PowerShift: Skid Row Kings Series, #2 (20 page)

“Yeah, go. That’s fine.”

“You’ll stay here until I get back? You and Levi can sleep in my bed if we’re gone for a while.”

“Um, I don’t know Mitch. I thought I could have Leelee give me a ride home. I don’t want to be in the way.”

I reached up and cupped her cheek. “You’re never in the way, Scar. You and Levi are never in the way.” She nodded her head but didn’t say anything. “Just stay, OK?” I pressed a quick kiss to her head and patted Levi on the back. “Wait for me.”

“You better go, Mitch,” she whispered. Something wasn’t right, but I didn’t know what it was, and I couldn’t stay to figure out what it was.

“I’ll be back, Scar. Don’t leave me.”

She bowed her head, snuggling into Levi. “OK,” she whispered.

That’s all I could ask for right now. I jogged over to Luke’s idling truck that he was sitting in, waiting for me and I climbed up and slammed the door shut. I looked one more time at Scarlett and Levi knowing something wasn’t right, and I didn’t know if she would be here when I got back.

Fuck, I hoped she would still be here. But if she wasn’t, I was damn sure going to find her.

______________

Scarlett

I didn’t stay. I couldn’t stay.

I had heard everything Violet and Leelee had told me, but I was still running scared.

After Kurt had taken off and Levi freaked out over all the yelling, I knew the best thing for him was to go home. Whenever Manny and I would yell, he would do the same thing. Leelee and Greg had given us a ride home, and all I could think about the whole way home was Mitch and what he was doing. Well that, and what the hell Leelee was doing with Greg. The conversation was so stilted in the car, that the uncomfortable silence was welcome when Leelee and Greg stopped talking.

Levi had finally fallen asleep twenty minutes ago, and I was getting ready for bed myself. Granted, I would be sleeping on the floor tonight and not the air mattress. Levi had asked right away where the bed was when he walked into my room, and I had just told him it had popped, and new beds would be coming tomorrow. Thankfully he hadn’t asked how it had popped.

I had just filled my wine glass full of my favorite Boones Farm when there was a knock on the door. I stood there with my glass in hand and just stared at the door.

“Scarlett,” he called. “Open the door.”

I glanced down the hallway, making sure Levi’s door was shut and walked over to the door but didn’t open it. I still didn’t know what I was doing or going to do. I liked Mitch, hell if I was honest with myself, more than liked Mitch, but I still hesitated.

When Levi and I had moved here, I told myself that I was going to make a new life on my own, and I didn’t need anyone besides Levi, but then Mitch came along, blowing all of those plans out of the water.

“Scarlett, please. I’m worried about you.”

I reached out, my hand on the handle, but I still didn’t open it. “I don’t think I can do this, Mitch.”

“Scar, open the door. I don’t want to talk to you through the damn door.”

Shit. I turned the handle and Mitch pushed it open, elbowing his way into my apartment. “You left.”

“Um, yeah.” I closed the door, leaned against it and took a sip of my wine. “Levi needed to go home, and Leelee gave us a ride.”

“I wish you would have stayed, at least tonight. You don’t have a bed to sleep on.”

“I’ll be fine sleeping on the floor for one night, Mitch. I’ve slept in worse places.”

“Scar, please.” He reached out and brushed his finger over my cheek. “Come back to my place. I’ll grab Levi and he can sleep on the couch.”

“Mitch, no.” I stepped out of his reach and walked into the kitchen.

“Scar, what the hell is going on. I know you were upset when I left, but I don’t know why. Is this about Levi knowing about us? He was going to find out eventually.”

“It’s not that, Mitch. Or, well, it is, but it’s more than that.”

“Then tell me what it is, and I’ll make it better.”

“That right there
is
the problem, Mitch. You just come in here, fixing everything without me even asking you to.”

“I’m not going to stand by and watch you struggle, Scar. You needed a car, you needed someone to watch Levi, you needed a Goddamn bed,” Mitch boomed

“I only need a bed because you popped mine,” I hissed.

“Pretty sure you were an intricate part of popping that sorry excuse for a bed.”

“Ugh, that’s not the point, Mitch. How am I supposed to know that I can do things on my own if you’re always there fixing my problems before I even know I have one?” I set my glass down and propped my hands on my hips. “I left Manny because he was hurting me, but also because I needed to live my own life. I needed to prove to myself that I can do this on my own.”

“Who the hell says you need to do it on your own? If you have someone there to help, take the damn help. I’m not going to walk away so you can prove to yourself some asinine idea that you need to struggle to make it.”

“I can’t expect you to always come along and rescue me.”

“When are you going to see, you rescued yourself. You are the one who left Manny, and drove halfway across the country and started a new life. You saved yourself.”

I shook my head. “That was three days of my life, Mitch. Not three years. I just… I just need to know when you leave that I can do this on my own. I can raise Levi by myself and not have to depend on anyone.”

“This is ridiculous.” Mitch paced the length of the living room. “Who’s going to watch Levi when you’re working? You know he hates going to work with you.”

“I’ll find a daycare. I’ve saved up some money, and I should be able to swing it.”

“You’d rather send Levi to daycare then let him stay with me?”

“Mitch, I can’t expect you to uproot your whole life for Levi and me. How many children did you watch before I moved here?” Mitch tossed his hands up in the air and continued pacing. “I like you, Mitch, so much, but it’s almost too much at once. I just left Manny, and now I’m here with you. I haven’t been alone in so long that I don’t really know who I am.”

“So with me, you can’t figure out who you are? This is bull shit, Scar,” he boomed.

I flinched at his words. I didn’t want to hurt him, but I didn’t know what else to do. “Mitch, I don’t want to-”

“Stop, I get it, Scar. I’ll give you some space, but I’m not fucking going anywhere. I’ll be here at eight to pick up Levi, and I’ll watch him while you work.”

“Mitch, no. I-” He held his hand up, cutting me off.

“You need daycare. I’m just doing what a daycare would do. Just think of it that way. You want to do this on your own, that’s fine. But just know, I didn’t want to step back, you made me.” He cradled my cheek and pressed a kiss to my forehead. “I’m not going away.” His thumb wiped away the tears that were falling from my eyes and then he was gone.

He walked out without looking back and closed the door behind him.

I looked around my apartment, and I’d never felt more alone.

I knew this was what I asked for, but I couldn’t help but feel like I had just made the worst decision of my life.

______________

Chapter 29

Mitch

“What the hell are you doing here?”

“I could ask the same of you. I figured you would have been upstairs with Vi.”

“She passed out, and I couldn’t sleep, came down here to work on the car.”

I had driven around for an hour after leaving Scarlett’s, trying to figure out what the hell I was going to do. I had finally ended up back at the shop and was surprised to see Luke working on his Charger. “So, what the hell are you doing here?”

I didn’t really know what the hell I was doing here. I should have told Scarlett she was wrong, but I knew she had to figure that out on her own. “Well, I think Scarlett broke up with me.” I grabbed the wrench Luke had laying on the fender and leaned into the car.

“I hope it didn’t have to do with Kurt and the bullshit he pulled today.”

“No, at least I don’t think it did.” I loosened the bolt on the radiator and helped Luke lift it out of the car. “She didn’t even mention Kurt.”

“Good. Vi had said that Levi was pretty shaken up, and they went home right after we left.” We rested the radiator on the ground, and we both looked down at it.

“I don’t know what the hell to do, Luke.”

“Well, what do you want to do?” He pulled a rag out of the back pocket of his jeans and wiped his hands.

“I wanna pound on her fucking door until she lets me in and make her change her mind.” Changing her mind wasn’t the only thing I wanted to do to her, but Lord knew when the next time would be that I would be able to touch her.

“Then why aren’t you?”

“Because I know that’s not what she wants or needs. She had a shit life, Luke, and I don’t want to add to it and make it even shittier. I want her to choose to be with me because that’s what she wants, not because I made her.” I ran my hands over my head and closed my eyes. Had I been forcing her this whole time to be with me and she just finally had the chance to stand up to me?

“From what I saw of her, she didn’t act like she was being forced to be with you.”

“Then why the hell doesn’t she want to be with me?” I had so many fucking questions, I couldn’t make heads or tails of them all.

“Why did she break up with you?”

“She said she needed to know that she would be OK if we would ever break up. That she could support herself and Levi and not rely on anyone.”

“So, just take a step back. Let her be. I mean, you did buy her a fucking car and watch her kid for her while she worked. I get what she’s saying. You never know if you can make it unless you try.”

“Why the hell can’t I be there to help her? I’m not trying to take over her life.”

“Mitch, come on. Think about it. Look around at this place. Do you think I could have done this on my own if I had someone giving me everything? I had to fucking earn it. Work hard for it.”

“It took you fucking years to build this place up to what it is, Luke. I’m not going to wait fucking years for Scarlett.”

“I get you, but is she worth waiting years for?” He tossed the rag at me and slammed the hood of the car shut. “I don’t think you have to wait years, Mitch. But I do think that you need to give her space, and let her realize she needs you in her life.”

None of this made sense. I needed to step back and let her realize she needed me? Why I couldn’t be with her while she realized that she needed me? “This fucking blows, Luke.”

“Nah, it really doesn’t Mitch. If something is that good, it’s worth waiting for.” He clapped me on the back and headed to the stairs.

“Hey, wait. Did you figure out anything more about Kurt?” Luke and I had driven all over, talking to everyone we could think of that might have a clue as to where Kurt would go. Everyone we spoke to had no idea who was making offers to him.

“Nah. I can’t find a trace of him anywhere. I don’t know what else to do, Mitch. He knows where we are and that he’s always welcome here. His leaving might help him realize that this is where he needs to be.”

“And what if he doesn’t come back?”

“Then I guess this wasn’t where he was meant to be.” He jogged up the stairs, and I leaned against his car.

What a fucking shit night. Kurt disappears into thin air, and Scarlett tells me to get lost.

I was going to give her the space she wanted, but I wasn’t going to be very far away. Scarlett was mine. Now she needed to figure that out for herself.

______________

Chapter 30

Scarlett

It was a quarter to eight and Levi was refusing to put his socks on, and I was ready to pull my hair out. I was more than determined to leave the house before Mitch got here, but it didn’t look like that was going to happen.

“I don’t want to go to work with you. I wanna stay with Mitch and work on cars. Your work is so boring.”

He had me there. The gas station wasn’t the most exciting job, but it was paying our bills for the time being. “No, Levi. I told you Mitch had other things he needed to do today so he can’t watch you.”

“I don’t believe you.” He crossed his arms over his chest and stuck his lip out.

“Well, believe, Levi. Now, get your socks on so we can leave. I can’t be late for work.”

He stomped down the hallway to his room and slammed the door shut. I couldn’t tell if I was a raising a four-year-old or a teenager anymore.

Just as I slipped on my shoes, there was a knock at the door, and I hung my head. We hadn’t outrun Mitch. I opened the door, fully expecting to see Mitch standing there in all his handsome glory but was surprised when I was face to face with a balding, beer-bellied man in his fifties. “You Scarlett James?”

“Um, yes. Is there a problem?” He looked down at his clipboard, scribbled something on the bottom, tore the sheet off and handed it to me.

“Keep the door open. We’ll bring the car up first.” I grabbed the paper out of his hand trying to read what it was. He lumbered down the stairs before I could put two thoughts together and ask him what the hell he meant. “Shit,” I mumbled when it dawned on me that he was here to deliver the beds.

The paper was ripped from my hands, and I looked up. Mitch was standing in front of me, a smirk on his face. “Good, I made it in time. I’ll make sure they get the beds set up and then Levi and I will head over to the shop.”

“What are you doing here?” I pushed him out in the hallway, partially closing the door behind us. “I thought I told you I needed to figure out how to do this on my own.” I peeked in the door, making sure Levi was still in his room.

“And I thought I told you I would be here at eight to watch Levi.”

“You did, but I don’t want you to.”

“We’re not going through this again, Scar. I get that you want to do whatever the hell you think you need to do alone, but I’m still watching Levi for you. Like I said, you need daycare, just call me Daycare from now on.” He pushed past me, opening the door.

“Mitch, stop.” I grabbed his arm, and we both looked down at my hand.