by Elena Aitken
When We Fell
Elena Aitken
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Contents
When We Fell
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Join Me!
About the Author
Also by Elena Aitken
Love in the Moment
When We Fell
A young widow…
A grieving brother…
Could a second chance heal them both?
Widowed too soon, leaving her alone with a young son and a broken heart. Drew’s only priority is to rebuild a life for herself and her son. Love is the last thing on her mind.
As long as he can remember, Ben has secretly loved Drew. But now his only job is to be there for his older brother’s widow and son, not act on his forbidden feelings. No matter how strong they are.
Despite the promises she made to her dying husband, Drew never expected to be able to open her heart again. But shared grief brings healing, and when Ben finds a way to make good on his vow to his brother. It’s not only laughter and happiness he brings back into Drew’s life—it could also be love.
Chapter One
The second Drew Ross opened the garage door, she wished she hadn’t. When the door rolled up, the only thing staring back at her were boxes. Piles and piles of boxes.
“Awesome.” Drew rolled her eyes and put her hands on her hips but there was no help for it. If she was going to find her son’s baseball glove, there was only one thing to do.
Start opening boxes.
“Here goes nothing,” she said aloud before taking a step into the garage. Her long, dark hair was twisted up on the top of her head in a messy bun and she’d managed to find a bandanna that she’d tied around that. Dressed in an old t-shirt and a pair of cut-offs, she at least looked as if she was prepared to do a little organizing and cleaning.
Which was good, because she certainly didn’t feel ready to face the lifetime of stuff the cardboard boxes and rubber totes held. Not that she had a choice.
Austin was going to start Little League, and he needed a glove. He was just barely five. He needed stability. He needed everything to be as normal as possible.
He needed his glove.
That was the thought that propelled Drew forward and into the garage full of boxes and memories.
She held her breath and opened the flap of the first one. It wasn’t labeled. Most of them weren’t. When she and Eric had decided to pack up their entire lives and move back to Timber Creek so he could live out his last few months in their hometown, there hadn’t been much time to pack up properly or label anything. In fact, it would be a miracle if half of their things weren’t broken and smashed inside those boxes.
Not that she cared all that much anymore.
Drew did most of the packing herself, with Eric helping out as much as he could. He was already so weak, even then, that he spent most of his time resting in a chair, keeping her company and trying to make her laugh while she threw things in boxes so they could uproot their entire lives that were about to be shattered completely.
“You might want to wrap that in bubble wrap,” he’d said when she picked up his overstuffed trout pillow. He’d owned it for years and for reasons Drew could never understand, insisted on keeping it on the living room couch.
Drew paused, the pillow in her hand. “Seriously?”
He nodded, a grin on his handsome, but way too pale face. “Deadly. It’s very special.”
“I was actually thinking maybe we could donate this.” She held the printed pillow up. “I mean…really?”
“No way.” Her husband of eight years pushed himself to his feet and made his way over to her. He took the trout out of her hands and kissed it before turning and using it to kiss her. “This is my most prized possession.” He laughed and before she could protest, wrapped his arms around her, and pulled her into him.
There were times when, if she didn’t look close, Drew could forget that cancer was ravaging his body, and just for a minute she could pretend that it was just an ordinary day. When he pressed his lips to hers, and dipped her backward, just a little, it was one of those times.
Maybe the doctors were wrong and as soon as they got home to Timber Creek, Eric would finally beat the cancer and they’d live to be old and gray together.
The memory washed over Drew as she stood with the box open in front of her, surrounded by their memories.
The doctors hadn’t been wrong. She was the one who was wrong. Being home in Timber Creek hadn’t saved Eric. It had been almost nine months since he’d been gone. Nine months that Drew had to adjust to the idea of a new future.
For the most part, she was succeeding. With the help of her friends and family, she was starting to live again. More and more each day, it got a little easier to breathe without wanting to cry, kiss their son—who looked so much like his father—without thinking of all the things Eric would miss out on, and just get through the day without having a total meltdown.
Yes. Most days were easier.
But most days she didn’t have to go through their boxes.
Drew wiped a tear from her cheek and shook her head. “Come on, Drew. You’ve got this. They’re just boxes.” She scanned the garage again, a new determination steeling her resolve. “And one of them has Austin’s glove in it.”
She took a deep breath, held it and opened the first box.
The rush of air came out in a laugh as she realized she was looking at the very same trout pillow she’d just been remembering. She should have thrown it in the donation pile before they’d left Nevada. After all, it was completely ridiculous. She lifted it out and held it in her hands for a moment before putting it aside.
Maybe she should have donated it, but Drew was glad she hadn’t. It was ugly and ridiculous but it had been Eric’s. She had no idea what she was going to do with it, but for the time being, it was going to have to live in the garage. She had more pressing issues than redecorating the house. Although the time would come where she would have to go through the boxes and actually do something with them, it was not on that particular warm day in the middle of May.
Drew shoved the fish back in the box and reached for another one.
Nothing but photo albums and old books she’d never read again.
Next.
Mercilessly, as if each box that turned up without the glove fueled her toward the next, Drew reached for box after box. She dug through the contents, sometimes pulling them out to the floor around her, before shoving it to the side and reaching for the next as if the contents of each container didn’t hold the intense power to hurt her.
They did.
But she refused to let the pain in. Not today.
She had to find the glove.
After too much fruitless searching, Drew finally stood and wiped her arm across her brow.
“Come on.” She groaned and stretched her back side to side. “It has to be here.” She straightened up and looked at the stack in front of her. It was the highest pile of boxes, mostly Rubbermaid totes that were leaning against the back wall. The glove had to be in there. She was running out of options. Austin’s first practice was that night and— “Dammit.” There wasn’t much help for it—she was going to have to get to the top of that pile.
She didn’t have a ladder, so she moved a few of the larger boxes to the bottom of the stack, put her foot on the lip of a tote and hoisted herself up. For just a moment, it looked as though it would work. Her hands brushed along the top box, the one she was aiming for, and then…the entire stack wobbled to the right and then swayed to the left. And in the split second before the entire tower of totes fell with her still clinging to the side, instead of panicking, all Drew could do was laugh.
Ben Ross lifted the last of the oversized planters out of his truck bed and hauled it to the brick patio at the back of the Log and Jam. He set it with the others he’d just unloaded and used the edge of his t-shirt to wipe the sweat from his face. It was only the end of May, but it was already hot for the mountain town of Timber Creek, a fact that boded well for the new patio he’d just finished constructing behind his pub.
He’d opened the Log and Jam almost ten years ago and it had quickly become the favorite place for locals to hang out. The problem, at least as far as Ben was concerned, was that the cozy timber-framed interior, decorated with local logging antiques, was cozy and perfect during the snowy winter months, but during the all-too-short mountain summer months, he just wanted to be outside.
And if he wanted to be outside, then his customers likely wanted the same thing, which was why he’d spent the last six weeks getting permits and loans and then finally, building the huge outdoor patio at the Log and Jam.
Ben leaned back against the log wall of the building and surveyed his work. It had been a huge job and one that had taken a whole lot of collaborative effort from his friends and people in the community, but it was almost done.
He’d taken the empty space next to his building, which had served as overflow parking, and had created a combination of decking and brick-laid patio space. Because the weather could be unpredictable in the mountains, he’d covered half of the space with a huge timber-framed open-sided roof, which not only served as shelter in case of inclement weather, but also held his lighting and industrial space heaters, which would be perfect on cool evenings and extend his patio time well into the fall months.
He’d been able to leave most of the trees around the space, which gave it a feeling of privacy and intimacy, but he’d been told by almost all of his female staff members that planters full of bright flowers were an absolute must. Which was why he’d just spent the last few hours unloading the massive ones he’d bought in Seattle and hauled back earlier that morning.
Soil and plants could wait though, because as much as he’d like to finally see the space ready to go, Ben had other matters he had to take care of that afternoon.
He left the patio and entered his pub through the side door.
“Something smells amazing,” he called into the kitchen at Michael, his head chef. “What’s the special today?”
Michael appeared a moment later from the swinging door. He wiped his hands on his apron. “Roasted chicken club sandwich with a loaded baked potato soup. Want some?”
He hadn’t had a chance to grab anything to eat, and Ben’s stomach rumbled. But a quick glance at the clock over the bar told him that as much as he’d love to sit and enjoy a meal, he didn’t have time.
“Maybe later,” he said. “I’ll be back for the evening shift, but I have to run right now.”
“I can’t promise a sandwich,” Michael said. “But I’ll save you a bowl of soup.”
Ben laughed. Even as the boss, he didn’t seem to have any pull when it came to enjoying the amazing food Michael created. Ever since he’d started working at the Log and Jam, the pub had become one of the most popular lunch destinations in town, and the dinner crowd was picking up too. Business was booming. Which was a good thing, considering the loan he’d just taken out in order to make the patio happen in time for the summer season.
But he couldn’t think about that right now. It would only stress him out and there was nothing he could do about it. Sometimes you needed to spend money to make money, and the pub business wasn’t any different. The patio would pay off; he knew it would.
Ten minutes later, Ben was across town in the childhood bedroom he’d shared with his older brother. It never failed to hit him how much things hadn’t changed inside this room, with the matching twin beds, various posters tacked to the walls—mostly cars because their mom wouldn’t let them put up anything that might be considered too provocative. Good thing she didn’t know about the Playboy Eric had stolen from a friend’s dad when he was thirteen.
Ben chuckled a little at the memory of how Eric had given him the contraband magazine two years later when he’d turned thirteen. He’d treated it very seriously, as if it were a rite of passage for his little brother. Things had been different then. They’d been close when they were young. Inseparable. Ben’s chest ached with the familiar pain of loss that had dulled, but not disappeared in the months since his brother passed.
He didn’t think it would ever go away completely. How do you fill the hole your brother leaves behind? It was a question he couldn’t even begin to answer.
The idea of searching for the box where he’d hid that magazine crossed Ben’s mind. No doubt it was still under his bed where he’d left it all those years ago. But he shook it off. That’s not what he’d come to find.
“What are you looking for, Ben?” His mother’s voice from the doorway startled him out of his memories and Ben turned around to see Sylvia Ross, a dishtowel in her hands, watching him.
“Sorry, Mom. I didn’t think you were home.” Ben crossed the room and gave his mother a quick hug and kiss on the cheek.
She looked tired. Older. She’d aged at least ten years since Eric had died. It wasn’t easy to lose a brother; Ben couldn’t even imagine how hard it had been for his mom to lose her oldest child.
“You look good, Mom.”
She gave him a look that made it clear she knew he was lying, but she managed a smile anyway. “I’ve been sleeping a little better these days.”
“It’ll come, Mom. Maybe you should go see the doctor about some sleeping pills. You really do need to take care of yourself.”
She shook her head and waved the dishtowel to dismiss the idea. “The best medicine for me is seeing you. Can I get you a cup of tea?”
Ben instantly felt guilty. He knew he wasn’t spending enough time with his parents. But there was only so much time in the day, and…well… “I’m sorry, Mom. Not right now. I came to grab something. But I’ll come for dinner tomorrow,” he added when his mother’s face fell.
“I’ll make roast chicken.” Her face once more lifted, but Ben’s guilt didn’t disappear. “And I’ll see if Drew and Austin would like to come by as well. There’ll be plenty for everyone.”
“It sounds perfect.” Ben made a quick mental note about making sure the bar was staffed properly for the following night. He wouldn’t let his mom down.
“What is it exactly that you are looking for?” Sylvia asked as Ben got down on his hands and knees and started rooting around Eric’s old bed.
“I’m hoping that you still haven’t cleaned under here,” he teased.
“If you’re talking about that dirty magazine, I got rid of it years ago.”
“What?” Ben lifted his head so quickly, it made a sharp, hard contact with the bed frame. “Ouch.” He turned around, his hand on his head to see his mother grinning at him.
“Don’t tell me I don’t clean under there.”
He couldn’t help but laugh as he resumed his search. A moment later, it was Ben’s turn to smile as his hand landed on the item he’d been hoping to find.
“Got it.” He held the item up over his head in triumph. “I’m glad you’re so sentimental, Mom. Because I know one little boy who I’m hoping will be pretty excited to see this when he gets home from school.”
“Oh, Ben.” Sylvia put her hand to her mouth and bit her bottom lip. “I didn’t even think…you’re so thoughtful.”
He shrugged. “Anything for him, Mom. Anything.” He gave his mother a kiss on the cheek. “Don’t cry, Mom. Please.”
Sylvia wiped her tears, but Ben was sure she’d be crying again the moment he left. He knew in his heart that it would have broken Eric’s heart to see his mother still so torn up about his death, but she’d always been an emotional woman. Strong, but emotional. She was healing; it was just taking her a bit longer.
“I’ll be fine.” She waved him away. “You get going and I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Ben left his mother at the front door, and made the quick drive down the street. Not even five minutes later, he was parked in front of the low-rise bungalow where he’d spent more time in the last nine months than his own house.
She may have been laughing as she fell from the boxes, but Drew definitely wasn’t laughing a second later as she toppled to the ground. Fortunately for her, she landed in one of two oversized cardboard boxes where she’d packed a variety of throw pillows that Eric had always complained were more of a pain in the ass than decorative.