Come Home to Deep River

by Jackie Ashenden

  “Silas—”

  “We haven’t finished our conversation.”

  He was being a dick and he knew it, but he couldn’t help himself. There had been something in Hope’s eyes that had caught him like a blow to the chest, something electric in the air around them that hadn’t been there before.

  An electricity he recognized and thought would never happen—not with her. But it was there now: sexual tension. He could feel it vibrating in the space between them and even though he knew he should let it go, he couldn’t.

  Once or twice, back when they’d been teenagers, he’d thought he’d caught a glimpse in her eyes of a response to him. But he’d never been sure and it had only ever been a glimpse, definitely not enough for certainty. So he’d let it go, told himself he’d been seeing things because that was easier than pinning his hopes on something that wasn’t real.

  Except the tension in the air now was definitely real and so was the glow in her dark eyes.

  Telling her he would have stayed for her was probably a stupid thing to do, but he hadn’t been able to help himself. If he wanted the truth from her, he’d have to give her some of his own.

  Hope’s gaze flickered over him, full of hot little sparks. “You might not have finished, but I have.”

  “Have you? You still look mad to me.”

  “I’m not—”

  “Did you want me to stay, Hope?” Suddenly nothing was more important than the answer to that question. “Is that why you’re angry with me? Why you were so angry with me yesterday when I first arrived?”

  “Why do you want to know?” she snapped. “What does it matter? Haven’t we got other more important things to discuss?”

  He heard it then, underneath the anger—a sharp note of pain. And before he could stop himself, he’d raised his hand and cupped her cheek, an instinct bone-deep and years old gripping him.

  As soon as his fingers touched her skin, she went utterly still, and it felt like the entire universe had gone still along with her, as if all of creation had taken a sharp breath and was holding it.

  There was silence around them, even the sounds of the bar outside the door disappearing. Her fine-grained skin was warm beneath his fingers and as soft as he’d always imagined, and he knew he shouldn’t be touching her and yet he couldn’t bring himself to stop.

  “I want to know because you’re my friend.” He let his thumb brush slowly over her cheekbone, relishing the satiny warmth of her. “And it matters because I hurt you.”

  She said nothing, standing unmoving, staring at him like he was a stranger. There were currents in her dark eyes, deep and powerful as those in the river that ran through the town, but unlike those, Hope’s ran hot rather than icy cold. “It was years ago,” she said, her voice a little husky. “And I’m over it. Are we done now?”

  But she wasn’t over it, not when that note of pain was still there, edged and jagged as a shard of broken glass embedded in a thick, soft rug.

  He spread his fingers out on her cheek, continuing to brush his thumb back and forth, wanting to soothe her, ease that pain somehow. Except he couldn’t, not if she wouldn’t acknowledge it.

  You really want to push this? Why? What difference will it make?

  Perhaps no difference. She was right; it had happened years ago, and maybe he was being a bastard bringing all of this up again. But…he couldn’t let it go. He just couldn’t. She was mad and she was hurt, and that meant something. And maybe he was reading things into it that weren’t there, but it had to be about more than just friendship. Certainly the sudden sexual tension between them hadn’t come from nowhere.

  God, how many years had he wanted her? Too many. And he’d never done a thing about it, never crossed that line. He wasn’t going to now, either, not given the situation with the town and the uncertainty around it. Yet even though it might be selfish of him, he wanted to know once and for all if she felt even a glimmer of what he felt for her.

  “No,” he said. “We’re not done.”

  “What do you want from me?” She didn’t pull away from his hand, but she didn’t lean into it either, and he could see the tension vibrating through her, as if she was holding herself back from doing one thing or the other.

  Either way, it meant his touch affected her.

  Heat spread through him, quickening his heartbeat, all the blood flooding down to a certain part of his anatomy. Which very definitely shouldn’t be happening, but he didn’t drop his hand or step away.

  “What do I want?” he asked instead. “I want the truth.”

  “The truth about what?”

  “The truth about why you’re really so angry with me.” He studied her face, watching the ebb and flow of emotions in her eyes. “Because I get the feeling that it wasn’t Cal that you really wanted.”

  “You have no idea what I really wanted.” The hot glow in her eyes burned brighter. “And why the hell would I tell you anyway? What makes you think you deserve it?”

  “Oh, I don’t deserve it.” He brushed his thumb back over her cheek, the feel of her skin a glory he hadn’t imagined. “But I’m asking for it anyway.”

  Her pupils had dilated, her eyes even blacker than they were already and full of an expression he didn’t understand. There were too many things in them—pain and anger knotted with other emotions too complicated to name. “You left me,” she said suddenly, her voice thick. “Both of you left me. Grandad had died, and I had Mom to look after, and I was afraid. And I needed both of you. But you’d both gone. And then you stayed away, Si. For thirteen goddamn years.”

  His chest tightened painfully. After he and Cal had left Deep River, he’d told himself a lot of lies to make leaving Hope okay. But that’s all they were. Lies. There had been nothing okay about leaving Hope, and he’d always known, deep down, that they’d both hurt her. Caleb had at least gone back, yet he hadn’t.

  Because you’re a coward.

  Yeah, maybe he was. But the night he and Cal had told her they were going, all he’d felt was pain. Her grandfather had gone into the water to save his father; his father was the reason the both of them were dead, and he hadn’t been able to handle his own guilt about that, let alone handle her grief too.

  And he hadn’t gone back because he’d told himself she was better off without him. That she’d forgotten him. That Cal had visited and Cal was who she really wanted after all.

  More lies—certainly judging from the hurt in her eyes now.

  “I had to go,” he said. “Dad was the reason Bill died. And I couldn’t…” He stopped, trying to find the right words. “I felt guilty.” You are guilty. “And I didn’t want to stay and deal with the fallout,” he went on quickly, drowning out that particular thought. “I’d been dealing with the fallout from Dad’s drinking for years already, and him and Bill… It was too much.”

  “I get that.” Pain glittered in Hope’s eyes. “But would it have killed you to come back at least once to say hi? You didn’t have to leave me with no word for so long, Si.”

  The ache in his chest deepened, widened. “I didn’t think it would matter to you that much. It was always Cal you wanted.”

  Her throat moved as she swallowed, her dark gaze on his unwavering. “How could you think it wouldn’t matter? You were my best friend.”

  Yeah, and some best friend he turned out to be.

  You never wanted to be her friend anyway.

  And that was the problem. He didn’t. He’d always wanted to be so much more than that.

  Let her go. You’re not going to follow through on this so what’s the point insisting?

  But he couldn’t bring himself to step away. That tension in the air was still there, electric, and she wasn’t pulling away from him. She was standing very still and letting him touch her.

  So he stepped closer, cradling her cheek in his palm, staring down into her dark
eyes. “There was a reason I stayed away.”

  “Don’t,” she began as if she knew already what he was going to say.

  And maybe he should have stopped. But it was too late now. If it wasn’t going to matter anyway, then why not say it? Why not tell her?

  He brushed his thumb over her cheekbone again, conscious of the fact that he was standing very close to her and that she smelled sweet, like a field of wildflowers, along with a delicate musky fragrance that made everything male in him sit up and take notice. “That reason was you,” he went on. “And it didn’t have anything to do with being your friend.”

  Red stained the clear olive skin of her cheeks, yet again, she didn’t pull away. She only stared up at him, the pulse at the base of her throat fast and hard. “What do you mean?”

  “Do I really need to explain?” He pressed his fingertips lightly against her cheek. “I think you know exactly what I mean.”

  The blush in her cheeks deepened, the hot glow in her eyes glittering. “You know, I think you’re going to have to spell it out for me. Just so we’re clear.”

  Fine, he would. Because now they’d headed down this path, there was no reason not to keep going. “I want you, Hope,” he said. “I’ve always wanted you. Is that clear enough?”

  Shock flared in her gaze, unmistakable and bright, and her mouth opened, then shut. She shook her head. “No. No, you can’t have.”

  “I did. Don’t tell me you didn’t know.” She’d never let on that she had, but some part of him had wondered if she’d somehow picked up on his feelings for her. Because as teenagers, he’d often gotten the impression that she was uncomfortable around him. He hadn’t made any move toward her, had tried to make sure that his true feelings for her stayed locked away so she saw nothing but friendship. But maybe he hadn’t hidden them as well as he’d thought.

  Something shifted in her eyes. “You never said anything.”

  “Are you surprised? After you told me all about your crush on Cal?”

  Her expression was unreadable. “It wouldn’t have made a difference, Si.”

  He pressed his thumb against her cheekbone, watching the shifting emotional currents in her eyes, seeing the gleam of heat in the depths of her gaze, glowing like banked embers. “Wouldn’t it?”

  He shouldn’t push. He should let this go, let her go. Yet he wasn’t going to. He wanted the truth, wanted to know once and for all if she felt anything at all for him. No, he didn’t deserve it, but he wanted it anyway.

  And surely she did. Because if she truly felt nothing but friendship for him, she wouldn’t be standing so close to him. She wouldn’t have let him touch her, let him stroke her cheek. She wouldn’t be blushing. And those hot embers in the depths of her eyes certainly wouldn’t be glowing the way they were now.

  She stared back at him, unwavering. “No. It wouldn’t.”

  “Really? You didn’t want me to stay instead of Cal?”

  “And why would I have wanted you to stay instead of Cal?” Her voice was husky, the look in her eyes challenging almost.

  “Because you wanted me, Hope.” He moved his thumb down in an arc, over her cheek, brushing the corner of her lovely mouth. “You wanted me the way I wanted you.”

  Her lashes fell, veiling her gaze. And there was a very long silence. “Whether I did or I didn’t won’t change anything,” she said at last. “We can’t go back to what we had before.”

  “I know that. And I’m not expecting anything from you. I just…want to know.”

  Slowly, her lashes lifted again, her eyes as dark as the river at night and just as deep. “I really did think it was Cal I wanted. And I really did want him to stay. I was disappointed when he didn’t and angry that you were the one who offered instead.” She paused. “But…maybe I was wrong.”

  It wasn’t a shock. It felt like he’d always known on some level that she wasn’t entirely immune to him the way he’d always thought.

  Satisfaction stretched out inside him, a hungry, possessive kind of feeling following along in its wake, and if he’d been back in Juneau and she’d been a woman he’d met in a bar, he might have pulled her to him and kissed her.

  But he wasn’t in Juneau and she was Hope, his best friend, and there was too much history behind them and too many different futures in front of them.

  Knowing didn’t change a thing.

  He allowed himself one last stroke of her cheek with his thumb before he dropped his hand.

  Then he turned and walked out of the office without another word.

  Chapter 7

  The community center was packed. Hope had never seen it so full of people, not even on Christmas Eve when they held the town’s annual Christmas dinner there for those who could get through the snow.

  Then again, it wasn’t any wonder. After Cal’s death, people were uncertain about what would happen to the town, and they were clearly hoping that the meeting that had been called was going to give them some answers.

  And it would. They just wouldn’t be the answers everyone was expecting.

  Up at the front, Silas stood with his arms crossed over his chest, looking tall and powerful as he surveyed the crowd like a general surveying his army. That they were all surveying him back with varying degrees of suspicion didn’t seem to bother him, or at least if it did, he didn’t show it.

  Hope leaned back against the wall and folded her arms over her frantically beating heart, tearing her gaze away from him and looking out over the assembled townspeople instead.

  She’d spent all day berating herself for what had happened between them in her office the day before, for letting herself get caught up in a discussion that she didn’t want to have and only made things more difficult between them. She should have simply shoved him out of the way when he’d stood in front of her, but she hadn’t. She’d stood there and gazed back at him, mesmerized by the fierce look in his eyes instead.

  She hadn’t meant to give herself away like that, but she hadn’t been able to move. And most especially not when he’d lifted his hand and touched her face. She’d felt the touch of his fingers move through her, sweet and bright as summer lightning, and something deep inside of her had trembled.

  Then he’d told her he’d wanted her, that he’d always wanted her, and she’d been unable to breathe. She would have preferred it if the breathlessness had been due to shock, but it wasn’t. No, on some level she’d always known that Si’s feelings toward her had never been purely platonic, and it had been habit that made her ignore it. Or more accurately, self-preservation.

  Admitting to herself that he wanted her would have meant she’d have to examine her own feelings about him, and they were complicated. They’d always been complicated.

  You know what your body wants, at least.

  She shifted restlessly against the wall, her gaze drawn yet again to the man standing at the front of the hall, tall and silent, his expression enigmatic. He was in his usual outfit of jeans and a T-shirt—this time a soft-looking gray one that clung to his broad chest, drawing attention to the hard muscle of his pecs and abs. He was built so very fine and a part of her, a part she’d never wanted to admit to herself, had always noticed. Just as she had always noticed his straight, sharp jawline and high cheekbones, and appreciated the fascinating shape of his mouth.

  “You wanted me, Hope. The way I always wanted you.”

  Her breath caught, and she looked away from him yet again. God, she should have denied it, told him that of course she didn’t want him, what was he thinking?

  But that would have been a lie. And standing there with that electric tension crackling between them, it was a lie he wouldn’t have believed anyway.

  He wasn’t wrong. She did want him.

  Restlessness coiled inside her. Admitting that to him or even to herself wasn’t going to change anything though. The past was dead and gone, and nothing wa
s going to happen in the present. Sure, they didn’t have a friendship left to preserve these days, but he’d be leaving soon, which made doing anything about their attraction pointless.

  She didn’t want to do anything about it anyway. There had been something hungry in his eyes as he’d looked at her, something that had told her that sleeping with him would change her and change her completely. That it would make things deeper and far more complicated than they already were, and she wasn’t ready for that kind of thing in her life right now. Maybe she wouldn’t ever be ready for it.

  The buzz of conversation in the room increased as more people came in, the door banging shut behind them, and looking over the crowd in an effort to distract herself from Silas, Hope caught her mother’s dark eyes looking suspiciously back at her.

  Damn. She and Silas hadn’t ended up talking about the phone call Angela received or formulating a plan for how to deal with it. In fact, Hope hadn’t seen him at all the whole day today, which she had to admit to herself was deliberate.

  Since when did you get to be such a coward?

  Since she’d found herself helplessly attracted to her best friend, not to mention the owner of an entire town, neither of which she wanted on her plate right now.

  “Is everyone here?” Astrid’s cool voice rang out over the crowd and everyone quieted. “Let’s get this meeting started then.” She nodded to where Silas stood. “For those of you who don’t know him, this is Silas Quinn, Caleb’s best friend. He has some news that’s going to affect the entire town, so if you could be quiet until he’s finished speaking, I’d appreciate it.”

  A murmur ran through the crowd before it gradually died away, everyone looking attentively at Silas.

  Hope tensed. Once everyone knew, things would change and there was no going back. No putting this particular genie back in the bottle. God, she hoped it wouldn’t end up ripping the entire town apart.

  Silas nodded, then began to speak, his deep, dark voice filling the hall. He stuck to the facts, delivering them levelly and stripped bare of any emotion or judgment. Telling them about Caleb’s will and how Cal had signed the town over to Silas and his two friends. And once he’d gotten that out of the way, he told them about the oil.