Hope Falls: Hearts Afire (Kindle Worlds Novella) (6 page)

He was losing his goddamn mind. Casey had no idea what the hell possessed him to pull Katie into a hug and tell her she’d find her Mr. Right someday. For the first time, he completely understood where she was coming from with her children’s books. She was writing from her own experience, hoping to help kids get through what she hadn’t been able to. But dammit, he hated that she felt like she wasn’t worth sticking around for. He knew better than anyone how it felt to be abandoned by a parent. Her dad had no idea how it would haunt her for the rest of her life. Every time some asshole like Brendan broke up with her, she would just chock it up as one more time she wasn’t worth someone’s time. Hell, she
was
worth it. She was completely lovable. She needed to know that.

When she hugged him back, he could feel that the weight of his words meant something to her. He hoped like hell she believed them.

“Now it’s your turn,” she said as she dropped her arm from his side.

He did the same, letting her go. Instantly, he felt a chill come over him. He wondered if it was the weather or something else. He’d just stick that idea to the back of his mind. Casey didn’t need to remind himself that she was his friend and nothing more.

Wanting to distract himself from his very active imagination, Casey spoke up. “Lay it on me, Kay. What’s your question?”

“Why are you afraid of being in a committed relationship?”

That was not the question he had anticipated. In all honesty, he had no idea what to expect, but that wasn’t it. He looked over at Katie and she was smiling widely again. Rolling his eyes at her, he shook his head.

“Who has been filling your head with stories?” he asked her.

She chuckled before answering. “Sue Ann.”

They both laughed. That woman was going to be the death of him. If not with her cooking, then definitely with her gossip. “Oh, really. I’m going to have to have a talk with her if I ever speak to her again.”

Katie continued to chuckle. He was happy to take her mind off of her dad, Brendan and any other man that had done her wrong in the past. It’s obvious that they didn’t see what he did—this smart and beautiful woman who made you smile by merely being in her presence.

“So what else did she tell you?”

With a flutter of her brows, Katie started spewing nonsense. “She said that your apartment may as well be a one-man brothel because more women pass through there while they’re in town than they do the B&B or the lodge.”

Casey stopped right there in the middle of the beaten path. “She said
what
?”

With her fists dug into each hip, Katie faced him, a wicked grin spread wildly across her face. She was totally enjoying his discomfort. He could see it in her eyes how amused she was. “She said you’re the town manwhore and if I was smart I’d take a whirl on the Palmer Express before I left town.”

If he were Katie, he’d be slapping his thigh at how funny that was. Instead, he let out a hearty laugh at the absurdity. Sue Ann was quite the crazy old woman; he just didn’t know she had taken to chatting about his sex life.

“She said it just like that.” Katie laughed right with him and even pumped her right arm up and down, calling out, “Choo choo!”

Shaking his head, Casey continued down the path. “Stop already. I’m not a manwhore or whatever Sue Ann called it.”

Katie followed him, but she didn’t let up. “So tell me then. You haven’t answered the question. I told you why I’m done with firefighters. You tell me why you won’t give women, in general, a chance?”

“I’m talking to you, aren’t I?”

“Yeah, but you’re not trying to sleep with me or have a relationship with me.”

He almost thanked her for the reminder, but he bit his tongue. He wondered if it would hurt her more to hear it than it did for him to think it. He also wondered why it hurt him at all. She was right. He wasn’t trying to sleep with her. He wasn’t trying to have a relationship with her. She was just his friend.

Fuck if Nicole’s face didn’t just flash in his mind like a dirty neon sign.

“Maybe I have some issues of my own.”

“Well, no shit, Sherlock. I shared mine. Now it’s your turn.”

Bile crept up his throat. He wasn’t sure he was going to be able to keep his breakfast down. The thought of telling her about his mom or Nicole made him so sick to his stomach it physically hurt him. He had never told a soul about Nicole. He’d only talked to his dad about his mom. It had always been something he kept to himself and tried to deal with alone. He’d never had anyone he could actually talk to about his
issues
.

Maybe it was about time he changed that.

Maybe it would make him feel good to get it out.

And if not, Katie would be leaving soon anyway, taking his secrets with her.

“I guess you could say I have two issues that have gotten in the way of me settling down.”

She didn’t say anything, though her pace had gotten slower. It surprised him that she didn’t have a funny comeback or urge him to continue. The only things that could be heard were the sounds of crunching leaves and grinding pebbles beneath their feet, along with the whooshing of the river. They had yet to get to the clearing where they could actually see the running water, but they would soon. Then they could sit and talk for as long they needed to get all their
issues
out in the open.

“So, you’re not the only one with an asshole for a parent. My mom left when I was eight and never came back. I remember her being really hand’s off. I didn’t go to her for much because she just directed me to my dad. He took care of my meals, baths, schoolwork; you name it. He did it all. She didn’t want to be a mom. My parents were only eighteen when they had me. She wanted to abort the pregnancy, but my dad begged her not to. He thought she would change her mind when she had me, but she never did.”

Anger stirred inside Casey until he felt her touch. Katie had curled her hand around his forearm, and instantly the pain was gone.

“I’m sorry, Case.” She pulled her hand back and he wished that she didn’t.

“Yeah, well from then on, I kind of had mommy issues. I craved attention from girls. I had guy friends, but I mostly hung out with girls.”

“Let me guess,” Katie said. “I’m about to hear about reason number two.”

“Ding, ding, ding. We have a winner,” he chanted.

They finally arrived at one of the many picnic areas along the river. Casey pointed to the table closest to the water where they got comfortable sitting across from each other. He was grateful for the weather, for once, since they had the place to themselves. If it were warmer out, the trails and the viewpoints would be filled with people.

“So, Nicole was my best friend. We’d been friends since kindergarten. She was there for me when my mom left. Even at such a young age, she knew I was hurting and would always try to get my mind off things. As we grew older, she became my best friend. She was everything to me. She was the first and last girl I ever loved.”

Even though it was cold as balls out, Casey could feel the heat creeping up his spine and the back of his neck getting sweaty. The grip around his throat wasn’t feeling too great either. He felt like something was lodged in there, and he was finding it hard to breathe. He couldn’t distinguish between sadness, pain, and embarrassment. The fact that he was actually telling someone about Nicole, telling the story aloud was equally horrifying and amazing at the same time.

“In high school we were inseparable. We both dated other people, but for me, no one could make me feel what Nicole did. One night, our senior year, she asked me to have sex with her. She said she wanted our first times to be together. She wanted her first time to be with someone who loved her. It was what I waited my whole life to hear.”

Finally, Casey looked up and into Katie’s eyes. She had tears puddled there, but they didn’t spill over. She knew the story didn’t end well, and he could feel her feeling sorry for him. That’s not why he was telling her. He was just answering her question.

“Don’t get emotional, Kay. I’m over it.” She raised a brow at him. “Do you want to hear the rest of the story or not?”

“Only if you want to tell it,” she said. God, she was amazing. She was going to let him off the hook, give him a way out. But he had to tell her, he’d already come this far.

“That night, I made love to her. It was nice, for what it was. Neither of us knew what the hell we were doing, but it was cool. I woke up the next day thinking I had a new girlfriend, the girl I would have given anything for. She woke up the next day with a new boyfriend. The only problem was, it wasn’t me. She wanted her first time to be with someone who loved her, but she didn’t love me back. Not the way I loved her, anyway. She used me. And it’s not something I’ve been able to forget.”

Katie slammed her hand on the table, startling him. “What in the fucking fuck? Tell me who the dumb broad is and I’ll cut a bitch.” She seemed genuinely angry. He had no doubts that if he gave Katie Nicole’s address, he’d have to bail her out of jail.

He was going to miss Katie when she left Hope Falls.

After what he just confessed to her, Casey realized he was letting his guard down and he shouldn’t be. Sure, they were friends, but they weren’t supposed to get so close. He’d done that before and look where it had gotten him. Close to twenty years of repressed sadness and anger. He wasn’t going down that road again. He was not going to get too close to Katie. She was going to leave. He had to remember that.

“Hey, girlfriend.”

Katie was thrilled to hear her sister-in-law’s voice. She had just stood up to take a break from writing. She had been going at it all day, and her body ached from sitting at the computer. She had to get up and stretch her legs and get the blood flowing. She also needed to give her eyes a rest.

“Hey, sissy! What’s up?” Katie told her. She had always wanted a sister. Lizzy was an only child. An adopted one at that, who grew up with woman she likened to Mrs. Hannigan. As soon as Katie met Liz, she loved her like a sister and intended to treat her like one. She didn’t care how it worked out with her brother. Lucky for all of them, Ryan had pulled his head out of his ass and married the woman.

“I miss you,” she said. “Are you done yet? I need someone to keep me company at the library.”

Katie shook her head knowingly. “You don’t miss me. You need me.”

“I miss you.
And
I need you.”

Liz was the children’s librarian at the local library back home. She was amazing at her job and often had guest speakers and authors come in to read to the children and do activities with them. Liz had been the first to ask her to do a reading when she got the job at the library. Since then, Katie had made appearances at a few bookstores to do signings and visit with little ones. If Lizzy needed her help, she would bend over backwards to make it happen.

“What’s going on?” she asked. “And yes to whatever you need.”

“Ooo, I should ponder this for a minute.” Liz was quiet for a brief moment before she started giggling into the phone. “Your publisher just announced your next release. Moms have already asked if you’ll be doing a reading. You’re great with the kids, and I want to be able to tell them you’ll be here.”

“Of course. Sign me up.” She loved doing these things. Even before she had written her first story, she had loved volunteering in elementary school classrooms and reading to the kids. Her mom had teased her and told her she should be an actress because she was so animated when she read aloud. She couldn’t help but bring the characters to life with different voices. If there was an exclamation point at the end of a sentence, you bet your ass she was going to read that sentence with some gusto.

She had forgotten what that feeling was like since she’d been working on her romance. That’s not to say that her love story didn’t bring about gooey feelings inside. She found herself smiling at her pages often. Writing for children and writing for adults was very different, but it no doubt brought her the same excitement and joy.

“Awesome. I’ll send you an email with some dates and I’ll put a poster up. That should quiet the masses. You’re a hit.”

“At home I am.” Katie laughed at the absurdity. She only had a few books out, but they had done well. People did know her, but it’s not as if she was signing animated series contracts or anything. “Enough about work, how’s everyone doing? I miss you guys so much.”

“Everyone is great. The girls ask about you and we can’t wait to read your book. Your brother thinks it’s gross, of course. He can’t imagine his little sister writing naughty things. I mean, how would you know anything about boys and what to do with them?”

They both laughed. Her brother would rather she join the convent than date. He had been like that since she was in middle school and developed her first crush on a boy—her square dance partner. She fell in love the first time she held his hand. Ryan would rather die than consider his little sister had ever kissed a boy, much less had sex.

“My brother has such a warped sense of reality,” Katie told her. “Luckily for him, my book is pretty tame. Every time I start to write anything remotely sexy, I start to look over my shoulder. I feel like someone is watching me and I just can’t do it. This is definitely going to be one of those books where the couple closes the door and you know they’re getting busy, but you don’t get to read about every dirty detail.”

“I love me some steamy hot romances, but I love the sweet ones too. You write what comes naturally to you and I’m sure it will be a hit.” Lizzy and her friends belonged to a book club. Well, the book club was a front to get together to check out the local firefighters. It just so happens that their little meetings had led to Liz and her brother falling in love. She could have easily turned their story into a book.

Katie felt warm inside. She missed being able to go to the library and visit Liz whenever she wanted. Or going for a run and ending up on their doorstep. But she also wasn’t ready to go home yet. Hope Falls was really starting to grow on her.

“Thank you, Lizzy. I love you, sister.”

“Aww. I love you too. I gotta run. I’m going to meet your mom for lunch.”

“Give her a big hug for me and make sure she eats some protein,” Katie told her. Her mom was a diabetic and was adjusting to eating a healthy combo of carbs, proteins, and fats.

“I’m on it,” Liz said. “Chat later.”

Katie said goodbye and headed downstairs to the kitchen. Liz had reminded her it was lunchtime and she was hungry. She wished she could be having a meal with her family, but she couldn’t imagine they were eating anywhere with the view she had.

Hope Falls continued to take her breath away. Looking out at the mountaintops from the B&B windows would always feel surreal to her. This is where she had been living for over a month, and she was still in awe every day. She wondered if the people who grew up here felt the same way. Did they see the beauty of their town the way she did?

She was just about to search the fridge for something to eat when her phone rang. She smiled at the screen when she saw that it was Casey.

“When you look at the mountains, does the view take your breath away?” she asked him.

“Excuse me?”

Katie realized she didn’t answer the phone in a traditional sense, but the question wasn’t a hard one. “Hi Casey, how are you? Do you look at the mountains in awe of their beauty or is it just whatever since you’ve seen them every day of your life?”

“Uh…” She knew she had caught him off guard. She seemed to do that often with him, and she kind of liked it. “They’re not whatever. How could they be? Hope Falls is gorgeous. It’s my home town and I’ll never take for granted that I get to look out my window every day and see what I do.”

“Do you have an amazing view?”

“I sure do,” he said. “Want to see it? I was just about to make lunch. Come over if you need a break.”

“I’m on my way.” Katie hung up without saying goodbye. She ran upstairs, threw on a hoodie and a pair of boots and was headed out the front door of the B&B in no time. She had no idea why she was in such a hurry. Maybe she didn’t want to talk herself out of going to Casey’s place. A guy’s place. A cute guy. If she was being completely truthful, a super-hot guy. One she kept telling herself she wasn’t interested in.

She was finding it harder and harder every day to believe that. What he shared with her the other day made her think things. Casey was a good man, a great man, yet he felt like he couldn’t trust women. He thought they would all use him and leave him. That wasn’t true. If any woman spent any amount of time with him, she would see what she did. A kind, loyal, and sensitive man who deserved the love of a woman. Someone should be so lucky to have him love her back.

She wasn’t that woman, but… She didn’t know what the
but
was.

It dawned on her that she had no idea where she was going, but no sooner than she thought that did she get a text from Casey with the directions. He knew her too well. Already.