You Promised Me Forever (The Dirty Ankle Series Book 1)

by Lizabeth Scott

  “Get it back now. I’m not staying.” She didn’t hear him move. “Now!”

  “No, Nic. Not until we talk.”

  Nicole shook her head; she couldn’t believe this was happening to her. “I have nothing to say to you. I don’t even know you. I never did.”

  “You know me, Nic, just like I know you. I know you think you hate me right now. Let me explain, please. Hear me out and then if you still want to leave, I won’t stop you.”

  “No!” She turned on him, advancing as he retreated into the treehouse. “No, you do not get to explain. The time to explain was five years ago. That was when I would have listened. I don’t owe you anything. Now get the ladder back. I’m finished here.” She stood quaking with rage but still refusing to look him in the eye.

  “Nic, you’re right. I should have explained, but I couldn’t. Just hear me out.”

  Nicole turned towards the picture window and looked across the forest all the way to the snow-topped mountains in the far distance and then willed herself to turn around. “Say your piece, Will, but then you get the ladder back, and I never want to see you again.”

  “Nic, you can’t mean that.” He started towards her but froze when her hand came up.

  “Stop right there. You went to a lot of trouble to get me here, so talk.” She crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow in his direction, hoping to give the illusion of being in control.

  “Can we sit down?”

  “No. I can’t stand to be near you. I can hear you just fine from here.” She tried to calm her racing heart by taking in gulps of air and releasing it slowly. The pained looked on his face didn’t move her at all.

  “Oh, Nic. I’m so sorry for hurting you.”

  “That’s it. That’s the revelation?” She didn’t believe him for a hot second.

  “No, that’s my heartfelt apology.” Will ran his hand through his hair.

  Nicole crossed her arms, unimpressed with his apology. “Stop. Just stop. Say what you have to say and then get me out of here.”

  “Do you remember Juan?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “Two weeks before we were leaving to come home he took a mission I was slated to do. His Humvee ran over an explosive device, and Juan didn’t make it. He took my place, and he died.” Will paused and his voice shook. “It should have been me.”

  She grasped the chair nearest her to stay upright when her legs turned to rubber. Nicole couldn’t help the way her stomach dropped at even the thought of Will being in that Humvee. Her eyes found his and she saw the tremendous guilt he’d taken on over Juan’s death.

  “While we were on deployment, Juan met and fell in love with Reca. They were expecting a baby and were planning to marry when our tour was up. When he died before they were married, she wasn’t eligible for any medical insurance. Her family was very poor. She had found out the baby had a medical condition that would require major medical expenses. I owed it to Juan to step up and take his place, like he did for me. I…” Will paused again and looked straight into her eyes.

  Nicole saw flashes of Will’s struggle with his inner demons. She felt his conflicting emotions. He needed to tell her something but was afraid. Afraid of what? Losing her? He already had. She watched it all play out on his face before he spoke.

  “I married Reca for Juan. I couldn’t tell you because it had to appear as if we were a legitimate couple for four years until her citizenship came through.” Will waited, watching her reaction. “She wanted to move her family here, and she needed her citizenship.”

  Nicole had heard what he said, but all she could focus on was the part about marrying someone that wasn’t her. It had been his choice, and he’d chosen someone over her. She closed her eyes tightly to keep the tears in and turned back toward the window, unwilling to allow him to see how deep his words had hurt her; she would not let him see her tears. “Will you move the ladder back now?”

  “No I won’t move…” He grabbed her by the arm and turned her around. “Don’t you understand? We can be together now.”

  Her eyes went to his hand on her arm, willing it to move and stop tormenting her. She refused to look at him. Her voice was void of all emotion. “No, don’t you understand? Nothing’s changed. Move the ladder back.”

  “Nic, I lo…”

  “No! Do not call me that again,” Nicole screamed. Her eyes flashed with anger. “My name is Sugar.”

  “Never. You’re Nic, and you will always be my girl.”

  “It was you.” Finally, she put the pieces together. “You had Babs play that song and you had the mayor send me daisies, and the cookies, you gave them your mom’s recipe. It was all you. Her voice throbbed with anger. “What did you think? You would get me back by going down memory lane and then swoop in and carry me back to your home where everything would just fall back into place?” She jerked her arm from his grasp and moved away.

  “Calm down, Nicky.”

  Sparks flying from her eyes should have told him he’d said the wrong thing.

  “Do not tell me to calm down. I came to Alaska to get away from you. Now get the ladder back or I swear I will jump.” Nicole turned and headed once again for the door.

  “Please don’t leave things this way.”

  How could Will think things could ever go back the way they were. He had been everything to her; she thought he felt the same way about her. He had just proven she was wrong. “At least I gave you the courtesy of telling you to get lost. Now go back to your wife and leave me the hell alone.” Her nails bit into the flesh of her fisted hands.

  “I don’t have a wife anymore. We’ve been divorced officially for three months,” Will explained softly.

  “You.” She had to pause, the hurt a physical ache in her heart. “You thought you could just show up and I would fall right back into all those delusional plans we made all those years ago. Go home, Will. There’s nothing for you here. I have nothing for you anymore. The only thing I see when I look at you now is all the misery you caused in my life.” She turned away from him.

  “There won’t be anyone to put the ladder back until in the morning.”

  “Args!” Nicole threw up her hands and looked around the room wildly. She couldn’t take anymore. She had to get away from him before she totally lost it. Spying only one option, she ran into the bathroom, slammed the door behind her and grabbed her chest, taking in huge gulps of air. Air! She needed air. After pushing the window open wide, she stuck her head out and took in huge mouthfuls of air. The entire time she’d been in Will’s presence she hadn’t taken a single breath, or at least that was the way she felt.

  Will had dropped back into her life as if he hadn’t ripped her beating heart from her chest and had tossed it away so very carelessly. Nicole looked around the room in a panic. She had to get rid of Will. Everything had to go. She started pulling fluffy white towels from the shelves behind the toilet and went back to the window, with the intent of dumping them and everything else out the window. Her irrational mind raced to purge Will from the room, from her life. But the closer she came to the window the more her hands trembled.

  Do it! Throw him out, just like he did to you!

  Nicole pushed with all her might but her hands wouldn’t move the few inches it would take to toss them out.

  He left you for her without a backwards glance. Throw him out!

  She dropped the towels on the bathroom floor and fell to her knees and let tears fall silently from her eyes. No. No. No. She thought she’d changed. Being stronger and taking charge of her life had only been an illusion because when it came right down to it, she was still a product of her grandmother’s upbringing. How screwed up was she?

  “Nic? Are you okay?”

  She heard the concern in his voice, but it didn’t move her. No, she wasn’t okay and she didn’t know if she would ever be again. To answer him, she crawled to the door and flipped the lock. She sat with her back against the door and her head resting on the wood. She doubte
d she would ever be okay again.

  “Nic, please. Let me in. We can get passed this. I know we can.” Will waited but no answer came from the other side of the door.

  Nicole pulled her legs up and wrapped her arms around them and rested her head on her knees. All those years ago all she’d wanted was to know why. So many scenarios kept her in a constant state of depression back then. Had she done something to push him away? Had he found someone else he loved more than her? Was he simply tired of always taking care of her? All she’d ever wanted was the answer to why Will had deserted her. That was all, just an answer. Now she had it, and it hurt just as much knowing why he’d left her.

  Will had chosen another woman. The reason didn’t really matter; he’d still deserted her. Yes, it had been for a selfless act, but it still hurt to know someone else had been more important to him than her. No matter the reasons or the circumstances, Will had tossed her away like yesterday’s trash and married someone else without a single thought as to how she would feel. He hadn’t even had the common curtsey of telling her what he was doing and why. He’d just left. Disappeared and took his family with him. He’d left her to pick up the pieces of her life and go on without him.

  Nicole pulled herself up and leaned against the white porcelain sink. Bracing her arms on both sides, she looked into the mirror. Who was the disturbed woman with the wild green eyes and mussy hair? She peered closer into the mirror. Her lips were a sickly grayish blue, probably from her lack of oxygen earlier.

  After rinsing her face, she dried off with a towel she rescued from the floor. Once again she looked at the woman in the mirror. At first she didn’t see it, but then she leaned forward. There in her eyes was the truth. She’d felt more alive in the ten minutes she’d spent with Will than she had in the past five years. She turned away from the image, not wanting to see the truth reflected there or willing to accept what that meant.

  She pushed away from the sink and began to pace the small room. Three steps one way, turn, and three steps back. She had been so weak back then. She’d been her grandparents’ invention. Later, going to college had been good for her, but she only really lived for Will’s visits, to make Will proud, and to prepare herself for their lives together. Where had she been in all those plans? Back then Nicole didn’t exist. Everything she did, she did for Will. That was so terribly sad and wrong.

  When Will jilted her, she’d had no choice but to grow up. When her grandparents left her and moved to Florida, that had been the turning point for her. That was the moment she knew she had only herself to depend on. It wasn’t safe to put her trust and happiness into someone else’s hands. She didn’t need anybody else to complete her. Those had been hard, but necessary lessons to learn.

  Seeing Will’s picture with his wife had been the death of her love for him. So why was he able to affect her now? Why did she feel such pain from someone she supposedly felt nothing for? He shouldn’t have the power to do that to her anymore. Nicole turned her back on the mirror. She wasn’t ready to see the truth staring at her.

  “Nic, it’s getting late. Come and eat something. I know you must be hungry.”

  Nicole stared at the door but didn’t answer. She could hear the strain in his voice.

  “Honey, it’s getting late. If you’ll come out and eat, I’ll go sit on the porch. I promise you’ll not have to see me if that’s the way you want it.”

  Nicole listened as his footsteps paused and finally moved away from the bathroom door. She heard the click of the front door closing. Still she didn’t move. She had no intentions of leaving the bathroom before morning when she could leave. She had no desire for food anyway; if she ate anything it would only come back up, the way her stomach was still churning.

  She crumbled down onto the tile floor and rested her head against the door. Through all the years she had known him, the one constant she knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, was that she could always trust Will. He had always looked out for her, protected her. And never once had he lied to her. Until he promised to marry her and promised he would return. He’d lied and betrayed her. Nicole heard the outside door open and Will’s steps approaching the closed door.

  “Nic, please come out. Let’s talk.”

  Nicole sighed. “There’s nothing to talk about. You said it all five years ago.”

  “I love you, Nic. I always have and I always will.”

  “You have a funny way of showing love. You don’t love someone and abandon them without a word.”

  “I wanted to tell you. I really did, but I couldn’t. My marriage to Reca had to appear to be real.”

  Her voice quivered. “I trusted you, Will.”

  “Nic, not a single day went by that I didn’t think of you, that I didn’t wish I could see you or pick up the phone and call you. Or that I could wrap my arms around you and get lost in you.”

  “I’ve not thought much of you at all.” It had hurt too much to think about him with his wife and son. For her sanity, she had refused to allow him into her thoughts until she slept. Unfortunately, she couldn’t control her dreams.

  He refused to give up. “I don’t buy that. I know I hurt you. But you still love me. I know you do.”

  “What I felt for you was successfully killed during the one-year vigil I held after you and your family disappeared. I waited for some small scrap of information from you for a whole year. You not only killed what I felt for you, Will, you also killed the Nic you knew. She doesn’t exist anymore. I don’t even believe in love anymore. So go home. There’s nothing for you here.” Nicole dropped her head, weary from the emotions he had stirred up.

  “I don’t believe that. I can’t believe that. I messed up. I admit it. I know I did. I wasn’t thinking straight then. I should have told you, should have explained what I was doing and why. My parents warned me, but I wouldn’t listen. They miss you too, Nic.”

  Nicole laughed. “They betrayed me also. They no longer exist to me either.”

  “Please don’t say that. They love you.”

  “I can do without that type of love.”

  “Reca knew it was temporary. She knew it was a marriage in name only. Do you hear me, Nic. My marriage was in name only. I never slept with her. We never shared a bed. It’s always been you, Nic, only you.”

  “No, it hasn’t. You made the decision, and it wasn’t me. I understand what you did five years ago, but you made your choice. Go home, Will.”

  “Sugar!”

  “Parker!” Nicole sprang up, hurriedly unlocked the bathroom door and almost fell over Will sitting on the floor on the other side. She jumped over him and rushed into Parker’s waiting arms.

  ***

  Will straightened to all of his six-foot-two inches, angry at the interruption. Finally, he’d gotten Nic to start talking and Parker had to come to her rescue. “I’ll only give you one warning, Boydt. Turn around and leave now.”

  Parker ignored the angry words of his boss; instead he held Nicole by the shoulders and looked into her eyes. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah,” Nicole answered softly.

  “I’m sorry, Sugar. I didn’t know it was you he wanted to be stuck up here with until I overheard Babs talking about it in the diner. Do you want to stay or go?”

  “She stays,” Will demanded, as he started towards them.

  Parker pushed Nicole behind him, ready to take whatever measures were necessary. “Listen, Mr. Harrison, if Sugar wants to go, then she’s going with me.”

  ‘If you value your job, Boydt, you’ll take your hands off Nic, turn around and walk away.”

  When Parker heard him say “Nic,” he turned to Nicole. “He’s the one isn’t he?”

  Nicole silently begged Parker to let it go, and he did, once he saw the answer to his question in her eyes.

  “Parker, would you wait for me down below? I’ll just be a few minutes,” Nicole moved aside and asked.

  Parker gave one last glare in Will’s direction befor
e he left.

  Before the door closed, Will moved towards Nic. This could be his only chance. She couldn’t leave this way. “Nic, please stay. We can work this out. I know we can. Give us another chance.”

  “See, that’s just it, Will. You did what you had to do. I understand why you left me. But it doesn’t change the fact that you chose her, and that, Will, I can never get past. It’s over, and has been since the day you said ‘I do’ to her.”

  With those parting words Nicole turned and walked through the door, leaving his heart bleeding out on the floor.

  “No!” Will said to the empty room. He had no idea how he could make this right. But he had to because there was no way he could give up on his girl, even if she thought she’d given up on him. Nic had changed, and he couldn’t help but be proud of the woman she’d become. She’d never believed in the confidence of her own strength.

  She was hurt and angry and needed time to adjust to him being back in her life. From the window he could see Parker leading Nic away, his arm holding her close to his side. The jealousy that burned in Will’s chest was a new emotion for him where Nic was concerned. He didn’t like it. She belonged to him and he would make that crystal clear to Parker, or he would find another contractor.

  His eyes traveled over the room, the room he had built for them. He ran a hand through his hair in irritation. He knew Nic; he hadn’t expected her to make it easy for him. Tomorrow was another day, and he had his work cut out for him.

  He smiled at her retreating figure through the trees. Nic could still take his breath away. She had matured over the years they had been apart. Her hair was darker and only a few of the burnished highlights remained. Her eyes were just as intensely green against the creaminess of her flawless skin; however, her five freckles were still there, decorating her nose and cheeks. He loved kissing each one of those sun-kissed spots. And he planned to do that often. He just had to get her on board.