Couldn’t help but wonder if the same would happen to me if I lost Georgia.
“It’s only three weeks away.”
“Three weeks and—” I did the mental math. “Four days.”
“Exactly. You don’t think you’ll have the book done by then?”
My jaw flexed at the thought of lying to my sister. To anyone, really. “It’s not about the book.”
“It’s not? Wait, am I on speaker? Where’s Georgia?”
I laughed softly. “Which question would you like me to answer first?”
“The last one.”
“She’s in town, working at her studio.” Georgia had been a sight to behold this last month. She worked tirelessly, overseeing the construction in the front end of the studio, and completing pieces she wouldn’t let me see—wouldn’t let anyone see. She’d set the opening date for her birthday, January twentieth, and I wasn’t even sure I’d be here to see it, which was a swift kick to the gut.
“Nice. I bet she’s loving life out of the tabloids.”
“She is.” Which was just another reason she didn’t want to go back to New York.
“She hasn’t frosted you out yet?” There was a teasing lilt to my sister’s voice, and it wasn’t like she wasn’t aware of the rocky ground Georgia and I had started on.
“You should fly out here and meet her. She’s opening the studio next month with a party. She’s nothing like what you read in the gossip rags, Adrienne.” I sighed, shoving my hands through my hair, then taking the phone with me as I started to pace along the bookshelves. “She’s kind, smart, funny as hell, driven to help whoever she can. She’s never content to sit idle, she’s great with her best friend’s kids, and she has no problem putting me in my place, which I know you appreciate.” I glanced from picture to picture that lined Scarlett’s shelves, pausing on the photo album Georgia had left out. “She’s…” I couldn’t even put her into words.
“Holy shit, Noah. You’re in love with her, aren’t you?”
“She’s not ready for anything like that,” I said softly, flipping through the album.
“You are!” She damn near squealed in excitement.
“Drop it.” The last thing I needed was her filling Mom’s head.
Adrienne scoffed. “Yeah right. Have you met me?”
“Fair point.” I rubbed the skin between my eyebrows. “The second I leave here, it’s over, and I don’t want it to be, but Ellsworth scarred the shit out of her.”
“So don’t leave,” Adrienne stated like it was the simplest answer.
“Yeah, if it were only that easy. She said it herself: this is a book-writing fling. Once the book is finished, so are we.” And it was done, just waiting to be attached in an email to Adam.
“Okay, so don’t finish the book?” she suggested, her voice pitching upward.
“Helpful.” I flipped to the wedding pictures and covered Ellsworth with my hand so only Georgia smiled out at me, then peered closer. She was happy, but that smile wasn’t as bright as the ones I’d been gifted with.
“I’m serious. Stay. Push your deadline back for once in your life. I’ll bring Mom here for Christmas, you can call in. Trust me, if this gets you married and settled—”
“Adrienne,” I warned.
“Eventually,” she amended. “Mom will be all about it. We both just want you to be happy, Noah. If Georgia Stanton makes you happy, then fight for it. Fight for her. Pretend you’re one of your own characters and help her fix whatever Ellsworth broke.”
“Are you done with your inspirational speech?” I teased halfheartedly.
“Do you need me to launch into the rarity of finding someone to truly love?”
“God, no.” I glanced back at the laptop. “Don’t count on me for Christmas. But I love you.”
“I love you, and I’ll forgive you for missing out if you give me a sister-in-law!”
“Bye, Adrienne.” I hung up, shaking my head and scoffing. If it were that easy to heal Georgia, I would have done it already.
I lifted my hand and stared down at Georgia’s wedding picture, hearing her words from that day play like a soundtrack. There’s a warning, a sound your heart makes the first time it realizes it’s no longer safe with the person you trusted.
It all came down to trust with Georgia. Ellsworth had broken hers so completely that she didn’t have any left. But she’d given me Scarlett’s story. She’d climbed the wall. She’d opened her home. She’d unabashedly offered her body without reservation. She trusted me with everything but her heart, because she’d been left, abandoned—
The first time…
“Oh, shit,” I muttered as it hit me. I never said he did.
I flew back through the album as her words hit home in a way they hadn’t when she’d said them. I passed her high school graduation, the birthday Ava had reappeared, and slowed when I’d backtracked as far as her first day of kindergarten.
The pictures just before showed Georgia living with Ava, her eyes bright, her smile a younger version of the dazzling one she gave me these days. Real love has to be choked out, held under the water until it stops kicking. And that’s exactly what the pictures showed year after year. The slow drowning of love.
It wasn’t Ellsworth who had broken Georgia—it was Ava.
Ava, who had disappeared, then shown up whenever it suited her.
Whenever she needed something.
“If this were a book, what would you do?” I asked myself, flipping through the pages and landing on that twelfth birthday picture. “You’d use the past to heal the present.”
The studio opening—I could fly Ava in. If you’re still here in seven weeks. Georgia had already given her everything she wanted, and without ulterior motive… It could work. I could slowly start to repair the canyons Ava had left in Georgia, if I started with the cracks. I just had to make sure Ava wanted to be there for Georgia’s happiness alone.
I slammed the album shut, then took my seat at the desk, parted the boxes of manuscripts to pull my laptop in front of me, and opened it. How the hell was I going to convince her to let me stay another seven weeks?
I shot a healthy heaping of side-eye at the picture of Jameson and Scarlett that sat on the left side of the desk. “Any advice?” I asked him. “It’s not like I can fly her off into the sunset, and let’s be honest, you had a hell of a wingman in Constance.” It also hadn’t hurt that the pair had lived during a time where being reckless was a wise use of whatever time you had left.
I drummed my fingers on the desk, staring at the two finished files on my desktop.
If Jameson had won Scarlett by bending the rules…maybe the same would work to win his great-granddaughter.
I pulled out my phone and called Adam.
“Please tell me you’re about to send me the finished manuscript.”
“Well, hello to you, too,” I drawled. “I’m still two days early.”
“You know the print deadline on this is tighter than my mother-in-law’s Spanx.” I heard his chair creak.
“Yeah, about that…” I cringed.
“Do not tell me that for the first time in your career, you’re going to blow a deadline. Not on this book. Do you know how hard it’s going to be to edit it? To constantly question if I’m messing with Scarlett-freaking-Stanton?” His voice pitched upward.
“You sound stressed. Have you been for a run since I left?”
“You’re the reason my blood pressure is high in the first place.”
And I was about to ask him to raise it even higher, all so I had a shot at winning Georgia. What kind of selfish prick did that to his best friend? You, apparently.
“Noah, what’s going on?” Adam’s tone gentled.
“On a scale of one to ten, how good of friends would you say we are? Because I’d probably go with—”
“You were the best man at my wedding. You’re my best friend. Now, are you talking to me as your editor? Or as my kid’s godfather?”
“Both.”
“Shit.” I could picture him rubbing his temples. “What do you need?”
“Time.”
“You don’t have it.”
“Not mine. Yours. How do you feel about doing twice the work without twice the pay?” I held my breath, waiting for his answer.
“Explain.”
So I did. I laid it all out to the one person who had served as a linchpin in both my personal and professional life, barely finishing by the time I heard the garage door open. Georgia was home.
“Georgia’s back. Will you do it?”
“Damn it,” he muttered. “Yes, you know I’ll do it.”
“Thank you.” Every muscle in my body sagged with relief.
“Don’t thank me,” he barked through the speakerphone. “I’ll get started on what’s already there, but you owe me an ending, Noah.”
The office door opened, and Georgia slipped her head in. “Bad time?” she whispered.
I shook my head, motioning for her to come in. “I know it’s a pain in the ass, but I promised.”
“Okay, but we’re going to run tight with the printers. You have the time you need, but you’d better be prepared for some rushed edits.”
Georgia’s brow puckered in concern as she unbuttoned her coat.
“I can handle it.” I’d handle anything that got me the time I needed with Georgia.
“You’d better. Oh, and Carmen told me to let you know that the kid’s Hanukkah presents got here. You know you didn’t have to do that, but thank you. We’ll miss you for the holidays, Noah.”
“Just keep running, Adam. I’d hate to leave you in the dust when I get back.” If I get back. We hung up and I pulled Georgia into my lap, sliding my hands beneath her coat and sweater to the warmth of her skin.
“What was that about?” she asked, brushing my hair out of my eyes.
God, I loved this woman.
“Time,” I answered, kissing her softly. Now all I could do was pray that mortgaging my career had bought me enough.
Her eyes flew wide. “Oh God, your deadline. It’s this week, isn’t it? Is the book done?” Was that a hint of panic in her voice? Or was I just hearing what I wanted to?
“Not yet.” It wasn’t, at least that’s what I told myself to steal a little more time with her. Sure, it was written, but it wouldn’t be done until it was through edits. “Don’t worry. It’s just delivery. Adam’s juggling a few things on the calendar and starting with what we have so we don’t blow the print deadline while I’m getting these endings just right. Think you can stand having me around for a little bit longer?” Semantics, but it still felt like a lie.
Because it was.
But the smile she gave me? Absolutely worth it.
Chapter Twenty-Four
January 1942
North Weald, England
Scarlett glanced between the small gift box on the table, her typewriter, and the dishes that lay piled in the sink. She hadn’t had a spare moment since breakfast. William had fussed all morning, and was finally down for an afternoon nap, which hopefully gave her at least forty-five minutes to get something done…but all she’d wanted to do was nap right next to him.
The days blurred together with the nights, which one of the other wives had told her was normal when caring for a newborn. She was so tired that she’d fallen asleep sitting at the dinner table last night.
And speaking of dinner…
She sighed, mentally sending an apology to her hatbox of stories as she made her way to the sink, blatantly ignoring the gift box addressed in her mother’s handwriting. This was her third kitchen in the past year, and though she appreciated the sizeable yet frozen garden just beyond the kitchen window, she wished it had come with a view of Constance.
They’d been at Martlesham-Heath for over a month now, and she’d only seen her sister twice. It was the longest they’d been apart since Constance’s birth. She missed her immeasurably, and while they were only an hour apart in distance, they were years apart when it came to this new stage of life.
Constance was still billeted with the other women, still taking her watches, eating in the officers’ mess—and planning a wedding. Scarlett’s closest confidant was now a six-week-old baby who wasn’t much for conversation. She really was going to have to get out and make some friends.
She was pleasantly surprised when the house was still quiet after she finished the dishes.
A quick listen told her William hadn’t woken—she might just have a few minutes.
It felt rather indulgent, but she slid behind her typewriter anyway. It took her a matter of seconds to load the first crisp piece of blank paper. She stared at it for a moment, contemplating what it would become, what story it would hold.
Perhaps she should do as Constance suggested, and finish something. Maybe publish it.
That hatbox was already half full with semi-formed plots, snippets of dialogue, and ideas that needed execution. It contained stories she should write for other people, endings she could twist and sweeten to make other people happy. Endings like the one Constance should have been given.
Endings like the one she wanted for herself and Jameson and William, but couldn’t guarantee. She couldn’t even guarantee that there wouldn’t be a bombing raid tonight—that she wouldn’t be among those counted as casualties.
But she could leave as much of their story for William as possible…just in case.
She started on that hot day in Middle Wallop when Mary forgot to pick them up at the train station. She remembered everything she could, writing even the smallest details about the moment she met Jameson. A smile stretched across her face. If only she could go back and tell herself then where they would end up…she never would’ve believed it. She wasn’t sure she even believed now. Theirs had been a whirlwind romance that settled into a passionate, sometimes complicated marriage.
Jameson hadn’t changed much in the last eighteen months…but she had. The woman who had made quick decisions at the planning board, who had been a rock-solid, valuable officer in the WAAF, was now…none of that, really. She was no longer responsible for the lives of hundreds of pilots, only William, not that she was alone in that, either.
When he was home, Jameson was a hands-on father. He held William, rocked him, change nappies—there wasn’t anything Jameson wouldn’t do for William, which only made her love him more. Becoming parents hadn’t stripped them of their personalities, it had given new, deeper facets to them both.
She wrote as far as Jameson asking for their first date before William woke with shrill demand. Hearing that first cry, she removed the paper from the typewriter and put it into the hatbox, adding to the stack she’d been careful to leave on top so it wouldn’t get mixed in with the rest. Then she put it away and went to fetch her littlest love.
Hours later, William had been fed, changed, cleaned up and changed again, fed once more, mopped up after another spit up, then fed one last time and burped before he was back to sleep.
She headed into the kitchen to contemplate dinner, pulling out fish to fry, and as though right on cue, Jameson walked in the front door.
“Scarlett?”
“In the kitchen!” The relief was a jolt of energy through her system, just like it was every time he came home to her.
“Hey.” His footsteps were soft, but his mood filled the room like a thundercloud, dark and ominous.
“What’s the matter?” she asked, abandoning the fish she’d planned on frying.
He strode across the kitchen, took her face in his hands, and kissed her. It was soft, which, considering his mood, only made it that much sweeter. He was always careful with her. Their lips moved together in a soft dance that quickly deepen
ed, intensified. It had been six weeks since William’s birth. Six weeks since her husband had shared her body, and not just her bed. According to the midwife, six weeks was long enough, and Scarlett couldn’t agree more.
…
Jameson lifted his head slowly, keeping a tight leash on his self-control. She was so damn beautiful, it was nearly impossible to keep his hands off her. Her curves were lush, her hips grabbable, and her breasts full and heavy—she was every fantasy, every pinup painted on a plane, and she was his.
He knew she needed time to heal, and he would never push her to heal faster. He wasn’t that big of a bastard. But he missed her body, missed the feel of sliding inside her, the way the rest of the world faded until it was just the two of them, straining together. He craved her taste on his tongue, the way her hips ground against his mouth, the silk of her hair sliding over his face from above as she kissed him when she took the lead. He longed for that little catch in her throat before she came, missed the way her eyes glazed over, her breath caught, her muscles locked, the sound of his name on her lips when she finally let go. He missed the sweet oblivion he found in her body, but mostly he craved just a few moments of her undivided attention.
He wasn’t jealous of his son, but he could admit the transition had a few bumps and growing pains. “I missed you today,” he said, cradling her cheeks in his hands and sweeping his thumbs across the soft skin.
“I miss you every day,” she replied with a smile. “But I saw the look on your face when you came in. Tell me what happened.”
His jaw tightened. “Where’s William?” he dodged, noting that his little man wasn’t in the bassinet.
“Sleeping upstairs.” She tilted her head. “Tell me, Jameson.”
“We’ve been denied permission to leave for the Pacific front,” he admitted quietly.
Scarlett’s spine stiffened against the counter, and he instantly regretted the words.
The Things We Leave Unfinished Page 30