“I imagine you missed your dad a lot while he was away,” she said casually.
Gracie regarded her suspiciously but nodded.
“I know he missed you, too. He told me how much the e-mails and pictures you sent meant to him.”
“Yeah, sure,” Gracie said, her skepticism plain.
“It’s true,” Hannah confirmed. “You know, you and I have something in common, Gracie. A very long time ago, my dad went away and I was really, really angry at him.”
Gracie’s eyes widened. “You were? Did you tell him?”
“I never had the chance to tell him, because he didn’t come back, so for a very long time I just had to keep all that anger bottled up inside.”
“Did he die?” Gracie asked, her voice dropping to a whisper.
“No, he just left, and I never saw him or heard from him again. You’re so lucky that your dad is back home. You can tell him how you’re feeling and work things out. I would have given anything for a chance like that.”
Gracie sighed. “It’s not the same. He’s not really back. He’s down here and we’re in Atlanta.” As if she realized what she’d just admitted, she added, “But he is coming home.”
“And, just as important, you’re together right now,” Hannah pointed out. “That’s something you should enjoy, but I know it’s hard to do that when you’re still mad. But there is a way to get rid of all that anger.”
Gracie looked interested but perplexed. “What is it?”
“You could tell him everything you’re feeling,” Hannah replied.
“I don’t think so.”
“Why? Because it’s hard?”
Gracie nodded. “And I’ll hurt his feelings.”
“He’s your dad. He can take it. But if it will help, you can tell me first. Just say whatever you would say to your dad if you could.”
Gracie hesitated, her expression uncertain.
“It’s okay,” Hannah said. “I won’t tell him.”
“You promise?”
“Of course. This will be between you and me. It’ll be your decision about when you tell him.”
Tears welled up in Gracie’s eyes. “He…he could have died in Iraq,” she said, her voice choked. “He went there and he could have died. He almost did die. Stuff about Iraq was on TV all the time and Nate and I saw it. Every single time a soldier died and they showed it on the news, I thought that could be my dad, but—” her voice broke “—he didn’t think about that at all. Or about what we’d do if he didn’t come back. We didn’t even matter.”
Hannah wanted to reach out and enfold Gracie in her arms, but she sensed the girl wouldn’t welcome the overture. She also had a hunch Gracie was saying something she’d heard her mother say, probably more than once. The suggestion that her dad didn’t care about any of them had clearly made an indelible impression. Hannah felt heartsick.
“Oh, sweetie, I can imagine how scary that was for you, but please don’t ever think your dad didn’t worry about how his decision would affect you. There is nothing that matters more to your dad than you and Nate. Nothing in the whole world.”
“Then why did he go?” Gracie asked.
“Because he knew he could help some of those soldiers who’d been injured. That’s what he was trained to do, to help people with serious injuries. He couldn’t turn his back on them. You should be proud of him, Gracie, for being so brave, for putting himself on the line for his country.”
“I guess,” Gracie responded. She leaned against Hannah, clearly needing whatever comfort Hannah had to offer, after all. “Do you really think he missed us?” she asked, her expression hopeful.
“I know he did,” Hannah said emphatically, putting her arm around Gracie and giving her a reassuring hug. “Maybe you need to focus on the fact that he’s back home. That’s something to be very grateful for, don’t you think so?”
“Yes.” Gracie sniffed.
“You know what, though? I think it would be okay for you to tell your dad how upset you are about everything that’s happened. Tell him exactly what you told me about how angry you are and how scared you were. I know he feels really bad that you’re mad at him, and if you talked about it, just the way you did with me, you’d both feel better.”
“He doesn’t love us,” Gracie said miserably. “If he did, he’d come home.”
“You’re wrong about how much he loves you, and you’re old enough to understand why he can’t come back home,” Hannah told her. “He does love you, Gracie. He loves you and Nate more than anything, and he wants you to be happy.”
“I don’t believe it,” Gracie said stubbornly. “If he did, he’d come back to our house.”
“I’m afraid there are a lot of reasons why that might not happen, but it has nothing to do with you and Nate. Wherever he is, you will still be the most important people in the world to him.”
Gracie gave her a look that was entirely too knowing. “More important than you?”
Hannah smiled. “Way more important than me. Your dad and I have known each other since we were kids. We’re friends.”
“He doesn’t look at you like you’re a friend. He looks at you the way Uncle Brad looks at our mom.”
Hannah was rapidly getting out of her depth. When had ten-year-old kids gotten wise to the nuances of a look between grown-ups? She needed to get the focus back on Luke’s relationship with Gracie and Nate. “Just talk to your dad, okay? Don’t spend this whole week being mad when the two of you could be having so much fun together. Will you at least think about that?”
Gracie heaved another dramatic sigh. “I guess.”
Hannah bit back a grin. “Good. Want to race me to the water? Looks to me as if your dad and Nate are having a great time without us.”
Gracie stood up, then regarded her hesitantly. “Are there really sharks in the water?”
“Sometimes, but they’re usually way offshore. If any have ventured in closer, I imagine your dad and Nate have scared them away with all the noise they’re making.”
“They’re just being guys,” Gracie said with world-weary resignation. “That’s what mom always says.”
“And guys can be a nuisance,” Hannah replied. “But all in all, they’re pretty nice to have around.”
Gracie grinned shyly. “Especially if they chase away the sharks.”
“Definitely if they chase away the sharks,” Hannah agreed.
Luke finally got the children settled down for the night, then grabbed a beer in the kitchen and headed for the porch, anticipating some quiet time with Hannah. After four days of nonstop activities to keep the kids entertained, he was coming to treasure these brief late-night encounters, even if they never discussed anything more important than the next day’s plans.
“Hey, you,” he said, dropping a chaste peck on her cheek, which was the most she’d permitted since the arrival of the kids.
“Hey,” she said, glancing up at him. “Kids tucked in?”
“Finally. I had to read two stories to Nate, then Gracie wanted to talk.”
“About?”
“She finally admitted how mad she’s been at me.” He glanced sideways at Hannah. “How’d you convince her to do that?”
“What makes you think I had anything to do with it?”
“I saw the two of you talking on the beach. You looked very intense.”
“I just told her it was okay to be mad, but that she should talk about it to you so you could make it right.”
“Anything else?”
“Nope. That pretty much sums it up.”
“Really? Because I got the feeling from her that she might have told you that I was off limits,” he said, watching Hannah’s face closely. She smiled.
“Yeah, she did warn me off. She said you were going home to her mom.”
“Wishful thinking,” he said, then frowned. “You didn’t listen to her, did you?”
“I recognize wishful thinking, Luke.”
“Yet I hear a but in there somewhere.”<
br />
“The truth is, neither of us knows what’s going to happen, not between you and your ex-wife or between you and me.”
“Oh, I know the answer to part of that. There is no going back for Lisa and me, period.”
“Because you’re hurt and angry,” Hannah said.
“No, because it’s over. She’s moved on. So have I.”
She gave him an anguished look. “I’m not sure either of you have the right to move on without doing more to save what you had. Those kids in there deserve better. They love you to pieces, Luke. And they need you in their lives.”
He stared at her in shock. “What are you suggesting?”
“That you go home and try to make things right with your wife and your family. It’s not like you to walk away from anything without a fight. Don’t you owe at least that much to your kids?”
“You want me to go back to a woman who’s fallen in love with my best friend and intends to marry him?”
“I don’t want any of this,” she retorted. “But I’m trying to make you see what’s for the best. Earn your way out of the marriage, Luke. Make Lisa earn her way out of it, too. You’ve made it too easy for her, and neither of you has thought about what it’s doing to your children.”
“The outcome will be the same,” he insisted. “The marriage is over. Why prolong it and put the kids through even more heartache? Giving them false hope would be cruel.”
“Well, sure, if that’s the attitude you take into it, it will be a waste of time. But what about going in with an open mind and an open heart? Give the wounds some time to heal.”
Luke studied her, trying to figure out what was behind this sudden pep talk for his marriage. “What’s this really about, Hannah? Are you scared of what’s happening between us? Are you worried about the complications that lie ahead?”
“I’d be a fool if I weren’t,” she admitted. “But when I was talking to Gracie earlier, all I could think about was how I felt when my dad left all those years ago. I don’t want that for Nate and Gracie.”
“But you lost your dad forever. You never had contact with him again. I’m still going to be around,” he said. “I will never abandon those kids.”
“You just won’t go back and fight for the one thing they want more than anything.”
“Because it’s too damn late,” he said heatedly. “That ship has sailed, that train has left the station. It’s over, Hannah. Brad’s living under my roof now.”
She almost smiled then. “And he’s too big and tough for you to kick out?”
“No, actually he’s a wuss, but you’re missing the point. I don’t want to go back, not to that house, anyway. Not to Lisa. I get all the stuff about forgiveness and second chances, but some betrayals are just too huge to be forgiven. What happened forced me to take a hard look at our marriage. It was broken before I even left, Hannah. Fixing it is out of the question.”
She leveled a look into his eyes. “If you don’t want to fix your marriage, then what do you want?”
Luke started to answer, then sighed. That was, indeed, the million-dollar question. One of these days very soon, he was going to have to stop drifting and figure out the answer. He had a hunch that Hannah was going to turn out to be part of the equation. Right this second, though, he had to wonder if she’d be pleased about that.
Kelsey stood in the doorway between the kitchen and the dining room and studied the layout of the room. It had been bothering her for days, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on what seemed out of place.
Though she’d never waited tables in her life, she didn’t think it had anything to do with the access the waitresses would have between the tables. The aisles were wide enough, even if someone had a chair sitting too far back from a table.
Most of the room’s dozen or so tables had a clear view of the beach. Each seated four people, though they could easily be pushed together for larger groups. The linen tablecloths and matching napkins were striped in blue and sage-green, almost the exact shades of the sea glass collection she had started in a large glass vase on a table in the foyer. Next week each table would have a small green or blue vase on it with fresh flowers. She’d already spoken to the florist about delivering long-lasting blooms once and possibly twice a week, at least during the busy winter season.
Slowly she walked around the perimeter of the room, trying to figure out what was bothering her. When she almost bumped into an old oak sideboard in which they stored extra table linens and clean flatware, she got it. The heavy piece fit perfectly with the room’s decor and was great for storage, but it was totally inconvenient. The staff had to cross the entire width of the dining room if they needed to replace napkins or a fork during a meal. If it were across the room, closer to the kitchen, it would not only be more accessible, it could also be used for pitchers of ice water and tea, which would save the staff from having to go back to the kitchen to refill glasses.
She took another survey of the room and saw the perfect spot for it. She started moving tables and chairs out of the way and was just about to shove the awkward piece across the room when Jeff walked in.
“Kelsey, what are you thinking?” he said, sprinting to her side and nudging her away from the sideboard. “This thing is too heavy for you to move. And who shoved all those tables around?”
She frowned at him. “I did. I’m not helpless, you know.”
“Of course you’re not helpless,” he said impatiently. “But you are pregnant. If you wanted something moved, you should have called me or Luke.”
“Why, when I was perfectly capable of doing it myself?”
He frowned back at her. “Because you’re having a baby, that’s why.”
“And according to the doctor, I’m healthy as a horse. I wasn’t trying to lift the stupid sideboard. I was just pushing it across the room. It’s on rollers, in case you haven’t noticed.”
“Still, you should have asked for help,” he said stubbornly.
She barely resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “Jeff, you really need to stop hovering over me.”
“Was I hovering? I wasn’t even in the room. I was on my way to the kitchen to get a bottle of water and here you were moving furniture. Excuse me for thinking that wasn’t very smart.”
“Smart?” Kelsey echoed, her voice turning to ice.
He backed down at once. “I didn’t mean you’re not smart,” he said. “Of course you are. It’s just that this whole baby thing is new to you. Maybe you don’t even realize what your limits are.”
“Limits?” The temperature of her voice dropped below freezing.
He stopped pushing the sideboard and stared at her. “Are you going to make an issue about every word I use?”
“I am if they’re demeaning. I’m every bit as smart as you, Jeff Hampton, and there are no limits to what I can do.” She stepped up until she was in his face. “And the fact that you don’t realize that is exactly why I don’t want to marry you. This whole baby thing has turned your brain to mush. You don’t give me credit for anything anymore.”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake,” he muttered in frustration. “Most women want the men in their lives to care about them. You act as if it’s some kind of crime for me to be concerned about you and the baby. Even your grandmother told me she thought it was sweet that I worry so much.”
“Yeah, well, you’re not telling her what to do all the time, are you?”
“Are you saying this stuff just because your hormones are all out of whack, or do you honestly believe it? Do you really think I’m trying to control you?”
He was lucky that she wasn’t a violent person, because that crack about her hormones would have sent some women over the edge. “My hormones are just fine, thank you very much,” she snapped, then burst into tears.
Jeff blinked hard, then pulled her into his arms. “Hey, it’s okay, Kelsey. Everything’s going to be fine.”
She clung to him and let her tears soak his T-shirt. “Sure,” she murmured. “In about seven-an
d-a-half months.”
She swore she could feel his lips twitching against her cheek. “I swear if you’re smiling, I will hit you,” she said with a sniff.
“Not smiling,” he assured her.
She pulled back and saw that he was struggling to keep his lips turned down into a frown. She punched his arm. “You are, too. Stop it.”
“I love you,” he said, rubbing her back until she finally began to relax against him. “And I worry about you. I can’t help it. But I promise I will try not to hover.”
Against his chest, her sensitive breasts began to tingle. His hands, moving innocently across her back, were stirring up an unexpected maelstrom of sensations.
“Um, Jeff,” she said, her voice ragged.
“Sshhh. It’s okay. Everything is okay.”
She pulled back again and looked into his eyes. “Jeff, I think we ought to take a break.”
“A break?” he repeated blankly.
“While everyone’s gone over to the mainland,” she said.
She watched with amusement as understanding dawned.
“Oh, that kind of a break,” he said. “Are you sure? Is it okay?”
“If you ask me if it will harm the baby, I swear—”
“I just meant is there enough time before they get back?”
“It’s barely noon. The ferry doesn’t get back for hours.” It was one of the advantages of living on the island, she thought. Comings and goings were fairly predictable.
A grin spread across Jeff’s face. “Hours, huh?”
“So,” she said, studying him speculatively. “How’s your stamina?”
“A match for yours, I’ll bet,” he said, taking her hand and leading her toward the stairs.
She drew to a halt before they started up. “This doesn’t change anything. I just want to be clear about that. I’m still not ready to marry you.”
“Just ready to have your way with me,” he said.
Seaview Inn Page 21
