Brazen Bossman: A Hero Club Novel, стр. 60
“Yeah, have another one. That’s definitely helping everything.”
“What would you have me do then, huh?” His voice has raised a few octaves. He isn’t shouting, but I can feel that it’s not far away. “What is your magical plan that is going to fix everything?”
“I want to know where this came from!” I shout back. “We were having a perfect time and something happened that was well outside of your control, by the way, and it’s plunged you into the asshole I thought you were finally leaving behind!”
“Sorry to disappoint you, baby, but I’m always going to be a fucking asshole. Get used to it.” He tosses back another shot of alcohol.
“Is it so wrong I want you to talk to me? Isn’t that what boyfriends—” I stop myself from finishing my sentence.
“I’m not your goddamn boyfriend, Piper. I’m not going to lay my shit at your feet. I think you have enough family drama of your own.”
The hurt in my face is clear and concise. He may as well have sliced me open and poured whiskey in the wound.
I swallow the knot in my throat and fight tears, because I refuse to shed a tear in front of him.
“Fuck you, Nathanial. Just… fuck you.”
I kill the heat on the stove and leave the kitchen as quickly as I can.
By the time I sink onto the bed and the first tear sheds, I hear him shout “God fucking damnit!” and slam the patio door, leaving me completely alone.
***
I must have fallen asleep at some point because I wake with a start and the entire room around me is pitch-black, save for the moon shining through the open window. A cool breeze swirls in and soothes my heated skin.
I push myself to sit up and snatch my cell phone from the nightstand. He hasn’t texted or called me, and it’s nearing midnight.
I leave the room long enough to check outside to see if the car is still here, and it is. He didn’t leave me. I know that much.
I do a quick search of the house, and I can’t find him anywhere. I pass through the kitchen, seeing our half-cooked dinner still sitting as we left it.
I bend over the counter with my elbows on the marble surface and hold my face in my hands.
With anyone else, this much time passing without some kind of connection or text message would infuriate me, but with him, it just makes me sad, cutting open a little piece of my heart and squeezing it just a bit. I don’t like it.
I tuck my cell phone in my back pocket, deciding to just go wait for him on the patio by the pool, when lights from the far side of the backyard catch my attention.
The air is a bit chilly when I step out into the night, but I welcome it. I love this type of weather, especially on my skin that is just reddened by my time in the sun earlier today.
When I reach the light, I see it is an illuminated path that extends through a gate and leads all the way down to the ocean. Tall grass lines each side, so tall it nearly towers over my head.
With bare feet, I step into the sand and through the gate, following the lights. The sound of the ocean starts as a distant whisper, almost so quiet one could think it didn’t even exist, but with each step, the crashing waves become louder and louder.
I reach the clearing and step onto the empty beach, staring out in the vast power that is the ocean.
Just a few feet from where the tide is kissing the shore, sits the man who—without even trying, and without me even realizing—has captured my heart.
My brazen bossman, who I want nothing more than to stomp toward and throw my arms around.
Nathanial
I’ve been sitting in this exact spot so long I swear I can even hear the ocean telling me what an asshole I am.
“Fucker,” it says with a crash of the waves.
“She’s too good for you,” it says as the tide gets sucked back out.
“You piece of shit,” I hear in the sea-foam crackling on shore.
All I can do is hang my head in complete agreement. Piper didn’t deserve an ounce of my anger. Now that I’ve made a complete ass out of myself, I’m nearly too scared to go back, out of fear she left me.
And truly, I’d deserve it.
My father strikes this nerve inside of me that is a lighter to gasoline. We aren’t good for each other, he and I.
I reach down to the sand, sliding my fingers through the cool grains until I feel the sharp edges of a seashell. I pull it free and hold it in my hand.
“I think that one would be nice to give your mom too.”
Her voice from behind me is a salve to my embarrassing wound.
“I’ll be sure to give it to her.”
I don’t look back at her, but I don’t have to. She comes to sit at my side, close enough that our shoulders are touching.
We don’t talk, not at first. She doesn’t push it, and neither do I, but as the moon rises higher, I know something needs to be said.
“Piper, I’m sorry.” I finally turn my face to look at her, and I can see the redness in her eyes. She’s been crying.
“I would say it’s okay, but it’s not. You can’t snap at me for caring,” she sniffs. “But I’m sorry too. It’s not my place to press for answers. You don’t owe me anything, because you’re right, you’re not my boyfriend. I shouldn’t have said that.”
“Jesus, Piper, you have nothing to apologize for. Nothing at all.” I reach over and take her hand in mine. “I had no right to treat you the way I did.”
“No. You didn’t.”
I stare back out at the horizon. “My father