Perfect Bastard (Mason Creek)

I pulled out a cliché line, but it worked. “A lady never tells.”

“I like it. Would you be putting this under your name?”

“No,” I said emphatically. The last thing my father needed was folks in town talking about my sex life. “I plan to use a pen name for the sake of my parents.”

“Okay. Well, I’d like to see more before I commit but color me completely interested. No, hooked. I’m totally hooked, but I need to see it all. Is it ready?”

“Almost.”

“How soon will it be finished?”

“Two or three days,” I said.

“Good. Send it by this weekend and I’ll call on Monday. Sound good?”

“Perfect.”

When the call ended, I immediately went to dial Haley, but she was in the air by now and likely didn’t have her phone on. Dad was at the shop and Mom was at a breakfast with her soon-to-be stepchildren. I checked the time. It was early, but not obnoxiously so.

There was one other person I wanted to share the news with. But also, I needed to confess. I’d been holding back my feelings for Nate because of what I’d yet to tell him. And if this article came out, pen name or not, he’d figure out who it was about. I hadn’t put any fiction in it.

I printed out the first draft I’d done. The one that had been more of a revenge article. As much as I didn’t want him reading that, if we had a real shot at a relationship, there had to be complete honesty. From there, I’d explain all the ways I’d changed my article into something very different. The original had come from an angry place. What I hoped to sell came from a place of utter happiness with few doubts, which I’d hoped to eradicate in the last article in the series.

When I arrived at Nate’s, my heart raced with excitement until I reached the door. I held up my hand to knock, but hesitated. It hit me that Nate hadn’t brought me in the house since before Christmas. I shook it off because he’d been so open about his plans for the bunkhouse. He’d said I was the first person he’d told. It was nothing. I was being stupid.

I knocked and then as I waited. I wondered if I should have texted him first. Too late now, I said to myself as footsteps came to the door.

My breath caught in my throat as a gorgeous blonde answered the door. I could barely utter out, “Is Nate here?” even though I desperately wanted to run.

Please, please, please be wrong, I thought in my head.

“He’s in the shower.”

I felt sick, like a punch to the gut, because she too wore a robe.

“Can I help you?” she asked with genuine concern.

The manila envelope I’d put the article in fell from my hands as I spun around and used my hands to instead cover a sob.

“You dropped this,” she called after me.

But I couldn’t speak. I thought I might vomit. I got in my truck and drove. I didn’t want to go home. He’d find me there. That was if he came looking. I drove to the shop and hit ignore on the calls that came five minutes later. I turned my ringer to silent as tears drenched my face.

How could I have been so stupid? This was who he was. All the things he’d said had been bullshit. He’d eased me into believing in him. Oh, how I’d fallen for it when the evidence of what a complete bastard he was, was out there for all to see.

I rushed through the door of the shop and found Tugboat finishing up with a customer. I managed to hold in the worst of my sobs until the guy left. Tugboat, seeing my distress, called for my dad as I clung to him.

“What happened? Are you hurt?”

Emotionally, yes, and I knew if someone didn’t hold me, I’d fall to pieces on the floor.

The bell rang overhead, and I turned to find Nate standing with the audacity to glower at me.

“What the hell is this?” he bellowed, holding out the envelope.

My spine stiffened to steel as I swallowed any remaining tears. “The truth.” Because wasn’t it? What I’d written recently had been pure fiction, at least on his part.

TWENTY-FIVE

Nate

I’d just ended my shower when I heard the knock at the door. After dressing, I came down and found Sunshine in the kitchen distressed.

“What? Who was at the door?” I asked.

She glanced down at the island where an envelope lay. “She came and left that. I didn’t open it. She was upset. I offered to help, but she left,” she said in a rush.

“Who’s she?”

“You’ve never said her name, but I recognize her Jeep. I think maybe…”

I picked up the envelope and pulled out the papers inside. Sunshine might have been talking, but I was focused on the word ‘Bastard’ and the byline of Avery Bean that followed.