“Okay.”
“Anyway, it’s not serious between us. We’re both adults and we didn’t go into this looking for romance.”
Even though that was true, it didn’t feel like the whole truth. Things had changed for him and it was going to hurt like hell to say goodbye. She had no idea how much it would hurt, and he didn’t plan to tell her. If he’d fallen in love with her, that was his own damn fault.
No ifs about it. He had fallen in love with her. But he’d take that secret with him back to Texas.
“Maybe she could come with us,” Dylan said, surprising him.
“You like Kate, huh?”
“Yeah. She’s kind of my lawyer. She never looks at me all judgy like some people do.”
Another testimonial to the amazingness of Kate. “She’s pretty damn cool. But like I said, she’s doing her own thing. She’s a California girl. You should hear her go on about brunch.”
He stepped closer to Dylan and dropped a hand on his shoulder. “Anyway, this decision is about you. You and me.”
Dylan looked up with one of his sudden, rare smiles. “I still can’t believe you’d move for me.”
The stunned wonder in his voice made Darius want to hit something. Had the boy been an afterthought his whole life? Hadn’t anyone ever put him first?
He remembered some of the things Kate had said about her childhood, and suddenly understood why she and Dylan had hit it off so well. She understood Dylan in a way he probably never would.
“Believe it, kid.” He hesitated, searching for the right words. “I’m late to this father thing, so I have to make up for it. And I’m going to. From now on, I’m a father first, before anything else. Understand?” He didn’t want to get sappy, but he needed Dylan to know he was serious.
Dylan nodded, his wide eyes glued to Darius’ face.
Darius squeezed his shoulder again, then added lightly, “We might want to find another sport besides hockey, though.”
“Yeah.” Dylan pulled away the ice pack and handed it back to him. “Or maybe we can skip the sports. Kate said you’re a good bass player. I was learning guitar before Mom died, but I didn’t bring it with me. Maybe…”
“Say no more.” Darius pulled out his phone and punched in the name of Lost Harbor’s only music store. “We’ll find you a guitar. We can have a jam session with Harris Badger, he’s a kickass fiddle player. He and I play backup for Gretel sometimes—”
He broke off as it occurred to him that there would be no more Lost Harbor jam sessions for him. No more Lost Harbor Puffins, either. No more bantering with the local police chief. No more town council meetings. No more hanging out at Gretel’s Cafe or the Olde Salt. No more Lost Harbor at all.
And worst of all, exponentially worse, unimaginably worse—no more Kate.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Whistling, Kate reached into the back of the Ford truck for one of the new raspberry canes that Emma had ordered. Since peonies bloomed year after year—sometimes as long as seventy years—no more new bushes were needed. To scratch her planting itch, her adventurous grandma had decided to try some raspberries. It was a bright sunshiny day and they’d be better off under cover, out of the brilliant sun, until they could be planted.
It was a time-sensitive task, and Emma was in town at a doctor’s appointment, and neither S.G. nor Dylan was available. Perfect timing for Darius to show up and lend a hand.
But as soon as she caught sight of his sober expression, she knew something was wrong. He didn’t have to say those lovely words, “We need to talk.” They were written all over his face.
And then other words were coming from his mouth, but the world had turned strange and surreal and she barely took them in.
Moving to Texas. With Dylan. Leaving in a few days.
A few days.
Leaving.
Leaving her. As if their relationship meant nothing. As if she meant nothing.
“Wow, big news,” she managed. On autopilot, she lifted a burlap-wrapped cane from the bed of the truck and set it into the red wheelbarrow.
“We just decided this morning. I wanted to tell you right away.”
She barely heard him. This feeling—this horrible helpless rejected feeling—it was so familiar. She’d grown up with it and she knew exactly how to handle it.
Make it not matter.
She and Darius had no commitment to each other. They’d never spoken about a future together. They were both jaded grownups who knew the drill. It didn’t matter if he left. But it hurts.
Make it not matter.
She could do this. Cool under pressure, that was her. Bluff your way through. Fake it until you make it.
“S.G.’s going to miss Dylan,” she said. Her voice sounded strange to her own ears, but hopefully not to his.
Darius studied her for a moment, while she schooled her expression as if she were facing a Superior Court judge. Show nothing. No weakness. No vulnerability.
“We’re hoping she can visit.” Stepping to her side, Darius grabbed two of the raspberry canes, one under each arm, and loaded them into the wheelbarrow.
Oh sure. Visit. S.G. could visit. That’s who they were worried about.
Feeling almost savage, Kate stalked back to the truck. “Sounds fun. I’m sure she’d love to see another part of the country. Especially one that’s so different from Alaska. I doubt she’s ever experienced temperatures above seventy. Should be quite the adventure—” She broke off as Darius put a hand on her arm and spun her around. “Hey!”
“Are you upset, Kate?” The softness in his deep voice nearly made her snap.
“Upset? Why would I be upset? I’m sure S.G. would love that.”
Something flinched across his face, and she realized that some of her inner fury was leaking out.
“Maybe you could come with her.” A tentative suggestion, nothing more.
“Maybe. Like a chaperone or something. She certainly can’t travel by herself, she’s never been on an airplane. I’ll consider that.” His touch on her arm felt like torture, all that warmth and strength that would never be hers again.
She freed her arm and returned to unloading the truck.
“Kate…”
“Yes, Darius?”
“It’s not…it has nothing to do with…that is…” He dragged one hand through his thick hair, leaving a smudge of potting soil on his forehead.
She could guess what he was trying to say, but she refused to help him out. If he was going to spring this on her, the least he could do was express it in his own words.
“I have to do what seems best for Dylan.”
“Of course you do.” Her fierceness seemed to take him by surprise.
“Then you aren’t…are you…okay with this?”
“Of course I am.”
Of course she wasn’t. He was leaving, without any warning at all. Just—up and leaving. After she’d let down all her protective shields and given him her trust. She never did that. She knew better.
On the other hand, the logical side of her agreed with his decision. He’d just become a father without any warning at all. He was trying to readjust his life to that new reality. He wanted to do his best for the son he’d just discovered. He was trying to do the right thing, and that was Darius in a nutshell.
And she loved him for it. Loved him so much it hurt.
And hated him for it too, because he was leaving.
Grow up. She busied herself with a raspberry cane, her face shielded by the burlap sack. This is how things go. We’re not committed to each other. I don’t know how he feels about me. I don’t know how I feel about him.
No, that was a lie. She knew exactly how she felt about him. She loved him. She loved him wildly and passionately. And most of all, she deeply, deeply respected him.
Which meant that she shouldn’t make “doing the right thing” difficult for him. Using every speck of her willpower and self-composure, she forced her lips into a smile and straightened up to face him.
“I truly respect your decision, Darius. You’re a good man. You’re a good father. You’re putting Dylan first and I completely support that. Without hesitation.”
He absorbed her words, holding her gaze with a searching intensity that made her nervous. She didn’t want him to see what was going on behind her calm facade. She didn’t want him to second-guess his decision.
“You don’t have to worry about me,” she said brusquely. “I’m a big girl and we always knew this was just a…” She ran out of words at that point. “Thing,” she ended weakly.
“Kate, it was never just a ‘thing’ to me.” His deep voice, the voice that had offered her so much kindness and strength, so many hot, sexy growls, made this infinitely harder. She couldn’t bear it. She had to put a stop to this.
“Well, it was to me. A fun thing. A very fun, sexy thing. But we’ve never talked about anything more than that. So please, like I said, don’t worry about me. We’re good, you and me. It’s all good.”
His eyebrows drew together over his silvery eyes. Had she hurt him with her cavalier attitude? Could he tell it was completely fake?
The wheelbarrow couldn’t hold any more raspberries, so she bent down to grab the handles. “When are you leaving, exactly?”
“As soon as we can. We’re going to rent a van and drive the Al-Can Highway. I figure there’s no better way to get to know each other than a road trip.”
Next couple of days? So soon? With a sense of panic, she adjusted her grip on the wheelbarrow. This was happening so fast. Her heart couldn’t keep up.
Her well-honed bravado skills came to her rescue. “Wow. You must be a speedy packer. It took me a week to leave LA.”
He cleared his throat and tucked his hands in his back pockets. “I was thinking that we should spend as much time together as possible until I leave. You could stay with us. We could plan your first visit to Texas and—”
“No.” That would be flat-out unbearable.
He gazed at her steadily, his gray eyes capturing hers.
“Let’s not drag this out.” She made an instant decision that felt like a lifeline. “I’m going to stay here on the farm and help Emma get these raspberries in. You guys take your time packing and planning your trip. There’s no need for me to hang around for that.”
She lifted the handles of the wheelbarrow and steered it down the path toward the high tunnel.
“Kate!” He strode after her, but she didn’t turn around. “Please. Don’t walk away. Let’s—”
“Let’s let it go.” She paused the wheelbarrow and twisted to face him. “That’s life in the big city. It’s been a fun ride, Darius. Let’s not make it more than that. Let’s move on down the road, okay?”
His eyes flared with emotion, but just then his phone rang. He glanced at it and swore. “Gotta take this.”
“Goodbye, Darius. Have a great trip with Dylan.”
She pushed forward, right into a patch of mud. The wheelbarrow’s front tire slowed in the muck, but she shoved furiously through it.
The last thing she needed was a reenactment of their first meeting. She might completely lose it if that happened.
She made it through the mud with only a brief wobble. When she reached the high tunnel, she trundled the wheelbarrow through the opening in the plastic and fastened it behind her. If only she could deadbolt the plastic flap and pile furniture against it. She needed to be alone right now. Away from any temptation to show Darius how she really felt. Which was—heartbroken.
Darius had broken her heart.
She hadn’t thought it was possible. She’d believed that all the tenderness had been drained from her heart by the time she filed for emancipation. Definitely by the time she got through law school. Most certainly by the time her father ruined her career.
But oh, how wrong she’d been. She’d fallen so hard and deep for Darius Boone that she had no idea how to get her heart back.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Three days after that maddening conversation with Kate, Darius completed the speediest packing job in history. He’d accomplished it by donating all his furniture to the Lost Harbor thrift store. The rest of his personal belongings he’d crammed into boxes and loaded into an RV called the “Sun Seeker.”
He and Dylan had bought the Sun Seeker on Craigslist from a widower who had no use for it anymore. The two of them had driven it home and parked it in Kate’s space in the driveway, then cleaned it from top to bottom.
Kate wasn’t using her spot, after all. In fact, Kate hadn’t come to the duplex once during their entire three-day packing spree.
She was moving on. Just like that.
He was trying to do the same thing. The long list of things to deal with before they hit the road helped. Every moment was occupied with meetings with the city council, the mayor, Nate Prudhoe, his crew, his hockey team, his music buddies.
Everyone expressed shock or distress over his decision, and most urged him to reconsider. It touched him that the town had accepted him so completely.
Only Harris Badger seemed unworried by this sudden move. “Eh, you’ll be back,” he said with a shrug. “I thought about leaving once. It didn’t sit right, and I turned around when I reached Tok. We’ll be seeing you again.”
Darius shrugged and gave the man a hug anyway.
Saying goodbye to S.G. was the hardest part of all—not including Kate, obviously. That goodbye had been a total disaster. S.G.’s wasn’t much better.
He took her to the Burger Queen drive-through, her favorite place for cheeseburgers. But she flat-out refused to accept that they were leaving.
“Dylan doesn’t want to go,” she kept saying. “He likes it here.”
“I think he likes you, S.G.. Not the town.”
She blinked her wide eyes at him as two spots of pink colored her cheeks.
“That’s why we’re hoping that you’ll come to Texas for a visit.”
But she was shaking her head with a panicked no. “I can’t leave here. I don’t want to leave here. I live here now and I can’t leave.” She put her burger down on the dashboard. “You can’t make me, can you?”
“S.G., of course not. It’s just an invitation.” Slowly, her fear drained away and she picked up her cheeseburger again. “You really love Lost Harbor, don’t you? You feel safe here.”
“I don’t ever want to leave,” she said firmly.
He could understand that. Lost Harbor was the only safe haven she’d known after running away from that trapper. He could understand her attachment to the charming little spot clinging to the edge of the wilderness.
He loved it too. But what he wanted—or needed—didn’t matter right now. Dylan was all that mattered.
As far as he could tell, Dylan was fully onboard with the road trip and the move back to Texas. He threw himself into every step of the process, from packing to acquiring road trip snacks.
Every night, after the busyness of the day, Darius lay in bed and thought about Kate. Where she was, what she was doing, what she was wearing, what she was thinking. He’d wake up in the middle of the night with the intense urge to text her, to beg her to see him one more time. To let him kiss her one more time.
Was this really the end? Was it really so easy for her to dismiss him from her life?
What if he opened his heart and told her just how deep his feelings for her went? What if he told her he…loved her?
But how fair was that when he’d made the decision to leave? And when he’d committed to putting Dylan first, no matter what he himself wanted?
So he turned his phone off and pulled a pillow over his head, knowing how absurd that was.
Sure, hide from his feelings for Kate. That would work.
By the time Departure Day arrived, he’d had three nights of rotten sleep. His eyes were gritty with fatigue as he packed up his bedding. The bed and mattress were staying put, to be picked up later by the thrift store.
Same with the couch, where Dylan slept. Except that it
was empty. All of Dylan’s things had already been packed in his backpack, which was propped against the couch.
He was probably saying one last goodbye to S.G., or having one last quad shot at Gretel’s Cafe.
Darius carried the box containing his bedding and Dylan’s backpack out to the RV. The Sun Seeker had a little kitchenette and a coffeemaker, along with the groceries they’d packed. But instead of wasting their road trip supplies, he decided to mosey down to Gretel’s and join Dylan.
As he strolled the peaceful streets, he took deep breaths of the fresh Alaska air, so different from Texas humidity. If only he could bottle this up and take a whiff when he needed it. He nodded to a few people working in their front yards as he passed. Everywhere he looked, daffodils were blooming like splashes of earthbound sunshine.
Was Kate planting those raspberry canes? Was her hair falling out of its ponytail? Did she have mud on her shirt? Was she thinking about him?
Stop it.
No one at Gretel’s had seen Dylan. He ordered a large coffee to go and quickly walked home, hoping the boy had reappeared. No sign of him at home either. His phone wasn’t receiving texts, but that wasn’t unusual. He had sketchy service from some company in Texas.
The upstairs apartment? Unlikely, but just in case, he jogged up the outdoor staircase and tapped on the door. No answer. He checked for the key that Kate used to leave under the mat, but it was gone.
Shoving aside all the hot memories of the time he’d spent behind that door, he ran back down the stairs.
Next theory: maybe Dylan was with S.G.. S.G.’s phone didn’t pick up either, so he called Denaina, who called for S.G. to come to the phone.
S.G. came on the line, a little breathless. “I was learning how to jump rope. Did you ever try that?”
“Oh yeah. That’s good exercise. Hey, have you seen Dylan?”
“No.” Sadness filled her voice. “He said goodbye yesterday. I cried last night.”
“I know what you mean. Okay, kiddo, if you see him, tell him to call me immediately.”
Naughty All Night (Lost Harbor, Alaska Book 5) Page 23