Unraveled (Holding On Book 3) (21 page)

“Come on in,” Carly said with a little laugh.

Melissa was bundled up in her winter gear. Her long, blond hair was mostly tucked under her hat. She handed the pizza and beer to Carly so she could peel everything off. “I figured you might need some cheering up,” she said.

“Thanks, Mel,” Carly told her as she moved into the kitchen. She grabbed two plates out of the cupboard and then they moved on into the living room.  Carly set the food down and flipped open the box. Now that pizza was in front of her, she realized she was hungry.

“So,” Melissa said as she plopped herself onto the cushion beside Carly. “That was the notorious Jesse Nyland? Now I can see why you’re taking your break-up with Nolan so well. I have to admit, when you were gone and I talked to you on the phone, I thought you were putting on an act. But seeing you last night?”

A small smile quirked the corner of Carly’s lip up.
She found the raised-eyebrow look on Mel’s face amusing.

Without waiting for Carly to respond, Melissa gushed on. “Now, Jesse?
He
looks like a hard guy to get over.”

Carly couldn’t help but laugh at that. She couldn’t disagree. She’d spent eight years trying. It hadn’t worked out so well for her. She handed a plate of pizza to her friend.

“I do have a question though,” Melissa said with a grin.  She leaned toward Carly, ignoring the plate she settled onto her lap. “Last night? He called you Cricket a few times. I’m dying to know why. What the heck is that about?”

Carly shrugged. “It’s a long, kind of silly story.”

“So you better get started. Tell it,” Melissa commanded.

With a smile, Carly recalled how during her senior year of high school, she’d crashed a frat party because she knew Jesse would be there. One of his frat brothers had been hitting on
her. At the time, the frat boys had been calling any young, innocent girls ‘grasshoppers’. Jesse, in his drunken state, had tossed the guy off of Carly.

“He said, ‘Hands off. This cricket is mine’.” Carly rolled her eyes but she was grinning. “Obviously he meant grasshopper. I teased him about it. He teased me back by continuing to call me Cricket. It’s stuck.”

“What’s wrong?” Melissa asked.

Carly hadn’t realized her thoughts had been wandering until Melissa asked the question. The smile had fallen from her face and was now a deep frown. She put her hands up to cover her
cheeks as a wave of embarrassment flooded over her.

“I was just thinking. I used to do the stupidest things to get his attention.” She gripped the plate in her lap, looking at her pizza and realizing her appetite had already faded. “Looking back, it’s humiliating. I was so messed up. I would’ve done
anything
to get him to notice me. In fact, I did do just about anything. I wish I could go back in time and take it all back. I wish I wouldn’t have acted like such a desperate
child
.” She laughed at her words, trying to lighten the mood. Yet she meant every word she said.

“Hey, Carly,” Melissa said soothingly, “we all make mistakes.”

“I know. I just think I made more than the average person. It’s just that he broke my heart. I mean, I was completely wrecked. I know now why he did it. But for years, all I could think about was hurting him the way he hurt me.” She cringed as more memories washed over her. “I made it my mission to make him want me. Then not let him have me so he could see what it was like. I ended up so caught up in this stupid game of my own making.”

“He seems like a really nice guy,” Melissa offered.

Carly nodded. “For the longest time I had myself convinced he was just a womanizer. I never let myself open up to him enough to realize that he’s a genuinely good person.”

“And now?”

The smile slowly moved back into place. “Now, I’ve realized he really is everything I’ve ever wanted.”

“I thought so. Last night? I could tell. Now, eat your pizza,” she commanded. She leaned over to the coffee table and cracked open a beer for each of them.

While they ate, they talked about the upcoming semester. Melissa was also a senior. She and Carly had met their freshman year. They hadn’t gotten to be good friends until Carly had started dating Nolan because Nolan happened to be a good friend of Dan’s. Even after their brief break-up last year, Melissa had made it clear to Carly that they were friends no matter what.

When Carly and Nolan had gotten back together, and Nolan had eventually proposed, Meli
ssa had been ecstatic. But now that things had ended a second time, she was making it clear to Carly that
their
friendship still came first.

“So,” Melissa carefully asked when they were done eating and the rest of the pizza was placed in the fridge, “what’s up with Nolan? Have you heard from him?”

Carly scowled. “Not really. And it’s starting to piss me off.”

Melissa gave her a questioning look.

“I can’t get him to call me back. My parents wrote out a five thousand dollar check for their half of the wedding.”

“Their
half
?” Melissa asked wide-eyed.

“That was
after
the discount. But it covered everything. It was the premier wedding package that the resort offered. Caterer, music, photographer, banquet hall, honeymoon suite—”

“Wait!” Melissa said as she threw her hand up in a halting motion. “Hold up. You were going to get married at his parents’ resort and they were going to charge you for space?
And the honeymoon suite? I mean, okay, maybe I can see charging for the caterer and the photographer. But…
really
?”

Carly let out a defeated sigh. “I know. But I had shown my mom photos of prior weddings and she was as hooked on the place as I was. She didn’t even flinch when Nolan asked her for the five-thousand dollar down-payment.
They cashed the check and now, of course, my parents want their deposit back. I’ve called Nolan repeatedly. At first he ignored my calls. Then when I finally got a hold of him, he simply ignored my request.”

“Oh, Carly,” Melissa said. Her face had suddenly paled.
“I need to tell you the real reason I’m stopping by.”

“What?” Carly asked with a little laugh. “You didn’t just stop by because I’m so much fun to hang out with?”

Melissa didn’t smile back and Carly’s stomach suddenly twisted.

“Dan told me that Nolan is in town,” Melissa admitted.

Carly frowned, unsure of what she was supposed to think about that.
He’d told her he was heading back to his parents’ resort.

“It gets worse,” Melissa said with a grimace. “I hate to be the one to tell you this. But I think you deserve to know. I mean, I
would want to know, even though it sucks.”

She waved her hand in the air, motioning for Melissa to get on with it.

“Apparently, they got drunk together the other night. Nolan confessed a few things to Dan.”

Carly groaned. “He was cheating on me, wasn’t he?”

“
Nooo
,” Melissa said. “But he was being an asswipe all the same. Look, the details were all kind of jumbled because he was wasted. Dan put a few things together but some of it still didn’t make sense. Until just now,” she muttered, almost to herself. “Apparently, Nolan failed out of school last fall. Don’t ask me where he was when he was pretending to be in class. I do know that by halfway through the semester, his grades were so bad his professors told him he’d never raise them enough to pass. So he more or less dropped out. Anyhow, his parents were furious, so they cut him off.”

“
What
?” Carly asked. “He wasn’t in school that whole time? How could I not know that?”

Melissa gave her a sympathetic look. “You weren’t the only one. Dan was plenty surprised.”

“No,” Carly said with a shake of her head. “No way I wouldn’t have known that.”

“Carly,” Melissa said patiently, “not necessarily. I mean, some people are good at hiding things. How many people hide affairs?
Or addictions? Or in this case, just general jackassary.”

“All those months he was
lying
to me?” She threw her hands up in frustration. Not able to sit still any longer she leapt up from the sofa and began to pace. He had upheld his façade until the very end. Not even that last day had he hinted that he’d dropped out. “No. you know what? I’m not going to freak out about this. I don’t care! I really don’t. Him leaving me was nothing but a huge, gigantic favor. I should send him a damn thank you card!”

Melissa cringed. “Uh, no you shouldn’t. I haven’t gotten to the bad part yet.”

Carly spun to face her. “That b-bad part?!” she sputtered. What else could Melissa possibly say about this…this stranger? This man she’d thought she’d known. This man she’d planned on
marrying
.

“
Are you sure his parents really requested that money?” Melissa hesitantly asked.

Carly’s blood turned to ice in her veins. “It was a deposit. For the wedding at his parents
’ resort,” she explained again.

Melissa suddenly looked ill. Carly couldn’t help but wonder what the deposit had to do with anything.

“Out with it,” Carly commanded.

Her friend cringed.
“He was babbling to Dan about five-grand and something about how you wanted it back. Dan wasn’t really following that part because he couldn’t imagine why you would give him that kind of money.”

“I didn’t,” Carly clarified. “My parents did. His parents wanted my parents to pay their half for the wedding upfront.”

Melissa grimaced. “I don’t think they did. If I’m piecing everything together correctly, I think he just told you that. I think since they cut him off, he was looking for another way to get some cash. Carly, he spent it. All of it. I’m pretty sure your parents are never going to see a penny of that money again.”

Carly’s knees went out. She slid down, landing hard on the
sofa cushions. “He what?!”

“Now, I could be
wrong
,” Melissa said, going for optimism but failing terribly. “But it sounded like he planned on leaving here. He planned on using the money to find a place out in California. He told Dan he wanted to get out from under his parents’ thumbs.”

“So he was just going to take off,” Carly said. “And go somewhere that I couldn’t find him?”
It would make sense. Move to another state, making it hard to track him down. Five-grand was a lot. But it wasn’t so much that her parents would go to desperate lengths to get it back. He probably figured that they would just give up in frustration.

Melissa nodded. “Yeah, that sounds likely.”

“So…what happened?”

“The moron got drunk one night,” Melissa said in a
no-surprise-there
tone. “Apparently, he thought if he hit the blackjack table, he could double his money.”

Carly nodded. Nolan had a knack for blackjack.
When he was sober, anyway. When he was wasted? Not so much.

“He lost it. All of it,” Melissa said. She was only telling Carly what Carly had just figured out for herself.

Carly ground out a sigh. “That’s probably why he called me, telling me he missed me.”

“He did?” Melissa asked. Her tone held both confusion and disgust.

“Oh, he did,” Carly assured her. “Now, that makes sense. I’m sure he didn’t want me back at all. He just wanted to get me
off
his back. I was so stupid!”

Melissa shook her head. “If you were, we all were. None of us had any idea.
If you had gone back to him? That would’ve been stupid. But you didn’t.”

“So where is he now? Did he finally go back to his parents?”

Her friend shrugged apologetically. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. He was pretty adamant when he talked to Dan. He said he wasn’t going to let them boss him around anymore. I think there’s a good chance he’s still hanging around Roseville.”

“I don’t want to put him in the middle of this,” Carly said, “but would Dan know where he is?
” This news had tangled her stomach into a miserable, sick knot. “I really need to talk to him. Not that I want to, but I really need to find a way to get that money back.”

“Believe me, if I knew where he was, I wouldn’t hesitate to tell you,” Melissa assured her. “But I don’t. Neither does Dan. He was really pissed off when Nolan told him what he’d done. Not just about the money—because he wasn’t entirely sure what that was about. It didn’t really make sense at the time. But he was also pissed off for the way he walked out on you. He hasn’t talked to him since.”

“Well that’s just fantastic,” Carly growled.

“I know,”
Melissa sympathized. “I promise if either Dan or I hear from him, you’ll be the first to know.”

17

Carly’s nerves sizzled through her body. It had taken nearly two weeks for Nolan to surface again. A phone call from Melissa had let her know he was in town and what bar he was at. Carly had quickly shoved her textbook aside.

Usually, she’d spend a crazy amount of time getting ready before going out. Tonight, her appearance was the least of her worries. She’d rushed out of the house wearing a pair of worn jeans and an old but comfortable cream sweater.
Her old, worn tennis shoes adorned her feet.

Now, she was parked outside of a seedy establishment she’d never gone into before. A quick scan of the lot brought her to Nolan’s car. Satisfied that he was still here, she alighted from her own vehicle and hurried across the dim
ly lit parking lot.

When the door
creaked open, she was assaulted by the malodorous combination of body odor and stale beer. This was definitely not the kind of place sometimes-prissy Nolan would typically hang out. Then again, something as low scale as this was probably easier on his decimated wallet.

She spotted him immediately, playing a game of pool.
Or
, she thought with some disgust,
hustling a game of pool
. A quick glance around let her know the place wasn’t crowded. She spotted a corner booth that was empty.

Steeling herself, she crossed the short distance to her ex.

His face lit up when he saw her.

“Carly!” He said with a big drunken grin.
His usually neatly trimmed blond hair was longer than usual. It curled up slightly on the ends, making him look boyish. Or simply unkempt.

“Nolan,” she returned with far less enthusiasm. She grabbed him by the arm. The man he was playing pool with gave her a questioning look as he rested his stick on the floor. “You don’t mind if I borrow him, do you? Thanks,” she said, smiling sweetly and not waiting for a reply.

“I like it when you’re all bossy,” he said as he leaned in, close to her ear.

She grimaced at the stench of his beer-breath as she towed him to the quiet booth she’d spotted.

“Sit,” she said as she gave him a little shove. He grinned at her, probably enjoying her bossiness, as he complied. “We need to talk,” she said.

“Missed me so much you hunted me down, huh?” he asked with an appreciative nod.

She rolled her eyes and scoffed. “Oh, please. Cut the crap. I know you blew the five-grand.”

He gave her several, hard blinks. As if her words had suddenly sobered him up a few notches.

“I
know
, Nolan,” she repeated. “And I don’t care
what
you did with the money. Or
why
you basically stole it from me in the first place. All I care about, is getting it back.”

He frowned at her. “How am I supposed to do that when you know I don’t have it?”

She shrugged. “Not my problem. So I suggest you start thinking real hard. You better figure this out.”

“If I don’t?”
He sounded more curious than defiant.

Carly felt a blush slam into her cheeks. She couldn’t believe she was going to say what she was about to say. “Then I’ll call your parents. I’ll tell them what you did.”

He snorted a laugh. “You’re going to tell my parents on me?”

Carly had met his parents only a few times. They had actually gotten along quite well. While she hadn’t seen enough of them to consider
herself close to them, she sure as hell knew them well enough to let them know what kind of scam their son had pulled. And that he had used his parents to do it.

The Abbots
were well-off. They’d been providing full financial assistance to their son for years. The fact that they had actually cut him off when he started failing school led Carly to believe that they had hit the limit of their patience with him. She was sure that overall, they were good people. She also had a hunch that they would right this wrong that Nolan had created.

“You can’t do that,” he said.

She cocked her head to the side, not bothering to answer. Because of course she could. And she would.

“I have a better idea,” he said as he reached for her hand. “Let’s
try to work things out. I admit I was stupid. I made a horrible mistake. Both in taking the money and in leaving you.”

She snatched her hand away. Her tone was annoyed when she said, “You do realize how ridiculous you sound, right? I mean, you’re totally lame. I see exactly what you’re trying to do. In fact, if you were actually sober, you would probably realize how pathetic you’re being. Now,” she said as her tone hardened and her posture became resolute, “why don’t you just man-up and fix this mistake?”

“I am trying to fix it. I never should’ve left you. You and I—”

Carly cut him off with a string of profanities. Realizing she was getting nowhere by trying to play nice, she stopped. A
s she got to her feet, she glowered down at him. “I’m heading back to Lanford tomorrow afternoon, after my last class. You either have my money by then, or I’m asking your parents for it.”

His sullenness vanished and now he was the one that looked annoyed. “They won’t believe you. They’ll never believe it.”

“Well then,” she said, “I guess it’s a good thing I have the cancelled check.” She didn’t, of course. There was no reason for her to have it. But that wasn’t the point. The point was, she could get it if she had to. She wasn’t looking forward to admitting this latest fiasco to her parents, but she wasn’t willing to have them out that much money on her account, either. Not because her ex-fiancé was a thief. So if she had to confess, ask for a copy of the cancelled check, she would do that.