Wrong Side Girl (The Girl Series Book 1) (16 page)

He chuckled. “Baby, seriously? There isn't much to distance myself from. My mother has never been a nice person, you know that. That’s probably the only thing my father and I ever agreed on. We are family by blood, but that’s about it. They refuse to accept you, which means they refuse to accept me and my happiness.”

That was true, but still. At least he had family to spend time with.

“What about your cousin Daniel? You guys always got along fine.”

“How about this? Daniel dislikes those family gatherings just as much as I do. We’ll invite him to come to dinner here. He can bring his girlfriend, who by the way, my mother also won’t accept but can’t do much about, seeing as my aunt and uncle adore her. Ask some of your friends and colleagues to join us and we’ll celebrate our first holiday with the people we actually like to be around. Okay?”

“That actually sounds great. I would love that.”

“Then it’s done. I’ll call Daniel and Steve. You call your friends.”

And so we planned to spend Thanksgiving with our chosen family of friends. I couldn’t be happier. Everyone was coming at noon and I couldn’t wait.

It was early in the morning when I pulled into the shelter to help with the food prep until I had to head home for my own prep. Jesse and Chloe were now living at a foster home with an amazing couple that only took in older kids nobody else seemed to want. I had worked with them before and had practically begged them to take them in. They had only had one spot open after one of their wards had started college in the fall, but agreed to take on both kids after I told them their story. Both Chloe and Jesse had settled in fine and often stopped by the shelter after school to spend some time with me. We had developed a fairly deep bond and I cared about them immensely. They wanted to be home for turkey dinner, but were coming to help with the Thanksgiving preparations at the shelter today before I was going to drop them off at their house on my way home.

When I walked into the common room, Marie was already in a tizzy trying to get everyone organized. All the staff and volunteers were there today to make this holiday something special for the kids. The only one coming over to Cole and my place was Marie. She had worked closely with me during the past few months and we had become friendly. Rainey was staying at the shelter until early afternoon then was going to head home to spend Thanksgiving with her mother and a family friend. Everyone else was here for the day. Seriously, I loved my job and the people I was working with.

“Lizzy! Thank God you’re here! There is so much to do!” Marie advanced on me as soon as she saw me walking in.

“Relax, Marie. It’ll be fine,” I tried to calm her down then turned to the kids. “Kids, listen up! Girls, grab those decorations and put them up. Boys, go to the basement and grab enough tables and chairs to seat about thirty people, then set them up. Once that’s all done, the boys can start vegging out in front of the TV and hang with Rainey and Jimmy and the girls can meet me and Marie in the kitchen and we’ll put you to work.”

Everyone started buzzing around to do their respective jobs. Marie followed me into my office so I could drop my coat and purse.

“It kinda annoys me sometimes that they all listen to you and not to me, you know,” she mumbled under her breath. I gave her a small smile.

“Don’t worry, Marie. You’ll get there. With these kids you have to earn it. Took me a good year until everyone knew I was kind of a ball buster and would follow through on my threats. You’ve only been here a few months. They are hard kids on the outside, Marie. They have to be to survive and you have to earn their respect before they let you in even an inch, but you’ll make it. I’m sure.” Marie nodded and gave me a hesitant smile in return.

“If you say so.”

“Exactly. Now, what do we need to do first?”

“The turkeys and potatoes are being delivered at three. Taryn, Jimmy, and Rainey know, so they should be fine. We’ll have to start on the veggies and pies to have them ready on time. Jimmy is currently setting up the screen in the back room so everyone can watch the game, and Taryn brought a bunch of new games and stuff for the kids that are not interested in football. Rainey brought her camera to take pictures. We’ll need to make up the rooms. All our regulars agreed to spend the night and it sounded like some of the not-so regulars intended on staying as well.”

“Alright. Sounds like everything’s under control then. Let’s head to the kitchen to get a start on those veggies and pies. We’ll get the boys to set up the rooms for everyone once they’ve finished with the tables and chairs.”

We got to work. The girls joined us in the kitchen to bake a variety of pies while the boys enjoyed a holiday tradition and spent most of the morning in front of the TV. It was getting close to crunch time and I had to hustle my butt back home to get ready for my own guests. I sent Chloe in search of Jesse so we could get a move on and went into the common room to make sure everything was ready. The girls had done a fantastic job with the decorations. The room actually looked kind of home-y and cozy. I was proud of them. I poked my head into the back room to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving before I left. A chorus of Happy Thanksgivings from the girls echoed back at me. The boys were too immersed in the game to pay me any attention.

“You did good,” I heard a low voice utter beside me. I looked over and gave Jimmy a smile.

“We all did.”

“Yeah, we all do our piece, but you go above and beyond the call of duty, Liz. The kids see that and respect you for it. They trust you. Look at them. Since you started working here, our numbers of kids who actually stay and accept our help has more than doubled and that’s all you.” Tears started pooling in my eyes at his words.

“Stop, Jimmy. Crying like a baby is gonna make me lose my street cred.” He chuckled, then gave me a quick hug and wished me a Happy Thanksgiving before he rejoined the group on the couch to watch the game. I took a deep breath to control my girly tears then grabbed my stuff from the office and met Jesse and Chloe by the door.

Cole was sitting on the couch watching the game when I came home. When he heard the door open, he turned his head to look over the couch and smiled. “Hey, baby.” He got up and walked towards me.

“Hey,” I replied, then lifted up on my toes to give him a small kiss on the lips.

“What was that?” Cole asked, amused, when I stepped back.

“What was what?” I was busy taking my boots and coat off and going through my to-do list in my head, so I didn’t see him getting close. He hooked an arm around my waist and gently pulled me to him until he could wrap both arms around me. I looked up at him in confusion.

“Baby, kiss me like you mean it,” he murmured before his head descended toward mine and he took my mouth in a long kiss that left me a little dizzy.

“Everything good at the shelter?”

“Yeah. They have a lot of kids there, but they’ve got it under control. Marie is on her way over. I should probably get started on the turkey,” I informed him while extricating myself from his arms and moving toward the kitchen. “You stay out of the way and go follow Thanksgiving tradition. I’ll be slaving away in the kitchen. You’re on door duty.” I heard him chuckling behind me and smiled to myself, happy and content, then I got to work immediately.

The turkey was almost ready to go in the oven when Cole came in to get a beer. He stopped in the doorway and looked at me, then smiled and came over to where I was standing at the counter. When he got close, he leaned down to murmur in my ear, “I like this. Watching you work in our kitchen to make a holiday dinner for our friends. It’s very sexy.” I giggled.

“Watching me with my hands up a turkey’s butt is sexy, huh?”

He chuckled low. “You have no idea.” I giggled again.

“You happy?” He looked deep into my eyes.

“Yeah,” I whispered.

“Good. Me too,” he whispered back then headed to the fridge to get himself a beer. I watched him as he did this so I could appreciate his butt as he walked out of the room, and felt so very, very lucky that that ass and everything attached to it was mine.

Marie showed up ten minutes later and Katie and her boyfriend, Chris, five minutes after that. The women came straight to the kitchen, where I poured us all a glass of wine.

“Good God, woman. Now I know why you’ve been hiding that hunk of a man. Please tell me he can be an asshole or is really bad in bed,” Marie said, fanning herself and making me laugh.

“Yes to the first, no to the second,” I informed her through my hilarity.

“He can be an asshole?”

“Yes, but he’s never one to me. At least not on purpose.”

“It’s about time he got his head out of his ass. I honestly didn’t think he had it in him,” Katie chimed in.

“What do you mean?” Marie asked.

“He’s been in love with Liz since they were kids but was too busy screwing around to see what was right in front of him all these years.”

“Ah, here comes the asshole part.”

“It wasn’t like that, Katie,” I tried to defend Cole.

“No? What was it like, then? Every party he was at he hooked up with a new random girl, but made sure that no guy ever came near you, or God forbid, touched you. Every guy in town was too afraid to even ask you out on a date, scared they would have to endure the wrath of Cole, even after he left for college. Tell me, how many dates exactly did you go on during high school?”

“Boys didn’t ask me out on dates because I lived on the wrong side of town. It would have tarnished their reputation.”

“That’s bullshit, Liz. Every guy in high school had the hots for you, but Cole kept a close eye on the situation. He was the school king even after he graduated and made it very clear to everyone that he considered you his. Nobody wanted to mess with him. That’s why no guy dared to come near you.” I stared at Katie, completely dumbfounded. My whole life I thought the boys I went to school with treated like a pariah because of where I came from, because of who my mother was. I couldn’t wrap my head around what Katie just said.

Boys had been interested in me?

Katie saw the shocked expression on my face and her tone gentled. “I confronted him about it once. He told me he was just looking out for you, that he didn’t want any of those pigs using you or breaking your heart. I’m sure that’s what he was telling himself he was doing. But not all of those guys were bad news. There were a few good ones that would have treated you right, given the chance. Like Scott, for example.”

She was right.

Scott had been one of the good guys. After that fateful night at the party when my world came crashing down, when I knew that Cole and I would never be a couple, I had opened myself up to the idea of dating and had hoped that Scott would ask me out. He was the nicest guy in school, good looking, always helpful and friendly, polite. We had been partnered up for one of our science assignments and had spent a good amount of time together, just the two of us. He had made me laugh and seemed to be genuinely interested in me and what I had to say, which made me forget about all that crap that was going on in my life. I had caught him staring at me a few times during class and in the cafeteria, and had thought he might be into me, but when he never made a move on me, I thought I had imagined it or read too much into a friendly look. We had stayed friends during high school and still sent each other messages and talked from time to time. Now Katie was saying that the reason he hadn’t gone for more was because he was afraid he’d have to deal with Cole?

I narrowed my eyes at the living room.

“Yeah, I see it’s sinking in,” Katie murmured.

Yes, it was definitely sinking in.

“Well, the way I see it, if they didn’t have the balls to go for it despite Cole, then he was right and they weren’t worth your time in the first place.” This came from Marie. I turned my head to look at her.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, a man or a boy who will be a man, at any age, if he wants something, he’ll go for it, no matter if someone is threatening him or warning him off. He’ll take the threat head-on if he thinks what waits for him at the end is worth the effort. And seeing that none of them went for it proves that Cole was right. They weren’t good enough for you if they didn’t think you were worth the effort of taking him on.”

“Huh. I’ve never looked at it that way. That kinda makes sense in a roundabout way,” Katie mumbled, then took a sip of wine and looked towards the living room with a thoughtful look on her face. My irritation with Cole dissipated at Marie’s words. I agreed with Katie. They did make sense in a roundabout way.

“Anyways, from what I’ve seen and heard, he has claimed you now and has no intention of ever giving another guy a chance of even considering making a play for you. He's gone whole hog and made you move in with him after a few weeks of dating. No man does that unless he’s found what he wants and is going for it, no matter the consequences. Actually, after what you’ve been telling me, I’m surprised he hasn’t tattooed his name on your ass to show his ownership.”

“Whose name tattooed on whose ass?” Cole’s voice came from the door. I lifted my eyes over Marie’s shoulder to see Cole waltzing into the kitchen with empties. Marie turned around and filled him in.

“Your name, her ass,” she said, pointing first at Cole, then at me.

Cole’s eyebrows shot up, then his face split into a grin. “I like that idea.”

“See? Told you,” Marie looked back at me and gave me a pointed look.

I looked over at Katie and watched her take in what Marie had said. Her eyes were on Cole, still thoughtful, while she twirled her wineglass in her hand. They followed him as he got close to me to softly kiss my temple, and kept following him as he retrieved more beer from the fridge, until he disappeared back into the living room. Then her eyes came to me and she gave me a small nod and a smile.

“Marie is right. Doesn’t mean I won’t still keep an eye on him,” she said as she put her wine aside and went to work at rolling out the dough for the pie. Fair enough. Still a little shocked by what I had learned, but also, strangely, even happier than I was ten minutes ago, I went back to work.