I Found You (26 page)

“Rach…” Jason’s voice called me to stop talking.

I looked at him and probably turned bright red, but even so, I said, “Well, she shouldn’t think badly of you, because you aren’t bad.”

God, I was glad of the flat boots he’d bought me, at least I could storm out without falling on my ass.

Jason didn’t follow.

“She’s pregnant?” Lindy’s incredulous voice rang with a high pitch behind me. It was followed by Jason’s low voice trying to brush things over. “Lindy, just leave it, you’re going to have to accept this…”

“She’s foisting a kid off on you?”

Unworthiness and uncertainty suddenly whipped at my back as I walked out. He was much closer to Lindy than me, emotionally. I could hear the depth of knowledge and awareness in their voices. They knew each other inside out–– but bits of
us,
were still strangers meeting for the first time.

I was confused. Fuck! Why the hell had Rach said that? Where had her outburst even come from? Bullshit. She’d been deathly quiet for the last hour and now she’d flown into a temper over Lindy’s insult. Neither thing seemed like Rachel to me. But what did I know of Rachel really? We’d only had a month together, no matter what Lindy thought. But then I knew Rachel’s moods could swing erratically. She could be up one minute and down the next. On Manhattan Bridge one night, singing and dancing in a club the next.

But, why tell Lindy about the baby? Dammit. Now it would spread, and the baby was going to suffer the judgment of every small-minded person in this town. I wanted the baby to be mine. I was going to bring it up. It was going to be mine.

Lindy’s look of shock at Rachel’s statement immediately turned to anger, but even so her expression had slipped to self-congratulation, a typical cat with cream on its chin.

“Oh this is great, I mean really, she’s trailer trash. Are you a fool? Or is she some kind of fucking superstar in bed? What did you do, dump me for a blow job?”

“Shut up, Lindy.” I kept my voice low. Far too much of my life was being broadcast in here. “You don’t know her.”

“And do you?”

No, not totally, but I knew how I felt and I wanted to know everything there was about her––to properly know her. Better than anyone else.. But dammit, I wish she hadn’t spoken about the baby. “I know as much as I need to know to love her, and I’m sorry I let you down, but–”

“I’m not. I’m glad you let me down! Now I know what a fucking bastard you really are!” Lindy flew at me then, claws out, ready to scratch my face, but Billy caught her arm.

“Just leave it, Lind,” he whispered harshly.

She fought to be free of his grip.

“Yeah, listen to Billy, there’s no point in this.”

Billy’s gaze suddenly spun to me as he let Lindy go. “I’m not defending you, Jason. You’re a bastard for bringing that girl here. It’s a fucking insensitive thing to do. If I were you, I’d just go. Leave town now, and stay away from here.”

“This is my home.” I wasn’t going to let them force me out of it.

“Not anymore it’s not…” Billy answered.

Bullshit, he’d only come to talk to me earlier to take a look at Rach. He’d been sizing her up. Lindy had taken my family from me and now my best friend. I just stared at them.

But then Lindy’s hand swung out, and in the next instant it struck my cheek. “I hate you!”

The slap stung, but I didn’t move, just watched the anger drop out of her. She’d reddened, as though she remembered where she was.

I couldn’t be angry back at her. This was my fault. I’d created this mess. I just had to work out a way to fix it now, and I couldn’t see a way, except to do as Billy said and just leave town, and never come back.

“I’ll see you tonight. I hope you’ll start to see things differently soon. You’ll find a guy who’s more suited to you than I am, Lindy. We weren’t right. You know we weren’t. If we were I’d never have been attracted to Rachel, would I?”

That earned me another slap.

I didn’t stay to hear what either of them had to say in answer. Fuck them. They could think what they liked. The whole fucking town could.

I paid, then went outside to see Rachel pacing beside the truck and ranting to herself.

She noticed me coming, and stopped as she looked up.

“Dammit, Rach … ”

Her eyes were still burning bright.

Shit, how could I be angry at her? She was carrying a baby. She was the one who’d endured the crap from the guy who’d got her pregnant. She’d only been trying to defend me. But fuck, the sentiment had been misguided.

I sighed and stepped down off the sidewalk, but didn’t move to the driver’s side. Instead I went to her.

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault! It’s mine! I shouldn’t have…” Her gaze dropped to the ground, her well of anger appearing to run dry.

“What?”

“Gone home with you that night, or flirted with you, or… Or had sex with you… Or––”

I grabbed hold of her, and hugged her. “Honey, just shut up.”

She was crying then, her head leaning against mine as her arms gripped about my waist.

I felt out of control, and out of my depth, like I was treading water in a lake and the shore was a mile off.

“Let’s get back in the truck and get out of town,” I whispered in her ear. “There’s a lake near here, it’s private property, but we all used to go there when I was young. Let’s go there?”

I pulled away and smiled. She didn’t, but she nodded.

Rach was the strongest, most vibrant and outgoing individual in the world. She was a person I looked up to. But then, there was this Rachel. The woman I’d met first. The quiet, guarded, haunted looking woman, whose eyes were pools of deep sorrow I could swim in if I wished to seek despair. This Rachel I just wished to hold, protect and defend––and love.
God, I did love her.
I wanted to take every hurt away from her. The emotion was a living being in my chest, it roared and breathed fire and grew hungry with need. I’d never felt this way with Lindy.

Rach pulled away and moved to get in the truck.

I sighed and then walked around the other side.

I still didn’t know how to fix this, other than to press the eject button on my life.

The lake was only about fifteen minutes out of town, and there was a place to park beneath the trees, and a walk that went around it. I think it was a fishing lake. Occasionally I’d seen other people there. A couple of times I’d been yelled at for trespassing and asked to leave. But it was the place we’d all hung out late at night, once we could drive.

I parked up and switched off the engine, then just sat back.

Rach’s head turned to me, her eyes asking, what now?

I didn’t know.

“Do you want to get out and walk round?”

She nodded.

I got out, but she didn’t move. So I played gentleman and walked about the truck to open her door.

Again she didn’t smile when I did. But when I lifted my hand, she took it, and used it to help her climb down.

I shut the truck door.

It was a seriously cold day, and the track around the lake was hard packed snow. Snow also hung in the trees. It would glint in twilight.

Keeping hold of her hand I started walking. “I’d teach you to skim stones, but that’s kind of pointless when the lake’s frozen.”

She glanced across at me. “Who says I can’t skim stones?”

I smiled again. “Can you?”

“I once made one bounce three times. I bet I could get a stone to bounce tons of times on a frozen lake.”

This was still the Rachel I’d met first, belligerent, withholding judgment and wary, but she was at least trying to shine through it and make me laugh.

I’d already broken though these barriers once, but now, bringing her here, I’d made her raise them up again. I was pissed off with myself for giving her cause to go back behind them. Maybe Billy was right. Maybe we should just leave, and never come back. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought you here, should I?”

She stopped walking and gripped my other hand, the two of us standing framed in an arch of snow covered tree branches. “You know, if you want to change your mind and go back to her, that’s okay. I just want you to be happy.”

I gripped her hands hard, probably so hard it hurt. “Rachel. That isn’t what I want.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure. Don’t talk trash, Rach.”

Her green eyes glowed up at me, unfathomable. I wanted to know what I didn’t know about her. I wanted to know everything.

“Jason.” Her forehead dropped against my shoulder, but she carried on talking, her words a feeling which ran down my arm, through the leather of my jacket. “I should tell you… There’s something… I… I mean…”

Her head lifted and her eyes met mine again, and they looked odd, like there was some sort of battle of wills going on in her head, or like she was nervous. “We don’t know each other well, do we?” She seemed to change tack. “I’m jealous of her. She knows you far better than I do. I… I want to know you like she does. I hate her because she knows you better, and I hate her for judging you badly. This was my fault, not yours. I hate myself. I shouldn’t hate her.”

I frowned as my fingers ran over her hair.

“Rach, we do have more to learn about each other, yes, but it makes no difference to where we are now. We’re right for each other, we both know it. So don’t start fighting it, and for God’s sake, do not regret me. I’m not regretting anything. I know us getting together has been sudden, too sudden to know each other properly, but so what. I know this is right, Rachel. Don’t you? I’m not wrong, am I?”

She nodded, but began crying again. I pulled her to me and held her.

“It’s going to be okay, we’ll work it out. I love you. There’s no one to blame.”

“I’m sorry I flipped out at the restaurant.”

“You were just trying to stand up for me, honey, I know that. Perhaps your response was a bit misguided, but hey, I know you meant well. I just wish you hadn’t told the whole town the baby isn’t mine. I want it to be mine.”

Her head lifted sharply. Her green eyes catching hold of my gaze. “I’m sorry I said it. I didn’t mean to say it…”

I drew her head back to my shoulder and felt her warmth and solidity. “It’s okay.” But I really wasn’t sure it was okay. I didn’t know what to do.

My hands dropped to rub her arms. “Come on, let’s walk. It’s getting cold standing still.”

We set off and I took her hand again and held it tight.

For a bit we walked in silence, but that was okay. I loved that we could give each other time for silence without feeling pressured. Silences had always felt awkward with Lindy, like I should have been saying something. Not with Rach.

“What’s the best thing you’ve ever done?” she asked after a long while.

Ah, this was clearly a question intended to begin filling in the gaps about each other.

The only thing that came to mind was the way I felt when I was running. “Just running… Not even winning, it’s the freedom of being able to run fast.” I looked at her. “Does that make me boring?”

Her eyes seemed to be absorbing me, taking in details that made me wonder what she saw.

“Nope, it makes you salt of the earth, Jason Macinlay.”

“What about you?”

“Met you.”

There was no hesitation, it was an immediate response.

I stopped walking and hugged her, again, just for a moment. My heart felt so fucking full of her. I was totally in love.

I kissed her.

But she turned it from a simple kiss to a passionate kiss, full of desperation and need.

If she hadn’t been wearing jeans, I’d have moved her back against the trunk of the tree behind her and lifted her legs… and well––repeated the scene in the alley the first night we’d got together.

She broke the kiss. “What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?”

I thought for a minute. Then smiled. “Probably stealing spray paint from Dad’s store and spraying graffiti on the fence of a neighbor’s house when I fell out with him over a ball going into their backyard.”

She took a breath and answered the question in return before I’d even asked it. “I’ve stabbed someone, and stolen things tons of times.”

“Stabbed someone?” My eyebrows lifted. That didn’t sound like Rach.

“I got angry. Like I almost got angry with Lindy just now. He… He made me mad and I broke a mirror and – and I hurt him.”

I saw her hand clench and unclench.

I understood.

I picked up her hand, and took off her glove, looking at the healed cut. It was just a jagged red, raw looking scar now. “When you did this?” I looked up at her, my thumb running over her palm.

“Yes.”

“Looks to me like you hurt yourself as much as him… Was it the guy you left?”

“Yeah.”

“And the stealing?”

“Sometimes it was when I got into debt and I didn’t know how to get out of trouble… I keep doing it. I keep trying not to… But sometimes it was just for fun.”

“So what are you saying? You need me to look after the money and watch out for your light fingers in shops, and not make you mad when you’re standing near mirrors?” I smiled.

She laughed, but it sounded hollow. Then she said, “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

We kissed, again, and the ground felt solid once more, and my future clear and certain. It was with her. That was all I needed to know.

I broke the kiss. “Come on, let’s finish walking before the sun goes down and it gets colder.”

She nodded.

I opened the conversation with another rudimentary question. “What was your favorite food when you were a kid?”

We continued the conversation as we walked along the snow covered track, talking nonsense really, but doing what I’d intended doing today and getting to know each other more.

Once we’d walked a circuit of the lake, I pressed her back against the trunk of a tree and kissed her, with a hard fierce passion. We’d told each other more, but I still only felt like I knew facts about her, not her. I wanted to be a complete part of her. I wanted to feel like I knew her inside out. Like she was me and I was her … 

Her fingers snuck under my leather jacket.

I slipped a button loose on her coat and felt skin beneath her shirt.