Kristen Ashley - At Peace

“Vi –”

“Shut up, Joe.”

“Buddy –”

“I said, shut up.”

Surprisingly, he shut up.

And he didn’t do what I worried he’d do, retreat, not in any way. He turned into me, slid his knee between my legs, forcing my thigh to hook on his waist and he gathered me close in his arms as mine went around him.

He didn’t say anything, not a word, he was silent.

I fell asleep before him, I knew I did because his weight didn’t settle but his arms kept me locked tight.

But I fell asleep hoping that maybe I just gave him a little something that would make him feel less empty.

And I was hoping hard.

Cal left Nadia and went to his truck.

He didn’t fuck her, she wanted it but he wasn’t in the mood and he had to get home.

It was going to end with Vi tonight.

He knew it because when Nadia got dropped at his place, Vi, Kate and Keira were saying good-bye to Sam and Melissa in their front drive.

The timing couldn’t have been better. Tina was also getting in her car and Colt, Feb and Jack were just getting back from somewhere. They all saw Cal greet Nadia in his drive with a kiss, they saw him put her in his truck and they saw him drive away.

He’d looked through them. Tina looked smug; he could see it two yards away, the fucking bitch. Colt looked pissed, Feb worried. Sam and Melissa looked confused.

But it was Vi, Kate and Keira that hit him, straight in the left chest, a twist and squeeze so brutal it was a wonder he didn’t drop to his knees.

Kate looked shocked but in that way someone looks when they just got hit with a surprise attack, not expecting it and then, all of a sudden, they get socked in the gut, the wind knocked clean out of them.

Keira looked betrayed. It was plain on her face, betrayal and pain.

But Vi looked like he’d inflicted a mortal wound, face pale like he’d shoved a knife in her and twisted it, letting her blood leak out.

He just got in his truck and drove Nadia to her place.

* * *

The last week with Vi and the girls had been good.

He’d stayed home. After the gift had come, he’d had Lindy rearrange his appointments, telling his clients he had an emergency.

The gift had been an enormous, expensive vase. No card, no prints that came up in the system, just some random message from a dickhead who liked fucking with people’s minds.

Cal checked Vi’s front steps before joining her in bed at night and he checked them after he got up and went home in the morning. Nothing more.

But Vi had changed, after that night she found him on his deck drinking beer, she’d changed. She wasn’t unconsciously getting under his skin just by being Vi. Now, she was digging her way in.

And he was letting her.

He knew she went to dinner with Mike because she let him know.

But when he hit her bed, every single night for a week, she was all about him, all about finding that opening, tearing it wider, forcing more of herself in.

Fucking her had always been great but it got better. She didn’t lie when he’d made her make herself come and she watched while he did the same, she liked everything they did together. He thought he had her, she was all his when they were fucking but she proved differently. When he was in her bed, she opened something up in herself and there was so much of it flooding out, if he wasn’t careful, he’d get washed away.

And she talked to him in whispers either before he fucked her or after or in between. She talked about work, about the side job she got doing up someone’s yard, about maybe starting her own business the next summer if that worked out. She talked about Keira’s new dog who was creating havoc in the house. She talked about the girls, their friends, the crazy shit they did and said, laughing softly against the skin of his shoulder, by his ear, her face pressed into his neck.

He laughed with her because the crazy shit they did and said was funny. And he liked the idea of her setting up her own business designing people’s gardens, by the look of hers, she’d be good at it. He liked hearing the hint of excitement in her voice, as if that was something she never thought of but something she really wanted to do, a dream that snuck up on her. He liked listening to her share pieces of nothing, scraps of life that somehow measured up to a full meal.

And he also liked that both Keira and Kate had taken to popping by his house when their Mom was at work, just to say hi or ask him to dinner or tell him they were going to a movie and seeing if he wanted to come (he never went, but then again, they didn’t figure he would, they were just using it as an excuse to talk to him). He liked it because, when they did he knew they were okay, just being kids having a good time over the summer and not touched by Daniel Hart’s madness. He liked it because, each time, they grew more comfortable with him, less hesitant, more sure of themselves, and they stayed longer and longer. They were opening themselves to him too, giving just by talking, letting him know they liked having him around.

He didn’t eat at Vi’s table, not after the pancakes, so no more family time that felt too good but was pretend. He was a stand in, not who they wanted to see in that chair, so it sure as fuck was not something he needed.

Except when he went over to have dinner when Sam and Melissa were there last night.

That’s when he knew he had to do something.

Because the girls acted like he was over all the time (which he was, they just didn’t know that). They acted like he wasn’t a stand in. They acted like he was a welcome staple in their lives and they’d welcome it if he became more of a staple. Keira teased him. Kate even grabbed his hand and clutched it when she laughed at something he said. Like their mother, they were sucking him in, using him to plug that hole their father left and their combined power was almost unbeatable.

But it was also because he liked Sam and Melissa. Sam acted toward Vi like Cal remembered Uncle Vinnie acting toward his Mom. He didn’t hide his affection for Vi and her kids. He loved him. The world shone in his eyes when he looked at them and he let them know it. He was fucking hilarious too and an easy man to like. His woman was the same, funny and easygoing, a straight-talker and she felt like her man did about his family. It wasn’t like she’d been in their lives since she met Sam. It was like she’d been in their lives the length of it. They were a unit, bonded tight and unbreakable. A family that was blood but their bond ran deeper than blood.

What Cal had always wanted.

And Vi behaved just like her girls. She wasn’t demonstrative with Cal but she found her times to give him looks, touch him, promise things with her eyes that needed no words.

They’d gone to J&J’s after dinner and Sam and Melissa proved they were what they were, funny and able to have a seriously fucking good time. Vi let herself loose with them, laughing more than he’d ever seen her laugh, her face relaxed, happy and even more beautiful than normal because of it.

If he let himself go, he would have enjoyed it. Instead, he had his word with Sam and got the fuck out of there.

His word with Sam didn’t go as easy as his words with Tina and Dane did. Sam wasn’t going to stop and told Cal this flat out then he took the time to explain. Cal understood his reasoning, even admired it, but he gave it back to Sam straight that he was playing with fire and, he got burned, so would Melissa and Vi.

“This is your business because…?” Sam asked.

“Because Vi asked me to have a word,” Cal replied.

“And because you’re fuckin’ my sister,” Sam returned.

Cal stared at him and didn’t respond. He wasn’t surprised Sam had figured this out. Vi might have found her times but that didn’t mean no one was paying attention.

“She talks about you, so do the girls, they like you. I’m cool with that,” Sam told him. “She needs good shit in her life and the minute I saw you, brother, you struck me as good people. I’m happy for her. But you installed a security system that rivals the Pentagon’s to help keep her safe so, I’m guessin’ you know where I’m comin’ from.”

He did, he just didn’t agree with it.

“I’m tellin’ you, you need to stand down,” Cal repeated.

“And I’ll tell Vi-oh-my you did what you could. But I’m not standin’ down.”

Cal again didn’t respond.

Sam held his stare for awhile and finally asked, “We good?”

They weren’t anything or they wouldn’t be.

“Yeah,” Cal replied.

“Fantastic. When we come back and Vi makes her risotto again, I’d hate to see you sittin’ there glarin’ at me while I’m eatin’ it. Shit’s fuckin’ ambrosia and, brother, you’re kinda scary. Would ruin the risotto.”

Nothing would ruin Vi’s risotto that shit was the best thing he’d ever tasted in his whole fucking life.

Cal wanted to laugh. He didn’t because he knew, Sam came back, he wouldn’t be sitting at Vi’s table eating anything.

He finished their pool game, said his good-byes to a surprised Melissa and a shocked Vi and he got out of there.

He went home, called Nadia and set it up for the next day.

It needed to be done.

It didn’t matter Cal didn’t open the door, the three of them were charging through. Vi, Kate and Keira, female battering rams who were relentless.

And he needed to close it down, cut her loose, cut all of them loose so he could close himself off and open the way for them to move onto a good life.

But Vi had to end it. It had to be her decision this time so there was no going back.

So he was forcing her hand.

* * *

He was sitting in the dark, in his living room, in his father’s chair with a bottle of bourbon, a glass half full in his hand when he heard the sliding glass door open.

He’d been home an hour. It took longer than he expected for her to come over.

She slid the door closed and stood at it, her back against the glass, a shadow silhouetted by the moonlight. He didn’t know how she knew he was sitting there. He’d never been sitting in his living room when she came over then again he usually met her at the door. But she knew.

“Did you fuck her?” she whispered.

“None of your business, buddy,” Cal forced himself to say.

“You don’t use protection with me, Cal, so yeah it is. Did you fuck her?”

He didn’t hear any words after she called him Cal. His body had frozen, his mind had blanked.

“I asked you a question,” she prompted, still whispering.

“You want this scene then yeah, I fucked her, Vi,” he lied.

She was silent.

He knew she’d hate it when he reminded her softly, “You don’t get to do this, buddy, this isn’t what we have.”

“I know about Nicky.”

It took everything he had not to surge to his feet.

“Come again?” he asked only after he unclenched his teeth.

“I know about your son, Nicky, your Dad. I know about Bonnie. I know everything.”

Cal swallowed the acid taste burning his tongue then he said, “Everyone knows. It isn’t a secret, Vi.”

“You’re empty.”

He stared at her silhouette. How she knew that, he had no fucking clue but she wasn’t wrong.

“Yeah,” he agreed.

“Nothing can fill you up,” she stated.

“Nope,” he agreed again.

“You won’t let it.”

“Barrel’s got a hole in the bottom, buddy, everything leaks out no matter how much you pour in.”

She was silent a moment then she whispered, “Right.”

She turned to the door and his hand gripped his bourbon so hard he had to focus everything on loosening his grip or the glass would shatter.

Before she opened it, she turned back. “You don’t know, Cal, you have no idea. You’ve shut yourself up for so long in this fucking house with your tragic memories, you have no idea what’s about to walk out your door. Kate, Keira and me, we could have plugged that hole. We could have filled you so full, you’d be bursting. We would have loved that chance. We’d have given it everything we had, no matter the time that slid by, graduations, weddings, grandbabies, you’d have been a part of us and we’d have given everything we had to keep you so full, you’d be bursting.”

Cal didn’t reply.

“Joe,” she whispered, “you let me walk out this door, you’ll lose your chance.”