Don't Let Go (18 page)

He nodded, not turning around, and pushed through the door as I took a deep breath and sagged against the counter. There weren’t any more tears. I was just exhausted. Mentally, emotionally, and physically spent.

I covered my face with my hands, still seeing his face—his eyes—in my mind. So close I could have kissed him three different times.
Shit, shit, shit.
Everything we used to be in another lifetime was still there, pushing and tugging and teasing. It wasn’t just my imagination. I’d seen it in his eyes as well.

I had to stay away from him. That was all there was to it.

Chapter 11

I needed normal. Like, in a big way.

I needed to just come to work, do my job, go home, argue with Becca, go to bed, and do it all over again the next day. Well, Becca’s piece of that pie was still covered, but not in a comfortable way. And what wasn’t in the pie, but basically the whipped cream on the side—no pun intended—was Patrick. Or someone like Patrick. Someone to feed that adult side of me that didn’t require major maintenance or deep feelings.

Unfortunately, I’d probably burned that bridge, and I felt bad about that. Not for me, but for him. He was a good guy and treated me like a queen. He even had started to pick up on things—little things that were important to me. Like a boyfriend might do. Which put him back in that maintenance category that probably needed trimming back. Just maybe not in the manner I’d trimmed it.

And now, with the current change in tide, I wouldn’t have been satisfied with the side of whipped cream anymore, anyway. I wanted more pie. The original pie.

I was screwed.

Ruthie kept eyeing me for the next hour as I pulled extra copies of older titles from the shelves and loaded them into a box for donation to the library. My mother used to make a big event of that, advertising for people to come drop off their used books, making little stickers to attach to the insides of the books that said
Donated with love and sparkles from Book Enchantment.

I just couldn’t get into all that. Ruthie would if I gave her half a chance, but I didn’t have the patience. I needed to stay busy and not hover and obsess over Becca’s life, and not think about mine at all. Anything was better than what wanted to invade my thoughts.

“Hey, did you turn in an idea for the store decoration?” I asked, completely not caring whatsoever. And she knew that.

“Yes, ma’am,” she said with a wink.

“And?”

“And I’m on it,” she said, haughty little head tilt in play. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Works for me,” I said, already not worrying about it.

“Are you okay?” she asked when I tossed the box on a chair. She stopped me and made me look at her. “Seriously?”

I swallowed and nodded. “Yes.” Then I shook my head. “No. But it’s okay.”

“I worry about you,” she said, her dark eyes soft.

A small smile relaxed my face muscles. “I know. I’m good, I promise. I’m gonna go—” I pointed at the box and lost my train of thought as I gestured toward the door.

“To the library?” she asked, squeezing my arm.

“That would be it.”

“Yeah, you’re good, all right,” she said with an eyebrow cocked. Conceding, she let out a sigh. “Headed over there right now?”

I grabbed my purse and balanced the box on one hip. “Good a time as any.”

“Because there’s an awesome old rocking chair over at The Brass Ass I want you to look at when you get a chance.”

I blinked. “A rocking chair.”

“For Story Time,” she said. “It’s beat up, but Frank can restore it and make it look really cool.”

I nodded. “I thought you hated that place.”

The Brass Ass was an antique-slash-resale shop on the other side of town. They were annoying. They had a brass donkey on the lawn.

“I do,” she said. “I like the barn better, but the rocker can’t help where it ended up.”

The barn was an actual old barn turned into a junk business the next block up and run by the Barneses. Old Tin Barnes. Too cute for me, but Ruthie had an antique fetish. And Copper Falls was proud of its discards.

“Okay,” I said, palming my keys. “Brass Ass. Rocking chair. Is there more than one? Do I need a guide?”

“Nope, just the one,” she said. Her eyes searched mine, though, always seeing too much. “I can go rip some ass, I’m telling you,” she said.

I smiled. I wasn’t feeling it, and I knew she knew that, but I smiled anyway. “No ass ripping necessary. It’s all fine.”

“Didn’t look fine.”

“Appearances are deceiving,” I said, walking toward the door. “If you really want to rip somebody, though, go cut Johnny Mack’s tires or something.”

“Really?”

I gave her a look over my shoulder. “No.”

“Whatever you said to him, by the way,” she said as my hand landed on the door handle, “he looked ready to lose it.”

I stopped, knowing the “him” wasn’t Johnny Mack, and stared out the window to the trees behind the gazebo.

• • •

It took me a few minutes to get on the highway and drive the few exits down to the Katyville Public Library, the same highway that took me everywhere. Including two trips to the hospital to give birth. The radio crooned a love ballad, and I stabbed at the button with my finger. The next station’s DJ made a comment about an hour of eighties music, and I snapped the power off, rubbing a temple to ease the dull headache coming on.

It wasn’t worth my sanity.

When I pulled into the library’s parking lot, I avoided the side area that was closer to the building but so cramped that it was difficult to get your car out unscathed. Choosing the longer walk with a heavy box, I pulled in and parked.

Just as I was tugging the box from the backseat and fighting a snag against the door, all my senses took note of a dark blue truck with shiny chrome trim pulling in next to me.

“Seriously?”

I didn’t think I could take another Noah encounter just yet. It was going to go badly. Furious at the turn of my day, and trying to stomp back all the sensations that kept attacking me every time he made an appearance, I yanked one last time to free the box of books.

And it came out. Knocking me off balance as the box toppled and all the books scattered on the pavement around me.

I will not cry.
I heard the door open and shut, and I pulled anger from every cell in my body to help overcome feeling like a weak klutz. I braced myself for his voice, but what I got was significantly lighter.

“Jules?” It was Shayna. “Oh, my Lord, let me help you.”

I looked up in surprise as she hurried to kneel beside me and pluck the books up as the wind rifled their pages. Shayna driving Noah’s truck around—like a couple. They
are
a couple, I chided myself.

I was struck with relief, gratefulness, and then guilt as I remembered her fiancé’s hands in my hair earlier, wiping my tears and coming so damn close to kissing me. I doubted she’d be on her hands and knees in a skirt helping me if she knew about that.

“Thank you,” I said, tossing an armful into the box, no longer caring if they were straight. “God, it’s been a day.”

She blew out a breath and shook her head, little pieces of hair blowing into her face. “I know, I’m so sorry.”

Oh. No. She had no idea. Johnny Mack’s insults were a distant buzz in the back of my head, spurring my headache on. That had been bad, but what had my heart pumping pain into it was Noah.

“I couldn’t believe—” she continued. “I mean, I know you said something about him the other night, but that was just—uncalled for.”

I nodded, choosing not to let my emotions be pulled back in again. “You’ll find that he doesn’t have a filter, Shayna, he just says whatever is there.” I forced out a chuckle. “You’d think I’d be immune to it by now.”

I felt the pause.

“You and he were close once, weren’t you?” she asked, grabbing one more wayward paperback hiding behind my tire.

My first reaction was to lie and make some off-the-cuff remark about how no one could ever be close to Johnny Mack Ryan. But something about Shayna made me feel that I could be honest. In some things. Things that didn’t involve me wanting to undress Noah and lick him.

“A million years ago,” I said on a laugh, scooping my hair out of my face. “Before—” I said, glancing her direction. “Well—before. He used to make cookies for all Noah’s friends when we were young, and they had the good backyard with all the trees, so it was kind of the place to be.”

We rose at the same time, and I saw the questions in her face before she asked them.

“And when you were together?”

I nodded and smiled over the pinprick to my midsection. “It was good until it wasn’t. Why?”

She blinked a couple of times, appearing to ponder that. “Because if he’d always been mean, he wouldn’t have the power to hurt you.”

I chuckled and looked at the pavement. “Very true.” I shifted the box of books onto my hip and started walking, wishing for a subject change as she fell into step beside me. “So what brings you over here?”

She laughed lightly and grinned a little sheepishly. “I wanted a book.”

I raised an eyebrow. “I know a closer commute.”

Her laugh grew melodic. “I know, I’m so crazy. But I didn’t know if it would be awkward—me coming over there.”

I scoffed. “I take everyone’s money equally,” I said, making her snicker again.

“Well, I’ll keep that in mind,” she said. “Now if Noah would just relax.”

My stomach clenched and I gripped the box tighter. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, he’s so paranoid we’re going to end up in the same room or something,” she said. “Like we’re gonna compare notes.”

I laughed, but it was an uncomfortable laugh, and I felt he might be right. Just talking about him with her was giving me the willies.

“And he’s been so moody the last two days. Today when he got to the diner he was somewhere else completely, not listening to anyone, so I dropped him at home and told him to have a beer and tell me how to find the library,” she said. She held up her palms as if to justify. “He’d do that a lot when he was working, so it’s not new to me. Everything was classified and everything ate him up until it was done. But, my God, we’re just sitting here in this sleepy little town, what could be so damn stressful?”

My mouth opened and closed, and I turned to focus on the doors ahead, spotting Becca’s little blue Chevy parked on the side. Where all the cars were jammed together. A new irk joined all the rest in my brain as I thought about her not telling me she was going anywhere, parking where I’d specifically told her was a guaranteed fender bender, and Noah’s apparent mood change after our encounter. I felt a sweat breaking out.

“Well, coming home is probably an adjustment,” I said, turning to face her before we went in. “He’s about to be a dad—and a husband.” And I said that with not a bit of stutter.

The light left her face. “Yeah.”

I was taken off guard by that and wasn’t sure how to respond. It wasn’t like we were best friends or anything tight enough to dig around. She wasn’t Ruthie. I couldn’t threaten to take her mixer away if she didn’t spill the goods.

I bit my lower lip. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” she repeated, distracted. She twisted her fingers together and averted her eyes. “Can I ask you a question?”

Oh, shit.

“Okay,” I said, not actually feeling okay about it. Her face said it wasn’t going to be okay. It wasn’t going to be something innocent like who cut my hair or where I got my necklace.

Her eyes met mine, blinking fast. “Do you think things really happen for a reason? Like—you know—every purpose under Heaven and all that?”

Wasn’t what I expected. “Um, yeah, I guess so.” My mind reeled, looking for the reasons behind that question. “I’ve always kind of had to believe that, it got me through some rough times.”

“That’s what I mean,” she said, her pretty face going serious. “I worry about stuff like that. My mom’s always been one for ‘Give it to God, things happen like they’re supposed to,’ and all that, but—”

She stopped, and I was intrigued.

“But what?” I asked.

“What if I’m not making the right choice?” she asked, her voice fading at the end and the color in her cheeks fading with it.

I blinked and pushed down the feeling of impending shock that wanted to land on me before I even knew what she really meant.

“About what, Shayna?” I asked.

She licked her lips and her eyes misted. “About marrying Noah.”

• • •

It felt as if all the air in my lungs was sucked out with a vacuum cleaner.

Oh, my God.

I stared at her, trying not to look shocked or disturbed or confused as hell. I must have pulled one heck of a bluff if she was able to admit any reservations about her relationship with Noah to me. It went against all brands of woman code to show weakness with your man’s ex. Then again, I realized, she was new to town and alone except for Noah, and I was probably the closest thing she had to a friend in Copper Falls. That just proved how truly twisted up the situation was.

“That’s just nerves,” I said on a whisper.

“I don’t know,” she answered with a forced smile as she dabbed at her eyes.

“You’ve got double-duty hormones going crazy, too, so don’t let your mind mess with you like that,” I said, wondering where the words were coming from. “And my ex-husband’s floor show probably didn’t—”

“We were about to break up again when I got pregnant,” she blurted, two heavy tears breaking free from her eyes. She instantly sucked in a deep breath and blew it out slowly like the words had been strangling her. All the color came rushing back to her cheeks.

And probably to mine, as well.

“Ag—” I stopped and cleared my throat. “Again?”

“Jesus,” she breathed, covering her face with her hands. “What is this, true confessions day?”

My box suddenly felt like it grew in poundage, and I shifted it on my hip. “Let’s—go inside, Shayna,” I said, pulling the door open. “We can go sit down.”

I needed the seconds to pull my head together as well. Okay, pregnancy before marriage happened all the time; that was no shocker. It had been the same with me, and Noah was trying to make sure he did it right this time. That explained his revisit of so much of our history, too. It probably felt like déjà vu.