Nora
I can’t believe that just happened.
Brand literally burned his past down.
It’s astounding. Overwhelming. Exhilarating.
And it’s nothing short of what I would expect from him. He’s so decisive. When he takes control of something, he doesn’t do it halfway. The mere thought sets my belly aflutter.
I hear the shower running as Brand washes away the lake water, the ash from the fire and probably some bad memories, too. I know how that goes. I curl up on the sofa and give him his privacy. He deserves some solitude after what he just did.
As I lay still, I can’t help but stare at the little wooden box.
It’s fascinating to me. Ebony wood with an ivory inlay. Black and white. I have to wonder if his father did that on purpose…. Did he contrast black with white as an analogy for life? Life isn’t black and white.
Unable to stop myself, I pick it up, turning it over and over. I shake it lightly.
There’s a solid clunking noise inside. Something in the box has some heft. With a man as hateful as Joe Killien apparently was, it’s hard telling what he put in the box.
I get goose bumps as I remember horror movies of the past… when body parts and worse have been sent as messages. Quickly, I set the box down.
Surely Joe didn’t put a body part in the box, but I’m not sure that I want to know what actually is in there.
“I’m curious too,” Brand says from the hallway. I turn to find him standing there, a towel slung around his waist. I’d been studying the box so intently, I hadn’t even heard the shower water turn off.
He takes a few steps into the room, his strong calves flexing with his movement. Each movement he makes is so lithe and controlled. He picks up the box and turns it over in his large hands.
“I want to know, but yet I don’t want to give him that satisfaction,” he finally says, turning to me. “Does that make any sense? I know he’s gone and he’ll never know if I look or not. But I’ll know.”
“So you’re not ever going to look?” I ask quietly, in a tiny bit of disbelief. Because I know I’d never have that kind of willpower. I’d have to know. Even if what was inside killed me or fueled my guilt or hate. But this is just one more way that Brand and I are different. He’s got willpower. I don’t.
Brand shrugs and sets the box aside. “I don’t know. Maybe I will. But see, it’s taken me years to get to the place where I don’t care what he thinks, or what he says. I think it’s something inborn in every person…. you need the approval of your parents. For better or worse, you need to know that you’ve met their expectations, that you are good enough. I know that I never will. And that’s something I’ve had to let go of—and get past. It’s taken me a long time.”
“But anyone would be proud of you,” I begin to argue, but Brand holds up his hand.
“You don’t have to do that. I know all the arguments. Jacey used to argue the same things. When I graduated West Point with honors, they didn’t come. They didn’t send a card. They didn’t acknowledge it at all. I threw a party with Jacey and Gabe. When I made the Rangers, they didn’t say anything, and again, I celebrated with Jacey and Gabe. But at the same time, I didn’t write home and tell them, either. It’s been a two-sided road. I haven’t held up my part, but neither did they.”
I shake my head and interrupt because he can’t stop me. “But they gave you very good reasons to stay away. Your father beat you. Your mother didn’t stop it…”
Brand nods. “Yeah, I know. But life is fucked up. People get hurt, people are scarred, people are damaged and sometimes, things aren’t meant to be fixed.”
“And you’re afraid if you looked in the box, it might mess up your resolution?”
He nods. “I guess. I just don’t want to have to start back at square one and try to forgive them again.”
I suck in a breath. “Have you forgiven them?”
He stares out the window. “I don’t know. I try. But I guess, mostly, I just continually put it out of my mind so that I don’t have to think about it.”
“That’s denial,” I tell him needlessly.
He smiles grimly. “I know. But it works for me right now. So I’m not going to look in the box…not right now. I don’t need to. There are other things I need to worry about. More important things.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Such as?”
Brand grins. “Lunch. I’m starving.”
I roll my eyes. “You’re always starving.”
“Lunch at the Hill?” he asks, his eyes twinkling. I nod.
“It’s a date,” he tells me and he disappears back down the hall to get dressed.
It’s a date.
A date with Brand Killien.
Gah. Oh how the worm turns in life, from one moment to the next. You never know what’s going to happen.
I pull my hair back into a low ponytail and within twenty minutes, Brand and I are walking into The Hill.
Together.
I’ve got my arm looped through his and Maria looks up from the cash register, her face lighting up like fireworks when she sees Brand.
She rushes to him, kissing his cheeks and muttering Italian endearments. He smiles and hugs her and she shows us to a table by the window.
“You let me know if I can get you anything else,” she tells him before she bustles away. “I’ll get you a special dessert.”
I look at Brand over the top of my menu. “She really likes you.”
“She’s very loyal. She doesn’t forget it when someone has done something for her. All I did was move her daughter’s stuff to college.”
“And come and help her cut brush, and do a bunch of other stuff outside after her husband died,” I add. He glances up at me, surprised. I shrug. “She told me last time. You did a lot for her.”
“And so did Gabe and Maddy, and even Jacey,” Brand says simply. “Maria’s good people. So was Tony.”
We fall silent as we decide what to eat, then hand our menus over after we order.
Brand stares out the window. “I always forget how much I do like this little town,” he muses absently. “I always associate it with ugliness because of my parents, but I had good times here, too. I spent most of every summer down at the Vincents’ place. Gabe and Jacey shared their grandparents with me. They were good people, too. Their gran has always been the mom I never had.”
Something about that statement and the softness in his eyes at the mere mention twinges my heart.
“I’m glad you had that with them,” I tell him honestly. “It sounds like they filled a void in your life.”
And oh my god, how I wished I could have helped do that. I was here every summer too. Only I was four years younger and back then… well, that might as well have been an ocean of time.
Brand nods. “Yeah. Their gran taught me a lot. She was full of good advice. She still is, actually. She’s in a nursing home in Chicago.”
I take a sip of water. “What kind of advice? I’m afraid I grew up without much of that. My father is very focused on business and my mother… well, she’s very focused on trying to put on the appearances that everything is fine in the Greene household. There wasn’t much sage advice floating around.”
Brand looks at me. “Well, Gran taught me everything I know about women.”
This definitely catches my attention. “And what is that?”
He smiles. “There’s too much to list. She never hesitated to share her opinion.”
The affection on his face at her memory warms my heart. They say that if you watch a man with his mother, it’s a good indication of his character. But I know that if I’d seen Brand with his ‘gran’, that I’d have known all I ever needed to know about him.
“Well, share a couple of things,” I urge him. “Remember, I didn’t get much advice. I can borrow yours.”
He chuckles. “Well, I’m not sure how helpful it will be for you. She focused a lot on advice about women….on what I need to know.”
I wait.
He sighs. “Okay. Well, she said that women don’t always know what they want, but they almost always know what they don’t want. Sometimes it takes them a while to narrow it down by elimination.”
I ponder that, then nod. “Yeah. She’s right about that one. What else?”
“One time, when we were about sixteen or so, Gabe and I were at the beach with her. Apparently, I was staring at some girl in a bikini, and Gran slapped me on the back of the head and told me that women weren’t ‘vaginas with legs’. I then got a lecture about how women are more than just sex. It was the most humiliating discussion of my life.”
I giggle at the mere thought. “Did Gabe get the talk too?”
Brand nods. “Yeah. He wanted to die. There we were, right out on the beach in front of God and everyone, including hot chicks in bikinis, and his grandma was talking about sex.”
I giggle again. “She sounds awesome.”
“She is,” Brand says firmly.
Our waitress refills our drinks and I look at Brand.
“Did she give you any other valuable advice, or was it all about women?”
He rolls his eyes. “Oh, for a teenage boy, trust me, it’s always about the women.”
I stare at him drolly. He smirks.
“I wish I’d paid more attention to the things she told me back then,” he admits. “She was really a wise lady, and unfortunately, because I was a stupid kid, I didn’t remember it all. But there was something she told me once, after some girl broke my heart, that has always stuck with me.”
I wait.
He doesn’t say anything.
“And that was?” I prod.
“Well, this chick had screwed me over in a big way. She was pretty messed up. And I’d come to the conclusion that women weren’t worth it, that they were more trouble than they were worth.”
“I can see where you might think that sometimes,” I nod. “What did your Gran say?”
“She said… Branden, the best things in life are worth the greatest risk. Sometimes, before we fall, we fly.”
I stare at him, at the smile that lingers on his lips, and I can’t help but fall just a little bit in love with this big strong man that has held onto such a sentiment from his ‘adopted gran’.
Knowing him now is so different from being wildly in love with him as a teen.
There’s so much more to him than I’d ever have guessed before.
“That’s beautiful,” I tell him simply. “You’re right. She was very wise.”
Brand nods. “She never pulled any punches. She warned me away from her own granddaughter, too.”
This freezes my hand on my glass.
“What?” I manage to ask.
Brand chuckles. “She was very perceptive. She knew, even before I did, that I was falling for Jacey a long time ago. And she pulled me aside and in her very direct way, she told me that Jacey wasn’t ready for a guy like me. That maybe she never would be… because Jacey needed someone to tame her. I was offended at first, because I thought she was saying that I wasn’t man enough to do it.”
That’s what it sounded like to me, too, and I have to wonder if Gran even knows him at all.
“Then what did she mean?” I ask curiously.
“She said that I had a soft spot for Jacey and that I’d never be able to give her the tough love that would fix her. She said I’m the type of guy who will come to your rescue when I’m needed, and it wouldn’t be fair to me if I was with Jacey, because I’d always be coming to her rescue. She said I need someone more considerate than that, someone who has their act together.”
I swallow hard. “I think your Gran really was wise. She nailed you to a T.”
But I don’t have my act together.
Brand shrugs. “I don’t know about that. But she was right about Jacey. I came to her rescue a hundred times over the years. If I’d been ‘with’ her, it would’ve been a hundred more. So, Gran was right.”
Our food arrives now and as I’m eating the steaming pasta, I can’t help but consider that.
Brand really is the kind of guy to come to a girls’ rescue. And Lord knows that my life is fucked up. If he were with me, really with me, he’d constantly feel like he needed to save me.
I’m no better than Jacey.
I’m conflicted… between the desperate need that I have to be with Brand, to soak him up… and to let him go so that he’s not hurt by me, or by my life.
When Maria had told me about Jacey before, I’d felt so high and mighty, so judging. But yet, I know that I have to meet my uncle tomorrow, and he’s going to threaten Brand and me, and still I want Brand.
Still I want Brand, no matter the cost.
So really, when it boils down to it, I’m as selfish as Jacey ever was.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Brand
Talking about Jacey makes me uncomfortable.
Not because I still love her, because I don’t. Not in that way.
But because I can see that it puts Nora on edge. That’s the last thing I want. She’s been edgy ever since the dinner at her parents’. I don’t want to add to that.
“Jacey’s happily married now,” I remind her as I finish up my lasagna. “And I don’t want her anymore.”
“I know,” Nora answers. “And I’m sorry. It’s not even my business. Who you want and who you don’t want are your business, not mine.”
I put my fork down and eye Nora carefully.
“Since when?”
The entire time we’ve been together at the cottage, her actions have been contrary to that statement.
She shrugs. “I just realized that I don’t have the right to dictate anything to you. That’s all.”
I narrow my eyes. This is new. And strange.
“Weren’t you the one saying that the bullet has already left the gun and that there’s no going back now?”
Something soft flits through Nora’s eyes before she covers it up.
“Yeah. I did. But I can be selfish sometimes. Anyway, what would you like to do this afternoon?”
She changes the subject clumsily and now I’m the one on edge.
What the fuck?
I shrug, attempting to appear nonchalant. “I don’t care. Want to go swimming?”
It’s an attempt to lighten the mood. But Nora rolls her eyes.
“Let’s not push it.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Why? When we first came to the cottage, you went skinny-dipping by yourself. Perhaps we should go together. It’d be a whole different experience, I can assure you.”
Nora’s face brightens, the clouds clear, and she’s happy again.
“Sure,” she agrees. “I’m sure it will be far different.”
I pay the check and we head back to the cottage.
As we walk inside, Nora looks at me. “It’s broad daylight, you know.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Your point?”
She grins. “I don’t have one. I was just making an observation.” She slips off her shorts. Then her shirt. Then tosses her bra and underwear onto the couch.
She stops still and stares at me.
“I see you haven’t undressed yet. Are you scared?”
I strip off my shirt. “Nah. Just distracted.”
I drop my shorts and underwear at her feet.
“Let’s do it.”