Reckless (A Second Chance Romance) Read online

  “I’m sick.”

  “Sick.” The way she said “sick” didn’t sound like cold sick. It sounded…I froze, my hand curled around the handle of the exit door, my body feeling like someone had popped my head off and poured in ice water. “What do you mean sick? Explain.”

  “I mean, I’m not well. It’s been…bad.”

  I checked my phone. Two a.m. No way in hell she’d call me at this time of night if things weren’t terrible.

  “What’s been bad?” I wanted to reach through the phone and shake her, make the words fall out that I needed to know.

  “I’m in the emergency room, sweetheart, and my doctor is insisting that you should come.”

  “What hospital? What’s…” My breath evaporated as I tried to finish the sentence but couldn’t.

  My mom was strong, an independent woman, and she never let on to so much as a cold, much less suffering from it. There was something she wasn’t saying. And I knew she wouldn’t tell me, not unless I dragged it from her. But I was in New York, and she was in Pennsylvania.

  I glanced back over my shoulder at the stage door. We had a break after tonight, four blessed days we’d planned on laying on an anonymous beach somewhere. But fuck that. “I’m coming home.”

  “Oh no, I wasn’t telling you for… for you to come back here. You have the tour. Dates to keep. Fans. I’ll be fine.” Her voice got stronger on that last bit, and that was what told me how bad it actually was. Mom only fought harder the worse things got, which was the reason for our survival when I was a kid. “I just wanted to keep you…up to date.”

  My whirlwind life meant nothing compared to this woman. Compared to what she had done for me, Gaged, the rock star lifestyle, and even the boys were barely a blip. She’d always been the person there for me when no one else was, the one who helped me through not only rough patches but a broken heart. And now she needed me.

  It was time to be the rock. Minus the star.

  “Mom, I don’t want to hear it. I’m on the next flight.”

  “Gage—”

  “Mom. Please, just relax until I get there, okay?”

  I hung up the phone and sought out Ron. He wasn’t going to like this, but tough. No matter where I was in the world, no matter what was going on, my mom came first.

  2

  Kelly

  “You look tired.” Millie, my fellow nurse, narrowed her eyes at me across the hospital bed that held our newest patient. “Are you getting enough sleep?”

  I rolled my head from side to side, trying to stretch the knots out of my shoulders. “Thanks. Just what I want to hear first thing in the morning, that I look like crap.” I hadn’t taken time to cover up the purplish streaks beneath my eyes this morning, and apparently, it showed. “I’ve been sleeping fine, thank you very much.” The lie practically flowed off my tongue.

  “Sure, sure. I’ll believe you, thousands wouldn’t.” She eyed me as she helped the elderly lady we were gowning into the ugly scrap of material and tied it behind her neck. The New Hope Hospital ER wasn’t busy this morning quite yet, but it probably would be since it was Saturday. That was one of the things I loved most about being a float nurse. I never knew where I’d be working or what challenges I would face. It kept me on my toes.

  “I don’t believe you either,” said the shrunken form in the bed, her blue-gray hair curled into tight rings.

  I stopped short and looked into intelligent, faded blue eyes that blinked up at me innocently. She was so adorable that I couldn’t help but smile.

  Before I could respond, Millie went on, “I do worry about you, you know. You do always seem…I don’t know, sad, I suppose.”

  “You have a lost look in your eyes,” our patient piped in.

  I frowned and checked her chart. Violet Wade. Four surviving children.

  “That’s just the mother in you,” I said to Millie and darted my eyes to Miss Violet, “and you. Looking for reasons to worry.” I gave Millie a shut-up look. “Now, let’s focus on our patient.”

  Millie planted her hand on her hip. “Yeah, I suppose you could be right. But that’s because I have two teenage boys who give me a reason to worry then refuse to speak to me. You’re twenty-six years younger than me. I technically could be your mother.”

  “Listen to your mother, dear,” our patient said as her eyes dipped closed.

  I tried to strangle back the laugh. “I have a mother, thank you very much. She’s not here, but thanks for reminding me that I need to call her on break.”

  “What a sweet little dear, calling her mother,” came from the hospital bed.

  Unlike our patient, Millie wasn’t buying my bullshit. “What are you calling her for this time? You just called her on break.”

  I chewed my bottom lip, searching for a cover. “If you must know, I needed to make sure she called that plumber. I was up late last night trying to get the faucet to stop running continuously, so excuse me if I didn’t get a full eight hours.”

  “Sounds like you’re the mother.”

  I shot a bemused glance at the old lady in the bed, wondering if Millie had conspired with her to take her side. Millie was always telling me to lighten up, to go out, that I’d only be twenty-three once and that I should find me a man and “get it on.” I squirmed just thinking about the words coming from her mouth.

  “So, you haven’t been sleeping. Well, if your mother isn’t checking up on you, and quite the opposite, why shouldn’t I? Is everything all right?”

  The usual response of I’m fine bubbled to the edge of my lips, but today, I couldn’t manage to spill the lie. I knew I’d reached the end of what I could handle and needed to let off some steam before it boiled my insides.

  “I don’t know,” I replied instead. “Not really. I had a dream about the…accident last night. But instead of it changing everything, it replayed in reverse, then everything went back to normal.” I clamped down on the desperate sob that threatened to escape my chest.

  “Accident? Honey, we need to get you to the hospital.” Violet’s eyes were out of focus now, the fever she’d come in with taking over. I wondered what she’d been like before lung cancer had marched in and taken over her life. She seemed like a pistol. But now, after…she was just so sad.

  Of course, my own life could easily be divided into two sections: before and after.

  If I closed my eyes for long enough, I could transport myself back to the before time. Which was exactly what the dream had done, reversed the after to before. For a glorious thirty seconds after waking, I’d thought it was a normal day, one where before was now. Then the truth hit me like an angry semi-truck.

  “Is it the anniversary? I can’t believe that’s come around already. I’m sorry, doll.”

  “Sorry, doll.” Miss Violet patted my arm.

  I patted her hand back, the fragile skin feeling so very thin beneath my touch. “No, it’s not the anniversary. I don’t know why I had the dream. I’ve just been…pensive, I guess.”

  “Kelly, you lost your father and your brother in a senseless accident. I’m surprised it doesn’t affect you more. I’m always amazed at how strong you are. You’re allowed to have an off day every now and again. Or even take an actual day off work.”

  I shrugged. I was sixteen years old when my life was torn to shreds. When I’d been forced to become the head of household because half my family was gone and my mother checked out, as if her will to live had gone with them. The memory of that night would never leave me.

  On my period, I had cramps and was bitchy, so when I normally would have ridden along, Dad went to pick up my brother from basketball practice alone. And they were late. Very late. Neither were answering their phones—we’d tried calling and texting numerous times.

  The night streamed through the windows, the blackness outside taunting Mom and me with its empty silence. Mom paced the lovingly placed hand-hewn planks of the living room floor in endless worry.

  I checked the time again—almost midnight—as I had
every five minutes, waiting for the familiar sound of a key sliding into the front door lock, not daring to say what I was thinking.

  Mom let out a relieved, “Oh!” as a car turned into the gravel drive.

  But it wasn’t Dad. It was the Hickory County Sheriff who banged on the door and delivered the devastating news.

  A drunk driver.

  A kid coming back from a party, who’d over imbibed, crossed the yellow line.

  He’d died on impact, taking half my family with him only hours later.

  At first, I’d refused to believe it, even as my mother screamed and sank to the floor.

  After, when the double funeral was over, as my mother lay in bed, zonked on a prescription that had held her together through the proceedings, I told myself to focus on the one positive thing: they hadn’t suffered. Maybe they were the lucky ones. Lucky because I could see nothing but a long empty space of suffering for us, the ones left behind. We would be expected to pick ourselves up and go on, live our lives in the best manner we could.

  Maybe I did that, lived as best as I could, but I could never get back to the me I’d been before. Not really. I’d never been exactly reckless, but now, you couldn’t shove me from my comfort zone with a bulldozer.

  “How is your mom these days?” Millie continued. “I know she’s still relying on you a lot.”

  I nodded slowly. I’d been her rock ever since that day. I supposed we clung to each other, probably in an unhealthy way, but we were all we had left. “Yeah, I still see her almost every day and do the odd things around the house she can’t do herself.”

  After a great deal of consideration, I’d finally moved out last year. Distanced myself so she would be forced to do some things herself. It helped some, but I still went over and made sure her bills were paid, that she was eating, not living in filth.

  “Can I ask you something?”

  I glanced down at our patient again, who was watching me in what looked to be eager curiosity. “Maybe we should focus on Miss Violet first,” I said cautiously, unsure what direction my friend might take our conversation.

  Miss Violet had other ideas. “Please do go on, dear. It’s nice to be part of something interesting. It takes my mind off of…” she waved her hand to indicate the room, “everything.”

  I searched her sweet face and sighed before looking back at my friend. “Ask away, Millie.” I knew it would do no good to change the subject. Millie was like a hawk sighted in on a mouse when she had her mind set on an issue.

  “Where do you think your life would be if it hadn’t been for the accident? Would you still be an RN? Was that your dream?”

  I plumped the pillow I’d just slipped into its case, giving it an overly hard whack. I smiled, recalling what my naïve plan had been once upon a time. “I was actually going to follow a famous rock group around the world. Maybe even write a novel or two along the way.”

  Millie tossed her head back, and mirth burst from her like fireworks. “Oh yeah? Teenage dreams! Any band in particular?” My breath froze in my chest as she jammed her fists on her hips again, giving me a hard look. “And what’s keeping you from writing right here? I’m sure you would be amazing at it.”

  I had to turn away so Millie wouldn’t see the tears that pricked my eyes. “No band in particular.”

  Another lie because my mind was screaming one word…Gaged.

  God, even thinking the name burned like a stuck bandage being ripped off. Which was why I hadn’t listened to a rock channel in years. “Just a silly, naïve girl’s dream. And I don’t have any time to write. I like being a nurse much better.”

  Millie frowned. “No rock. No days off. No boyfriend. You’re living the life of an old woman, and you’re barely two decades.”

  “Fuddy dud.” Violet’s finger pointed at me, and she mumbled, “You’re gonna be an old maid. You better get you a man while you still got your bait.”

  “My…my bait?” I leaned over her and frowned, wondering if her temperature was spiking. Did she think she was going fishing?

  The little lady’s eyes focused on me. “Your bait, girl! Your looks, your attractiveness.” Her head lifted up off the bed, and she whispered, “Your baby maker.”

  I held back a surprised snort. Baby maker? “Uh, my bait got lost a long time ago.”

  Millie came around to my side of the bed. “Hon, you just think it did.”

  “Yeah, you just think it,” Violet agreed. “You could reel you in a big one if you just wiggled your bait a bit. It’s still there.”

  My mouth fell open.

  I wasn’t going to try to figure out if she was talking about my bait, or some other part of my anatomy that might be prone to wiggling. I wasn’t what you’d call skinny, or what you’d call fat. Just in between. I was always in between something.

  Millie gave me a finger wave and exited the room, leaving me with our patient.

  “Well, you gonna wiggle that bait or not?” Violet cackled. “Men your age are getting snapped up and married off quick. Before long, there won’t be any left but the ones who got thrown back. Wiggle! And it wouldn’t hurt to jerk the bait away and let it float back in front of their face again.”

  “Their?” I gave a very unprofessional snort.” As in plural?”

  Violet smiled, showing perfect dentures. “Why, honey, with a little blusher here, a little mascara there, you’ll have more biters than usual.” My entire face grew warm, nullifying any need for color on my cheeks. Violet frowned, her keen expression examining my features. “You do already have biters, don’t you, dear?” When I just stared at her, she gasped. “Any biters at all? Ever?” I continued to stare, unsure how to answer her. She clasped my hand. “Honey, have you ever been with a man?”

  I looked up at Millie, who was staring at me just as intently, and I wanted to run screaming from the room. This sweet little lady was a patient under my care, so I stayed and turned my attention to her IV tubing. “My sex life or lack thereof is none of your beeswax.”

  She gave me a sideways look, like she agreed and would tuck the subject away, but reserved the right to butt in any time she wanted. She had the grace and dignity to change the subject. “So, you were going to be one of those lucky people who managed to escape New Hope?”

  I offered her a one-shouldered shrug. “I don’t mind New Hope, there are worse places to be. It’s probably good that I ended up at Bucks Community College.”

  “Hmmm, sure, but for a beautiful girl like you, there is a whole world out there.”

  I again swallowed back the urge to tell her to mind her own business. “I think New Hope is perfect. The hospital isn’t too big, we don’t often get anything too dramatic to deal with.” I pinned her with a one-eyebrow-hoisted look. “I enjoy the work. I love helping people, even if I don’t save lives on a daily basis.”

  It beat sitting around on a smelly tour bus. Even if I would’ve loved it purely because it would have meant I was with Gage.

  I clenched my teeth as the memory of our breakup rolled over me unmercifully.

  The morning after the worst day of my life, just after my friend’s mom had taken me home so I could get some rest, Gage came to the house.

  I was staring out the window, wishing it would snow so I’d have something besides dead trees to look at. Everything outside was dead—just like my dad and my brother. With my back turned, he couldn’t see my face when he spilled his news.

  “This awesome band just made me an offer. They want me to sing lead. They just lost their singer and are in the middle of a tour, so I’ll have to be on the road for a while, but it’ll be worth it cause when I get back…” I could hear him take a step toward me on the carpet. I was going to lose him too. Well, why not? Everything was dead, even my heart, after all. “Kelly?”

  I didn’t think I had any more feelings left in my body, but at his words, what little composure I had left tore in two.

  I’d just lost the two most important men in my life, my existence as I knew it had come
to an end. It wasn’t Gage’s fault he hadn’t heard about the accident, had come to my house the morning after and announced he’d been headhunted into a band.

  He had a right to be happy. Leaving New Hope and being a rock star had been his dream, after all.

  A day ago, before, I would have been certain I was going with him. But now…after…

  He received the brunt of every emotion that had been roiling just under the surface of my skin all night as I accompanied my mother to the morgue then sat in her hospital room after she was sedated. Writing two obituaries.

  In clipped sentences, the horror of the previous twenty-four hours slipped from my tongue, my insides nothing but ice.

  He tried to take me into his arms, but I pummeled him with my fists.

  “Go! Just go. I don’t ever want to see your face again,” I sobbed, feeling nothing but cold air under my feet where he’d ripped out what was left of the floor with his announcement.

  “I’m sorry, Kelly, I didn’t know. I-I’ll stay. I’ll turn them down.”

  I couldn’t let him do that. Even under the heavy weight of my immense pain, I knew I couldn’t hold him back from his dream. And I knew I couldn’t go with him.

  So I did the only thing I could think of.

  “No, Gage, please. I know how badly you want this. Just go. Please, go.” I knew he wanted it. I could see the excitement tamped down in his eyes, underneath his pity for me.

  He kept promising to stay, but I couldn’t take the brunt of that decision. What if he could really make it and he gave it up to stay with me? The girl whose family might still be alive if she’d just gone to pick up Stephen with Dad as usual. They might have taken a different route, stopped at the store, any number of things.

  Guilt stabbed deep and responsibility weighed heavy. In a matter of hours, I’d become cold and stern and weighted down, so heavy with what I faced that I didn’t recognize myself. Dad and Stephen’s funeral only made me worse. Mom’s slipped under the waters of depression, she couldn’t cope. Too much rested on my shoulders, and I couldn’t see anything but the black hole of death. Nothing else, including Gage, mattered.