Risking It All (34 page)

“And that’s the problem right there, Kennedy,” he said. “You wouldn’t end it with him unless you knew you had something with me. Why couldn’t you just do what you wanted to do and see where things went between us naturally? Why did you have to know for sure before you could make a move with Brooks? Are you that afraid to be alone?”

Kennedy opened her mouth to tell him off, but he shook his head and cut her off.

“It doesn’t even matter anymore. I’m done. Leave.”

“Memphis, please. I need—”

“Get out!” he screamed, the sound bouncing off the walls and making her jump.

Kennedy looked at him in horror, too shocked at his outburst to move even though she wanted to flee.

Memphis ran his hand down the side of his face, and he swore under his breath as shame filled his eyes and he looked at her with guilt.

“Kennedy, I—”

Her entire body trembled, and her legs felt like they were going to give out as she took one step forward and then another until she was running down the hallway to the stairway.

She burst outside as rain pelted her in the face, mixing with her tears as she dashed for her car. She was panting and out of breath by the time she got behind the wheel and slammed the door on the weather. Her hands shook as she tried to shove the key in the ignition, and she lost her grip on them as they jingled to the floor.

Kennedy sucked in deep gulps of air as she sobbed, leaning her head against the steering wheel until she calmed down enough to grab her keys and start the car.

She had lost Memphis. He hadn’t just ended their affair; he had kicked her out of his life for good. He was gone.

The realization of that hit her so hard it felt like someone was stabbing her over and over again in the heart. Her stomach twisted and rolled in a coiled ball of nausea, and she felt lightheaded enough to pass out at any second.

She pulled into her building’s parking lot just as the bile rose in her throat, and she threw open her car door and vomited on the pavement. She heaved until there was nothing left in her stomach. Her abdominal muscles clenched as her body continued to try and purge, until finally she stopped gagging and caught her breath.

Kennedy wiped her mouth and laid her head back on the seat. She stared up at her building, wondering if Brooks was still there and what she was going to tell him.

The ring caught her eye, and she slowly slipped it off her finger and held it up at eye level to examine.

She should have taken the damn thing off before she saw Memphis. But what good would that have done? She still would have had to tell him. She still would have had to face Brooks. And she still didn’t know what the hell to do, but none of it seemed to matter anymore since the most important person in her life was gone.

Kennedy slowly got out of the car and forced her legs to carry her to her apartment. She hoped Brooks was gone for the night so she wouldn’t have to face him right then.

But as she entered the apartment her hopes were dashed when he jumped off the couch and hurried toward her.

“Kennedy, I’ve been worried sick. Where the hell have you been?”

“I was just . . .” She shook her head as it all became too much, and she crumpled at Brooks’s feet.

“Kennedy!”

He knelt beside her and tried to lift her chin so she would look at him, but she shook him off, covering her face with her hands as she bawled.

“What’s wrong?”

She rambled incoherently as the sobs shook her body. Brooks pushed her drenched hair off her hands and ran his hand down her back, trying to comfort her.

“Baby, you’re soaked.” He scooped her up and carried her to the bedroom, setting her on the bed and peeling her jacket off her. “Don’t move.”

Kennedy curled up into a ball on the bed still crying as she listened to Brooks fill the tub with water. He came back to the bedroom, helped her off with the rest of her clothes, and then got her into the warm water.

Neither said a word as he gently washed her back and then handed her the loofah so she could do the rest.

“I would do it for you, but you’ve been very distant when it comes to me being close to you,” he told her when she looked at the loofah and then up at him.

She nodded and took it from him as he got up and grabbed a clean towel, and went back to the bedroom to grab her something to sleep in.

Kennedy mindlessly ran the sponge over her body. It was only then that she noticed she still clenched the ring in her palm. She stared down at it as it sparkled against her skin and looked up to where Brooks had been standing only seconds ago.

There was a man who wanted to take care of her. Who loved her enough to tell her and tried to change who he was to make her happy. There was a man who wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. To take care of her when she needed to be taken care of and stick by her side through the good and bad. He loved her enough to push through and work on it even when he knew she was so close to giving up.

Only a good man would do that. A decent man. A man she could love again if she really put all of herself into the relationship.

Brooks came back into the bathroom, laid her clothes on the counter, and then turned to her.

“Are you okay?”

Kennedy nodded.

“Do you want to talk about what just happened?”

“No,” she answered hoarsely.

Brooks was silent for a few seconds while he watched her and then finally nodded.

“Okay. I’ll just be in the living room if you need me, then.”

Kennedy watched him leave and then got out of the tub. She stared at her red, swollen eyes in the mirror, at the faint red marks on her arms where Memphis had grabbed her, and then finally down at her left hand.

Was Memphis right? Had she just been keeping him around because he was her excuse not to try with Brooks anymore? She could have ended things with him many times, Memphis was right about that. So why hadn’t she? Had she really been so afraid that Memphis would reject her that she needed someone there so she wasn’t alone? Or did she still have unresolved feelings for Brooks and it was more complicated than that? Since Memphis had thrown her out of his life, did any of it really matter anymore? Was there any reason why she shouldn’t be with Brooks now?

She really didn’t have any clue what she wanted, but there was only one thing left she could do in order to know for sure.

Kennedy grabbed her bathrobe off the back of the door and slipped it on, not bothering to get dressed. She waited in the entrance to the living room until Brooks looked up from the television and noticed her standing there. He gave her a tentative smile.

She swallowed back all the doubt she had, buried the fear away, returned his smile, and said, “I’ll marry you, Brooks.”

Chapter 18

“This is fantastic, Kennedy.” Ryder clapped his hands in delight as he looked at the clay statue she had brought to him that morning. “This is what I need from you!”

The statue had been exhausting for her to make. It had drained her emotionally to work on it—had hurt her in ways she had no idea she could hurt, but once it was done, she felt freed.

Kennedy forced a tight smile and swept her eyes over the statue, her own heart aching at the quick glance. It was a heart being torn apart by two different pairs of hands. Each hand gripped a side of the heart and tugged, ripping it down the center in jagged pieces until just the end of it remained barely stitched together.

“I can feel the pain in this piece,” Ryder continued. He looked up at her, then down at her engagement ring, and frowned. “Art like this comes from someone whose heart has been broken.”

Kennedy flicked her eyes up to meet his, and shrugged. Ryder sighed and dropped to his chair as he leaned back and folded his hands across his stomach.

“What are you doing to yourself, Kennedy?” he asked in concern. “You look like shit.”

“Gee, Ryder, tell me how you really feel.”

“Doesn’t Brooks see a difference in you?” he asked.

“Brooks is busy.” She cringed at the words.

She hated to admit it, but just as Memphis had predicted, Brooks’s new attitude hadn’t lasted very long. She was his center focus for three weeks until he started spending more and more time at the hospital again. He’d come and go at all hours of the night when she let him stay over, he forgot plans they made, and when he actually did find the time to show up, he was always distracted with some other thought. She was once again on the back burner, forgotten and alone.

The sad truth was she didn’t mind. She relished the days she could be alone and not have to listen to him drone on about his work. She found she was sneaking off more and more on the days he did have off to visit Vanessa and Samara, or she would just hang around her studio all day so they wouldn’t have to spend time together.

She knew it was wrong, and their relationship was completely dysfunctional and not even a relationship anymore, but neither one even cared enough to bring it up and talk about it. It was as if they had both moved on with their own lives and were only tied together by a promise Brooks made to her by slipping a ring on her finger. There was nothing left of them but that ring.

And she wished more than anything Memphis was around to say
I told you so
.

Her chest constricted at the thought of him, just like it always did. There wasn’t a day that went by that she didn’t think of him. She had to stop herself every day from dialing his number or sending him a funny text about something she had heard or had happened to her. He was the first person on her mind in the morning and the last when she went to bed.

And she hadn’t seen or heard from him in four months.

“And what about Memphis?” Ryder asked as if reading her thoughts. “I haven’t seen him around here in a long time. Where’s he at?”

Kennedy shook her head and looked down at the floor, willing the tears away. It still hurt like hell to think about him, but when other people asked where he was or how he was doing and she had to admit she didn’t know, it was like taking a bullet.

“Do you have any more of these?” he asked, changing the subject when he saw the effect his question had on her.

She nodded and sucked in a deep breath before looking up.

“I have a few more clay and a lot of paintings. You could do a show completely on depression and heartache if you think it would sell,” she tried to joke, but he wasn’t amused.

“Bring me the pieces, and we’ll see what we have.”

“Okay.”

She stood to leave just as Ryder said to her, “Good call on giving me that business card for Alec Bell. We have some of his work coming in next week.”

Kennedy smiled.

“That’s great. See, you should listen to me more often.”

“And when are you going to start listening to your own instincts?” he asked with a knowing expression as he looked at her ring once again.

“One day,” she said, turning her back on his annoyed sigh as she left the office.

Her apartment was quiet and dark when she got home. She had drawn all the shades the night before and hadn’t bothered to open them that morning before leaving to go to the gallery. She kicked off her shoes, tossed the mail she had picked up from downstairs on the floor, and stretched out on the bed, hugging the pillow as she rested her chin on top of it.

Her eyes landed on the copy of
Hot Spots
she kept by her bed. The familiar ache returned. She reached over, grabbed it off the nightstand, and spread it open in front of her, turning to the page where the Alaska article was written.

A little over three months earlier she had received a release form, asking permission to use her photos in the magazine and the ads for Alaska. She hadn’t even known Memphis had passed along pictures featuring her. She signed what needed to be signed, and a month later the article was printed and her face was among the scenery.

She was grateful there were only two pictures of her. One was by the lake where she had been trying to catch snowflakes with her tongue, and the other was with the horse right before the sleigh ride. She hadn’t been too thrilled the snowflake one had been used, but surprisingly it was the one that earned her the most compliments.

Ryder had even requested copies and had them enlarged and shown in the gallery. That was something she had definitely not been too thrilled with, but he had laughed it off and said it would help sales.

The magazine was like her own personal torture device. Every time she looked at it, she was reminded of their time together—how happy she had been and then how she had fucked it all up. It pained her to look at the pages, but she couldn’t help it. It was the only way she felt close to Memphis anymore.

She pushed the magazine away, laid her cheek on the cool pillow, and closed her eyes. She hated herself. She hated what she had done to him. She hated what she was doing still. She had no idea what she had been thinking when she agreed to marry Brooks four months earlier. She had known the next day—as soon as she opened her eyes—that it had been a huge mistake. Yet she had gone on with her day and tried to ignore everything eating her alive inside.

Four months later she felt drained. She was a shadow of the person she used to be. Part of her had died the day she ran out of Memphis’s apartment, and the rest had simply given up.

And she was tired of feeling that way.

Kennedy opened her eyes and started to sit up when she caught sight of a yellow manila envelope under the pile of mail she had tossed on the floor. She had noticed it when she grabbed the mail, of course, but the rest of the envelopes and magazines had been piled on top of it, and she hadn’t bothered to pay any attention to it. Once it was on the floor and the rest of her mail had slid off it, she noticed for the first time the writing.

Slowly, she reached for it and stared down at the messy scrawl of Memphis’s penmanship. She sat with it in her lap for a few minutes before tearing it open and peeking inside. What she saw made her breath catch in her throat, and her hands trembled as she carefully slid the contents out of the envelope.