“How long until you find out?” I can hear her eating on the other end of the phone. “I’m out of black jelly beans. You’re going to have to pay me a visit, so I have an excuse to buy a new bag.”
I snort, but it makes my head hurt. I lay my palm across my forehead and hold it there, trying to will the headache away.
“I also got a job application while I was there. I’m going to send them my resume as soon as I feel better. They’re hiring.”
“Well, that sounds like a fine idea.” She chews slowly. Apparently, the absence of black jelly beans has not slowed her down. “So you’re thinking about staying, huh?”
“I need a job and they have an opening. I wouldn’t be opposed to staying for a while. Besides, I don’t like being the topic of conversation back there. I know they’re all talking about me.”
Gran makes a tsking sound with her teeth. If she does that too much, they’ll fall right out of her mouth. I’ve seen it happen. “They’re too busy talking about Charles and Sandra to talk about you. Apparently, Charles went to where Sandra works to raise a little hell when she refused to accept his calls. They’ve put her on administrative leave at the hospital.”
If I felt better, I’d do a little Snoopy dance. Instead, I settle for a small fist pump and plaintive silence. “Is that so?”
“And word has it that after she got put on leave at the hospital, she went by his office and raised Cain and he got sent home for the rest of the day and a formal warning.”
No matter how that made my heart feel like things were a little better in line, I still felt somewhat bad for them. And even more for that unborn child. Babies don’t ask to be born into drama-prone families that start the way theirs did. I desperately hope they can get their shit together, if only for the child’s sake.
“Well, that’s just awful,” I finally reply.
Gran snickers. “I can tell you’re all tore up about it.” She chews loudly for a minute. “So, tell me about Ethan.” She waits, not even breathing into the phone.
“What do you want to know?”
“You found out what happened? Where he has been?”
“Yes. He told me. It was a tragic accident.”
“Yes, it was,” she says quietly.
“And he has paid for it.”
“Has he?”
“He served his time. Isn’t that enough? You should have seen the people in town, Gran. They were like mice picking at a wheel of cheddar. And he was about as defenseless. It was sad to watch.”
“Sometimes, Abigail, we have more than one demon to fight. Sometimes it’s the past, sometimes it’s the present, and quite often it’s ourselves.”
“He’s pretty great, Gran,” I say. I yawn into the phone. “Oops. Sorry.”
“I’ll let you get back to sleep. Just wanted to check on you.”
“Thanks, Gran.” I yawn again. I disconnect the call and let the phone drop heavily to the bed. My arm hits just as hard, weak and tired from holding up the phone.
“Still not feeling well?” Ethan asks. I didn’t even hear him walk in.
I look over my shoulder at him. “I’m okay.”
He chuckles. “No, you’re not.” He comes and jumps onto the bed, landing beside me. “You feel like eating?”
“Nope.”
“Even if I make it?” He waggles his brows at me playfully.
“Nope.”
“What did your grandmother have to say?” He reaches over and brushes a lock of hair from my face. His face is so calm and serene in that moment that he almost seems pretty to me.
“Just gossip,” I say over another yawn, my mouth wide open.
“The good kind?”
I roll my eyes but doing that hurts. “Is there a good kind of gossip?”
He shrugs. “I guess it depends on who it’s about.” He heaves out a sigh. “So, what are we doing tonight?”
“I have no plans to do anything. Not with you or with anybody else.” My fever is better, but I still feel like doo-doo.
“Want to play UNO?” he asks. He grins while he says it and rubs his hands together. “You wouldn’t have to get out of bed.”
“I haven’t played UNO since I was a teenager. I’m afraid I’ve forgotten how.”
He cups his hands around his mouth. “I can read instructions,” he whispers at me, like he’s telling me an important secret.
“Fine.” I groan and pull the covers under my chin. “I’ve never been so warm as when you were in bed with me this morning.”
His cheeks turn a little pink, and he looks everywhere but at me. “Glad I could help,” he says, his voice a little deeper than before.
“Why are you looking like that?” I ask, suddenly curious about his response.
“Like what?” He motions toward his face. “This is my face, Abigail. It’s the only one I have. Don’t disrespect it.”
“Shut up,” I say, as I playfully kick out at his knee. “Your face did something weird.”
“And I’m to be judged for what my face does?” He lets his mouth drop open like a cartoon character who has been shocked.
“Why did you turn all pink?”
“I don’t know what you mean.” He gets up and starts to wander around, picking up glasses and dishes.
“Would you stop that?”
“Stop what?” He freezes en route to the kitchen and looks back at me.
“Stop hedging around the question.”
“What was the question?”
I enunciate very slowly. “I asked why you looked funny when I mentioned how much I liked having you be my own personal heating blanket. I was just joking. I won’t make you do it again.”
“See…that’s where you’re wrong.” He walks into the kitchen, and I can hear him opening the refrigerator, pouring something into a glass, and then he comes back carrying a fresh glass of purple juice with a straw in it. He drops some chopped up fever reducers in my hand and holds the straw close to me.
“What am I wrong about?” I ask, as I drop the pill bits into my mouth and wrap my lips around the straw.
“You’re wrong about my not wanting to get back into your bed. It’s all I’ve been able to think about ever since this morning. I woke up with you pressed against me. My hand had slid up under your shirt, and my palm was on your stomach. We were skin to skin, and it’s been a long time since I was as happy as I was in that moment.”
He sucks in a long breath, and then blows it out slowly. “And if you want me to be honest, my face probably turned a little red because all I’ve thought about all day long is how nice it’ll be when I get to sleep in your bed for real, not because you need me in it, but when you want me in it. That’ll be one of the best days of my life. Because ever since this morning, when I woke up with your ass pressed against me, all I can think about is how it’s going to feel when I finally get to fuck you.” He points to his face. “If my face turned red again just now, that’s why.”
I must jerk or something because he suddenly rushes to reassure me. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I thought we were being honest. Should I have said ‘make love’? That might have been more romantic.” He scratches his head. “I probably just totally fucked that up.” Worry mars his brow, and if I wasn’t so weak and so tired, I’d reach out to rub it away. “It’s been a long time since I’ve done any of this. I might be out of practice. Forgive me?”
I lay my hand on his leg. “No, it’s fine. Fuck is a fine word. It really is. And if I felt better, I’d totally lift this blanket up and invite you in here with me and we could do it all day long.”
He grins. “I like the way you think.”
“But I’m sick.” I have to remind myself as much as him.
“You’re sick.”
“I’m going to put in a job application at the clinic we went to today.”
He tilts his head as he gazes at me, the corners of his lips tipping up into a smile. “Really?”
“Really. I’m still in like with you, even though I feel
like shit.” I squeeze his knee again. “Did I say thanks for taking care of me yet?” I yawn at the end of the sentence, suddenly so tired I can barely keep my eyes open.
“No need,” he says. He leans down and presses a kiss to my forehead, lingering over me a beat longer than I’d expected. “I’ll be back after I finish what Mr. Jacobson asked me to do. Apparently, there’s a chance of a late-season hurricane next week, so he asked me to take the canoes out of the water and put them in the storage building. And the little sailboats too.”
“A hurricane?” I ask. “I haven’t heard anything about it.”
He shrugs. “Me either. But if Mr. Jacobson is worried about it, I suppose I had better get to work. I’m supposed to go help him and Jake, which really means they’ll yell insults at one another while I work.” He gets up and stares down at me. “Can I get you anything before I go?”
“Just give me a promise,” I reply.
“What’s that?”
“Promise me you’ll come back.”
He grins. “I swear it.” Then he leaves me lying there, my eyes already closing from exhaustion, and the last thing I hear is the sound of the front door closing behind him.
25
Ethan
The sun has just begun to set when I put the last kayak on the upper racks of the storage building. I step back and look around, wondering what else there is here that I need to do. I’ve taken apart all the sailboats, rolling up the sails and putting them in a place where they’ll be safe. I’ve retrieved all the kayaks and canoes from the water. I’ve taken the two small motorized boats, one ski boat and one fishing boat, out of the water using my truck and two boat trailers I found behind the shed. And I’ve battened down all the hatches I can find. I don’t think I’ve missed anything, at least not anything the Jacobsons put on my to-do list.
Jake and Pop were working with me for a while, but they got to bickering as usual. When Katie called to tell them that dinner was ready, that it was time to call it a day, they’d invited me to come and eat with them. But I really want to eat with Abigail tonight. She did promise to play UNO with me. She used to be a shark at UNO, and she won almost every game. Now I’m not sure that I even remember how to play, but I’m sure I can google it.
As I step out of the storage building, I find Pop Jacobson walking toward me. “You finished?” he asks. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a toothpick and pops it into his mouth.
“I think so.” I list all the things I finished. “Do you need me to do anything else today?” I wait, watching him as he looks around the shed.
“I heard tell that you took that Marshall girl to the doctor this morning.”
“Yes, sir. She’s sick.”
He narrows his eyes. “Thought I told you to stay away from her.”
I nod. “You did.”
He stares at me hard. It’s not a glare, but it’s more than a stare. “Why didn’t you listen?”
Because I’m a grown man and I can make my own choices. “Mainly because I like her, Mr. Jacobson. I like her a lot.” I’ve always liked her, even back when we were kids.
He walks over and plays around with the straps I used to hold the kayaks in place, tightening and loosening them, even though they don’t need tightening or loosening.
“Does she like you back?” he asks. He keeps on poking around the shed like he’s trying to keep his hands busy, checking behind me, although I know my work is perfect.
I shrug. “She says she does. But I’m not sure.”
“Well, keep at it,” he says. “Any woman worth having needs some bringing around.”
I stop what I’m doing to stare at him. “Beg your pardon?”
“I’ve always hated that expression. I’d a whole lot rather someone just ask me what the hell do I mean than hear them beg my fucking pardon.”
I bite back a grin and my surprise, holding my lips closed tight for a moment. Then I say, “What the hell do you mean by ‘keep at it’? It was you who warned me away from her, the first day she arrived.”
He grins. “Well, when Jake was a young man, I knew he’d always do the opposite of what I suggested, so I learned that one of the easiest ways to help a young man find a path is to warn him away from it.” He chuckles. “Ta-da. It worked.”
I scrub my hand across my nose, trying to hide the grin that’s tugging at my lips. “I think I might just be immune to your brand of persuasion.”
He laughs. “Sure, you are. It took you less than twenty-four hours to find your way to her. I’d say that was a job well done on my part.” He pretends to pat himself on the back.
He thinks I went to Abigail just because he told me not to? That’s not the case. Not at all. “So you told me to stay away because you thought it would send me in her direction?” The dodgy old coot.
“Well, it wasn’t because I think you’re shady or damaged or not good enough for her. I don’t know much about her, but everything I’ve seen about you has impressed me.” He chews on the toothpick. “You show up on time, you work hard, you’re smart as all get-out, and you care about people, son. Nobody impresses me more than an honest man.”
Suddenly, I have a lump in my throat that I can’t swallow past, and I have to blink hard to clear my vision. “Thank you,” I finally say when I can speak.
“Don’t you let those people in town get to you. Small-minded people are quick to carry a grudge. And when you have a town as small as Macon Hills, it’s easy for a hive-mind to develop, meaning that if one person thinks it, they spread it to everyone else. I’d wager that as soon as one influential person starts to pull for you, the rest will stop giving you such a hard time.”
“I don’t particularly care if they like me. I’d just like for them to leave me alone.”
“That boy of yours,” he says. “He’s going to come and live with you?”
“The jury’s still out on that one.”
He turns to face me, and he looks straight into my eyes. “Why?”
I fidget for a moment and shove my hands into my pockets. “I’m afraid,” I admit.
“Of what?”
“That his association with me will do him more harm than good.”
“What will do him more harm than good is losing his father,” he says firmly. “When Jake’s mama died, I wanted to crawl in a hole and die with her. My goddamn heart was broken, and I felt like every day was a chore to get through. That lasted for a few weeks.” He fiddles with the loose end of a tie-down strap, running it back and forth across his palm. “But that boy of mine, he needed me. So I had to get my shit together and be his father rather than a big old ball of sorrow.” He points his thumb at his chest. “I had to remember that even though she was gone, I wasn’t. So I got my shit together and I kept it together.”
I nod, unsure what kind of response he’s looking for.
“You’re worthy of being that boy’s daddy,” he says slowly and succinctly, while staring straight into my eyes. “Don’t you ever let anyone convince you different.”
My nose suddenly clogs, and my eyes burn as I walk to the open door of the storage building and look out at the darkening sky.
“Ethan,” Mr. Jacobson says quietly.
I lift the tail of my shirt and swipe at my nose where he can’t see me. “Yes, sir?” I say without looking back.
“You’re worthy of raising that boy,” he says again, and he says it so clearly and directly that I feel like something breaks inside me.
“What if I’m not?” My nose is suddenly stuffy again, and I feel like an idiot. But Mr. Jacobson pays me no mind and he keeps messing with those straps that don’t need fixing. “What if the people in this town can never forgive me? What then?”
I feel his beefy hand clamp onto my shoulder. “See, Ethan, that’s the thing. The town doesn’t need to forgive you. You need to forgive yourself.”
I shake my head. “I’m not sure I can.” I finally turn to look at him. He doesn’t blink when he sees how full my eyes are. He looks at me l
ike I’m a man who’s not about to lose his shit. “I killed her.”
“You didn’t kill her, son,” he says, his voice soft like he’s talking to a wild animal that could startle and bolt. “It was a tragic accident.” He shakes his head. “It could have happened to any one of us, but it happened to you, and it’s unfortunate. But you don’t have to give up your life because she lost hers. She wouldn’t want that for you. She’d want you to be happy.”
“Well, she’s the only one,” I say, and I know I sound just like Mitchell did this weekend when I told him he couldn’t have any more marshmallows. I sound petulant and sorry for myself.
He tosses his hands up. “Fuck the rest of them.” He stares at me. He rocks his head from side to side, like he’s thinking something over. “Or you can choose to love the rest of them. Whichever suits you best will be just fine. You can ignore them, or you can embrace them. But that boy is yours, and he will suffer for want of a parent.”
“But my mom—”
He cuts me off. “Your mom is his grandmother. She’s not his mother.”
“What if I don’t know how to be a parent?” I feel like I’m grasping at straws here. I feel like I’m free-sliding down a ladder and can’t catch a rung to pull myself up.
He laughs loud and long, so loud and long that it’s annoying as shit. “Nobody knows how to be a parent, you dipshit,” he says. “We protect them from what can hurt them, and push them toward what can help them, and we love them even when they hate our guts. That’s parenting for you. It’s a thankless job, or at least it seems like it for a while. But I can assure you that almost any parent of an adult child that you talk to will tell you that they spend an awful lot of time trying to get their adult children to come home for a spell. Kids can drive us nuts, it’s true, but we sure do miss them when they’re gone.” He motions for me to follow him as he walks out the door. “C’mon. I want to show you something.”
I follow him down the lane toward Abigail’s cabin, but he stops at the one right next door.
Feels like Rain (Lake Fisher Book 3) Page 17
