Chapter
twelve
He’d known he shouldn’t kiss her.
He’d known. And he’d kissed her anyway. Now their entire relationship hung in the balance, and with it, his connection to the Bradford family.
After dropping Britt off at the Hackberry Lane Cottages, Zander made his way to Lake Shore Pine because there’d been no way he could do what he’d told Britt he intended to do—get an iced coffee and write. Writing required tremendous focus. He was only going to be able to focus on one thing today: their kiss and the conversation that followed.
For two hours straight he sat on a bench and stared at the surface of the lake. Sick to his stomach, he battled worry and blame.
Then he climbed into his car and drove country roads. He took turns at will, not caring where they might lead. Over and over again in his memory, he replayed the day’s events.
Another hour slipped past.
Earlier, when he and Britt had fallen onto the sand and the length of his body had been braced above hers, he’d been like a man who’d denied himself water for far too long, then been confronted with a waterfall. By that point, he’d been dying of thirst.
Then he’d seen the scar on her stomach, and a stunned stillness had come over him.
Nothing about Britt could ever be anything less than beautiful to him, the scar included. Fierce scars suited warrior princesses. But he hadn’t been able to fathom what that scar was doing on her stomach. Worse, the scar was evidence. Evidence that while he’d been gone, she’d been hurt. Badly.
For years he’d done everything in his power to protect her, to make sure that she was healthy and happy. Then, as soon as he’d let down his guard and left Washington, Britt had been involved in the kind of terrible accident he wouldn’t wish on his worst enemy.
As she’d explained how she’d been injured, he’d been horrified by several things at once. The fact that he hadn’t been there to help her. The fact that he’d continued his trip, oblivious. The fact that she hadn’t told him something so incredibly important.
He’d tried to keep himself under control during the argument that followed, but his frustration had risen and risen until there’d been no place left to contain it.
He hadn’t decided to kiss her. One heartbeat, he’d been standing there rigid and furious. The next heartbeat, he’d been kissing her. No thought had separated those two heartbeats. They’d been separated only by unstoppable instinct.
He’d imagined kissing Britt a million times. Yet the reality of kissing her . . . Britt, in his arms, their mouths intimately exploring . . . had turned him inside out.
Even now, hours later, the kiss had the power to shake him.
He pulled up at a stop sign. Was the silver BMW behind him the same one he’d seen shortly after leaving the lake?
After the police chief had questioned Nick, he’d been far more conscious of the cars surrounding him on the road. He’d seen very few black Expeditions. Those he had seen definitely hadn’t appeared to be tracking him. This was the first time since that day with the chief that he’d suspected any car of following him.
He waited for the BMW to draw nearer.
It took a turn onto a private drive.
He was becoming delusional. Fabulous.
He pressed the gas.
The joy that had overtaken him when Britt said she’d liked the kiss had deserted him as soon as she’d started writing off what had happened between them as no big deal, as something they’d needed to get out of their system.
“I’m guessing that while you’d play football with me again, you’d rather not repeat the kiss,” he’d said to her. He’d been able to predict how she’d respond. Even so, he’d harbored stubborn hope that she’d leave the door open a few inches to allow for the possibility of more between them.
She hadn’t.
Of course she hadn’t.
He shouldn’t have been surprised. Which is why he couldn’t explain the fresh heartbreak he’d experienced at her answer.
Or why he was still experiencing it now.
Zander hardly slept that night. The sleep he did get came to him in broken, anxious patches.
He finally gave up when daylight began to frame his room’s curtains. Since he’d rather be depressed and awake than depressed and trying to sleep, he showered. He pulled on track pants, running shoes, and a T-shirt, then ran along the inn’s twisting pathways.
Only when he’d exhausted himself—all he could hear was his breath, all he could think was how much his lungs hurt—did he turn back toward the inn. He needed a productive writing day today. He was falling further behind on his goals. Between now and his deadline, steady output was mandatory.
A quarter mile from his destination, he transitioned from running to walking in order to cool down.
He reached the inn’s yard, lifted his gaze—
And saw Britt sitting on the inn’s front steps, watching him.
His heart stuttered. He came to an immediate stop.
She wore yoga pants and a dark purple fleece sweat shirt. She’d pulled her hair into a ponytail. Gold sunshine gilded her cheekbones and mouth. Piercing brown eyes set beneath the expressive arches of her brows followed him as he crossed the remaining distance.
Has she changed her mind? Does she want more with me than friendship?
His stubborn hope wouldn’t die.
Gracefully, she stood. Her hands remained in her sweat shirt’s pockets. “Are you doing okay?” she asked.
“I am.”
She cocked her head, and he was afraid to think what she might see in him. “Really?” she asked gently. “You looked pretty gloomy walking up to the inn just now.”
“I was just deep in thought.”
“About us?”
“Yeah,” he admitted.
“I’ve been thinking about us, too. Which is why I stopped by.” Britt had never shied away from hard things. She preferred to deal with difficulties head-on, then move past them. “Are we good?” she asked. “You and me?”
Are we good?
She’d posed that question to him following every disagreement that had occurred between them. He’d always tried to honor her directness with a direct answer in return. This time, though, the fully honest answer was no. They weren’t good because what was between them wasn’t good for him anymore.
He was so raw at the moment that he didn’t trust himself to say that. His black state of mind could easily goad him into speaking something he might bitterly regret later.
Are we good?
“I don’t know,” he answered. That, too, was true. “Are we?”
“I don’t know, either.” She scrutinized his face. “But I’m willing to do whatever I need to do to make sure that our friendship stays strong. I can’t overstate . . . how much you mean to me.”
Tenderness tore free, spilling through his chest. “I can’t overstate how much you mean to me,” he said in a low, hoarse voice.
He could tell her that he loved her, right now, the two of them standing in the hush of a new day. Just three short words. I love you. The statement gathered on his tongue, waiting.
Except he knew Britt wasn’t ready to hear it.
Also, he wasn’t exactly handling the small rejection she’d given him yesterday well. If her decision to limit their total number of kisses to one could rock him like this, then it didn’t seem possible to survive the rejection that would follow his I love you.
“I think we might have needed to have a longer conversation yesterday on the beach.” With a gesture of her hand, she invited him to sit on the brick step she’d been sitting on when he’d arrived. “I think I rushed us, and I wish I hadn’t.”
He sat and used his bicep to wipe sweat from his forehead. His hair was drenched, his shirt sticking to his skin.
She took a seat beside him on the step, then bumped his shoulder with hers.
He aimed a look at her.
Coaxing mischief lit her eyes. Without words, she was daring him to lighten up. She bumped his shoulder again. He bumped her back.
“What did we not talk about yesterday that we should have?” she asked him.
“I have more questions about your accident.”
That sobered her. “What would you like to know?”
He wanted to know everything. He asked her specific questions about how she’d capsized. What had gone through her mind while underwater. How much pain she’d been in. How she’d gotten free.
She answered every one in detail, and he absorbed each word, even though the scene she painted turned his chest into a cold, hollow void. Paddlers bigger and stronger than Britt had been pinned against strainers by water current until they’d drowned. If any piece of her situation had gone differently, she’d be dead.
The health flowing from her assured him that she was fine. She’d lived. But it had been a very close call. He couldn’t stop thinking, What if? He couldn’t quit visualizing the situation she’d been in and imagining all the ways it could have killed her. He couldn’t stop picturing her lifeless body, pale and soaked.
He asked her about the helicopter ride that had carried her to the hospital and about her surgery. Her recovery. Her rehab. “What aftereffects do you have now?”
“Stiffness and sometimes soreness on that side of my waist. That’s about it these days. It took quite a while to build up my stomach and lower back muscles, but I’m almost there now.”
“Do your doctors think you should take it easy?”
“They did at first, but eventually they cleared me for strenuous exercise. The accident happened almost a year ago.” A beat of quiet. “I felt like I had good reasons for not telling you, back when it happened. But after I was better, I should have told you. There’s really no excuse. I should have said something about it much sooner.”
“Even if you had good reasons for not telling me when it happened, you should have overruled them,” he said levelly. “You should have told me right away.”
“That would have been a horrible phone call to receive while you were in the middle of a trip overseas.”
“Right. But I don’t want you judging for me what is and what isn’t too horrible for me to hear.” He met her gaze. “Bad things and good things happen, and I want to know about all of them.”
Her attention didn’t flinch. “You’re right. I screwed up, and I really am sorry. Do you forgive me?”
He nodded. “You’ll tell me stuff from now on?”
“Yes. Will you tell me stuff?”
“Yes.” Guilt stabbed him as he spoke the half-lie. He was angry at her for cutting him out, but he’d been cutting her out for years. He’d never told her how he felt about her. Like her, he had reasons that seemed good to him. Like her, he’d been judging what she could and couldn’t hear. And even after giving her a hard time about her silence, he wasn’t prepared to break his.
“What about our kiss?” she asked bluntly. “Do you want to discuss it more?”
Don’t think about what kissing her felt like, he warned himself. And whatever you do, don’t look at her lips. “No. You?”
“No. I mean, anytime you want to chat about it, I’m game. It’s just that I don’t really have anything else to add. Beyond what I said yesterday.”
“Neither do I.”
“It happened. And now I know that my friend Zander is a very good kisser.” Her voice turned teasing. She hopped off the step and pulled her car keys from her pocket. “Which is useful information to know. I’ve been trying to set you up for years, but now I realize I was undervaluing your assets.” She shot him a charming, lopsided smile.
“Were you?”
“I was. But no longer!” She sailed in the direction of the inn’s small parking lot. “See you later.”
“Yep.” He watched her car until it disappeared from view.
The next afternoon, Nora told Willow and Britt about the series of books she’d purchased to read on her honeymoon, and Willow wondered aloud whether Nora would have time for reading on her honeymoon while Britt scanned the faces of the arriving international passengers at SeaTac airport.
Mom and Dad had spent the past two years serving as missionaries in Africa. Today they were coming home.
A family exited into the terminal after clearing customs. Not Mom and Dad.
A young couple exited. Not Mom and Dad.
“There they are!” Britt called.
Her sisters squealed, and they all moved forward en masse to give hugs. Britt, always the fastest sister, reached them first.
Her father, Garner Bradford, wrapped her in a bear hug. “Hi, sweetheart.”
In response to the powerful reassurance and protection of his hug, tears pricked Britt’s eyes. The degree of sturdiness in his arms hadn’t changed. His bristly five o’clock shadow felt like it always had against her temple.
“Hi, Dad. Welcome home.” She hadn’t expected to get teary. She almost never got teary. Clearly, she’d needed a hug from her dad more than she’d realized.
Gloom had been hovering over her for the past two days since the kiss on the beach. Several times, she’d tried to pray. She wanted to trust God with the situation with Zander and experience peace as a result. But she’d had a hard time focusing her mind. She couldn’t feel God’s presence at all. So far, He’d answered her prayers with echoing silence.
Her sleep had been lousy and, at this point, her brain was exhausted from fretting over Zander. She’d done everything she could think of to set things right between them. Even so, their friendship was sputtering like a car with a glowing Check Engine light.
She didn’t think he was being completely honest with her, and she wasn’t being completely honest with him because yesterday, when they’d been sitting on the step and she’d looked into his eyes, she’d had to force her hands to stay down. They’d wanted to lift, tunnel into his hair, and pull his mouth to hers.
Had kissing Zander resulted in an instant addiction?
She embraced her mom, who smelled of her familiar crisp perfume. The bracelet Dad had given her during Britt’s middle school years made its quiet jingling sound.
“I missed you,” Mom said.
“I missed you, too.” Britt took a step back to allow her sisters to complete their turns.
Garner and Kathleen Bradford were fifty-seven and fifty-five, respectively. They’d met almost thirty years ago at Bradford Shipping, shortly after her father inherited the company from his father. Her mom, who’d been working in the customer service department, had been full of plans for improving Bradford Shipping. Dad had moved her into an office near his and added her to a task force bent on saving the failing company. While pursuing their shared goals, her dad had fallen for the ambitious strawberry-blond beauty, and her mom had fallen for the green-eyed heir to the empire. The rest was history.
They’d loved each other in word and deed for decades now. The two of them were friends and allies, as well as spouses. Serving as a missionary was a dream Mom had hit upon when Britt and her sisters were little. It hadn’t been Dad’s dream, but because of their partnership, he’d entrusted the reins of Bradford Shipping to his managers in order to take Mom to Africa so she could live out something that had been important to her for so long.
Britt had only seen her parents twice in the past two years. They’d returned to Washington after her kayaking accident. Then they’d met up with the family a few months later in Switzerland for Willow’s late summer wedding to Corbin.
Willow had decided on a destination wedding at a chalet complete with snow-crowned mountains and green pastures. Cows wearing bells around their necks had ambled through drifts of purple alpine flowers. During the entire trip, Britt had felt like a character in the children’s book Heidi.
She’d taken stock of her parents on those other occasions, just like now.
Her mom wore her hair, which had mellowed to a pale nutmeg color, in a straight, shoulder-length cut. Couple that with her ivory complexion and passionate, persuasive personality, and most people were able to correctly deduce her Irish heritage.
Her dad’s broad shoulders and square jaw proclaimed him to be the patient, steady one of the pair. The age lines marking his face and the gray streaking his thick, dark hair revealed his wisdom but did nothing to lessen his handsomeness.
They were both tanner and leaner than they’d been before they’d left for Africa. A deeper sense of calm emanated from them. When Britt had mentioned that sense of calm the last time she’d seen them, her dad had told her that serving in Africa had helped clarify what was important and what wasn’t. He no longer saw the point in getting worked up over the unimportant.
“It’s good to be home,” Dad said, sentimental moisture gathering in his eyes. “Look at you three.”
“Impressive, aren’t we?” Britt asked.
“Very,” Dad answered.
“I can’t believe all that’s happened since we left.” Mom adjusted her carry-on so that it stood to her side like a short soldier. “Willow got married, and now Nora’s getting married in a few weeks. Is there something in the water?”
“If so, it hasn’t affected me,” Britt said.
“Good,” her dad joked. “That’s how I like it. Stay away from boys.”
“Grandma, Valentina, and Clint are all waiting at the house,” Willow told them. “Valentina made borscht, so no one’s going to go hungry tonight.”
“Borscht,” Dad said. He and Mom exchanged a laughing look. “Perfect.” Valentina, their Russian nanny-turned-housekeeper, had been employed by their family since Willow was a baby. She’d been making the hearty Russian stew called borscht for so long now that it had become their unofficial family meal.
“John, Corbin, the extended family, and your friends are all champing at the bit to see you,” Nora said. “We wanted to give you a little time to deal with jet lag before everyone descended on you, so we’re thinking we’ll cater fajitas and have a game night at John’s house on Thursday.”
“Sounds good,” Dad said.
“Zander’s still in town, right?” Mom asked Britt.
A thrill zipped through Britt at the mention of his name. “Right.”
“Will he come to the game night?”
“I’m pretty sure he will, yes.”
“Great,” Mom said. “It’s been way too long since I’ve seen him.”
Phone call from Nora to Britt: