This Heart of Mine (8 page)

“The stitches won’t take more than a few seconds. I keep a bag here at home,” the doctor said when they walked back into the room.

She wanted to continue her argument, but they were obviously united against her, or he wouldn’t have come back intent on giving her stitches.

She’d have to figure out a way to pay for his services, she decided. At this point, that was the only dignified course of action. So she kept her mouth shut and let him work. And when he was finished, she allowed Riley to drive her home.

Fortunately, her mother’s dogs weren’t out when they turned into the property, but all the junk she’d been embarrassed to have Kyle see was right there for Riley’s view. She hated that he couldn’t possibly miss it.

The doctor had given her a local anesthetic when he stitched her up and some pills for the pain. Because her head was no longer pounding, she was able to get out before Riley could come around to open her door.

“Thank you so much for your help,” she said as she moved past him. “I don’t know what kind of arrangement you made with the doctor about the bill, but I’d appreciate you sending it to me when it comes. I might have to make payments, but I’ll handle it over time. And I’ll buy you a new shirt, too.” The doctor had returned Riley’s, but it was balled up on the rubber floor mats, too soaked with blood for him to put on.

Realizing that he probably wouldn’t want to touch it, with biohazards being as dangerous as they were these days, she walked back to the truck and started to reach inside. “Here, I’ll just...throw this one away so you won’t have to...”

He grabbed her arm. “Leave it.”

She did as he asked in case he was planning to try to save it. Maybe it was a personal favorite. “I was tested for AIDS and other communicable diseases before I was released, and I don’t have anything.”

“Good to know,” he said, but he didn’t sound concerned. “Let’s get you inside.”

Much to her chagrin, he insisted on helping her to the trailer, which made her regret that she hadn’t finished fixing it up. She’d worked as hard as she could, but the rest of the improvements required money she didn’t have.

Riley held the door as she stepped inside. “You need some sleep, like the doctor said,” he told her.

“I’ll go straight to bed.” Anticipating the relief she’d feel when she could crawl into bed and try to forget the humiliation of having Riley rescue her, she turned to say goodbye. But he didn’t stay on the landing. She had to move back because he was following her into the house.

“He also thinks you’re not getting enough to eat,” he said with a frown.

Why the heck was he in her living room? She didn’t want him there. The place didn’t look good enough yet. She’d planned to get it just right before he came over to inspect it. “I’ve never been very big.”

“Malnourishment is something else.”

Why had they been talking about her diet? That was none of their business. “Well, you know what they say about prison food.” She said that as if she was joking, but she’d purposely eaten as little as possible. Meals were handled by other convicts, and she’d heard too many stories about what some of the food contained.

“He also said someone needs to wake you every few hours.”

“I heard him. But I don’t have a concussion.” It was difficult not to let her gaze fall to his chest. All those muscles were appealing, even though she didn’t want them to be...

“We don’t know that,” he said. “It’s better to be safe than sorry.”

“Okay.” She stood at the door. Maybe
now
he’d leave and she could quit fighting the urge to ogle him. The hunger she felt had far more to do with physical touch than food.

“Okay what?” he said.

“I’ll...be careful.”

“I’m asking who’s going to wake you up.”

“My mom. Of course.” She gestured at the other trailer. “She lives right there.”

He frowned again. “And never comes out.”

Lizzie felt safer staying out of the public eye.

“She’ll check on me,” Phoenix said, but that was a lie. She didn’t even plan on telling her mother what had happened. She was going to take a nap. Then she’d pull herself together long enough to make some bracelets so she could pay off her doctor bill.

“You’re sure,” he said.

She put more energy into her voice, hoping to convince him. “Positive. You should get home. I’m sure Jacob’s wondering where you are.”

He seemed offended that she was in such a hurry to get rid of him. “Look, I can tell you don’t like me much, Phoenix. And I don’t blame you. You’ve been through hell and it’s all associated with me. But...I don’t want to make things worse. I’m just trying to help.”

“Because you think there’s a need, but there’s not,” she said. “And I don’t know what gave you the idea that I don’t like you when I’m so grateful for all you’ve done for Jacob. You’ve been a fabulous father.”

“Nice segue,” he murmured.

Thanks to the pain meds the doctor had given her, Phoenix’s headache was gone, but she still wasn’t completely lucid. She knew that because she was looking at Riley’s chest without even trying not to. Worse, she wanted to touch it—touch
him
. “Excuse me?”

“Whether or not I’ve been a good father has nothing to do with what I just said.”

“Yes, it does,” she argued, struggling to remain coherent. “It’s important that you understand how much I appreciate your efforts—all you’ve done to make life so good for him. He’s a great kid. And now you’re being sympathetic to me because I’m his mother. But that isn’t a burden you need to carry. I’m not as helpless as I seem. This bandage just makes me
look
pathetic.”

She laughed even though he didn’t laugh with her. “Bottom line, I’m no one you have to bother with. And just to reassure you...since we’ve never had the chance to discuss it, at least as adults...what I did before, becoming such a nuisance. Please don’t feel that could ever happen again. Honestly, it was nothing more than a schoolgirl crush that got out of control.” The damn pain meds were making her babble, but she figured she might as well get this out in the open while she had a private audience with him. It wasn’t as if she’d ever call him to say any of this. She wouldn’t call him for
any
reason—unless it was an emergency and she needed to reach Jacob. “You were the first boy I ever...well, you know...”

He was staring at her so intently she could no longer meet his eyes. “I remember. I was there, too.”

“I thought maybe you’d blocked it all out. But it’s probably not so unusual for a girl in that situation to feel some sort of...attachment, right? You can understand that.”

He didn’t say he could. He didn’t say anything, so she stumbled on.

“I was just too naive to realize that...that ‘I love you’ for a...for a guy means something different than it does for the typical girl, that’s all. I thought we both meant it, although how could we, at that age?” God, what was she saying? Was she making any sense? She tried even harder to explain. “I put
way
too much store in those three words and...sex. I completely bought in.” She added another laugh to let him know how ridiculous that had been. “And then I panicked when I learned I was going to have a baby.” She tucked her hair, caked with blood, behind one ear. “I’m not excusing my behavior, don’t get me wrong. I shouldn’t have called you so many times or driven by your house. ‘Go away’ is ‘go away.’ Not that I heard you say it very often, but maybe that was because I didn’t
want
to hear it. Anyway, I hope you understand that I’d never try to force my affections on you again. I’m a little wiser about how the world works these days, despite my lack of experience with men. So there’s no need for you to worry.”

“You understand how the world works,” he repeated.

She’d said so in that diatribe...somewhere. But why had he picked out that particular comment? Was she getting through to him or not? “Yes. Probably better than most people.”

“And ‘I love you’ means something different to a boy.”

His voice had a rough edge that made her fear he wasn’t taking what she’d said as the apology she’d intended. “Right. Sex and love are two different things, and boys can make that distinction more easily than girls. That’s all I’m saying. I get that now.”

“I see. What a great thing to learn.”

Was he being sarcastic? She was so confused. “It was a lesson I needed. And learning it the way I did means I’ll never forget.”

A muscle moved in his cheek.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “Did I say something wrong? I was trying to apologize for...for falling in love with you. Or for holding on to you when I should’ve let go.” None of this was coming out right. She could tell that much, so she stopped trying to explain and opted for the direct approach. “Regardless of anything else, know this—I
promise
I’ll never single you out like that again or do anything else to make you uncomfortable.”

There. That had to be clear. She smiled up at him, hoping what she’d said would finally meet with his approval. But there was that damn frown again. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Nothing. Don’t worry. You nailed it. And so innocently, too.”

She pressed her fingers to her temples. The pain meds had
really
kicked in. “I admit my thoughts are...somewhat disjointed. What, exactly, did I nail?”

“That you can’t trust a guy,” he replied. “That a guy doesn’t know what love is.”

That sounded a bit harsh. Had she actually said those things? “Maybe not
all
guys,” she clarified.

“Okay. Only me,” he said, then walked out.

“I was trying to apologize!” she called after him.

He shook his head as he turned back. “For ever loving me?”

She tried to follow him out onto the stoop but felt too weak to move that far. She leaned against the door instead. “But you didn’t
want
me to love you! I swear I’m not finding fault with you or blaming you for anything. I’m trying to figure out a way to coexist here. I don’t want you to be miserable just because I’d like to get to know Jacob, don’t want you to feel as if that’s going to cost you anything. Even what you did today.” She pointed at her head. “That trip to the doctor. The ride home. I feel bad that you had to go to the trouble and I wish you would’ve let me handle it.”

“You think you can handle Buddy?”

“I’ll have to,” she answered. “He’s not your problem.”

“Yes, he is. He’s not going to get away with what he did.”

His remark propelled her outside despite her shaky legs. “Don’t say that. You can’t get involved. You don’t want to lose his friendship on my account.”

“Because he’d be a much better friend than you.”

She laughed again, hoping to
finally
lighten this up. “Not many people could offer you less than I could.”

He shook his head as he gazed back at her.

She used her fingers to comb the tangles out of her hair. She had to look a sight covered in the blood from her cut and the dirt from her fall. “There’s no need to feel conflicted, Riley. You’ve got it all. Just enjoy life and carry on the way you always have,” she told him, and shut the door.

7

O
n the drive home, Riley cursed softly to himself as everything Phoenix had said ran through his mind. Her words wouldn’t have affected him so deeply if she’d been accusing or resentful. Then maybe he would’ve felt defensive. But she’d assumed responsibility for everything, going all the way back to when they’d been together—even though he
had
told her he loved her and taken her virginity. Of course she would assume she could count on what he said, because she’d been sincere with him.

It was easy to see why she’d felt sucker punched when he broke up with her. But he honestly hadn’t intended to put her in that position. She had no idea how much pressure he’d been under—from his parents, from everyone, including his teachers—to distance himself from her. No one wanted him to get mixed up with “Lizzie’s girl.” It was his mother who’d wanted him to date Lori, her best friend’s daughter. Riley had never been that interested in Lori. Phoenix had been every bit as special to him as he’d told her at the time.

Maybe that was why it had stung to hear her discount what he’d said and done—categorize his part in their relationship as throwaway, the difference between boys and girls, sex versus love. Although it was logical that she would. He’d let her down, hadn’t been old enough or mature enough to know how to stand up against his parents. He hadn’t even been convinced that he should! In his eyes, at that time, his parents were always right, the guiding beacon he relied on. He hadn’t wanted to lose their love and approval. And he certainly hadn’t wanted to “ruin his future” as they’d insisted he was doing.

So he’d unwittingly ruined Phoenix’s future. If he hadn’t set that chain of events in motion, Lori would still be alive.

He thought about that occasionally, late at night when he tried to work out how he should treat Jacob’s mother. But with his parents’ support—with everyone’s support—he’d always been able to justify his behavior, to believe she had indeed reacted out of jealousy and done something unforgivable.

The more he dealt with Phoenix as an adult, however, the easier it was to believe her explanation of that tragic event.

Parking his truck in the driveway instead of the garage, since he was planning to leave again, Riley hurried inside the two-story house he’d built four years earlier to put on a clean T-shirt and check on Jacob.

“Is Mom okay?” Jacob asked, coming out of his room the minute he heard the front door.

“She’s going to be fine.” Riley hoped. The doctor had indicated she
should
be. But it seemed crazy to leave her over there all by herself, drugged up and with a possible concussion. That trailer had no air-conditioning, and she didn’t have a phone. How would she call for help if she needed it? What if she couldn’t get over to her mother’s? And who would she call even if she did reach Lizzie’s?

There was a chance she might not be able to get out of her bed, so Riley planned to go back and check on her. No way could he count on Lizzie to take care of anything or anyone. She was the most dysfunctional person he’d ever known. If he didn’t return, he wasn’t sure Phoenix would even get dinner, and that worried him. For one thing, she was supposed to have something in her stomach when she took more of the pain meds the doctor had sent home with her.

Jacob stepped out of the way so Riley could get past him on the stairs, then followed him to his room. “Did you take her to the doctor?”

“I did.” Riley pulled a T-shirt from one of his drawers and yanked it over his head. “He cleaned her wounds and stitched her up.”

“She needed
stitches
? How many?”

“Six. It was quite a gash but not as bad as it looked. Head wounds bleed a lot, like she said.”

Jacob dropped onto the bed while Riley went into the master bath to wash his hands and face. “That whole thing scared the crap out of me,” he said, speaking loudly enough that Riley could hear him over the running water. “When I saw Buddy racing up on me in that Excursion of his, I thought he was playing with me at first. But then I saw the look on his face and knew we were in trouble.”

The fear his son must’ve felt in that moment made Riley angry all over again. Jacob had only been driving for six months.

“Can you believe Buddy would do something like that?” Jacob asked.

Riley couldn’t. He’d known Buddy wasn’t pleased to have Phoenix back in town, but this was ridiculous. “I’m going over to the police station to talk to Chief Bennett right now. Why don’t you come with me, so you can explain exactly what happened?”

“You’re going to report him?”

“You’re damn right I am. He had no business doing what he did.”

Jacob seemed hesitant. “But you don’t even like Mom.”

“I’ve never said that.”

“You weren’t very happy about her coming home. And you didn’t want to meet her for breakfast.”

“I wasn’t sure what kind of person she turned out to be. That’s all.”

“And now she’s okay?”

“Let’s just say I’m giving her the benefit of the doubt. As long as she doesn’t break my trust, I don’t have a problem with her being here.”

“But if you stick up for her, it’ll get us in a fight with Buddy, and that won’t be good. Grandma really likes the Mansfields. She hangs out with them all the time, and that means we have to see Buddy once in a while.”

“Sometimes you have to do what you think is right regardless of the fallout.”

He didn’t comment, so Riley thought maybe he’d left. “Jacob?”

“I’m here.”

“Don’t you think that’s true?”

“Yeah, I do.”

When Riley reentered the room, Jacob was still on the bed. “You’d better get your shoes. We need to leave right away.”

His son got up, but didn’t head to the door. He walked over and gave Riley a hug. It was a man-hug—a brief clasp. But it was meaningful because it was so unexpected.

“Thanks, Dad.”

* * *

When Riley returned to Phoenix’s trailer, all appeared to be quiet. He didn’t want to drag her out of bed and down the hall to answer if she was sleeping, so he knocked softly and, when no one came, tried the door. It was locked. He thought he’d have to rouse her, after all—until he realized that the door wasn’t quite latched. He was able to open it without a problem.

The trailer was hot, but not so hot that he considered it dangerous. He was more concerned about the fact that it didn’t appear as if she’d been up since he left four hours earlier. Nothing in the trailer had changed.

After setting the soup he’d bought at Just Like Mom’s on the counter, along with the backpack and purse she’d left in Jacob’s Jeep, he walked down the hall, knocking gently on the cheap paneling to alert her. He didn’t want to scare her.

“Phoenix? It’s me, Riley.”

There was still no response, but her bedroom door stood ajar, so he poked his head in. She’d showered, but that was about as far as she’d gotten. She’d fallen into bed with a towel wrapped around her head; she didn’t appear to be wearing anything under the sheet that covered her. Hot as it was, he couldn’t blame her, but the sight of her bare arms and shoulders, and the profile of her face, made him pause. She was pretty, all right—even when she was beat up.

“Phoenix?”

Nothing.

He moved to her side and took her hand. “Hey, Phoenix. Are you okay?”

She mumbled something about being fine and rolled over, jerking her hand away. The sheet dropped in the process, baring her shoulder blade, which bore a tattoo of Jacob’s name and the date of his birth written in cursive. A bit lower he found an oddly shaped scar, as well as the fresh scrapes from having dived into that ditch.

Averting his gaze before he could see anything more revealing, he muttered a curse. She looked so small and fragile lying there. Damn Buddy for making a difficult situation even worse.

“Phoenix,” he said, shaking her. “It’s time to wake up. I brought you some dinner.”

“Later,” she grumbled.

Figuring he’d fulfilled the doctor’s orders by getting her to talk, Riley decided to give her another hour. She’d been through a lot. Maybe, right now, rest was more important than food.

“Okay. I’ll wake you again in a bit,” he told her.

As he closed her bedroom door, his phone vibrated in his pocket. He had an incoming text. It was Jacob, wanting to know about his mother.

She’s fine. Just sleeping
, he wrote back while walking to the living room. Jacob had wanted to come with him, but he’d had a group homework project. Riley had said he could stop by after.

So what to do until then? Phoenix didn’t have a television. She didn’t have much of anything, he saw as he wandered around the place. There was a bedroom on the far side of the living room, which she’d furnished with the same type of broken-down furniture that filled the rest of the trailer. He found a warped chest of drawers, a bed that was set up on cinder blocks and some homemade bookshelves. It all looked as if it had been retrieved from a junkyard, but it was clean. The whole trailer was clean. He could smell the ammonia from whatever she’d used to scrub the place.

In the kitchen he came across a small, cheap microwave, but he wasn’t sure what she used it for. Other than the food he and Kyle had delivered, her cupboards were bare. When he opened the fridge to put away the soup, he discovered that it was almost as empty as the cupboards. A half-eaten bowl of oatmeal, an apple and some hummus sat on one shelf, which made it easy to see what she’d been surviving on. But that hardly constituted a balanced diet. How she’d had the strength to do the cleaning she’d done, and in such a short time, was a mystery. There was evidence of her work all over. For instance, she was in the process of removing some old wallpaper in the living room, but she didn’t even have a scraper. From what he could tell, she’d been using a butter knife and a razor blade, both of which were sitting on the corner of a wobbly side table.

He shook his head at how tedious and painstaking a process that would be, and yet she’d made significant progress—through sheer determination. She was used to making do with whatever she had, he thought, which reminded him of her bike. So he called Noah.

Noah answered with “What’s up?”

Caller ID had identified him. “Not much. What’s going on with you?”

“I’m closing the shop for the day so I can go home and have dinner with my wife. I think she’s cooking her famous meat loaf. Want to join us?”

“No, I’m tied up. I was just calling because I have an old bike I’m hoping you can fix.”

“What kind of old bike?”

Noah sold mostly high-end mountain bikes, so he was assuming Riley would be able to name the make and model. “It’s a twenty-year-old ten-speed, if it’s that new. And it needs tires, maybe a lot of other work.”

“Dude, what are you doing with a piece of shit like that when I own a bike shop? Come on in. I’ll set you up with the perfect ride at my cost.”

“Actually, it’s not mine.”

“Whose is it?”

He stood at the window of that extra bedroom and gazed out at the depressing sight of Lizzie’s yard. “It belongs to Phoenix.”

There was a slight pause. “I can help her out, too, if you want.”

“She doesn’t have any money. But she doesn’t have a car, either, and needs a way to get around.”

“I see.” There was another brief silence. “How’s that going, by the way? When we were at the coffee shop on Friday, you weren’t too excited about her being back in town.”

“I don’t mind,” he insisted, feeling guilty for having bitched about her impending return.

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Does that mean she
doesn’t
have horns on her head and carry a pitchfork?”

“She’s not so different from everyone else.” He considered telling Noah what Buddy had done, and how apathetic Chief Bennett had been when he and Jacob had gone to complain. Of course there was going to be some resentment, he’d said. Buddy would get past it. The Mansfields were good people. Buddy was just having a hard time since his wife walked out on him. Yada, yada. Although Bennett had said he’d look into it, Riley had gotten the distinct impression that he didn’t plan to do much more than issue Buddy a cursory warning.

As much as that irritated him, Riley didn’t want to get into a long discussion right now. Despite how disoriented Phoenix had seemed when he tried to wake her, there was always the possibility that she might overhear him.

“I’m glad,” Noah said. “That should make things easier for Jacob.”

“I agree.”

“So when do you plan to bring in the bike?”

“Tomorrow okay?”

“Tomorrow’s fine with me. We open at ten, but if you have to be at work earlier than that, leave it on my front porch. I can take it around to the shop when I walk over.”

Riley turned his back on the piles of rubble he could see from the window. What a place to grow up... “I’ll do that. Any idea when you might be able to get to it?”

“Biking season’s started, so we’re swamped. But you don’t need to worry, since you know the owner.”

Riley smiled at his jocular tone. “It’s nice having friends in high places. Thanks.”

“No problem. If I ever need my roof repaired, I’ll expect the same treatment,” he joked. “See you tomorrow.”

Riley sighed as he hung up. Then he realized he didn’t have to stand around being bored. He had his tools in the truck; he could finish removing that old wallpaper.

The wallpaper was gone within the hour, but Phoenix still hadn’t stirred, so he began to look for other odd jobs. He fixed the hinges on some of her cupboards so they’d close properly, replaced a broken screen so the mosquitos couldn’t get in and repaired a leak under her sink. He was in search of more small repairs he could make when he opened a door off the hallway and discovered her workroom.

“What the hell is this?” he muttered, but it was quite obvious. That bracelet she’d given Jacob? She’d made it. Apparently, she made a lot of them. Several different types—some braided, some with carved pieces of wood or silver beads, some personalized—hung on a coat hanger dangling from a nail above her desk, and a pile of packages, all addressed and ready to be mailed, were stacked along the far wall. A shelf consisting of a length of board supported by two cinder blocks held an array of stampers, hole-punchers and heavy-duty scissors. On another shelf he saw several bowls of beads, metal pieces, fasteners, even feathers. And the whole room smelled like the leather strips that filled an old suitcase lying open on the far side. There was also a chalkboard leaning against the wall with names and checkmarks and what he decided must be a style number.