General Joe (Magnolia Ridge 2)

I remember seeing it snowing outside, and when I pointed it out, Kayla nearly came out of her skin with excitement. She pulled me outside and we had a snowball fight in the front yard in the middle of the night. At one point, I nailed her in the back and she started to fall. I ran over and caught her, but she ended up taking both of us down and we fell into the snow laughing.

I rolled her over so I was on top, and when I looked down at her I saw she’d become more than just a little sister who made me sing Disney songs in the car on full blast. I saw a woman below me that I loved more than my own life and everything changed. What I wanted to do out there in the snow would have broken everything we’d built and change our little family forever.

I left the next morning without even saying goodbye because I couldn’t look her or Chief in the eye. I didn’t even bother to open my Christmas presents and took the coward’s way out. It’s not something I’m proud of, but I would have been more ashamed if I’d stayed.

That’s when the letters began.

Kayla had always sent me a few letters and care packages when I was on deployment, but never this many and never writing so many things I shouldn’t have read. Things I couldn’t stop reading.

I’ve been gone from home for a long time and I’ve finally ended my service. My plan before this all started was to come back and then figure out where in the world I wanted to go. I dreamed about living in another country for a few years or just traveling until I found the place I loved most. But the longer I pictured what my life would be like, the more I couldn’t picture it without her.

She’s too damn young to know what she wants and she doesn’t deserve an old man like me holding her back. Her father is a damn good man and someone I consider a father and mentor. There isn’t anything I would do to break his trust, but my head and my heart are at war. I may not be the thing that’s best for her, but I know I won’t let anyone else try and do better.

“Hey, Joe, you back in town?” Amelia from the diner calls as I walk by the storefront.

“Yep, trying to find Kayla. You seen her?” I shove my hands in my jeans as she smiles at me.

“I might have seen her ducking out the back of the jailhouse a little bit ago. Can’t say where she went afterwards, but if I were you, I’d check the gazebo by the park.”

“She still likes to sketch out there?”

“It’s almost like she’s got something on her mind she can’t seem to shake.” Amelia raises an eyebrow. “Funny, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.” I nod my thanks as I get in my truck and go toward the park.

Small towns love good gossip, but I don’t give in to Amelia’s bait. The thing I do love about small towns is they’re only so big.

Kayla is running out of hiding places.

Chapter Two

Kayla

“What is wrong with me?” I throw my arm over my eyes as I lie under the gazebo. I’m running out of places to hide. For so long I’ve been waiting for Joe to come back home. Now that he’s here, I’ve spent the last two days hiding from him. Never in all the time that I sent things to Joe did I think I’d be running from him. I’m acting like a coward.

Before now it was all a fantasy and I could live in an imaginary world. One in which I’d made myself believe Joe had this long-lost love for me, that he held out on love for me. I imagined one day he’d come home and confess it all, but now it all could come to an end and I’m not ready. I’d rather live in my made-up world than face the reality that Joe isn’t mine.

Life has been full of too many heartaches and I’m not sure I can face another. Living in the world of make believe is so much easier. In that space no one died or left me. I know I’m fighting the inevitable and I can’t avoid Joe forever. Unless I can hide until he leaves for another deployment.

I can’t let my heart think that he’s out of the Marines and finally coming home. The possibility of seeing him every day, even if he isn’t mine, is too much. Although I wouldn’t have this constant worry that he could get hurt and we’d get a call that something bad happened to him.

If anything, this should send me running to him because you never know when it might be the last time you see someone. I don’t know if I can risk falling more in love with him. The hurt could ruin me.