by Rachel Hauck
“See, girls are nothing but trouble.” Clem stepped in between them, waving the ball. “Focus. We’ve got a season to win. That tailback from Memphis who ran through our D line last year? Heard he bench-pressed three hundred in the spring.”
Bradley moaned. He was a defensive lineman.
“Yeah, we got some work to do.” Clem sprinted forward, then whipped around, sending the ball in a high arc toward Jimmy. Man, he could throw a shot. Jimmy caught it and ran through Bradley’s soft blocking.
If all went as planned, Clem would start as quarterback and Jimmy as halfback. They were juniors but the best ones for the job. So they hoped.
With the ball tucked in his arm and the sun peeking in a patch of blue sky, Jimmy left the street, the football field in view, cutting through Mrs. Whitaker’s backyard where Spice chased the old lady’s cat up a tree.
Jimmy raced ahead, the end zone in sight. Clem ran a close second, Spice and Bradley lumbering behind.
Jimmy spiked the ball as he crossed the goal line.
Yeah, this was what he needed to clear his head. To be on the field. Looking forward to the season. Fixing on his goals.
Dad was looking forward to his boy starting this season, and Jimmy didn’t want to let him down. He liked to brag on his son’s football talent to the fellas on his crew.
Jimmy would do his dad proud. He’d not allow a girl to get him off track.
Nevertheless, when he lined up behind Clem for the first practice play, his pulse thudded in his ears. Not from racing with his friends to the field, but from the lingering image of the girl in the photograph.
Chapter Two
TAYLOR
BROOKLYN HEIGHTS, NEW YORK
SEPTEMBER 16, 2015
Taylor glanced up with a wash of anticipation as she heard his key in the lock. Jack was home.
Her computer-tired eyes adjusted to the dark shadows filling their fourth-floor apartment, the glow of Brooklyn streetlights muted against the windows.
“Look, Hops, it’s a great campaign. Let’s just make the presentation and see what they say.” Jack moved through the apartment, phone pressed to his ear.
“Hey—” Taylor said, standing, smoothing her hand over her hair. She ached from sitting so long. Now that her husband was home, she longed to nab a bit of his attention.
Husband. Six months and the word still felt so foreign.
But Jack crossed to their bedroom without pausing or even nodding her way, his laptop case swinging from his shoulder, his broad, muscular presence and over-the-top confidence a light of its own, consuming the dim apartment.
Taylor sank back down to her chair, the ache in her muscles creeping toward her heart. If he didn’t want her here, then why did he propose?
Even more confounding, why did she say yes?
She sat with her fingers poised at her keyboard, the angle of light from her desk lamp glinting off the silver sheen of her wedding band. A platinum symbol of their trailer park commitment.
She’d preferred things free and loose in the beginning. The whirlwind of their romance had launched her to the moon. An emotional place she never wanted to leave.
But after their Martha’s Vineyard elopement, she slowly sank back to earth, leaving the moon and stars behind. The seasons changed—spring to summer, summer now giving way to autumn—and Taylor sensed their love fading and withering.
They fought lately, often over money. She claimed he spent too much. He charged her with being a skinflint. But he had more shoes than she did, and his clothes took up two-thirds of the closet and a whole chest of drawers.
With a sigh, Taylor returned to the image she was editing on her screen. A wedding gown, of all things, she’d photographed for a new designer. The shots were due tomorrow.
The touch-up work had been body-tensing tedious. All the gowns had dirt on the hems from the outdoor location. For the last ten hours she’d been enhancing light and shadow in each photograph, the setting, the models, the dresses, and at last, making brown spots white.
After a few seconds, Taylor lost her concentration. Sitting back, she checked the time. Ten o’clock.
“Jack, you hungry?” she called toward the bedroom, waiting, listening.
She’d worked through the dinner hour, ignoring her rumbling belly, determined to get this job done.
If she wanted to grow her résumé as a commercial photographer, she needed to deliver excellent work on time.
“Jack?”
The closet door clicked shut, but otherwise there was no response. Okay, back to work. Three more dresses and done.
Breathing in, Taylor hunkered down, willing herself to press on.
Right after she eloped with Jack, she landed her first commercial client, Melinda House Weddings, a European designer famous for dressing the Grand Duchess of Hessenberg, Princess Regina.
Landing Jack Forester and Melinda House in the same month? Serendipitous. Dreamlike.
“What are you doing?” Jack entered the room and dropped down to the couch, reaching for the remote. He was dressed for exercise in his basketball shorts and oversized Ohio State National Championship T-shirt.
“Working . . .” No kiss. No tender hello. No sultry gaze like in the days of old—six months ago felt like the days of old. “Are you hungry?”
“No, ate at work. Is this the Melinda House job?”
“Yes, the hems are dirty. I told her it would happen, but she insisted on an outdoor shoot.” Which had taken Taylor and her assistant, Addison, on an exhausting yet exhilarating ride all over the city.
“By the way, Keri texted me today. She wondered if you had her wedding done yet.”
“Why is she texting you? She’s got my number . . .” Taylor doubled down on the image on her screen. Why did Keri insist on using Jack as an unnecessary middleman?
“Don’t snap, just asking.”
“I told her the end of the month.” End of the month . . . a hundred times.
“Fine, just shoot her a text or an e-mail. She’s dying to get her pictures. I can’t blame her.”
“Guess not. A girl has a right to revel in her wedding.”
The only pictures she had of her wedding were snapped with her iPhone by the officiant presiding over their vows. She’d not even thought to take her Canon with her to the ceremony.
That’s how head over heels she was for Jack. Giggly. Forgetful. Spontaneous.
She hadn’t wanted to shoot Keri’s wedding because the job wouldn’t build the commercial résumé Taylor wanted. But Keri was a friend of Jack’s, a former client, and probably an ex-girlfriend, though Taylor wasn’t sure about that last part. Either way, she would do just about anything for Jack.
Even marry him when she didn’t believe in marriage.
He was her weakness. Her shoe sale, her milk chocolate, her ice-cream cone on a summer day, her high school crush come to life.
She didn’t know he was in Manhattan until that cold January afternoon when she literally ran into him coming around the corner of Madison and 67th. She’d just finished a job and thought a perusal of the Tory Burch store would be a nice reward.
Not that she had Tory Burch kind of money to spend, but looking and dreaming never hurt. She’d get a latte on the way home as another reward.
Instead, she’d rediscovered Jack. So much better than drooling over clothes she couldn’t afford. Yes, that’s it. Drool over a man she couldn’t afford either, but somehow her emotional bank was willing to risk investing in one Jack Forester.
At first it was, “Wow, hello!” Two friends from Heart’s Bend, Tennessee, in the Big Apple.
Then dinner, followed by lunch, and dinner again. Eight weeks later, he whispered two stunning words on a Martha’s Vineyard beach. “Marry me.” She didn’t hesitate or take one contemplating breath. “Yes.”
Eyes tired and blurry, Taylor closed her laptop. She’d finish in the morning and get them to Melinda on time. “A-are you going out?”
Jack cut a glance her way
, then back to the TV where he’d landed on SportsCenter. “Yeah, Aaron called. Wanted to play basketball.”
“Now?”
“It’s been a long day. I need to burn off some energy. Hops is all in a wad over the FRESH Water account.”
Jack was an up-and-comer in the New York advertising world. Ad Age called him the “Charmer.” His work on a Super Bowl spot had won his agency their first CLIO Award.
“What’s going on with FRESH Water?”
She’d wanted Jack to recommend her for a FRESH shoot. But his boss, Hops Williams, deplored nepotism. It didn’t matter how good Taylor was, or how cheap—did free count? He’d not entertain the thought of his main man’s wife working on one of the accounts.
“Nothing, just working all the angles.”
Nothing? It didn’t feel like nothing. “Hops is in a wad over nothing?”
“Taylor—” Jack stood, moving to the kitchen. “It’s just business.” He jerked open the fridge.
She felt all this keenly, a sign their relationship was dying. In the beginning, they’d lain together in bed, legs and arms entangled while they talked about their work, their dreams, the funny bits on Jimmy Fallon. Then they would fall asleep in each other’s arms. But now they went to bed at separate times. Jack clammed up about his job, and by Taylor’s calculations, it’d been awhile since they’d . . . well . . . entangled.
“How’s Aaron’s new baby?”
Jack twisted the cap from a bottle of water as he returned to the sofa, laughing low. “Why do you think he wants to play midnight basketball? Burn off some tension. I guess the thing is colicky or teething or something.”
The thing? One of the conversations omitted in the whirlwind was how many babies, if any, they wanted. Besides his standard response of “not now,” Taylor wasn’t sure of Jack’s feelings on family.
Other than that he loathed his own.
Taylor studied him, the palpitation in her chest tangible. Try as she might to get a realistic grip on her marriage, she was still a bit mesmerized by Jack. The troubled, brooding, gorgeous boy from high school who walked among the wounded yet excelled in everything. For some unknown, aggravating reason, she had this desire to get and keep his attention. To make him smile at her, because of her, only for her. To see in his eyes that she mattered to him. Made his life complete.
“Why do you have to do it?” she asked without preamble.
Jack peeked her way. “Do what?”
“Be . . . perfect.”
“Perfect?” He made a face and swigged from his water. “You mean besides spending too much money?”
“Jack—”
“I’m determined, purposeful, precise, maybe a perfectionist, but hardly perfect.” Another swig of water. “I don’t have perfection scheduled until I’m forty-five.” His wink and grin flooded Taylor with the warmth of want. “So relax.”
Beneath the fortitude and confidence, Taylor caught a glimpse of the boy from Heart’s Bend who wrestled with demons only he could see. He’d used all his skill and unique talents to act as his own healer; Taylor had yet to determine if he was becoming whole by his efforts or only more wounded.
Was his impulsive proposal another Band-Aid on the wound? Another way to forget his pain? Had they been too impetuous? Too full of lust or something? Out of their heads?
Never mind that Jack could have any woman he wanted. Underline any. Models. Actresses. Beauty queens. She’d scanned his Facebook friends.
So why did he pick her? A throwback-hippie photographer. From their small hometown?
Back at the fridge, Jack checked a carton of leftover Chinese.
“Do we have anything to eat besides three-day-old fried rice?” He arced the small white box toward the trash, basketball style.
“I thought you weren’t hungry.” Taylor held her tone low and cool, trying not to be defensive.
“Changed my mind. Wow, we have a fifteen-hundred-dollar fridge with nothing but leftovers.”
“There’s milk,” she said as she went to the couch and sat next to where he had been. “And cereal.”
“Cereal?” His heavy sigh irritated her.
“What?”
“It’s just . . . you’re here during the day. At home. I thought you’d handle the food, the kitchen . . . dinner.”
“Handle dinner?”
“You know what I mean.”
“No, I don’t.”
“It’s just . . . you’re home.”
“I’m not just home, Jack. I’m working.” She motioned to her little office set up in the corner of their apartment. The space was small, but she had an amazing view of the East River and the lower end of Manhattan.
“Fine, but can we clean this out once in a while?” He made a show of it by tossing another carton of Chinese into the trash, then slamming the fridge door shut.
“Feel free, Jack.” Taylor reached for the remote, changing the channel. Resentment bubbled under her skin. He was gone all day, then walked in without a tender word, changed to go play basketball, and criticized her for having too many leftovers.
What was on TV at ten thirty? Something funny . . .
“What’s with you and leftovers anyway?” she asked. “I wanted to throw that stuff out two days ago and you said, ‘No, keep it.’ ” She landed on a rerun of an eighties show. “So eat it, Jack.”
He folded his arms and leaned against the counter. “I’m just saying, Taylor, the kitchen is sort of your domain.”
“My domain? What’s yours? Telling me what to do? I already do the cleaning, the laundry, the shopping and errand running.”
“Your time is more flexible than mine, Taylor.”
“That’s so not true, Jack. I’m every bit as busy as you, and I don’t have a big-name company to back me up. If I don’t have a job, I have to find one. Once I get said job, I have to book the studio, rent the equipment, do the scheduling, and organize the shot list. Then I do research, without assistants to help me.”
“What do you call Addison? She’s your assistant. One I agreed we could pay for out of the household budget.”
“Said the man with twenty-five pairs of shoes.”
“What do my shoes have to do with anything?”
“Your shoes, your spending . . . and you’re busting me because I wanted a bit of money to hire an assistant.”
“And is she assisting? Why are you doing Melinda House edits instead of Addison?”
“She’s not that good at it. Yet.”
“Then find someone who is good at it.”
“What? No. She’s organized and detailed, keeps me on track.”
She was too tired for this. And weary of this merry-go-round. You do, I do. How did they get here within a few words?
Jack opened one drawer, then another, making a racket of shoving the contents around and every few seconds flashing her with his blue eyes. “Don’t we have any paper and pens in this place?”
Taylor pointed to the canister by the phone. “What are you doing?”
“Making a list of chores.”
“Jack, come on.”
“Come on, what? I hear you. Things need to be more equitable. Let’s write Taylor on one side and Jack on the other.”
Why was he doing this? Taylor wanted to fly across the room and grab his arm, shake him, say, “Let’s get back to where we were in the beginning or end this.”
With a sarcastic flair, Jack started detailing their respective chores. “You do . . . shopping, cleaning, laundry . . . Is that right? Did I get them all?”
“Finances.”
“Right, of course, the budget Gestapo.”
Taylor’s eyes misted. He’d asked her to do them because she was good with numbers. Good with denying superfluous expenses. But lately he didn’t even talk to her about his spending. Just handed her receipts.
“I handle the dry cleaning—” he began.
“Because you insist on that crazy cleaners by your office. He charges too much, you know.”
“—garbage, earning the money, supporting the house and your business—”
Taylor bolted off the couch and snatched the paper from under his pen, wadding it up. “Stop, just . . . stop. I said I’ll pay you back for Addison’s salary.”
“Did I ask you to pay me back?” He stooped for the wadded-up list. “I’m just trying to figure out the great divide in our responsibilities.”
“Then why did you say, ‘I earn all the money around here and support your business’?”
“Because I do. I don’t know why you’re so upset.” He tossed the pen back in the canister. “I was just commenting—”
“You were putting me in my place.”
“And you’re not putting me in mine? I get it, you don’t want to be responsible for dinner. Good to know. I should make another list. ‘Things to discuss before eloping.’ ”
There. Doubts, out in the open. She knew he had them. Knew it. So what choice did she have but to reel in her heart?
“I’ve got to meet Aaron.” Jack disappeared in their room, returning after a second with his keys. “Don’t wait up.” He glanced back to her as he reached for the knob, a flicker of something soft lighting his face. “Taylor, I—”
“Yes?” Her heartbeats thundered in her ears.
“I just want to say—”
The doorbell sounded, startling Jack backward and jarring the intimacy from the moment. Jack frowned, opening the door. “Who’s here at this hour?”
Doug Voss stood on the other side. Taylor exhaled, trembling. Oh no. Her Big Mistake. The one she escaped.
“What are you doing here?” Taylor moved toward the door, standing between her past and her present, the shadows in the room seeming longer and darker.
He smiled his perfect, oh-so-sly smile. “I was in the neighborhood. Thought I’d visit the newlyweds.” He crossed the threshold without invitation, surveying the room as if he owned it.
“J-Jack, this . . . this is Doug Voss.”
“I know who he is,” Jack said, offering the publishing mogul a stiff handshake. “Publisher of Gossip.”
“Number one celebrity magazine. Thanks in part to this girl here.” Doug motioned to Taylor as he moved through the living room. “Nice place. They’re doing a lot with these old refurbed buildings.”