Fight or Flight

“Hot date?” I asked, following him into the living room.

He shrugged. “Just some bird I met at the gym. Said I’d meet her for drinks.”

Bird? Charming.

It almost made me not want to thank him, but he ultimately deserved my gratitude. “I don’t know if I said this before, but thank you for your help last weekend.”

Jamie grabbed his watch off the coffee table, and as he put it on he studied me beneath his lashes. When the watch was on, he straightened, sliding his hands into his trouser pockets and cocking his head in contemplation. “You thanked me already. You know … I misjudged you, Ava. I’m sorry.”

Remembering our first meeting, I nodded and crossed my arms in an unconscious defensive maneuver. “Why did you get all judgy with me when we met?”

“Because you reminded me of Carissa. Caleb’s ex-fiancée was just like you. Or so I thought. Well put together. Designer clothes. Into her looks and material shit that doesn’t matter. Everyone could see it but Caleb. He thought she had hidden depths, but the woman was a bloody kiddie pool.”

There was no way to describe what I felt in that moment. “Stunned” didn’t quite cut it. Neither did “hurt.” Or “angry” or “bitter.” I was all those things as Jamie continued talking as if he hadn’t delivered the epic, discombobulating news that Caleb Scott had once been engaged to be married.

“Carrie messed Caleb up. She really did. And there is something about you that reminds me of her.”

“Gee. Thanks.”

He held his hands up in defense. “I dinnae mean—Look, you just have that same quality about your physical appearance. But that’s where the similarities end. I saw that for real on Saturday night. You really care about your friend. And I think you really care about Caleb too. I dinnae think Carrie ever cared about anyone but herself.”

Ex-fiancée.

Carissa.

Carrie.

WHAT?!

“Anyway, I best get going. Make yourself at home. Caleb shouldn’t be long.”

I was barely aware of him leaving, my mind in chaos over the information bomb that had just exploded about my supposedly commitment-phobic friend with benefits.

Not even ten seconds after Jamie departed, the door opened again. I marched across the living room into sight of the door as Caleb shut it behind him and threw his keys into a bowl at the end of the kitchen counter. His lips started to turn up at the corners at the sight of me.

Then he saw my expression.

Caleb drew to an abrupt halt. “What’s happened now?”

I glared at him even as I was desperate for some explanation that would mean that the only man who I’d trusted to be completely honest with me hadn’t goddamn lied to me this whole time! “Carissa.” The name was supposed to come out in an angry huff. But I just sounded sad and confused.

His eyes flattened, his features slackened, and he gave me that blank look I hated as he began to loosen his tie. “What about her?”

Indignation fired through me. “What about her? What about her?! How about the fact that she was your fiancée, Caleb? Mr. I’ve Never Been in a Serious Relationship with Anyone. You lied to me!”

Whipping the tie off, he kept his blank expression all of five seconds. Caleb started toward me, a flush of anger in his cheeks, his eyes intimidatingly cold. “I didn’t lie.”

“You told me you’d never been serious with anyone before,” I retorted as he strode right by me and into his bedroom.

I followed, ignoring the fact that he was shrugging out of his suit jacket. “Well?”

“I never said that,” he bit out. “I said I didn’t do serious relationships, not that I never had.”

Furious that he was trying to get out of this on a technicality, I yelled, “You implied otherwise!”

“Do you want tae keep your voice down,” he growled at me as he marched by me in just his shirtsleeves and trousers.

Where the hell was he going now?

The thought was answered instantly as he delved into the liquor cabinet in his kitchen and poured himself a whiskey. I wanted to throw it in his face! “You said you would never lie to me. And I stupidly trusted you.”

Caleb turned to face me. “I didn’t lie tae you, Ava.”

How could he be so calm? “Yeah? It was a lie by omission.”

“I’m not talking about this. You can either march that sweet arse back into the bedroom and take off your clothes or you can get out.”

I flinched like he’d slapped me. I was barely aware of the instant remorse in his eyes as I grabbed my purse and began to make my way to the door.

His strong hand circled my left bicep and jerked me around with enough force to bring me colliding against his chest. Once there, Caleb wrapped his arms around me, trapping me. “I’m sorry for saying that,” he apologized, his voice hoarse. “But I’m not a liar, Ava, and I won’t let you say I am.”

“We’re supposed to be friends,” I whispered, letting my feelings show in my gaze as I looked up into his. “You know everything about me. You know about my parents, about Nick and Gem. And now I realize I don’t know anything about you.”

“That’s not true.” He gave me a little shake, his gaze accusatory. “You know more than most.”

I immediately thought of Quinn. Confiding in me about his brother’s death couldn’t have been easy and I felt ashamed for momentarily forgetting that he had. Still, it didn’t erase my anger. “Then why didn’t you tell me about Carissa?”

Like I’d suddenly turned scorching hot in his arms, he pushed me away and turned around. I watched in confusion as he walked into the living room, running a hand through his hair in seeming frustration.

“I dinnae want tae talk about her.”

“Well, I do!”

He spun around and yelled, “Tough shit!”

I winced, frozen to the spot, because he was more than a little intimidating. I’d never seen him so furious and I began to dread knowing the truth about his ex-fiancée. It cut me deeply that she could elicit this kind of emotion from him. “Caleb … you’re still in love with her, aren’t you?”

Instantly, his features arranged themselves into a harsh mask of revulsion. “I hate the bitch.”

Shock parted my lips at the dark vitriol in his words. Now I really wanted to know. “Tell me what she did.”

“Why?” He strode toward me, his chest heaving with emotion. “Why are you doing this tae me?”

As I saw the desperation in him, my motivations changed in an instant. It was no longer about me and my feelings, but about him. For as long as we’d known each other, there had been this quiet anger simmering within him. I hadn’t acknowledged it before, always putting it down to whatever was happening in the moment. But it didn’t just surface in moments of frustration like our first meeting or my announcement that I was going on a date with someone else. It was always there. “Because whatever happened to you is slowly eating you up inside.”

He stopped, his body inches from mine, and stared at me with such pain I wanted to reach out and soothe him. What had she done to him?

“Ava …” My name sounded like it had been dragged out of him. It was a plea.

“You told me that Harper needed to talk about what happened to her. It’s time to take your own advice.”

Caleb exhaled a shuddering breath, and to my horror I watched his eyes fill with tears. “She killed my baby, Ava. She killed my baby.”

Just the sight of him, this big, strong man who made me feel so safe, in tears, in agony, so vulnerable, was enough to bring tears to my own eyes. And his words caused a sharp streak of pain through my chest. “Caleb.”

His whole body seemed to sag and he stumbled back toward the couch and dropped into it. Resting his arms on his knees, he bowed his head, breaking eye contact. “Carrie … We dated four years ago. We were together a year when she fell pregnant.” His voice was so hoarse, the words like sandpaper against rock. “I was happy. Thought she was. I proposed even though my family told me they had doubts about her. She was twelve weeks pregnant, and a day after saying yes tae marrying me, she went behind my back and had an abortion. I was dreaming of holding that wee person in my arms one day, of watching him or her grow up, being part of a big family like I had been. And she decided she didn’t want tae be a mum.”