Page 5 of Be My Temptation (Temptation 2)
And stopped wishing for anything but the life my mother had wished for me. Kate replaced the lid on the bin of photos. Ignore what you can’t face. That’s what my mother believed. And I followed in her footsteps. It’s what allowed me to turn a blind eye to blatant evidence that my husband was cheating on me, until it became so obvious I had no choice but to leave.
Now I’m avoiding Brock’s calls because I don’t know what to say. I didn’t come home because I want to recapture the past. I see that now. I came here hoping I could find a way to free myself from it. How to stop being who others want me to be and find myself.
Rising slowly, Kate walked back downstairs. She went into her kitchen and opened the drawer where she kept the phone she had used to communicate with Mr. Elf. She hadn’t opened it since telling him she had chosen Brock. She hadn’t wanted to know if he’d written to her since.
As she held the prepaid phone in her hand, she thought of how she’d found it on her doorstep. She half smiled at the memory of what Mr. Elf had told her to do and how much she had enjoyed doing it. While she’d been following his naughty instructions, Kate had been defying the strict way in which she’d been raised. She’d done what she’d wanted without regard for whether it was right or wrong. Without worry of what others would think of her. She’d felt free during her time with Mr. Elf, until he’d begun to involve Brock too much. Good, honest Brock. What would he think of me if he knew what I did with Mr. Elf? That our relationship started as part of a game I was playing with another man?
Why can’t I tell Brock I love him? Because I feel guilty about the way we got together? If so, I can fix that. Kate opened a cabinet door and held the phone over the trash can. Good-bye, Mr. Elf. Thank you for giving me the push I needed to stop hiding in my house and worrying what everyone thought of me. Thank you for teaching me that sex can be fun, and partners are optional. I may never know who you are, but I won’t keep feeling guilty about having known you. I wouldn’t have Brock if it weren’t for you. You’re not a temptation, Mr. Elf; you’re a confession I need to make. One I hope Brock will understand.
Once that hurdle is removed—I’ll be free.
Free to tell Brock “I love you.”
Because I do.
Kate smiled.
I do love you, Brock. There are so many things I don’t know, but I know that.
Kate dropped the phone into the trash bin and closed the cabinet door. She put on her coat, gathered her keys, and headed out the door. She drove to Brock’s office trailer at his construction site, hoping to catch him before he left for the day. She was knocking on the door of the trailer when his sister came sprinting toward her.
“Kate.”
“Linda, is he here?”
“You just missed him. Call him, he’s probably not that far. He said he was heading home to shower and then over to your place.”
Kate hesitated. On the way over, she had tried to figure out exactly how to explain Mr. Elf to Brock, but she hadn’t yet found the right words. Writing her thoughts out on paper had always helped her express herself better. If Brock was waiting for her back at her house, she needed to figure this out now, before she got back home. She needed him to understand that being with Mr. Elf had opened her up in a way that had made it possible to be with him. What kind of declaration of love involves gratitude to another man? “Linda, do you think it would be okay if I used his office for a few minutes? I just need to write something down.”
“Sure.” Seeing the concerned look in her eyes, Kate knew Brock had already talked to her. “Anything you need. He keeps everything locked up, but I have a key. There are pens inside the top drawer.” Ushering Kate inside, Linda unlocked Brock’s desk. “Sit in his chair. I always do. I’ll stay and file a few things while you write out what you need to. Just tell me when you’re done, and I’ll lock everything up again.”
“Thank you,” Kate said and gingerly sat in Brock’s chair. It was a humble desk for a man who ran a business the size of his. That was one of the many things she admired about him: Brock didn’t put on a show. He was exactly what he appeared to be.
In search of writing instruments, Kate opened the top drawer of his desk. She took out a blank writing pad and a pen. She was just about to close the drawer when she caught a glimpse of something that looked oddly familiar. She pulled the drawer out farther.
There, among pens and pencils, was a cell phone that looked exactly like the one she had thrown in the trash earlier that day. She told herself it meant nothing. Cell phones, even simple models like the one before her, were common.
Kate glanced over to make sure Linda wasn’t watching her. Brock’s sister was busy filing papers, just as she’d said she’d be. Kate turned the phone on.
She felt a little crazy, and more than a little paranoid, when she opened the messages. There was no way this phone could be what she feared it was. The room around her spun as she read its last texts.
Good-bye, Mr. Elf.
Good-bye, Kate.
Kate tossed the phone back in the drawer and slammed it shut.
Linda called out from across the room, “Are you done already?”
Brock has Mr. Elf’s phone? Why? How could he have it, unless—? Furious and still in shock, Kate stood and said coldly, “I’m done, all right. So done.”
Without explaining herself to Linda, Kate walked out of the trailer and back to her car. She sent Brock a text saying she didn’t want to see him that night.
He didn’t respond, which was fine because he was the last person she wanted to see. If Brock was Mr. Elf, that meant everything they had was a lie.
Nothing more than another game.
***
Standing in the middle of his room, with only a towel wrapped around his waist, Brock cursed as he reread the text Kate had just sent him. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
If any of his friends had called him for advice on a problem like this one, he would have told them to give the woman space. Dating was a game of chess, where a man had to choose his next move carefully. Contacting a woman after she told you she didn’t want to see you gave her all the power, and often served as a deathblow to the relationship. He’d seen his friends do it a hundred times.
Play by the rules if you want to win. At least that was what he’d believed before he fell in love with Kate. It was different with her. He didn’t want to play games with her. Well, not head games. He tried to ignore the hard-on he got just thinking about some of the role playing they had tried together in the bedroom. Stop that, he chastised his traitorous dick. This is serious.
He paced his bedroom impatiently. He wanted to give her time, but not enough time to move on to another ma
n. Things were a hell of a lot easier when women were chasing me.
He gave in and called her. He couldn’t play cool with this one. Her phone went straight to voice mail, and he cursed for a good five minutes before he threw his phone across the room.
Chapter Five
That bastard.
Kate drove back home, flopping back and forth between wanting to hunt Brock down to tell him off and wanting to hide away from the world and cry. She thought she’d found a good guy, but turns out he was just like her ex: a lying bastard.
I told myself to take time off from men. I knew I wasn’t ready. But what did I do instead? I jumped right into bed with the first guy who paid attention to me.
Instead of stopping at her house, Kate pulled into Angie’s driveway. She paused when she noticed that Mike’s car was in the garage, but she decided she didn’t care if she looked crazy in front of him. She needed a friend, and Angie was the only one she had.
Angie answered the front door with one of the twins straddled on her hip. She took one look at the expression on Kate’s face and called her husband to take the baby. Mike rushed over, still dressed in the charcoal dress pants and ivory shirt he’d worn to work. He was already holding one of his sons; Angie handed him the other. “Mike, I need a few minutes with Kate. Can you feed the boys? There are bottles in the fridge.”
Mike nodded. “Sure. Kate, are you okay?”
Kate hated that her eyes were shiny with tears. “Yes, I just have to ask Angie something. It’ll only take a minute.”
Once they were alone and settled on the couch in the living room, Kate gave up trying to look brave and started to sob. Angie handed her a tissue box and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “What happened, Kate? I saw you this morning and everything was fine. Did someone die?”
Kate shook her head and blew her nose. “No.”
“Did you find something while cleaning out your mom’s stuff? I know that makes you sad, but I’ve never seen you like this.”
