The Firefighter's Family Secret

by Shirley Jump

  “And this story is supposed to make me feel better?”

  Rachel smiled then put up a hand. “Just wait. After two months of this, Winona realized her appetite was gone, not because she was grieving, but because she was pregnant. The baby that she and Charles had prayed to have was finally on its way, but Charles wasn’t here. Everyone told her to move on, forget her husband and start her life anew. She was a pregnant widow, and she would do well to find another husband. This was decades ago, remember, and women didn’t have many options or life insurance plans.”

  “That had to be tough.”

  “But Winona was tougher,” Rachel said. “She decided to believe that Charles was still alive and that he would come back to her. So she got back to living as if he was. She tended to the berries, canned the jams and jellies, cleaned her house and painted it a bright yellow color, so that he could see it from the ocean. She wanted to be sure that he had a beacon to guide him home.”

  “And what did the rest of Stone Gap think?”

  “They thought she was crazy. They told her she should accept reality and let go of the impossible. Move on and quit believing in what wasn’t real.” Rachel’s voice was quiet, dark, carrying a spell as the tale wove between them. “But she refused to listen. Every day, she’d dress in her prettiest dress, do her hair the way Charles liked it and make a dinner that he would enjoy. In between, she grew her berries and canned, and made enough money to keep up with the property and the taxes.”

  He was completely hooked on the story. He wanted to know more, to hear how it ended. The cat had fallen asleep, its tail twitching against his back from time to time, but Colton kept on rubbing the cat’s head, his attention fixed on Rachel’s words. “How long did she do this for?”

  “Five months and two weeks. The baby was nearly here, and still Winona refused to let any other men court her or to give up on the dream of Charles coming home. One night there was a terrible storm, more terrible than the one that Charles’s ship had disappeared in. Winona went into labor, alone in that little house, so sure she was going to lose her baby. For the first time in the months since her husband disappeared, Winona gave up on ever seeing him again. She was certain that she and her child would die that night, and she accepted that fact, because she knew they would be reunited with Charles. Maybe, she thought, this was what God intended for her and their child.”

  “This better have a happy ending, Rachel. I’m starting to get depressed.” Seriously, thought Colton. He wasn’t quite sure how Rachel saw this as a good way to pass the evening, not to mention help him see through the despair plaguing him. He might need to ask for his money back on the twenty-five-cent tour.

  Rachel laughed. “Hold your horses, cowboy. The storm raged on, with the wind howling outside and beating up the little yellow house with branches and rain. Lightning flashed as bright as sunshine, over and over. And just as the baby was about to crown, the door burst open, and there, standing in the doorway, soaking wet and with a beard reaching his chest, was Charles.”

  “No way. Where was he all this time?”

  “He’d wrecked on one of the barrier islands off North Carolina. It took him months to build a boat big enough and strong enough to get him back to his beloved Winona. But he’d done it, and just in time to help deliver his son.”

  It was a story that left even Colton a little choked up, but as touched as he was, no way was he willing to admit he had a couple of tears in his eyes.

  “Charles said it was the bright yellow paint that got him back to the right place. As he neared the coast, he could see the house through the lightning, so he set his course and kept on going until he reached home. He knew Winona would never give up on him, so he never gave up on her.” Rachel smiled, a soft, sweet look that touched her eyes.

  “That and eating all that magic love jam.”

  She laughed. “Yeah, maybe that, too. But the point of the story, and the reason people still tell it to this day, is that it should remind you that all is never lost. That there’s always hope for a new beginning, for a new start.”

  He knew what she meant. That just because he had watched a tragedy unfold before his eyes, powerless to stop it, didn’t mean that he wasn’t a good firefighter. Didn’t mean he couldn’t take this job in Stone Gap and find a new life here. Maybe with Rachel. Maybe in some little yellow house on the water with berries growing in the yard and the ocean breeze drifting in through the windows.

  A part of him really wanted that. Could even picture it, seeing Rachel standing in that yard, waiting for him to come home. But then he reminded himself that dreaming of a new future and actually having it were two different things. It was entirely possible that Harry would rescind the job offer once Colton told him about Willis and Foster. Then Colton would have to go back to Atlanta, back to the small brick building where the other men gave him those looks of pity and sympathy, and where every corner held a memory of the friends he had lost.

  He could go back there, but where would that leave Rachel? He thought of the little hardware store, and knew she intended to go right back to working behind that counter instead of pursuing her own dreams.

  “I’m not the only one who should remember the lessons from Winona and Charles,” Colton said.

  “What do you mean?”

  He sat on the bench, his arm draped on the back, fingers brushing against her shoulder. The cat stirred in its sleep but didn’t move, like a furry wall between them. “You have a chance at a new start, Rachel, once the shop reopens and your dad goes back to work, yet you keep dodging the answer of whether you are going to take it.”

  “I’m not dodging anything. I’m just helping my dad.”

  “Which is noble and wonderful. And which is what you have been doing for a year now, while the business you started withers away.”

  “There are only so many hours in the day, Colton.” She scowled. “I couldn’t keep both going.”

  “Couldn’t? Or chose not to?”

  She spun toward him. “What are you talking about?”

  “You could have hired someone part-time for the hardware shop. Or worked at night on the wedding planning business.”

  “Easier said than done.” She blew her bangs out of her face. “The shop has been struggling financially. I couldn’t afford to hire someone else to work there. I barely took a paycheck myself all year.”

  This was where it got difficult. Where Colton had to say the things to her that he was pretty sure she already knew, but hadn’t acknowledged. Things he was pretty damned sure he should also say to himself, but it was far easier to lecture Rachel than to face the same truths himself. “Don’t you think you could have asked any of the dozens of people in this town who showed up throughout the day today to help rebuild, to take a shift or two for free? All I heard from the folks of Stone Gap was what a great guy your dad was and how they were more than willing to do what it took to help him get back on his feet. All you would have had to do was ask, Rachel, and I bet they would have lined up to help.”

  She shook her head. “It’s not that simple.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it had to be me. Because I owed him.” She jerked to her feet, scaring the cat. It jumped from the bench with an angry yowl and disappeared into the woods. “You don’t understand, Colton, so stop pretending you do.”

  “If anyone in this world understands owing people, it’s me.” Colton crossed to her and took her hands in his. “We’re so much alike, Rachel. Both of us trying to make up for mistakes we didn’t even make.”

  She shook her head and tugged her hands out of his, putting distance between them again. The ocean whooshed in and out, like one of those white noise machines playing behind them. But it didn’t ease the stress in Rachel’s face.

  “But I did make this mistake.” Her voice was soft, broken. “I ran away when I should have
stayed. I just couldn’t...couldn’t handle my mother another day. She drank and she got mean and she was so much to take care of. I was young and selfish and just wanted...space.”

  He could understand that. There were many days when he was younger when he’d wanted to just leave town and not be responsible for his mother and sister. He’d wished he didn’t have to be the “man” of the house and he could have just been an ordinary kid. “There’s nothing wrong with that. We’ve all had those moments.”

  “But I left my father to deal with her. And when she got sick, my dad did everything alone, instead of telling me. He wanted me to keep working at my business, to pursue my career. By the time I found out...it was too late.” She bit her lip and swiped at the tears welling in her eyes. “The least I could do for him was to run that shop while he grieved for however long it took.”

  “And put your own life on hold.”

  “I...I had to.” Now the tears in her eyes brimmed and spilled over. Colton reached up and caught them on his thumb, wiping them away.

  “How long are you going to let fear run you, Rachel?” he said.

  “I’m...I’m not afraid.” The words wobbled, and he knew he’d hit a truth.

  “Oh, honey, you are. And that’s totally okay.” He drew her into his arms, not caring that her tears dampened his shirt. Colton was a man used to rescuing people. And once again, he couldn’t rescue this one. If Rachel wanted the life she deserved—the life she had walked away from a year ago—she was going to have to be the one to go out there and get it.

  There was probably a message in there for him, too, but he was going to have to shelve that for now.

  “Take a chance,” he whispered against her. “Take that leap.”

  She held on to him for a long time while the ocean crashed against the shore and the little yellow house stood bright and determined under the moon. “I wish I could, Colton,” she said.

  Then she walked away. He let her go, because he knew that until he was ready to take his own advice, he was never going to have the right words to convince Rachel to do the same.

  * * *

  Rachel woke up Saturday morning and lay in bed for a long time, staring at the ceiling. She missed Colton. Her hand snaked across the empty space beside her, but found only cold sheets. She’d dreamed about him, a dream so vivid, it seemed as if he should be here.

  But he wasn’t.

  And a lot of that was her fault. He tried to get close to her, and she pushed him away. She kept undermining the very thing she wanted.

  He was an incredible man. Considerate, loving, giving. He’d rushed in there and saved her father when another person might have run from the flames. He’d gone and single-handedly spearheaded the rebuilding of her father’s store, and for no other reason than to help him. And he had made love to her in a way that had left her breathless and feeling like the most treasured woman on the planet.

  All of which terrified her. How many years had she been planning weddings and dreaming of the very same happy ending for herself? Now that she had finally met a man who could fit the image she’d long wished for herself, she was afraid it would all pop, like a balloon.

  Either way, she needed to focus on her father for now. Colton Barlow—and all he represented and all the questions he raised in her heart—would have to wait. Okay, so maybe she was making excuses, but she really didn’t want to answer the questions that Colton had asked her last night.

  She swung her feet over the bed and got up before she was tempted to lie there another second. A few minutes later she had showered, changed into old jeans and a T-shirt and pulled on some sneakers. She swept her hair into a ponytail and grabbed a granola bar and a water bottle on her way out the door. A little past seven, she pulled into her father’s driveway and knocked on the door.

  To her surprise, her dad opened the door. For almost a year, she’d knocked and gotten no response, and always ended up letting herself in. But there was her dad on the other side of the door, already dressed, his hair combed, his face shaved and a hot cup of coffee in his free hand. “Good morning.”

  She blinked. “Wow. You’re up and ready, Dad?”

  “Yup. Figured it was about time I got my act together.”

  “Are you feeling okay? Shouldn’t you be resting—”

  He put up a hand to cut off her words. “I feel fine. And I’m going to feel a lot better when I get out of here and over to the store. Sun’s been up for thirty minutes already, and time’s a-wastin’.”

  She laughed. This was the father she remembered, the can-do man who would work all day and then take her out in the yard to play catch or build a birdhouse. In her memory, her dad was tireless, a superhero she could always count on. “Okay, but what about breakfast?” She started to brush past him. “I can make some eggs and toast—”

  “Already ate. I left you a plate on the stove. But eat fast, will you? I want to get down there as soon as I can.”

  Rachel turned to her father. “Who are you?”

  His gaze softened, and a smile filled his face. “The dad you used to have.”

  That made Rachel’s eyes water. Good Lord, she had cried more in the last few days than in the last year. She drew her father into a tight hug and said a silent prayer of thanks.

  He patted her back. “Okay, okay. Enough of this before we turn into weeping willows. Eat your breakfast and we’ll go.”

  She took a seat at the table. The roles had reversed, she realized, when her father put a plate before her and poured her a cup of coffee. Maybe her father was more ready to go back to his life than she thought.

  How long are you going to let fear run you?

  Was Colton right? Was she avoiding her business because she was afraid? Afraid that it had sat by the wayside for too long and may never recover?

  Yet another set of questions she was not going to answer today. Or at least not right now.

  Her father sat down across from her and sipped at his coffee. “Before we leave, I wanted to talk to you about your mother. I know you’ve been bothered by what happened last year. And I just didn’t talk about it, no matter how many times you tried to bring it up.”

  “It’s a painful subject, Dad. It’s okay.”

  “No, it’s not okay.” He let out a long sigh. “Not talking about the painful subjects is how we got to this place. With me sitting at the kitchen table, working on the same crossword puzzle all damned day. And with your mother, getting to the point where the cirrhosis was irreversible before she told us about it.”

  Rachel fiddled with her toast. “Maybe because we all perfected that over the years. Not talking about her drinking, not talking about how she had changed.”

  “Acting like if we pretended it didn’t exist, it would stop being a problem?”

  Rachel nodded. “Yeah.”

  “I loved your mother, Rachel. Loved her more than I can even say. But I failed her. I didn’t stop her. I couldn’t stop her. I tried, Lord knows I tried. Three times, I put her into rehab.”

  Rachel had never known that. She’d always thought her father had looked the other way, ignoring the truth for years. “You did?”

  “When you were away at school. I thought maybe she’d get clean and we could have some semblance of family life. But every time, she’d come home and start again. It was as if she couldn’t shake those demons, no matter how hard she tried.”

  “She was stuck in a rut, too scared to climb out of it.” Gee, who did that sound like? Rachel realized she was doing the same thing, only she was using the shop instead of alcohol as a reason not to move forward. Except moving forward was a lot easier to think about than it was to do.

  “I guess that’s what kept me in this house for a year.” Her father sighed. “I always felt like I had let your mother down. If I had tried harder or pushed her more...”
/>   “We both should have, Dad,” she said. The sunshine-shaped clock in the kitchen ticked past the hour, as it had for most of Rachel’s life. So many things in this kitchen had stayed the same, stuck in a time warp. Her mother hadn’t changed anything, not the stoneware pattern or the curtains in the window. Everything the same, day after day. “Honestly, I don’t know if anything we could have done would have made a difference. She was the one who had to want a change, and we couldn’t force that. Only encourage and support it.”

  “You’re right, but that’s a hard truth to accept,” he said. “Maybe we all just needed to try harder.”

  “And maybe I shouldn’t have gone away to school or worked so hard and left you to deal with all this.” She sighed.

  “I don’t blame you, honey, for staying at school and working all the time. You saved yourself, and you have to do that.”

  She covered her father’s hand with her own. “I did it at the expense of you. That’s not right.”

  “It’s exactly right.” He patted the back of her hand and his eyes softened. “What do they tell you on the airplane? Put the oxygen mask on yourself before you put it on someone else. You saved yourself, and got yourself out of this situation so that you could grow up and be happy and healthy. And when you were strong enough, you came back and saved me.”

  She thought of the last year, of all the time and energy she had given to the man who had scared the monsters out of her childhood closet and taught her how to fish. Hours she would gladly give again and again.

  He drew her into his arms. His cheek was smooth, scented with the familiar cologne she’d known all her life. His hug was firm and solid and comforting. “I love you, too. All the way to the moon...”

  “And back,” she whispered. “All the way back.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Colton stood in Harry Washington’s office on the second floor of the brick building housing the Stone Gap Fire Department at an ungodly early hour on Saturday morning. Harry was eating a glazed donut and sipping from a giant coffee mug.