Return to Glory (Hqn)

by Sara Arden

  His laugh was bitter. Jack’s jaw clenched as if he endured some physical pain, but he dipped his head and brushed his lips over hers. “You want me to take you right here, right now out in the open where anyone could see us?”

  “No one can see us here except for cops looking for teenagers who are doing exactly what I intend us to be doing, and they won’t bother us, either. I told India I was coming here to talk and I didn’t want to be bothered.”

  He looked out over the muddy swirling water as it rushed by them. “Why?”

  “I told you,” she said stubbornly.

  Betsy stopped thinking about goodbye. She pushed tomorrow out of her head. All she wanted to think about was this moment. She wanted it to be sweet and pure, with no taint of sorrow and regret.

  “You saved me, Bets. You did what you set out to do. Knowing that, do you still want this?”

  She looked up at him. “What do you mean?”

  “I’m getting counseling, I’m going to group, I’m not drinking. I didn’t drink tonight. I’m trying, just like you wanted. I’m barely treading water, but I’m not drowning. So you can go to France and you don’t need to worry about me.”

  She opened her mouth to speak, but he kissed her, and all thought of speech died with the hot press of his lips on hers.

  Betsy’s fingers did a quick dance over the buttons on his shirt. She needed to feel his skin. She memorized every intake of breath, every flex of his muscles, the play of the light on his body.

  She knew she wasn’t supposed to think of him as beautiful. He was a man, so he was supposed to be handsome, rugged, purposeful—but he was beautiful.

  All of him.

  Betsy wanted to show him how he looked to her, and maybe if he didn’t know it, that she never saw him as broken. Maybe lost, but not broken.

  She had to tell him that she didn’t want France, but Betsy couldn’t find the words, not with the way he kissed her—it stole her breath away. It was just as well, because it was still goodbye.

  Jack had made that clear. She couldn’t keep doing this. She couldn’t keep hoping and dreaming about something he didn’t want, or wasn’t ready for.

  This would hurt less if she could just go without touching him again, without another memory of what it was like to lie in his arms.

  But she couldn’t. Betsy would devour every moment, every touch, every shared breath. She meant what she said when she’d agreed to make a good memory to replace the bad. It was different somehow if they said goodbye together, rather than him leaving her standing alone in the dark—yet again.

  She pushed the shirt off over his shoulders and splayed her palms on his broad chest. She loved touching him, the way her hands slid over his skin. He was so hot and hard all over. This was better than any fantasy of him she’d had—and she’d had so many.

  The thought kept coming back to her, and it was like a new discovery each time.

  He suddenly broke the kiss. “Bets, I don’t have anything.”

  She knew he meant protection, but he hadn’t used any that night in her shop. “I don’t care.”

  And she didn’t. She wanted this part of him, this memory; she wanted for just this moment for there to be no barriers between them.

  She waited for him to protest, to say it wasn’t a good idea, to list all the reasons why it shouldn’t happen this way, but he didn’t.

  Instead he kept kissing her, kept touching her.

  “I remember the taste of blackberry cordial,” he mumbled against her mouth.

  The first night they’d said goodbye.

  “Can you taste it on my lips now?” Along with the same sorrow that shadowed me then?

  “Make me taste it, Bets.”

  She pressed her mouth to his with all that intensity that stormed inside her. Her lips were swollen with their passion, tender and raw, just like her heart.

  “I need you, Jack. I need you now.”

  This wasn’t about the orgasm for her; it was about the connection. Her heart ached, and the impetuous part of her personality that Jack had always indulged demanded that she tell him everything in her heart.

  It was sure that he just didn’t understand what she wanted, and once he did, he’d give it to her, as he always did.

  Only it wouldn’t be like that this time.

  Being joined with him, being skin to skin, feeling his heartbeat against her palm and his hips grinding against hers, it was so right and made her feel something she’d never had with Marcel.

  She felt whole.

  She felt home.

  No, Betsy didn’t want to go to Paris. She wanted to stay. She wanted to be with him.

  Betsy tried to tell him with every caress, every cry of pleasure and every time his mouth crashed into hers.

  When her body and soul couldn’t take any more, she told him with her voice.

  Betsy orgasmed beneath him, crying out, “I love you.”

  He froze and pulled away from her. “No, Betsy. You don’t. Right now you want to hide and you want to use me as an excuse. I won’t let you do that.” Jack started pulling on his clothes.

  “You don’t know what I feel. You’re not inside my head.”

  “I’m more inside your head than you know. Someday when you have everything you ever wanted, you’ll thank me for this. For not letting you settle.”

  “I’m not settling. I’m in love with you!” she cried. “I’ve loved you forever.” Her voice was softer now. “I’ve loved you as a little girl loves, that’s true. But I’ve also loved you as a woman.”

  His mouth straightened into a hard line. “Don’t say that.”

  “Why not?” She put her hand on his shoulder.

  He turned to face her. “Because I don’t love you. Not like that. I care about you, you’re sexy as hell, but I’m not in love with you and I never will be.”

  And just like that, he’d cut out her heart.

  You don’t mean that, she mouthed, unsure if sound actually passed her lips.

  “But I do. That’s what I had to tell you. There is nothing for you in Glory.” He straightened his clothes.

  “I know you don’t mean that,” she said again. After what they’d just shared, the way he touched her, as if she were made of spun gold. Jack loved her. He’d always loved her. He...

  “I don’t want to hurt you, Betsy, but if you won’t listen, I’ll have to be cruel.”

  “You’re just doing this to make me go.”

  “That check is still on your mom’s sideboard. Cash it. Be on that plane.” He walked to his car and he didn’t look back.

  He didn’t argue with her. He didn’t disagree that he was just trying to make her leave. But he’d said he didn’t love her, not like that, and he never would.

  When he knew her fear was of failure and humiliation, why would he say those things unless he meant them? There were other ways to get her to go to Paris. If he wanted her to go so badly, he could’ve offered to go with her.

  Something hot streaked down her face and splashed on the backs of her hands. Tears, hot and rancid.

  She dashed at them with her balled fists.

  Betsy wasn’t going to leave Glory and go to Paris just because he said so. Just because he said there was nothing for her here.

  It was because everyone wanted her to leave. No one wanted her to stay. They all thought they could make better decisions for herself than she could. None of them believed in her enough to think she knew what she wanted.

  Yes, she was afraid, but rightfully so. And her dreams had changed. She wished she could go back and not fail, but she didn’t want to go try again. Not with the humiliation of what she’d done hanging over her head. Maybe she would go to Paris, and she wouldn’t even go see Chef Abelard. Maybe she’d spend that check on cafés, museum
s and expensive shoes. Or maybe she’d go to the Bahamas and spend it on swimming suits, Mai Tais and cabana boys.

  She’d had enough of it. Her brother’s meddling, her mother’s, even India’s. Everyone kept telling her what she wanted, what she should know, as if their lives were perfect and they were qualified to hand down advice like sages from up on high. Screw them all if they thought it was okay to plan her future without her say-so.

  And Screw Jack McConnell in particular.

  She flopped back on the blanket and stared up at the sky, but she wasn’t looking for shapes; she wasn’t looking for anything. Betsy was waiting for the flood of tears to pass, to sink back down inside her where no one could see them.

  It seemed she’d spent her whole life waiting.

  Well, she was done with that now.

  She scrambled to her feet and scooped up the blanket that had been home to so many hours of hoping, dreaming—waiting. She flung it over the ledge. Betsy didn’t watch to see it swallowed in the churning, muddy waters.

  And she didn’t look back. If Jack could walk away without a backward glance, then so could she.

  At least that was what she told herself.

  Shame flooded her hotter and even more acidic than the tears. What a fool she’d made of herself over him.

  Part of her kept protesting that it had to be a lie—he was doing what he thought was best for her because he really did love her. He was that kind of man. That was the little girl whose voice got quieter and quieter as the days passed, replaced by one more logical and stern. The one who favored reason over hope.

  The one who said if a man wanted her, he’d say so. If he wanted to be with her, he would. That he could offer to go to Paris with her because that was also the kind of man Jack was. He’d planned invasions of small countries. He could certainly figure out how to stay with a woman if he loved her.

  He’d made himself clear.

  He didn’t want her.

  And even though she knew it was overwrought and patently untrue, it felt as if Glory didn’t want her, either.

  She left the picnic basket where it lay, walked toward her car and drove straight over to her parents’ house, where Marcel was staying.

  Everyone was gathered in the family room drinking coffee, eating another of her desserts. Caleb looked up at her expectantly and she flashed him a glare filled with as much venom as she could muster.

  “Everyone is getting what they want. I’m going to Paris.” Then she focused on Marcel. “How soon can we leave?”

  “Don’t you want to spend the holiday with your family?”

  “That wasn’t important to you when you told me I had to come to New York.”

  “I may have been a bit overexcited. Abelard will wait until January. I’m just thrilled you’ve decided to take him up on it.”

  “No, it’s now or never. I don’t want to wait until January. If the chef is otherwise occupied until then, I can finally see Paris and do all the touristy things I missed the first time.” She walked to the sideboard, where the check from Jack was still stuffed haphazardly in the torn envelope. “I have a generous benefactor, after all.” She knew she sounded petulant and childish, and above all, angry, but she couldn’t help it.

  “Whatever you wish, chérie. I will check flights.” Marcel pulled out his phone and began swiping at the screen.

  “Just wait a minute, Betsy,” her mother said.

  “No. You all practically shoved this down my throat because you all know what’s best for me. So now you don’t get to say anything else.”

  Lula turned to look at Caleb. “What did you do?”

  “I didn’t do anything.”

  Betsy glared at him again. “You know exactly what you did.”

  “There’s a flight to New York tonight. We can fly out from there tomorrow afternoon.”

  “Fine. Get your things, and we can get a car service to the airport from my place.”

  “Betsy, honey,” her mother began again.

  She relented the merest fraction of an inch and hugged her. “I love you. I’ll call you from Paris.”

  “Are you sure this is what you want to do?” her mother asked softly.

  “No. But no one will stop meddling until I go. So I’m going. Caleb said he’d take care of the shop, so I expect him to do it. Marcel, I’ll be waiting in the car.”

  She fled the warmth of her parents’ house, her childhood, to pursue a dream that was no longer hers.

  Betsy remembered what Jack had told her about living the life everyone had carved out for him here—how it was like living in someone else’s skin. She wondered if maybe now she knew what that felt like.

  * * *

  IT WAS QUITE the climb down the embankment to retrieve the checkered blanket, but Jack managed. It had gotten hung up on some exposed roots and it swayed in the slight breeze like a banner of surrender— a white flag splattered with the blood of what might have been.

  His desires.

  What she thought she wanted, and the magnificent future that almost wasn’t because she was afraid. He wouldn’t let her do that to herself. Jack knew that as long as she thought he needed her, she’d stay.

  And he did need her. He needed her more than the breath in his body, but he wouldn’t take away her dreams to have her. Jack knew he still had too far to go before he was even a facsimile of whole—he was barely functional.

  No, that wasn’t true. He was a little more than barely. A month ago, he wouldn’t have considered trying to scale down the ledge, and neither would he have laughed at himself when he got a root tangled around the titanium limb and he almost had to remove it to get free. No, he wouldn’t have laughed. He wouldn’t even have been outside, much less down by the river with Betsy.

  He held the blanket close, and the familiar scents wafted around him. He gripped the blanket so tightly his knuckles were white with the effort.

  She said he’d been drowning before—drowning in the whiskey and the dark. But he hadn’t felt as if he was drowning; he didn’t know he couldn’t breathe. This...this absence of her, this was drowning, this was suffocating.

  Betsy took all the air with her, all the light.

  And suddenly he was so very thirsty, so very empty. There was a hollow space inside him that needed to be filled.

  He told her that he was all right, but he wasn’t.

  Jack didn’t want to die. He wasn’t going to go home and eat his gun. But he couldn’t feel all of this now. He needed something to give him some silence. A reprieve to that blessed numb nothing he could only find in the bottom of a bottle.

  He knew it was wrong, he knew it wasn’t the answer, but he drove to the liquor store anyway. He sat outside in his car for a full fifteen minutes before he went inside. Jack kept telling himself to start the car, to drive home, because he didn’t have to do this. Jack knew he could choose.

  And he made the wrong choice.

  He went inside and bought a nice bottle of aged scotch. As if it weren’t sordid because it was expensive. Jack wasn’t fooling himself. He knew exactly what he was doing and why it was bad.

  But he was so unbearably empty.

  “Need someone to share that with, handsome?” He looked up to see Mindy Kreskin behind the counter. “I get off in an hour.”

  Part of him wanted to say yes. The act would be as empty and meaningless as what he was feeling now.

  She wasn’t Betsy, though, but neither was the scotch.

  He closed his eyes and breathed.

  “Maybe some other time.” He pulled out his cash for the scotch.

  “You sure about that? I hear Betsy is leaving for Paris again.”

  News traveled like wildfire in a small town. “Yes, she is. I’m so happy for her.”

  “So happy for her you’re
going to drink yourself into a stupor all by your lonesome, McConnell?” She gave him half a smile.

  “What’s best for the people we love isn’t always what’s best for us, now, is it?”

  The haunted look in her eyes told him that she knew exactly what he meant. “No, it’s not.” She sighed. “Does that woman know how lucky she is?”

  “I don’t think she feels very lucky at the moment.”

  “You, Paris, the career of her dreams? What more could she want?”

  “Everything, I hope.”

  “What about you, Jack? What do you want for you?”

  “That is for me.” Suddenly the pain wasn’t so empty, his insides not so hollow. For Betsy to be happy, it really was enough. He exhaled heavily and smiled. “Buy yourself something pretty, Mindy. I changed my mind about the scotch,” he said as he handed over some money.

  He walked back outside before she could say anything else, or he could change his mind.

  Jack drove home. He was still hurting. There was that giant black hole inside him, but there was that flickering hope, too. The candle in the dark that burned because of Betsy.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  BETSY HAD A lot of time in her own head on the flight to New York, and she knew she’d have even more on the flight to Paris. She didn’t mind so much; she was glad that Marcel didn’t expect her to entertain him. She didn’t have anything to discuss anyway. The scene with the mushroom bordelaise kept replaying itself over and over in her head on a loop.

  It was like watching a horror movie where she’d scream at the heroine not to run in heels, or not to go check the inhuman noise coming from the dark woods, but she did it anyway and the audience kept watching even though they knew what was going to happen.

  She watched herself prepare: picking the mushrooms, talking to Marcel, tossing them merrily in her basket as if she hadn’t a care. Betsy had been so sure of herself, utterly absorbed in the experience of the moment rather than paying attention and keeping herself grounded in the present.

  Stupid, naive Betsy, always with her head in the clouds.

  Not anymore. She decided she was going to keep both feet firmly anchored to the earth. It was the only way to get by. Her stomach twisted in on itself and nausea climbed the back of her throat.