Wanting It All: A Naked Men Novel (21 page)

“Jesus H. Christ in a tutu, Knox!”

Great. The whole reason he’d come down to the basement was so he wouldn’t be overheard. “Sorry. Thought everyone was out.”

Underhand, Josh tossed him back the phone. “Cable went out at McGonigle’s Pub. I came home to watch the end of the soccer game.” With slow deliberation, Josh used the remote to turn off the TV. Stood. Hiked up his plaid pajama bottoms. “Did I hear right?”

“Dunno. How about we say you didn’t hear anything and watch the rest of the game?”

One arm outstretched, Josh held him off from flopping on the couch. “Did you just threaten to kick Logan out of the house?”

“Yeah. I did.” The guy hadn’t left him much choice. Pushed to the limit, what else was Knox supposed to do?

“Have you lost your freaking mind?”

“I don’t know. I
do
know that I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Tough. You need to start at the beginning and explain what just went down. This is some serious shit.”

“I said I don’t want to talk about it.” Madison was upset. Logan had sounded furious. Josh looked pissed. Knox knew he was smart. Usually the smartest person in the room. So how was everything in his carefully crafted life suddenly so messed up?

The ceiling suddenly felt low. The walls pressed in. Josh was staring at him with those condemning eyes. It was too much. He’d dealt with too damn much tonight. Knox spotted what had to be Josh’s T-shirt on the couch. He lunged for it, then headed to the stairs. “I have to go.”

Josh grabbed at his arm. “No, you need to sit your ass down and talk to me.”

“I can’t.” He shook off Josh. Pulled the shirt over his head and stuck his phone in his pocket. “Madison’s upstairs. When she comes down, tell her…tell her I’m sorry.”

And he ran up the stairs and out of the house. Away from all the complications. Away from the people he didn’t know how to handle. Knox could admit it to himself.

He just fucking fled.

Madison burst into Summer’s shop. Yes, burst through the door. Because apparently everything she did now was dramatic. Trying to tamp down the fact she was an emotional wreck seemed to only be making things worse. In the shower this morning she’d shaken her conditioner so emphatically that half the bottle squirted onto the wall. At work, she’d dropped a coffee mug, which of course shattered on the more than century-old marble floor. Madison felt out of control. Like she wasn’t herself. And she absolutely hated it.

She stopped short at the sight of Annabeth leaning over the counter, her black uniform skirt pulled high on her thighs. “Oh, good. You’re both here.”

“I’m just here on a pop-in. Summer texted me a 911 fashion emergency when her new shipment of earrings came in. Look at how hot these are.” Annabeth shoved her hair behind her ears to show off silver hoops with protruding studs that usually decorated leather cuffs. They were edgy and sexy and totally Annabeth.

Madison blinked. Hot earrings wouldn’t fix anything. She didn’t even bother looking at the jumble of jewelry on the counter. As jumbled as her thoughts. Geez, she’d been doing that all day. Going off on tangents. Not paying attention. Probably driving everyone around her crazy. “I wanted to talk to you, too. But I didn’t know how to find you.” Although now she remembered that Annabeth’s schedule was up on the refrigerator at their apartment. Nobody had ever mentioned that falling head over heels for a man totally and utterly scrambled the brain cells. Or maybe it was just her.

“Well, for the next eight hours or so you’ll be able to find me schlepping drinks at the POV. I’m leaving for work.” Annabeth straightened up and gave a windshield-wiper half wave to Summer.

“No. Not yet.”

“Yes, now. Talk to Summer. Then talk to me tomorrow.”

“I need to talk to both of you. Now. Right now. My Grand Plan just took a U-turn, and I don’t know what to do. This isn’t how I work. I make a plan, I stick to the plan, I achieve my goals. That always works. But now…I don’t…I can’t…” Madison circled her hands in the air, unable to keep going. God, she was pathetic.

Summer raised her voice. “Elisa, you’ve got the store. I’ll be back in a bit.” She hurried around the counter and took Madison’s arm. “Do you need a brown paper bag to breathe into?”

“I don’t know. I don’t panic like this. Ever. I plan. I move forward. It always works.” Madison knew she was repeating herself. Repeating herself continually,
not
making sense, which was undoubtedly a special kind of conversational hell for her friends to witness.

“Let’s go.”

As they left the store and walked down the crowded Georgetown main drag, Annabeth raised an eyebrow. “Is this worth my being late to work? Is it truly that world-shakingly big?”

Madison had waited out her own workday. Of course, she’d only had to wait an hour. And she was still in her first-sixty-days probationary period…which was the only thing that had kept her at her desk. But…Annabeth
was
sort of offering. Which meant she had earned the leeway to be a little late, so darn it, Madison would totally abuse her friend’s goodwill and paycheck and say, “Yes.”

The tall brunette took her other arm. “Okay, then.”

They ran down a steep set of stone steps to the grassy edge of the canal. People hung over the bridge, staring at the slow-moving water, but few hung out on their narrow ledge. It was that post-work-but-not-yet-dinner-hour strolling slump. Summer gave Madison a gentle shove to the ground, then sat herself, seemingly uncaring of what the grass would do to her pale mint skinny jeans.

“What happened?” Summer twirled the top of her hair into a twist and tucked it under. “Did Knox finally come around with his tail between his legs and apologize for ghosting on you?”

“No. I haven’t seen Knox since he left his bedroom on Tuesday night. That was almost forty-eight hours ago. Not a word since.”

Madison had plenty of words for him, though. Words about how she’d lain there, waiting for him, for more than an hour. Already upset after the conversation with Logan, she’d tacked on a sticky layer of humiliation, going through the rectory floor by floor looking for him. When she’d found Josh in the basement, the confusion in his eyes matched her own. The pity, however, was all from him.

Why had Knox walked out on her? He’d made this amazingly sweet gesture by going above and beyond to connect her with Logan. Of his own free will. Then he’d made love to her. Not sex. Not a fast and furious hookup. But with tender, full-of-feeling intimacy. Of his own accord. There was simply no other way to interpret what he did.

But then he left.

No calls. No texts. No emails.

Madison was an up-to-date woman. She knew that ghosting was the trendy, pansy-ass way out of a relationship. She’d just never expected it from someone as classy and together and smart and freaking grown-up as Knox.

“He’s an idiot,” Annabeth declared hotly.

“Agreed.”

“He’s a coward,” Summer added, with just as much heat in her tone.

“Agreed.” Madison had a few other disparaging names to call him. But they were missing the biggest clue his behavior revealed. “I actually think that’s more on point. I think he’s scared. On Tuesday night, Knox waded into a new depth of seriousness and caring with me. I think it freaked him out. Remember, he’s a complete virgin at a real relationship.”

Annabeth stabbed her sunglasses to the top of her head to squint at Madison. “Are you actually giving him a pass? For treating you like this?”

“Not a pass, no. I’m saying I don’t think he was mean to me on purpose. I think it was a side effect of his getting emotional flop sweat.” It made her sad for Knox. Despite all her hurt and anger, there was still a part of her that appreciated how panicked he must’ve been to go to those lengths, and wanted to fix it. “I will require one heck of an apology. And even though I frown on him throwing money at women, I think this episode calls for a very large, very expensive bouquet of apology flowers.”

With an approving nod, Annabeth slid her glasses back into place. “That’s a good plan. If you’re willing to forgive him for being a spineless worm.”

Summer spread her arms wide. “The big-as-Texas part that you’re missing? It’s how you’re going to get him back. If you truly
want
him back after this.”

“That sounds like a bigger conversation. A planning session.” Annabeth shoved her purse higher on her shoulder. “So now can I go to work? Finish sympathizing later?”

Since Madison didn’t have much experience with girlfriends, she only guessed that she was pushing her luck with Annabeth. But she needed to get this all out at once.

Oh, yes. No man was perfect. Heck,
nobody
was perfect. She’d known going into this that Knox would require a bit of training, molding, and compromising. There was no doubt in Madison’s mind that he thought exactly the same about her.

“Five more minutes? Because that’s the problem. Not the emergency, but one part of the bigger problem.” Madison fell backward onto the grass, continuing her unavoidably dramatic approach to everything about this day. Looked up at the puffy white clouds dotting the perfect blueness and thought how bizarre it was to say this to her girlfriends before saying it to Knox.

“I love him,” she declared in a voice that surprised her with its steadiness. Without bothering to turn her head to look for their gaping jaws or wide eyes. Because she clearly heard a duet of loud gasps.

“Are you sure?” Summer asked.

Fair question. Smart question. It had been just over a month since they met. “I wasn’t one hundred percent sure. I mean, I was sure I’d been
falling
in love with him. But everything he did Tuesday night—until he disappeared, of course—pushed me over the cliff. I love this man. So if he really just got scared, got cold feet, then heck yes, I want to move heaven and earth to get him back.”

Summer flopped back, too. “If he won’t talk to you, how will you find out?”

“If he won’t talk to you, how will you get him back?” Annabeth circled her arms around her knees.

“I told you,
that’s
not the emergency.” Madison held up a hand and shooed the question away. “It’s a problem for another day. I’ll come up with a plan. I always do.”

“The man you’ve decided you love ghosts on you, and
that’s
not an emergency? What on earth is bigger than that?”

Dragging in a deep breath, Madison said, “Logan wants me to visit him.”

“Your brother who blew you off?” Annabeth clarified.

She nodded.

“You really like to tackle a challenge, don’t you?”

“He emailed me today. Considering it took Knox bribing the local police to get him to a phone, I have no idea what Logan went through to find Wi-Fi, but email me he did. Just listen.” She sat up and pulled the printout from her bag.

Madison ~

I’m sorry. I should probably say that about twenty more times, but I don’t know how long I have until this connection craps out. You surprised me. Hell, you dropped an atom bomb of a surprise on my head. Caught me off guard. Nobody expects to get a baby sister at age twenty-eight. I never wanted one. Once I had the ACSs in my life, I never needed one. But here you are anyway.

I get that you didn’t plan this. That you’re stuck with this new reality, too. I don’t know how you feel about our dad. I don’t know how I feel about him, about what he did, right now. Aside from how he cheated on my mother and almost split up our family? I think I’m leaning toward mad. Betrayed. Because it probably would’ve been cool to have a sister. Knox told me that all the guys like you. That’s enough for me. You must be pretty great to win them over.

No matter how I end up resolving this with Dad, I shouldn’t have taken it out on you. That was a dick move, and I’m sorry. We can’t ever make up for the time we lost. But I would like to get to know you.

I’m just about done here in Kazakhstan. How about you come join me? Not digging wells or anything. We can travel for three months. I was going to hit the beach in Turkey for some R&R, and then Thailand. Search for the perfect pad thai. Then you could pick a country. My treat. I’m guessing that if Dad didn’t share his existence with you, he probably didn’t share his money either. Not fair that I’ve got a whole bunch of it, so I’m happy to foot the bill. Let’s start building memories together. Not boring ones like getting together for three holidays a year. Let’s blow it out and do something amazing. Let’s learn to be a family.

Madison carefully refolded the email. She’d save it for the rest of her life. And count it as the first
real
contact with her brother. “Well? What do you think?”

“Wow.”

Annabeth pointed at Summer. “I second what she said.”

Accurate, but unhelpful. “Could you perhaps expound on that a little? It’s kind of hard to make a life-changing decision off of just a
wow.
”

“Shouldn’t you go first?”

Summer lifted her torso and legs into a vee that propelled her back upright. “What do you want to do?”

“If I knew that, I wouldn’t be keeping you two from work, now, would I?” Madison sniped. Then she scrunched her eyes shut. “I’m sorry. I’m bitchy. Off balance. Anxious. Completely at sea. And I
loathe
that feeling.”

Shimmying leaves off her top covered with green and black geometric shapes, Summer said, “Let’s start with the obvious. Two days ago, you thought you’d hit a dead end with Logan. Suddenly, he’s lifted the traffic gate, laid down fresh asphalt, and offered you a first-class ride to Siblingville.”

Annabeth gave a wicked case of side-eye. “Don’t ever call it that again.”

“I thought
Brotherland
sounded too George Orwell and
1984.
”

“If those are the only two options, then strike the entire metaphor.”

The topic of her brother was definitely much rosier than it had been forty-eight hours ago. But his willingness to connect—under his generously offered terms—created a big problem. “I’m thrilled Logan emailed. Just making that happen had to be a major effort on his part. I’m touched. I’m relieved. That part of my Grand Plan worked out. Not how I planned, but I can technically still put a check mark next to one of my bullet points.”

“You mean
find brother and cultivate instant relationship
? Like it’s as easy as adding boiling water to ramen noodles?”

“Yes.” Madison might have sky-high hopes, but her feet were still on the ground. Cultivate, yes. Assume they’d be finishing each other’s sentences in a day? Heck, no. “Don’t worry. I don’t expect us to be like separated-at-birth twins who discover each other forty years later and learn they both stir their coffee counterclockwise and have a secret love of quilting.”

Annabeth snorted. “Good. Because I know Logan pretty well. I’d be willing to put good money on him not quilting. Or even being able to thread a needle.”

See? Madison wanted to know Logan well enough to make teasing put-downs like that. Or maybe, since he fended for himself for months at a time in stark conditions, he could sew buttons back on in his sleep. Either way, she wanted to
know.

“I don’t need us to be besties. I just want the connection. To always know, deep down, that he’ll be there for me. A three-month adventure would cement that bond. Hands down, no questions asked. Travel glues people together fast and furiously. We’d get to know each other in a way that might not happen even after a year of Sunday dinners here in D.C.”

Summer tapped her on the arm. “What if you don’t like him?”

Happily, that wasn’t a concern. “Annabeth likes him. Knox, Griffin, Josh, and Riley like him. That guarantees that Logan’s likable. Plus, he’s dedicated his life to helping people recover from disasters. That makes him selfless and full of interesting stories. And I’m delightful, so obviously he’ll get along with me.”

“Obviously,” Annabeth said dryly.

“When I planned to leave Alaska, I wanted to see the world. Taste things. Try things. I wanted it all. A globetrotting adventure would put a check mark next to a big chunk of that part of the Grand Plan, too. Much, much sooner than I anticipated.”