Come Home to Deep River

by Jackie Ashenden

  But why? Why had she done that? Was it fear? Fear of having to come back in the end? Or was it fear that she’d leave and never return?

  “What is it?” Silas asked, a note of concern in his voice.

  She met his gaze, her heartbeat loud in her ears. He’d be disappointed and she didn’t want to disappoint him, just like she hadn’t wanted to disappoint her mother or the memory of her grandfather all those years ago. But she wasn’t sure she liked the alternative either. She’d put everything she’d wanted on hold once before; she didn’t want to do it again.

  “I’m sorry, Si,” she said, her voice sounding strange even to her own ears. “I don’t think I can take on the town after all.”

  * * *

  Si didn’t know what he’d been expecting, but it hadn’t been that. And he wasn’t sure what to say. Yes, she hadn’t exactly been thrilled with the idea of owning the entire town, but she’d agreed to take it on.

  Then again, there had always been a part of him that hadn’t liked what he’d asked of her. That still remembered the eighteen-year-old with tears on her cheeks, telling him and Cal that she had to stay. That she couldn’t leave after all. He’d seen the death of her dreams in her eyes that night, and that vision had stuck with him all through the years.

  Was he really going to insist on her staying true to her word now? Because clearly, given the glow in those same beautiful eyes now, she had plans again. And not just for the town, but for herself as well.

  He couldn’t kill those dreams—not again. Yet he felt an uncomfortable twist inside him all the same. “Why not?” He tried hard not to make it sound like an accusation. “You have something else you want to do?”

  “Yes.” She met his gaze squarely. “I know I said I’d do it, but…I can’t stop thinking about what Mom said. You were right when you asked about her wanting to sell. There was something else going on there.”

  He’d thought as much, but he hadn’t wanted to push it if she hadn’t wanted to tell him. “What else?” he asked now, unable to keep the edge from his voice no matter how much he tried to mask it.

  “I was trying to talk Mom out of leaving. But then she basically accused me of using her as an excuse not to leave myself. And…well, I can’t help thinking that she was right. I have been using her as an excuse not to go.”

  Si found he’d curled his hands around his coffee cup again, holding on a little tighter than he should have. That thought had crossed his mind about Hope too, but he hadn’t followed up on it since he had no right to accuse her of anything, still less of her using excuses.

  “Why?” he asked instead, puzzled that he wasn’t more disappointed, because he should be, shouldn’t he? “Did you really need an excuse?”

  “I didn’t think I did, but you asked me once before why I stayed, and I think it’s more than just being here for Mom or because of the Moose.” She hesitated, glancing down at her hands a moment before looking back up at him again. “I think I stayed because when it came down to it, I was afraid to go. And I didn’t want to admit it was fear holding me back. It was better to give myself other reasons to stay.”

  That made sense to him. At least using her mother and the bar as an excuse.

  After all, not anything you haven’t done yourself, right?

  He’d told himself lies for a long time about why he’d stayed away from Deep River. Lies to mask the truth, which was he hadn’t been back because of her. Because she was here and he was afraid of coming back in case he stayed with her. But that hadn’t happened. He’d come back and they were sleeping together, which was better than he’d ever imagined, but he knew it was temporary. He’d be leaving and hadn’t felt tempted to stay.

  Bullshit you haven’t. And now, if she’s not going to take on the town…

  The feeling that had been dogging him for a couple of days now tugged harder—the pull of a responsibility he hadn’t asked for and didn’t want yet was still there, nagging at him.

  If she didn’t want the town, then who else was there? Morgan had been unequivocal in her refusal, and he wasn’t going to force her. There was Astrid, the cool and collected mayor. She looked more than capable, but he had a feeling she wouldn’t want it either. Maybe Mal?

  You don’t want to give it to anyone else, though.

  He shifted on the bench, uncomfortable with that thought, mainly because he had a horrible sense that it was true. He’d never thought he would want the responsibility, not initially, but after coming back here, after talking with everyone… Yeah, he was beginning to feel differently about staying away, and where that left him and Wild Alaska he didn’t want to think about too closely just yet.

  Or what it would mean for him and Hope.

  “Okay,” he said, trying to ignore that thought. “So what does that mean, then?”

  There was a glitter in Hope’s dark eyes—excitement, yes, and something else he couldn’t decipher. “It means that I’m thinking of leaving, Si. Not that I’ll sell the Moose’s lease to whoever’s been calling Mom, but maybe I’ll find someone else to take it on. And then Mom and I can just…go.” She gave him a small smile. “Maybe I can finally do the things I’ve been wanting to do for so long.”

  He should be happy for her. He should be pleased. But his stomach dropped as if he’d taken a dive off a rock and into a deep pool. A deep, freezing-cold pool. Which didn’t make any sense, especially since this was what he’d always wanted for her. To follow those dreams she’d had when she’d been young.

  “It was you that did it,” she went on, apparently oblivious to his sudden silence. “You asking me why I stayed. In fact, I think it was just you coming back and offering me the town that got me thinking about things. And then Mom mentioning me using her as an excuse…” Her eyes were shining, and suddenly she was eighteen again, the object of all his fantasies, all his longings. Bright and beautiful and full of the thing she’d been named for: hope. “I put what I wanted on hold, Si. I locked it away for years, telling myself I couldn’t have it. That I had too many responsibilities, too many other things that were more important. But those dreams never went away. And I…” She took a breath. “I don’t want to put them on hold again. I want to do them. I want to get that degree. I don’t want to get to the end of my life and realize there was a whole lot of stuff I didn’t get to do because I was too afraid.”

  Shit, what could he say to that? Telling her to stay because he wanted to offload the responsibility for Deep River onto her was petty, not to mention selfish. And sure, he’d developed a bit of selfishness over the years, but not if it would cost Hope. She’d paid enough already.

  “That’s fantastic,” he said, unable to say anything else. And if he said it enough times, maybe that cold feeling inside him would go away. Not that it should be there, since what did it matter to him if she left?

  The irony, though. You’re considering the merits of staying while she’s deciding to leave.

  Oh yeah, he couldn’t escape that. He was fully aware. And of course, if she was leaving, then didn’t that solve the difficulties of him deciding to stay? Since there would have been difficulties. Their affair was based on the fact that it was temporary, and him staying would have been…problematic.

  So her deciding to leave didn’t change anything, did it?

  Hope tilted her head, that small smile becoming uncertain. “You don’t sound very sure.”

  “I am sure.” He adjusted his tone, making an effort to sound as if he meant it this time. “It’s really fantastic. I mean, you deserve this, sweetheart. And I’m happy for you, I really am.”

  She let out a breath, her smile relaxing, which meant he’d obviously been more convincing. “Good. It’s kind of scary to finally accept that’s what I want to do. But I think it is.” Picking up her coffee again, she took a sip. “Of course, I can’t do any of this without finances, so I’ll need to think about who can buy the lea
se to the Moose. And that’s not going to be easy.”

  “You don’t have any savings? I remember you telling me about a college fund?” And she had once, years ago. She’d put in a lot of hours at Mal’s stocking shelves as well as cleaning up the Moose in the afternoons, saving all that hard-earned money for a college fund that never went anywhere.

  “Yeah, I did.” She leaned back against the bench, the midday sun igniting the burn of auburn in her hair. She wore it in her usual braid, the red-brown coil hanging over her shoulder, and he wanted to take it in his hand and pull gently on it. “But it all got spent on various catastrophes over the years. The Moose isn’t cheap to run, and we had a couple of winters that were pretty bad snow-wise, which meant everyone stayed at home rather than coming in for a beer.”

  Five minutes ago, he would have responded to that urge, grabbing her braid and tugging her in for a kiss. But he felt oddly hesitant about it now, though he wasn’t sure why. Because again, nothing had changed.

  “Well,” he said, deciding on something then and there, “if you don’t find anyone, come to me.”

  She blinked, her long, thick lashes as auburn as her hair, the perfect frame for her dark chocolate-brown eyes. “Come to you? What for?”

  He couldn’t bear it, he realized. He couldn’t bear for her not to take this opportunity again. Which meant he was going to do what he could to make sure she realized all those dreams she’d had to give up.

  “I’ll buy the Moose’s lease from you,” he said. “What do you think?”

  Shock moved over her face. “You will? But…you said you weren’t staying, Si. And you can’t buy it if you’re not staying.”

  His jaw felt tight, but the certainty was settling down inside him, and he knew that of any decision he’d made recently, this was the right one. The only one. “Yeah, about that. I think I’ve changed my mind.”

  Her eyes went wide. “What? When did you decide that?”

  “I’ve been thinking about it the past couple of days, and talking to people here has just made me realize that maybe I’m not as over this place as I thought. And Cal left it to me and the rest of the guys for a reason.” He paused. “Now I think about it, I wonder if he was anticipating trouble with the oil and thought that we were the best people to handle it.”

  “But what about your business? What about you getting back to Juneau?”

  “I’ll have to figure out what to do with the business. And hell, Juneau was never my home.” He glanced out at the river, the certainty inside him becoming fact, making a weight he’d never realized was there abruptly lift. “Not like this place is.”

  “Oh,” Hope said. “Oh…”

  He kept his focus on the river, still conscious of her shock. Conscious too of the pressure of her gaze, that she was looking at him like she’d never seen him before in all her life.

  Tension pulled tight between them—a tension that hadn’t been there for the last couple of days—and he was sorry for it.

  “This doesn’t change anything.” He glanced at her, meeting her dark eyes. “So if you’re thinking this makes our little arrangement different, it doesn’t.”

  Our little arrangement. Such a stupid thing to call what they did together in bed at night. A paltry thing to call something so raw and precious and real. Like a rough diamond mined straight from the rock. The pleasure she gave him and the pleasure he gave in return, the satisfaction he felt when she was in his arms, the possessiveness too. The hot, burning thing that lived in his heart, that blazed brightly whenever she was near. No words could describe that.

  Hope blinked, and her gaze flicked away from his for a second. Then it returned, and this time there was nothing but her own ferocity meeting his. “Okay,” she said, determined and sure. “Nothing changes.”

  And the weight in him lifted a little more, because thank God she wasn’t ready for this to be over yet and he was glad. Ferociously, savagely glad.

  It was still temporary, which meant this was all still possible.

  “But,” she went on, “just so we’re clear, you’re not staying for me, are you?”

  “No.” The word came out easily because it wasn’t a lie—of course it wasn’t. “I’m staying because Cal left this town to me. It’s my responsibility. And I can’t walk away from it. Not the way I did thirteen years ago.”

  The look on her face this time was indecipherable. “You don’t have to, you know.”

  “I do know. But who else is going to do it? I could ask around, see if someone else could take it on. Except…” He stopped.

  “You don’t trust anyone else, do you?” she asked.

  Yeah, that was the reason, wasn’t it? It wasn’t simply because it was his responsibility. There was more to it than that, and it could have been about his ego, about the whole power trip of it. But he knew deep down that it wasn’t.

  It was because this place was home to him and always had been. He loved it. It was important to him, as was carrying on the legacy that the Wests had founded the town on. A haven for people who couldn’t find a haven anywhere else.

  He wanted to make sure it stayed that way, make sure the spirit of the town stayed alive.

  “Maybe there are other people who could do a better job,” he said. “And maybe I’ll hand it over to them if that’s what’s required. But Cal gave it to me for a reason.”

  “Si—”

  “It’s not your responsibility anymore,” he cut her off as gently as he could, because he didn’t want to talk about this right now. “It’s mine, okay?”

  She gave him a long look, her dark eyes full of that indecipherable expression. Then she said, “Okay.”

  “Good.” He pushed himself up off the bench. “Let’s go see if Mal’s had another call then, hmm?”

  Chapter 14

  “I was just thinking about calling into the Moose to tell you,” Mal said. “The guy called me back this morning.”

  Hope stared up at Mal, who was currently up a ladder tugging down a fishing rod from where they’d been stuck over several ceiling rafters. “Did you get his number?”

  Mal tugged again on the fishing rod and this time managed to pull it out without it getting tangled on the other rods or on the various other long-handled items that he kept stored in the rafters. “Yep,” he said laconically.

  Hope glanced at Silas, who was standing next to her, part of her dreading what Mal might say next. Silas gave her a minute nod that was somehow reassuring, then asked, “I take it you figured out where the guy is from, then?”

  Mal tucked the rod under his arm and descended back down the ladder. “He was reluctant to leave it, but I got it out of him in the end,” he said as he stepped onto the floor. “And sure, I checked on the number.” He gave them both a meaningful look. “I think you know where he was from.”

  “Oil company?” Silas bit out.

  “Yeah. Oh, he wasn’t straightforward about it. The number was for some warehouse in Juneau, but guess who owned the warehouse?”

  “Damn,” Hope muttered, disappointment gathering in her gut. God, she’d really hoped it would turn out not to be an oil company sniffing around, since it would have made everything a lot simpler. But of course it wasn’t going to be; of course there would be nothing but difficulty.

  Mal lifted a shoulder. “It’s nothing I didn’t expect. When money’s involved, word gets out fast, and I always knew those types were going to be looking into things around here.”

  “So what did you tell him?” Silas asked.

  “That I was still considering it.” Mal turned and went over to the counter, putting the rod down on top of it. “I expect Nate’s had a call too, not to mention your mom.” He looked at Hope. “She know this guy isn’t on the level?”

  “I told her.” The disappointment shifted into a cold, sick feeling. “But she likes the sound of the money too much.” And
that was going to be an issue. An oil company with deep pockets would be able to offer Angela a lot of money, and who could compete with that? Could Silas?

  She could feel him standing behind her, a tall, strong presence, and she still didn’t know how to deal with everything he’d told her out there on the boardwalk. That he was staying. That if she couldn’t find a taker for the Moose’s lease, she could come to him.

  Staying. He was staying.

  What was she supposed to do with that? With the irony that, after thirteen years, he would be the one to return and she would be the one to leave? But then, did she have to do anything? He was right; it wouldn’t change anything ultimately, so there was no reason for her to feel so…strange about it. As if she was losing something, which made no sense, since the thing she was losing had always been temporary anyway.

  He still wanted to keep sleeping with her, and she was happy with that. More than happy. Especially since it meant she had some good memories to take with her when she left.

  Don’t you want more than good memories?

  Hope swallowed, her mouth dry, the feeling of loss deepening inside her. It was inexplicable. She and Silas were never going to have any kind of relationship—never. Years ago they’d been too young and she hadn’t seen him like that anyway—or at least never consciously. And now, sure, the sex was great, but to have anything more than that? Definitely not. She was too busy at the Moose for relationships and anyway she couldn’t now. She was leaving and he was staying here.

  Apart from anything else, he’d made it very clear he wasn’t looking for anything more than sex. That was the whole reason they’d entered into this arrangement in the first place. Both of them knew it was temporary.

  You do want more, though. You’ve been so lonely…

  Hope pushed that thought firmly back into the box it had escaped from, bringing her attention back to what was going on, which was way more important than her stupid feelings.

  “We’ll deal with Angela,” Silas said quietly from behind her. “I think it might be worth letting everyone know, though, that this guy has been calling around and offering people money. And most especially they need to know who he is. I’d say that if he’s called you back already, Mal, he’s feeling some urgency.”