Misty Reigenborn Romance Boxed Set (134 page)

"It'll only be torture if you insist on making it that way Tor."

"Bleh." She followed him up the stairs.  "You are an optimist to a fault aren't you Tony?  I used to be one too.  That was a long time ago though, before my mother crumpled up the mother's day card I spent hours making for her in kindergarten and threw it in the trash.  Don’t tell me Lindsey's not a bitch and that it's not going to be hell spending the day with her and her husband of the moment.  You see if you can still look on Lindsey's bright side when she takes everything that you care about and crushes it in her hand.  The one not holding the drink and the cigarette of course."

"You're what I care about baby.   It sure as hell looks like she's done a number on you hasn't she?"

They stood in the hall outside his bedroom door.  "I don't want to talk about my mother anymore." She sighed.  "Let's go to bed.  But of course we can't go to bed together, even if we don't have sex.  I might get pregnant if you lay beside me fully clothed."

"You can at least understand where they're coming from right?  Even if I loved my daughter's boyfriend I'm not sure if I'd be okay with them sleeping together under my roof.  Call it parental blinders.  If they can't see their kid doing it in front of them it can't be happening."

"Whatever.  Goodnight Tony.  I love you.  Hey, you think I should sleep with nothing but my locket on tonight?"  She gave him a smile. 

"You wait until we get back home to do that darlin'." He groaned. 

"Spoilsport."

"Old spoilsport wants to keep his penis attached to his body Tony."

"Night Tony." She gave him a kiss. 

"Goodnight Tor.  I love you baby.  Thanks for a nice day today.  I had fun."

"Me too.  Just gotta survive tomorrow."

"You'll be fine."

"Yeah, yeah.  Well, I'd better go to my lonely room."

"Yep." He leaned against the door and watched her walk away. 

"You don't need to take a shower in the morning since you took two today.  No running into you in the hall in the morning half naked okay?"

"And you don’t make any detours down to use my bathroom, in case I forgot to put a shirt on okay?"

"That doesn't seem like a very fair deal to me."

"Sweet dreams baby."

"You too Tony.  But make sure I'm the only one in them."  He laughed.  "Seriously.  Or I'll come into your room and watch you sleep.  I'll know and drag you back to the motel for some more forget other women exist sex."

"Hush Tory.  What if your parents came in when you were talking like that?"

"Then Langston would know you respected him enough to screw me somewhere else.” She blew him a kiss and then shut her bedroom door behind her. 

Tory had a hard time falling asleep, and even when she did fall asleep she kept waking up.  It didn't help when she'd fallen asleep for the third time only to be awakened rather rudely to the sound of Lindsey and Langston arguing loudly.  She rolled over, and glanced at her clock and saw it was seven minutes after three in the morning.  Had they just gotten home she wondered?   Or had they gotten home, gotten even more drunk and then decided to start arguing loudly enough to wake up the whole damn neighborhood? 

She couldn't catch most of what they were saying even as loud as they were, but the one word that came out loud and clear was divorce.  And then she heard prenup.  Langston threatening Lindsey with the prenup she wondered?  But then she heard prenup again from Lindsey this time and it was loud enough to catch the whole sentence. 

"Fuck you and your prenup.”

Then she heard the sound of glass shattering; then the front door opening and then slamming shut and finally the revving of an expensive engine.  Damn, what if Lindsey was hurt Tory thought?  A guy who would threaten to cut his stepdaughter's boyfriend's penis off might not be above smacking his bitch of a soon to be ex-wife around, right? 

Ugh she really should get up and check on her mother, much as she hated to she thought.  But by the time she got to the stairs Tony was already down in the living room.  And it was Langston who was bleeding. 

She sat down at the head of the stairs and listened as Tony talked to Langston.

"You all right sir?"  He turned on another lamp and stepped around the broken glass.

It looked like Lindsey had thrown an ashtray at him.  Besides glass on the floor she could now see ashes and cigarette butts littering the normally spotless carpet.

"I'm all right Anthony.  It's worse than it looks.  Head wounds tend to bleed a lot."

Geese the bitch had thrown the ashtray at his head she thought?  That was low even for Lindsey. 

"Let me get you a towel.  You're ruining your shirt."

"It's already ruined, but thank you."  Langston held his fancy dress shirt to his head. 

"You mind if I ask what happened?"  Tony stepped back into the room with a wet towel and a broom and dustpan to take care of the mess. 

"It's always the same thing with that woman." Langston sat down on the couch.  "We go out somewhere nice with important people, and I end up trying to get her to leave graciously before she can ruin everything by embarrassing us all with drunken antics.  She takes offense, gets mad as a hatter.  Chain smoking the whole way back in my car so that it always stinks, and by the time we get here she's so mad she's apt to kill me if she doesn't go up to bed and pass out.  This time I'd had enough.  This time she did blow it.  Now, I'm not hurting for money, but what she did tonight was mess with her daughter's future.  I've tucked money away for Tory to go to college for years, since I first married Lindsey.  Tory's a smart girl.  She deserves to go to the best school, but college is expensive.  And what Lindsey did tonight was blow a deal that could have made sure we were taken care of for years and made sure that Tory could go to whatever school she chose and not have to worry about the cost.  With the way that Lindsey spends money, even a billionaire could end up broke after a few years and I'm not a billionaire.  Sometimes dealing with Lindsey is like dealing with a child.  Tantrums; if things don't go her way she won't talk to you for days or she'll do like she did tonight and get physical.  That's not the first thing she's thrown at me and not the biggest either.  Luckily it was the first time she's hit me, but there's a first time for everything right?"  Langston let out a harsh laugh. 

"I'm sorry." 

"Nothing to be sorry about son, it's not your fault my wife's a bitch.  Or should I say soon to be ex-wife?  I love that woman more than life itself, would lay down in front of a bus to keep a hair on her pretty head from getting harmed; but she done messed up good tonight.  Even if I didn't suspect she's been sleeping around which I'm positive she has been now, has to have another fish on her line, to tell me to fuck the prenup which was my stupid way of trying to keep her around for a while.  .  .  Yeah, she's got someone waiting in the wings.  I hope his bank account's bigger than mine.  I'm gonna be paying off credit cards for the next five years.  But that girl up there, she's taken care of.  It was supposed to be a surprise, but I traded out my BMW for a car for her to take to college.  She might not have the money to go Ivy League because of her mother's little fiasco tonight, but she'll damn well have the money to go to her choice of more moderately priced schools.  And it's all wrapped up so that her mother can't get her greedy hands on it and believe me, that bitch would.  She's got a beautiful, smart daughter and she takes it all for granted.  If that was my daughter up there, I'd tell her I loved her.  I'd tell her I was happy to see her.  I'd tell her how sorry
I was that we had business meetings at this time of year and that I wasn't able to spend more time with her.  But did she say a word to her?  No, and she never does.  In the time that I've been married to Lindsey has she told Tory that she loved her?  No, not once.  I can see how much it hurts her.  I know she thinks of me as nothing more than some guy that her mother is married to, but Tory deserves better.  I'm sure you agree."

"She does."

Tony looked up the stairs then and saw her sitting there, but she shook her head at him.  She was not going to get weepy now because her stepdad had a heart.  Yeah, probably when she went back to bed she thought, but not now. 

"So we're gonna make a deal.  You take care of that pretty girl.  And if you ever need any assistance in doing that you give me a call even after the divorce is final.  Tory's got my numbers so don’t hesitate to call."

"No, I don't think she does."

Langston sighed.  "I'll make sure you have it before you leave then.  I think I'm gonna make myself a stiff drink and then head up to bed."

"No problem.  Do you think Lindsey will be okay if she took off when she was drunk?"

"Oh, she was way past drunk Anthony.  But she can't be heading far.  You go too far south and the dollars start dropping off of the real estate."

After he had cleaned up the broken ashtray and dumped the mess in the garbage can, Tony headed up the stairs.  Soft jazz was playing from the radio in the kitchen.  Tory figured they had at least a few minutes before Langston made it upstairs.

"How much of that did you hear?"  Tony said softly, walking with her towards his room.

"Pretty much the whole thing."

"So he's not such a bad guy after all huh?"

"Yeah, yeah.  And my mother's an even bigger bitch than I thought.  Yaay!"

"Do you think we should leave tomorrow with your mom being gone?  Or at least go stay at the motel?"

"Oh, she'll be back.  She's got to get her stuff doesn't she?  Nah.  This place beats that crappy motel room any day.  And we wouldn't want to miss the fireworks when Lindsey does come back, right?"

"Sure Tor.  You better go back to bed hon.  I'm sure Langston will be up soon."

She nodded, giving him a quick kiss.  "I love you Tony."

"Love you too Tor." He yawned. 

She hurried down the hall since the music had faded and she heard Langston's footsteps heading toward the stairs.  She slipped inside her room and shut the door silently behind her.  Let Langston think she'd slept through all of the theatrics with Lindsey she thought.  She'd deal with it in the morning. 

Chapter 15

She awoke a little after ten the next morning.  She got out of bed and ran her hands over what she thought was a cute suede outfit hanging in her closet.  She pulled it off the hanger and looked at it more closely. 

It was pale green, only a shade or two off from the color of her eyes.  She thought she had a pair of panty hose shoved in the back of her underwear drawer.  She had a pair of flats that she'd only worn twice in their original box in the back of her closet.  She might as well look nice and not embarrass Langston if they were still going out to lunch and to see that stupid play she thought. 

She used the bathroom and brushed her teeth and her hair, deciding to leave her hair down.  She went back to her room, put on a sleeveless white sheer blouse and pulled on the suede jacket and skirt, having managed to put on the panty hose without snagging them. 

Slipping her feet into the flats, she took a last look at herself in the mirror.  She thought that she looked pretty good.  The outfit brought out the green in her eyes.  Tony was always bugging her to leave her hair down because he liked the way she looked.  And she did not look like Lindsey.  She stuck her tongue out at her reflection at the thought, and left her room, shutting the door softly behind her. 

She was glad she'd dressed up.  Tony was sitting on the couch across from Langston dressed in a collared shirt and a pair of dark slacks.  Langston looked up when she came in the room, giving her a nod.  "I'm glad you remembered we were going out to lunch today Tory.  You look very pretty."

"Thank you Langston.  Is my mom here?"

"No, she hasn't been back.  So I guess we'll be going out to lunch ourselves, and then on to the play.  Oh, Tory I almost forgot, merry Christmas dear." He handed her a set of car keys.  "I wanted to wait to tell you until graduation, but since you're mom and I am very likely divorcing, I might as well tell you now.  You don't need to worry about money for college.  I've got you covered."

She knew that it was coming but it still felt funny to be taking the keys from Langston's hand.  "You shouldn't have Langston."

"It was no trouble.  I traded a car in that I hadn't driven in years for something that you could use when you go to school.  You can take it now if you like if you've got somewhere to park it at school."

"Uh, not really.”

There were girls at the school that had cars of course but she didn't want to be another spoiled girl with a fancy car.  She was still holding the keys.  Tony was grinning at her.  Langston was looking at her in the way that she figured Lindsey should look at her.  Kind of sentimental with a trace of pride. 

"Aren't you going to look at the car Tory?" Langston said.

"Sorry Langston."

She got up and followed him out to the garage, where two cars still sat under covers.  To the left was a shiny red mustang. 

"Do you like it?  I had one when I was in high school.  I'll cover you on my insurance for six months or so after you leave for school.  If you need any help with it after let me know okay?"

"Uh, sure."

Tony had a huge grin on his face.  He looked like he was stoned she thought. 

"Do you want to take her for a ride?  We've still got some time before we have to leave for lunch."

"Uh, okay."

"Don't look so thrilled Tory." Langston gave her an amused smile.

"Oh, no Langston.  I love it.  It's just too much.  With the car and the money for college, I'll never be able to pay you back."

"You don't have to Tory.  I would never ask you to do that.  Since I don’t have children of my own you're the closest thing I have to a daughter.  I know that we've never been close.  I know that it's been hard for you.  Your mother certainly doesn't make it easy for anyone to love her.  But I'd like to think that even if your mother and I do get divorced that you'll feel free to come to me if you need anything."

"I wouldn't feel right." She looked at her shoes. 

"Why not dear?  I want to do this for you.  Besides, if I thought you were going to spend four years partying, I wouldn't be willing to pay for your schooling.  You're a smart girl.  I know that every penny of that money will be well spent." 

"But
.  .  . “  She didn't know how to put it into words without offending him. 

"I know that I'm not your mother's first husband and I know I probably won't be her last, though there was a time when I had hopes that I would be.  I see the way your mother makes you feel, and believe me; I've talked to her about it.  She won't listen.  That woman is as stubborn as the day is long.  She takes advice from no one, even if it's for her own good.  If I ever father a child, I could only hope to have one as bright and beautiful as you are.  I like to think that maybe I haven't been the worst stepfather you've ever had." 

"Of course not Langston.  It's just that I.  .  ."

"You don't want to accept anything from anyone because you don't think you deserve it.  Don't sell yourself short Tory.  It kills me to say this because I've never loved a woman the way I love your mother, but you are twice the woman she is already.  Sometimes I wonder if you were switched at birth kiddo."

"I only wish.  I wouldn't feel right taking the car and having you pay for college.  It's too much money Langston."

"I'm not a young man.  I'm not exactly an old man either thank god, but I'm beginning to doubt that I'll have the heart to get married again.  So what am I going to do with my money?  It was your mother's idea to buy this huge house, when there's enough room for ten people.  I'll probably sell it.  I'd be perfectly fine with a one bedroom place, maybe two bedrooms in case I have visitors. 
I've got four cars, two that haven't been driven more than a few miles for damn near two years.  Even with the way your mother spends money, I've still got more money than your average man can spend in a lifetime.  Let me do something that matters with the money.  You deserve it for having to put up with your mother for eighteen years.”

"You're probably right."

But it still didn't feel right she thought.  She's not sure if it would feel right anymore taking something like that from her father.  It felt like she was getting something for nothing.  She didn't want to be like Lindsey.  Even if this was completely different than marrying a man for his money, it still felt like it was wrong. 

"I'm not going to take no for an answer Tory.  You take the car, you go to college and you do your best.  Send me a letter now and then, let me know how you're doing.  Make me proud.  That's the only repayment I want from you.  Do something worthwhile with your life."

"Okay." 

"Go on now; take your car for a spin.  If you're going to be leaving it here until you go to college, you should at least drive it before you have to leave town."

She wanted to throw the keys to Tony because she didn't want to drive.  She didn't want to look at it.  It reminded her more of how much of a bitch her mother was.  And if Lindsey had been married to any other man right now she thought, she probably wouldn't be holding the keys to a new mustang in her hand, and she'd have to work her ass off to pay for college.  Looking at the shiny car made her want to curl up in a ball and cry. 

"It's okay Tory.  Take Tony for a ride in your new car."

And he was calling Tony, Tony now.  She was going to get sentimental and end up giving him a hug she thought.  Damn. 

"Do you want to come?" 

"No, you two go on.  I'm too old to be riding around in a mustang.  Just make sure you're back by 11:30 please.  We have reservations for noon."

"Okay."

She got behind the wheel of the car, sitting there for a minute while Tony practically bounced around in the passenger seat, like a little kid who needed to use the bathroom.  She couldn't smoke in the car because she'd feel guilty, knowing that Langston wouldn't like it. 

She backed slowly out of the garage, looking at Tony's car with longing.  She would much rather be driving Tony's car right now.  Hell, she'd be more comfortable driving Tony's old car right now.  And wouldn't it have looked so funny sitting in Langston's driveway she thought. 

"Tor, I think you can probably stand to go a little bit faster.”

"Sorry.  Do you want to drive?"

"Are you seriously telling me that you don't want to be the first person to drive your new car?"

"I don't want the car.  I'd give it back to him if he'd take it."

"C'mon Tor.  It made him really happy to give it to you.  He was so messed up about what your mom did that it's the only thing that's keeping him together."

"What did I do to deserve it?  Gee, I screwed your mother for a few years so that means I need to give you a car and pay for your college education."

"Do you think that you're the only person whose stepparent had more money than their blood parent?  Plenty of kids get cars and money for college from their stepparents."

"Most of those parents probably don't sit on their asses and spend their spouse’s money all day long like it's nothing."

Tony snorted.  "You really are naive aren't you Tor?  Your mother is not the only gold digger.  Far from it."

"But they're going to get divorced.  That makes it feel even weirder."

"He wants to do this for you Tor.  You're not going to talk him out of it so just deal with it." 

"What if I crash it on purpose?  Wrap it around a tree while doing something really stupid.  Then there's no way in hell he'll get me another one."

"Don't even think about it Tory.  You'd probably end up killing yourself in the process."

"Yeah, yeah."

"You're still driving slower than my grandma Tory.  The hundred year old man behind us looks like he wants to give you the finger." 

"You drive then.  I'm not in the mood to drive." 

"You wanna trade me cars?" 

Tory pulled over in a parking lot and they got out of the car and switched seats.

"Don't tempt me.  I notice he seems to have decided that it's okay to call you Tony."

"We talked for a while this morning while your lazy butt was still in bed." 

"What did you have to talk about with Langston?"

"Mostly we talked about your mom.  He really loves her."

"Dumbass."

"It really messes him up that she's cheating.  He said that he thinks that she's with this young guy, this computer genius who made millions off of some software he invented." 

"You are so kidding me.  What the hell does a smart guy want with Lindsey?"

"I don't think your mom's stupid Tor."

"No, she's just a money hungry bitch.  How young is this guy supposed to be?"

"Langston wasn't positive, but he's pretty young.  In his twenties."

"I am so glad that in four months I'll be able to pretend I don't have a mother, like she's been pretending for years that she doesn't have a daughter.  Now she's going to marry someone who's young enough to be her son?  Well, practically."

"It's not like she's the first woman who hooked up with a younger man." 

"I always thought that she'd marry some old guy with no family, and screw him into a heart attack so she wouldn't have to be worried about being married.  I don't think she's ever cared a bit about any of the men that she's been married to.  You'd never see her hugging or kissing them.  It surprised as well as disgusted me to hear her having sex with Langston."

"He's really broken up over the whole thing.  He was watching the door all morning, waiting for her to come back."

"She threw an ashtray at his head.  What is he, crazy?"

"No, just in love.  Love can make people do stupid things sometimes."

"He's just as bad as some stupid woman who stays with her boyfriend until he kills her because she loves him.  I heard him telling you that that wasn't the first thing she'd thrown at him or the biggest.  If she'd have thrown something bigger at him and hit him with it, she probably would have killed him."

"It's his life Tor.  He's lived with her for this long and is still in love with her.  I doubt there's anything that you can say to convince him otherwise."

"Blah.  Sometimes I think my dad's still stupid enough to love her.  He throws a shit fit when I say one bad thing about her."

"And that's a bad thing?  I had a good friend in high school, his parents were divorced.  His dad was kind of an ass but his mom was like the worst ex-wife you could ever ask for.  She constantly talked his dad down in front of the kids, no matter what he did.  She never got over the fact that he divorced her for a younger woman, had another kid and then ended up married to this woman that was a few years older than her.  His third wife made my high school English teacher
of the world famous blow jobs look like a beauty queen.  It's something that your dad won't let you say anything bad about your mom.  That takes integrity."

Tory snorted, glancing at her cell phone to check the time.  "I don't think that they call it integrity when he won't let his daughter say bad things about her mother that are true.  I don't know what they call the misguided sense of loyalty that my father feels toward Lindsey, a woman who bore his child, has been married four times but was always too good to marry him.  Men are so stupid."