Pride

“Kane, you dragged me out here into the middle of nowhere to waste the day in your brother’s pit of an apartment with his burnout friends. How, exactly, was that supposed to be fun?”

“Lighten up, Manning-do you always have to be so uptight?”

From the look in his bloodshot eyes, she could tell that it had just slipped out-but she could also tell that he’d meant it.

Kane stood and tried to put his arms around her, but she pushed him away.

“I’m leaving,” Beth said, with as much dignity as she could muster. “It’s obvious you’ll have more fun without me.” She meant it to sound cruel, angry-but maybe it was true. Maybe she was uptight. Hadn’t Adam always implied as much, even if he’d never come right out and said it? Why couldn’t she just hang out and enjoy herself for a few hours, turn her brain off, relax?

“Beth, wait,” he begged, grabbing her arms and pulling her toward him. “Don’t-I shouldn’t have said that. I didn’t mean it.”

“Yes, you did,” she said quietly, not meeting his eyes.

“I didn’t. I love spending time with you. Of course you’re fun.”

“Yeah, right.” Kane was a champion sweet-talker, but it was going to take more than charisma to fix this.

“Look, to be honest, I knew this wasn’t your thing,” he finally admitted, sitting down again. “You can go, if you want. I wouldn’t blame you. I never should have brought you out here.”

It wasn’t the words so much as the uncharacteristic note of sincerity-and, more than that, vulnerability-that gave her pause. Made her stay. She sat down beside him. “So why did you bring me here?”

He looked down at his hands, which were playing aimlessly with the fraying edge of his brother’s comforter. “It’s stupid.”

“Too bad,” she said, relishing the rare sensation of having control over the conversation. “What’s going on?”

“I just… wanted you to meet my brother,” Kane mumbled. “I wanted to show you off to him,” he added, putting an arm around her. Beth didn’t resist. “To show him…” His voice drifted off.

“What?” Beth asked gently. She took his hand.

“You’re the first girl I’ve ever introduced to my family. I’m… proud of myself, I guess you could say, for dating such an amazing girl. That someone like you would be with me.”

“Kane…”

“I sound like a total loser.”

“No!” she protested. It was possibly the sweetest thing anyone had ever said to her-and to think she’d almost walked out before giving him a chance. It was just like her, Beth berated herself-always judging, always planning, never willing to take things at face value, to just relax into the moment. The only good news was that it was never too late to change.

“We should get back out there,” Kane suggested, obviously embarrassed.

“What’s your hurry?” Beth asked, pulling him toward her into a kiss. Suddenly she didn’t care about the dirty comforter or the sagging futon, the spiderwebs in the corner of the room or the deadbeats eavesdropping on the other side of the door. She only cared about Kane-and she was ready to show him just how much.

Adam tried to remember what the Web site had cautioned him about calming down, releasing his stress.

Relax, he told himself. Enjoy the moment. Enjoy Harper.

So he tried. He kissed her, rubbed her back, closed his eyes, and pulled off her shirt. She was beautiful, she had an amazing body-but it just wasn’t… it just wasn’t happening. The whole thing felt so fake and scripted: put this hand here, that hand there, think sexy thoughts. And the damn Christmas music in the background wasn’t helping.

“Mmm, Adam, I love the smell of your hair,” Harper mumbled, her face buried in his neck.

It was the same thing Beth always used to say.

And that was all it took-her face, unbidden, swam up in his mind’s eye, smiling mockingly at him. And there was Kane, suddenly next to her, kissing her, both of them laughing at Adam, at his stupidity, his weakness. His inadequacy.

Get out of my head, he wanted to scream, feeling like the walls were closing in. He hadn’t slept the night before, going over and over the game in his head, seeing Kane’s face as he scored the winning shot while Adam rode the bench. All he’d wanted to do today was get away, forget all his problems. But here was Harper, pushing him, reminding him of everything he couldn’t do, couldn’t be… it was all too much-

“Stop!” he finally said harshly, pushing her away, feeling like his head was going to explode.

“What is it?” she asked, lightly touching his cheek. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s all this, this shit,” Adam said, throwing wide his arms to encompass the decorations, the music, all of it. “This is the last thing I want to think about, Harper-I thought we agreed to just forget that night ever happened. And then you go and throw it in my face?”

“I just thought, if we tried again…”

He wasn’t angry at her, he knew that. But he was too ashamed to admit it-too ashamed to admit that he’d failed her once again. What kind of teenage guy was he? Where were all those raging hormones when you needed them? Instead, here he was, stuck with a horny girlfriend, lukewarm hot chocolate, and a limp dick.

“I have to go,” he said quickly-and it was, suddenly, a physical need not to be there anymore, not to have her look at him with those pitying eyes. He was too proud to accept her pity-and too terrified of what would happen when her pity turned to scorn. What if, after a few days of this, a week, she got sick of it? Of him? What if she told her friends?

This is Harper, he reminded himself. You can trust her.

“I’m sorry,” he said sincerely. But he couldn’t touch her. “I really am. I’m not mad. I’m just-” He stood up and backed away. “I just need to go. I’ll call you.”

He was out the door before she could say anything.

True, it was Harper, and he could trust her more than anyone-but how much was that?

After Beth, after Kane, he wasn’t sure he believed in trust anymore. And if betrayal was inevitable, maybe it was just better to be alone.

She’d bought it. He’d known the family card was just the right one to play-and once again, his instincts had proven infallible. Poor Kane, so reluctant to open up, so eager to show off his beloved girl to his beloved brother. All they’d done in Aaron’s room was kiss, but Kane wondered. If only he’d thought of the teary-eyed routine back on the ski trip, when they’d had a room to themselves and all the time in the world.

And yet-it hadn’t been a total He, had it? Why else had he brought Beth along on this little excursion, knowing ahead of time it would likely be more trouble than it was worth. Wasn’t he trying to show her off to his brother, prove that Kane had managed to get something Aaron never had?

Kane shrugged it off-he didn’t care to plumb the depths of his subconscious. Leave that to the ladies.

“We can take off in a minute,” he whispered to her. She was pretending to be deeply engrossed in his brother’s explanation of the differing merits of Grand Theft Auto and Gran Turismo 4. What a girl.

She nodded slightly, and Kane patted her on the shoulder before standing up and catching the eye of one of the guys across the room-a lanky, scraggly haired college dropout who went only by the name of “C.” He jerked his head slightly toward the door and headed outside, knowing C would follow. Time to accomplish what he’d come for.

“Yo, Kane, good to see you,” C said in a raspy voice, once they were alone. He bumped fists with Kane, then frowned. “I’m just sorry you came all this way for nothing.”

“What are you talking about?” Kane had, after much thought, come up with the perfect present for Beth- something to make their New Year’s Eve a night neither would soon forget. And C had promised that, as always, he’d be able to hook Kane up.

“Man, sorry, I thought I had enough, but you know how it is.”

“No, I don’t know how it is. You couldn’t tell me this before I drove all the way up here?”

“Forgot.” C shrugged. “What can you do?”

“You’ve got nothing?” Kane asked in frustration. “Absolutely nothing?”

“Well”-C’s mouth widened into a rat-like grin-“you gotta keep a little something, just in case.”