Carolina Blues (21 page)

She’d told Jack she loved him. Love involved trust.

Of course, he hadn’t said it back. But he was committed to her. Wasn’t he?
I’m in this thing with you, whether it fits your theories or not
, he’d said.

Stay . . . As long as you want
, he’d said.

Lauren wandered back on deck, restless. The fact that he was also at least an hour late wasn’t a particular source of concern. Okay, maybe it was. A little. Only because he hadn’t called.

She stared up the empty road, willing his cruiser into sight. Was he all right?

Tiger mewed at her feet. Lauren scooped up the kitten, cuddling its soft fur against her cheek.
Don’t overthink this. Don’t get stuck in your own head
.

Headlights flashed, pale against the fading sun.

Her heartbeat quickened. She watched as the black-and-white SUV drew up to the end of the dock and Jack got out, moving stiffly.

“Sorry I’m late,” he said as he came aboard.

She leaned in to kiss him, a soft brush of lips. Stepped back to scan his face, the tension bracketing his mouth, the lines of tiredness around his eyes. “That’s okay. Bad day?”

“Accident out on the highway. Bunch of kids going to the beach. Teenagers, three girls, two boys. The driver was texting, hit the median, and flipped.”

Her heart squeezed. “Oh, Jack.”

“Looks like we’re going out tonight after all. I didn’t have a chance to pick up dinner.”

“Of course. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay.” He scratched Tiger briefly behind the ears. “It’s over.”

“I’m glad you were there to help them.”

His hand dropped. “Yeah.”

He walked past her toward the galley.

She trailed after him. “How . . . how are they?”

He bent to get a beer from the fridge. “Nobody died. Bumps and bruises mostly. Lucky for them, they were all wearing seat belts. The driver got it the worst when she hit the steering wheel. I had to stay with them ’til the paramedics got there.”

“And how are you?” Lauren asked softly.

He popped the cap. “Fine.”

No
, she thought,
you’re not.
Frustration and concern roiled inside her. “You had an exciting day all around,” she observed.

He swigged his beer. “I’ve had better.”

Lauren took a deep breath. Say something now? Or say nothing and let the silence eat at both of them?

Say something, she decided. “Renee came by this morning looking for you.”

“She found me.”

Lauren waited. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.”

“We can discuss it later.”

He lowered the bottle. “There’s nothing to discuss. She came. I dealt with it.”

“That’s very reassuring. But it’s not enough.”

His eyes were very dark. “You don’t trust me.”

“Of course I trust you. But you have to trust me, too. You should be able to share with me how you’re feeling.”

“I just had to tell some parents their sixteen-year-old daughter is on her way to intensive care. I can’t be feeling the feelings all the time the way you do.”

Ouch.

“So you’re going to close down and keep everything to yourself.”

He didn’t say anything.

He was a guy, she reminded herself. Guys had a tendency to compartmentalize. She needed to be patient.

“I understand you need to separate your emotions in order to do your job,” she said, choosing her words with care. “But a visit from your ex-wife . . . You need to talk to me about things that affect you personally.”

“I didn’t say anything about Renee’s visit because it doesn’t have anything to do with you.”

The words slapped, stinging color to her cheeks. Her mouth jarred open.

Jack dragged a hand through his hair. “Oh, Christ. I meant, it doesn’t make any difference to me. To us.”

“Wow.” She shut her mouth to swallow. Opened it to say, “We are now dealing with textbook levels of denial and compartmentalization.”

“I’m not some patient you’re seeing at the free clinic, sweetheart. I don’t need you analyzing me. I don’t need fixing.”

Heat and hurt swarmed to her face. Maybe she’d been guilty in the past of treating lovers like clients.
Fixer-uppers
. But not Jack.

“I’m not trying to fix you. I’m trying to know you. I’m trying to be supportive.”

“If you don’t know me well enough to believe I wouldn’t run around on you with my ex-wife, I don’t see much point to this conversation.”

She had obviously hurt his pride. Trust, she thought. It was clearly a hot-button topic. “I’m not accusing you of sleeping with her.”

“Good.”

But she couldn’t stop trying, couldn’t stop digging. “Was that an issue for you before? In your marriage, I mean?”

“You could say that.” He sipped his beer. “She slept with my partner.”

“Oh.” For a man like Jack, loyal and principled, the combination of physical and emotional infidelity, the betrayal of friendship, vows, and honor, would be unthinkable, unanswerable. The worst kind of blow. Her heart hurt for him. “Oh, Jack.”

He set down his bottle, the glass clicking precisely against the countertop. “I need a shower before we go out.”

Running away, she thought. “I can wait.”

He tugged at his buttons, a black glint in his eyes. “You’re not going to offer to scrub my back?”

Hurt and helplessness roiled around inside her. “Normally, I would love to scrub your back. Since I’m not really into sex being used as a diversionary tactic, I think I’ll pass.”

“Fuck,” he said tiredly. “What do you want from me?”

“I just want you to talk to me. Could we talk, please?”

“Fine.” He leaned against the counter again, arms crossed over his chest. “What do you want to know?”

Her chest ached.
Tell me you love me. Tell me everything’s going to be okay.

“You could start by telling me why Renee was looking for you.”

“She wanted to let me know there was a job opening in my old department. Detective squad with a chance to get back onto the tactical response team.”

“She didn’t have to come down here to tell you that.”

He was silent, giving her time to work it out.

Lauren moistened her lips. “I suppose the job comes with . . . special compensation.”

“She mentioned perks, yeah.”

She nodded, unsure how to respond.

“I’d be living near my family again, for one,” he said, watching her closely.

She struggled to contain her reaction. This wasn’t about her. This was about Jack, what he needed, what he wanted. “Is that what you want?”

“All other things being equal?” He shrugged. “Sure. But I like it here. I like small-town policing. I like being able to follow every case from beginning to end. I’ve got no plans to leave.”

“Well, that’s good,” she said, relieved. “That’s good to know.”

“Unlike you.”

“What?”

“Marta told me you have a book tour coming up. When is that, a couple weeks, a couple months away? Funny how we never talk about that.”

She gaped at the unexpected attack. “It’s not like I’ve been keeping secrets. I’ve been totally honest with you. You’ve always known I was leaving.”

But he was right, too, she thought guiltily. They never talked about it. Because that was a need she preferred not to acknowledge, one pain she didn’t want to feel.

“Yeah, I’ve always known.” He stuck his thumbs in his pockets, those black, alert eyes fixed on her face. “So what do you care what I do or where I go after you’re gone?”

The blood drained from her face, from her brain, leaving her light-headed. Her lips felt numb.

Jack swore again. “Fuck, I’m sorry. Look, we’re both tired. This is stupid. Let me get cleaned up and I’ll take you out to dinner.”

“You’re right. We are both tired.” There was a band around her chest, cutting off her air, making it hard to breathe. She inhaled carefully, painfully, holding the boiling hurt inside so it wouldn’t spill out and scald them both. “It’s been a long day. Why don’t you take me home instead?”

S
HE’D BEEN STRAIGHT
with him, and he’d cut her off at the knees, Jack thought as he dragged his sorry ass on board the
Wreck
the following night.

Three six-minute sets on the heavy bag in the back room after work, fighting an invisible opponent, hadn’t knocked out the voices in his head. But maybe the exercise had exhausted him to the point where he could sleep tonight.

Alone.

Alone and fucking miserable.

His own fault.

He dropped into a deck chair and propped his feet on the rail, but for once the rocking boat, the coastal breeze, the deep, bright water, didn’t ease his piss-poor mood.

He closed his eyes. He’d pressed too hard.

Or she had, with her questions and concern. She was always nudging, pushing, prodding, trying to get inside his head, to poke around in his heart. She uncovered pieces of him he’d thought were buried, brought feelings into the light. He’d shared things with her he didn’t talk about with anybody else.

They were a match in so many ways he’d lost sight of the fact that they were fundamentally different people.

Or he hadn’t wanted to see.

Could be their differences made them work. He admired her loyalty to her family, her determination to make a difference in the world. He appreciated her quick observations, her bright, curious mind. Her willingness to see the best in others, her courage in putting everything out there.

Her heart.

I love you
, she’d said.

But the words didn’t matter. Because at the end of the day, at the end of two weeks, she was gone.

He wanted her. Fine.

He could respect her, admire her, enjoy her. But
need
her? Not smart. Not when she was on her way out of town.

Better for both of them, maybe, to get used to the idea, to get a taste of what life would be like when she was gone.

Hell
. It was going to be hell.

He dropped his head back against the chair, willing away the pain pounding at the base of his skull, the tiredness dogging his body, the whisper of his heart telling him he was a fool.

He’d give her one more day to cool off, he decided. Give them both a chance to step back, simmer down. Take stock.

And then . . .

“I hear you and Pookie had a fight,” said his ex-wife’s voice.

His eyes snapped open.

Renee was standing on the dock beside the
Wreck
, holding a pizza box and a bottle of wine.

He lowered his feet from the ship’s rail and stood cautiously. “I thought you left. Yesterday.”

She bared her teeth in a smile. “You know me better than that. I won’t go until I’ve got what I came for.”

“Not from me.”
Not ever again
.

“I brought pizza.” She lifted the box, offering it like a bribe or a . . . What had she said the other day? A peace offering.
Sorry I fucked your partner. Have a pie
. “Bacon and garlic. Your favorite.”

He could smell it, garlic, grease, and tomato sauce, drifting over the diesel-scented water. His stomach rumbled. He wanted dinner out with Lauren and got pizza in with Renee. It had been that kind of fucked-up day.

Renee tilted her head. “You going to make me eat this by myself?”

He should tell her to go. But he was hungry and feeling sorry for himself and too tired to go to the effort of making a meal. She was here. The pizza was here.

He shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

So she came aboard.

The habits of marriage died hard. How many times over the years had they come home at the end of the day, too tired to cook, too exhausted for sex, and split a pizza or an order of Chinese from the take-out place around the corner? They slipped without discussion into the familiar division of labor,
You get the napkins, I’ll open the wine
. Maybe that’s what Renee was counting on, that he would fall without thinking into the old routines.

They carried the glasses out on deck.

The kitten followed, drawn by loneliness or maybe the smell of bacon. He wove around Jack’s ankles when he sat, head-butting his shins for attention.

Renee tucked her feet under her chair. “You got a pet rat. How cute.”

“This is Tiger,” Jack said, reaching down to scratch behind the cat’s ears.

“Jesus, Jack, if I’d known you were this hard up for company, I would have come down sooner.” Renee blotted the grease from her pizza with a napkin. “So, what did you and Pookie fight about?”

“We didn’t fight.”

Fighting involved yelling. He and Renee had fought, simmering resentments exploding into anger and bitter, hurtful words. Renee had always known what buttons to push, how to turn him from a decent guy trying to do his best into an angry asshole. Even when they hadn’t connected emotionally any other way, they’d known how to fight.

Lauren hadn’t yelled. She’d been caring and concerned, patient and dignified. And hurt.

He’d seen her face go white, heard that distressed little hitch in her breath when he went after her.

He’d hurt her. Damn it.

He took a bite of pizza he didn’t want and put the slice down.

Renee looked from his plate to his face and raised her eyebrows. “Want to talk about it?”

He gave her a flat look.

She laughed. “Okay, not our style. But if you want to tell me how she makes you miserable, I’m happy to listen.”

Reluctantly, his lips twitched. “I’m good, thanks.”

“Yeah, you are. Too good for me, everybody always said. Saint Jack, the cool and incorruptible.” She licked her fingers. “Except with me.”

He heard her satisfaction. Was that what she was after? The anger that would turn him back into the man that she remembered, the rage that would give her power over him again.

“I’m no saint.”

“I know that. But it got kind of old, listening to them go on all the time about what a great guy you are.”

“You mean, my mother,” he said dryly.

“Your mother, my mother, all of them. Frank.”

He stilled. “I’m not talking with you about Frank.”

“Suits me.” Renee swallowed. “Bastard dumped me, you know. Couldn’t get over what he did to you.”

“He didn’t do it alone,” Jack said.

“Yeah, but what he did was worse.”

He stared at her in heavy disbelief. “You were my wife.”

“And he was your partner. Hey, I knew where I stood in the pecking order. The job came first with you. It always did.” She slid him a sly look. “You ever think maybe I screwed Frank as a way to be closer to you?”

“Bullshit.”

Renee grinned, not embarrassed at all at being called out. “Yeah, well, maybe not. It was worth a shot.” Her smile faded. She leaned forward, putting her hand on his knee. “Come home, Jack. Come back to a real job. Back to your real life.”

She was sincere. Looking down at her hand, he felt a flash of . . . Not regret. Not that. Remembered affection, maybe, the way he felt about his first bike or the car he’d sold when he joined the Marines, things he’d loved and outgrown.

Things he didn’t need anymore, not worth the space they required.

“I have a job,” he said. “I have a life. A home.”

Renee rolled her eyes. “Jack, you’re roughing it on a
boat
. Your uncles’ old fishing boat. This isn’t home. This was never meant to be anything more than temporary. You were never going to stay here.”

Was she right? Maybe when he first came to the island, but now?

“Renee . . . I’m done,” he said quietly. “I’ve moved on.”

He wasn’t sure when that had happened, or how, but . . . Yeah. Done with her, done with them, done holding on to his anger and the past.

You’re ready for a rebound relationship
, Lauren said in his head, and maybe it had started out that way, but it was more than that now. She was more than that.

“Moved on to what?” Renee’s voice sharpened. “This job, that girl . . . They’re like this pizza. Okay if you’re starving, but you’ve had better. Sooner or later you’re going to want the real thing again.”

Real?
Lauren was real, her open heart, her genuine smile, her lack of pretense. The shallow rise and fall of her belly as she slept, the warmth of her breath on his neck, her eyes reflecting back the moonlight in the darkened cabin.

“You’re going to want me,” Renee said. “Let me stay and I’ll prove it to you.”

He shook his head. “It’s time for you to go.”

“Seriously? After twelve years, you really going to tell me no? Where am I going to sleep tonight?”

“Wherever you stayed last night.”

“They’re full up. I don’t have another reservation.”

He stood. “You’ll think of something. You always do. Plenty of places along the highway.”

“Screw you, Jack. Just—” Renee broke off, searching his face. Her eyes glittered. With anger? Or tears? “You’ve changed.”

He nodded slowly. “I guess I have.”

He just hoped it wasn’t too late.

*   *   *

L
AUREN WAS GOOD
at fixing things. But she didn’t know how to fix this situation with Jack. Her failure poked at her as she tossed in bed that night, replaying their fight over and over in her head. Like the princess on the pea in that fairy tale, every remembered word a prod.

Should she apologize?

She didn’t need to be right all the time. She didn’t care about keeping score. In a relationship, it shouldn’t matter who won or lost, only if you could find a solution that worked for both of you.

But if they were in a relationship, she should have the right to ask Jack questions. All her research, all her clinical practice, stressed the importance of healthy communication. She’d told him she
loved
him, for heaven’s sake. And he’d said . . . He’d said . . .

I’m not some patient you’re seeing at the free clinic, sweetheart. I don’t need you analyzing me.

Her eyes burned. As if her interest somehow insulted him. As if his feelings were none of her business.

I didn’t say anything about Renee’s visit because it doesn’t have anything to do with you.

So he “dealt with it.” Full stop. He didn’t need her help. He didn’t want her interference. And the more she pushed him on a personal level, the more he clammed up and withdrew.

She rolled over and thumped her pillow.

Part of her appreciated that he was strong enough to handle things his own way. She admired his quiet confidence, his uncompromising principles, the matter-of-fact way he assumed responsibility not only for himself or with her but daily in his job.

But how could she be with someone who wouldn’t be open with her, who wouldn’t talk to her about what was important in his life? Who didn’t value her thoughts and ideas.

Although . . . Another poke. Another toss. She hadn’t been completely open with him, either.

She shot a look at the room’s clock, the numbers glowing softly in the dark—3:00
A
.
M
.

Well, that figured. After the robbery, this was the time when she would wake, heart pounding, mind racing with worry. In the quiet stretches of the night, with no outlet or distractions, her anxieties became overwhelming. Inescapable.

Except with Jack. She’d slept with Jack.

She flopped onto her back, staring up at the shadowed ceiling.

She couldn’t, wouldn’t, apologize for leaving, for going back to her real life. But Jack was right. She
had
avoided talking about it. She’d told herself she didn’t want to spoil their remaining time together by focusing on its end.

But that was an excuse. The sneaky little truth, the one she hesitated to admit even to herself, was even more humiliating.

She didn’t know what her leaving meant to Jack.
I love you
, she’d said.

And he hadn’t said it back.

He acted like he loved her, at least in bed. He was a passionate, demanding, inventive lover. Outside of bed, well . . . He was guarded. Private. Cool.

But she knew he had the capacity to love. Underneath the expressionless face, his deceptively relaxed stance, he was decent and caring. She’d seen the way he did his job, the way he interacted with the Fletchers, his gentle courtesy with Tess, the smile he always had for Taylor. The way he made time and room for that skinny, affection-starved cat.

She was tempted to believe he could make room for her, too. On his boat, in his life, in his heart.

But then what?

The robbery had not broken her. But it had shattered her life in two, into Before and After. She’d put her plans, her career, her dissertation, on hold. She’d left her little student apartment and her family.

Caught up in the wave of fame and publicity, in the stress of writing another book, she’d nearly lost herself, her breath and her balance.

Dare Island had been her escape.

Jack had been her salvation.

He had kindled her heart again, given her the courage to love, to reach, to feel. To grow.

Writing the book had been another step in the healing process, a slender narrative bridge connecting her past and her future. But now she had to step onto that bridge. She needed to go back, to fit together the pieces of her old life with her new understanding. She was overdue for a meeting with her advisor. She missed her mom and Noah.

She wanted to go home.

She tossed and turned until dawn.

*   *   *

“D
ID YOU AND
Jack have a fight?” Jane asked Lauren the next day.

The lunch rush was over, the bakery quiet as people took advantage of the glorious weather to hang out at the beach. Thalia worked the front of the shop. Jane was in the kitchen, putting the finishing touches on a duplicate of Kate and Luke’s wedding cake for the display case.

Lauren flushed and finished reloading the tray of pastries for the front. “Why?”
Red-rimmed eyes? Puffy face?

Jane tilted her head. “Maybe the way you’re binge-eating chocolate chip cookies?”

Busted
. Lauren smiled weakly. “It was that or self-medicate with ice cream out of the carton.”

And she thought of Jack, smiling at her with that dark glint in his eyes.
Guess you don’t worry about stereotypes, either
.