Chapter Eight
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As they dressed and made their way slowly back to the bunkhouse, Kai once more wished he could read Addison’s mind. She held his hand tightly, as if trying to keep the connection between them, but her face was a study of worry and doubt that sent his stomach sinking.
Together, they’d been amazing. Moving into a rhythm so easily. Bringing each other such pleasure without any awkwardness or missteps. What had her so worried?
Was it because they’d known each other for such a short time?
Addison was a mess of contradictions. Sometimes she seemed so free and easy. Sometimes so caught up in her concerns. He wished he knew everything about her so he could guess what she’d do next.
“Are you okay?” he finally asked when they were nearing the camp.
“Yeah.” She kept her gaze on the ground in front of them. “Yeah, I think so.”
“You don’t sound too sure.” He stopped, and she did, too. “What’s wrong? Are you regretting—?”
“No!”
Kai hesitated. He’d never heard her say that before.
“No,” Addison repeated. “It’s not that at all. It’s just… do I… do I fit here?”
“Of course you fit here.” Couldn’t she see that?
“In what way?”
Kai bit back a curse. He shouldn’t have to explain it. “We just made love—twice.”
Addison’s brows came together. “I don’t mean with you. I mean here—at Base Camp.”
“Isn’t it the same thing?”
“No.”
The ground dropped out beneath his feet, and Kai fought to regain his balance. Just a few minutes ago he’d been at the top of the world, convinced he’d found the one woman he could share his life with. And now she was questioning if she even belonged here at all?
“Why did you even come here?” He didn’t mean to sound so angry, but this was his life they were talking about. More than that—
His heart.
She turned away, and Kai pursued her.
“Addison. Why the hell did you apply to be my wife when you thought the whole thing was a joke?”
“I… I don’t know.”
“That’s not good enough.”
“it’s just… I wanted a different life.”
Okay, he could understand that. Kai tried to calm down. “And now you’re wondering if it’s the right life? Is that it?”
She turned to face him. “Yes. It’s all moving so fast, and it’s different than I thought it would be, and you’re asking me to make a huge decision after a couple of days.”
“You’ve been here a week and a half!”
Addison’s eyebrows shot up, and she quickly bit her lip. Kai’s jaw tightened. Was she—was she laughing at him?
He replayed the words he’d said in his mind. Found his own lips quirking.
Hell. A week and a half.
“Okay, that’s not a lot of time,” he conceded. “But you knew when you applied those were the terms.”
“Except I thought it wasn’t real,” she reminded him. “Now I know it is. I have to be sure.”
“You let me make love to you.” He moved closer to her again.
“And it was wonderful.”
He set his hands on her waist, willing her to know that was the most important thing. “When will you know?”
“Soon. I promise.”
“I’m going to hold you to that.”
He bent down and kissed her again.
It was a long time before they stopped kissing and continued back to the bunkhouse. When Addison’s phone rang, she swiftly pulled it out, grateful for the interruption. It was her parents’ number, however, and Addison hesitated before taking the call. She hadn’t told them anything about this trip, except to say she was traveling to see a friend. She knew her parents would have all kinds of questions if they knew she’d quit her job, left her apartment and gone to hang out with a strange man on a television show. Luckily, they’d never been fans of Base Camp.
“Hi, Mom,” she said brightly, waving Kai on.
“Meet you in the kitchen,” he told her, and she nodded.
“Addison Elena Reynolds!” her mother cried. “I cannot believe you. What do you think you’re doing?”
“Uh…” What did her mother think she was doing?
“Don’t bother to lie. I just watched this week’s episode of Base Camp—because one of my friends informed me you were on it. Imagine my humiliation when I watched my daughter parade her body in front of a million people and prostitute herself to an actor? Did you give one thought to your sister or me when launched yourself into this venture?”
“Felicity—”
“Is so heartbroken she can’t even answer the phone,” her mother shouted. “Her career is already on the ropes. She’s nearly washed up, hasn’t had a job in weeks, she’s running away to Rome to hide from it all and now you’ve done this!”
“Mom—”
“I can’t believe you’re defending yourself. It’s jealousy, isn’t it? You were always jealous of your sister. Always wanted what she had. Never could content yourself with your limitations—”
“Felicity’s the one who got me on the show,” Addison burst out. “And she’s not answering the phone because she’s sick of you always clinging to her. You’re the one who doesn’t have a career. You’re the one who’s jealous of Felicity. Go get your own life, Mom.” She cut the call and threw her phone into the trees.
Then spent five minutes finding it buried in a pile of dead leaves.
This was a mess, she told herself. Her mother was right; it was jealousy of Felicity’s life that had gotten her here. Now it was time to choose her own path. One that really made sense.
She paced the track, trying to sort her thoughts. If she stayed, her days would be filled with a multitude of tasks. Helping Kai feed the people of Base Camp. Working at the bed-and-breakfast. Taking charge of some of the events—or maybe lots of them. She could lift the burden of much of the work that went into the Regency weekends from her new friends’ shoulders, which they’d already proved they were grateful for.
Maybe she could expand their repertoire, too. Cater to larger events for companies. They already offered weddings. She imagined those were fun to prepare for.
She’d be surrounded by smart, creative people with a common goal. She’d have an opportunity to learn all kinds of things.
The only thing missing was the glitz and glamour of city life. Could she live without that? Could she give up the idea of cosmopolitan existence and make do with a ranch life, instead?
If she didn’t—if she returned to Connecticut or New York—would she be happier?
One thing she knew: she didn’t want to make her mother’s mistake and try to glean happiness from someone else’s leavings. Her mother hovered around Felicity the way Addison did when she attended one of her sister’s parties. Off to the side, expendable. No one came to those parties to see her. They only accepted her for Felicity’s sake.
The same went for her mother. She wasn’t necessary to Felicity’s career—hadn’t been since Felicity was a teenager. She was superfluous, too.
Addison shook her head. That wasn’t the life she wanted.
It wasn’t the glamour and glitz she was after, either. She didn’t need bling to make her happy. It was the details of her work that charmed her. The perfectly placed rose. The thoughtful gift. The right song playing in the background.
She could do all that here.
With Kai.
Addison’s heart throbbed. That was the most important part of the equation: here, she’d be with Kai. There, she’d be alone.
When she put it that way, there wasn’t any question what she’d choose.
Addison pocketed her phone and strode toward the bunkhouse.
She was ready to tell Kai what she’d decided.
Ready to tell him she’d stay.
Kai slowed to a stop when he entered the kitchen and found Samantha and Angus there. Sam spent most of her time outside in the gardens. A cheerful, active woman, he was surprised to find her in her present state: her eyes rimmed with red, her arms crossed tightly over her chest. Angus looked grim, too. He shook his head when their gazes met.
“What’s wrong?” Kai asked.
“The wheat crop,” Samantha said. “It’s not doing well. I think we’re losing it.”
Hell. If the wheat failed—after the potatoes and the rest of the root crops—
They’d be living on bison after all.
Not exactly sustainable.
“Are you sure?” Kai asked. He’d checked it just a couple of days ago. It had seemed fine then.
“I’m sure.”
Angus nodded, too. “It’s bad. I don’t know if it got too much water or not enough, or if it’s some kind of disease, or if we simply planted it too late last spring. Everyone else has harvested theirs. That’s the thing; none of us knows what we’re doing here.”
“We knew there’d be a learning curve.” Still, this lesson was really going to hurt. “How about the potatoes?”
“Too early to tell,” Sam said. “They’re an experiment. What if they don’t make it?”
She was panicking, Kai realized, and he understood why. There was a lot of pressure on the food production team. The men and women working on the houses had a deadline to beat, too, but were well on their way to achieving it. Jericho’s team had hooked up multiple power sources to run Base Camp on.
Now it was down to food. It was up to him to rally the troops. He was one step removed from the day-to-day operation of the gardens, which gave him the distance to see things more clearly.
“One way or another we’re going to do this, and we’re going to teach people about food security along the way,” he told them. “We’ve got bison coming out of our ears. Eggs, too. We’ve got pork. Milk products. We’re growing greens. And in a pinch Walker will use his foraging skills to get us through. Maybe we’re going about this all wrong,” he added. “Keeping our problems a secret.”
Angus opened his mouth to protest, but Kai cut him off. “This is the kind of lesson we need people to learn. How to get by when it all goes to shit. Right?”
Sam nodded slowly. “You’re right. If we pretend that nothing ever went wrong, other people won’t learn how to problem solve when something does.”
“You want to tell Renata about the root cellar and wheat—today?” Angus asked. He looked tired. Kai knew he’d been on guard duty last night. All the men were working on too little sleep.
“I think we should. We should explain our mistakes. Ask for help to solve them.” Kai made a face. He wasn’t looking forward to that.
“I’ll do that,” Angus told him. “You’re not even a principal member of the growing team. We’re the ones who should take the blame.”
“I don’t think this is about blame. It should be about solutions,” Kai insisted. “That’s the story. Let’s note down everything we’re doing to fix this. When Renata gets back, we’ll spin the story our way. Then we won’t have to sneak around to guard our food, either. We can be open about it—and about napping when we need to.”
“Sounds good,” Angus said reluctantly.
“How is it going with Addison?” Sam asked. “Are you two on track? Will you marry in time?”
“Yes,” Kai said forcibly, but he wished he was as confident as he sounded.
Addison felt for Kai as he faced off with Renata a half hour later. She was frustrated she hadn’t gotten a chance to talk to him alone before he and Angus had called a meeting, but now most of the members of Base Camp had assembled in the bunkhouse on folding chairs brought out for the occasion. Only a few of the women had stayed with their guests up at the manor, where Riley was treating them to a watercolor painting lesson. The garden crew stood together up front. Renata confronted them, hands on hips.
“Someone stole all of your stored vegetables and you didn’t think to tell me?” she asked again. “We could have framed a whole episode around that!” She shook her head. “Maybe it will happen again.”
“Definitely not,” Angus said. “We’ve posted guards and locked the root cellar.”
“Without telling me.” Renata looked fit to burst. Addison exchanged a glance with Avery. She understood Renata’s anger, but she also understood why Kai and the others had tried to hide it from the director.
“It’s going to be a long winter without vegetables,” Avery whispered to her.
Addison nodded. “But they’re already trying to grow more.”
Nora stood up, and a cameraman focused on her slim figure. “We’re low on fresh vegetables,” she said. “Our meat supply is fine, though, right?”
“The problem is the wheat crop is failing,” Samantha explained. “We think we can grow greens over the winter in the greenhouses. We’re less positive about other vegetables just because none of us have tried it before. We’re trying to get potatoes growing so we have something starchy.”
“What about the canned goods?” Nora asked. “Don’t we have enough of those to see us through?”
Angus, Boone and Samantha turned to Kai. “I hadn’t even thought of those,” Boone said.
“That’s because there aren’t any,” Kai admitted.
Addison straightened. That seemed like an oversight.
“But…” Samantha stared at him. “What have you been doing with the harvest? We had tons of tomatoes and cucumbers…”
“We’ve been eating them. I thought we’d have plenty of fresh winter vegetables to see us through,” Kai told her. “Why eat canned stuff if you can have fresh?”
“That’s… ridiculous!”
It was the first time Addison had seen her angry, and Avery seemed startled, too. Normally, Sam was a cheerful woman with a ready smile.
“We trusted you to plan our food use. You said that was your thing. How could you just not can anything when you had bushels of food to preserve for the winter?”
“It wouldn’t have made any difference. If we had any canned food we would have stored it in the root cellar, too.”
“You didn’t know the cellar would be broken into. Not canning anything is criminal! Why—?”
“I hate canned food!” Kai burst out. “All right? That’s not the way I do things. I eat with the seasons. The plan was to feed you fresh food year-round, not some disgusting leftovers from the back of a cupboard.” He shoved a chair aside as he strode across the room and out the door, slamming it behind him.
Silence reigned in the bunkhouse until Addison jumped to her feet and followed him, bursting out of the door to find him well on the way down the track toward the creek.
“Kai,” she called, then picked up her skirts and raced after him. “Kai!”
He didn’t slow down, even when she caught up to him. Addison strode alongside him. “None of this is your fault.”
“Yes, it is,” he said heavily. “Samantha’s right. I could have canned enough to keep us in vegetables all year round. I might have stored some of that food in the bunkhouse, and we’d be in a much better place. Instead I made soup after soup, salad after salad, stir-fry after stir-fry, and now look at us.”
“The others made an assumption. They could have canned the food as easily as you—”
“It was a smart assumption—that the person in charge of the food would can a few jars.”
“Why do you hate canned food so much?” Addison asked.
Kai slowed down a little, and she was grateful. It was hard to keep up with him. “I’m adopted,” he said suddenly.
“Adopted?” She fought to keep up. What did that have to do with anything?
“My mother—she wasn’t ready for kids. She had my sister Grace and me when she was a teenager. She’d left home. She was always bouncing back and forth between friends and boyfriends. We didn’t have a home of our own until I was seven.” He walked on a ways. “Hell, she was so proud of it.”
His pace slowed again, and Addison held her breath. She’d had no idea Kai had a childhood like that. When they’d spoke of their families, his parents had seemed so normal.
“She finally got a steady job as a waitress. When she showed us our new place, we thought it was a palace. Grace and I got the bedroom. My mother slept on the couch. It came furnished—with a television. The utilities were included.” He chuckled grimly. “That was crucial.”
“I bet.” Addison wanted to touch him, but she was afraid to interrupt. She had a feeling it was important for him to tell her this.
“What we didn’t realize until we got there was if Mom was working, it meant we had to stay home alone. That had never happened before; we’d always lived with other people.”
“Alone? At seven?”
“Seven and four,” he corrected. “It was my job to watch my sister. My mom worked evening shifts. She’d lock us in. We weren’t supposed to open the door under any circumstances except a fire. We had to be quiet so no one knew we were there.”
“Kai.” Addison’s heart ached for the little boy he once had been. “That was a lot for you to take on.”
He nodded. “Not in the best part of town, either. You can imagine what we heard. We always kept the television playing on low to block it out. To keep the dark away. Mom’s shifts ended around two or three in the morning. I could never sleep until she got home, but once she did I’d crash, and everything would be okay. Then one day she didn’t come home until the following afternoon.”
A chill raced through Addison’s veins. “What happened?”
“She said she had a double shift. Said as long as we kept inside everything would be fine. Not to worry. It was just work.” A muscle tensed in his jaw as he swallowed. “I have never been so scared in my life.”
Addison’s heart squeezed. She could only imagine what that admission cost him.
“It got worse,” he said. “She started having double shifts all the time. Sometimes it was two or three days before she came home. I learned how to cook mac and cheese. I’d hold my breath when I heard footsteps in the hall. Hope it was her, dread that it wouldn’t be. I had to keep Grace from talking too loud, keep the television turned low.”
“That’s not okay. What was she thinking?”
“She wasn’t. My mom was an addict. I didn’t understand that back then. Now I do.” They’d reached the banks of Pittance Creek, and Kai stopped. “She wasn’t at work all those extra nights; she was turning tricks. Getting high. Coming home when she couldn’t score anymore. One day she didn’t come home at all.”
Addison waited, knowing there was more to come.
“We waited, like usual. I watched Grace. Kept her quiet. Kept the TV playing. We ate the mac and cheese. The crackers. The cereal. Then we ate the canned soup. The canned chili. The canned green beans. Black beans. Fava beans. Finally tried a can of sardines. We didn’t like them much.”
A tear spilled down Addison’s cheek.
“She didn’t come home. And there was nothing left. I don’t know how many days she was gone. I broke the rules—” Kai’s voice cracked, and Addison longed to pull him into her arms. “I opened the door—just to see if she was coming. Someone saw me.”
He paced away suddenly, his fists clenched by his sides. “They called Child Protective Services.”
“Thank God.”
He swung around, and the anguish on his face struck Addison dumb. “I was supposed to wait,” he told her. “If I’d just held in there—”
“You could have died,” Addison cried. “Grace could have died. What your mother did was wrong!”
“We got scooped up, put in foster care. They found my mom. Tried to get her into a program. She could have had us back.”
“Jesus!” Anger coursed through Addison. “She didn’t deserve you back!”
“She was my mother.” Addison watched him pull himself under control. “She was my mother. But she didn’t want us back. She said they could keep us. When the Ledbetters asked to adopt us, she signed us over just like that.”
“Because she knew she couldn’t raise you,” Addison said. “Not because you opened the door.”
He opened his mouth to say something, lifted his hands and suddenly strode away.
This time Addison didn’t pursue him. She knew a man like Kai wasn’t going to succumb to emotion where she could see him. She knew he needed a chance to let those feelings out. She hugged her arms to her chest as a chill wind sprang up, lifting leaves to dance in billowing circles. She watched one land in the creek and slide away.
How the past could haunt a person, she mused. How one small action—one short sentence—could change a life. Kai had opened a door. She’d closed a figurative one once in her life and always wondered what would have happened if she hadn’t. Fate had turned a corner, and life had marched on. Neither of them could guess where they’d be today if they’d chosen differently.
The thing was, she wanted to be right here, Addison realized. Here with Kai, ready to listen to him, talk to him, hold him—whatever he needed once he’d confronted his pain on his own.
She turned when footsteps approached, surprised to see him coming back.
“I don’t want to walk away from this—from you,” he said simply. “I don’t want to be like her.”
“You’re not. And Kai—you yourself said she was young. An addict. I think—I think at some point you’re going to have to forgive her.” She closed her eyes. “Wow. I’m a hypocrite. Forget it—don’t listen to me. I don’t know what I’m talking about.”
He took her hand and waited for her to open her eyes again. “Why are you a hypocrite? Do you owe someone forgiveness?”
Addison wasn’t sure. “She’s still doing it,” she began, then started over. “My mother. And it’s such a small thing it doesn’t bear mentioning after what you’ve said.”
“Let me be the judge of that.”
She had a feeling he was relieved they weren’t talking about his past anymore. Maybe she should push him to talk more, but instinctively she knew he’d said enough for one day. They’d revisit it another time, when his emotions weren’t so raw. Maybe it would be kind to distract him with her far more petty problems. Although they weren’t petty to Felicity. She was moving halfway across the world to make a change.
“I began competing in beauty pageants before Felicity was even born,” she said. They’d reached the creek, and she sat down on the bank. Kai sat down beside her. “My mother loved dressing me up for them, teaching me to sing, all that primping and fussing.”
“Did you like it?”
“I liked the attention—especially all the attention I got from her. It was something we did together. I was a bit of a show-off. Liked to belt out a tune.”
He chuckled, and she was grateful to see he’d relaxed.
“Then Felicity joined in. I wasn’t as pleased with that. At first, she was in the baby categories, and that was okay, but when we got a little older, it became very clear Felicity was pageant gold. And I wasn’t.”
“That must have hurt.”
“I stuck it out for a while. I’d get third place now and then. Felicity won every category every time. And Mom focused on her.” Addison shrugged. “Which makes perfect sense.”
“But not to a little girl.” Kai was frowning now. He took her hand and rubbed his thumb over her knuckles.
“Not to a little girl,” she echoed. “One day I’d had enough. I confronted her. Said maybe I should just quit—”
Addison swallowed, unprepared for how sharp her pain still was when she thought of it.
Kai’s lips pinched together. “Let me guess; she agreed with you?”
Addison nodded. “It hurt. Bad. My dad stepped in. Did his best. Got me into sports. I actually went to school on a softball scholarship at first. Injured my arm and that was that.”
Kai touched her arm. “I didn’t know.”
“It’s fine for everyday life. Just not for throwing fastballs.” She stared at the water. “I let those old pageants make me feel second best, and that’s not fair to me or Felicity. I’m glad I came here. I don’t think I’d ever really have realized how much I was living in the past if I hadn’t.”
“How about your sister?”
“Felicity? She’s a supermodel now. Has a beautiful penthouse in New York City. A wonderful husband. But my mother—” Addison shook her head. “It’s like she’s trying to suck the lifeblood out of her. She’s so obsessed with Felicity’s career. My sister is moving to Rome.” Tears pricked her eyes. “I’m going to miss her so much.”
“She’s moving to break free from your mom?”
“Yes. Don’t get me wrong; she loves Mom. We both do. She’s not a monster.”
“She’s just not operating with your best interests at heart.”
“I think Felicity and I both wonder if we’re lovable.” She’d never put it so starkly, and saying it took her breath away, but it was freeing, too. It explained so much.
Kai cupped her chin and turned her to look at him. “Yes, you are. I can guarantee that.”
When he kissed her, something shifted inside Addison, as if a giant boulder slid away from her heart so there was room to let him in. She clung to him, suddenly needing him close.
“You are lovable, Addison Jones,” Kai said when he pulled back. “And I want to marry you. For real. Not because of the show. Not because of anything except I want to spend my life with you. Would you… be my wife?”
Once again Addison pictured herself on the edge of a cliff—Kai down below waiting to catch her. This time Felicity wasn’t pushing her. She was on her own. She had to make her own decision.
It was surprisingly easy. In her mind, Addison stepped back, took a deep breath and seized a running head start.
Leaped off the cliff into the abyss—
“Yes.”