Up at Butternut Lake: A Novel (The Butternut Lake Trilogy)

by McNear, Mary

  Walker smiled. “Bragging rights are important. And a teacher who looks like a princess? That’s definitely a bonus.” He chuckled, some of his nervousness fading. “But what about fishing?” he asked. “Have you taken him fishing recently?”

  “No,” Allie said, with a little shake of her head. “I’ve tried. But I’m a poor substitute for you, apparently. Wyatt said . . .” But she stopped midsentence. “Never mind,” she amended, quickly.

  But Walker understood. And if Wyatt missed their early morning fishing trips, he knew exactly how he felt. He missed them, too. He hadn’t been fishing, in fact, since the last time he’d gone with Wyatt. It felt wrong, somehow, to go without him.

  Caroline brought their sandwiches over, and when Walker looked up, a few minutes later, she’d disappeared, along with Jax and the baby, and the few other customers who’d been lingering over their lunches. They had the place all to themselves, he realized. No more excuses for him to stall, then.

  “Look,” he said, his nervousness returning as he fidgeted with his napkin. “I’m not very good at talking. That’s why I like fishing, I guess. No talking necessary. But I need you to understand why I acted the way I did. So just hear me out, okay? And try to keep an open mind. I just . . . I just really need you to listen.”

  “I’m listening,” Allie said, her face unreadable.

  So he took a deep breath and started, without any preamble. He began with the day that Caitlin had come to his office at the boatyard and told him she was pregnant. The day he’d proposed to her. And then he moved on to the long, lonely months that followed, the two of them living together, as man and wife, but also, it turned out, as perfect strangers.

  He was careful not to shift the blame on to Caitlin. In fact, he accepted all of it himself. He could have been honest with Caitlin when he’d realized their marriage was a mistake, he admitted to Allie. But instead, he’d ignored her and buried himself in his work. It was easier than telling Caitlin the truth, he said. But it was also more cowardly.

  When he reached the part about Caitlin’s not being able to feel the baby move anymore, he stumbled a little. This was new to him, this openness. He’d never talked about these things with anyone before. Not even his brother, Reid, who’d had to fill in most of the blanks on his own. But he kept going. There was no turning back now. Not when the stakes were this high.

  So he told her about taking Caitlin to the hospital. About the news they’d gotten there. About her plans to leave him as soon as she was released. And about his convincing her to come home with him and give their marriage another try, even though, he’d realized later, he had no intention of trying again himself. And, finally, he told her about Caitlin’s leaving, in the early hours of that snowy January morning.

  He’d been looking down at his paper napkin—which he’d by now systematically shredded—but he stole a glance at Allie, half expecting her to look appalled by his insensitivity. Or disgusted by his selfishness. But she didn’t look either of those things. She just looked sad.

  “That was the last time I saw her,” he said, reaching for another napkin from the napkin dispenser. “Until she came up here a month ago. And I might not have seen her again, Allie, if it hadn’t been for you.”

  “Me?” she said, surprised.

  “You,” he nodded. “Because the morning after we spent the night together, I realized two things. The first was that I needed to see Caitlin again. I knew, then, my relationship with her wasn’t over yet. It was over on paper. But that was all.”

  Allie frowned, not understanding.

  “I don’t mean that I still cared about her in that way,” he said, quickly. “In a romantic way. But I cared about her as a person. And I owed her an apology, Allie. A big apology.

  “As it turned out, though, I had no idea how to get in touch with her. Probably because she didn’t want me to be able to get in touch with her. I finally tracked her down through a friend of hers, though, and I asked her if I could come down to Minneapolis to see her. But, instead, she came up here. I didn’t know she was coming, Allie. I would have told you if I had. But she explained to me later that she didn’t call ahead because she didn’t know until she pulled into my driveway whether or not she’d be able to go through with it. That’s how angry she still was.”

  He watched, now, while Allie looked down at her BLT and prodded it gently with one finger. But she didn’t eat it.

  “Anyway,” Walker went on, “she stayed at the White Pines for a couple days, and we spent some time together. I’m not going to lie. It was a little tense at first. But we talked. We talked more than we did when we were actually married to each other. She told me that she’d gotten engaged.” He brightened at the memory of how happy Caitlin had been whenever she’d mentioned her fiancé. “And I told her that I was sorry. And that . . . that I still blame myself for her losing the baby.”

  “Walker,” Allie said, shaking her head. But he kept talking. “No, it’s true, Allie. I do. Her doctor made some speech about how ‘these things happen, and we don’t necessarily know why.’ But would it have happened if she hadn’t been so miserable? Honestly, I have my doubts about that. I think I always will.

  “But, still, it was good for us to see each other. Good for us to finally end our marriage, in a way our divorce never could. I think, I know, she’s let go of some of the anger she felt at me. And I got to give her something I had that belonged to her. Nothing valuable. Just something she’d left behind.” He shook his head, remembering the nightgown that, for a time, had taken up residence on the top shelf of his hall closet.

  “But, Allie?” he went on, returning to the task at hand. “I realized something else that morning, lying in bed with you, watching you sleep . . .” He saw her color, slightly, at the intimate image his words evoked. “I realized that I was terrified. Terrified of the fact that I was in love with you,” he said, looking steadily at her.

  Her hazel eyes widened in surprise, and her golden skin flushed an even warmer pink. She definitely had not expected a declaration of love with her lunch order, Walker decided.

  “It’s true,” he said, simply. “Not only that, but it was a first for me. I’ve never been in love before. And it scared the hell out of me. For a minute, I panicked. I thought I was having a heart attack.” He chuckled at the memory. “Before then, I guess, I thought of falling in love as something that happened to other people, but not to me. I wasn’t stupid enough to do that. But looking at you—and you looked beautiful, by the way—I was so filled with love for you. And I realized that you were it, Allie. And I thought, ‘God help me, because I’m done for now.’ ”

  Walker went on. “The simplest thing to do would have been to tell you how I felt. But that would have required more courage than I actually had. And when Caitlin came, I used that as an excuse to try to buy some time. I didn’t realize you’d react that way, Allie, and tell me to get lost for good.” He was still chagrined at the memory.

  “I don’t think those were my exact words,” Allie murmured, with the closest thing to a smile he’d seen from her that afternoon.

  “No,” he agreed, “you were too polite to say that. But if you had said it, it probably wouldn’t have been any less than I deserved.”

  He smiled at Allie now, marveling at how pretty she looked in the slats of light coming in through the coffee shop’s half-closed blinds. A strand of hair had worked itself loose from the knot at the nape of her neck, he saw, and it was all he could do not to reach over and brush it off her cheek.

  “Walker,” she said, suddenly, straightening up in her chair, “I appreciate your honesty. I do. I know it couldn’t have been easy for you to tell me everything you’ve told me. But I don’t see how it changes anything. Between you and me, I mean.”

  He started in surprise. “Allie, it changes everything,” he said.

  But she looked doubtful. “I don’t know that it does. I mean, it sounds like you’ve been able to gain some perspective on your past. And that’s a
good thing. But as far as I know, you’re still the same man who panicked the morning after he spent the night with me. What makes you think you’ve changed? And what makes you think you won’t panic again the next time? If there is a next time.”

  If. He didn’t like the sound of that word.

  “Look, Allie, I was that man. But I’m not that man anymore. I love you. And loving you, it’s given me a courage I didn’t even know I had. Maybe that’s what love does to people. I don’t know. I guess my learning curve is still pretty high.”

  But she shook her head. “Walker, how do you know this is love? How do you know it’s not just some kind of infatuation?”

  “I’ve considered that,” he admitted. “Especially since this all feels new to me. The not being able to sleep. Or eat. Or concentrate at work. Or do anything, really, besides think about you. But I don’t think it’s just an adolescent crush, Allie. I think it’s gone way beyond that. I think—or I like to think—that I’m capable of more now. I like to think I’m capable of loving you.”

  She thought for a second. “So that feeling you felt that morning, after we spent the night together, that fear, it’s gone?” she asked.

  He shrugged. “There’s a little left, I guess. But mostly, that old fear has been replaced by a new fear. A fear of you not being part of my life.”

  She looked down and bit her lower lip. “I don’t know,” she said finally, softly. “I just don’t know.”

  “What don’t you know?” he asked. He was staring, involuntarily, at the hollow at the base of her neck. Remembering all the kisses he’d lavished on it. And all the pleasure he’d elicited from her by doing so. But sitting across the table from her now, it was as if there was an invisible wall separating them from each other. She was so close to him now, so tantalizingly close, but he couldn’t reach out and touch her. Couldn’t touch her neck. Couldn’t even touch the pretty fingers of her suntanned hand resting lightly on the table. He swallowed some lemonade. This is torture, he thought. With no apparent end in sight.

  “Walker, I’m sorry. But I don’t know if I trust you,” she said now, speaking so quietly that he had to lean forward to hear her. “And not just for my sake. But for Wyatt’s sake, too. Because if it doesn’t work out again, Walker, I’m not the only one who is going to get hurt. He’s going to get hurt, too.”

  “I know that,” he said quickly. “And I know I must seem like a poor risk to you. But, Allie, I can’t prove to you that I’ve changed unless you let me prove it to you.”

  “So I’m just supposed to take some gigantic leap of faith?” she asked, doubtfully.

  “Exactly,” he said. “That’s exactly what you’re supposed to do.”

  “I . . . I need time to think,” she said, finally. “I can’t give you an answer right now.”

  Walker nodded. “Take as much time as you need. And, Allie, if you decide it’s a no, that you don’t want to try again, then I’ll spare you the awkwardness of having to run into me in line at the grocery store anymore.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “My brother, Reid, wants me to move back to Minneapolis. He’s been trying to persuade me to do it all summer. He says the Butternut Boatyard doesn’t need me there full-time anymore, and he’s right. It doesn’t. Cliff, our GM here, is more than capable of running it by himself.”

  “And if we did decide to try again?” she asked, frowning.

  “I’d stay here, with you and Wyatt, and run the Butternut Boatyard. And Cliff would move to Minneapolis and be Reid’s right-hand man. That’s my preference, obviously. But if I can’t have you, then I don’t want this,” he said, gesturing around him.

  “But you love your cabin,” she objected. “And you love the lake.”

  “I do,” he admitted. “But they won’t mean anything without you and Wyatt in my life.”

  “Walker,” she murmured. “This is a lot to take in.”

  “I know it is. I don’t want to rush you, Allie. Take your time. And when you’ve made up your mind, call me. Or come over. Any time of the day or night.”

  He smiled, remembering the last time she’d come over. And the night of lovemaking it had led to. She saw that smile and frowned. She knew what he was remembering.

  “Walker? Whatever happens, you know it’s not just about you and me, right? It’s about you, and me and Wyatt.”

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way,” he said, immediately. “He’s an amazing little boy.” And I miss him, he almost added. I miss him like crazy.

  He watched her glance at her watch and saw the surprise register on her face. He glanced, guiltily, at his own watch. Had they really been sitting here for that long? She needed to get back to the gallery.

  She reached into her handbag and took out her wallet, but Walker intercepted her.

  “I’ll take care of it,” he said. “I’m sorry I kept you so long.”

  She said a quick, preoccupied good-bye and was gone.

  Walker exhaled, slowly. He’d done everything he could do. He’d said his piece. It was out of his hands now. And whatever decision she made, he’d have to respect it. Live by it. The best that he could.

  He left some bills on the table. Then glanced across at her plate. She hadn’t taken a single bite of her sandwich. He sighed and wondered if he should have Caroline wrap it up so he could drop it off at the gallery. But he decided against it. He didn’t know if she ever wanted to see him again or not.

  CHAPTER 30

  Caroline rang the front doorbell again, but this time she left her finger on it. She knew somebody was home. Lights were blazing from all the windows. And, from somewhere inside the house, she could hear the repetitive thudding of rock music. She wasn’t leaving until somebody—anybody—opened this door.

  Finally, after five minutes, she heard a voice. An exasperated voice.

  “All right, knock it off. I’m coming, damn it.”

  The door opened, and there was Jeremy, looking thoroughly irritated. And thoroughly disheveled. He was wearing a dirty T-shirt and an old pair of jeans. His hair was uncombed, he had at least a three days’ growth of razor stubble on his face, and his brown eyes were shadowed with fatigue.

  “Oh, Jeremy,” Caroline said sadly. “You look like hell.”

  “That’s sweet of you to say,” he growled, sarcastically. Caroline frowned. It wasn’t in Jeremy’s nature to be sarcastic. In fact, before his separation from Jax, he’d been unfailingly good-natured, not to mention polite. It was amazing, really, how much one person could change, and in how little time they could change, under the right circumstances. Or, in Jeremy’s case, under the wrong circumstances.

  “Are you going to ask me in?” Caroline asked coolly, when he made no move to do so.

  He shrugged. “I assume you’re here on some errand for Jax?”

  “Actually, Jeremy, Jax doesn’t know I’m here. But, yes, now that you mention it, I am here on her behalf.”

  “Well, I have nothing to say on that subject,” he said, starting to close the door on her.

  “Jeremy, don’t you dare close this door in my face,” Caroline said, warningly.

  He looked at her defiantly, then lost his nerve. He looked down at the floor and sighed. A defeated sigh. “Fine, suit yourself,” he said, opening the door wider.

  Caroline came into the house and followed him into the living room. She looked around the room, speechless. The place was in a shambles. There were clothes, books, toys, and DVDs strewn everywhere, and dirty dishes were stacked on every surface.

  “Jeremy, what happened here?” she asked, appalled, as she righted a large potted plant that had been tipped over, spilling dirt onto the living room rug.

  “Three little girls happened here,” he said, with an indifferent shrug.

  And one presumably adult man, she wanted to say, but didn’t.

  “I’d ask you to sit down,” he said, “but as you can see, there’s nowhere to sit down.”

  Caroline nodded, frowning. The two armchai
rs had been dragged together and draped with blankets in some attempt at building a fort. And the couch, she saw, with surprise, was made up like a bed, though it was so rumpled she wondered how anyone could sleep on it. Staring at it now, something occurred to her.

  When her husband had left her, it had been too painful to sleep alone in her suddenly too-big bed, so she’d slept on the couch instead. She wondered, sadly, if Jeremy was doing the same thing now.

  She heard a commotion from upstairs now, angry, childish shrieking, followed by a door slamming.

  “That’s Joy and Josie fighting,” Jeremy offered, glancing in the direction of the stairs. “That’s all they do now. I don’t know how Jax ever got them to stop.”

  “They’re still awake?” Caroline asked in surprise.

  He nodded, and even in his surly mood he had the decency to look embarrassed.

  “Jeremy, it’s almost eleven o’clock,” she objected. “It’s way past their bedtime. Especially on a school night.”

  “I can’t get them to go to sleep,” he admitted. “They miss Jax. And the good-night phone calls don’t seem to be helping.”

  Caroline winced. She’d heard these phone calls, or Jax’s side of them, anyway. They were pathetic things. Jax saying good night to each of her daughters in turn, while she tried, valiantly, not to cry.

  “Jeremy,” she said, something occurring to her. “What exactly do the girls think is going on here? With you and Jax, I mean?”

  “They think Mommy and the baby are staying with you because Mommy needs some rest,” he said.

  Caroline sighed. “And how long do they think this arrangement is going to continue?”

  “I have no idea,” he said, still not looking at her.

  She edged over to the couch and sat down, gingerly, on the edge of it. “We need to talk,” she said, gesturing to the couch beside her.

  “We are talking,” Jeremy pointed out.

  “No, I mean really talk,” Caroline said.

  “I have nothing to say,” Jeremy said sullenly. He didn’t sit down next to her on the couch. But he did pull one of the armchairs over and sit, noncommittally, on the arm of it.