William tugged her hand toward him. She knew he wanted to kiss her. Wasn’t that why he had brought her up here again? A place where they had once stolen kisses against a hot, balmy backdrop. Wasn’t that why she had agreed to come? The stirring in her heart couldn’t be muffled forever, and drunk in the moment, she didn’t want it to.
When she lifted her face to his, he pushed her sunglasses back, crowning her head, and then removed his own. His eyes twinkled as if he truly saw her. Saw into her heart and silently promised to mend together the parts of it he’d broken. Annie released a breath she hadn’t known she was holding and without thinking, swayed into his arms and kissed him. Her lips molded to his and she prayed that the dreamland they had effortlessly drifted into was one from which they would never awaken.
* * *
“READY?” WILLIAM ASKED, cutting the engine and grabbing sodas. “Let’s make a break for it.”
Annie snatched the bag of sandwiches and barreled out of his truck, running up the walk to her front door in a peal of laughter. Rain pelted her body so hard, she didn’t know from which direction it was attacking. She could only shield her eyes with an arm in a poor defense. Her keys, already in hand, jingled as she clumsily fumbled with the lock.
“Come on, Curtis!” he jested. “I’m getting soaked out here!”
Annie squealed until she felt the lock click, then thrust her body against the door and pushed her way into the house with William practically on top of her to escape the storm. As he slammed the door shut behind them, sheets of rain pounded violently against the house, their acoustic rendition transforming the tiny Cape Cod into a sanctuary rather than a home.
William shook himself in a rotten attempt to dry off. Droplets still hung from his eyelashes like glistening morning dew as a hearty laugh bellowed up from his gut. Annie leaned against the kitchen counter and took in the sight.
“You look like a drowned rat!” she said and then burst out laughing.
He laughed, dropping the sodas on the counter. “You don’t look so great yourself, you know.” When his gaze locked on hers again, his wide-set eyes seemed to be willing her to reveal something. She relaxed on her feet, transfixed by his penetrating gaze. She yearned for a sign that falling in love with him all over again wasn’t a mistake, and silently she pleaded to the heavens to grant her this prayer.
“I’ll get you a towel,” she said weakly, teetering back on her heels. She could feel his eyes still on her as he began to navigate his way around her living room, quietly assessing the family photographs strung along the far wall.
“There’s no doubt you adore your children.” He chuckled.
“Whose pictures would I hang instead? After all, it’s only us.”
She didn’t want a pity party, but it was the truth. Aside from the occasional friend passing in and out of their lives, it had mostly been her and the children clinging together for dear life. And sweet Marjorie. And the diner.
“This is a good one.” He had paused in front of a sepia-toned photograph of James and Betsy frolicking on the beach. “Betsy’s a little ham.”
“Isn’t she?” Annie beamed, handing him a towel. “She’s so much like my mom.”
“She was a great lady,” he said, sounding genuine. What little her mother had known of William she had liked, but she’d died so shortly after he’d left, there hadn’t been time to talk to her about her heartbreak. There were days she was sure she would suffocate from the grief and sorrow. She had been all alone then. Desperately, tragically alone. Recalling those days made her shiver and yearn for any assurance she would be okay. Her subtle wince wasn’t lost on William.
“Are you all right?” His stance had shifted toward her.
“I want to show you something,” she whispered, hugging a towel around her shoulders. With William following, she went up the stairs, past framed pictures before pausing at a midway landing. A cushioned bench framed a windowsill overlooking the roaring rainstorm flooding the backyard. Annie carefully unfastened a frame from the wall. He pressed up behind her to view the photo, his quiet presence rapidly stirring in her an ache to be held.
“Betsy?” he guessed, eyeing the picture.
“Me,” she said, grinning. “When I was a little older than she is now.”
“She’s the spitting image of you.”
A clap of thunder shook the house while a bolt of lightning struck nearby. The surprise sent Annie into William’s waiting arms. As instantly as the thunder and lightning had struck, the noise and brilliant flash dulled to total darkness inside as the two clutched one another. Her chilled body warmed against his.
“The power in the whole neighborhood is probably out,” she babbled. Her eyes adjusted as her other senses heightened. She was thankful her blush was undetectable in the dark, as she couldn’t tear her eyes from the outline of William’s lips. “Maybe the breaker box...” she continued, barely audible. William whispered her name while coaxing her to sit on the bench. Her body quivered as he stroked back her hair and circled the nape of her neck with a hand. She pressed into him, and he pressed a kiss to her lips.
Annie squeezed her eyes shut, delving into the embrace. Soft, salty, warm kisses. She relaxed and realized she missed how he touched, how he moved. She missed the calm strength of his voice as he whispered how he had longed to hold her again. She had longed for him, too, though, she suspected, for much longer.
Rain drummed against the windowpane, reverberating with such intensity, Annie couldn’t differentiate where it stopped and her pounding heart began. Each time the thunder cracked, she eased closer to William. His arms flexed, his body strong and taut. And she instantly recalled a time when she hadn’t been so scarred and alone. When they had been carefree and had fun all over town, and he had pursued her single-mindedly. She had reveled in his attention and returned his affection in varying degrees—from playful to sensual—her own naivete preventing her from knowing where she hoped those touches would lead.
William breathed her name again, his lips rasping over her throat, tickling each nerve along the way. She relished each delicious caress, each kiss. She savored the gentleness of his touch while fully aware he was holding himself back from asking for more.
For a minute she could hardly believe this was happening. She was wrapped in William’s arms and savoring each moment for fear the lights would power on and interrupt the fantasy. William enveloped her. She felt young again. Foolish, innocent, needing. But her desire was still outweighed by a fear she was about to tumble back down a rabbit hole that had nearly broken her once before.
“William,” she whispered. “I can’t.”
All these years she’d imagined him returning home to sweep her back up into his arms and erase all the hurts she’d endured since the last time he’d said I-love-yous against her cheek. But no matter how she’d tried to drown those hurts with new dreams, they were there when she’d surfaced. Reality always sunk in. She wasn’t a lovestruck teenager anymore, and they couldn’t rewrite the past. She was a mother who needed to keep her senses. She couldn’t afford to get her heart broken. Not by him. Not again.
“I can’t,” she told him, putting her hands on his chest, shoving herself away.
His face scrunched in confusion.
“What’s wrong, Annie?” he asked in the same tone that had lulled her to kiss him at magic hour. “Did I misread something?”
She folded her arms across her chest, frightfully aware she had exposed her still vulnerable heart to the only man she had ever loved. “You should go.” She scrambled to piece together an excuse.
“If I moved too fast...”
“The children might come home...because of the dark...and...the storm.”
“You don’t want me here?”
She willed herself to agree with his statement. It was all she had left.
“It’s best.” Another lie. Until she could get
her wits about her again, she needed him gone, his smoldering gaze and all. She watched his shadowed profile as he seemed to consider her words.
“Are you going to send me out in this monsoon?”
“It’s letting up,” she replied, grimacing at her own coldness. He drew a breath and released it before rising. His stance was hesitant, arms hanging lifelessly at his sides as he looked at her. Words tumbled in her mind, so many words. But none of them would align into a logical explanation. None of them could suffice for all that cried out in her heart. “I can’t.”
When he attempted a goodbye kiss, she pulled away from sheer fear she’d be drawn to him all over again, his tender masculinity clouding her rational mind. One brief touch could lead her astray.
When she heard him slip out the front door, latching it behind him, she squeezed herself in a desperate hug and pressed her forehead to the chilly pane-glass window. Outside, the storm was ceasing while the one in her heart was still gearing up to rage.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
WILLIAM GROANED. HE’D returned home to discover Earl’s car parked in his mother’s driveway. As if being tossed from the intoxicating haven of Annie’s arms wasn’t disappointing enough, he now had to make niceties with the man wooing his mother.
He sat in the parked truck for a few moments as the windshield wipers methodically dealt with the light rainfall. He replayed the date over again in his mind, recalling Annie’s gaze, her touch. What had he gotten wrong? Didn’t she want him the way he wanted her? When he held her in his arms, he felt as if they were picking up right where they had left off so many years ago. All the mistakes he’d made had been forgiven and washed clean.
Slogging through the wet grass to the back door, he didn’t bother to outrun the rain.
“There he is,” his mother called. She and Earl were canoodling on the porch swing, sipping tea and seemingly unaware of the irritating creak the swing made with each pass. “How was your date, dear?” she asked as the swing swayed with a mincing waaaah.
William shrugged, unable to politely shift his narrowed eyes from Earl’s pleasantly relaxed face. “It is what it is.”
Joyce tilted her head, her eyes filled with concern. Waaaah. “That doesn’t sound good.”
“We called it an early evening.” He continued to the back door to escape further questioning and the assault on his ears.
Waaaah. “Your friend called the diner looking for you.”
William halted at the threshold, his hand hesitating on the door handle.
“Who?” Joyce slowly took a sip of tea, testing his patience almost as much as the high-pitched wail of the swing. Waaaah.
“Your friend from the Navy.”
Waaaah.
“Did he leave a name?”
Waaaah.
“Um...oh, dear.” Waaaah. “Yes, perhaps he did... He left a message with Bobby, but I can’t remember now.”
Waaaah.
“Danny, didn’t he say, Joyce?”
Waaaah.
“Like from the diner?” Waaaah. “No, Earl, I think I would’ve remembered that.”
William’s eyes darted between his mother floundering to recall the name and the chain link grating against the hinge. Waaaah. Waaaah. Waaaah.
“Don’t you have any oil?” he finally snapped. Joyce and Earl slowed the swing to a stop, the silence between the three of them only broken by the light pitter-patter of rain on the porch roof. “Never mind.”
“I’ll ask Bobby tomorrow!” Joyce called after him as he retreated into the house. He tore into the kitchen, suddenly aware he was hungry, but before he could fix a sandwich, something caught his eye.
The counter was clear of all clutter, wiped pristine clean, except for a single piece of paper. Stark white, trifold crease, waiting to be read. He leaned over it, and a raindrop slipped from his hair, marking his presence with a resounding plop. He knew his mother had intentionally left it out for him to see, to read, to learn. The medical jargon, so blunt and barely decipherable on her bills he’d read days earlier, was missing. This, this, was easy to understand. It was an appointment schedule for a full-body scan.
Her appointment was on Friday, and to William, it loomed like impending doom. He slunk away from the note, breathing easier as he put more distance between himself and it. She hadn’t mentioned the cancer. He hadn’t admitted he knew. He preferred they kept to that arrangement. It was one thing to know she was fighting cancer; it was another to have to acknowledge it to her out loud.
As he heard shuffling on the porch, he stole away upstairs, quickly assessing what he needed to pack. Aside from a couple duffel bags, he could be ready in a few minutes if needed. Leaving was the easy part. Outrunning his past, and the women in his life, would be much harder.
* * *
ANNIE MUSCLED TOGETHER her pride and approached her shift with a fierce determination to proceed as normally as possible. Pop’s Place had been her home away from home in recent years, and she wasn’t going to tiptoe around the diner for anyone, let alone William Kauffman. She had reminded herself over and over again that while she might have been developing feelings for William, they weren’t anything she couldn’t control. Responsible, steady, wise. She was going to consult only her logical, rational frontal lobe. Yes, her head was going to prevail over her heart...or so she told herself in the bathroom mirror before leaving for work.
But no sooner had she finished her pep talk, she shuddered with goose bumps at the thought of him. He had pulled her close and brushed his lips to hers as if that was where he was meant to stay. He stirred an ache within her that yearned to be his forever. If her desire wasn’t terrifying enough, the memories of having been hurt or abandoned in the past certainly were. The memories were difficult but were balanced by the joy she found in her children. For as much as she felt sad, she would double down to love them that much harder. And as much as she wanted to believe things with William would be different—could be different—she’d experienced enough to know that playing it safe was what she had to do. For her own protection. And theirs.
She’d barely made it into the office when she realized she wasn’t alone.
“Morning.”
Annie’s skin flushed at the mere sound of his voice, like a lover’s hand tracing the small of her back, confident yet gentle.
“Good morning, William.”
“Were you okay last night?”
“I guess I should be the one asking you that question, considering I kicked you out in the pouring rain.”
“You have to treat me a lot worse than that, Annie Curtis, if you want to get rid of me.”
“Is that a challenge?”
William’s eyes sparked with amusement. “I wouldn’t put it past you.”
This game they were playing had to end. “I don’t want to hurt you, William,” she began, though she was more terrified it would be her heart broken first and hardest.
“Then don’t.”
“I don’t know what we’re doing,” she breathed.
William closed the distance between them. “I know what I wish we were doing.”
Annie pulled away. “You’re still leaving, right?”
“Eventually.”
“Eventually when?”
“Soon.”
“See? You can’t even be honest with me about that small but very important detail. Why the big secret?”
“It’s not a secret, Annie. I don’t know the answer.” He moved to her again, but she wouldn’t be pulled back into his warmth without some answers.
“Tell me something real. Something I can hold on to, William.”
“Annie Curtis needs something real? And I suppose the magnetic pull we feel toward each other isn’t concrete enough for you?”
Annie tipped her head in the air. She had lived enough to know not to mistake infatuation for some
thing she could count on. “Not for me it ain’t. Let me know when you’ve got something.”
She strode out of the office, sure of herself, but the feeling quickly crumbled away when she found Sean waiting for her at the counter.
“Look who decided to finally show up for work. Tsk, tsk. It’s five after.”
“What do you want, Sean?”
“We’ve got some things to discuss.”
“Not now. I have to start my shift.” Sean’s eyes darted behind her, making her stomach drop. She knew what he would think when he saw William following her from the office. And this time his suspicions would be accurate.
“Well, well,” Sean muttered. “Look who we have here.”
“Sean.” William’s voice had downshifted gears to deep and barely audible. Even the shuffling of the Old Timers and other patrons into the restaurant didn’t detract from the tension mounting between the two men.
“Now I see why you were late,” Sean jested, but a darkness had shadowed his eyes, proving there was nothing cute about it. The tightness in his shoulders made his arms billow to his sides awkwardly, puffing up his already stout frame.
“What can we do for you, Sean?” Karrin asked, the slightest crack in her voice the only indication she was anxious.
Annie braced herself. She could read his tells better than a professional poker player.
“I’m taking the kid on a little trip.”
Annie’s face fell as she tried to maintain her composure. “What?”
“I have vacation time coming up, and I’m taking James with me to check out California.”
“No, you’re not,” Annie sputtered. She didn’t care enough to ask when or where exactly. She couldn’t part with James for more than two hours, let alone send him on a plane or train with the man she hated most in this world. The word trip made her want to cry nasty, ugly tears...or swing nasty, ugly punches.
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