Dirt: A Sexy Small Town Romance (Copperwood Book 1) (11 page)

I caught the flash of blonde hair in my peripheral vision and suppressed the urge to moan. Alene. Of course she was there. Why had I expected anything else? Images of her hanging off of Shane in the bar flashed through my mind and I turned away from her.

I smoothed my shirt down over my stomach and smiled at the butcher. Maybe if I pretended she wasnt’t in the same vicinity as me, Alene wouldn’t say anything. I pointed at the filets, they were the most expensive, but they looked good. “Four please.”

The butcher nodded his head and grabbed the cuts, weighing them, then wrapping them in paper before sticking the price on them. I watched his movements. Mainly because I had no desire to even acknowledge Alene presence.

I knew it was going to be impossible to avoid her. Alene demanded people pay attention to her, even if the attention wasn’t good.

“Don’t you think it’s a little too soon to be celebrating?” Her grating voice cut through me just as I reached for the package.

I snatched the steaks out of the butcher’s hand and dropped it into my basket. I had planned on finding some fresh vegetables and maybe something to make a salad, but I would rather use canned stuff from home then stay in the same building with Alene.

I cleared my throat and attempted to smile at her. “No. Just making dinner.” I turned and walked away. Maybe Alene would get the clue and leave me alone.

She didn’t. She hounded my steps. And my thoughts. “He doesn’t want you, you know.”

My stomach roiled at her words. Why did they have any effect on me? Why did I let her get to me?

“Have you been to his motel room yet? I have.”

That stopped me. I turned around to face her and she almost bumped into me, not expecting me to stop and face her. And I wouldn’t have back in high school, but a lot of years had passed since then and wasn’t the kid a few years younger who tagged along anymore. At least I tried to tell myself that.

“Alene, why?” I shook my head at her. I honestly didn’t get her antagonism to me. It wasn’t like I ever took any of her boyfriends away from her.

“Because you’re just the friend. You’ll always be the friend and I don’t want you thinking that just because he’s giving you a little bit of attention, you’ll ever be more than that.”

I tried to camouflage the hurt her words caused. I was transported back to being a sixteen year old girl admitting to Shane that she liked him only to have him reject her. Gently, but it was still a rejection.

I bit down hard on my bottom lip and looked down at the basket with the steaks. Sure, we had sex, and yeah, he kissed me, but we hadn’t really talked about what was happening between us. And he didn’t want to have dinner alone with me, he told me to invite my dad. Maybe Alene was right, maybe I was destined just to be the friend.

“He saw me last night. After he dropped you off, it was me who met him at his motel room.”

My stomach stopped tumbling around and dropped. I felt my heart racing beneath my chest, trying to break through my ribs. Was it true? It made sense that he wouldn’t spend the night alone. I didn’t think I ever remembered Shane being without someone and never voluntarily walk away from a sure thing, which was what I was offering him last night.

I conveniently pushed aside the thoughts of what we had done that afternoon. What he said to me. He told me he wanted me and I believed him. Just like when I believed when he told us he was coming back after he graduated.

I turned on my heel and hurried towards the cashier. I couldn’t stand to hear any more from her. I couldn’t stand to look at the smug grin on her face. She had to be lying. Shane wouldn’t sit and have breakfast with me, share all his secrets with me, not unless I meant something to him.

“We’re seeing each other this afternoon. We need to talk about some business matters of father’s. Should I tell him you say hi?”

I ignored her, at least in body. In my mind, I was replaying everything she said to me and cringing. But I couldn’t let her see it, so I straightened my shoulders and turned to the produce section. If Alene saw that her words were getting to me, it would all be over.

She’d do exactly what she set out to do and drive a wedge between whatever Shane and I might have. Which wasn’t much if even a fraction of what she said was true. I tried to push those concerns away while I picked through the different vegetables.

Alene stopped following me and by the time I made it back to the checkout line, I couldn’t find her distinctive mob of teased blonde hair. Too bad she wasn’t gone from my thoughts. I couldn’t shake her words and each time I replayed what she said, my mind just confirmed everything she said.

Shane might have shared the information about his dad with me, but he also shared it with her.

I tried to tell myself it didn’t matter. I tried to convince myself that everything she said wasn’t really important. But it was important. Shane said he was staying, but he never said he was staying for
me
.

She hadn’t even spent the night at Mike’s on Friday night. Mike went out of his way to tell me. Maybe that’s why he was such an ass to Shane on Saturday. He knew that he hadn’t spent it with Alene and made the only reasonable assumption available. She had spent Friday and Saturday night with Shane.

Yeah, he spent time with me. But he hadn’t kissed me until Saturday. He might have slept with me today, but maybe it didn’t mean anything.

I paid the cashier, but only because there was a line of people behind me. I wanted to walk away from it all, to just leave the groceries and run back home and hide in my bed. But then I’d never have the answers.

I grabbed the plastic sacks and stumbled out of the grocery store to my car.

By the time I got my engine to turn over and pulled out of the parking lot, I had made a decision. I needed answers and the only one who would be able to answer those questions was Shane. I definitely didn’t want to ask him.

The way I saw it, he would either deny it and I would have to make a choice about whether to believe him or not. Or he would confirm everything Alene said. And it wasn’t like I could be angry if Alene was telling the truth.

Shane never promised me anything. He never had.

21

Mya

I
sped through town. At first, I headed towards the motel, but as my hands sweated against the plastic of the steering wheel, I thought better of it. I pulled a quick U–turn and drove to the one person who I knew I could trust.

Reaching into my purse, I pulled out my phone and skimmed my thumb over the screen. I split my attention between the road and the names scrolling by. My thumb stopped the motion when the K’s rolled by and I quickly pressed down on the name before I lost my nerve.

Kirstin picked up the phone on the second ring. “Please tell me that we don’t have to work today. It’s our one day off.”

“I need your help.”

The silent pause on the other end of the line lasted only a few seconds, but it felt like an eternity.

“You know where to find me.”

While I drove to her apartment, Kirstin kept me on the line, asking questions I didn’t want answer and coming to a similar conclusion. By the time I pulled into her parking lot, we had formed a plane. Sort of.

Shane didn’t know her car, but my trusty little Dart was recognizable from a mile away. We’d take her car and go to the motel first. Depending on what we found there would decide what we did next.

We weren’t covert operatives, but Kirstin was getting into the whole stake out idea and pulled me along. Her reasoning was sound. If I accused Shane of everything Alene claimed and it wasn’t true, it would cause more problems. If Alene wasn’t at the hotel or never showed up, then Shane would never know I questioned him.

It was a better plan than me pounding on the motel room door and demanding answers.

After dropping the food from the grocery store into her fridge, we got in her car and headed to the motel.

Kirstin pulled into the parking lot next to the motel and turned off the ignition. “No point in being obvious with a car running.”

I sat back in the leather seat and stared out the front windshield.

“So, turns out Alene’s a bigger bitch than I first thought.” Kirstin smiled at me.

I knew what she was trying to do and I was grateful, but it didn’t change anything that happened up to that moment. It didn’t change Shane leaving town and never coming back. It didn’t change the rejection felt by a sixteen year old girl so many years ago. And it certainly didn’t change the hint of truth lurking beneath Alene’s words in the grocery store.

“She’s not really one of those nice girls.”

“Don’t tell me, she saw Mean Girls and thought it was handbook?”

I shrugged my shoulder at her, “I don’t think she needed to see the movie.”

Kirstin snorted out a laugh. She actually snorted. And I laughed. Despite everything I was feeling, I couldn’t keep the laugh down. I looked over and she blushed, covering her face with her hands.

“I didn’t mean to.”

“Snort?”

She nodded her head behind her hands.

“I won’t tell anyone.” I almost said Mike.
Almost
. But neither of them said anything to me and I wasn’t going to be the one to tell them the obvious if they hadn’t figured it out yet.

Kirstin turned the key in the ignition towards her and turned the radio on. She turned the volume down, but the sounds of the top forty from six months ago still filled the car.

“I wish we thought to bring coffee.”

I bit down on the inside of my cheek, trying not to laugh. “This isn’t a real stakeout. I doubt we’ll have to be here for very long.”

Unfortunately, I was right. No sooner had I spoken then Alene pulled into the motel parking lot and got out of her car. She looked around, like she was expecting to see someone, but I didn’t notice any other recognizable cars. Well except for one. Shane’s rental was parked in the parking lot.

Before I could jump out of the car and charge across the parking lot, Kirstin grabbed my arm and pulled me back.

“Wait. We don’t know why she’s here yet. Okay?”

I nodded my head up and down, not trusting myself to say anything. I wanted to take Alene down, knock her to the ground and pound the shit out of her and
then
I wanted to do the exact same to Shane. I wanted to scream and yell at him.

But Kirstin was right. Maybe Shane didn’t know Alene was coming over.

The last feelings of hope drained from me when Shane opened the door and Alene walked in. They didn’t even say anything to each other.

“Maybe it’s not what you think.” Kirstin tried, but I think we both knew it was hopeless.

“Let’s just leave, okay?”

Kirstin nodded her head and turned the ignition, starting her car easily. A small part of me wished my own car would start as easily.

“For what it’s worth, I don’t have the whole history that the rest of this town has, but the way he looked at you at Pick’s last night, I don’t think you mean nothing to him.”

Kirstin was a good friend. I knew she was just trying to make me feel better, but she couldn’t. I was forever relegated to the role of friend. Alene proved that when she walked into Shane’s motel room.

“Hold up.” Kirstin slammed her car back into park and I grabbed at the dashboard.

We both looked out the windshield. Shane and Alene were leaving his hotel room. That was either the fastest screw in the history of Copperwood, or something else entirely. We watched them get into Shane’s car and head out onto the road.

“Should I follow them?”

I shook my head. I didn’t want to see anymore and following them would be even more desperate than sitting in a parking lot watching Shane’s motel room. God, what was I thinking?

We drove back to Kirstin’s in silence. I got in my car and drove away, not even bothering to reclaim the steaks I left in her fridge. The last thing I wanted to think about was the dinner that wasn’t going to happen.

I drove around town, not wanting to go home. I didn’t want to face Mike or my dad. Mike would never say the words ‘I told you so’, but he wouldn’t have to. He tried to warn me. But I wouldn’t listen. Just like I wouldn’t listen all those years ago when I first admitted my feelings to Shane.

22

Shane

A
lene reached across the front of the car and tried to take my hand, but I pulled away from her.

“Let’s get this straight. This is a one–time deal. Once I take care of this, we’re through. You won’t come to me, you won’t call me, hell, I’d be happy if you don’t talk to me.”

“You don’t mean that, Shane.” She put her hand down on the top of my leg and I carefully picked it off of me and dropped it back in her own lap.

My hands tightened around the steering wheel and I ground my molars together. Leave it to Alene to get in debt to drug dealers. She didn’t look like a coke head, but then they didn’t have a distinct look and she was really good at covering some of the physical symptoms.

I’d pay her debt and let them know I wasn’t going to help again. If they sold to her, they sold at their own risk. Somehow, she convinced them to keep her afloat, probably with blow–jobs. She tried with me when she first showed up at the motel, but I pushed her away.

There was no fucking way I was letting her get anywhere close to me. Not when I finally had Mya. I wasn’t going to let Alene ruin it.

Alene crossed her arms over her chest and pouted at my non–response. “Did Mya finally put out for you? She can’t be that good. She can’t keep a boyfriend for longer than a few weeks.”

I slammed on the breaks and pulled off onto the shoulder of the road. Too bad Alene had her seatbelt on. A very sick part of me would have loved to see her bash her pretty face hard against the dashboard.

I yanked the shifter into park and spun on her fast enough to make her flinch. I’d never hit a woman. Ever. But Alene made it difficult. “You don’t ever say her name again. Do you understand me?”