Fire and Love

by Erin Wright

  She’d never felt as good as she did in that very moment. She’d found her backbone. She was no longer a mooch.

  Life didn’t get much better than that.

  Chapter 40

  Levi

  The clinking of the silverware and murmur of low voices were the only sounds in the posh restaurant. Candlelight flickered in the dim lighting, little sparks of light glinting out when the flames caught the silverware just right.

  Levi felt like he was being buried alive. What am I doing in this place? I don’t belong here. He’d picked the nicest restaurant in Franklin in hopes of impressing Tennessee. See? I’m not such a hick after all. I know the difference between a salad fork and a dinner fork and a dessert fork.

  He didn’t, of course, but he was awfully good at following Tenny’s lead and picking up the right silverware at the right time.

  He reached up to tug at the borrowed tie and then stopped himself. It wasn’t actually choking off his airway; it only seemed like it was.

  Tennessee caught the movement and the corners of her mouth quirked up a little. “I know you don’t believe me, but you look handsome in that tie,” she told him seriously.

  And that was the reason he’d been willing to wear it. He’d do anything for Tennessee, including wear a ridiculous tie and eat at a ridiculous restaurant and spend a ridiculous amount of money on overpriced food.

  She flashed him a smile and he grinned back.

  Yeah, fine, he’d wear the tie if she wanted him to.

  “So are things still going okay at work?” Tennessee asked after taking an appropriately tiny bite of food.

  Levi cut the bite of food he was about to eat in half. No wonder it took rich people so long to eat their dinner. They were only putting three calories into their mouths with every bite.

  “Real good,” Levi said with a surprised note in his voice. “I hadn’t worked anywhere but the dealership for years, so I’m kinda liking the change anyway. I’m not just welding up tractors anymore. Makes me use my noggin’ in a way that I hadn’t had to in years.”

  The topic drifted on and they talked about what it was like to have a sister (weird) to having two brothers (although his relationship with Rhys was more in the theoretical stage at this point – Moose’s younger brother was still in Japan in the Navy and wouldn’t be able to come stateside for at least another year) to getting used to the name Levi Garrett.

  “Has Steve contacted you at all?” Tenny asked quietly, the candlelight catching the blonde in her hair and making her look like an angel, with a halo glowing around her head.

  Maybe Levi was in over his head and he shouldn’t be looking at Tennessee the way he was, but still…

  He couldn’t help himself. God help him, he was in love with Tennessee Rowland and it was a permanent affliction.

  He shook his head. “No. He won’t. I know it seems harsh – because it is harsh – but I was never more than a delivery device for beer and money for beer. He’s not capable of love. I’m not proud of my mother’s choice to have an affair with a married man but looking at Steve…it’s not hard to see why she was starved for affection.”

  Tenny nodded her head thoughtfully. “He must’ve put up a front at some point, enough for her to be willing to marry him, but it seems like that disappeared pretty quickly.”

  Disappeared pretty quickly. That’s what would happen to his and Tenny’s relationship if he didn’t man up and take the next step.

  “I took you here tonight ‘cause I wanted to ask you to move in with me,” he blurted out, with all of the finesse of a bull in a china shop.

  “Oh,” Tenny said, her full lips making a perfect circle. Before he could work himself into a full-blown panic at the lack of enthusiasm on her face, she broke out into a huge grin. “Yes!” she whisper-shouted. She looked around the upscale restaurant as if waiting for a waiter to come along and hush her, and then leaned back towards Levi. “Yes, please,” she said a little quieter, but with just as much feeling.

  He reached out and squeezed her hand across the table, wanting to pick her up and twirl her around and around in circles to celebrate but restraining himself.

  Barely.

  “I’m full,” Tennessee said out of nowhere. Levi cocked an eyebrow at her – her plate was only half empty – but she continued, “Want to go back to our place to celebrate?”

  Suddenly, Levi found he too was stuffed to the brim and ready to head home.

  Funny how that worked.

  They burst through the front door, hands flying as Levi tried to pull down on the hidden zipper tucked into the side of Tennessee’s dress while she simultaneously tried to loosen his tie.

  “Bweck!” he gasped when the tie accidentally went the other direction and truly did start cutting off his air supply. His hands dropped from Tennessee’s side and he began scrabbling at his neck, tugging at it until it loosened and he could breathe again.

  “So sorry!” she cried, looking up at him, horrified. “I didn’t mean to—”

  “I know,” he said with a laugh. “Erotic asphyxiation doesn’t seem like your cup of tea.”

  “Erotic asphy…are you being serious?” She was staring up at him in bewilderment. “That’s a thing?”

  “Don’t ask,” he said, laughing. “Now, back to what we were doing…”

  But she wiggled out of his arms and headed down the hallway to the bedroom, leaving him to hurry along behind her. “I’ll just draw these blinds real quick,” she said casually as she began pulling on the strings to drop them down into place.

  “Don’t!” Levi said, pulling her back from the window. “I want to see your body this time. It’s so damn gorgeous.” He began nibbling on her neck and she laughed with delight, but he could also feel the tension in her.

  “It’ll only take a second,” she promised him, pulling away and towards the window. “Let me just—”

  “Why do you never want me to see your body?” Levi asked bluntly. She tensed and he tensed and she turned and stared at him and he stared back, levelly. Not blinking an eyelash. “Every time we’ve made love. Every. Single. Time. You never want the blinds open or the lights on.”

  “Well,” she said, clearly stalling for time, “I just…what if the neighbor looks in or something?”

  “You can’t see in this window from the outside. Between the fence and how high that window is, unless my neighbor is renting a hot air balloon, we’re fine.”

  She shrugged nonchalantly, but her hands…they were fluttering around, picking at the half-undone zipper on her dress, at her necklace, at her bracelet, at the ring on her finger.

  “Don’t ever become a poker player,” Levi drawled. “You’ve got a tell that someone could see from space.”

  Her mouth dropped open in surprise. “But people always say that they can’t read me; that I’m a closed book.”

  “Oh, it took me a while, but then once you see it, you can’t unsee it. Your hands – when you’re nervous, you fidget. I used to think that it meant you’re lying, but it’s just nerves. Today, though? Right now? It’s lying. Tenny, I asked you to move in with me tonight. I’m serious as a heart attack about you. I’ve never loved another woman as much as I love you, and if we break up tonight, I never will again. You are it for me. There’s no one else. But I can’t stand liars. I’ve been lied to all my life about who I am, and I’m done. Done with lies, done with secrets. You either tell me why you’re obsessed with my bedroom blinds, or you walk out that front door and you never come back. Them’s your choices.”

  She stared at him defiantly for a moment, her fingers twisting a ring around and around, the yellow diamond flashing in the muted light when she turned it to just the right spot, but he didn’t flinch. He didn’t move. He didn’t breathe. He just stared at her, and he waited.

  Waited for her to finally tell him the truth.

  .

  .

  She blinked.

  He almost let out a war whoop at the tiny movement, but didn’t. He wa
sn’t about to move a muscle until she actually told him what the hell was going on in that crazy mind of hers.

  Her hands went to her side and she tugged the zipper the rest of the way down, undid the clasp at the base of her neck, and then let the evening gown fall into a circle at her feet. For a moment, Levi forgot what they’d been talking about and just drank in the sight of her. Strappy high heels that most women would be clumsy in, but Tennessee wore as effortlessly as tennis shoes, led up to slim calves the color of golden honey, to the flare of her narrow hips where the lacy straps of royal purple underwear rested, up her flat abs, then the perfect breasts, held up by pieces of lace no bigger than a fly’s ass, and up to her face. Her beautiful, supermodel face.

  “I don’t get it,” he finally said, when he could speak again. “What am I supposed to be seeing, other than the most gorgeous woman to ever walk this earth?”

  She turned her wrist upwards and held out her arm, letting the silver bangle slide freely on her arm.

  “You’re wearing a bracelet?” he asked, completely bewildered, and then he saw it. Well, them, to be more exact. Line after perfect line, on the soft underbelly of her upper arm, almost in her armpit but not quite. White, straight, even lines. “What kind of surgery would cause—” He broke off.

  The world tilted and then spun around.

  “You did that,” he whispered in a strangled voice. “You tried to kill yourself.”

  She shook her head adamantly. “No, never. I was trying to feel alive. I wanted to—”

  “How could you?” he whispered, the shock of it like a punch to the gut. “How could you? You had everything – beauty and talent and money…was it the money? Did you do this when you found out your parents were poor after all?”

  His mind spun at the idea. Did she really hate being poor so much that she’d rather die than live in poverty? Maybe she was the spoiled, self-centered brat he’d always thought she was. Maybe the “new” Tennessee was a façade and the old Tennessee was the real one. Maybe—

  “No!” she practically shouted. “I stopped a long time ago. Well, a while ago,” she amended, waving her hands in the air, trying to wipe the past away. “I didn’t do it because of my parent’s spending habits. What kind of person do you think I am?”

  “I don’t know what kind of person I think you are,” he said slowly, shaking his head, trying to understand the world he’d just been dumped into. My girlfriend is suicidal. How can I love someone if they’re just waiting for the right moment to end it all? “It turns out, I don’t know you at all. I guess…I guess I never really knew you.”

  Her face went white at that, and then she shut down. Like watching a store shutter up at closing time, her face went blank, smoothing into impenetrable features. Calm, unflappable, unmarred by worry or frustration or anger, the old Tennessee was back.

  It was creepy, that. He’d forgotten what Tennessee looked like when she was blocking out the world. It’d been so long since she’d turned her public face on him. She had been letting him in. She had let him see the true Tennessee Marie Rowland.

  Except, she hadn’t. She’d still been lying, even when he finally thought she was being truthful.

  Just someone else in his life hiding the truth from him.

  She was tugging her dress back into place, the graceful, sheer sleeves covering the scars.

  Sleeves.

  He had never seen her without sleeves. No matter the temperature outside, she wore short sleeve t-shirts, never tank tops. Her evening gowns all had some sort of sleeve on them, and with the cuts tucked away on the bottom side of her arm…no wonder she’d been able to hide them.

  “How did you do the bikini?” he blurted out.

  She stared at him, her fingers paused over her phone. The phone he’d given her so he could hear her voice whenever he wanted.

  Just so she could lie to me.

  “The swimsuit portion of the pageants,” he clarified. “How did you hide the scars then?”

  “Makeup, and standing right. Not hard to do, if you’re careful.” Her voice was even and calm, as if they were discussing how hot it was supposed to get outside that day. She tapped the screen and then brought the phone up to her cheek. “Hey, Georgia,” she said, no emotion in her voice. She was a life-sized doll. “Could you come pick me up at Levi’s house?” Quick pause. “See you then.”

  She slipped her phone into her purse and then paused. She pulled it back out and placed it on the dresser.

  “Have a good life, Levi,” she said quietly, looking him in the eye as she spoke. “I hope you get what you want out of it.”

  She walked out of his bedroom and down the short hallway and into the living room, her heels clicking on the floor quietly, and then the front door closed behind her and Levi couldn’t breathe or think but only feel.

  Feel like shit.

  Chapter 41

  Tennessee

  “I’m not hungry,” Tennessee said dully. Which was the truth. She wasn’t. She wasn’t trying to kill herself through starvation or cutting herself or anything else. She didn’t want to die.

  She just wasn’t sure she still wanted to live.

  And that was a totally different thing.

  “Thank you for the offer, though, Uncle Carl. And for letting me use your garage. It’s really sweet.” She leaned up on her tiptoes and pressed a kiss to her uncle’s cheek.

  He blushed and muttered something before heading back inside the house, leaving her and Georgia to stare at the pile of metal on the workbench.

  After the Great Breakup of 2018, Uncle Carl and Aunt Shirley had offered to let her use half of the garage to work in. She’d taken them up on their offer because she had to keep working on welding and building up her business.

  Or at least, she had to try. Or at least, she had to pretend to try.

  “Are you wanting to work for a while,” Georgia asked delicately, “or do you want to call it a day?” She hurried on, obviously not wanting to pressure Tennessee too much, “I mean, I’m good with either one. I just need to know and I can make it happen. Totally flexi—”

  “I’m okay, Georgia. Truly, I am,” Tennessee broke in before her normally unflappable cousin could babble on another ten minutes about absolutely nothing at all. “Just a little tired, is all.” She sent her hovering cousin a convincing smile.

  Georgia didn’t look convinced.

  Dammit.

  “The funny thing is,” Georgia said slowly, “you’re exactly the same as you’ve always been: Polite, friendly on a surface level, beautiful, poised. You are the Tennessee I grew up with, and I had no idea you could be anything else. Not until you and Levi started dating. Then you became this new person who laughed freely and made jokes and didn’t wear this front every moment of every day, and…I discovered that I had this kickass cousin all this time that I never knew existed. I’d always known that I had a beautiful and talented cousin, but I never knew that I had a funny and free and gregarious cousin. And now that I know she’s in there somewhere, I can’t help but miss her.”

  Tennessee’s chest hurt, a stabbing pain that radiated through her. It was so strong, so overwhelming, she wondered for a moment if it truly was possible to die of a broken heart.

  “I was open and free with Levi,” she whispered. “Then in the end, I told him the truth because he forced me to, and…you know that saying that the truth will set you free? I never realized that they meant free from your relationships; free from ever loving someone again. I wanted to love; I didn’t want to be set free from it…”

  She trailed off, staring at the metal pile in front of her, overwhelmed by it all. With Levi by her side, she was invincible. She could stand up to her parents, she could weld metal, she could steal her own clothes and sell them to earn money to start a business, she could…

  She could show him the scars of her life, hidden from the world who would judge her harshly if they knew about them.

  And then he could reject her for revealing that truth to him
.

  “It can’t be that terrible, right?” Georgia said quietly, breaking into her thoughts. “I mean, you’re Tennessee Rowland. You’ve probably never so much as jaywalked in your life. I just don’t understand…what caused him to react like that?”

  Tennessee sent her talented and smart and hard-working and driven cousin a sad smile. “I told him the truth.”

  Chapter 42

  Levi

  Levi stood back, wiping his hands on an oil rag. His truck was now good to go for another 3000 miles. He felt good. Accomplished.

  He saw a flash of movement at the open garage door and looked up to see Georgia standing there, biting her lower lip, looking like she was debating whether to come in or not.

  The good feeling disappeared as quickly as it’d come. She was there to talk about Tennessee. He didn’t want to talk about her. He wanted to stay right where he was, cocooned and safe away from the Rowland girls and the pain that seemed to follow behind them wherever they went. First Georgia broke his heart, then Tennessee. All he’d need to do now was wait for Virginia to graduate from high school and then ask her out. She could make it the holy trifecta.

  She read the look on his face correctly, and instead of backing slowly towards her car like any sane person would, she plunged in. “We need to talk,” she said, her tone brooking no argument. He opened up his mouth to argue anyway, and she held up a sheaf of papers, cutting him off. “Actually, we’re not going to talk. I’m just going to give this to you, you’re going to read them, and then you’re going to pull your head out of your ass.”

  Before he could protest her highhanded ordering of him around, she shoved the papers into his hands. “Read them all. Then go talk to Tenny. You ought to know that she’s exactly the same as she’s always been, which is terrifying the ever-lovin’ hell out of me. She changed so much since you two started dating. And now…she’s back to hiding behind her impenetrable wall. You’ve damaged her in ways that I don’t think anyone else – not her parents, not Moose, not me – had the ability to do, because she let you in. You at least owe her the time it takes to read this.”