Gentlemen Prefer Curves: A Perfect Fit Novel (41 page)

“How did this happen?”

“She dropped her soccer ball in the parking lot and she ran after it. There was a truck pulling out and I went after her. I grabbed her arm to pull her away from the truck and I dislocated her shoulder in the process.” She went to Ruby’s bedside, smoothed her hair away from her face to kiss her forehead. “I didn’t mean to hurt her. I just wanted to get her out of the way. Thank God that truck slowed down when it saw me. It just barely tapped her.” She cupped Ruby’s cheeks and kissed every inch of exposed skin on her face.

Ruby opened her eyes. “You keep kissing me and kissing me.”

“I know. I’m not going to stop, either. I’m glad you’re okay. You scared me.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. Is Daddy here yet?”

“Yeah, Cherri must have gotten ahold of him. He’s right over there.”

“Hey, Rube.” He approached her, gently taking her little hand in his. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m okay. The doctor gave me medicine for my arm. Can we still go get frozen yogurt?”

“Yes. We can have whatever you want.”

*   *   *

Later that evening Belinda had given Ruby a bath and put her to bed. She kissed her probably a thousand more times since she left the hospital. She was going to be fine, but Belinda’s heart still raced when she thought about it. The child had taken ten years off her life today.

It could have been worse. It could have been so much worse, but it wasn’t. Ruby was safe in her bed, in one piece, and hopefully she had learned her lesson from all of this.

She went to the kitchen where Carter was cleaning up after dinner. The day had finally caught up to her, and so had the soreness that was starting to throb throughout her body. She had been hit by the truck, too. Her thigh and hip had taken most of the impact.

She went to Carter, whose back was turned to her, and wrapped her arms around him, resting her face on his wide strong back. He stiffened at her touch. She felt it immediately but she didn’t move away at first. Her body didn’t want her to.

“Is Ruby settled?”

“Yes. The pain medication the doctor gave her this afternoon made her sleepy. She asked why you didn’t come say good night to her when I did.”

“Go lie down,” he said with frost in his voice. “I’ll go alone.”

She stepped away from him, pulling him around so that she could see his face. “You have been short with me this whole evening. If you have something to say to me then I wish you would say it.”

“Just go to bed, Belinda. You don’t want me to say what I want to say to you.”

She put her hands on her hips, not backing down from him, refusing to walk on eggshells. “Say it, damn it.”

“How could you let her run out into a goddamn parking lot? I trusted you with her! Your only job was to keep her safe and you couldn’t even do that right.”

She recoiled at his words, feeling almost breathless. “You sound just like your father. I can’t do anything right? Am I your wife or your babysitter? I never meant for her to get hurt. I tried to stop her. I told her not to go. She didn’t listen. I went after her. What else did you want me to do?”

“Learn how to handle her in the first place. Learn how to be a damn parent.”

“Fuck you, Carter. That could just as easily have happened to you. She’s five years old. She ran after a ball, but she’s okay. She’s alive.”

“By the grace of God. She’s never been hurt with me. Maybe I’ve been stupid. Maybe I shouldn’t have let you near her.”

“Don’t go there. Don’t you dare go there. You came after me. You wanted this.”

“Well, maybe I don’t. Maybe I can’t trust you. She could have died today. You would have been the cause of that. You would have lost the most important thing in the world to me. And that’s got me thinking that maybe I don’t want you around her at all.”

She had thought she had been hurt by him before. He kept his marriage away from her, he kept part of his life a secret from her, but that was nothing compared with how hurt she felt right now. He didn’t want her around the most important person in his life and that meant he didn’t want her around him, either.

“Fine,” she said calmly even though calm was the last thing she felt. “I’ll go.”

“No!” They both looked down to see Ruby standing in the doorway. Her little face was red and twisted with anger, and her eyes were full of tears. “No. You won’t go.”

“I’m sorry, Ruby.” Tears stung at Belinda’s eyes, blinding her, but she refused to let them slip in front of Ruby. “I’m so sorry, baby. This is not your fault. But I have to go.”

She left then before her tears could slip out. Before she broke down in front of them.

*   *   *

“You get her back!” Ruby screamed at him. “You go get her back right now!”

Shit.
What the hell had he just done? He didn’t mean it. He didn’t mean any of those things he said to her. He was mad. The last few weeks were finally taking their toll on him. He kept thinking about the last time Ruby was hurt. He kept thinking about her fighting for her life. He kept thinking about the weeks he spent at her bedside. He kept thinking about afterward, when he had to raise her alone. He kept thinking about how mad he was at Belinda then. Belinda who left him. Belinda who threw away their marriage when she was supposed to love him.

He kept thinking about the past and because of that his future just walked out the door.

“You go now!” He took a step toward his daughter, reaching for her, not sure what else to do in that moment. He had never seen her so upset. This was his fault. He had screwed up a lot in his life, but he had never fucked up this bad.

“I’m sorry, honey.” He tried to hug her, but she shoved him away. She pounded on his shoulder with her fist.

“You’re not sorry. You were mean to her. You made her go away. You made my mommy go away.”

The sobs came then and he grabbed her, wrapping his arms tightly around her to stop her from struggling against him. “I’ll get her back,” he promised her. “I’ll get her back.”

He had to, because life was too hard without her.

*   *   *

“Are you sure you’re okay, my Pudge?” Carmina asked as she stroked Belinda’s hair. “Mommy can stay tonight it you want.”

“I’m okay,
Mamá
. You don’t have to stay.”

She had been back in her condo for a week now. It had been a week without Carter, a week without Ruby. Without the little girl who followed her around like a shadow, and tucked her little fingers into hers when they were out. Without the little one who totally changed her perspective on life. She missed her. She had missed Carter, too, but she missed Ruby like she missed a limb. It was just hard to function without her.

She hadn’t expected to fall in love with a kid. She hadn’t expected that the need to care for somebody else would satisfy her, but it did. She knew these past few months that she wanted to be a mother, but she never knew that she needed to be a mother; that it would be this important to her. But it was.

She needed her kid back, but how could she have Ruby in her life when Carter didn’t trust her with Belinda? He said that he didn’t want Ruby around her if she couldn’t keep her safe. It was bullshit. She would die for Ruby and if he couldn’t see that, if he didn’t know that by now, there was no helping him.

“What about me?” Ellis said, rubbing her growing belly. “I can stay over. I won’t hug you and kiss you like your mother, but I can help you do other stuff like set his clothes on fire. Or I could have his legs broken. I’m good at stuff like that. I used to be a lawyer. We wouldn’t even do jail time.”

She smiled at Ellis’s violent streak. “All I have to do is call my father,” she said. “I think he’s itching to put a beat-down on him.”

“Is Carter still calling?” Carmina asked.

“Yes. He only called ten times today. I think he’s getting tired. He called sixty times that first day.”

“Have you talked to him?” Ellis asked.

“No. There’s nothing for me to say. He doesn’t trust me with her. That’s never going to change. We can’t move on from that.”

“Don’t hate me for saying this, but I don’t believe that. I don’t believe that he doesn’t trust you with his kid. He was just upset. You know the thing with his father hurt him. And then he was faced with losing Ruby again. You know that had to kill him. He was probably just in a bad place when he said those things.”

“Is he going to say them every time we get into an argument? He’s supposed to love me. He was way too quick to turn on me when things got a little tough.”

Carmina and Ellis exchanged looks.

“What?”

“Nothing.” Her mother stood up and kissed her forehead. “Call me tomorrow. Okay?”

“Yeah, me too.” Ellis rose as well. “And no work tomorrow, either. You’ve still got that wicked bruise from the accident. I think I’m more pissed with him about that. You were hit by that truck, too, and he didn’t even seem to care. You could have died that day, too.”

“But I didn’t. I’m okay. I’ll be okay.”

They both looked at her disbelievingly. She didn’t blame them. She didn’t believe her words herself.

“Cherri will be over tomorrow,” Ellis said as she and Carmina walked out the door. “She found that southern pecan gelato you like. You two are going to commence the pig-out stage of the breakup. I wish I could be there for that, but the baby gets mad when I eat stuff I’m not supposed to.”

“We’ll pig out on shoes. Let’s go shopping next week.”

“Sounds like a plan. Good night, honey.” Ellis kissed her cheek.

“Yes, my Pudge. Have a good night,” Carmina said. “And call me if you need me.”

“I will. Good night.”

She closed the door behind them and went back to her couch, easing back down on her sofa carefully to avoid her still-aching side. She needed to snap out of this funk, this depression. She needed to get out of her house, she needed to come out of hiding, come out of this zombie state she was currently in, but she was afraid to. She was afraid to go out because she might run into him. He was the last person she wanted to see right now, even though she missed him. She was mad as hell at him but she missed him. She missed going to bed with him at night and waking up to him running his fingers through her hair. She missed how they would just sit in bed at night and talk. She missed showing up at his office with lunch sometimes. She missed his smell and the feel of his skin and the taste of his lips and she knew if she saw him again that missing would multiply tenfold. She refused to go back to him after a couple of
I’m sorrys
. She refused to be spoken to like that, to be treated without thought. She had put so much time into him, but it never seemed to work out. She could never seem to make it work with the man she loved.

There was a light knock at her door and she glanced at her clock. It was just past nine
PM
. Her mother and Ellis had barely been gone fifteen minutes. She thought about ignoring the knock, pretending she hadn’t heard it, but she didn’t. What was the point? All she was doing was sitting there with her painful thoughts.

She forced herself off her couch and answered her door. It wasn’t Ellis or her mother.

It was Ruby.

And she was alone.

“Hi,” she said softly. She had her backpack on her back and a pillow in her arms. “I came to live with you.”

“What?” She scooped Ruby up and smashed her against her, squeezing her tighter than she should have, but she couldn’t stop herself. She had missed her too much. “I’m so happy to see you, baby doll, but what are you talking about?”

“I’m very sad. I want to live here with you.”

“How did you get here?”

“I walked.”

“You walked here at night?” She pulled away from the child slightly. “Are you insane? Do you know what could have happened to you?”

“I’m sorry, Belinda. I was a bad girl last week in the park. I didn’t listen to you and Daddy got mad and you went away.” The tears streamed down her cheeks. “I miss you. I want to live with you now.”

“You’re not a bad girl. You’re not. This is not your fault. Your father and I had a fight, but it’s not your fault. I never want you to think that.”

“Then why won’t you come home?”

CHAPTER 26

Alone again … naturally.

Carter got out of the shower that night feeling no cleaner than he went in. He had stayed in for a long time, too long, letting the hot water rain over him, hoping it would make a small change in his mood. Maybe feeling cleaner wasn’t what he was looking for. He wanted to feel lighter, but he felt heavier than ever before.

This was worse than the first time Belinda had left. Much worse. The last time he had Bethany there to distract him, Bethany there to focus his anger on. He had Ruby there to wonder over. He had a major life change thrown at him, but now he just had his thoughts and time to think about how stupid he was. And all the wrong things he’d said and how his actions had ruined the best thing he had ever had. There was Ruby, too, who was so mad at him that she was barely speaking to him. Ruby who cried before bed and at random times of the day.

He had taken away her mother, she told him just that night as he put her to bed. She was so very mad at him. He went to her bedroom to check on her, thinking about how different the house felt since Belinda had gone, how quiet it was, how empty it felt. He had taken for granted sharing a meal with her. He had taken for granted being the first person to see her when she got up in the morning and the last person to see her before she went to bed at night. He missed their quiet times. He missed their lazy Sundays when they just lay in bed and watched TV all day with Ruby. He missed the smell of her on his sheets and the way she loved his kid. He missed her. He missed every part of her.

He needed her back.

He opened Ruby’s bedroom door—which was odd, because she never kept it closed while she slept. He walked inside and turned on the light, but she wasn’t there. Her bed was empty and unmade. There were no signs of her.

He backed out of the room and looked in the bathroom. Empty. The living room. Empty. The kitchen. Empty. She wasn’t there. She wasn’t there and he felt paralyzed. He reached for the phone, ready to call the police, when it rang in his shaking hands.