Stephanie Doyle - The Way Back

All she had to do now was wear him down. Win him over with her charm and personality until he trusted her. Trust would lead to comfort and comfort would lead to his story.

Charm and personality. Two things she used to have plenty of. Surely she could drudge them up again.

One thing was for sure, she needed to get over this crazy starstruck feeling. Seeing him in person had been like fire bolt to her system. It had taken her ten seconds to remember her name and why she’d come. He might be halfway between forty and fifty, but, damn, he still looked good.

She’d met semi-famous people when she’d been the host of Wake Up Philadelphia. There had been the mayor of the city, the governor of the state, sports figures, local actors and performers who had made good. She’d interviewed Kevin Bacon for Pete’s sake. Once you knew him, you were basically connected to everyone else in Hollywood. It was a known fact.

Jamison Hunter wasn’t any of those people, though. He was more. At least to her. Growing up without her father during her teenage years, it wasn’t hard to understand how she had formed such an attachment to a media figure—especially one who had seemed so perfect. A girl had to look for heroes where she could find them.

Of course, she hadn’t been some silly twelve-year-old when Colonel Jamison Hunter first captured the world’s attention. No, she’d been twenty-three, engaged and starting her career. She’d had the world in her hands and had believed her father’s abandonment hadn’t made a single dent in her perspective or her life choices. Maybe she wasn’t the most romantic person, and wasn’t overly sentimental. However, she had committed herself to a relationship. That was an achievement. Something to be proud of.

She really hadn’t had a reason to fall into a crush with an image on the TV screen. Something about him had captivated her.

Air Force Colonel. Astronaut. American hero.

It was a story everyone knew. As embedded into the American psyche as Apollo 13, the Challenger tragedy and Neil Armstrong walking on the moon. Colonel Hunter had commanded a space-shuttle mission to help with repairs on the international space station. Once there, the crew of the station informed him the situation was more critical than first realized. In fact, they feared an imminent explosion would not only take out the station but the shuttle docked to it, as well.

In an unprecedented move originally not sanctioned by NASA, Hunter did the unthinkable with an unplanned, untethered, space walk. He set out to make the repairs, knowing if he didn’t find and fix the problem, the lives of his crew and those on the station would be lost.

Gabby never understood all the specifics of what he’d done. Reporters explained the science, the possible complications and ultimately the risk he took, but none of it mattered to her. All she cared about was after he’d taken that brave action and was safely on American soil and she watched him being interviewed time and time again, she felt safe.

The world was a safer place because Jamison Hunter was in it.

Gabby wasn’t alone in her hero worship of him. It seemed everyone had all come together to place him on a pedestal. It was one of the reasons he’d fallen so hard and so far when the scandal broke.

A sunny day in Florida. A motel not too far from Cape Canaveral. A picture of Jamison Hunter standing in the doorway of the room with a woman wearing only a sheet. Next to them stood his wife with a look of sheer horror on her face. His deception had crushed the world. It had devastated Gabby. How could a man capable of such honorable and heroic actions cheat on his wife? And if he could cheat on his beautiful, accomplished wife, what chance did an average woman have of preventing much less heroic men from doing the same? Gabby couldn’t stop asking herself that question and becoming deeply suspicious of her own fiancé as a result. In retrospect that suspicion was a good thing…and warranted.

Finding her fiancé in bed with her half-sister might not have happened if she hadn’t started looking for signs.

Gabby owed Jamison Hunter for saving her from a marriage with a cheating scumbag—something for which she was eternally grateful. But she also blamed Jamison for her inability to make any other relationship in the past ten years since Brad work.

“Stop it, Gabby.”

The sound of her voice startled her. She needed the reminder though. She wasn’t here to contemplate her life and dwell on her failures. She was moving on with her life. Fresh start, et cetera.

The drive into what the residents of Hawk Island considered town was short. The car had finally heated up, but still Gabby shuddered against the chill. It was late, she hadn’t eaten since lunch and her stomach was grumbling so loudly she didn’t think she could wait until the B and B’s breakfast.

Of course she should. She had more than enough stores of fat on her body to hold her through the night. But the rational side of her brain reminded her starving wasn’t a healthy method of weight loss. She needed to fuel her body at regular intervals to keep her metabolism up.

There weren’t many options, though. The town consisted of four or five mom-and-pop shops—currently closed for the night—ranging from a small grocery, liquor and hardware stores to an antique toy place and an exclusive clothing boutique. Obviously those last two were targeted to the tourists who were starting to discover the charm of an island situated off the coast of Maine.

No fast food. No twenty-four-hour grocery stores. Everything was locked up and dark.

She spied one place that still had the lights on. Pulling up, Gabby peered through the window, which was painted with the name Adel’s. She could see booths lined up along the window and a counter with stools suggesting this was a diner. Food. According to the sign that dangled from the doorknob she had seven minutes to get some.

Hopping out of her car and sprinting as fast as she could, Gabby reached for the door and heard the satisfying ring of a bell overhead.

“Oy, you’ve got to be kidding.” The tall girl behind the counter stopped wiping the surface in front of her and scowled.

“The sign says you’re still open.”

“For only seven more minutes.”

At first the Gabby didn’t understand the woman, then she realized what had sounded like meenoots, was actually the word minutes. “I’ll be quick.”

“You’ll make a mess.”

“No, I swear I’ll order only a salad.”

The girl huffed and rolled her eyes. “Sit.”

Gabby didn’t have to be told twice. She plopped her butt on a round stool and tried to appear super hungry so the server would understand that she wouldn’t have come in here unless she was really desperate.

“Adel, there is someone here who wants food.”

An older woman pushed her way through a swinging door, carrying a tub of what appeared to be clean coffee cups.

“Oh, crap.”

Gabby shifted. “I’m sure you all don’t mean it but I’m starting to feel a little unwelcome.”

Adel plunked down the tub with a rattle. “No, sign says we’re open until nine, so I guess we’re going to have to feed you. Coffee?”

“Please.” She saw the young girl pour what was no doubt multiple-hours-old coffee dregs into a cup, but Gabby didn’t mind. It was piping hot.

She shivered as the heat transferred from the cream-colored ceramic to her hands. It had been spring in New York when she left this morning. She was sure of it. She took a tentative sip. It was as foul as she expected but it warmed her throat all the way down.

“What do you want?”

This was easy. She’d already committed herself to a salad so there would be no reason to look at the menu and tempt herself with any of the other offerings. Willpower, Gabby. Willpower.