Riptide (Rock Stars, Surf and Second Chances Book 2)

by Michelle Mankin

  “Good. That’s very good. That story collaborates with the statements from those at the scene. Your CT scan was essentially negative. You suffered a nasty scalp wound and a significant concussion, but you’ll be ok. I’ll go start the paperwork for your discharge. You’ll have to stay overnight as a precaution, but if all goes well, you should be able to leave the hospital in the morning.”

  I turned to Simone as the doctor left the room. “It came back to me. The memories. When I lost consciousness.” I told her. The residue of enduring regrets lingered in my eyes as I looked at her.

  “I’m so sorry.”

  I nodded slowly and swallowed with difficulty. “Not all of them were bad. My beautiful wedding. The good friends. You. Ramon. How happy I was to be pregnant. Then that awful day by the pier.”

  I sometimes feared Dominic’s death represented some sort of cosmic payback for what had happened with Ramon.

  “I was a horrible wife.”

  “Nonsense. You were very much in love with your husband. Everyone knew you how devoted to him you were. But love has to be nurtured in order to survive. You did a lot of that surviving by yourself.”

  “Maybe,” I allowed.

  “No maybes about it, honey. It’s easy to idealize the way things were. The truth is that we all screw up. Don’t let the missteps of the past prevent you from moving forward to the future that you deserve.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Ramon

  I’m alright,” Karen insisted. “Head wounds bleed a lot. You heard the doctor. It really wasn’t as bad as it looked. I…”

  “Hey.” I rapped on the open door to announce my presence to her parents. Her gaze had already flicked my way, so I knew she had seen me. “Complete your thought. I didn’t mean to interrupt. I was just stopping by to see how you’re doing.”

  “I’m fine. But I’ll be better once my parents stop making such a fuss.”

  “That’s what parents do.” Her eyes narrowed in response. She didn’t appreciate me siding with them. I saw something else as she held my gaze that made me wonder if time had slid backward for her like it had for me while she had been unconscious.

  “I don’t need you to drive me.” Karen returned her gaze to her parents. They had their arms around each other, each wearing stubborn expressions that mirrored hers. “I like walking.” Her voice rose and the crease between her brows deepened. “The accident could have happened regardless.”

  “Karen.” Her dad used that authoritative fatherly tone, the same one my pop invoked whenever he was getting ready to lay down the law with me. “You’re not a child anymore. I can’t make you do anything.” She rubbed her forehead as he spoke. I could tell she had a headache brewing and that the arguing wasn’t helping. “I understand you want your independence, but I hope that you’ll make the wise choice when it comes to your health.”

  “Yes, Daddy, alright.” She squeezed her eyes shut and sagged into the hospital bed looking and sounding as if she were nineteen again.

  “I can shuttle her back and forth to work,” I offered.

  Karen’s eyes opened, brimming with unexpected relief. “Could you? That would be a real help. My mom has enough to manage with my dad and his memory problems.” I glanced his way speculatively. He didn’t seem impaired to me. “Are you sure it won’t be too much trouble?”

  “No trouble at all,” I emphasized. I didn’t tell her how much the thought of spending time with her every day appealed to me.

  I felt her mother’s assessing gaze on me. “Tom, it’s getting late.” She stepped closer to Karen, kissed her on the cheek and murmured to her about getting some rest. “We’ll pick you up first thing in the morning.”

  Waiting for my turn to be alone with Karen, I tucked my hands into the pockets of my board shorts as her dad said his goodnight.

  “See you in the morning, Sunshine.” He leaned down and kissed the top of her head. His adoring daughter reached for his hand and squeezed his fingers before he withdrew.

  “Ramon, thank you.” Tom nodded his approval as he escorted his wife toward the door.

  “It’s really no problem, sir.”

  He stopped to study me for a long moment. “I believe you,” he decided. “Don’t stay too long. The doctor said she’ll probably have a bad headache. But you know she’ll play it down. See if you can get her to take the Tylenol they prescribed.”

  “Will do,” I confirmed, moving toward my stubborn patient as her parents made their exit. “Hey, surfer girl,” I said, stroking my hand down her arm. “You gave us all quite a scare today.”

  “I know.” She turned her head away. “I’m sorry. I should have been more careful.”

  “There’s nothing to be sorry about. It was an accident.”

  “I know. You’re right. I just hate that everybody’s lives got turned upside down with my drama.”

  She had been turning my life upside down from the day I had met her, but I didn’t get into that.

  “Karen. Look at me.” I gently grasped her chin and turned her pretty face toward me. She focused her soft as the seashore eyes on me. I could see the shadows of the past concealed within them.

  “Your perspective is all skewed on this. Yeah, everyone dropped whatever the hell they were doing when they found out you had been hurt. But not a one of the shit-ton of your friends out in the waiting room was thinking about it being an inconvenience. I’ve never seen a room full of people more visibly relieved than when the doctor came out and told us all you were going to be ok.”

  “But if I had been more careful…”

  “That’s not the real issue, is it? I can see it in your eyes.” I held her gaze. “I know what being here in this hospital is doing to you. Don’t withdraw into the past. The present is where you belong. Stay with us.”

  Stay with me, I pleaded silently. Let me back into your life where I belong.

  “That’s difficult to do. The best parts of my life are back there.”

  “I used to think that way, too. But I did a lot of reflecting while you were unconscious. A lot of soul searching. I think if we keep our feet in the past, we become mired in the unchangeable. We miss the opportunity to find the best path in the here and now. No more walking backward.” I could have lost her today. Maybe there was nothing I could do to absolve myself of the blame I knew I would always bear for Patch’s death. It had been in this very hospital, right after she had lost the baby when I had overheard her telling Simone that Dominic would never have taken that last tour if it hadn’t been for me. I couldn’t change that fact. I knew she could never feel the way I wanted her to feel about me because of that, but I would be a fool not to take what I could get. “Patch isn’t coming back. Stop acting like you died with him. You owe it to yourself, not to mention your family and friends, to live your life. This accident was a wakeup call for all of us. Life is precious. Don’t turn your back on it anymore. Take a moment to look around, to get a feel for the set pattern of the waves, then get back on your board, surfer girl and grab the best looking wave you can find.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Karen

  I closed the door of my room behind me, assessing as I glanced around at the bookshelves that celebrated times gone by. High school mementos. My prom and homecoming crowns. Pictures of Dominic and me. One of our wedding on the beach. One someone had taken when we had been on the road with the Dogs. Him in his uniform. There weren’t many of our final years together. Those times we’d shared during his days in the service time we hadn’t bothered with pictures—we, or mainly I, had been so desperate to live a lifetime in those fleeting moments that I hadn’t even thought about preserving them on film.

  But there was no future here. Ramon was right. He might be a year younger than me, but he always seemed wiser, certainly more experienced. As much as I thought I had grown in the years I had been married to Dominic, I was beginning to see that I had really been stuck in limbo, and I had lingered there even after his death.

  My f
lip flops sunk into the area rug as I crossed the room and sat on the little double bed still covered by the same white ruffled comforter from my childhood. My life had become as much a monument to the past as this room. Getting sober had been a major step to getting my life back in order. Coming home and coming to terms with what had happened so I could move forward was an even bigger one.

  I hugged my arms around my body and dropped my chin to my chest. Reluctance was a tightly wound, hard to unravel tangle within it.

  Because letting go of the past meant letting go of her, too.

  “Baby girl,” I whispered pulling in a shaky breath. Tears filled my eyes blurring my vision as I imagined her the way I always did with blonde hair and a smile like her father’s. “I wish I could have held you, fed you, tucked you in at night, watched you grow, taught you how to surf.” My breath hitched. “I wish I hadn’t failed you.”

  All that maternal joy once so gentle and beautiful suddenly ripped away in a hurricane of grief. I swallowed. The walls began to close in on me the way the way they so often did in New York. Never had I felt that way here in OB. I dug my fingers into my upper arms, nails marking my skin, refocusing myself. This was here. This was now. This was about me getting better.

  I couldn’t go back there anymore.

  The doorbell rang.

  I turned my head toward the sound and heard the front door downstairs open, then muffled, distant, deep voices.

  “Karen,” my dad called.

  I swiped the tears from my cheeks and cleared the knot of pain from my throat. “Yeah, Dad?” I managed.

  “Ramon’s here to take you to work.”

  I squeezed my eyes shut. Ramon being here gave me the last bit of courage I needed. I might be a little lost. I might be a little daunted by the task before me. I might not know exactly how I was going to get back to the person I was before but the key to rediscovery had arrived and was waiting downstairs. It was time for me to make that next step. The one I had avoided for too long. I threaded my fingers together and curled them tight. “Goodbye, my beautiful baby girl,” I managed after a moment, though my voice was thick. “I’ll always love you and your daddy. I’ll see you both one day, up there in heaven…when the time is right. But until then I need to try harder to make the most of the life that I have left.”

  She was still there inside my heart, but I felt a little lighter as I stood and moved steadily and purposefully toward the door. I cracked it open. “I’ll be right down, Daddy. I just need to take a quick shower.”

  “Ok, Sunshine. No rush. I’ll fix Ramon breakfast. And pack you something to eat on the way.”

  He was wrong. I had every reason to rush. I had wasted too much time already going absolutely nowhere but backwards for three years. Now that I had decided to make peace with my past as best I could, I was anxious to take another step; getting on with the business of relearning how to live.

  * * *

  As one day followed the next, I slowly emerged from the insulation of my cocoon. Ramon was always there. Ramon made all the difference. Like clockwork, he arrived each morning well before the dawn. Since I hadn’t been cleared to surf yet, I would watch from a bench at the top of the cliff stairs while he caught the waves in my stead. Afterward, we would share coffee from a thermos and maybe half a fried egg sandwich my dad put together. Then Ramon would drive me into work and bring me straight home when my shift was through.

  We didn’t talk about the past. We talked about surfing, music, our families. Things we both loved. Safe topics. Ramon seemed to understand that I was still sifting through the memories, dreaming with my eyes wide open, dipping one cautious foot into each day while prying the other free from yesterday.

  But on the third morning since the accident, though he remained quiet and patient as ever, I could feel the tension in him. His eyes continually shifted to me as he drove me into work.

  “You don’t have to walk on eggshells with me,” I announced preemptively once he made the turn onto Newport Avenue. He pressed his lips flat and pulled into a parking space. I shifted to face him knowing he had something to say. He cut the engine and turned toward me.

  “I can tell you’ve been crying, Karen. I keep hoping I won’t find your eyes red rimmed every time I come up from the surf.” He raked a handful of curls back from his furrowed brow. “I hate when you’re upset. Hate the thought that maybe I’m the cause of it. What I said the other day at the hospital…”

  “You were right. One hundred percent right. It’s just that taking those steps is not an instantaneous, pain free process. If it were easy I wouldn’t have been avoiding doing it for as long as I have. Right?”

  “Sure, I can see that.” His eyes held steady on my mine for a long searching moment. “Only when I said those things, I didn’t intend for you to take that journey by yourself.”

  “I’m not.” I reached for his hand, the one closest to me. He had his keys clutched in a tight grip. I laid my fingers over his and stroked my thumb across his knuckles. I felt the attraction between us the moment I touched his warm hand, but I also experienced a more weighty connection when I gazed into his eyes. “I’m just getting my bearings. A lot of what needs doing is on me. But I appreciate very much you sticking around and giving me moral support while I figure things out.”

  “You’ve got me. I’m here for whatever you need.” He shifted to use his free hand to tuck a strand of hair behind my ear. I shivered remembering the hundreds of times he had touched me that way. The same deep bolt of awareness rocked me now. The same gravitational pull brought me closer. For a long moment, I drifted on the familiar currents within his empathetic gaze. Then, he tapped my nose, breaking the spell. “Simone’s watching from the shop.” I turned and noted her presence. I didn’t think today was the first time she had spied on us. She had been giving me inquisitive glances since Ramon started bringing me to work, but she hadn’t pushed me. Ramon cleared his throat. His tone seemed lighter when he continued. “I think we’re a little late today, but I’m sure she’ll cut you some slack.”

  I nodded. I didn’t trust my voice or the wild feelings careening around inside of me.

  “I’ll pick you up at closing time, same as usual.” He gave me a long searching look. “Don’t stress. You don’t have to make a lifetime of decisions in a few days.” He swiveled away, popped open his door rounded the hood of the Explorer with that confident swagger of his, and opened my door. I got out, my hip brushing his, giving me another heady dose of what-the-hell-am-I-going-to-do-about-my-feelings-for-Ramon. I somehow managed to head toward the shop door Simone held ajar for me. I knew she could clearly see my post sexy guitarist haze. As soon as I stepped inside, I glanced back over my shoulder. I wanted one more look. Ramon was watching me. The chiseled edges of his lips lifting, he uncrossed his arms and pushed away from the side of the SUV where he’d been leaning. His gaze traveled along the length of me, not for the first time lately. His slight smile deepening, he tipped an imaginary hat to me as if he were my chauffeur wishing me a good day and folded his lean body back into the driver’s seat.

  Sa-woon. I sighed.

  “That’s it,” Simone announced saucily, breaking her silence. “What the hell is going on with you and Ramon Martinez?” She raised both brows. “I thought all the stuff I’d heard about the two of you at the Deck Bar was exaggeration.”

  “Not on my side,” I admitted honestly, taking a big bold step into my life’s new reality.

  “Hmm, Sleeping Beauty seems to have awakened. Sorry, Chulo,” she glanced down at the ever-present dog at her feet. “Apparently your Aunt Karen won’t be getting a furry companion after all. She’s chosen the more challenging route, without discussing it with me I might add.” She shook her head in mock sadness at the black and white fluff ball. His bandit masked head cocked to the side, he listened as if he could understand every single word. Simone turned back to me. “So that blow to the head has got you considering things. Good. It’s about damn time in my opinion. But are yo
u sure you wanna go down that particular path with him? Anyone can see you two have some serious chemistry. But he’s always been a player. If you cross that line with him, you could very well lose the friendship that you seem to have only just regained.”

  “You’re absolutely right.” I nodded. I would be a huge risk, a gamble I had taken before and lost.

  “I guess it comes down to what you think is more important.”

  I wanted both, the friendship and the fervor. It had been years since I’d slept with anyone. A drunken tryst with a coworker had been an unmitigated disaster. I wasn’t the type of woman who could do casual sex. I wanted to be with someone I cared about. I knew with Ramon it would be incredible, but I wasn’t sure if it was really a possibility. Imagining being with him was going beyond getting on with my life and into the realm of pure fantasy.

  “Today is just today.” I decided out loud, shaking off the rest, especially the hypnotizing effect Ramon had on me. “Let’s declutter and organize. Then eat chocolate. Lots of chocolate.”

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Ramon

  “I need a beer.”

  “Pretty early to be drinking don’t you think?”

  I gave Ash a look that would’ve sent most people retreating. He just laughed, took the stool closest to me and settled in like I had invited him. He told the bartender to fetch him what I was having.

  “Maybe you didn’t understand.” I frowned at him. “I don’t want company.”

  “What’s got you all crumbly?”

  Instead of answering, I took a long pull on my beer and tried to redirect. “Come to think of it maybe you can help me with something. The homeless girl, the one with the purple Laker’s cap. You know who I’m talking about?”

  “Yeah. Sometimes she hangs around the studio. I think she likes listening to the music.”