The Promise of Paradise (23 page)

But tonight it wasn't
there. Surprised, he closed his eyes and checked again. That awful
emptiness, that bone-deep ache that had greeted him each morning for
the last three years, had disappeared. Maybe the accident had shaken
it loose. Maybe grief had run its course. Or maybe he’d finally met
someone who cast light on him again.

He reached for the call
button. Cal was right. He had to let Ash know how he felt.
She’s
the reason I didn’t roll over and die.
She had to be. Nothing
else had changed in Paradise this summer, except for her coming here.

Eddie only hoped it
wasn’t too late to tell her that.

* * *

“Thanks for meeting
me here.”

Colin ducked under the
overhang. Rain dripped onto the back of his neck and soaked his
shirt. “No problem.”

Ash crossed her arms
over her chest and shivered.

“How’s your
friend?”

She shook her head, not
trusting herself to guess.

“Ash.” He took hold
of her arms and pulled her close.

She blinked away tears.
Fitting herself against Colin’s chest, the way she had so many
times before, felt right. It felt familiar. She knew his rough spots
and his edges. She knew the way he slept with one leg outside the
covers and the way he ordered his eggs in the morning. She knew the
feeling of his arm around her when they stood for pictures. And as if
the pages of her life had suddenly opened in front of her, Ash saw
the next forty years with Colin. She saw a lavish wedding, a house in
the suburbs, children, a dog, and vacations to Europe.

She saw TV interviews
and reporters. Elections and sound bites. She saw Congressional balls
and fund-raising banquets. She saw her own law practice grow and then
fade as she gave it up to support her husband’s presidential hopes.
She saw all the things she wasn’t sure she wanted.

“You made a
decision.” He whispered the words into her hair, a statement rather
than a question.

Ash nodded into the
soft fabric of his shirt. Even without looking at her, he knew.

“You’re in love
with him.” Another statement.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” Colin
pulled away from her and squeezed her hand. “It’s not your fault.
It’s mine. I screwed up. Waited too long.” He glanced over his
shoulder, at the parking lot, the sky, the tops of the buildings that
marked downtown Paradise. When he looked back at her again, a careful
mask had dropped into place.

She reached into her
pocket. “Here.”

Colin nodded as he
slipped the ring into the folds of his palm.

“It’s beautiful,”
she said. “But for someone else. You belong with someone else.”
Her chest lifted and felt lighter even as she said the words.

“I guess I’ll see
you around,” Colin said. He scratched his jaw. “Back in the city,
maybe. If you go home.”

“I’ll be there,”
Ash said and meant it. She watched as he got into his car and pulled
away without looking back.

Yes, she needed to go
back to Boston. But not now. Not right away. There was something she
had to do here in Paradise first.

* * *

“Don’t cry, Ma.”
Eddie patted her hand. “I’m gonna be fine. Doc said.”

Irene West drew a deep
breath. Tears traced a familiar path down both cheeks. Behind her,
Eddie’s father stood with his back to the room, looking out onto an
evening that had finally cleared.

“Goddamn fool.” The
man spoke to the window, but Eddie heard his anger, loud and clear.
“Didn’t learn a damn thing from your brother’s death, huh?
Thought maybe you’d be better off in the ground beside him?”

“Dad, I—” What
was he supposed to say? He hadn’t gone out looking for the accident
to happen. He hadn’t planned it, for Christ’s sake. Eddie looked
at his mother, who continued to weep, and wondered if the tears were
for him or for Cal.

Ash had never known
him. Eddie was startled to feel relief rather than regret. She'd
never cried for him. Never compared Eddie to Cal. And she was the one
person in Paradise who didn’t see the kid brother he'd killed every
time she looked at him.

It was, he realized
suddenly, one more reason he’d fallen for her.

“I’m not him. I’m
not Cal.” He paused. “And I’m not dead.”

His father turned. For
a long moment, he stared at his son. “Your friend’s here.”

Eddie frowned. “Frank?”

“The woman. The one
you kept asking for. Ashton.”

The name struck Eddie
square in the heart. “I asked for her?” Impossible. He would have
remembered. He would have felt her name on his tongue.

His mother managed a
weak smile. “A couple of times. The nurse on duty knew who she was.
Told us to call the restaurant.”

“And she came?”
Even after I acted like a jerk, ran away like I was twelve years
old?

His father nodded.
“She’s been here a while.”

Irene turned. “But
she’s…” She pressed her lips together and shook her head at her
husband.

“What?” Eddie
caught the look that passed between them.

Suddenly he knew. The
machine monitoring his blood pressure beeped a couple of times.
Colin. She’s here with Colin. Of course.
Again he saw the
guy down on one knee. Eddie coughed. Well, it made sense that he’d
come to the hospital with Ash. He probably gave her a ride, held her
hand in consolation while she did her duty and checked on her
neighbor.

“Do you want me to
see if she’s still downstairs?” Eddie’s father moved toward the
door. “I’m sure she’d like to see you.”

Eddie yanked up the
thin blanket that had bunched around his knees. All he really wanted
to do now was sleep. He felt like an idiot, calling out some woman’s
name while he was delirious with pain. Especially when the woman in
question had shown up at the hospital with another guy.

“Nah. Don’t bother.
You can tell her thanks, but she can go on home.” It was better
that way. Better for both of them, if they never saw each other
again.

“He’s upstairs.
Room 214.”

Ash stood in the
waiting room, where Malcolm West had found her pacing and biting her
bottom lip. “He’s okay?”

“He will be.” The
man smiled for the first time since she’d arrived at the hospital.
“He’s pretty banged up. Suffered a concussion, a broken ankle,
and a dislocated collarbone. Lost a lotta skin, too, but the doc says
he’ll be fine. He's very lucky.”

Ash wiped her hands on
her shorts. Looking down, she realized she still wore her work
clothes and still had her hair up in an unwashed ponytail.

“…said he didn’t
want to see you,” Eddie’s father finished saying.

“He…what?” Eddie
didn’t want to see her? But he’d asked for her. He’d wanted her
to come to the hospital. Hadn’t he?

“But I think that’s
the drugs talking.” Malcolm led Ash toward the elevators. “I know
my son.” His voice turned gruff. “Maybe not as well as I oughta.
But I know you mean something to him.” The elevator doors slid
open, and they stepped inside. “I knew from the look on his face
when his mother told him you were down here with someone else.”

“You…”
You
weren’t supposed to see that,
she finished silently.

He cocked his head and
looked at her for a moment. “You’re the senator’s daughter,
aren’t you?”

She nodded. No reason
to hide anymore.

“He’s a good man,
got caught in a bad spot,” Malcolm said. “You can tell ‘im I
said that. Hope he doesn’t let it keep him down.”

Ash smiled at the
kindness in the man’s words. “I don’t think he will. We Kirks
are pretty tough when we need to be.” The elevator doors creaked
open, and she could see room 214 to her right.

The older man’s hand
rested on her shoulder for a moment as they stepped into the hall.
“He looks a little rough right now. Just so you know.”

“He’s awake?”

Eddie’s mother
slipped out of the room and came toward them. “He’s drowsy,”
she said in response to Ash’s question. “But yes. He’s awake.”

Ash left them standing
in the hallway and forced herself to walk toward Eddie’s room. With
one hand, she knocked, pushed open the door, and stepped inside.

Oh, Eddie.

For a moment she
couldn’t speak. She could barely draw a full breath. Someone had
cut off the T-shirt he’d been wearing, and he sat up against the
pillows with a bare chest and scrapes along his chin. One foot looked
lumpy under the sheets. The edges of a purple bruise puffed out
around one eye, and his right arm lay strapped in a sling across his
chest.

But it was him. It was
Eddie, whole and alive and looking at her with something in his gaze
she couldn’t quite read. Anger? Relief? Happiness? Affection?

Neither one spoke.
He’s
still angry.
And he had every right to be. Between her father
waking them up and her ex-boyfriend reappearing with a marriage
proposal, she imagined that, quite possibly, Eddie wouldn’t want
anything to do with her again.

“Why the hell did you
take off like that? In the middle of a storm?” They weren’t the
words she’d meant to say, rough with anger and fear. But they were
the first ones that came out.

He frowned. “Got
about a hundred questions I could ask you, too.”

Ash hunched her
shoulders. She'd screwed up. In her mind’s eye, she saw dark red
hair, an hourglass figure, a local girl who’d soothed Eddie after
the loss of his brother. Maybe he wanted someone like Cass, someone
who didn’t lie about her background. Maybe he wanted someone who’d
grown up with him, who knew all the secrets of the town. Maybe he
wanted someone to climb on the back of a bike at a moment’s notice
and toss her hair across his lap.

Ash didn’t have hair
that tossed.

“My mom said you were
here with someone.”

She nodded. “I was.”
Truth. Only the truth from here on in.

“So where is he?”

She shrugged. “He
left. Went back to Boston.”

“Yeah?” Eddie ran a
hand through his hair.

“Yeah.”

I love you.
The
notion prickled her skin, startled her, terrified her, and yet the
longer she stood there, the longer she knew it to be true. All the
nights they’d spent on the porch, all the drinks they’d shared at
the bar, all the afternoons eating grilled cheese and watching the
Red Sox: they’d become all the little puzzle pieces that made up a
love, and a life.

Eddie was her best
friend, the one who caught her when she fell, who made her laugh
until the corners of her mouth ached, who danced her to sleep under a
midnight moon. He was the one who knew Ash the woman, not Ash the
Kirk daughter, and not Ash the Harvard grad. He was the one who lived
with her and put up with her. The one who loved her for the
complicated person she was. The one who made her happy.

“If I could take it
back…if I could change the things I said, the things I told you at
the beginning, I would…” She trailed off. “I would have started
the summer over,” she went on after a moment. “I would have told
you the truth from the start.”
I wouldn’t have tried to build
a whole life on a lie.

Eddie didn’t say
anything. Ash walked to the bed, and her legs brushed the sheet that
fell over the side. From up close she could see the fatigue around
his eyes, the glassiness in his expression, the scratches and scrapes
along his arms. She stood beside him and held her breath. One second.
Two. His free hand crawled across the blanket to hers.

“You asked them to
call me?”

“Apparently.” He
grinned. “Though I was pretty drugged up, so I might have asked for
the Queen of England too.”

“Not Cass?”

“Come on. What do you
think?” Eddie shook his head. “It’s always been you, Ash. From
the day we moved in, I think.” He chuckled. “You didn’t even
give me a chance, just reeled me in and made me fall.”

“But I lied about so
much.” She wanted everything out in the open, every last bit of the
ragged edges that needed mending.

“You had your
reasons, I guess.” He lifted her hand to his lips.

“I’m so sorry. You
need to know how sorry I am.”

“I already do.” He
glanced at her other hand, the one without the diamond on it. “You’re
here, right?”

She nodded. “Yeah.
And I’m not going anywhere.”

He relaxed his hold,
and his eyes fluttered. “Good.” His breathing deepened, and he
tugged her close. “Ashton Kirk.”

“What?”

“Stay with me.”

She laced her fingers
through his. “I will.”

“Tonight?”

She laughed. “I’m
not sure they’ll let me. I’d have to sweet-talk one of the
nurses.”

But he was shaking his
head. “Tomorrow. And the next day. And after the leaves fall. And
next spring. Stay in Paradise with me.”

Ash didn’t answer.
She wasn’t sure she could. But one thing she knew for certain:
whether she stayed here in New Hampshire, or convinced Eddie to move
to Boston, whether she moved to Europe to follow a job or opened a
restaurant with him in another corner of the country, she wasn’t
ever leaving.

I found myself here
just when I thought I’d lost everything

She’d didn’t need
to run anymore, didn’t need to hide. She didn’t need to pretend
away her name. She didn’t need to be anything except a woman who
was completely in love with the boy next door. Ash smiled and bent to
kiss Eddie’s forehead as he drifted into sleep.

“Yes,” she
whispered. “I’ll stay.”

Paradise, she’d tuck
into her heart no matter where they ended up. She’d have it with
her. Always.

One Year Later...

“Where's this party,
anyway?” Ash asked as Jen turned down unfamiliar streets. She'd
only been to Newburg Heights a couple of times. Located halfway
between Boston and Paradise, it was bigger than Paradise, a little
farther from the junior college and a little more wealthy, if Ash
could judge by the homes they'd passed since leaving the highway.