The crowd “awed” over the earliest pictures of Darlene and Gil’s relationship. ’80s hair. Ripped denim. Hair spray. They were so young and full of hope.
Young Darlene looked at the skinny, gawky Gilbert like he’d hung the stars in the night sky.
The photos tracked a timeline of love and laughter. An entire lifetime of happiness, Remi realized. Sure, it was a highlight reel. There had been fights and frustrations. There had been late nights with vomiting children and long talks about discipline. There had been bills to pay and parents to mourn. There had been rough patches and uncertainty. But they’d made a commitment to each other to grow and change together.
Tears filled her eyes as the happy couple stared down at fresh-to-the-world baby Kimber, sleeping peacefully as her parents gazed at her with awe. A family now.
There was Darlene, pregnant, working the dispatch desk at the station. Gilbert with his bushy mustache and plaid corduroys. Brick’s hold on her tightened almost imperceptibly at the next picture. A tiny, red-faced, red-haired baby frozen mid-scream.
They’d made room for her. Loving her as fiercely as she’d loved them. Even though she’d been different. Even though she’d been too much and not enough.
Was a life like this possible? Could she build one?
She reached behind her and put a hand on Brick’s rock hard thigh, reassuring herself that he was still there.
The song changed to Kool and the Gang’s “Cherish,” and the colors she saw shifted accordingly to purples and blues.
With care, Brick laced his fingers through hers and squeezed her hand, connecting them despite his unexplained anger, despite her confusion and fears. It was real and binding.
What he hadn’t shared with her created a valley between them. But what they’d shared together, the intimacy, the vulnerability, bridged it.
She was electrified sitting there with him in the dark. As if her entire being was plugged into his. As if those broad shoulders and wide chest were the home she’d sought. As if he was a beacon in the dark, a lighthouse.
The craving to have his hands on her, even now, even among family and friends, was overpowering. Handholding had never been erotic before. It had never signified anything more than a flirtation. But in this moment it took on the weight of this secret between them, the weight of the secrets he carried. She felt the steady strength in his grip and knew that her body belonged to him even if her heart and mind couldn’t trust it.
They needed to talk. Needed to set things straight. Needed to remember where they’d come from and where they were heading.
His thumb skimmed over hers as the screen followed the now teenage sisters and their parents. And there was Brick. It had to have been one of his first days on the island. He was standing in the Ford kitchen, cowboy hat on, quietly observing. He was so young. And there was hurt in the set of his shoulders. Sixteen-year-old Remi was standing in front of him, head tilted way back. She was smiling smugly up at him as if to say, “You’re already mine. I’ve already won.”
She’d loved him.
The truth of it struck true like an arrow. From day one, she had loved Brick Callan, and he’d broken her heart twice. What kind of a masochist kept coming back, kept asking for more?
She wanted to run. Wanted to get out of the tent, away from everyone. Wanted to turn up her music and pick up a brush and lose herself in the feelings. She wanted to exorcise the feelings onto canvas to make sense of them. How could she love a man she didn’t trust with her heart?
How could she trust him not to hurt her again? He would protect her. She had no doubt of that. Brick would lay down his life for her. But would he share it?
Dizzy, she started to pull away, but Brick held her there, anchored to him with a solid grip that made her feel like running and staying at the same time.
His thumb brushed hers rhythmically, insistently.
The pictures flashed forward on the screen. Christmases, birthdays, Fourth of Julys. They all got older. The house changed. The town changed.
Remi tried to focus on the slideshow and the colors the music produced as they floated up to the peaks of the tent and wove their way around the people gathered to celebrate with them.
“What colors do you see?” Brick’s voice was low and rough in her ear. His lip grazed her lobe, and she shivered involuntarily at the contact.
“I see greens and blues billowing like smoke,” she whispered back. The desire to slide into his arms even after her revelation was intense.
She glanced back at him, but his gaze was on the screen. The strong jaw under the neatly trimmed beard, the crinkles around his eyes. The firm set of his mouth.
His grip tightened without warning, and she sensed him tensing next to her. Scanning the room for the threat, she spotted the photo on the screen.
Brick looking dapper and stalwart on his wedding day. Audrey, stunning in white lace, beaming at him. Darlene and Gil posed next to them like family at the altar.
She remembered then. The why this wouldn’t work. He’d made his choice, and it hadn’t been her.
40
She gave serious thought to ignoring the knock on her door but recalled the shower incident and changed her mind.
“You ran away,” Brick said, pushing past her, not waiting for an invitation. While she had changed into her oversized hoodie and knee socks, he was still dressed for the party in dark slacks and a tie.
“I did not. I walked home at a leisurely pace,” she lied. As soon as the party wrapped, as soon as she’d done enough to help with the clean-up, she’d ducked out and run like hell before slipping on a patch of ice and almost taking a header through a tidy picket fence.
“You ran away. And that was after you shut me out.”
“I would hardly call giving you a blow job shutting you—”
“Don’t,” he snapped. The icy fire of his temper was evident in his gaze, his stance. He was coiled and ready.
“Don’t what?” she challenged.
“Don’t try to reduce what’s going on between us to that.”
“Sorry,” she said, heavy on the sarcasm. “I didn’t realize sucking your dick—”
She found herself backed against the wall with a hard, angry man in front of her. His hands were gentle on her, but the rest of him vibrated with anger. For some reason, she found his restraint fucking hot.
“No. We’re talking about this. No deflecting or distracting. We’re having it out.”
When he looked at her like this, it made her feel like she was the center of his universe. Like nothing else mattered but what was happening between them. But that wasn’t the truth.
“You want to talk?”
He nodded slowly, his teeth bared.
“You never want to talk.” Her voice shook as he leaned in and took a deep, carnal breath at her neck.
“I talk all the fucking time,” he insisted.
“Fine. Then talk,” she said, trying to duck under his arm but finding herself going nowhere as he cupped her jaw, holding her lightly by the throat.
“Do you know what it does to me to be that close to you and not be able to touch you like I want to?” he asked, his voice soft and jagged.
Wordlessly she shook her head.
“It’s fucking torture. It’s a new ring of hell to know what your skin feels like, to know what you taste like, but I still can’t touch you unless we’re alone.”