Let Me Love You (Love #4) (23 page)

“What’s up, Cooper?” Eli says when he answers the phone.

“Just calling to check in. Things have been busy, as you can imagine, and I’m not getting as much time as I thought I would.” I say, attempting to explain why I haven’t called in two weeks before he even asks.

“Yeah, yeah I get it.” His voice sounds tired and stressed, mirroring my own. “Things are going good. I had to let one of the bartenders go last night though.”

I feel a pang of guilt; this is why I should be there, for all this kind of stuff. It’s not fair that I’ve dumped all this on him. When we first started talking about opening the club I stressed to him that this could happen and he said it was completely fine and he could handle it.

“Who was it?”

Eli sighs, “Bri.”

I didn’t have a good feeling when Eli hired her but I didn’t say anything, figuring it was just me being extra picky.

“What happened?”

I hear him shuffling papers, “Her drawer was almost one hundred and fifty dollars short.”

“Damn.” We set up each bartender with their own drawers so they would be held responsible for anything that went in and out of it.

“Exactly.

“How’s everything else? Jaylinn?”

Eli sighs heavily, “She’s moving on.”

“Moving on?”

“Look, I don’t want to tell you this but you need to know. I don’t think it’s my place but whatever.” Eli curses under his breath. “She came in the other night with someone.”

God damn it. I look up to the sky and shake my head, annoyed, pissed, you name it, I feel it. I knew this was coming but in some sick kind of way I was hoping she’d wait it out a little longer. Like forever.

“After they left I asked Layla about it,” Eli continues. “She said it was some guy from her class.”

Fuck. I rub my hand over my chest in an attempt to ease the stabbing pain in my heart. It doesn’t help at all. If anything it just spreads the feeling over my entire body, makes me feel like I can’t breathe and my arms and legs go numb.

“From what I saw they didn’t seem to be having a good time. The dude was tall as hell and they just looked fucking weird together.”

He’s trying to make the situation better for me but no matter what it’s not going to hurt any less. I can’t be what she needs and I should be happy that she’s moving on with her life but I’m not. Not at all.

“Hold on a second, someone’s at the door.” Eli yells at whoever it is to come in. “Oh hey,” Eli clears his throat. “Um, have a seat. I’m just finishing up my conversation.”

My heart stops beating when Jaylinn’s voice replies, “I can come back.”

I take the phone away from my ear and hang my head. What is going on? Why is she there? I reluctantly put the phone back to my ear.

“Cooper?” Eli calls.

“Yeah I’m here.” I say defeated, my heart shattering in a million pieces.

“Well besides that everything else is going fine. Oh and everything at your house is fine too. I’ve been stopping by every other day to get the mail and shit.” Eli speaks quickly. He knows that I heard her.

“And you’re taking care of her too I see.” I don’t have to say her name. Not only did I ask Eli to check on my house but I asked that he kept an eye on Jaylinn as well. I know she’s going to be spending some time there with Layla working at the bar when I’m not around.

Eli huffs, “It’s not like that dude.”

“I know, I’m being an asshole.” I rub the sweat from my forehead. “How is she doing, really?”

“Pretty well.” He’s not providing details which means she’s still in his office.

I lean back against the warm wall and put my hand in my pocket. “That’s good.”

“Yeah.”

Mason walks out and looks right and then left before spotting me. I nod my head towards the car and I follow behind him.

“Well I’ll let you go. I’ll call tomorrow before my late morning practice.” I tell Eli.

Jaylinn laughs at something and it’s a kick to my gut.

Eli clears his throat, “Sounds good man.”

“Later.”

I end the call before he can even reply back. I didn’t need to hear anything else. I have enough thoughts running through my head of what could be going on. I know Eli wouldn’t put the moves on Jaylinn but in the pit of my stomach something doesn’t feel right. From the way Eli talks about Layla I thought for sure he would try to go after her. I’ve warned him that she had a boyfriend but he didn’t seem too concerned about it.

Mason starts up the car after I’ve climbed in and closed the door.

“You hungry?” I ask.

Mason looks at me like I just said something stupid, “Do you even need to ask?”

We stop at a steak house on the way home. It’s the first real meal we’ve had since getting here. Like I said, we don’t really get any down time.

I rest my elbows on the table and immediately cringe from the sharp pain that shoots right up my arm.

Fuck.

“You fucked up your elbow didn’t you?” Mason asks, gauging my reaction.

“No.” I say through clinched teeth.

“You’re a hard headed asshole you know that?” Mason shakes his head giving that look I know. “You need to get that shit checked out.”

I cradle my left elbow to my stomach and rest my right arm on the table. “I’m fine.”

Mason snorts and takes another swig of his beer. The waitress comes over and we place our order for food and Mason orders us a shot.

“You need something for that elbow.” He states, finishing off his beer.

I pick up my beer now that I’ve finally got the pain to stop radiating up my arm, and guzzle half of it in one pull. I wipe my mouth with my arm, “Yeah maybe I do.”

I’ll never tell Mason how bad it really hurts. I’m not a pussy, I’ll watch it for the next day or so and everything will be fine again. I down the rest of my beer as the waitress sets our shots down on the table.

We down them quickly, and a few more after that, and talk shit about the other guys on the team. Who looks good, who is playing like shit, who’s not going to make it through the season. A few girls have come over to our table and tried to flirt with us but we both blew them off. There’s no way I could even think about another girl right now and neither would Mason.

“You ready to get out of here?” Mason asks.

I roll my neck, feeling the stiffness settling deep into my muscles. “Yeah, but stop at the liquor store first.”

Mason chuckles, “That’s what I thought.” Asshole just had to rub it in my face that he’s right about my elbow killing me.

I give him the finger and make my way to the bathroom before we leave. When I get back to the table Mason has paid the bill and is waiting for me at the bar.

“Ready?”

“Yup, let’s get the hell out of here.”

We stop and pick up a twelve pack before we head back to our place.

“Coach is going to fucking rip us a new ass tomorrow, you know this right?” Mason says as he places the bottle opener over the bottle cap and pops it off.

I shrug, not really giving a shit. “Won’t be the first or the last.”

Sitting down on the couch, I take the beer Mason hands me. He walks back out to the kitchen to turn off the light before joining me in the living room. I scroll through the channels trying to find something on TV, bringing my beer up to my mouth and taking a swig. I stop on Transformers and decide to watch it since there doesn’t seem to be anything better on. Megatron is blowing shit up.

“I never thought I would say this but I really don’t want to be here. I feel like I’m failing Hailey by leaving her all alone.” Mason says taking a swig of his beer. “She cries every time we talk.”

I nod, “Nah, you’re not. She knows the role and if she wasn’t up for it she wouldn’t have stayed around.”

“You miss Jay?”

Inhaling sharply I narrow my eyes at my brother. “What the hell would make you ask that?”

He shrugs then sits up and takes his shirt off. “Just a question bro, relax.”

I turn back to the movie; I’m watching it but not really paying attention to all the action on the screen. I lay my head back and close my eyes, an image of Jaylinn comes to the forefront of my vision; she’s lying in my bed with her chocolate colored hair fanned out across my pillow. She’s giving me a shy innocent smile, lying there with my number five baseball jersey on and a pair of panties. She’s beautiful. Her pretty blue eyes speak volumes to me, she’s turned on and wants me.

Mason kicks my foot. “Don’t fall asleep on me. We’ve still got four beers to go.”

I glare hard at Mason for interrupting my day dream. “I’m not sleeping asshole, just resting my eyes.”

“That’s what you always say.”

I fucking miss my girl. There is no doubt that I will never get over the feeling that I’ve lost something that was so important to me. She’ll always be there, within reaching distance but far enough away that I’ll never be able to hold her. Things are so fucked up.

I reach up and grip my hair in my hands. “I miss her.” I mumble. I don’t know if Mason could have even heard me.

“About fucking time you admitted it.”

I sit up and rest my elbows on my knees and hiss as the pain shoots up my left arm again. “Fuck.” I rub my left elbow with my right hand, massaging the pain away. “What the hell do I do, Mason?”

Mason takes a swig of his beer, “I don’t know because I don’t know what happened.”

And there it is; the root of my problem. I haven’t told a single person about that night, or what the problem really is, because I made a promise that I wouldn’t tell anyone. I just don’t know what to do to move past it, so that we can be together like she and I both want.

“I can’t, Mason. I made a promise and I can’t break that.” I explain.

Mason watches me for a long minute. “Sometimes those promises are meant to be broken.”

I think back to the one promise I made to myself and broke it. When I agreed to let her come to that party, I promised I would keep an eye out for her and make sure she didn’t get into any trouble. Look where that got me.

I go into the kitchen and grab another beer for the both of us. I walk back into the living room and hand it Mason.

“You’re going to need that.” I sit down next to him and replay the night of the party for him giving him the play by play up until I realized Jaylinn was missing.

“Okay, I don’t see any problems.” Mason says looking confused like he’s missing a part of the story.

My body starts to shake and sweat as flashes of Kevin hovering over a naked Jaylinn surface. I grip the end of the couch and take a few calming breaths.

“I looked for her everywhere. No one had seen where she went. I ran upstairs and started looking in all the rooms but they all came up empty. I was staring at the last door and I knew something wasn’t right.” My stomach tightens. “No one would answer the door but I knew someone was in there, I heard the whimpering. I broke the door down and…” I swallow hard and Mason curses. “Kevin was laying there on top of Jaylinn. I yanked him off and when I got a glance at Jay all I saw was red, Mase. Fucking red.” I rub at my knuckles. “I kept hitting him in the face until he finally stopped fighting back. He fucking drugged her, Mason, she couldn’t move, he blindfolded her too.” My stomach rolls. “When I got a closer look at her she had a hand print on her right cheek, it was bruising already. I pulled the blindfold off her and her mascara was running down her face.”

Mason’s face is red, his eyes wide and panicked. “He didn’t did he? Please,
God
, tell me he didn’t.”

I shake my head, my eyes on the floor. “He didn’t. I made it just in time.”

“Thank fucking God.” Mason sighs in relief.

I continue on, “Do you know what it felt like to have to dress her Mase? She was fucking helpless. She couldn’t move, couldn’t even lift her head.” I pound my fist on the couch. “After I got her dressed I told her I had to get her out of there. I wanted to take her to the hospital but she wasn’t having it. She begged me to take her home with me.” Angry tears slip from my eyes; I reach up and wipe them away. “I love that fucking girl, Mason. I have for a long time but I denied myself because I didn’t think she had feelings for me.” I wipe more tears away. “Every damn time I see Jaylinn naked I see him on top of her. I can’t get it out of my head.”

I sit up and pinch the bridge of my nose. I laid it all out for Mason and while it hurts like a son of a bitch to relive that night again I feel a sense of relief. A weight has lifted and I finally feel like the dark cloud is turning into a gloomy sky.

“Damn, Coop.” Mason curses. “No fucking wonder you pushed her away. How the hell have you been dealing with this and not saying anything to anyone?”

I scrub my face with my hands. “I just have. There was no other way until now.”

“Cooper,” Mason says in a commanding tone. “You shouldn’t have kept all that in.” Mason places a hand on my shoulder, offering his support. “You should have come to me a long time ago Cooper. That’s some heavy shit neither of you should have handled on your own.”

“I made a promise. I
don’t
break them.”