Counting on Cayne (Hallow River Book 1) (12 page)

I shifted uncomfortably in
the red plastic chair and listened to the squeak and shuffle of shoes in the
corridor and the blips and beeps of machines. Aunt Lu breathed steadily in the
bed, looking shrunken beneath the blankets, her feet resting far short of the
edge.

“Here you go.” Cayne
slid through the partially open door and handed me a paper cup of coal black
coffee. “Any news?”

“The doctor said she’s
making good progress. She should be able to come home in another few days.”

Cayne and I had camped
out in Aunt Lu’s hospital room nearly every minute since the showdown with
Granton almost a week earlier. She’d sustained a bullet wound to the leg and a
head injury, but neither proved to be life-threatening. The doctors expected
her to make a full recovery. We placed Georgie in the care of a neighbor for
the time being, thinking it best not to let him see his grandmother poked through
with needles and tubes.

The past week had been
busy and chaotic. Granton’s arrest created a flurry of scandal in the New York
newspapers.
Wall Street Financier’s Southern Love Triangle
, read one
headline. His colleagues lined up to profess shock and dismay.

“Why on earth would
Granton Langley be threatening and kidnapping people in some hick town in the
middle of nowhere?” one of them asked.

They threw up their
hands from behind their sleek desks in shining Manhattan high-rises and
declared that it simply did not make any sense. Rather than believe the truth,
some turned me into the villain. They described me as a young temptress who had
callously used Granton for his money, stolen his heart, and shamefully run away
to my lover in the southern hills. It was a tale that made me laugh for its
sheer absurdity.

My phone rang day and
night with inquiries from reporters. I willingly told the truth about my life
with Granton to anyone who would listen. What was once a terrible secret now became
public knowledge. All traces of shame and guilt melted away. I was glad to tell
the world my secrets. Maybe my story would reach another woman silently
struggling through the same ordeal. Maybe it would remind her that she was not
alone and provide a portion of the strength that she needed to break free.

Aunt Lu stirred in the
bed, shaking her head back and forth and mumbling softly. Her eyelids fluttered
open.

“Brinley?” Her voice was
hoarse. I jumped up from my chair and leaned over the bed, massaging her cold
fingers. Cayne stood behind me with his hands placed protectively on my
shoulders.

“I’m here, Aunt Lu.”

“I need to tell you
something.” She attempted to sit up, but immediately sank back down into the
pillows with a sigh. “It’s about your mother.” Her words were spaced far apart
with the effort of speaking.

“My mother?” I asked
with doubt in my voice. I looked back at Cayne, but he seemed as dismayed as I
was.

“I know where she is. I
know where Charity is. I’m sorry.” She took a few shallow breaths to gather
strength.

“We don’t have to talk
about this now.” I placed a calming hand on her forearm.

“Yes, we do.” Her
fingers gripped mine. “You deserve to know. She called me last year.”

My heart leapt in my
chest. My mouth went dry. Cayne’s hands tightened reassuringly around my
shoulders. Aunt Lu took several more shallow breaths.

“She didn’t want you to
know yet,” she continued. “She didn’t think you could forgive her, not yet. I
promised to wait. I should have told you sooner. You should talk to her,
Brinley. Forgive her, please. She’s not a bad person. She was young. She made
mistakes. We all do. Her phone number and address are in the top drawer of my
nightstand. Call her. Write to her. Anything. For me. Please.”

I was too stunned to
speak. Aunt Lu was visibly exhausted. Her whole body sank into the bed. She
closed her eyes.

“Thank you for telling
me,” I said quietly. She nodded softly and went back to sleep.

Cayne wrapped me in a strong
hug. All those years, when I did not know whether my mother was alive or dead,
I watched and waited for her. A part of me never gave up hoping that she would
return. But now, with the prospect of a reunion before me, was I ready to let
her walk back into my life?

I thought of Cayne’s
tattoo and his words to me on the banks of the river.
Each of us is all the
sums he has not counted
. I could not escape the past and all of the pain
that my mother’s absence had caused me. That pain was a part of me and always
would be. But I also did not have to let it control me.

I rested my head on
Cayne’s chest and let his heartbeat steady my nerves. Aunt Lu’s words rang in
my ears. She still loved her sister and chose to forgive her. If it meant so much
to Aunt Lu, the woman who had raised me and acted as a real mother throughout
all of those years, then perhaps I could find it in my heart to forgive as
well.

***

“What are you going to
do?” Cayne asked. He was perched on the edge of the bed, watching me as I
stared dumbstruck at a small sheet of notepaper with the name “Charity
LeClare,” a phone number, and an address in Sedona, Arizona.

“I don’t know yet.” I
shook my head and set the notepaper on the nightstand. “It doesn’t seem real
right now. It’s just too much to take in all at once. Why did she abandon me
for all those years? Why did she never come back?”

“Well,” he said with a
thoughtful sigh, “there is only one way to get those questions answered, isn’t
there?”

“I guess so.” I still
felt unsure. I couldn’t imagine picking up the phone and calling her like we
were friends. She was a woman I no longer knew. But a letter seemed too
impersonal. How could I adequately convey the depth of my feelings in a letter,
and what would I even say?

“You have time to think
about it,” Cayne said gently. He stood, placed his palm tenderly on the side of
my face, and kissed me. I angled my hips toward him. “There’s something I’d like
to do right now though,” he whispered in my ear, his hot breath on my neck.

He scooped me into his
strong arms and carried me across the hall to my bedroom. When he set me back
on my feet, I was already removing my black tank top while he unbuttoned my
khaki shorts and slipped them roughly over my hips. I lifted the hem of his t-shirt,
pulled it up over his head, and flung it across the room.

I ran my fingertips
along his chiseled torso and kissed his defined chest, letting my tongue linger
and glide over his firm flesh. He unhooked my bra and slid the straps over my
arms, cradling and massaging my breasts while he kissed the side of my neck. I
eagerly unbuttoned and lowered his jeans and pressed my hips against him,
feeling his rigid strength.

He reached into the
front of my panties, rubbing and probing me with his fingers as my knees buckled
with a rush of erotic desire. He tore the skimpy fabric from my hips,
aggressively snapping the thin threads. I lowered his boxers and curled my hand
around his massive erection while he grunted with approval. I arched my back as
he took each of my breasts in his mouth. With a prolonged moan of ecstasy, I grasped
the back of his head while he vigorously licked and sucked my taut nipples.

He lifted and deposited
me on the bed with a bounce and a creak of mattress springs. I spread my legs
wide. He bent low and danced his tongue against my wet clit while I gasped with
a rush of hot pleasure. Then he climbed atop me, spread my legs wider apart,
and entered me in one thick grinding plunge. We kissed, our tongues intertwining,
as he thrust into me again. I lifted my knees higher while he pushed himself
into me with a series of emphatic groans. His strong steady rhythm grew faster
as my breathing grew shorter and raspier.

“Oh, Cayne,” I whimpered
and pleaded. “Give me more. I want it. Harder.”

He thrust into me with
added force. I panted and moaned, digging my nails into the thick rippling muscles
of his back. I crossed my legs around his waist as he pushed into me over and
over again, hard and fast and deep. With a sudden rocketing surge, I felt a
thousand tingling nerves pulse throughout my entire body, tensing my muscles in
a writhing frenzy and forcing a long throaty cry from my open mouth. I gripped
my thighs tight around his hips. He buried his face in my neck and growled with
a satisfied animal lust as he came deep inside of me with a mighty throb and a
torrent of release. He collapsed onto my chest in spent exhaustion. We both
breathed heavily into the silence. Then he raised himself up and tenderly
kissed my breasts, my shoulders, my neck, and my lips.

“I love you, Brinley,”
he whispered.

“I love you, Cayne,” I
whispered back.

“Ok, step up, but don’t
look.”

“I can’t look. I’m
blindfolded.”

The cotton bandana over
my eyes let through only a hint of the bright October sunshine. I lifted my
foot in an exaggerated arc and stepped on what I believed to be a street curb.
I held my arms out for balance as Cayne walked beside me with one hand on my
back and the other gently guiding my elbow forward.

“Hey, I kind of like you
in this blindfold. We might have to save it for use in other circumstances.”
His voice was flirtatious, and I could easily picture him winking and flashing
his irresistible dimple.

“That sounds like a fun
time to me.” I laughed and felt a rush of attraction that warmed my skin where
his fingertips rested.

The crisp fall air
smelled of dried leaves and apple cider. The steady passage of cars and snippets
of pedestrian conversation told me that we were probably in the vicinity of Beech
Street, Hallow River’s main downtown thoroughfare.

“Stop right here,” he
instructed. I felt his fingers untie the knot at the back of my head. The
fabric dropped at my feet. When I opened my eyes, I found myself facing a
boarded-up storefront. A sheet covered the sign above the entrance. Cayne stood
proudly in front of the windows, his hands on his hips like a conquering
superhero.

“Am I missing
something?” I asked after taking in the odd scene.

“Yes, you are.” He
tugged on a string that swung lightly in the breeze. The sheet fluttered to the
ground and revealed a freshly painted sign.
LeClare Dance Academy
. It
was written in lovely script and accompanied by a picture of a ballet shoe. I
looked at Cayne in confusion.

“I don’t understand,” I
stammered. “This is for me?”

“Of course it’s for you.
Come inside. I’ll explain.” He took a set of keys from his pocket and unlocked
the door. The lobby was a mess of nails, plaster dust, and wooden planks. We
tiptoed gingerly through the debris. He pulled me forward and opened an
interior door marked “Studio.” I gasped and held my hand over my mouth in
shock.

Inside was a dance
studio with a ballet barre running down each side wall and mirrors all around.
Everything sparkled with a fresh polish. The sun filtered through the high
windows in long shafts and illuminated the gleaming floor.

“This is beautiful. But
how can it be?” I turned to Cayne in disbelief.

“I signed the papers a
month ago,” he explained. “I’ve been trying to keep it a secret. Looks like I
succeeded.” He chuckled. “This all belongs to you now. We still have to finish
up with the front obviously, but that shouldn’t take long. I assume you will be
able to open by Thanksgiving.”

“This is unbelievable,
Cayne.” My mind still had trouble processing what he was telling me. I was
going to have my own dance studio? This was more than I could have ever dreamed.

“So, you like it?” he
bit his lip with uncertainty. I jumped up and wrapped my arms around his neck.

“Of course I like it!  I
love it!  This is amazing!” We kissed long and deep in the warm glow of a sunbeam.

“There’s, uh, one more
thing.” He cleared his throat nervously.

“There’s more? Isn’t
this enough?” I laughed. He took my hand and guided me toward a small chair in
the corner. On the chair sat my old “Escape Fund” jar. When I looked closer, I
noticed that the card on the front no longer read “Escape Fund.” It now read
“Wedding Fund.”

My heart fluttered with
excitement. I peered into the top of the jar and saw a small black velvet ring
box at the bottom. When I turned in stunned surprise, Cayne was already perched
on one knee.

“Go ahead. Take out the
ring,” he said gently.

I reached into the jar
and pulled out the box, opening it to reveal a circle of brightly sparkling
diamonds. Tears welled in my eyes.

“Beatrice Brinley
LeClare,” Cayne said solemnly. “I waited for you for ten years. The last few
months have been the happiest of my life. I love you more than anything. Will
you continue to make me the happiest man in the world and be my wife?”

Tears spilled down my
cheeks. I got down on my knees and pressed the full force of my body against
his, wrapping him in a tight hug and sobbing onto his shoulder.

“Yes,” I said between
sniffles. “Yes! I love you! Yes!” I shouted with elation. Cayne removed the
ring from the box and placed it on my shaking finger.

An unexpected burst of
applause erupted and echoed from the empty walls. I lifted my head and turned to
see our friends and family gathered just inside the door. Cami jumped up and
down, grinning and clapping with abandon. Aunt Lu hooked her cane over her
forearm and clapped softly. Jasper hollered and mussed Cami’s curls in a
brotherly tousle. Even little Georgie slapped his chubby palms together as he
hugged Pete the Dragon tightly to his chest.

Cayne and I both rose to
our feet. I wiped the tears from my cheeks and ran toward them, embracing them one
by one. Aunt Lu placed her hands on my shoulders and nodded.

“I always knew you’d
come home,” she said softly.

“And now I’m here to
stay.” I pulled her in for another long hug. Georgie squealed as Cayne lifted and
spun him around with delight. Cami reached for my ring finger.

“Let me see this thing.”
She appraised it like a jeweler, viewing the sparkling diamonds from every
angle. “Well, my brother has good taste after all.” She grinned wide and winked.
“Hey, maybe I can sign up for your dance classes again.”

“Oh no!” I said with a
smile and a playful wag of my finger. “You’re too much of a trouble-maker.”

We both laughed. She
hugged me close and whispered in my ear.

“Welcome home, Brinley.
And welcome to the family.”