CHAPTER 5
Present day.
GARRETT THORNE WASN’T ready for visitors, yet they just kept showing up at his family home in North Laguna. Despite its emptiness, he preferred it that way, and turned the well-wishers and nosy gossipers away. They’d never understand what he went through, and he wasn’t about to try to make them either.
Reporters kept calling, so much that he turned his phone off and prepared to change the number the next day.
Garrett parked his truck and stepped out into the warm air. The beach called to him. There were a million good memories that he hoped would free him from the pain he felt. He walked to the bridge that led from the parking lot to the sand and smiled at seeing the clear water that stretched into the horizon.
With a messenger bag filled with notebooks, pens, pencils, a sketchpad and a journal, he was ready to return to the passions that had helped him through his darkest times. Art was his therapy, and he needed it terribly right then.
Garrett took off his shirt and wore just a pair of dark blue swim trunks. He sat on the sand, letting the cool water of the ocean lap onto his feet. He stared out at the horizon as the sun began to set. Being home was both a relief and a cause for great inner turmoil.
Afghanistan had been an entirely different world, one where he’d almost lost his life.
Garrett looked down at the sand. In a way, he had lost his life.
The girl he loved was no longer his.
There was no one in the world who loved him.
His mother had passed from a brain tumor. They told him that it was a quick death, one that took her in her sleep, but he knew that the treatments she’d gone through hadn’t been pleasant.
Garrett laid back in the sand, his hands tucked beneath his head. While he was learning how to walk and talk again, his mother was fighting her own demons.
It was a shock to learn that while he’d won, she’d lost.
The world was a big place, but Garrett had never felt so small and alone.
Isla. His mind returned to her often. She was a distant memory that would never fade.
He’d heard that she’d left Laguna and lived with a marine. That news shouldn’t have hurt him as much as it did. It was his fault. He couldn’t blame her for moving on when he left her behind with her cold parents and even colder peers. They didn’t understand her or the reason she did certain things.
Isla put on a strong front for those who gossiped about her past and their relationship, but deep down, Garrett knew that she was a scared and lost little girl, desperate for love and acceptance. He’d given her that...and took it away.
Regrets could eat a man alive, and Garrett’s were doing just that.
The cool water rushed further and further, soaking his swim trunks as he wrote in his journal. That journal was all that he had overseas. It held all of his hopes, fears, and tales of his adventures. Once upon a time, Garrett had dreams of being an author. Perhaps it was time to pursue that dream.
He had nothing to lose.
A thought came to him as he read the first page of his journal. A picture he’d drawn made him wince with sadness. He should have been used to that feeling of loss. He hadn’t seen her in two years since the last time he was on leave, but a near perfect image of Isla Maxwell sparked something in him. She’d always encouraged him. He’d seek publication.
For her.
CHAPTER 6
ROBIN’S WORDS SHOT THROUGH Isla like a bullet. Her face paled, her heart seemed to stop. She nearly fell from her seat on the bar stool.
“Garrett Thorne came home yesterday.”
“Don’t play with me, Robin,” Isla warned, her eyes wide. She stood, folding her arms across her chest, suddenly feeling exposed.
Cold.
Robin shook her head with a sigh. “I’m serious, Isla. I just found out this morning. Everyone in town is all abuzz about it. He came back and reporters have been desperate to get his story. We don’t get this much excitement, and to have a war hero from our town return is huge.”
Isla’s lips parted. She felt as if she’d faint, so she held onto the dark granite countertop. She couldn’t breathe. “What?”
She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. It was impossible.
“He’s apparently a war hero,” Robin said, eating another green veggie chip. “I don’t know the details, but I think he was injured or something.”
“Dear God,” Isla murmured. Her mind spun.
What was happening? Was the universe playing a trick on her? Hours after dumping her boyfriend, the man she’d thought was dead—the only man she’d truly loved—returned out of the blue. Things like this only happened in movies.
They didn’t happen to Isla Maxwell.
“You okay?” Robin asked, her eyes narrowing. “Maybe you should sit down. You don’t look so good.”
Robin stood and reached for Isla to help her to the sofa in the spacious living room behind them that faced the beach.
“No,” Isla said, holding a hand up. “I just need some fresh air.” She poured herself a glass of wine.
“Okay,” Robin said with a sigh. She watched Isla. “How about you take a walk and I’ll make us some cocktails and salmon for dinner. We can have a girl’s night and catch up.”
Isla nodded, only half hearing her as she walked out the side door that led to a stone walkway that took her to the back where the beach awaited.
She covered her mouth, fresh tears gushing as she tried to process what she’d just heard. She walked the quiet beach, her dark hair lifting and flying around her face with the warm breeze thick with mist and the scent of sea salt.
Her mind was a torrent of thoughts that didn’t make sense. She wasn’t supposed to be crying so much, not after finally leaving the man behind who treated her like dirt, like he resented her for having money and was determined to put her in her place beneath him.
These tears were different. They weren’t bitter but overwhelmingly grateful. Even if Garrett would never be hers again, he was alive.
He is alive. She couldn’t get over those words and kept repeating them to herself.
She looked ahead, realizing something. Their favorite spot on the beach was near.
Isla held her glass of wine to her lips, breathing in the aroma as the air began to cool. She wished that she hadn’t been essentially driven away from her favorite place in the world.
The beach.
She looked ahead, seeing a man sitting on in the sand, just at the shore, his wavy brown hair rustling with the breeze. She wiped her face of tears and tried to clear her vision.
Her face paled as she recognized his tattoos on his arms and neck.
Her heart raced.
Garrett? She tensed. No way.
He was shirtless, revealing tan skin, tight abs, and strong tattooed arms. He looked out at the horizon.
Isla folded her arms across her chest and chewed her bottom lip. She felt as though a hand clutched her throat. She wanted to touch him, hold him tight, and kiss his soft lips once again.
Shame filled her veins with the guilt of giving up on his memory.
How could this be? She waited a year for him to come home.
The sun began to set and Isla turned to walk the other way. She’d purged him once before. There was no use going back and risking that pain again.
“Isla?” Garrett called.
She squeezed her eyes closed and drew in a sharp breath.
Torn between continuing forward and turning around.
Hearing his voice say her name all but tore her apart.
She turned, her heart thumping in her chest as Garrett walked through the sand toward her.
His green eyes locked with hers and a flood of memories nearly knocked her off her feet.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” he said, raking a hand through short wavy brown hair as a grin came to his lips. “Dear God, I’ve missed you.”
She couldn’t help but close the distance by running to him. She tossed
her wine glass to the sand and leaped into his arms. When he caught her, she breathed him in, her heart swelling with a mixture of joy and relief.
“Garrett,” she cried into his shoulder.
He picked her up and she wrapped her legs around his waist, holding onto him for dear life. She’d never let go. He’d have to pry her arms from him.
But, from the way he held onto her, his warm breath on her neck, she felt within her soul that he didn’t want to let go either.
“Look at me, love,” he said, his deep voice giving her chills that made her heart skip a beat.
It should be a crime for a man to have a voice that sexy, and an accent that could make her do whatever he’d ask.
She lifted her head from cradling his neck and shoulder to look him straight on in the face. She drew in a deep breath as his green eyes searched hers.
There was so much in them that was foreign to her. Garrett had seen things, things she knew she wouldn’t understand, but still...there was love within them.
For her.
“I was a fool for not telling you what happened to me. Please believe that I had my reasons,” he said. “But not a day went by that I didn’t think of you, look at your pictures, and wish that you were by my side.”
Isla chewed her lip, nodding. Words wouldn’t come to her, not with the way he was looking at her.
“I know you’ve heard about what happened by now, but I am here to tell you that I love you, Isla. I can’t imagine ever not loving you.”
“Didn’t I tell you that I’d love you forever?” Isla asked.
She held onto his face with both hands. She kissed him, no longer caring about the past or the future. The present was all that mattered.
“I may have been called many things, but no one has ever called me a liar.”
Garrett kissed her, pressing her body tighter to his sculpted frame. He devoured her mouth, his tongue caressing hers.
Breathless, she felt dizzy when he set her back on the sand.
She looked up at him, her chest heaving, wanting more than kisses.
He took her hand. “Back to my place? So we can talk.”
Was he being serious? Isla clutched his hand and leaned up to kiss him again, warmth filling her as he cupped her cheek.
Isla nodded, not one shred of hesitation in her heart. “I’ll go anywhere you want, Garrett. Just promise not to let me go.”
CHAPTER 7
THE DARK HOUSE was just as Isla remembered it. It smelled of the lemon-scented oil soap he used to mop the floor every Sunday when he and his mother would clean the entire house.
Isla stood in the doorway as Garrett turned on a tall lamp behind two Victorian-style sitting chairs in the corner of the living room. A bay window wrapped around the entire front of the house.
She’d always envied Garrett for that window, despite the mansion she’d grown up in.
“Wow,” she said, stepping onto the cherry wood floor. “Nothing has changed. Even the furniture is the same.”
Garrett nodded, folding his arms across his chest as he looked around. “It’s pretty much how my mother left it. I really don’t know what I would change about it.”
“Who says that you have to?” Isla said, closing the front door behind her. “This is your home. You do what you want.”
“I know. I just don’t want to touch anything. It almost feels as if she’s still here like she’ll come from her craft room and ask me if I’ve seen her glitter,” he said with a laugh.
Isla smiled, looking around the cozy room as he turned on more lights. She and Garrett would always go to his house after he’d pick her up from her private school. He used to drive his father’s Ford, and would be waiting outside of the school for her with a smile on his handsome face.
Leaving a school where everyone either already had their own luxury vehicle or had a driver waiting to pick them up, Isla always drew attention for her choice of ride. Having everyone gossip about the senator’s daughter riding off with the son of a convicted felon didn’t make it easy facing her peers each day. But Isla didn’t care. Garrett was hers and that was all that mattered to her.
“Do you have anything to eat?” Isla asked. “I kind of left Robin high and dry. She was cooking for us.”
“Oh,” Garrett said, rubbing his chin. “I didn’t go shopping yet. I’ve kind of been ordering takeout.”
“That’s fine,” Isla said, her brows lifting. “Chinese sounds perfect.”
“Okay,” he said and pulled a delivery menu off the fridge at the back of the open floor plan. “You sure Robin won’t miss you.”
Isla lifted her phone. “I sent her a text. She understands. How many girls get to reconnect with a ghost.”
His shoulders slumped. “I’m no ghost, Isla. I’m here, and I’m never leaving again.”
Isla rubbed her arms. “I know.”
He nodded and dialed the number. “Sesame chicken, right?”
Isla smiled. He remembered. Of course he did. Garrett never forgot anything. “That’s right.”
She walked around the living room, gazing down at Garrett’s family photos. She’d been heart broken when she’d heard of his mother’s death. His father was still in prison and would probably never be released.
“It will be here in forty-five minutes,” he said, opening his cabinet. “Want a drink?”
“Yes,” Isla said, already tipsy from the shots from earlier and the wine she’d had just moments before she’d seen Garrett on the beach.
Was this real life? Was she dreaming?
Just yesterday Garrett was dead, she was in an abusive relationship by choice, and the world was a dark and bitter place.
Today, though.
Hope peeked its little head out of the cold corner of her heart and asked her to believe in second chances.
“Wine or whiskey?”
“Oh boy. Better make it wine. I’ve already had tequila and wine, let’s not add another to the mix,” she said.
“Wine it is,” he said with a nod as he searched for a wine opener.
Her eyes roamed over his body as sand still clung to his tan skin. He was bigger than when he’d left. The skinny artist was replaced by a male sports model. He’d changed, but she wasn’t complaining.
She licked her lips. His swim trunks were still damp and clung to his legs. Was it bad that she wanted to take them off of him?
Isla stepped into the kitchen and leaned against the island as Garrett handed her a glass of red wine.
He held his glass of whiskey out to hers, their eyes locking.
She could barely breath when he looked at her like that—like he’d rip her clothes off and lick every inch of her body. Dear god. Please let that happen.
“Cheers to new beginnings,” he said.
“To new beginnings,” Isla repeated and they clinked glasses together before taking a sip of the potent cabernet.
“So, Isla,” Garrett began, swishing his glass around as he looked down at her. “What brings you back to Laguna? I’d heard that you were living in San Diego. With a marine.”
Straight to the point.
“I did. But, it looks like I’m back now. I broke up with him.”
Garrett’s face didn’t betray any emotion. He simply nodded. “Oh.”
“He enlisted for another term.”
Garrett shrugged. “It happens.”
“What about you?” Isla asked. “Are you ever going back?”
“I can’t. I’ve been discharged. I won’t be going back even if I wanted to.”
“I can’t pretend that I am not relieved to hear it. But...what happened?”
Garrett turned away. “We can talk about it some other time. I’m going to get out of these wet clothes and take a shower.” He paused and looked back at her, clearly spooked by her question. “There’s satellite in the front room. I won’t be long. Just listen out for the delivery.”
Isla chewed her lips, her brows furrowing as she nodded.
Was it too soon
to ask what kept them apart for two years? When he first went overseas, they’d talked every chance he got to access a computer. Two years went by with everything going smoothly.
They’d send each other pictures, would email every day, and chatted on Skype. Even when he couldn’t get to her right away, he’d apologize when he could make it to a computer.
She had no idea what it was like over there except for what little he could tell about the giant spiders, the people he met in the villages, and the new friends he’d made in his unit. His new brothers. The ones he never had.
Garrett would mention the missions he had to go on, never into detail, but there was always communication. When that ended, her world had crashed to a halt.
College was hell. She was lucky to have graduated at all after all of the classes she skipped, all the frat boys she’d tried to start relationships with, only to be used as a sex toy.
She watched him walk down the hallway to his bedroom and close the door.
Isla may have been an impulsive person, driven by a desperate need for love and affection. She was also a patient person.
She’d wait until he was ready. Garrett was worth it. He was worth more than all of her money in the bank, and she planned on making sure he knew it.
CHAPTER 8
AFTER THE DELIVERY ARRIVED, Garrett and Isla sat on his back patio. He’d started a fire in the fire pit and lit tiki torches.
“Wow,” she said as she ate some of her rice. “I was starving. I pretty much drove down from the base for hours. I stopped once for gas and a Red Bull.”
He drank more wine. “So, you’ll be up all night won’t you?”
“I hope not,” she said with a laugh.
The night couldn’t have been more perfect. Isla had dreamed of this but never thought that it was possible. She looked over at him as he put his feet up on the wicker ottoman. The back yard was a little overgrown with tall green grass. The rose bush was out of control with roses climbing up the house and sticking into the panels and roofing.
“How is it?” Garrett asked, slurping noodles from his chopsticks. He poured hot sauce into his container, and Isla grinned. He hadn’t changed. He was still obsessed with spicy food.