“Whoa. I didn’t say I loved her.”
Dad smiles at me. “You didn’t have to.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN - Olivia
Friday morning I make myself get a shower. I find it more than a little disgusting and pathetic that I haven’t taken one all week.
But today, I’m done being pathetic. I’ve wallowed long enough. I’ve got to do something. So I’m going home for the weekend. I’ll call Tad on the way and see if I can pick up at least one shift. After that, I’ll figure out what to do for the rest of…well, ever when I get back.
Just the thought of having to come back and deal with Cash and then Marissa and school and…life is so overwhelming. I push it out of my head in favor of a weekend spent in the familiar. In the comforting. In the safe.
Safe. I never thought I’d have such a literal application for that word in my life.
I pack a bag of essentials and head out, locking up behind myself. With Marissa gone and Cash/Nash being out of the picture, I feel completely disconnected to the city. To my life. To my home. It doesn’t feel like home right now. It feels like a prison of lies and heartache. The only place that feels like home is the one I’m traveling toward.
I call Dad and Ginger on the way. Ginger is kind enough to offer me one of her shifts, which I gladly accept. It’ll be tonight’s shift, which is probably a good thing. I can stay busy right off the bat. Tomorrow, I’ll go out and look for more lambs, even though there’s no real reason. But it’ll be good to get outside, to do something that doesn’t require me to think. Or hurt. Or want.
“Hey, punk,” Dad says by way of greeting when I walk in. I have the sudden and inexplicable urge to go throw my arms around his neck and cry on his shoulder like I did when I was a kid. Rather than doing that, however, and scaring the crap out of him, I set my bag down and go kiss him on the cheek and ask how he’s been.
I spend the day watching a CSI rerun marathon on television and chatting about this and that. It doesn’t completely get Cash off my brain, but it helps. I knew it would.
I shower and dress for my shift, happily slipping into the emotional comfort of the black shorts and tee as much as I slip into the physical comfort of them. I get Dad settled before I go and then I drive myself to Tad’s.
Everyone is awesome. Of course. Glad to have me back. I feel tears threaten more than once when regulars ask me to come back, assuring me that they’ll never be as good to me at my new job as they are at Tad’s. In a way, I believe them. But in a way, I also know that’s not true. Cash is at my new job.
Cash.
Ginger shows up, not to work, but to provide much-needed support from the other side of the bar. She sips her drink and waits patiently for things to slow down before she asks any questions.
“So, let me guess. ‘Bad boy’ turned out to be ‘worst boy’?”
I laugh. Yes, it’s a little bitter. “Um, I guess you could say that.”
“I was afraid of that.”
I stop stocking beer bottles into the cooler and stare at her, mouth agape. “You were? Well you could’ve said something, you know.”
“I took one look at him and knew he was trouble. He’s not just hot. He’s smart. That’s not a good combination for your heart, Liv. At least the others have been pretty useless and stupid. But this one? Yeah, I knew if he got his hooks into you there’d be trouble.”
I’d like to slap her. Hard. “Thanks for the head’s up, Ginger,” I say, trying to sound teasing, but knowing my anger is showing.
“Would you have listened to me if I’d tried? No. You never do. You knew you should’ve stayed away from him. But you didn’t. Do you really think I could’ve said anything that would’ve changed your mind?”
I don’t want to admit it, but she’s probably right. Cash had me breathless from day one. So did Nash. Because they were the same guy, only in different clothes and with different jobs. I think, deep down, my body knew. I responded to each of them the same way, sexually. They both set me on fire. And that’s not too likely to happen with two such supposedly different personalities. Why didn’t I see it? How could I be so blind?
I’m emptying the last of the bottles from the box, arranging them neatly in the cooler, when I see someone slide onto the stool beside Ginger. I look up and stop, my arm halfway into the cooler.
It’s Cash.
He doesn’t smile. He doesn’t say anything. He just looks at me. I wonder if that’s his heart I see in this eyes. Or if it’s just my imagination. Either way, I don’t trust it. I don’t trust him.
I say nothing. I finish what I’m doing, take the box into the back then come back out and pour him a Jack neat. I slide him the glass, he slides me a twenty and I pay for the drink and stick the change in the tip jar. I throw a smug look at him, daring him to make a comment. But he’s smart. He doesn’t say a word, just nods and tosses back his whiskey.
I don’t need to ask what he’s doing here. I only listened to one of his dozen or so messages, and it was him asking to talk to me. I saved the rest. I figured I’d listen to them eventually. Just not yet.
A guy that is widely known to adore Ginger sits on her other side and starts chatting her up, leaving me to tend to the few other customers at the bar. And Cash.
I keep myself busy with odd jobs, but it doesn’t really help. Every nerve, every cell, every sense of my entire being is focused sharply on Cash.
Cash.
By the time the night is over, I’m on edge. He still hasn’t said a word. Neither have I. But the tension is palpable. And it’s killing me.
When Tad gives last call, Cash looks at me long and hard then slides off his stool and walks out. I feel aggravated and bereft and sad and frustrated and hurt. But mostly I feel like chasing him. Like asking him to stay.
But I don’t.
I can’t.
I won’t.
As we are required to do, the bartenders stay as Tad counts the till. But my mind is wandering. To Cash. Always to Cash.
Taking my phone out of my pocket, I check for messages. There are no new ones, which both puzzles and disappoints me, so I randomly select one of the saved messages from him and listen to it. When his voice comes on, there is a quick, sharp stab of pain in my chest.
“Look, Olivia, I care about you. Can’t you see that? Can’t you feel it? I might not have always done the right thing, but try to see it from my perspective. Do you know how hard it was for me to tell you all this? Knowing that you might leave and never come back? I was just hoping that you wouldn’t do that. Leave. But you did. And I know I should let you go. But I can’t. I just can’t.”