Without You Here (18 page)

She glanced back. And then into her jar again. "Okay. Here goes." She held her breath and took a good swallow. Blake slid his arm around her waist when she stumbled back and fell into a coughing fit. Wyatt would have been amused except he couldn't stand seeing Blake touching her like that. "Good shit," she squeaked.

Cal laughed and took her jar. He turned and picked up a cider jug, pouring some amber liquid into the jar. "Try this," he said. "My homemade apple pie. Goes down much smoother."

She took a sip, tensed for impact, and then relaxed when she realized it wasn't going to knock her off her feet like the pure stuff had. She took another drink and grinned. "That's awesome."

"You reckon you're sturdy enough to stand on your own, now?" Wyatt asked. He was disgusted with himself, but he couldn't stand seeing her leaning back against Blake.

Her smile waned when she looked at him. "Yeah, I guess. Why?"

Wyatt nodded at Blake's hand on her waist. His fingers brushed the bare skin where her tank top had ridden up. "Cause he's still holding you up."

"What's the deal, Dad?" Blake asked, looking confused and irritated.

Wyatt took another drink. It didn't even burn anymore. "I just thought you two weren't dating anymore. But looks like maybe she's changed her mind."

Ettie stepped out of Blake's embrace. "What's your problem?" she asked.

He laughed bitterly. "You really wanna know, sweetheart?"

Cal grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him back toward the house. Which was when Wyatt realized he'd gone and gotten a little too drunk.

Ettie gaped at him.

"Dad, don't talk to my girlfriend like that," Blake said.

"I'm not your girlfriend," Ettie snapped.

"Ettie, just...drop it, okay? Dad, if you've got a problem with me, then we should talk."

"I don't have a problem with you. Just you shouldn't touch her if she's not yours."

"Coffee it is!" Cal said, laughing nervously. "Come on, Wyatt." Cal turned him around and gave him a shove into the house. They left behind a devastated Ettie and a confused Blake. Cal went into the kitchen, poured a mug of coffee, and slid it across the counter to Wyatt. "Get your shit together, Wyatt. Or go home."

"Home," he muttered. His home was a purgatory. Life was where Ettie was. He didn't want to go home. He wanted to pack up that girl and run away somewhere where there wasn't any guilt and misery. But how would that be fair to Amberlee? And what right did he have to enjoy life when she couldn't?

He sipped his coffee in silence, while Cal went back out to entertain his guests. It was getting dark out and there were no lights on in the house. He could hear the bluegrass music dimly through the walls. The door opened and he felt her. Smelled her. Ettie smelled like wildflowers. Just her natural scent drove him wild. The door closed behind her and her hands rested on his shoulders.

She rested her forehead on the back of his neck. "Take me somewhere, Wyatt," she whispered.

He sat his coffee mug down. Stood. Took her by the hand and led her out the front door. They got in his truck and drove. He drove down back road after back road. He wouldn't care if he got lost. But he wouldn't get lost. He'd grown up here. Knew the area inside out. He drove her down into a valley with an open field. The sky was dark blue, now and there were stars peeking out.

She helped him lay out sleeping bags in the back of his truck, just like last weekend. He was disappointed when she didn't just take her clothes off. She climbed in the back, fully clothed, and laid down. He laid down next to her and put his hand over hers.

"Blake will worry," she said, her voice barely a whisper.

Wyatt didn't say anything. He was all but dead inside. And the only thing holding him to this moment was her hand.

"Stars are pretty," she said.

"Mmm."

"I want to tell Blake. I want to work this out so you and I can be together."

He didn't have anything to say. There would be no working this out. No together. Certainly no telling Blake. It just wasn't an option.

She sat up and looked down at him. "I mean it, Wyatt. I'll wait for you. I'm very patient. You can maybe get some therapy."

He snorted at this. Therapy. What was everyone's deal with therapy? Why should a man get therapy just because he missed his wife? Wasn't he supposed to miss his wife?

"It's not bad, Wyatt. I have this great therapist who's helped me so much."

He touched her cheek with his finger. "Why does my sweet Ettie need therapy?"

She smiled sadly. "My mom was kind of crazy paranoid. Dad left when I was eight and she pulled me out of school and kept me at home. She was afraid he'd show back up and take me away. So she kind of locked us both in that house, but she didn't really homeschool me. So when I got old enough to rebel and get myself back in public school, I had some problems."

"What kind of problems?"

"Well, first of all, I was grades behind. So they held me back as a sophomore when I should have been a junior. I was really angry about that. Then they diagnosed me ADHD, which I thought was bogus, at first. They put me on medication, but I hated the side effects. So I switched to behavioral therapy to work on my sitting-still skills."

He smiled because even now she was bouncing on her knees as she spoke.

"And then I couldn't read right and it turned out I had some kind of dyslexia, so I had to have special tutoring. I still feel like it takes me so much longer than everyone else just to write a simple essay."

"How are you doing in school, now?"

"Oh, excellent. 4.0, thank you very much. Of course, I work my ass off. But I figured out in high school how much better I like numbers than anything else. So I'm getting an accounting degree. I figure I'll get a boring job as a bean counter somewhere and save up for vacations. A stable, practical career to fund my little adventures in the downtime."

"Four-point-oh," he murmured. "That's pretty amazing."

"What about you? Did you go to college?"

"No, I never did. I sent Stan off to get an agriculture degree."

"You mean you paid for it?"

"The farm paid for it. We figured it would be a good investment. And it has been. A lot of the business decisions we've made were because of Stan. I always figured you need brains and muscle to run a good farm. And Stan's got the brains."

"I guess that makes you the muscle," she said with a grin. She ran her hands over his chest and shoulders.

He closed his eyes while she touched him. Her hands were so small. But not timid. Not timid at all. He opened his eyes to find her staring down at him, her brow furrowed in concern. "What is it?" he asked.

"Do you care for me? Or...am I just a distraction?"

He wasn't sure of the answer to this. All he knew was he needed her. He wasn't sure, once she left, that he'd even have the energy to draw breath. He cupped her jaw and pulled her toward him, drinking in her kiss. She swung a leg over and straddled his hips. She stood up on her knees and he watched as she peeled off her shirt, then her bra. He sat up on his elbows, then, and studied her.

She sat and waited, letting him look at her. Her breasts were as familiar to him as if he'd known them a lifetime. That little mole on her ribs just beneath the curve of her left breast. The smattering of freckles atop her shoulders. The soft, subtle curve of her waist. All of it, familiar. Her wide, uncertain eyes; the gentle parting of her lips, the fragrance of her skin--all of it was his, as though it always had been. He lifted his eyes to hers.

She gave him a hesitant smile. "Aren't you going to touch me, Wyatt?" she asked.

He sat up and adjusted her on his lap, so that her legs were wrapped around him. He peeled out of his shirt and then hugged her against him. She laid her head on his shoulder. Her breasts molded against his chest. "Did your dad ever come back?" he asked.

"Huh? No. He never did. We don't know where he was."

"Was he dangerous?"

She hesitated. "Not physically. He was really strange. Kind of like...I don't know...like if he showed up on the news as a serial killer, I wouldn't be at all surprised."

Wyatt squeezed her more tightly. He held her in silence for such a long time. Just the chirping of the crickets and the occasional breeze rustling through the trees. "I wish I could keep you," he said softly.

"You can."

He couldn't. But he could have her for this moment. He was hard between her legs. She pressed her hips against him and he felt a light tremble in her body. He'd made her wait too long and she was ready to go. Gently he turned her onto her back and pulled off her pants and panties. He knelt between her legs, pushed her knees up to her sides, and took her with his mouth. She bucked and cried, within seconds of his tongue touching her. He savored the taste of her.

Then he shoved his jeans down and plunged into her, basking in the loss of time and space; the feeling that nothing in the world could possibly matter after this. He moaned her name and sweated with the effort of bringing her back to orgasm. When she broke again, he went with her, stifling his cry of pleasure in her hair.

She was holding him so tightly. With her arms and with her legs. "Wyatt, I'm in love with you," she gasped. "Oh, God, I love you so much."

She trembled beneath him. He pushed up onto his elbows and looked down at her. She pleaded with her eyes. "I love you," she whispered. But it wasn't a confession like before. It was a question. A plea.

"I love you, too," he said. And then he froze, because he hadn't meant to say it. He sat back and fastened up his jeans. Then he hopped out of the truck and paced back and forth. It wasn't true. He didn't love her. He loved his wife. His beautiful wife. He stopped and fisted his hands in his hair.

"Wyatt—“

"Get dressed. I'll take you back to Mom's."

She hugged her knees to her chest. "Wyatt, it's okay—“

"No. No it's not okay."

"I know it's hard, but it's okay to love again."

"Oh, it is? It is? Thank you, Ettie. I guess with all your life experience, you would know, huh?" He dropped his hands and turned to face her.

"Don't talk to me like that," she said softly.

"Tell me more about how it's okay to love again. Tell me how I deserve to be happy. After my poor Amberlee spent a lifetime in pain and misery because of me..."

"It wasn't because of you."

"...And then I just turn my back on her and screw around with you like a fucking animal. No wonder she hated me. Look what I am. A disloyal husband. An incompetent husband."

"You're none of those things, Wyatt!" she cried.

"Did you know by your age she'd had a complete hysterectomy?"

Ettie's expression turned pained.

"Do you even know what that means? What that meant to her? No more babies. But that wasn't all. A hysterectomy, they called it, but the word isn't enough. They cut out the part of her that made her a woman...that's what she said. She said she wasn't a real woman anymore. And I begged her to see that it wasn't true. I worshiped her. I gave her all the pleasure she'd let me and I could have given more. Then she had a double mastectomy. Another word. You don't know what it means, Ettie. You don't know until it happens to someone you love! A man with a white coat and a sharp knife cut off my wife's breasts."

Tears streamed down Ettie’s cheeks, but her eyes stayed locked to his as she bravely listened.

"Her beautiful breasts. And you know what? It didn't change the way I felt about her. Not one bit. I still loved her and thought she was the most beautiful woman in the world. More beautiful than you, Ettie, with your body completely in tact and your whole life ahead of you."

He went to her, caged her with his arms on either side of her as she sat on the tailgate, calm and strong. "Did you know I'd trade you in a heartbeat for five more minutes with her?" Even as he said it, he doubted its truth. "Just five minutes to prove to her how much I love her. How I'd give anything to be with her. I'd even give up you and you've given me more moments of happiness than I've had in my whole life put together."

"Oh, Wyatt," she murmured, her eyes begging him to stop.

"This isn't fair, Ettie. I'm no good. I'm no good, Ettie." He couldn't control the words as they were spilling out of him. He'd never in his life said so much, confessed to so much weakness. This girl was a fool to love him. He buried his face in her neck and kept saying how he was no good and she stroked his neck and shoulders and kept telling him he was wrong. He didn't cry. But he came close. It hurt like crying. But he managed to keep the tears at bay.

After a while he stopped and just held her. Her words dwindled. She was still naked, her skin warm against his bare chest. He wondered what would happen when he took her home. He wondered how Blake would react when he told him.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

He took me straight to Liza's. Despite his cruel words, I clung to his hand the entire ride. I wasn't sure what we'd find once we got there. Maybe Blake would be pacing the floors, worried about me. Maybe he'd be out searching.

But when we walked in the door, Liza greeted Wyatt with a slap in the face. I reached for him, taking his arm, protectively.

"I lied for you," Liza said.

Wyatt stared at her, his brows furrowed. Like he was confused. But also like he didn't really care.

"You made a liar out of me, Wyatt. I lied to my grandson." Her eyes were filled with unshed tears.

"Call him and tell him the truth," I said. "If it makes you feel better. I want to tell him. Let's tell him, Wyatt. Let's be done with this."

I could feel him pulling away, though his body remained near mine. His eyes were glazing over. "You're going home," he said coldly. "So it doesn't matter."

"If it doesn't matter, then let's tell him."

He met my eyes, then. "No." He stroked my cheek with the backs of his knuckles and then turned to leave. I grabbed his arm, suddenly terrified to let him out of my sight.

"Stay. Stay here, Wyatt. Don't go, just spend the night here."

"Absolutely not," Liza said. "I've done enough, I don't need that on my conscience."