Counting Stars (A Donnelley Brother's Novel) (16 page)

His words were like a
fist squeezing my heart. “No,” I breathed. “God, no. He wouldn’t
want me to feel this way, but I don’t know how to forgive
myself.”

Pain crossed through his
eyes and he pulled me back against him. I felt his breath warm
against my neck as he breathed. “It was his time to go, baby. We
all have a time and there was nothing you could have done to
prevent it. You don’t have to forgive yourself. You just need to
believe that there was someone watching over the both of you that
morning—someone who knew he needed one last kiss from you. Someone
who knew his soul couldn’t rest without one last taste to carry
with him throughout eternity.”

At his words—all I could
think of was the bright orb of light fluttering around Derek that
morning—like a golden halo—or an angel.

At the desperate sound
of my agonized cry, Logan pulled me tighter into his chest until I
could feel the beating of his heart against my chest. “You need to
live your life to the fullest, Reese. Know that when you’re
smiling, he wouldn’t want it any other way. Know that you were it
for him. You were his soul mate—the one who made him complete. And
although I believe firmly that he was your soul mate, I also know
he wasn’t the only one for you. There’s another, baby, someone out
there whose soul is waiting to be graced by yours. You never have
to let him go—you just have to let yourself live.” He pressed his
lips to my shoulder and I felt something wet. That’s when I knew he
was crying. For me—Logan was crying for my pain. “Promise me you’ll
live.”

Pulling back, I faced
him. With shaky hands, I wiped the tears from his face before
pressing my cheek against his. I whispered, “I promise you, I’ll
live.”

Logan pulled me back
against the sleeping bag until we were lying side by side, on our
backs. Gazing up at the clouds moving through the blue sky, we sat
in each other’s silent comfort. I knew his mind was more than
likely reeling with the information I had given him, but I didn’t
apologize. Telling him had been the right thing to do—and the funny
part of it was that I felt as though a weight had been lifted from
my chest. Hearing Logan’s words—so different from most people who
learned of Derek’s death and my feelings of blame—lifted me. I knew
that until the end of my days, I would cherish Logan’s strength as
he held me in my moment of pain. I would cherish his words of
beautiful wisdom as he rocked me in his lap. Never before had I
imagined I could ever feel so lifted by a man who wasn’t Derek. But
that’s what Logan did for me.

I had a feeling that I
was never meant to travel this journey with Gracie. All along, my
being here with Logan is what I needed to heal. Right now, he was a
friend who my heart was growing to love. There was a part of me
that wondered if I would ever begin to want more from Logan. The
idea was shocking. I’d just told him about my husband, whom I’d
loved and lost, and I was thinking about being with Logan.

I should be zapped by
lightning for the thought—but nothing happened. It had been a year
since I lost Derek, and although I didn’t think a year was long
enough, my heart seemed to be accepting the time for what it was, a
good cleansing.

Logan’s deep voice
interrupted my thoughts. “Do you want to talk about him?”

“Um,” I closed my eyes
against the blue of the sky. “I don’t know.”

“I won’t pressure you,
Reese.” He promised. “I just want you to know that I’m here. And
I’ll listen.”

“Thank you.” I
whispered.

I heard him shifting and
when his hand found mine, his fingers weaving with mine, I didn’t
pull away. I didn’t even open my eyes. When Logan touched me, I
felt stronger. I knew it was odd and probably all in my mind, but
there was something about him that made me want to move forward—to
take that terrifying step into the unknown.

I spoke. “We were just
kids when we met. He became my best friend and then our
relationship just progressed from there. I’ve never believed in
love at first sight, even though it’s awesome in romance novels.” I
chuckled, but the sound was pained. “We grew together. Derek
insisted that he knew I was it from the moment we met. You wouldn’t
believe how we met.”

“How did you meet?”
Interest sounded in his voice, but beneath the interest, I could
have sworn I heard wariness.

I pushed ahead
regardless. “It was the last class of the day. I’d been feeling
under the weather that morning, and I’d slept through my first two
classes. I’d arrived at school just as lunch was coming to a close.
My hair was still a little damp from my shower.”

. . . I spent the entire
class itching my skin, but it wasn’t until my last class of the day
that I saw the red welts appearing over my skin. Damn, they hurt.
They were like little terror blisters that itched! When I couldn’t
handle it anymore, I packed up my binder and dismissed myself from
class. I realized a little too late what the problem was.

I’d taken a shower
almost directly after my father had shocked our water system. He’d
poured high concentrations of bleach into our water system, as he
had to do every so often. A person wasn’t supposed to shower for at
least twenty-four hours after the procedure. But I hadn’t known.
Yes, I know, there were so many warning signs to this (like the
scent of bleach) as I stood beneath the warm stream of water.
Stupidly, I hadn’t thought much of it.

By the time I’d pieced
it together, my skin was on fire and I was running full-speed down
the hallway to my locker. I intended to grab my car keys and run to
my friend’s house (I had a key to her place) to wash the bleach
from my skin. I wasn’t paying attention as I ran and I ran into
you.

Your hands reached out
to steady me as I clutched my binder to my chest. I could feel my
eyes moisten with tears of frustration and humiliation as I looked
up at you. You were so handsome. Your green eyes flickered over my
face and your sandy brown hair looked windblown. I watched as your
handsome features marred into a frown.

“Are you alright?” You
asked me cautiously. “Do you need help?”

I shook my head.
“No.”

I tried to push away,
but you weren’t having it. Your hands tightened on my raw skin and
I winced. “What’s going on? Let me help you.”

I forced a smile. “It’s
nothing really,” I assured despite the fact that I didn’t even
believe myself. “I just showered in bleach and now I need to shower
again to get it off my skin.”

Your eyes widened. “Can
I give you a ride somewhere?”

You seemed so nice, but
I wasn’t in the trusting mood. Especially after showering in bleach
in my own damn house. “No thanks. I’ll be fine.”

With that, I charged
away from you on a mission to acquire my car keys . . .

Logan was grinning by
the time I was finished with my recount of how I met Derek. “You
showered in bleach?”

I chewed my cheek. “I
did. And don’t look at me like that, I was tired and my mind was
fuzzy that morning. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“You’re adorable, you
know that?”

I gave him my classic
bug-eyed look. “Adorable? Are you nuts? I probably looked like
something out of one of the Saw movies was chasing me.”

He laughed. “Okay, now
you’re just ridiculous. I can totally see why he fell in love with
you.”

I blinked, startled and
warmed by his statement. “Really?”

“Yeah,” he nodded,
rubbing the pad of his thumb over the smooth skin of my hand.
“That’s a legendary meet-cute.”

“Well, legendary or not,
if I had been Derek, I would have been frightened of someone who
looked as frantic as I did.”

“How did you two end up
dating?”

I blushed. “Well, I was
actually seeing someone else at the time. When we broke up, like
silly high school kids do, Derek texted me. I have no idea how he
got my number, but I’m happy he did.”

“What did he say?” Logan
asked.

“He asked me if I wanted
to go for ice cream.” I laughed. “He didn’t even bother telling me
who he was. When I finally found out he was the ‘bleach guy’ I told
him if he could find a place with sprinkles in their ice cream—we’d
go.”

Logan spoke softly, “He
found a place?”

I nodded. “Yeah, he
did.”

“I think I
caught one!” I squealed loudly as I tugged on my fishing rod. It
pulled deeper into the water and I did a little bare foot dance on
the pebbled shore of the river as Logan watched me with laughing
eyes. “Ohmigawd I did!”

“Reel it in, city girl.”
He encouraged and I warmed at the sentimental name. As much as I
loved it when he called me baby, I really liked city girl. There
was just something about it.

I started reeling in my
catch excitedly when I saw a silvery body flop around in the water.
“Logan! Did you see that?”

“I saw it,” he assured.
“It’s a big one, baby, you’ve got this.”

I shook my head,
grinning from ear to ear, as I pulled in my first catch. It took me
seven days to do more than catch seaweed and I was just thrilled
with myself. “Okay, it’s close now. I don’t want to touch it,
Logan.”

Translation—I didn’t
want to kill it.

“I’ve got it.” He
promised, taking the rod. Like always, I turned away from him as he
put the fish out of its misery quick. “It’s all done, you can turn
around now.”

Turning around, I
glanced at my catch. It was a decent sized fish. We would have
leftovers for breakfast tomorrow with the berries we’d pick. It was
an odd breakfast, but Logan was right, I’d developed a taste for
fish.

“Do you mind gutting it
too?” I gave him a hopeful smile as I tried to sneak my way out of
that gross task.

He grinned, knowing what
I was up to. “You’ve only done it once.”

“And once was plenty.” I
assured with a full body shiver. “Ew.”

“I’ll do it,” he
relented—like he had every other day. “You’re a wimp.”

I beamed. “Whatever you
say.”

I dipped my toes in the
water upstream from where Logan was cleaning the fish. I was
feeling good about the events of our day. Telling Logan had given
me a feeling of hope—a blossom of strength. As I twisted my rings
around my finger, I thought again of transferring them to my other
hand.

But I still couldn’t
find the courage. Or maybe it wasn’t courage I was looking for.
Maybe it was something else. I didn’t know—all I knew was that I
hadn’t found it yet.

Glancing up, my eyes
connected with Logan’s face and I realized he was watching me.
Every muscle in his body was strung tight and his eyes were locked
on my hands, where I was holding my wedding band between my
fingers. Startled, I hadn’t even realized I’d taken it off.

My eyes flickered back
up to Logan’s and this time his eyes weren’t on my hands. They were
on my eyes. He was waiting to see what I would do with my ring.
What did he want me to do?

My motions were
mechanical as I placed the band back against my engagement ring on
my finger. The charged air seemed to spiral in a matter of seconds
and I watched as Logan’s chest heaved deep breaths.

Breaking eye contact,
Logan glanced up at the sky. “We should probably be getting
back.”

I looked up to find
heavy clouds where the sun had been. “Do you think it’s going to
rain?”

He nodded. “Yeah. But
hopefully we can eat before that happens.”

I pulled myself up.
“Let’s get moving then.”