Where the Ivy Hides (5 page)

Chapter 5

Days pass turning into months, and before I realize, it's been a year. I'm sober. I'm happy.  I'm employed. And both Ryker and I are taking college courses. I don't know why I am, but he's working on the business end of opening up a Motorcycle Repair shop. Apparently, it requires more than just an old warehouse and a cash register. So until Ryker gets his shop opened and his attention focused on it, I'll just keep taking college classes for general studies, because I don't have a clue what I want to be when I grow up, and I'm really enjoying just being an instructor at Painting with a Twist.

I haven't been as good as I was the first six months at getting my ass to meetings either. But Ryker is good about not giving me any shit, he's also very good at being there for me and for the first time in my life, I’m beginning to feel true happiness and contentment.

It's fall, and he and I have finally moved into a new place a few weeks ago. It's nice. It's a little pink and blue house on a hill at the foot of a cul-de-sac with three bedrooms, two baths, a white picket fence, and a tree swing off the corner of the front yard. Ry and I don't have the furniture needed to fill it, and most rooms are still as empty as the day we moved in, but like Ryker says, if we take it day by day, we'll conquer the world, but first we'll furnish the house.

Jaci and I have somehow made it back to where we were before and we nurture that relationship with margaritas every Wednesday at lunch, updating each other on the woes of the daily grind.

As I'm leaving our weekly taco stand lunch on the beach, I hear someone call name and turn around.

When I see Ryker leaning against his bike with his big arms folded across his chest, I smile before stepping in his direction.

"Well, hey there, handsome." When I'm close enough to look up without fear of tripping directly into him, I do with a smirk and a cocked eyebrow. "What brings you to this side of the tracks? Huh?" I stop in front of him when we're toe to toe then wrap my arms around his neck and kiss him before smiling against his lips and awkwardly maintain eye contact. "You were missing me, weren't you?"

His arms slide around my waist and squeeze.

"I was missin ya, love. Missing the bloody hell outta ya." He breathes in with his face against the crook of my neck and chill bumps break out across my skin as his whiskers tickle my shoulder.

I nuzzle my nose against his neck, giggling, "I missed you too. Whatcha got going on this afternoon?"

His dark blue eyes sparkle with hesitant excitement as he cups my face. "You know me plans, right? With the shop?"

Hmmm...this is new. "Yeah, baby. I know."

"Okay, well me and Reesie boy were talking, and while I have the bikes engine and body repair skills down, he's got the money and the business side of it. So, we did it, hon, just like that, we did it. I have a shop!" His arms tightly squeeze around my waist as he lifts me up and spins me. After a full circle he sets me back on my feet and begins buckling his extra helmet on my head. "Wanna see it?"

Knowing how happy this'll make him, I smile. I smile as big and as fake as I can to hide the fear just beneath, and thank God he's distracted enough to not pay attention and see it.

"Only if you let me go in!" I straddle the bike before patting the driver seat cushion in front of me. "Well, are you coming?"

His long denim-clad legs square the bike straight before stomping on the clutch and starting the engine. "Oh, me sweet love, you'll know when I'm coming."

As he pulls the bike from the sandy parking lot and into traffic, I lie my head between his shoulder blades, and clutching my arms around his waist, I hum with closed eyes while listening to the sound of his heart beat.

I don't know what it is about Ryker David Killian and success, but everything that man has ever put his mind to, he's more than succeeded. His and Reese's bike shop, Lucky Pipes, had a substantial client list before the ribbon cutting ceremony was even concluded and business is steadily growing. I've never been so proud of him, and I pray he knows even though I don't say so.

And as crazy as his success is, it causes our lives to be crazy busy, but I prefer it this way so I'm not the focus of his entire attention.

I'm more comfortable with life now, which thankfully, mainly consists of making sure all of Ryker’s things are in order, to insure HIS life flows easily day to day. I still work instructing painting classes, but it's mostly just a weekend job that I keep to itch when my painting needs need to be scratched.

Jaci always laughs when I bitch about not being the center of Ryker’s world. Saying that my maternal colors are showing.

I always laugh and ask her where she's hit her head and what asylum I should admit her to. She says I'm too close to the subject matter. Something about a forest and trees.

All I know is that I'm finally happy and I hope things will stay this way.

It's just after dark and the night sky is pouring rain as Ryker’s bike thunders up the driveway and into the garage when I'm just coming out of the front office after a long, tedious day of appointment scheduling and hassling with clients about payments.

I've just turned off the computers, printers, and forwarded the phones back to the shop, when I head through the house, flipping the lights off as I walk toward the kitchen to start dinner.

I spot him in all of his six foot something glory, standing in puddles under the doorway just inside the kitchen, clutching a bouquet of roses and smirking just like the devil. "Well, good evening, me beautiful Ivy." His swagger is damn near intimidating as he shoulders his leather jacket off and sets it and the flowers on the counter.

His fingers comb through his too long hair and my heart flip flops as I smile.

"Top o' the mornin', to ya. Whatcha got? Some little hussy buy you some flowers?" I tease.

"Nope." He stalks towards me until he's close enough to grab me and pull me up. Once my legs wrap around his waist, my arms link around his neck and I smile against his lips when he speaks, "No, no. Sorry, love. I bought this little hussy," one of his hands connects hard across my bottom, "some pretty red flowers, but instead of just being a good girl, and saying thank you, she unknowingly turned my sweet,
un-
evoked gesture into something ugly."

My bare thighs brush the cool surface of the countertop before he gently sets me down. "Baby, I'm sorry. I was kidding-" He stops my apology mid-sentence with his lips.

His mouth opens and a guttural sound growls from his chest just as his arms around me tighten, pulling me closer to him.

"I love ya, me Ivy," he whispers and my body responds, telling him the same as the bare soles of my feet shove his ass forward so I can rub my core harder against his erection.

I would tell him that I do, too. That I love him. That to me, he is as everything as the stars are to the night sky. But... I can't.

I just can't say it.

So instead, I show it. Using my body, I tell him how much I love him.

The call no one ever wants came on the same day, coincidentally, as Lucky Pipes one-year anniversary. It had taken some time, but I'd finally, very slowly gotten Ryker adjusted to me drinking again. Not anything drastic, it wasn't every day drinking, and never was it day drinking, I just had a glass of wine socially and sometimes after a busy day.

I'd been working nonstop all day, it was late, and I was my third class of white wine when Ryker’s phone vibrated on the desk.

Without thought or second glance at the unknown number, I answered, "Hello?"

"Killian? Is there a ah...Mr. Ryker Killian there?" I hear a few whispered voices in the back ground as the familiar voice speaks before I answer.

"Yes. He's...well, he's in the shower at the moment, actually, can I take a message?"

It's in the very next moment that my assumptions about the caller are brought to an abrupt halt and my mind registers the threads of familiarity weaving and make the connection.

The moment I hear the caller gasp, "Ivy bean? Oh, God. Ivy..." she cries, shuffling the phone even more, making it harder to hear what she's saying.

It's Reese's mother. It's Mrs. Bonacci.

"Rachel?" A lump hardens in my throat as my mind runs a million miles a minute, worse-case scenario after worse-case scenario bombarding through my thoughts.

"Rachel?" I choke out before standing and hurrying towards the master bathroom.

Ryker's just stepping from the shower, in the midst of hooking his towel around his lean hips when our eyes meet in the mirrors reflection.

"Love, your face looks like ya seen a ghost, what in bloody hell—" I slam his iPhone against his broad damp chest and turn to pace.

"It's Rachel. She's not answering. Just crying. Find out what's wrong." On my current path of pacing, I reach into my closet and snatch clothes clean off their hangers, snapping the hangers in the process. I redress, never breaking the beat of my pace.

My eyes glance up at Ryker’s following me as I walk from one end of the bathroom to the other. "Rachel? Rachel, this is Ryker, are ya there, hon?"

When he shakes his head without breaking eye contact with me, my frustration begins to get the better of me, "Well, what the hell? Did she say anything? "

He's shaking his head and flipping through his phone when it rings in his hand and we both look up at each other.

He answers before the first ring ends, "Ay, this is Killian."

His eyes remain locked on mine, and I swear you can hear a pin drop as we stare emotionless at each other. "Ay."

"Earlier, he left about an hour before I did. 'Ad to get down to the bank and such. Ay."

When his face crumbles, I do the same, landing in a huddled heap on the cold bathroom tile floor.

"Bloody fucking hell. Bloody fucking...Ay. I'm so sorry, mate. We're headed that way."

I'm scared to death to hear what I know he's going to say next, and I brace myself.

But not nearly enough.

"Love, it's Jaci and Reese. I knew ya was feeling bad, with your cold and whatever that stomach bug thing is ya been dealin' with, I didn't want you to feel like ye had to go, so I just told them...ya know? I just...told him to take Jaci, that if ya felt up to it, we'd meet 'em later. Jaci was driving, I guess she was tipsy, but not as drunk as Reese, I...I don't. They said someone ran a red light, the impact was on Jaci's side. She died instantly..."

He scoops me up and cradles me to his chest before I've even realized he's moved. I look up at him and ask through my tears, "Reese?"

His big hand cups the side of my face and tucks my head under his chin before softly saying, "I'm so sorry, love. He's in a coma. He doesn't seem to be doing much better, from what his dad says."

He sets me on the bed and seconds later returns with a pair of my slippers. He tosses them on the bed before tugging his jeans up, shoves his feet into his laced-up doc martins, and tugs a dark v-neck t-shirt over his head. "We'll take the cooper since it was raining earlier. Just hold on tight, Ivy love. Don't go gettin' lost in that head of yours till we know everything, yeah?"

Barely able to hold it together, I simply nod as I shrug a light blazer jacket over a t-shirt and slide my feet in my slippers.

As soon as we walk into the hospital waiting area, I see Rachel and Sherry, Jaci's mother, and hurry in their direction with Ryker right on my heels. After some whispered hellos and apologies, I glance to where Ryker is consoling Sherry before turning towards Rachel and Paul, the only two parents I've ever really had, and ask them, "Reese? Have they said anything more about him?"