Light Unshaken (Unveiled #2)

by Crystal Walton

  “Come on, Barefoot Beauty.” He closed me in his arms and in the sound of instrumental music playing from the stereo. “Just you and me.”

  Jake pawed at my leg. “And apparently Jake. Think he might want to cut in.”

  “I think you’re right.” Riley motioned for him to lie down. “It’s a good thing he’s coming with me. He’d definitely try to steal your heart if I left him.” He twirled me around and drew me in even closer. “Not that I blame him. I told you, you’re irresistible. Seems like a line’s starting to form behind me.”

  I set my chin on his shoulder. “You’re really absurd sometimes, you know that?”

  “And you’re still too modest.”

  “Only when you’re exaggerating.”

  He sighed against my hair. “One day you’ll believe me.”

  We slowed with the music until our feet barely grazed the carpet. Riley rested the side of his face against mine. “This is what I’ll be thinking about while I’m gone. The scent of your hair after a shower, the warmth of your ear next to my cheek.” His gentle laughter shook against my chest. “The way you cling to me so you won’t fall.”

  I started to pull away to prove him wrong, but he kept me close.

  “Not a chance,” he whispered.

  My body melded with his, my heart already lost. I balled his Henley in my fingers, not ready to let go.

  His lips moved over the top of my ear. “When I’m listening to your voice over the phone, I’ll remember the way you feel in my arms right now.”

  Would memories be enough? Lifting on my toes, I nestled my face under his chin and clung to the strength that always accompanied his embrace.

  Amidst an undertow of unanswered questions, this much I knew beyond any doubt—the love I shared with Riley had forever ruined my heart for anything less.

  He might’ve been leaving his apartment, but not his home. He’d given his heart to me, and it was the only home I needed—the one I had to find a way to hold on to.

  The waning hours of our last night together dissolved too quickly. I fled to his bedroom before he saw the sense of loss fighting for control over my eyes. Not yet.

  “We still have to go through your dresser, right?”

  “It’s late, Em. I should get you home. Five o’clock is going to come sooner than you think. You need to get some sleep.”

  “Like that’s gonna happen,” I mumbled.

  Already at my side, Riley tipped my chin. All he’d have to do is say one word, and the veneer of composure I’d feigned all evening would crack. “Fifteen more minutes, ‘kay? But promise me you’ll try to get some rest tonight.”

  “I’ll try.”

  While he cleared the kitchen table, I meandered around the small space that had been his home for the last four years. Even though most of his things were staying, the apartment felt hollow now, barren. I traced the zipper of the suitcase lying beside his guitar.

  “Ready?” he called from the living room.

  Nowhere close.

  We’d driven the same route from his place to the campus countless times. Just like he’d stayed with me until I’d fallen asleep almost every night this summer. But knowing this would be the last one for at least the next four months brought the unknown crashing into the familiar.

  His Civic idled alongside the curb. Words felt miles away. I stared out my window, fingers whitening around my door handle. The distance to my apartment closed in on me.

  My heart beat against my chest like wings against a cage. “Stay.” I forced back the million exclamation points punctuating the simple word.

  Riley’s head sagged. He ran his hand along the bottom of the steering wheel, taking too long to respond. He swallowed. “Not tonight.”

  His lashes dropped and lifted slowly. The streetlight caught a look in his eyes that almost singlehandedly dismantled my resolve not to cry in front of him. “It would be too hard.” His fingers skimmed my cheek and disappeared into my hair. “For both of us.”

  My mind raced, scrambling for something to say—anything to prolong our time together.

  He brushed his thumb to my lips with a caress as tender as the kiss that followed. Fear fed into longing. His touch a tonic, I drank deeply. Each heart flutter. Each sensation. He withdrew slightly and then kissed me once more, making it clear why tonight would be too much, even for him.

  He rested his forehead to mine. “I love you, Emma.”

  Short, level breaths steadied my heart. I couldn’t let him see me fall apart. He needed me to be strong, not broken.

  With his face in my hands, I drew from the last recesses of courage I had left. “I love you too.” I crawled out of the car, steeled myself before turning around, and leaned through the passenger window.

  He stretched across the seat. “See you in the morning.”

  “Bright and early.” I held my weak smile in place until the dim glow from the streetlight fell behind me. I pushed up the walkway toward the glass door blurring ahead of me. The stairs to the second floor apartment multiplied with each step.

  My keys trembled in the lock. The tremor followed me inside and backed me against the cool door. And there, hidden in the shadows of my apartment, I gave in to the tears that now came without restraint.

  chapter seven

  Unguarded

  A twenty-minute drive with Riley to the airport wasn’t long enough. Parked alongside the drop-off curb, he curled my fingers around the keys he placed in my hand, smiled, and opened his door.

  I circled to the back of the car and laughed the second I reached the trunk. The bags he’d packed to move all the way across the country for four months were the same amount Jaycee would’ve packed for a four-day weekend getaway.

  He set a large duffle bag on the curb, propped his guitar case against the bumper, and tossed a carry-on bag over his shoulder.

  His friend Jackson parked behind us and pulled Jake’s kennel off the bed of his Tundra. “Should I take him up to the check-in?”

  Riley nodded. “Thanks, man. Be there in a minute.”

  I rocked on my heels. “Are you sure you don’t want me to come in with you?”

  His face creased. “Saying goodbye right here is hard enough.” He kissed my fingertips and lowered my hand to his chest. “You hold my heart, Em. Promise me you’ll always trust this. No matter what.”

  The urgency in his voice overpowered the jets’ engines in the background. Didn’t he know his love was the only thing I did trust? “Always.”

  Arm at his side, he dropped his bag to the ground and lifted a hand to my neck. It didn’t matter that his fingers had touched the skin behind my ear a hundred times, my breath still caught. I backed into the side of the car, but it was the promise in his eyes that anchored me.

  An unguarded kiss deepened, then slowed. He held me tight, his whiskers pressing against my hair. His lips hovered over my forehead a minute longer. “I love you.”

  I gripped his sleeve for balance under a torrent of feelings no words could touch. “I love you too.”

  Still holding my cheek, he kissed the corner of my mouth once more before releasing me. He shouldered his bags, smiled with his eyes, and turned to the airport.

  I stood on that sidewalk with empty arms and watched the distance stretch between us.

  He stopped at the entrance. “Meet me on our dance floor. I’ll be the one waiting to sweep my barefoot beauty off her feet.”

  “And I’ll be the one trying not to trip.” I laughed to stave off my tears.

  Experience told me seeing Riley in my dreams would almost be as good as seeing him in person. If dreams were all we had, they’d have to be enough.

  He disappeared behind the mirrored door, and something inside me closed. In the middle of a busy drop-off zone, with people buzzing by in all directions, I shouldn’t have felt so alone.

  I lumbered into Riley’s car, clenched the keys in my hand, and faced the rearview mirror. “How about you start with making it through today?”

&
nbsp; With a little coaxing, time graciously agreed to pass. Until the night ushered in a wave of restlessness. Fourteen hours of staying preoccupied between work and classes had apparently drained the power of distraction dry. The familiar felt stilted, my routine out of sync.

  The movie Trevor and Jaycee were watching in the living room hadn’t kept my attention. Studying hadn’t helped. And my rearranged dresser drawers were all but laughing at me. Could I blame them?

  I crashed headfirst onto my bed. Halfway into smacking some sense into my head with my pillow, a glorious sound filled my room. For a second, everything else stopped. I bolted from my prostrate position and floundered through the yards of blankets in search of my cell. A dozen highlighters rolled off the mattress onto the floor.

  “Hey,” I breathed into the phone now attached to my ear.

  “It’s kinda late to be working out.”

  “No, I was just . . . um . . . trying to get to the phone.” I wrenched a textbook out from under my back and sank my forehead into my hand. So much for avoiding embarrassment.

  But unlike Trevor would’ve, Riley skipped over the opportunity to tease me. “I’m sorry I’m just now calling. I sort of hit the ground running as soon as I got off the plane. They don’t waste any time getting you acclimated, which is great. Don’t get me wrong. Just a bit overwhelming.”

  He had to be tired, yet his animated tone eclipsed the exhaustion I expected to hear.

  “Oh, and get this. Brett called during my layover in Chicago. Told me he found a girl interested in being my manager. When I got to the studio today, she was already there waiting to meet me. Can you believe that? She said she knew potential when she heard it.” A self-conscious laugh merged into an exhale.

  “Of course she did. Just like every other raving fan will.”

  “So you keep saying.”

  We’d save that argument for another time. “Okay, so where’s my play-by-play?”

  Barely taking a breath, he filled me in on the studio, the people he’d met so far, and how demanding his schedule was going to be.

  “I had no idea how much was involved in recording an album,” he went on. “I’m starting to wonder if we’re going to be able to pull this off in only four months.”

  What? The statement caught me in the gut. Neither of us had money to fly and see each other if this ran longer. He couldn’t be talking about an extension already.

  Riley must’ve missed my reaction. Either that or was trying to divert it. “They have me staying in a one-bedroom condo less than a mile from the studio. There’s a park right across the street from the neighborhood. Jake’s gonna love the trail around the lake.”

  “Sounds perfect.”

  “Almost. Wouldn’t mind having this girl I’m in love with here with me.”

  I slipped one leg out from under the other. “Then who’d take care of your car?”

  He laughed. “You kidding me? I’d have that thing impounded in a second in a tradeoff for you.”

  Unsolicited emotion trekked up my throat. I shoved it down, straightened my blankets. “Tell me about the music industry.”

  “Oh, man. I’m stoked about that part the most. I couldn’t have asked for a more networked manager. She knows everyone. Has connections I couldn’t dream of making on my own. And she already has amazing ideas for the album.”

  “That’s really great. I’m so happy for you.” I was. Genuinely. Despite a pang of reservation weaseling itself through my ribcage.

  “I’m sorry,” he said out of nowhere.

  “For what?”

  “For how hard this is.”

  I hugged my leg to my chest and set my chin on my knee. “I’m fine.”

  He paused, and I could almost see the slow blink lifting his eyes to mine. “I’ve spent months falling in love with everything about you. I know your voice better than my own.”

  And my heart. Even when I tried to guard it. “I just miss you already.”

  “I miss you too. It’s killing me not being there right now, but we can make it through this.” An audible smile filled his voice. “My valiant fiancée, remember?”

  “So you keep saying.”

  “Touché.” His laugh cuddled me in place of his arms. “Are you in bed right now?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good. Close your eyes.”

  I sat up on my elbows. “Why?”

  “Just close your eyes,” he nudged again.

  My lashes fell in submission.

  “Picture us on the sports field. No one else is around. It’s just us, the empty field, stars above us. You there?”

  I sank into the mattress, memories blanketed around me. Even in a daydream, the look of love his eyes always held found mine. “Yes.”

  “Dance with me,” he whispered.

  Drawing on our last night together, I danced in a world where music hung between us instead of miles. Minutes waned as he sang, but I hung on.

  “I should let you get some sleep,” he said.

  “No, don’t go . . . please.” Even if it didn’t mean the same thing as when he was here physically, I needed him to stay.

  The streetlight outside my bedroom window buzzed in the silence. “Riley?”

  “I’m here,” he said softly.

  I rolled onto my side and ran my fingers down the beams of moonlight draped across the blanket. “Will you keep singing for me?”

  Another pause.

  “Just until you fall asleep.”

  He must’ve put me on speakerphone. His guitar’s soft cadence strummed into my bedroom with the song he sang for me the night he proposed. “Whose eyes are these, searching helplessly for joy? Eyes that stir a forgotten desire and unveil a hidden void?

  “How do they awaken things, things I thought I’d lost? And revive my fragile hope in a love worth the cost?

  “Why is it a mystery to me? Why does it have to be? I wonder if she sees what I see—this hidden treasure, whose eyes unveil me. If she could only see what I see.”

  One with the music, his voice led me into a dream where I never had to let it go.

  chapter eight

  Precautionary

  I checked my cell while pushing open the door to the campus center. Three-thirty on the dot. Props to Professor Clarke for actually letting our business statistics class out on time this week. I wasn’t up for spending another Wednesday drive into Portland, trying to dodge a speeding ticket. Even though Trey gave me grace, I preferred not to rush.

  At the row of mailboxes, I did a double take inside my mail slot and caught my name written in Riley’s handwriting on a folded piece of paper, taped shut.

  So, this was what he dropped off in the mail the night before he left. Figures he knew it’d take me almost three weeks to check my mail. I pored over the short letter, devouring every word until my eyes latched onto one sentence that stood out from the others.

  Remember, you’re braver than you think you are.

  Shaking my head, I smiled. Think so, huh? I held the letter beside my best “brave” face, snapped a picture with my cell, and pulled up Instagram.

  A photo on Riley’s account stopped me short. An unfairly sexy blonde had her arm around his neck, a champagne glass in one hand and what looked like some kind of contract in the other. Who—?

  “Emma,” someone called from down the hallway.

  I stuffed my phone in my pocket, along with my unanswered question, and turned toward the familiar voice.

  A. J. stopped a few feet away at an invisible boundary line and stared at the wall of mailboxes as if inspecting some unknown building code.

  If whatever he’d caught up with me to say was going to be as uncomfortable as he appeared, I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.

  My clasp tightened around Riley’s note. Maybe osmosis would spark the bravery he seemed to think I had.

  A. J. shifted his book bag strap up to the top of his shoulder. “Trev told me about the coaching position you guys have open at the center. I met with Dean Sulli
van about it. Since it’d be working with kids and sports, he said it could pass as a practicum.”

  My keys hit the tiles. I scrambled to swipe them from the floor without making my reaction any more obvious. Right.

  At least he ignored it. He took off his Trailblazers ball cap, forked his fingers through his hair, and slid the hat back on. “I figured I could at least go up one afternoon and check it out. It’s not like I’d have to make a commitment today or anything, right?”

  I blinked, waiting for my brain to catch up to the conversation. “Yeah,” I finally said. “You can come out and spend some time with the kids. No strings attached. I promise you won’t be disappointed. You’ll end up receiving way more than you give.”

  That truth hit me square in the chest the second it left my mouth. “It’s not really something I can explain.”

  “I think I know what you mean.” A. J. picked at a chip of flaking paint on the wall beside him. “Since I’m done with classes for the day, I was thinking maybe this afternoon would be a good time to go.”

  If his fingers weren’t boring a hole into the mailboxes, his eyes certainly were. Was he waiting for my permission? Even after the summer, I wasn’t used to seeing him this way. Hesitant. Unsure. It didn’t fit the A. J. I knew.

  I fiddled with my keys. “Um, today would be great. I’ll call Trey and let him know you’ll be by at some point. I’d offer you a ride, but Wednesdays are the nights I work ‘til nine. Doubt you’d want to stick around that late.”

  “Yeah, yeah, no problem. I’ll just, uh, see you later, then.” He shuffled backward without glancing at me for longer than a second or two at a time. A short distance away, he turned and jogged through the crowd toward the gym.

  Did anyone else notice how awkward that was? See, this was why I hadn’t asked him about the job to begin with. He’d make the perfect coach. The kids would adore him. No question. And a sports program might up the chances of us getting funding. But would the strain between us be too much?

  I held on to Riley’s note and his belief in me. Guess we’re about to find out how brave I am. Speaking of which. I shot him a quick text on my way outside. Was that his manager in the picture with him?