A Scarred Soul: A Small Town Love Story (Safe Haven Book 2) (17 page)

“I have to say, I’m with your sisters on that one.”

Vince smiled. “I think it hurt Dad the most. Mom of course carried that fear that I’d be injured, or worse, but for Dad, well, he’d hoped I might take over his business someday, but once I joined the Marines he sort of shut me out. Even at college, I helped him with design work, and of course, the whole nature of the business was changing in a direction he didn’t want to go—using computers and stuff. He prefers to work by hand. Now I understand why.

“I know they were proud of me, but I could see that start to slide away when I returned. They thought I was a hero, treated me like a hero, wanted to give me a homecoming fit for a conqueror and I was so disconnected from that. What I saw in their eyes—the person, the idea of me they’d built up in their minds—that’s not the ‘me’ who came home. It felt as though I was bringing something filthy to the table. It took three months before I finally accepted the celebration meal my mother had planned for me since the day I arrived. I wasn’t even close to ready for it but every time I put it off, it hurt everyone that little bit more. I barely made it through the meal. I never got to dessert. Taryn was so angry with me for ruining it, but it felt fraudulent. I was no longer their son because they didn’t deserve what I’d become. I was an impostor. Taryn kept telling me I needed to try harder. Hell, if she maybe once listened to me, to have some idea about how hard I was trying…”

He appeared to focus on something in the dying fire, but what he saw was maybe that night at his parent’s house, or possibly something thousands of miles away.

“Then it finally happened.” Lulah startled when he spoke again. “My middle sister’s boyfriend asked me if I’d killed anyone. Had I? How many? Dinner had finished and Gable slept on my lap when he asked. I clutched her so hard she woke and let out a small cry. It was the question. Why did he ask that? Taryn snatched Gable from me as if I was tainted with some sort of contagion. I didn’t blame her. I mean, what sort of mother would place her child in the arms of a murderer? In that moment she took Gable away I saw this look in her eyes and I realized she’d wanted to ask that question since my return.”

“
Y
ou’re not a murderer
, Vince. In your heart, you know that. I’m not the person to tell you this because I don’t have the skills to unlock the parts of you that are jammed up right now. You were a soldier, a warrior, doing the job that warriors have done for centuries. I wish I could help you, but all I can do is listen. I will listen for as long as you want to talk. Nothing you tell me will change the way I think about you. Believe that, please. Talking will help, but I’m sorry, really in-my-heart-sorry, that I don’t know how to bring you out of this.”

They were silent and she wondered again if he was somewhere else, at another family dinner, or back
there.
She would wait because in her own words she already professed her inability to make sense of the way he was right now. If she said more, she would only endanger that thread of trust played between them.

“We wear a uniform in the best attempt to deflect whatever is thrown our way. We protect our bodies, but our souls…” his voice drifted softly and hung in the night before he drew a long breath and spoke directly to her. “Our souls and our hearts go to battle exposed.”

Calliope came and stood beside him, looking first at Lulah and back to Vince as if waiting for an extra cue. Clearly she sensed Vince’s distress but it also seemed she didn’t want to muscle in with Lulah there. Lulah indicated with a quick nod of her head that Calliope should do her work.

The dog nudged Vince’s arm with her muzzle, gently drawing a pat from him. As he drew his hand along Calliope’s spine she settled on the floor at his side.

Vince turned back to Lulah. “I’m so tired of feeling like this. Maybe once the divorce is over I’ll feel a little more free. The more I tell Doc, the better some parts of my life are working. Now that I trust him, I don’t know what I’d do without him. And you, Lulah. You help.”

She stiffened before she had time to stop herself. “That’s what friends are for.” It was an attempt at a save and they both knew it. For some reason offering her help was okay, but she didn’t want him to
need
her. Whenever he made that sort of comment, it reminded her of the way her father used to tell her what a help she was by letting him empty her piggy bank. Such a fine daughter cleaning and cooking and doing the kind of housework a twelve-year-old girl shouldn’t be doing. How much he needed her. Being a good girl, never complaining, always helping out in any way she could, made it easier for him to shift from trailer park to trailer park, until in the end she wasn’t even being enrolled in schools when they moved to a new area. Who needed schooling anyway when she could help Daddy?

Now she’d totally messed up with Vince. He’d pulled back the way he did sometimes, instead concentrating on that long broad stroke along Calliope’s back.

“Have you seen your parents since?”

He shook his head. “We speak on the phone, but I’ve caused them so much hurt, I won’t go back until I’m better. It’s going to be hard because I’ve kept myself away for so long.”

His arm stilled mid-stroke. “The things you miss from your family, they’re so small yet so important. I remember being hurt as a kid, maybe when you came off your bike, something like that. Mom would patch me up, give me a drink, something to eat and she’d make a little joke to help you forget about your skinned knees and she’d always say, ‘There’s that smile.’ The next time I see her I want her to be able to say that again. Right now, if I visit them, all I can see is the pain I’ve caused and believe me, a smile is the last thing I can do. Can’t fake a smile, Lulah.”

She knew that because she’d tried.

V
ince sat
at the table trying desperately to stop his fingers from drumming the wooden surface, because that’s exactly the sort of thing that would really piss Taryn off. Calliope lay on the floor at his side, her head resting on his right foot. When he leaned back in his chair, the dog would raise one eyebrow at him, offering that
ready when you are, Buddy,
look.

If they’d told him a year ago he could sit through divorce mediation without blowing a fuse because of a dog at his feet, he wouldn’t have believed them. Add to that the distress of listening to a couple of strangers decide his access, or lack thereof, to Gable, based entirely on a textbook version of what they thought was wrong with him. He should have hurled every piece of artillery he could muster their way. He jigged one leg and almost smiled when Calliope reached a paw across and set it on his left foot to keep that leg quiet.

And suddenly that was it. Marriage dissolved like sugar in water, though the outcome wasn’t that sweet. Taryn had temporary custody of Gable until Vince completed this round of counseling. At that time the custody evaluator would assess the situation again. If Taryn agreed, Vince could still have access to Gable, but she wasn’t even close to allowing that to happen. She’d pushed the fallout of Vince’s flashback when he last took care of Gable and that pretty much cemented things for the evaluator.

As much as he hated to back down, he wasn’t prepared to get in a fight over Gable that would quite likely finish up by proving their deepest concerns about his volatility, so he shut his mouth and vowed to continue to work with Doc.

Now that it was over he wanted to bolt from the meeting room, but he could see the impression that would give so he waited until Team Taryn exited, before telling his lawyer he needed a moment alone so that his lawyer left, too. He counted out another minute before following.

The hallway was a clutter of people and the noise, the press of bodies, as entrances and exits were made from other rooms into the same too-small corridor, layered onto the stress of the meeting.

When he saw Taryn come out of the restroom along the corridor he was still amped. She would pass right by him and although the thought gave him a fresh load of adrenaline, he really wanted to speak to her about Gable. Couldn’t she give him one little piece of personal stuff he could take away with him?

“Taryn.”

She stopped, hesitating before the hostility swept over her face. “We’re done, Vince.”

“Please, Taryn, one minute. Tell me how Gable is?” He sounded pathetic.

“She’s doing fine.”

“Fine? Really, is that all you can say?”

“Don’t, Vince.”

Calliope nudged his leg but fuck that, he wanted to see his daughter. “It’s her birthday on Saturday. Can I—”

“Look at you. You’re a mess. All fidgety and uptight. Whatever help you’re getting doesn’t seem to be working. You have a long way to go before I’ll ever allow Gable near you again.”

“Come on, please? We can do better than this.” The heat of his rage engulfed him, at odds with the cool measure he managed to keep in his voice.

“She had nightmares for weeks after your last episode. Are you really so selfish that you’d put her through that again?”

Nightmares? Oh, Jesus
.
“I had no idea, I’m sorry. Tell Gable I’m sorry.” He wanted to put his fist through the wall, but when Calliope backed up to his legs it seemed the dog sucked the fury from him.

“Is everything okay here?”

Oh, great, the mediator. He managed a nod as Taryn headed for the door. Vince stumbled to the seat beside him and dropped his head into his hands, covering his face as the burning started up in the back of his throat, the telltale pressure building in his nose. Going to cry now, you useless piece of shit? Calliope climbed half into his lap, pushing her head between his hands and began to gently lick his face as a couple of tears slid down his cheek.

Some tension left with the tears and Calliope made a useful foil for his embarrassment, such as it was, in a busy corridor filled with strangers. When he felt a light tap on his arm he finally lifted his head. A young girl stood before him—maybe three or four—close to Gable’s age and because she didn’t resemble her in any way, he could believe she was real. She pointed at Calliope.

“Dog cuddles.”

“Yes, she’s a good dog,” Vince said softly.

The child looked uncertain for a moment before she lifted her hand and offered him the lollipop she’d half eaten. “Don’t be sad, mister.”

B
ack in the
barn for over an hour and that episode in the corridor left him thirsty, with a pounding head, and a need to be alone. Lulah had returned some minutes before and he watched through the window, her hesitation after she dismounted her bike.

His phone alerted him to a text message. With a quick glance he saw Lulah’s message.

Dinner in thirty minutes. K?

He needed a break. That was unquestionable, not negotiable. But she hadn’t come to the door so she hadn’t seen his notice. He picked up the phone to text her when it buzzed again.

…AND NO BREAK!!!

Seemed she had tuned right in today. He returned to his sanding, trying to find the peace and pleasure he usually experienced when doing something creative, but it wasn’t coming so easily today. He decided to tidy his workbench instead, so that he could work on the color scheme for Justice’s trappings. This part he was a little more nervous about. He’d never painted a carousel animal on his own, but now, if he listened carefully, he could hear the rumbling voice of his grandfather explaining color choice, the variation in brush strokes, how to use a stipple brush to pull color together, and most of all, how to have enough patience to take the time to enjoy the process.

His phone buzzed again.

If you don’t come over here pronto, your dinner will be in the dog.

He turned to Calliope. “We’re only staying an hour, so don’t settle in.”

Calliope bounded through the door the moment he opened it and he tried to suck up some of her enthusiasm as she passed by. The rain had arrived, big thick drops hitting the ground with solid determination, and he pulled the hood of his sweatshirt up before dashing across the yard. On the porch he copied Calliope in an effort to shake the raindrops off before entering the warm cabin. The food smelled fabulous, and he realized in that first breath that he had skipped lunch and never caught up.

Lulah had the table inside set, even managing to find a few wildflowers for a small jar. “Are you wet? Do you need a towel?”

“No, I’m good. Dinner smells wonderful.”

“I knew you’d regret it if I didn’t bust in on that break-from-life you tried to take. Let’s eat, and you can tell me as much or as little as you’d like about what went on today.”

“I kept Calliope busy today. She had a lot of work to do and performed like a star. I can’t believe she’s that good and we haven’t even finished our training.”

She played with the food on her plate. “I hear Adam’s roped you into giving a speech at the auction to talk about how Calliope helps you.”

“Yeah, no pressure or anything. I’m praying I can hold everything together and manage it. If people there can see what a help Calliope is to me, perhaps they’ll recognize it as a good cause to support.”

When they’d cleaned up from dinner, Lulah called him to sit by the fire again. The rain pelted even harder and the small cabin was cozy. She’d pulled the sofa closer to the blaze.

“Come and sit with me and tell me some more about your day.”

He didn’t want to. If he was honest he should tell her that what he really wanted was to dash back across the yard and sit alone. Being a good companion tonight was all but beyond him. “Well, there’s hope for gaining access to Gable in the future. We have this person assigned to our case, now, and they’ll reassess once my counseling has finished. No guarantees, but I’m hopeful.”

“It’s a big step forward, Vince.”

Her Nordic-blonde hair was tucked behind her ears. She looked fantastic sitting there, her gaze on the fire, knees gathered up to her chin, sipping from her glass of wine. They sat for a while, like this, rain pelting on the roof, the warm, soft firelight all around them.

“I feel you watching me, hot guy.”

“I might carve you, Lulah. You will be my Galatea.”

“And you, Vince, will be my Pygmalion, and I shall speak adoring words to my loving creator.”

“Oh?”

“If you make me beautiful enough, yes, although I expect even you will find it impossible to improve on perfection.”

He shifted up close and took hold of her chin between his thumb and the crook of his forefinger, turning her head slowly towards him and back again, taking time to study her profile. “I shall probably carve you exactly as you are,” he said, releasing her.

“No. Don’t do that. Give me eight more vertical inches and a D-sized cup.”

“But I like you as my perfect imp.”

“And what would my pose be?”

“Reclining, on your back like this.” He gripped her ankles and swung her around so that she lay full-length on the sofa.

She gave him a small smile and an easy whisper. “Vince, this is the moment you’re supposed to shower me with kisses.”

“Careful now, imp, you might end up with more than you bargained for.”

As she lay on her back along the cushions he noted the rise and fall of her breath, her heels resting in two heated points on his thighs. The socks she wore were black with red toes and heel pads, and bore a white angel motif on the outside of the ankle and an extremely wicked red devil on the inside. Vince took one heel and turned her foot each way, examining the socks. “Both sides of Lulah?”

“Yeah, but only one comes out to play at any time. Tonight, you choose which one.”

Did she really mean that? And how could he choose? He wanted all of her. The angel, who saw his pain and tried not to take it away from him, but rather stood beside him to help him fight his way through it. And the devil. The part of her that made a bonfire of all the things she knew to be right, and knew to be good for herself—things like his insecurities and unreliability—and lit the match, setting them both free in the blaze.

“Both.” He took hold of one ankle in a firm grip and with his free hand pulled off a sock by the toe. “Let me examine your foot.”

When he had it exposed she wriggled her toes at him. “Hello, Mr. UHT Guy.”

He silenced her with the way he captured her toes. “Ticklish here?”