Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
As dawn burned red and orange in the sky, lighting both the forest and rock formations, Nina walked in the front door of the small but well-tended casa she shared with her father—just as he was leaving.
Tom scratched his head and studied his precious only daughter. “I got your text. What do you mean you want to go home with Lyndie? Lyndie is home.”
“No, this is just a stop for her.” They stood in the open tiled hallway her great, great uncle had laid himself.
The walls were stucco from two centuries back, lined with shelves that collected dust like a showcase.
She looked around her and made a sound of disgust. “There’s so much damn dust in these damn mountains that it’s permanently seeded in my pores. ”
“There’s dust in other cities, Nina. And even in the States.”
“Yes, well, it’s probably a cleaner dust. And this isn’t Lyndie’s home. She loves us, very much, but San Robledo isn’t her home.”
“She’s home here,” Tom insisted, because he wanted it to be so. He wanted everyone to be as happy here as he was. “She owns the place next door, now, doesn’t she?”
“Yes, because otherwise Rosa would have gone belly-up. But you and I both know Lyndie’s true home is the air. Her home is wherever the fancy strikes her.” She sighed. “Do you have any idea how the freedom of that draws me?”
Tom felt his stomach slide to his toes. “You don’t want to live like that.” Please, don’t let her want to live like that.
“Papa, I’ve told you before, I don’t want to live here. You don’t listen.”
God help him, he’d ignored it, thinking she’d outgrow the need to go. But she’d never sounded so determined before, never.
To the bones, she was her mother’s daughter, with pure willpower running through her forceful, proud veins.
Maria had been his heart, his soul, from the moment he’d set foot in these rugged, isolated hills.
Actually, at first it’d been delirium, as he’d come through on a fishing trip and had collapsed from a terrible flu.
Maria had taken care of him, babied him, spoiled him for days, and by the time he’d recovered, he’d fallen hard.
Thank God it’d been mutual. He’d gladly stayed, loving the wide, open spaces, the pace of life, the feel that time had stood still.
They’d married, spent a few blissful years so in love it almost hurt to look at each other.
Then in one tragic heartbeat, she’d given him his precious daughter and lost her own life.
Even now, the memory grabbed him by the throat and threatened to choke him. He’d stood in that hospital holding the newborn Nina, unable to accept what the doctor told him. He’d gained a baby, and lost his wife.
Over the years he’d come to terms with the loss, and even though he still missed Maria terribly, he had Nina.
And now she was going to leave him too.
“Don’t look at me like that,” she whispered. “You make my heart hurt. Papa, you are my family, you are my everything, but I…I need more.”
“What? What is it you need? Just tell me.”
“That’s just it! I don’t know, not until I get out there and do some living.” She cupped his face, kissed both his cheeks. “You came here on a whim when you were younger than I am right now. Your parents didn’t stop you. Your friends didn’t stop you. Now let me do the same.”
“My folks are gone now. There’s no one for you there.”
“I don’t care. There was no one for you here either.”
“Your mother.”
“But you didn’t know that when you first landed here.”
He stared at her for a long moment, wondering how to reach her, how to make her happy. “You don’t know what the States are like, querida,” he said desperately. “It’s too dangerous for a beautiful young woman alone on the streets—”
“I’m not going to be on the mean bad streets of Los Angeles or New York. I’m going to be in sunny, beach-town San Diego, at least at first.”
“Nina.” God, how to reach her? “I’m sorry you’re unhappy. I hate that you are, but this will pass. Your home is here, your job is here, and translating—”
“No. Papa, please, listen to me. I’m not trying to disconnect from you, or even forget my culture.
I’m still going to love you. This is just something I have to do.
Lyndie is going back to San Diego either tonight or tomorrow, you know she is.
I want to go too. I want to be more American than holding a piece of paper. I want to live it. Like you did.”
“Don’t be silly. I’m a Mexican now.”
She looked at his white skin, his pale, pale hair, his freckles, and laughed.
“In spirit,” he said. “I’m Mexican in spirit, which is all that matters. Your mother was Mexican. That makes you full-blooded.”
“No. I’m half American. I speak flawless English, you yourself saw to that. I want to go to college there.”
“You said you didn’t want to go to college. I tried to send you—”
“Mexico City doesn’t interest me. I’ve told you, you don’t want to listen.”
“Because I love it here, I feel close to your mother here. I can no more leave here than I can forget her, and it terrifies me that you can.”
“I just want to see the rest of the world.”
Tom sagged a little, stared at the tall, beautiful, headstrong daughter he loved with all his heart. “You look so much like her. I want you to be happy, like she was.”
“You want me to be happy here. But I can’t be.” She took his hands, kissed them. “I’m glad I look like her, Papa. She was beautiful.” She rubbed her cheek over his knuckles. “But I can’t be happy here, not like she was. Please understand.”
“No.”
She looked into his eyes. “Then I’m sorry for you.”
“You’re not going.”
“I love you, Papa.”
Tom watched her walk away from him, right out of the room, and wondered how much longer he could put her off before he had to let her go. Let his only baby go.
Griffin sat outside under a still dark, fire-ravaged sky after Lyndie’s shower, concentrating on breathing and breathing only.
If he didn’t, he might wonder at the way he’d reacted to a woman after all this time, a woman unlike any other he’d ever met.
What was it about her that made him want to feel again?
Maybe he was tired of feeling raw and wounded.
Maybe deep down he wanted more and was willing to fight for it.
Because that was a difficult thought, he switched gears, thinking about the day ahead, about having to be out there dealing with the fire.
His stomach dropped. His gear was at his feet, he was ready to go.
As ready as he got, anyway. He figured Lyndie wasn’t the type to linger over hair or makeup or whatever other mysteries women engaged themselves in every morning.
She’d be in a hurry to get back up the hill and see what was happening.
He should be in a hurry as well, but he couldn’t deny that he wished he was sitting on a beach in San Diego, with his biggest concern being the rising tide.
The porch of the inn was wide and cool, and he leaned back against a post. Once upon a time he’d loved this early hour.
Now he typically slept it away.
Tallulah wandered out of the woods toward him, her little legs slowly carrying her. She whined, and when she finally came close enough, he could see why. She was sporting a two-inch gash alongside her nose, just beneath her left eye.
“What did you put your nose into, dog?”
Looking pathetic, she sat at his feet and whined again.
With a sigh, he went into his pack for his first aid kit. “Come here, then.”
Trustingly, she moved closer and a drop of blood fell at his feet. “Poor baby,” he said, and scooped her into his lap to clean her up, which she let him do with only an occasional whimper.
He’d just set her back down again when his open backpack rang. Odd, as he didn’t have a cell phone. He went through the red bag he’d have sworn he’d searched thoroughly by now, and pulled a cell out of an inside pocket.
His brother’s. He lifted a shoulder at Tallulah, who looked as surprised as he, and punched the answer button. “Hello?”
“You okay?” Brody asked.
“This is a new low, even for you, planting your cell phone on me.”
His brother laughed softly. “I was wondering if you’d even know what a ringing phone sounded like, seeing as you’ve been avoiding one for a year now.”
“Don’t you have something more important to do? Say, take a nap? Or maybe find a lake to toss a line into?”
“Nah. I’ve got plenty of time for both later. So…” All humor disappeared from Brody’s voice. “How’s it going? I didn’t sleep last night worrying about you, wondering if I’d pushed you too far too fast.”
“Well, you did. I hope that keeps you up tonight too. Make that every night.”
“Damn, Grif… It’s that bad?”
“What do you think?”
“I’m sorry. God, I’m so sorry.”
“Yeah. That helps a lot.”
“I just thought if I tossed you in, you’d swim, you know? I didn’t know what else to do.”
Chest uncomfortably tight at the anguish in his brother’s voice, Griffin squeezed his eyes closed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Look, I was perfectly happy sitting on that beach—”
“Alone.”
“I didn’t need this—”
“Yes, you did. You needed that kick in the ass.”
“It feels like a kick in the heart.”
“Griff—”
“I’ve got to go.” He clicked off and resisted the urge to toss the thing into the bush. He purposely blanked his mind, petting Tallulah, listening to the birds…and he managed too, until unbidden came the lovely image of Lyndie and how she’d looked in the shower, all wet and shiny and alluring.
That worked too.
Hard to believe that in all this time, another woman hadn’t turned his head, not once. And yet Lyndie turned his head plenty. Hell, she turned him completely around. Almost as scary as what he had to do today.
Fight a fire.
He’d dreamed last night; long, haunting, terrifying dreams, reliving everything that had happened a year ago, and had woken breathless, with the names of the fallen on his lips and tears on his cheeks.
And he had to go back to that hell today. Now he had Brody’s words in his head as well.
Call Mom and Dad…