Moments of Disarray: An Alex Kennedy Story Read online

  Luke shook his head. “You’re not lying.”

  “Not right now. No.”

  “If I asked you, right now, to tell me that you wanted to be with me. Like try a real thing. What would you say?”

  Alex chose his answer carefully. “I can’t say that.”

  “Lie, then,” Luke said. “You lie all the time, so lie about this!”

  Alex shook his head in silence. Luke’s shoulders slumped. He pulled his hand from Alex’s grip and used his other one to rub it, as though the touch had left a bruise.

  “I’m not the guy you want for real. I’m the guy you fuck because you’re curious. I’m the one you fuck because you’re lonely. Or confused. I’m just the guy you fuck,” Alex said. “That’s all.”

  Luke got to his feet, staggering once but catching himself before he could stumble. It was the first time he’d seemed less than sober tonight, but Alex knew Luke wasn’t drunk. Something inside him was cracking, getting ready to shatter.

  “That’s not all you are,” Luke said.

  Alex stood, too. “That’s all I am for you. It’s all I’ll ever be able to be.”

  Luke pulled himself up straight. Squared his shoulders. Lifted his chin.

  “I’ll be fine,” he said. “I’ll figure it out.”

  “Yeah, absolutely. You will.”

  At the door, Luke turned. “It would have been better if you’d been able to lie to me, at least for an hour or two.”

  He didn’t wait for Alex to answer him. Alex locked the door behind him, one hand on it, then put his forehead to it as he closed his eyes and listened to the sound of Luke on the other side. He still had the chance, this one last chance, to open up the door, but he knew that no matter what Luke thought, it would not have been better for either of them if Alex had lied.

  Chapter 18

  Alex had enough friends in enough places that all he needed was a plane ticket and an overnight bag. He had both within a few hours. He slept on the plane. He got off the plane. He got a cab to a friend’s house. Madeline was an acquaintance of a generous nature, with a nice guest room and low expectations. She’d been through a recent divorce and was not interested in dating or even fucking.

  “That’s the only reason I let you stay here,” she told Alex over mugs of hot, sweet tea and a plate of scones. “Because believe me, if I was in the mood to get laid, I’d have been all over you.”

  He laughed, but the comment stung. “I appreciate the honesty.”

  “Always.” She studied him over the rim of her cup. “You look different.”

  The last time he’d seen her had been at the party of a mutual friend. She’d just separated from her husband. “You do, too. You look happy.”

  “I am happy. Ecstatically.” Madeline tilted her head, looking him over with a furrow of her brow. “You don’t look happy, Alex.”

  “I’m not happy.”

  Madeline reached across the table to take his hand in hers. Alex drew in a breath that became a sigh, a muttering whisper. A small, helpless groan. Her simple kindness had unravelled him.

  “When you want to talk about it, I’m here,” she said.

  He didn’t think he would ever want to talk about it, but he found himself unable to stop himself from talking about it. The tea went cold, the scones uneaten, while Alex talked. They moved to the living room with glasses of wine, and Alex talked. The next morning, over the breakfast he insisted on cooking for her as a thank-you for the hospitality, Alex talked.

  For days. Weeks. A month. And another. Alex told Madeline everything, all about his friendship with Jamie. What had happened with Anne. With Luke. With everyone else in his life he’d ever done wrong or been done wrong by.

  When she asked him to travel with her — using her recent ex-husband’s money without qualms and more than a little bit of venom, Alex said yes. It was good to have a companion, Madeline told him. Better and safer, in some of the places she wanted to visit, if she had a man at her side. They moved from city to city, country to country, eating and drinking and talking their way around the world.

  It took a little over a year.

  By the end of it, Madeline had started giving interested glances at the handsome and usually younger men who’d been giving her the eye. “I’m not kicking you out or anything. You know you’re welcome to stay as long as you like.”

  They’d been sipping cocktails in her garden. Most of the flowers had died, but the day had been mild enough for them both to crave the sunshine that the winter would soon chase away. Alex savored the drink before answering.

  “I have a friend in the States who’s been after me to take on some work in his area.”

  “A friend,” Madeline said with amusement.

  Alex laughed. “He’s only a friend, as far as I’m concerned.”

  “With you, I know how that goes.” She gave him a small smile. “Will you be all right?”

  “If you mean can I resist him? Yeah. Probably. It wouldn’t be the first time I disappointed someone who wanted to get me into bed. One of the few times, but not the first,” Alex added with a wry laugh. “But I think it’s time I move on. Give you some room around here. You can’t really get your groove on with me hanging around.”

  “I could if I wanted to. You’ve never been a hindrance to that.” Madeline flicked her fingertips in his direction and tipped her head back to laugh toward the autumn sky. She looked back at him. “I think I’m ready to at least see what might happen. Thank you for that.”

  Alex’s brows rose. “Me? I haven’t done anything. I mean, you’re the one who’s been holding my hand for the past year or so, listening to me droning on and on about the same thing, over and over. Getting me through. I owe you.”

  “You gave me someone to love without expectation. I needed that,” she told him seriously. “Someone to take care of for a bit, so I’d stop thinking so much about how much I needed taken care of.”

  He wasn’t ashamed to cry in front of her. They’d gone past that, long ago. Alex swiped at his eyes, throat closing with emotion.

  “I’ve been happy to take care of you,” he said.

  Madeline smiled and brushed the fall of her silver hair out of her eyes. “But you’re not happy, Alex.”

  That was true. The best he could say was that he was at least no longer relentlessly miserable. “Maybe one day.”

  “One day, indeed. Let’s hope it’s sooner than you think,” Madeline agreed.

  She took his hand. He kissed the back of it. They sat that way in the garden, enjoying the sun, neither of them speaking about anything at all.

  Chapter 19

  A small city tucked into the rural countryside, Harrisburg was charming in its way. It had a beautiful capital building and a struggling downtown that had been revitalized more than once but had never managed to stay vital. Patrick lived in a nice little house that had been renovated without losing any of its vintage appeal. He offered Alex a room, but being a permanent house guest for the past year or so had left Alex wanting a little more privacy. A hotel room would lose its appeal quickly, he knew that, but for the time being it felt right.

  Patrick, as it turned out, had a lot of single, curious, confused or lonely friends, and many of them were happy to think of Alex as the guy they wanted to fuck. Alex, for all his determination to get his shit together, had never been any good at celibacy. Living with Madeline had made it easier when she held him accountable, but he was back on his own and randy as hell. Patrick’s friend Evan made it quickly clear he was down for some rumpy pumpy action to help him get over a recent breakup. It was supposed to be “just for fun.” The “fun” lasted all of two weeks, when Evan made the offhand comment that the extra toothbrushes were in the closet.

  Nobody would ever say Alex Kennedy wasn’t smart, but sometimes, he sure was a fucking dumbass.

  He’d only been keeping a small overnight bag at Evan’s house to save him time and effort the few nights he’d stayed over. He didn’t want to bother picking it up,