Redeeming (Red Lips & White Lies Book 2)

Mozart composed his first symphony when he was five years old.

He played in front of two imperial courts when he was six.

I’m twenty-four, and I just stumbled over my coffee order.

—Caitlin’s Secret Thoughts

“So . . . how was your date?” Bellamy asks as she stirs a pumpkin cream latte.

“I told you yesterday, it wasn’t a date.” I’m forced to inch away when the cinnamon smell hits me and turns my stomach.

Adelaide sits across from us with her head buried in whatever book she’s writing this week. I can’t keep up with her, and she never lets us read them before she’s done. “I just had to dress him.”

“Wait.” She pops her head up from her minty-green MacBook. “He was undressed, and it wasn’t a date?”

Bellamy pats the top of Addie’s head like she’s one of the dogs. “Maybe if you’d come out of the cave every once in a while, you too could undress a date instead of just writing about it.”

“Listen.” Addie rolls her pretty brown eyes. “Some of us work in a hospital. Others have a writing cave. You have surgeries, and I have a book due in three weeks that’s not done. You know that makes me nuts.” She spins her honey-blonde hair up into a bun and shoves a pen through it, locking it in place. “And I’d be happy to date if a single guy I meet is interesting enough to bother dating.”

“I mean, standards do complicate things,” Bellamy agrees, and my heart hurts again.

I know Jagger thought yesterday was a date. Killian tried to say he just needed a stylist when he introduced us, but Jagger was looking for more than clothes. He was good-looking with big muscles and gorgeous green eyes, but they weren’t Callen’s, and every time he got just a little too close, I was reminded of how much I wanted them to be.

He was just wrong.

Felt wrong.

Smelled wrong.

Looked wrong.

He wasn’t Callen, and that made him wrong.

Callen, who I’ll never forgive and may never recover from.

Fucking asshole.

“Cait . . .” Bellamy whispers my name, but I must not look up in time because the next thing I know, the bitch is kicking me under the table with the toe of her pointy black boot.

Like the adult I am, I kick her back. “What the hell?”

“Oh shit.” Adelaide looks over the top of her screen, and her eyes triple in size. “Do not turn around.”

Of course, I do the exact opposite of what I’m told because I despise authority and always have. I blame my parents for that. Only when I turn, my heart sinks.

There he is.

The dick who haunts my dreams with his eyes and pisses me off in my reality with his fucking existence. I’ve played nice. Nicer than he deserved.

I haven’t told anyone what happened between us.

Okay. Maybe not, not anyone.

But Bellamy and Adelaide don’t count.

They’re my friends. Not his.

And I needed to talk to someone.

When Maddox and Killian got home from Vegas, I told them I was sick. The flu. I was contagious. Whatever it took to get them to leave me alone. And it worked. They’re men. It’s simple. Get nasty and they get the fuck out of Dodge.

Just like some other people I know.

Asshole.

He and Cooper walk over to the counter, and I turn around, keeping my back to him. He doesn’t deserve to see me.

I hold my head high and straighten my shoulders, refusing to look back.

I’ve managed to avoid him for the most part. The one thing the son of a bitch was right about was that it’s easier not having him down the damn hall. But at the same time, it’s just another thing that breaks my heart.

“You okay, Caitlin? You’re looking a little pale.” Bellamy looks concerned as I close my eyes.

“I’m fine. My stomach has just been off today. The smell of your latte made it worse,” I admit as I break off a piece of the scone in front of me, hoping maybe it will settle my stomach, but no such luck. Damn it. “I think I’m gonna go, guys. I’m not feeling so good.”

“Cait. You really need to consider going to the doctor. You may have a food allergy or have developed a sensitivity to something. This keeps happening.” My bestie is an incredible nurse. She’s also got shit timing because right now, with Callen not ten feet behind me, I don’t want to be lectured about the possibility that I’m allergic to gluten.

I grab my purse and force a smile. “Talk soon.”

And then I’m gone before I can possibly run into Callen.

That doesn’t mean I can’t feel his eyes on me as I walk through the door.

Fuck you, Callen Sinclair.

I curl up on the couch at my parents’ house when I get there on Thanksgiving, opting to take a nap instead of helping to make the fresh ravioli Mom and Nonna make each year. I vaguely register my brothers coming in and out of the room and choose to ignore them when they turn on the Kings game. Because why wouldn’t Callen haunt me here too?

“Move down, Cait,” Lucky bitches as he sits by my feet, and maybe I kick him before I make room for him. Little brothers are dicks.

I pull the chunky red cable-knit blanket off the back of the couch and roll away from the television, not in the mood for this torture. Unfortunately, it only takes a few minutes and a ridiculous amount of yelling at the TV by all three of my brothers before I get up, deciding I need to find a quieter spot.

Like I said . . . dicks.

When I wander into the kitchen with the thick blanket wrapped around my shoulders, Nonna immediately stops stirring the sauce with her wooden spoon and presses her lips to my forehead. “You’re not warm, principessa. Why do you look sick?”

“Thanks, Nonna. I didn’t think I looked sick. Just tired. I’m fighting a bug I can’t seem to shake.”

“You should have your iron levels checked. They gave me a pill for that.”

I kiss my great-grandmother’s cheek and smile as she lifts the sauce spoon to my lips.

“Yumm. That’s really good.”

Mom walks into the kitchen, her dark hair pulled back, dressed in a black sweater and black leggings. If you didn’t know she was in her fifties, you’d never believe it. She’s as beautiful now as she’s always been. Yay for good genes. “Of course it’s good. It’s my sauce.”

She’s cocky too.

“Are you sick, honey?” She looks me over and furrows her brow. “You look pale.”

“She needs iron,” Nonna tells her, and I shake my head.

Everyone thinks they’re a doctor.

“I’m fine. Just tired. I can’t shake how tired I am,” I complain, not bothering to tell her it’s been months since I’ve gotten a good night’s sleep. That would only lead to questions I can’t answer.

“Sit, principessa. Tell us about all the exciting things you’re doing. In my day, you got married and you had babies. You didn’t design dresses for singers and dress athletes for interviews. I was listening to that Lilah Ryan on the Alexa this morning. I like her music.”

“Nonna . . .” I laugh. “You listen to Lilah?”

Nonna refuses to tell us her actual age, but we’re pretty sure she’s at least ninety, considering she’s Dad’s grandmother. According to her, age is a state of mind, and she refuses to admit she’s any older than fifty, even if Dad is older than that. The idea of her listening to Lilah makes me smile.

“She wears your dresses, so I listen to her music. It’s as simple as that. And that brother of hers is so cute,” she adds with a wink.

“It’s the Sinclair genes,” Mom agrees, and she’s not wrong. “They all had gorgeous kids.”

I’m pretty sure a growl slips past my lips before I can stop it, and judging by the looks on Mom and Nonna’s faces, they heard it too. Oopsie.

“Caitlin . . .” Mom corners me the way only she can. “Your brother mentioned you seemed upset with Callen last month. Is everything okay? Or has a different Sinclair made you growl like that?”

“Maddox’s friend?” Nonna asks as she drops fresh pasta into boiling water. “Why would he make you growl? That boy is so sweet.”

To her, maybe.

“Oh, Nonna.” Mom pulls the chicken Milanese out of the oven, and my stomach flip-flops. Not a good smell. “Don’t you remember the way she used to follow him around and the way she’d stomp off when Maddox and Callen wouldn’t let her play?”

I hold my hand up to my mouth until the nausea passes. “I was a kid.”

“Some things don’t change, Caitie.”

Nonna smiles at Mom, then looks at me, and my stomach drops. “You look green.”

“I don’t feel so good . . .” I feel it happening in slow-motion as I turn and dash to the bathroom. I barely make it to my knees before I’m throwing up again, only there’s nothing left to throw up since I haven’t eaten today, and I’m left dry-heaving as my brothers yell in the background.

“Should have laid off the shots last night, Caitie.”

Stupid fucking Rome.

Lucky chuckles as my body revolts, and tears stream down my face.

The boys are all decent pukers.

Not me.

Rome will actually gag himself to get it over with.

Just the thought brings on another round of dry heaves.

“Shut the door, Cait. I don’t want to get sick,” Lucky yells, and if I thought I could get up, I’d go back in the family room and puke on him. Dickhead.

“Here, honey.” Mom gathers my hair in her hands and presses a damp, cool washcloth to the back of my neck. “How long have you had this bug, baby?”

“I don’t know,” I moan and thank God for Mom’s obsessive need to clean as I lay my face against the toilet. “The smell of the Milanese turned my stomach.”

“Amelia, do you remember the way Milanese used to make you sick when you were pregnant?” Nonna asks Mom, and my stomach flips like an upside-down roller coaster.

“I’d have to be having sex to be pregnant, Nonna,” I moan.

“Shut the door,” Maddox yells.

“It was so weird because you didn’t get sick right away,” Nonna continues, and Mom brushes the hair from my temple as my eyes close.

“This is the first time she’s gotten sick,” Mom defends me.

No. No. No. No. My. God. No.

“She’s not pregnant, Nonna,” Mom tells her, and I start doing the math in my head.

“I was sick this morning too,” I croak. “And last week . . .”

We used condoms.

I’m not pregnant.

When was the last time I had my period?

Fuck.

I don’t even get a regular period.

For fucks sake, they warned me it could be hard to get pregnant.

I can’t actually be pregnant.

“Caitie . . .” Mom lifts my face and sees the concern. At least I think she does when she turns to Nonna. “Could you grab me my phone, Nonna?”

“What do you need your phone for? You’re not taking a picture, are you?” I moan.

“No, principessa. I’m DoorDashing a pregnancy test.”

Fuck my life.

One hour, two bottles of water, and four positive pregnancy tests later, I’m back in the fetal position on a bathroom floor. The difference is this one has radiant heating and is attached to Mom’s master bedroom. And this door is closed and locked.

“I can’t be pregnant,” I sob. “I can’t. This can’t be happening.”

Mom runs her fingers through my hair, trying to calm me down, but there is no calming down. Not now. Maybe not ever. What the hell am I supposed to do with a baby when some days I’m pretty sure I fail at taking care of myself? I had a bag of chips for dinner last night. You can’t feed a baby a bag of chips.

“Ma . . .” Lucky bangs on the door. “I’m hungry. When are we going to eat?”

She kisses my forehead and gets up as primly as she can from the floor, then cracks open the door. “Luciano Beneventi, I swear on all that is holy if you do not get the fuck out of my room right this second, I will tell that trashy little tramp you snuck out of the house this morning that she’s one of no less than three women you think I don’t know you sneak in and out of your room. And after she’s done clawing you apart with those daggers she calls nails, I will call the other two. And don’t you think I don’t know who they are or how to get hold of them. I’ve been your father’s wife for nearly three decades. I know things. Now get downstairs and do not come back up.”

When he doesn’t move fast enough, she shoves him back with a push. “Go.”

Under different circumstances, I’d laugh at the look on Lucky’s face.

Under these circumstances, I may never laugh again.

Mom shuts the door and locks it. “Honey . . . I have a few questions.”

“Yeah,” I croak. “So do I.”

Mom gets back down on the floor next to me and lays my head in her lap, then goes back to running her fingers through my hair. “Well, you know, kiddo. The time to ask may have been before you started having sex.”

A hysterical laughter bubbles up my throat and past my lips.

One I can’t control.

One I can’t stop until I’m sobbing again.

“We used a condom,” I protest.

“It only takes one time⁠—”

“We used them every time.” My heart cracks all over again, just thinking about that week.

“Oh . . .” Her hands stop. “Every time. There were a lot of times?”

“Mom . . .” I close my eyes. “There were apparently enough times.”

“Was it good?”

“Oh. My. God. Mother.” I never knew I’d one day wish the earth would open up and swallow me whole like some kind of bad sci-fi movie. But I’d take that over this any day.

“Honey, I just want to know that it was at least good sex. Trust me. Good sex can make a lot of things better.” She says it so matter-of-factly that I realize I’m too shell-shocked to even care that she’s talking about sex with my father.

“It was good sex. Really good sex. The kind of sex you never want to end because you know you’re going to be changed on a molecular level when it’s all over,” I whisper, remembering what it was like to be held in that asshole’s arms and wishing desperately that I was still there. That he was holding me now, making this all better.

She pushes up the sleeves of her sweater and fans her flushed face. “Damn, honey. I think I might need a cigarette after that.”

“You don’t smoke.”

She ignores me. “And do I know this man, Caitlin?”

Forget cracking. What’s left of my heart is shattered.

“It turns out, I’m not sure I even knew him.”

“And then what happened?” Bellamy asks, lying next to me in my bed the next day after she gets off her double shift at the hospital.

“I made her promise I could have a few weeks before we talked to my dad. I need to wrap my head around this before I can handle the freak-out he’s going to have.” I shove my hands under my pillow and ignore the fact that I’m wearing Callen’s shirt to bed.

Bellamy mirrors my position. “And Amelia’s going to keep it from him?”

I nod. “But I have to call the doctor’s office today and schedule an appointment. That was her one demand.”

“I figured your mom and dad had that whole you tell one, you tell both thing going for them.” Of course she did. Bellamy grew up in a normal house. With a schoolteacher for a mom and a fisherman for a dad. Secrets were probably never kept in her house.

“Secrets are part of my parents’ lives. She wasn’t happy, but I’m an adult, and she respects me. So she agreed.” Thankfully. Because I can’t imagine doing this without my mom, and the thought of telling my dad right now scares me almost as much as the idea of being responsible for keeping a human alive.

I’ve had plants die in less time than it takes me to pick out my clothes for work.

“So what are you going to do?” B asks after a few minutes. “You know you don’t have to go through with this if you don’t want to. It’s your choice.”

“I know in theory it is. But for me, there is no choice.” Once I calmed down enough to think more clearly, I knew what I was doing. I wasn’t excited about it. I’m still not. But my heart told me this was what’s right for me. Of course, my heart also told me I loved Callen, so its judgment skills are somewhat lacking. “I’m going to have it. I’m probably going to fuck up its life the way I’m apparently excelling at fucking up my own though. So there’s that to look forward to.”

Maybe I should start a therapy fund instead of a college fund.

Do they have them?

“What about Callen?” she asks the question I haven’t stopped asking myself since I climbed in bed last night. One I still don’t have the answer to.

“What about him?”

She holds my glare for so long, I think she may have forgotten how to speak. “You’ve got to tell him, Cait,”

“I know,” I answer softly. Aching. Wishing this was happening in a different time under different circumstances. One where he was here with me, and we were both happy about this surprise. “But I’m not even ready to talk about this with anyone else yet. I can’t think about Callen’s feelings now. I will. I promise. When I’m ready.”

Bellamy slides one of her hands under my pillow and links her fingers with mine. “The longer you wait, the harder it’s going to get.”

“Pretty sure I’ve already hit that wall. I’m not sure how much harder it can get.”

I know just how wrong I am before the last word even leaves my lips.

I thought hard hit the day Callen left, but it’s gotten incrementally worse each day since.

And that was before I learned exactly how much my life was about to change.

Another lackluster showing from our Kings tonight has left this reporter almost as disappointed by their lack of performance as a virginal bride on her wedding night is with her husband. Even worse . . . another loss means another lost opportunity for our favorite ballers to show up and show off in force to celebrate. Ahh . . . the good old days when all it took was Callen Sinclair appearing at a bar and bam—we’d have ourselves a juicy headline.

This reporter isn’t giving up hope though. With now twelve games behind us in the regular season, the Kings are leaving us desperate for two things: A chance at the taste of a post-season victory and a chance at a bite of some deliciously, decadent gossip.

#KroydonKronicles #TheGoodOldDays #FootballBlueBalls