Faked (Ward Family #2)(60)

So I paused but closed my eyes.

"You're freaking me out," she whispered.

"Just ... talk to your sister for five minutes, okay?"

"No."

My eyes popped open at her firm tone. Lia said her sister's name.

Claire's gaze never wavered from mine. "I want to talk to you. Lia, can you please give us some privacy?"

"Claire, it's my fault, I swear," Lia said in a rush. "Please, let me—"

Claire held up her hand. "I never ask you to leave me alone, but Lia, this is a moment when I need you to go away so I can talk to Bauer."

Lia's eyes widened, and even I was surprised at Claire's reaction. But Lia respected her twin, nodding her head slowly.

It was quiet enough in the kitchen that we'd gathered an audience.

"Shit," I whispered. "I can't do this in here."

Claire let out a long exhale. "What’s going on? Talk to me."

My chin dropped to my chest. I was going to fuck this up, I could already tell. I wish I'd never come out of that bathroom. I wish I'd told her I could meet her family another time. And I wished that I knew how to do bullshit like this with a woman who already meant entirely too much to me.

So much that the thought of her wanting my brother made me pound his stupid face in, right after I clawed my heart to try to temper this ... feeling.

Staring at her, trying to figure out what I wanted to say and how and where, all I could imagine was her in that yellow dress with the red lipstick painstakingly applied. The look in her eyes when I turned around, and she saw me for the first time that she hadn't been able to mask.

It hadn't been shock that kept her so quiet on the drive. It was disappointment.

Which was why I turned and walked out the door, and I wasn't entirely sure I wanted her to follow me.





Chapter Twenty-Two





Claire





The wide expanse of Bauer's back had never looked ominous to me.

Strong.

Capable.

Sexy.

But never ominous.

As I gaped at it, at the sight of him walking away from me, out the door that led to the garage, it was the most terrifying thing I'd ever seen. Mainly because I was so confused, so completely and utterly lost, I didn't know what the hell was going on.

Noise exploded behind me when he exited the house, and I refused to give my family a backward glance because it wasn't like I could explain anything. I jogged out of the house and yelled his name when I saw him pace between the parked cars.

"What is going on?" I begged. "You were gone for three minutes, and all of a sudden, you're walking out on me?"

Bauer stopped pacing, his hands propped on his hips, as he stared up into the cloudless sky.

Maybe it was a strange thing to notice, that the canopy above us was clear and bright, but it made me wish we were back at that cabin.

There we'd had blankets of white and clouds and wind to shelter our little space. Suddenly, I wanted that sense of security back.

"What did Lia say to you?" I asked quietly. It was taking everything in me not to march up to him and shake the answer out of him.

"I can see it."

My head tilted at his strange answer. I felt like a fish that had been plopped unceremoniously out of its bowl. It was hard to breathe because I had no concept of how to navigate this. "See what?"

He exhaled slowly, finally turning to face me. "You and Finn."

My stomach was now the thing giving me all the ominous feels because it turned dangerously. What the hell did my sister say to him?

"Me and Finn," I repeated quietly. "Bauer ... I—"

Denial trapped in my throat. Nothing else came up. Because I couldn't lie. And he saw that on my face.

He nodded. "You'd look great together. And it's probably really fucking stupid on my end that I never even considered that you went that night because of him."

"I don't want Finn," I argued. Carefully, I approached him with my hands held up. Don't spook the snowboarder, Claire, because he walked out of that house and had his mind halfway made up already. "I don't know what Lia said to you, or what she thinks she knows, but if she inferred anything that makes you think I don't want to be with you, she's wrong."

"Don't be mad at her." Ugh, my skin recoiled at his casual tone. The way he tucked his hands in his pockets as if this was no big deal, just any other conversation we might have had, standing under a cloudless sky. "She's just speaking the truth."

"How would I know? You haven't told me what she said."

"Fair enough," he conceded. Bauer braced a shoulder on the side of his Jeep and studied my face. "You would've canceled in a heartbeat if you'd known who was going to show up. No yellow dress. No red lipstick. No lying necessary. Because the only reason you did what you did was because you wanted a shot with the Golden Boy."

Normally, I prided myself on being a levelheaded person.

Seeing both sides.

Understanding differing opinions.

But now, I saw red.

"And you stormed out of my family's house because I might have made a different decision if I'd maybe known he was sick, when I'd never even met you before that night?" My tone gradually increased in volume, in pitch, in absolute mind-blown anger. "Is this a joke?"