Favors, Strings, & Lies_Men of NatEx_A Package Handlers Novel Read online

I’ve thought about her every day for the last year. Either I was hoping she’d be on my manifest or she was on my manifest and I was hoping I’d see her. Then I met her—really met her, not just said hi in passing—and she’s flawed and messed up and fucking fantastic. She has her issues and her bad days just like I do.

  Together, though—that’s where the magic happens. Together, we can heal, just like we said. Together, we can overcome. Together, we can get through anything.

  And I’d call her right now so we could do this together if it wouldn’t fuck her sister’s wedding day up. But it would. So…alone. I guess I have to do this alone.

  I knock my head against the bathroom door, my stomach roiling. This whole thing is so messed up. I didn’t want to hurt Cadence because we’ve both been so hurt in the past. And I knew I’d hurt her if I let her in. But it’s only happening because, yet again, I was hurt. Joyce decimated me with a letter I shouldn’t have ever had to read.

  She lied about the baby. There never even was a baby. This whole time, I’ve been a disaster of a person over a fake baby.

  This time when I think about it, I start laughing. Hysterical, uncontrollable laughter spills out of me, and I curl up on the floor of my bathroom. Into the fetal position, which feels both fitting and oddly inappropriate for this situation.

  Honestly, I want to get up. I want to get to whatever part of the wedding I haven’t missed and be there for Cadence. Give her the one thing I promised I’d do without a doubt. But the one thing I never saw coming—namely Joyce—hit me like a Mack truck today and my mind can’t wrap itself around what she said.

  A fake baby. What the fuck.

  I sigh and relax my tense, tight muscles. The coolness of the tile sends chills through me now that I can feel it, and I wish I were back in that bathtub with Cadence like I was earlier this week. Back when things weren’t beyond fucked up. Back when life was simpler and Joyce wasn’t ruining me. Again.

  As I shiver, I tug on fistfuls of my hair. Then, before I pull it all out, I dig into my pocket and fish my cell phone out. I turned it off the second I left the coffee shop, not wanting to be bothered. Or, rather, I couldn’t be bothered to answer it after reading Joyce’s fucked-up apology-slash-confession letter. So I turn it back on now and hover over Cadence’s name in my contacts.

  Then a slew of texts stream in, all from the woman herself.

  Cadence: Hey, it’s a little after 3:30. Just checking to see where you are. I hope everything’s okay.

  Cadence: It’s 3:45 now. Is everything okay?

  Cadence: Did your meeting with Joyce not go well? Please let me know where you are.

  Cadence: 3:59 and the wedding is going to start. Why aren’t you here? What happened?

  Ugh, Christ. I fucked up and feel even more like shit now. But now’s not the time to disturb her with my shit though. She wants her own life, so maybe I should just let her have it. I shouldn’t bring her down with this drama. Because that’s all my life is. As soon as something good with the potential to be healthy walks into my life, the past sweeps it away in one fell swoop.

  Instead, I find Aidan’s contact info and press the button to call him. He’ll talk some sense into me. Someone else will know what to do when I clearly have no fucking clue. But the phone rings and rings and he never picks up.

  Fuck. I don’t think I have a choice anymore. I have to pull myself together, get dressed, and go to the one place I shouldn’t right now. The one place I’m dreading the most. The one place where I’ll have to confess and tell the truth. The one place where everything might fall apart.

  So I reluctantly drag myself up off the floor and go.

  ∞∞∞

  Cadence

  “If you check your phone one more time,” my sister says, out of breath from being nearly nonstop on the dance floor. Everyone wants a turn with the bride.

  “I don’t know what else to do, Gina. I’m sorry if I’m ruining your night,” I say sincerely. I’m beyond worried at this point, but I don’t want to put my sister out.

  We’ve only been planning this day for a year now. The last thing I should do is a let a two-week-old kind-of relationship get in the way of this. But he won’t answer a text. He won’t pick up the phone. My heart pounds every time I get a notification. Yet it’s never him.

  There’s nothing. Total radio silence. And nothing about this feels right.

  Even on the days we didn’t communicate, I knew we were thinking about each other. So I have to chalk this up to Joyce. Something she did or said probably messed him up again. He wouldn’t miss this otherwise—he promised me “no matter what.” This never had anything to do with strings of any kind attached to anything.

  Even though I’d give almost anything to attach them right now.

  Gina huffs a breath out before snatching my phone from my hands.

  “Hey! What are you doing?” I ask, stretching my arm out to take my phone back.

  She holds it out of my reach. “I’m doing you a favor. Once and for all, we’re going to figure this out.” With her thumbs, she starts furiously typing on my screen.

  “I’m not sure what your great plan is, but I don’t think there’s anything you can do,” I tell her, giving up and sitting back in my chair.

  “Oh really?” she asks, bringing the phone to her ear. “Nothing I can do, huh?”

  I fold my arms across my chest and wait for her plan to fall flat on its face. Except someone on the other line picks up.

  “Hi, yes, I’m hoping you can help me. My package deliveryman has been the absolute best, and I was really hoping I could call to leave some glowing feedback on his behalf. Is there a way I can give you my address and you can tell me his name?”

  After a few mmhms and uh-huhs, she gives the person my address.

  “Matthew Kent?” she says into the phone, flashing her gaze at me. “Great. Well, he’s always on time, accommodating my delivery needs…” She quickly raises and lowers her eyebrows as she lists all the things Matthew is good at.

  I roll my eyes at her, but she actually accomplished something with her ridiculous plan. We have his name. Matthew. Not Brian, though that would have been hysterical.

  Then a throat clears to my right, my sister’s left. So we turn to see who it came from and find our mother standing next to us, impatiently tapping her toe.

  Gina rushes to end the phone call. “Okay! Well, thanks! Bye!” Then she hangs up.

  Mom puts a hand on her hip. “Does someone want to tell me why the bride is on the phone with someone, talking about how accommodating some other man is of her needs?” She throws her arms out to her sides. “And who is Matthew Kent?”

  Gina lifts one finger to Mom. “One sec, Mom. I have one more phone call to make,” she says as she lifts the phone to her ear once again. “Hi. This might be a long shot, but can you tell me if a Matthew Kent is at your location right now?”

  I hang on every word, hoping her magical plan hasn’t run its course yet.

  “He is?” Gina squeals, looking at me, her eyes wide and expressive. She slaps my thigh a few times in her excitement. “Great! Thanks!” Again, she hangs the phone up. This time, she hands it to me. “He’s at Sunnyview Senior Care over on Oak.”

  “Why do we care where a Matthew Kent is? Especially right now?” Mom is becoming impatient, but so am I now.

  “He’s with his grandfather,” I mutter mostly to myself.

  Gina heard me though. “Yeah. I figured he would be if he wasn’t blowing your phone up. At dinner, he sounded like he cared about him and visited him a lot. Luckily, we don’t have many options for nursing homes in this city.”

  I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. Thank goodness one of us was thinking clearly. Rushing up, I rise to my feet and tuck my phone into the clutch I brought to the wedding.

  Gina rises too, a big smile on her face. She puts her hand on my arm. “Go to him. And bring him back so he can properly meet us, okay?”

  “I’ll see what I can do,” I t
ell her, a small smile on my own lips. “Thanks for your help, sis. I’m sorry I’m going to—”

  “Don’t even.” She waves me off. “This day couldn’t have happened without you, and that kind of love is worth missing the rest of this night for. You deserve it.”

  Before I start crying, I wrap her up in a big embrace. “I couldn’t have done this without you, either. I love you,” I tell her on a sniffle.

  “I love you too!” she coos in my ear, squeezing me hard.

  Then another pair of arms snakes around us, and we both turn our heads and find our mother joining in on the hug.

  “I don’t know why we’re hugging, but I love you girls too,” she tells us, tightening her embrace on us.

  “We love you too, Mom,” we both say at the same time and then giggle.

  When I break away from our hug, tears glisten in her Gina’s eyes. My mom looks confused, so she raises her eyebrows as a request for what the hell is going on.

  “Basically,” Gina starts for me, “Brian is actually Matthew Kent, and he’s not here because—”

  “Something with his past came up today,” I finish for Gina so she doesn’t make it sound like something it’s probably not. I’m still not sure what happened, but I don’t want my mom to think something bad about him before he gets a chance to set the record straight. “So I need to go make sure he’s okay, and Gina found out that he’s with his grandfather.”

  “Ahh.” Mom nods knowingly. “Matthew, huh?”

  I squint at her and tilt my head a little. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, I knew there was no Brian when you first mentioned him,” she says, smirking, “so I was wondering if that was actually his name when you brought him to the house.”

  My jaw falls wide open. “What?”

  Next to me, Gina exclaims, “You did? And you didn’t tell me?”

  “What was there to tell?” Mom asks Gina. “If I was wrong, I would have upset everyone. If I was right, I would have hurt you,” she says to me. “I knew you’d tell me the full story when you were ready, though I have to say that I thought you knew it and just weren’t telling.”

  “There’s a lot I have to learn,” I admit, “but his name wasn’t that important when everything else made enough sense.”

  My whole body deflates as I think of how badly I screwed this up with my family. But I don’t have time to think about it. I need to get him and bring him back. Either back here or back to life in general. We’ll see what I’m up against when I get there.

  Mom puts her arms around me and rubs my back. “It’ll be okay. But you didn’t have to lie to make me happy, sweetie. I love you no matter what.”

  “I love you too, Mom.” Then I leave her embrace and dab at my nose to see if it’s running. All this emotion is getting to me. “We’ll talk about this later, okay?” I ask, gathering my things.

  My mom and my sister nod in unison.

  “Go,” my mom says. “Call me though and tell me how it went.”

  I give my mom a small, sad smile in acknowledgement. “I will.”

  Gina grins like an idiot at me. “Go get your man!” she whisper-shouts at me.

  Her smile is contagious, so I give her one back, but by the time I get to my car, I’m wondering what I’m going to find when I get to the nursing home. Will there be any pieces of the man I knew as Brian?

  Or will Matthew Kent be a bunch of fragments thanks to a past that has destroyed him once again?

  Chapter 18

  Matt

  “I’m the biggest asshole on the planet,” I tell my grandpa, the only person who will listen to me whine like this right now. I fucked up and I know it. But Aidan won’t answer his phone and Cadence doesn’t want to hear it, I’m sure. Her sister is probably married already and I missed the whole thing.

  Definitely the biggest asshole on the planet.

  “Son,” he says for the fiftieth time today. “You got hit with some hard news. You needed some space to process. Cut yourself some slack, will ya?”

  “It’s more than that.” I slump forward in the chair, put my elbows on my knees, and lean my head against my hands. “I blew her off all day. I could have at least told her that I’d be late.”

  He pretends to check a watch on his wrist, though he hasn’t worn one since he’s been here. “I’m not sure ‘late’ is the word for it at this point.”

  “Exactly,” I moan, grabbing fistfuls of hair and tugging.

  After a few moments of silence, he asks, “And you’ve really told her nothing at all?”

  I shake my head while staring at the floor. His gaze will cut straight through me if I look at him.

  “Matty, you done screwed up,” he says, slapping a hand on my back. “But all hope isn’t lost.” Then he taps my shoulder.

  When I lift my head, he’s pointing to the door, so I twist to see what’s there. Then I have to blink and rub my eyes. Maybe I’m dreaming. Maybe I was too drunk to drive here and still have lingering effects from the beer. Or maybe I died and went to heaven—though that one seems unlikely.

  No, this must be real. Cadence must actually be standing in the doorway. Staring at me like she’s seeing me for the first time.

  It’s confirmed when my grandpa says, “You must be Cadence, aren’t ya?”

  In a killer dress that shows off all of her amazing curves and makes me wish I’d gotten my shit together to spin her around on the dance floor, she nods. “And you’re Matthew’s grandfather.” As she waves to him, the fringe at the end of the shawl around her shoulders sways.

  My name on her lips hits me square in the chest. My heart skips a beat, and I rise from my chair. Then she looks at me and my entire world flips upside down.

  “May I come in?” she asks so politely.

  I wave her inside, but she points to my grandpa.

  “I was asking him.” A light, airy smile tilts her lips up.

  “A pretty girl like you don’t gotta ask me nothin’.” He pats his chest as though his heart aches as much as mine does. “Come on in, sweetheart. Make yourself comfortable.”

  Quickly, I offer her my chair, and once she’s sitting, I slip my fingers under the shawl as if to ask if she wants me to take it. She shrugs it off, and I set it on the table next to my grandpa’s bed.

  “How did you know I was here?” I ask, folding my arms over my chest as I take up residence at the end of my grandpa’s bed.

  “Is that really the most important question to be askin’ right about now?” he says before coughing into his hand. He reaches for a tissue, but his hand doesn’t quite make it to the box.

  Cadence removes a tissue from the box and hands it to him, all gentle movements and kind gestures. “My sister apparently moonlights as a detective,” she explains, crossing one leg over the other. “She got your name from the company you work for, which sounds illegal or something. And then a nice young woman named Randi at the front desk was polite enough to tell her that you were here.” Then she flicks her gaze to me. “Though I think that’s because she has a crush on you and got caught up by hearing your name.” She raises an eyebrow at me, one side of her mouth curved up.

  I put my hands up in a surrender gesture. “That’s never happened,” I assure her. “I’m just charming like your sister must have been on the phone.”

  The other side of her mouth joins the party and tips up. Her smile is beautiful. Everything about her is beautiful. And I was a fool to have blown her off today. I can only hope and pray that she’ll understand why I needed that space.

  “So you look like you’re goin’ to a wedding,” my grandpa comments, moving the conversation along. “Wasn’t that tonight, Matty?”

  Cadence’s eyes light up when my grandpa uses my nickname. But she schools it away and focuses on him to answer his question. “It was. That’s where I came from.”

  My heart squeezes. I knew that already, but to hear it from her hurts. “How was it? Is it over?” I ask, gripping the side of my grandpa’s bed.


  “It was beautiful,” she says, her eyes shining. “And they’re still dancing. My sister and Paul will probably be there for another hour or so.”

  “I’m so sor—” I start to say.

  But she stops me with a hand in the air. “We’ll talk about that later. Let’s visit with your grandfather. Matty.” She winks at me.

  “Yes,” my grandpa says. “Let’s visit with me.” He chuckles, which leads to another coughing fit. He uses the tissue to wipe his mouth. “And I know just what we should chat about.”

  “What’s that?” I ask him, straightening up to my full height.

  “I think Cadence and I should have a chat about you.” His head swivels toward me, a mischievous gleam in his eyes. “Alone.”

  ∞∞∞

  Cadence

  Matthew meets his grandfather’s suggestion with some resistance, but I wave him out of the room and assure him I’ll be okay. Once his grandfather and I are alone, he reaches for my hand.

  “I’ll let him tell you what happened this morning,” he begins, “because that’s his story to tell. But I can tell you what happened when he got here because that involves me, and I think you should know.”

  I nod and work the knot in my throat down by swallowing.

  “When he got here, he was a mess. She messed him up again real good. But I get the sense that it’s over now, and I’m a good judge o’ character. Can’t get nothin’ past me.” He winks at me in a way that reminds me of Matthew and shows me where he got the habit from.

  It makes me smile. And wonder how much he really knows. Maybe he’s not as blind to the truth as Matthew seems to think.

  “So I’m gonna need you to forgive him for messin’ up today and not gettin’ to the wedding.” He pats my hand with his other one, his tissue forgotten on his blanket. Then his solemn expression morphs into amusement when he says, “But then I’m gonna need you to keep his ass in line after today.”

  We both chuckle at that, which lightens the mood even more.

  “He’s had a rough day, and disappointing you has made it even worse,” he tells me, reaching for a new tissue.