Fragile Hearts (Poplar Falls Book 4)

by Amber Kelly

  “Well, I do.”

  “Fine,” I say, and then I proceed to recount every detail from the time I reached for the tequila and missed to me asking Brandt to bring me here to see Elle.

  “Wow,” Sonia declares.

  “Yes, wow,” Doreen and Elle agree.

  “So, where did you leave things?” Sonia asks.

  “Just like that,” I say.

  “You didn’t tell him why you’d stopped and insisted on talking to Elle?” Sonia asks.

  “Well, kind of. I told him it was girl code.”

  “Girl code? He has no idea what girl code is. He probably thinks you’re a tease. Or insane,” she yells.

  “I’m sure he could deduce what she meant by girl code,” Doreen adds.

  “You think?” I ask.

  She reaches across the table and reassuringly covers my hand with hers. “If not, I’m sure Walker is filling him in right about now.”

  Perfect.

  Brandt

  Walker has me drive over to Braxton and Sophie’s house. Braxton is sitting on the deck with his feet propped up on a cooler when we arrive.

  I park and follow Walker as he ascends the steps up to the puppy gate and lets us through it.

  “So, the women ran you two off, huh?” Braxton says as we take a seat in the other two Adirondack chairs that face out to the gorge.

  “Yep, best-friend crisis,” Walker says as Braxton reaches into the cooler and tosses him and then me a beer.

  “What was it this time?” he asks.

  Walker shrugs. “Don’t know, but if I were a betting man, I’d say, Doc here knows.”

  Both their eyes come to me, and they wait.

  “All Bellamy said was girl code,” I offer them the only information I have.

  Walker’s eyes widen.

  “What does that mean?” I ask.

  “Why, it means that Miss Wilson has caught interest in you, Doc,” he declares.

  I wrinkle my brow. “Caught interest in me?”

  “Yep. See, in women’s language, girl code means that one of them likes a dude the other of them has either liked, crushed on, or dated in the past. The girl then has to get the all clear from the other one that it’s okay to proceed with said love interest. If girl number one doesn’t give girl number two the permission to pursue said old flame, then it’s game over. They never bring it up again. First girl’s claim trumps the new girl’s affection even if it was never reciprocated by said old flame,” he explains.

  “Can a guy be considered an old flame if he was never a flame to begin with?” I ask for clarification.

  “In chick world, abso-fuckin’-lutely.”

  “Really?”

  “Yep. It doesn’t make sense, but then again, it doesn’t have to make sense to us. It does to them,” Braxton confirms.

  “So, Bellamy wanted to talk to Elle about me?”

  “Correct, sir. You did go out with my girl a time or two last year,” Walker points out.

  “But Elle and I are just friends. We’ve only ever been friends,” I assure him.

  “Doesn’t matter. You guys went out, so Bells is going to make sure Elle is okay with her tickling your pickle,” he insists.

  “You and Elle are engaged,” I state.

  “Yep.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Like Brax said, it doesn’t have to. They are chicks.”

  Braxton nods his agreement.

  “Tickle my pickle?”

  “If you’re lucky,” Walker says and grins at me before he takes another pull from his beer.

  “That’s not going to happen. I think Bellamy is a sweet girl, but—”

  Walker cuts me off, “Sweet girl? She’s gorgeous. And she’s into you. I could tell the other night at the bar. So, why won’t it happen? Are you carrying a torch for my woman, Doc?”

  “No.”

  “Then, what’s the problem? If it’s Myer, don’t worry. He might sucker punch you when he finds out, but he’ll eventually come around.”

  Braxton cuts his eyes to Walker. “That’s still debatable.”

  “You love me, and you know it.” Walker blows off his comment.

  “I’m just not someone she wants to get involved with.”

  “Why not? You’re a good-looking dude. Successful. Good to your momma. What’s wrong with you? You got a secret girlfriend or a lovechild back in Oregon or something?” Walker digs.

  “No, not a girlfriend. A wife.”

  All humor falls from Walker’s face, and both he and Braxton focus their big-brother stares on me.

  “Come again?” Braxton bites.

  “Her name is Annie. Was. Her name was Annie. She was killed by a stranger in a restaurant parking lot almost three years ago.”

  Walker whistles low, and they both sit back heavy in their chairs.

  “Damn, man. I’m sorry to hear that.” All humor is gone from Walker’s voice as he takes on a serious tone for the first time ever in my presence.

  This is why I don’t share. I hate the pity that people instantly feel when they hear the words.

  “What happened exactly?” Braxton is focused on me, but he isn’t offering sympathy or feigning pain over a woman he has never met.

  “It was our wedding anniversary. We had reservations at her favorite Italian restaurant in town. I promised I wouldn’t be late. My practice was new, and I was always working. Always running late or missing everything important to her. I insisted I’d be there. Then, I got held up at the office.

  “A lady came in, and she was in a panic about her dog, just as I was trying to lock up. The dog was having a seizure. The poor woman was a mess. So, I brought them in and looked the dog over. It was an older dog. I texted Annie to tell her I would be there as soon as I could, and I waited with the lady until the seizure passed and she was calm. Then, I sent them to the emergency clinic.

  “Angry, Annie had texted back not to bother, to go ahead and treat the dog. I hurried to the place as fast as I could, hoping to catch her before she was gone. I made it just in time to watch a vagrant slit her throat with a dirty blade and yank her purse she was clinging to. She bled out in my arms before police or medics could make it to the scene.”

  Until now, I haven’t told that story out loud to anyone since the trial. Not a single soul.

  “Did they catch him?” Braxton asks.

  “Yeah. I was able to describe him and tell them the direction he had taken off in. They found him in an abandoned house with a needle in his arm a few hours later. He used the twenty-three dollars Annie had had in her wallet to buy a single hit of heroin. He’d killed my wife for a thirty-minute high.”

  “Fuck,” Walker utters.

  “It’s good they got him,” Braxton affirms.

  “Yeah. But he wasn’t the only one responsible. I should be rotting in that cell right beside him,” I mutter more to myself than to them.

  “Are you shittin’ me?” Walker asks.

  Braxton puts his hand up, and Walker halts what he was about to say.

  “You been carrying that shit on you all this time?” Braxton asks the baffling question.

  “Shit?”

  “Yeah, that guilt you have sitting on your chest like an anchor.”

  I don’t respond as he bores his eyes into mine. It’s like he can see all the way to my soul.

  Then, he starts his story. “It was early November. We were on our way to cut down a Christmas tree at Kringle’s Tree Farm. We usually waited until after Thanksgiving to get one, but it had snowed that weekend, and since Aunt Madeline and her new beau were coming for a visit, Momma wanted to go ahead and decorate the house and start being festive a little early that year. It was the first time we were getting to meet Jefferson Lancaster, and she wanted everything to be perfect for Aunt Mads.

  “I remember Dad and I were outside, shoveling the drive and walkway, when she came out of the house with Elle on her hip, all bundled up, and they ambushed us with snowballs. We spent
that afternoon together, laughing and playing in the snow. Then, I helped her convince Dad to load us all up into his Cherokee to go get a tree. It took us both. He wanted to wait because he said the tree would be too dried out by Christmas, but I begged him. Elle was so excited. It was the first Christmas she was old enough to grasp the idea of Santa and presents. He finally gave in after I promised to keep it well watered every day.

  “I can still see that entire ride vividly. Momma popped in a CD and made us all sing carols. Elle was clapping, and Dad was purposefully getting all the words wrong while I laughed. The car came out of nowhere. The last thing I remember before we were hit was my mother’s face looking back at us and going from a wide, happy smile to pure panic. I didn’t have time to turn and see what she saw before I heard the sound of wheels squealing and steel crunching. She was in a seat belt, but she managed to snake her arms out and twist in the seat like lightning, trying to reach us and shield us with her body. The impact was so hard it slung us around in circles and threw her against the windshield. Her head slammed into the glass and busted open. We went over the side and I remember the feel of falling, and when we slammed into the ground, part of the frame broke loose and ended up imbedded in her chest. Her body was shaking from the shock. I tried so hard to get loose and get to her, but I was trapped. I swear, for years, every time I closed my eyes, I could hear her petrified screams.”

  I watch him get lost in that memory as he closes his eyes tightly, and the pain washes over him.

  “I’ve never told anyone that. Not even Elle,” he confesses.

  “I’m so sorry,” I tell him.

  “We ended up upside down at the bottom of the gap. It took rescuers forever to reach us. Momma went silent fairly quickly, and I could hear Dad’s anguished cries as he reached for her face. He was coughing blood. I remember the gurgling sound when he tried to talk. Elle was screaming as she hung from her car seat. He struggled to get free, but he was pinned, and his chest was crushed by the steering wheel. I was dazed, but I was able to finally get my belt undone, and through my sobs, I asked him what to do. He told me to take care of my sister. I crawled over and grabbed her, got her loose, and wrapped her in my arms. We sat there, huddled on the roof of the SUV, with him reassuring us that everything would be okay as he lost his fight. He took his last breath as the sirens filled the air, and lights from the sheriff’s car and ambulance reflected on the back windshield. He held on until that moment. Until he knew help had arrived for us. Then, he took one last labored breath. He hadn’t wanted to leave us alone in that wreck.”

  “Jeezus,” is all I can manage to say.

  “I blamed myself, just like you, for a long time. I was the reason we had been out that night. I convinced him to go get the tree. If I hadn’t promised to water it, he wouldn’t have given in. It was all my fault,” he says as he looks up at me.

  I shake my head. He was just a kid. It was an accident.

  “When I ended up here with Aunt Madeline and Jefferson, I was so closed off. I was afraid to get close to them. Afraid to love them. I thought I didn’t deserve love. In the beginning, the only thing that kept me going was Elle. I had to take care of Elle.”

  He stops for a moment and gets a far-off look. One I know well.

  “Hard to tell which is worse sometimes. Being the one dying or the one left behind.”

  I nod in agreement.

  “Guess we won’t know till we’re dead,” Walker utters.

  “Survivor’s guilt. That’s what Gram called it,” Braxton goes on. “See, I was angry and grieving. It took me a long time to realize that I hadn’t killed them. The drunk driver plowing into us had killed them. It was an accident. It could have happened anytime. While they were on the way to the store, going to work, or at a gas station. It could have happened with or without us in the truck. It could have happened that night or four weeks from that night on our way to get a tree if we had decided to wait. Accidents are just that … accidents and they’re senseless. And it was not my fault. Gram helped me see that.

  “Brandt, what happened to your wife was not your fault. She was leaving the restaurant early because you were late. So? She could have been attacked on the way out while you paid the bill, or you could have walked out of that door together and been attacked. She’d still be the one who lost her life, and you still would have lived. It could have happened at any time or anywhere when she wasn’t with you. You are not to blame because you were running late. The man with the knife and the evil intent is the one to blame.”

  He brings his eyes to meet mine, and I can see the truth in them.

  “You didn’t kill her, brother.”

  “I do every night when I relive that moment in my dreams,” I tell him.

  “Because you don’t believe it yet, but hear me. You did not kill her.”

  “You did not kill her,” Walker repeats.

  Bellamy

  I end up calling home and telling my parents that I am staying the night with Elle.

  We continue to dissect the evening’s events over two plates of cookies. Ria joins us for plate number two, and she lets us in on a conversation she had with Elaine while they had coffee one morning.

  Apparently, Brandt is a widower.

  “Well, that explains a lot,” Elle says after Ria breaks the news.

  She says she always felt something from his past was holding him back from opening up fully. Ria doesn’t know the circumstances surrounding his wife’s death but just that it was out of the blue and that Brandt did not cope very well with her loss.

  “She hoped that moving here would help him heal,” Ria says.

  “I’m not sure he has,” I share.

  “No, not completely, not yet,” she agrees.

  We end the night somberly, all curled up in the living room, watching reruns of Gilmore Girls, like we did when we were younger, until the aunts fall asleep, and Sonia leaves to go home to Ricky.

  I don’t sleep much. I toss and turn all night, thinking of how painful it must be for Brandt and wondering if I made things worse for him.

  By the time the sun comes up, I have decided to back off and pretend it was just the tequila and no big deal.

  Hopefully, work won’t be too awkward on Monday morning. Thank goodness we have the weekend.

  We get up and help Ria and Doreen make breakfast before the ranch hands show up, hungry. Once everyone has eaten, Elle goes off to take a shower, and Sophie and I use the opportunity to sit Doreen down and discuss the fake engagement party.

  Sophie put a deposit on Mystic Mill, which is an old sawmill outside of town that has been converted into a special-event venue. It is a gorgeous space that hosts everything from weddings to retirement parties to political fundraisers for the people of Poplar Falls.

  Doreen gets excited at the news.

  “I love that place,” she remarks. “It’s big and romantic. The perfect venue.”

  Sophie smiles and then asks our input on food.

  “We can help with that. Ria and I will make the food,” Doreen chirps.

  “Um, I’m going to hire someone to do the food,” Sophie insists.

  “Why on earth would you do that? We know all her favorites, and we are more than happy to do it.”

  “Because, Aunt Doe, if you two are in this kitchen for days, cooking enough food to feed the town, Elle will catch on to it. Besides, I need you to be the one keeping her distracted and get her to the party.”

  “Me? Why me? I’m sure Bellamy and Sonia can get her there.”

  Sophie looks panicked for a moment, and I weigh in.

  “It’s the weekend of the church’s mother-daughter dinner, and Elle and I bought tickets. She plans to ask you to go with her and Momma and me. Just act surprised when she asks you, okay?”

  “She wants me to go to a mother-daughter dinner with her?” Doreen asks.

  “That’s what she said,” I tell her, and it’s not a lie. Elle does plan to take her. The dinner is just the weekend after.
/>   “What about Madeline?” she asks.

  I shrug. “She said she wanted you to come.”

  “Oh goodness,” she says as she dabs at her eyes with a kitchen towel.

  “Don’t cry, or she’s going to get suspicious. You’re going to have to miss the dinner anyway,” Ria reminds her.

  “Oh no, you girls already spent the money,” she cries.

  “It’s fine. It’s for charity, and a big ole engagement party is way better,” I assure her.

  “Yep, it will be,” Sophie agrees. “Now, let’s discuss the food.”

  “You should call Flying Horse Catering in Aurora. They’re excellent,” Ria suggests.

  “Oh, that’s a splendid idea,” Doreen agrees. “I love their food. It’s so good, and the staff is amazing. They catered my friend Nancy’s daughter’s wedding. I highly recommend them.”

  Sophie grins. “Done. I’ll call them today.”

  Elle comes walking in with her hair in a ponytail and her riding gear on.

  The room goes silent.

  “What?” she asks as she strolls to the fridge and grabs a pitcher of juice.

  “Nothing, sweetie. We were just talking more about Bellamy and Brandt,” Doreen covers.

  “Bellamy and Brandt?!” Sophie says, and her eyes fly to me.

  “Yes, Bellamy. And. Brandt,” Doreen enunciates clearly while staring at Sophie.

  Sophie nods. “Yeah, they were filling me in.”

  “Well, I hope you two explore things,” Elle says without missing a beat.

  “I thought about it last night, and I think, in light of his story, it’s not such a good idea after all.”

  “Why not?” Elle asks.

  “He’s probably not ready, and I just broke up with Derrick twenty-four hours ago.”

  “His wife has been gone for a few years, and it’s not like you and Derrick were that serious. There’s nothing wrong with you both moving on,” she insists.

  “I guess we’ll wait and see what happens,” I decide.

  “Good plan, dear,” Ria agrees with me.

  Brandt

  “I’m much obliged you came all the way out here on a Saturday, Dr. Haralson.”