The Promise of Paradise

Chapter Twenty-Five


Ash stumbled down the porch steps as Eddie jumped back onto the motorcycle. He sped through the intersection and left a strip of burnt rubber three feet long. Colin’s hand fell onto her shoulder, but she shook it off.

“Colin...” She looked down at the ring on her finger. Already it felt heavy with the weight of the gem, not to mention his offer and the promise it held if she said yes. “I can’t make this decision.”

His Adam’s apple moved once, in a hard swallow that betrayed his disappointment. “It’s okay. Take some time. Take as much as you need.”

He didn’t look mad, or impatient, or as though he wanted to change his mind. He just looked sad, as if he knew maybe he’d waited too long. As if he understood he’d made the wrong decision and now couldn’t right it.

“I know…ah…that maybe you didn’t expect it,” he went on.

“You think?”

Colin reddened. “Took me a while to figure things out.” He stared at his feet. “I screwed up. But I don’t want to lose you. I’ll do whatever it takes.”

Ash sank onto the bottom step. She didn’t want to blame Colin for her heartache. She didn’t want the exhaustion of hating him anymore. She wanted to watch the rain fall and not count all the times she’d walked with him in it. She wanted to sleep for more than two nights in a row without waking up thinking of him. She wanted what he was offering her: the chance to forgive, move on, and change the past.

But that made it harder. She wished he wouldn't be so damn nice about it. Give me an ultimatum, and I’ll throw the ring across the porch and tell you to go to hell. But don’t tell me you’ll wait. Don’t turn into this sensitive guy I don’t even know.

“You broke my heart.” She meant to hurt him with the words, to make him feel one ounce of the pain he’d put her through. “You can’t just make everything better with an apology and a ring.”

Colin nodded. “I know.” He looked down at his hands. “I don’t blame you if you tell me to go to hell,” he added. “I guess I probably deserve it.”

“You do.” But her voice faltered.

He bent and brushed a kiss across her cheek. “I still love you,” he said again. “And I’ll wait, however long it takes, for you to see that I’m serious. That I want us to work.” He stopped halfway down the sidewalk, shoulders hunched against the rain. “I’ve got a room at the Holiday Inn over by the interstate. I’ll be there until tomorrow.” He paused. “Then I’m heading home. Be at the Vineyard with your folks next weekend, if you want. Or if not, then…just call me, okay? Let me know.”

She blinked, surprised, at the kindness in his words. The sincerity. Maybe he really was sorry. She glanced down at her left hand. Maybe it wasn’t too late for a life like that.

“I’ll call you,” she said.

He nodded and jogged to his car, slipping inside and turning the wipers on high. The next moment the BMW turned the corner, a silver streak in the distance. He’s gone, just like Eddie. Only Colin was willing to wait for her. Eddie wouldn’t even stop to let her explain. She shivered in the damp air.

After a minute—or ten, she wasn’t quite sure—Ash let herself into the house. Halfway upstairs she had to stop and catch her breath. Palms wet with perspiration, she tugged on the ring until it slipped from her finger. She held it up to the light.

Gorgeous. And perfect, of course. She wouldn’t expect less from Colin Parker. But what did it mean? That he still loved her? That he was sorry? That he wanted her back, along with her name, her future, and the benefits they offered him? If she sliced away his top layer, could she see through to the bottom? Was there anything in the middle? Anything past the good looks and the intelligence that made him a shoe-in for political office?

Ash shoved the ring into her front pocket and made her way up the final few steps.

But if she did the same thing to Eddie, what would she see there? A man too angry to trust anyone again? Someone who was happy spending his whole life bouncing in and out of beds in Paradise? Or someone who could see through the layers she wrapped around herself?

She reached for her cell phone and punched in the number for the restaurant. Sometime while Colin was on his knee and Eddie was staring across the lawn, she’d heard the church bell ring twelve times, which meant she was now officially late for work.

“…I’ll be there in ten minutes,” she promised J.T. She walked to the front window and studied the sky, blue-black and scorched with lightning. She'd have to take her car. She couldn’t walk in this.

She’d bring an extra shirt, just in case she got soaked running across the parking lot. Maybe an extra pair of socks. Cataloging the things she needed to take care of in the next five minutes helped Ash keep her mind off the bigger things she had to figure out in the next twenty-four hours. Get from here to the bedroom. Then from the bedroom to the car. Then from the car to the restaurant. She could deal with the rest later.

Ash glanced outside. Near the curb, Eddie’s motorcycle helmet lay in the rain. She started, as if the lightning outside had reached into the apartment and sizzled her. Eddie’s helmet. Here. On the ground. Not on his head. Not protecting him. Without stopping to put on her shoes, she ran out into the rain and retrieved it, laying it in front of his door.

She hated motorcycles, had lost a classmate back in high school to a violent accident. Something stole the heat from her face as she stumbled upstairs. She couldn’t think about Evan Traler’s funeral, or the fact that his parents had a closed casket because his face peeled off when he hit the pavement going eighty miles per hour without a helmet.

Without a helmet…

Ash shook her head as she made her way to the car and negotiated the water filling Main Street. Eddie had seen enough damage from careless driving to know better. He’d be careful. Right? But that look on his face when he spun away from the sidewalk. That anger.

Stop it. He’ll be fine. His brother had died in a car accident, for God’s sake. He wouldn't risk putting his parents through that again. She pulled into the lot behind the restaurant. That thought felt right. That thought, she could believe and find comfort in.

When she got home from her shift, she’d go see him. Maybe they could talk rationally. Maybe she could convince him that whatever he’d seen on the porch wasn’t the whole truth. Maybe, with tiny steps, they could sift through their feelings and the lies that she’d told. Maybe, just looking up at him, feeling his hands on hers again, would help her make a decision.

Baby steps. Just get yourself through the next few hours. You’ll be fine. He'll be fine.

She skipped over a puddle, not knowing that this time, she was wrong.

* * *

Near the end of the lunch shift, the crowd at Blues and Booze finally trickled to a stop. With a single family in a booth and a couple of guys at the bar, the two waitresses headed into the kitchen. Ash leaned against the stainless steel counter, exhausted and starving. She grabbed a packet of soup crackers and realized she hadn’t eaten a thing since breakfast. Since before she’d gotten the phone call from Marty. Since before she’d walked her way through town only to return home and find Colin waiting for her, with an engagement ring and a promise of forever. Crackers fell from her hand and made a yellow crumb pile on the counter. Without the distraction of taking orders and running food, the memories returned, painfully sharp. Had all that happened just today? It seemed as though a thousand hours had passed since she woke up.

“Everything okay?” Lacey began refilling ketchup bottles.

“Fine.”

“I heard Marty asked you to take over full-time.”

Ash didn’t answer. News traveled fast. Too fast, sometimes.

“So are you thinking about it?”

“I don't know. I never really planned on staying in town.” She grabbed a pile of napkins, fresh from the dry cleaner. “I only sublet my apartment for the summer.” Edge to edge, fold once and then twice. Her fingers followed the rhythm that had become second nature that summer.

Lacey chuckled. “Yeah. Funny how plans change, huh?”

Ash finished folding and carried an armful of napkins to the closet. On her way back, she took a detour to the ladies’ room. She didn’t feel like making conversation, even with Lacey. How was she supposed to answer Marty’s question with Colin’s hanging over her? Sinking onto the toilet seat, she sighed and rubbed her legs. The ring, still in her pocket, dug into her thigh. She pulled it out. Look at it fifty different ways, think about all the things it meant she had to choose, it still was the most beautiful piece of jewelry she’d ever seen.

“Marry me…make me the happiest guy in the world…”

The door banged open, and a pair of feet appeared in the stall beside her. “Ash? J.T. said Marty called, wants us to close up early today.”

“Why?” She glanced at her watch. Almost four. She wasn’t ready to go home. She wasn’t ready to see Eddie, to call Colin, to make any kind of decision. She wanted to wait until the wee hours, tomorrow’s dawn maybe. Not mid-afternoon of a gray, lifeless day. She flushed and headed for the sinks, avoiding her reflection in the mirror.

“Guess the storm’s pretty bad,” Lacey said. “Shoot. I could have used the dinner shift. Lunch tips weren’t so good.”

Ash lathered up and watched the soap swirl into the drain. I wish I could do that. I wish I could just vanish in a whirlpool until I sort out my life. Hide in a dark hole until things on the outside made sense again. She frowned. Except she’d come to Paradise with the intention of doing just that, and look where it had gotten her. Her shoulders hunched up. Maybe you couldn’t ever run away from your life. Maybe the big choices did follow you no matter where you went.

Back in the bar, J.T. nodded over his toothpick when she asked about the weather.

“Yep. Marty said the bridge to Forestburg’s under water. He’s stuck down in Salem overnight. Plus the news said there are a couple of accidents on the other side of town. He said to forget it, go on home.”

Outside, lightning sliced the street into jagged white pieces, and the rain poured down, heavier than ever. Ash nodded. If she were calling the shots, she'd say the same thing. No use staying open. The way this weather looked, she couldn’t imagine anyone in Paradise leaving the comfort of their couches.

The telephone rang.

“Blues and Booze,” J.T. answered. “We’re getting ready to close…oh, yeah. Hang on a minute.” He held out the receiver. “For you.”

Ash frowned. No one called her at work. “Who is it?”

“Dunno. Some guy.”

“That’s helpful.”

J.T. shrugged and started counting his drawer

“Ashton Kirk?” She didn’t recognize the voice.

“Yes?”

The man paused, giving way to a cough. But when he spoke again, she knew who it was. She knew before he told her his name. She knew from the way he formed his vowels. She knew from the way he dropped the end of his sentences, from the way he stopped every so often when the words became too hard to say. She knew because he spoke exactly the same way his son did.

“Eddie’s been in an accident. He’s asking for you.”