Nuclear Heat (Firework Girls #4) (20 page)

“What?” I ask softly.

“It should be that he was beating the shit out of my mother. I think that time he was trying to kill her. But that’s not the worst part.”

She stops. She stops for so long I don’t think she’s going to tell me. I squeeze her tighter and rub her arm.

“It was that I didn’t do anything to stop it,” she says, her voice breaking.

“Ah, Sammy.”

“I just sat there,” she says, crying again now, “watching him do that to her.”

“You were just a kid,” I say.

“I was seventeen.”

“Like I said.”

She shakes her head against my chest, still crying.

“You were a kid,” I say firmly, “and even if you weren’t the fault lies with him, not you.”

“But I think...”

She stops again, unable to say whatever it is she thinks.

“What, sweetheart?”

“I wouldn’t stand up to him now either, and I’m not a kid anymore. But—” she chokes down a sob “—I feel like that little girl I used to be every time I’m around him. I... I can’t ever seem to stand up to him. I’m just like my mother...”

“You’re not.”

“I hate how I am around him. I’m so weak. And he makes me feel so... dirty and horrible and worthless.”

God, that bastard.

“And I’m so scared of him. I never know what he’s going to do. I’m scared to say anything to make him mad because I don’t know what he’ll do to me. And I—”

She chokes out a sob again, then says with more venom than I’ve ever heard in her voice, “I
hate
him. I fucking hate him.”

Then her whole body sort of collapses against me like it’s the last thing she has to say and she cries quietly against me. I take a deep breath. “Well,” I say gently, “I’m not such a fan myself.”

After a while, she starts to settle down and takes a deep breath. “Ugh,” she says, putting her hand to her forehead and slightly rolling onto her back. “I’m so sick of being blindsided by him. I never know when the fuck he’s going to show up.”

We lay there quietly for a while, then I say, “Have you thought about getting a restraining order?” Maybe some counseling, too, but now’s probably not the time to suggest it.

She sighs. “Yeah, I’ve thought about it before, but what the fuck is that really going to do? You know how useless those things are? Besides, I’m afraid all that will do is piss him off more and then what will he do?”

“But...” I sigh. “Maybe that’s exactly why you need to do it.”

She looks at me, bringing her brows together. “What?”

“Well,” I think about how I want to say this. “Honey,” I say gently, “you’ve had a hard time drawing your boundaries around this guy. I think that’s the thing that’s bothering you the most. I mean, I get that he’s an asshole and he’s scary. And I’m sorry about that. I really am. You deserve so much better than that. But I think the thing you need to do is discover that you’re not as helpless against him as you think you are.” She’s looking at me wide-eyed. I rub my hand softly on her shoulder. “Your dad’s always going to be who he is,” I say gently. “That’s not going to change. But I think you can change how you’re coping with it. You can find ways to stand up to him.”

“I don’t know, Jack. I don’t know if I can.”

“You can,” I say. “Of course, you can.”

She sighs and looks up at the ceiling. “So...” she says thoughtfully. “If I file a restraining order and he still shows up, what do I do then?”

She’s considering things, and I’m glad for that. I think she needs to come up with this answer on her own though.

“Okay,” I say. “You’ve filed an order and he shows up at your house. What would you do?”

She’s quiet for a moment, her eyes distant. “I wouldn’t have to let him in,” she says quietly, “because he already knows I don’t want to see him. I don’t want him there.”

I nod.

“So... I could...” She takes a shaky breath. “I guess I could just close the door or not open it and call the police and let them deal with it.”

I nod again, but she’s starting to get that frightened look again, and tears are pooling in her eyes. “But what if that’s not what he does? What if he sees I got a restraining order and breaks into my house in the middle of the night or something? What if he finds me at work and does something there? What if he gets a gun and goes all postal and we’re like those headlines, ‘Man kills family, then shoots himself.’?”

“Sam, honey, stop,” I say firmly. She lets me pull her in against my chest. “You’re going to drive yourself crazy with what ifs like that.” It’s amazing, how out-of-control our fears can sometimes get. She lets out a shaky breath. “Come on, honey,” I say, squeezing her tighter. “Deep breaths.”

She takes a few and eventually settles down again.

After a while I think she’s fallen asleep, she’s so still and her breathing’s so quiet, but then she says softly, “Thank you for being here for me.”

“Of course.”

“I’m sorry, Jack.”

“Sorry for what, honey?”

She’s quiet. I pull her gently away so I can look at her face. I’m shocked by the pain I see there. “You don’t have anything to be sorry about. Geez, Sam.”

“But...” she says.

I think she wants to look away, I sense it more than I see it, but I’m holding her eyes. “But what?”

But she stubbornly closes her eyes and tucks back into my chest, and doesn’t say any more.

I’ve made Jack a promise.

I told him I would think seriously about getting a restraining order, and that I would definitely get some counseling. I don’t really want to talk to a counselor, I’d rather just talk to Jack. I’ve told him more in the last twenty-four hours than I’ve ever told anyone, and it helps. But he wants to make sure I don’t lock this stuff away again, and I guess he might be right.

Today, he’s come home with me. I still haven’t decided if I’m sleeping here tonight, or grabbing some clothes and sleeping at Jack’s again. He’s made it clear I’m always welcome, but he’s worried my reasons for staying over there are the wrong ones. He doesn’t want me to be afraid of my own house.

It looks strange to me now too, as we come through the front door and into the living room. The place seems changed.

Or maybe it’s me who feels that way.

Jack’s arm is around me, but in his other hand is a bag of groceries. Our plan is to have dinner and watch a movie. Easy, right? So he says. “Time to claim your house back,” Jack said.

But as I follow him into the kitchen, everything still feels dark and eerie and I wonder if my dad has forever ruined even more parts of me. Not just this house, either. Jack, too.

I watch him pulling out the groceries and I can’t help but feel this is more trouble than he should have to go through for me. Why would he want to date a girl who’s a pain in the ass, has to file a restraining order against her own father, and needs to promise her boyfriend she’ll go to counseling?

Then I see the glass. Someone’s put the whiskey bottle away, Shane probably, but the empty glass is next to the sink.

I look at it, and feel a jolt of fear, and instantly I’m pissed by that jolt of fear, and my vision blurs.

“Hey,” Jack says gently, seeing me crying once again. And once again, he has to stop his entire world to come over here and comfort me. But when he puts his arms up to hold me, I step back.

“No,” I say.

He drops his arms and looks at me.

“No,” I say again. “It’s not fair to you.”

“What’s not fair to me?”

I exhale sharply, furiously wiping my tears away. “Oh, come on,” I say. “I’m fucked up, Jack. I can’t do this. You don’t want this.”

“Hey,” he says, firmly. “Don’t tell me what I want.”

I blink at him, taken back by his tone.

“There’s only one thing in the world I want, Sam, and that’s you.”

“But...” I say, softening but throwing my hand up in exasperation. “Why? Why do you want me? I’m a messed up pain in the ass.”

“No, you’re not.”

“I need fucking
therapy.
”

He laughs.

“Why are you laughing? It’s not funny.”

“Isn’t it?”

I cross my arms. “No.”

He’s grinning again.

“For god’s sake, what?” I say.

“I’ll tell you what,” he says, a fire in his eye. “I see that little spark coming out in you, and I’m
glad
because that spark is what you’ve needed. You think you’re weak, Sam, but you’re not. You’re one of the strongest people I know. Yeah, you’ve got a wound you need to close, but if you want to know the truth, I think it’s pretty fucking amazing you don’t have a hell of a lot more.”

Something in me softens. Something in me is suddenly desperate to believe what he’s saying. Maybe he knows this, because he comes to me and puts his hands on my face and all I can do is put my hands to his sides and hang on.

“Somehow you managed to come out of all that,” he says, “with the most amazing heart and the kind of genuine confidence most people would kill for. You’ve been living life on your own terms, and look at the life you’ve built for yourself. You have a great job, your own home, wonderful friends who love you. You. Are not. Your father.”

Tears spring to my eyes again.

“And you’re not your mother either. You’re
you
. And you’re an amazing person. And I love you more than I knew it was possible to love anybody. And let me tell you something else, Samantha Lawson...”

This stuns me more than anything. He said my name so soft, so gentle, in a way that communicated not just his love for me but his understanding, and his pure acceptance of who I really am. It’s the first time in my memory someone has called me by my full name without something inside me cringing. I even... want to hear him say it again. Exactly the way he just said it.

“I am going to love you for the rest of my life,” he says, “and there’s not one thing you can do about it.”

With tears still in my eyes, I go up on tiptoe to kiss him. Then kiss him again. I throw my arms around his neck and hug him and sink into the sensation of him hugging me back. “I love you,” I tell him.

He pulls back and looks at me, smiling.

“I love you,” I say again. Then I hold his face and kiss him and say it again. “I love you, Jack Thomas Anderson. I love you so much.”

And that’s the exact moment I start drawing boundaries. I draw a boundary right around Jack and I, and decide I won’t let my father touch us. I’m not going to worry about my mother with her string of divorces. I don’t care about their mistakes any more. Their mistakes aren’t mine, and while Jack might think it’s amazing I don’t have more wounds, I am only amazed by one thing.

That a girl like me found an incredibly good guy like him.

And I am not letting go.

I claim my house back by finally ripping out the old carpet and putting in the new. Then I have all my friends over and we drink and laugh and eat way too much food. Then Jack and I have sex on the new carpet and make love in my own bed with my awesome fucking pillows and I sleep in his arms all night long.

With the front door bolted and the new window locks Jack installed for me, but you can understand that, right?

I do my best to clean out and close that big ol’ wound from my dad. After a few initial counseling sessions that feel absolutely pointless, I finally start to connect with my therapist and we begin to make progress. First, she gives me permission to grieve the fact that I got stuck with the dad I did and will never have the kind of relationship with him I see my friends having with their amazing dads. That’s the first thing. Then I learn to recognize my relationship with him isn’t ever going to be something I feel great about, and it may sting and throw me off balance sometimes as I go through life, but he doesn’t have to control me so much anymore either. She walks me through mental exercises about how I’ll act the next time he resurfaces, which get less and less scary every time I do them. Then she helps me see that there’s something hard-wired in us humans to need love and acceptance from our parents, no matter who they are, and she helps me not hurt so much over the fact that I’ll never have that from him.

I find a new level of peace inside myself. It’s one more scar I’ll always carry around, but it’s not oozing blood and puss anymore, sorry to be gross about it.

And I just summed up three months of counseling for you. You’re welcome.

I did file a restraining order against my dad, and spent about a day feeling a little nervous about it, but mostly I felt empowered. I still do.

And then there’s Jack.

Today, I come home from work and walk into my kitchen to find something on the island that stops me in my tracks.

It’s a beautiful dragonfly figurine maybe six inches across, with great wings of cut glass and a body made of polished silver. I slowly go over and pick it up with both hands, running my thumbs over the smooth wings. Then I notice the little piece of paper it was sitting on. It’s a hand-written note that reads: “Be the dragonfly, yo.” There’s a little arrow indicating I should flip the note over. The back says: “P.S. That cake was delicious.”

I look over to where the raspberry layer cake used to be and see he’s eaten the last piece.

I smile.

In fact, as I look back to the dragonfly, I’m more than smiling. My heart is lifting me right off the ground. Something in me clicks. I feel it. I damn near hear it.

Then I hear the door of Jack’s truck close out front.

I set the note and dragonfly on the counter, then hurry through the door to greet the man who understands me better than anyone. There he is, coming up the walk. Tsunami Jack. He still sweeps me away, but I don’t fight it any more.

I run up and jump into his arms. He laughs and holds me as I wrap my arms and legs around him. He tries to put me down but I hang on. He chuckles and squeezes me hard. “Hey, you. I take it you liked the dragonfly.”

I let him put me down, but I stay close, my arms still around his waist, and look up at him. I can’t stop smiling, and seeing the way he smiles back at me only makes my heart swell.

I open my mouth and let myself say the words I’ve felt in my heart for a while now. “Marry me, Jack.”

He blinks at me in shock, but all I can do is look at him earnestly.

“Please,” I say. “Make me your wife.”

He’s still recovering from his shock, but he’s starting to grin and he’s getting that light in his eyes I’ve learned is reserved only for me. “Uh, we’re doing this kind of backwards,” he says, holding my face in both his hands.

He’s glowing. My Jack is glowing. But I need to hear him say it.

“Propose to me later then,” I say. “Just say yes first.”

He grins and says “Hell, yes” and kisses me before I can even respond. Then kisses me again and again, then we’re hugging so tight and he’s lifting me up again.

When he sets me down, he says, “Go get your purse,” like he has a mission to fill.

I don’t argue or ask why. I dash in, grab my purse, and we hustle into his truck.

“Where are we going?” I ask as we’re pulling away, me tucked right in next to him.

“My place,” he says.

“Uh... my bed’s way closer.”

He grins at me and I grin back.

“I’m just saying. It’s not too late to turn around.”

“It’s not for that,” he says. “Well, not
yet.”

When we get to his condo, he has me stand in the middle of the living room and points a finger at me, grinning. “Don’t move.”

I only grin back. Because I’m going to marry that sexy man right there.

He disappears down the hall toward his office. I wait with so much exhilaration, it’s flowing off my body and humming in the air.

For the record, I was wrong. Love is amazing.

When Jack comes back, he’s wearing an expression of love and excitement and nervousness, and carrying a little black ring box.

My breath catches.

I watch with an open mouth as he gets down on one knee and opens the box to reveal a softly swirling silver ring with a gorgeous central sapphire stone, off-set by diamonds.

I gasp. “Oh my god.”

“Do you like it?”

I nod earnestly. “It’s beautiful.” My heart pinches and I swallow past a lump in my throat. “It’s perfect, Jack. But when did you—”

“Months ago,” he says, smiling, but his voice is trembling underneath. It makes me realize the weight of what we’re doing. I don’t care. I want it. “I knew it was way too soon, but I saw it in the window and couldn’t help myself.”

He’s had this ring for months? He takes my hand in his. “Okay, hush now so I can propose properly.”

I grin. “Okay.” But I can’t resist slipping down and tucking myself into his arms.

“Sam,” he says laughing. “You’re supposed to stand there.”

“Uh-uh,” I say, shaking my head. “You have to do it like this.”

He laughs again, then his eyes get that tender fire in them and he takes my face in his hands. We’re kneeling together on the floor, stomachs and thighs touching, breath mingling. “God, I love you,” he says.

“I loved you first.”

It’s our new joke. He says he was first, because he fell in love with me when I almost died in the hospital, but I didn’t fall in love with him until later and he has my drunken escapade to prove it. But I say I win, because even though I thought it didn’t count when we weren’t having sex, I gave my heart to this boy years and years ago.

But Jack doesn’t play the game right now. He’s still looking at me with that fire, and holding me so close. “Samantha Lawson,” he says, in that way I love, “I promise to do my best to make you happy every day.”

You already make me happy every day,
I think, but I don’t interrupt so he can propose properly.

“You’re my favorite girl,” he says. “My best girl. You always have been. Will you please be my one and only girl, for the rest of our lives?”

“Yes, Jack,” I say, only able to whisper past the lump in my throat. There’s nothing I want more.

We’re gathered on the second floor patio of Giovanni & Co, a classy restaurant and event hall in Swan Pointe, with a nice view of the ocean. The covered balcony we’ve reserved looks as it always does, the dark wood-beamed ceiling strung with twinkle lights and little iron lanterns. It has a great atmosphere, so there wasn’t anything more we needed to do to it. On one side of the room are two long tables full of food so good, even our resident foodie Chloe has been impressed. There’s a small, private bar area in one corner with an ample supply of drinks, and there are high cocktail tables scattered about so people can have a place to set their drinks and food while they talk. There are lovely gas stone fireplaces at the two outer corners of the patio, which keep the space cozy in spite of it being a mild, mid-December evening.

We reserved the room a couple weeks ago and sent out emails and texts, telling people to come in cocktail party dress, prepared for an important announcement.

We’ve gathered the Firework Girls and their guys, and flew in Jack’s family and my mother. We invited a few other key extended family members (including Isabella’s mother, who’s always kind of mothered me, and who honored me by taking the trouble to come), and friends (mostly Jack’s, because that boy knows everybody) who we knew would give the place a festive atmosphere. But aside from making sure the Firework Girls and our parents would be free, we let the chips fall where they may for everyone else, no offense to them.

It’s been a good turn-out, though, and now that everyone’s had their fill of food and are chatting happily with one another, Jack and I look at one another and smile.

He’s wearing a black suit and black tie, but he hates ties, so I loosened the knot when we first got here, and I gave him a kiss and said, “Now you look like my Jack.”

I’m wearing a form-fitting, sleeveless, silver dress, that’s covered in beads, falls to my ankles, and has a delicate slit in the back that goes to my knees. I’ve worn it several times to Ashley’s recitals, and Jack requested it, saying it’s his favorite.

Holding my eyes now, and holding my hand, he asks, “Ready?”

“Yes, please.”

We each take a deep breath and head over to the front of the balcony. The room slowly falls to an eager silence as people notice what we’re doing. They’ve been pestering us all night about the promised announcement, but we’ve stayed mum.

All Jack has to do is clear his throat and the last bits of chatter fall away. Still holding hands, we look at one another, grinning.

“Okay,” he says. “We have an announcement.”

“Really?” Ashley says, smiling. “We had no idea.”

Light laughter ripples around the room and I scrunch my face up at her. She does it back.

Jack and I look at one another one last time.
Here we go.
He faces the gathering and says, “We’ve set a date to get married.”

“I knew it!” Chloe says, beaming.

There are little swells of excitement as people react to Jack’s words, but he raises his hand to keep them contained so he can tell them the actual date. After he says it, I watch everyone’s faces: confusion, surprise, disbelief. More confusion.

Yeah, this was an awesome idea,
I think, grinning.

“But...” Isabella says. “That’s today’s date.”

“Boy, you can’t get anything past a Harvard grad,” I say, winking at her.

Then the noise on the balcony swells as everyone realizes what’s happening.

“Wait a minute,” Chloe says, still in shock. “Are you getting married
right now?
”

Chloe’s been knee-deep in wedding plans for several months and still has a few more months to go. We were a little worried she’d be upset at us for cutting in line, but hope she’ll understand. I’ve never been one to fantasize about wedding cakes and bridal bouquets so there wasn’t much to plan, and once we made the decision, neither one of us wanted to wait.