“I thought about it,” Jake said. “But I wasn’t sure how long I was going to stay and I didn’t want to start any major renovation projects that I wasn’t going to stick around to finish.”
“And now?” Luke asked.
He shrugged. “I’m still not sure how long I’m going to stay.”
He only wished he had somewhere else to go.
Somewhere he wouldn’t be assailed by thoughts and memories of Sky every way he turned.
“Well, at least Uncle Ross finally updated some of the furnishings.” Luke ran a hand over the smooth wood surface of the kitchen table. “He did really good work, didn’t he?”
“Actually, I made that table,” Jake told him.
His brother’s brows lifted. “Guess you were paying attention when he was showing us how to use all those fancy tools.”
“I didn’t remember much,” Jake said. “The table’s a pretty basic design.”
“Basic or not, it looks great.” Luke put both palms flat on the top and pushed forward and back, then grinned at his brother. “Just checking to see if it’s level.”
“Might be that both the table and the floor aren’t,” Jake said.
His brother chuckled. “I’m going to be honest, when Mom first told me that you were going to be staying here awhile, I didn’t think it was a good idea. But maybe I was wrong. Maybe this is the right place for you right now.”
“I thought maybe it was, too. But now I’m not so sure.”
“Your doubts have anything to do with the attractive brunette you kept stealing glances at during lunch?” his brother guessed.
“Yeah,” he admitted.
“So why didn’t you introduce me to her?”
“Because I screwed up—just like I always do.”
“I would have liked to meet her, but not making an introduction is hardly a screwup.”
“No, I meant that I screwed up,” he said again, with emphasis this time.
Understanding flashed across his brother’s expression. “Ah. Now I get it. But maybe you could fill in some details for me?”
Jake shook his head. “You’re only here for a couple of days, and it would take longer than that to explain.”
“So buy her some flowers and tell her you’re sorry,” Luke suggested.
“Does that work with Raina?” he wondered.
“Sometimes,” his brother said.
“What do you do the other times?”
Luke grinned. “R-rated stuff in the bedroom.”
Jake winced. “TMI.”
“You asked.”
“My mistake.”
“So start with flowers,” his brother urged.
“She deserves someone better than me.”
“I’m probably a little biased,” Luke admitted. “But I don’t know anyone better than you.”
“A former Marine with PTSD and no career prospects?”
“A decorated veteran who’s steering his life in a new direction.”
“That’s a good spin,” Jake acknowledged.
“I don’t know how I’d cope if I didn’t have Raina and the kids to go home to, and I’ve never had to deal with anything as up close and personal as you did,” his brother said. “What happened to your team would have messed up anyone, and sometimes even having family to ground you isn’t enough.”
Then Luke slid a business card across the table.
“What’s this?” Jake asked.
“It’s the number for a residential treatment facility specializing in PTSD.”
“You’ve been asking around for help for your crazy brother?”
“No.” Luke held his gaze. “I asked my therapist if she knew of any good programs in this area.”
Jake frowned at that. “Since when do you have a therapist?”
“Since about six years ago,” Luke said.
“For real?”
His brother nodded.
“How did I not know this?”
“Because it’s not the type of thing we talk about.”
Jake wasn’t sure if the “we” was intended to refer to their family or veterans, but he could acknowledge that both interpretations were equally applicable.
“It was Raina’s idea,” Luke told him now. “When I came back from my third—or maybe it was my fourth—deployment, she suggested that talking to someone about my experiences might help me transition back to civilian life.”
“Did it?”
His brother shrugged. “It doesn’t hurt.”
“Six years?” Jake looked at his brother again for confirmation. “Really?”
Luke nodded. “I talk to her about once a month, if I’m in town. More often if necessary. And Raina and I go together a couple times a year.”
“Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“Because I didn’t want you to know. I didn’t want anyone to know. But I’ve realized that pretending everything is okay doesn’t make it so, and healing is an ongoing process.
“No one expects that a thirty-day program is going to miraculously stop the nightmares and flashbacks or make you let go of your guilt and grief. But it just might help you learn to live with it and move on with your own life. Maybe even with the brunette from the restaurant.”
Jake shook his head, refusing to be tempted by the prospect. “She deserves someone who doesn’t have to deal with that kind of stuff.”
“Maybe she does,” Luke agreed. “But from where I was sitting, I’d guess the woman wants you.”
* * *
Jake’s brother left Haven on Sunday.
Sky was aware of his departure because she saw his truck in Jake’s driveway when she drove past on her way to the Trading Post just after lunch, but it was gone when she returned home a short while later.
Jake’s truck had been missing, too, though she’d let herself believe he was only running an errand. But when she passed his house again the following day, she realized he was gone—and she suspected that he wasn’t coming back.
It wasn’t just that the driveway was empty, it was that his house looked closed up. Abandoned. Lonely.
That was kind of how she felt, too.
“Why do I always put my faith in the wrong people?” Sky asked her sister, over coffee and donuts the following Sunday morning.
“Are we talking about any wrong people in particular?” Kate asked.
She nodded. “Jake Kelly.”
Her sister seemed surprised. “Watching the two of you together at Caleb and Brielle’s wedding reception, it looked like things were going well.”
“I thought so, too,” Sky said.
“What happened?”
“I don’t know.” Then she sighed. “Or maybe I do know.”
“If you want me to commiserate and empathize, I’m going to need a little more information than that,” Kate said.
“We had a great time that night. Actually, we had a lot of great times over the past few weeks, but now...” she blinked back the tears that stung her eyes “...now he’s gone.”
“Where’d he go?”
Sky shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“He didn’t tell you?”
“He didn’t even say goodbye.”
Her sister responded to that with a single word that questioned Jake’s parentage.
“Ba-turd,” Tessa echoed.
Kate winced. “Oh, that one’s going to come back to bite me.”
“Ba-turd,” the little girl said again, confirming her mother’s prediction.
“Come here, Tessa.” Sky patted her knee.
Her niece climbed up and immediately reached for the cell phone Sky had pulled out of her pocket. She pointed to the screen.
“This is bat turd,” she said, enunciating carefully. “In some places, it’s used as a
fertilizer to make flowers grow pretty.”
“I ’ike fwowers.”
“Do you think you could maybe draw me a picture of a flower?”
“O-kay,” Tessa said, scrambling down from her aunt’s knee to search for her crayons.
“You are a marvel,” her sister said to Sky. “And he obviously has no idea what he walked away from.”
“I feel so lost, Kate. Lost and sad and confused and so many other emotions. All those times I cried over broken relationships... I don’t think my heart has ever really been broken before. Not like this.”
“Maybe because you were never all the way in love before,” Kate suggested.
“What does it say about me that when I finally did fall, I picked a guy who couldn’t love me back?”
“I wouldn’t be so sure that he doesn’t love you.”
“He left,” she said again. “Without a word.”
“And for that he’s flower fertilizer,” her sister agreed, making Sky smile through her tears. “But without knowing why he left, you can’t claim to know what’s in his heart.”
“That doesn’t make me feel any better.”
“I don’t know if there’s anything that will,” Kate admitted. “And I can’t think of anything to say that doesn’t sound patronizing or cliché.”
“Give me something,” Sky pleaded.
“It will get better,” her sister said. “Each day, it will be a little bit easier to get out of bed, to go on with your life without him.”
“I know I can live without him,” Sky said. “I just wish he’d given me the chance to show him how much better both our lives could be together.”
“Do you want me to have Reid track him down and arrest him?”
“On what grounds?”
“Breaking and entering your heart?” Kate suggested.
Sky managed another smile. “A tempting thought, but no. Right now, I think the only thing worse than living with a broken heart would be for Jake to know that he broke my heart.”
“Are you sure he’s gone for good?”
“I’m not sure of anything,” she admitted. “All I know is, one day he was here, the next day he was gone.”
“And maybe tomorrow he’ll be back.”
But Sky wasn’t going to let herself count on it.
* * *
“How are you doing?” Sky asked when she met Jenny at the courthouse the following Thursday morning.
“I’m scared,” the other woman said. “Not of Darren as much as everything else that’s going to happen.”
“That’s understandable,” she said. “But I’m going to be here with you. If you have any questions about anything, ask.”
“I feel like such an idiot.”
“You’re not an idiot,” Sky said firmly.
“But I let him do it for so long... Do you think the judge will believe I liked being hit?”
“No, I don’t think the possibility will even cross the judge’s mind.”
“He—Darren—” Jenny clarified “—said that if I ever told, people would think that I liked it.”
“He only said that because he didn’t want you to tell,” Sky reminded her.
Jenny nodded. “I wish I had a lawyer. I know you said I should get one, but Darren closed out all the accounts, so I have no money. My parents offered to help, but they don’t have a lot of money, either, and they’re already doing so much for me.”
“You do have a lawyer,” Sky said, watching her sister walk into the courtroom. “In fact, here she is now.”
Jenny followed the direction of Sky’s gaze, but she still looked confused when the introductions were made.
“I appreciate you being here,” she said to Kate. “But I can’t afford a lawyer.”
“I’m taking your case pro bono,” the attorney said. “That means you don’t have to pay for my legal services.”
“But why would you do that?” Jenny wondered.
“I have a full-service practice with a lot of clients who can pay, and that allows me to help other clients who can’t.”
“I don’t know how to thank you,” Jenny said. Then her gaze shifted to Sky. “Either of you.”
“There is one thing you can do for me,” Sky said.
“What’s that?”
“Go back to school and get that teaching certificate you always wanted.”
“You don’t think I’m too old?” Jenny asked, half skeptical and half hopeful.
“It’s never too late to follow your dreams,” Sky told her.
“That’s good advice,” Kate said, looking at her sister. “For all of us.”
Chapter Seventeen
“Get your head in the game, Gilmore.”
Caleb’s sharp rebuke snapped Sky back to the present.
“What?”
Her brother shook his head. “You’re on deck.”
“Oh.” She swapped her baseball cap for a batting helmet and jumped up from the bench to head toward the on-deck circle, grabbing her favorite bat on the way. She took her position and gave a practice swing.
Joel Rosenthal hit a line drive straight into the second baseman’s mitt for the third out of the inning.
Sky leaned her bat against the fence and caught the glove that her brother tossed to her. She traded the batting helmet for her ball cap again and jogged out to her usual position on third base.
“Head in the game,” Caleb reminded her, as he moved past her to left field.
She pushed her preoccupation aside and focused her attention on the batter stepping up to the plate.
A walk-off two-run homer resulted in a 5–4 loss for Diggers’ in their second game of the round-robin tournament leading up to the Heritage Day Slo-Pitch Charity Championship. It was their first loss—and not Sky’s fault in any way—but she knew that, depending on the scores of the other games, it might be enough to jeopardize their appearance in the championship.
“Everything okay with you?” Caleb asked as they were packing up after the game.
“Sure,” she replied, not looking at him. “Why do you ask?”
“You seemed a little distracted tonight.”
“I’ve just got a lot on my mind.”
“Anything you want to talk about?”
She shook her head.
“Work stuff?” he guessed.
It was a believable excuse—and certainly easier than acknowledging the truth—so she nodded. Because she didn’t want to admit to her brother, or even herself, that she couldn’t stop thinking about Jake. Wondering where he was and what he was doing. Because it was pathetic to want a man who didn’t want her, and the fact that he’d left town was a pretty clear indication that Jake didn’t want her.
She impulsively hugged her brother.
“What was that for?” Caleb asked warily.
“For being you.”
“The most amazing brother in the world, you mean?”
“And because I’m grateful to know that you’ll always be in my corner, no matter what.”
“Always,” he confirmed.
* * *
The championship game of the Heritage Day Slo-Pitch Charity Championship was at three o’clock the following Saturday afternoon. Despite their earlier loss in the round-robin, Duke’s Diggers advanced to the final against Sweet Caroline’s Sweethearts—a group that was anything but a bunch of cream puffs.
It seemed to Sky as if the whole town had turned out to watch the big game, packed onto the bleachers or huddled along the sidelines in folding lawn chairs, their feet propped up on coolers.
The Gilmores were out en masse. Katelyn and Reid and Tessa; Liam and Macy with Ava, Max and Sam; Caleb’s wife Brielle with baby Colton; her dad and Valerie; and Sky’s grandparents. Duke was there, too, not only to cheer on his team but add coaching assistance
at third base. In addition, she recognized several of the bar’s regular customers: librarian Lara Reashore, theater owner Thomas Mann, and even Jo had entrusted her staff to watch over the pizza ovens so that she could take in at least part of the game.
It was a closely contested event—at least in the beginning. But the Diggers rallied for six runs in the bottom of the sixth, which put them ahead by five. And yet, Sky couldn’t help but notice that Ashley didn’t seem as excited by the prospect of victory as everyone else on their side of the diamond. Even when they held onto the lead until the final out, the scorekeeper’s cheers were uncharacteristically subdued.
After the players had shaken hands and the championship trophy was presented, the field quickly emptied of players and spectators.
“What’s wrong?” Sky asked, when most of her teammates had gone, leaving her alone in the dugout with her sister.
Ashley shook her head. “Nothing.”
“I thought we had a deal, that you wouldn’t say nothing when it’s obviously something.”
“It’s my own fault, for expecting too much of people,” her sister said unhappily.
“Anyone in particular?” Sky pressed.
Ashley started to shake her head again, then stopped. “Yes,” she admitted. “But I don’t want to talk about him.”
“Ah,” Sky said. “This is about a boy.”
“No,” her sister immediately denied. “Well, yes. But it’s not who you think.”
“We’re not talking about Chloe’s boyfriend’s friend, the one you met at the movies?”
“No. It’s... Jake.”
“Jake?”
Her sister nodded. “I texted to tell him about the game today. I thought maybe he’d had enough time to realize how much he missed you and he’d come to watch and then you’d get back together.”
Sky had to swallow around the lump that had risen in her throat. “Oh, Ashley.”
“He didn’t even reply to my message.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Why are you sorry? You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I’m not sure Jake did anything wrong, either.”
“How can you say that?” her sister demanded. “He left without even saying goodbye.”
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