Keep On Loving you

by Christie Ridgway

  “I...I’m sorry, Ash.” What else could she say?

  He stared out the windshield, his expression stony. “I feel dirty just knowing it. I feel stupid, too. Betrayed and bitter and fucking tainted by him, John Fucking Robbins.”

  “It’s not your fault. It has nothing to do with you. It doesn’t change you.” All phrases she’d said to herself, over and over and over.

  “Like hell it doesn’t change me. Because you won’t want to look at me again once I tell you...” He glanced away from her again, a muscle in his jaw ticking.

  She swallowed. “Tell me what?”

  His fingers curled into fists, and then he faced her again. “The woman my old man had an affair with—an affair that began, by the way, when I was sixteen years old—was your mother.”

  Tilda recoiled. Not because the news was new, but hearing Ash’s vitriol toward his father and the words your mother in the same tone stabbed deep. Guilt shot from her belly toward her throat, choking her.

  Ash’s eyes widened. “Shit. I shouldn’t have said that. I shouldn’t have said anything to you about it...”

  She bolted from the car. It wasn’t Ash or his apology or even her own misery she was trying to escape.

  It was the glimpse of a shiny future she’d been given that had now been so cruelly snatched away.

  * * *

  THREE NIGHTS LATER, Ash took the stool at the end of the bar at Mr. Frank’s. The man on the other side didn’t even bother asking what he wanted. For the third night in a row he slid him a draft beer, one of the first Ash planned on drinking. Thank God there was a taxi service to take his drunk ass home.

  The bartender had been making those calls on Ash’s behalf. Yeah, so blotto his fingers wouldn’t work on his phone.

  He was doing his best to silence the thoughts that spun in his head like a carousel. A few beers and he hoped he wouldn’t be plagued by the decision that had to be made.

  His mom wanted him to continue with his plan to go to London.

  They hadn’t hashed over the details of his father’s affair. She said she wanted to keep him out of the middle and that she didn’t want to do or say anything that might damage his relationship with his dad.

  Ash didn’t know if they’d ever have a relationship again. His father had been what Ash considered the model of integrity and loyalty and now he didn’t think he could even look at his dad.

  But then again, he couldn’t look at himself.

  Avoiding the mirror hanging over the back of the bar, he downed half the beer in one long swallow. Then a voice called his name and he closed his eyes, wishing he could avoid her, too.

  “Go away, Tilda.”

  “I have some things I need to say.”

  The air around him moved and he knew she’d taken the empty stool beside his. Eyes still closed, he heard her ask the bartender for a Diet Coke.

  “The evening’s not going to get better if you stick with that, sweetheart,” he murmured to her.

  “How’s all that beer working out for you?”

  He opened one eye and rolled it her way.

  She shrugged. “Mountain grapevine.”

  Instead of answering, he downed the rest of his beer, then indicated to the bartender he’d take another. “Tequila chaser.” It was going to be that kind of night, unless Tilda took her pretty ass out of the place.

  When her cola came, she settled more firmly onto her stool.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, keeping his gaze on the bar where his shot of blue agave–based alcohol should show up any second. He owed her that apology. “I can be a hothead, and I just spewed all that out without thinking about your feelings. Maybe if I’d given it a second thought, I would have broken things off more...gently. At least I would have found a better way to tell you the truth.”

  Her deep breath was audible. “Don’t blame yourself for that.” She took in another. “That’s why I’m here, to tell you things you should know.”

  That drew his complete attention. Those beautiful green eyes were big in her face. Her bottom lip looked swollen, as if she’d been worrying it. She looked as if she’d been worrying, period.

  “Tilda,” he said, “I messed up. I was messed up after what my father told me, then I messed up when we talked. None of this is on you.”

  “It’s all on me,” she whispered. “It’s all on me...and more.”

  His shoulders cramped with tension, his muscles prepping his body for blows he could sense in the offing. “What? No, don’t tell me.” Hadn’t he had enough crappy news? “I don’t think we should talk about this.”

  She ignored him. “First, you need to know that you did share good things with me. You gave me pleasure and acceptance and you made me feel beautiful in my dollar shoes and discount clothes.”

  “You are beautiful.”

  “I thought you were out of my league, but you made me believe I could be a member of any one I want. You did that just by listening to me, Ash.”

  His head started pounding and a vise clamped down on the back of his neck. “Tilda—”

  She held up a hand. “Let me have my say, please.” Her fingers reached for her drink, curled around it. “My mother...”

  Ash saw that his tequila shot had been delivered and he didn’t hesitate to knock it back. “Let’s not go there. I don’t blame her—”

  “She poured drinks at the yacht club on Tuesday and Thursday nights. That’s where she met your father. I don’t know if he lied to her about being married, but I can tell you she wouldn’t have cared. He wasn’t her first lover who was someone else’s husband. She wanted attention—I guess to be seen in her own way—and she liked the presents and the cash she was given by men like your dad.”

  Ash frowned. “Wait—”

  “She didn’t have much of anything, including self-esteem, though that doesn’t excuse her having an affair with your father. I...I’m ashamed of her.”

  “Are you...” He blinked. Blinked again. “Are you saying you knew?”

  “And I’m ashamed of me, too. Deeply. I’m so, so sorry.”

  The tequila was moving in his belly like a fire-breathing monster. “You knew. When—” Fuck. Was it so? It had to be so. “You knew that night last May.”

  “You introduced yourself. I never met your father face-to-face... I tried to stay out of sight when he came to the apartment, but the walls were thin, and I heard him talk about his son on occasion. His son, Ash.”

  The walls were thin. Ash thought he might be sick. He pressed the heels of his hands to his temples. “Why the hell did you go back to the hotel with me?”

  “Last spring my mother was getting too clingy with your dad. I heard it in her voice, I heard them argue. He broke things off and she...she stopped caring for herself as she should. She got sick and that sickness turned into an infection that caused her death.”

  Groaning, he let his head drop back.

  “It wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t even your dad’s fault. Not really. But that night... I wanted to punish someone and it turns out I did it to both you and to me.”

  “Yeah,” he said, putting it all together now, the whole series of events coming into painful, nauseating focus. “No wonder you didn’t want to see me again when I came back here. I thought we’d made a connection and you thought...” Christ, he didn’t know. What the hell had she thought?

  “I thought I was finding some way to ease my hurt and loneliness and... I don’t know, Ash. I was grieving and upset.”

  “And I was a fool.”

  “No,” she said quickly. “That night you were fun and game for dancing and I liked you, truly. You didn’t deserve what I did.”

  “Fucked me so hard I passed out?” he asked bitterly.

  “What I did after that.”

  His body
went rigid again, bracing. “What did you do after?”

  “I made there ever being an us impossible. This last week, I’ve been kidding myself that we could somehow get past everything, and that I could give you something as powerful as you’ve given me and we could...could go somewhere with that.”

  If he didn’t feel the darkest of dark clouds hanging over his head, maybe he’d be gratified to know that the past week had been good for her, too. If he could believe her about that. If he could believe anyone about fucking anything.

  His father was an adulterer.

  His girl was a liar.

  “Even while I was trying so hard to believe we could be something, guilt has been eating me up inside because...” She hauled in a breath. “Because I stole from you that first night, Ash.”

  His girl was a thief?

  He turned his head and his whole body went cold. “What do you mean?” Because yeah, his belief in other people’s honesty was gone, gone, gone.

  “That money...the four hundred dollars you thought you’d tipped the room service person?” She didn’t flinch from his gaze. “I took that before I left. I can’t explain why. I’ve never stolen anything in my life. But it was sitting on the dresser and when I grabbed up my purse...I just grabbed the stack of twenties, too.”

  Her face turned red and he saw tears swimming in her eyes. “It was an absolutely despicable thing to do, and I regretted it instantly. You don’t have to believe that, but it’s true.”

  He felt sick again. “I don’t believe a word you say.”

  The color drained from her cheeks, but she nodded. Then her hand went into the purse perched on her lap. She drew out a wad of bills. “The twenties are gone. But this is four hundred one-dollar bills. My roommates’ tips.”

  His eyebrows flew up.

  She shook her head. “I paid for them. I just wanted to have these four hundred pieces of paper to say four hundred times that—” She broke off, gave a quick shake of her head and began again. “So you’d know I’m being punished for what I did. I’m paying for everything I did wrong by never being able to have you.” Then she shoved the money his way, slid off her stool and left the building.

  Ash stared at the cash without seeing it. Instead, he saw himself that first night, sending over a drink to a tipsy birthday girl. He saw them dancing, her face bright with laughter.

  He saw how hard she’d resisted him when he came back to the mountains and how he’d broken down that resistance. He saw the flush on her face when he’d gone down on her and the wonder in her eyes as they took flight in the helicopter.

  He remembered the pitch of his belly up, then down, up, then down, when they’d ridden the elevator.

  Her first time to be in one.

  His first time to be in love.

  Despite everything, he still wanted her.

  Yet his philandering father had slept with Tilda’s mother. Tilda’s dead mother. And the affair was no longer a secret between his parents.

  His mom said he shouldn’t worry about their marriage, that it was up to her and his father to work out the repercussions of John Robbins’s actions. Adult life is complicated, his mother had said. It’s better to learn that sooner than later.

  But could he look at Tilda without thinking of their cheating parents?

  Could she look at him without remembering, too?

  Could they really get past that and be an “us”?

  At sixteen, no, he thought. But he was a grown-up now, by all measures. Adult life is complicated.

  But Tilda had stolen from him!

  Truth be told, though, it was his dignity that took the blow. He didn’t miss the stupid four hundred dollars; the cocky asshat he’d been that night had flung cash around as if it meant nothing. With a fingertip, he nudged the pile she’d left behind and one bill curled free. Writing stood out on the green-and-white dollar, written in a dark pink felt-tipped pen.

  I love you.

  He nudged another bill free to find the same message. I love you.

  Hands starting to shake, he flipped through the mass. I love you. I love you. I love you.

  Four hundred times.

  Tilda was in love with him, and she saw it as her punishment. I’m paying for everything I did wrong by never being able to have you.

  She hadn’t made a fool of him. Or if she had, she’d become the exact same kind of fool.

  A fool in love.

  And so? What kind of examples did either of them have of love? Her mother, who’d apparently had a string of married lovers?

  But Tilda wasn’t her mother.

  Might Ash become like his father, though? A man who looked the right way and said the right things but who had flaws in his character that had finally come to light. Christ, he didn’t want that for himself.

  So don’t become that. Even if your father is not the man you thought, that doesn’t prevent you from becoming the man you want to be.

  The man who should be reaching for his own life, future, love.

  Ash jumped off his stool. Shoving the four hundred bills in his pocket, but dropping some of his own to pay his tab, he ran out of Mr. Frank’s and into the night. In the dimly lit parking lot he spotted his car, then noticed Tilda’s a few spaces away from his own.

  She was nowhere in sight.

  Piece of shit probably broke down on her again. Looking around, he thought he saw a slight figure in the distance, heading in the direction of the village. Without thinking, he tore after her.

  The central part of the main street through the village was draped in fairy lights. They even crossed overhead. Ash slowed as Tilda came under their canopy. From half a block back, he called her name.

  She stiffened, then glanced over her shoulder. Seeing him, her eyes widened and she turned to face him with the air of someone preparing to receive bad news. Cautious but resigned.

  He wanted her smiling. And he knew he wanted her back. He was that annoyingly arrogant...and maybe that was a good thing his upbringing had given him. “Can we talk a minute?”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea.” She began scuttling in reverse.

  “We should talk a minute.”

  “No,” she said and stepped into the street to cross to the other side.

  Damn, she was moving fast.

  “Tilda!”

  As she glanced over her shoulder, he pulled a bill from his pocket. Not one of the four hundred, but another that he dangled over the grate in the gutter. Melted snow ran in a small river that would take the money in a flash to wherever melted street snow ended up. “We talk or I’ll drop this.”

  She paused, her gaze glued to the money, fluttering at his fingertips. “That’s wasteful.”

  He let it fall. Her gaze followed its quick journey down into the sewer. When her eyes shifted back to his face, he pulled out another bill.

  Her expression turned aghast and she swung around to return to the sidewalk. “Ash, no.”

  It was a stupid stunt, but at least he’d halted her flight. Without looking away from her, he slowly approached, the cash still in his hand.

  “We can get past this,” he said.

  She shook her head.

  “We can. You said I made you believe, and I can make you believe this, too.” He shoved the bill back in his pocket.

  “It’s such a mess—”

  “Not our mess, not really.” He was close enough to touch her, and he did that, stroking one fingertip over her cold cheek. His heart moved in his chest at that coolness. He wanted to pull her into him. Warm her forever.

  “Your parents—”

  “It’s their mess.” He tucked her hair behind her ear, certain now he was right about that. “What we have is a future to plan. Come with me to London for six months.”

 
; Tilda crossed her arms and tucked her hands in the crooks of her elbows. Because she wanted to touch him, too?

  “I can’t do that,” she said.

  “Of course you can.” He pulled one of her hands free and laced his fingers with hers. “When the six months are over we can decide what comes next.”

  “Six months of you,” she whispered. “After all this, you’d really give me that?”

  “Six months of us. Maybe it will be happy-ever-after, maybe it will be happy-for-now. I think it’s the former but I’ll settle for the latter. Bottom line—I want happy...and every instinct I have tells me that’s being with you.”

  The twinkling lights overhead revealed the sudden hope on her face. Then she shook her head. “No, no. I’m—”

  “Too smart and too determined to throw away this chance.”

  She looked around. “I’ve never been anywhere else. The mountains...”

  “We can come back if you want that. But for now, let them be your stepping stone, not your cage.”

  Her gaze returned to his face. “A stepping stone,” she murmured. “Not a cage.” Then she shook her head. “Ash, think about it. Really think about it. Our parents—”

  “They shouldn’t be a cage, either—your mother and my father and what they did. We’re not them.”

  “Who are we, then?”

  “I guess this is the time in life when we get to figure that out. We make our own choices. Become our own persons.”

  He saw her tremble. “I’m a strong, smart mountain woman.”

  “Then you’ll make a strong, smart choice.” He lowered his voice as his heart beat hard in his chest. “Please, Tilda, please. I’m in love with you. Give us a chance. Give us that chance at happy.”

  Her gaze studied his face. Then she released a small sigh. “O-okay.”

  Tentative relief sluiced through him. “Okay...what?”

  She stepped into him and he wrapped his arms around her as hers rose to circle his neck. “Okay, I want happy, too,” she said. “God, how much. And that’s with you.”