Chapter 8

CHAPTER EIGHT

C olson

“I baked cookies,” I growled.

Joey cracked a shit-eating grin that pissed me off. Then again, anytime anyone was around Tully and taking all of her attention, it pissed me off. I thought maybe that reaction would lessen given space and time apart, but clearly it hadn’t.

“You what?” Tully blinked like she didn’t understand simple English.

“Good to see you again, Tully.” Joey gave Tully a side hug, grinning at me the whole time, knowing his proximity was pissing me off. I’d have to have a talk with him about putting his hands on her. He was a married man. He’d do well to remember that next time he felt the urge to hug someone who wasn’t his wife.

“Figured if we were going to abuse your time with this fundraiser, I could at least make it worth your while. Still drool over those chocolate peanut butter chip cookies?” I remembered how much Tully loved the chocolate-and-peanut butter combination. At least she did when we were kids.

Tully stepped over to my side, looking more like her younger self in a pair of loose-fitted jeans with holes at the knee and a bright red blouse despite her gorgeous hair being wrangled into a straight hairstyle again. When she did her television show, she was always in a skintight polo shirt and tool belt, not a hair curl in sight. This casual look reminded me of old times. More Tully Cassio and less Tully Starling. “Egg bites and now cookies? You trying to butter me up, hotshot?”

It was the nickname that had me losing the frown. She used to call me that, back when I was only talking about getting into firefighting. She’d been my biggest supporter. Until she wasn’t.

“I can add in tacos and a margarita if that’ll help.”

Tully smiled at me, both of us just soaking in the sight of the other person. Joey cleared his throat and I stepped back, remembering he was there. I indicated Tully should follow me into the fire station. She swept past me, and right before the door closed, I turned around and flipped off Joey. His bark of laughter was muted by the door between us, thank God.

“We have a meeting room over here.” I ushered Tully into the closet-sized room we rarely used.

I shut the door behind us, not wanting any of the guys to poke their heads in and fawn over the Hollywood celebrity like they did last time she was here. There was just enough room for a small table and two chairs in the plain room. I held out one chair and Tully sat down. I took the other, though the tight room meant our elbows were touching. I didn’t mind that part at all. Except now her perfume was clogging the airspace, and I wasn’t going to be able to think straight.

I pushed the notepad toward her, where my chicken scratch writing listed out about fifteen items we’d need her help with. She eyed it and then gave me a hoity-toity look I hated.

“Still haven’t learned to write above a second-grade level?”

I gave her a dirty look right back. Good handwriting was overrated. “Been busy saving lives. You?”

“Been busy building a multimillion-dollar show,” she fired back.

“Touché.”

Her lips begrudgingly pulled up at the corners. Thing was, I could do this all day with her. She’d always been a spitfire and I much preferred the crackle in her eyes right now than the pinched look when she told me she’d been fired.

“So, I have a list.” I pushed the notebook into her hand. She snatched it up and started reading down the list, lips barely moving as she read silently.

She tapped the paper and looked up at me before she could have possibly read all the items. “Captain said three fifteen-minute segments. This is days of work.”

I shrugged, playing it off when I knew I’d added way more than she originally agreed to. Could I help it I just wanted a reason to be around her again? One that didn’t involve mud? Although the naked part of last night had been fine…

“If you can’t hack actual work, just say so, Tully.”

She scoffed like I knew she would. Tully had never been afraid of hard work. She ripped the paper off the pad and folded it, hanging on to it like she had intentions of doing all the things I’d listed out. “You always did underestimate me.”

That offhand comment hit me like a physical blow to the chest. She could have slapped my cheek with all those muscles she’d built renovating houses and I wouldn’t have been more surprised.

“ Underestimated you?” I gaped.

She shrugged, clearly nonplussed at the huge insult. “Weren’t you the one who said you couldn’t wait to see me barefoot and pregnant?”

I glared at her. Nineteen years and I still remembered our arguments like they were yesterday. What did it mean that Tully remembered too?

“Yeah, pregnant with our baby. And not just pregnant. Pregnant and renovating houses. Pregnant and sitting on your ass all day. Didn’t much matter to me as long as you were mine and having our baby. How is that underestimating you?”

Tully squeezed her eyes shut and then suddenly stood up, the chair scraping back loudly on the concrete floors. “I didn’t come here to argue and sling insults, Colson. I really didn’t. I just want to help out Blueball with the fundraiser.” She tucked the sheet of paper in the back pocket of her jeans, looking toward the door like she couldn’t wait to get away from me.

I stood up cautiously. It felt like any abrupt movement or careless word could set this little office off like a box of TNT. I held my hands out in a gesture of peace. “And I didn’t mean to make you angry. Believe it or not, I thought I worked all these issues out with my therapist years ago.”

Tully’s head snapped back to me. “You went to therapy?”

“Yeah, I went to therapy. The woman I loved ditched me for Hollywood. Of course I had issues that needed sorting out.”

Tully lifted her nose in the air and folded her arms over her chest. “It was more than that, and you know it. But I’m glad to hear you went to therapy.”

An errant thought tried to wrestle my lips into a grin. “You thought I’d punch Boon to get the rage out?”

“Or wrestle a grizzly bear.”

“Go to that new hatchet place Gannon built at Glamper’s Paradise?”

Tully frowns. “What’s Glamper’s Paradise?”

I sighed, though the smile stayed in place. I put my hand on her elbow and led her out of the office. After all, I promised her cookies. “You have so much to learn about Blueball, wife.”

Tully copied my sigh. “ Ex -wife.”

I made a detour to the kitchen to find Danny and Frank hovering over my cooling plate of cookies, dirty mouths stuffed with the sugary goodness. “Get out of here, assholes!”

They jumped away like I shot them, but not before they each snatched another cookie off the plate. I shook my head at their retreating backs, but offered the plate to Tully anyway. Half the plate only held crumbs, but there was still enough cookies there for her and Sofia to share tonight. She took the plate, eyeing the remains.

“Are they always like that?”

“Those bastards? Yeah. They grow on you though. Kind of like a fungus.”

Tully grimaced. “Well, thanks for the cookies. And the list. I’ll read through it and let you know if there’s anything I can’t swing.”

“Full schedule?” Yeah, I knew I was being a dick highlighting her unemployed status and yet it still came out of my mouth.

Tully backed away, clutching the plate to her midsection. Her eyes lit up right before one hand came up in the air, middle finger extended. I barked out a laugh. She spun away from me, but I caught the smile I’d always loved. She was almost out the door leading out to the truck bays when I opened my mouth one more time.

“Hey, Tully.”

She spun back around, back against the door, eyebrows raised.

“I have one question my therapist could never help me with. Clearly you became famous and had a successful career.” At her nod to continue, I did, dreading the answer as much as those first days after our divorce when I’d come home from work and Tully was gone. “Are you happy?”

She took a few moments to inhale deeply while my heart rattled in my chest. When she answered me, she was staring down at that plate of cookies. “I thought I was.”

And then she was gone, taking her scent with her. I stood in the same spot for several long minutes, absorbing everything that had gone down between us since she came back to town.

I thought I was.

That answer haunted me. Part of me wanted to cheer and pat my beaten-down pride on the back that maybe she had regrets about leaving me. A bigger part of me grieved that answer right along with her. I loved Tully once, loved her with everything I had. Which meant I wanted her happy, even if she wasn’t with me.

“Heard the fuckin’ Keebler elves are handing out cookies.”

I spun on my heel to see Warrick coming from down the other hallway in his fancy pants. The man had some obsession with designer jeans that didn’t fit in with Blueball. His wife, Em, had been trying to get him to wear Wranglers, but it was a losing battle. “What are you doing here?”

He didn’t bother to address my not-so-friendly greeting. He was used to it. “Was that Tully I saw driving out of here?” He pointed over his shoulder. Ah, I got it now. He was just here snooping. Mom probably sent him.

I nodded, not trusting myself to say anything else on the subject of my ex-wife.

Warrick clapped me on the shoulder. “Were you trying to get back in her pants with your baking skills? Really? That was your big move after nineteen years?”

I shrugged off his hand, not at all in the mood to listen to his shit. “No, fuckhead. I tackled her in the mud. That was my big move.”

Warrick studied me, trying to figure out if I was joking or not. He finally shook his head and tried to blink away the confusion. I wasn’t going to help clarify. It was none of his goddamn business.

“Well, I’m glad you’re trying something. Dad would be proud you’re settling things,” he finished in a soft voice.

I snorted. “Pretty sure the divorce papers settled everything.”

Warrick clapped me again on the shoulder. This time I glared at him until he removed his hand. “Yeah, right. You’re still in love with the woman, even after nineteen years.”

“No, I’m not,” I snapped back, finding the idea ridiculous. Tully had shattered my heart, my dreams, the very person I was at twenty-three. My pride has taken a similar beating. Do you know how humiliating it was to have the girl you’d been with all through high school and married at eighteen leave your ass? Or the absolute rage that would fuck up my day when I happened to pass a television and there she was? In all her Hollywood glory having a perfect little fucking life without me?

I certainly wasn’t in love with Tully.

I wanted to hate her.

Warrick leaned in so close I could count the gray hairs that had been added to his beard since Vivi was born. “Then why haven’t you gotten your tattoo removed?”

My hand, the one with the aforementioned tattoo, shot out, shoving him away from me. He didn’t put up a fight, just threw his hands in the air and walked out of the fire station without a backward glance.

“Why are older brothers such dickweeds?” I asked out loud. The empty fire station didn’t answer me.

I grabbed an apple from the fruit basket we kept on the counter at all times. I bit into it, juice soaking into my mustache as I chomped away. Energy crackled underneath my skin as I paced the fire station. Maybe I’d grab some of the guys and wash the rig again. Anything was better than sitting around with nothing to do but run down memory lane. Having Tully back in town was messing with my head.

I opened the door to the bay where the guys were shooting the shit. “Danny! Frank! You’re on car wash duty with me!” They grumbled, but immediately cut it off when they saw the caged animal in my eyes. Those fuckers ate my cookies, they could wash the damn rig. And hopefully, they’d keep my mind off Tully.