The Hero's Sweetheart Page 17

  “I don’t think I can do this,” Olivia said. “Trauma care when it’s someone I know.”

  “You handled yourself exceptionally in that emergency. You’ll be a great paramedic.”

  She scoffed. “I can’t even seem to get through EMT school.”

  “You will. Your grades are coming up, right?”

  “Yes, but...only because of you helping me study and giving me grace with the schedule.”

  “You have what it takes, I promise you.”

  “I don’t even care about that. I just want him to get better.”

  “I know. I think he will.”

  But not without significant life changes.

  Jack recalled the doctor saying they needed to rethink Sully’s long-term goals. And that meant that he might not be able to return to running the diner.

  Jack had a big decision ahead. But with Olivia feeling so right in his arms, somehow the mountain didn’t seem so impossible to scale.

  After a pretty significant crying jag, during which Jack felt utterly inept, Olivia settled down and sniffled into Jack’s chest.

  He swallowed, not knowing what to say or do. “I’ve never seen you cry,” he said.

  An irritated scraping sound came out of her throat as she murmured, “Well, enjoy it while it lasts because you’re never going to see it again.”

  Jack couldn’t help it. It was so typical Olivia that he laughed.

  To his joy, her tremulous mouth curved up in a smile, too.

  After a moment of calm, still holding her, Jack said, “You’re such a bright spot in Dad’s life. I had no right to try and shove you out.” He leaned back to tip her face up to his. “I am so very sorry, Olivia. Please forgive me?”

  She nodded. Then she grinned up at him with a smile so staggeringly beautiful he couldn’t help but smile back. And somewhere between her smile and his, he forgot that he wasn’t supposed to be falling in love with her.

  Jack skimmed a gaze across her face, to her bright eyes and lovely mouth. Lovely mouth.

  No more resisting. It was futile.

  Jack lowered his face but paused a breath away, giving her a chance to be the one to come to her senses and stop this. Instead, she slid her hand up the rough edge of his jaw and blessed him with another sweet smile. Then she closed the distance between them.

  He wasn’t sure where she left off and where he started but the kiss was bliss. Within its ministrations, Jack felt his emotional barriers begin to melt away. She clung sweetly and more tightly, as though needing to glean strength from his embrace. He met her motion willingly, offering the strength and tender comfort she needed, only to discover that he needed it as much as she did, maybe more. Jack gave himself to the powerful current of emotion. Olivia responded in kind.

  In the kiss’s wake, Jack was pleased to discover Olivia’s tears had stopped, blessedly replaced by joy in her bright eyes. And she was smiling. A smile he knew packed more power and danger than any explosive he could run across overseas. “Woman, you have me completely undone.”

  And he didn’t regret it for an instant.

  That amazing kiss began to restore every feeling he thought forever lost, obliterated in the ambush that had defused every emotion he’d ever had or been capable of.

  In short, he’d started shutting down. He’d had to, to protect himself and to stay levelheaded. Unfortunately, the shutting down had never stopped. The massacre had left him lost in terms of how to feel, because he didn’t want to feel at all. The pain was too much. The images too overpowering. But with help, and with God, and with a good woman at his side, he’d not only make it through, he’d overcome.

  Looking into Olivia’s eyes gave him reason enough to want to. To do more than just get through, more than just exist or survive. Jack wanted to be the man he saw in her eyes. He wanted to thrive.

  He looked into her eyes and saw love.

  Then the doubt crept in.

  There was reality. The issue of his military standing. His unfinished business overseas.

  Was he looking into the eyes of his new forever love? Or had God merely put Olivia in his path to prove to him that his emotions weren’t gone forever after all?

  Would he break her heart by loving then leaving?

  How dare he indulge in a kiss when he couldn’t confidently commit?

  “Olivia, I—”

  As though sensing his uncertainty, his impending apology, his war within, she slid her fingertips over his lips, then down to calm his heart. Slowly she shook her head, smiled in that way of hers and said, “Shhh, Jack. Don’t ever be sorry for it. Not ever.”

  * * *

  Never. Ever again. “This is your worst one yet,” Olivia said to Patrice two weeks later and slid the experimental green-only-it’s-orange smoothie back across the counter. “I’m sorry, but...no.”

  Patrice huffed. “What’s wrong with avocados, cumin, oranges, carrots and pumpkin?”

  “You lost me at cumin. Plus, it looks too much like the sawdusty stuff the elementary schools put down when kids lose their lunches. Blech.”

  Patrice giggled. “Party pooper.” She slid the shake back toward Olivia. “It tastes better than it looks. Come on, Chicken Little. Just one swallow.”

  When Patrice turned her back to check her phone as a text notification came through, Olivia used the opportunity to rush the hideous drink to the sink. She tilted the equivalent of ten gulps down the disposal and tossed orange peelings over it to hide the evidence.

  “I saw that.” Patrice sipped her shake while one-thumbing a message back to whomever had texted her.

  Olivia rolled her eyes, wondering when Patrice’s strange shake-ology spree would end.

  Patrice’s phone bleeped another incoming text.

  “Your honey called a crew meeting. Check your messages.”

  Pleasure rushed through Olivia at the thought of Jack. She checked her phone. “Nada.” Why hadn’t he texted Olivia? They’d been talking constantly, all week, and had been since their courtyard kiss.

  Patrice lowered her legs from the stool next to the one on which she was seated. “Huh. That’s weird. He seemed okay this weekend hanging out with the diner gang.”

  “Yeah.” Olivia was thankful Jack had started doing things with the crew. That was a big step for him. Something occurred to Olivia. “He received a phone call from his military superiors late yesterday and seemed troubled ever since.”

  Olivia had given him space, but now she was getting concerned. “When’s the meeting?”

  Patrice stood. “This morning before shift opening, if possible.” Her brows furrowed. “Must be an emergency for him to give no notice.”

  “Must be.” Olivia thought of his phone call. A bad feeling went through her.

  Jack had shared with her about the mission he’d been given the opportunity to head. His superiors were simply waiting for more intel to give it a go.

  Had that intel arrived? And...would Jack be leaving sooner rather than later?

  On the way downstairs to the diner, Patrice asked Olivia, “How’s Sully doing?”

  “Better than expected.” Not only had he been moved out of ICU and back to the rehab wing, doctors were optimistic he’d get to come home in the next few weeks. Things were definitely looking up there, as well as at school. She couldn’t wait to tell Jack she’d aced her EMT final. After helping her study the day after their kiss, he’d joined the day-shift crew at a local play in the park, put on by members of her congregation—and Jack’s, now that he’d begun visiting church with her. Unfortunately, the play had been a princess-and-the-frog parody called Their First Kiss and Olivia had felt Jack’s eyes and grin on her the entire time.

  Other than Patrice, no one knew about the courtyard kiss. They hadn’t repeated it, but they had talked about it. She
and Jack had decided that, while they both agreed that the emotion of Sully’s situation drove them to the kiss, neither regretted it and they acknowledged something between them of substance.

  Jack had called it love.

  Olivia wasn’t so sure.

  She just knew she didn’t regret the moment and all it meant. It mattered to her especially because of the healing impact it seemed to have on Jack, now in counseling for post-traumatic stress over the combat-related events he’d disclosed the evening of their kiss. Unimaginable things he’d endured while serving his country. That he was willing to walk right back into that level of danger and trauma spoke of his duty-bound dedication to the greater good. And convinced her that he’d come out the other side of that ambush with his character intact, despite the fact that his emotions had been left smoldering in the sand.

  When they got downstairs, Jack was out back helping Naem, Darin and Tristan, the new dishwasher, unload a delivery truck.

  Patrice brought Olivia into the office to show her a note Jack attached to the front edge of his Ford license plate poster in such a manner that the text read Olivia loves Jack’s... Ford.

  “I’m going to kill him.”

  “Hate the truck, but love the man.”

  “I do love him. I do not choose to love that truck.” She laughed, surprising even herself by admitting it aloud.

  “So, you really do love him?” Patrice beamed at the possibility.

  “Don’t overreact. The future is too unsure for us to do anything serious about it.”

  Patrice sighed. “I knew you two were falling.”

  “To me, a person doesn’t fall into love. They choose to love.”

  To Olivia, love wasn’t as much of an emotion as it was a conscious decision. Because emotions could be battered and they could wax and wane, whereas choices, at least hers, remained, no matter what fickle tricks emotions pulled.

  “I can’t believe he asked you out, to be his girlfriend exclusively and you turned him down,” Patrice scolded Olivia.

  “I can’t commit until I have my EMT license and a job. You know that. It’s what I’ve always said.”

  “And what if he returns to duty? What then?”

  “Then if it’s meant to be, God will bring him back to me.”

  Patrice sighed again. “I can’t decide if that’s romantic or pathetic. So let’s go with romantic.” A text came in on her phone. She eyed it and shook her head, then accidentally filled the sugar container all the way up.

  “Shoot. Jack’s going to come unglued.”

  “No, he won’t,” Olivia said. “I have firsthand knowledge that in today’s staff meeting, Jack is going to remove the mandate to only fill them half full.”

  “Just how did you manage that?”

  She smirked. “One day when we were slammed, I put him in charge of refilling all of the empty condiment containers halfway. He got sick of it and so now he’s changing it back to filling them all up.”

  Patrice laughed. “Figures. When it’s him doing unnecessary work...”

  Olivia felt Jack before she saw him. Every other day when he’d approached, his arms had discreetly curved around her waist and he’d planted a kiss on the back of her head. Today, he just stood behind her. Patrice cleared her throat and left to get the seating area ready to open.

  Olivia turned around trying to summon peace but feeling dread. One look in Jack’s eyes and she knew. “You’re leaving.”

  Something flickered in his eyes. “It looks that way.”

  There was a part of her that wanted to ask him to stay, and she thought maybe he wanted that too. But she could not. She would not be the cause of derailing his dreams.

  Tears pricked her eyes. She quickly turned. “I need to help Patrice.”

  Jack moved quickly, his hand on her arm. Their gazes locked, but Olivia forced herself to look away. Then slowly she eased from the power of his tender touch.

  He seemed at first to start after her, but something stopped him. The hitch in his breathing and the conflicted look on his face left an empty feeling inside her. All their memories and moments flashed in in her mind as her vision was blurred by tears.

  The only way to keep from running back to him was to forge ahead.

  And so she did, despite that her heart shredded more with every step.

  God, give me strength to do this. I don’t want to be the one to hold him back.

  Nor did she want her own dreams to die over love that gave no guarantee. But one look back over her shoulder to find his eyes still fastened on her and she realized she’d rather run back to him and be held, than to be held back.

  Instead of breaking through the fear that swirled around her, she kept walking, away from him.

  Lord, if this is meant to be, bring it back to me.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Where’s Patrice?” Jack asked Marci, the new hostess Olivia had trained.

  Marci indicated the spoon-and-fork-themed wall clock. “She hasn’t come back from lunch yet.”

  Olivia stood up from where she stacked trays behind the customer order counter. “Really? That’s weird. She’s never late returning.”

  The concern on her face made the hair stand up on the back of Jack’s neck. He met Olivia’s dark and troubled eyes. It was the first time in two weeks that she’d bothered to hold his gaze. “Call her. Make sure she’s okay.”

  He hadn’t meant to come across as bossy, but he had a meeting in ten minutes with prospective buyers for the diner. Then he had to work on finding Dad an apartment that didn’t involve climbing stairs.

  It suddenly hit Jack that he’d need to tell Olivia and Patrice there was a possibility the diner’s possible new owners may not want the upstairs to remain rental units.

  Which would mean they’d have to move, and maybe quickly.

  If Patrice was okay. She’d been slow in following advice from her doctor and counselor to get away from Frankie and press charges.

  “No answer,” Olivia said, holding up her phone. “Marci, cover my tables. I’m going to go look for Patr—” Olivia was saying just as the door bells jingled and Patrice stumbled in crying.

  Marci covered the dining room while Jack and Olivia ushered a sobbing Patrice back to the office and closed the door. They helped her sit but she sprang up, arms thrashing. “He’s cheating on me.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I caught him.”

  Olivia handed Patrice a handful of tissues.

  “I tried to call him to tell him I wouldn’t be able to make the dinner party tonight, after all, but he didn’t answer. His voice mail was full and I wasn’t able to leave a message. So I decided to go to his law firm and tell him in person. The secretary wasn’t at her desk.” Her words came out in huge hiccupping sobs. “I went to his office. Only when I pushed the door open, she—she—she was on his lap and—well, they certainly weren’t working. How could he do this to me?”

  “I’m so sorry. What did you do?”

  “I turned around and left. Then vomited in the parking lot. I heard him calling across the lot and knew he’d be coming to try and make some excuse, but I know what I saw. There was no mistaking what was going on. I took off and he started yelling at me and chasing my car.”

  “I’m actually impressed,” Jack said wryly, “that you didn’t opt to run over him.”

  Patrice snorted. “Oh, trust me, I thought about it. But he’s not worth doing hard time. I’m done with him. Why didn’t I listen to you all before now?”

  No one really wanted to answer that, as evidenced by the silence.

  “You need to watch your back, Patrice. Don’t go anywhere alone,” Olivia said.

  “I’m sure Darin would be willing to be your bodyguard,” Jack said.

  Olivia sa
w where Jack was going with this and recalled a conversation in which Darin admitted to having feelings for Patrice. Obviously Jack wasn’t above matchmaking in addition to ensuring protection for Patrice.

  “Yeah, and since Darin doesn’t have his license, you could swap rides for his company and companionship,” Olivia added conspicuously.

  “I wouldn’t want to put him out. Darin has his own life.”

  Olivia peered at Patrice thoughtfully. “I’m quite sure he wouldn’t mind.”

  She looked from Jack to Olivia. “Why do I get the feeling there’s something brewing here that you’re not telling me?” Her eyes widened. “Darin’s not, he’s not interested in me, is he?”

  Jack’s eyebrows lifted. “For someone so smart, you can act dense.”

  Patrice blinked twice, then looked hopeful for the first time in ages. Olivia met Jack’s amused gaze and smiled.

  Marci poked her head in. “Egg substitute and turkey bacon for Mayor Whiffler’s wife?”

  Olivia sank lower in her chair as Jack turned around to stare at her. “You’re still catering to her complaints about our not having healthy meals?”

  “She’s the only citizen in Eagle Point who cares enough to complain about Sully’s greasy spoon. So, yes, we went against your directives and keep turkey bacon and egg white mixture in the fridge for her...and the few other customers who happen to come in with their doctors, nutritionists or Pilates instructors already in the dining room. Otherwise, it’s great gobs of grease for all. Really, Jack, you should consider a healthy alternative menu.”

  “That, or let us carry clot busters on the condiment cart,” Patrice quipped.

  Jack shook his head.

  “You look exactly like your dad when you do that.”

  “Speaking of Dad, I need to call about the assisted-living place.”

  Olivia’s face blanched, as though it were becoming real that Jack was leaving.

  He’d barely come to grips with it himself. In fact, his impending departure felt surreal. He’d been unsettled since making the decision. But who could blame him? So much had changed. Dad’s stroke, falling in love with Olivia, the battle to save the diner...