by Liz Isaacson
“I don’t have to do anything you say,” he said, sneering at Blake. “You’re not my father.” He threw the bag of popcorn on the ground, spilling even more of it, and leapt to his feet. He stomped away while Blake stared after him, his chest so, so tight.
“Cole!” Erin called after him. She started to get up, but Blake put his hand on her shoulders.
“I’ll get him.” He went after the boy, easily keeping his eye on him as the crowd waited on blankets, making Cole the tallest moving target. The concert started just as Blake reached the back of the crowd, and disappointment lashed through him. He’d wanted to have a fun evening together, and an eight-year-old had ruined it.
Anger snuck into him as he caught up to Cole just before he entered the playground area. “Cole,” he said. “Please wait.”
The boy looked over his shoulder and kept right on going. “Leave me alone.”
Blake wanted to reach out and grab him, make him stop, but he didn’t think it wise. He was surprised he could think at all, given how upset he’d become. He let Cole go until he came to a bench near the tennis courts, where he sat.
Blake approached slowly. “I know I’m not your father. I don’t want to be.”
“Yes, you do. I’ve seen you with my mom.”
Embarrassment heated his face further. “What have you seen?” Blake crouched in the wood chips in front of Cole, trying to make himself smaller. It wasn’t easy with his height, but Cole didn’t seem like he was about to run again.
“You kiss her after she puts us to bed.”
Blake nodded, his eyes staying evenly on Cole’s. “I like her. That’s what grown-ups do when they like each other.”
“She already has us. She doesn’t need you.”
“Of course she doesn’t.” Blake wasn’t sure why he was agreeing with a child. “She loves you. She’s not going to love you less by loving me.” Blake shook his head. “I mean, not that she loves me. We’re just…dating.”
“If she wants us to do things as a family, I don’t see why you get to come.”
“Cole—”
“Leave us alone.” The boy got up and Blake did grab him this time. “I already have a dad, and he’s a lot better than you.”
“Cole, I’m not trying to replace your dad, or you, or anyone.”
“Let me go.” He tried to wrench his arm free, but Blake was significantly stronger and the boy’s struggle barely registered against the grip.
“Not until you understand—”
Cole screamed. A horrible, high-pitched scream that would surely draw the attention of everyone in the town.
Blake released him and watched him sprint away, his pulse bobbing somewhere behind his ears. A couple of mothers looked his way, but he ignored them and sat on the bench. In the distance, the bass notes from the concert could be heard.
Blake’s thoughts had scattered and he couldn’t seem to find them. Shouldn’t have disciplined her child, he thought.
Cole’s right.
You’re not his dad.
Blake heaved a sigh as he stood. No matter what, no matter if he and Erin got married, no matter how many times he took Cole fishing, Blake would never be Cole’s father. He walked away from the concert with those thoughts tumbling through his mind.
He left the park and started down the block away from Main Street, where the bakery stood. In order to walk around the entire park and get back to the bakery, where he’d parked his truck, he’d have to cover a couple of miles at least.
As he made the journey, he ignored the buzzing of his phone until it drove him mad. Then he silenced it. He didn’t know what to tell Erin, and seeing as how Cole had run toward the concert instead of away from it, he figured the boy had made it back to her just fine.
He still didn’t have the right words to say when he reached his truck, so he drove up the canyon, turned off his phone, and dropped to his knees beside his bed.
For a problem this big, he definitely needed divine help.
The following morning, Blake called Erin a few hours before he usually met her for church.
“Blake,” she said, her voice on the outer edge of angry. “What is going on? I called you a bunch of times last night, and nothing? I get nothing from you?”
“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice ringing with apology in the morning air behind his cabin. “I needed some time to think.”
“And have you?”
“Yeah.” He exhaled, his next words well-practiced and the ones he knew he needed to say. He just couldn’t get himself to say them.
“And?” she prompted.
“Erin, I—I don’t think we should see each other anymore.”
The silence coming through the line testified that she hadn’t expected him to say that. The fissures that had started in his heart last night widened into full-blown cracks.
“Why not?” she whispered.
He didn’t want to blame the break-up on her. She didn’t deserve that, had done nothing wrong. He absolutely wouldn’t put it on her eight-year-old son. Which left one person. “I’m not ready,” he said. “See, there’s this girl I fell in love with in high school, and I thought I was over her, I swear I did. But I’m not.” The story of his insane crush on Jessica poured from him, and while they weren’t true, he could shoulder the blame for ending this relationship.
He finally stopped talking. Problem was, Erin didn’t say anything either. He glanced at the phone, and the call was still connected.
“Erin?”
“What’s her name?”
“Who?”
“This girl you’re still in love with from high school.” Erin spoke in a freaky calm voice Blake had only ever heard her use on Cole when he was misbehaving.
“Jessica Charles.”
“Blake—” A sound very much like a sob came through the line, and Blake hung his head. He did not want to upset Erin. He never wanted to add more to her burdens.
“Blake, tell me this has nothing to do with Cole.”
“Of course it doesn’t.” He was relieved she wasn’t here to see his expression, because he was sure she’d be able to discover his lie.
“Because he said he’d apologize to you at church today.”
“That’s not necessary.”
“You won’t come to church today, will you?”
“I think I’ll be there,” Blake said.
“Great, we’ll see you there.”
“Erin, I—” He pressed his eyes closed and swallowed. “I don’t want to sit by you.”
The sniffling entering his ear was definitely crying this time. “Blake, please don’t—”
“I have to go.” He hung up and gripped his phone so tight it made his knuckles ache. He tossed it a few feet away in the grass, catching Rosco’s attention. He went over to the device and sniffed it. Blake breathed rapidly, trying to figure out how he could live with this band of tension around his chest for the rest of his life.
Chapter Twelve
“Let’s go visit Grandma and Grandpa,” Erin announced as soon as she’d deemed herself presentable enough to leave the bedroom where Blake had just broken up with her. After hanging up, she’d cried into her pillow for a good ten minutes. Then she’d showered, hoping the hot water would erase the evidence of her puffy eyes.
With more makeup on than she normally wore, she bustled into the kitchen, which still wasn’t put back together. Doug had ordered a new refrigerator and apparently it had gone out of stock, and Blake hadn’t had time to get the walls patched and textured and painted yet.
“Grandma?” McKenzie asked, and Erin turned toward her. “That’s right. Come on, guys. We haven’t seen them since we moved out, and I don’t feel like going to church today.”
“No church?” Cole’s eyes lit up. He whooped and ran toward the bedroom he shared with Davy.
Several minutes later, Erin drove away from Brush Creek, finally able to draw a decent breath. She couldn’t stand the thought of seeing Blake at church and not sitting by
him. What was she supposed to do? Sit on the back row with her kids all alone?
She shook her head and gripped the steering wheel, oscillating between the need to cry and the need to punch something. With her emotions bombarding her thoughts, the drive to Vernal passed in a snap.
She pulled up to her parents’ house, hoping her mother had stuck something in the Crock Pot, as she usually did in the summer months. Sure enough, the smell of marinara sauce met her nose when she pushed through the front door.
“Mom? Dad?”
The sliding glass door opened, and her father appeared. A sob worked its way up her throat, just as it had when she’d shown up in this very house the day she’d left Jeremy.
“Erin?” He turned back to the backyard. “It’s Erin.” Her mother followed her father, and several minutes passed with hugs and laughter and smiles. Erin did her best to join in, but all the joviality exhausted her.
“You’re just in time for the irrigating,” her dad said, and Davy cheered, dancing around like watering the lawn was the greatest thing on the planet. Erin had to admit it was pretty cool. Her dad would open the irrigation floodgate, and the entire backyard would fill with about six inches of water. He did it once a week, and the lawn stayed green and lush.
And her kids loved to wade in the flood, lay down in it, and as Davy liked to do, make “water angels.”
He pranced up to her, his demeanor darkening. “We didn’t bring our swimsuits.”
She smoothed his hair. “Just take your shirt off, baby. We can throw your shorts in the dryer. I’m sure Grandpa has a shirt you can wear while they dry.”
“I have their pajamas in the drawer in the bathroom,” her mom said.
Erin forced a smile in her mom’s direction. “Even better.”
“So we can go?” Cole waited with his hand on the handle of the sliding glass door.
“Go,” Erin said. Her father followed the kids into the yard, leaving Erin alone with her mother.
“What brings you here?” her mom asked, busying herself in the kitchen. She opened a bag of rolls and started slicing them. “How’s the bakery?”
Erin sat at the counter and watched her mom for a few moments. “Aunt Shirley has me making all the pies now. She doesn’t come in until five, and she only does the tarts.”
“She called yesterday.” Her mom flashed her a quick smile. “Told me you’re doing great there.” She paused in her work and trained her eyes on Erin’s. “Do you like it?”
“You know what? I do like it.” She wasn’t sure if it mattered if she liked it. The job at the bakery paid the bills, and she had her own place to raise her kids. Her gaze wandered to the glass door and the three little people beyond it. “I came today because I didn’t want to go to church.”
“No?”
Erin shook her head, her tears getting dislodged. “The man I’ve been seeing broke up with me, and I—” She sniffed and wiped her eyes, shaking her head some more. She studied the countertop, wishing she hadn’t gotten so attached to Blake.
Her mom laid the knife on the counter, her lunch preparations stalled. “You were seeing someone?”
“Dating, yes.” Erin covered her face with her hands and took a deep, deep breath. “I don’t remember breaking up feeling this bad.” She lowered her hands and looked at her mom with raw emotion streaming from her. Her chin shook as she said, “Even ending things with Jeremy didn’t feel like this.”
Her mom gazed at her with eyes full of compassion. “Things with Jeremy had been over for a long time by the time you officially ended it.”
“No, I know.” Erin got up and tore a paper towel off the roll to wipe her eyes and nose.
“You must’ve really liked this new guy.” Her mom leaned against the counter, watching Erin.
“I did, I guess,” Erin said. “I mean, yeah, I did. I—” She drew in a shuddering breath. “We’ve been dating for a few months is all. He works at the ranch outside of town, and he’s a general contractor too. Doug hired him to work on the bakery, and we’ve been—we’ve been spending time together and…and….” She trailed off as she realized she wanted to spend all her free time with Blake. She wanted him at her side at church, at home, all the time.
She gasped and covered her mouth with her hand. “And I fell in love with him.” She spun toward the front door, like Blake would be standing there, a dozen roses in his hand.
“You fell in love with him?”
Erin locked eyes with her mom, completely dumbstruck herself. “I think I did.”
Her mom’s eyes shone and she smiled with true happiness. “That’s wonderful, dear. Your father and I have been hoping you’d find someone again.”
The feeling of elation that had been rising through her chest stalled, stopped, exploded. “But he just broke up with me.”
“All right.” Her mom picked up the knife and resumed cutting the rolls. “Tell me what happened, and let’s figure this out.”
So Erin took her seat at the bar again and started talking, ending with, “He said he wasn’t over some girl he’d been in love with since high school.”
Before her mom could offer what Erin was sure would solve all her problems, Cole led the kids and her dad back into the house. Things got loud for several minutes while towels were handed out, and hair dried, and clothes changed. Erin tossed all the wet clothes in the dryer and glanced to the plaque hanging on the wall above it.
Our greatest weakness lies in giving up.
Erin read it again, and again. She thought about Blake. Had he given up on them? Because of her? Because of Cole? Because of this Jessica woman?
Would Erin give up on them?
“I don’t want to,” she whispered to herself. Her love might be new, fledgling, trying to grow real wings, but it existed inside her heart. She couldn’t give up on Blake because he had a decade-old crush.
“What should I do?” she asked as she steadied herself against the dryer.
Find out who Jessica Charles is.
With a plan and renewed determination, Erin returned to the kitchen, where she whispered to her mom about her idea to look up this other woman and then talk to Blake about how she felt.
“Doable?” she asked as her mom put the finishing touches on the pasta.
“Definitely doable.” Her mom gave her a quick squeeze. “Call me when you know anything. After you talk to him. Anytime.”
Finding Jessica Charles was harder than Erin thought it would be. Probably because her computer was as old as Davy, and the Internet at the bakery needed to be updated. Her kids had gone to bed an hour ago, and she felt like a modern female MacGyver as she brought up a couple of search windows.
She knew Blake had grown up in Colorado, and she found sixteen Jessica’s in his graduating class. None of them had the last name of Charles.
Perplexed, she started at the top of the list with Jessica Anderson and turned to Facebook. A lot of women—Erin herself included—used their maiden names when they got married. But nothing made sense, because why would Blake still be hung up on a girl from ten years ago who’d gotten married?
Confused but undaunted, Erin searched until she found a Jessica Jeffries Charles. She couldn’t see a whole lot of information, but she could see that she’d graduated from the same high school as Blake.
“Can’t be coincidence,” she muttered to herself. She wanted to see everything about this Jessica Charles, get all the facts, make the best case she could for why Blake needed to leave this other woman in the past.
She clicked the “Add Friend” button even though she and Jessica didn’t have a single friend in common. Her mind ran through that information. Jessica wasn’t even friends with Blake.
“Maybe he’s not on Facebook.” She clicked and searched and scanned, and sure enough, she found a Blake Gibbons with a profile picture of him riding a bull. Upon further examination, she realized that it couldn’t be Blake, but had to be his twin brother.
She wasn’t sure how she felt about Blake�
�s misrepresentation of himself, but then she realized that the last time he’d posted had been over a year ago. He obviously didn’t use the social media platform much and she didn’t want to judge him on a photograph. Maybe he was just proud of his brother. She’d put pictures of her kids up as her profile picture before.
Satisfied she had a good start to the information she needed, she shut down the computer and went to bed. She paused by the sleeping form of McKenzie, love rushing through her for the little girl. She’d thought Kenz would be her miracle baby, the one that would heal all the rifts in her marriage with Jeremy.
How foolish she’d been. For a few months after the divorce, Erin had trouble adoring her little girl. She still loved her, but looking into McKenzie’s eyes—the same shade of navy blue as Jeremy’s—had sometimes made her breath cut through her chest.
She felt none of that now, thankfully.
Erin sent a prayer of gratitude up to God for His help over the past year. She added, And help me know what to do with Blake. What to tell him. What to say to bring him back to me.
As she stood there in the brown-black darkness, she realized she’d never prayed for help to fix her broken relationship with Jeremy. Maybe she hadn’t had enough faith. Maybe she hadn’t really wanted to repair the marriage. No matter what maybe was true, Erin knew she didn’t want to give up this time.
Chapter Thirteen
Blake didn’t see Erin and her kids at church that day. Or the next week. He missed church for the following two weekends due to harvesting. And he was behind due to his main harvester throwing its chain. He’d spent hours in the machinery shed trying to figure out how to get it up and running again.
He hadn’t been able to, and Walker didn’t want him taking a day to get to Salt Lake to maybe find the part they needed. His argument of it needing to be special-ordered had merit, and Blake woke before the sun so he could get the numbers he needed to call in an order.
He stomped across the street and around the homestead, the weather growing cooler and cooler each morning. He pulled his jacket tighter as he entered the machinery shed, surprised to find Walker there with his son Michael.
