Three Rivers (A Gateway to Love Novel)

by Barlow, Chloe T.

  The morning? What? Oh God. I've got to get out of here.

  Althea swallowed dryly around the panic that started to creep into her throat. She'd been almost asleep when those words broke through her consciousness.

  Althea knew she couldn't be there when he woke up, that was most definitely not the plan. Her heart went from a lazy sleeping rhythm to a frantic pace. She tried to stay calm until Griffen finally seemed to be completely asleep, then carefully slid out from under his arm, intending to shimmy off the bed. Unfortunately, her trademark clumsiness kicked in and she plopped flat on her bottom on the floor. She grimaced and looked up at Griffen in the bed from her undignified perch on the floor. He took a deep breath and rolled over closer toward her face, though she could tell he was still asleep.

  She gulped but didn't hesitate to take another long perusal of his handsome body and face.

  Way to go Tea, that is one hot male!

  She shook off her gawking and found her phone. She made sure it was silenced and texted Jenna to pick her up at his hotel.

  After she dressed, Althea sat on the floor of Griffen's hotel room silently admiring him and wishing life was different. He was so good looking, but more than that, he was confident and charming, with a vein of intensity and strength that made her feel at once contented and unsettled. Their lovemaking had been passionate and hot, but it had also been so much fun.

  What if she were free enough to stay till morning like he asked? To make love again, shower together, wear a fluffy robe and feed each other room service while planning a fun day in, and out, of bed. The fantasy wrapped around her heart and mind so clearly she could almost smell the room service coffee and pancakes.

  She hadn't had this much fun with anyone since Jack died.

  Dammit! What about Jack?

  And there it was, the guilt. The feeling that she'd cheated on her one and only. He was gone, but it still felt like he would come back the next week from a trip, even after all these years.

  The sadness and memories had become a form of comfort to her — they were a partner that would be with her forever, one that would never die.

  But she'd felt no guilt while having sex with Griffen, in fact, so many facets of his personality reminded her of Jack's charming strength and beauty inside and out that it made her feel connected to Jack in some way, even if for only this brief time. She hadn't felt the usual sadness or guilt tonight until just now when she'd decided to leave.

  She actually felt disappointed, like she was leaving a wonderful vacation and wishing she could buy a home and move there permanently, but knowing she would never be able to afford it.

  The light on her phone shocked her back to consciousness.

  It was Jenna. "I'm downstairs. C u soon."

  Althea stood, grabbed her purse and walked out of the door quietly in her bare feet, ridiculously high heels in hand. She scuttled through the now empty hotel lobby, which was resting until the dawn of a new day, with no hint of the boisterous conversations and antics of only hours before.

  As she stepped through the revolving door, her heart leapt at the sight of Jenna. She heaved a sigh of relief and climbed into the passenger side of Jenna's practical Ford Focus.

  She looked over and smiled. "Hi girl," Althea said.

  "I'm glad to see that phase one of 'Operation Get Tea a Life' appears to have been a success."

  "It was. Whew, was it ever."

  "And you feel okay? Not entering some kind of Tea shame spiral?"

  "I did for a minute there, but I forced myself to stop. I'm letting myself be happy about it."

  "Good for you!"

  "Now get me home and put me to bed."

  "Bossy, bossy! But I am getting details tomorrow."

  "Of course!"

  Althea leaned her head back and looked out the window as Jenna raced across the Smithfield Street Bridge, adrenaline and pleasure still warming her heart. The dark night enveloped them, but for the lights flickering on docked boats below and lining the elaborate wrought iron decorations of the trestles above them.

  The city was sleeping. Even the rivers and streets, the constantly moving veins of the city, seemed tranquil.

  "Jenna?" she eventually said.

  "Yeah babe?"

  "Thank you."

  "For picking you up? You think I would drag you out for a night on the town and just leave you to the wolves? Or one wolf in particular?"

  "Of course not. No, I mean, thanks to both you and Aubrey for — for everything." Her voice caught in her throat, a gulp of air and emotion lodging inside and choking her lightly. "Thank you for not giving up on me, for pushing me. For being...aw shit..."

  "We know, honey, we know." Jenna reached across the console and held her hand. "We're sisters and it's an honor. I love you."

  Althea smiled. "I love you, too."

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Light stretched across Griffen's face and he cursed himself for not closing the curtains before he and Althea went to sleep. He reached over to pull her close.

  If I have to be up this early, I might as well get some pleasure out of it, right?

  His hand found nothing but pillows and sheets. He pried open his eyes, only to confirm he really was alone.

  What the hell?

  He sat up and found his room completely empty. No woman, no clothes and — upon further inspection — no phone number.

  Her being gone wasn't really surprising, even though he'd asked her to stay, she owed him nothing. No, what was the shocking part was that for some reason Griffen felt disappointed. He had really wanted to see her again and her running out left him more than a bit pissed. He'd specifically asked her to stay and she had snuck out like a...well, like him.

  Griffen started to work out in his brain how to find her. Pittsburgh was certainly a larger sized city, but in many ways it was still a small town. The remnants of a blue-collar culture and challenging geography of rivers, hills and valleys had created a unique archipelago of self-contained walkable neighborhoods. Each had its own culture, but they were all interconnected, like a family tree. Add into that a rabid sense of hometown pride and the place had maintained a small town vibe. In Pittsburgh there were only two, maybe three, degrees of separation between people and Griffen knew this meant he had a good chance of finding her if he put his mind to it.

  He knew a fair amount about her. He investigated for a living, right? A lawyer, young, with a unique first name. Maybe he could find her in his spare time.

  Oh Christ Griffen, 'find her in your spare time?' and that is not stalking, why?

  Just as frustration really started to take root, he noticed a text from his mother asking him to call her.

  Griffen took a breath. She was an early riser, so he might as well get it over with. "Morning, Mom."

  "Hey baby. Welcome back to town stranger. What are you up to today?"

  "Well, I was planning on going for a run and then working on my first lesson plan."

  And maybe trying to track down a hot local lawyer that ran out on me last night, but you don't need to know that Mom, he added to himself.

  "Okay, well whatever you do, I need you to be free by noon."

  "Why?" He breathed out slowly. "What do you have up your sleeve, Mom?"

  "I want you to come with me to Jack's son's birthday party."

  "Jack Taylor's son?" he asked as a pain shot through his chest.

  "Yes, little Johnny Taylor."

  Griffen had heard that Jack's wife found out she was pregnant after he died. The idea of meeting a little Jack was amazing, but Griffen didn't feel like he had the guts to follow through with it. Just thinking about Jack felt like a knife in his gut.

  "Mom, I don't know if I can do that. How about I go by and meet him on my own sometime before I leave?"

  "Oh no you don't, Nicholas Griffen Tate. You will not blow me off on this. Jack was your best friend since you were little. You meant the world to each other and his
mother still asks about you, even though you checked out of his life after high school."

  "I didn't check out on Jack, I wanted to move on — from everyone."

  "Well, it's been years since he died and you didn't even go to his funeral." Griffen cringed and wondered to himself how such a great night could have morphed into a morning this terrible.

  "Christ, all right, I feel like shit now, are you happy?"

  "A little. But I will lay off if you go to this birthday party today with me. You need to meet his son."

  "Fine, I'll go."

  "Great, I'll come pick you up at noon and we can head over together."

  "I have a car here with me."

  "Oh, no you don't. You'll sneak out first chance you get. I'm trapping you there. I'll pick you up."

  "All right. Just call me when you're downstairs."

  After taking a shower Griffen wrapped a towel around his waist and walked over to his laptop. Pulling up his email, he opened the folder labeled "Jack."

  Griffen's mom hadn't been totally accurate in her scathing description of Griffen's desertion of Jack. They'd kept in touch over the years through phone calls and emails, but nothing like how inseparable they'd been growing up. They'd gone to different colleges and Griffen had been on his location assignment in Afghanistan when Jack married his wife.

  He sat on the bed, rubbing his face. He had tried to avoid remembering Jack. Done everything he could not to think of him, but being here in Pittsburgh, waking up in this hotel, all he could do was think about him.

  His mind suddenly wandered.

  Jack had understood that Griffen needed to get as far away from the painful first part of his life. Other events always came up to keep Griffen away and neither pushed to get around them. From the outside, the world saw that he and Griffen ruled the school; stars on the football team. No one knew how bad things had been with Griffen's dad, not even his mom. Only Jack knew, which is why he never pushed Griffen to come back to Pittsburgh and face down his demons.

  His eyes went to the last email from him. If it had been a letter, it would be frayed and torn at the edges from the thousands of times Griffen had taken it out and read it. It was a simple message from Jack to him:

  Nick - Are you back from Mexico yet? I could really use your help with something. Call me. Jack.

  Even though they were still friends, Jack's cryptic email had seemingly come out of nowhere. Jack and Griffen had both been consumed with work for months. Griffen had just returned from Mexico for follow up research on his second book centered on the violent La familia Mexican drug cartel and knew that Jack had been wrapped up in some high priority robotic projects. It had been a huge opportunity for Jack and the book was a breakthrough for Griffen, so they hadn't spoken or emailed in months.

  Griffen had gone to sleep that night intending to call Jack in the morning, but he'd gotten so wrapped up in his publisher's requests and final edits that a week had passed before he circled back to calling Jack.

  A call from his mother beat him to it.

  Jack was dead.

  Killed in a horrific car accident the night before.

  Griffen felt his mind go back to that terrible morning.

  His phone had slowly slid out of his hand. He had sensed himself walk across the room to his laptop. He'd seen words quivering in relief on the screen and thought fleetingly that they looked liked the ones from Jack's email.

  He'd known on some level it was his legs that were moving but he couldn't have controlled them if he wanted to. Instead, he merely watched hands grab his computer fiercely and heard a voice growl and scream like an animal. He watched as those angry hands threw his laptop across the room. It broke into several pieces and scattered across the room.

  Griffen had suddenly fallen back into his own body just in time to feel his heart break into a million tiny pieces that exploded painfully out of each of his pores. In their place he was filled with rough, fragmented shards of self-loathing and regret.

  He eventually bought another laptop but the broken and jagged remnants of his heart never made it back inside his chest.

  And Griffen hadn't written a new word since.

  Griffen swallowed hard and brought himself coldly back to the present. He dreaded facing Jack's family and finally confronting his own failures head on. It was bad enough being back in this town but now he had no choice but to see the aftermath of his neglect of Jack.

  At first Griffen refused to come home because it reminded him of his brute of a father, but after Jack died, this city became even more horrific to him — turning into a living, breathing reminder of what a selfish failure he was. Seeing Jack's family would only drive that home more.

  He’d never been any good with feelings. He preferred the cold comforts of denial and instant gratification.

  Sex. Great sex always helped distract him from the pain, if only for a fleeting moment. But he didn't want that empty relief with just anyone. No, he needed to lose himself in a certain honey-haired lawyer, even if she was a bit of an ongoing flight risk.

  Griffen wouldn't be deterred. He would just need to get through little Johnny's party and then get back on the task of trying to find this woman again.

  And he would find her — in a completely non-stalker way, of course.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Althea opened her eyes slowly and felt a pleasurable soreness she hadn't experienced in years.

  Oh yes, nothing like the feeling of knowing you had a fun nighttime workout, she thought with a lazy grin. She yawned and stretched her arms above her head and enjoyed the calm before the storm. Her mother would be arriving soon and Carol would be downstairs preparing for the party like a cyclone.

  After she'd showered and dressed she knew she couldn't delay the inevitable anymore. She would have to face Carol. Althea felt more than a little awkward when she walked downstairs and found her scurrying around the house, doing the final preparations for Johnny's party. Oh please don't let me have missed any beard burn or hickeys. It would kill me if Carol knew I had done something with another man. Ugh.

  "Carol, it's so good to see you. Thanks again for all your help."

  "Of course, dear. And don't you look lovely this morning! You must be so excited about Johnny finally making it to five, because you are glowing!"

  "Oh, uh, yeah, I slept really well. I am relieved to have all this planning done. Yup." Oh yeah, good cover Althea. Jeez.

  "Tea, honey, where are your rings?"

  Althea looked down at her bare left hand. She'd stopped wearing her wedding rings a year ago in an effort to come to terms more with Jack's death, but she still wore them around Carol to avoid just this moment.

  "Oh, well, I don't wear them as much anymore. It hurts to see them all the time."

  Carol glowered at her and Althea felt horrible. "Humph, well I guess it's up to you if you just want to disregard the symbols of your husband's love, but personally, I don't think it's right."

  "Carol, please..."

  Carol turned from her and started to fill the goody bags for their young guests. "No, you just do what you want." Her words were cutting and Althea could feel tears come to her eyes.

  "I'm sorry."

  Carol turned and hugged her. "You can go put them on later, no worries. By the way, sweetie, I invited a couple more people."

  "Oh? How many?" Althea breathed in and out slowly to fight off her emotions and started to do a mental catalog of all the food and hoped it would be enough.

  "Just two."

  "Phew, what a relief. That I can do."

  "Good, because I'm so excited for Johnny to meet Nick."

  "Who's Nick?"

  "He was one of Jack's oldest friends growing up. He left town ages ago, but I was always friends with his mom. I hope you don't mind."

  "Of course not. You know, I remember Jack mentioning him. Football, right? I never met him, he couldn't make it to the wedding."

  "Oh, that's
right. He went to Pitt for a couple years and then left to travel the world. Honestly, I'm not sure if Jack and he ever saw each other after high school, but they were so close growing up. Jack probably showed you pictures."

  "Yes, I think so. When we were planning the wedding. God, that was so long ago," Althea's hand trembled around the cheese wrapper she'd been opening up. She felt her heart rate pick up as images of their perfect wedding day invaded her brain and she took a step away from the table.

  "Oh honey," Carol reached over and hugged her tight until she started breathing again. "Are you okay, Tea?"

  "I'm fine, thanks," she said, pasting a weak smile on her face. "It's just hard, hearing about Jack's childhood friend, thinking about the wedding, all on this day..." She looked away again.

  "I can tell Valerie and Nick not to come if it's too upsetting. I just thought Nick should meet little Johnny."

  "God no, don't un-invite them because of me. I need to be able to do this."

  "Oh good. He really is a total sweetheart. He was a lady killer in high school, just like Jack. Now he's some sort of world-famous investigative journalist writer type but he'll always be little Nicky to me."

  Althea tried to act normally, returning to slicing cubes of cheese for the meat and cheese tray. "So just him and his mom, not his dad?"

  "Oh no, he died ages ago. Good riddance. He was a horrible abusive drunk, just a general piece of crap. Best thing he ever did for them was dying."

  "Gosh, how terrible! Are you still close with his mom?"

  "Not as much as when he and Jack were in school. I still see her around some, she lives on the other side of Mt. Washington, but you know how it is. We chat on Facebook and the phone, though."

  "Have I met her?"

  "Um, well, she went to the funeral, but I don't think you met her."

  No, Althea wouldn't remember anyone she met at Jack's funeral. It had been packed with people because Jack had been extremely popular his whole life and so young when he died.

  "I talk about you to her all the time, so she probably feels like she knows you," Carol continued.