Chapter 7

Brayden

Rein Petty’s smile stopped me dead in my tracks. When I walked over to meet Emmett, who was sitting with two young women, I hadn’t even realized that one of them was Rein. She was a woman now. Her cheeks were still cute and plump when she smiled, and her lips were still full and pink, but everything else about her was different somehow.

She was sexy in a way that made my tongue feel thick in my mouth.

Her curves were obvious, even though she was sitting down and her lower half was hidden beneath the table. Her eyes were bright, her lashes long, and her once raven-black hair was now streaked with vibrant columns of red.

“Take a seat, man.” Emmett pulled out the chair between him and Rein. “We’ve got some more food coming. Want me to call the waitress over so you can put your order in, too?”

“I’ll probably just order a drink,” I said, wishing the only vacant chair wasn’t the one right beside Rein. She probably felt the same way.

If she did, she didn’t show it. She reached for her beer and sat back to sip it as I dropped down into the chair beside her.

“So, Hennie Enterprises,” Gracie said, resting her chin on her knuckles as she regarded me. “How’s that going?”

Emmett shot her a dark look. “The man just got here. You can’t find the decency to talk to him about something other than work right off the bat?”

Gracie rolled her eyes. “Nice shirt. Where’d you get it?”

“What?” I asked. “I don’t remember—”

“That’s fine,” Gracie said. “So, Hennie Enterprises. How’s that going?” The corner of her mouth curled in a devious smile.

I chuckled and raked my fingers through my hair. Leave it to Gracie to cut to the chase. I had always liked that about her. She was a no bullshit kind of girl. I recalled her being very good for Rein when they were young girls in high school. She helped her speak her mind.

“It’s good,” I said simply. “It’s profitable.”

“Apparently,” Gracie mused, looking me up and down. “Must be nice.”

“It has its pros and cons, like everything.” I resisted the urge to tell her she was just as bitchy as I remembered. “Work takes up most of my time. If I’m being perfectly honest, this is the first time I’ve sat down in a bar for a drink that wasn’t a business meeting in over four years. And even now, I can’t stay too long. I have to get back to my daughter.”

“She’s a cutie,” Emmett said, nudging my elbow with his. “How old is she?”

“Four.”

“Emmett was telling us a bit about her earlier,” Grace said. “Her name is Bella?”

I nodded.

“Where’s her mom? Back in Florida? I bet she’s enjoying having the place to herself for once.” Gracie laughed, reaching for her beer and taking a sip of foam off the top.

I shifted in my seat. “Bella’s mom died while she was giving birth to her,” I said, already knowing how badly the mood was about to change. I hated this. I hated the pity, the sympathy, the apologies—all of it. “It was a long time ago, and Bella and I are just fine.”

“I shouldn’t have—” Gracie started.

I held up my hand. “It’s fine. You didn’t know.”

The waitress arrived at the perfect time, and I ordered a whiskey on the rocks. She returned with it shortly, and I took a sip, ignoring how uncomfortable everyone now was around the table. Rein had yet to say a single word to me, and I couldn’t blame her for that. If I didn’t feel like such an ass sitting beside her, I would have had the nerve to speak up first.

I drank the whiskey faster than I intended to, due to nerves.

I put the empty glass down a little too hard on the table and felt Rein’s eyes on me as I turned to Emmett. “Sorry, I have to head back. It was nice catching up with you guys.”

Both of Gracie’s eyebrows shot up toward her hairline as she sat staring up at me. “You’re leaving so soon? We barely had a chance to talk. You didn’t even ask what we were up to.” She forced her red lips into a pretty pout.

“Sorry, fatherhood calls.”

Gracie shrugged her shoulders and slumped back in her chair. “No one can argue with that. I bet you’ve used it to get you out of a lot of uncomfortable situations.”

Awkwardness crept in, and I caught the way Rein’s head snapped in Gracie’s direction. The two women shared a look that reminded me of old times as I tucked my hands into my jean pockets and rocked back on my heels. “I’ve used it in a bind once or twice.”

Emmett chuckled nervously and slapped his knee. “Leave it to you to use your daughter as an excuse.”

“Not this time.”

Emmett got to his feet and clapped me on the back. “Well, it was nice seeing you, regardless. You think you’re still going to be around for a bit longer?”

“Yeah. A bit.”

“Good to hear,” Emmett said. “Give me a ring anytime or pop in the diner. I’ll fix your daughter the best damn cheeseburger she’s ever had.”

I laughed. “Good luck getting her to eat meat.”

Emmett gasped. “No. Did you raise one of those crazy vegetarian kids?”

“I don’t think Bella knows what a vegetarian is, but she refuses to eat anything that used to have a face.
“That’s adorable,” Gracie sighed.

“It’s a nuisance,” I noted. “Making sure she eats enough is a pain in my ass.”

“I think every daughter is a pain in her father’s ass,” Gracie said.

“I won’t argue with you on that one,” I said.

I glanced over at Rein, who was still looking anywhere but at me. I tried to catch her eye, but she remained stiff, her gaze fixed on Gracie. Say something to her, you idiot, I scolded myself. But the words wouldn’t seem to come. During the years after I first left Valdez, I had thought of her often and thought of all the things I should have said to her, starting with “I’m sorry.” But now that she was right in front of me, looking more beautiful than ever and refusing to so much as look at me, I couldn’t fathom how pathetic an apology would sound coming out of my mouth. It had been ten fucking years. She had every reason to hate me.

“I’ll catch you guys around,” I said as I turned from the table.

“Bye,” Gracie and Emmett said in unison.

I hated that I had strained my ears to see if I could hear Rein’s voice amongst theirs. I couldn’t.

I made my way straight to the front doors and grabbed my jacket from the hook. I put my gloves on first and then shrugged my arms into the jacket. As I did up the buttons around the collar, I shot one last look back at the table.

I locked eyes with Rein.

I froze with my fingers under my chin as the last button slid through the hole. Rein’s eyes widened, and she looked sharply down at the table, her eyebrows pulling together as she did so.

I put my back to her and shouldered open the door, stepping out into the cold night air.

Each step through the snow on the sidewalk reminded me why I had left this shitty fucking town in the first place.

The cold was an ever-present inconvenience, and the lack of anything to do in Valdez offered no reprieve from the weather. I had spent all my time in this place aching for something more. I always knew there had to be more than life in a small town. I needed a challenge, and Valdez couldn’t offer me that.

Rein had been collateral damage, and ten years had a funny way of altering your memories of how something used to be. Seeing her now reminded me of how fiercely I had cared for her back then and how good we had been together.

I guessed it hadn’t been good enough for me to hold on to when the opportunity to get the hell out of Dodge crossed my path.

I left her at the drop of a hat to carve my own path in the world, and I never looked back.

Not until now.

I groaned as I climbed up into the cab of my rental truck and started the ignition. I rubbed my gloved hands together as I waited for it to heat up and chase away the frost that had gathered along the edges of the windshield. The headlights illuminated the little red coupe in front of me, and the surprise of seeing it hit me like a train.

I would recognize that car anywhere.

It was Rein’s car, the same one she used to drive back when I still lived at home. It still had her favorite band stickers plastered to the back window. The rear bumper was rusted from all the salt on the roads, and she had a cracked taillight.

I smiled to myself and shook my head. Some things never changed.

I reached over to the glove box and found a pen and a napkin. I quickly jotted down a note and hopped out of the truck. I left it running as I slipped the note under her windshield wiper, then hurried back to the warmth of the truck.

For both our sakes, I knew I probably shouldn’t have left the note. But I needed closure. It was selfish, and I knew it, but I wanted to be able to close the door without feeling the ominous weight of guilt that rested on my shoulders now. I had to bury it somehow.

“Just stop thinking about her,” I growled to myself as I pictured the way Rein had been looking at me as I left the bar. I couldn’t place it. I wasn’t sure if she was angry, disgusted, confused, or all three. She had every reason to be miffed at me and was probably appalled at the size of my balls for coming back without saying a word to her.

I was a little surprised with myself, too.

Maybe extending a little kindness would change things, and we could both move on like adults. Maybe it would make things worse.

“It doesn’t matter,” I said, reaching over and turning on the stereo. Country tunes filled up the cab. I rolled my eyes and flicked through the stations until I settled on one playing a Beatles song. “You both have your own lives now.”

Which was true. A lot had happened in ten years. I had met and married Bella’s mother, Isabelle. I had started a massive billion-dollar company and built it from the ground up. I had found myself and made a home for me and my daughter in Florida.

I had left this town and these people behind.

Now I had to face them again, and I couldn’t help the fact that I was starting to feel like the small-town boy again who was fenced in on all sides. I wanted to escape. I wanted to grab Bella and hightail it the fuck out of this town and never look back.

But I loved my mother.

She deserved more than that. She deserved more than me for a son.

I pulled away from the curb, and the truck rolled and bounced over the snow bank until I steered it to the middle of the road. I drove slowly and carefully back to my mother’s house and found myself wishing I was back on a highway in Florida, driving my Jag. Speed didn’t matter there. There was no ice and no snow, just shitty drivers.

I sighed.

This was all temporary. Soon, I would be back home, and everything would go back to normal. I tried to convince myself that that was a good thing.

But the only way I was going back home to Florida was when I had no reason to be here. And that reason would die with my mother.

My throat tightened.

“Fuck,” I grated, swallowing against the burn. Anger lit inside me, and I lashed out, punching the dashboard in three quick successions. “Fuck!”