揙oh!?Peggy dove off the bed and lunged for her purse, which was hanging on the back of the room抯 single chair. 揘ate gave me a brochure for this nightly drive out into the desert. You make a bonfire and the guide tells ghost stories. 厰
Sage held up a finger. 揂ctually, that抯 not exactly the way Nate described it棓
揥ho is Nate??Rita asked.
揟he bartender at the Liquor Hole,?her brother answered, his tone dripping with impatience. 揘othing to do in this town except get shit-faced, so we抳e become well acquainted.?
揧eah, well it worked,?Rita shot back. 揧our face does look like shit.?
揋uys.?Peggy stepped in between them, waving the brochure back and forth. 揑 say we do it. Nothing could be as bad as sitting around bickering.?
Another knock at the door. Stupidly, Rita抯 heart went bonkers, thinking Jasper might be standing on the other side. She must have betrayed her feelings somehow, because the room抯 three other occupants watched her with interest. 揑t抯 probably Bel,?she said, taking the few steps toward the door. After a cursory peek through the hole, Rita抯 heart sank, but she managed to school her features in time to let Belmont into the room. 揌ey.?
Belmont gave her a brisk nod as he stepped into the cool darkness. His gaze immediately zeroed in on Sage, who tugged the hem of her dress down under his regard, cheeks flaming. 揊ood??Belmont asked.
Rita noticed that the brothers refused to look at one another, but, surprisingly, Aaron answered. 揑 could eat.?
Peggy turned in a circle, holding up the desert-excursion brochure like it was Simba from The Lion King. 揌ot dogs and s抦ores are included in the price. Come on, you guys. Adventure awaits.?
With a sigh, Aaron plucked the brochure from his sister抯 hands. 揑t leaves from the church parking lot in thirty minutes.?He laughed under his breath. 揘o idea where the church is, though. Only the bar.?
揑t抯 not far,?Sage murmured. 揧ou can see the steeple from the parking lot.?
揂 bonfire.?Crossing his arms, Belmont frowned at Sage. 揑s this something you want to do??
Sage glanced at a frantically nodding Peggy and smiled. 揧es.?
揑 guess that settles that.?Aaron hopped off the dresser, throwing Rita a measuring glance. 揕et抯 go start a fire.?
Chapter Twenty-Five
Jasper hadn抰 been on a bender in two years, but he sorely needed to break that streak. He hadn抰 moved from his office chair after collapsing into it sometime after Rita had left. No. Not left. After she抎 been kicked out. By him.
Outside in the bar, bottles of whiskey and beer clinked together, probably Nate filling the ice bins, marrying new liquor with old in preparation for the Friday night crowd. It would have been so easy to tuck one of those bottles梡referably one containing gold liquid梚nto his waistband and spend the night forgetting what had happened with Rita, but it would be the coward抯 way out.
So he would sit there and remember every brutally perfect second. Let the touch and feel of Rita drill into his gut, over and over. Or, worse, the way she抎 recoiled when he抎 blown up. What had she expected? For him to beg and plead for her to stay, like some weak-willed asshole? Much as he抎 wanted to, he抎 refrained. And wasn抰 it ironic that the strength of will that had been cemented on the mesa this morning was the very thing that had forced him to send Rita away this afternoon?
Yeah. He reckoned it was. He just couldn抰 break through the dread of never seeing Rita again to figure out what it meant. Or if she抎 imbued him with enough confidence to break it off, maybe he just didn抰 want to know, because it was too big a kick in the teeth.
Jasper dragged both hands down his face, then gave up the battle to keep from staring at the desk. Seeing Rita as she抎 been, body tightening as he slipped a hand around her neck. Trusting. So trusting of a man she抎 been in the process of gutting. Or had it all just spun out of their control? He抎 spent enough time with Rita to know spitefulness was out of character, so he must have underestimated the loop she抎 been thrown for with the cooking demonstration.
The man Jasper had been when Rita arrived in town梩he man who抎 only been hoping to prove something to himself by spending actual, quality time with a woman梙is knee-jerk reaction was to chalk up what happened with Rita as a failure. Proof that he was a good time, nothing more, nothing less. But something must have changed along the line, because new Jasper beat back that belief with a flaming baseball bat of fury. Fuck that. He wasn抰 the town抯 entertainment anymore. Rita hadn抰 broken him this afternoon?
卆nd had she really wanted to? Would she have stayed if he hadn抰 told her to get lost?
Pain lanced his stomach, doubling him over. No. No, he couldn抰 do this to himself. Agonizing over a woman whose actions had been so clear earlier. Over. She抎 wanted it over, whether his gesture had been all kinds of wrong, or she simply needed to move forward in a different place, far from Hurley, and hadn抰 known another way to cut ties.
Jasper pushed up from his desk, restlessness alive in his blood, wishing for the hundredth time he抎 just slammed the door this afternoon and had it out with Rita. Hell, a good old-fashioned argument might have been exactly what they抎 needed.
Go on. You got what you had coming. Get out.
Going to find her was a bad idea. Bad. Hell, watching her leave with his temper at full volume had been murder, but a calm, collected Catch-you-on-the-flip-side would be so much worse. If he could just see her, though?
You should Google me sometime.
揕aptop. Laptop,?Jasper muttered, turning in a circle, trying to remember where he抎 stowed the damn piece of technology. He used a paper and pen for record keeping. Always had. His home computer seldom got a workout, too, but the office one had barely been used since he抎 taken it out of the box. Please let it be charged.
Jasper pushed aside a stack of paper on the small file cabinet, finding the flat, silver laptop smirking up at him, still attached to the charging wire.
揝ave it. I抦 not in the mood.?He snatched up the device, opening it on his desk and powering it on. Energy fizzled in his fingertips, knowing he might see Rita soon. Even a digital version of her would be welcome. Anything to replace the shock of being kicked out of his office, her mouth still wet from his kiss. Please. I抦 dying.
He had Google open in seconds, Rita抯 name typed in lickety-split. First thing to pop up was a video titled 揜ita Clarkson Knife Attack?and ho-lee damn, a lot of people had watched the sucker. His eyebrows lifted as he read the description, mainly because a person usually mentioned when he or she had been on television, but apparently Rita had decided to leave out that vital information, although the title gave him a notion as to why. The idea of so many people putting eyes on Rita made the back of Jasper抯 neck itch, so his finger hovered over the touch pad a mere breath before punching play on the hit-heavy video brought up by the search engine.
He melted back in his chair when Rita appeared on the screen in a white chef jacket, staring down at an oven with tentative hope in her eyes, while someone screamed in the background桾wo minutes!梡eople rushing past in the background, complete chaos all around. A boom mic dipped into the frame, just a touch, but close enough to Rita抯 face to startle her out of the trance she seemed to be stuck in.
Jasper tugged the laptop closer, as if he could climb inside and calm Rita down. Quiet, stretching-on-the-rug-during-a-rainstorm Rita, caught up in tsunami. What had she been thinking, signing on for this torture? Cooking was a skill Rita had been blessed with, whether she recognized it or not. But this? It was designed to be the furthest thing from the woman he knew. She needed to breathe, and they weren抰 letting her. She had no room to think or?