The Wright Brother (8 page)

“What are you talking about?” she asked as she dug her nails into the recliner armrests.

“Elisa, when you go away, don’t forget him. Please.”

Thundering heart slowing just slightly, she cocked her head. “What?” That hadn’t been at all where she’d thought this conversation might lead.

Crossing her legs, Lori pinched the bridge of her nose. “Julian has no idea I’ve come over—in fact, he’d probably kill me if he knew. But I had to, I had to get this out to you before you left.”

Her blue eyes were rimmed with dark circles. Loribelle didn’t work. The Wrights lived off of her husband’s stocks and insurance, which was substantial to say the least. Elisa didn’t know exact amounts exactly, but she’d heard it whispered that it had to be close to five million.

They didn’t live like they were uber wealthy, so she wasn’t sure whether to believe it or not, but then again the East Coast wasn’t the cheapest place in the world to live.

The obvious stress Lori was under didn’t come from bills, but more than likely stemmed from the fact that she was a young widow with three teenage triplets, one of who had health issues.

Lori’s nervous finger tapping was starting to make Elisa anxious. She wiggled on her seat.

“I don’t want to put pressure on you, Elisa. But you have no idea what you’ve done for my boys. Most especially Julian.”

A hard lump wedged itself in her throat, making it hard to swallow.

“You know his problems. That’s obvious. But when Carter died, Julian took it harder than the rest of them. Carter was his world. His dad made Julian feel alive.” She smiled, her eyes distant and remembering a memory. “He’d always tell Julian that no matter how he was born, he could be whoever he wanted. Carter was so proud of our boys, but I think he secretly favored Julian most. I mean”—she shrugged, blinking back to the present—“he needed a lot of help in the first few years of his life. Deaf and colorblind, it was so overwhelming. I just thought it would be impossible, that Julian would never have the kind of life like his brothers would.”

“But it hasn’t stopped him at all.”

“I know.” She nodded and gave her a gentle smile. “He’s perfect. And Lord if that boy ain’t handsome.”

Elisa’s grin wobbled. That was a statement she’d like to stay far away from.

Lori sighed and the sound of it was so full of sadness that it squeezed Elisa’s heart. “Kids were so cruel to him, even his own brothers at one point.” She shook her head. “New York was no good to Julian. He suffered. He will probably never admit it, but the loss of his father has left a lasting impact on him. Where Roman and Christian threw themselves into sports and the validation of their peers, Julian withdrew into himself.”

That much was fairly obvious to her. Julian had always been quieter than his brothers. “Julian’s always been different.”

“Yes.” She looked at Elisa. “Quiet and shy. But in New York he grew wild and angry. Started hanging out with the wrong crowds. My parents tried to help the best they could, but”—she took a deep breath—“he was just too much for all of us. He started dealing drugs—”

“What?” That didn’t sound at all like Julian. “Was he using too?”

“No, thank God.” The relief in her voice was short-lived. “But he was getting into fights, and, well, you’ve seen the tattoos.”

Elisa wouldn’t admit to his mother that those tattoos were part of what intrigued her so much about him. She nibbled on the corner of her lip.

“My last hope was to come back here. But I was afraid you know. Would Carter’s memory haunt those halls and make it harder for our boys?”

“And did it?”

“At first, a little. But”—her smile grew wide—“then they saw little Elisa Jane Adrian, and it was like my boys were five all over again. Bit by bit they came out of their shells. Roman grew less sarcastic, Christian, well…” She shrugged and laughed. “He’ll always be Christian. But Julian,” she said, nodding proudly, “Julian became my Julian again. It took a while, but soon I began to notice that you made him laugh, you brought him out of that shell and…” Her eyes began to swim with tears, and yanking a tissue out of the box from beside the candy bowl, she dabbed at them.

Elisa knew exactly what Lori was talking about. She’d witnessed the transformation herself. Just thinking about it brought a smile to her face, but reality came crashing down hard.

“He’ll be fine. He has to be, I’m leaving.”

Lori’s brows gathered into a tight vee. “Elisa, I don’t know what happened the other day when you guys went swimming.”

Squirming, she plucked at her nightgown. “No…nothing happened.”

But Lori didn’t seem entirely convinced by her weak words.

Waving a hand, she said, “I’m not here to talk about that. Because like I said, I don’t know. All I do know is he came back that day devastated. I suspect my boy has developed a serious crush on you.”

Cringing, Elisa shook her head.

But Lori only nodded harder. “Not only do I believe that, but I think you know that. Which is probably why he returned to me as he did. I understand there’s a fairly significant age gap—”

“Mrs. Wright—”

“Lori.” She raised her brows.

Huffing, Elisa corrected herself. Habits were hard to break. “Lori. I’m nineteen. Yes, there is a huge age gap, and I’m sorry for how he feels about me.” She squelched the little voice reminding her that he’d not been the only one affected that day. “But I would never cross that line.”

“Oh dear Lord.” She grabbed her chest. “I hope you don’t think I’m asking you to. I would never.”

Elisa flicked her wrist. “Then what are you doing?”

“I’m only asking for you to understand that it’s a phase, and he’ll get over you. He’s got two more years before college, he’ll understand it could never be, what I don’t want though is for you to ignore him. You’re good for him, Elisa.”

Why had the thought of him getting over her made her feel such a heavy flash of sadness? It shouldn’t, because the fact was that was exactly what she wanted. What she needed. Elisa was going to college and she was going to flirt, she was going to date, and, hopefully, she’d find the man of her dreams, graduate with honors, and forget all about that stolen moment on the pier that’d made her heart beat faster than it ever had before in her life.

“Write to him. Email him. Text him. Just every once in a while. Just let him down easy, Lisa, that’s all I’m asking. I’m afraid what will happen if you shut him out. Once he realizes you two could never be anything, he’ll move on, and he’ll be happy again, but I’m begging you, please, don’t lock him out.”

She knew Jules. And the fact was, she knew Lori was right. What Julian felt for her was puppy dog worship, an infatuation that would end. But when it did the one thing Elisa wanted was to know that they would always remain friends.

“I really do love them all.”

Lori dabbed at her eyes again. “I know you do, sweetheart. And I’m so grateful for that.”

Then she got up and Elisa assumed their conversation was over, but Lori stood there fidgeting, glancing between the door and her, before with a loud sigh she reached under her shirt and yanked out a sheet of paper that looked as though it’d been crumpled at one point and tossed away.

She stared at the paper. “I wasn’t going to give this to you. I figured you wouldn’t want it anyway. But…” She glanced up and started to walk over to Elisa. “Julian is an amazing artist. One of the best I’ve ever seen, but this drawing…” She sighed and smoothed her fingers over the sheet lovingly. “It has his soul stamped on it. You can keep it or you can toss it, like he did, but…”

Then, with a twitch of her lips, she thrust the paper at Elisa. She took it without glancing down.

“Good luck in college, Elisa Jane. I’ll always be pulling for you.”

And without so much as a wave, she turned and walked away. Elisa waited for a good minute after Lori had left to finally glance down and when she did her vision began to shimmer.

Staring back at her was an image of her face. It was a charcoal sketch. Nothing but black and grays, and yet life had been breathed into the picture. Her eyes were wide and luminescent, her button nose tilted up just slightly at the tip. A smattering of freckles lined the bridge of it. Her lips were wide, but not too wide. Slightly thinner on the top than the bottom, and he’d even managed to capture the tiny dimple that sometimes dotted her left cheek when she smiled wide. Long strands of hair billowed off like wispy clouds in a strong breeze behind her.

And she knew there was no way she really looked like that—because the girl staring back at her was breathtakingly soft and lovely, a graceful picture of femininity. Elisa was none of those things. She was an athlete who almost always wore her hair in a sloppy bun, and acted stupid whenever a camera was placed in front of her.

Her fingers shook as she traced the line of her jaw. He’d drawn this, Julian had drawn this, and then he’d crumpled it up and tossed it away.

~*~

The next morning she was just getting into the car when the Wrights’ door opened and Julian came running out with an anguished look burning in his sea-green eyes. He’d not been careful with what he’d picked.

His shirt was red, his shorts a glaring shade of neon blue. She recognized the clothes as actually belonging to Roman.

Neither one of them said anything as he rushed up to her and dragged her into his arms, hugging her as though he meant never to let her go. He smelled like Julian, like clean soap and mint.

Elisa had clung to his back, wishing for just a moment that things had been different. That either she was only sixteen or he nineteen, that life hadn’t dealt them the cards it had.

The kiss he’d planted on her cheek had felt full of meaning. Pain. Misery. And love, all of it rolled up in that touch and it made her tremble. Made her want to say words she knew she could never say again.

His cheeks were wet when he pulled away.

And when she got into the back seat of her parents’ SUV, she realized hers were, too.

College was going smoother than she’d hoped and that summer spent with Julian and the boys was slowly becoming nothing more than a happy but weird memory.

It was hard sometimes to believe how much had changed in the few months she’d been away from home. She had a boyfriend who she was crazy about, she still hadn’t really decided on a major yet, but there was still time for that.

All her fears and worries now seemed so silly in retrospect. And her momentary strange attraction to Julian was absolutely gone. Distance had been the best thing for them.

She did as she’d promised Loribelle and wrote to Julian once a week, updating him on her life, sending him pictures of whatever stupid thing she sometimes did. And while it was hard to judge emotions from words on a screen, she was pretty sure Julian was also over whatever crush he’d had on her. His emails were friendly, and most of the time short. Just a sentence or two. He’d sometimes ask for more pictures, but that was it.

The day she realized he was over it, she finally told him about Thomas. And just as she’d suspected, he hadn’t seemed all that fazed by it. He’d simply written back a quick, “That’s good. Glad you’re happy,” email and that’d been that.

Shutting her economics book with a weary sigh, she glanced up at Tom. He still had his nose buried in his anatomy books. He was studying to become a nurse. Something his parents didn’t approve of. They still had the notion that if you were a boy and going into medicine, it was doctorate or nothing. But Thomas was adamantly sticking to his guns and Elisa admired him for it.

Thomas was a sophomore. They were actually teammates—it was how they’d met. Elisa’s heart had nearly flopped out of her chest the first time she’d seen him come out of the pool. With his shocking red hair and slickly muscled swimmer’s body, she’d almost drooled on herself the first time he’d smiled at her. That’d been almost five months ago now, and they’d been inseparable ever since.

His keen blue eyes looked up. “You ready to go home?” His deep voice always made her shiver.

They’d been dating for a while now, and Elisa was trying to decide if she was ready to go all the way. Some days she was sure she was ready, and other times, she wasn’t. She didn’t know why she kept holding back, he was hot, smart, and could swim his ass off.

They got along great.

She smiled.

Maybe tonight would be that night.

“Yes.” She grinned wider when his blue eyes twinkled.

“What are you thinking, little fish?”

His pet name for her was probably the most unattractive thing about him. She rolled her eyes. “Seriously, Tom, call me something else.”

He tapped his pencil on his books. “Like what?”

“I don’t know.” She kicked out her foot, tracing the length of his calf with her sneakered foot. Not nearly as sexy as it would have been had she been wearing sandals, but it was the second week of December and there was no way in hell she’d be walking around a snow-covered campus in sexy sandals just for her boyfriend. No matter how much she adored him. “Dolphin, or mermaid, or—”

“Barracuda!” He chuckled.

“Ssh.” The librarian glanced up at their loud laughs.

Giving him a long eye roll, she got up. “Let’s go before the ogre throws us out, and if you call me a barracuda, I’ll—”

Running around to her side of the table, he wrapped his arm around her waist and planted a kiss on her lips.

Thomas kissed like he swam. With passion and intensity.

Heart racing out of control, she broke off the kiss before she made a fool of herself, like going into full-on porn mode in the library. Not cool.

Tonight would be the night, she was decided.

She was nineteen, it was time to pop the cherry at some point, and preferably before she hit twenty. She hadn’t been hanging on to her virginity because she was scared, or because morally she felt it was wrong; mostly she’d hung on because she’d wanted to make sure that whomever she did it with for the first time would still respect her in the morning.

“Come home with me,” she whispered, tapping her finger on his chest.

Chastity was already home for Christmas break. Elisa would have joined her, too, if it wasn’t for the fact that her econ professor, Mr. Richards, had postponed the final for two days after Chas’s last class because of some sort of filing mix-up.