Atonement(13)

“That’s cool. Listen, I just need a place to crash for a while. If you can talk to Drew…”

“Listen, we’ll be there in about twenty minutes. Can you please wait outside? I don’t want to have to troll that f*cking club looking for your ass.”

Aubrey sighed in annoyance. “Sure, fine. I am in a dress that hits me just below my ass and it isn’t exactly one hundred degrees outside. Just phone me when you get here and I’ll make my way down, okay?”

“Fine.” I ended the call and threw my phone down on the bed before my hands went directly to my hair to hold it out of my face.

Every time it looked like I was about to get a handle on my life, my life seemed to throw a curveball which always seemed to manhandle me. Do people ever grow up? Of course they don’t. We, as a species, didn’t grow up, we just got older and no one was a better example of this phenomenon than Aubrey Gault.





Chapter Five





“SO, DO YOU wanna tell me what’s going on here?”

I glanced at Colin’s profile and a part of me wanted to smile though he looked a bit pissed off we’d had yet another interruption so I decided to play it safe and just give him the details he needed to know.

“Aubrey is my cousin on my mother’s side of the family—my real mother. Her father and my mother were siblings. They came from a fairly decent family. Hard working Creole Louisianans who provided a good life for their children who grew up to become responsible adults. Unfortunately, my uncle fell hard for an exchange student at Louisiana State University. She was from Montreal and it was love at first sight, or so I’ve heard.

“The woman is a total basketcase. She left Louisiana State University their mid-sophomore year and went back to Canada. My uncle didn’t even know he had a daughter by this woman, Sandrine, until Aubrey was ten. She’d been in and out of the system because her mother is a paranoid schizophrenic with an alcohol and drug problem. Anyway, she’s always been smart as a whip and she looked my uncle up on the internet.

“By this time, my uncle is married and has two sons but his wife is a complete and utter sweetheart. They take in Aubrey but she is just a nightmare. She doesn’t want to go to school, severe emotional problems, sexual abuse…you name it, the woman has been through it. I mean, she’s only twenty-six but her life is completely out of control and she kind of goes from man to man.”

It was the first time I’d stopped talking long enough to take a moment to breathe.

“How did she manage to get here to Seattle?”

“Um, after a stint at some brothel in Nevada, she decided to look me up and she’s been here since January. I had enough issues with my dad dying so I just threw some money at her and hoped for the best—like maybe she would get bored and go home or something but that didn’t happen. She’s sexy and has a knack for meeting the right people. She’s quite popular at Bare—you know, the strip club for all the wealthy and moneyed of the city—and she manages to turn up on time and does her job but she can’t seem to keep anything else.”

“So, what do you want to do?” Colin wondered out loud after a long silence.

“I don’t know…we’re leaving on this trip soon…?”

“How about next week?”

“Yeah, that’ll work. She can take my room and I’ll butter up Drew to let her stay because I can’t have her out on the street. I mean, my uncle would kill me and he’d have a point. There is plenty of room but the thought of sharing a room with that chick—”

“Why don’t you just take my guest room then? I mean, until we leave? That way you get privacy and your cousin can take your room. We have a lot of planning to do and my work schedule is, unfortunately, pretty hectic next week. We can agree to meet up at O’Shaughnessy’s or talk when I get home from work? Might as well get used to one another’s company now since we’ll be seeing a lot of one another soon,” he explained in a rational tone.

It was a great idea but the thought of spending more time within this hot-blooded male’s presence was enough to make my heart beat double-time.

“Or…I can ask your cousin if she’d like to stay with me?”

God no!

“I don’t mind staying in your overpriced condo,” I responded in a nonchalant voice. “I mean, you bring up a good point and besides, I don’t need my trip ruined because you decide to f*ck Aubrey and she does something you would blame me for so it just works out better this way.”