Instinct took me out of town and towards Sandgrove Park. Mia smirked but didn’t comment as I followed the trail to the Christmas tree farm. I wondered if she was remembering the many times we’d snuck out here before we’d realised her mum slept too deeply to notice me crawling through Mia’s bedroom window.
Probably not. She likely just thought I was a desperate idiot trying to score some al fresco nookie, and I couldn’t deny the idiot part.
I parked at the lookout spot and shut the engine off. Silence cloaked us, but it felt good—to me, at least. I sat back in my seat and closed my eyes, absorbing the clean air and fresh pine scents, even in the safe cocoon of the van. This place had always been home.
Mia’s hand slid over my thigh and gripped my wrist, her long fingers ghosting a trail of fire on my skin. “I got married,” she whispered.
I opened my eyes. “When?”
“Four years ago.”
The calculation meant nothing to me. Four years ago I’d been promoted to a role that had kept me busy enough to almost forget about home entirely. Chances were Mia had got married on a day when I hadn’t thought of her in weeks. When life on the destroyer had been so hectic I’d barely had time to blink, and had finally felt at peace on the ocean. “Why?”
She smiled slightly. “Only you would ask me that.”
“Do you know the answer?”
“What do you think?”
I thought a lot of things, but none that were my place to say. I sighed. “I think it was a bonehead question because it’s none of my business, but I’m betting if it was because you loved him, you’d have fucking said so.”
Mia said nothing, and after a beat of silence, opened the van door and slid out.
Alarmed, I followed her, but when I hurried around the front of the van, I found her waiting for me.
“Come on,” she said. “Let’s walk.”
We ambled to the lake, both of us easily finding our way in the dark. Beyond the water was a path that led to a tiny pond with stone-carved seats and a break in the tree cover that made the water sparkle in the moonlight, but Mia stopped before we got to it and sank onto a picnic bench.
“I haven’t been here in so long.”
“I saw you here a few weeks ago.”
“That was the other side, smart arse. You know each part of the park is another world.”
I did. I remembered Billy reading Colin Dan books and telling me Sandgrove was like White Deer Park. We’d even gone out hunting for the fictional woodland community, but we’d got lost, and our dad had found us not far from where I sat now.
I still felt lost as I absorbed what Mia was telling me. It shouldn’t have shocked me that she’d moved on, but married? Shit. I imagined her in a big white dress, long hair flowing, eyes sparkling...all for someone else when it could’ve been for me. Should’ve been for me, if life hadn’t got in the way. My only selfish comfort was he clearly hadn’t made her happy. She hadn’t loved him, so perhaps her heart was as stuck in the past as mine.
Mia nudged me. “What’s the matter?”
“Hmm?”
“You went somewhere.”
“Did I?”
“Yes. Is it so bad being here with me?”
“Wouldn’t be here if it was.”
My phone chimed in my pocket. I retrieved it and squinted at the screen.
Billy: lke u bro but not got the toolbox yet
I sighed. Two days of trying to get hold my brother and this was the nonsense I got back. I tossed the phone on the wooden table.
Mia peered at the screen. “Billy?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Where’s he living these days?”
“Somewhere up north.”
“Somewhere?”
“Yeah, apparently we’re both good at fucking off.”
Mia raised a delicate eyebrow. “This isn’t the same. He knew where you’d gone, vaguely, at least.”
Billy had never told me about any conversations he’d shared with Mia after I’d left. Curiosity burned my soul, but Mia spoke again before I could formulate a coherent question.
“Is he okay? Gus said he went a little wild.”
I snorted. “Gus is being kind.”
“So be unkind and tell me the truth.”
Because life’s just that fucking easy? I dropped my elbows onto the table and leaned on my folded arms. “There isn’t much to tell. He got in with a bad crowd a few years ago and started banging coke and drinking a lot. He’s always been a handful, but Fran couldn’t deal with him on her own. She had to kick him out, so he disappeared.”
“But you still speak to him?”
“I try. It’s hard when we’re both stubborn enough to only make contact when shit’s gone wrong.”
Mia eyed my phone again. “You should probably text him back then.”
“No point now. He’s obviously wankered. I’ll do it tomorrow.”
She looked as though she wanted to argue, but it turned out to be one of the rare moments she held her tongue. Or maybe she’d changed. Maybe marriage had changed her.
I reached across the picnic table and took her hand, bracing myself for her to snatch it back.
She didn’t.
It was my turn to whisper. “Who did you marry?”
Mia sighed. “Some arsehole who promised me the world.”
“What happened?”
“He didn’t have it.”
“Are you still married?”
Mia twined her fingers with mine and stared at our joined hands as though hers belonged to someone else. “Why does that matter to you?”
“I’m curious.”
“Are you?”
“Yes.”
“Why? You haven’t been curious about me in ten years.”
“That’s not true.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Of course it is. You’ve never asked Gus about me the whole time you’ve been back.”
“Asking Gus questions isn’t a barometer of how I feel.”
Mia reclaimed her hand and folded her arms. A breeze made her shiver, and I felt every shudder as it passed through her slender torso. “I wrote you a letter once. The Navy returned it.”
I said nothing, too chicken to admit that it had been me who’d sent the postcard-sized envelope straight back to Rushmere the moment it had reached me on the other side of the world. That I hadn’t even opened it, let alone read whatever had been inside. “What did it say?”
“What do you care?”
“Harsh.”
“Yeah. It was.”
We were no longer talking about letters. I shifted in my seat and fought the urge to stare at the table. Guilt burned a path from my soul to my heart, but I held her gaze. “Just say it, Mia. Call me a selfish bastard and get it over with.”
“I’ve never called you selfish.”
“Liar.”
Her answering smile was unexpected. “Well, okay...maybe a few times, but not for the reasons you think.”
“You don’t know what I think.”
“Don’t I?”
“No, and that’s your problem. Assumption is dangerous.”
“Nah, emotion is dangerous, Luke. You taught me that.”
Boom. I sucked in a breath. “You don’t understand.”
“You never gave me a chance.”
“A chance to what? Scream at me all the way to the recruitment office?”
She shook her head. “You lied to me.”
“I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did, even if it was just by omission. It takes months to join the navy—I checked back then—which means you spent all that time after your dad died hiding it.”
“You were busy retaking the exams you’d failed because you’d bunked off school to be with me. I didn’t want to dist
ract you.”
“Right.” Mia flicked something off the table. She looked bored, which offended me more than it should’ve.
Weirdo. Do you want her to punch you in the dick?
I kind of did.
“Mia.”
She glanced up. “What?”
Was she taking the piss? “What do you think?”
“I think,” she said slowly, “that we should stay away from each other.”
Chapter Thirteen
Mia
I was caught in a strange place between feeding my awakened craving for Luke and freaking the fuck out that some loon had broken into my shop for no apparent reason. By day, I fantasised about swinging by his bachelor pad with dinner and a promise, and by night I lay awake fretting over the newly installed alarm system I’d had to borrow money from Gus to pay for.
Occasionally, it was the other way round, but right now, two days after some moron broke into my shop, I was tuning out a well-meaning policeman while daydreaming about Luke’s magic fingers.
“Break-ins around here are relatively rare,” the officer said. “But there are still a number of steps you can take to make your premises more secure. The new window is a good start.”
I shot Gus a look.
He ignored me, apparently fascinated by the policeman’s sermon. Perhaps it was the uniform.
A little while later, Gus saw the officer out, then returned to the backroom with a murderous scowl.
“What’s the face for?” I demanded.
“Are you fucking serious?” he snapped. “That geezer just spent half an hour of his own time inspecting your security system and you pretty much ignored him the whole time.”
“Did not.”
“Yes, you did. What’s the matter with you? Do you want whenever scoped the place last time to come back and lift all your stock?”
“My stock? Jesus, Gus. You think someone’s going to make off with a van full of petunias?”
“No. I’m being optimistic, because the alternative is that some nut broke in to get to you, and you won’t tell me enough about your arsehole ex for me to know if it could be him.”
I dropped the knife I was trimming rose stems with. “It’s not him. Why on earth would it be? I signed the papers.”
“You said he always gets what he wants—”
“Well, that’s not me, is it? He left me, remember? Fuck, I’m sensing a theme here.”
I turned my back on Gus and went back to prepping the roses I’d need for tomorrow’s wedding. I sensed him staring holes into my back, but eventually he sighed and left.
Relieved to finally be alone, I finished my prep and moved on to the bridal bouquet. The design I’d sketched was creative and consuming. For a blessed while, my world narrowed to dusky pinks and floral scents, and I forgot about the clusterfuck my life in Rushmere had become.
A knock at the back door startled me some time later. I jumped a mile, then dragged it open.
There was no one there. Just an envelope on the step, addressed to me in handwriting so perfect I cried.
* * *
I’d buried my phone under a pile of clean washing. Dirty clothes got on my nerves, but folded laundry could sit around for days before I got round to putting it away, a habit that had infuriated my mother and Luke equally. They’d bonded over it. She’d liked him before he’d broken my heart. That boy doesn’t know what he’s lost, child.
I hadn’t argued with her at the time, but I should’ve. Luke had lost his whole life. As dysfunctional as his family had seemed to outsiders, they were everything to each other.
In an effort to distract myself from the letter burning a hole in my pocket, I lay back on my bed and thought of Billy. I hadn’t needed Luke to tell me he’d gone off the rails. He’d been well on his way before I’d moved to Paris, but the disassociation I’d seen in Luke the other night bugged me. Billy had always been difficult, but as children, he and Luke had been so close that people often mistook them for twins. Was this who adult Luke was? A man who could cut himself off from people he loved without a flicker of emotion? “Emotion is dangerous.” They’d been my words, not his, but I wondered if Billy still had the same number.
Idiot. What are you going to do? Call him up and tell him to fix his shit?
The hypocrisy of the mere idea was galling enough for me to roll over and shove my head under my pillow. I couldn’t work out why I cared so much, or why the aborted conversation I’d had with Luke under the stars didn’t feel like anything. I’d waited a lifetime to throw those accusations at him, to rain fury on him for his bland response, but the rage I’d counted on hadn’t come. Instead I’d been ambushed by the burning desire to reclaim his hand and swear to him none of that mattered anymore. That our scars belonged in the past.
Storming to his van and demanding he drive me home had seemed a fair compromise, the vow to never meet with him again a double lock across the stable door, but the sensation that the horse had already bolted wouldn’t quit.
Groaning, I gave in to the temptation I’d been resisting all evening. I fished the hand-delivered envelope out of my pocket and opened it, smoothing out creases that were as old as the hurt lancing my heart.
Mia,
This isn’t going to reach you, but I have to write it all down, or I’m gonna fucking explode, I swear.
I know you’re never going to understand, but I have no choice. My mum needs money, and if I don’t do this, Billy will leave school and do it instead, and I can’t let that happen. He’s wild...you know he is. If he gets out there too young, he’ll never come back.
And it’s not just that—it’s me too. I love you, Mia, but I see my dad around every corner and it’s suffocating me. I can’t spend the rest of my life climbing his ladders, using his tools, wearing his fucking boots... I just can’t do it. The Navy ain’t what I want either, but it’s a way out, and I need that... I wish I could explain how much. It’s different for you. You speak a whole other language—there’s another side to your life you can escape to whoever you want.
It’s not like that for me. Rushmere is all I have and it’s killing me.
I don’t want to leave you. I love you, but I don’t know what else to do.
I’m sorry. Please don’t hate me forever, you’re worth so much more than that...you’re worth so much more than me.
I love you,
Luke xx
The paper crumpled in my fist, but I didn’t realise it was damp until a tear trickled onto the back of my hand. I stared at it, my heart swelling and deflating with every second that passed. He’d never told me he loved me—never said the words aloud—but in the weeks leading up to his father’s death, part of me had believed it, had bought into the emotion lacing every kiss and touch, to the intensity in his gaze as he’d moved inside me. When I’d woken that morning to find he’d left me, I’d cursed my stupidity, my naivety, and cynicism had grown inside me like a cancer. The notion that I’d been right the first time round left me dizzy.
He loved me.
God. I wished he hadn’t. All these years it had been so easy to hate him.
I pried the letter from my clenched fist, rolled over, and spread it out on my pillow, tracing the words with my fingertip. Luke had never been much of a writer. For years, we’d swapped homework; he’d done my maths while I’d fudged his English enough to make it look like his own work. Who’d have thought I’d be pushing twenty-seven and weeping over his scrawled words?
Scrawled. Ha. He wrote like he did everything else, meticulous and proper. He didn’t do anything by halves, even breaking my heart all over again.
I glanced at my phone. The urge to text him was strong, but my internal pessimism was in overdrive. So he’d loved me ten years ago. Didn’t mean he loved me now, and if he did, what difference did it make? I didn’t love him.
I just wanted him so b
ad I could hardly think straight.
And that wasn’t even the point. The letter wasn’t about me. His admission was a sideshow to the real issue, a truth that exposed me as the selfish brat I’d always been. Luke had left Rushmere—and me by default—because he’d been drowning, and I’d done absolutely nothing to save him.
The rumble of a diesel engine sounded outside. I jumped and scrambled off my bed, darting to the window. Luke’s van was pulling onto the driveway. Despite me telling him not three days ago to stay away, my heart leapt, and I was in motion before I truly knew what I was doing.
I dashed downstairs and threw open the front door just as a tall figure slid out of the van. In the darkness, I couldn’t make out his face, and I ran forward...straight into the strong broad chest of my brother.
“Ow!” He pushed me away and rubbed where my shoulder had collided with him. “Why are you running around the driveway in your nightie?”
“It’s not a nightie, you goon. It’s your fucking T-shirt.” The words came out far sharper than the situation deserved, if Gus’s twitching eyebrows were anything to go by.
“Are you okay?”
“Of course I’m okay,” I snapped. “I just didn’t know who was parking on your drive at this time of night.”
“It’s eight-thirty, and if it had been someone else, what the fuck were you going to do with no clothes on?”
I flipped him off and flounced back into the house, resisting the unfair compulsion to slam the door in his face. Was it his fault it hadn’t occurred to me for a single second that he’d be driving Luke’s van?
Come to think of it, I’d never seen him driving Luke’s van.
I rounded on him as he followed me into the kitchen. “What are you doing anyway? Why have you got Luke’s van?”
Gus moved past me to the kettle and filled it at the sink, apparently finding the cold tap the most interesting thing in the world. “I work for him, Mia. I do whatever he asks me to.”
“Why would he ask you to drive his van? Is it so he doesn’t have to pick you up from here?”
It was Gus’s turn to round on me. “Don’t do that.”
Forgiven--A Second Chance Romance Page 8