Carolina Blues (23 page)

She tried again. “At least I didn’t hurt my book-signing arm.”

He didn’t seem to find that funny, either.

Frankly, neither did she.

A depressed silence fell.

“When do you leave?” Jack asked.

Not,
Why don’t you stay?

She swallowed a lump in her throat. “I told my agent I was taking a little time off. I still need to go back and meet with my advisor, but I thought . . . two weeks?”

Two weeks
. Two short, bleak words that dropped like stones into the silence.

“We could keep in touch,” he said. “After you go.”

She felt a ripple that might have been hope. “Are we talking about exchanging Christmas cards?” she asked cautiously. “Or something more?”

Something flickered in those dark, dark eyes. His lips curved just a little. “More than Christmas cards.”

Definitely hope. Her heart lightened. Fluttered. “I could visit.”

“That would be good. When you can get away.”

“I could bring pizza.”

He met her gaze, his face expressionless. “You heard about that.”

She shrugged her bare shoulders. “You warned me how it was. Everybody knows everything on an island.”

“And what they don’t know—”

“They make up,” she finished.

“I sent her away.”

She cocked her head. “Before or after the pizza?”

He searched her eyes, and some of the tension left his taut body. “After,” he admitted.

“Did she offer you the job again?”

“It doesn’t matter. I told her I’m not interested.” He caught himself and braced visibly. “Unless you want to talk about it.”

She had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling, overcome with tenderness and affection. He was trying. Despite his own obvious reluctance, he was making an effort to talk for her sake. Which meant she could let it go—for now—for his.

His willingness was everything. Nothing he could say showed his heart more clearly. Except . . .

“Jack, are you sure this is what you want?”
That I am what you want?

“I’m sure. Renee can’t offer me anything but the past. My present is here.” He cradled her face in his hands. “With you.”

Her nose and eyes stung. That was so sweet. More than she had any right to ask for.

And not nearly enough. What kind of future did they have, with him here and her in Chicago?

“Long-distance relationships take work,” she warned. “Commitment. Compromise.”

“‘Compromise is always a good idea. Especially if it gets you what you want.’”

It took her a moment to recognize her words from their very first meeting. “I can’t believe you remember that.”

His gaze met hers. “I remember every word you ever said to me. Including that you love me.”

He robbed her of breath. “I
do
love you. But . . .”

Give me something to hold on to. An excuse to stay. A reason to come back. Tell me you love me.

“You can’t give up everything you are, everything you’ve worked for, to be with me,” he finished for her. “I know.”

Of course he knew. Or thought he did. Because he hadn’t been willing to leave Dare Island. Not for the woman he’d been married to for ten years. Not for the family he’d loved and left.

Certainly not for her.

He liked it here, liked being police chief of a small town in coastal Carolina, serving the people, getting to know them, making a difference in their lives. Part of a population that shifted and renewed itself like the island shifted and was renewed by the tides.

She wasn’t sure of her words or her next move. “I’m not leaving
you
.”

“I get that. You’re moving on with your life.”

Without you
. The realization ripped her heart.

“No, I meant . . .”
Live in the moment
. Don’t take the good times for granted. Because in a blink, in a heartbeat, in the space of a phone call or a man bursting in at the door, everything could change.

My present is here. With you.

She slid her arm over his chest, holding on to as much of him as she could. “I’m still here. Now.”

She snuggled close, hitching her leg over his thigh, and kissed the underside of his jaw.

He shivered, his hands flowing over her, her back, her arm, the side of her breast. “You sure you’re up for this, sweetheart?”

She bit his shoulder lightly, savoring the hot pressure against her thigh.
Think positive.
“I’m sure you are.”

He slanted a smile down at her. “Using sex as a diversionary tactic?”

He really did remember every word.

“Do you have a problem with that?”

“Hell, no,” he said and kissed her.

He touched her until she was damp and trembling, until he groaned with need. Because of her head injury, she had to be on top. She crawled over him, shaking, straddling his warm, firm body, claiming him, taking him, making him hers. He let her set the pace, rocking, rocking to the pulse of her body, the rhythm of her heart.

And when she rose over him in the dark, when she arched and he thrust and they both shattered, she owned him.

For the moment.

“L
AUREN
P
ATTERSON IS
having a big book signing in Chicago at the end of the month,” Marta said to Jack.

He knew. She’d told him all about it in her last e-mail, which had been full of the kind of newsy details he could have shared with his mother.

Hank lowered the newspaper. “How do you know about some book signing in Chicago?”

Marta raised her brows. “It’s on her Facebook page. I’m a fan.” She studied Jack over the top of her reading glasses. “I sure would like a signed copy of her book.”

Jack kept his face impassive. “You can probably order one from the bookstore.”

“Or you could get it for me. If you were going.”

He shot her a narrow look, the look that warned drunken boatmen and rowdy Marines that he was nobody to mess with.

But Marta, the mother of four boys, three of them grown, was made of sterner stuff. She smiled back blandly, waiting for a response.

“At the start of the fishing season?” he said. Dodging.

The summer people were gone. October brought new visitors to the barrier islands. The schools of baitfish, croakers and herring, were already on the move, chased by stripers migrating from the waters north of Chesapeake Bay, followed by flocks of gulls and crowds of serious fishermen. Every weekend between now and January the cheaper motels and rentals would be packed, every beach access crowded with SUVs and pickup trucks.

“I just thought you might. Seeing as you are in the book and all.”

“Not by name.”

Shortly after her return to Chicago, Lauren had written mentioning that her editor wanted an epilogue, asking permission to include him in her book. She hadn’t explained exactly what role he would play, and he didn’t ask.

Most of her e-mails were like that, full of facts and details, leaving out the stuff he really wanted to know.
Just the facts, ma’am
.

The longer she was gone, the more he felt her slipping away, being absorbed into her old life—her new life—in Chicago.

Could he fit into that? How could he fit into that?

He’d said yes to the book, of course. What else could he say? She was doing what she should be doing.

But he wanted to be more than an epilogue to her. He wanted to be part of the first chapter of the rest of her life and the happily-ever-after.

“They’re talking about it down at the tackle shop,” Hank said. “You’re quite the hot topic these days.”

“I live to serve,” Jack said dryly.

“And that’s enough for you, is it?”

Jack glared, which didn’t faze Hank any more than it had Marta.

“That’s why you should go to this signing thingy,” Hank said. “Before it’s too late.”

“I am not discussing this,” Jack said tightly.

“Well, you should,” Marta said.

“Not with us,” Hank put in. “With her. You should listen to me, boy. I know.”

“Yeah, because you’re all about sharing your feelings,” Jack snapped back, goaded.

Hank looked back at him steadily. “No, I’m not. Never was. Never could find the words to say how I feel. Not with my wife. Not with my daughter. Which is how I know that if you keep your mouth shut, you could lose your shot at the best thing that ever happened to you.”

*   *   *

T
HE BOOKSTO
RE WAS
decorated for Halloween, wisps of fake cobweb stretched over the display of books about goblins, ghosts, and witches, a giant crepe paper pumpkin on the wall above the children’s section.

But the staff was prepared and the turnout good for Lauren’s signing, with lovely stacks of books all over the store and a banner poster with her cover tacked up behind her signing table. The store manager and another bookseller worked the line, verifying purchases and handing out Post-it Notes for the attendees to write their names on. The in-store publicist hovered at Lauren’s elbow, keeping her supplied with water and pens.

Lauren took a deep breath and smiled at the next woman in line.

“I just love your book,” the woman said.

“Oh, thank you so much”—Lauren glanced at the Post-it Note with the woman’s name neatly printed on it—“Amy. I hope you like this one, too.”

“Oh, I do. I read it already. I downloaded the e-book at midnight last night. This morning, I guess I should say.”

“Me, too,” confided her companion.

“Well, I really appreciate that.” Lauren hesitated, her pen hovering over the title page. “Should I make this out to you?”

“Yes, please.” Amy smiled. “I always buy my favorite authors in print, too.”

“Wow. Thank you,” Lauren said.
To Amy
, she wrote.

“So, your sexy police chief . . . Does he have a name?” Amy asked.

“Or a brother?” asked her companion.

The woman behind them in line leaned closer. “When are you going to see him again?”

Lauren lifted the pen before she smeared the page. “I’m not sure,” she said honestly.

They’d been in touch. Jack called, often at dinnertime, to tell her about his day, stories about Tiger or some routine police call, the progress of the new construction, snippets of island news she could and often did hear from Jane or Meg. She e-mailed: stories about Noah or her mother, her meeting with her advisor, her plans to finish her dissertation after the book launch publicity died down. Except for the fact that she always typed
I love you
above her signature, her e-mails to Jack weren’t that different from her communications with Ben.

She swallowed and tightened her grip on the pen.
Live for the moment. Hope for the future
, she wrote in bold, black script.

She wrote that in every book.

Work for the future
, she sometimes thought the inscription should be. She was beginning to believe the best shot you had at the life that you wanted was a leap of faith followed by a series of well-thought-out, deliberate steps.

But that philosophy didn’t fit neatly on a title page. Or even in an epilogue. Although she’d tried.

Give your readers what they want, darling
, her agent, Patricia, advised.
We want to be inspired, not lectured to.

She smiled. Signed her name.

“Thank you for coming . . .” Another quick glance at a Post-it Note. “Stephanie.”

The line moved. She looked up. And . . .

There he was.

Her heart leaped. She dropped her pen.

Jack Rossi, in the flesh, or rather, in a black leather jacket over a button-down shirt and jeans, was hanging back at the end of the line, the way people did sometimes when they wanted an extra word. The stalkers, the weirdos, the aspiring writers.

For a moment she couldn’t breathe.

The in-store publicist caught the direction of her gaze and moved closer. “Is everything all right?”

“Yes,” she whispered.
Very all right
. More all right than things had been in a really long time.

He was here.

He smiled at her, his dark, hooded eyes, that tiny crook at the corner of his mouth, and everything inside her zinged and pinged and tingled.

“Do you need me to call security?” the publicist persisted.

“No.” She cleared her throat. “No, it’s okay. I know him.”

The women in front of the table heard her and turned. A murmur spread outward. The line shifted back and surged forward, a swell of whispers pushing Jack along like the foam at the crest of a wave.

He stopped in front of her table, his thumbs in the pockets of his jeans. “Hello, Lauren.”

“Hello, Jack.” Her smile worked its way from deep in her belly to her lips, glowing, spreading. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to buy a book.”

“I already sent you a copy.”

“I wanted to see you.”

Her heart swelled until she thought that it would burst. With pride, with nerves, with happiness.

Jack took a book off the display on the table. Turned it over in his hand to look at her new author photo on the back, the new Lauren with long hair and the tiny gem at the side of her nose.

“How does it end?” he asked.

“You haven’t read it yet?”

He shook his head, still looking at her with those dark eyes and that half smile.

Her tongue tied. She had thought—hoped—that the epilogue would speak for her.
I’m working for the future. For our future, Jack.
But the ending wasn’t in her hands alone. “It’s . . . hopeful.”

His eyebrow arched. “Not happy?”

He wasn’t trying to torture her, she told herself. He couldn’t know that she’d put her heart out there for the world to see. Her hopes, her plans, all in her book.

The book he hadn’t read yet.

She smiled wryly. “A wise man once said happiness isn’t getting what you want, it’s wanting what you’ve got.”

“I’ve got an alternate ending for you.” He put the book down on the table. His fingers brushed her photo, and she felt the caress deep inside. She trembled. He looked from her picture right into her eyes. Seeing her. Loving her. “I put in for a job with the Chicago PD,” he said quietly.

She blinked, stunned. “But . . . What?”
Wow
. Not the declaration she was expecting. Not in her plans at all. Everything he’d said about small-town police work crowded into her brain. “You love Dare Island.”

He watched her. “I love you more.”

Her mouth dropped open. “Jack . . .”

“Hear me out.” He reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a small velvet box. A customer gasped. The line crowded closer, cell phones appearing as if they were at a rock concert.

Lauren stood, knocking back her chair, pressing both hands to her heart.

Ignoring the press of people behind him, Jack lowered himself to one knee.

“Oh, my God, it’s him,” Stephanie said. “From the book. It’s Sexy Police Chief!”

Lauren couldn’t breathe.

Jack opened the box. Something flashed. A diamond, brightened and blurred by her tears. “Lauren, will you marry me?”

“Yes,” she said inaudibly. She said it again, louder. “
Yes!
” She stumbled around the table, joy rising inside her.

Jack stood and pulled her into his arms.

They kissed to the sound of applause.

She burrowed into his chest, hiding her hot face between the lapels of his jacket, breathing in the dear, familiar smell of him. “Did you resign already?” she asked, the words muffled against his shirt.

He kissed the top of her head. “Not yet. I’m waiting for the official offer letter.”

“But you’re still police chief on Dare Island, right?”

His arms tightened around her. “Why?”

She raised her head, smiling at him through her tears. “Because I just applied for a counselor position at the Dare Island School.”

His chest expanded with air. “Moving on? Or running away?”

She answered him with love and perfect confidence. “Looking for a place to call home.”

His answering smile started deep in his eyes. “Guess you need to write another epilogue.”

“Another book,” she said, and stretched on tiptoe to kiss him again.