Tough Luck Hero

by Maisey Yates

  She had no doubt that Colton was strong enough to oppose that. Colton was the strongest man she had ever met. It wasn’t weakness that kept him where he was, it was actually an unimaginable strength. Self-sacrificing. Giving. She imagined him standing there, physically holding his family members together, keeping them from breaking apart, using everything he had in order to keep them whole.

  But he deserved more. That was the bottom line. Eventually, everyone would have to support themselves. She stood by that.

  As the meal wound down, and the hour came closer to the election results, Lydia could scarcely breathe. Suddenly, the insulation provided by the gathering felt claustrophobic.

  She edged to the periphery of the crowd, keeping watch to see if anyone noticed as she slipped away from the well-lit area and into the darkness. She took a deep breath as she walked across one of the expansive fields, headed out toward a clearing where she could see the moon shining on the ocean down below. This truly was a beautiful place to live. A beautiful place for a ranch. But it wasn’t Colton’s.

  She wondered if he would do it. If he would fold himself into that little box his father had prepared for him. If he would do everything that was expected of him, continue to sacrifice at the expense of himself.

  “Are you okay?”

  She knew it was Colton before she turned around. Part of her thought maybe she had felt him before she heard him. That she was just that connected to him now, whether she wanted to be or not. That was the real scary thing. That no matter what happened, even if she did go home to her own house tonight, even if she did wake up just Lydia, not the mayor, not Colton’s wife, things still wouldn’t have gone back to normal.

  She was changed. Fundamentally, from the inside out. He had changed her. Had taken all of the spaces she had carved out for herself, to simply be Lydia, and somehow imprinted his name all over them.

  That was terrifying. On a soul-deep level nothing else had ever been.

  “I’m fine,” she said, taking a deep breath and turning to face him. He was a stark, dark silhouette against the brightly lit party, broad-shouldered and slim-waisted. Basically, the hottest man she had ever seen. “Did I win?”

  “No announcement yet. You look like you’re going to win.” He took a couple steps toward her, and her lungs contracted, all of her breath disappearing into the velvet night. “I thought you might actually want to hear that before you went back for the announcement. I thought you might need a minute to prepare.”

  She felt dizzy all of a sudden. Both with the revelation that she was actually pulling this off, and with the simple truth that Colton knew she would need this. That success was going to be almost as terrifying as failure. “Several minutes,” she said, putting her hand flat on her stomach. “Actually, a few hours, a drink. That would be nice.”

  He grabbed hold of her chin, tilting it upward. “A kiss?”

  She swallowed hard. “I guess so.”

  He leaned in, the press of his mouth against hers warm, comforting, sending a wave of sensation through her body. She could exist like this forever. Then she wouldn’t have to worry about the future. Wouldn’t have to worry about what it meant to realize that she would never go back to how she’d been in her pre-Colton existence. Wouldn’t have to worry about all of the changes that lay ahead.

  It was so tempting to sink into him completely. So tempting to just melt into him. When had she started to depend on him so much? That was what all of this came down to. The scattered, strange emotion she had been having ever since they arrived suddenly crystallized, forming one clear picture.

  She was dependent on him. She had come to Copper Ridge to make an independent life for herself, and she had managed to do that for close to a decade. Now, suddenly she found herself utterly welded to this man, afraid that she would never be able to separate herself from him again.

  She was going to win. She was going to win and she was going to have to stay with him like this. And it was only going to get worse. More intense. She didn’t possess any self-control where he was concerned—she knew that beyond a shadow of a doubt. If she did, she wouldn’t be married to him. If she did, she wouldn’t be sleeping with him. Suddenly, getting everything she wanted seemed like it might actually be a disaster.

  Lydia pulled away from him, her heart thundering in her chest. “Colton—”

  A scream rose up from the direction of the party. Not a party kind of scream. A terrified scream. Colton’s body jerked toward the direction, then he turned and looked at her. “Go,” she said, lifting the front of her dress and following him as quickly as she could back toward the lights, back toward the crowd.

  Sierra.

  That was Lydia’s first thought. That Sierra had gone into horrible, hideous labor now, at this party. Sweet, wonderful Sierra, who was being tricked just like everyone else and was now probably in pain.

  The TV was playing loudly, the election results being read out now. And, at the same time, the guests had all crowded around a person who was lying on the grass. It was not Sierra, who was standing on the edge of the tight group of people, her hand resting on her stomach, her face full of concern.

  Lydia could see Maddy, down on her knees in front of the inert figure. And when Lydia moved to the side, she could see that the person who had collapsed was Nathan West.

  “Has someone called an ambulance?” Colton asked, breaking through the people and kneeling down beside his father.

  “Yes,” Maddy said. “And Mom is inside, lying down. Genevieve is with her.”

  Lydia had no idea who Genevieve was, but she supposed it didn’t matter.

  It didn’t take long for the paramedics to arrive. When they did, they had everyone take a step back, including Colton, who came to stand beside her. The TV was still going in the background, and as Nathan West was taken away from the party on a stretcher, Lydia dimly heard that she had been declared the winner of the election. That Lydia Carpenter was the new mayor of Copper Ridge.

  Her head felt fuzzy; it felt like everything around her was echoing. She had no idea how to process any of this. Had no idea how to exist in a moment that had her feeling so torn in two.

  “I have to go to the hospital,” Colton said.

  He didn’t say we. He said that he had to go. And she supposed that this was her out. A chance to establish some distance. To take stock of what had just occurred. But she couldn’t. She couldn’t leave him.

  “I’m going with you,” she said.

  He just looked at her, his blue eyes filled with fear. “Thank you.”

  * * *

  LYDIA HATED HOSPITALS. Hated them. She avoided them at all costs, though she supposed everyone did. But she really, really hated them. It was still hard for her to set foot inside. It always reminded her of the last time Frannie had gone into the hospital. Of how she had never come home. Of how they had left the hospital forever changed. A family of three instead of a family of four. Of how she had left feeling like half of herself was missing. A half that would never be regained.

  But this was for Colton. She was here for Colton, and she couldn’t back out now.

  When they arrived, Maddy was already there, having ridden in the ambulance. A few moments later, Ace and Sierra arrived. “Is Mom coming?” Colton asked.

  “Tomorrow,” Sierra said. “I didn’t think it was a good idea for her to come tonight, and she agreed.”

  Lydia couldn’t fathom letting your husband lie in a hospital bed by himself. But then, she supposed, given the fact that this particular husband had had a child with another woman and kept it from his wife for years and seemed to treat his wife more like an accessory than a partner, it was safe to say they didn’t have a conventional union.

  Sierra took a seat and her husband stood behind her, rubbing her shoulders. She put her hand over his, the gesture so casually caring. They were
like that all the time. Lydia had to wonder what it would be like. To have someone care about you like that, constantly. To have someone look to you first when the world was in turmoil. To have someone reach out to you as the storm raged around you.

  Lydia had spent so many years alone in the storm.

  Her family fought through the wind and the rain in isolation. And here the West family was, all together in this, even though they had differences and a million disagreements.

  She was very aware of the fact that she wasn’t touching Colton. If Sierra or Madison noticed, they certainly weren’t going to say anything. Not now. Likely, they didn’t notice at all.

  She thought about reaching out and taking hold of his hand again, but then she just couldn’t. Her hand felt like it was made of lead, like she couldn’t lift up her arm.

  “Did they tell you anything, Madison?” Colton asked.

  Maddy shook her head, gripping her elbows, looking as though she wanted to fold in on herself. The incomparable Madison so rarely looked at a loss. But now she looked small and pale. “Nothing yet. He’s stable. But I’m waiting for more information.”

  “Did he have a heart attack?” This question came from Sierra.

  Madison frowned. “I just said I didn’t know.”

  “I’m speculating,” Sierra said.

  “I’d venture to say the speculation isn’t all that helpful,” Maddy responded.

  Ace looked up at Madison, his gaze sharp. “I think that’s enough.”

  “Killing each other is maybe not the best course of action at the moment,” Colton said, his tone even and steady. “We just have to wait and see.”

  His words seemed to calm both of his sisters. She imagined they were used to looking to him for guidance. That was his position. The place that he assumed in the family. She had gotten an even closer look at the dynamics tonight than she had over the past weeks of living with and interacting with Colton.

  Their father was thoroughly self-absorbed. He was a self-described pillar of the community, and while a good portion of the town had bought into that, she felt that no one bought the myth of Nathan West more than Nathan himself.

  Their mother was something beautiful and breakable to be protected at all costs. And someone had to stand strong for Maddy and Sierra.

  She could see that Colton was bound and determined to stand in every gap.

  And that he had done so perfectly, admirably for all these years.

  Minutes turned into hours, and Lydia began to feel like her rear end was welded to the pink hospital chair she’d been sitting in ever since they arrived. Colton was leaning forward in his own seat, his chin resting in his hands. He was radiating weariness, the lines on his face more pronounced than they usually were. She wanted to reach out and smooth them, to find a way to relieve some of his stress. To take some of this burden from him.

  At some point, a doctor appeared, and asked if she could talk to Colton privately in the hospital room.

  Sierra and Maddy watched him leave, their eyes glued to the door, waiting for him, and news, to appear. Lydia could hardly stand it. It was too reminiscent of the night her sister died. Too awful and tense, and most especially egregious because this wasn’t actually her family. Because she was here under false pretenses, because she was sitting here like she was a part of something that she just wasn’t.

  The doors to the emergency room slid open, and Lydia looked up. It was Jack Monaghan. His blue eyes were filled with concern and matched Colton’s in a way that she had not fully appreciated until this moment. Until Colton’s eyes had become so intimately familiar to her.

  “I heard what happened,” he said, stuffing his hands into his pockets. He hung back, clearly uncertain about whether or not he should be here.

  “Sit down,” Maddy said.

  He nodded once, crossing the space and taking his position with the family. Now she felt even worse. Even more of an interloper. These moments, these difficult, crushing moments that they were experiencing didn’t deserve to have a witness who was nothing more than an imposter.

  “I don’t know if he would want me to be here,” Jack said. “But I felt like I needed to be.”

  “Thank you for coming, Jack,” Sierra said.

  He forced a smile. “I told Kate not to come until morning. She’s...well, in about the same boat you are.”

  “Exhausted?” Sierra asked.

  “Yes.”

  Colton was in the hospital room for about forty minutes, and when he appeared, he looked grim. Sierra, Maddy and Jack all stood. Lydia stayed rooted to her seat.

  “He had a stroke,” Colton said, moving closer to the waiting area. “They’re doing what they can to minimize the damage. It’s a good thing he made it to the hospital right away. But it was pretty massive. They don’t know what he’ll recover, and what he won’t. It’s just too soon to say.” He looked like he wanted to say more, but didn’t. His eyes landed on Jack. “Thanks for coming.” He echoed what Sierra had already said.

  “Family is a helluva thing,” Jack said. “But it is a thing.”

  “True.”

  “Whether or not he wants me to be, I’m his son.”

  There was no ignoring Nathan West’s sins, not even now as he lay unconscious in a hospital bed. His sins were real, living, breathing. They had affected everyone here. And yet, they all stood by him. A testament more to them than to him. The strength of this family overwhelmed her. Awed her.

  “We could probably all go home,” Colton said. “I’m not sure there’s going to be any other changes tonight.”

  Nobody made a move to go. And as long as Colton was here, Lydia would be here too.

  The doors to the emergency room opened again, and Lydia felt like she was experiencing a moment of déjà vu. Because this was another man who looked startlingly similar to Colton. The same height, breadth and blue eyes. His hair was darker though, and he didn’t have the same sort of civility that Colton carried himself with. There was something raw about him, and it wasn’t just his torn jeans, black cowboy hat or the dark band tattooed on his forearm.

  Something in Colton tensed, his manner changing completely. Like a dog who had spotted danger, his hackles were raised, his hands clenched into fists. “This has to be a joke,” he said, his voice low.

  “I’m not here to have a fistfight with you in the emergency room of a hospital,” the other man said.

  Based on the family resemblance and Colton’s anger, Lydia could make a fairly educated guess about who the newcomer was. It didn’t seem possible. Not after he’d been gone for so long. But this could only be Gage West.

  “Then why are you here?”

  “I was contacted by Dad’s lawyer,” Gage said.

  Lydia looked at Maddy and Sierra. They were both white-faced, their lips blue around the edges. For his part, Gage barely flicked them a glance. His younger sisters, who had to have been children the last time he’d seen them, and he was barely giving a nod to their existence. But then, based on what Colton had said about him, she couldn’t be too surprised that Gage had a self-absorbed streak.

  “How did he know where to find you?”

  “I’ve kept in contact.”

  “Not with us,” Colton said.

  “With Dad’s lawyer.”

  “Well, great. I hate to break it to you, but Dad’s still alive. So if you were expecting to show up and collect some money...”

  “I’m sure you would enjoy that,” Gage said. “But I don’t have any interest in Dad’s money. I do have an interest in a few things, though. But I’m not going to discuss them here, not with you.”

  “I don’t think you’ve earned the right to be cagey with me,” Colton said. “It may have escaped your notice, but you walked into a situation that was being handled. A situation that has been handled
for the past seventeen years. We didn’t need you to come back in to handle things. I’m not going to apologize for assuming you’re here for money.”

  “If I gave a damn about Dad’s money I never would have left in the first place.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  “Responsibility.”

  “That’s a joke. You haven’t cared about responsibility at all from the moment you left. You left all of us to deal with life on our own, so don’t barge in here now like some busted-ass savior ready to rescue us. If we waited around for you things would have fallen apart a long time ago.”

  Lydia felt like she was on the verge of panicking. It wasn’t fair. She knew it wasn’t fair. This was something major and terrible that was happening to Colton; it wasn’t happening to her. But she shouldn’t be here. She shouldn’t be here witnessing this. She wasn’t anything to him, wasn’t anything to them.

  It was just too much. It was too big, too real. It had nothing to do with her and still it reached beneath her protective layer and squeezed at her heart, threatened to crack her open completely.

  She couldn’t do it. She just couldn’t do it. She should never have been here in the first place. This was for the West family, and she had inserted herself into it, under the guise of helping Colton keep the peace, but really just to serve her own ambitions.

  Now she was mayor. She had accomplished everything she had set out to accomplish, maybe because she had ended up getting the endorsement of Nathan West. Possibly because of her marriage. She would never know.

  And now she was here, taking up space during this tense moment between family members. Taking a space she didn’t deserve. A space she wasn’t equal to.

  She stood up, and no one seemed to notice. Then, she slowly extricated herself from the group. It was Madison who saw her. Madison who made eye contact, whose expression spoke loudly. With accusation. With understanding. Lydia ignored it.

  She turned and walked out of the emergency room. The early-morning air was sharp, cutting into her like glass. She wrapped her arms around herself, trying to hold herself together. It was up to her to hold herself together. Colton had enough on his plate, was preserving enough things. He didn’t need to preserve her too.