Deep River Promise, Jackie Ashenden [large ebook reader .TXT] 📗

It wasn’t a question, and he saw no reason to answer. It was the truth after all.

“I’m sorry,” he said, knowing it was pointless. Knowing it didn’t mean anything but saying it anyway. “It’s better this way.”

Her gaze was very steady in the fading light. “I’m sorry too.”

He wished he could say something that would make her feel better, but he couldn’t think of anything that would help. “If things were different…”

“But they’re not different,” she finished. “It’s okay.” She turned away to the door of her office, and then stopped. Then she turned her head to look at him, and for a second her eyes glittered. “No, actually, it’s not okay. I know we haven’t known each other very long and you’ve had a really hard time. But I think you were wrong when you said love wasn’t something you could do anymore.”

His heartbeat thumped in his head. “What?”

“You said you would have loved me if you’d been able to, but love wasn’t something you could do. I think you’re wrong, Damon. You’ve done nothing but care since you got here. Caring about Cal and what he asked you to do. Caring about Connor. Caring about this town. Caring about me.” She gazed at him as if she was seeing things in him that even he didn’t know about. “You have so much love inside you, Damon Fitzgerald. I can see it every time I look at you.”

He stiffened in instinctive denial. “No. Whatever you think you’re seeing…it’s not that.”

“It is. But I get why you think it isn’t.” She gave him the saddest smile he’d ever seen, and it almost broke his heart. “Just remember that love isn’t finite and you don’t ever lose the ability. It’s always there, always part of you. It’s just that sometimes fear gets in the way.”

“I’m not afraid,” he said through gritted teeth, as if he said it enough times it would be true.

Astrid let out a breath. “Don’t worry. I’ll let you go now.” She turned away, pulling open the door. “Goodbye, Damon,” she said and disappeared inside.

He stared at the closed door, pain tearing at his chest. He’d let her down and he knew it. But there wasn’t another way.

She was wrong about all of it.

Damon turned on his heel and walked back to the boardwalk, heading for the docks.

Kevin Anderson only nodded as Damon approached to ask for a trip over the river. It seemed to take too long and yet no time at all, and then he was moving in the growing dark to the hangar, where the Cessna sat waiting.

He began the usual preflight checks and then stopped. He hurt. Everywhere. And there was no good reason for it. No reason at all.

Astrid was wrong. There was no love left inside him, no spark in that dead hearth. It was all gone, sucked out of him by the endless demands of Ella’s illness and then her death, by the grief that had swamped him and by the lack of support that he’d had afterward. There was nothing left but meaningless smiles and empty charm.

His phone beeped in his pocket. He took it out, glancing down at the screen to find that he had service. And then prompted by an urge that came from God only knew where, he found himself pressing his mother’s number.

She answered almost straightaway.

“Hey, Mom,” he said.

“Damon? Is that you?” Her voice was so familiar, that Texas drawl she’d never left behind.

“Of course it’s me,” he said. “Who else calls you ‘Mom’?”

“Huh, well, you never know.”

“Look, I’m heading to Juneau now, which means I’ll be back in LA pretty soon.”

“Good,” she said. “I need to talk to you about the strangest phone call I got yesterday.”

Oh hell.

Damon closed his eyes briefly. “What phone call?”

“From a child. At least, I think it was a child. He was telling me about some town in Alaska called Deep River and how wonderful it was, and that you were there and you liked it.”

His mother knew where he was, but sometimes she forgot.

“Yeah, I’m there right now. But I’m leaving to come home.”

“He said I would like it. That there was a house with a porch and a chair on it. And there were mountains I could look at. And he would come visit every day.” She sounded curious. “I don’t know why he would, but I do like talking to young people.”

“He shouldn’t have called you,” Damon said through gritted teeth.

“Why did he? I wasn’t sure what he wanted.”

Damon sat down on the concrete of the hangar floor and leaned against the little plane’s front wheel. The pain refused to leave him, sitting heavily in his chest like the mountains surrounding the town, and he knew he shouldn’t have this conversation. His mother had never been able to deal with her own emotions very well, let alone his, and it was unfair of him to unload his issues on her. But he was tired of holding it all inside. So goddamn tired.

“He wants me to stay in Deep River,” Damon said. “And I told him I couldn’t because of you.”

That’s not really why.

He ignored the thought.

“Huh.” She sounded unfazed by this. “Why because of me?”

“Because you’re sick, Mom. And you need someone to take care of you.”

She gave a snort, as if that was the most preposterous thing she’d ever heard. “Where’s his father?”

Of course she didn’t want to talk about her illness. She never did.

“His father died,” Damon said flatly.

“What about his mother?”

The pressure in his chest became wrenching. “He lives with her. She’s a single mom, brought him up on her own. Very strong. Very capable.”

“She sounds decent,” his mother pronounced. “Why does he want you?”

Anger suddenly coiled inside him, hot and raw, and he didn’t have the energy to keep it down, not right now. “I don’t know, Mom. Why would he want me? There’s no reason, is there? I’m no use to him. No use to Rebecca. No use to Ella. And