Page 24 of Hidden Vows (Love in Ashford Falls #3)

eighteen

JUDE

Five weeks, and I’m still staring at a blinking cursor on a blank screen. I can’t remember a time I’ve ever gone this long without writing a single word, not since I started publishing.

The advice every author, agent, and editor has ever said plays on repeat in my head. Forget about the end result and get the words on the page. The first draft isn’t meant to be good.

I know it, and yet I’m still struggling to start. My mind keeps returning to last night, standing at the threshold of Abbey’s apartment.

I wasn’t planning on knocking on her door last night, but when I heard the soft rumbling of voices I couldn’t stop myself.

My first thought was that someone was there with her, and I couldn’t stand the thought of another man in her apartment.

I had no right to care one way or another if she was with someone else, but feelings are rarely logical.

When she opened her door, a soft smile on her lips, I wanted nothing more than to go inside and just be in her space. Reaching out and touching her may not have been the smartest, but I needed to feel her skin against mine. And when she relaxed into the simple touch, I felt like I was soaring .

It sparked the hope I kept pushing down inside me. Maybe all hope isn’t lost. Maybe there’s room for me in her life. Maybe we can find our way back to each other.

The sound of the door opening pulls me back to the blank screen before me, and I turn to find Abbey standing just inside the door.

“Sorry. I know I’m a little early.”

“No, it’s fine. I’m not doing anything that can’t wait for another day.” I close my laptop and switch it with the stack of brochures I laid on the bar next to me. “Can I get you anything to drink?”

“It’s a little early for a drink, don’t you think?” She laughs as she steps up to the seat next to me.

There’s a lightness to her that wasn’t there last night when I left, and I can’t help but wonder where it came from. There may not have been any harsh words between us last night, but there was a discomfort between us, one that I haven’t felt since the birthday party three weeks ago.

“I was thinking more along the lines of coffee or water. Maybe a soda? But they say it’s five o’clock somewhere, so I’m happy to pour you a drink if you want one instead.” I smile as I stand from my seat and move behind the bar.

“I thought you didn’t like coffee.”

With my back turned, my smile grows. I like that she still remembers things about me, even the things that don’t matter. “I don’t, but you do.”

“Hmm,” she hums. “I’ve already had a few cups this morning, so I’ll go with water for now.”

I grab a glass and turn to fill it, my eyes catching on her as she flips through the brochures, pulling her hair over one shoulder.

She’s in what I’ve realized is her every day look—cut-off shorts and a loose shirt—but instead of her hair piled on top of her head, she lets the natural waves fall down her back.

No matter how long I’ve known her or how many times I see her, she always takes my breath away.

How have I gone so long without seeing her? How have I survived it?

“Have you looked through any of these yet?” Her voice breaks me from my trance, and I reach for the soda gun, filling the glass with water before placing it on the bar in front of Abbey.

“I glanced through them. There are a few nearby, but they don’t seem the best.” I want to move back around the bar and sit next to her, but I think staying on this side of the bar might be smarter—for now.

“What do you mean?” she asks, looking up at me, her brows pinched.

I fidget with the rag sitting on the underbar, not entirely comfortable with the words I’m about to speak.

“The ratings aren’t great and, from the pictures online, they seem pretty run down.

” I take a breath and let my shoulders fall.

I hate that I’m in this situation, but I’m not going to put my dad some place I’m not positive he’ll get the care he deserves.

“Oh.” Her eyes fall to the brochures, a frown marring her beautiful face. “How far do you have to go for nursing homes that have good ratings?”

“There’s a couple of private homes a town or two over that I’d like to look at.”

“Can Walt afford the private homes?”

“On his own, no, but I’ve got some money saved to help make up the difference.

” I force myself to meet her eyes even though every inch of my skin itches with the half-truth I’ve just given her.

It’s not the biggest lie I’ve told, but I hate that it’s a lie at all.

I know I should tell her the truth about me being AJ Doherty, but now doesn’t feel like the right time.

Her eyes return to the brochures, her fingers toying with the edges. “I’d like to help too,” she says so quietly I almost miss it.

“Abbey, it’s not necessary. I’ve lived a pretty cheap lifestyle”—not a lie—“when I say I have some money saved up, it’s a decent amount,” I tell her, placing my hand on her arm.

I love that Abbey wants to help my dad—that he still means so much to her—but I won’t let her spend money she doesn’t have when the truth is that I have more than enough to cover his stay at any facility.

Her eyes lift to mine, studying me. I don’t move, letting her take in whatever she needs. Her mouth opens and closes a few times before her eyes fall back to the brochures. “What have you been doing since you left?” she asks softly, as if she’s afraid of the answer.

“A little bit of everything.” I shrug. Abbey might be afraid of my answer, but part of me fears telling her. Not because I don’t want to share every aspect of what happened over the last seventeen years—and have her share the same with me—but because I don’t want to cause her pain.

I know hearing what I missed out on while I was gone will hurt, maybe more than leaving ever did, but I can’t learn about the woman she’s become without knowing what I missed.

And I want so badly to know the woman Abbey’s become.

From the little bit I’ve learned so far, she’s more amazing than I ever imagined.

“When I first left,” I start, watching her closely for any signs of distress, “I went to this little town about thirty miles north of here, in Pennsylvania. I ended up at this little family-owned inn where I got a job as a dishwasher.”

Her eyes lift to mine, and the interest I see in them keeps me telling her more.

“It’s not the stereotypical tourist town, but they have a higher population in the summer and fall, so they hired me and gave me a place to stay.

The couple who owned the inn had three kids; their oldest was a year older than me, and I think they did it because they would’ve wanted the same for their son if he’d been in my shoes. ”

“Your shoes?”

It’s my turn to look away from her. I don’t know if my words will cause her pain, but I know they’ll cause her discomfort, and I don’t want that. But I also don’t want to lie to her—not anymore.

Stonebridge Hollow felt more like Ashford Falls than any other town I ever stayed in.

Maybe it’s because it realistically wasn’t far from home, and it felt easy enough to go back if I wanted to, but out of all the places I’ve lived—and there have been many—Stonebridge Hollow is the place I would pick if I were looking for a home outside of Ashford Falls—even after staying with Willie and Mae in Minnesota.

“I never told them exactly what happened to make me leave home, but they could see I was hurting, and I think they just wanted to lessen as much stress as they could.” I lift my gaze back to hers, offering a small smile.

“They were good people. It was a good place to land right after everything that happened.”

She’s quiet, her eyes moving over my face as she thinks. I have no idea what’s going through her head, but the look in her eyes is still inquisitive. “How long did you stay there?”

“About three months. I moved on to a new town in Ohio, one a bit bigger than Stonebridge Hollow but still small. There, I got a job cleaning a few businesses in town. It started as just the local lawyer’s office, but he recommended me to a few other people, which helped significantly.

I was only there a couple of months before I ended up in Chicago.

” I shake my head, remembering how much I hated it there.

Not only was it harder to find someone willing to take a shot on a kid, but it was even harder when they saw I hadn’t stayed in my two previous jobs long.

“That’s where I got my first job in construction. I picked up a couple of skills and quickly moved on. I learned definitively in Chicago that city life wasn’t for me.” I notice she’s finished her water and grab the empty glass to refill it. “I think I was only there a month before I moved on.”

She runs her fingers over the rim of the glass, her eyes tracking her movements. “Did you ever stay anywhere long?”

“I stayed in a little town in Minnesota for about six months. I got a job at a local mechanic shop. The owner and his wife let me stay with them and quasi-adopted me,” I tell her honestly. “I never lost contact with Dad, but that first year wasn’t easy.”

“Why?” she blurts.

I fight the smile at the Abbey I used to know peeking through. “He wanted to know what happened, and I wasn’t ready to hear the disappointment in his voice.”

“Jude—”

“I know he would’ve supported and loved me no matter what,” I interrupt. “But I didn’t want him to look at me differently. Though, I think in the end, he still did.”

There was a disappointment I felt from him in our conversations that first year, but it was a disappointment I could live with.

One based on wishing I trusted him enough to tell him what happened.

And I guess, it was always my fear of disappointing a man who did so much for me as a father that kept me from telling him the truth.

To this day, I have no idea what my dad would’ve done if he knew all the details of what led to my and Abbey’s divorce.

I can guess, though, and it would’ve meant losing something he loved and cherished more than most things in his life.

“So, six months in Minnesota?” Abbey asks in the silence, bringing us back to the moment.

“Yeah. From there, I moved all over the country, picking up whatever job I could to support me for however long I was there. If you can think of it, I probably did it. I generally stayed in town for a season before moving on to the next, and I only stayed in smaller towns after Chicago. Though, I found myself hitting some tourist spots along the way.”

“What kind of tourist spots?”

I can’t stop the laugh from breaking through.

“Any and all of them.” And even though we’re supposed to be spending this time looking at the brochures for different nursing homes and scheduling time to visit a few, we spend the next forty minutes before opening the bar talking about all the places I’d been.