Can't Let You Go: A Wheeler Brothers Novel (28 page)

I should've known saying what I said would set Nash off. It's a touchy subject for him because the girl he dated before Callie was a lawyer and always made rude comments about people without degrees, despite knowing Nash didn't have one. And when she'd introduce him to people, she wouldn't tell them he worked construction. She was too embarrassed. I know Jen would never act that way, but the people she'll be working with will judge me for what I do, and how I look.

"I'm going inside." I open the door but he grabs my arm.

"Just listen to me, okay? I've made decisions in the past that I regret and I don't want to see you do the same. If you let Jen leave, you'll regret it. You'll try to move on with someone else but it'll never be the same because she won't be Jen."

"Yeah, got it." I yank my arm from his grasp and get out of the truck, slamming the door.

"Hey!" Nash catches up to me. "Don't be an ass."

"I'm not. I'm just—" I open the door for a woman coming out of the building, then Nash and I go inside and I continue. "I just have a lot to think about right now."
 

He's quiet as we ride up the elevator.

Maybe Nash is right and I should stop worrying about all the things that have kept me from being with Jen and just focus on what I want. Which is her.

When we get to my apartment, we find the girls still hanging out in the kitchen.

"Where have you guys been?" Callie asks as she takes a jar of salsa out of the fridge.

"Downstairs, talking about how to do an estimate." Nash holds up the clipboard he had in the truck. "I brought him the template we use. What are you two doing?"

"Making lunch."

Jen points to Callie. "She's making it. I'm just watching."

Like me, Jen doesn't know how to cook. We can both heat stuff up, but making a meal from scratch is not a skill we've mastered.

"What are you making?" Nash asks Callie.

"Quesadillas. They have like no ingredients so I don't have much to work with."

"No ingredients?" I walk over and stand by Jen. "We just went to the store."

Callie rolls her eyes. "You bought all that frozen prepared stuff. Those aren't ingredients. You need real food. You don't even have a package of ground beef or chicken."

"Because that would require cooking," I say. "Something we don't do."

Jen laughs. "We really need to learn. We can't be living on frozen meals forever."

We. Forever.
It's like Jen is already planning on us being together in the future. Is that really what she wants? Has she thought this through? Because I haven't. Whenever my mind has even tried to go there, I've always shut it down because I never even wanted to imagine something I'd never have. But now? Maybe I
will
have it.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Bryce

Nash goes up to Callie and kisses her. "Why don't you and I go out for lunch and leave Bryce and Jen alone?"

"They have the rest of the day to be alone." Callie pulls a skillet out of my oven. I don't even remember storing it there. Or buying the damn thing. "They can't do it all day, Nash."

Jen and I freeze. Callie knows? We both look at Nash.

He holds his hands up in surrender. "I swear, I didn't tell her. I wanted to make sure I was right first."

"Didn't tell me
what
?" Callie asks, opening the jar of salsa. "That Jen and Bryce are dating?" None of us answer so she says, "I knew as soon as we got here."

"How'd you know?" I ask.

"You're both smiling more than normal and Jen was all giggly. She's never giggly, so that was a dead giveaway. And you never smile so I knew something was up."

"I smile all the time," I tell her.

"Not like that." She points to my face.

"Told you," Nash says. "That big ass grin on your face is going to make this difficult to hide from the rest of the family."

"Why would you hide it?" Callie asks. "We all assumed you'd eventually get together, so what's the big deal?"

"It's not," I say. "We just wanted to wait a little. So for now, don't tell anyone."

Jen laughs. "He's afraid his dad will show up with a minister to marry us."

"Hey, that's not funny," I tell her. "He might actually do that."
 

She laughs again. "He has to marry off Nash and Callie first."

"Did you guys set a date?" I ask.

Callie answers. "I want to finish school first, which means it'll be at least a couple years." She smiles at Nash. "Although Nash might convince me to do it sooner."

"I don't know what you're waiting for." He points to himself. "Who wouldn't want to be married to this?"

Jen and Callie both laugh, then Callie says, "You guys get out of here. Jen and I are having girl talk while I cook."

"I'll be in the living room if this girl talk gets out of hand," I say to Jen, then I give her a kiss. I didn't even think about it. I just did it.

"Okay, that's weird," Callie says, then shakes her head really fast. "Not in a bad way. I'm just not used to seeing you two kiss. I'm sorry. It's not weird. I shouldn't have said that."

Nash kisses her. "Don't worry about it. Just finish up lunch so we can get out of here and leave the lovebirds alone."

"See?" I say to Nash. "That's why I didn't want to tell anyone. Callie thinks it weird and you're making dumbass comments."

Nash smiles. "I won't do it again. Come on, let's leave the ladies alone to talk about us."

The four of us have lunch, then Nash and Callie leave, and as expected, Jen and I have sex. What can I say? We've wanted to do this for years and now that we finally are, we can't stop. But we agree to take a break and go to a movie.

It's the matinee so there's hardly anyone there. We sit in the back and hold hands and end up kissing and not watching the movie. When we get out of the theater, Jen turns her phone on and sees that her mom called. She immediately tenses up, assuming something's wrong. When it comes to Rita, that's always the assumption. She never calls just to say hello.

Jen calls her back when we're in my truck. "Hey, Mom. What's up?" She listens, biting her lip, her face tensing up. "I know. I forgot. Bryce and I were at the movies and I wasn't even thinking about it. We'll go there right now and bring them over." She listens again, then nods. "Okay, bye."

I sigh heavily. "What now?"

"I forgot to get her groceries. I was supposed to bring them over this afternoon. We have to go get them. Let's go to the store by her house."

"So we have to stop what we're doing and go get her groceries? Fuck that. She's a grown woman and she has a car. She can drive down the street and get her own damn groceries."

"She said she's out of money."

I clench the steering wheel, trying to control my anger. "Then we'll give her the damn money and she can go herself."

"If we do that, you know she won't buy food. She'll spend the money on cigarettes. She needs to eat, Bryce. She's skin and bones." She puts her hand over mine. "Please? Will you just do this for me?"

"Last time, Jen. This is the last time you're buying her groceries."

"Bryce, I can't promise you that. I can't let her go hungry."

"My God, Jen. Your mom is not going to go hungry. If she's that poor, which I know she's not, but if she were, she could get a job. And if she didn't want to work, she could stop going to the salon to get her hair bleached, and stop getting her nails done, and stop going to the tanning salon. She could buy a lot of food for how much all that costs." I've said this to Jen so many times I feel like a broken record, but I just keep saying it, hoping someday she'll listen.

"I'll have a talk with her, okay?"

"How did she buy food when you were a kid?" I ask, not ready to let this go.

"I don't know. She probably asked some guy for money."

"And did he do her grocery shopping?"

"Bryce, come on. I don't want to fight about this."

"As long as Rita's in our lives, we'll always be fighting about this."

"What are you saying? You want me to cut her out of my life? That's not going to happen, Bryce. I've told you that a million times. She's all I have for family."

"You have
my
family. And how do you know you don't have other family? Maybe you do and Rita's just never told you about them."

"Her parents died when I was a kid. And she has a brother but they haven't talked in years."

"So you have an uncle and probably some cousins. Maybe you should meet this uncle and see if he has any ideas for how to deal with your mom."

"I've never met him. I don't even know where he lives and I'm not going to try to find him."

"How about your dad? Why has she never told you anything about him?"

"Because she doesn't know who it is. She slept with a lot of guys back then. It could've been any one of them."

We're now at the grocery store and I pull into a spot. "Are we really doing this? Grocery shopping for a grown woman who's perfectly capable of doing it herself?"

She opens her door. "Just wait here. It won't take me long."

"I'm not waiting here." I get out of the truck and catch up with her and take her hand, stopping her. "Jen, I'm sorry, okay? I'm not mad at you. I'm mad at your mom."

"I know, but we can't keep doing this. You have to learn to get along with her. And you have to understand that she'll never change."

"Let's just get the groceries." I keep hold of her hand and we go in the store.

I'm not going to argue with her about this in the parking lot. I don't want to argue with her at all but it's what we do whenever the topic of her mom comes up. If Jen and I really did end up together, her mom would always be an issue, which worries me.

When we get to her mom's house, Mark is there, wearing a dingy white t-shirt that looks like it hasn't been washed in a year.

"Did you get everything on the list?" Rita asks Jen.

"Yeah, but Mom, I'm not going to keep—"

"This doesn't look like everything," she says, as she pulls stuff out of the bag.
 

"The rest is in the truck." I look at Mark. "You gonna help?"

"Nah." He smirks. "You go ahead. I'll stay in here with the ladies." He winks at Jen and I almost punch him. I seriously hate this guy. He's one of those people who goes out of his way to cause trouble, just like Rita. It's no wonder those two hooked up.

I bring the rest of the grocery bags in and drop them on the kitchen counter. Then I go over to Jen, taking her hand. "Come on, let's go."

"She's not leaving," Rita snaps. "She just got here. She needs to stay and visit with her mama." She comes over and kisses Jen on the cheek. "Isn't that right, sweetie?"

"I can't right now. Bryce and I need to go."

"What's the rush?" Mark asks, standing next to Rita and lighting up a cigarette.

"Jen can't breathe with the smoke," I say, glaring at Mark.

"She can breathe just fine." Mark puffs on his cigarette. "She's just faking it so she has an excuse not to stay here and talk to her mama. You need to show some respect, little lady."

Little lady?
He talks like an old man and yet he's only a few years older than me. And respect? Seriously? He doesn't even know the meaning of the word.

"Come on, Jen," Rita says. "Just stay for a few minutes."

"Only if he puts his cigarette out," I say, nodding at Mark.

"Bryce, it's okay," Jen says quietly to me. "We won't be staying long."

"Now that's more like it," Mark says to her. "Your mama's house, your mama's rules. You remember that, sugar. And be sure to teach it to your little boyfriend." He puts his eyes on me and smirks, and it takes everything in me not to punch the guy.

Just a few minutes. Then we can get out of here. But I don't know if I can stand being here for even a few minutes. It's bad enough coming here when it's just Rita, but now we have to deal with Mark.

"What's this?" Rita asks, pointing at Jen's hand in mine. "You two are dating?"

Jen holds my hand tighter. "Yeah. We are."

She laughs. "Well, well. When did this happen?"

"Just the other day," Jen says.

"Is that so?" She smiles at us as she steals Mark's cigarette from him, takes a puff, then hands it back. "So should I start planning the wedding?"

"We're just dating, Mom."

Rita glances at me, then back at Jen. "Guess this means you're not leaving Chicago."
 

"Probably not," she says, and I swear I heard a hint of sadness in her voice. Was I just imagining it? Or is Jen sad about the idea of staying here? What if she really does want to leave to get away from her mom? She says she doesn't, but I think if she got a job somewhere else, she'd be secretly happy about it. It's the only way she'll ever escape the hold her mom has on her.

"I knew you'd never leave," Rita says. "You love your mama too much, don't you sweetie?" She reaches out and moves a strand of hair off Jen's face. "Jen, honey, you really need to lighten your hair. You'd look so much prettier with a lighter color. It'll brighten up your face. Let's go to the salon together this week."

"She doesn't want it lighter," I say, gritting my teeth.

Rita narrows her eyes at me. "Are you speaking for my daughter now? You think you own her just because you're dating her?"

"Mom, stop," Jen says, her voice rushed. She's stressed. We've only been here a couple minutes and Jen's already stressed. "Bryce only said that because he knows I like my hair the way it is. I don't want it lighter."

"I'd like to see it lighter," Mark says, smiling in a sick, perverted way as his eyes move over her body, landing on her breasts. "You got quite a body on you, sweetheart."

I step in front of Jen. "Don't fucking talk to her that way. And don't you dare look at her like that again."

"Bryce, let's just go." She tugs on my jacket.

"She's not allowed to get compliments?" Mark asks. "Rita, I think this boy needs to be taught a lesson. He definitely needs to learn how to respect his elders."

"You're not my fucking elder," I say, keeping my eyes on him. 'We're practically the same age. And there's no way in hell I'd ever respect you."