by Addison Cole
She shifted her eyes away. “I…Um. I just came to hang out for a while.”
“Stay with me.”
“I don’t know. You looked pretty busy down there.” She ran her finger over the steering wheel. When the car ahead of her pulled onto the road and her car rolled forward, Tony walked alongside, gripping the door.
Something in her voice made him take a deeper look at her expression, and that’s when he noticed it. He’d been so excited to see her that he’d missed the conflicting emotions in her beautiful eyes.
“Please?”
“Tony…I’m…I’m not ready to give up the job in Australia.”
“I…” He hadn’t thought she’d still go. He hadn’t put Australia into the picture at all since last night. Why would she just give up on them like that? “I just want time with you.”
She sighed. “You came here to surf.” Despite the efforts he could see her making to restrain it, a smile curved her luscious lips.
And now he knew just how delicious they were. “Come on, Ames. It’ll be fun.”
Her finger tapped the steering wheel.
“We’ll take a walk and find the ugliest bathing suit.”
She smiled at that. She must have allowed that memory to resurface just as he had. The summer they were together they’d stalked the beach claiming they were seeking out the ugliest bathing suits as a cover for just wanting time alone. Their ruse had worked perfectly—their friends made fun of them for doing something so lame and never wanted to tag along. They couldn’t kiss in front of their friends, but after walking a mile down the beach, they kissed like kisses were food and they were starving.
“But after everything…”
“We need this, Ames.” He ran his knuckle down her cheek, and she closed her eyes for only a second, but that second was enough for him to know she was more on his side of the fence than not. “Please?”
They walked down the beach with the sun at their backs and silence filling the distance between them. Amy looked sexy and sweet, something only she could pull off so effortlessly. She wasn’t walking with tension in her steps, but Tony didn’t have to see the tension to know it existed.
The ease of their friendship was strained by the past. Tony didn’t have a goal when he’d asked Amy to stay with him. He just wanted to be with her, see where things went, in the same way he’d fallen in love with her all those years ago. He hadn’t planned it. He’d fallen more in love with her second after second, day after day, year after year. He hadn’t tried, and at first he hadn’t even realized it was happening. They’d been drawn together in a way that felt natural and very real.
Tony knew by the way her eyes were dragging over every person they walked past that Amy was searching for the ugliest suit. The thought made him smile. They no longer needed to use the game as a cover, and they were no longer confined by keeping their attraction a secret, but it felt as though they were facing new barriers. Barriers dividing the past from the present and another line of hurdles between the present and the future.
The summer they’d found each other, he’d known his feelings were bigger than anything he’d ever experienced, and now, despite the barriers that seemed insurmountable and the pain he knew lay in wait, those feelings rushed forward at breakneck speed, with the intensity of a board snapping in two, hard and fast.
Unstoppable.
Chapter Nine
“ORANGE BATHING SUIT,” Tony whispered in her ear.
Amy scanned the beach, glad for the distraction from her thoughts. Her eyes landed on an old man wearing neon-orange bathing trunks.
“That’s a winner.” She was so nervous that she had no idea how she was walking, much less talking. She silently prayed that Tony wouldn’t try to bring up the past, and battling with those thoughts were equally as determined wishes that things could go back to the way their relationship had been a week ago. When they were able to walk with his arm slung over her shoulder and her only worry was if it was because he liked her or if he was just being Tony. But she’d wanted answers, and now she had them—and she was glad she had them—but that didn’t make all this discomfort any easier.
She tried to focus on the positive. At least now she knew the truth.
She knew what just being Tony meant. He was protecting her, getting close in the only way he could, but she wasn’t ready to turn away her dream job for a tenuous relationship teetering on intangible things she wasn’t sure she could handle. And yet even having taken the job in Australia, she wanted more with Tony. She didn’t want to revisit the past, but she darn well wanted a future with him, even if she had no idea how to make it work. It was time to suck up her fear and face the music.
She reached for his hand, and for the first time ever, she felt the slightest hesitation in his grip. Was she pushing him away? Losing him over her unwillingness to face the past? The thought scared her. She drew in a breath of courage and walked closer to him. He glanced at her, the sun striking his bangs as they dusted his eyes, and his mouth quirked up in a half smile. She wrapped her other hand around his biceps. Leaning her cheek against his arm didn’t feel as unnatural as she feared it might after last night, and when he leaned down and kissed the top of her head, she knew everything had changed and stayed the same all at once.
Which only made whatever they were doing more confusing. But still she was unwilling to pull away and dissect it like she should.
“I’ve missed you,” Tony said as he kicked the surf.
“I’m always around.” She knew that wasn’t what he meant, but her nerves weren’t making it easy to find the right response.
“No. I mean I’ve missed you for all these years, Ames.” He gazed down at her with a piercing stare that told her exactly what he meant.
He wanted this. Her. Them.
She opened her mouth to respond, but no words came. He unlaced their fingers and draped an arm over her shoulder. When he pulled her against him, she felt like she was on the precipice of the past and the present. How could she cross that line without getting lost in the pain?
Tony stopped walking and turned her toward him. He slid his hands beneath her hair and tilted her head up. It was the same intimate caress that they’d shared so many times that summer, and it still made her insides hot and melty.
“Everyone has a past. I have mine, you have yours, and we have ours. No matter what it takes, I will prove to you that our past, no matter how hurtful, didn’t ruin the future we could have. Only we can either make that happen or run from it. It’s our decision this time, Amy. There are no outside influences that can push us one way or the other. There’s only you and me and what could be.”
Amy didn’t think as she went up on her toes and reached her hand around his neck. He met her halfway, and their lips came together in a warm and wonderful kiss, filled with passion and sprinkled with worry. It was sweet and rough at once, like the path they had to travel to figure out their lives.
When they finally drew apart, Tony pressed another soft kiss to her mouth, then her forehead, before settling his cheek against hers and whispering, “I’ve made my decision. I’m going to prove I’m your man.”
“Tony.”
He searched her eyes. She wished she could pretend she didn’t feel doubt or pain, but they were there, lingering in the corners of her mind.
“I’m not perfect, Amy, but I’m going to try.”
She trapped her lip between her teeth to steel herself against tears over the sincerity in his voice. Her dreams were coming true, and she was scared to pieces.
“All I ask is that if you decide you’re going to walk away this time, please, Amy, don’t go silently. Talk to me first. Give me a chance. I can’t take being thrown away again. Not by you. Not if I take down my walls and let you in.”
She lost the battle, and tears streamed down her cheeks. Tony wiped them away with his thumb. “Please,” he whispered.
She managed a nod, feeling sick to her stomach for having hurt him so badly. They began wal
king down the beach again, and she forced her voice to work. He deserved to hear what she’d been hiding behind for so long.
“I was scared.” She didn’t recognize the tentative strain in her voice, though it resonated with her feelings as she fought to tell Tony the truth.
“I know. So was I. I thought I’d lost you forever.”
“I was scared for you.” She felt his step falter a moment, then regain its momentum. “I was already worried about my father finding out about us, but then after I got pregnant, I worried that your father would use it against you.”
He squeezed her shoulder. “I could have handled him.”
She nodded. “I know. Even at twenty you were the most confident man I knew. It was one of the things that drew me in. Still does. I knew you could handle anything, but I didn’t want you to have to.”
“I understand,” he said quietly, and she wondered if he really did.
They walked in silence a little farther. “When I came to your school, I was going to tell you not to worry, that it wouldn’t change anything between us.” He paused as those words sank in. “But as an adult, I realize how misguided that was.”
Amy stopped walking. Misguided? Her entire world had changed that last night at the Cape. Her outlook, her goals, her desires. Everything. And now she was learning that he’d been misguided? How? Was their love misguided? After everything he’d said to her just now?
“I think I need to sit down.”
“Sure, of course.” They were on an empty stretch of beach. Tony led her up the shore to the crest of a hill. They sat in silence and watched the breaking waves.
Tony leaned back on his palms. Amy missed the comfort and closeness of his arm over her shoulder.
“Are you okay?” he asked. “I know it’s a lot to process. All of this. Us.”
“Yeah.” She was not okay. But she wanted to be.
“Amy, I know now what I couldn’t see clearly then. You can’t go through something like what we did without it changing who we are, at least on some level.” He slid his feet closer, leaned his arms over his knees, and folded his hands together. “But I wanted to be there with you, no matter what it meant.”
“I changed, Tony. I was barely hanging on when I got back to school. I tried to stuff all the hurt and the self-loathing into a box and shove it as far away as I could, but no matter how far I kicked it, it returned. And when I saw you…” Her eyes welled with fresh tears. This was so darn hard. How could she put into words what she felt? It was too much, too hurtful.
Tony put his arm around her. She drew strength from his touch, feeling guilty for doing so after the way she’d shut him out, and at the same time, feeling relieved that he was giving her another chance.
“I’ve never loved anyone like I love you, and everything hurt after that. It hurt to sleep, to eat, to think. To feel.” She turned away, ashamed by the constant flow of tears.
He drew her chin back toward him, and it was all Amy could do to look into his compassionate eyes and not break down sobbing. She reached for his other hand and held on tight.
“I’m so sorry. I know…” Tears blurred her vision. “I was scared. I didn’t know if I’d survive how empty and scared I felt, and I was so worried that I’d ruin your career, and you were just starting out and doing so well…”
He pulled her against his chest and caressed her back. “It’s okay,” he whispered.
“No. It isn’t, and it never was. I faked my way through the next few years, until faking it became so real that I could no longer tell the difference between who I really was and who I was pretending to be.”
“Oh, baby. I’m so sorry.” He pressed his lips to the top of her head, holding her cheek against his chest. “I never wanted you to experience that. It’s no way to live.”
She listened to his heartbeat, remembering all those nights they’d snuck out and fallen into each other’s arms, and afterward, how she’d lay on his chest and count his heartbeats beating in time with her own.
“It was the only way I could live…” Her voice faded into the sound of the waves.
“Are you still wearing that armor, Amy? Even with me?”
She shifted away from his chest and met his gaze. “I don’t know. It’s been so long that I’m no longer sure.”
He searched her eyes and then his became serious. “I know who you were, and I know the woman you are now. You know who I was, and I mean who I really was. Not the guy covering his feelings. Not the guy everyone else thought they knew.”
Amy felt the impact of his words, the intimacy of their relationship winding its way deeper into her. She did know him, and he knew her, better than anyone else ever could. She hated that she’d hurt him and hated hearing the pain in his voice now. She watched his lips move, and she had the overwhelming desire to climb into his lap and kiss the pain away, but she was unable to move.
“Together we can figure out who we are now. We can find the people we were before we lost…”
He lowered his eyes and she felt her chest tighten. He cleared his throat, and when he spoke again, his voice was not quite as solid.
“Before.” He met her gaze. “Together we can figure out who we are now, without our armor. Together we can become the people, the couple, we should be.”
She stayed where she was, sitting beside him and leaning across his chest, the weight of fourteen years pinning her in place.
“Do you want to see if we can salvage our relationship?” he asked. “Or do you only want a relationship with me if I can pretend the past never happened?”
She’d been asking herself that for the past hour. She’d been so in love with him for so long that she hadn’t considered that if they ever got back together, their relationship was dependent upon her confronting their past. And ever since they’d kissed, she’d thought of nothing else. She knew the only answer she could give was one he wouldn’t want to hear. How could she tell him that she didn’t know if she would ever be able to deal with the past? Or that she was scared they might not survive uncovering all the hurt they’d survived? How could she tell him that she feared that discussing it would cost her any chance she had with him? The longer she remained silent, the more worried his eyes became, and then, as if he were remembering a joke, his lips curved into a smile and he stroked her cheek.
“Take your time, babe. I deserve the torture.”
She wasn’t out to torture him, although this whole conversation was torturous for them both. She asked herself again how she could tell him the truth, and the answer became clear. Because the truth was the only answer she could give.
“I don’t know what I can handle. But I know I want you.”
Chapter Ten
“A DATE!” JENNA sat on the edge of Amy’s bed in a pair of daisy dukes and a purple tank top that made her tiny waist look even smaller. She fell onto her back, kicked her feet up in the air, and wiggled her purple toenails. “A real date with Tony. Oh, Amy, this is amazing!”
Amy stood in her closet, fidgeting with the edge of her shorts. “I don’t know about amazing, but…Who am I kidding? Yeah, it’s pretty amazing.” She was thrilled that Tony wanted to try to be like a normal couple. Date, talk, and see where things go. It was the talking part that frightened her. She really didn’t know what she was capable of handling without panicking. Or running away. She definitely did not want to run away. All of the excitement over Tony overshadowed her lingering indecision about the job in Australia. And now, as Leanna waltzed in and out of Amy’s closet, holding up dresses and outfits, and Bella paced the room, a whole new panic was setting in.
She couldn’t betray her friends’ trust any longer. When the past was put away completely—safely tucked away in the land of denial—she could pretend she wasn’t keeping such a big secret from them, but now that she and Tony had opened Pandora’s box, the guilt pressed in on her.
“This will be interesting, Amy. I mean, how do you decide if you stay at his cottage or yours?” Bella crossed her arms an
d stared up at the ceiling. “Or maybe you go back and forth. One night there, one night here.”
“But remember to close the windows,” Leanna said as she held up a blue sundress. “This would be pretty.”
Close the windows. Maybe she could close the windows on her past. Or rather, keep them closed and continue to pretend it never happened. Did her friends really need to know?
Jenna jumped off the bed and headed into the closet. “No. She needs something sexier.”
“Oh my gosh. Amy.” Bella grabbed her arm. Her blond hair was pinned up in a messy ponytail, and she was still wearing her bathing suit beneath her sundress. “You took the job in Australia. What will you tell Duke?”
She hadn’t thought that far ahead. To be fair to Duke, she probably needed to make a decision sooner rather than later. But she wasn’t ready to make a decision. Her heart screamed for her to stay with Tony, but they were like a garden that had just been seeded, and she wasn’t sure that one big storm wouldn’t wash them away. She needed time to think things through, and tonight she’d barely been able to think about getting dressed.
“It’s too early to worry about that, don’t you think? I mean, we’re just going on a date.” Now she was lying to herself and to her friends. She knew perfectly well that she and Tony were rekindling a summer of the deepest love she’d ever known, and the only love she’d ever wanted.
“When are you supposed to start the job?” Bella asked.
“December. I was going to give my clients enough notice to try to hire someone to replace me, well, the few who wouldn’t be able to continue working with me remotely.”
Jenna tugged at Amy’s T-shirt. “Take this off.”
Amy pulled her shirt over her head.
“Put this on.” Jenna handed her a slinky silver dress.
“I am not wearing that. This is Tony, remember? Think casual, comfortable, sexy but subtle. I don’t want to wear something that makes me feel like I’m someone I’m not.” I’m having enough trouble figuring out who I am at the moment. “I need a dress that says, It’s me, only better.” She reached past Jenna and pulled out a green print halter-top dress with a beaded neckline that gathered in the middle.