Page 11 of Quake
I stared at him, completely bewildered for a moment. When I found my tongue, I said, “Juliette.”
“Well, Juliette,” he said with a bright smile, “have you done self-defense before?”
I shook my head.
“Any fitness classes?”
I shook my head again.
He chuckled, his eyes crinkling in the corners. “No worries. We always start each class by running through the basics, so don’t worry about not knowing much. I’ll be here to help, and…” He turned, looking around at the assembled women and gestured to a tall brunette who bounded over, her ponytail swishing from side to side. “Ellen, this is Juliette. It’s her first time with us. Would you mind partnering up with her?”
“Sure thing,” she said, her confidence shining so bright it dulled my itty bitty spark and almost extinguished it. Turning to me, she said, “I’ve been coming here for a few months now. I’ll help you out, no problems.”
I looked at her and was immediately jealous, but I nodded and attempted a smile. “Thanks.”
Tommy left us to go stand at the front of the group, and as I listened to his instructions, I hoped to God I was actually half-decent. I needed a boost.
“Don’t worry,” Ellen whispered into my ear. “I fell over a million times when I first started coming here, now I could flip a knife-wielding man twice the size of Tommy without even messing up my mascara.”
“Really?” Despite my raging jealousy, there was something likable about her, and I felt myself soften.
“Oh, sure,” she said, waving her hand. “You’ll be doing the same in no time. You’ll see.”
“Oh, man, I hope so,” I said with a moan.
Then the class started, and I immediately fell on my ass.
6
Caleb
Your girl is here.
I stared at Tommy’s message on my phone and cursed under my breath. She’d come back, and I wasn’t there.
“Caleb.”
Glancing up at the woman sitting across from me at the table adorned with plates of artfully sculpted food with fancy names I could hardly pronounce, I grimaced.
“Sorry, Mum.”
She shook her head and pouted, her head of full strawberry blonde hair fluttering around her shoulders. Shit, she’d had her hair done for tonight, and here I was staring at my phone and swearing in front of her. She hated it when I swore.
“I said I was sorry,” I said, putting my phone back into my pocket.
“Your father could have had the decency to say he was going to be late,” she declared, reaching for her glass of Pinot Noir.
At the age of sixty-five, Lilly Carmichael was well versed in the comings and goings of her rich and asshole-ish husband. Why she was surprised he hadn’t turned up to the dinner he arranged was beyond me. I’d expected it, which was why I’d shown up in the first place.
I loved my mum, but after thirty years of marriage, I thought she knew the guy. He’d been pulling this shit my entire life. Birthdays, school recitals, sports days,Christmas. He always had someplace better to be…except when I was in the ring. That was the only time he gave a shit about me. When I was upholding the Carmichael legacy.
“You know he’s not coming,” I said. “Otherwise, you wouldn’t have let me order.”
She sighed, her eyes rolling. “You’re right. I don’t know why I keep hoping he’ll take some time off. I’ve been trying to convince him for years.”
“Do you know he came by Beat the other day, demanding changes.”
“Oh, honey, just let him be. It makes him happy.”
