by Amy Gamet
“Ugh. That was bad.” Melanie scrunched up her nose. “So, tell me what’s going on with the sale of Crescent Moon. Has Bonnie started the process yet?”
His face fell. “I’m not going to buy the vineyard.”
“Why not?”
“The financing fell through when they found out about my father, and somehow got ahold of my juvenile records.”
Her eyes widened. “Can they do that?”
“No, they can’t, but they did.”
“Oh, my gosh. That’s terrible. I’m sorry, Rafael. No one deserves Crescent Moon more than you.”
“I don’t know what’s going to happen now. I know Peter wants to buy it, but I don’t think he has enough money on his own.”
“Can he get financing, or find an investor?”
Rafael shook his head. “He and his wife filed for bankruptcy just before they separated. I know his family has money, but I don’t think he has enough on his own. He wanted me to go in with him 60/40 to buy it.”
“Sixty you, or sixty him?”
“Him. He wanted to be the managing partner.”
She blew out air. “What, and you didn’t jump all over that one?”
He smiled and stared at her. “You make me feel better. I’ve been upset about this for two days, and just telling you about it makes it okay somehow.”
“I think that’s the nicest thing anybody’s ever said to me.”
I love you.
His chest tightened with emotion. It was true, but he instinctively knew the words would make her run. “If you give me some time, I might be able to do a lot better,” he said.
Her eyes darkened and her lips opened the slightest bit. The moment stretched out between them.
Crawling on his knees, he moved to her and took the pizza out of her hand, placing it the box and throwing the box on the floor. He lowered her back to the bed, his body settling on top of her as he trailed kisses along her face and down her neck.
“Rafael…” she whispered.
I love you.
He thought it with every touch of his lips to her skin, every breath he breathed onto her body.
Rafael didn’t deserve her, but still she was here—with him, beneath him, inside his mind like the fiercest thought.
I love you.
They came together slowly, locked tightly together, their passion equally matched, and Rafael knew with certainty his heart would belong to Melanie Addario forever.
* * *
It was a glorious morning, and Melanie went for a walk. The sun was shining brightly and her body had the feeling it had been well and completely loved.
Love. Was that what this was?
It certainly felt like love, better than she remembered. But had she known him long enough to be truly in love? She and Greg had been childhood sweethearts, so it was hard to trust the feeling of being so completely attached to someone after such a short time.
Rafael isn’t going anywhere, no matter what happens with Crescent Moon.
He’d told her as much last night after they’d made love the second time. They had all the time in the world to explore their feelings for each other. She smiled as she walked down the street, feeling so happy she could have skipped right down the sidewalk like a girl.
She went to the bakery that used to belong to her parents and bought bagels and lox, then strolled home, waving to everyone she saw. Turning the corner onto her own street, she immediately noticed the blue Jeep and stopped walking.
It must belong to one of the neighbors.
Yes, surely that was it, far more likely an explanation than the return of Greg Mora. But still her gut twisted with another possibility—that the car did in fact belong to Greg, and perhaps he was even sitting in it.
She walked slowly up beside the Jeep and peeked inside.
Empty.
Her shoulders dropped.
Would he ever come home? Or had he simply disappeared with no intention of ever returning to the life he once had and the people who mattered to him? That was the part that was so hard to believe, so hard to get over.
Melanie walked up the steps and into the house. “Hey, Ma.”
“Melanie?” called her mother. “Come in the kitchen.”
Melanie hung up her coat and turned toward the kitchen, just as Greg appeared in the kitchen doorway.
She stared at his sweet familiar face, the blue eyes she’d looked into thousands of times. His shoulders were just as broad and muscular as she remembered, his smile as surely connected to her heartstings as it ever was.
Her own face crumpled as he began to walk toward her, opening his arms, the arms she had longed to feel around her for so very long.
Then she was crying, and Greg touched her face to dry her tears.
“Isn’t it wonderful, Melanie?” asked her mother, clasping her hands together. “Greg is home, and he came to see you.”
Through her sobs, she said, “I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.”
Her mother was beaming. “I’m going to make you a strudel from scratch. I’ll bet you haven’t had real strudel since you’ve been gone. You’re too skinny.”
Greg didn’t take his eyes away from Melanie’s. “I had to come back. I missed you too much.”
Then her head was in his neck, the smell of his skin and the feel of his body so familiar to her senses.
He kissed the top of her head, her temple, her nose, then he kissed her gently on the lips.
Rafael.
Melanie pulled away, and his arms fell to his sides.
Her mother stepped closer, her smile beaming. “You want chocolate or apple?”
“Anything is fine, Mrs. Addario.” He turned back to Melanie. “You look great.”
Her eyes raked over him from head to toe, taking in the subtle differences two years could make. His jaw was more defined, his eyes somehow more jaded. “So do you.”
He was staring at her in a way she remembered, a way that made her think of private moments and intimate touches. She swallowed hard. “You want to sit down?”
“Would you like some lemonade, or some iced tea, Greg?” called her mother.
“I’ll take some lemonade.”
Melanie sat down on the sofa and Greg followed. “Tell me where you’ve been,” she said.
“Everywhere. Gosh, where should I begin. I moved all over the country.”
She stared at him, waiting for a better explanation than that. “And?”
He dropped his chin to his chest, then took a deep breath and met her eyes again. “At first, I wasn’t sure I wanted to be anywhere.”
He wanted to be dead.
Hadn’t she known that already? Feared it every day since he left? She took in the hardness of his expression and could feel the emotion alive and well inside him, making her shiver.
“I drove and drove for weeks without a destination. Then I came across a fallen soldier memorial in a little good-for-nothing town.” He stared into space. “The whole town only had one stoplight, but it had a war memorial with every name listed of the soldiers who fought and died from that place in every war and conflict since WWII. I stayed there for days. I’d just stare at it. I memorized all thirty-four names, and I imagined mine was one of them.” He met her eyes. “See, I could never get over the fact that I survived when so many of them didn’t.”
Melanie nodded gently. “I know.”
“And then one day, I starting driving again. Two days after that, I found another one.”
The idea of him driving through strange towns alone looking for memorials to the dead made her sad for his suffering. “I would have gone with you.”
He frowned. “I needed to do it alone. I don’t even know what I was doing. Trying to make some sense out of something that can’t possibly make any sense to any rational person.”
“Then what happened?”
“I ended up at a VA hospital in Pennsylvania. There was a memorial right out in front of the building, and I stayed there a couple of day
s before I walked inside and asked for help.”
“Why didn’t you call me? Send me a postcard, anything? Do you know how worried I was, how much I missed you?”
“I wrote you letters I didn’t mail, and bought you presents I didn’t send.”
A chill went up Melanie’s back as she remembered Loretta’s dream. “Why not?”
“I didn’t want you to wait for me, Melanie.”
In an instant, she thought of every midnight grocery store run she’d made since he left, of every time she cried for him, or stared at the ceiling wishing she knew if he was dead or alive. She thought of how memories of this man had weighed on her when she was with Rafael, how she was chained to him as surely as if he alone held the only key that could set her free.
He didn’t want me to wait for him.
Suddenly, it was just too much.
“Screw you, Greg.”
His eyes went wide. “Excuse me?”
“I said screw you. Do you know what it did to me when you walked out? You didn’t want me to wait. What was I supposed to do, when I didn’t know if the man I’d loved for years had gone off and killed himself? Gone shopping for a new dress so I could pickup a new boyfriend? You didn’t want me to wait.” She stood up. “Screw you.” She walked to the bottom of the stairs and turned around. “Welcome home. I don’t feel like talking anymore. You can wait for your strudel without me.”
* * *
The next morning seemed like the continuation of the previous day, since Melanie didn’t sleep enough to separate the two spaces.
Her mother walked into the kitchen. “I take it things went well with Greg?”
“Nope.” Melanie flipped a pancake onto a plate. Two years, Mom. Two years I waited for that guy to come back. Now here he is, and all I want to do is punch him in the face.”
“Sounds like it went as well as could be expected. You’ll calm down and the two of you will settle back into your routine.”
Settle back into our routine?
“You can bring him the strudel I made for him.”
Melanie poured more batter onto the griddle. “What do you mean, settle back into our routine?”
“Greg’s home now. You can go on with your life.”
“Go on with my life with Greg, or go on with my life without him?”
Her mother’s face fell. “With him, of course.”
Melanie turned back to stare at the pancakes, air bubbles just rising to the top.
“You are going back to him, right?”
Melanie had imagined Greg’s homecoming more times than she could count, but never did she expect to feel so conflicted about the man himself. “I don’t know.”
“Melanie Anne, that poor boy has lost years of his life because he fought for his country. Now he’s back home, and he’s ready to resume his life, and you need to be there for him. Of course you do. You love each other.”
The pancakes were dry on top, air bubbles everywhere, but Melanie didn’t move to flip them.
“This isn’t about that Rafael man, is it?”
That Rafael man.
Just the mention of his name sent heat through Melanie. She could feel her cheeks beginning to color. “I don’t know.”
“Well, figure it out. It’s one thing to be upset with Greg, and I’m glad you told him how you felt, but now you need to move on. Let the past be in the past and move forward.”
The smell of burned pancakes reached Melanie’s nose, and she closed her eyes, inhaling the scent. “What if I don’t love him anymore, Mama?”
Her mother stood up and took the spatula out of Melanie’s hand, then flipped the pancakes. “Of course you love him. You’re confused right now is all. Angry. I understand that. But this is Greg Mora we’re talking about. The love of your life, for goodness’ sake! A town hero!” She scooped up the pancakes and put them on a plate. “You’ll settle down together, get married like you planned, have a family.”
“But, Mom…”
“You owe him that, Melanie. Don’t you see?” She cupped Melanie’s cheek. “He needs you to take care of him. The rest will come with time.”
“What about you?”
“Don’t you worry about me. I’ll be just fine.”
“But, Mom…”
Her mother held up a hand. “I’m moving into assisted care at St. Theresa’s.”
Melanie shook her head. “I don’t understand. Why are you doing this?”
“It was never my intention for you to become my nursemaid.”
“I’m not your nursemaid.”
“Yes, you are. Besides, Greg needs you now, and I’m looking forward to the change,” said her mother. “They have social activities there. Places to go and people to meet. I’ve been sitting in this old house for far too long.”
“I thought you liked sitting in this house.”
“I did. And then a funny thing happened. I watched you sit here with me, and kept thinking about how you were wasting your life. Then finally, I realized I was wasting mine, too. I want better for us both. Of course that isn’t a problem for you now that Greg’s back.”
Greg was back, and he wanted to get back together with her.
The mermaid was holding the boulder again, the light no longer reaching through the waves as she sank deeper into the sea.
“There’s something else you should know,” said her mother.
“What?”
“I’ve contacted Lisa.”
Melanie turned around slowly and stared at her mother, who took a sip of her coffee with a shaking hand.
“Don’t look at me like that,” said her mom. “I’ve been considering how I want to spend the rest of my life. You have to expect I’d want both my daughters in it.”
“Do they have memory care at that nursing home?”
“Assisted living facility. And you’re not funny.”
Melanie shook her head. “Come on, Mom. She didn’t even make it back for Dad’s funeral.”
“We all have our issues.”
“And you think now everything will be fine?”
“She didn’t hang up on me. Her phone number was listed, right where she said she would be. How much could she want to be gone if she made herself so easy to find?”
Melanie’s voice was a whisper. “What if she comes home, and you wind up wishing she hadn’t?”
“Oh, child. That’s one thing you won’t understand until you have babies of your own. I would never—ever—wish she hadn’t.”
Chapter 11
There was a light drizzle of rain falling as Melanie made her way out to the field where Rafael’s truck was parked. She peered down row after row until she found him, working on the trellis of wires that held up the vines.
Her heart was heavy as she made her way toward him, his words coming back to her like an unfortunate prediction.
I don’t want to be your second choice, Melanie. I don’t want to hear his name and wonder what he means to you, or spend my time hoping he never comes back to town.
He looked up as she got close. “Hey,” he said. “I tried to call you.”
“I know.”
“What’s wrong?”
She shook her head.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Greg’s back.”
He opened his mouth and stared at her as seconds ticked by. “And what does that mean for us?”
She frowned, her brows drawing together.
“Son of a…” He hung his head, then came up quick and kicked a wooden post. “So, that’s it? Goodbye, Rafael? Thanks for nothing?”
Tears burned her eyes. “I’m so sorry.”
He took a big step toward her, his hand reaching up to caress her cheek. “Don’t be sorry, stay with me.”
“I can’t.”
“You belong with me, Melanie. Not with that guy. You know that, I know you do.” His hand moved into her hair. “Can’t you feel it?”
“Please don’t do this.”
“I can feel it whenev
er I’m around you. And when we made love, I know you felt it, too.”
She pushed his hands away. “I have to go. Let me go.”
“I won’t. I can’t.”
“He’s waiting for me.”
“Here?” Rafael’s hands dropped to his sides. “You brought him here?”
She nodded. “In the tasting room.”
He turned to look at the building in the distance. “Where are you going?”
“What?”
“You said he’s waiting for you.” His stare met hers. “Where are you going?”
She hung her head. “His parents have a place on the lake they rent out. It’s vacant right now. We’re going to go for a few days and get…reacquainted.”
“Reacquainted.” He crossed his arms. “You’re going to sleep with him.”
Melanie turned abruptly and walked quickly away, not knowing if he was following her or not. She started crying, her sobs mixing with great gasps of air.
Then his arms were around her from behind, halting her steps and turning her around to face him. “Melanie…” He kissed her hard on the lips and she thrilled at the contact, knowing it was the last time she could touch him, the last time she would taste him, and he pulled her tightly against his body.
“Don’t go back to him. Stay with me,” he whispered against her mouth, and she cried again, knowing she had never wanted anything more, even as she knew it wasn’t possible.
She shook her head. “I can’t. Don’t you understand I would if I could? He almost died out there, a piece of who he was did die. I can’t abandon him after that. It’s not right. Please don’t ask me to do it.”
He pulled back, his eyes meeting hers, and she could tell he must have seen her resolve somewhere in their depths, because he released her and turned around, slowly walking back from where he came.
* * *
Melanie ran down from the high field, as if hopelessness itself were chasing her from the vineyard. Rafael’s face was engrained in her mind, every word he used to beg her to stay, circling through her consciousness.
Didn’t he see that the choice wasn’t hers, that it had been taken away from her the moment Greg returned? If he had left her of his own free will, it would be different, her obligation erased, but as it stood she couldn’t bear to turn him away.
