Face the Music: Beyond Jackson Falls Book 1

by Laurie Breton

  “Can I say something? I don’t want to cross any lines.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “You’ve probably already heard this a thousand times, but have you seen a counselor? Not because there’s anything wrong with you that needs to be fixed. But you seem so…adrift is the only word that seems to fit. Couldn’t a counselor help you figure out what you want?”

  “I already know what I want. I want to go back. Back to the way things were before.” Back to when he was whole, and Rachel was alive and smiling and shoving that stupid camera in his face thirty times a day. Something twisted in his gut, so hard he had to take a series of short, panting breaths to untangle it. “I have a VA counselor. I’ve seen him a couple of times, but he hasn’t addressed the real issue. He thinks that if you create new habits and think new thoughts, it’ll solve everything. Learn how to live with one leg. Practice what you’ve learned until it becomes second nature. But that’s only a piece of my problem. Besides, I’m not looking for new habits or new thoughts. I’m looking for the fucking life I lost.”

  A single tear spilled from the corner of her eye and rolled down her cheek. Ignoring it, she said, “It’s gone, Mikey. I’m not saying there isn’t a life out there for you. But it won’t be the same life you lived before. Maybe that’s what he means by new habits and new thoughts.”

  “I’m so tired of it. Tired of being treated like a circus side show. Tired of being a cripple. Just plain tired.”

  “You still have to make the effort. I think you do a great job of talking the talk. But I’m not sure you’re really walking the walk.”

  “Are you calling me lazy?”

  “Not lazy. Lost. Until you find yourself, until you learn to love yourself again, just the way you are, you’ll continue to flounder. I would fix it for you in a heartbeat if I could. But you have to do it yourself. You have to find a way to live with what’s happened. A way to accept it. You can hate the reality all you want, but it’s not going away.”

  Her words were brutally honest, but spoken with such kindness that he couldn’t be angry with her. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m not good at sugarcoating things.”

  “It’s okay. Actually, I feel a little better now.” It was true. He had no idea why. “I guess I needed to vent to somebody who wouldn’t judge me.”

  “You have to take baby steps,” she said. “Force yourself to do normal things that will take your mind off the stuff you want to forget. In that sense, I agree with your counselor. If you don’t put yourself out there, you’ll become a recluse. And then, you know what?”

  He slid his fingertips up and down the handle of his paddle. “What?”

  “Then they win. The bad guys. Whoever did this to you. They win.” She stuck her paddle into the water and shoved off, her voice floating back to him. “And I know you don’t want that.”

  PAIGE

  THE LATE AFTERNOON sun was brutal. Morning was the best time to run, before the sun was high in the sky, but they had to work around Mikey’s shifts with the JFPD. So sometimes they ran in the morning, sometimes later in the day, after his shift ended. Running could be a bitch, sweat trickling and irritating intimate places, wetness rolling into her eyes and causing a salty sting. But those endorphins were addictive, and she felt so good afterward that it was worth the torture.

  They skirted a pair of runners coming from the opposite direction, nodded acknowledgment, and kept on moving.

  His gait no longer seemed awkward to her. It wasn’t that he’d changed; she’d simply adjusted to the new Mikey. To be honest, she barely noticed it any longer. It was simply part of who he was. Clearly, he didn’t like having attention drawn to his disability. The fact that she paid no attention to it was probably a relief to him. On the other hand, just because she’d become accustomed to his odd gait didn’t mean she should ignore the fact that the disability existed. A true friend would be watching for signs that he was tiring, or in pain, or needed to take a break. Paige silently promised herself that she would do a better job of being his friend.

  She shot a quick glance at him, saw the beads of moisture that had formed at his temple. In this hot summer weather, the man had to be suffocating in sweat pants. But she’d never heard him complain. Clearly, the word “stoic” had been coined with Mikey Lindstrom in mind. She wasn’t entirely sure that was a good thing.

  She cleared her throat and said, “You doing okay, champ?”

  “When I’m not okay, you’ll be the first person I tell.”

  “Don’t be snippy with me. I’m just asking.”

  “I appreciate your concern, but don’t waste it on me.”

  By the time they reached the parking lot, her clothes were soaked through, and her head felt like she’d just yanked it out of a 450-degree oven. Side by side, they leaned against her little yellow car, both of them sticky and stinky, both of them taking long, slow breaths to lower their body temp and bring them down from the runner’s high.

  Her bare legs touched the car’s smooth, shiny finish, and she could almost smell the odor of charred flesh. “Man,” she said, removing her sweatband and shaking out her hair. “Is this hot, or what?”

  “It’s hot. Too bad you showed up here during the summer. It’s so much nicer in October.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “I’m so sorry I couldn’t schedule my fiancé’s marriage to another woman at a more suitable time of year.”

  The grin took its time coming. It started at the corners of his mouth, crawled up those wonderful cheekbones, and changed his face completely. Gone was the grim countenance that was his everyday expression. When it reached his eyes, when it warmed them, she felt the impact deep in the pit of her belly.

  Oh, yeah. This man definitely had droves of women crawling up his ass. It was a little embarrassing to admit she had the same physical response as those hordes of nameless, faceless women. When he wasn’t looking dour as your friendly neighborhood undertaker, the man was a sex god. In spite of herself, her legs weakened. She pressed harder against the car, ignoring the searing pain on the back of those traitorous legs.

  And then he said, “Want to get some dinner?”

  His words, so unexpected, slapped her out of her daze. Paige blinked a couple of times, scrambled to change gears, and heard herself say, “Surely, you’re not asking me out on a date, Lindstrom.”

  He crossed his arms over his chest and said, “Of course not.”

  Thank God. Her hormones, too long deprived of male attention, simmered down a notch. It was a simple dinner invitation, nothing more. An opportunity to break bread with a friend. A cousin, actually, if you ignored the “step” part. It would be preposterous to think of it as a date. They’d already tried that, with disastrous consequences. Twice. This was just two old friends, two people who currently had no significant others, getting together for dinner. It was one hell of a relief to know he didn’t think of it as a date. Because that would have been awkward. Too awkward for words.

  Move along, folks. Nothing to see here.

  “I was thinking about driving into Farmington,” he said. “There’s a Chinese place that’s not terrible. I just thought that if you don’t have plans, you might want to come with me.”

  Trying to sound casual, she said, “There’s a place with edible Chinese food here in the sticks?”

  “I didn’t say it was good, MacKenzie. I said it wasn’t terrible.”

  “Point taken.”

  There was no legitimate reason to refuse dinner with him. She would pay for her meal, he would pay for his. They’d make polite conversation, enjoy a beer or two, share a couple of laughs. And neither of them would have any illusions about where it was headed.

  Because it was headed nowhere.

  Paige peeled her sticky tee shirt away from her overheated skin and said, “I’m game, as long as you give me time to clean up first.”

  * * *

  FULLY REJUVENATED, SHOWERED and dressed in a clean tee shirt and jeans, her damp hair falling loose around her
shoulders, Paige grabbed her purse and car keys and took a detour through the kitchen. Casey, slicing vegetables for a salad, the knife moving up and down in a rapid motion, looked up, said, “Hey,” and smiled.

  “Hey.” Paige reached out and snagged a slice of cucumber. “I won’t be home for dinner.” She popped the cucumber slice into her mouth, chewed and swallowed. “I’m eating with a friend. Not sure what time I’ll be home.” She deliberately didn’t name the friend. If she let her family know she was having dinner with Mikey, they were apt to read something into it that simply wasn’t there. Casey would be fine with it, but she didn’t want to tangle with Dad over a casual dinner between two old friends. Dad was about as territorial as a man could get. If it hadn’t been utterly taboo to piss in a circle around his daughter, he would have done so.

  “Well, then, have a nice evening. Oh, something came for you in the mail. It’s on the counter.”

  The letter bore the embossed logo of Leland Epstein, Attorney-at-Law. Probably not good news. If it had been good news, Leland would have called her. Outside, she started up her car and tore open the envelope. It held another, smaller envelope from a law firm in Southern California. Attached to it was a sticky note. In Leland’s spidery handwriting, it said: We have our response. Call if you want to pursue further.

  Oh, boy.

  She took out the letter, read it, and ticked one pink fingernail against the steering wheel. The little prick had hired his own lawyer. She had to wade her way through the legalese to get to the meat and potatoes, but the gist was clear: Push this any further, and we’ll see you in court.

  Pretty nervy, considering they were her damn dogs.

  Paige tossed the letter on the passenger seat and shoved her sunglasses onto her face. Transmission whining, she backed down the driveway and into the road. Shoving the shifter into gear, she took off, tires squealing.

  She wasn’t giving up. Those dogs were her babies, and she missed them so much it hurt. But the prospect of court was scary. If a judge awarded them permanently to that asshole and his bitch of a wife, it would kill her. There had to be a better way, and she would find it.

  But not right now. Right now, she had other fish to fry. Like a non-date for dinner at a not-terrible Chinese restaurant with a man who was not hard on the eyes. Ryan Legend, the little weasel, could wait until tomorrow.

  She was halfway to town, tooling along with the top down, hair flying in the wind, when she realized it had been more than two weeks since she’d last watched 17 Harwood Street.

  * * *

  THE RESTAURANT SERVED standard American-Chinese fare, tasty and filling but not particularly inspired. Dim overhead illumination and soft candlelight on each table made a feeble attempt at ambiance, but the place was really just one more small-town pseudo-Chinese joint that sold chicken fingers and fried rice and served duck sauce from a plastic squeeze bottle. Not terrible, Paige decided, was an accurate description. “There’s this little restaurant in Kowloon,” she said, toying with her lo mein noodles, “just off Nathan Road, where the seafood is to die for. It’s called Shanghai—”

  “Moon,” he finished for her.

  She set down her fork and stared at him through narrowed eyes. “You’ve been there?”

  Mikey sat up a little straighter. “You’d be surprised by all the places I’ve been.”

  “I knew you’d traveled with the military, but Hong Kong is a long way from Iraq.”

  “I didn’t spend all my time in the Middle East. When I was on leave, I traveled.”

  The flickering candlelight highlighted the bone structure of his face, softening his skin but exaggerating all those angles. Tiny crow’s-feet had begun to work their way outward from the corners of his eyes, making him look a little older than his thirty years. She supposed war might do that to a person.

  “I’ve always thought of you as a small-town boy,” she said. “It doesn’t get much more rural than Jackson Falls. When did the travel bug bite you?”

  “Probably at birth. Being born in a small town doesn’t necessarily dictate your destiny. I love to travel. Or at least, I used to, before—“ He stopped abruptly, leaving a heavy silence hanging over them.

  Because she couldn’t bear the pain in his eyes, she said, “Where else have you been?”

  After a moment, he came back from wherever he’d gone. “Besides Hong Kong, I’ve been to Paris. Katmandu. The Galapagos Islands. Copenhagen. Montrèal. Sydney.”

  “Wow. You do get around. Favorite place?” She was seeing him in a whole new light, this guy she’d thought she knew, this small-town boy turned world traveler.

  He picked up his fork, trailed it randomly through a puddle of sweet and sour sauce on his plate. “Even though I know it’s a cliché, my favorite place was Paris. L’arc de Triomphe. The Eiffel Tower. Jim Morrison’s grave.”

  “You visited Père Lachaise?”

  He looked a little embarrassed. “Guilty as charged.”

  “I never figured you for a Doors fan.”

  “Mom used to play their music when I was a kid. She was a huge fan, so I know a lot of their songs. Mostly, though, it’s a thing. If you go to Paris, you have to make a pilgrimage to Père Lachaise. The same way a trip to Memphis has to include a stop at Graceland, whether or not you’re a fan of The King.”

  “I’ve traveled a lot, but I didn’t see much. I envy you the freedom to just hop a plane and explore.”

  “I thought I should do it while I was young. Since I didn’t have a wife or a family waiting for me at home, I thought, why not? No mortgage, no car payment, no overhead. Uncle Sam took care of that for me, and I took advantage. I banked most of my money, and every time I had a leave, I traveled someplace I hadn’t seen yet.”

  “Lucky you. I’ve been all around the world, multiple times. But when you’re on tour, you don’t have the time to get out and explore. I’ve seen more than my share of hotel rooms, airport terminals, and every backstage area from here to Timbuktu. Once in a while, there’s a limo ride here or there. Like to the Shanghai Moon. But you don’t see much of the world from the back seat of a limo.”

  “Sounds sad.”

  “It’s not. Really.” She poured herself a second cup of hot Chinese tea from a shiny aluminum pot and stirred in half a packet of Equal. “Sure, there’ve been times when I fantasized about walking away from it. We all do, once in a while. You get no privacy, no real life to speak of, not while you’re on the road. But the time you spend on stage is heaven. The music lives in here.” She thumped her chest. “And it makes up for all the rest. The fans are out of this world. And I work with a great group of people. We’re family, in the best sense of the word.” She thought briefly of Tim, and forced the thought from her mind. Tim had made his own bed, and she wasn’t responsible for his sins of omission. “Like everything else in life, it’s a trade-off. But after a while, life on the road gets old. Sometimes, it would be nice to stay in one place longer than twenty-four hours. I’ve been to Paris a half-dozen times, but I still haven’t seen the Eiffel Tower.”

  “That’s a shame. Everyone should see it at least once before they die. Along with the Great Pyramids. And Venice. I spent three days in Venice once. Took a gondola ride with a girl I met in one of the cafes.”

  Suddenly, out of nowhere, Ryan was there, inside her head, bringing with him a pall of sadness thick enough to strangle her. What would be the point of a romantic Venetian gondola ride without somebody of the opposite sex by your side? Or, for that matter, a trip to the top of the Eiffel Tower? Who the hell would go there to stare out at the lights of Paris alone?

  “MacKenzie? You okay?”

  She glanced up, momentarily disoriented, and then, like a ship that had listed to one side, slowly righted herself. “Sorry,” she said. “Just wool-gathering.”

  “Thought I’d lost you there for a minute.”

  She took a sip of tea to help regain her equilibrium and, with false brightness, said, “Dad and Casey spent three months in Paris, on
an extended honeymoon.”

  “I remember.”

  “They loved it. Casey still talks about retiring there someday.”

  “You should go sometime. Just take a couple of weeks and explore. Paris, Venice, Rome. You’d love it.”

  “Maybe someday.” Studying him over the rim of her cup, she said, “So you liked the military life?”

  “I loved it. It suited me. I’ve always been drawn to logic and structure. It’s probably why I did so well in math and geometry. You don’t have all those shades of gray in math. The answer is, well…the answer. I like that. Dad raised me with a certain sense of order, and it stuck. There’s no place more ordered than the military. You have structure. Protocol. You always know where you stand. The rules are the rules, and no matter what situation you find yourself in, once you’ve been through basic, you’ll never dither around, trying to figure out what to do. Because you know. The answers were taught to you and you’ve internalized them. They’ll be with you until you draw your last breath. Even in war, even in the midst of chaos, there’s structure and form and protocol.”

  “And you liked that? It didn’t feel like they were trying to box you in? I don’t think I could deal with that kind of external control.”

  “You’re an artist. That kind of structure would suffocate you. But for me, it just fit.” He leaned over the table, his eyes lit with an enthusiasm she hadn’t seen there before. “It’s a lot like being on a football team. You work together, and you work hard. Everybody knows their job well enough so they could do it in their sleep. And when the time comes, you do that job, without having to think about it, because you know it so well. A good football team is like a single organism with lots of arms. Like an octopus. Every arm has its job, and performs it flawlessly. A military unit’s the same.”

  “That makes sense,” she said. “When you look at it like that, it’s pretty much the same with my band. We may look like a bunch of crazy yahoos, but the minute we hit the stage, we become a cohesive unit. Everybody knows their job, and we all just do it. I could perform blindfolded. Or drunk. Or asleep. Sometimes, I actually run guitar riffs in my sleep. When I step on that stage, I don’t have to think about how to play a riff, or how to sing a certain song. I just get up there and do it.”