by Marr, Maggie
I’ve spent the last four weeks with Jack. I’ve stayed nearly every night at his place. We’ve played house, nearly living the life we might’ve led if there hadn’t been a big wave accident or a Phuket. Or if I wasn’t the COO in Australia and running Bliss Boards.
“Looks like we’ll need to find the right person then, in LA,” Brett says. “If Jack doesn’t want to do it, and this Presley person is only interested in marketing, that’s fine, but we’ll need to find someone who gets who we are as a company and can work with Jack.”
“On it,” I say. “I’ve already put out some feelers. Once I get back to…” My gaze glances across the area outside my office. “Sydney.” My heart hurts with the word.
“Okay then. Once you get to the airport turn off that phone. There’s nothing we can’t handle for a week—”
“Two weeks,” I interrupt.
“Two?”
“That was the deal.”
“Not as I remember it.”
“Jack. The report. Presley. Marketing guru. Great numbers. Great recommendations.”
“Two it is!” Brett says. “Have fun. Call if you want.” His voice softens again. “If you need anything at all, you know that right?”
“I do.” He’s telling me without actually bringing up the things I don’t want to discuss with him that he’s always there for me. At least I don’t want to discuss them today. Today my emotions already run close to the surface. They’re conflicted and confused and I simply don’t have the bandwidth to drill down into my feelings with my brother and he’s good with that, but he’s also a good guy.
“Thank you,” I say. We hang up. I check the time. Couple more hours and I’m on the way to the airport. Is Jack really going to let me leave without saying goodbye?
I walk out of my office and turn the corner toward Presley’s office. “Hey Presley, I wondered if you’d seen Jack?”
“Hmm?” She looks at me as though she’s been caught doing something or hiding something. She stands and closes the door behind me. “So listen, about me going to Australia,” she says, and leans against her office door.
“Mmhm. After my vacation, give me a week or so. I thought beginning of month after next. Just so you can meet everyone. See how we operate there and then you can come back here and work or stay there—”
“Or move to Reykjavek?” she asks, excitement pulsing in her eyes.
“Okaaaay…not much surfing in Reykjavek,” I say. “Really, not even much sun.” I squint.
“I don’t surf and do I look like I enjoy the sun?” She waves her hand in front of her paper-white skin.
“Actually no, which makes it even more amazing how good you are at marketing surfboards and everything else surf related.”
“The peeps and what they want? Not so difficult.” She twirls her pink pigtail in her fingers “So listen, about my raise and my benefits. Do you think I could have a horse?”
“You really are an odd duck aren’t you?”
A smile spreads over her face. “I really am.” She glances past me toward the window behind me. “Hey! Let’s get some coffee. In the break room.”
“Coffee? It’s nearly five. I have a very long flight and I don’t think”—Presley grabs my arm and shoves me from her office—“OK, we’re doing this, we’re getting old coffee.”
Presley pushes me down the hall and around the corner into the break room. “Surprise!”
I jump back. My mouth drops open. The entire Bliss Board office stands just inside the break room.
The cake is the original Bliss Board surfboard design that was scratched out on a napkin by me, Jack, and Brett with our logo.
“Oh my God! You guys!” I say. I scan the crowd. The entire team of summer surf coaches and the office staff stand around the cake. Jack is directly across from me. His smile is huge, just like always, and if I didn’t know him the way that I know him, his smile would hide the feelings in his eyes.
He’s sad. I’m sad. But we’re both smiling. Smiling at each other and smiling at the people around us. The people who depend on us.
“You’re one of us now.” Jack reaches out and places a Bliss Boards Venice Beach hat on my head.
I smile. “This’ll come in handy.”
“Mesquale?”
I nod. “I love it there.”
“Yeah,” he says, “so do I.”
We look at each other. There was a lovely vacation that took place at the Tahitian resort just before the accident.
Heat thrills through my body with the memory. A private beach, a private bungalow, firelight, hot tub….Us.
“Who wants cake?” Presley asks. A chorus of ‘yes’s’ burst through the room. I smile as people pat me on the back and thank me for my work. Presley shoves a piece of cake on a plate into my hand. I take a big bite. I lick my lips. Jack scoots around the table to me. “Want a bite?”
“Of course,” he says.
I feed him the cake.
A tingle crashes through my body. A wave of want.
“You know,” I say, and lick the frosting from the fork tines. “If you wanted to visit Mesquale, with me…” I lift an eyebrow.
His eyes sparkle and then he glances around the break room. “I read your report,” he says. His smile remains plastered to his face but the intensity fades. “It was amazing. You hit the market points just right.” He reaches out and clasps my elbow. “Presley will do a great job on the new worldwide marketing campaign. Plus, I know that your expansion plan will be a big success.”
And with those words, I have my answer to my invitation to Mesquale. “Thanks,” I say. My happiness about what I’ve accomplished and what will be accomplished for the entire company, fades. I want more. I want my work and my job and my brother and my nieces and I want Jack too.
I look at him.
Ache fills my heart. I have my closure. We had our conversation and we’ve had a great time together. Now it’s time for both of us to move on. We can’t seem to find a compromise. I can’t convince Jack that he is what I want and what I need and he can’t accept that his limitations won’t hamper who I want to be. We’re stuck. I toss my remaining cake into the trash. I hug Presley and every other staff member goodbye and head toward my office to collect my bag. It’s time for me to go.
11
Jack
Waves stroke the shore. A warm breeze rustles the palm trees. I walk through the sand to the water. The sunrise reflects off the water. Deep breath. I press my hand to my forehead and stare into the distance.
There aren’t any celebrations that make my heart sing anymore. The cake in the break room to celebrate Delia leaving for college didn’t make me happy. Instead, there was a longing that throbbed through my chest. A longing for Em.
In the distance, three surfers float on their boards waiting for their wave. One paddles and catches her wave. She stands and steadies herself, gliding across the water. She’s like a mermaid with legs. Long, wet, hair flying behind her. Eyes focused. Muscles in her legs defined. Steady and sharp, she owns the wave she’s on. A smile breaks over her face. She tips into the drink. A few seconds later she pops up. She’s on her way in.
I walk to the water’s edge. She looks up.
Our eyes meet.
For a moment, fear pulses through me. Did I make a mistake? Should I have stayed in California? Maybe she wanted to be alone? Did I misread her actions?
“Oh my god.” She widens her eyes and the smile that I love; the smile that I always want to see; the smile that I need in my life and in my world breaks over her face. “You’re here! You came!” She runs to me.
I wrap her in my arms. The scent of sun, sand, and surf wafts into my nose. I squeeze her to me. “I can’t be without you,” I say. I pull back and look into Em’s eyes. “I don’t want to be without you. Can I stay? Can we try? Can you ever trust—”
She presses her fingers to my lips. Again, her smile breaks over her face. “I can.” She presses up on her toes and presses her lips to mine. Thi
s kiss in the morning sunshine seals us together. I know it.
She pulls back and looks at me. “We can do this,” she says. “We did it for four weeks in LA. I wasn’t just auditing your shop, I was also running Bliss Boards and we were happy.”
I smile. “Those four weeks are the happiest I’ve been since I left you in Phuket. I made the biggest mistake of my life that day. I need you to understand that I know that. I realize what I did and even if I thought I was doing the right thing, I wasn’t, and I won’t make that mistake again.” I press my fingertips to her chin. “I want you to understand that I am yours. I’m not going anywhere without you again. Not leaving. Not running. Nope, you’re stuck with me and my post-it notes and my inability to grasp nuance and my faulty memory.” I press my lips to her nose. “Think you can stand all that?”
Emma hitches her arm around my waist and we turn toward her beach bungalow. “You know, you may not realize this, but you were never organized.”
“What are you talking about? I was completely organized. Do you remember how I used to keep my closet?”
“Uh, that wasn’t organized. You and Brett always relied on me to organize paperwork. So while you may think that our lack of organization is a big burden, it’s not.”
I smile. I can’t believe how ridiculous all my reasons for leaving seem now. That I would leave the woman I love because I thought that I was too big of a burden to her and that she could soar higher and further without the burden of me. But we aren’t burdens to each other. How did I not see that? We aren’t burdens — no — we are launching pads. I’m a better person when I’m with Em. I’m secure. I’m grounded. I’m able to strive.
“We complement each other, Jack. You don’t hold me back and I don’t need you to be different. You give me joy and ground me and I give you—”
“My world,” I say. “You give me my world.” I lean down and press my lips to Emma’s. We push open the back slider of her private beach bungalow. I pick her up and walk her to the bed.
“This is the beginning of the rest of our life together, Bubbles.”
“Yes, it is,” she says and smiles. “It absolutely is.”
Epilogue
“Oh my god, look at them,” I squeal. Lily and Hazel walk into my room wearing white dresses and pink roses in their hair. “You two look perfect.”
Lily hides behind Torrey’s leg while Hazel’s grin takes over her face.
“You both know what you’re supposed to do, right?” Torrey asks.
“Drop the flower petals on the white carpet,” Hazel says.
“Lily?” Torrey looks down at my shy niece.
“Yes, Mama.”
“You can do that, right? For Aunt Emma? You can drop the rose petals?”
Lily nods and her wide, blue eyes look so serious. “It absolutely does not matter to me whether they drop one petal or all of them. They are precious and I’m simply happy they are here and this day is happening.”
“Fingers crossed. We practiced at home. I think we’ve got it,” Torrey whispers in my ear. “Okay girls,” she says. “Let’s go out and wait for Aunt Emma.” Torrey looks at me. “You look beautiful. Jack is a lucky, lucky guy.”
“Thank you,” I say.
I look in the full-length mirror. My three bridesmaids scramble around. Getting their flowers and mine. Deep breath. They file out of the room. I stand by the back door.
“You ready?” My dad pops his head in.
I nod. We exit the house overlooking the beach. And there, standing on the sand, with the Pacific as a backdrop, stands Jack with my brother by his side. I smile. I’ve been ready for this moment for what feels like my entire life.
Epilogue
Epilogue 2
“Is it normal to be this nervous?” I glance at Brett. We both sit beside the pool.
“Dude, you’re doing better than I did. When Torrey was pregnant with the twins I thought I’d lose my mind. All I kept thinking about was all the things that could go wrong. With the birth and then after and what if there was an earthquake on the way to the hospital and what__”
“Okay, got it, thanks,” I say. I look at Emma who is in the pool. She’s always loved the water but she especially loves the water right now. It’s the only place where her hips and back don’t hurt.
“Guess this baby is going to take its sweet time to arrive, I say. “The due date was last week.”
“Yeah, the twins were early but that is pretty normal with twins. Singles, I know nothing about,” Brett says.
In the pool, Emma walks to the stairs. Lily and Hazel walk out the back sliders of the house. They run to the deep end and jump. I look across the water to the shallows where Emma lumbers from the pool. I rush over and hold out a towel.
“How you feeling, babe? I pull her into my arms,which can just barely get all the way around her with the baby bump between us.
“We need to go,” she whispers. She presses her hand to the side of her giant belly and looks up at me.
“Okay you’re tired—”
“No,” she whispers and shakes her head. “I mean we need to go.”
“Wait, what?”
“The contractions have been coming for about half an hour.”
‘And you didn’t tell me?”
“Look, it could take forever. So I didn’t want to say anything to anyone. I want to quietly go and get my bag and you can take me to the hospital. OK?”
I nod. “Whatever you want Bubbles, you know that.”
A smile crosses her face. She laces her fingers through mine. I press my hand to her lower back and slowly walk toward her shoes beside the chair.
This is happening now. I’m going to be a dad and Emma is going to be a mom and together, the three of us are going to be a family.
***
Did you love Brett (Em’s brother) and his wife Torrey? Read their HOT SEXY love story in BLISS! FREE in KU!
Read about Matt & Ashley’s SEXY full-length love story in HUGE!
Want to read more about Ryan & Charla and Mesquale in Last Call For Love!
Read about Devon & Ilana’s (Jack’s neighbors’) love story in A FORBIDDEN LOVE!
Read about the artist Rhiannon Bliss and her love story with Sterling Legend in FAST GLAMOUR!
