ImPerfectly Matched! (The Match #2) (18 page)

“Just like you to run from your problems instead of facing them.”

I lean forward. “My problems? You’re the one with the problem. I just fixed it for you.”

“Did you have an abortion?”

I feel the blood drain from my face. I hear my heart beating in my ears. I can’t form words that would make any sense so I sit looking into the face of a man who solidified my belief that I, Katherine Ann Teresa Brun, would never trust in my heart again, and would do everything in my power to avoid believing that fairytales and a happily ever after were anything but pretty stories with pretty ideas and pretty pictures.

“Did you?”

I shake my head no, because it’s the truth.

“I know you were pregnant. I know it was mine. So you wanna rethink that answer Katherine?”

RICCO

Natalia and Darby sit across from me coloring on the placemat while we wait for three prime rib dinners.

My girl looks so fucking happy. Darby is a sweetheart, even though at first she was kind of a little snot. She genuinely likes my kid, hell she’s wonderful with her.

She says she came back here because she’d rather spend time with Nat than get a job on the beach serving soft drinks. She says that type of job would be the equivalent of cleaning toilets.

“I’m fun-er,” Natalia smiles.

“Sure are,” Darby grins back at her.

I watch as she dots out the letters, N-A-T and takes Natalia’s hand and traces them.

“Nat, you just wrote your name.”

“I did?” she asks and then she laughs. “I did!”

“You did,” Darby laughs.

“Again.” She pushes the crayon to Darby and Darby does it again and again and again.

When the food comes she sets down the crayon and Nat grabs it and gives it to her. “Again.”

“Time to eat Nat,” I say.

“But-” Natalia starts to whine.

“Natalia,” I gently warn her.

“What if Darby goes home Daddy?”

“Kat can do it,” Darby smiles. “She taught me.”

Kat.

***

We walk into Kat’s place carrying bags of ingredients for ice cream sundaes. The girls wanted to stop for ice cream, I decided I’d like to make them, at Kat’s.

They’re settled in front of the TV watching Despicable Me, and I am setting up a buffet of sundae toppings. Bought out the fucking store honestly, they were having fun, and I was wasting time, thinking that Kat may be home by now, but clearly she wasn’t.

On a fucking date.

Do I like that shit? Fuck no I don’t but I like Kat, a lot.

I like her pussy, I am enjoying playing with her toys and throwing those fuckers out one by one. I like the way she smells and tastes, feminine and sweet, even though it is a complete contradiction to who she is at work.

I like Kat here, in her place and under me. I like that she doesn’t give herself to everyone, she keeps shit tight and to herself, and to the few people she lets in. That tight little circle was expanding as I push in hard to make damn sure it does, just like I do to her hot little box.

There’s a knock on the door and Darby jumps up and walks to the door. “Kat probably forgot her keys again.”

I feel relieved knowing that she’s not out with some dumb fuck and she’s home.

“Stephanie, come in.” She steps back opening the door wider and the little blonde chick walks in.

“Hey Darby.” She hugs her. “Look at you all grown up.”

“Look at you.” Darby steps back and looks at her. “Stephanie?”

Stephanie pulls her in to a tighter hug and I see her crying. “Where’s that sister of yours, I sure could use some of her strength.”

“Daddy what’s wrong with that girl?” Natalia asks in the way a three-year old does, loud and unaware that she may be hurting someone’s feelings.

“I’m fine, just got a bug in my eye,” Stephanie says wiping her tears away as she steps back.

“You need Kat?” Natalia asks.

“Yeah.” Stephanie forces a smile.

“She’s on a date. We got sundaes.” She waves her little hand toward the kitchen island as if ice cream and sprinkles will make everything better.

“I’m not very hungry,” she says and looks at me.

“Don’t have to be, just have to like ice cream.” Natalia takes her hand and drags her to the Island. “White?”

“Sounds good.” Stephanie pats her on the head.

As the three little women load up their bowls there is another knock. This time I get to the door in hopes to warn Kat she has company.

When I open it I see a dude.

“I’m sorry, I must have the wrong address.”

“You trying to sell something?” I ask because I’m thinking he has the right address; I see Kat’s fucking phone in his hand.

He huffs. “No.”

“Where’d you get the phone?” I ask swiping it out of his hand.

“Who the hell,” he starts and I lean on the door.

“Darby, you got Nat, I need to run to the store.”

“Of course,” she yells back.

“So this is Katherine’s house.”

I shut the door behind me. “No, but tell me why the fuck you have her phone.”

“Are you her brother or-”

“Listen asshole, you show up here with her phone looking like someone she’d just assume stab than deal with I’m gonna assume one of three things, you’re some sick fuck, you fucking stole it, or she gave it to you and my Kat doesn’t hand over her shit. So unless you answer the questions, I’m gonna beat them out of you, you hear me?”

“Your Kat?” He laughs. “She left it on our date this evening.”

“This evening,” I mock him.

“In my car,” he says snidely.

“And what, she jumped the fuck out while you were driving down the road to get the fuck away from you and left it behind?”

“She forgot it. I looked in her contacts this was the emergency address.”

“How the fuck did you know her password?” I snap.

“I took a guess and I was right. It’s been the same since she was at Harvard. I’m Owen Michaels, I used to date Katherine.” He holds out his hand like I’m gonna shake it. I don’t.

He rolls his eyes. “You said the name Darby, I know that’s her sister. Is her mother here as well? I ask because I know her father passed years ago. I know because I knew Katherine before she had to go,” he eyes me up and down and I know damn well he’s looking at my ink, “express herself.”

“Tell me Oscar,” I say trying not to fucking blow.

“It’s Owen,” he interrupts.

I shrug to say, ‘so fucking what’. “How’d the date go?”

“As well as expected,” he says smugly.

“Great then where the fuck is she?”

He looks uncomfortable which brings me worry and concern for my Kat.

He clears his throat. “She left her phone.”

“To get the fuck away from you.” I poke him pretty fucking hard in the chest and he steps back.

“I don’t know who you think you are, but it went well enough that we will be spending a weekend together at friends of ours engagement party. So tell Katherine, I’ll see her then.”

As he turns I have an incredible desire to kick him square in the ass to see him and his khaki Dickies and his navy blazer grass stained up, but I don’t, I’m a dad now.

She isn’t back, it worries me. As the dick pulls out in his Volvo, I snap a pic of his license plate because if I don’t find her I am going to hunt him down and kill him with my bare hands.

Something doesn’t feel right and it’s not fucking jealousy either. I walk over to my truck and get in. No fucking clue where I’m going, but I know one thing for sure, as tight lipped as she is about her Harvard days, she sure as hell wasn’t expecting to come face to face with a man who pissed on her art.

Her art, I think.

I pull up to the shop and I see a light coming from the back. I drive down the alley leading to the back and her car is parked there.

I get out, punch in the security code and walk in, shutting the door quietly behind me.

I walk down the dark hall toward the sound of music and a light coming from her room.

I walk to the doorway and look in.

Kat is lying on her table, feet planted on it, knees up with a sketchpad resting against them. She has a bottle of wine in her hand and her face is tear stained. The song playing comes to an end and then the same one starts up again. I know the voice, it’s Pink, but I don’t know the song.

My chest tightens immediately.

I knock and her not being startled tells me Kat’s fucking buzzing pretty hard.

She looks over, sees me, looks away and takes a drink.

“You okay?” I ask and walk over to her chair, sit and wheel it over next to her.

She shrugs and I hold up the phone. She takes it and gives a haughty laugh. I lean back and hit the volume on the old school boom box.

“Wanna talk about it?”

“Fuck no,” she says and yeah, she’s fucked up.

“Okay, well it’s obvious the fucker made you feel some kind of way, and Kat,” I pause until she looks at me, “no one is here but you and me so fucking talk.”

“How did you get this,” she holds up her phone.

“Some tool in Dickies and a blazer.” She smirks. “Says he used to be your man. That true?”

“Professor Michaels?” she slurs.

“I guess,” I say because it’s the first I heard that.

“He was no man.” She pushes up and her sketchpad falls to the ground.

“Good to know,” I say, because it fucking is.

“Says you’re spending the weekend together,” I begin. “Not gonna lie, it fucking pisses me off.”

Her jaw drops.

“What? Did you think I’d be okay with it?”

It snaps shut and she scowls.

“Cat got your tongue?”

She shakes her head.

“Alright then, let’s get you home. Your friend Stephanie showed up, she’s waiting for you and so is your sister.” I walk to the door and she’s still standing there just fucking looking at me.

Fuck!

“Don’t give a fuck what you do Kat, you fuck him, we don’t anymore.” I shrug like it means shit to me. “You want to relive your Ivy League experience, have at it. But you could have given me a heads up about needing time off. Piss on me but not this place.”

In order to keep my shit together I fucking walk.

She walks out, hits her key fob and I rush her and snatch up her keys. “You aren’t fucking driving!”

“No shit,” she pushes against my chest. “When the hell have I been one to drink and drive?”

“Who the fuck knows Kat.” I tap a finger on her head. “Seems to me things aren’t gearing right up here.”

She bats my hand away. “My father died because he was drunk and driving. Things will never be that fucked up!”

“Then what the fuck are you doing? Get in my truck!”

She opens the door and grabs her purse. “I’ll call a cab.”

I wrap my arm around her from behind and she starts kicking. I open the door to my truck and do my fucking best to put her in it gently, it ain’t easy.

I slam the door behind her and thankfully she stays put.

I get in and start the truck and she turns to me and starts yelling.

“Don’t you think I would have mentioned it if I was going away tomorrow? The fucking party is in two weeks! I am fucking responsible asshole, and I have never once pissed on you or this place! Don’t you ever talk to me like that again! Ever! I will lop that fucking dick of yours off and shove it in your ass!”

“You better shut the hell up Kat or so help me God I will pull this truck over and spank that ass, but this time you won’t get my dick to take away the sting.”

“Fuck you,” she hisses.

“Not if you’re fucking him.” I stop at the light and look over. “You hear me?”

“Loud and clear asshole!”

I grip the steering wheel tighter because my hand is aching to sting her ass and I’m giving less fucks now than ever before.

Silence is fucking deafening.

***

I lay in bed with my girl, from the time I scooped her up and hauled ass out of Kat’s place until the time we got home she complained of a stomach ache. I was pretty sure it was the steak she destroyed topped with ice cream but you never know.

At three in the morning she throws up and I know my little one is sick.

For the first time in years I shoot a text to Zack and ask him to cover me that I won’t be in today. He lets me know he’ll reschedule my appointments and I thank him.

I clean her up, the the rest of the shit and we lay in her tiny little bed with her shivering beside me. Fuck.

KAT

I listened to Stephanie cry and fuck if she didn’t make me cry. Partly due to the fact that she was so hurt, partly due to that fucking asshole showing up, and partly because I hurt my friend, him, Ricco.

Poor Darby even cried. Partially because we were and partially because she’s a teenage girl, normal ones cry a lot. Hell I did, behind closed doors of course.

Stephanie put in her two-
day
notice, packed up her shit, bailed on her lease, and told me she was staying with me. She worked for Pete’s uncle at his office. She was a dental assistant.

I lay in bed, sandwiched between sobbing Stephanie and down and out Darby thinking of just him. No, not the asshole who tricked me into meeting him, the asshole who was still sending messages up until an hour ago when I blocked his number.

Ricco.

Fucking Ricco.

He started this shit, yet blamed my drunken wandering hands until admitting he spanked his mountain cock thinking of me for years.

Now I’m not a delusional female and think because a man jerks it to my image he’s in love. Shit is untrue. I know that men look at a woman and wonder what they’d be like in bed. I took on that trait when I gave up on giving a fuck. The difference is I never, not once, looked at my co-workers and thought of fucking them. Work is work… well work was work.

We all slept in until noon. Normally I was at work at this time, today I would not be going in early.

My chest tightens at the thought and not because of Ricco, or the shop, but because for three days I have hung out with… her.

Fucking kids, I don’t like them I swear I don’t, but she’s, well… she likes art, yeah that’s it. And she’s cute as hell and funny. Plus, she expects us to be there.