Avoiding Commitment (Avoiding #1)(40)
Author: K.A. Linde

Ramsey couldn’t help himself from staring at her. She looked to be in such ecstasy from just a few grapes and it was torture to keep himself firmly planted on the opposite side of the blanket. Her cheeks were flushed from the Georgia summer heat and lips wet from licking off the grape juice that had squirted onto her bottom lip. He gulped heavily fishing around in the basket for something to distract him. He uncovered the remaining food and removed two cans of Coke for them. But he was drawn back to her mouth as he glanced up.

She caught him watching her, and in her eagerness scooted closer towards him so they were nearly touching. "Want one?" Lexi asked holding a grape between her fingers. He nodded and before he could reach out to take the fruit, she pressed it in between his lips letting her finger linger for just a second before pulling away.

He crunched down on the fruit trying to act as if that hadn’t affected him. "Thanks."

Lexi batted her eyelashes before sitting back on her side of the blanket. Her hand brushed her bag and felt the vibrations through the material. She jumped unexpectedly and flipped open the device. "Are you okay? Where are you? Why aren’t you returning my texts? Lexi?"

Lexi sighed heavily and bit her lip as she read through Jack’s text message. She had completely forgotten about messaging him back. She quickly typed out a reply and closed her phone. "Sorry. Alive."

"You got to your parents safe then?"

Turning her head to look at Ramsey’s perfect bone structure, she giggled a little to herself. Man, if Jack knew where she was at this moment, he would have a fit. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to tell him though. At least, not over text message. Not when she couldn’t use the information as leverage. "Safe."

"Anyone important?" Ramsey asked casually taking a bite of the sandwich in his hand.

Lexi rolled her eyes. "Just Jack again." God, she hated how familiar this all felt.

"Ahh…" he said not sure if he was prepared to broach that subject just yet.

"Do you want to come over tomorrow or something?"

Lexi sighed again. Did she want to go see him? Yes. No. There wasn’t really a good answer. If she was honest with herself, the answer would be yes. The answer would always be yes. She always wanted to see him. She hadn’t spent any time with him in two years, and she missed him. A part of her always missed him. They had gone through so much it was hard to not want to be around him. Even though things always ended so f**ked up, her brain wouldn’t let her forget the in between times when things were oh so good.

"Yeah. I’ll let you know."

"Great."

"So what’s up with you and Jack?" Ramsey asked against his better judgment. Lexi’s eyes immediately darkened. Something within her completely closed off at the question. He’d known it would be a bad subject. After what he had witnessed yesterday, he knew something was up and was determined to find out. He just hadn’t expected such a dark response. He hadn’t thought it would be pretty, but the way her eyes narrowed and jaw tightened simultaneously would have scared him if she didn’t look so beautiful.

"Oh just…you know," she stated vaguely unsure how much she wanted to reveal. He didn’t know anything now which was probably for the better.

"Not really. You two seemed pretty heated last night. Was he just drunk? I’d never seen him that way before," Ramsey admitted hoping to push the right buttons. He could see her begin to visibly relax as the attention fell away from her.

"I’ve just known Jack for a long time, and he’s pretty protective. Kind of like an older brother," she said dryly. She couldn’t help thinking that Jack would make the worst older brother in the world.

Ramsey smirked noticing the ever so slight twitch in her muscles that indicated she was lying. He had always considered himself a great judge of character even when his parents hadn’t. So whatever had gone on between her and Jack had not been platonic which begged the question as to why she was here if they had been previously involved. But he didn’t get to ask his next question as Lexi’s phone began to buzz next to her again.

"Hello?" Lexi asked not recognizing the Atlanta phone number. Last time that had happened, she had been led here. That thought almost made her want to drop the call, but the sound of a chirpy voice cut off the line of reasoning.

"Hello dear," Bekah said from the other line.

Cringing at the uppity sound of her voice, Lexi pulled the phone away from her ear. "What’s up?"

"Where are you?"

No way had Jack put her up to this. Then again she had to have gotten the number from somewhere, and Jack was the prime suspect since she had a feeling Bekah didn’t know her parents. Those were the only people in the city who had her number. Not even Ramsey who was sitting directly in front of her; her first real date in God knows how long, and he didn’t even have her number. She sighed pathetically. "I’m busy. Was there something you needed?" Lexi asked avoiding the question.

She let her eyes fall back on Ramsey who looked at her inquisitively. She shrugged and mouth Bekah to him. His eyebrows shot up in surprise.

"Yes," Bekah stated rather deliberately. "I don’t believe we’ve finished our conversation just yet. Do you have plans tomorrow? I’d really like to take you shopping for Jack’s big day and we can talk then."

Jack’s big day? She hadn’t heard anything about his big day. What was his big day? What were they celebrating? She had no idea, but she didn’t particularly want to give Bekah the satisfaction of knowing that piece of information.

"Fine. How about I call you tomorrow?"

"Sounds great sweetie," Bekah said happily. "Jack stop," Lexi heard her mutter playfully in the phone. She didn’t even know if Jack was actually there or if Bekah was just being a bitch. She supposed it didn’t really matter since it had worked. Lexi could feel her heart constricting and pain crease her temples. Her throat was closing up and she felt her body seizing at the thought of Jack being alone with Bekah. Lexi coughed uncomfortably and said a rushed goodbye before slamming the phone shut.

"What was that about?" Ramsey asked concern evident in his voice.

"You’re sister wants to take me shopping," Lexi informed him pushing several strands of hair behind her ear forcefully.

"That’s nice of her," Ramsey said. Though for some reason, he didn’t really think it was. Thinking of Bekah only brought back memories of their conversation from the night before.

* * *

"What are you doing Ramsey?" Bekah asked scolding him before he could even utter a word. "You don’t even know this girl. She’s not just another one of your girls."

He stared at her in awe. His jaw had gone slack. "Why are you protecting her? I’m pretty sure that she can take care of herself."

"Yes I’m sure she is quite capable," she said her jaw tightening. "That’s not the point. You just need to back off."

His sister never spoke to him like this. He’d done some pretty f**ked up stuff in his time and all the while she had been there for him. She supported him. Even if she didn’t agree with him, she had always accepted his decisions. It was strange to be scolded by his younger sister for something this miniscule. He would have expected this type of treatment from their parents. After all, they didn’t really expect him to care about anything outside of the Club, but not from Bekah.

That left him to believe one thing: Bekah was in on it. Whatever reason Lexi had for showing up in Atlanta to see Jack had something to do with Bekah as well. He wasn’t sure the reason, but he wanted to know. Something was wrong with this situation. He could just feel it. Bekah had always confided in him with everything, and since she wasn’t in this case, it only enhanced his concerns.

"I’ll back off when you tell me what the hell is going on Bek."

"There’s nothing going on," she said squaring her shoulders and tilting her head in the dignified way she had learned while practicing to be a Debutante.

He knew that look. It was the determination that characterized their family. It was that look coupled with brains that had allowed their family to succeed for generations. "Fine. Don’t tell me what’s going on. But I’m smarter than everyone lets on Bekah, and I’m going to find out. She has history with Jack that much you’ve told me. What I can’t figure out is what you have to do with all of this." A muscle in her jaw twitched slightly while the rest of her body remained still. "What’s the master plan, my mastermind little sister?"

She had recovered almost instantly from how sharp his intuition had proven to be. But it didn’t matter to her. It’s not like he was going to find out anything more. "There is no master plan. It’s really simple. Lexi and Jack are old friends. Old friends do on occasion come and visit each other. Obviously, I would want to meet this old friend. That’s it."

She was lying and he knew it. She wouldn’t be worked up about the whole situation. She wouldn’t be acting so out of character if there wasn’t something more to this whole charade. He stared into her cold blue eyes and saw the resolute decision pass through them that she would say no more. He nodded in comprehension. "If it’s just old friends, and neither of you care that much, then I think she should stay with me after all."

Bekah sighed seeing the same look pass from his emerald orbs. "Why do you want her here?"

"She’s hammered. I don’t think it would be intelligent to move her. How would you like her to throw up all over your car?" Two could play at this game. He wasn’t going to go spill his guts about his instant attraction to Lexi, if Bekah refused to divulge any further information about why Lexi was here in the first place.

"Can we just compromise?" He raised an eyebrow allowing her to continue. "She can stay, but take her to a hotel afterwards. I don’t want you to get any ideas," Bekah said looking him up and down.

"What do you think I’m going to do Bekah? Jesus."

"I know what you’ve done in the past," she said pointedly.

"Whatever," he said acknowledging her triumph. "Hotel it is, but you will fill me in on this shit right?"

Bekah’s eyes narrowed. "It would be smarter if you just dropped it."

* * *

Lexi snorted bringing Ramsey back to reality. "Nice. Right."

"You don’t have to hang out with her," he stated absentmindedly. He passed a sandwich to her and she reached into the basket to investigate the contents further.

"Yeah I know, but Jack wants me to," she said shrugging.

"Why is that?" he asked honestly curious.

Lexi shrugged again. "Beats me. We’ve known each other for a long time, and I guess since I’m here he wants me to get to know his girlfriend too."

Ramsey took a deep breath to keep from asking too many more questions. He had a million, but the last thing he wanted to do was overload her with them on their first date. If he had it his way there would be many more to come. "So how long are you here for exactly?"

"Well schools starts on Monday. So I guess until Sunday then. A week total." Lexi smiled at the grimace that crossed his face. She wasn’t entirely sure if that was because she was staying too long or too short, but she was going to go with the later. She had found herself in quite an interesting scenario.

"I guess you’ll be here long enough for Jack’s birthday then," Ramsey said leaning back on his elbows and examining her reaction.