Forgive & Regret Read online

  “Creepy place, huh?”

  She followed his gaze around the cracked lot, quietly nodding her agreement. This guy could kill her right now and no one would be the wiser until checkout.

  Don’t forget the rules.

  “You have perfect lips.”

  Her gaze snapped back to him.

  “Everyone wants your lips.”

  Her eyebrows drew together. “They do?”

  His smile spread like wildfire through his stubble. “My clients, I mean. They always want those full lips.”

  “Oh,” she muttered, watching him sweep a tongue across a fine pair of lips of his own. “Plastic surgeon?”

  He nodded.

  Stella straightened her posture, raising her chest. She could always tell when men were undressing her with their eyes and this time was no different. Only this time, she let him. He could undress her with his hands right here in front of the ice machine and fuck her six ways to Sunday for all she cared. After all, who was going to notice?

  Grinning as if he read her mind, Roman’s eyes flickered with heat. “If you ever consider having any work done,” he said, glancing at her breasts, “don’t.”

  “I would never,” she whispered back.

  His eyes dropped to her feet. “Nice shoes.”

  She laughed a little and looked away, surprised and unnerved by the bashful smile pulling on her lips. “Thank you.”

  “Well, drive safe tomorrow, Sabrina.”

  “You too, Roman.”

  With a quick nod, he turned for his room. Stella watched him go, barbed quivers slicing through her at the sight of his backside. His ass was tight and round; the kind you want to sink your nails into. Roman glanced over his shoulder and Stella spun around a moment too late. Making a beeline for her room, she cursed herself under her breath.

  “Ya know,” he called out, freezing her to the walkway. “I’ve got a bottle of Templeton Rye sitting in my room I was afraid would be there until morning.”

  Excitement sizzled through her body. This was it, her porno moment served up on a silver platter – just what she needed before coming home with her tail between her legs. Hesitantly, she turned to face him, pulse quickening when she found his eyes on her.

  Roman rubbed his day old stubble, accentuating his sexy jaw line. “Care to join me for a nightcap?”

  “Thanks, but I have to get up early tomorrow.”

  He stared at her for a moment longer and shrugged, his slim fitting suit pronouncing his broad shoulders. “Probably best if I rationed anyway,” he said, a forlorn sigh sinking his chest. “Who knows how long I’ll be stuck here?”

  “Hopefully, not long.”

  He smiled warmly, her skin prickling wherever his eyes landed. “Goodnight.”

  “Goodnight.”

  She watched him turn for his room, unable to pry her eyes from him. Her breath squeaked past her throat in a sliver and she wanted to tell him to stop. Tell him she changed her mind and would love a drink, but the words clung to the tip of her tongue and she didn’t know why. It irritated the hell out of her because a dirty one night stand was just what the doctor ordered. No one would ever know. It would just be her and Roman’s dirty little secret they could take to their separate graves. One night of passion so red hot, she’d forget all about her troubles looming on the horizon.

  Roman stopped at his door and stuck an old fashioned key into the lock. This time, Stella turned before he could catch her staring again. That wasn’t her style and she wouldn’t make the same mistake three times. After passing a few doors, the need to look back became too much for one woman to bear. Was he still there? Watching her? With that look in his eyes? Holding her breath, she glanced over her shoulder. Roman hit her with a bright smile that tickled her insides. Stella whipped back around and picked up the pace. “Shit!” she hissed, unlocking her door and rushing inside.

  Shutting the door, she leaned against it and blew out a stream of air. “Get it together, girl,” she whispered into the musty smelling room. Unfortunately, old habits were hard to break.

  Chapter Three

  Roman looked so good with his shirt off it made Stella’s fingers go faster. He looked even better with his pressed slacks crumpled around his feet, and, boy, did he know what he was doing with his tongue. Stella’s two fingers mirrored his wet licks, rubbing soft circles into her flesh. Short of breath, she arched her back when his tongue plunged deeper. The room got hotter. The bed creaked. The cell phone on the nightstand started to ring. She did her best to ignore it because Roman’s tongue flicks set him apart from the pack. It had never been like this. Never. The phone kept ringing and Roman moved away from her. Stella squeezed her eyes shut and tried to focus, wondering when voicemail would get off its ass and answer the damn phone. After a few more rings, Roman faded into a hand painted portrait of a cottage above the television. Stella let out a frustrated breath and snatched up the phone, squinting at the bright screen.

  “Jase,” she breathed, sitting up and tucking her hair behind an ear.

  “Why don’t you ever answer your damn phone?”

  “I was getting ice!”

  “Ice? Where are you?”

  She looked around, head still foggy with Roman’s devilish grin, and pulled her top down. “The Bates motel out in the middle of nowhere. On the bright side, it includes a complimentary funeral in the morning.”

  “I take it Dad cut your plastic.”

  “Yep,” she replied flatly, pouring bottled water into a cup of ice. “All but one, which is about toast.”

  “Shocking.” He exhaled into the phone. “I can probably float you a little until you get back on your feet.”

  She stopped pouring and looked up. “Did I ever tell you you’re my favorite brother?”

  “I’m you’re only brother and you’re paying me back.” He paused. “With interest.”

  “Fine. So how pissed is Dad anyway?”

  “If it was me who flunked out of college, he’d be super pissed. But you know he can never stay mad at his little girl.”

  “I don’t know about that; he was pretty upset the last time we talked.”

  “Listen, he’s bummed you didn’t finish, Stell. What dad wouldn’t be? He wanted you to get out of Cottage Grove and find your dream job up in the city.”

  She sighed. “Yeah, me too.”

  “When will you hit town?”

  “Tomorrow, but not till late. Will you be working?”

  “Nope, I’m taking Jodi out for the time of her life tomorrow night.”

  “Oh.”

  “Don’t sound so excited.”

  “Wait, who is Jodi?”

  The phone rustled with movement and Jase lowered his voice. “You don’t know her. Super hot brunette who moved here with her mom about nine months ago to take care of her dying grandma - Parkinson’s I think.” His voice relaxed. “Jodi is…incredible. Best thing to happen to this town in a long time.”

  “Oh yeah, sounds like it, especially for the grandma.”

  Jase laughed before growing quiet. “Tomorrow night could be the big night.”

  Stella furrowed her brow. “That her grandma dies?”

  “No, that I finally crack Jodi’s nut. We’ve been dating for almost two months now and it still hasn’t happened!”

  “Nut? What are you a squirrel? Don’t rush her, Jase, you’re better than that.”

  “No, I’m not. And if she doesn’t put out tomorrow night, I’m dumping her. End of story.”

  “What! I thought she was so incredible.”

  “You know I don’t waste time on virgins and their little fairy tale fantasies about meeting their Prince Charming. I don’t have time for all that; I just wanna get laid. Period.”

  Stella let a short laugh out, watching a pair of headlights sweep across the thin curtains. “Well, I can’t wait to meet her.”

  A longwinded breath stormed the line, leading to an even longer pause. “Listen, there’s something I have to tell you.”
/>   Her eyelids rolled back in her head like window shades. “Oh my God, did Dad cut me out of the will? I fucking knew it!”

  “What? No. I don’t know anything about that.”

  “If he does, you better still split everything with me, Jason Talvert!” She took a calming breath and lowered her voice. “And I want the boat.”

  The silence that followed set the gravity in his tone. “Debbie passed away last week.”

  Tunnel vision set in, pulling her through the room at a blinding rate. It took her voice a few seconds to catch up. “Are you serious?”

  “Neighbors hadn’t seen her for a few days and came knocking. Found her in bed.”

  Stella sat down in a small green chair without looking, despair throttling her voice. She was afraid to ask the obvious but needed to know. “W-What happened?”

  “Not sure yet, but Earl told me they found sleeping pills and vodka on the nightstand.”

  Stella covered her mouth, eyes welling with tears. The room seemed smaller than before and she wished the window would open. “No,” she whispered, mind traveling into a past she dared not go. Debbie was like a second mother to Stella and Jase, always going out of her way to arrange play dates and sleepovers with her only son, Sawyer. Never failing to provide bubbly compliments on their outfits and stories before dishing out taco pizza during whatever movies they’d rented for the night.

  While packing for her return trip home, Stella came across a leather journal Debbie gave her for her eighteenth birthday, meant to record her exciting adventures as a new adult. But Stella could never bring herself to write in it. Probably for the same reasons Debbie couldn’t bring herself to keep living.

  A slow rolling tear tickled her cheek. “When?”

  “A few days ago.”

  “What! Why am I just finding out about this now?”

  Jase sighed. “Dad wanted to tell you in person when you got home.”

  A bitter laugh ruffled her lips. “Why? Because his little girl couldn’t take it over the phone? He’s afraid I’ll be next?”

  “He just thought you had enough on your plate right now and wanted to see you get home safely without driving like a maniac.”

  Her pulse hammered in her ears. She felt lightheaded, like she was watching herself with her back pressed against the ceiling. Regret pulled her back into the chair. She should have been there for Debbie, to share in her grief. But no, Stella fled as fast as humanely possible, no one else on her mind, desperate to outrun it. Whatever it was. She tried to swallow but her mouth was too dry. Her toes dug into the carpet, locks clicking into place. It was clear now, like someone suddenly flipped on the lights. That night wasn’t done with them yet. She filled her lungs and tried to sound natural. “Have you seen Sawyer?”

  “He came back two days ago for the funeral.”

  She gasped. “I missed the funeral?”

  “Everything happened so fast, Stell, it was over before we knew it.” He stopped to soften his tone. “It was short and sweet. Debbie would’ve liked it.”

  “You should’ve told me,” she shouted, gripping the chair’s bony arm. “And who would like their own funeral? No one!” Stella drew in a calming breath and stared at the bed. “How is he?”

  A glass broke in the background. “He’s hanging in there. Hey, I’m working behind the bar and we’re getting really busy. Text me when you get into town and we’ll do lunch the next day.”

  “Okay,” she replied dully, blurring the framed picture of a cottage resting on the banks of a babbling brook into a frizzy rectangle.

  “Drive safe,” he said.“Bye, Sis.”

  “Bye.” With a blank look in her eyes, Stella lowered the phone.

  Debbie was dead.

  And Sawyer was back.

  The telekinetic link between twins was a scary thing. Growing up, it was the only thing to explain how she always found Jase during hide-and-seek, or how she could locate her iPod hidden somewhere in his messy bedroom. But Jase didn’t know everything, not about her and Sawyer. No one did.

  Some secrets are bulletproof.

  Sawyer was back.

  Had it really been almost four years since that night? It didn’t seem possible. Her heart wept for him and the pain he must be under, but she dreaded seeing him just the same. This wasn’t fate telling her to give it another shot; she fell for that last time. No, this was fate punishing her for her sins. A shadow stopped in front of the room’s window, drawing her distant gaze. Stella watched the shadow watch her through the thin curtains with a lump lodged in her throat.

  It was him.

  Roman.

  Bare foot, she crept to the door and peered out the peephole with one eye closed. Roman stared back, unleashing a swarm of fireflies in her stomach that fluttered into her arms and legs, fanning her pulse with tiny flashes of light. He raised his fist to knock, signaling her heart to beat faster. Roman held his fist in front of the door and studied his shoes, a thin door the only thing between them. Then, without warning, he turned and walked away.

  Stella yanked on the door, wincing to find it locked. She flipped back the locks, whipped the door open and rushed out onto the cold concrete. “Hey!”

  Roman stopped but didn’t turn around, hands stuffed in his pockets.

  Just the sight of him made her eager to see more. Tonight, she needed to forget and TBS wasn’t going to cut it. “Is your offer still good?”

  He turned on his heels to face her in the dim light, a destructive grin slicing through his unshaven cheeks. “My room or yours?”

  Chapter Four

  ALMOST FOUR YEARS AGO

  With dawn sneaking through the windows, Stella quietly swung her feet to the floor and sat on the edge of the bed without moving a muscle. Sawyer’s heavy breathing remained unchanged, so she inched out of bed and slid into a breezy yellow dress that stopped just short of her knees.

  He looked beautiful when he slept.

  It was the only time she couldn’t see into his eyes.

  Those eyes would never let her forget.

  Never.

  She wiped away a tear and grabbed her keys, wiggling into her sandals without taking her eyes from the bed. The one time she needed him more than ever before, he couldn’t be there for her. Not because he wouldn’t, but because they shouldn’t. Sawyer would do it without asking but everything was different now and she hated it. He wasn’t the little boy she’d fallen head over heels in love with anymore. Like her, that person was gone and never coming back. She missed him so much this past summer it incapacitated her on a daily basis. While her friends were out partying at the lake, she was reading The Bridges of Madison County and eating ice cream. When her friends let their hair down and hit the town on a hot summer night, Stella curled up in bed and blurred the whirling ceiling fan into a complete circle.

  Last night that all changed. Finally giving in to Wendy’s begging, Stella went to the annual end-of-summer bonfire. And so did he. She was positive it was fate’s way of telling her to give it another shot, that two wrongs can make a right. So she did and it was wonderful. They picked up again like they hadn’t been apart since May, two halves of a heart clicking into place like a locket. Stella didn’t regret sleeping in his bed again either. With the lights out, it was the first time she completely forgot about her mother’s death and that was nice. Very nice. But when the lights came back on...

  Those eyes were still there.

  Cold and dark.

  A war between remembering and forgetting.

  All summer long, her mind drifted from her mother to Sawyer, gut wrenching whichever direction she chose. But summer wasn’t done with her yet. There was one card left to play and this was it. Slinging her purse over her shoulder, she stopped in front of an open window and looked back. It was a mistake. The way Sawyer’s long hair fell over his face turned her insides to mush. A breeze swept through the room. Sheer curtains wrapped Stella in a consoling embrace as her broken heart shattered. In calm strokes, his chest rose and fe
ll, undisturbed by her suffering. What should have been could never be and it tore her up inside. Silent tears streamed down her cheeks, falling unnoticed to the floor. She didn’t know which hurt more, leaving him for good or looking into those golden eyes. No, that wasn’t true. She knew the answer and that was why she was leaving. He knew it too and that’s why there was no need for a note.

  He would always have a piece of her heart, but she would keep the rest.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, filling her lungs with his scent one last time and then sneaking out the bedroom window. The thought of never seeing him made her sick. Then it made her mad. She’d already lost one person on that rainy night and the thought of losing him as well drove the air from her lungs, like a piano falling on her chest. This should have gone waaaay differently and it wasn’t fair! She wanted to lash out, scream loud enough to wake the entire neighborhood. Tell Sawyer’s bed-head neighbors to go fuck themselves when they poked their sleepy little eyes outside. As far as she was concerned, everyone could go to hell.

  Stella pulled her last leg out the window and hit the grass with an oomph rushing from her lips. Gathering up her purse and keys to a chorus of crickets and owls, she dashed through the shadows to her car parked down the street, battling the heartache without looking back. She would never see him again and, for that, she would never forgive her mother.

  Chapter Five

  PRESENT

  The sight of her old elementary school stirred mixed emotions as she drove past, pushing her thoughts of Sawyer to the far corners of her mind. Wherever her headlights went, memories pressed in from all sides, swiping at her with jagged claws, leaving trails of blood behind. The calm waters of the lake, ice cream cones at the Tastee Freez, and the blue swings her mother used to push her on brought sorrow to Stella’s eyes. If only she’d known back then what she knew now, she would’ve made her mom push her on those swings for a little bit longer. It wasn’t the big stuff that hurt the most – like missing Stella’s high school graduation or her send off to college – it was the little things that killed. Sarah would never know about Stella’s newfound love of Yoga or Banana smoothies but most of all Sarah would never be there to just talk. And that’s what Stella longed for the most; some good old girl talk with her wise ass mother. Like before.