by Delia Latham
Dec used familiar, universal techniques combined with some of his own to create a uniquely individual style. Apparently, the art admirers and connoisseurs in attendance hadn’t overlooked it either.
They’d been there less than an hour before Raine knew with absolute certainty that Dec’s debut event was a phenomenon. She’d attended enough art shows in the Los Angeles area to recognize the indicators, and her excitement and pride built as the evening progressed.
Attendees stood in small groups, enjoying complimentary wine, appetizers, and conversation, much of which centered around Dec.
Raine, making her quiet, unobtrusive way back and forth through the rooms, also figured out which of the guests were important cogs in the wheels of the art world. Having spotted them, she found ways to steer Dec in their direction and involve him in conversation with those crucial contacts.
At a rare lull, during which no one stood waiting for Dec’s attention, she pulled him into a quiet corner and gave him the run-down on her observations.
Dec grinned. “I don’t know if I’m more jazzed about what you’re telling me, or the fact that your eyes shine like emeralds while you do it.” He glanced around the room, and then bent to brush his lips against her cheek. “I’m glad you’re with me, Raine. Knowing you’re here, seeing your beautiful face in a crowd of faces I don’t know…well, it means a lot to me.”
“I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. And Dec…I’m so proud of you!” She bent her head to indicate a woman standing a few feet away, clearly waiting to speak with the artist. “I think one of your subjects awaits,” she whispered.
Dec turned, but instead of walking away, he drew Raine with him and kept her close to his side as long as he could.
Toward the end of the evening, Raine excused herself to the ladies’ room. She checked her hair, powdered her nose, and sat quietly in the adjoining lounge for five minutes. She’d told Dec she wouldn’t want to be anywhere else tonight, and it was absolutely true. At the same time, the last month had been a constant push. Standing out there with Dec, the strain had caught up with her, and she suddenly needed a few minutes’ reprieve.
Finally, she picked up her evening bag and pushed open the door. She could hold on another half-hour, and then they’d be on their way home.
The restroom door closed behind her, and she scanned the room for Dec, who wasn’t where she’d left him. When she found him, she gasped, her eyes fixed on the woman who stood beside him.
Mother?
21
Casting a frantic look around the room, she found her dad, standing next to a distinguished gentleman a few feet away. She started toward them, trying to draw breath while her heart pounded against her chest with sharp, painful jabs.
Her father stood with his back to her.
Good. That gave her a little longer to compose herself. As she came within hearing distance, however, she heard her name…and Dec’s.
“Dec has called every week to keep me updated, as you know from my subsequent calls to you. Raine couldn’t have been in better hands, Mr. Presley.” The man glanced over at Dec and Raine’s mother. “If I had a daughter and needed a ghost guard, he would be my first choice. That’s why I recommended him.”
Raine froze, mid-step. Dec…a ghost guard? For her?
She swung back toward Dec and her mother, moving as if through an invisible sludge.
Her mother reached up to pat his cheek. “Thank you for watching out for Raine, Mr. Keller.”
If Raine had doubted what she’d already overheard, her mother’s thanks removed all traces of it. The cultured voice floated with crystal clarity across the few feet to where Raine stood. “Why she needed to gallivant off on her own I’ll never understand. She’s never given us a problem of any kind until then. Knowing you were watching over her was all that made her silly shenanigans bearable for her father and me.”
A strangled sound erupted from Raine’s throat, drawing her mother’s attention.
“Oh, there you are, darling!” She took Dec’s arm and moved toward Raine.
Raine took an involuntary step backward, her frozen gaze fixed on Dec’s trapped expression.
“Raine…!” He pulled his arm free of her mother’s grasp and strode forward, but she held up a hand.
“Don’t.” Her voice grated like glass on the verge of breaking into a million pieces. “Just…don’t.” She swung toward the door and bumped into her father.
“Sweetheart.” He gave her stiff shoulders a perfunctory squeeze. “We wanted to surprise you—”
“You succeeded, Father.” She felt detached, as if she watched it all play out from outside her body. “I’m surprised.”
Without another word or another glance at Dec, she stepped around her startled dad, swept by his friend without a glance, and headed for the door. If God had any mercy at all, she’d reach it before any of them could intercept her.
Dec’s voice rang out across the room. “Raine…honey, wait! Let me explain.”
She ignored the desperation in his tone and stepped up her pace. No explanation needed. She was smart enough to figure it out on her own.
Dec had been escorting her all over the coast, spending time with her…capturing her heart forever…only because he’d agreed to play the part of “ghost guard” over her, at her parents’ request.
How could she have been so foolish as to think a man like Dec might really care for her in the way she cared for him? She didn’t doubt his integrity—he’d surely thought he was doing a good thing, keeping her entertained while he kept her safe and allowed her parents to get through this time without being overly concerned for her welfare.
But why had he pretended to care about her? Not that he’d ever used the l word. If only she’d never faced her own fall into l territory, tonight’s horrid discovery wouldn’t be ripping her heart to shreds.
The crisp night air felt cool and refreshing on her flushed cheeks, but she didn’t take time to stop and enjoy it. Raine rushed around the building and into a narrow, dark alley between the gallery and a neighboring structure. She stepped into deep, inky shadows beneath an overhanging eave and pulled her cell phone from her evening bag. Stubbornly denying the tears that burned her eyes, she punched at the dial pad with a shaky fingertip, searching for taxi companies in Santa Barbara. She had to get as far from Dec and her parents as possible, as fast as she could make it happen.
She called the first listing she found.
After only two rings, a bored voice responded. “ABC Cabs. This is Grady.”
“I need a taxi right away, please. I’m at the Mills Gallery on State Street.”
“OK, lady. I can be there in about twenty minutes. What’s that address?”
“Oh! I’m not sure of the street address. Do I have to have that, or can you look it up?”
“No problem. I’m pretty sure I know where it is anyway. Just a sec, let me—”
Raine’s cell disappeared from her hand, and hard fingers gripped her shoulder. Terrified, she uttered a little scream, shook herself free, and ran hard for the street.
****
Dec’s longer legs made it easy to catch up with her just as she reached the sidewalk fronting the gallery, and he caught her by the arm. “Would you just wait a doggone minute?”
She jerked free of his hold and shot him a glare that turned his blood to ice. He’d never seen her in such a state.
“You scared me to death, Declan Keller! Give me my phone.” She stuck out her hand, meeting his gaze with a frigid stare filled with disdain and anger. And crushing, smothering pain.
He held out the phone. When she took it, he wrapped his fingers around her wrist. “Raine, I’m so sorry. I was going to tell you—”
“Oh, you were? When, Dec? Were you going to call me on Monday, after I get back to Pasadena?”
“Honey, listen—”
“Don’t call me honey.” She gritted the words through white lips that didn’t move when she spoke.
He sighed
and raked a hand through his hair. How in the world was he to get through to her when she wouldn’t listen to anything he said? “OK, OK. Raine. Please hear me out. Please?”
She shook her head. “I’ve heard enough, Dec. You’ve been lying to me all along. Why would I want to hear anything else you have to say?”
“I haven’t lied.”
“You’re a smart man, Dec. You know about lies of omission.” She punched a button on her phone, and then raised her gaze to his once more. “Go back inside. You don’t want to destroy the results of all your work, and Mills’s, at this point.”
“Raine, don’t do this. Please, just wait. Let me take you home. This thing is almost over. We need to talk.”
She shook her head. “I don’t have anything to say.”
“Raine!” Mrs. Presley burst through the glass gallery doors and descended on them like a whirlwind. “What in the world is wrong with you? Your father and I came all this way to surprise you, and you leave us standing in the middle of the floor like that? I’m ashamed of you. I thought I raised you better!”
“Mrs. Presley, this is my fault.” Dec tried to halt the woman’s tirade.
Raine already appeared on the verge of collapse.
“I should have—”
“Stay out of this, young man. This is between my daughter and me.”
Raine’s little chin inched up a notch or two, and Dec watched as her shoulders straightened. “No, Mother, this is between Dec and me. You and I have something to discuss as well, but we’ll deal with that when I get home on Monday. Until then, please allow me to speak with my ghost guard in private.”
Dec held his breath, waiting for the fireworks to start.
Raine was so beautiful in that moment, with fire in her eyes and steel in her spine.
To his surprise, Mrs. Presley made no immediate comeback. Her mouth dropped open. She quickly realized her lapse of propriety and snapped it closed, her gaze fixed on Raine. Then she hauled in a breath that looked painful, gave Dec a confused glance, and shrugged. “Well…all right then. We’ll talk Monday, sweetie.” She turned a white face to Dec. “Congratulations, Mr. Keller. I’m quite impressed with your talent.” Then she simply turned and walked back into the gallery.
Dec stared after her, shocked by her easy acquiescence.
Raine too watched her mother disappear inside the building, her gaze wide and startled. “I can’t believe I just did that,” she whispered.
Dec didn’t for an instant think she was talking to him, but he answered anyway.
“You did. You did it perfectly—with respect, but also with firmness. I knew you could.”
She blinked and seemed to remember where she was and what had brought about that surprising interaction with her mother. Her shoulders drooped, and she went white, but kept her feet.
Dec’s heart dropped at the obvious effort required for her to remain upright. He slipped an arm around her waist.
She stiffened, but allowed him to leave it there, apparently unable to deny her need for support.
“Come on, honey. I’ll tell Mills we’re leaving immediately.”
She shot him a glare. “I told you not to call me honey. And you’re not going anywhere. I won’t let you mess this up.”
“This doesn’t matter to me, Raine—not like you do. Come on.” He led her back into the rapidly emptying gallery and straight to Mills, who watched their approach with concern. He’d made no secret the entire evening of how intensely he admired Raine.
“Is everything OK, Dec? Raine, are you ill?”
“She’s not feeling well at all, Roland. I want to take her home. Now.”
“Of course. Go.” The man waved his hands in a dismissive gesture. “For heaven’s sake, you’ve been here for hours. I’ll make your excuses to our few remaining guests, and I’ll be in touch, probably tomorrow. But I can tell you now, this showing has been a mega success. Mega! Every piece on display tonight is sold…and at prices you won’t believe.”
“That’s great. I appreciate all you’ve done, but right now, I’m more concerned with getting Raine out of here.”
Mills leaned in to kiss Raine’s cheek. “Take this beauty home. We’ll talk later.”
In the car, Raine leaned back against her seat and looked out the window.
Dec gave her a few moments, and then reached for her hand.
She didn’t pull it away, but let it lie limp and unresponsive in his.
Dec swallowed icy fear and squeezed her cold fingers. “Raine, we need to talk, honey. Are you up to it?”
“I’m fine,” she murmured. “I’m disappointed. You hurt me, Dec. I wouldn’t have believed you capable of such deception.”
He sighed. “I didn’t do this to deceive you, Raine. Can I just tell you what happened?”
She shrugged. “Do I have a choice? I’m a captive audience, aren’t I? Talk if you feel you must.”
Not exactly the reaction he’d hoped for, but at least she hadn’t said no.
He started with the call he’d received from his dad.
At first, she focused on the darkness outside her window, but then she relaxed enough to angle her body just barely toward him. Her head rested against the back of her seat, as if she lacked the strength to hold it up, and even in the dark interior of the car, he noted her pale cheeks. But she was listening.
So he talked, ending with his promise to himself only the day before…to come clean tonight, on the way home from the showing. How ironic that he was doing exactly that, although he hadn’t foreseen the strain under which he’d make his confession.
She asked a couple of lethargic questions and gave him short nods when he answered. Other than that, she made no attempt to turn his desperate soliloquy into a conversation.
The last thirty miles of the drive, neither of them spoke.
Raine turned again toward the window.
Dec didn’t pressure her to talk. He’d spoken his heart. Whether she forgave him or not would have to be her decision. He pulled up in front of the steps outside her apartment, and she had the door open before he came to a full stop.
“Congratulations, your show was amazing. Don’t get out, please.”
Watching her climb the stairs and disappear inside, Dec fought the urge to follow her. To fall on his knees and beg if need be. But he didn’t. He pulled the car around the circle drive and headed home. Not until he parked in front of his cabin and opened his car door did he notice Raine’s little evening bag wedged between the two seats.
He stared at it, once again seeing her pull the necklace out, letting it swing between them in the car. Steeling his jaw, he picked up the little bag. Guilt washed over him as he unzipped it to look inside. Had he ever opened a woman’s purse before—and without her permission? But something told him she might have brought something else along.
And he was right. With the purse in hand, he strode to his front door. He had a little job to do tonight.
22
Raine loaded the last of her belongings into the trunk of the car the next morning, exhausted from a sleepless night. She was really leaving Cambria. Leaving Dec. Leaving her heart and her happiness behind. Two days early.
She knocked on Miss Angie’s door, already dreading saying goodbye to the woman who’d come to mean so much to her.
The door swung open.
“Oh, Raine, dear…come in!” Miss Angie pulled her inside and wrapped her in a warm hug that nearly brought Raine to tears.
She’d determined not to cry as she bid her friends farewell. Leaving Miss Angie would be so hard…and she’d also promised to swing by the shelter.
Shay would be there with Pastor Merckle and the kids.
Dec…well, she refused to think about him. Last night had been hard enough. She couldn’t see his face again. Couldn’t look into those gray-blue eyes, and then walk away. Their unsatisfactory parting last night would have to suffice.
“I’ll miss you, Miss Angie.” She returned the woman’s hug, and then h
anded her the key to the apartment that had been her home for the happiest time of her life, along with a beautiful gift bag containing the glass sand dollar she’d purchased in Harmony. “You’re so much more than just the landlady at Paradise Pines Lodge. You’ve become a precious friend, and I’ll never forget you.”
“Nor I you, dear one.” Miss Angie tapped the corners of her eyes and placed both the key and the gift on a table in the entry. “You come back. Anytime, do you hear?”
“I’d like that, but…well, I’ll be pretty busy once things return to normal. I’ll call though. I do want to stay in touch.”
“You’d better! Now, before you go, I have something for you too. Wait right here.”
She hurried out of the room, only to return holding a large canvas with a bright bow secured around one corner. “That day we visited the Cambrian Arts Gallery together…remember I had another errand to take care of when we got back to the car? I sent you to meet Shay while I took care of it.”
Raine’s eyes widened. “Miss Angie, you didn’t…!”
“I certainly did.” She swung the gift around, revealing the Moonstone Beach scene by Logan Bullard that Raine had so admired. “I want you to have this to remember your visit.”
“Miss Angie, I could never forget this visit—and I could never forget you. This is too much!”
“No, it isn’t. Please, I want you to have it.”
Despite her intentions, Raine found herself brushing at persistent tears. “Thank you, Miss Angie. I love it…but then, you know I do.” She picked up her little gift and held it out. “Now you, although my gift to you is nowhere near this grand.”
“I don’t need grand, Raine.” Smiling, the sweet lady removed the object from the bag and peeled back several sheets of prettily plumped tissue to reveal the gorgeous blue-and-purple sand dollar. “Oh, my dear, this is beautiful!” She turned it over and one hand flew to her heart. “There are angel wings on the back.”
“Yes. That’s why I got it, Miss Angie. Because you’re like an angel to me.”
“Well, aren’t you the sweetest thing!” Miss Angie laid the item on the table again and wrapped her arms around Raine once again. “Dec left something for you too.” She pulled Raine’s evening bag from her apron pocket. “You left this in his car last night.”
