by Louise Bay
“I want to stay here all day,” he whispered, “but we need to go. We have thirty minutes before Brianna starts getting people up.”
I snaked my arms around his waist. “Let’s escape. Feign illness. Go check into a hotel.”
Blake chuckled. “It’s the last day for you. You don’t want to miss out.”
“You’re right. I don’t.” I didn’t want to miss out on him. The rest of Christie I wasn’t so concerned about. Being with Blake was more of a lesson than I could have hoped for. But I had to face the reality of our final day of Love Rehab.
I reached for his jaw, stroking the stubbled skin that had left its buzz all over my body, then pressed a kiss on his cheek next to my fingers. I had just twenty-four hours left. Saying good-bye to Blake was something inevitable, but not something I’d choose. Not now. Leaving felt like I was being robbed of something important, something fundamental. There were few people I was so unselfconscious with. And none of them were lovers.
“You’re going to do the horse therapy thing again. You’ll have it nailed this time.”
I groaned. Was he serious? That horse didn’t like me. And I couldn’t face another public shaming. It was exhausting being wrong all the time. I’d uncovered a lot about myself and my approach to men over the last few days, and I was determined to try to do things differently in the future, but if the horse didn’t lift its leg again, it would all have been for nothing.
“You’ll be good. Just be yourself.”
“Everyone will be watching and judging.” I pulled the covers up, settling lower into the bed, decidedly not going anywhere.
“Hey.” Blake took my chin between his thumb and forefinger. “You have nothing to prove to anyone but yourself.”
Easy for him to say. He didn’t have to stand up in front of everyone and possibly be called a liar. “You know when I said that I wasn’t scared of any of the activities yesterday morning?”
“Uh-huh.” He bent his head to my neck and sucked, sending sparks of pleasure across my body. My thighs parted instinctively.
“I think that’s because of you. I think you give me strength.”
Blake pulled back, then propped his head on his palm. “I give you strength?” He narrowed his eyes, concentrating on me.
I nodded. “Yeah. I think it’s the way you want me, the real me,” I said, sweeping my hand down my body. “A Mackenzie I don’t think I’ve ever shown anyone. You want her. And I think that gives me power.” It felt good, freeing.
“You’re special, Mackenzie. I like that I’m the only one who’s had this version of you.” Blake clasped his hand at the back of my neck and pulled me toward him, pressing his lips to mine. “Shall we go to the lake tonight? After Jimmy’s.”
“Sure. We’re going to Jimmy’s later?” I asked, sitting up. I found my T-shirt at the bottom of the bed and pulled it over my head. We really did need to get going.
“Yeah. Tonight you’re back at the ranch, so you get a night at Jimmy’s before you fly home.”
“Wow, alcohol, makeup and music.” I grinned. “I know it’s only been a few days, but all that stuff feels like a world away.” I’d enjoyed my time off the grid, hadn’t thought about my email or the life I’d left behind as much as I thought I would.
I glanced over my shoulder at Blake. He looked up at me, rumpled and beautiful, and with eyes that looked at me as if he’d known me my whole life. I wanted to tell him I’d miss him. To suggest he visit me in Boston, or that I could come to Oklahoma City. But that wasn’t how this worked. I stood and dressed. A huge part of what made me different with Blake was that there was no future. He was my Munich. He was the journey and not the destination.
Things would shift if it became more between us. This wasn’t real life.
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“Here we are, girls,” Brianna called out from under a tree. We’d moved farther into the woods, to just the other side of the clearing where we’d done the stones exercise the day before. “See these trees?” Brianna stretched her arms out wide. “They have a whole different perspective of the world being so high up there.”
“Tell me we’re not climbing trees,” I whispered to Kennedy.
“No, we’re not,” Brianna answered. Shit, she wasn’t supposed to have heard that. “Well, not exactly. You see this?” Brianna walked to the left and pointed behind the oak tree we were in front of. I’d been so focused on Brianna I’d not noticed the huge wooden structure standing between the trees. It looked a hundred feet tall. Maybe more. The sides were partially open and surrounded a pine staircase. I tipped my head back to see a viewing tower at the top. Were we going to be bird watching? If so, I was out. I wasn’t good with heights.
“Oh wow, you see the zip line?” Kennedy pointed skyward, and between the leaves of the trees, I saw a thick metal wire attached to the roof of the viewing tower heading down into the clearing. “This is going to be so much fun.”
Blood started to pound in my ears. There was no way I was purposefully stepping off solid ground a hundred feet in the air. No way. No how.
“We’ll all go up together, and I encourage you to take in the scenery and see the world from a different perspective. When we get up there, ask yourself if you were a stranger looking at your life, what would you see? What would be the good and the bad?” Brianna walked toward the bottom of the stairs.
“I’m going to sit this one out,” I said. Brianna turned her head and I smiled, hoping she’d just say, “Okay, whatever you need.” But I had a feeling it wouldn’t be that easy. “I’ll be right here watching, and I don’t mind doing some contemplating. I just want my feet on solid ground.”
“Y’all go on up. My little brother Bentley’s up there and will help you get strapped in to the safety gear,” she said to the others as she changed direction and headed straight for me. “Stay away from the edge, mind.”
I stayed rooted to the spot as I clasped my hands together.
“Hey,” she said as she sat on the grass in front of me. “Take a load off.”
“I’m sorry. I’m just not good with heights, I—”
“Oklahoma not what you thought it would be?”
I sat. I’d expected her to tell me the tower wasn’t that high or the view from the top was beautiful. I wasn’t expecting a general chat. “Not exactly,” I confessed, pulling a few blades of grass from the ground. Blake aside, it hadn’t been what I’d been hoping for at all.
“You expected I had some kinda magic potion I was gonna give y’all and you’d be cured. You’d suddenly have the love life you deserved?” She snapped her fingers. “Just like that.”
Well, yeah, kinda. “No. It’s just—”
“I hate to say it but I’ve got news for you, you do have the kinda love life you deserve.”
Her comment was a little uncalled for, and given all the stones she’d seen in my pile the day before, a little misguided. I was a catch, a good girlfriend. I’d been engaged three times. I must be getting something right.
“We all do,” she continued. “The thing is, I think you can see it in your friends. You understand the patterns in Rose’s behavior that make her miserable, but you’re not quite seeing it in yourself.”
Heavy footsteps clunked up the tower, drowning out the sounds of the birds.
“I’ve not learned nothing.” I thought back to my conversation with Blake last night. “I know I should think more about what I want in a relationship rather than concentrate on being who the other person wants me to be.” Being with Blake had let me glimpse a world where I was allowed to want things in a man, where I was just me and someone was happy with that. The problem was, just like I said to him, I wasn’t sure how realistic that was. Who I was with Blake wasn’t real life.
“Yes, but I need you to take it a step further. You have to understand you’re not going to be right for every man out there.”
“Well of course not.”
Brianna raised her eyebrows as if she thought I di
dn’t believe her. “There are going to be plenty of men who don’t want you when you’re just yourself.”
Although she was making perfect sense, her words were like nails down a chalkboard. I closed my eyes.
“That’s okay, Mackenzie, because when you let all those other guys go, it’ll be easier to see the others that are right. The men that can make you happy. And then things can be different. You’ll not need to try so hard to be what they want. And you’ll be able to stop worrying that if you’re not perfect, they’ll leave you.”
“I know I’m not perfect. Far from it.” I could only strive to be better. I thought Love Rehab was going to help me improve.
“Do you want a man who wants the woman you’re pretending to be, rather than the real Mackenzie?”
Voices chattered in my head—Phil telling me he didn’t know me. Kennedy saying I never considered whether or not I actually liked the men I was with as long as they liked me. Blake telling me that it was okay for me to ask for what I wanted. Blake wanting me even though I’d been needy and upset, dirty and in need of a blowout. Blake making me come like it was his job.
I thought back to my broken engagements. I couldn’t see myself married to those men. Was that because I’d not been myself? My eyes started to fill. Everything was such a mess. I just wanted to escape, climb into someone else’s life.
“Don’t be sad.” Brianna patted me on the knee. “This is good. Now that you’re aware, you can change things. You learned this behavior decades ago; it’s deeply embedded. Sometimes it takes a while to see it.”
“Decades ago? I didn’t start dating until I was in college. Not really.”
“What about your father? Was he around much?”
I took a breath, understanding that what I was about to say had meaning I didn’t yet get. “He left. When I was little.”
Brianna didn’t respond.
“I watched from the top of the stairs. I saw my mother beg him to stay, to promise to be better. He left anyway. And I never saw him again.”
“And there’s nothing you can do to bring him back,” Brianna said. “It was his choice to go. You can’t force anyone to stay.”
My stomach twisted in realization and I closed my eyes. I was trying to be the girl that men didn’t leave, that my father didn’t abandon. All this time, I’d been trying to bring him back.
My throat grew tight and tears formed in the corners of my eyes. Adrenaline surged through me as the pieces fit together. It all made perfect sense.
“Fuck this.” I stood up. “I was just a kid. Me wearing a pretty dress or smiling more wasn’t going to keep him from leaving.”
“Is that what you thought?” Brianna asked, standing.
“Maybe. Yes.” Although as an adult I knew it wasn’t really my lack of smiles that drove him away, a part of me felt responsible for him going—that I should have been able to do something. But how could I have been? I’d been a child.
“Him leaving wasn’t about you.”
“I know,” I replied.
“Do you?” she asked. “Children often end up paying their parents’ debts. And that’s just not fair,” Brianna said. “Because kids are kids. But now you’re a beautiful grown woman. You get to choose. You can stay at the top of the stairs hoping he comes back, or you can know you’re worth more and get on with your life.”
It wasn’t my fault.
My dad leaving was about him. It probably wasn’t even about my mother, or why had he not kept in touch with me?
It was as though I’d been set free.
I took a deep breath and instantly felt lighter. Warmth flowed through my limbs and power bounced around my body like a pin ball. I felt invincible. “I wanna try that,” I said, pointing at the tower as I started to pace toward it. Brianna followed. “It’s not dangerous, right?”
“No, you’ll have a safety line and a helmet.” I glanced at the staircase and then back at Brianna, who smiled. “And hey, sometimes a risk is worth taking, right? The view’s amazing.”
“Well, hey, I’m ready for a change in perspective.” And I was ready to take a risk.
Blake
Last night had been intense. Mackenzie and I were only supposed to be a fling. A great distraction while I figured out whether I was staying in Oklahoma or putting my whole life on red and spinning the wheel. But every time I sank into her warm, soft body, all I could focus on was the next time I’d see her, the next time I’d be with her. I’d thought hot, casual sex would provide clarity so I could make a decision about my career. Instead it had thrown me for a loop. The last thing I needed right now was a complicated … relationship. I had to find some space away from the campsite to get my head on straight, so I’d come back to the ranch house.
I stomped dirt and hay from my boots outside the back door. “Hey,” I called as I opened the screen door and stepped inside. The smell of my childhood—and my mother’s bread—welcomed me back.
“In here, son,” my mom called. “We’ve got a guest.”
As I headed down the corridor, my mother stood at the big, old-fashioned stove. It was a view I’d taken in a thousand times. The kitchen was where we’d all congregated as kids, because that’s where Mom was, which meant guaranteed food and hugs.
“Hey.” I kissed my mom on her soft cheek, though she didn’t stop stirring whatever was occupying her on the stove.
“Hey, Blake,” a familiar voice came from behind me.
I turned around to see Mary, my high-school sweetheart, sitting at our big oak kitchen table, surrounded by mismatched chairs. She beamed at me and opened her arms as she stood. I bent and pulled her into a hug.
“It’s so good to see you back in Christie.”
“It’s good to be back.” I held Mary at arm’s length and looked her over. Still beautiful in that All-American, girl-next-door sort of way, and exactly the kind of woman I’d always assumed I’d end up with. “Yup, you look good.”
“Well, of course I do. It’s all this clean air. You should come home and experience it more often,” Mary teased, the scent of her—something a little too strong—lingering when she moved away. “So, tell me about your love life.”
I shrugged. “Nothing much to report.”
“Oh, that’s too bad. You need a nice country girl.”
If a nice country girl was what I needed, then Mary would have fit the bill and we’d have made it work. Mary was as sweet as iced tea but she wasn’t who I needed. Who I had to be with as I’d described to Brianna.
“Can I set you up with anyone? What’s your type these days?” Mary asked. My mother placed a bowl of peas in front of Mary and, without being asked, she began to crack open the pods.
I chuckled. I’d never needed help to find girls.
Fitting a girlfriend into my life had always been the difficult part, and usually the reason things didn’t last. I worked a lot, and I liked it that way. Until I found someone who held my interest more than the lab, it was probably how it would always be.
Mary was everything I thought I was supposed to want. She was Oklahoma and old friends and easy smiles. She just wasn’t vibrant. With Mary, everything was familiar; there was nothing new to discover, no exciting adventure to take.
And so different to Mackenzie.
“Now, now. Don’t be nagging at my son,” my mother said, knocking her wooden spoon against the side of the pot and then putting the lid on top. “You have a husband for that. We’re just happy to have Blake back with us for a short while.”
I bent and kissed my mom on the top of her head. I loved how she was still protective of me, even now that I was fully grown.
“There’s some lemonade in the fridge,” she said.
I reached into the cupboard for my own glass, then retrieved the lemonade from the refrigerator and refilled everyone’s cup before pouring a drink for myself.
“So I hear you’ve been helping Brianna out with her broken-hearts retreat,” Mary said.
Her tone was a little dispar
aging. Brianna was doing amazing work with people who wanted a better future. It was nothing but a good thing. “Yeah, not much for me to do. Brianna’s made a great camp up there.”
“How are the city girls coping with the Oklahoma outdoors?”
Flashes of Mackenzie writhing under me, my hand over her mouth, her fingers clamped around my cock, flashed through my brain.
“Blake!” My mother grabbed my hand, stopping the overflow of lemonade into her glass.
“Sorry.” I took a cloth from the sink and wiped up the spill. “Oh, they’re coping just fine. Big John came last night.”
“It’s amazing what these girls will pay for,” Mary said.
I looked at Mary, trying to stop the corners of my mouth from twitching. “Oh, I think we’ve all paid handsomely for Big John’s talents at one time or another.” She’d drunkenly confessed at her wedding that she’d gone to see John, hoping she could arrange for me to flunk out of Harvard. As it turned out, I’d left of my own accord, but Mary and I hadn’t reconciled as she’d hoped.
“All I’m saying is that he doesn’t always get it right.”
Mackenzie would agree. I’d witnessed her frustration at John’s prediction for her.
“Or maybe he does,” I replied. After all, Mary and I splitting up had been best for both of us in the long run.
Leaving Oklahoma hadn’t been a difficult decision the first time around. So why was it so hard now? Brianna had been right when she said I was used to overreaching and that I wanted to help people, so it should be easy to commit to moving. When Mackenzie had said that giving up the offer from ARK would be giving up on a part of myself, she’d totally called it, so why was I still unsure?
“Any plans to come back home on a more permanent basis?” Mary asked, glancing up from her task.