The thumping drumbeat pumping from the radio suddenly stopped. Cash whirled around and discovered he wasn’t alone anymore.
“When I first got here I thought there was a concert going on. I never thought this old radio of Livie’s dad would play that loud. Then again, I’ve never tried to drown out my own thoughts,” Jax stated as he hooked his thumbs through his belt loops. He scanned his gaze around the room, then landed back on Cash. “Looks good in here.”
Cash swiped one arm and then the other, ridding himself of the powdery dust as much as possible. “What are you doing here?”
Jax took a step, then another, and started around the room, examining the walls closer. The silence grated on Cash’s last nerve and he wasn’t in the mood for whatever game his cousin wanted to play.
“If you’re here to lecture me about Jade—”
“Lecture you?” Jax stopped and turned to face Cash. “I’m here because I had to get out of the house with all the women, wine, and tears that had taken over. Well, Jade had the wine. Melanie and Livie were sticking with water.”
Confused, Cash raked a hand through his hair, which only produced another round of particle dust floating around him. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Well, Melanie can’t drink yet, Livie can’t either with her pregnancy, and Jade is pretty upset over the breakup.” Jax crossed his arms over his chest and pinned Cash with a dark stare. “Which is odd, because I didn’t even know there was a relationship, let alone a breakup going down.”
Cash shook his head and tried to process everything Jax had just said.
Okay, Mel couldn’t drink because of breast feeding . . . he assumed.
“Livie’s pregnant?” he asked.
Jax smiled. “We’ll get to that later, but yes. Piper doesn’t know yet, and we haven’t made an official announcement.”
“Congrats, man.”
“Later,” Jax warned. “Right now, I want to know why my wife is angry and consoling her best childhood friend.”
Gritting his teeth, Cash tried to gather his thoughts. He knew Jax or Tanner wouldn’t wait long before coming to him. They’d want answers. Hell, so did he. He’d like to know how he was ever going to recover from this. He’d also like to know how the hell they all could continue to work together when just the thought of Jade felt like a punch to the gut.
“I’d say your wife is angry because Jade and I didn’t want anyone to know what was going on.”
Cash glanced around and found a handle with a rag on the end. Might as well do something while he was getting raked over the coals. He grabbed the tool and started swiping the dust off the walls.
“Any reason why you guys were sneaking around like a couple of teenagers?”
Cash ran the rag from the ceiling to the floor. “Because it was nobody’s damn business and now it’s over.”
If only the past month was that simple.
“And you’re the one who ended things?” Jax accused.
Cash snorted. “You could say that.”
He had ended things, once she’d made it clear in front of witnesses that he was nothing more than a warm body in her bed.
“You want to give me your version of events?” Jax asked.
Swipe. Swipe.
“Not particularly. What have you heard?”
Jax crossed the room and pulled the bucket of spackle out of the way for Cash. Then he grabbed another rag and went to the adjoining wall to start working.
“I only heard a little actually. I took Piper to a sleepover and then I was trying not to eavesdrop, but I did hear Livie talking about finding you in your underwear in Jade’s kitchen. Then Jade told Melanie that she’d made a mistake with you.”
Cash didn’t think his heart was capable of shattering again, but knowing Jade thought they were a mistake damn near crippled him.
Jade thought everything they’d done had been a mistake. Wasn’t that just a smack in the face of reality? He’d been so sure that she was falling for him. He’d clearly read her all wrong when she’d let him stay over, when she wanted to make him breakfast in bed. He’d opened up about his father. Hell, he’d been ready to take her to see him.