Chapter Thirty-Four
Pepper took the window seat flight in front of the wing. The only good part to a last-minute red-eye hacker-fare flight was the near empty plane. With any luck, no one would claim the space to her right. Once they were in the air, she’d curl up into a tight ball and give herself over to the numbness. Her core was so cold she might never get warm again. Sleep? Yeah, right. But if her cheeks happened to mysteriously dampen over Virginia no one would be the wiser.
A rheumy-eyed woman in a purple and yellow tracksuit shuffled past. Then a guy with impressive mutton chops. A few bored-looking businesspeople. A visibly exhausted mom ducked into the empty seat in front of her, a baby whimpering from the sling. Then no one. The flight attendants locked and armed the doors.
She sighed and pressed the heels of her palms into her eyes and took a deep breath. “And away we go.”
The takeoff was smooth and uneventful. Pepper zoned out the window, the lights below fading from town, to country, and the blackness of the sea beyond. Everland was down there somewhere. Right now Tuesday would be sleeping while J.K. Growling and Kitty snored from their crates. The only thing her sister said before Pepper left was a curt agreement to puppy sit. Rhett would be home, in the bed where they’d gone from a fling, to a sexy friendship, to something that pushed up on the edge of forever.
Was he asleep? Or out in the backyard, sanding his kayak in an insomniac haze, regretting everything that transpired? Did he see her passing overhead, not a star, just a blink, soon gone? The flight time to New York was two hours, and each minute passed like a lifetime. At the descent, she squeezed the armrests. There was the Hudson. The familiar city lights. The vast forest of steel and windows. The Freedom Tower rose high and proud and behind it the first hint of dawn lit the horizon, a red line of fire cutting through the darkness.
Below stirred millions of people, and not a single one was Rhett.
Enjoy getting what you never wanted.
Her forehead knocked against the window, the glass cold against her hot skin. No matter what happened with Dad, if she ended up living in Maine or back here in the city, she’d never belong, because it would never be home. Because Rhett wasn’t there.
Tuesday had been right. The sob Pepper had been holding back for hours choked her. She didn’t trust herself to be happy, because vulnerability scared her. All air sucked from her lungs. Her chest ached. The world seemed unreal, as if she were looking at it through the surface of the waves, trapped underwater.
What if she gave voice to the hunger buried deep down inside, and was rejected? What if she went all in with Rhett but she wasn’t enough and someday he left just like Mom?
How could she withstand that level of pain?
All she’d ever wanted was a home, a place to feel safe and loved. The rest was mere details. But what if home wasn’t a place?
Home was together. She braced her hands on the airplane seat, fingernails sinking into the cheap gray vinyl. Inside her shoes, her toes flexed and relaxed, flexed and relaxed as if kicking through the murk and up toward an invisible surface. The wave of realization broke over her, tumbling her senses. Her head spun and her mouth tasted of salt.
Home was love.
She gasped. Home was Rhett.
The truth smacked her in the face like a rogue wave. She’d been the one to leave and it was the worst mistake of her life.
***
Rhett took another pull from his beer. Shit. Empty already. He set it back in the pack and searched for another one. All six were drained to the dregs. When the hell did that happen? The wind hit the mast, knocking about the rigging, a lonely sound of metal chinking off metal.
Pepper was gone.
He’d asked her to stay, put himself out there, and what did he get?
A no.
“Rhett? Hey, man.”
Shit. Beau. He didn’t feel like talking to anyone. Not even his best friend.
“How’d you know to find me here?” he grunted, rubbing his eyes in a stupor.
“You’re drunk.” Beau jumped into the boat.
“Tell me something I don’t know.”
Beau crossed his arms and leveled a long hard stare. “Girl trouble?”
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and swayed. “No.”
“Liar.” Beau crouched next to him. “I’ve known you since you had that crush on Britney Spears in the schoolgirl uniform. Never told anyone about the poster you hung up in your closet.”
