by Mia Kayla
I glanced at my mother. I had so much to say, but suddenly, I had too much pride to say it. When she approached the bed, brushed my hair back, and cupped my face, I began to cry. Goodness, I’d cried more in the last few days than I had in my whole lifetime.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, finally getting out the words I’d hoped I’d be able to get out when I had the barrel of Susie’s gun pointed at me and my own mortality staring me in the face.
Her normally composed demeanor crumbled. Her lip quivered. “No, honey, I’m sorry. I thought we were going to lose you.”
She swiped at the tears in her eyes, and I didn’t know what to do because I didn’t remember the last time I had seen my mother cry.
She swallowed and then tore back the foil from the soup. Steam rose from the bowl. “When you were a little girl, you worshipped me.” She stared at the soup as though she was afraid to look at me. “You wanted to do everything I did. You’d go in and wear my makeup and slip your tiny feet in my high heels.” She stirred the soup with a spoon, trying to cool it down. “And I adored you. I wanted to give you everything you wanted because you were my firstborn, my little girl.” She brought the cream of broccoli soup to her lips, temperature-tasting it. “I was pregnant with you before I got married,” she admitted, watching me for my reaction.
What? My eyebrows flew to my hairline. It couldn’t be. They’d gotten married in July, and I was born … I tried to do the math in my head.
She laughed when she saw my reaction. “Shotgun wedding. I mean, I loved your father, and there was no doubt that it would have been us eventually.” She blew out a breath. “But I wasn’t prepared to be a mother. I … I had to drop out of college to raise you.”
Realization seeped into my skin, and relief flooded through me. There was a reason. A reason to explain all of this, why I believed she’d hated me so much.
“For the longest time, I was bitter and angry.” She averted her stare, looking into the mix of broccoli and cheddar soup. “I loved you as a baby, as a toddler, as a child.”
She blew on the spoon and angled it toward me. I took the soup in my mouth, and the motion brought me back to when she used to spoon-feed me and Angie at the same time.
“But you became very independent. And then in high school, you started making the wrong choices, and I didn’t want you to make the same mistakes that I had too early.” She shook her head. “Not like you’re a mistake. You and Angie are the best things that have ever happened to me, my greatest achievements, my proudest joy.” She placed the bowl back on the tray and rubbed at her brow. “I grew to be jealous, though, especially when you took over Armstrong with your father. At one time, I’d thought that would be me, working side by side with him.” Her face crumbled again, and a tiny sob escaped her, all her remorse pushing through.
This time, I reached around and wrapped my arms around her. My ribs hurt, but I pushed through the pain. Her sobs vibrated through me, and small tears of my own tore down my cheeks. I couldn’t remember a time when I’d been this close to my mother before. I needed this. Life was too short to hold grudges against the ones you loved. Life was too short to not hold the people who meant the most.
“I don’t know what happened for us to get to this point, Tene. Sometimes, I wish I could go back to the days where you loved me unconditionally, where you depended on me, where there wasn’t always this tug-of-war between us.”
“I know, Mom,” I said with full-on, sullen regret.
I ran my fingers through her dark locks, so similar to my own. There were years of hurt between us and anger and words not meant. Now, all that pent-up madness was replaced with regret, shame, and remorse.
“We’ll get back to where we were.” My chest bloomed with hope that, in the end, we could repair all the hurt that had happened between us.
Chapter 33
After hours in the ER, the doctors finally gave me a rundown of my injuries. Broken ribs and bruises all up and down the left side of my body, but no major organs had been damaged.
It could’ve been worse.
That was what the police had said after they interviewed me—worse. And it could have been, so I was thankful that I was breathing and alive.
I stared at the ceiling as my mother, father, and Angie babied me, fed me, held my hand. I couldn’t bear to tell them I felt crowded because my being alive gave them such comfort. Every ten minutes, I would ask for a status update on Jordan. Cade had come earlier, alleviating some of my worries and informing us that Jordan was recovering.
But the worry would not stop. I wanted to see him for myself.
“Sleep,” they said. “Rest.”
What a load of bullshit.
How could I rest when I couldn’t confirm for myself if the love of my life was truly okay and safe?
My hand flew to my heart. Love of my life. He was, though, wasn’t he?
Though our whole romance had been short, it was most definitely not fleeting. I cared about him … deeply. And I was in love.
When Susie had her gun pointed directly at him, I had known, if he died right then and there, I wouldn’t be able to survive. At that moment, my safety had been second to his. When you loved someone deeply, truly … you put them above yourself, but more than that, I couldn’t picture my life without him.
Yes, I was in love. It was in the undying need to see him and hold him in my arms. It was this immense heaviness in my chest that wouldn’t go away. And I knew it wouldn’t until I told him how I felt.
My heart thumped frantically in my chest, and I jolted to a sitting position, awakening to darkness with a cold sweat running down my back. The scene at Wells had played back in my head, a nightmare personified, where Susie was slowly and surely torturing Jordan, cutting him, until his last dying breath.
My father was on Tene duty, sleeping on the couch. His loud snores came in and out in a steady rhythm.
I swiped at my eyes, only then realizing that I had been crying in my sleep.
It was just a nightmare. I repeated. It was just a nightmare.
It’d been two nights since I’d been admitted, and tomorrow morning, they would discharge me. Every night, the nightmares intensified.
I’d had enough. All this waiting was making it worse. Now, I was afraid to close my eyes, worrying that behind them, I’d see Susie’s animated face as she tortured my boyfriend.
“Dad …” I whisper-yelled.
When he stirred, I loudened my calls.
He rubbed his eyes before peering over and pushing himself up to a sitting position. “Tene … are you okay?”
He blinked away the slumber, and I wanted to cry all over again because I was far from okay.
“Daddy?” I called out.
With that one word, he was up on his feet, stumbling as he walked and ended up beside my hospital bed. “Are you hurting?”
He reached for the call button, ready to summon the nurse, but I placed my hand over his.
“How much do you love me?” I asked, playing for cute. I hadn’t known I had it in me, but this time, I was beyond desperate.
He leaned in, and with the lightest of touches, he kissed the top of my head. “What do you need, my little girl?”
And with those few words, I knew my plan would come to fruition.
I had convinced my father to get me a wheelchair and push me into Jordan’s hospital room.
Yes, he loved me. With Angie and my mother, everything was by the doctor’s orders. With my father, everything was by my orders. Gosh, did I love this man.
No one was at the nurses’ station when my father wheeled me into Jordan’s room and right by his bed.
I watched the rise and fall of his chest and listened to the soft breaths escaping him. I reached out to touch his forearm, just to know that this was real, that this wasn’t part of a wicked nightmare where the next scene would take us back to the Wells property.
My father leaned in and brushed a tender kiss at the top of my forehead. “See? He’s fine
. Just sleeping.”
I nodded, and he squeezed my shoulder before slipping out of the room.
A gush of air escaped my lungs, as though I’d been holding my breath the whole time we’d been apart.
The pull to be closer was too strong to ignore, so I reached for his hand, intertwining our fingers, and then brought his hand to my lips. His hand was warm and heavy within mine.
He stirred, his eyes fluttering open.
And then he gave me his signature beautiful actor smile, dimple in his chin and all. “Hey …”
Full-on tears fell down my cheeks—big, fat, and ugly—but I didn’t care. “Hey.” I lifted my chin, blinking them back, but they kept on coming, so I swiped at the waterfall trailing down my cheeks.
“Easy there. What’s the sad face for?” The sound of his voice had me smiling because that meant he was well and safe, but most of all, he was alive.
“I’m fine.” I wiped my cheeks. “It’s just …” I sniffled. “Cade has been filling me in. On your surgery. On your recovery.” I swallowed down a sob. “I’ve been having these nightmares … and not being able to see you for myself has been making it worse.” I lifted my shirt and rubbed at the corner of my eye, wiping the tears away.
His thumb brushed lightly on the top of my fist. “You’re okay. I’m okay. You know what would be better than okay?” He gently tugged on our intertwined hands. “If I could hold you.”
“But what if I hurt you? Where did you get shot?”
“My shoulder. And right now, all that matters is that you’re on this bed with me.”
As I peered up at Jordan, I realized I knew that, over the past few days, I’d mastered the art of worrying.
We both winced when I slipped right next to him, which also caused us to laugh. It took a bit to get adjusted, where I wasn’t lying on him, and he wasn’t hurting my ribs.
“Do you think they know I’m here? The doctors?” I asked. I’d almost bet, in about two seconds, an army of hospital workers would be in here to take me back to my room.
“Of course not.” He slid his arm over my lap, lightly running over my broken ribs. “Anyway, I charmed the nurse into getting me a Coke earlier. I’ll just use my charm if we get in trouble,” he said, mischief heavy on his features.
Maybe his actor beauty could charm the nurses into getting us better food.
I laid my head on his shoulder and inhaled deeply. I blew out a breath, sighing, letting out my relief. He was in a hospital gown, and his bandages pushed through the thin fabric. It seemed so surreal—what had happened, how he had gotten shot, how close he’d come to death.
“It didn’t hurt. Don’t cry. They got it out.” He angled closer and leaned into me, his hand on my cheek, peering in my eyes.
“I’m not crying.” I was so crying. The stress of the day and the relief that we were going to be all right rushed through me like a high-speed train. Goodness, I hoped that I was not turning into a crier.
He reached up and swiped at my tears. When he adjusted on the bed, he groaned.
I laughed. “We’re a mess, aren’t we?”
“Yes, we are.” He chuckled.
Then, his eyes turned thoughtful. With one hand, he gripped the handrail on my side, so he was facing me.
“That day …” he began.
“I want to forget about that day.”
“No. No.” He shook his head, his eyes determined. “We need to talk about it. I did go home to see Candice …” His voice trailed off, and I stopped breathing altogether, blinking up at him.
I pressed a finger to his lips. “It doesn’t matter.” Because it didn’t. This whole daring adventure had made me realize that dwelling on the past or worrying about a future that might never come wasn’t worth it. What was important was the here, the now, that he was safe, that we were both alive.
He lifted my hand from his lips and kissed me sweetly, softly. “It does matter. I went to her grave … to tell her about you.” A small smile touched his lips. “To tell her how beautiful, how kind, and how incredibly smart you are. And I know in my heart that she’d be happy for me. Happy that I was happy.”
Heat radiated in my chest, moving through every part of me, causing unshed tears to line my eyes again.
He had gone there to tell her about me. About us …
I swiped at my cheeks again. I thought I’d shed enough tears for ten years.
“I’ve never felt peace, ya know?” His stare was unfocused, his smile dimming. “Every time I felt happy, it didn’t feel right. Because how could I be happy when she was dead?”
My head rested on his chest as he threaded his fingers through my hair. I wanted to hold him, comfort him.
“But after that moment … this overwhelming peace took over. The sun was shining so bright, and when I lifted my head, a dove flew above me.” One arm wrapped tightly against my shoulders, bringing me flush against him. “I’d needed to see her. Tell her about us because I knew she would have been happy for us. Candice was like that … the sun, a shining light.”
We held each other in silence, listening to each other’s breathing and reveling in the warmth of each other’s touch.
He moved his fingers through my hair, slow, drugging tugs that had me sighing softly.
“If we have to pee, that’s going to be a problem,” he joked.
“Yeah, it will be.” The laugh that rumbled through my chest made my ribs hurt.
We both exhaled at the same time, and I knew he felt as I did, finally able to relax now that we were in each other’s arms, and everything was out in the open.
“Christene,” he whispered, “I’m tired.”
My eyes closed, and I felt his heartbeat against my cheek and his soft breaths against my hair. “Me too,” I replied.
“Christene?”
“Hmm?”
“I love you.”
His words filled me with an ecstasy that I’d never known before, and I nodded into his chest again. A lightness spread throughout my arms and legs and head.
“I love you too,” I said, lifting my head to take him in.
His smile was breathtakingly beautiful, just like that very first day I’d met him.
“You sure about that?”
“The surest I’ve ever been.” I touched his face, my fingers brushing gently against his cheek.
On the brink of losing everything, I’d realized I needed to live in the present, appreciate all I had, and fully love those who mattered. If the last few days had proven anything, it was that I’d never loved anyone more than the blue-eyed man staring back at me.
“We’re going to be okay?” His question was quiet, vulnerable, as he searched my face for confirmation.
“If you mean me and you and forever …” I lifted my chin. “… I think we’ll be okay.”
He smiled and then followed up my words with a kiss, and we both drifted off into the first good night’s rest we’d had in forever.
Epilogue
Six Months Later
The sun shone brightly on my beach chair as I watched Jordan from afar, hitting the waves. I hadn’t taken a vacation in what seemed like forever. And here I was, on vacation in the most beautiful place on Earth—Hawaii.
My fingers flew to the spaghetti straps of my teeny-tiny bikini.
While I was baking under the summer sun, Jordan was working. Working on a movie. A love story, to be exact.
I had joined him on the last leg of filming, so we could spend some time together.
My life since I’d met him was a whirlwind. Practically everywhere I went, there were photographers. When the paps were out, Jordan would lift up our joined hands—showing them my five-karat internally flawless diamond—smile big like the cheeseball he really was, and pull me into him, kissing me senseless.
Jordan had proposed to me at my apartment the day after we were discharged. He’d gotten down on one knee and said because tomorrow wasn’t promised, he didn’t want to waste a day without me in his life. It was crazy and
spontaneous and just how our lives were meant to be. He’d made his permanent residence at Rosendell, though he traveled frequently to shoot.
When filming had died down, and the thrill of having Hollywood in town was over, people in Rosendell grew protective of us, shooing paps away and even sending them on wild goose chases around town.
Everywhere else I went, people knew me as Jordan’s fiancée. I was stalked, and when we were together, we needed more than Larry and Dex to get us through a crowd. We had an entourage of bodyguards.
It had taken me a while to get used to, but eventually, it’d sunk in, and I didn’t care. All I cared was, he was mine, and I was his.
They were in between takes, and when I peered over at their filming destination, Jordan waved and jumped up and down like the silly man he was. I was far enough from the taping site where I could sneeze and talk and do practically whatever I wanted with no issues, and we were on a secluded island that no one else had access to. Overhead helicopters could be heard, but at least no one was on the ground, bothering us.
I brought my palms to my lips, one after the other, blowing him kisses nonstop. And he caught them midair and then stuck them in his pocket, or he pretended to catch my kisses in his mouth.
The actress, Lena Reynolds, laughed behind him.
Lena was beautiful and sexy and held all those qualities that I used to be jealous of, but not anymore.
That part of me had died. The jealous part of me that had caused me to have doubts and have an inferiority complex was gone, replaced by a love for my fiancé. Being with Jordan had brought me to the realization that no matter what, you couldn’t control how others treated you or force others to love you. They simply did, or they didn’t. What I could control was how I reacted to situations.
And not once did I doubt Jordan or how he felt about me because, each and every day, he made me feel loved. It was in the sweetness of his cards, the tenderness of his kisses, and the crassness of his texts.
As time passed slowly, and even though we were miles apart at times, we made an effort to make it work.
