RECKLESS - Part 4 (The RECKLESS Series)
Read RECKLESS - Part 4 (The RECKLESS Series) Online
Authors: Alice Ward
RECKLESS
PART 4
By Alice Ward
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2014
Alice Ward
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Part 5: December 5
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This is the fourth part of RECKLESS - a
five part steamy new adult series by Alice Ward.
You should start with part 1.
Some mistakes bring you to a path that you never planned to go down, a path you never saw coming.
Broken hearted and left all alone on a plane, heading home to see her family after a tragic accident, Andrea is left re-evaluating every choice she’s made over the last few weeks, especially the decision to accept Jace’s proposal. She’d given everything up—including the life she’d built with the man she once thought she would marry—when she decided to listen to her heart instead of her head.
But don’t our hearts sometimes deceive us?
Will Andrea find that she made the wrong choice? Or will Jace Richardson find a way to unlock a part of Andrea that she never even knew existed? Will their love stand the test of time, or was it ever even love to begin with?
Find out in the next installment of Reckless!
The RECKLESS Series is intended for a mature audience, 18+ only.
Sitting on the plane, earbuds crammed into my ears, listening to Evanescence, it felt like the weight of the world was on my shoulders. In just a matter of days, every part of my life had gone to shit—my career, my schooling, my family life, of course, my love life.
I’d thrown it all away, my perfect plan... and for what?
A man that couldn’t stand by me in one of the worst moments of my life?
A man who bailed at the first sign of trouble?
But what had I really expected from Jace? Did I expect him to profess his undying love? Go against what I’d said and follow me to the airport anyway in some crazy, romantic gesture? After everything I’d done—basically calling him a man whore, doubting him and his intentions at every turn, pushing him away, telling him I didn’t need his help when what I’d really wanted was for him to do anything but buckle against my stubborn attitude...
Get real, Andy. Shit like that only happens in books and movies.
The honest truth was, I knew there wasn’t anyone to blame for my life falling apart but me. I might not have caused my brother’s accident, and there might not have been a way for me to have prevented it, but I had pushed Sean away, and then Jace. I was the reason I was sitting all alone on that fucking plane, bawling my eyes out, so damned delusional that I could actually smell Jace’s citrusy scent, could feel the weight of his stare, the heat of his body next to mine.
Just watch, I’d open my eyes and probably have a pregnant woman next to me, or an old man going home to see his grandkids. Only...
I saw his mouth moving—that beautiful, perfect mouth—but I could only hear Amy Lee’s haunting voice in my ears. As those warm brown eyes held mine, I squinted and tried to figure out why I couldn’t hear him, but I was in too much shock to register that I needed to remove my earbuds... so he did it for me.
“Hey,” he said, still holding the earbuds in his hands.
I just kept staring, tears still trickling down my cheeks, because my brain still hadn’t remembered how to execute primary functions, like speaking.
“I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you, but I can’t let you do this alone,” he continued, setting the earbuds in my lap. “Actually, no.” He shook his head. “I’m not sorry for going behind your back to be here. I just hope you’re not so pissed at me that you don’t want me sitting in this seat next to you.”
“I—I—“ My tears of sadness morphed into hysterics. I didn’t know what I felt, other than relief, relief at not having to face Sean and my parents and my brother lying in a hospital bed alone. Relief that he hadn’t given up on me. Relief that he was sitting there, waiting for some kind of coherent response from me. “I am—I mean, I’m not.” I bit at the inside of my cheek. “Thank you,” I finally said.
Relief swept over his features as the smile pulled at his lips. “Good, because they’re about to take off and I don’t think there are any seats left on the plane.”
Just about the time that smile started reaching sexy smirk status, it all started to hit me—him leaving me in the terminal, thinking that he wouldn’t show up, wouldn’t say goodbye, that he’d decided I was too much to handle—and that’s when I got mad.
“Hey!” he shouted when I punched him in the arm instead of taking his hand. “What was that for?”
“For making me think you’d left me for good.”
His small chuckle warmed my insides. “You’re not getting rid of me that easy,” he said, taking my hand inside of his. “Besides, how could I pass up a chance to see Seattle?”
“Oh, so
that’s
why you’re going,” I joked, elbowing him in the ribs.
“Damn, you got me,” he said, softly. But as he wiped away the remnants of my tears with his thumb, those warm eyes of his told an entirely different story.
Unfortunately, those tears were still coming in small streams, not because of Jace or what I might have lost, but because I was genuinely scared about what might be awaiting me in Seattle. I didn’t know what to expect because my mother hadn’t given me any real details; I only knew that, if she wanted me on a plane right away, it had to be bad. “Do you think he’ll be okay?” I asked, leaning into his hand as he cupped my cheek.
“I wish I had an answer for you,” he said, his lips pulling into a tight frown. “The only thing I can promise is that I’ll be right there with you, no matter what happens.”
Too weary to talk about much of anything else, I allowed him to pull me into the crook of his arm. And, as our plane took off, I looked out the window, thought of home and sent a prayer up to anyone that might be listening. But until someone actually answered that prayer, I would let myself lean on the man that had somehow known I’d needed him.
It was a weird thing to say for a girl like me, someone who was used to standing on her own two feet—a girl that had always loathed the needy girls she’d gone to school with—but it was my truth in that moment. I’d needed his touch, his presence, his smile, and his sense of humor right then. I’m not sure I would have made it through the eight hour plane ride any other way, not without having a complete mental and emotional breakdown.
Maybe some mistakes really are just opportunities. Maybe those moments that you think you’re making a mistake, you’re actually taking a new path that you never thought you’d go down. Maybe life didn’t need blueprints and plans to work out for the better. Maybe, just maybe, Jace Richardson was my new future.
I only hoped that burying my brother wouldn’t be a part of it.
I ended up sleeping most of our first flight. In fact, Jace had to practically shake my brains out of my head to wake me up when the flight attendants asked us to lift our seats for our landing in Las Vegas. The emotional exhaustion must have really played a number on me.
Once we’d landed and exited the plane, we had a little time to kill for our layover. With still a few more hours of flying ahead of us, it seemed best to use that time to grab something to eat. After taking a look at what the airport had to offer, we opted for a sandwich shop called Schlotzky’s, a place I’d never been and had never heard of.
We placed our orders up front and then found a seat at one of the tables to wait for our order to be made. “I still can’t believe you’ve never had an Original,” Jace said, pulling up a seat across from me.
“I’m from the West coast,” I said, answering his disbelief with a shrug. “We have Pike’s, which is prime eating grounds. And mostly locally run bakeries and restaurants.” Still, I had to admit, the food did smell pretty amazing; I only hoped it tasted half as good because I was starving.
“No major chain food stores?” he asked, his mouth hanging open, as if he were appalled at the idea of not being able to eat at a McDonald’s or a Burger King.
I laughed. “Of course there are major food chains. Just hardly anyone eats at them, unless they’re in a hurry. And really, once you’ve had real Seattle food, fast food is just... disgusting.”
Growing up in the Northwest meant that I’d always been a bit of a food snob and I rarely ate anything outside of my usual cafeteria salad. Unfortunately, Jace didn’t share my love for green food.
“Banish the thought!” he said, waving his hand in the air.
“What? I’m being serious. You haven’t had real food until you’ve been to the Athenian or the local fish market.”
“The Athenian...” His brow creased in deep thought. “Isn’t that the place in that movie? The one with Tom Hanks?”
“Sleepless in Seattle.” I nodded. “The same.”
“Then it’s official. I’m buying you dinner there.”
I was going to tell him that we wouldn’t have time for touristy stuff, that I probably wouldn’t be heading to Pike’s that week, or anywhere else, for that matter, but our order number was called and he stood to go and grab it before I had the chance.
I felt awful that he had come along—to a place that he’d apparently wanted to visit for a long time—and his entire time there would be spent inside a hospital. But what else was I going to do? I couldn’t leave my brother, my parents, my other siblings, not when they needed me and I needed them.
Maybe he could go and see some of the city on his own, at least the areas nearby where he could hopefully find his way back on his own. If he refused to go—which I pretty much guessed he would—I could make some sort of a plea for food, something that you couldn’t get at the hospital. Pike’s wasn’t far; I could even ask him to go there. Everyone deserved the Market experience their first time in Seattle.
When Jace returned with our food, I decided it would be best to lay it all out there, let him know what he was getting himself into. I just had to find a way to tell him without breaking down. “So... “ I stared at my food and busied my hands with unfolding my napkin; the distraction would hopefully help with curbing the emotion that rested just below the surface. “Things are really bad. Like, ICU bad. And I don’t know how long I’ll be here, or if I’ll even get to leave the hospital.”
For the longest time, Jace didn’t say a word. I wondered if he was starting to regret coming along, if maybe he’d thought this would be like a mini vacation, a situation that was serious enough to come home for, but not one big enough to take up an entire week of your life. But then he reached across the table and settled my hand, a hand that I’d lost control over because I was apparently shredding the napkin up on the table.
“Andrea... “ He moved his hand to my chin, lifting my gaze to his. “I didn’t come along for Seattle. I came for you. If we don’t leave the hospital, we don’t leave the hospital.”
I gulped. “But this is your first time there. It should be special.”
He gave me a sad smile and shook his head. “Everything and everywhere is special when I’m with you.”
Did he have to have the perfect answer for every situation? Did he have to make my heart swell and flutter like that all the time? Why did he have to be so damn wonderful all the time?
This man was going to be my undoing, especially if, after the six weeks was over, he decided that I wasn't the kind of girl he wanted. I wasn't the rocker girlfriend. I couldn't keep up with his lifestyle, the traveling, the constant swarms of adoring fans. Just the idea of him being gone all the time, surrounded by beautiful women, and me, at home, without him, seemed too much to bear.
And we'd only been "dating" a few days.
What would happen after six weeks? How much more would the thought crush me then?
"You're thinking too far ahead," he said, as if my thoughts were written on my forehead, right there for him to see.
"How did you--?"
Little lines formed around his eyes as that sexy smirk of his tipped up one side of his mouth. "You do this thing when you're thinking."
"Thing?" I asked, lifting my brows. “What thing?”
"You gnaw away at the inside of your mouth."
Oh, God, I did do that.
"Oh," I said, looking down at my food--the food that was getting cold before I even had a chance to try it. "I--I'm sorry. It's just, with everything going on with my brother, my career, school... it just seems like our relationship is another thing for me to worry about. I—I keep waiting for you to realize that I'm not who you think I am. That I'm not the girl you're looking for."
"Andrea, I wasn't looking for anything when I met you.”
I lifted my eyes to look at him. "No?" I asked, tilting my head to the side a bit, a little confused. Hadn’t he been the one to approach me? Wasn’t he the one that had come up with this crazy offer of his? Why would he have done all that if he hadn’t even been looking for a relationship in the first place?
"No," he answered, shaking his head. "That's how I know, how I've always known. I know, to you, it sounds crazy. But I knew you were the one the second I laid eyes on you."
"Jace, that's--"
"Crazy," he said, nodding as if he understood just how insane he sounded. "I know. But it's the truth. I don't know how to explain it, really. I just knew I had to talk to you, had to know you. And then you gave me that attitude, that little spiel about how you didn't need a man to buy you coffee, and that just kind of sealed the deal for me."
I laughed. "Most guys would run from something like that," I said, picking up my sandwich.
"If you haven’t noticed yet, I’m not most guys.”
I mulled over that, and what it all meant as we finished our sandwiches. What did it all mean? Was this the undying love profession that I’d been so naïve to think about before I had known he was sitting right next to me?
I decided it probably didn’t matter right then and there, or maybe I was just too distracted with my food and the light conversation that Jace had pulled us over to. He was right, of course—my sandwich was amazing, even if it was a little cold. And I was grateful that he’d distracted my heavy heart and spinning head from all the swirling thoughts and emotions, even if it was only for a little while.
As the time passed, as it got closer to take-off time, I withdrew into myself and stopped listening to him talk somewhere along the way. Thankfully, he’d caught on pretty quickly and, rather than try to force me to talk, he sat with me in the boarding terminal, holding me against his chest as we waited for our last plane to start boarding.
About the time that my stomach started to feel like someone had gone and filled it with lead, they called us in. It wouldn’t be much longer before we landed in Seattle, the place I called home. I had missed it, and I couldn't wait to feel the mist on my face, smell the ocean and pine in the air. But I hadn't ever planned to return home under these circumstances. And I certainly hadn’t planned on having a tatted up rocker on my arm when I put my feet back on Northwest ground.
I started to wonder what the situation look like when I got there. Would my brother be okay? Would he be nothing more than a vegetable? Would we have to make a decision that no family should ever have to make? Would my mother be nothing more than a mess of tears and tissues? Would my dad look tired and twice his age? Would we be able to talk about everything? Would there be even a shred of hope? Or would we all sit there and wait for the hours to pass, knowing that we’d soon have to say goodbye?
As we prepared for takeoff, Jace took my hand in his. "I'm going to be right here," he said, pulling me back into the crook of his arms as we prepared for take-off.
"I'm just worried,” I said, choking back the tears again as we sped down the runway for take-off.
He placed a gentle kiss on the top of my forehead and then smoothed the hair out of my face. "I know,” he said, softly, the depth of his voice sending vibrations through my chest.
For a while, he held me like that, letting me cry. But somewhere between the first and second hour of our flight, he turned the conversation back on. It seemed impossible for me to be distracted at first, but once he got me talking about home—what it was like growing up in Seattle, my favorite restaurants, my friends, La Push, the ferries—it probably would have been impossible to shut me up. All of it reminded me of why I'd always wanted to come back after college, why I'd made plans for my life in the first place.
Seattle had always been my heartbeat, the place that I knew I belonged.
Don’t get me wrong, it had been nice, seeing another part of the world, being far away from home and figuring out how to make it on my own. But I missed everything about my city. The people and their artsy, introverted nature. Turtlenecks, boots, sweaters, and jeans. Seeing the fish throwing every week when I went with my family to shop at the Market. Going to the library, a place that was like no other on the planet with its ceiling to floor windows and indoor plants. The temperate climate and short, short summers. Long days and nights by the fireplace as the rain lulled you into a peaceful state of mind.
I'd been gone for far too long.
And now I was on my way back, with a man that would likely frighten the bejeezers out of my parents and infuriate Sean. Yet he was exactly what I needed. He made me laugh with his crazy stories about the band. He made me smile with heartwarming stories about his mother. And he made me feel safe with his arm wrapped around my shoulders.
This man, a man that I never saw coming and had never planned for, served as my anchor that day.
That thought comforted and frightened me all at the same time because, while it was nice to feel grounded by something other than my blueprints for once, it was also terrifying to think I might lose that source of comfort, especially at a time when I needed it the most.