BooksBarbecue
Back Hiding Places Save as PDF
Chapters (37)
  1. Title Page
  2. Table of Contents
  3. Chapter One
  4. Chapter Two
  5. Chapter Three
  6. Chapter Four
  7. Chapter Five
  8. Chapter Six
  9. Chapter Seven
  10. Chapter Eight
  11. Chapter Nine
  12. Chapter Ten
  13. Chapter Eleven
  14. Chapter Twelve
  15. Chapter Thirteen
  16. Chapter Fourteen
  17. Chapter Fifteen
  18. Chapter Sixteen
  19. Chapter Seventeen
  20. Chapter Eighteen
  21. Chapter Nineteen
  22. Chapter Twenty
  23. Chapter Twenty-One
  24. Chapter Twenty-Two
  25. Chapter Twenty-Three
  26. Chapter Twenty-Four
  27. Chapter Twenty-Five
  28. Chapter Twenty-Six
  29. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  30. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  31. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  32. Chapter Thirty
  33. Chapter Thirty-One
  34. Chapter Thirty-Two
  35. Books by Skye Warren
  36. About the Author
  37. Copyright

And it does, but it also turns me on.

Chapter Ten

CHAPTER TEN

Emily Rochester

Mateo Garza stands in my kitchen, leaning against the countertop when I come downstairs from putting Paige to bed. He watches in silence while I pour two glasses of wine.

Independent or not, I didn’t want to watch Joe’s interview alone.

Somehow Mateo makes sense as the person who’s going to be here with me. He was there at the courthouse and the beach afterward. He showed up at my door with the security team. I can’t stop thinking of the way he kissed me.

That last part has nothing to do with the interview. It’s just true.

“Wine,” I say. “Cheese.” I pull out the pre-cut slices of cheese from the fridge, ready on their little tray. “Crackers. Want anything else?”

“You don’t have to watch, you know.”

The suggestion in his voice is seductive. Forget about Joe, it says. Forget about the pain he caused you. Forget about Rhys. Forget, forget, forget. Impossible to do when I’m writing a memoir about him. Then again, I couldn’t forget if I wanted to. I have nightmares every night.

“I do have to watch.”

Mateo straightens up, his brow furrowed. “Why?”

He and Beau are best friends, but they’re very different men. Beau would ask me why I wanted to watch in a broody, frustrated tone. Mateo’s holds only curiosity tempered with concern. I’m sure both of them would say that they don’t want me to get hurt. It’s a noble thing to want.

But hiding from something doesn’t make it hurt less. Pretending that Joe never existed won’t change the fact that he does. It won’t undo what he did.

“Because I still love him. He’s still my brother. And family is complicated.” I brace for more back-and-forth, more argument about how I shouldn’t care about Joe.

Instead, Mateo picks up the cheese tray and the box of crackers. “You can’t blame me if I eat the whole thing.”

“You’re going to eat an entire box of crackers during the interview?”

“I’m not planning on it,” he says with a smile. “I’m just saying that if it happens, it’s only because I really, really like these crackers.”

We settle on the living room couch. I have a flash of dread. I got the wine and the cheese and the crackers so I’d have something to do during the interview. Counter it with decent wine and melt-in-your-mouth crackers. What if this is just another attempt to hide? If I sip wine and eat cheese, am I pretending this isn’t a big deal?

No. It is a big deal, otherwise I’d turn it on in the background while I cleaned, like some shitty reality show. Mateo came over for moral support. A little light alcohol isn’t a hiding place.