by Bella Andre
New options?
Future?
From the day he'd graduated high school, Connor had been up in the mountains chasing wildfires. What the hell was he supposed to do with himself now? Teach from a book for the rest of his life? Wear a suit and get a paunch and tell the same stories over and over again about the "good old days" to the rookies?
He felt the bomb that had been building inside of him during the past two years start to detonate, slowly but surely. Blackness was swirling up from deep in his gut--a blackness that he hadn't wanted to face, not even in the darkest days of his burns and skin grafts--like thick ink soaking straight into his cells.
Two years ago, everything had happened so fast he hadn't had a chance to brace himself for the hit. Whereas this loss of everything he was, his world falling literally off its axis, was almost coming in slow motion.
But at the same time that the agony was prolonged, it gave him time to try to find something to hold on to, anything, just as long as it would keep his head above water for a little while longer.
Ginger's arms came around him, then, and as she murmured how sorry she was, he realized the answer was right here.
As long as he could keep losing himself in Ginger, he might be able to keep the demons at bay.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
GINGER HAD never felt the need to comfort someone as much as she did in that moment after Connor heard the bad news. She tried to think what she would want him to do if their positions were reversed, if an all-controlling organization took her paints and canvases away for good. She would have wanted to bury herself in his warmth, let her tears pour down onto his chest while he stroked her and told her everything was going to be all right.
So she'd taken one step and then another toward him and put her arms around him. Tears pricked at her eyes as she held him and although his arms came around her too, even though he didn't push her away, after a few moments she realized he wasn't letting loose at all, wasn't giving in to the inner turmoil that had to be ripping him apart.
He probably just needed some time to digest the news was what she told herself as they went about their day. She drew sketches for some new paintings out on the porch; he worked on the cabin. By noon the storm had blown out of town, leaving behind brilliant blue skies and blinding sparkles across the surface of the water. But the underlying tension in the cabin was suffocating.
Even after lunch, when he'd said it was time for dessert and then lifted her up on the indoor dining table and made love to her, while the pleasure was just as intense as it had been all night long and into the morning, she couldn't help but feel like what was between them had changed.
On the one hand, it was obvious that he needed her more than ever. His constant caresses and kisses in the hours after the phone call were testament to that. But at the same time, she felt that he'd begun to hold pieces of himself back.
She tried to tell herself that she'd only known him five days, but no matter how she spun it, any way she looked at it, his behavior didn't make sense.
He should be yelling. Lashing out.
She still remembered how she felt that night at the auction when Jeremy had said those horrible things, how she'd finally let go of everything she'd been holding back for so long. Her smiles gave way to rage. And, oh, it had felt so good to just let it all come spilling out. Not to worry about the mess she left behind, because she was already gone. Already starting over.
And it was because Connor's situation felt so similar--and because she already cared so deeply for him--that she wanted to call him on it, wanted to force him to grieve, to truly face what had happened, to start to come to terms with his new future.
Whatever that future held.
There had to be plenty of other people hurting for him today. His brother obviously was. And his parents, when they finally found out, would probably be devastated as well.
Thinking of Connor's parents made her finally remember.
The love letters.
Everything had happened so fast after they'd left the workshop the night before. The kids lighting fireworks. Kissing Connor in the rain. Thoughts of him had used up every last brain cell until now.
She needed to see Isabel. Give the stack of letters to her friend. And maybe, while she was gone, Connor might start to come to terms with the about-face his life had taken and he might be more ready to talk to her about it when she got back.
Thankfully she'd stashed the letters back in the dresser in the workshop. If she'd had them with her when they left the workshop they would have gotten soaked.
Connor saw her grab her keys and purse. "Heading out?"
"I just remembered an errand I've got to run."
It almost felt like lying, not telling him that she was going to give Isabel the letters, but she didn't think mentioning those right now would make his day any better and, at least for today, it seemed more important to protect him from any further pain.
"Come here first."
The command in his voice, along with the sensual promise in his eyes, had her walking over to him in a semi-daze. And then, when she was barely within reaching distance, he pulled her into his arms, his fingers threading into her hair, his mouth coming down over hers. His kiss consumed her and she felt herself falling, heading further and further beneath his spell.
Finally, he let her up for air. "You sure your errand can't wait?"
And even though a voice in her head told her that making love with him again was only helping him hide out from everything he needed to face, she couldn't walk away. Not only because giving herself to him like this was the best--and only--way she could think of right now to provide the comfort he desperately needed.
But, on a less altruistic note, because stealing every hour that she possibly could with him was what she most wanted for herself.
By the time Ginger walked into the diner, the old letters safe in her large purse, Isabel was just turning the sign to CLOSED.
"This is a nice surprise. I didn't expect to see you here today. Hungry?"
"No. I've already had lunch." And then some.
"What's up?" Isabel stopped fiddling with the blinds on the windows, looked more carefully at Ginger's face. "Is it Connor? Did something else happen since I last saw you?"
Ginger hadn't come here to talk about Connor, but now that her friend was asking she just couldn't hold it in. "We ... he ... and then ..."
Isabel grabbed her arm, pulled her over to a bar stool. "Coffee. That's what you need. And then you can tell me everything."
"But what about how you said I should stay away from him?"
"I'm not sure that's exactly what I said, but you were right. Just because I have a past with his father, doesn't mean I have anything against Connor. If you say he's great, I'm sure he is." She put a cup down in front of Ginger. "So how great is he?"
Ginger blushed, tried to buy herself time by taking a sip.
"Never mind. I think I get the gist of it already, just looking at you."
But Ginger wanted to try to put what she was feeling into words. Maybe then she'd understand it better.
"It's like something in him just pulls at me. And every second we're together, I just ..." She put her hand over her heart. "Right here. I feel him here."
Isabel came around the counter, sat down next to Ginger. "You're in deep already, aren't you?"
There was no point in lying to herself about it. "Yes. And I don't know how to stop it."
"That only matters if you want to stop it."
"It's just a summer fling." It was all they'd agreed on.
"No reason summer can't turn to fall," Isabel suggested.
Suddenly, Ginger realized they'd made that agreement when they thought he was going to be heading back to work for the Forest Service in California. But now that everything had changed for him, she realized that every day she spent with Connor was going to start and end with her hoping for one more day. For more of him.
Even after he'd told her flat-out that he had nothing to give.
"You're scared, aren't you?"
Ginger looked at her friend, saw love and concern in her eyes, and knew she could confess, "More scared than I've ever been. And at the same time, I'm so incredibly happy. Almost as if I could burst from it."
Isabel leaned her head on Ginger's shoulder, two friends sitting in an empty diner, sharing confidences. "I wish I knew the right thing to say to you. The perfect advice to give to make it less confusing. But I'm afraid you're talking to someone who doesn't know the first thing about making relationships work."
Damn it, Ginger thought. She'd forgotten about the letters again.
"Actually, I came here to give you something." Ginger reached into her purse and pulled them out. "I found these stuck behind one of my dresser drawers."
Isabel's face went white with shock. "My letters to Andrew." She rubbed her fingers over the papers. "He kept them."
"Isabel, I'm sorry," Ginger blurted, "but one fell open and then once I started reading, I couldn't help myself."
But Isabel didn't seem to hear her. "I was so young," she said so quietly it was almost a whisper. "Sitting here, just like you are now. So in love with him that I could hardly see straight."
Isabel's words nearly knocked Ginger off of her stool. She didn't think Isabel had even heard what she'd just said, she was so wrapped up in poring through the letters. But now that it was there--love, oh God, could that be what this pull was?--Ginger couldn't look away from it.
"I can't believe I wrote these things," Isabel was saying. "I had the future all planned out." She pressed her lips together. Sighed. "Stupid girl."
"I still don't get it," Ginger said, working like crazy to focus on what her friend was saying, rather than the swirling mass of emotions pushing around inside her. "How could all of that," she gestured to the letters, "have become ten terrible words?"
Isabel shrugged. "Who the hell knows. Andrew and I were just kids who didn't know any better, I guess."
"Is it going to be weird to see him when he comes out for Sam's wedding?"
"Very," Isabel admitted. "But at least I have a few weeks to prepare myself for it, right? Not," she said with a rueful grin, "that I should be wasting too much time on that." Pushing off the stool, she said, "I know you have a lot of painting to get done. Thanks for bringing these to me."
Understanding that her friend wanted to be alone with the letters, and glad to have some time on her own to think, Ginger headed out.
Was it possible for her to have fallen in love with Connor already? During her short drive home, her brain insisted on playing out a montage of images.
Protecting her from the falling branch, his heart beating wildly against her back, even harder than hers because he'd been so afraid of something happening to her.
Connor's anguish the night in his bedroom when his fingers had gone numb as he stroked her. Holding his hand but feeling she was really holding his heart.
The way he'd looked at her paintings and seen straightaway what she was trying to get down on the canvas, understanding her in a way few people ever had.
And, of course, all those precious, sweet hours in his arms.
A sharp sense of relief shot through her when she came home and saw that the red truck was gone. She couldn't face him yet. Not when the possibility of being in love was still so new to her, when she felt as if she were strapped into a runaway train that she couldn't even remember getting on.
Walking over to stand in front of her canvas, she stared at the painting she'd been working on.
"Before Love" was how it seemed now. How, she wondered, was she seeing things so differently after such a short time with Connor? After only one incredible night in his arms?
And yet, there was no denying that even the colors in her palette were richer now. Deeper.
A voice in her head told her she should be looking at falling in love with Connor as a disaster, the biggest one of her life. But that scared voice sounded so much like the one that had told her for so many years that she didn't know how to paint, that she couldn't possibly follow her own heart and create something beautiful.
She picked up her brush and then, before she could possibly get ready for it, all hell was breaking loose, her fingers and hands and arms all pushing her to paint as fast as she could.
The images came to her as quickly as she could put them onto the canvases, one after the other. And while there was similar motion and color and energy to the paintings she'd made since coming to Poplar Cove eight months ago, there was something more to these paintings.
More emotion.
More tenderness.
When she finally stepped back to catch her breath, she realized what she was doing. She was painting Connor in all the ways she saw him. Swimming across the lake, doing sit-ups on the beach, but also naked and levered above her in bed, his eyes full of desire as he told her she was beautiful. She was painting him as a hero, saving the world single-handedly. And then, standing in the middle of flames, melting down inside, but doing everything he could to hide it.
She jumped as a sharp sound knocked her out of the zone. Realizing it was the phone, she dropped her brush and ran to get it.
After this morning, the phone felt like the bearer of bad news. What news could be coming now? She prayed it wasn't anything that would hurt Connor more.
"Ginger, darling, it's me."
Ah, her mother. She plopped down on one of the nearby kitchen chairs. Alexandra liked to tell her all the gossip. And even though Ginger wasn't at all interested in the comings and goings of a bunch of her mother's friends, she was glad for the growing connection with her mother. Amazingly, in the eight months since she'd left the city, they'd spoken more on the phone than they had in person during her whole marriage when they lived just down the street.
"I'm sorry I haven't been in touch since last week. It's been so busy with fund-raising for the upcoming opera season, as you know."
Her mother cleared her throat and Ginger had the strangest sense that she was uncomfortable.
Alexandra Sinclair was never uncomfortable and it sent a flicker of unease down Ginger's spine.
"In any case, dear, I needed to call and tell you the news. Before you hear it from anyone else."
Ginger could hear her father saying something in the background.
"No, I can't just hang up without telling her now," her mother hissed at him, before saying to Ginger, "Honey, when I was at lunch today I heard that Jeremy and his new girlfriend ..."
It wasn't hard for Ginger to fill in the blanks. "They're getting married."
Honestly, she was glad if her ex could find happiness with someone else. Everyone deserved a chance at love. Including her. And Connor, too.
"Yes, they're getting married." Her mother made a small sound of distress. "Because they're having a baby."
Connor walked into the kitchen as she said, "Oh. I see. A baby." She could feel her limbs shaking, her eyes starting to water. "But he never wanted--"
"Oh honey, you're better off without him. You always were."
"Mmm," was all Ginger could manage around the lump in her throat.
Fortunately, her mother wasn't a big fan of emotional scenes. "If I were you I wouldn't give it another thought."
"No. I won't," Ginger lied. "I'll talk to you soon, Mom."
"Ginger," Connor asked, his eyes dark with concern as he came to kneel in front of her. "What's wrong?"
"My mother called. My ex-husband is having a--"
The final word got lost on her tongue, refused to come, but he'd obviously heard enough of the conversation to guess.
"A baby?"
She nodded, hating the tear that rolled down her cheek.
"You want a baby," he said again and overpowering longing hit her before she could brace herself.
"More than anything."
"Did he shoot blanks? Was that t
he problem? Is that why you don't have any already?"
Laughter was the last thing she'd expected, but his question was so perfectly timed--so perfectly Connor--that she couldn't help but choke one out.
"No," she said, a split second before her smile fell away. "That wasn't the problem."
"Then what was?"
"Our marriage sucked for one."
"Plenty of people have kids when their marriages suck. Take my parents. It was the only thing they did well together."
"Jeremy didn't want a baby." No, that wasn't true anymore. "Not with me, anyway."
"I know I've said this before, but he sounds like a stupid fuck. Why the hell did you marry him?"
She matched the anger of his words with hers. "Because I thought he was the best I could do. Because I couldn't believe he actually wanted me. That he'd chosen me instead of one of the perfect sorority girls throwing themselves at him. It's why I didn't leave for so long. Because I thought I'd never do any better."
"And you actually wanted to have a kid with this guy? Jesus, Ginger, don't you have any sense at all? What the hell do you see when you look in the mirror? Who do you think you are?"
The answer was easy. A girl who had never been good enough for anyone, no matter how hard she tried.
"You're coming with me."
Grabbing her hand, he pulled her out of the kitchen, up the stairs, into her bedroom, not stopping until they were standing in front of the full-length mirror, her back to his front.
"I've never admitted this to anyone before," he said in a soft voice, "but do you know how hard it was for me to look at my burns for the first time?"
She swallowed hard, instinctively covering his hands and arms with her own, gently stroking the raised scars.
"When they unwrapped the bandages that first time and I saw the wreckage of what had once been perfectly good hands, perfectly good skin, I wanted to cry like a baby. But I couldn't. Not with everyone watching. Not when everyone expected me to be the tough firefighter."
She'd never thought about how hard it was on men like Connor to get injured and feel like they couldn't break down, not even once.
