Not a Chance (24 page)

"Well, she might be ready," Arden said. "But she can wait. Don't let her push you around."

Dustin glanced at her, a hint of a smile forming. "It's hard to say no."

"I'm sure. But you've only been dating a couple of weeks. Set your boundaries early so she doesn't form expectations that you're not comfortable with."

Dustin laughed. "That's some damned good advice. You should have your own column in the paper."

"Right," Arden said sarcastically. They rode the rest of the way in silence. Arden was glad to get out of the car and away from him.

At home she gathered up the basket of things that belonged to Nick. She got the ring out of her purse and tossed it in. Her plan was to drive to the bank and put the stuff in Nick's car. Then go inside and break up with him. And be home by lunch. But her phone rang again.

"Yeah?" she said, frustrated that she kept getting interrupted from this task.

"Hey, Arden," said Shannon. "Could you come over in a few minutes?"

"Sure. What's going on?"

"Nothing. Vince wants to talk to you. I don't know why. But he didn't want to call you himself because he hates talking on the phone."

Arden smiled. That sounded like Vince. But she couldn't figure out what he wanted from her. They weren't exactly close friends. "Okay," Arden said. "I'll be there in a little while."

She hung up. Okay, she thought. Amended plan. Talk to Vince, then break up with Nick.

Arden drove to the café where Shannon greeted her with a kiss on the cheek. "Vince isn't here yet. Can I get you anything?"

"Coffee. Please."

Shannon hustled off to the kitchen. Arden took a table in the corner. Vince showed up and sat across from her.

"Thanks for coming," he said, in that low, booming voice of his.

"No problem. Did you want to talk about Alice? Because as her friend, everything she says to me is confidential."

Vince's face remained stony. "I can talk to Alice myself. She's my wife. She'll always be my wife. I came to talk about my next door neighbor, Clint Holbrook."

Arden was taken aback. She didn't have any connection to Clint.

"I'm buying his farm," Vince said.

"Congratulations," Arden replied, not sure why she should care.

"Shut up and listen."

Arden's jaw dropped, but Vince didn't let her object.

"He's going bankrupt. Can't hold onto his farm. I offered to help him out, but he decided he just wanted to move on. So I'm buying it off him. I asked him how come he was having money problems. He said he took out all his savings and gave it to Nick to invest. That's how come I wanted to talk to you. I wanted you to know."

Arden's brows drew together. "I don't understand."

"I assume it's the same investment opportunity that Nick came to me with. Some sort of corn hybrid for biofuel or something. Nick said he was investing and the return was huge and about as sure a thing as you can get."

"Did you invest, too?"

"No. I keep my money tucked under my mattress. But Clint did. And the Raymers. And Lloyd Redding. Probably a bunch more folks, but those three were convinced enough to put all their eggs in Nick's basket. I guess some FDA or EPA or some government agency put a halt to the project with a bunch of investigations and regulations and so no one saw their money again. Nick just told them that was the risk they took. Which I guess is right. But these people weren't rich, city speculators...they were friends and neighbors...working folks.

Arden felt all emotion drain from her. She sat back and stared in front of her.

"You don't seem surprised," Vince said.

"I'm not."

"Well, I wasn't going to bother you with it," he said. "But Travis thinks you're the best thing since camouflaged duct tape, so I figure maybe you're a nice person and might want to know this about the man you're fixing to hitch yourself to."

"Thank you," Arden said. She felt terrible. She knew Vince was telling the truth. Nick wouldn't have troubled himself worrying about the consequences of financial loss to the people in this town. He'd always had money. It would be nothing to him. But when she recalled the image of June and Rory lying together frozen in the attic, she realized she should never have been with Nick.

Vince pushed his chair back, about to stand up.

"How are you?" Arden asked, thinking about Alice.

"I'm fine."

"You and Alice are doing alright?"

Vince clenched his jaw tight and Arden saw tears spring to his eyes. "We're fine," he said.

"She'll come around, Vince," Arden said softly. She hated to see him in pain. It reminded her of how Travis looked every time she rejected him.

"She hates me. I don't think there's any coming back from that," Vince said.

"She doesn't hate you."

"She used to chase me around. You probably don't remember. She was just a little girl. She called me Mr. Evans. I'd be at church with my first wife and Alice would come running up to me. 'Mr. Evans, Mr. Evans!' And then she'd ask me to marry her. Once she put a ribbon in my hand, all solemn like, and told me ladies always gave a ribbon to their chosen knight. After Kate left, I never wanted to fall in love again. But Alice swore to me on her life that she would never break my heart. Wish I'd known then that she was a liar."

"Why did you marry her? As careful as you were with your heart after Kate left...you went and gave it to the most volatile, unpredictable woman on the face of the planet. We used to think she'd never get married."

"Why would you think that?"

"Because nobody likes her," Arden said, certain that he must have been aware of that fact.

He wasn't, though. He looked confused and a little hurt. "Nobody likes Alice? Why?"

Arden laughed. "Because she's a bitch. Even she admits it. How do you not know it?"

Vince looked even more confused. "I guess I never noticed. Up until her parents got divorced, we had a fairly blissful marriage. But you like her, don't you? And Shannon and Emma?"

"Of course."

"Good. Because she needs friends. You'll take care of her for me since I can't, won't you?"

Arden swallowed, a lump forming in her throat. It was so pitiful and heart-breaking. She simply nodded.

"Good. I have to go. Don't tell Alice we talked." He stood and left.

Arden stared down at the table and lost track of time.

Arden had parked outside of the bank and sat there for almost an hour. She finally realized that she didn't want to do this in public. Too unpredictable. The situation had the potential to be completely humiliating. So she'd gone home and killed time. When she was sure Nick would be finished with work and would have gone home, she went to his house. She walked up the steps to his front door with the laundry basket of his things on her hip.

He opened the door, but didn't smile. Instead he stood tall and proud, clearly certain he was the superior one in the relationship. "Come to apologize, at last?" he asked.

"To break up with you. May I come in?" She didn't wait for an answer and instead shoved past him into the front hallway. She tossed the basket down next to the stairs and then reached in her purse to retrieve the black velvet bag that contained his ring. He was staring at her in shock, now, as he closed the door behind him.

"I was going to break up with you because you clearly don't respect me and I very obviously don't love you," Arden said. "And then I talked with someone who told me that you were the one who invested the money that bankrupted the Raymers."

"Did Ashley tell you that? I told you not to believe anything that comes out of her mouth!"

Arden shook her head. "Someone else told me. Also that you invested Lloyd Redding's money. You saw the paper a couple of weeks ago, didn't you? He committed suicide."

Nick put on his patient-father look. "Arden, people commit suicide for many reasons. Everyone who invested did it because they wanted to. They knew the risks involved."

"But why would you pitch an investment like that to people like them? Why, Nick?"

"Because the venture needed capital. My partner raised half of it and I had to come up with the rest. It should have been a very profitable investment, but it flopped. These things happen. We'll recover."

Arden stared at him in disgust. "You'll recover. Clint Holbrook is having to sell his farm. Others have lost their lives. These people aren't businessmen...they're farmers. How could you do this?"

"It's what I do, Arden. I don't want to work for your father forever."

"How come you never told me about any of this?"

"I've told you about the investment. You just weren't interested. I could tell you weren't listening. You never listen to anything I say."

"Well I'm listening now. I truly thought you were a basically good and decent person. But this...this is low. And you don't even feel any remorse."

"I refuse to be held responsible for the decisions of others. I presented an opportunity. Some folks took it, others didn't. That's their choice, Arden."

She shook her head, biting back tears of frustration. "You didn't see those two people, frozen in their attic, clinging to each other. They were still young, Nick. They had their retirement years to look forward to. You took that from them. Justify it any way you want, but as far as I'm concerned, there's blood on your hands."

Nick rolled his eyes and looked away. "Stop being so dramatic. You're acting like a spoiled princess."

She laughed then. This was what Travis had often accused her of. "I lied to you. Something did happen between me and Travis. I didn't sleep with him. But I do have feelings for him."

Nick seemed to harden all over with tension. "Arden, you and I are going to get married. Maybe it will be just a paper marriage. Maybe we'll live in separate bedrooms and screw around with other people. But I'm not losing out on this investment."

"Ha! I knew it!" She pointed her finger at his chest. "You're just after my money. You're a lying, cheating, conniving..."

"And you're no better than me with all your false declarations of love and fake orgasms all the time dreaming about some disgusting, worthless mechanic!"

"This is over, Nick. I'm done." She threw the ring bag at him.

He let it drop to the ground. "No you're not," he said. He strode toward her and before she could back away he was gripping her shoulders, digging his fingers harshly into her flesh. "You and I are going to marry. Because if we don't, your parents will disown you. You'll have nothing. And then you'll go running to your filthy mechanic. Which you may think is fun at first. But when you have to scrape and save to pay your bills and the novelty fun of having sex with a grease-covered, flannel-clad knuckle dragger wears off, you'll realize just how good you had it with me. So you're going to save yourself the torment and marry me now. And we're going to put smiles on our faces and look like the perfect couple to all of our friends."

"Let go of me!" she shouted. She tried to shove him away, but he held tight. She kicked him in the shin, which momentarily broke his grip. He hauled back and slapped her with the back of his hand, his big class ring catching her cheekbone. It didn't break skin, but it would definitely bruise.

Arden had never been hit before and was overwhelmed with a wave of terror and humiliation. She turned and ran as fast as she could. He didn't pursue her and she drove home and fled to her room where she proceeded to sob harder than she'd ever done before.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Arden had avoided seeing Travis for the rest of the week. She called him a couple of times to see how the baby was doing and to reassure him that they were still on for Saturday. But she was hoping the bruise from Nick's ring would disappear enough that she could at least hide it with makeup. But Saturday night came and it was still fairly visible. It had faded some and the swelling was down, but there was no covering it up. So she put it out of her mind.

She climbed out of the shower and dried off. Then she put on pink lace bra and panties she'd just bought the day before. After admiring herself in the mirror for a few moments, she dressed in a pair of jeans and a white, button-up blouse. She kept the top three buttons undone. She tried the fourth, but then decided that would be too slutty. She brushed her hair. Tried it up. Then back down again. Then up. And finally left it down, hanging loose over her shoulders.

The doorbell rang. She ran to her bedroom window. She couldn't see the front door, but she could see Travis's car in the driveway. Forcing herself to swallow down her excitement, she calmly walked downstairs and opened the door.

Travis's smile vanished. He shoved a bouquet of roses at her and then reached for her face, leaning in close to examine it. "What happened?" he asked, his voice full of sympathy.

Arden pulled her face back and shoved her nose in the roses. "This was nice of you."

"Yeah. I haven't dated in forever, minus one-night-stands and short flings; so I didn't know whether people still brought flowers or not. What happened to your face?"

"Come on, I'll put them in water." She led him to the kitchen where she got a vase from the china cabinet and put the roses in it. She turned to face him and saw he was still staring at the bruise. "Hey! I got new underwear," she said. And then she hooked her thumb in her waistband at the hip and pulled it down far enough to show the lace at the top of her panties.

This worked for a moment. He grinned and turned a light shade of red in the face. "Nice," he said. Then his eyes drifted back up. "So...did you get in another fight or something? You're becoming quite the scrapper, aren't you?"

She turned to a cookbook she had laid out on the counter. "You ready to figure out how to make spaghetti and meatballs."

She felt Travis's hand on her lower back. "If it was Nick," he said softly, "I promise I won't let it ruin our evening. But I am going to have to kill him."

She turned and looked up at him. "It wasn't Nick. It was an accident. And I don't want to talk about it."