by Toni Blake
Just then, Amy’s cell phone made a meowing noise that caused Anna to flinch. “That’s my text alert,” Amy said with a smile. “Isn’t it adorable?”
In truth, it creeped Anna out a little—sounded like a cat was trapped in Amy’s phone—but she kept her own smile firmly in place. “Sure. Definitely.”
Amy checked her phone, then called to Tessa, who was in the back of the store straightening books. “Logan says the game’s been moved to six-thirty, so we’d better step on it.”
A glance at her watch revealed to Anna that it was almost six-fifteen now. “What game?” she asked, mildly curious.
And when Amy looked up at Anna, her eyes brightened. “You should come with us. There’s a softball game at Creekside Park against a big rival team from Crestview. I don’t know why I didn’t invite you sooner. Why don’t you come?”
Anna thought she actually did know why Amy hadn’t invited her sooner—because she usually turned down such invitations. Though she’d gone only once last summer, Mike and others had invited her many times.
As Tessa emerged from between two bookshelves, she raised her eyebrows in Anna’s direction. “What do you say? I’m sure Lucky and Mike would both love to see you there.” Lucky didn’t play on the team, but Anna knew he often came to watch.
And she was actually tempted. Not only because she was suddenly warming a little to the idea of being more social, but also because of all the good-looking guys at the ballpark. After all, hadn’t Duke let her know this morning that he didn’t want anything more with her than the sex they’d had? And hadn’t she been telling herself he wasn’t her type anyway? And weren’t the kind of guys who hung out at the ballpark—friends of Mike’s and Logan’s—a lot more likely to be her type?
But then she bit her lip, glancing down at her platform wedges. “Am I too overdressed?”
Though Amy instantly shook her head. “We’re dressed for work, too, and you look great. And we can sit low on the bleachers so you don’t have to climb in those things.”
So Anna decided to cast any doubts aside. She needed to keep her mind off Duke; what better way than to find some new, and more compatible, guys to focus on. “Okay,” she said, “I’ll go.”
Anna sat between Rachel and Sue Ann on the metal bleachers behind home plate, watching the game and listening to the other girls cheer on the team. Sue Ann’s handsome, dark-haired boyfriend, Adam Becker, who ran a local landscaping business, guarded first base while Logan played shortstop. Mike was the pitcher, and though he claimed to enjoy this game, Anna thought he seemed even more on edge than usual. Behind her, Amy played patty-cake with Sue Ann’s daughter, Sophie, and Tessa and Lucky sat a few rows higher up with Jenny and her husband, Mick.
As Amy had predicted, both Romo brothers had indeed been happily surprised to see Anna at the game—though even then she’d thought Mike’s hug had felt stiff and he’d seemed quieter than usual when greeting her. Now he was the opposite of quiet—bellowing at his teammates for errors, and cussing at himself for throwing a wild pitch. And watching Lucky talk with Mick reminded Anna of his friendship with Duke, something she felt she was almost impeding in some way by keeping Duke’s whereabouts from her brother.
After all, wouldn’t Lucky want to help Duke weather whatever he was going through that had him living in that shack? At moments, the isolation of Half Moon Hill made it easy to believe she and Duke were the only two people that existed—but seeing Lucky reminded her that she wasn’t the only person here who cared about Duke.
But stop. Caring. About. Duke. In that way anyway. It just seemed like a losing proposition, leaving her angry at herself for allowing the emotion to sneak up on her, and further, for letting herself be so open with him yesterday—both physically and emotionally—since she knew that was the reason she was feeling overly attached right now.
And besides, you’re supposed to be here looking at guys.
And there were plenty to look at. A couple of other local firemen played on Mike and Logan’s team who were none too shabby in the hot department, and more than one guy on the opposing team caught her eye, as well.
The only problem was that she kept thinking about Duke anyway. Watching them sweat made her remember watching him sweat. Watching their muscular arms as they swung bats and threw balls reminded her of the way Duke’s arms and shoulders had looked when he’d been sawing that wood yesterday. Or, really, when he was doing about anything with them—and at this point she’d seen those arms do quite a lot of things. I should have let myself enjoy it more when he was carrying me through the woods.
Just then, Mike walked the other team’s pitcher, creating a bases-loaded situation. He looked as tense as she’d ever seen him.
“Come on, Mike—get it together, dude,” Logan called encouragingly from behind him.
And Mike spun to face him. “You wanna pitch the damn game, Whitaker?”
Logan just gave him a matter-of-fact look, relaxing his ready stance only slightly. “No, I just want you to calm down a little, that’s all.”
One of the things Anna had most admired about Logan when she’d had that crush on him last summer was his ability to remain unruffled by Mike’s theatrics. In response, Mike just drew in a deep breath and looked like he was trying to do as Logan had advised.
“Does Mike get like this at every game?” Anna asked Rachel.
Rachel kept her eyes on him, though her expression struck Anna as being a bit distant. In fact, now that she thought about it, Rachel seemed quieter than normal tonight, too. “No, not usually.”
“Maybe I picked the wrong game to come to,” Anna remarked.
And Rachel merely replied, “Could be,” her voice still sounding far away, and like her thoughts weren’t entirely on the conversation at hand.
Anna hoped nothing was wrong, but decided not to ask. She’d endured a lot of prying questions herself upon her return to Destiny—even if they were well-meaning—and despite her sudden and inexplicable penchant for being all open and talkative the last twenty-four hours or so, that didn’t mean everyone felt that way.
So go back to watching hot, sweaty guys.
She tried. She really did. And it was even enjoyable in certain moments. But it was hard to concentrate on them with Mike’s grousing—especially when the next two batters hit home runs—and she just kept remembering being in bed with Duke anyway.
Rachel’s body felt heavier than usual as she got out of Mike’s truck and walked up to the Whippy Dip, the local dairy bar where the whole gang was meeting for post-game ice cream, despite the loss. Mike hadn’t said a word on the ride from the ball field, and she hadn’t tried to cheer him up. She’d never seen him play worse, and she couldn’t think of anything cheerful to say anyway.
When they approached, everyone else already sat or stood around a large wooden picnic table, eating ice cream cones or scoops in a dish. A glimpse of Adam’s hot fudge sundae almost made Rachel want to throw up, so she looked away.
“You want anything?” Mike asked her. Given the state of her stomach lately, he almost seemed to know she didn’t.
“No,” she said quietly, still almost stunned beyond comprehension by what she’d found out at her doctor’s visit today.
“Me neither,” Mike murmured. And Mike never passed up ice cream.
When they slid wordlessly into the open spots left on one side of the table, Rachel tried to tune in to what Logan was saying—something about he and Amy still not having picked a wedding date. But as more conversation about that ensued, her mind drifted elsewhere—to worry, and disbelief. She knew she should be thankful; she knew she could have gotten much worse news. And in that way she was relieved, and she knew Mike was, too. She just still couldn’t believe the diagnosis they’d been given.
“Rachel? Are you in there? Hello?”
She flinched, snapping her gaze to Tessa’s.
“You’re not having anything?” her friend asked. “Stomach still bothering you?”
She jus
t nodded, too preoccupied to muster words.
That’s when Lucky spoke up. “Hey, wasn’t today your doctor’s appointment? Did you find out anything?” She supposed some people might consider the question intrusive, but they were family, and really, their whole group of friends were close, so she didn’t mind. Except that the answer was still so shocking to her.
“We did,” she said. Just that.
“And?” Amy asked.
Rachel and Mike exchanged glances. They’d gotten the news just before heading to the park and had, in fact, almost been late for the game, so they’d had no time to digest it, or to discuss telling their friends.
Only now, unfortunately, she could immediately sense that her hesitation was making them worry. Their expressions grew grimmer with every passing second she made them wait. So she knew that even though she and Mike hadn’t made any sort of decision about sharing, she had to tell them. Especially when Amy said, “Well?” sounding almost alarmed.
“Well,” Rachel said, “I’m . . . pregnant.”
“An agonizing silence now reigned . . .”
Gaston Leroux, The Phantom of the Opera
Nine
Anna watched Mike and Rachel’s friends react. Cumulatively, their faces were painted with surprise, joy, and confusion. And she was pretty sure the confusion was because both Rachel and Mike appeared so downcast at what most happily married couples would consider good news.
And then there were Jenny and Mick. They sat at the far end of the table, on the other side from Mike and Rachel, their expressions wooden. Mick silently slid his arm around Jenny’s shoulder, as if holding her up through this.
“What amazing news!” the ever-happy Amy said. She appeared to be the only person not tuned in to the fact that Rachel and Mike weren’t beaming with joy. But when no one responded to her happy outburst, her expression changed. Her eyebrows knit as she bent her head slightly to ask, “Isn’t it?”
“Look, we don’t mean to be assholes,” Mike said, “but . . . we just didn’t see this coming. We never even talked about it. Except in a ‘maybe someday’ way.”
“All we wanted was a cat,” Rachel bemoaned, “and he’s handful enough.”
“I didn’t even want the cat,” Mike groused. “But I went along with it.”
“And just like the cat, you’ll love your baby,” Sue Ann pointed out, often the voice of reason in the group.
“Of course we will,” Rachel was quick to say. “We just . . .”
“You just what?” Tessa asked when she trailed off.
Rachel hesitated and sounded almost a little ashamed when she replied, “I don’t know if I’ll be a good mother. I mean, what do I know about babies? I know about clothes. I know about advertising.” Anna knew Rachel had been an ad exec in Indy before coming home to Destiny. “But I don’t know anything about babies.”
“And seriously, me as a dad?” Mike asked the crowd at large. “Would any of you want me as a father?”
When they all stayed silent at the question, Anna, to her surprise, felt compelled to speak up. “You’ll be a good dad, Mike,” she said from the end of the table nearest him.
Their eyes met and his registered utter bewilderment, even though she suspected he was trying to hide it. “I will?”
She nodded. “Because you’ll care. A lot.” She knew that from firsthand experience.
And when still he and everyone else stayed speechless, she decided it was time to inject a little lightheartedness into the conversation. “Now, Aunt Anna might need to lecture you on not being too overbearing—especially if, God help you, it’s a girl—but I know you’ll be a good dad to your kid. Just like you keep trying to be to me.” And she ended on a wink that made Mike’s eyes soften a little, even if he didn’t quite smile.
“And you’ll be a great mom, too, Rachel,” she went on. “With Sue Ann to give you pointers, and Amy to give you cat-themed baby stuff, and Edna to whip you into shape if you need it, how can you go wrong?”
And again, though a smile didn’t quite make it to Rachel’s face, Anna could see in her sister-in-law’s eyes that her words were appreciated.
And that’s when a huge revelation hit Anna square in the face. She’d known for a long time that she loved both her brothers, but maybe it had taken this long for her to . . . begin to let her defenses down. With them, with the girls, with the whole town. After the colossal lie her “other mother” had perpetrated her whole life, maybe she’d just had a hard time . . . letting herself depend on anyone, trust in anyone. But the small bit of kindness she’d just doled out to her big brother made her realize—I trust him now. To take me as I am. To not bail on me. To be there for me. I’m starting to trust them all, bit by bit, step by step. And every day it got a little easier.
“It’ll all be fine,” Tessa was saying reassuringly to Rachel when Anna came out of her reverie. And Anna heard it in a different way, almost like . . . a voice from above. It’ll all be fine.
“Even if you guys are the two most ill-equipped people to have a baby that I’ve ever met,” Logan added on a laugh that everyone joined in on—even Mike and Rachel a little.
Well, everyone except Jenny. And Anna’s heart broke for her.
But at the same time, she was still basking in what she’d just figured out. Trusting in people was hard, especially after someone hurt you. Yet she thought life was a lot happier when you found the people who made you brave enough to believe in them.
A sweet evening breeze blew in through windows Anna had opened wide a few hours earlier, carrying the soft scent of honeysuckle. Temperatures were predicted to be cooler over the coming few days, and now that the sun had dipped behind the trees beyond the backyard, she could already feel more pleasant weather setting in.
Curled up in a loveseat in the small room she’d started calling the library, despite the modest number of books she’d amassed here so far, she sat reading Cathy’s diary.
Before starting, though, she’d balanced several of the old record albums on the spindle in the center of the ancient record player, the kind that held a stack and let them drop one at a time. There was something in the simplicity of that, the old-fashioned mechanics of it, that appealed to her. Or maybe it was just the sense of being swept back to a simpler time.
As if to make the scene complete, on the trip to the attic to get more records, she’d also carried down the copy of The Phantom of the Opera, placing it on one of the room’s built-in shelves. She wasn’t sure she’d leave it there—mainly because she wasn’t sure she would trust the average inn guest to realize how special a book it was and take care of it properly—but she’d also decided she probably wouldn’t give it to Amy now. She wished she could, yet as she began to feel closer to Cathy—and to the house itself through Cathy’s written memories—she now felt the book belonged here, within the walls where Cathy had held it in her hands and surely cherished it.
The day after she’d had sex with Duke, she’d worked at Under the Covers and then gone to the softball game, not returning until after dark, and other than that brief meeting on the porch, she hadn’t seen him that day.
The next day, she’d worked a shift from ten to three at the bookstore, and when she’d gotten home, she’d heard a hammer banging on the far side of the house, but she’d made a point to just go inside and keep to herself. She’d done a little cleaning and paid some bills. She’d thought more about Rachel’s news and Jenny’s reaction to it. She sympathized with them both, just in different ways. It didn’t seem fair that one person should get what another wanted so badly, especially when that person didn’t want it at all, but Anna had come to understand better than most that we didn’t always get to choose our fate, only how we reacted to it. And she hoped both Jenny and Rachel would be considerate of each other’s position going forward.
Since then, she’d seen more of Duke, but not a lot. A couple more half day shifts at the bookshop had kept her away from home part of the time. And when she was here, she’d asked him i
f he needed her help with anything and he’d mostly declined.
But in those moments when their paths crossed, when they spoke to each other, Anna suffered a thick, almost desperate desire for him. The weather had gotten even hotter, and that didn’t help. At times she’d been forced to ask herself: Is it the heat making me feel so breathless or is it Duke? And she wasn’t sure of the answer. She only knew that in his presence, now her whole body felt heavy, needy. And with every second they were together she found herself remembering details of their sex: his powerful erection in her grip, her own cries of pleasure when he’d made her come, the way he’d licked and suckled her breasts so thoroughly, the way he’d pounded into her body with such relentless vigor. God, how could she not be breathless when being constantly barraged with such memories?
Did he feel any of that, too? She couldn’t tell. Did he sense her thinking about it, feel the tension rolling off her in waves? She didn’t know that, either. Was Duke just an expert at showing no emotion when he chose not to—or did he really feel as little about their sex as it seemed?
Since she was off from the bookstore today, she’d felt almost obligated to do some work on the house. Because yes, she was paying him, but she hadn’t expected him to accomplish the entire job single-handed. So when she’d insisted on helping, he’d found jobs for her to do. He’d set her to sanding some pieces of wood he’d cut to repair some of the delicate gingerbread trim in the house’s eaves. He’d shown her two different types of spindles he’d bought for the porch and asked her which one she wanted to use. He’d discussed with her the merits of covering the house with vinyl clapboard versus repainting it. The vinyl would be attractive, came in lots of colors, and would require little maintenance—while sticking with wood added value to a historic home and allowed for color changes down the road, but would require painting and other repairs every few years to stay looking good. She’d thanked him for the information, took a brochure of vinyl colors he’d picked up at the Home Depot in Crestview, and said she’d think about it and let him know.
