Pucker Up (5 page)

“Who
has come to visit,” she asked after a pause, not liking the look in his eyes,
“my lawyer or my friend?”

“I
– ”

“No,”
she said, her voice strong even though she felt like sighing the question, “my
lawyer or my friend?  Only one of you has a chance of coming in here right
now.”

Jackson
took her by the upper arms and smiled down at her.  “Sorry, Faith, but right
now I really need to be both.  Neither of them are staying out on this
doorstep.”

“I
don’t need this, not this week.  Can’t whatever it is just wait?  Everything
else can wait.  Everything else always does.”

He
gave her a slightly aggrieved look.  “Don’t you think I know better than to
bother you with trivial stuff right now?  We’ve been friends long enough to
know that rule.  But Faith, we really need to talk about the night of your
birthday party.”  She looked away, a wave of awkwardness hitting her.  “Good,
you remember the last time I was here,” he said, pushing past her into the
house.

“Remember
could mean so many things, Jackson,” she said, cringing.  He’d driven her home
after her party.  And looking down the loaded barrel of thirty, Faith did
something she hadn’t done in eight years; she got blissfully, recklessly drunk.
 And then poured her heart out, emptied it of shadows she was sure she’d never
let see the light of day.  She’d have to pay him better now that he knew even
more of her secrets.

He
grinned.  “Yes, well, the look on your face says you recall enough.”  She was
still standing by the open door, wishing she could convince him to leave and
avoid rehashing any of it.  She’d managed it almost a decade the first time – she
had hope.  But Jackson had disappeared into her study, so he didn’t look like
he would oblige.  Faith cast a wistful glance out the door, wondering how far she
could make it before remembering the promise she’d made herself when she
reached the bottom of the bourbon.  No more running.

“My,
haven’t we made ourselves at home.”  Faith’s dry tone didn’t even make the
lawyer flinch from his perch on the edge of her desk.  She sent him a raised
brow when she noticed the glass in his hand.

“It’s
not for me; it’s for you.”

She
held up her hands in protest.  “I think I’m good for another decade or two.”

“You
might need it.”

She
rolled her eyes at his melodrama before dropping down on the couch.  Then she
remembered Jackson wasn’t overdramatic.  He was even-tempered, level-headed,
and didn’t overreact; that was why she liked him.  “Why?” she asked in
suspicion.

“Because
you’re not going to like what I have to say.”  He let a small smile play across
his features.  “And you’re either going to fire me for interfering, thank me
for being an overachiever, or curse the day you laid eyes on me.  You actually
might go for the trifecta and do all three.”  She eyed him curiously and took
the glass from his hand.

Jackson
took a seat across from her, unbuttoning his suit jacket and leaning forward in
earnestness.  He always selected his words carefully, but he opened his mouth
three times to start, each time reconsidering.  “Out with it, Jackson, or I
really will fire you.”

He
looked resigned.  “How much do you remember telling me?”

“I
don’t really –” she began, rising in agitation.

“It’s
important.”

With
anyone else she wouldn’t have believed it.  She glared at him before turning to
look out the window.  “I don’t remember exactly what I said.  There was the
summer at the ranch after that never-ending tour.  And my twentieth birthday. 
And… him.”  She couldn’t bring herself to say his name now, though it had been
all over her lips then, she was sure of it.  “Where are you going here,
Jackson?”

“I’m
trying to determine if you recall telling me about the hospital.”  Faith’s eyes
got wide, and the drink tumbled from her hand, bouncing off the carpet, ice
clanking together.  She never told anyone about that, ever.  How drunk had she
been?

“You
told me about the wedding too.”  Faith grabbed for the table, wanting to feel
something solid against her hand.  Jackson was at her side in an instant,
helping her back to the couch.

“Then
I told you about the…”  She couldn’t say it.  Didn’t recognize the haunted
voice that was talking – was that coming out of her?

“End.” 
Jackson finished.  “Yes, yes you did.”

She
stared off into space, not wanting to look at him, resting her head against his
shoulder as the pain crashed over her.  Just the thought brought tears to her
eyes; she tried valiantly to blink them away.  “Why are we talking about this?”
she asked on a whisper.

 “Because
I looked into it.”

Her
head whipped up to glare at him.  “What do you mean you looked into it?  Who
did you talk to?  That doctor?  Dus – ”

“No,
not that part.”  Now it was Jackson’s turn to stand.  He pulled at the knot in
his tie, and Faith gulped, suddenly fearing the worst.  “About the wedding.”

Faith
never thought about her wedding.  Her marriage didn’t exist – it had been
cancelled out by bad luck and fear.  There was no marriage; there had been no
wedding.  It had all just been a hazy dream.  “What about my wedding?”

“On
your birthday, drunk as a skunk, you told me about that day.  How it had been
both the worst and best day of your life.  How you prayed every day that it
never happened.”  She winced and wanted to look away but couldn’t.

“And
you told me that it wasn’t legal.  That you could go on with your life and
pretend it never happened because you never filed the marriage license.  You
called the justice of the peace, and he didn’t either, and it was a day that
you’d just erased like it never was.”

“That
sounds like something I’d say.”  She could barely get the words out.

“Faith,
it doesn’t work that way.”

She
looked at him, perplexed.  “I know you can’t really erase a day, but cut me
some slack, Jackson; it’s just a figure of speech.  I – ”

“I’m
not talking about the wedding.  I’m talking about the marriage.”

“I
didn’t file the marriage license,” she said simply.

“Yes,
but the justice of the peace did.”  His voice softened at the quick denial
shining in her eyes.  “I went back ten years looking at the records and called
the man myself.  He remembered you, says he always remembers the ones so in
love.”

Faith’s
heart splintered into a million pieces.  She bent over in agony, like it was a
physical pain slicing through her.  Jackson was beside her, a comforting hand
on her shoulder, and she was too distraught to pull away as the memory came
flooding back.

She’d
pulled over at a rest stop, the side of the road, tears so thick she couldn’t
see the highway any longer.  She wouldn’t mind dying, then the pain would end,
but she didn’t want to crash and take someone with her.

She
sat in the car for an hour until she was all dried up, until she could feel the
hole inside of her where it had all been.  Until she knew he wasn’t coming
after her.  And just when she’d reached the end of her rope, knowing that she
could never go back, she’d seen it.  A phone booth with a light shining down,
as if waiting for Clark Kent to enter and spit out Superman.  She wanted to be
a new person, get a new identity, become someone different, anyone but this
girl in so much pain.

So
she’d run, streaking through the rain she’d sworn was lucky just twelve hours
earlier, and pulled the door closed behind her, soaked down to the bone.  How
she knew the number was a mystery, but she dialed it, almost crying in relief
when the minister answered.

She
told him the story, or as much as she could get through, repeating over and over
not to file the marriage license until she couldn’t speak anymore.  And she’d
believed for the last ten years with the foolishness of youth and
self-assuredness of a girl who got what she wanted, that he hadn’t.  Never once
had that been the part of the story she’d doubted.

“What
are you saying, Jackson?” She could feel her illusions crashing down around
her.

“That
for the last ten years you’ve been Mrs. Dustin Andrews even though neither of
you knew it.”

“Weird
stuff is going on around here.”  Harmony closed the door to her bedroom and sat
cross-legged on the floor, looking at her sister’s video feed on her phone.

“You
always think weird stuff is going on.  What book are you reading right now?”
Melody asked.

“Not
that kind of weird.  Uncle Dust’s acting weird.  Did anything else happen when
he came to see you?”

“No. 
Pretty sure I told you everything.  Came by my dorm, took me out to lunch, met
Eric, saw famous people, went and bought me snow tires for my car, that was
pretty random actually, ate frozen yogurt at the park, and then he left right
before my night class.”

“Hmm.” 
Harmony stared off into space, lost in thought.

“Well,
what’s he doing that you think is weird?”

“Um,
he got drunk right after he got home yesterday and was super hungover this
morning.  The only time he ever gets trashed is when people die, right?  But
Dad was not acting like we should pull out the black dresses.  And no one would
talk to me about it.  It was just all around weird.”

Melody
rolled her eyes.  “Harm, you’re like the only one in our family that likes to
talk about stuff.”

“You’re
a psych major.  Don’t you want to hear people’s problems?”

“So
I can help them, not so I can solve them.  Our relatives are not puzzles for
you to solve, Nancy Drew.”

“Okay,
let’s talk this out,” Harmony said, ignoring Melody’s assessment.  “Either
something happened when he was with you, or something happened on the way
home.  But I checked, and his car is not dented like he was in an accident. 
Maybe he witnessed an accident?  But no, why would that cause him to get
plastered…”

Melody
sighed and decided to play along – it was always easier than arguing with her
sister.  She’d just steamroll over any objections anyway.  “Maybe he’s just sad
‘cause it’s that time of year.”

“Yeah,
but he never gets wasted.  He builds things, remodels things, demolishes
things.  He doesn’t get hammered.”

“Are
you trying to use every euphemism for drunk that you know in this
conversation?”

“Ha
ha.  I’m totally serious, Mel.  I’m worried.”

Melody’s
expression sobered.  “I know.”

The
line was quiet for a moment, both of them lost in thought.  “Why would he buy
you snow tires?!”  Harmony burst out first.

Her
sister shrugged.  “I don’t know.  We finished lunch, and he asked how my car
was.  I told him everything was fine, but he just kept pushing it.  It was like
he was running down a list of all the things that might be wrong with it, like
he wanted there to be something he could fix.”

A
wide smile appeared on Harmony’s face.  “I knew it!”

“What?”

She
rolled her eyes.  “Aren’t you supposed to be the logical one?  Shouldn’t you
know what Uncle Dust wanting to fix things means?”

Melody
looked startled.  “You’re right.  I can’t believe I missed that.”

“Well,
I’ll cut you some slack.  You haven’t asked for a bedtime story in years, Miss
College.  I, on the other hand, channel my childhood way more often.”

“He
always wants to fix things after he tells us about Ally.”

Harmony
smiled.  “
Ally and the Truly Remarkable Happily Ever After
.  God, he was
bad at bedtime stories the first time he told us that.”

“I’m
pretty sure he’d never told one before.”                         

The
sisters shared a look, both of them remembering the same thing.  Just a month
after their mother died, still unable to sleep through the night in their new
home, their new uncle, the one who liked to growl a lot, took them upstairs to
tuck them into bed so they wouldn’t see Peter crying.  He tried to get them to
sleep and ended up with a story none of them would ever forget.

“He
cried that first time,” Melody said.  “Never did it again though, no matter how
many times we made him tell it.”

“Which
is why we always thought the girl was real.”

“So
what are we saying?”  Melody asked.

“Something
must of reminded him of Ally when he was visiting you.  Reminded him hard.  Maybe
Ally looked like your idol Madison Duncan?”

Melody
rolled her eyes.  “Wouldn’t we have noticed if he squirmed every time we made
him watch one of her movies?”

“You’re
right.  More likely she looked like Eric.”

Melody
laughed.  “Now you’re reaching.  Mystery not going to get solved tonight.”

“You’re
right again.  Uncle Dust could totally land a hottie.”

“He’d
have to growl a whole lot less.”

“Maybe
he used to.”

Faith
stood in the kitchen and stared at the plate in the sink, her mind still too
jumbled to think anything even resembling straight.  Things had been fuzzy and
incoherent since Jackson dropped his bombshell.  Her fretful night of sleep
hadn’t helped at all.  She was completely useless now – a software update that
crashed all the servers.  Where was she supposed to go from here?

She
was married.  She was someone’s wife.  This was not the way she saw herself
when she looked in the mirror.  She was a single, carefree pop singer.  The
most connection she had to another living thing was her cat, and she outsourced
most of Citrus’ care to people that didn’t wander for a living.  How the hell
was she supposed to be part of a unit now?

Which
didn’t even take into account who she was paired up with.  Only the most
dangerous guy she knew.  Not because he was deadly with a weapon; he was deadly
to her sanity.  That rainy day she’d left and vowed never to go back; the part
of her that wanted a family and a brooding man and a lemon tree, that died. 
She’d had to bury it, or she’d never been able to get up off the floor.  Now
she was friendly and encouraging, optimistic and dedicated, sunshine and
unicorns; she dealt with the other angrier things when she couldn’t ignore them,
a steam kettle that whistled to signal the angst was ready. 

She
was never supposed to see him again.  And then ten years later, right on cue,
as if she had been planning on a reunion, he popped up in a restaurant.  But
she’d escaped that.  She didn’t have to talk to him or look at him or admit she
knew of his existence long before now.  She’d survived that.  Ahh, but the
universe, her very best friend, had better revenge than that.  She couldn’t
escape acknowledging him now.  Now that they were linked with a big ampersand
between Mr. and Mrs. – Decade-Ago-Faith still living down an abominably bad
mistake.

“Morning!” 
Faith practically jumped at the cheery male voice breaking into her reverie. 
She closed her eyes, counted to three, and turned, hoping she looked a hell of
a lot better than she felt.

“Morning. 
Coffee?” 

Trevor
beamed.  “Yes, please.  I have become way too accustomed to good coffee in the
morning, and Mady banned the really good stuff when she had to stop drinking
it.  If she had to grow a human without caffeine, then I could manage fixing
computers without it.”

“Am
I going to get in trouble for fueling you?”

“Nah. 
You saved us from temporary homelessness; you get a pass.”  Trevor’s eyes twinkled
with easy comradery.  Faith turned away to get a mug and blanched – where was
the sunshine and unicorns now?

“I
didn’t stop you from getting turned out on the street, you know, so you can
stop pretending like I’m your savior.  I belong on no pedestal.”

“Well,
if we stop pretending that, then I have to stop pretending the real reason we
took you up on your invitation was Sophie’s termites. Sometimes denial is
useful.”

“When?”
she asked as she returned the coffee pot to the counter.

“All
sorts of times.  Denial can make things seem less monumental, insane situations
a little easier to handle.  Denial kept me from freaking out when I fell in
love with a famous movie star.  It was a little less useful when I met my
childhood hero, but it’s not duct tape, can’t fix everything.”

Trevor
paused for a moment and took a sip of his coffee.  He smiled in appreciation
before his face became more serious.  “If we spent all of our time obsessing
over all the bad things that could happen, no one would ever get up in the morning. 
Or leave their house.  Or go to work when people are following you around
hoping they can get a picture of a baby bump and not caring who they put at
risk to do it.”

Faith
took a sip of her own coffee, the conversation veering into territory she didn’t
expect.  “Madison told me about that.”  About being followed all the time
because pregnancy shots sold tabloids.  About being hounded anytime she stepped
out of a building.  About her bodyguard almost hitting a guy with the car. 
Madison had looked so shaken up about having to spend the next few weeks in a
hotel that Faith had offered her house on the spot. 

Trevor’s
irresistible smile was back in place.  “I know.  And I’m going to put you on a
pedestal, as big as I like, for as long as I want, for opening your home to
us.  Just you try and stop me.”  He winked, and Faith couldn’t stop the laugh
from coming.  “Now I need to go get to work on your home studio to show my
gratitude before I head out to the office.  A tech guy’s work is never done.”

He
was almost out the door before she asked, “You really think denial is good?”

“I
think denial is a good thing to have in the toolkit.  You should never
underestimate the ‘run straight at the problem and damn the consequences’
maneuver though.  Always produces immensely interesting results.”

Dustin
parked his truck behind the stables and jumped out, grabbing his baseball hat
and sunglasses from the glove compartment.  He had tried to work on his
remodeling project but was having trouble with his concentration.  He’d checked
in at the other worksite, made some notes on old invoices, and even went to
give a quote on a gazebo, but none of that could realign his thoughts.  So he
did the only thing he could to find any semblance of peace.

“Here
to see a man about a horse?” a female voice chided as soon as he entered.

“Or
a woman it looks like,” he replied, leaning over to give Maya a peck on the
cheek.  He started grumbling on the inside though; he’d just wanted to grab a
horse and go for a ride, not be confronted with another blast from the past,
not this week.

“I
haven’t seen you for a while.  Whatcha been up to?”

“Same
old, same old,” he murmured, hands thrust deep in his pockets.  “Which one of
these guys are you finished with, Doc?”

“Ronaldo
here is good to go,” Maya said, stroking his mane and feeding him a carrot from
her pocket.  “But you know the rules.  Have you been over to see Bea?”

He
let out a puff of frustration.  “No.”

Maya
raised an eyebrow at him.  “Care to elaborate?”

“No.”

She
shook her head.  “For a man trying to convince me to let him steal a horse,
you’re doing a bang up job.”

“Borrowing,”
he argued, “not stealing.  And as long as my face is on a billboard, I can ride
whatever horse I want.”  He grabbed the reins from her hand and walked the
stallion away from the veterinarian.

“Have
a nice ride,” he heard Maya yell after him.

“I
plan on it.”  He saddled the horse in record time and jumped on, cantering down
trails barely used anymore.  He was chasing after solitude, the kind that
expands to fill the empty spaces, the kind he couldn’t get in his own head. 
The complete quiet necessary to evict a pop star from his thoughts was only
found on the back of a horse with the wind blowing against his skin.

Faith
lay in the middle of her backyard, grass tickling her arms, and stared up at
the canopy of greenery.  She watched the leaves dance in the breeze, gently
waving at her, and tried to get her mind in order.  For the first time in a
long time, her problems couldn’t be solved by the strum of the guitar – she was
too mixed up for even the music to find the point.

“There
you are.”

Faith
looked up and groaned.  “Jackson, what are you doing here?”  She threw her hand
up over her eyes, childishly pretending that if she couldn’t see him, she
wouldn’t have to deal with him.

“Looking
for you.  Pearl said you were out here, but I almost missed you.”

“What
caught your eye?  So I’ll know how better to camouflage myself next time.”  And
to coach that chef of hers on the definition of ‘do not disturb.’

She
heard Jackson lay down beside her and sighed, knowing she wasn’t going to be
able to wish him away.  “It’s always so beautiful back here.  Though I’d prefer
a bench.”

“I
can’t take any more surprising news, Jackson.  If you’re here to rock my world
again, I suggest keeping it to yourself.”

“Hmmm,
I rocked your world, did I?”  His voice was teasing, and it took a moment for
her to hear the innuendo.  Jackson was nice, compassionate, and handsome, but
they’d never gotten into any world-rocking – her heart had always held out hope
for her husband it seemed.