Lorelie Brown - Riding the Wave

Something fluttered deep in Avalon’s chest. Home. Yeah, this was home. She’d made the right choice. “Yep.”

“Good. I’m making pesto pasta.”

“My favorite.” She managed to keep the thickening out of her voice, but there was no doubt her eyes watered a little.

“That would be why I’m making it.” Her hand flew out and wrapped around Avalon’s wrist in a gentle grip. “Hey.” She tugged Avalon around and down, then kissed her cheek. “Everything happens for a reason. There’s no such thing as chance.”

Avalon shook her head. “I don’t like this one. It hurts.”

Eileen sighed. Her eyes were the same color as Tanner’s. Avalon hadn’t quite noticed before and it hurt. Badly. “Tanner is so much like his father. I always knew that was why they stopped talking. The excuse doesn’t matter. And for all his faults . . . for all his mistakes . . . Hank always made me feel special.”

Avalon’s eyes burned with the force of the tears she held back. She shook her head again, as if that would matter, then shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. Done is done.”

Eileen patted her cheek. “You’ll always be a daughter of my heart. The rest is details.”

Avalon wrapped her arms around Eileen and squeezed. The older woman rubbed Avalon’s back. The warmth that spread through Avalon was as close to comfort as she’d gotten in the last few days. But at least it was better than nothing.

She felt sort of traitorous for wanting Tanner’s arms. The feeling wasn’t at all the same.

Finally she wiped at her eyes, then pulled back. “See ya.”

Eileen gave a wistful smile as she waved.

But getting out of the house wasn’t near that easy. An atom bomb waited on her in the kitchen.

Tanner.

He looked so good, it shouldn’t be allowed. The charcoal gray pants and green button-down made as nice an outfit as Jack could have picked out, but Tanner wore it with aplomb. With his hands spread to each side of his hips, curled around the tile edge of the counter, he leaned back. The length of his legs stretched out before him, crossed at the ankles. A pair of metallic-sheened sunglasses covered his eyes, but the curve of his mouth was soft.

Everything relaxed. Not a care in the world. Because he was the motherfucking world champion.

Avalon’s movements became sharp, her steps like mincing through a pool of pudding, every step a slog. Fucker. Bright, hot anger rushed through her.

Anger was easier, after everything.

She slapped the flap of her camera bag shut, then slung it over her shoulder. The pain arrowing up the back of her head would give her an awful headache soon.

“Avalon.” Tanner’s big, warm hand curved around her shoulder. With one tug, he turned her around. The heat of his hand burned into her flesh. Part comfort and twice that much pain. “You’re not even going to talk to me now?”

“I need a little distance.” At least her voice came out steady and calm. Nothing of the mess inside her. “Besides, I’ve got to go to the meeting.”

He glanced down at her, taking in the slim pencil- cut skirt that stopped below her knees and the red silk blouse. “You look amazing.”

She managed to snort. The strap of her camera bag dragged the blouse all out of alignment. And she didn’t want to admit how good it felt to hear it from Tanner. She still wanted him. Which meant she wanted him to want her as well, as convoluted as that might be. “I clean up nicely.”

“No.” He caught the side of her face in his cupped fingers. His gaze bore into hers with an intensity that zinged all the way down to her toes. “You look gorgeous. Don’t blow it off.”

Her breath caught in her chest. But it wasn’t enough. That gaping, angry place within needed something more to hold on to. “What exactly are you saying, Tanner?”

He shifted on his feet. When he shook his head, it looked more like he was trying to shake free of some confusion. But he still didn’t remove his hand from her cheek. Instead, he flipped it over and trailed the back of his knuckles over her jaw. “I’m not sure. I know I miss you.”

She swallowed down the threatening tears. Part of her wondered why this wasn’t enough. This, right here. The moment when Tanner came to her and said that he missed her.

But the truth was: It still wasn’t what she needed.

She needed to know he wouldn’t let her down. Maybe the expectation of an end was part her own problem, but goddamn had it hurt when he’d just started in on her, and he’d assumed she’d been operating from the worst possible motives. He’d been quite ready to let her walk out, hadn’t he, without even a word of protest?

She needed someone who’d make life better for her. Who didn’t assume she’d be the one to make everything better for him.

More than that. She deserved someone who’d have her needs in mind.

Maybe her mom hadn’t and maybe Matthew hadn’t, but that didn’t mean she shouldn’t get someone who would.

She shuffled around in the outside pocket of her bag until her fingers curled around the chunky hard drive. Pulling Tanner’s hand from her face was one of the hardest things she’d ever had to do. Winding her fingers through his would be entirely more natural. Instead she spread them open, so his hand was held up.

Setting the drive in the middle of his palm, she folded his fingers over it. He watched her with a fine line of worry between his eyes, like he didn’t exactly understand what she was doing.

That was fine. She didn’t know, either.

“I’m not going to lie and say I’m not glad you miss me.” She smiled a little at that. “But it’s not enough. Call me if you figure the rest out. Or don’t. And we’ll be friends again in a little while.”

“Avalon . . .”

She lifted her brows, waiting for him to finish. Instead his voice trailed off. All gone. She didn’t get him after all.

And damned if that didn’t hurt a little bit all over again. That somewhere within her had been a tiny well of hope that he’d fight for her. Fight with her.

She stretched up on her toes, until her calves strained. She meant only to brush a kiss over his cheek, but at the last second Tanner turned his head. Took her mouth.

Flash-fire incendiary. Everything they’d been together. Exactly how they’d ended up in this tangled mess in the first place. Avalon’s lips clung to his, trying to drink in a last measure of his calm. But there was no more to be had, at least not when his kiss also made her want to cry.

She pulled away. There was a tiny smudge of red lipstick across his bottom lip. She wiped it away with her thumb, her fingers folded over his sharp jaw. The line of his scar pulled. So damned stubborn. Why couldn’t part of that stubbornness be for her?

She wanted to say something else, to put a point on the moment. A statement that would end things with a good flounce.

But in the end she only walked away.

Tanner’s gaze burned into her from behind as she slipped out of the kitchen. Her heels clattered on the tile, making the only noise in the house.

The bright, sunny day she found outside sure didn’t feel right when compared to the mess swirling around inside her. Birds even had the audacity to chirp and sing as they swooped down the street.

She didn’t slam the front door. No point. Everything was said and done.

Tanner bounced the external drive in the palm of his hand. Avalon was gone.

He’d have to decide for how long.

He found his mom out on her patio. She spent uncountable hours out there. When he was younger, Tanner had never understood why anyone would hang out somewhere that was practically walled in when there was an entire beach a block away.

She was lying in the hammock, but to Tanner’s eyes she didn’t look particularly relaxed. There was still white strain at her knuckles, curled around the edge of the net, and the tendons along her throat were as sharp as he’d ever seen them. Even the time he’d been caught sneaking out of the house at three thirty to catch the front wall of a storm surge.

“Hey.”

When her eyes opened, she smiled. “It’s nice to have you here.”

“You’ve said that before.” He tugged a chair up beside the hammock and dropped into it. Sun-warmed metal still didn’t come anywhere close to warming up his flesh after that moment in the kitchen.

He knew what that had been. Avalon saying good-bye. Yeah, maybe they’d see each other here and there, including at the WavePro meeting in less than an hour, but that wasn’t the same. She wasn’t going to be his anymore.

He didn’t know if he could take that.

“It’s still true.” Eileen laced her slender fingers behind her head. “It’s nice that you feel able to come and go. That’s always been one of my biggest goals. To have a life where my children were comfortable with me. Happy and well adjusted is a bonus.”

“Am I well adjusted?”

Eileen looked at him out the corner of her eyes. “Nope. Not really.”

He cut his gaze up to the pale blue sky. A tiny cloud peeked out over the roofline. “Thanks, Mom.”

His mom shrugged, but then she pushed up to a seated position, her legs dangling over the edge of the hammock. For a moment, in her tiny white Keds and pale pink shorts, she looked surprisingly like a teenager. “Son, you’re the one who won a worldwide championship two days ago. But you look like your favorite toy got broken in half by the schoolyard bully.”

It was more like he missed Avalon already. He could still taste her on his mouth.

Half that choice had been his, though. He’d known what she wanted. Some declaration. For him to own up to his part in their fight.