Healing Hearts (The Challenge Series) (8 page)
She yanked the door open and jumped down to the pavement. Passing through the automatic doors without a backward glance, she let the nurses guide her to a back, curtained area where she identified her mother’s body. The woman had taken a bottle of pain killers and downed a fifth of vodka. And now she lay cold and dead, leaving Abby with no one. Abby put a hand on her mother’s arm, cursing her, cursing herself and crying until she collapsed on the floor, bringing the nursing staff running. When she woke, Lynn sat beside her, holding her hand. But the one presence she wanted did not appear. And who could blame him? When she’d been such a thoughtless bitch in the face of his agony in front of the hospital.
“Oh, sweetie.” Lynn patted her hand. “We’ll throw Janice a kick ass party, just like she’d want. Okay?” She sniffled into her tissue.
Abby nodded, looking up at the ceiling and wishing Jay were there before realizing he never, ever would be. Not anymore.
***
The small funeral drew most of the regular townies, and Abby had plenty of opportunity to hear how special her mother had been, once. She’d been so dependent on Abby’s dad, when he passed from fast-moving cancer, she never recovered, or even coped without the help of liquor. Abby sighed at one point, wishing the whole fucking ordeal was over. She’d spent the last several years missing her real mom. The skeletal creature whose remains she’d had cremated was not the strong, robust, opinionated woman who’d raised her. That woman had died five years ago. The rest of this remained a formality, inevitable and sad, but true.
A hand settled on her shoulder. She didn’t look up. “What are you doing here?” she ground out. “I’ve already called the school and declined the placement. I won’t take your fucking charity, Jay Longmire. I don’t need it.” She’d spent the few days between the scene at the hospital and now convincing herself to let him go, chalking it up to one more thing to mourn at this point. She glared at him once, long enough to take in how amazing he appeared in a dark suit, then dropped her gaze to the floor.
“You have got to be the most stubborn woman on the planet,” he whispered, settling into the empty seat next to her. His presence sent a bolt of longing and real pain to the center of her chest. She channeled it to fuel the pounding anger in her temples. “Luckily I cut my teeth on one a hair more mule-like than you.”
“Don’t compare me to your wife.”
“Fair enough,” he said, keeping his voice low. “But you will listen to me at least once more.”
She allowed herself another look at his profile, ignoring the signals from her body that demanded that she hang onto him, let him soothe her. Fuck that six ways to Sunday. She’d learned her lesson and would never rely on a man for anything other than sex ever again. “Why should I?”
He put a casual arm around her shoulders, making her tense, then calm, which pissed her off even more. His lips near her ear brought every inch of her skin to attention. She shut her eyes. “Because I …I think I love you, Abigail Elizabeth. And all I did on behalf of your desire to study nursing at U of M was make a call to the admissions office pretending to be your counselor at the community college checking on the status of your application. They said they’d had a screw up with the acceptance process and were Fed-Exing all the letters. I intercepted yours at your place and took it out of the delivery envelope so I could surprise you—I wanted to be the first to see the look on your face when you got the news. You were not given any special attention, nor did I politic my way into getting your application pulled ahead of anyone else’s. You made it in on your own, like you wanted. Now call them back before you lose your spot.” He kissed her cheek, brushed his lips across hers, and stood.
“I have to get back to Ann Arbor,” he stated. “I’m going to be a real father to my daughter and let her go in peace like she deserved to do a year ago.”
She stood, gripping his arm, her brain awash with words she couldn’t find. He took her hand and put it to his lips and spoke words that seared her very soul. “I love you, Abby, and that makes me terrified of losing you. So you should live your life now. Like you planned. Thank you for healing my heart.” He kissed her palm and pressed it to his chest. Then turned and left.
She watched him go, speechless, until the door shut behind him. Then she sat, stunned, but realizing what she had to do.
Chapter Twelve
Jay sat, listening to the bereavement counselor who had to be present at all such life and death discussions. He heard nothing. He felt less. His eyes burned and his ears were stuffed with cotton. The gaping hole that had been his life for so long yawned wide again, beckoning him back to its freezing cold but oddly familiar depths. He set his jaw and prepared to jump back into it. Living without….anything he loved.
His wife and children, torn from him before his eyes, and now, the woman he’d let creep into his life and grab his heart so hard he barely saw it happen—she had gone too. And he didn’t blame her. His baggage was heavy, and he had no business asking anyone to help him lug it.
“Jay.” His sister touched his hand.
“Huh? Oh, um, yeah. Sorry.” He wiped his aching eyes and focused on the paperwork she’d put in front of him.
“You should go sit with her awhile now,” some total stranger told him, putting a damp palm on his arm. Jay drew back, anger suffusing every corner of his being. What did this smarmy asswipe know about his life? About what he’d seen, heard, and been helpless to change?
“Fuck,” he muttered, standing and pacing the small but tastefully decorated counseling room. “I can’t, Maddy, I…. God help me, I can’t let her go. She’s all I have left of—” The stone he’d been lugging around in his gut rose, choking him with the twin evils of memory and fury. He put his clenched fists on the tabletop, trying like hell to channel the three weeks of utter joy he’d found with Abigail. But it remained elusive. He put his face down, the cold granite soothing his hot skin. Something down in the giant gaping maw of despair snickered at him, crooked a finger, and beckoned him, dangling a fifth of bourbon and a red-eyed smile.
“Jay.” He heard it from about a million miles away. He turned his head toward the bank of windows, unwilling to acknowledge any more talking or mealy-mouthed bullshit about his feelings. He had no feelings left. He’d seen the worst life could offer and now had to watch his own daughter die because he’d been unable to help her, to keep her safe from predatory, drugged-up child rapists.
“Jay,” the voice called, as he started to make his way into the hole again, where he’d lived and would live once more. He raised his aching head. His neck creaked and his temples pounded. The headache crouched in the corner began to stretch painful tentacles into his brain.
“Leave me alone,” he whispered. “Go away.”
“No, Jay. I won’t.” The hand on his shoulder felt good, not like someone doing their job, or his sister with her infernally logical advice. “Look at me.”
He stood, shoving his chair back so fast it tipped over with a carpet-muffled clatter. “I told you to leave me alone. Go live your fucking life. You do not want any of this, trust me.” He glared at the woman he’d come to love. Her calm, olive-skinned face stayed neutral. Her innate soothing nature worked its magic even without words. She reached out and took both his hands. Her skin felt warm against his and every inch of him ached to hold her, to fold her into his arms and never let her go. But the baggage, he couldn’t share it. It was too much to ask of anyone.
She held on, though. And at that moment, he knew. She waited, letting him shake a few more minutes before speaking. “Take me to her, Jay. Introduce me to Mia. Then I’ll sit with you while you do what you have to do. I’m here. And I’m not going anywhere.”
Epilogue
Four Years Later
“Oh, God, my feet hurt, my back hurts, my shoulders hurt. I think my hair hurts.” Abby groaned and dropped onto the couch. Dexter’s tail thumped on the hardwood floor of the large loft condo as if sympathizing with her. But he’d gotten too old to jump around anymore.
The double shift in the University of Michigan emergency room had worn her out. She sighed and glanced up at the industrial, mechanical crap on the ceiling. She loved her new home, nestled right downtown, walking distance to all her favorite places, with giant front windows out over Ann Arbor’s Main Street. But she’d be damned if she hadn’t told him that those duct work things would get dusty and spidery and…. “Ack!” she yelped when a giant rubber spider landed on her shoulder then slid down to her lap. “You asshole.”
Jay jumped over the back of the couch and tugged her onto his lap, nuzzling her neck. Her skin pebbled at his touch. “You smell like blood. Gross. Go get a shower,” he muttered as he kissed her and held her close until she felt the unmistakable press of his erection. She wiggled around, making him sigh into her skin. “Mmm.” He slipped a hand under her scrubs and cupped her breast. “A little bird told me it’s your birthday.”
“Yeah, the same little bird that wrote ‘Abigail’s Birthday’ in big letters on the kitchen calendar, I guess.” She smiled and kept her arms around his neck. A stickler for milestones, Jay insisted on celebrations for the smallest events. Birthdays made him pull out all the stops. While exhausted at the moment, she had no complaints, not anymore.
“Maybe.”
“Fine, yeah, it’s my birthday so what. You know I don’t like to celebrate that stuff. You posted all that crap on the calendar. Besides all I want to do is hit the…oh.” She sucked in a breath when he held out a small, square, velvet-covered box. He smiled, setting her heart ablaze. He’d grown the beard back at her request, keeping a short but soft covering over his jaw. Longmire Group had sold the beer distribution business, losing money on paper but gaining Jay and his brother-in-law all kinds of peace of mind by getting rid of it. Jay had launched himself into a new project with gusto—he’d funded and opened an actual brewery on the west side of Ann Arbor and after two and a half years, they were already expanding. Personal Bubble Brewing had become the darling of the Midwest brewing world, winning awards and boasting standing room only in their large two-hundred person Tap Room almost every night. And he smelled great, especially now, when the astringent hops and sweet malt soothed her stomach.
He took the simple solitaire diamond ring and slid it onto her left ring finger, before pulling it to his lips. “Will you please, after years of begging, pleading, threatening, boycotting, and withholding sex for periods as long as twelve hours—please, God damn it, will you marry me, Abigail?”
She bit her lip, nodded, a tear slipped from her eye. His bright blues flashed, making her breathless with unbelief. This incredibly handsome man claimed she’d given him his life back. “Yes, Jay. And I have another bit of news for you.” She took his palm and put it to her still-flat stomach. “We’re having a baby.”
He gulped, jerked away as if burned. “You know how I feel about that, right?” His voice stayed low.
He’d made it clear from the start that he did not want children. That the thought of being responsible and potentially failing yet again to protect a family made him sick to his stomach. But she’d worn him down and gone off the pill with his reluctant blessing. He shook, but she held onto him.
“It’s okay, honey. You don’t have to be afraid. It will all be great.”
He pushed her away, gripping her shoulders, his eyes bright with unshed tears. “I know.” He leaned down, lifted her shirt, and pressed his lips to her stomach before standing and picking her up. “And I’m gonna make it even more great in a minute. You know, birthday style.”
~ABOUT THE AUTHOR~
Mom of three teenagers, and soccer fan, Liz lives in the great Midwest, in a major college town. Years of experience in sales and fund raising, plus an eight-year stint as an ex-pat trailing spouse, plus making her way in a world of men (i.e. the beer industry), has prepped her for life as erotic romance author.
When she isn't sweating inventory and sales figures for the brewery, she can be found writing, editing or sweating promotional efforts for her latest publications.
Her groundbreaking romance subgenre, “Romance for Real Life,” has gained thousands of fans and followers who are interested less in the “HEA” and more in the “WHA” (“What Happens After?”)
Her beer blog a2beerwench.com is nationally recognized for its insider yet outsider views on the craft beer industry. Her books are set in the not-so-common worlds of breweries, on the soccer pitch and in high-powered real estate offices. Don’t ask her for anything “like” a Budweiser or risk painful injury.
www.facebook.com/lizcroweauthor
You may also enjoy these other books by Liz Crowe
Violence, intrigue and passion are brewing in the craft beer world. When bitter rivals Jennifer Baxter and Sean Garrison meet, the notorious and handsome owner of Garrison Brothers Brewing stays true to form, seducing her at a national brewer’s convention. What Jen doesn’t realize is how much her life will change from just one encounter. Her attempt to debut Brick Street Brewing’s experimental pale ale “Cheeky Blonde” shockingly turns out to be the day her avowed adversary becomes the love of her life.
Sean Garrison arrived at the convention expecting to get down to business, including his stated goal of hiring Jen away from her company. But the beautiful fellow craft beer expert provides more of a distraction than he expected, and his priorities quickly change. As Sean tries to prove that he can be more than just Jen’s competition, they finally unite to solve the sabotage mysteries at their fellow breweries. Shocked by depths of shared emotion, they battle the forces keeping them apart and wreaking havoc in the brewing world, before fate deals them a final blow.
