Fighting to Breathe Read online

  “It is, but I’m thinking about moving here and making this my home base. You know, the things we do for love,” she says, and my heart sinks a little at the thought of her and Austin in love, moving in together, and eventually starting a family. “Well, I better go. Austin’s waiting for me. See you around.”

  “Bye,” I murmur, watching her walk away.

  “God, I hate her,” Rhonda says, pulling my attention to her. “Just so you know, she and Austin are not as serious as she makes them out to be. They see each other when she’s in town, and from what Ben told me, Austin doesn’t even want to see her even then, half the time.” I have no response. I have no idea what to do with the feelings that are swirling around inside of me at the moment.

  “Let’s find your mom.”

  “Yeah,” I agree then follow her down one of the aisles, where my mom is standing, looking at stickers for scrapbooking. “Did you find anything you like?” I ask, coming to her side.

  “I’m not sure I have the patience to do a scrapbook, but they have so many cute things that it almost makes me want to.”

  “I’ll help you. We can make one together,” I suggest.

  “Maybe we can do one with all the pictures I have of you and your dad,” she says quietly, picking up a packet of stickers of boats and waves.

  “I would like that.” Although my dad has been gone for years, I feel like the wounds from his loss are still wide open. When he first passed away, we didn’t really talk about him much. I don’t think either of us really got any closure.

  “It would be good for us,” she says, pulling her eyes from the items in her hands to look at me. “I think it’s time we let him go. Maybe we can see if Ben will take us out on his boat, and we can go to the place he was lost, to say goodbye?”

  “I would like that,” I tell her watching as tears fill her eyes, she nods once whispering.

  “It’s long overdue,”

  Wrapping my arm around her shoulder and leaning my head against hers I nod. She was right; it was well past time we said our goodbyes to him. Over the next hour we picked out scrapbooking stickers. It felt good to laugh and talk about the good times we shared before he passed.

  “I’m starving,” Rhonda says as we put our bags into the back of my mom’s SUV.

  “How about we stop for tacos?” Mom suggests as I climb behind the wheel, and she and Rhonda buckle in.

  “Yes,” Rhonda groans, making me laugh. She wasn’t lying about eating for three. Since we left the house this morning, I have seen her eat three cereal bars that she had tucked away inside her bag.

  “Is that okay with you, honey?”

  “Sounds good.” I say putting the car in drive. Today’s been one of the best days I’ve had in a long time. Mom has always been like my best friend, so spending time with her is always nice, and Rhonda is funny and easy to be around. I’d forgotten what it was like to have girlfriends to talk to. My friends from back home had been Ken’s friends as well. After I found out about his affair, I found out most of them knew about his relationship with Courtney. No one wanted to be the one to tell me what was going on so I was left to find out on my own while my friends went on like they didn’t know my husband was a cheating asshole.

  “Baja Tacos is down near the pier,” Mom directs from the backseat as I pull out of the parking lot. When I reach the area near the pier, I comprehend how much the town I had grown up in has changed. Long gone are the small shops, and in their place are large buildings, most of them new.

  “Make the next left,” Rhonda says, and I do, turning onto a small dirt road that travels back behind a few of the larger buildings and ends in front of a red shack that sits on stilts, with a large front deck covered in a white roof.

  “How long has this place been here?” I ask, shutting off the engine.

  “The owners opened it a few years ago. They actually appeared on Food Network for the ‘Best of Alaska’ a while back,” Rhonda replies, getting out and slamming the door.

  “That’s so awesome.” I smile into the rearview mirror at my mom before hopping out.

  “Austin.” Rhonda yells as I shut the door.

  Turning my head, I see Rhonda walking toward the stairs of the restaurant, where Austin and Anna are stepping down into the dirt parking lot. The moment Rhonda stands in front of him, a smile comes over his face that takes my breath away. He leans forward, placing a kiss on her cheek, saying something to her. When she points her thumb over her shoulder, his body goes tight, his head lifts, and our gazes connect, causing a pain to slither through me.

  When Austin was mine, I knew every single expression that would cross his face. Most of the time, he would look at me with tenderness, but there were times I would see frustration. What I never saw was anger, and that was the look he was giving me now. That was the look that was slicing me open.

  “You ready to go inside?” Mom asks, and I pull my eyes from Austin’s as she takes my hand.

  “Yep.” I smile down at her, giving her hand a light squeeze, taking some strength from our connection, a reminder of why I’m really here. When I look toward the restaurant, Austin and Anna are walking off in the opposite direction and Rhonda is waiting for us. My excitement about sitting down to a nice meal is gone, replaced with unease. I don’t even know if I taste the salmon tacos I ordered, and I try to smile when appropriate, but for the most part, I sit with a weight in my stomach while looking out at the beautiful view of the harbor, watching as boats come and go.

  “I’ll get it,” I say, getting up off the couch when there’s a knock at the door.

  “Will you bring me some of those cookies you baked when you come back?” my mom asks from her recliner, where she sat so we could watch a movie.

  “Sure.” I smile, running my hand over her hair.

  “Hey,” the deep timber of Austin’s voice greets me as I pull the door open to see him standing on the front porch. My heart starts to beat at a faster tempo as I realize he’s in front of me, so close I can smell his warm, masculine sent mixed with the smell of the ocean…so close I could reach out and touch him, if I was brave enough to do so. “Can I talk to you for a minute?” He shoves his hands into his pockets and takes a step back.

  Swallowing hard, my eyes scan over him. “Um.” I look over my shoulder, seeing that my mom is still sitting in her chair. “Sure.” I pull my sweater tighter around me as I step out onto the front porch, letting the screen door close behind me. The moment I’m in front of him, I tilt my head back to catch his eyes. He was always much bigger than me, but now his presence seems to tower over me, making me feel small and insignificant. “What’s going on?” I ask, going for casual hoping that he doesn’t notice the way my voice shakes.

  “I wanted to come clear the air.”

  “Okay,” I reply, wrapping my arms tighter around myself, when all I want to do is touch him in some way to see if he’s real.

  “This is a small town, and there is no way we’re not going to end up running into each other from time to time.”

  “I know.”

  “I know why you’re here, and I know your mom needs you right now, so I don’t want you to feel awkward when we do see each other.”

  “Thank you.” I breathe in relief and his eyes drop from mine to my mouth and annoyance fills his features.

  “I hate you, Lea,” he says, causing that small glimmer of hope I was feeling to fizzle out and turn my insides dark.

  “I’m sorry,” I choke out.

  “You fucking killed me when you left, and I will never forgive you for the things you told your mother to tell me after you were gone.” His words barely register over the anguish twisting my gut and the loud slosh of blood pumping through my veins. “Stay out of my way and I’ll stay out of yours.” I nod, because my lungs have closed up on me. “Later,” he says, then disappears into the darkness, leaving me alone as my lungs collapse.

  “Who was at the door?” Mom asks as I hand her the plate of cookies she asked for.

>   “No one important,” I tell her, taking my seat on the couch, pulling my knees up against my chest, and wrapping my arms around them while I stare at the television, not really seeing it wishing I could just disappear.

  Chapter 3

  Austin

  “Josie,” I greet Lea’s mom as she steps from the dock onto my boat. I can’t say that we’ve ever been close; I sure as hell can’t say she’s ever come to see me. Hell, when I was searching for her daughter, I thought at one point she was going to place a restraining order against me.

  “Austin,” she says then walks to the wheelhouse, opens the door, and gestures toward it.

  Growling, “Fuck,” I follow her inside, letting the door slam behind me. This is not what I fucking wanted to deal with today, not after tossing and turning all night, haunted by the look in Lea’s eyes after I told her I hate her.

  “We need to talk,” she states as I cross my arms over my chest and lean back against the control panel.

  “Gathered that much, Josie,” I tell her, trying to keep the bite out of my tone, but failing. I thought I was over this shit, but now, after seeing Lea, I realize I’m far from over it; I just tucked it away, and now it’s all bubbling to the surface. Lea is even more beautiful now than she was when we were teens. Her face was still soft and round, her skin still creamy in complexion but her lips seemed fuller. Her body filled out giving her curves in all the right places, curves that any man would beg to study with his hands and mouth. Her brown hair was the kind that you could picture spread out on your pillow or wrapped around your fist., and her eyes, though sad, still held that sparkle of wisdom that called to me. Everything about her spoke to me, but there was no fucking way I would ever go there again no matter how badly my dick disagreed.

  “Are you even going to ask what we need to talk about?” Josie asks.

  “No, I know what you want to talk to me about, and like I told Lea last night, I know why she’s here, and I’ll stay out of her way, but she needs to stay out of mine.” I feel like an asshole, but this is how it has to be. There’s no other choice.

  “That’s very diplomatic of you,” she says sarcastically, making me grit my teeth.

  “The floor is yours Josie.” I sweep my hand out.

  “You’re so damn stubborn. You know, you remind me a lot of my Jacob—so ornery, always thinking you know everything,” she says, referring to her late husband, a man I respected and cared deeply for. “I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life, some worse than others, but seeing how God is giving me time to right my wrongs, I’m planning on taking advantage of it and doing just that,” she says, taking a seat in my captain’s chair then looking out the window, into the harbor.

  “When I lost Jacob, I may as well have been buried at sea with him. I was drowning in grief and couldn’t find my way to the surface. I have a lot of regrets from that time.” She shakes her head then lowers her voice to almost a whisper, but still doesn’t look at me. “When Lea told me she was thinking of leaving home, I knew it was the right decision for her. I knew I didn’t want her to stay here in this town with you, and risk her suffering the same fate I did. I wouldn’t wish the pain I suffered on my worst enemy, and I definitely wouldn’t wish it on my daughter.”

  She sighs, returning her gaze to me. “I knew you loved each other, but I thought your lives would move forward with time and that each of you would move on, but you didn’t. Neither of you were able to settle, and my sweet, beautiful girl married a man who didn’t really love her, because she was searching for something to fill the void of leaving you,” she says, causing a sinking feeling to fill my chest.

  “I lied to you both, told each of you the other had moved on. I believed at the time I was doing the right thing—”

  “Get out,” I cut her off before she can say anything else.

  “Austin.” She says softly as tears fill her eyes.

  “No.” I lean forward.

  “Get.

  Out.

  Now.”

  I open the door and step out onto the deck, pulling in a lungful of air as rage burns through me.

  “I’m not telling you this so you guys get back together,” Josie says, coming to stand in front of me. “I’m telling you this, because my baby doesn’t have many people to lean on, and when I’m gone, she’s going to need good people around who truly care about her, and as much as you may not want to admit it, you still do.” With that parting blow she turns away, and I watch her step off the boat onto the dock then disappear.

  “Are you okay, baby?” Anna asks, walking upstairs from the lower deck, where she had been taking a nap. When she told me she was coming into town for the weekend, I figured this visit would be like all the others, but then she started talking about moving here after the summer, and I knew then that along the way, I somehow fucked up, making her believe this is more than it is. I haven’t even touched her since I laid eyes on Lea again.

  “I gotta head out.” I move to the wheelhouse, grabbing my keys, slipping them in my front pocket before pulling my hoodie on over my head.

  “I’m leaving in an hour,” she reminds me while her eyes track my movements.

  “Text me when you get home.” I move past her and stop when her fingers dig into my arm.

  “I heard what her mom said, and I’ve heard people in town talking since she came back. She left you, and you’re going after her?”

  I watch as she attempts to force tears to come to the surface, but none fill her eyes. Anna doesn’t care about me any more than I care about her, and this moment proves just that. “Anna—”

  “No, don’t Anna me. I thought that we had something, that we were building something.”

  I don’t want to do this, but I can’t lie, either. I have loved really loved three women in my life: my sister, my mom, and Lea. Since the moment Lea left me, I have been forcing myself to move forward, never really gathering the momentum to do so. How Lea got married to someone else, I don’t fucking know. No one could replace her for me, even if all I was holding onto was a memory.

  “You knew what this was Anna,” I sigh, pulling from her grasp.

  “You’re such an asshole, Austin!” she screams.

  “I know,” I agree, walking to the edge of the boat and stepping onto the dock. I wasn’t going after Lea, not the way Anna believed. I would do as her mom asked. I would try to be her friend, and when the time came for her to leave, I would let her go this time, and get the closure I need to move on with my life.

  “What’s up, Wolf?” Ben answers on the second ring.

  “Meet me at the bar.”

  “Is everything okay?” He asks and I hear shuffling coming from his end.

  No…fuck, no. “I need a beer.”

  “On my way.”

  The line goes dead and I tuck my phone into the back pocket of my jeans then walk the three blocks to the bar, trying to get my head straight on the way.

  As soon as I enter, I scan the bar and see Ben sitting alone at one of the high-top tables.

  “You want the usual?” Maggie asks from behind the bar as I pass her.

  “Yeah.” I pull out a five and slide it to her as she passes me a bottle of Alaskan Amber. As soon as I take a seat across from Ben, I put the bottle to my mouth and tip it back.

  “What’s going on?” He questions wearily.

  “Josie just came to visit me.”

  “Who’s Josie?” he asks, then his eyes close in realization. “Shit, what the fuck did she want?”

  “She came to tell me that she lied to me and Lea.”

  “What do you mean, ‘lied to you and Lea’?” His voice has an angry tinge to it.

  “She kept us separated, because she didn’t want Lea to suffer the same fate as her. She didn’t want Lea to loose me the way she lost Jacob.”

  “Are you shitting me?” He slams down his beer bottle, making the table shake.

  “You know I searched for Lea. I begged her mom to tell me where she was, and she always had the
same story Lea had moved on, and I needed to do the same. Only, Lea didn’t move on; she was hurt and alone, thinking I was living my days happy without her.”

  “Christ.”

  “Yesterday, I told Lea I hated her.”

  “You did what?” His eyes get big and I rub my forehead once again, bombarded by the memory of the way she looked when I told her.

  “I was pissed! Seeing her brought everything to the surface.” I scrub my hands down my face.

  “Rhonda hung out with Lea and Josie yesterday.”

  “I know. I saw them together while I was with Anna.”

  He nods, tips back his beer, and then puts his elbows on the table, taking a deep breath.

  “She told me Lea seems depressed, that even though she smiled, she could tell it was forced.”

  “She just found out her mom only has months to live,” I remind him.

  “Yeah, she also has no one here besides her mom.”

  “Jesus.” I know he’s right, but there is still so much pent-up anger inside me when it comes to her.

  “Ro told me to tell you to be nice to her.”

  “She did, huh?” I laugh. Rhonda has Ben wrapped around her finger and is the one person my best friend is afraid of.

  “She also invited her to the baby shower.”

  “Good.”

  “Wait…what?” he asks.

  “Lea’s a good person. She was always sweet, and she needs a friend right now. Rhonda’s a good one for her to have.”

  “What about you?”

  “What about me?” I ask, confused.

  “Are you going to be her friend?”

  “I need to let the past go. I need to let Lea go and finally move on with my life.”

  “That didn’t answer my question.”

  “I’m going to try to be her friend, and hopefully, when she leaves town, I can finally get the fuck on with my life,” I say, while deep down I know it’s not going to be that easy. Nothing ever is.

  “What about you and Anna?”