by Bella Andre
Oh God. Her father. He was going to kill her. She felt her skin grow hot and then cold as she thought about what he'd do, the way he would yell, if he ever found out about her impromptu--and completely unladylike--train trip.
"We need to get off at the next town." Her voice sounded way too shaky for her liking, and she forcefully steadied it before adding, "I shouldn't have done this. I know better."
The train slowed down at the next stop, and she was more than a little surprised when he helped her climb off, even more surprised to find him getting off right behind her with both of their packages in his hands.
He looked at the timetable posted on the wall. "The next train back won't be here for an hour."
She tried to tamp down on it this time, that itch on the back of her neck, that wild yearning coming over her again. But one taste of adventure had given her a craving for more.
She wanted more so badly that she could taste it on her tongue, almost as if someone had given her one short lick of the sweetest lollipop before wrapping it back up and putting it away--out of her reach but where she could still see it and long for it--for good.
"Well," she found herself saying, despite the fact that she knew better, "if we're going to be stuck here anyway, I might as well show you the waterfall."
His beautiful mouth quirked up slightly at the corner, and when he raised his eyebrows, she raised hers right back. This adventure might have been his idea, but now it was her turn to show him things he hadn't seen.
The waterfall was only a few minutes' walk from the train station over the pretty red covered bridge. Soon they were standing in front of a cascading wall of water that arched off the rocks toward them. Warm from their short walk, feeling more confined than usual by the long, tight sleeves of her dress, she moved closer to the cool spray of water.
His warm voice caressed her. "Have you ever seen the back side of water?"
"Water doesn't have sides."
"Sure it does. The back side looks completely different. Come here, and I'll show you."
But this time, she definitely knew better. Heck, it was her stupid wild yearnings that had gotten her here, wasn't it? Carlos was dangerous. She'd known that from the start, right from that first conversation when he had unraveled her control as though she were simply a strand of tightly wound yarn.
"I can see it just fine from here, thank you."
"It's okay to be scared, pretty Olive. But life is unpredictable. Don't wait too long to take a risk."
"Stop calling me scared!" She turned on him in sudden fury, not just for constantly goading her, but at herself for all the things she wanted but was so scared to want, so scared to let herself feel. "I'm here, aren't I? I got on that freight train, didn't I?"
"Yes, you did."
But she could hear what he wasn't saying. That just because she'd taken one step didn't mean there weren't more in front of her, just waiting for her to decide if she was brave enough to take them.
"Fine. Show me the back side of water."
And this time when he reached for her hand, she wasn't distracted by the movement of a train, wasn't breathless from running...and she felt his touch all the way down past her skin, past her bones, past the blood that moved in her veins. All the way down into her heart as he carefully led her over slippery rocks to the small bank of dirt between the waterfall and the rock wall.
"Do you see it now?"
The water was a thick wall of movement, mesmerizing as it poured down from the rocks above their heads. It was nature's misty curtain falling with such grace and ease.
"You're right," she breathed in wonder. "Everything does look different from the other side."
She could feel his eyes on her, knew he wasn't looking at the strange shapes of the trees, the sky, the mountains through the water. Her mouth tingled in anticipation of the kiss she knew was coming.
But then he said, "Come on, pretty Olive, let's get you out of here before you get too wet."
And that was when she realized, just as he hadn't forced her to get on the train with him, he wouldn't force her to kiss him either. If she wanted a kiss from Carlos, she'd have to be the one to take that step.
To choose not only his kiss...but him as well.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Present day...
Sarah was halfway across the park when a man and woman she didn't know stopped her. "Are you the one bringing those condos into town?" the guy asked.
Her brain couldn't compute his words, not when she was still lost in thoughts of her father. Her body couldn't quite keep up either, and she stumbled to a halt as she said, "Excuse me?"
"You're in charge of the condos, right?"
Stunned that someone was actually bringing this up--at her father's commemoration of all places--it was all she could do just to nod.
"You're going to have a fight on your hands, you know."
She rubbed her hands over her eyes. "If this is about the carousel--"
"I don't give a damn about the carousel." The woman beside him looked deeply uncomfortable. "This place is meant to be forever wild."
Sarah had spent enough time poring over building restrictions to know that he was talking about the meeting at which the fourteenth amendment to the New York Constitution, the Forever Wild clause, had been created. Concern for the importance of the watershed was one of the driving forces for creating the Adirondack Park.
Trying to get her brain to function again, she said, "I'm just as concerned about protecting the water sources as you are, and I can assure you that the proposed development will not in any way alter it."
"You don't live here anymore, do you?"
"No, but--"
"Then if you'll excuse me for being perfectly frank, you are not anywhere near as concerned as I am."
"I'm not an outsider," she finally protested. "I grew up here, spent eighteen years of my life in Summer Lake. My mother is here. My grandmother is here. This is where I'm from."
"Look, I'm not trying to hurt your feelings. I'm just trying to make you see what I see when I drive outside the Adirondack Park. More and more open space converted to developed land. New homes being built faster than people can occupy them while the old ones fall, neglected and rotting. Roads that shunt rainwater and snowmelt and pollution into streams at accelerated rates. I'm just saying you're probably used to all that in the city. I don't think you can see how important this is as clearly as someone who's actually here can see it."
Another time she might have taken out her phone and made notes. She would have scheduled a meeting to address this man's concerns. But right now she was just too tired--and too full of a heart-deep sadness--to do anything more than say, "Okay."
The man's wife tugged on his arm. "George, this isn't the time for this." The woman lowered her voice. "They had the ceremony for her father today."
The man grunted. "There will be a town meeting for this, won't there?"
Sarah nodded. "Yes." She had almost everything she needed to turn in the paperwork. "This coming Thursday."
"We'll see you there. And I sure hope you'll have thought about what I said by then."
Needing to get away from the couple, Sarah realized she was close to the carousel. Needing to hold on to something--anything--she climbed onto it.
The paint had mostly chipped off, giving way to large patches of bare metal and porcelain. The red-and-white awning was faded to pink and gray, and the whole thing rocked dangerously as she stepped on. As much as an inanimate object could project an emotion, it looked desolate, forlorn.
She hadn't cried in the boathouse with Calvin. She hadn't cried at the commemoration. But hearing that stranger point out all the ways she didn't belong, all the ways she couldn't possibly be a part of a town that had raised her, finally had tears of grief and loss spilling down her face.
Straddling one of the horses, she leaned her head against the pole that held it to the splitting ceiling boards above, her tears soaking the scarf her mother had made in her
father's memory.
*
It had been Calvin's idea to build the new playground in James Bartow's name. But watching Sarah stand in front of everyone--trying to be so brave, so strong, when she was only a heartbeat away from breaking as she gave her beautiful speech--had him wondering if he'd been wrong.
Lord knew he owed her father a great deal for his help in keeping Jordan from going to a foster home when she was a baby. But nothing was worth adding to Sarah's grief, damn it. And when she had fled the festival, and he'd seen that couple corner her, he had to follow her, had to go to her. He was too late to intercept the man who had barged into his office earlier that day to demand answers about the condos. But by God, despite the words they'd thrown at each other in that boathouse on Loon Lake, whether he liked it or not, whether it was easy or not, Sarah was a part of his soul.
And she needed him.
He'd spent the past three days trying to wade through what had happened between them in the boathouse. Not only the mind-blowing kiss they'd shared, but what had been said.
When they were eighteen, they'd both screwed up. Badly. Did he wish they could have done things differently? Hell, yes. But they hadn't. And while neither of them was blameless, neither was more to blame than the other.
In the end, he knew one thing for sure: Both of them had paid the price for their anger, for their pride in not wanting to admit fault, and for their stubborn desire to be the one to hear I'm sorry first. And the price had been high. Way too high.
Because he'd missed her like crazy for the past ten years.
And he didn't want to miss her anymore.
Sarah didn't look up when he approached. "Whatever you want to say to me about the carousel or anything else, can it wait? I just want to be alone."
Calvin wasn't surprised she tried to push him away. He'd be more surprised if she didn't.
Climbing up onto the carousel, he lowered himself beside the horse she sat on. "I know it feels like that, but you need somebody right now. I know it doesn't seem like it will get easier, but I swear it will."
Finally, she looked at him, her cheek still pressed against the pole, her blue eyes glassy with tears. "When? When will it ever get better?"
With anyone else, he could have told the lie she needed to hear, but he couldn't lie to Sarah anymore. Never again. "The truth is that it won't ever go away completely." Another sob rocked her--and the old wooden horse she was sitting on. "But it will fade, and you'll wake up some mornings and actually be able to convince yourself that you're okay."
"But what if--" He had to get closer, had to practically press his ear to her mouth to hear the raw words. "What if I get too okay and forget him?" Pain clawed at each word. "What if I'm already forgetting the way his eyes crinkled when he laughed and how he used to drive me crazy humming 'God Bless America' all the time?" With each word, Sarah's breath came out shakier, the words barely audible through her tears.
"Your father loves you, Sarah, and wherever you are, believe me, he knows how much you love him. You don't have to mourn forever to prove that to him. Or to yourself. Your father wants to look down and see you smiling. Laughing. Forgetting."
He was ready for her to say he was only making things worse. He was ready for her to tell him to go away. The only thing he wasn't ready for was her whispering through her tears, "Why didn't you tell me?"
Not sure what she was asking him, he gently asked, "Tell you what?"
"How much you needed me. When your parents died." She didn't wait for him to reply. "I left you. I know I left you. But I swear I didn't know what it felt like, not until he died. If I'd known, I would have been there for you." Calvin reached out to wipe her tears away but he couldn't keep up with them. "I would have been here for you. I swear I would have come back and stayed for you. Please believe me." She was crying harder now, his strong Sarah no longer strong--and it was breaking the last part of his heart that hadn't been broken out in the boathouse on Loon Lake. "I'm just so sorry for what happened. For what I did."
"I know you are. And I'm sorry too. I wasn't there for you either. Not when you needed me the most. Let me be here for you now."
She shook her head, tears launching from her cheekbones and landing on his skin, searing him with her pain. "I don't want to hurt you more than I already have, Calvin. I don't ever want to hurt you again."
"Come here." He knew she needed someone to hold her. Knew she needed him to hold her. "Just a hug, I promise."
And then she was in his arms, his chin on the top of her soft hair, her face buried in the crook of his shoulder as she cried, the wind taking the end of her scarf and wrapping it around him too.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The following night, Sarah wasn't exactly sure what she was doing walking in the door of Lakeside Stitch & Knit, only that she couldn't stand the thought of another second alone in her bedroom with nothing but her computer for company.
"Sarah, you came!" A dozen smiling faces turned toward her. Everyone from last week, except for Rosa, was there. "I knew you'd be back," Dorothy continued. "Didn't I say that, Helen?"
Helen poured her a glass of wine. "Here you go, my dear."
And suddenly, Sarah knew exactly why she'd come here.
Calvin's arms around her as she cried on the carousel at the Fall Festival had comforted--and confused--her more than ever. She'd known deep inside that there would be laughter here. Not only softness from the yarn, but the true warmth of other women who'd surely loved and lost before, just like her.
"It's nice to see you again," Christie said, then reached into her bag and held out the shawl Sarah had been working on the week before. "I must have accidentally grabbed it last week when I was packing up my things."
"I didn't know you were working on a shawl." Denise looked simultaneously pleased and maybe a little bit hurt that her daughter hadn't mentioned knitting something at any point during the week.
Sarah's grandmother patted the seat next to her. "Come sit next to me. Just like you used to."
Sarah did as she was told, taking a deep breath and trying to get comfortable. She was just about to make her first knit stitch when her grandmother said, "I was telling everyone about how we're going to save the carousel."
Her heart skipped a beat or two before it went down like a heavy rock. She hadn't wanted to take the wind out of her grandmother's sails with the bad news, but not telling her now would feel like lying. "I talked to my client about that, and they didn't think they would be able to incorporate it into the project."
"Of course they're not going to save it." Olive patted Sarah's knee. "I never thought they would. Not when there isn't a dime to be made from it."
"Actually," Sarah made herself say, "I was hoping to talk with all of you about the details of my project tonight. That is, if you don't know already." She could feel Catherine's eyes on her. Not angry. Not cold. But watchful. Knowing her old friend worked as Calvin's part-time assistant at city hall, Sarah chose her words extra carefully. "I'm working with a builder to put up several beautiful residences on the waterfront." She knew the women who had been at the knitting group last week, but tonight there were several faces she didn't recognize. "In addition to bringing in additional revenue to the town and the store owners, they are also planning to add in some wonderful extras."
"Like what?" one of the women asked.
"A new boat launch." When no one looked particularly excited about that, she was glad she had something else to give them. "And a new football field--lights, locker room, bleachers--the whole nine yards."
The woman who had looked so unimpressed before suddenly smiled. "That's wonderful. My sons are both on the team." She turned to the woman next to her and said, "Isn't that great news?"
Sarah silently breathed a sigh of relief as the conversation blew off course for a few minutes while several women started talking about the team's chances at a championship this year. No one was freaking out. In fact, it was abundantly clear that the football field might end up b
eing the tiebreaker.
Catherine leaned across the coffee table. "Can we talk in the back?"
Sarah put down her knitting and made an excuse about getting another bottle of wine before following Catherine into the back room.
"I've been trying to keep my mouth shut, but I can't anymore." The other woman's voice was quiet but determined.
"If you're upset about my project, I'd be happy to meet with you tomorrow morning to discuss it."
"I don't care about your project. I want to know what you're doing with Calvin."
Sarah felt the remaining color leave her cheeks. "I understand that you care about him, but my relationship with him is private."
Catherine crossed her arms over her chest. "I don't know what happened between the two of you last week, but I know something is wrong. He's not himself." Catherine pointed a finger at Sarah's breastbone, right where pain was flaring. "I know your type."
"My type?"
"I was married to one of you."
Sarah couldn't keep her eyebrows from going up, her arms from adopting the mirror image of Catherine's defensive position.
"Are you comparing me to your 'rat bastard' ex-husband?"
Catherine's eyes narrowed. "You think you're too big, too important for a place like this, don't you?"
"I grew up here, Catherine," Sarah reminded her, the same way she'd been reminding pretty much everyone recently. She'd expected to take some flak tonight at the knitting group, but about the project, not this personal attack. "We used to be friends. Why are you so angry with me?"
"The fact that you don't know why says it all."
"Are you in love with Calvin?" Sarah guessed, even though the pieces didn't quite add up.
Catherine laughed, but there was no humor in it. "Don't you think I wish I could have fallen in love with him instead of--" Her mouth wobbled slightly around the corners.
"I'm sorry," Sarah said softly, and despite the way Catherine had just attacked her, she was.
But the other woman wasn't interested in her apologies. "Do you have any idea how hard it was for Calvin after his father killed himself? All of us were there for him, babysitting, bringing over food, cleaning up that dank trailer the best we could, teaching him how to deal with a sick kid. But not you. The one person who should have been there wasn't."