Falling for You

by Becky Wade

  Chapter

  Nine

  Corbin’s dad was standing outside the barnhouse, waiting for Willow, when she pulled up. She exited her car and approached.

  Corbin had clearly inherited the auburn tint in his brown hair from Joe. Though Joe’s still-thick hair had faded to a pale ginger color with age, he looked to her like a man who’d once had a full head of copper hair.

  His fair skin was pinpricked with tiny freckles and a few age spots. Like Corbin, Joe’s eyes were brown, though lighter in hue and faintly rheumy. She’d guess his height to be a few inches shorter than Corbin’s. Maybe six one?

  They were both brawny, big-boned men. But if Joe’s body had once been as filled with strength and good health as Corbin’s currently was, then his cancer or maybe his psychological health or both had sapped much of that strength from him. Joe’s muscles hung on him. His thin frame held none of the latent, ropy power that characterized his son.

  Unexpected fondness welled within Willow for Corbin’s dad. Regardless of the challenges Joe had faced, he’d been exactly like her own dad in one critical way. He’d stayed. When her mom had left, her dad had raised her. When Joe’s wife had left, Joe had raised Corbin.

  For his part, Joe didn’t appear to be experiencing a matching sense of fondness for her. He regarded her warily.

  “I’m Willow Bradford.” She extended her hand.

  He shook it. “Joe Stewart.”

  “Nice to meet you.”

  “We should probably be getting on our way.”

  “Sure.” For the second time in under an hour, she found herself driving a Stewart to the rehab center.

  Joe wore sneakers, jeans, and a long-sleeved T-shirt with a graphic of the sun, ocean, palm trees, and the word Hawaii. He’d strapped a ’90s-era Timex with a glowing electronic display around his wrist.

  “Corbin mentioned that you’re from South Haven, Michigan.”

  “Yes. Have you been there?”

  “I’d like to. But no, I haven’t.”

  “It’s on the shore of Lake Michigan.” He sat with his hands on his knees, face turned toward the side window. One of his knees bounced worriedly. “There’s some good golfing around there. When the weather’s nice.” He spoke with a Midwestern accent. “Where are you from?”

  “I’m from just down the road, Merryweather. My home base has been L.A. for more than ten years, though.”

  He rumbled assent.

  Willow racked her brain for more to say. She could almost always keep conversation clicking along with people she’d just met, but Joe was proving to be a challenge. He was saying the right things, but he wasn’t saying them naturally. It was as if he were a bad actor, woodenly speaking lines he’d been given.

  “I think you missed the turn for Dr. Wallace’s Center,” he said.

  Had she? She didn’t think so, but then, she wasn’t the one who lived in Shore Pine. She pulled to the curb and checked her phone. According to the GPS, she was right on track. “I think it’s straight ahead, then left, then right.”

  His face swung toward her, his strawberry blond eyebrows drawn down as though he suspected her of kidnapping him. “It’s back that way.” He pointed behind them and to the side.

  The rehab center was most assuredly not in that direction. “Let’s just drive up here a little farther and see,” she said smoothly. She had decades of experience dealing with Grandma, who often spoke and acted in direct opposition to everything Willow believed to be true. “I’m glad that Dr. Wallace is Corbin’s doctor. I’ve heard he’s excellent.”

  “Hmm?” he said distractedly.

  Willow repeated herself.

  “Yes,” Joe answered. “Dr. Wallace has done a fine job. Not like those doctors who operated on Corbin the first time.”

  The Wallace Rehabilitation Center came into view. Willow pulled into a parking space.

  “Thank you for the ride,” Joe said gruffly.

  “I’ll come inside with you—”

  “No, you’ve already done more than enough, what with driving us around.”

  “It’s really no problem—”

  “I’m sure you have a lot to do today. We don’t want to keep you.” He ducked his head in a gesture of parting and let himself out without giving her a chance to reply.

  Willow scrambled from the car and locked it behind her. “I’d like to see how Corbin’s doing.”

  Joe responded with a frown. Inside the waiting area of the sleek, modern building, he approached the receptionist.

  Willow took a seat and after a few minutes, Joe came to sit in the chair next to hers. He moved carefully, as if unsure of his balance. “They’re running tests on him. X-rays and whatnot. They’ll let me know when I can go back.”

  “Sounds good.” The two of them stared straight ahead. “Magazine?” She pointed to the stack on the coffee table.

  “No.”

  Most of the time people warmed to her. Usually people liked her. Only . . . not Joe. Willow didn’t know if he disliked the majority of people or if he disliked her in particular. It could be the latter. After all, he no doubt remembered her from when she and Corbin had dated. There’s no telling what Corbin had or hadn’t said to his dad about their breakup. Plus, Joe might be blaming her for Corbin’s screwed-up shoulder. Which wasn’t altogether without merit.

  In a bid to keep her mind occupied, Willow scrolled through email on her phone.

  At last a young nurse in scrubs came to a stop before them. “Mr. Stewart? I’ll take you back to see Corbin now.”

  Willow began to rise, too, but Joe stayed her with a look. “I’d like to speak with my son privately.”

  “Of course.” She remained where she was as Joe and the nurse walked out of sight.

  Joe’s shut-out stung. On the other hand, it wasn’t as if she had a right to visit the patient. She wasn’t a family member or a girlfriend or even a friend of Corbin’s.

  Which begged the question: Why was she determined to see her not-family member, not-boyfriend, not-friend Corbin before she returned to the inn?

  He’d been injured protecting her. On her property. That’s why. If she was harboring reasons beyond those, she didn’t want to confront them.

  “Miss Bradford?” The nurse had returned. “Corbin would like you to come back, too.”

  “He would?”

  “Yes. And if you know him at all you know that he almost always gets what he wants.” The nurse dimpled, and Willow could see that here was another of Corbin’s groupies. Great.

  Willow followed the woman down a few different hallways before entering a room that looked very much like every other doctor’s exam room she’d entered in her life, with one very important distinction: This exam room contained a shirtless man.

  Oh dear.

  Even though she, Corbin, and Joe were the only occupants of the room at the moment, Willow edged against the wall next to the door in order to make herself unobtrusive and also to put as much space as possible between herself and Corbin.

  He was reclining on the adjustable table wearing nothing but jeans. His upper half was raised to around a 45-degree angle, and they’d adhered ice packs to his shoulder with tape. His chest and abs were—heaven help her—even more beautiful than she’d remembered. Contoured muscles and sinew resting beneath bronze skin.

  It seemed that sticking around to see him had been a tactical error on her part.

  Her attention skittered to Joe, sitting in a chair by the window, looking disgruntled.

  “You stayed.” Though Corbin’s face still showed evidence of pain, warmth lit his eyes.

  “I just wanted to hear what the doctor had to say.” I didn’t stick around because I wanted to see you shirtless or because I care.

  “It’s a separated shoulder,” Corbin told her. He was unashamedly masculine and not the least bit shy. “I’ve torn some ligaments, but that’s all.”

  “Will it require another surgery?”

  “No, thank God.”

 
“What’s the treatment plan?”

  “Painkillers. Immobility of the shoulder. Ice.”

  “How long will it take to heal?”

  “Four weeks.”

  She winced.

  Joe glared at her.

  Don’t look at Corbin’s chest. Don’t look at his abs. If you have to look at him at all, look right into his eyes.

  Willow smiled in the direction of the window. “Well! I’ll leave you guys to it. See you later, Joe. Corbin.” The heels of her boots rapped against the floor as she hurried down the hallway.

  She tightly gripped the steering wheel as she drove back toward Merryweather. There’d been a time, right after their breakup, when she’d happily imagined all sorts of scenarios in which harm might befall Corbin. It had been a pastime of hers, dreaming up all the ways he could suffer. But just now, when she’d actually seen him suffering, her vindictiveness had left her.

  It had left her in part because he’d seemed less . . . invincible than usual, there on the examining table with only his dad for support. If she’d been the one with a separated shoulder, her sisters, parents, Grandma, Valentina, and Zander all would have packed into her exam room.

  Which served to highlight the differences between herself and Corbin.

  She’d been raised in a quaint town in the Pacific Northwest. She had siblings and, from the age of five onward, both a dad and a mom. For well over a century and a half, the Bradford family had enjoyed the advantages of wealth and prestige. Opportunities had fallen into Willow’s lap like ripe plums.

  Corbin had been raised by a blue-collar father in a Midwestern city down on its luck. No mom. No siblings. He’d had to make his own opportunities.

  She’d thought recently about how Zander was the underdog in his friendship with Britt. In many of the same ways, Corbin had begun life as an underdog, too. Willow had met him in his post-underdog days, after he’d achieved tremendous success, so it was easy to forget that he’d known difficulty. Corbin’s toughness had been engraved into him early.

  Willow had acquired her toughness gradually, first through the traumas she’d weathered early in life, then through the knocks the modeling world had dispensed.

  She was composed and introspective.

  He was charming and handy with his fists.

  She was steady.

  He was untrustworthy.

  Willow chewed the edge of her lip. Except what she’d learned about Corbin today didn’t square very well with the “untrustworthy” label she’d stamped on him long ago.

  When she’d needed him this morning, he’d been there.

  And he was taking care of his dad and had been for three years. Which probably explained why he’d been late for lunch on Melinda’s back deck that day and why he sometimes had to leave the room during Operation Find Josephine meetings to take phone calls.

  “That’s not your lane, Mazda.” She made a tsking sound and massaged one of her temples.

  She didn’t want to think that she could have been wrong about Corbin in any way.

  Corbin woke the next morning from a dream of Willow to the familiar sensation of shoulder pain. He was beyond sick of it. Stupid shoulder pain.

  He’d been trapped in a tunnel of grief over the loss of football and his shoulder’s limitations for months. Even before he’d separated his shoulder, he’d been unable to find a way out of the tunnel, so this setback definitely wasn’t going to help.

  He rolled onto his side in bed to squint at his alarm clock.

  He’d been late to meet Willow outside Bradfordwood’s gates yesterday because his dad had been having a bad morning. Experience had taught him that his dad did best when he stuck to a daily schedule. Same wake-up time, meal times, exercise, bedtime. But yesterday his dad hadn’t wanted to get out of bed. So Corbin had pulled him upright, brought him his medications, made him breakfast. All that had put Corbin behind by a few minutes.

  When he’d finally reached the inn’s parking lot and saw Willow being manhandled, white-hot rage had washed through him. It had blotted everything else out. He couldn’t even remember exiting his car and running to her. He’d acted out of instinct.

  Corbin let a groan escape as he pressed to standing. The blankets fell away.

  It was Saturday. Willow didn’t usually work at the inn on the weekends, but he’d drive by the Inn at Bradfordwood anyway to make sure Todd hadn’t returned.

  Pulling on his track pants one-handed was an exercise in coordination. Or maybe humor. Zipping up a sweat shirt was an exercise in agony. Once he’d managed it, he settled his right arm into the sling Dr. Wallace had prescribed and slipped his feet into Adidas slides.

  He found his dad in a kitchen that smelled of bacon and coffee, frying an egg. It looked like his dad was having a better morning today than he’d had yesterday, which was a relief.

  “Hey,” Corbin said.

  “Morning.” His dad’s attention followed Corbin as he crossed to the coffeemaker and filled a travel mug. “Going out?”

  “Yeah. Do you need anything at the store?”

  “Not that I can think of. I . . . Are you going to drive with a separated shoulder?”

  “I’ll take the sling off when I get in the car and put it on when I get out.” He’d strained and torn ligaments. It hurt to move the shoulder, but he could move it if he needed to while behind the wheel. There was no way he was going to be sidelined from driving like he’d been after his surgeries.

  “Is the store the only place you’re going?” his dad asked.

  “No.”

  “You driving to Merryweather again?” His dad turned off the stove and used a spatula to move the egg onto a plate.

  Corbin had become his dad’s chaperon in recent years out of necessity. However, his dad was not his chaperon. Corbin was thirty-five years old. “Yes. I’m going to make sure Willow’s fan hasn’t come back.” He stirred creamer into his coffee, screwed on the mug’s lid, then faced his dad. Heat seeped through the travel mug into his palm.

  “I don’t trust that woman.” His dad’s frown sent grooves into a face that had once been handsome.

  “Her name’s Willow.”

  “I can tell that you still like her.”

  Where had he put his keys? Corbin lifted a stack of mail in search of them.

  “I don’t understand what you’re thinking, son. Don’t you remember how hard you took it when you guys split up?”

  “I remember.”

  “So do I,” his dad said flatly. “It was rough on you. Starting back up with her is a really bad idea.”

  Corbin walked along the counter, looking for his keys.

  “Corbin.”

  He glanced up to see his dad nod toward the bowl they used as a catchall. His keys lay within. “Thanks. I’ll be back in time to take you to your ten thirty group session.” Corbin strode through the chilly morning, climbed into his Navigator using only his left arm, and drove toward the inn.

  Willow had come back into his life through no wish of his own. But now that she was back and he was spending time with her on a regular basis, he could see the good in her.

  His dad couldn’t see the good because he was so tied to his memories of the bad. Four years ago his dad had been watching Entertainment Tonight when he’d seen coverage of Willow on the red carpet with Derek Oliver before Corbin had told his dad that he and Willow had broken up. His dad had called Corbin, irate, because it had looked to him like his son’s girlfriend was cheating on his son.

  Corbin wasn’t in the habit of sharing the details of his relationships with his dad, but he’d tried to set things right back then. He’d explained his role in their breakup. Corbin had always understood just how much he was at fault for the end of his relationship with Willow. But his dad never had been able to understand. He’d picked sides while watching Entertainment Tonight and decided that Willow was the enemy.

  The fact that Corbin had been miserable for months after their relationship ended hadn’t helped Willow’s standin
g in his dad’s eyes. He’d blamed her for Corbin’s heartbreak, in large part because he himself had faced a similar heartbreak when Corbin’s mom had walked out on them thirty years before.

  His dad’s mental health had been shaky during Corbin’s preschool years. But so long as Dawn Stewart had loved him and remained by his side, he’d been able to keep his life on course. When she’d jerked her love away, it had devastated his dad. His life headed into a ditch, and bipolar disorder took the upper hand.

  His dad had been suspicious of women in general and beautiful women—like Dawn and Willow—in particular ever since.

  Divorce hadn’t been easy for his father.

  Neither had parenting.

  The honest truth was that it hadn’t always been easy for Corbin to be his father’s son, either. At times, it had been downright brutal for them both. But one thing Corbin knew—his dad had done his best. He’d earned money to feed and clothe Corbin. He’d sacrificed to make sure Corbin had every chance to learn and play the game of football. Whenever his work schedule had allowed, he’d shown up at Corbin’s middle school and high school games. He’d driven him to every tournament.

  His dad had supported Corbin when Corbin had needed it, and now it was Corbin’s turn to support his dad. He’d made the choice to act as his dad’s caregiver. He didn’t regret it, and he didn’t blame his dad for the fact that Corbin’s professional life was currently in a holding pattern.

  He wanted to be a football commentator one day, but there was no way he could pursue that at this point. Not with his dad’s health the way it was. It wouldn’t be possible for him to do everything he needed to do for his dad, plus work full time, plus travel for work.

  The City of Shore Pine, Population 6,220 sign slid past.

  Their move to Washington had ended up serving several purposes, some of them unexpected. Until they’d come to Shore Pine, Corbin hadn’t fully understood how beneficial it would be for his dad to see Mark, Jill, and their kids on an almost daily basis. The kids had brought something to his dad’s life—and to his own—that had been missing.

  It surprised Corbin how much his dad had taken to the Pacific Northwest. Here they were surrounded by green hills and blue water. The pace was slower. They could go watch a game at a bar or grab chicken wings for dinner, and no one would mob them.