Holding Her Breath (Indigo) Read online

  She sat back, picking at her string beans. Her appetite had dulled a little even though her stomach had been growling when she first sat down to her mother’s perfect meal.

  Hopefully Christmas Day wouldn’t be too wild. Something always went wrong, though. And it usually happened when stepdad number one and his girlfriend stopped by on Christmas night. Jo tried to remain civil to him for Devon’s sake, but it was always iffy when those two saw each other.

  Chapter 2: But It’s Christmas Eve

  “I’m moving out.” Kelly put her hands on her narrow hips and delivered the news to Chace. Kelly was the only reason he’d moved to this place that wasn’t even a dot on the map.

  “What?” Why was she saying this? On Christmas Eve. They were supposed to be exchanging presents before heading to her parents’ house for Christmas carols and eggnog. Like last year. And the year before that. The big Weiss tradition.

  “Chace, I can’t do this anymore.”

  “Can’t do what?” They hadn’t had any big fights. He wasn’t aware of anything he’d done to piss her off. Anything he’d done wrong at all.

  She put her hands over her face and shook her head. “I’ve been seeing someone.”

  Chace dropped into the chair he’d just risen from. “What do you mean, seeing someone?”

  “Hank.”

  “I don’t understand.” He didn’t want to understand. Hank was a lawyer in town and Kelly’s boss.

  “Remember how I told you I wanted to move back here from Richmond to be closer to my family?” She took a deep breath. “Well, I also wanted to be closer to Hank. We’ve been seeing each other off and on for three years now.”

  “But we’ve only been together for two.” Chace felt sick.

  She crossed her arms over her chest and stared away from him.

  “Hank’s married.”

  “I know,” she said. “But he’s finally going to leave his wife for me. He’s telling her right after the holidays. But I can’t live this lie with you anymore. I’m going to stay with my parents until after New Year’s.”

  Did her parents know what she’d done to him? And he’d thought they liked him.

  Chace stared at the presents under the Christmas tree. That was why she’d barely let him touch her lately? Was hardly ever home? Never wanted to go out anywhere with him when she was? Because of balding, ancient Hank?

  “Chace, you have to know I didn’t want it to be this way. Hank and I had called it off before I met you. I really liked being with you, and I’ll always care about you.”

  “Is it the money, Kelly? Is that why? Because Hank is a big, fancy lawyer and I’m just a freelance photographer with a crappy day job? Because I’m not afraid to follow my dreams and try to be what I really want to be?”

  “Hank and I…we have a very special bond. When I’m with him—don’t make me say these things. I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “Uh, you don’t want to what?” Her words were a brick to his stomach. Two years. And it was going to end like that. He stared at the shiny red wrapping around the box that contained her present. He remembered being so excited about finding the right frame for the photo of her grandparents on their wedding day. The photo that he and Kelly’s mom had spent hours digging through old shoeboxes full of photos to find. The perfect prelude to a New Year’s Eve or a Valentine’s Day proposal. He hadn’t yet decided which. Now he wouldn’t have to.

  Kelly cleared her throat, breaking the uncomfortable silence. “Amy is coming over to help me pack. I want to get out tonight. Make this as quick and painless as possible.”

  Chace had to laugh. “This isn’t ripping a bandage off a scratch, Kelly. Nothing about this is quick and painless.”

  “Don’t. This is already hard enough.” She walked over and put a hand on his shoulder.

  He shrugged away from her. “Don’t touch me. Ever. Again.”

  “I do lo—”

  “I swear, if you say it? I’ll put my fist through a wall,” Chace said, standing up and walking over to the wall near the balcony as if readying himself to carry out his threat.

  Kelly ran a hand through her long brown hair, settling it back behind her shoulders. There was a knock at the door. Kelly went to answer it. Chace folded his arms over his chest and leaned against the wall.

  Kelly opened the door and a petite blonde with a round face and short hair walked into the room. Kelly’s friend, Amy. She dragged two boxes in with her that were almost bigger than she was.

  “Hi, Chace.” Amy gave him a sympathetic smile. The kind of smile you’d give someone if they’d lost their best friend.

  “Hey,” Chace said, kicking at the carpet with the toe of his gray sock.

  Kelly took the boxes from her and set them on the couch. “Did you bring more?”

  “Yeah, there are some more in my car. I brought those crates you asked about, too. I found them in my garage.” Amy handed her car keys to Kelly.

  Kelly nodded and headed out of the door.

  Amy walked over to him. She twisted her wedding ring around her finger and looked up at him and down at it alternately. The look she gave him reeked of guilt. Amy was the only person who knew Chace had planned to ask Kelly to marry him.

  “Did you know?” he asked.

  “I knew about him, but she told me that it was over.” Amy looked over her shoulder. “She said she’d broken up with him for the last time, and she was all about you. Otherwise, I would have told you when you told me you were going to ask her to marry you. I swear.” She looked up at him with pleading brown eyes, as if willing him to believe her.

  Chace nodded, letting his brown hair fall into his eyes as he looked down at the carpet.

  “She told me this morning that he told her he couldn’t live without her. That if leaving his wife was what it took to get her back, he was going to have to do it. I’m sorry.”

  He looked across the room. “Yeah. Me, too.”

  “Really, you’re better off not being in this mess.” Amy put a hand on his arm.

  “Would have been nice to have a warning about the kind of mess I was in.”

  “I couldn’t—I couldn’t say anything. Kelly made me promise. We’ve been friends since first grade.”

  He nodded, swallowing thickly. He knew it wasn’t Amy’s fault. The one he really needed to blame was downstairs getting boxes out of Amy’s car. He walked over to the bar counter that bordered the kitchen and slipped on his shoes. He grabbed his keys from the counter.

  “Where are you going?”

  He shrugged. “Somewhere. I can’t be here and watch you two pack up her things.”

  “But what if we don’t know what belongs to who?”

  “She can take whatever she wants. She’s already taken the most important thing anyway,” Chace said. He shuffled toward the front door. He grabbed his coat from the back of the sofa on his way there.

  “I’ll text you when we’re done.”

  Chace shrugged and walked out to the breezeway. When he heard Kelly’s high-heeled black leather boots clicking past, he didn’t even look up.

  “I still want us to be friends,” Kelly said.

  Chace kept walking, pretending she hadn’t just said something completely idiotic so he wouldn’t have to get even angrier.

  Chapter 3: Christmas Cheer.

  Sort of.

  Whitney woke up early Christmas morning. The first thing she did was go to her window. She hoped for a white Christmas even though she didn’t really expect one. She closed her eyes and pulled back the curtains. When she opened her eyes and saw the frostbitten lawn, she sighed. No snow. Just a cold, gray morning.

  It was cold near the window. She shivered a little and reached for her fuzzy yellow robe, which was draped over the post of her four-poster bed nearest the window. She heard her personal cell phone ringing—she’d promised to turn off her BlackBerry on Christmas Day after Jo threatened to hit her over the head with a rolling pin—and she went over to retrieve it from her night stand.
Erika. Of course.

  “Hi.”

  “Am I the first person to wish you a merry Christmas?” Erika asked.

  “Yes, you are, Erika dear.”

  “Good. I thought you probably hadn’t left your room yet. I bet I woke you up.”

  “Maybe.”

  “I don’t know how you get up for work in the mornings ’cause you sure don’t get up if you don’t have to.”

  Whitney grinned. “Why should I get up for no reason? And I was awake, for your information.”

  “Yeah, uh-huh. When did you get up, then?”

  Whitney rolled her eyes, but laughed before answering. “About five minutes before you called.”

  Erika laughed. “See?”

  “Yeah, yeah. You know me too well. How are things with the fam?”

  “Great. They all asked about you.”

  “Same with mine. They miss you for some crazy reason,” Whitney said. “It’s been forever since you came down here with me.”

  “Yeah, I need to go down there soon. How’s that brother of yours?”

  “He’s good. And engaged.”

  “I know. And you know I’m kidding. For now. He knows where to find me if they break up.”

  “Sure,” Whitney said. Erika and Devon were both huge flirts.

  “Aunt Cheryl riding your last nerve yet?” Erika’s tone indicated that she’d guessed the answer to that question.

  Whitney tapped her fingers against the window pane as she answered. “Oh, she’s well past it. Again with the man and the marriage and the babies and all that. As usual.”

  “You know, she might almost have a point. A year is a long time to be single.”

  “You should talk. You’re almost single. And your boyfriend lives with you.”

  “Hey. Don’t you start on A.J. It’s Christmas, after all.”

  “Ha. Right. Anyway, the only thing on my mind right now is making partner. You know that.” Whitney was on the partnership track at her firm and making good progress toward that brass ring.

  “You know you’re going to get it.”

  “I sure hope so,” Whitney said with a sigh, thinking of her supposed mentor who was overseeing her progress on the partnership track. Kim. That woman lived for Gibson and Grey, and she didn’t have much patience for things like mentoring. She only did it because all junior partners were required to mentor senior associates on the partnership track.

  After Whitney got off the phone with Erika, she tightened the belt of her robe around her waist, slipped her phone into her robe pocket, and followed her nose down to the kitchen. The scent of cloves blended in with the scents of vanilla and ginger.

  Jo had probably been in there at least since five that morning like she was every Christmas. Jo’s hair was covered with a red scarf, and she wore a purple sweat suit that had streaks of flour across it. The apron she wore hadn’t saved her outfit from the streaks. She was wiping her hands off on a dish towel when Whitney walked over and kissed her cheek.

  “Merry Christmas, daughter,” Jo said.

  Whitney hugged her and laughed. “Merry Christmas, Mother.”

  “Grab that apron and start chopping the vegetables for the stuffing,” Jo said, nodding to an apron hanging from a hook near the pantry door.

  Whitney grabbed the apron and tied it around her waist. “I talked to Erika this morning. She said to wish you a merry Christmas.”

  “When is she coming down here again?”

  “I don’t know. She said she hopes soon.” Whitney diced a stalk of celery as she spoke.

  “She still with that no-good A.J.?”

  “You know it.” Whitney picked up a knife and began chopping onions. Her mother didn’t like A.J. any more than Whitney did. He didn’t treat Erika with enough respect, even if Erika refused to see it.

  Whitney prepared vegetables and her mother baked, sautéed, and measured. All the while, they talked about Shorty’s business, Devon going back to school, and Alicia wanting a new car.

  Brianna ran into the kitchen, shouting that it was time to open presents. Whitney put down the knife and wiped her hands on the front of her apron. She scooped the girl up in her arms so that she could no longer run circles around the island in the center of the kitchen.

  “Presents, huh? I guess you think Santa left you something.” Whitney tickled the little girl under her chin.

  She giggled. “Of course he did,” the little girl said with an adorable lisp. Her two front teeth were missing. She put a tiny fist on her non-existent hip.

  “Oh, really? And what is it you think he left you?” Whitney said.

  The little girl’s big, round eyes widened and so did her toothless grin. She clapped her hands together. “Lotsa cool toys!”

  Whitney laughed. “Is that so?”

  She nodded vigorously. “Just wait. You’ll see.” She started squirming to be let down. “Let’s go. We have to get everybody and open up presents!”

  Whitney set the girl down. She grabbed two of Whitney’s fingers. Her little cousin dragged her around the house, harassing the rest of their family to get up so that they could all open presents.

  Least happy was Whitney’s sister, Alicia. Alicia had crept back in the house only a few hours ago. Whitney, a light sleeper, had heard it all.

  “What were you doing out until three in the morning?” Whitney kept her voice low so that only Alicia would hear her.

  “None of your business.” Alicia groaned and pulled a pillow over her head.

  “Whit, ‘Leesha. We gotta open presents,” their cousin said.

  “Go ahead, Brianna,” Alicia said. “We’ll be down in a minute.”

  “We’re right behind you,” Whitney said, smiling at her little cousin. “You’re doing such a good job waking everybody. Keep up the good work.”

  “Okay, but I’ll be back in fifty-five minutes if you don’t come downstairs,” she said in a serious tone.

  “Okay,” Whitney said. The girl skipped out of the room. Whitney turned back to her sister. “So you’re not going to tell me where you were?”

  “Nope.”

  “Do our parents know about you going out any time you feel like it?”

  She shrugged and yawned. “Dad wants to believe I’m always up to no good because I’m hard headed. Why disappoint him?” Alicia pushed back her covers and slowly swung her feet out and over the side of the bed.

  “Be nice.”

  “He’s always trying to boss me like I’m Brianna’s age or something. He needs to get it in his head I’m not a baby. He still trying to tell me where I can go and what I can do.” She rubbed her eyes, muttering about people waking her up in the middle of the morning.

  “He’s your father. He cares about you,” Whitney said, wishing the father nature had given her had cared half as much as Shorty did.

  “Whatever. Tell him if you want. He’ll yell. I’ll yell. It’s our routine,” Alicia said before standing and stretching. She wore shorts with candy canes on them and a matching camisole. Alicia had always been rail thin. A combination of being a picky eater and taking after Shorty’s side of the family saw to that. “Last night wasn’t the first time I ever snuck out, you know.”

  Whitney had curves her sister always complained about with envy. She went to the gym, but she wasn’t obsessed with it like some of her friends were.

  Alicia yawned, slipping on a flannel robe. “We better get down there before Brianna has a fit.”

  Whitney followed her sister downstairs. A large pot of coffee was brewing in the kitchen, and it smelled too good. She reached for the coffee maker as her mother scooted her in the opposite direction.

  “You know better. Coffee in a minute, but we better go open these presents before these children eat us alive.”

  Whitney grumbled, but stumbled to the family room, knowing her mother was right.

  Shorty put a CD in the stereo in the entertainment center. Moments later, Christmas-themed jazz filtered out of the speakers on low volume. Her family w
as sprawled around the living room. Everyone was half asleep except for the kids, who were almost sitting underneath the Christmas tree. They were arguing about who would get to open the first present. Half the adults in the room had cameras aimed at the kids.

  Uncle Larry, Janet, Aunt Brenda, and Glen sat on one side of the room. Aunt Cheryl, who was in a sour mood and frowning already that morning, sat on the other side with her sons. Uncle Larry’s and Aunt Janet’s older kids from their first marriages hung in the background. Whitney’s favorite cousin, Uncle Larry’s eldest child Melinda, wasn’t there yet. She was getting into town that night, having wanted to spend half of Christmas in New York with the people at the homeless shelter at which she volunteered.

  “Okay, everybody. Presents,” Jo said, clasping her hands. She hurried over to the kids and helped them hand out packages wrapped in colorful paper decorated with snowmen, reindeer, and Santas.

  “How long do you think this is going to take?” Devon muttered from where he was standing next to her.

  “Why, you got somewhere you gotta be, Grinch?” Whitney said with a playful smile. When she saw his face, her smile faded. He narrowed his eyes at her.

  “He’s been like this for a week,” Alicia said. “He can’t get along with his girl.”

  “Stay out of my business,” Devon snapped, walking away from them and going over to stand next to Uncle Larry.

  Whitney heard squeals of delight and turned her attention back to the present opening. Wrapping paper was briskly ripped off of packages. Toys came out of shiny boxes. Soon, the living room was filled with the lights and sounds of new toys, shredded wrapping paper, and some very happy children.

  After tearing through the gifts everyone had bought for them, the children started insisting everyone else in the room open their presents. Brianna and L.J. had made gifts for each family member. Brianna hand-delivered Whitney’s to her.

  “What’s this?” Whitney took the package.

  “Won’t know until you open it, silly.” She giggled.

  Whitney smiled and turned the lumpy package over and over in her hands. The red and gold wrapping paper was wrinkled and secured with masking tape. She opened it and found inside a hair tie glued to a piece of cardboard with her name written on it in multi-colored crayons. Around her name were various drawings—a briefcase, a cell phone, a square with circles on the bottom that was apparently a car since the word “Lexus” was written on it, only it was spelled “Leksus.”