He babbled some more, and my stupid heart that was running wild tried to leap right out of its hold, cracking my ribs wide open as it went.
Hand shaking like mad, I reached out and touched the back of the little boy’s plump hand.
“Everett.”
It felt like a whisper somewhere in my mind. A taunt. A plea.
“You are so precious, aren’t you? I’m Frankie Leigh.” Affection tugged at one corner of my mouth, sorrow and cheer.
And the little boy?
Everett.
He smiled a smile that could shatter the entire world. Rid it of hate.
It was enough to send a stake of misery to impale my spirit.
It was funny when you thought you’d gotten over things, healed of them, and you hadn’t healed at all.
And it was all right there, suddenly almost too much to bear.
He pointed one of those chubby fingers at the display of treats, his lips pursing in a tiny ‘o’ and his green eyes going wide with excitement.
“Ball? Ball? Ehvie ball?”
My attention darted that way. He was pointing at the colorful cake pops in the display.
“You want one of those?” I asked.
“Ehvie, please?” He patted his chest, his mouth twisting into that same smile again.
Oh God.
This was too much.
Torture.
Still, I was looking over the top of the counter at Evan who had edged closer, his big hands shoved in his pockets and his own fear racing through his features.
Everything hurt.
Every cell in my body felt like it had gotten compressed. So tight it was going to explode.
Cracks getting busted up and vacancies getting filled.
“Can he have one?” I attempted to ask, the words getting locked around that grapefruit that had grown spikes where it was getting tossed like a bowling ball up and down my throat.
Those eyes flashed regret and something that looked way too close to desire.
Evan nodded tight, though a frown dented that strong brow.
He pulled his hands free to sign. I THINK SO.
He thought so? I was pretty sure it was issued as a question.
What the hell did that mean?
And suddenly I was wishing I would have pelted Aunt Hope with the million questions that had roiled in my brain all day. Problem was, I’d been too terrified to force a single one from my mouth.
To terrified to hear the truth.
Last thing I wanted to hear was that Evan had moved on and he’d left me behind and there was absolutely nothing that my broken heart could do.
We both looked to Aunt Hope. She smiled a wary, knowing smile, like she was wading through the unease lapping between Evan and me. “I think that should be fine, as long as he ate lunch?” she asked, looking at Evan.
“We ate with Dad at the cafeteria,” Evan said with a tight nod.
Oh, was I ever a glutton for punishment because the masochistic side of me went on a hunt of his stupid ring finger, desperate to know what his situation was—if he was happy and in love and if he was there to show off his family, or if he was as lonely as he looked.
I did my best not to gag while I braved the inspection.
Bare.
I nearly buckled in two at the relief.
And that was just about the faultiest thinking I’d ever endeavored.
I jerked my attention away from his hand, only for it to go and do something even more foolish, like land on that gorgeous face.
Emerald eyes flashed, pinned on me, reading my intentions like they were projected on a lit-up marquee.
Shit.
Damn.
Hell.
This was gonna be the end of me.
“What color is your favorite, Everett?” Aunt Hope all but sang, leaning down so Everett could pick.
“Dis.”
He basically pointed at the entire tray, that tiny finger jabbing at everything he could see.
A little laugh escaped the turmoil.
Aunt Hope giggled, too. “Only one, sweetheart. How about blue?” she asked, reaching in and grabbing one of the pops so she could hand it to him.
Everett squealed and kicked his feet.
“Can you say ‘thank you’?” she asked in that encouraging way.
“Fank ooo,” he cooed with his nose all scrunched up. His voice a balm and the steely blade of a knife. He shoved the cake pop into his mouth, his chubby cheeks instantly smeared with frosting.
Pure affection filled Aunt Hope’s face. I didn’t want to be jealous of it. I didn’t. But God did it feel impossible to stand there and not get all busted up watching it.
She looked back over the counter at Evan who was standing there, invading my space. “How about you, Evan? It’s been so long since you’ve had one of my treats. I have some of those strawberry cupcakes you always loved so much . . . even have a few A Lick of Hope lollipops. Of course, they’re not the same now that you haven’t been around to help me make them.”
My attention went to the lollipops that were on one of the cute display tables set up at the front of the lobby where we featured A Drop of Hope merchandise—cups and T-shirts and aprons and trinkets.
But the lollipops? They were the focus of it all—one-hundred percent of the profits from each sale went to the nonprofit Hope had started up when Evan was just a little boy—A Lick of Hope.
Hope had poured her heart and soul into the organization that supported children with heart defects—Evan such a huge part of it that I was sure a piece of him had been ingrained in each one.
Let me tell you, every single time someone came up with one of those lollipops over the last three years, it’d been brutal. A constant reminder of what we’d lost.
Evan watched his mom and Everett and somehow simultaneously watched me.
As if he were wielding some more of his special super powers. His hearing deficit only amplifying his awareness of everything happening around him.
Reading.
Calculating.
Then his attention dragged across the selection, to the lollipops and back across the glass display at the danishes and cookies and every kind of treat.
That gaze climbed to me when he said, “Actually, think I want one of those unicorns.”
His voice was jagged and low, the way it always had been. Raspy. The syllables always a bit clipped or elongated.
Shivers raced.
The out-of-control connection we’d always shared fired and blistered and made it all sorts of crazy-hard to breathe.
Because I knew what he meant.
Knew exactly what he was referring to.
My hand instantly went up to fiddle with the necklace he’d given me, the words engraved that had meant so much and the unicorn that dangled from one end.
Unicorn Girl.
Why was he doin’ this to me? How could he walk out of my life and then come ridin’ back in and stand there and imply these things?
Like nothin’ had changed?
Like he hadn’t left me completely shattered and crushed and alone. Those wounds were barely scars. Just flimsy patches he was threatening to rip right off.
“You’re sure that’s what you want?” I asked, unable to keep the hurt out of my voice. The accusation.
“Yeah.” His response was hard.
Huffing out a disbelieving breath because it was a whole lot easier to give into the anger that was threatening to rise than the sorrow that scraped below the surface, I quickly plated the stupid unicorn cupcake that was a rainbow of candy and sparkles and a cookie horn for the topper.
They were pretty much a boon for adorable little girls who came in with their parents and immediately gravitated toward them and were sold out half the time.
If I would only have been so lucky today.
I set the plate on top of the display, hand shaking like mad, getting jolted by a blast of that energy when he reached over and touched the tip of my finger when he took it.
Lik
e I’d been burned, I stumbled back, but that didn’t mean I could tear myself from the intensity of that gaze as he continued to stare at me from over the counter.
Pinning me to the spot.
Heart going frantic and wild and my skin feeling sticky.
God, I was gonna burn up right there.
I needed a good jump in the lake.
Maybe that would wash away all this insanity.
I forced out a smile and tried to smooth out my hair. “Well, since it looks like y’all have things under control, I think I’m gonna . . .”
Run, flee, get the hell out of Dodge.
I gestured awkwardly toward the back door. “. . . go.”
You know, only three hours before I was supposed to get off, but desperate measures and all.
Because I couldn’t stay there with Aunt Hope bouncing that baby and him making all these adorable noises as he got lost in the sugary bliss. Couldn’t stay there with Evan watching me like he was a starved man when it was abundantly clear that he wasn’t.
A bumbling smile curled my mouth, and I probably looked all kinds of nuts, but I’d take it as long as it got me out of this mess.
I started for the door.
Carly grabbed me by the wrist, her face angled so her words were only for me. “Hey. Are you okay? Let me drive you home. You don’t look so good.”
I didn’t feel so good.
“I’m fine.”
Her expression shifted. Silently shouting, ‘liar’.
That little voice was going to town behind me, that tiny boy telling a story that only he knew, and my heart was going haywire. If it beat any faster, I was sure it was going to explode.
Before I completely lost myself, I burst through the swinging door, going for the bins where we kept our things, hands trembling so hard that I could barely dig out my keys from my bag.
Somehow, I managed to get them free, and I slung the strap of my bag over my shoulder and flew out the back door into the dirt lot that was basically an alley.
The Alabama summer smacked me in the face.
Hot, sticky humidity an oil slick on my flesh, or maybe it was just the heat I was trying to escape from inside.
I started to stride for my car I had parked next to Carly’s, only to stop in my tracks when I felt the presence cover me from behind. The shift in the air and the punch to the atmosphere.
Shivers curled down my spine, spreading far and wide, and for a second, I froze.
Froze at the feeling of being in Evan’s space again.
Froze beneath the memories.
Beneath the hope and the love and the outright grief that had chased me for years. The problem was I had never figured out how to breathe beneath the magnitude of them all. The pendulum shift that I could never stop.
Could feel the force of his breaths coming at me like shockwaves.
An earthquake that shook my world.
Finally, I convinced myself to turn around.
To face the boy.
The man.
His hands moved, Evan communicating in his first language. The only one I was sure my heart truly recognized.
DON’T LEAVE. I watched the tremor roll down his thick throat when he swallowed.
PLEASE.
Could feel the despondency, the fierceness as he pled with me to stay.
It sucked that he hadn’t given me the chance to do the same. That he hadn’t stuck around to see the wreckage he’d left behind, for him to feel the torment of what living without him might be like.
That he chose it.
Old wounds convulsed in the middle of us.
Energy alive and weeping.
Still drawing and begging.
That was the hardest part.
This connection that remained so real and intense that I could barely force myself to continue to stand in place without getting sucked right into the beauty of this boy. Into his beautiful heart and spirit and mind.
Oh, that body sure wasn’t helping things, either.
I forced that wayward thought down.
Bad, Frankie.
There was no way I could allow my mind to start going there.
E-V-A-N.
I signed slow, every letter emphasized, my mouth moving with his name.
A whisper of regret.
A murmur of praise.
I blinked at him, my hands and fingers quickened in their plea. I’M NOT SURE I KNOW HOW TO STAY. HOW TO STAND IN FRONT OF YOU AND HAVE TO WITNESS THIS.
I gestured toward the café, heartbreak spilling out with the motion. My own selfishness and greed getting loose of its chains. Then my hands were clamping down on my chest, words tumbling out like a confession.
“You’re a daddy. He’s so incredibly beautiful. I’m so happy for you.”
It was funny how both emotions could be completely true.
Evan watched me.
Knowing me the way he always had.
I wanted to cower behind a bush or maybe throw a towel over my head to hide what I was feeling. This boy reading me like I was a story that only he could tell.
“I never meant to hurt you, Frankie.”
Tears broke free.
YOU DIDN’T MEAN TO HURT ME, EVAN? YOU NEARLY KILLED ME.
Eight
Evan
I stood out in the deserted parking lot, chest heaving with pants like I’d just run a goddamn marathon. On some account? It felt like that was exactly what I’d done.
Run all the way across the country only to end up right back here.
Standing ten feet away from her.
Begging.
For what? I wasn’t sure.
I’d been convicted of my reasoning then, sure the path was right, and now I was standing there wondering if the only thing I’d been was a fool.
But how could I stand there in front of this girl and expect her to give her entire life to me when I might not have one to give her in return?
It seemed so fucking selfish.
So fucking wrong.
Yet there I was, wanting to walk up to her, drive my hands into her hair, and claim her.
Because I saw it.
She was mine.
Same way as she’d always been. Same way as I was always going to be hers.
Guilt blustered through the wind, and I tried to get it together. To say something that would mean something when the only thing I was saying again was, “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.”
I could feel the way the laughter that tumbled from her was brittle. “You left me, Evan. You walked out of that hospital and out of my life without looking back. Only a note that explained absolutely nothing. You had told me you were gonna marry me.”
She was clutching her chest again, but her upper body was angling toward me, like she couldn’t help herself. “And you’re really goin’ to stand there and tell me that you didn’t want to hurt me? You chose to leave me, Evan. You picked the pain. You chose the hurt. And now all you can say is that you’re sorry?”
Regret churned and coiled. Problem was it was getting all mixed up with the lust that curled my guts.
The only thing it took was the sight of Frankie Leigh to bring it surging back.
Fingers itchy.
Dick hard.
Had no right to it, but my eyes were drinking her in, mouth watering as I dragged my gaze over her.
Would never forget the way it felt to be lost in this girl. In her body and those hands and the caress of her fingers.
She stood there seething and soothing under a spray of the blazing sun.
The sight of her a balm.
A punch to my soul.
Tall.
Always a little bony and skinny.
All sharp angles and subtle curves.
She stood there wearing a pink frilly skirt that landed under her knees over a pair of black leggings.
Of course, she’d paired it with a pair of pink high-top Chucks.
Frizzy, brown curls blew all around her.
Wild chi
ld.
My unicorn girl.
“I would have died for you, Frankie, and that’s what it felt like when I let you go.”
Disbelief curled through her expression, and her head was shaking, those tears streaking down her cheeks and across her mouth, wetting her lips. She huffed out a sound that I knew was derision. Felt it like a lash on my heart. “You think you did me a favor? That you were actin’ noble?”
My hands curled into fists.
She took a step toward me. “Is that what you think, Evan Bryant? You took the coward’s way out, that’s what you did. That wasn’t noble. I needed you.”
A sob followed the words out, and shit, there was nothing that I could do but erase the space, pull this girl into my arms and bury my face in her hair and listen to the thrum of her heart. It’d always felt like the beat of it had led mine.
Frankie lost it the second we touched. The girl weeping in my arms, her fingers clinging to me.
Shame spiraled.
But in the middle of it was something new. Something that should have been there all along.
Determination.
Because she was fucking right.
I’d been a coward. A goddamn coward. That ended now.
I pressed a kiss to her forehead, and fuck, the taste of her skin nearly sent me spiraling.
Wanted to sink into her.
Dig deeper.
Crawl inside.
“I am sorry, Frankie. I am. Need you to know I thought I was doing what was best. That in the long run you’d be better off.”
She pulled back to look up at me. Couldn’t do anything but set my hand on her precious cheek.
Tears kept streaming free. “You had no right to make that decision for me. None at all, Evan. Did you even consider the consequences of what you leaving would be?”
Dread tightened my chest.
Something about the way the words dropped from her lips felt final.
Like she was saying I was too damn late.
Frantically, she scraped the moisture from her face with the heel of her hand. Almost as frantic as I could sense the frenzy of the laughter that tumbled out of her.
Disturbed.
Disbelieving.
She twisted herself out of my hold and took a step back.
That tiny space screamed.
“You know the sad thing, Evan?” She seemed almost frustrated with herself. “All this time? All this time I’ve been worried about you? All the nights I laid awake terrified that you were alone or sick or maybe hurt? Or the nights I was sick thinkin’ about you with someone else? The times I was angry with you or hurting for you and just all around praying to God that I could just forget about you? You want to know the most pathetic thing? Last night when I crossed the street, when I was in your arms for that fleeting second, it was the first time in all those years that I felt almost complete.”
Hold on to Hope Page 8