by Liz Talley
He closed his eyes. “I’m not asking for your heart, Renny. I’m not asking for anything but the possibility of what the next week or two could bring. Can we leave it at that? Can we just be for the next few weeks without trying to define things?”
“Sounds rather convenient for you.”
“No. Not convenient, but necessary. At least from my vantage point.”
“So you want me to be with you with no expectations?”
“Yeah. I mean, no.”
Her laugh was dry. “You don’t know what you want, and I understand. Ever since you came back and those old stirrings cropped up, things are cloudy, but you can’t expect me to take all the risk.”
He released her. “Don’t say you won’t see me. I like having you—”
“Be your comfy pants?”
He smiled. “That was a bad analogy.”
“You think?” She picked up the rod she’d abandoned and started for the truck.
“I didn’t mean it as an insult. I like comfy pants and I need you, Renny. More than you know.”
She turned back and looked at him silhouetted against the pond. “I don’t trust myself around you.”
“The feeling’s mutual, but it’s like the top has been ripped off the past and I can’t stop what’s coming out...even if I want to. Maybe this is why I never came home—I didn’t want to feel the way I felt when I left. All that resentment toward my father, that betrayal by my mother, and then there was you.”
The anguish in his voice swayed her, made her doubt throwing up any walls, but she knew that, like the ocean, being with Darby would be treacherous—it could bring destruction and leave her broken on the rocks. Things had happened so fast she didn’t want to pull on a bikini and plunge into the waves without thought. Better to stay on the beach and wade into the tide slowly. “But I didn’t hurt you. I had nothing to do with what happened. And I can’t heal you.”
He turned his head to the pond, giving her his profile. “Guess I’ll have to live with what I’ve created.”
She turned and walked to the truck and whispered, “But can I?”
* * *
DARBY STARED AT THE CELL phone he’d tossed onto his bed. Not good.
He’d finally talked to Shelby, and it hadn’t been fun. She hadn’t been very sympathetic to his plight of being confused about their potential future. In fact, she’d been a little aggravated—not something he’d heard from her in all the time they’d spent together in Spain. But could he blame her?
Especially when he’d told her he needed to postpone the job interview, put everything on hold in regards to Seattle until he could figure out what he wanted. He’d also told her he couldn’t commit to a future with her. Wasn’t exactly fair, but it was honorable. He couldn’t move forward until he figured out an answer to the two questions Renny had thrown at him earlier that evening—who he was and what he wanted in life.
At that moment, he was answer-free.
And feeling a little guilty he’d strung Shelby along, unintentionally or not.
Because he’d heard the hurt in her voice when he’d given her the news.
“Well, should I come down to Louisiana? Sounds like you need someone on your side. I’ll be happy to be your shoulder, Darby.” Her words were exactly what he wanted to hear, but Shelby’s shoulder would be one more complication he didn’t need. Yeah, the last thing he wanted was his now ex-girlfriend on the front porch with her engaging smile and warm nature.
God, why did life have to be so complex?
He’d thought divorcing Renny would be easy, that he’d feel next to nothing when he saw her. Instead, he’d been slammed by feelings he’d buried deep inside him—pressed down, folded like a forgotten love note tucked in a drawer of his heart. And he wanted her. Burned for her. Taste, touch, smell—all of the senses ignited around her. So he couldn’t go to Seattle and start a new life with Shelby. Not until he emptied himself of the past.
“Don’t worry,” he’d told Shelby. “I’ll figure things out. I’m just stuck between two worlds right now, you know? I don’t want you or your father waiting on me. Not fair to either one of you.”
“What are you saying? You aren’t coming here at all?” Her voice had held panic.
“I’m not saying anything for sure, but I don’t want to lead you on a wild-goose chase, Shelby. At this juncture, I’m still planning on Seattle, but that could change. Louisiana is a sticky situation.” Like I had sex with my secret wife. And I might be falling back in love with her. And I might have missed home more than I thought I did. And I might never see you again.
Somehow he didn’t think Shelby would appreciate that last unspoken bit so he didn’t say it.
“I should come down there. I have a month before I start my new job.”
“No, there’s nothing you can do, Shelby.” Except muddle the water.
“Darby.” Her voice lowered, and he felt crappy at the little lost girlness of her tone. “What about us?”
“Shelby, this sounds really selfish, but there can be no us right now. I’m telling you this because I totally respect you. You’re a wonderful friend, and I had hoped we might move in a more intimate direction, but I can’t right now. I’m sorry.”
Silence had sat on the line for a few seconds.
“If that’s what you want, but I’m not giving up on seeing you climb off that airplane. I know we could be good together, but I won’t force you to be with me.” Her voice sounded determined, and an inkling of worry cropped up. Shelby was sweet, kind and obviously not as passive as one would think.
“You’re no consolation prize, Shelby. I would never treat you as such. I care for you too much. I need to be sure before I come to Seattle. If I come to Seattle.”
And the conversation had ended with a thud. Like the other shoe dropping. Or a dog crapping in the pristine white of newly fallen snow.
Nothing pretty about cutting a person loose.
But he couldn’t have both worlds.
He’d have to choose.
But not tonight.
And not tomorrow.
And probably not the next day.
He’d thought on the way home from Renny’s about her firm stance she wouldn’t risk her heart. His rebuttal was they needed time, and hopefully, time would lead to clarity. If Shelby found someone else, then it validated what he felt. If Renny found someone else, he’d trip the guy, drag him into a dark alley and beat him down.
Something about that last thought told him about the direction he headed, but he didn’t want to admit his initial plan of divorcing Renny, leaving Bayou Bridge and carving out a new life on the West Coast was wrong. Maybe because he’d sat down, listed pros and cons, talked ad nausem with Hal and Shelby, and made this commitment to himself—that he would not go home to Bayou Bridge. That he was done with his former home. Done with his former life. Done with his former love.
Not yet. His mind whispered.
Maybe not ever. His heart echoed.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
DARBY SAT READING THE Bayou Bridge newspaper and sipping chicory coffee in the kitchen of Beau Soleil. Not much was going on in town, though it seemed like the Bayou Bridge Rebels were facing a huge football showdown with St. Thomas Aquinas later that week, which meant that Abram would be busier than usual. Darby hadn’t had much opportunity to visit with Abram who was occupied with his team and the new life he’d built in their hometown. During their lunch Abram hadn’t even talked about football, only his girlfriend Lou’s upcoming band gig at a country-and-western bar in Leesville in a few weeks.
So not like his brother who lived, ate and breathed football, but he guessed love did strange things to a fellow.
Love.
Scary word.
“Hey, I missed you at dinner last night,” his mother said from the open doorway, interrupting his musings on love, football and the lack of news in Bayou Bridge. “Thought having you here would mean actually seeing you.”
Guilt flashed as he set the pa
per on the table. Funny, how he’d not felt much guilt until coming home. “Yeah, sorry about that. I took Renny fishing.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. Uh, just trying to burn old bridges.”
“Is that what you call it?” Picou picked up a framed photo of him and his brothers sitting on the desk next to the window that overlooked the tree he’d used to sneak out many a night. “I would think spending lots of time with an old flame would burn something...just not bridges.”
He tilted himself back in his chair, drawing a frown from his mother, so he thumped back onto all four legs. “We just went fishing.”
“Fishing? Well, Renny always liked being outdoors, didn’t she? Guess her job choice suits her.”
“Why did you let Dad split us up?”
His mother sighed and joined him at the table. “You’re really wading through stuff, aren’t you?”
“I think I might need bigger galoshes—the crap’s pretty deep. Maybe the truth will help.”
“The truth is easy. Your father tired of you gallivanting all over the parish, tearing things up, drinking yourself into a stupor and acting like a boy who had a death wish. Truth.”
Darby regarded her with little expression. How did that help clarify anything? “Couldn’t we have talked about it instead of packing my bags for military school? Pretty radical to make me feel like I’d screwed up so badly you didn’t want me anymore.”
His mother smiled and laid a hand on his, giving a gentle tap. “Is that what you really thought? I didn’t want you around? And how conveniently you forget the talking we’d done over the years.”
Fine. He knew his mother loved him. And if he tried hard enough, he could remember lots of talking. His father strutting around the library, shaking a thick finger at a boy who’d rather eat glass than do as his parents suggested. “Guess I heard only what I wanted to hear. Felt what I wanted to feel.”
“You were stubborn—and angry,” Picou said, fiddling with the end of the braid that trailed down her shoulder. Her blue eyes were starting to fade and it struck Darby that she was close to sixty-five years of age. Mothers weren’t supposed to get old. They were supposed to stay the same. Forever.
“But you could have stopped him.”
She shrugged, dropping her braid. “Maybe, but I couldn’t wholly disagree with him. You were intent on proving to everyone you could do as you wished. I didn’t want to lose another child, and many of your shenanigans were death defying...like you wanted to die. So many brushes with death wear a parent down.”
“I was just a kid.”
“A kid with survivor’s guilt. A kid trying to prove he was infallible.”
Darby shook his head. “No, I wasn’t guilty I had lived and Della hadn’t, or at least we thought she hadn’t. I just didn’t like Dad trying to control me.”
“Protect you,” Picou murmured, sliding a hand to his hair, smoothing an imaginary cowlick with motherly intent. “You couldn’t see what losing Della did to your father. He was a man who’d lost control of a world he’d always run with an iron fist. Having a child taken and presumed murdered rocks your world in a way that’s unexplainable. Some may have channeled energy into pursuing and finding the culprit, but your father drew a shield around his family and tried to keep what he had left.”
“But he smothered me.”
Picou sighed. “Yes, he did. But that wasn’t his intent, just an unfortunate result.”
“You would think he wouldn’t send me away if he wanted to protect me.”
“You would think, but as you now see, being an adult is rather complex. Your father and I were having problems in our marriage—problems that started when Della disappeared. It’s not easy to live with grief and it set a gulf between us.”
Darby felt a weight in his gut. A child never knew what parents felt—until he got older and the rosy glasses of childhood were broken by the reality of a life that had sharp corners and deep potholes.
“By the time you hit high school, your father wasn’t well. The doctors put him on medication, but his heart was weak. He’d already failed in controlling you, and he’d already looked at various military schools he thought could do what he could not. Even though it would take you away from us, it would take away the temptations you liked to court here in Bayou Bridge.”
Renny. Yeah, she’d definitely been temptation with her wide smile and sexy laugh—she’d hooked him and reeled him in as easily as she had that bass last evening. But, she hadn’t been a bad influence, quite the opposite. Renny had been smart and ambitious with high grades and scholarship offers on the horizon. She’d also been down-to-earth, easy to like and destined for good things. “But Renny wasn’t holding me back.”
“No, she wasn’t. You were holding her back.”
Ouch.
“So you sent me away because I was a bad influence on Renny? You lied and kept us from each other because—”
“No, because you both needed to grow up. That accident nearly killed her and her mother agreed not to press charges against you if we would keep you away from her daughter, and, honestly, honey, you needed to leave Bayou Bridge for a while. Gaining maturity wasn’t going to happen where you were comfortable.”
He stood and walked toward the antique chest his mother had bought him that had once sat in his bedroom, but now served as a coffee table in the new seating area his mother had created in lieu of the old banquette. He’d loved that trunk and hadn’t wanted to take it with him, thinking he’d be back soon.
His mother had taken him to New Orleans for Mardi Gras when he was nine, and he’d seen the old steamer trunk in the window of an antique store and had become fascinated with the brass fittings and intricate silver-plate placard. Picou had taken him inside and bought it without blinking an eye. She’d later sat him on an iron bench as they waited for the streetcar and told him it was a portent. She’d known it meant he would go far and wide before he found his home.
He’d thought she was cuckoo—he’d wanted it because he loved pirate tales and wondered if there might be secret compartments with treasure maps.
But maybe she’d been right.
Maybe he’d spent over a decade living away so he could become the man he was—a man who was a bit confused about his direction, but outfitted with a compass and knowledge that he could find his way.
Darby turned and studied his mother as she perched on a bar stool, eyebrows lifted slightly, as if she expected his answer, so he gave it to her. “I guess I see your point.”
“Do you?”
“Your hands were tied.”
“Partly. We could have let the chips fall where they may, but your father, along with the judge and district attorney, thought giving you a new perspective would be best.” She paused, a ghost of remembrance in her eyes. “It wasn’t easy sending you away. Lord knows I begged your father to change his mind, but he saw what I could not. My only regret was hurting that girl. Renny never deserved to think you didn’t care.”
“And I didn’t deserve to be kept from the girl I loved.”
Rising, she came to him and gave him a pat. “And I’m trying like the devil to give you a second chance. It’s the main reason I didn’t pitch a fit about you missing dinner.”
He shook his head. “Mom, what is or isn’t between me and Renny isn’t your concern. You can’t fix the past. Renny and I are two different people on two different paths.”
“Oh, pish. Like you can’t merge two paths. Makes for easier traveling when you’re walking the path with someone who fits you like an old comfortable—”
For a moment he thought she might say pair of pants.
“—shoe.”
“I don’t think Renny would like being compared to a shoe, Mom.”
“I have a fondness for a good pair of shoes, so I don’t find it insulting in the least. Feel free to call me an old shoe any day of the week.” With one last pat she waltzed out the door. Like literally waltzed, keeping time with a one, two, three count.
/> Darby shook his head and glanced back at the trunk. Journeys were odd. A person could set out knowing where he was headed and then end up in a ditch or on the wrong road, or in an unexpected place of rightness. The question was did he want to backtrack and take the road to Bayou Bridge, the road back to the girl who still sparked something within him?
Or a new road promising a whole new life?
He wished the answer would appear, but the kitchen of his childhood held no answers. Maybe he needed to talk to someone who could give him perspective, so he walked up to his room, grabbed his cell and called the person he knew would shoot it to him straight.
“Yo, buddy! How’s life on the bayou?” was the greeting he received from Hal Severson. After several minutes of chatting about the new JAG Corp officer, Della and the progress he’d made with her, he moved into murkier waters and told Hal about Renny and the fact they were married—and that he’d rediscovered feelings for her.
“Dude, that’s the strangest thing I’ve ever heard,” Hal said. “You’re married? And you didn’t know it?”
“Looks like it,” Darby said, kicking off his shoes and lying back on the just-made bed. Hal might have some good insight, and Darby trusted him.
“Wow, that blows the mind.”
For a few seconds, his friend was silent. “So you’re saying there wasn’t much closure between you and this girl, and now you’re into her again? What about Shelby? Thought she looked like part of your future?”
“She did. I mean, she does. I’m not sure about anything anymore, Hal. That’s why I called you. Thought you might give me a different perspective. Around here, I feel like everyone’s pushing me toward Renny.”
“Why?”
“Because of the way things were left between us. My mom thinks that if she fixes the past—it’s part of this prophecy she got from a voodoo priestess—she can have everything the way it should be...with a cherry on top.”
“A voodoo priestess?”
“Don’t ask,” Darby said, wishing he hadn’t brought that up. “Thing is I still feel connected to Renny, and these feelings I have are really intense.”