Out of the Darkness: a Hope Valley novel

by Prince, Jessica

  And just like that, I was done for. My heart was his completely. In response, I launched myself over the couch and into his arms. We had sex right there on the floor behind the sofa, and after that, he took me for a ride on the back of his bike. It was late, so I didn’t have the sun on my face, but I had the wind in my hair and Xander’s body pressed into my front.

  That was all I needed.

  He gave me something new every single day, just by being himself, and in return I did everything I could to make sure those shadows stayed locked down whenever I was with him.

  There were times they were just too strong to push down, and on those nights he was usually quiet and contemplative, but I never stopped trying.

  We didn’t talk about his past, not ever, and he never shared anything about himself outside of the things I’d been able to put together on my own. I knew nothing of his childhood, his early adult life, or his time in the military, and I never asked.

  I wasn’t thrilled about it, but I was following my instincts. He proved to me on a daily basis he was worth it, so I fought back that little voice nagging at me that it wasn’t enough. On the nights he went silent on me, as hard as it was, I simply sat back and gave him a safe, quiet place to be. If that didn’t work, I’d crack jokes and act like it was any other day.

  Danika’s words remained in the back of my mind, and I held tight to the hope that he’d eventually come to trust me enough to let me help him with whatever it was that haunted him.

  Meanwhile, I kept telling myself over and over that this was enough.

  And for now, it was, so that nagging voice could kiss my ass.

  I was living in a town that was nothing but beauty, I had great friends, I had a job I loved, and I had a man who made me feel amazing on a daily basis.

  There wasn’t much more a woman could ask for.

  Except cake. Cake made everything even better.

  “Hey, darlin’.” I pulled out of my musings and looked up from my computer at the sound of Roxanne’s voice to see her standing in the doorway of my office. “Staff meeting’s about to start.”

  I gave her a huge smile and stood from my chair. “Be right there. I just have to grab the cake.”

  This week’s birthday celebration was special for me for one reason and one reason only. Xander.

  He hadn’t said a word about his birthday, but I knew from being responsible for the calendar that it was today. When I’d asked him about it, he’d said it was no big deal, just another day, but as far as I was concerned, birthdays were special and needed to be celebrated. He didn’t like crowds, so keeping a mind to that, I’d decided to go low key, just the two of us, but I’d still gone all out in an effort to show my man he mattered.

  I’d gone for chocolate on chocolate today, not wanting to do anything that might look like I was playing favorites, even though I so totally was. But even going simple, Sugar and Spice added their own spin on everything, so the chocolate cake was layered with what looked and tasted like melted Snickers bars. In other words, it was freaking delicious.

  “Happy Birthday Xander” was piped in white, and there were little white dots of frosting on the chocolate rosettes around the top.

  When I walked into the conference room, all eyes shot to the pink box in my hand, and when they did, I got whoops of excitement from everyone.

  Everyone, that was, except the birthday boy himself.

  “Hell yeah,” Trent said, scooting his chair back to come around my way. “It’s a cake week.”

  I’d been at Alpha Omega for two months now, and the staff meetings happened every Friday, but with only eleven employees, the meetings didn’t include cake as often as I’d have liked. And after the first one, I’d quickly discovered something about the men I worked with: they might have been alpha badasses, but they totally dug cake.

  “Hands off,” I snapped when Trent went for the box I’d just placed on the table, earning him a hand slap. “Sit down and wait for me to cut the pieces and pass them out. I swear, you guys are worse than children.”

  He shook out his hand and gave me a look that was a cross between a glare and a scowl.

  I ignored him and flipped the lid open, pulling the cake from the box. “Happy Birthday, Xander,” I said, giving him a big, beaming smile. His face remained flat, and with the exception of those shadows, his eyes were lifeless.

  Doing my best to push down the ache in my chest at his lack of reaction, I began cutting and plating as the guys chatted and ate.

  That first cake I brought had been the only one Xander had turned down, proving he’d been full of it when he said he didn’t eat cake, but when I placed the slice in front of him now, all he did was stare at it.

  I kept a neutral expression on my face as I took a seat and dug into my own piece, pretending to listen as the meeting progressed, but I kept sneaking peeks my guy’s way throughout the whole thing, waiting for him to eat the cake I’d gotten specifically for him.

  The minutes passed, the meeting eventually ended, and as I stood from my chair and started from the conference room, it took a lot to hide the fact that it killed me when Xander got up and walked out, leaving his cake completely untouched.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Sage

  The digital numbers on the microwave blinked, marking the passing of another minute.

  10:05.

  I knew he was going to be late. He’d told me as much when I’d gone to the control room five hours ago to see if he was ready to leave. But I hadn’t expected him to be this late.

  “Got a lot of shit to do here, Shortcake,” he’d said, not bothering to pull his eyes from the computer long enough to look at me. “Gonna be late. If you’d rather just stay at your place tonight, I get it. If not, you’ll be waiting for a while.”

  I swallowed down what felt like a wad of cotton drying my throat. “I don’t mind waiting,” I said, trying to look calm and collected as he gave me a shrug in response, but it hurt like hell.

  Just push through, Sage. Just push through. He was just having a bad day, nothing I hadn’t seen before.

  I left work and headed straight for his place, still planning to go through with everything to make this a good night for him.

  I’d burned through a good chunk of my paycheck on Xander’s gifts. Finding a Harley Davidson store in Richmond, I bought Xander a new pair of motorcycle boots since his were worn out. I got him some new tees and a couple sweaters as well, but it was my main gift that I was proudest of. A couple weeks back when the weather had been a little nicer, Xander had taken me out on his bike. We went to that spot near the cliff he’d shown me on our first ride. The sun had been setting, casting the sky above the valley in vibrant pinks, yellows, and oranges. I wasn’t sure what had driven me to do it, but I’d been standing behind him at the time, and when I looked up from doing something on my phone, the sight in front of me had taken my breath away.

  I’d quickly snapped a picture with my cell, and it turned out better than I could have dreamed. The sky was stunning, the valley below peaceful, but my favorite thing about the picture was that just to the left near the bottom, Xander was standing right next to his motorcycle, staring out at the gorgeous view.

  I’d paid an arm and a leg to get it blown up as big as possible without ruining the quality and printed on canvas, then I found a frame made of rough, raw wood that fit in with his cabin perfectly.

  The picture was totally beautiful and totally biker all at once, and I couldn’t wait for him to unwrap it.

  But the gifts weren’t all there was. I’d gone to the butcher and bought the finest steaks they had. I was preparing them with au gratin potatoes, green beans with slivered almonds, and homemade biscuits—a recipe I’d gotten from my granny on my dad’s side before she passed away when I was thirteen.

  He’d mentioned once in passing that he liked peach cobbler but hadn’t eaten it in years, so I’d gone all out on dessert, making one from scratch, even going as far as to blanch and skin fresh pe
aches instead of using canned.

  It had all been a pain in the ass—I wasn’t the best cook—but in the end, everything had turned out great.

  Then it all went cold.

  I waited as long as I could before my stomach’s protest finally won out. I made myself a plate and ate dinner by myself at Xander’s kitchen table.

  At ten thirty, I’d given up the ghost, and with a sore, deflated heart, I’d packed everything up and put it in the fridge.

  By eleven the pain was still there, but it had dulled as my anger came into play. I mean, would it have killed him to shoot me a text to at least give me an idea when he’d be home?

  Moving from the kitchen to the living room, I looked to where Bear was lying on the couch and grumbled, “Your daddy can be a real asshole sometimes.”

  Bear’s tail thumped against the cushion once in understanding. He’d been around Xander long enough, I was sure he already knew the guy could be an asshole when he wanted to.

  I curled up next to the sweet pup and turned on the TV, flipping mindlessly through the channels until I found something that caught my attention.

  I didn’t know how long I sat there, staring unseeing at the television before the chill in the house got to be too much. The temps outside had dropped again, going from cold to downright frigid. It had been years since I lived in Tennessee, but the senses I’d developed there had never gone away. It felt like snow was coming, and if I hadn’t been consumed with worry over Xander’s behavior today, I would have been giddy with anticipation.

  Getting off the sofa, I headed for the closet near the front door in search of a blanket I could snuggle under while I waited for Xander to get home.

  It was a hodgepodge of stuff, random items thrown inside the closet like it was a catch-all for the items Xander didn’t feel like putting up. Everything from jackets to boots to miscellaneous boxes were crammed inside.

  He wasn’t exactly a neat freak, but from what I’d been able to tell, he at least kept the cabin tidy, so this closet was a bit of a surprise.

  I shuffled stuff around, managing to locate a fuzzy-looking quilt on the top shelf. Standing on my tiptoes thanks to my limited height, I strained to reach the blanket. I finally caught it with the tips of my fingers and latched on, giving it a yank to get it down.

  “Shit,” I yelped, jumping out of the way as the quilt unfolded and a small metal box came crashing to the ground with a loud clatter.

  The box looked old, dented and rusted with serious age. The latch had popped up and the hinged lid swung open, spilling the contents all over the floor.

  I dropped to my knees to gather everything, flipping the box right side up, and froze solid. Lying face up was a picture of a younger-looking Xander holding a beautiful blonde woman in his arms. She was wearing a puffy, princess-type wedding dress and he was in a classic tux. He still had a beard in the photo, but it was nothing compared to now. It looked to be only about a week or two’s worth of growth. His hair was much shorter, brushed back from his face in a casual, yet sexy way. My heart throbbed at the sight of him in that photo. Not just because he looked breathtaking in a tuxedo, which he did, or because this was a picture of the man I’d fallen in love with on his wedding day, but because the expression on his face was so open and blissfully happy, it stole my breath.

  The woman was standing with her front against his side, her hand resting casually on his chest while his arm was looped around her back.

  She was gazing up at him with a dreamy, adoring expression, but it was his face that captured my attention and refused to let it go. While his new bride was looking at him, Xander was facing the camera with the biggest, brightest smile on his face. The smiles he’d given me that I’d been mentally tallying for weeks were nothing compared to the smile in this picture.

  It was a smile that said he was holding his life in his arms and he couldn’t have possibly been happier. There were no shadows, no darkness, no demons.

  Just pure, unadulterated happiness.

  The differences between him then and now were so extreme it hurt to look at the picture any longer, so I moved it aside.

  The next photo showed the same Xander as the one before, but in this one he was standing with five other men, all of them in desert camo and combat boots, with shades covering their faces.

  A picture from his time in the service.

  There was a Humvee behind them and desert sand at their feet. All of them were grinning huge, even the few who were flipping off the camera, and all of them were holding big ass guns.

  The shot showed so many things, it showed brotherhood, loyalty, comradery. It showed these men were tight, they were important to each other, so I couldn’t understand why it was tucked away in a beat-up box, along with a photo of his wife.

  Then I dug around some more.

  I found five sets of dog tags, each with names of men I hadn’t heard before. A sick feeling hit my stomach, burning like acid as I flipped the picture around. There on the back in Xander’s handwriting were six surnames, including Caine. The other five matched the tags. I could only think of one reason Xander would have these.

  The last item that had been in the box was a small clipping from a newspaper roughly six inches long and two and a half inches wide.

  The woman in the grainy black and white photo that took up the top half of the clipping was the same woman from the wedding photo. Xander’s wife.

  I looked below and began to read the text.

  Rebecca Lindsey Caine, loving wife and friend went to be with her Lord on . . .

  That was as far as I got before I had to stop. I couldn’t take it anymore.

  An obituary.

  This wasn’t a box of fond memories. It was a box of his past. The past he refused to talk about. The memories in this box were the source of his shadows.

  It was full of love and pain and loss; knowing Xander had experienced so much heartache ripped me to shreds.

  I felt the tears hit my eyes just before they started sliding down my cheeks, and I stared at the items on the floor until my vision went blurry.

  Then I tucked the dog tags and clipping back into the box. I closed the lid, flipped the latch down and set it on the coffee table. I went back for the photos and the blanket and returned to the couch, wrapped myself up, and stared at the Xander of the past, the Xander who hadn’t experience unbelievable loss. I stared at those two photos as the tears continued to fall, until my eyelids grew so heavy I couldn’t keep them up any longer.

  I fell asleep with wet on my cheeks and those pictures clutched in my hands, grieving the loss of six people I didn’t know and one I did, because the Xander from the past was most definitely gone.

  And I didn’t know if I’d ever be enough to bring him back.

  * * *

  “What the fuck is this?”

  I came awake at the enraged shout, shooting up on the couch. My eyes burned from crying and my vision was bleary, but once I blinked it back to normal, I saw Xander standing over me with that metal box in his white-knuckled grip. His eyes were on the pictures I held in my hand, and I didn’t think I’d ever seen him so angry before.

  I pushed off the couch, reaching for him as I started, “Xander, I—”

  But he shot back several feet before I could touch him. “Are you fuckin’ kidding me, Sage? You snooped through my shit?”

  “I wasn’t snooping,” I insisted. “I swear. I was just looking for a blanket. I found this one in the closet, and when I pulled it down, the box fell down and the lid flipped open.”

  He slammed the box onto the coffee table so hard the loud crash of metal against wood made me jump. “Yeah? That how you ended up with those pictures in your hands?”

  “I didn’t—”

  “You had no goddamn right!” he bellowed, leaning in close. “What’s in that box is none of your fuckin’ business.”

  “I—” I had to clear my throat past the lump that had suddenly formed, but my voice still came out as a croak when I sa
id, “I’m so sorry.”

  Instead of acknowledging my apology, he snatched the photos out of my hand, bent to open the box, dropped them inside, then slapped the lid down again. He didn’t speak until he was on the move, heading for the closet.

  “You can go ahead and leave,” he said as he stowed the box back on the shelf and slammed the closet door. “This shit is done.”

  My whole body rocked back at that. “Wh-what?” I whispered, feeling like the world had just shifted beneath my feet.

  “Done,” he clipped then continued to explain like he was speaking to an idiot. “Finished. Knew before tonight this thing was gettin’ old. I just hadn’t gotten around to pulling the trigger yet. Now I am.”

  My stomach plummeted to the floor. My lungs squeezed and my heart beat so hard against my ribs, I felt like it was trying to escape my chest. “You can’t be serious,” I said, continuing to speak in a hushed whisper.

  “Oh, I’m dead fuckin’ serious, Shortcake. Had my fun with you, I’ll give you that, but now it’s time to move on.”

  That was when the pain began to burn, creating a fire deep inside me. “Stop it,” I hissed, clenching my fists and jaw.

  But he didn’t stop. Raking a hand through his hair, he began mumbling like he was talking to himself, “I knew this was gonna turn out to be a mistake. Never should’ve started with you.” Then he pinned me with those black eyes and proceeded to rip me apart. “The women I fuck, they all know the score. We fuck for as long as it’s good, and when it stops bein’ that, it’s time to call it.”

  “And that’s what you’re doing?” I asked, fighting against the tears that wanted to fall. “You’re calling it?”

  “Yep.” His face was like stone. I didn’t even recognize the man standing in front of me. I’d seen him mad, I’d seen him playful, I’d seen him morose, and thanks to those pictures, I’d even seen him happy. But I’d never seen this.

  “Oh, I get it,” I exclaimed sarcastically, letting out a biting laugh. “I accidentally stumbled on your box of secrets, so now you’re being an asshole because it’s easier than actually feeling!”