said something to me that really shook me.  He told me to stop using Megan as the standard I use to judge other women.

I did that to you.  When Dad showed me those pictures and the court document, I put you in that category.  Andi, I’ve always felt guilty for how Megan and Carl’s scheme hurt my dad’s business.  If it wasn’t for me, he would’ve finished those big projects on time and wouldn’t have lost so much money.  When he showed me those pictures and told me that stuff about you, I immediately jumped to the conclusion that you were using me for something and lying to me about who you really are. 

I was completely in the wrong for that, and I am sorry, even though I know that won’t make up for how much I hurt you.  But I swear to you,
on my life
, that I had nothing to do with my dad’s scheme and I didn’t know anything about it.  He knows without a doubt how mad I am at him right now.  Brandon’s mad at him, too, and he feels really bad about everything.  The only time I’ve ever seen that man cry is when he talked about how he’d hurt you and me.

I know I broke my promise to you, Andi, and as much as that hurts you, it hurts me.  It hurts me every single day.  I will spend every single day of the rest of my life doing everything and anything within my power to make it up to you.  No matter what it takes or what sacrifices I have to make – you are more than worth it.  This whole mess is no one’s fault but my own.  No matter what my dad – or anyone – said, I should’ve stood by you.  I will never make that mistake again.”

“Is that why you never thought your family accepted your career choice?”  Her voice is so soft but it is full of emotion. 

I nod, “Yes.  I made a terrible choice in the girl, right?  Not only did I catch her with my brother, but she and her father screwed my dad over.  I got the brunt of that blame from the family.  So when I didn’t follow the family’s advice and go into business, or real estate development like my dad, everyone automatically thought I’d fail again.”

“
You
thought you’d fail,” she states.  It scares me sometimes, how she sees so much of me that no one else sees.

“It doesn’t make it right or excusable, but I hope you better understand my reaction now.”  It’s a statement, but I raise my eyebrows in question, looking for an answer.

She considers me for a minute, her astute eyes boring into my soul again before she answers.  “Yes, I understand better now.  I still wish you would’ve listened to me, though...,” her voice trailed off with her last statement.

“Andi, I should have-“

“Luke, wait.  I wish you had let me explain
that
night, but I should have told you about it before then.  I have to take my part of the blame in this.  I wanted to tell you, I really did, but I was selfish.  I was afraid I would lose you, so I kept putting it off, wanting just a little more time with you.  You never should have heard it from someone else first.  I’m sorry for not telling you when I first realized how important you were to me.”

The tears are glistening in her eyes after her apology.  My mind caught her words –
but I was selfish
– and all I can think is how she’s the most
un
selfish person I’ve ever known. 

“Andi, you’re not selfish.  You are the kindest, most giving and most loving person I’ve ever met.  How can you say you were selfish?” I ask sincerely.

“Because you had a right to know.  If you wanted to be with me, you had a right to hear from me exactly what you were getting into.  I just wanted to keep you a little bit longer.  Every day, I just wanted one more day with you.”  She’s wiping tears away as soon as they fall, trying to maintain her composure.