Don't Let Go (14 page)

“You okay?” she asked, mirroring what Noah had asked me earlier.

“I’m fine,” I breathed, knowing I wasn’t. Knowing that she knew I wasn’t, too. I dabbed under my eyes with a napkin and grabbed a handful of nuts, not even caring for once if they’d been freshly opened or if five hundred other patrons had pawed through them.

“Noah just walked back in the same door,” she said warily.

“Yep.”

She nodded and I saw her gaze follow him before returning to mine. “Didn’t go well, I’m guessing?”

I closed my eyes and blew out a slow breath to return my heart rate to normal. The heat radiating off my skin would take a little longer.

“Doesn’t matter,” I said, fanning myself with a coaster and forcing a smile. “So tell me about you and Becca’s conversation. What did you say when she told you that?”

Ruthie’s eyes widened in surprise. “O—kay. When did we get back here? I thought you wanted to talk about anything else.”

I pushed another handful of nuts in my mouth and proceeded to talk around them.

“Turns out, it’s the sanest subject of the night.”

• • •

The girl had freakish stamina. When I was pregnant—both times—I had trouble staying up past eight o’clock. She looked just as perky at eleven as she did at seven, whereas I was fading, big-time.

I was ready to go—had been since that little exchange outside—but I refused to let a pregnant woman outlast me. I didn’t care if she was thirteen years younger.

While the people-watching was interesting enough, including a brief wardrobe malfunction from an inebriated couple groping on the dance floor, the crowd began to thin. The only-here-for-dinner crowd was falling out to go catch a movie or have sober sex, while the true partiers were holding out for the drunken variety.

Or in my case, holding out for a Sprite-drinking pregnant woman to leave.

“Um, what’s—” Ruthie began, narrowing her eyes to something across the room. “That can’t be good.”

I followed her gaze through the handful of remaining dancers on the floor and my stomach twisted up. “Oh, shit,” I said, pushing off the stool.

Hayden had approached Noah and Shayna’s table and appeared to be asking them both questions with a grim expression. Shayna visibly backed up a little, looking wide-eyed.

“Hang on,” Ruthie said, patting the table at my side. “They’re men. They have to do the whole dick-swinging thing. Just wait—”

Her words were cut off by our unified gasp as Noah stood up quickly, putting the two men in that unmistakable stance.

“Shit,” I said, my feet already propelling me forward. I could hear Ruthie behind me muttering curse words as we wound our way through the oblivious gropers, reaching their table just in time to hear Noah ask him to leave.

Chapter 9

Judging by the edge to his voice filtered through his teeth, it wasn’t the first time he’d made that request.

Hayden was laughing in his face. And stupid drunk.

“Hayden, what are you doing?” I said, rounding the table to get to him. “I’m sorry,” I mouthed to Shayna, who smiled politely.

“Jules!” Hayden said, his eyes lighting up like we were all at a party. “We were just talking about you.”

“I’ll bet,” I muttered.

He slung an arm around me and I tried to use that to move us both along and away from their table, but it didn’t work that way. Noah’s eyes were dark and menacing, and I could only imagine what Hayden had mouthed off about.

“Did you know that these two are having a baby?” Hayden said loudly. “That’s fantastic.”

“Let’s go, Hayden,” I said, trying in vain to move him. He was surprisingly solid for a drunk.

“Just like we had a kid, Julianna,” he said, his words slowing. “Although I’m sure your kid’ll be perfect,” he said to Shayna, who darted a glance from me to the table and back to Noah. “Not like our daughter. I mean, she used to be. When she was born and had all that hair and perfect little fingers,” he said. I stared at him, mortified. “But now she wants to chop her hair sideways, dress like a freak, and have sex with God knows who.”

“Hayden!” I pinched him in the side, hoping he’d feel it. He didn’t. “Y’all, I’m so sorry.” I felt my eyes well up.

“Jesus,” Noah muttered, shaking his head. “Have some dignity, man. Go home.”

“But yours won’t be like that, sweetheart,” Hayden said, leaning toward Shayna, who scooted back more. “Because Jules just had me. You’ve got Superman here.” Hayden clapped Noah on the shoulder, which he shoved off with a jerk of his arm. “What could be more perfect than the man everyone wants.”

I closed my eyes, wishing the floor to swallow him whole.

“No one could ever live up to you,” Hayden said, refocusing his eyes on Noah. I got the distinct impression he’d just forgotten about Becca in that split second and was on another course entirely. “Not the perfect ghost of Noah Ryan past,” he continued on a chuckle. “Didn’t matter that I stuck around to raise
my
kid—”

Everyone moved at once. Noah stepped forward with lightning speed and I tried to move between them. Shayna’s stool scooted backward as she jumped to her feet. Ruthie hopped sideways to get out of the way.

Hayden had the idea all mixed up in his riddled state, and I knew it, and Noah knew it, but it triggered something primal that was already touchy.

“Noah, don’t, he’s drunk,” I yelled, turning my back to him and pushing against Hayden, dimly aware that we were developing an audience. “Stop this, damn it!” I yelled up into his face.

“Let him come, if he’s such a badass,” Hayden slurred, wrapping an arm around my neck possessively. Even drunk I could feel every muscle in his torso tensed and tight, wound and ready for a fight. It was an old hurt with him, his insecurity over Noah. His feeling that I never gave my heart to him completely. I thought it was a buried subject. Clearly, not so much. “Maybe I’ll show you once and for all the difference between a real man and a memory.”

As he said it, I felt Noah’s body against my back.

“You don’t want to go there, buddy,” he growled.

“Hayden—” I pleaded, but my voice was cut off as he pushed Noah back, jostling me in the process. His arm around me tightened and I wrestled against him. “Hayden, stop it!”

As Noah moved forward again, Hayden’s awareness of me morphed into more of an annoyance—something in the way of what he wanted. His grip on me turned into leverage to fling me aside, and like something in a slow-motion action scene I saw an empty table coming my way. Or more like it saw me coming its way.

Ruthie yelped as I crashed into it, and it probably looked and sounded worse than it was, as silverware and a metal napkin holder banged to the floor with me.

That was it.

In time that didn’t seem possible, Noah lunged at Hayden and spun him on the spot, wrenching his arm behind him and planting his face on the table. With his other hand he yanked Hayden’s head up by the hair so that he was sure to see me, and leaned down, his face contorted with something unrecognizable to me.

“That your idea of a real man, asshole?” he growled into his ear, his voice seething. “Throwing her around?”

Ruthie and Shayna rushed to either side of me, taking an arm.

Hayden’s eyes slowly adjusted on me, still reeling from the shock of moving so fast and not seeing it coming. I saw the dawning in his expression.

“I’d never hurt her,” he said, his voice cracking.

“No, you just wear her like a trophy,” Noah said, barking in his ear. Which wasn’t really true, but my current position on the floor wasn’t the place to pipe up on that. “Beat down her dreams so far that she doesn’t even remember she had them.”

What?
My head spun, wondering where that came from.

“Was that just your thumb on her?” Noah hissed in his ear. “Or did you join forces with her mother on that?”

I scrambled to my feet ahead of Shayna and Ruthie’s helping hands, the words burning in my ears.

“Noah, I’m fine,” I said. “Let him go.”

He yanked on Hayden’s hair a little harder, pulling his head into an awkward position. “Feel like a real man now? Get your point across?”

Hayden’s face was blood red, and there were angry tears in his eyes. He was too drunk to really know the scene he’d caused, but not drunk enough to not feel the embarrassment.

“Noah,” I repeated, which fell on deaf ears. I wrapped both hands around his arm and tugged, putting my face right next to his. “Noah!”

His head jerked in my direction, and the eyes that met mine were glazed over. Realization hit a second later, and he stood upright again, moving me behind him with one hand before releasing his grip on Hayden.

“Are you okay?” he asked under his breath, and I nodded.

Hayden jerked upward and stumbled sideways, searching for dignity and anonymity at the same time. I grabbed his arm and turned him around so we could walk away. All I wanted was away.

“Don’t bitch about your daughter or trash her in public,” Noah said, his voice thick with simmering aggression. Hayden tensed and paused mid-step but didn’t turn around to face him. “Be glad you’ve gotten to know her at all.”

Heat flashed from my neck to my scalp on the stab, and I looked away as his gaze landed on me.

“Let’s go find your buddies,” I said to Hayden, wondering where they’d been for the floor show.

He pulled his arm free, refusing to look at me. I knew he was horribly humiliated, and horrified that he’d pushed me down. Even in his current state, he was coherent enough to remember that. Never since I’d known him had he ever gotten physical with me, and I’d definitely seen him a lot worse off.

“They left,” he grumbled.

“They left you here?”

He shook his head, running fingers through hair that was sticking up in all directions. “I met them here.”

I blew out a breath. “Well, you aren’t driving.” I glanced at Ruthie and she nodded. It was time to call it. “We’ll take you home.”

Ruthie took over walking Hayden out while I paid our bill. When I chanced a look toward their table again, Shayna was picking things up to leave as well, and Noah wasn’t around. She looked distracted and distant. I walked back over there and smiled politely the way I’d come to expect from her, and she touched my arm.

“Are you okay?” she asked, sounding genuine.

I nodded. “I’m fine. I’m—really sorry he came to hassle you. He’s going to be so mortified tomorrow when he remembers this.”

She shook her head with a smile. “You don’t have to apologize, Jules. It wasn’t your fault.”

Kinda was.

“Well, it was my ex-husband being a douche, so—”

She smiled but her eyes didn’t, and the hands that shouldered her bag trembled a little. “Well, Noah didn’t have to rise to the bait, either,” she said. “That was his choice.”

I raised an eyebrow, remembering the flash reaction. “I’ve never seen Noah get so—” I stopped. “But then I’ve never seen him be an adult before, so what do I know?” I said, attempting a chuckle that fell short.

“He has a hot fuse,” she said. “I’m sure the military created some of that, but he also has a lot of baggage.” She looked down and palmed her still-flat belly and then looked back up at me with those same distracted, distant eyes. “And he wears that baggage twenty-four-seven, so I’m used to it pissing him off on occasion.”

I wasn’t sure what she meant by that, but something in me wanted to put her at ease. She looked troubled. And was
likable
, damn it.

“Well, I’m sorry that Hayden ruined your evening.” And me. And Noah’s baggage. I glanced around at the crowd that was left, wondering if any of them were regulars at the diner. God, Johnny Mack would have a field day with gossip like this. “Hopefully Noah’s dad won’t get wind of it and this can all die down.”

She chuckled at that. “He’s quite the character.”

There was a definition.

“Quite.”

“You know, even Noah thinks he’s acting weird,” she said. “I told him that he’s just been gone too long to know.”

“Exactly,” I said, moving as I spoke. I spotted Noah coming from the restroom and didn’t want questions. Or advice. Or resolutions. Or pity. I didn’t want any more conversation with him, period. “He’s just odd. That’s all there is to it.”

She laughed, and that time it was real, transforming her face into rainbows and sunshine. I said my good-bye and made my way to the door around the long way so that I wouldn’t pass him. I caught his look across the room anyway. I couldn’t read it, but it lit my skin up.

 But he wasn’t walking to me. He was walking to Shayna. I had to admit, I could see the attraction. She was genuine, and sweet, and beautiful. And impossible to despise.

I, on the other hand, was walking to the car to bring home my drunk and slightly obnoxious ex-husband. I was one lucky lady.

He was leaned up against Ruthie’s car when I got outside, with his arms crossed and his lips in a tight line.

“He wouldn’t get in,” Ruthie said, throwing her arms up. “I give up, he’s too big for me to shove in, and these heels aren’t spiky enough to poke holes,” she said with a smirk and a head tilt.

“Get in,” I said, leaving no room for argument. “You’re going home. I’m going home. This night has officially kicked my ass.”

“I didn’t mean to push you, Jules,” he said, his voice belying his stony expression.

I met his eyes, and they looked worried. “I know,” I said. “But if you’d just kept your mouth shut it would have never come to that.”

“I had to meet him.”

I sighed and closed my eyes, disgusted. “And a handshake and a hello wouldn’t do it for you?” I rubbed at my face and opened the front passenger door since he was leaning against the back one. “Get. In.”

He gave me one last imploring look, and got in, all his puffed up-ness deflating in defeat.

I got in the back, and Hayden was snoring before we even made it to the highway.

• • •

My eyes felt gritty and heavy, the result of staring at my bedroom ceiling instead of sleeping. It had crisscrossed beams that made a cool pattern, but not that cool. My brain just wouldn’t shut down.