Chapter 27 The Woman from Nowhere
TWENTY-SEVEN
The Woman from Nowhere
Mabel
“God, it was epic,” Kacey said in my ear the next Saturday evening. “I wish you were there. I wanted to film it all, but I was laughing so hard, most of the video is of the grass or my boobs.”
That made me laugh.
When I quit, I noted, “I think it says good things that Tara asked you and Mona to her engagement party. She was so busted up by what Bryce had done, I didn’t think she’d bounce back so fast.”
“Stronger, smarter, faster,” Kacey said. “It’s so totally weird we all bonded through that. But we did.”
It was so totally weird.
But we did.
“How did Bryce find out about the engagement party so he could crash it?” I asked.
“Who knows? When Bryce wants to act like more of a dick than his resting dick, he finds his ways. I’m just glad it was an evening thing, and his kids weren’t there to see their soon-to-be new stepdad flatten Bryce with one punch.”
I did not condone violence.
But I wished she hadn’t videoed her boobs.
“When he was down, did Mona really bend over him and say, ‘You think to switch back to Callie, her man is a former SEAL, so get used to being flat on your back with a bloody nose…or worse.’?”
“She so said that,” Kacey confirmed.
Since Mona didn’t even know Hutch, but she told no lies, I said, “God, I hope it got through to him.”
“Babe, he knows where you live, but he doesn’t know who you are.
Before he ponged back to Tara after pinging to you, Olivia told me that Alan told her that Dirk told him he was bitching about how he couldn’t find out where you lived up there ‘in the middle of nowhere.’ Olivia said she kinda wanted him just to fly up there and wander around, asking for Callie Maine, and everyone being baffled as to who Callie Maine was. ”
I chuckled where I sat in front of my fire, sipping tea, gabbing with one of my besties.
“It really doesn’t matter anyway,” Kacey said in her fishing-for-info voice. “You have your SEAL.”
I did.
And I didn’t.
I said nothing.
“I know. FWB. He’s still yours, in a way,” she said.
At least I could agree to that.
“He is totally that.”
Totally.
Lord.
“I’m groovin’ that you’ve got it going on up there,” she said.
“All the pix you send. It looks like a beautiful place. I told Mona it was so you. You never really jived with Orlando. That’s more your style.
Of course, Mona just moans about that meaning you’ll never come home.
But I told her I thought you were home. And anyway, she just needs to take a good dive into the Misted Pines TikTok.
We can go up there and see all the scenery. ”
That made me laugh again too, and it was better this time, because I had a happy, warm sensation in my chest that she got it.
And that I did, finally, finally feel I was home.
“Anyway, I gotta hit it,” she said. “It’s late here and I have a brunch date with some idiot I’m probably going to hate five minutes in. But even a hater has to have good hair.”
And more laughter.
God, I missed Kacey. And Mona.
“I hope you guys think of coming up for a visit,” I replied.
“We are. Just not when it’s cold as hell. Maybe next May or June. Though, Mona says there’s some wildflower gig that happens, so we might time it so she can pretend she gives a shit about wildflowers.”
Annnnnnnd.
More laughter.
“Well, I can’t wait for you to meet Tonks, and Moxie, and Abigail and her family—”
“And Hutch.”
“And Hutch,” I said, the warmth fading because…
Would he still be in my life next spring?
He would.
But how would he be?
“I’ll get with Mona, and we’ll start seriously planning. Now, bedtime for bad girls. Love you to my bones and ciao for now.”
“Ciao, sister.”
We hung up, and I threw my phone on the coffee table as I stared at my merrily dancing fire.
I had Moxie in my lap, Tonks on the floor beside me, and a rare night after a day I had all to myself because Hutch was having a bro day with his buds Jaeger and Stormy (neither of them I’d met, both of them Hutch said he’d invite up to The Link so we could chat over a drink before he played).
They’d started the day with a trail run, then were off to go fishing in Misted Pines big misty lake, then they were going to Jaeger’s to eat their catch, and Hutch said he expected to be back in the evening but, “Wiped, babe. I’ll probably fall asleep in the boat.
That trail run will shatter me.” He’d then patted his perfectly flat belly. “I’m getting out of shape.”
As if.
For my part, I’d scored a box of used and abused designer bags in an online auction (Louis Vuitton, Prada, Gucci and Chanel) that I was determined to breathe new life into, so Tonks and I’d spent the day in the workshop (PS: I had chops, only one Gucci evaded my talents).
I was going to Hutch’s mid-morning the next day to help him do some puppy training, then to hang, and finally, to spend the night.
We still had our Tuesdays and Thursdays off.
And I had my life, my work. Abigail and I had started the yoga class at the Art Center Tuesday evenings, and we were thinking about trying meditation too. So I had my girl times as well.
But as much as I didn’t want to think about it, or, if I was honest, wouldn’t allow myself to go there, we needed this break. Because I needed some time to think.
And I wondered if Hutch organized his bro day to give it to us.
I also feared what he might be thinking, even if he gave no indication he was thinking anything but that he enjoyed being with me.
Gah!
I was seeing what Abigail was saying, tardily.
We were boyfriend/girlfriend.
Bottom line.
That was what we were.
I could try to convince myself that it was something else, but it just wasn’t.
I could pick his soft snore out of a hundred of them.
I knew what he ate for breakfast. How he took his coffee.
That his favorite color was green and he didn’t enjoy bell peppers in anything.
I didn’t hesitate to call him to do me favors.
We connected regularly when we were apart.
We checked in, so pretty much at all times, one knew where the other was, and vice versa.
Abigail was a friend. We talked a lot. We were getting really close.
But I didn’t know where she was at all times.
So now I was in that terrifying place where I had two choices.
The first, tell him I cared for him a lot more than just a friend, so we needed to take a step back so I could recalibrate, and then return to each other without us having the stuff that would mess with my head…or our relationship.
Or second, tell him I cared for him a lot more than just a friend, in fact, I was falling in love with him (oh yeah, I was there, burying your head in the sand only lasts for so long before you realize you can’t breathe), and I wanted to know if he was willing to explore that with me.
I didn’t want the first.
I was desperate for the other.
I knew he’d give me the first.
I didn’t know about the other.
And that was what was what I knew could turn out to be the slow death of me.
I could survive anything.
Except losing Hutch.
One could say, the man had been burned. It wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest that he didn’t want to go there.
I knew he cared about me too.
A lot.
But he’d fallen in love with two women, only to give his heart, and have them shit all over it. Eventually finding a fuck buddy for sex and company, only for her to shit all over him in totality.
Why would he assume I’d be different?
I just got burned by Bryce and decided to give up on the whole romance thing.
Sure, that was intense.
But luckily, I hadn’t gone wedding dress shopping or put any deposits down anywhere.
And although Bryce and I had mutual friends now, they were people I introduced to him. And I sensed they put up with him so they could keep an eye on him and make sure he didn’t screw with me (or, Olivia did that, but she also did it because she was nosy).
Or they put up with him because he was messy, and messy was always amusing if that mess wasn’t yours or you weren’t in it.
I didn’t lose friends or people I thought would be my family for the rest of their lives.
Hutch’s songs now made complete sense.
Sometimes, it was best just to give up hope and get on with it.
How was I going to convince him to hope again and try to get on with it with me?
And if he didn’t, how was I going to live without having all of Hutch?
On this thought, I nearly spilled my tea down myself because Tonks jumped up and started viciously barking.
Moxie went flying.
Tonks raced to the window by the fireplace.
It was the one that faced the south of the property.
The one beyond which was The Lion and The Lamb.
I locked my doors as a matter of course, as everyone should, city or not, but my mind flew to them as I started to reach toward my phone.
And that was when I heard it over Tonks’s barking.
“Help!”
The woman’s scream was filled with such terror, such desperation, it caused pain to the point I couldn’t move.
“Help! Help! Help me!”
My mind disconnecting, I tossed my tea mug aside and raced to the window.
And froze.
A woman was coming out of nowhere.
She was wearing a stark-white old-fashioned, billowy nightgown. Her blonde hair was down. And she was racing through the wood toward the cabin like the devil was at her heels.
She saw me in the window, reached an arm to me, and I jumped as she was abruptly tackled from behind by a figure that came out of the darkness.
Tonks went berserk.
I hated myself for it, but the tableau before me was so petrifying, I couldn’t move, even as she kept screaming and fighting while she was thrown over a man’s shoulder.
She reached to me again, “Please help me!”
And then another man came out of the darkness, long beard, long hair, dark button up, dark pants, and my blood stilled in my veins as he looked right at me, lifted his finger to his lips, stood there for what felt like an eternity (but was likely only a second), then he turned and loped into the woods.
I turned and dashed to the phone.