One Thing I Know

by Kara Isaac

  “Hey.” He blinked. His words were soft, his eyes softer.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I . . .” He looked around them like he had something he’d rather not say in front of others. The absurdity of it all almost made her laugh. They were surrounded by people but not one of them was cognizant of anything, let alone them.

  “Can we talk?” His hands tumbled over themselves.

  “I um . . .”

  Lacey’s voice sounded from behind Lucas. “Go for a walk in the garden.” She appeared beside him, all no-nonsense. “Shoo, out.”

  “But, it’s . . .”

  “I’ll let you know if Anna needs us. But you two need to talk. So scat.”

  A smile quirked up Lucas’s cheek. She could lose herself in that dimple forever.

  Without even knowing how, they were suddenly outside, Lacey closing the door with a thump of finality behind them, and Rachel’s flight instinct kicked in.

  She wrapped her coat around her and stalked across the grass. Distance, she needed distance. If he was here, then he knew something about her father. And if he knew anything, he knew that she’d failed him as a daughter.

  “I didn’t know. I never thought for a second that he might be in danger. I know that might be hard to believe.” The words tumbled out of her.

  Lucas walked across the grass. His legs ate up the distance between them. “Rachel.” Her name fell from his lips so quietly, it almost got stolen away by the wind before it reached her ears.

  Reaching out, he ran his fingers down the side of her face, tilting her chin so she was forced to look at him. “I know that you twist your hair when you’re nervous or stressed. I know you don’t suffer fools. I know when you laugh hard, you snort like a baby rhino and it’s the cutest thing I’ve ever heard.” His eyes darkened and smoldered. “I know you look smokin’ hot in a red dress.” One hand was around her waist, drawing her in. “I know you are protective and sassy and funny and smart. I know you drive me crazy and when you’re in the room I can’t think about anything else. I know I would rather have a two-minute conversation with you than an entire date with anyone else. I know that that,” he pointed at her father through the French doors, “was not your fault. No matter what you think.”

  Her mind scrambled. What did he know? Who told him?

  “Rachel . . .” He searched her eyes, then paused. “What’s your middle name?”

  “Elizabeth.” She barely managed to get the word out.

  “Perfect.” His fingers tucked her hair behind her ears, caressed her cheeks, captured her chin. “Rachel Elizabeth Somers. I know we haven’t known each other that long and I know I still have a lot to learn about you, but I’m crazy about you. And you can run as hard and as fast as you like, but I will run harder and faster.”

  “Lucas . . .” She managed to get a word out.

  “Shhh.” A finger settled on her lip. “I’m not finished.” His fingers gathered her hair. With a will of their own, her hands encircled his neck, lifting her heels from the ground.

  The tips of their noses grazed. He stared at her with such intensity she almost believed nothing else mattered.

  “Rachel.” His voice was husky. “Don’t fight me, because this is one battle I intend to win.”

  His mouth quirked, then everything collided as his lips brushed hers. His hands traveled down her sides, resting on her hips for a moment, then wrapping around her. It wasn’t anything like the split-second affair in the kitchen. She couldn’t even remember the last time she’d kissed anyone properly, but she knew it had never been like this. The kiss deepened until her knees gave out and she almost forgot her own name.

  Her shameless fingers ran through his hair, the way they’d wanted to do from the first day they’d met. Her body melded against his. Finally, she knew that what she’d spent a decade writing about was worth holding out for.

  The kiss broke off and Lucas looked at her with the kind of shaken smile she’d waited her whole life to see. “Is this it?” He murmured the words as his nose touched hers.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Is your dad your last secret? Nothing else I need to know?”

  His words struck her like a hand grenade. She lurched backward. Palms on his chest.

  His eyes were still glazed. He was still in the moment, didn’t even know she was already running. From him. About to ruin the best thing she’d ever had a chance at. She had to tell him. She couldn’t stand here and tell him there was nothing more. It would haunt her. And then it would destroy them.

  Her head was already shaking. Even as her heart screamed at her to find a way, to try and find a way. Everything she’d ever wanted was standing here in front of her and she was about to give it up for what? The truth? Surely she deserved a trade-off. Surely her conscience would let her get away with it.

  But her heart thumped in her chest, telling her that she had to tell him. And she had to do it now.

  “Rach?” Confusion clouded ocean eyes. “What’s wrong?”

  She forced herself to step back. “I can’t do this, Lucas. I—” She couldn’t even get the rest of the words out.

  She didn’t even know what they were going to be. Her feelings she couldn’t, wouldn’t, deny. She had too many lies in her life as it was, without piling more on top.

  His shoulders tensed, as though ready to take on whatever it was pulling her away. “So, what? You’re telling me you work day in and day out with Donna and yet when a guy who just wants a chance and puts everything on the line, is right in front of you, it’s all too hard?”

  Hysterical laughter. Right in front of her. Shame he couldn’t appreciate the irony. “It’s all a lie, Lucas. The whole stupid mess is one big, fat moneymaking lie. What do you think pays for all of this?” She waved her arms around to encompass the manicured gardens, the immaculate buildings. “An assistant’s salary?” The truth tumbled from her lips. Oh, it felt so good to finally say it out loud.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I’m the one who created Donna.”

  Lucas was as gray as the clouds rolling above them. “I still don’t understand.”

  She couldn’t look at him.

  “What do you mean you ‘created Donna’?”

  “I write the books. Donna was, is, the front person.” The words came out mumbled.

  “What?”

  She forced herself to look at him. Into his face that stormed with emotions like squalls across a sea. “I write the books, Donna is the front person. Well, mostly. We collaborate a lot.”

  “So, you’re her ghostwriter.” He didn’t look angry so much as just a little confused. “For how long?”

  “Since the beginning.” The breeze picked up and the skirt of her dress whipped around her legs. The dress that was supposed to mark a new beginning. Not this. Not here.

  Lucas squinted at her. “I’m sorry. I’m really not following. Donna wasn’t famous in the beginning. Why would she need a ghostwriter? What got her the publishing deal if it wasn’t her writing?”

  Rachel blew out a breath. No turning back now. “When I was in college I interned at a newspaper one summer. Part of my job was filtering the mail for the advice columnist. She didn’t care about what happened to the letters she didn’t answer, so I started a blog. I called it Ask Donna.” It had been meant as a tribute. After her mom died and everyone else had gone back to their lives, Donna was the only relation who even checked up on her.

  “Why?”

  “I guess because I know what it feels like to be invisible. And I hated that there were people who might be opening their paper every day hoping for an answer that never came. I guess it was my way of trying to help them be heard.” It had given her purpose. Even though she knew the people would probably never read it. Might not even recognize themselves if they did since she changed some of the details.

  “Rach—” Lucas reached out his hand and stepped toward her, but she pulled back. If he touched her, she might lea
ve it there. At only half the truth.

  “About a year in, I wrote a post that some celebrity tweeted and it went viral. Suddenly I had all these social media followers and requests for Donna to appear on shows, and it all just spiraled.”

  Lucas ran a hand through his hair. “I still don’t understand why the need for the whole ghostwriter front-person charade. People use fake names on the internet all the time.” He didn’t sound angry, just puzzled.

  “When the acquisitions team at Randolph found out how old I was, they said I had no credibility. That I was too young. Donna knew about the blog. She had a psychology degree gathering dust so she helped me out sometimes with answers I was struggling with. She had three kids and was in huge debt. I . . . My dad had just had his accident and insurance didn’t even come close to covering his care. So we put together a proposal for me to write the books and Donna to be the face and when the head of marketing met Donna, she loved her. All we were hoping for was a bit of breathing room. We had no idea how big it would get.”

  “Okay.” Lucas said the words slowly. “But lots of people like her have ghostwriters, right? I mean, isn’t the plan that I’m going to have one, or at least someone to help me?”

  “Yes.”

  “What am I missing, Rachel? I feel like I’m missing something.”

  She scrubbed her hands through her hair. This was it. If she continued from here he would never look at her the same way again.

  “Rach?”

  “We also shared some of the media stuff.”

  “Shared some of the what? What do you mean?” Lucas probably didn’t even realize it, but he shifted back as he said the words, already putting distance between them.

  Why had she added that? She couldn’t say it. Couldn’t say the words that would make him hate her with every ounce of his being. Because she knew that even if the ghostwriting didn’t matter to him, this would.

  “I had voice training. To sound like her. Sometimes if the schedule was tight or there were two things we wanted to do at the same time, I would do radio slots for her or phone interviews.” She watched the pieces click into place across his face like a perfectly aligned Rubik’s Cube.

  Lucas didn’t say anything for a few seconds. “That night . . . the night that Donna was on my show and she talked that woman off the window ledge. Was that her or was it you?”

  Rachel sucked in a breath. That was the night that changed everything. When she had woken up the next morning, Dr. Donna was a household name. Randolph had gone from saying they weren’t going to offer them another book contract to throwing a six-figure advance at them.

  “It was me.”

  When he spoke his voice was choked, eyes haunted.

  “Did . . .” His breath shuddered. “Did you know about my father because Donna told you?”

  The shame was so heavy she could barely stay on her feet. Her head turned left, then right. “I’m so sorry. We never meant to hurt anyone.”

  “How many? How many times were you on my show?” The last sentence came out in a roar of fury.

  Tears pooled in her eyes. “Probably most of them.”

  “I trusted you. How could you?”

  She had no answer. What was she supposed to say? That he was supposed to just be a conduit to kick-starting a stalled book? A book that he was now going to be cowriting.

  She forced herself to look into his wrung-out, haunted face. “I’m so sorry.”

  He looked at her, a flicker of the old Lucas in his eyes. “Was any of it real, Rach?” He waved his hands around. “Or was this,” he swallowed, “was I just being played for a fool the whole time?”

  “It was all real. Every single second.”

  He blinked, then his eyes hardened and his soul put up shutters. “Huh. Well, forgive me if every second of a well-orchestrated web of lies doesn’t mean a whole lot.”

  “We . . .” Her breath came out in gasps, words having to fight their way around the boulder crushing her chest. “We never meant to hurt anyone.”

  “This book. That Donna said she was struggling with ideas for. Was this the plan the whole time? The reason for bringing me on the tour? For all of it? To get me as a coauthor? Save you from being in breach of contract when you had no book to deliver?”

  “No. No. We never planned for it to happen like that. That was all Donna and Lacey. The tour. I had nothing to do with it. And they definitely didn’t plan on that. They hoped that maybe it would give me some ideas. And what was the harm? Your ratings are up. Once the book is out, you’ll practically be able to pick your path.”

  “Once the book is out?” He spat her words out like they tasted bad. “You can’t seriously think I’m going to do this book now? I’m not even going to do the last two stops of the tour.”

  Not do the book. For some reason that hadn’t even occurred to her, even though it should have. “But Max is renegotiating the contract right now.” She couldn’t hide the panic in her voice.

  Lucas shrugged. “I haven’t signed anything.”

  June. They were in June. If Lucas didn’t sign, she had less than eight weeks to deliver a book or they’d have to give the advance back. Hundreds of thousands of dollars. Rachel felt her knees start to give way just thinking about it.

  “You don’t mean that. Think of all the good you could do with a book. I get that you may never want to have anything to do with me again, but whether you like it or not, I saved that woman that night. I’ve written thousands of words that have helped people.”

  “So the ends justify the means.” Lucas shook his head. “You’re just like him. I don’t believe it. How could I have been so stupid?”

  His words didn’t make any sense. “Just like who?”

  “My father.” He barked a harsh laugh. “You should meet him sometime—the two of you could swap tales of your best tricks.”

  The conversation had stopped making sense. What did his father have to do with anything? She opened her mouth, not knowing what would come out. “I—”

  “I’m not even sure which one of you is more impressive. I mean you, you’ve managed to fool the whole country, but he had two wives and two sets of kids to fool.” He shook his head, eyes spitting condemnation. “I hate to say it, but I think my old man might have met his match in you two.”

  Her head spun like a roulette wheel as she tried to process what he was saying. “Please, just let me explain.”

  “You’ve explained more than enough.” He turned away, crossing his arms across his chest.

  Something stirred in her chest, anger bubbling up and out. “Tell me another way, Lucas. You got any better ideas for how I could have made a million bucks? Because it’s either this, or my father eventually ends up in an institution where he will be left to fester in his own bed sores because the staff aren’t paid enough to give a fig!”

  He turned to her, eyes dead. “Just leave, Rachel. Go away.”

  “Lucas, please.” But he turned away again. Her anger disappeared, replaced by desperation. It couldn’t end like this, after everything, not this.

  He turned back to her, eyes blazing. “Just leave me alone!” He roared the last word with a raw fury she hadn’t seen since she was eighteen and her father discovered she had poured out all his liquor.

  Resisting the urge to run, Rachel turned and made her way back to the door, her flip-flops slapping against the dew-drenched grass.

  She had to go to the hospital. She had to go to the hospital and stand in a sterile waiting room while her friend’s husband’s organs were harvested.

  And when she woke up tomorrow, she might have a broken heart. But at least she still had one.

  - 30 -

  “All right. What happened?” Scott’s voice cut through the haze.

  Lucas lifted his head, opened one eye a slit, grunted, and dropped his head back down. “Who let you in?”

  “I did.” The jangle of his spare key being tossed permeated his brain. “Seriously, little bro. You stink, and as for these . . .�
�� Scott gave his sweatpants a tug. “Thank goodness I didn’t bring Grace with me. No one needs to get a bird’s-eye view of their brother-in-law’s family jewels.”

  Oh. He’d forgotten about the slight hole in his pants. “Ventilation.”

  “I’ll give you ventilation.” He cracked open one eye to see Scott throwing back his curtains and flinging open both windows.

  “Show some respect for the man cave.”

  Scott picked his way across a variety of take-out containers spread across the living room floor, picking up a couple of pizza boxes as he went. “Have you eaten anything in the last couple of days that wasn’t from Pizza Hut, Mr. Chow’s, or . . .” He eyed a wrapper on the floor, still showing the remnants of what had been a pretty average beef burrito. “Mexican Express?”

  Lucas groaned. “I can neither confirm nor deny.”

  “And I can neither confirm nor deny that if you do not get up off that couch in the next ten seconds, I’m going to make you.”

  “Give it your best shot.” Lucas leaned back and closed his eyes again. He had two inches and twenty pounds on Scott. His brother had no chance. And he still had a good two days of vacation time left to wallow away.

  “Argh!” What the . . .? He blinked. He was on his feet, ice-cold water pooling on the floor, dripping off his arms, running down his back. His pants were barely holding together under the onslaught and wow, that hole was a lot larger than he remembered. He clasped his hands in front to protect what little modesty he had left.

  Scott stood at the end of the couch, bucket in hand, self-satisfied smirk on his face. “I’ll brew the coffee while you hit the shower.”

  “I’m going to get you back.”

  “Yeah, count me scared, big guy. Go.” He pointed to the doorway.

  Lucas looked at the floor, now polka-dotted with splashes of icy water. What had his brother done, brought a melted iceberg with him? Brat. “Fine. But revenge will be sweet.”

  Half an hour later, the brothers sat at the rickety dining table in his kitchen, two mugs of steaming black coffee clasped in their hands.