Laughing uncontrollably, she heard the sound of her bike crashing to the ground and her laughing stopped.
#
Chapter Five
Tears filled Nina’s eyes as she tried to focus. When she wiped her tears away, she felt Gray kneeling by her side, breathing hard. His face was hovered above her. Laughter had been replaced by concern.
“Are you okay?”
Once she knew he hadn’t fallen, she pulled herself up from the cold ground, resting the weight of her body on her elbows. “I’m fine.”
She glanced over at her bicycle in the middle of the driveway and saw that the handlebars were detached from the rest of the bicycle frame.
“Unfortunately, the bike isn’t.” Her laughter started anew. Nina laughed until her stomach muscles started to hurt. “Now you know why I upgraded to the SUV.”
When he realized she was fine, Gray laughed, too. “Did you jump off the bike on purpose?”
Nodding, she said, “I didn’t know what else to do!”
Gray shook his head. “You could have asked me to stop.”
As she sat up, she brushed the moist dirt from her jeans and her shirt. “Yeah, I could have done that. But jumping was more fun.”
“And you didn’t hurt yourself?”
“Gray, I’ve been thrown a time or two from my horse. I think I can handle a bumpy dismount from a bike.”
He stood up and extended his hand to help her to her feet.
Looking up at him, she said, “I don’t think I’ve laughed that hard in a long time.”
He smiled. “That’s what I love about being with you. I always laugh when I’m with you. It feels good.”
He reached out and brushed away an errant strand of hair from her face. The contact of his skin against hers made her dizzy. Looking into his gray-blue eyes, the heat was unmistakable. She wanted to kiss him. She had dreamed of it many times before, but she always pushed those dreams aside.
The screen door slammed. She couldn’t see if it was from one of the movers or one of her parents. But the intrusion was enough to break the connection between her and Gray.
Gray stepped back and then bent down to pick up the bike. The handlebars were only attached to the bike by the brake cable. He held onto the seat and started laughing again, which made it hard for Nina to hold back from laughing too. She wiped the moisture from her eyes as Gray pushed the bike up the driveway. They walked around the dumpster, still laughing from their failed bike ride.
As the front of the house came into view, Nina saw her father. He stood at the garage door and stared at the two of them as they laughed. His expression sobered her immediately.
“I thought you two were cleaning out the garage?” he said.
Nina cleared her throat. “We were just getting rid of the bike.” She turned to Gray and tried her best to hold back her smile. “Yes, I think the bike should go in the dumpster.”
“Will do.” With one fell swoop, Gray lifted the bike with the dangling handlebars and tossed it over the side into the dumpster. The frame of the bike hit the wall on its way down and made a loud bang.
Her father was still staring. After a few seconds, he propped his hands on his hips. “Your mother was thinking of calling out for pizza. I thought maybe you two could take a drive over to Salvatore’s to pick them up.”
With his heavy stare bearing down on her, Nina wiped the dirt from her hands on the seat of her pants. “Sure. I’m getting hungry.”
Her father nodded and stalked back into the house, letting the screen door slam in his wake, a sign he wasn’t too happy with her.
Nina glanced over at Gray’s stricken face over her father’s reaction. “I hope you like pepperoni,” she said.
He smiled weakly. “Sure.”
* * *
“The truck is loaded,” her mother said. “Are you sure you don’t want us to stay here and help you with the rest?”
Nina shook her head. “No, it’s fine. I can clean up everything. Whatever is left, will go in the dumpster. I’ll call them in the morning to pick it up. If you don’t get on the road soon, you’ll end up getting caught in that storm that they forecasted. There’s nothing worse than being on the road in weather like that.”
“Your mother’s right,” her dad said. “I don’t like you being here alone. Ever since that ice storm last year the power in the house has been iffy during storms.”
“I’m fine, Dad. I still have my bed upstairs and plenty of linens. If the power goes out, I’ll drag everything downstairs and sleep in the living room. I know how to light a fire. I’ll survive.”
Gray came up behind her. She felt the heat of his body against hers even though they weren’t touching. “Are you two taking off soon?”
Her mother nodded. “Gray, I can’t thank you enough for helping today. We were able to get so much more done with that extra hand.”
Gray stepped around Nina and pulled her mother into a tight embrace. “I’m glad I could help.”
Her mother’s eyes were misty when she broke the embrace. “Don’t be a stranger. Come visit us sometime.”
“I’ll try to.”
Her father stared at Gray for a moment and then smiled. “You were a big help today. I appreciate it.” The two men shook hands. Any tension that she’d seen with her father regarding this afternoon’s incident was gone. She still didn’t understand why he’d reacted the way he did, but Nina chocked it up to stress. They were all feeling it.
Gray moved aside, and with the motion, Nina caught the slightest hint of his scent. It was uniquely him and male and alluring, something she had committed to memory a long time ago. She hated that she was still so affected by him even after all this time.
Nina’s mother turned to her. “We’re going to make a quick stop at the rehab center to see Jen. Colleen called earlier while you were out getting pizza to say that Jen developed a fever.”
Startled by the news, Nina gasped. “A fever? Just out of the blue like that?”
Her mother touched her arm to reassure her. “Colleen said it could be some fluid in her lungs. It happens sometimes. They’re on top of it. They always are. I just want to see Jen before we leave to be sure. It’s going to be a week before we can come back and move her.”
Her father gave her a hug. “There’s nothing to worry about.”
“Are you sure?”
He tapped her on the nose. “Since when are you the worrier?”
“Things change,” she said quietly.
Her father tapped her on the nose again. “Look in on your sister a few times this week. That’ll make us both feel better.”
“We both will,” Gray said.
After another hug to her father, Nina stood on the front porch and watched her parents drive away from the house that had been their family home for nearly twenty years. A few minutes later, she found Gray sitting on a barstool at the kitchen counter, looking through one of the boxes she’d set aside to bring with her to wherever she was going.
He seemed startled as she came into the kitchen, and gave her a sheepish grin as he placed an item back into the box.
“You caught me snooping.”
“You’ve been looking through boxes with me all day. There isn’t anything in there that’s earth shattering. Did you find anything interesting?”
The corners of his mouth lifted slightly. It was just enough to show her that he had found something, yet he said nothing.
“Yeah, okay. I don’t want to know.”
“I didn’t say anything,” he said, his eyes twinkling.
“You didn’t have to. What did you find?”
“Just some old pictures.” He reached into the box. “Here’s one of those school photos of you.”
He handed her the picture. She glanced at it and groaned. “Look at those pigtails. Who ever thought those were attractive?”
“You were six or seven in that picture?”
She shrugged and tossed the picture in the box. “About that. I’ll have t
o make sure to keep these put aside. My parents must have forgotten to put the box in one of their cars. I’ll take them with me when I go.”
“So you are going to Chicago.”
“Eventually. For a visit. But not right away. I’ll stay here until the house is sold and I know for sure where I’m going.”
“You’re really going to stay in this big empty house all alone?
She shrugged. “Sure, why not? I’ve got plenty to do. I need to sweep up and wash some things down. The house will be quiet.”
“I can already hear echoing when I walk now that all the furniture is gone.”
“Yeah, it’s funny. I vaguely remember that sound when my parents bought the house.”
He frowned. “I thought you lived here your whole life?”
She shook her head. “I was six. Jen was eight. We came to see the house the day my parents closed on the house and the two of us ran through all the rooms. We made a hell of a racket.” She chuckled with the memory. “My father installed carpeting a week later just to help buffer the sound.”
“I wonder what he’d have done if he’d had me and my brothers running around.”
She chuckled. “He’d have built a man cave outside where he could hide.”
Gray walked over to the sliding door leading out to the back yard. “Nice tree house. Did you and Jen build that with your father or was it already there?”
“My father and I did. Jen never liked the tree house. I used to go out there all the time when I was mad at her. It was the only way to get her to come out to me.”
He turned and looked confused. “What do you mean?”
“She hated it when I ignored her. So if I went out there to the tree house, I knew she’d eventually come out after me. She hated me having fun without her. I didn’t mind being alone like she did.”
“I didn’t know that about Jen.”
“It’s because she was always with you when you were together. You don’t remember the long stretches when you were on the rig and she was home waiting for you.”
“There were so many long stretches between when we could see each other that she didn’t want to leave my side. That’s what she used to say.”
Nina looked around the room. “This house sometimes spooked her when she was here alone.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, there were always noises. Banging. Whistles from the wind. She was always imagining something ominous, like we had ghosts.” Nina couldn’t help but laugh. “One time I took my dad’s chains from his tires and went up to the attic and dragged them across the floor. It totally freaked her out.”
Gray’s expression softened. “You are so wicked.”
Nina laughed. “I know. It was so fun.”
“I didn’t know she was afraid of things like that. I guess there was a lot we didn’t know about each other.”
“You weren’t dating all that long before she got into the accident. What was it? Six months?”
He shrugged. “Maybe a little less. Even six months can feel like a lifetime.”
“And another lifetime since she’s been gone.” At his startled look, she amended her statement. “Gone from here.”
“You have no one to come pull you down from the tree house anymore.”
“Who said she pulled me down? I convinced her to come up. Jen hated heights.”
“And for you, she’d do anything.”
A smile tugged at her lips. “We’re sisters. Sisters make sacrifices for each other.”
He grabbed the door to the slider and pushed it open. “Do you mind?”
“What? You want to check out the tree house?”
His smile was devilish, like a little boy about to embark on a new adventure. “Why not?”
They ran through the yard to the wide oak tree that housed her home away from home. Glancing up at the sky, Nina inspected the dark clouds that had threatened them all day.
“I think I just felt a raindrop,” she said.
“Are you going to let that stop you from climbing the tree?”
“Not a chance.”
“Why don’t I let you do the honors since it’s your tree house?”
She gave him a wry grin. “You just want a good view of me climbing.”
His lips lifted to a tilted grin. “I never said I was an angel. Besides, this way I can catch you if you fall.”
With her hands on the first rung of the wooden ladder her dad had built, she turned to him. “I’ll have you know that I have never fallen from this tree house.”
“When was the last time you were up there?”
“Never mind.”
“Thought so.”
She climbed the ladder as she had done many times in her youth. When she got to the top, she squeezed through the opening, noting for the first time how much her body had filled out since she was a girl.
“Careful coming through the opening. It’s kind of narrow.”
Gray turned his body sideways as he eased himself inside to the platform. “I can see that. Is this floor strong enough to hold both of us?”
“We’ll find out soon enough, won’t we?”
He sat with his back against the tree and his feet pulled up in front of him, clearly in need of more room than what the inside of the tree house afforded.
“What’s this?” he said, picking up a box tucked against the tree on the side he was sitting. It wasn’t until he pulled it out front that Nina recognized it and its significance.
“Tissue box.”
He looked around for any other items. “The only thing you keep in your tree house is a box of tissues? That’s it? No treasures?”
“I brought it up with me the last time I was here.”
He nodded, as if he understood. But his words told her he was wrong. “Did a boy break your heart?”
“No. Life did.”
#
Chapter Six
Gray cocked his head to one side, not understanding. How could he? She’d never confessed her feelings for him. And then after Jen’s accident, there were too many other things that were more important than her broken heart.
“Jen had been in the hospital for a few weeks. You remember. We were all there at the hospital looking for signs she’d get better. And then the doctors said they wanted a meeting with my parents. That was the day we learned Jen was never going to come out of her vegetative state.”
Gray’s shoulders slumped. He handed her the box of tissues. The old box of tissues had seen better days. The exposed tissue on the top was stained from rain having gotten into the enclosed area.
“I’d forgotten I’d come up here that day after we got the news,” she said, taking the box in her hand. “My parents stayed at the hospital and I came home. I didn’t know what I was going to do. I stayed up here for hours. No one was home. I could have easily just gone to my room to have a good cry. But for some reason being up here gave me comfort.”
“I remember that day. Your parents called. I was halfway through a fourteen-day shift at the rig. I wasn’t staying at the base camp like I normally do now. I was working my shift and then driving to the hospital and sleeping in that chair by Jen’s bed. When your dad called, I couldn’t get back here fast enough, as if somehow that was going to change Jen, and make her better.”
“I just sat here,” Nina said as the memory of that day flooded back. “I cried and thought and cried some more until it got so dark I couldn’t even see. I kept expecting Jen to poke her head up here and tell me I was being an idiot for wallowing and to come in before it got so dark I fell out of the tree. I don’t know what I was waiting for.”
“I do.”
She glanced at Gray. “Yeah?”
“You wanted someone to tell you it wasn’t true. You wanted to hear that they’d made a big mistake and that one day Jen was going to get up from that bed and be Jen again. I know, because for the longest time, that’s how I felt.”
She pulled a tissue out of the box and crumpled it in her fist. “Yeah
, I guess. I haven’t…”
“What?”
“I think I get why my parents finally decided to leave. So much of our lives have been stuck in time, marked by life before Jen’s accident and then just existing in the days after. My mom said that sometimes she feels frozen in time like Jen. As much as I was against them leaving here, I get it. I don’t know how much easier it’s going to be to have Jen at home with them or how that will make a difference. Jen will still be the way Jen is today. But it will certainly be easier for them than having to run back and forth to the hospital. I can’t really fault them for wanting to try.” She looked at Gray, who was picking on a piece of wood that had splintered free from the deck. “Do you know what I mean?”
“It doesn’t really matter what I think or feel. She’s not my daughter. She was never my wife. I have no say.”
“But you were engaged. You wanted a life together.”
His eyes pulled at his forehead into a frown. “What made you think we were engaged?”
Confusion filled her. “ Jen said…”
He looked at her directly. “She told you we were engaged?”
“I…guess I misunderstood.” She stuffed the crumpled tissue she’d fisted in the pocket of her jeans. “All this time you stayed true to her. I just assumed.”
“I loved her. I think in time…maybe we would have taken that step. But it hadn’t happened yet. What kind of man would I have been if I’d given up on her so easily?”
Nina drew in a deep breath and proceeded carefully. “You had to know…there was no future for you with Jen.”
“The heart and the head don’t always agree.”
“That I know well.”
“What do you know about that?”
She’d spoken her thoughts out loud and instantly regretted it. She often did that while she was up in her tree house. Her sanctuary. But in the past she’d always been alone. She’d let her guard down with Gray and now he was staring at her, wanting to know more.
The wind outside the walls of the tree house was getting stronger, causing the tree to bend and sway ever so slightly, and the tree house to move with it. “You can want something and know you can never have it. It just is what it is. You except it.”
His Dakota Heart Page 6
