Burn for You (Slow Burn Book 1)

by J. T. Geissinger

  I crept over to the bed with my heart pounding, terror closing around my throat like a hangman’s noose. When I grew nearer and saw the serene expression on Mama’s face, the terror faded away like a tide receding, and I could breathe again.

  I knelt beside the bed and took her hand. Not even a hint of warmth still lingered in it.

  “I can’t believe you left me,” I whispered, hearing the accusation in my voice. All of a sudden I was a child again, six years old, lost in the Mardi Gras parade when Mama briefly let go of my hand. I had the same feeling now as I did then, raw disbelief mixed with rising hysteria, searching desperately for her face in a crowd of strangers.

  Only this time the hysteria wouldn’t be replaced with sweet relief when I was found. I’d remain lost forever, alone in a sea of unfamiliar faces, crying out her name.

  I told her I loved her. I told her she was the best mother who ever lived. I told her I hoped one day to be half the woman she was, and that I’d always try to make her proud. Through it all she was silent and still the way only a corpse can be, that utter absence of life like a negative charge sucking the air from the room.

  It wasn’t until I whispered, “Tell Daddy I miss him,” that I sensed a change in the atmosphere. Something shimmered briefly. The air gained a palpable spark.

  Maybe it was my imagination, but I’d swear on the Bible I felt a gentle touch on my head.

  Then it was gone, and I was alone in a cool, quiet room with the body of my mother, and all the pain I’d been holding off came rushing over me at once.

  I threw my head back and howled like an animal, loud enough to scour every ghost within miles from its grave.

  The bland-faced men from the funeral home spoke in soft, soothing tones and wore black suits with white carnations in the lapels. I picked out a casket from a catalog, one with a beautiful lavender lining I knew Mama would’ve liked. Arrangements were made. Paperwork was signed. Condolences were given.

  Then they loaded Mama into a hearse and took her away.

  Eeny sent her off with a teary cry of, “Safe travels, Miss Davina!” and the pain was so breathtaking I almost fell to my knees.

  Through it all, Jackson was a rock. He kept his hand on my lower back, or my shoulder, or my arm, a constant, gentle touch of support. When I found it hard to stand, he held me up. When I found it impossible to speak, he spoke for me. He thanked Jennifer and told her to go home, then he asked Eeny if she could go to the restaurant and take care of things there, because we all could see that I was in no shape to handle it.

  “Cancel all the reservations for the rest of the week,” I told her in a dull voice. “Put a sign on the front door. CLOSED INDEFINITELY.”

  “Should I call anyone for you, boo? People will want to know Davina passed.”

  “Yes,” I said, my head pounding. “Call everyone. I’ll let you know as soon as I schedule the funeral service with the church. Thank you, Eeny.”

  When Jackson said, “Tell the restaurant employees they’ll be paid for the days off,” I didn’t have the strength to argue. By then all I wanted to do was lie down and sleep for a few years.

  Weeping, Eeny left. Then Jackson and I sat at the kitchen table, staring at each other like two people who’ve survived a plane crash only to find themselves stranded on a desert island with no food or shelter and a hurricane blowing in.

  “I’m so sorry,” he finally said. His eyes were fierce. “She was a lovely woman.”

  I looked at the table, its wood surface nicked and scratched from years of use, while grief swept through me like a raging river overflowing its banks. “Yes. Thank you. For everything you’ve done, thank you. You’ve been a great help.”

  I didn’t mean for it to sound like a dismissal, like a decision had been made by a committee that he’d performed well under pressure but should now be on his way, but somehow it did. He flinched a little, slouched lower in his chair.

  A minute passed in silence. Then Jackson cleared his throat. “You’re staying here tonight?”

  I hadn’t thought about it, but the moment the words were out of his mouth I knew I wanted to do exactly that. “Yes,” I said, strangely relieved.

  He nodded. His jaw was set. My engagement ring caught a ray of light and reflected it around the kitchen in a million prism sparks. I couldn’t imagine a more awkward moment had ever occurred.

  He asked, “Is there anything I can do? Anything you need?”

  When I said no, he visibly deflated.

  “Okay,” he answered quietly. “Then I’ll just . . . I guess I’ll just go.”

  I couldn’t look at him. A chaos of wingbeats filled my chest. Did I want him to go? Did I want him to stay? I didn’t know anything anymore, only that it was hard to catch my breath. I feared if I looked up into his face, I might shatter into a thousand tiny pieces.

  He stood. “Call me if you need anything.” His voice had an edge of sorrow, like he already knew I wouldn’t.

  He kissed the top of my head, his lips the barest brush of pressure, fleetingly there, then gone. Then he walked slowly to the front door, his shoulders slumped in a way I’d never seen before. When I heard the door open, my lungs filled with breath, as if I were about to shout, but then the door closed, and I was left alone in silence, the awful reality of the day settling into my bones.

  Somewhere off in the distance, a dog howled. It exactly matched the sound inside my head.

  That day passed. Heartless how the sun has the nerve to rise and set and rise again, witness to so much ruin.

  I awoke in the morning with no idea where I was. I bolted upright on the sofa, staring around the small parlor in confusion, in my clothes from the day before, blinking against the glare of sun streaming through the curtains. Then I remembered, and felt a thousand years old.

  Everything looked different without Mama in the world. Even my own face in the mirror. I looked older. Harder. Something had extinguished in my eyes.

  I couldn’t eat but desperately needed coffee. I made myself a cup and almost dropped it when the phone rang, my nerves were so shredded.

  “Hello?”

  “Bianca,” said the Colonel, sobbing. “Oh, Bianca, tell me it isn’t true!”

  I closed my eyes and rested my forehead against the wall. “I can’t believe it, either. It’s impossible that she’s gone.”

  Listening to a man cry is one of the most terrible things in the world. Their tears seem so much more devastating than female tears. Maybe because they so infrequently shed them.

  “Was it a heart attack?” the Colonel asked, his voice choked with shock.

  “I don’t know. She didn’t want an autopsy, so we won’t know the exact cause of death, but the chemo was really hard on her system.”

  There was a stunned silence. “Chemo?”

  “She had lung cancer,” I whispered. “She’s been on chemo for weeks. She was scheduled for surgery on Wednesday.”

  The Colonel’s small cry of distress pierced me straight through my heart. “Cancer? My God! She never said a word—I thought she had the flu!”

  “I know. I’m sorry. That’s what she told everyone.”

  It was a minute or two before he composed himself enough to talk. “You know what I think?” he said in a ragged whisper.

  “No. What?”

  He drew in a long, shuddering breath. I imagined him on the other end of the phone, wiping his eyes and pulling himself up straight into that ramrod posture he was known for. He said, “I think she was just tired of bein’ without your daddy, and now that you’re settled, she decided it was time for her to be on her way.”

  A sob broke from my chest. Fighting tears, I clapped a hand over my mouth.

  “I loved your mama, Bianca. She was a good woman, and I’ll miss her somethin’ fierce. But I always knew she’d given her heart away a long time ago. I knew she’d never stop loving your daddy, but I’m grateful for the time we spent together because she made me happy. She made the world a better place.”

>   I didn’t know how I was still standing. Strange, strangled noises gurgled up from deep in my throat.

  The Colonel asked gently, “Is there anything you need, darlin’? Anything I can do for you?”

  I managed to tell him no, but it was someone else’s voice who answered. Someone with a whiskey-soaked growl and a broken heart. We said good-bye and hung up, but before my coffee got cold the phone rang again.

  It didn’t stop ringing for hours.

  In between phone calls were the visitors.

  They came in a constant stream, friends and neighbors and members of Mama’s church, bearing casseroles and weeping into crumpled-up tissues. Everything became a blur. All the faces began to blend together. I was simultaneously exhausted and energized by all the people who came, their grief piling on top of my own, their voices like the angry buzz of wasps inside my head. I started to feel disconnected, numb again, and was grateful for it.

  Numb was better than the alternative. With any luck, numb would get me through the rest of my life.

  I spoke to the church and set Mama’s funeral for Wednesday at noon. So the day she was supposed to have life-saving surgery was the day she’d be buried. I didn’t want to examine the coincidence.

  When Jackson called, I told him I needed to stay at Mama’s house for now to deal with everything that had to be done. When he asked if he should come over to help, I said no. After the awkward pause that followed, he said he’d send some of my clothes over. I think he was hoping I’d say don’t bother, I’ll be coming to live at Rivendell soon, but I was so tired I just said, “That’s fine.”

  When we hung up it felt like I’d been untethered. I was a little boat who’d lost her moorings and was drifting aimlessly out to sea.

  For the next two days, I didn’t eat. I barely slept. I survived on coffee and adrenaline, forgetting to shower until Eeny told me I smelled like a goat. By Wednesday morning I was a wreck. I didn’t know how I’d make it through the funeral without collapsing.

  But once again, Jackson’s strength shored me up.

  Then he gave my little boat a hard push into rough waters and set me free.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  BIANCA

  It was a bracing fifty-eight degrees, the sky a clear, brilliant blue above our heads. Eeny stood to my left, crying softly into a handkerchief. Jackson was to my right, stony as the inside of my heart.

  The church service was beautiful, attended by almost four hundred people. A gospel choir raised the rafters in song. Hoyt arranged for a jazz funeral procession from Saint Augustine’s to the cemetery. Two dozen musicians in black caps and white dress shirts slowly led the mourners on foot through the streets of New Orleans to the sound of hymns played on trumpets, drums, saxophones, and clarinets. At the grave site there were so many flower arrangements the bees came out in force, adding a gentle hum to underscore the priest’s final blessing of farewell.

  Then Mama’s casket was lowered into the ground, and it was done.

  Back at the house, the wake lasted for an eternity. Finally, well after nightfall, the house emptied, and I was left alone with my grief and a grim fiancé who looked exactly as wrecked as I felt.

  His rough black beard was back. His hair had obviously only been finger combed. He was restless and edgy, a dark thundercloud of mood over his head. Though he wore a suit and tie, he seemed more of the Beast than I’d ever seen him.

  “Let’s sit down,” he said gruffly, gesturing to the sofa. “We need to talk.”

  Surprised, I sat and folded my hands in my lap while I waited for him to sit, too. That moment never came. He stood looking at the floor, his hands hanging loose at his sides and slightly trembling.

  “Jackson?”

  He glanced up at me. His eyes were so dark. Something about the look in them made my skin crawl.

  Spooked, I said, “What is it?”

  He moistened his lips. From the inside pocket of his coat he slowly withdrew a set of folded papers. “We don’t have to draw this out any longer than necessary. I wanted to wait until after . . .”

  He swallowed, moistened his lips again, then started anew. “I knew you had so much on your plate. I wanted to wait until after the funeral to give you this.”

  He held out the papers. “It’s my copy of our contract.”

  Taking the papers, I furrowed my brow in confusion. “I don’t understand.”

  Jackson dragged a hand through his hair. He loosened his tie, then went to stand at the front window and gazed out at the night like he was no longer holding out hope of finding something he’d lost. His voice low and rough, he asked, “You didn’t think I’d force you to go through with it now, did you?”

  When I was silent, stunned because I thought I understood what he meant, he turned to me with a look so anguished it made my heart skip a beat. “Please tell me you don’t think I’m the kind of man who would do that.”

  I slowly rose. The papers shook like mad in my hands. “We made an agreement,” I said hoarsely, not recognizing my own voice. “Your inheritance—”

  “It hasn’t been about my inheritance for me for a while now, Bianca,” he interrupted harshly, his eyes glittering. “Honestly, I’m not sure it ever was.”

  It hung there between us, breathtakingly raw. I whispered, “Jax.”

  Something in my expression caused him visible pain. He turned away, stuffed his hands into his pockets, and bowed his head. “I’ll have all your things brought back here. I’m sorry you had to let go of your house. The timing was just”—his laugh was hollow—“shit.”

  I wanted to say something—anything—but words wouldn’t come. Jackson was letting me out of our deal. I didn’t have to marry him.

  He was going to lose everything.

  Finally I came to my senses. A deal was a deal after all, and I wasn’t about to renege on my end of the bargain, no matter what circumstances had changed. “I can’t let you do that,” I said, and dropped the papers on the coffee table. They landed with a dull slap that seemed unnaturally loud in the quiet room.

  Jackson turned from the window. He looked at the papers, then at my face. Then he crossed the room in a few long strides and picked up the contract. He ripped it in half with one abrupt, savage motion. “Don’t you get it? You’re not obligated to me anymore! You’re free! Go live your life!”

  His voice was choked with emotion. His eyes were wild like I’d never seen them. I put my hand over my thundering heart.

  “I’m sorry,” he rasped, instantly contrite, taking a step back. “Fuck. I’m so sorry. I’m an asshole. I know this is the worst day of your life. I didn’t mean to—I can’t—”

  He cursed again, whirling away, and headed for the front door. “Keep the ring,” he said over his shoulder. “Hock it. Throw it away. Whatever you want. I’ll send all your things tomorrow. Let me know if there’s anything else you need.”

  He opened the door and was gone before I could even decide if the words forming on my lips were “Thank you” or “Don’t go.”

  The screen door slammed shut behind him.

  True to his word, Jackson had all my things delivered to Mama’s house the next day in the same boxes I’d packed them into a lifetime ago. I spent a few days in a weird kind of limbo, puttering around aimlessly, trying to decide if I wanted to sell the house or keep it, before I gave up pressuring myself to make any big decisions and retired to the sofa in the front parlor, where I stayed for several more days, rising only to scrounge from the casseroles and leftovers crammed in the fridge.

  I didn’t allow myself to think about Jackson. There was a dangerous ache under my breastbone when I got too close to even picturing his face, so I shoved the memory of him and our short, magical time at Moonstar Ranch down into a dark corner of my heart and concentrated on the business of being depressed.

  Eeny didn’t let that continue long before barging through the front door and scolding me to within an inch of my life.

  “Get off your behind, girl, and get back
to work! Who do you think you’re honorin’ with all this mopin’ around? Because it sure ain’t your mama! She’d be scandalized if she could see you right now, lyin’ there wallowin’ like a pig in shit!”

  Eeny loomed over me, hands propped on her hips, scowling down at the pathetic picture I made in my dirty pajamas and unwashed hair on the couch.

  I severely regretted giving her a key.

  “You’re right,” I said tonelessly, staring at the ceiling. “I know you’re right.”

  “Then get your ass in gear and get up!” She gave the sofa a frustrated little kick, jostling me.

  “I’m in mourning. You shouldn’t curse at people in mourning.”

  She snorted and crossed her arms over her chest. “You’re in danger of gettin’ on my bad side, boo.”

  She didn’t have to say more than that. The last person who got on her bad side ended up with four slashed tires on his car, a headless rooster on his doorstep, and a strange, persistent rash.

  “I’m up,” I grumbled, rousing. “Terrorist.”

  “You’re the terrorist, child. Have you looked in a mirror lately? You’re so frightenin’ I’d hire you to haunt a house! You’re so scary lookin’ you’d make a freight train take a dirt road! You look so bad—”

  “I get it, I get it,” I said, stumbling to my feet. “I look like crap.”

  Eeny nodded as if I’d said something remarkably intelligent for once. “Like you fell out the ugly tree and hit every damn branch on the way down.”

  I sighed heavily. Eeny grimaced and waved an offended hand in front of her face.

  “Lawd! That breath of yours is nuclear, girl! Can’t believe it hasn’t melted the lips right off your face.”

  From somewhere deep inside me emerged a grudging chuckle, which made Eeny smile and nod her head.

  “That’s better. Now go take a shower and put on some clean clothes. We’re goin’ to the restaurant. You got people to feed, and I miss that ornery ol’ billy goat Hoyt more than I ever woulda guessed. Don’t gimme that stink eye!” she snapped when I raised my brows. “And if you repeat that to anyone, I’ll mash your potatoes!”