“Awesomeness. Love you!”
“Love you, too.” He grinned, imagining her rushing to her dresser and pulling out her old clothes…and hoping Mama didn’t find out.
—
Gemma snapped a few pictures of Pax walking away, chastising herself with every artificial shutter click. His words drifted over the breeze to her. Janey. Had to be his girlfriend, with the warm way he’d greeted her. And then his words of love.
She forced her lens toward the open water. Damn, why did those words stick a dagger into her belly? Of course he’d have a girlfriend, or maybe even a wife. Though he didn’t wear a ring. And why did it matter at all? They would never, ever be anything more than this odd combination of frenemies.
Love you, too.
His words echoed, taunting her. She’d never heard a guy proclaim that, apart from her dad.
“You are crazy mad, Gemma. Absolutely batshit crazy.” Was there something even crazier than that? Because she was flipping through the pictures she’d taken, stopping at the close-up of his face. “And you, Paxton, are batshit gorgeous. It’s not fair.”
Not fair that sitting on the beach sharing even just a little bit of themselves swirled through her. That he’d cared enough to come out and find her didn’t make sense. Maybe it was the same with him, this odd connection between them. As a seagull squawked noisily, a thought hit her: he made her feel…something. Something she hadn’t felt in, well, seven years.
She took several more pictures, even one of a lizard doing push-ups on a palm leaf. That’s what it looked like, anyway, and then a bright orange disk extended from its throat. A smaller brown lizard on an adjacent branch bobbed up and down, too, an answering call. Ah, a mating ritual.
Speaking of romance, she needed to make sure the guest room was ready for her lovebirds tomorrow.
She trudged through the sand to the wooden steps where she’d left her shoes. Across the way, her dad’s dream, blue and elegant, except for the plywood “bandage.” She took a couple of pictures so she could show him.
Later that evening, she headed back to the hospital. She was caught up in her thoughts about Pax as she strode through the lobby. A nurse on her way out stopped and stared. Gemma gave her a quick smile, but her chest tightened. She knew her. Hopefully, she wouldn’t recog—
“Gemma?”
Damn. Gemma slowly turned, not sure what kind of reception she would get from Emily Dungard. Given the absence of a smile, not a warm one.
“Hi, Emily.”
“Hi? Hi? You screwed up my senior year, ruined my social life, and you just say ‘Hi’? Are you serious?”
“Then look at it as a required response when you see someone you know, rather than a friendly greeting.” She started to leave, but Emily grabbed her arm.
“You know what would be a much better response? ‘Sorry.’ ”
“What do I have to be sorry about?”
Emily’s pretty face bloomed red. “You ruined my senior year, the most important year of my life. Everyone hated me because I was the one who brought you into our group, introduced you to Blake. Even he hated me for a while. Blake and I were the best of friends until you came along.”
Gemma shuddered at the mention of his name, but she wrenched her arm free and leaned into Emily’s face. “I’m sorry if my getting date-raped spoiled your prom. Life sucks sometimes, doesn’t it?”
“He didn’t rape you,” she hissed. “You just couldn’t take being rejected by the most popular guy in school. You didn’t want to take responsibility for getting shit-faced. You were sitting on his lap earlier, getting all slutty-cozy. Maybe this is what you do—give your body away and then get revenge when the guy doesn’t marry you. But why, why did you have to pick on poor Blake?”
Gemma took deep breaths, calming her fury and humiliation. Yes, she had been on Blake’s lap, had taken those shots when she knew she’d had too many. He’d kept pushing them on her.
“I picked on ‘poor’ Blake because he raped me,” she said, and walked away. Gemma knew how everyone felt. Emily had been one of the most vocal, in person and online.
“Is that her?” another woman’s voice whispered from behind her. “The one who…”
People stared. Not that Gemma met their gazes; she focused on the green carpet in front of her. But she felt them just the same. She sagged against the wall in relief when the elevator swallowed her up.
Three minutes later, she pasted on a smile as she entered her father’s room. It became real when she saw that he was awake and sitting up. “Hi, Daddy.” She leaned in and hugged him. “How’re you feeling?”
“Achy, but not enough for morphine.” His voice still quivered, but his smile beamed strong. “You, however, look like you’ve been through the wringer. Everything all right?”
She sank into a chair next to his bed, annoyed that she couldn’t hide her feelings. No wonder Pax wouldn’t let up until she told him why she’d been upset. “Being back is hard. But I’m managing. The guys who met at the B&B and booked to celebrate their honeymoon and anniversary are still coming. I’m going to pick up some flowers and champagne on the way home and pretty the room up for them.”
“Exactly what I would do. Thank you for doing that.”
She was glad she hadn’t told him she was leaving. The gratitude and pride on his face warmed her. “The other two bookings decided that they didn’t want to put up with construction noise,” she added. “Not that I blame them.”
“How bad is it, Gem?” he asked, his eyebrows knitting together. “From what I remember, it felt like the whole building imploded.”
“No, just the kitchen. Here, I took some pictures.” She cued up the pictures and handed him the camera. “You can see for yourself.”
He flipped through them, his face relaxing in relief. Then he smiled. “Nice lizard shots. I thought you hated the…what did you call them? Wee beasties?”
A phrase she’d borrowed from a Scottish romance novel she’d immersed herself in after moving down to Chambliss. “Yep, but the beastie presented an interesting contrast against the green palm frond.” She reached for the camera as he kept advancing through the shots. “They’re just pictures of—”
He turned the camera around to show her the display, an impish grin on his face. “Paxton?”
Damn. She should have held the camera for him.
She shrugged. “He’s interesting, too, from a purely photogenic point of view. Like the wee beastie. He has great facial structure.”
“This isn’t his face,” he had to point out as he continued to scroll.
“All right, he has other great structure, too. They’re just pictures, Daddy.”
He flipped to the one of Pax’s face. “It must be awkward.”
“Terribly.” But their conversation on the beach hadn’t felt awkward at all. In fact, her conflicted feelings made it most awkward of all. “He’s being respectful. Nice, even.”
He handed the camera back to her. “You liked him, didn’t you? Back when—”
She tried not to let her surprise show. “Why do you say that?”
“Even when you were dating…you know. Him. You talked about Paxton more than you talked about him. How he’d gotten into trouble taking off with the car during driver’s ed. How you and he played a mean game of pinball.” His voice softened, and he settled back into his pillow. “You had a light in your eyes. It worried me, because I thought for sure you were going to fall for him. Now I wish…”
“What?” She wanted him to voice what she couldn’t.
“That you had. Now that I know Paxton, I see beneath that troublemaker façade. His older brother was the golden boy. The brownnoser, if you ask me. Where else could Paxton fit but in the ‘bad son’ category?” He’d made finger quotes on “bad son,” but then his hands dropped down to his lap.
Her dad was beginning to fade. No, she wanted to know more! “You said he’s a good man.”
He nodded. “I hate to tell you this…but you still ha
ve that light…” His eyes drifted closed.
She did? She laughed it off rather than deny it. “Well, it doesn’t matter anyway. He has a girlfriend. Or a wife. Janey.”
Her dad’s laugh was soft. “Girlfriend…” he managed before his face went slack.
So Pax did have a girlfriend. Good. It made him off-limits. Which, of course, he should be anyway.
Bad choices, Gemma. You made some doozies.
She patted her dad’s hand. No matter what, coming back for her dad wasn’t one of them. Running back home, as she’d wanted to do, would definitely have added to the list.
She held her breath as she waited for the elevator to open once it had reached her floor. No Emily or anyone else she knew. As she stepped out on the main floor, she searched for the wicked girl. Whew, no sign of her.
As Gemma strode through the lobby, the scent of baked goods from the little pastry shop lured her over. She took her place in line and studied the case, settling on an apricot bear claw.
“Go on,” a woman’s urgent whisper hissed behind her. “Say something to her.”
“I only—”
Gemma turned around to see Emily at the entrance, with her hands on a man’s back as though she were ready to push him forward. Gemma’s heart dropped to her toes.
Blake.
He circumvented Emily’s hands and slunk to a table in a corner of the café, plopping down onto a chair. His sulky gaze was riveted to Gemma, while Emily perched next to him and said in a loud whisper, “Where are your balls? Say something!”
Another nurse took her croissant from the counter and joined them. “Is that her?”
All the blood drained from Gemma’s face. Maybe even from her whole body. She broke out in a sweat. Memories hit her from all directions. Kissing him beneath the bleachers after a football game. Flirting in the hallway. Stupid, benign memories right along with the ones from that night at the beach. His breath, sour with whiskey. His tongue, clumsy and thrusting. His body on hers, hot and sweaty.
The women whispered while Blake continued to stare at her. Others gave her curious looks. But if he stormed over and called her the vicious names her so-called friends had used on Facebook, no one would come to her rescue. She imagined everyone in the room scowling, throwing cups and sugar packets at her, chanting, “Slut, slut, slut!”
Blake stood, Emily surging to her feet beside him. Gemma broke out of her frozen state and darted to the door, bumping into an elderly man. She mumbled a “Sorry,” as she walked on jelly legs to the automatic sliding doors at the entrance. She didn’t dare look back.
She didn’t dare not look back. What if they were following? Obviously, Emily had told him she was at the hospital. Since he hadn’t spoken to her, he had probably just wanted to catch sight of her to…what? Sate his curiosity? Make his case that he’d been in the right? As though that was something she might have misunderstood.
She shut herself in her car and checked again. No sign of him. Her chest hurt. God, had she not breathed through the entire walk to her car?
Panic and shame washed over her just as strong as they had the day after the party. She’d been an inexperienced kid. Had she misinterpreted unbridled passion? Had she played a role in what happened?
The courts decided there hadn’t been enough proof to prosecute, only one distraught seventeen-year-old’s word against another’s. Her judgment had been called into question by so many.
And now I’m doing it myself. I hate this.
That was the problem. She’d never gotten closure. No guilty or not-guilty verdict. And those insidious doubts that sometimes plagued her, even when, at her deepest level, she knew she’d been violated. She pressed her forehead against the wheel and sucked in long, slow breaths. “Get a grip. You have to stop at the grocery store.”
She would walk calmly into the store and buy flowers and a bottle of champagne. Then she would return to the B&B and clean the room. That would help calm her. She hoped that Pax went home tonight. Because she wasn’t in the mood to see anyone. Especially him.
Chapter 6
Pax drove down the long, gravel road leading to his family’s home but passed the turnoff and continued to the small bay just beyond it. He spotted Janey sitting on the covered dock, her legs dangling over the murky water. She must have heard him, though, because she popped to her feet and came running over.
Pax jumped down from his truck and Harley followed, racing toward her. Janey knelt down, gathered the dog in her arms, and rocked back and forth. “My Cuddlebug.” She closed her eyes in that all-out way of immersing herself in the experience. Harley was a complete rag doll, soaking it in. The moment she released him, she continued barreling toward him with her arms out. “Pax!”
Ah, to be greeted as if he mattered. Her hugs were as unbounded as her smiles. He braced as she threw herself at him; she weighed close to what he did. He gave back as much as he got.
“You got away, huh?” he asked when she stepped back.
She gave him a conspiratorial smile. “I told Mama I was going for a walk.”
It sucked that they had to sneak around. Their mother should be happy for Janey to grow and accomplish new things. To gain her independence. Lord knew the girl craved that. But Mama wanted her to stay a woman-child, dependent and needy.
Even with Down syndrome, Janey was the healthiest person in the family mentally. Emotionally. She had the purest heart of anyone he knew.
He fluffed the hair that their mother insisted on being picture-perfect. “Ready to catch some fish?”
She clapped. “Yes!”
While he grabbed the tackle box, she took the poles from the back of his truck, and they walked down the dock together.
“Tell me about your day, Pax,” she said, hungry to hear about the world outside her sheltered existence.
And he did, every detail, which she sucked right up as he let her catch their bait fish with a net.
“Who’s Gemma?” she asked when he got to the surprise-bleachers part.
“You know my friend Wade, the one in the hospital? She’s his daughter.”
She nodded. “Gemma must be scared.”
“Yeah, she is, but she’s brave as hell. She’ll be all right.”
Janey tilted her head at him. “You like her.”
Hell. He did not want that in her head, to be blurted out at dinner, say. “No. I do not like her.”
“But you get a little smile right here.” She touched the corner of his mouth. “And here,” she said, touching near his eye. “That means you like someone, right? I get that smile when I see Jimmy at the grocery store.”
Shit. He couldn’t have a smile there. Or anywhere when it came to Gemma. He didn’t want to screw Janey up, either. She prided herself on understanding people. He had, in fact, taught her to interpret people’s expressions and subtle nuances, like sarcasm. In his family, it helped to know where people were coming from.
“You can’t tell anyone, ’kay?” he said. “It’ll be another of our secrets. ’Cause Mama and Dad don’t like her at all.”
Janey nodded. “I’m good at keeping secrets.”
Pax hated it. But her smile faded, and he wondered if she hated it, too.
Wait a fish flippin’ minute. Had he just admitted that he liked Gemma? Damn. As much as he didn’t want to, he did like her. That was the last thing he needed. “Let’s go fishing.”
An hour later, Janey had caught two trout and he’d caught one. He’d delighted in her delight as she took each one off the hook and even filleted them herself at the built-in table over the water. If only Mama could see the pride on her face, and the careful, deft way that she handled the knife. Their mother kept Janey from the world under the guise of protecting her. Janey could live on her own, he bet. And she wanted to.
“You talked to Mama any more about that group home?” he asked.
“Noooo! She won’t listen, Pax. And I don’t want her to know I’m on the Facebook page talking with the people who supervise it. Or
with Jimmy. I’m afraid she’ll take away my computer.”
“I won’t let her do that.” He’d bought it for her and taught her how to use it, even helped her set up her Facebook page. But the truth was he had no say as far as Janey was concerned. “She’s stubborn. Every time I see her, I try to talk about you driving. I’ve even printed out stories about people like you who studied hard and earned their driver’s licenses. How happy they are, and how responsible. But she won’t even listen.”
She frowned as she pulled her brand-new license from her pocket, rubbing it reverently. “This makes me so proud, and so sad that I have to hide it. It’s not fair, Pax.”
“I know, Janey Bear. I know.” He checked the time on his phone. The fun portion of the evening was over. Now it was on to the pain-in-the-ass part: dinner.
She made her way down the pathway to the house while he packed up the equipment and the fish. He threw the ball for Harley for a few minutes. Then he made his way back up the road and pulled around the circular driveway.
Sullivan Manor, as it was jokingly referred to, reminded him of a big plantation-style house. Granddad Paxton had built it eighty years ago, and Pax’s parents meticulously maintained it so that it looked as new as it once had.
Pax kicked off his shoes outside the front door. “You know the rules. No dogs allowed.” He left his dog, his shoes, and his happy self on the porch as he stepped through the massive door. Dinners were always fraught with the unhealthy dynamics he’d lived with his whole life. Browbeating. Emotional manipulation. Gossip.
As he filled Harley’s water bowl in the kitchen, his mother came in with a scowl. “You’ve been taking Janey fishing again, haven’t you?”
“Yep. She caught two speckled trout. You should have seen her fighting them. She’s good, and she loves it.” He wasn’t going to lie. “You didn’t get mad at her, did you? ’Cause it was my idea.” No need to tell her that Janey had begged him for another fishing foray.
“I’m mad at you. I smell you all over this. That and fish.”
He leaned back against the counter, his arms crossed. “What do you have against her fishing?” He’d heard it before, but he wanted to make her say it again.
Falling Hard Page 9