Page 40 of Bursting With Love
“Well, I’m not sure why you need all of that in New York, but I guess you know best,” her father said.
Her father was always careful about supporting the things they did. Right then, she needed support of a different kind. “Dad, I’m a pretty strong person, right?”
“Other than your mother, you’re the strongest woman I think I’ve ever known, Savannah. Is there something on your mind?”
She pictured him leaning against the kitchen counter, his long legs angled out from his body, his thick eyebrows drawn together as he waited for her to lay her problems out before him. What am I doing? She couldn’t run to Daddy when things got tough. That alone would prove that she wasn’t strong or confident.
“No, Dad. I was just checking.”
“All right, but if you need me, you know where to reach me. You gonna make it to Hugh’s award ceremony?”
Hugh was always winning one award or another. They’d all head out to wherever the event was being held, and Hugh would flash a smile, dole out hugs, and inevitably get swept away by some leggy woman they’d never see again. She smiled. Hugh’s every woman’s dream come true—the face of Patrick Dempsey on Hugh Jackman’s body and with a love of all things risky. Regardless of how much she loved Hugh, all she could think was that he probably left a trail of broken hearts in his wake just like the men she needed to avoid.
“I wouldn’t miss it,” she answered. “Good to talk to you, Dad.”
“Vanny?”
“Yeah?”
“You can learn all the fancy skills you feel you need, but the strength and ability to survive comes from within. You just remember that, darlin’. And you’re a survivor. There ain’t nothing this world can hand you that you cannot endure.”
The tears she’d been holding back sprang free. I hope you’re right.
JACK’S VINTAGE INDIAN Chief motorcycle snaked swiftly up the long gravel driveway of the Bedford Corners home that he and Linda had shared. Jack leaned into the curves that used to bring him such comfort. Now, riding beneath the canopy of trees that arced overhead felt strange, and the air beneath, oddly cold.
He parked his bike in front of his cedar-sided chalet and placed his helmet on the back. After Linda had died, he’d holed up inside for days, wallowing in guilt and hiding from both of their families, until seeing her ghost in every photograph and reliving the memories they’d shared drove him into darkness and he’d escaped to the mountains. He walked past a wooden rocker as he climbed the porch steps, remembering the day he and Linda had purchased it from a man who looked like Grizzly Adams at a farmer’s market on the outskirts of town. Jack unlocked the heavy wooden door. When he stepped inside, it wasn’t the cooler temperature that had him rooted to the floor of the open living space. It was the emptiness that came with it. The way a room felt when it had been uninhabited for too long. Stale. Lonely. Dead. Like a garden after the vegetables and leaves had withered away and all that was left were the brittle stalks.
Jack forced himself to step inside. He blew out a breath and closed the door behind him. He looked down at the wide slats of wood beneath his feet and followed their lines to the sunken living room tucked just beyond the dining room table to his right. The stone fireplace that once crackled with warmth now stood barren before the rich blue couches. He managed a few steps in that direction and felt the kitchen looming to his left. Linda had been a talented cook, and as he turned to look at the stainless-steel stove, he pictured her wide smile as she’d leaned over multiple pots atop the stove, her hips moving to imaginary music. He could almost feel her eyes lifting from a pot and catching his, could envision the tilt of her head and her blond hair spilling into her eyes as she blew him a kiss. His heartbeat sped up, and he turned his body fully in that direction.
Jesus, Jack. Get a grip. He closed his eyes, and when he opened them, the image was gone. He pushed through the tightening in his chest and his racing heart and forced himself to move past the kitchen to the staircase.
His legs felt like lead as he took each step up the open slatted staircase. At the landing at the top, two bedroom doors remained closed. He hadn’t been in them for months. He turned, his muscles trying to spur him into a hasty retreat, but his mind brought him back to Savannah and he fisted his hands, then spun back around with a growl.
“I’m not turning back.” He lowered his eyes and stormed to the first bedroom door, grabbing the cold metal handle and turning it fast and hard, then thrusting the door open. He stormed into the master bedroom, and anger boiled in his veins. Savannah’s voice sifted through his mind. Too bad you can’t live in the past, Jack. Heat spread up his neck and cheeks. He threw open the double closet doors. His chest expanded with every breath. Two years he’d lived with the strangling guilt and self-loathing. Two long fucking years. He reached into the closet and grabbed a fistful of Linda’s clothes, then yanked them from the hangers and threw them on the floor at his feet. His arms shook at the sight of them.
