Chasing River

I guess I can understand how River might not think anything of climbing into a car with his brother, to head to a place where he’d learn how to shoot guns.

But it doesn’t sound like his brother was ever just in it for the target practice.

And here, I’ve always thought Jesse was a problem sibling. At least he never tried tangling me in his messes. Not that he’d ever be able to, anyway.

And yet River has.

I just lied to the police for him.

I’ve had a fling with an Irish bartender who spent eighteen months in a maximum security prison for weapons charges due to IRA affiliations, and I lied to protect him. River has somehow managed to push me off course, and I need to get back on. I need to feel like me again.

The problem is, as I lie here and stare at the guy lying beside me—not the convict, but the guy who saved my life and got injured in the process, who charmed me with his kindness and his smile, who swept me off my feet with his romantic storytelling, who proved to me exactly how quickly I could become deeply intimate with a man—I don’t see how I can do that.

It’s so hard not to judge River for what he’s done, and how he’s lied.

And yet it’s hard to judge him after everything else he’s done for me.

Maybe I should reserve judgment for the time being.

I just don’t know.

And so I simply watch River sleep, until those thick lashes begin to flutter, and his strong limbs stretch.

And then those green eyes open to meet mine. Silently pleading for me to believe him, in the same way they did almost a week ago. He doesn’t say anything, and neither do I. We simply stare at each other, trying to read what the other is thinking. I’m not afraid of him anymore. For those first five minutes last night, finding him in my house, I was absolutely terrified. I wanted to run, hide, scream.

I’m glad I didn’t, though. I needed to hear what he had to say.

Our moment is interrupted by the sound of ringing.

He sighs in exasperation.

“What time do you have to be at work?” I ask.

He doesn’t answer me. He slips the phone out and puts it to his ear, his morning voice extra deep and scratchy. “Yeah . . . No . . . Can you cover for me today? . . . Thanks, Rowen.” He drops his phone on the nightstand beside him. “I don’t. Not today.”

“You’re taking the day off?”

He reaches over, running the tips of his fingers over mine, still splattered with every color of spray paint I touched last night, which I didn’t have a chance to wash off.

I could pull away. That voice in the back of my mind tells me I should.

But I don’t.

“I think we could both use a day away from all this. Together.” He slips his long fingers through mine. “What do ya say?”

I could say no. That voice in the back of my mind tells me I should.

“Okay.”

His eyes roam my face, which I’m sure is streaked with mascara and dried tears, hovering over my lips. I see the question—and the wish—in his eyes, but he doesn’t try anything.

I break off a piece of bacon. The plate of food and a coffee were waiting for me on my nightstand when I emerged from the bathroom. Which means River left and came back in the time that I had showered. While my appetite hasn’t been fully restored, I’m hungry enough to pick away at this.

“Do you mind?”

I glance over my shoulder in time to see River yank his T-shirt off over his head. The sight of him still makes me catch my breath. Even with that phoenix, now that I know what it represents. “Go ahead.”

“I won’t be more than ten minutes.”

I watch him disappear behind the door, the wounds on his back still red and wearing stitches. The rush of water sounds a moment later, and my mind begins to wander with memories of his jeans falling off him.

Jeez, Amber.

Shaking my head at myself, I open up the closet to peruse my clothing options. There aren’t many; the pile of laundry in the corner grows every day. I’m normally so on top of things like that. Finally settling on a royal-blue summer dress, I throw it on quickly, hoping it’s suitable for a trip into the mountains. The hemline sits high on my thighs. River loves my thighs; he’s told me many times.

Subconsciously, that’s probably why I’ve chosen it, I admit to myself. Even if our little fairy tale is dead.

How awkward is today going to be? Most guys would want nothing to do with a day like this, now that the chances of it ending in any kind of sex are long gone. So why does he still want to spend time with me?

A memory pokes its ugly head out. The memory of Alex being left in the mountains to die.

I push it away because I know River wouldn’t do that. A guy who takes shrapnel for a stranger instead of running won’t then kill the same person to protect his secret.

Right?

The shower’s still running.

I quickly reach for my phone.

I’m heading to Wicklow Mountains with River today. If something should happen to me, find Detective Garda Garret Duffy. And don’t ask questions. Please.

If there’s one person who wouldn’t freak out from a text like that, I’m guessing it’s Ivy.

With that small safeguard out of the way, I finish getting ready.

River falls into step beside me as I head down the narrow, gravel path of the Glendalough Monastery, the tombstones flanking us covered with fine moss, the engravings mostly illegible, the corners rounded. The hour-long drive along the narrow country roads south of Dublin has been quiet but oddly peaceful. Neither of us attempted idle conversation, an unspoken understanding that we’re not ready for that.

Now I take pictures of the ruins—what was once a church but is now only a grouping of stone walls; a tall, narrow Rapunzel tower where the monks apparently hid during attacks—and read the few legible markings, and eavesdrop on the various tour groups milling about. But my mind’s not really here. I’m still trying to make sense of River.

I did ask for the truth.

Every once in a while, I’ll look at him and wonder what he looked like in handcuffs, in an orange jumpsuit—or whatever prison inmates in Ireland wear. The thought makes me sad. This is a guy who yesterday I was actually considering changing all of my travel plans for.

The toe of my boot catches a large rock near a half wall of stone and I stumble. River’s hands are there immediately to catch me, saving me from smashing into more stone.

Always saving me from something.

“Thanks,” I offer with a small smile, inhaling the bit of cologne on his clothes, as his hands linger against my skin a touch longer than necessary before pulling away. Stirring my blood, despite my heavy thoughts. We continue on as if nothing happened, past the last of the ruins and toward the wooded trail that leads to the two glacial lakes. Must-sees, according to the tour guides I just overheard.

“I hate cemeteries,” he finally says in a mumble.

“This one was beautiful, you have to admit.”

“I spent plenty of time in old cemeteries, growing up.” His eyes flash to me. “Ma likes to pay her respects to her relatives, and she’s got a lot of them in the ground.”

I hadn’t really given much thought to his parents in all of this, until now. “How did your parents handle you and Aengus going away?”

“Da has always had high blood pressure. The night we were arrested, he had a heart attack.” Knowing eyes flash to me. “So . . . not well. Our uncle Samuel had died some years before, and Da had nobody to help run the pub except Ma and Rowen. Rowen wasn’t even out of high school yet and he was there every night and weekend. He was supposed to go straight to college, but he set that aside, practically living in Delaney’s so my dad wouldn’t have to work, on account of his health.”