by Robin Caroll
Had she lost her mind? Why had she agreed to come talk to Max? Clear the air?—not likely.
Yet she sat on the bench beside him, ignoring that her heart was caught in her throat, and tried to think of what to say.
To his credit, Max remained silent. But just his close proximity stole her thoughts.
Suck it up, Ava. Stop hesitating and just get it all out.
So he could move into hating her.
She twisted to look him in the eye. She owed him that much. “I’m so sorry, Max.” She blinked back the tears burning her eyes.
“What happened?” His voice cracked.
And it nearly undid her.
She swallowed, forcing herself to explain. “Mother sent me off to the most horrible boarding school. All girls, mean girls. Snobs.” She shuddered as memories held her hostage. “It was nothing like what I knew from Loomis.”
Max laid a hand over hers, providing her with immediate comfort. Reassurance she didn’t deserve, yet she couldn’t bring herself to avoid his touch again. She enjoyed it entirely too much.
“I wrote you every single day, stealing stamps from the teacher’s desk and sneaking down to the mailbox to get them out to you.”
His eyes widened. “I never received a single letter from you.”
She knew that all too well. “I didn’t know that at the time. I thought you weren’t writing me.”
“But I did. Every day. Sometimes, twice a day.”
She smiled, his vehement testimony warming her inside. “I know that now, but I didn’t then. All I could think was that you’d moved on. Forgotten me.”
“No.” He shook his head and squeezed her hand.
Ava inhaled deeply, dreading going any further. But she had to. Max waited for the long-deserved truth. “I didn’t know Mother had made arrangements to have my incoming mail tossed and someone to follow me and destroy any correspondence I had written you.”
“She destroyed our letters?”
“And denied my phone access except to call home. Even sneaking and using someone else’s phone code had your number blocked.”
Disgust seeped into his features. Ah, she knew it well.
“But at the time, I didn’t know this. All I knew was that you didn’t write and didn’t call.” She swallowed, the lump in her throat nearly choking her. “I cried a lot that year. My senior year, ruined. All because of my mother.”
“Oh, Ava.” He leaned close, planting a feathery kiss against her temples.
She wanted nothing more than to lean against him, let him comfort and reassure her. But she couldn’t. She didn’t deserve that. Ava shrugged from his embrace. “When I finally graduated, I learned Mother had already made arrangements for me to return to Loomis and attend the university here.” She smiled. “I was excited. I was coming home. I was coming back to you.”
“But I had already left for LSU.”
“Mother knew that and didn’t tell me. Let me believe you were still in town.” The enormity of her mother’s invasion in her life slammed against her once more. She pushed down the now-familiar resentment and continued.
“I came back and learned you’d gone. I was beyond distraught. Mother wouldn’t even allow me to wallow. No, I had to keep my grades up, keep being the perfect daughter. She even went so far as to tell me what I should become.”
“I wondered why you became a wedding planner.”
“That was why. At that point, I was so hurt and felt so betrayed, I didn’t even care. I let her make all those important decisions.”
“Why?” He ran a thumb under her chin.
Chills tickled her skin. “Because I’d been told you were very involved with someone else at college, and if I’d ever cared about you, I should just let you go.”
“Your mother told you that?” His eyes were so filled with concern, yet anger.
Oh, she hated to tell him. But tell him she must.
“No. Your mother did.”
FIFTEEN
“My mother did what?” Max’s mind couldn’t quite wrap around what Ava had just told him. He’d expected lies and manipulation from Charla, but from his own mother? How conniving of her. Anger seeped into his veins.
“I was desperate. I visited your mother, hoping she’d give me your address or number, anything.”
“You went to see her?” Ava had to have been at wits’ end to risk having Charla find her at the condo. And then to have his mother lie.
“Yes. She looked me square in the eye and told me you’d fallen in love with some girl at college and if I’d ever cared anything about you, I’d not contact you and just move on with my life.” Ava’s eyes shimmered with moisture. “She basically told me to forget you and what we had together.”
Anger held his heart in its tight fist. “And you believed her?”
“Why wouldn’t I, Max? Unlike my mother, she’d never shown any indication that she had a problem with you and me being together.”
Oh, he should’ve told her the truth—how much his mother hated them dating. He hadn’t because he didn’t want to hurt her feelings. And he’d known how much grief Charla had laid on her. “She did. And I should’ve told you, but I didn’t want to hurt you.”
Big tears swam in the pools of her hypnotic green eyes. The Renault eyes. How many nights had he lain awake, haunted by their image?
“I should’ve figured it out. But I was so hurt, felt so betrayed…well, I didn’t think clearly.”
“Oh, Ava.” He wrapped an arm around her shoulders, drawing her against him. “I’m so sorry.”
She hugged him for a long second, then moved away. “At first, I just wallowed in misery. Then, I went a little crazy.”
“Crazy, how?”
“I joined a sorority in college. Started hanging around some new people to town.” She ducked her head, her strawberry hair shining in the sun. “Dated some boys I knew my mother wouldn’t approve of.” She let out a shuddering sigh. “I think I did that just to annoy her. I didn’t care about them. Not a single one.”
Something strange twisted in his gut as trepidation spread in his chest. “And?” His heart rumbled as loud as rolling thunder.
“And I really strayed as far away from my faith as you can ever imagine.” Big tears leaked from her eyes.
“How so?” His stomach wound in such a tight knot, he didn’t think he’d ever get it untangled. It was one thing to have been aching to have her back—it was another thing entirely to hear the pain their mothers had caused her.
“I began to drink a little. Then, a lot. Smoke. Try things I never should have.”
“What are you telling me, Ava?”
Her tears fell freely. “I did so much I’m not proud of, Max. I did things just to make myself feel numb, anything to stop feeling the pain and betrayal.” She sobbed, hanging her head and covering her face with her hands.
He wanted to comfort her, wanted to tell her it was okay, but he couldn’t lift his arm. Couldn’t open his mouth and speak. Couldn’t even think straight. Shock held him in check. Ava, drinking and smoking? The girl he’d known nearly had an asthma attack when walking past smokers.
His heart pounded so hard that his chest hurt. What drugs had she done? What had she done under their influence?
Her sobs subsided and she lifted her gaze to his face. He struggled to mask his shock from her probing gaze, knowing she was looking for reassurance and understanding.
She sniffed. “About then, Daddy came to see me, sat me down and really talked to me. Took me to see Reverend Harmon.” She smiled through tears. “I rededicated my life to Jesus and got myself straightened out.”
“How?” He hated that he couldn’t give more than a noncommittal reply, but his heart was having a hard time. Guilt nearly strangled him. If only he’d been there. If only he’d known.
“Finished college magna cum laude. Set up a local business right here in Loomis, to stay close to the church and Daddy. And Dylan. Fought to keep my life on track.”
“T
hen why…” Max struggled with his next question, suspecting the answer but wanting to hear it from her. “Then why, when I returned from college, did you avoid me like the plague? You didn’t think I’d notice you crossing the street to avoid passing me? Did you think that wouldn’t hurt my feelings?”
Oh, it had almost ripped his heart right out of his chest.
“For one, Mother told me that Pershing Land Developing had lured clients away from the Renault Corporation. Stole investments from Dylan. And that you were the one calling the shots, even from Baton Rouge.”
“And you believed such nonsense?”
She met his stare head-on. “I believed your mother.”
Touché. Both women were liars with total disregard for their children’s happiness.
“And you have to remember, I thought you’d been involved with someone in college, and I was upset.” Her cheeks turned a slight shade of pink. “I wasn’t exactly proud of my past, Max. I wasn’t as pure as the driven snow, and that made it hard to face you.”
Max ran his hands over his face. He wanted to shake her mother. His mother.
He wanted to turn back time.
Could Max ever get over what she’d done? What she’d believed about him? Her rebellion?
The earthy smell of bayou drifted on the cool breeze circling the pier. Ava pulled her sweater tighter around her shoulders. She wanted nothing more than to crawl into a hole and never come out. But she’d come this far. She hauled in a deep breath. “It was only months after you returned that I found out the truth. Surprisingly, from Dylan.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Angelina told Dylan that Georgia told her you were never involved with anyone in college. Period.” Ava failed to mention how much her heart had pounded when her brother had told her. Hope flared. But just as quickly, she remembered her own past. The balloon of hope had burst.
Max stared at her, his expression frozen in an undetectable mask. “I didn’t even date in college.” His voice was thready, gravely.
“I shouldn’t have believed your mother, Max. What I should have done was get in my car and drive to Baton Rouge and hunt you down on campus to talk to you.”
“Why didn’t you?”
Good question. One she’d asked herself many times over the last several years. “Maybe I just didn’t have enough faith in us.” Her heart ached in an old, familiar way.
He ran a hand over his hair. How she longed to run her fingers through the waves. She curled her hands into fists.
An egret swooped low over the water, scooped up a fish, then took flight again. Why couldn’t she just fly off as well? Far away from Loomis. From Max. From the truth of their tangled pasts filled with lying mothers and regret.
Max let out a long breath. “I’m furious at my mother, but, Ava, you should’ve sought me out.”
The first wisps of anger smoked across her heart. “You knew I was back in Loomis. Why didn’t you seek me out?”
Max opened his mouth, hesitated, then snapped it shut.
“Not so easy, right?”
“No. Nothing about this is easy.” Again, he raked his hands over his sculpted face.
She wiped the sweat from her palms across her jeans. “So, now you know.”
Yes, he finally knew the truth. Honestly, the truth wasn’t as bad as he’d expected. At least, not on Ava’s part. His mother was a totally different story. In his worst-nightmare scenario, Ava had just fallen out of love with him. But now…well, he could understand why she’d avoided him. He didn’t agree with her logic, but he could understand it.
“And it’s in the past, right?” Her eyes held so much hope in their intensity.
“Yes. It’s in the past.” He took her hand in his, rubbing his thumb over her knuckles.
“Then can I ask you one last thing, and we can just put the past behind us?”
“Sure.” But his heart quickened.
“What happened to your faith, Max?” She pivoted slightly to stare him in the eye. “You were once so strong for Jesus, sharing your testimony, a walking witness for the gospel. But now, I haven’t seen you in church since I got back to Loomis. What happened?”
He’d rather have to discuss a past drug use than explain how he felt. Especially to Ava. Letting go of her hand, he rested his elbows on his knees, hunching against the cooler breeze coming off the bayou.
She laid a hand on his shoulder. Warm. Comforting. Reassuring. How many times had he ached for that touch? And God had said no.
“It’s hard to explain, Ava.”
“Try.” She leaned closer to him, not quite touching him, but her scent and essence surrounding him.
“I guess I used to think He really cared about our day-today problems down here on earth. That He listened to our prayers and answered. That He was our strength.”
“But you don’t anymore?” Her voice cracking almost killed him.
“No. Not like I did. I felt like a hypocrite for believing He’d always be there for me.” Learning that He wasn’t had broken Max’s heart more than Ava leaving.
“Oh, Max. You know better.”
He twisted to face her. “Do I? How’s that? I prayed nightly for you to come back to me. Yet, here it is, years and years later, and we’re just now talking.”
“But I am here now. So are you.” She stood, the wind softly lifting her golden hair. “I don’t know why all things happen, I just know that God has a plan for it all. Even if we never understand it this side of heaven.” Her footfalls thumped against the weathered wood of the pier as she paced. “Maybe we were too young, too delusional about the real world for it to have worked.”
“You really believe that?” Their love had been strong, not some infatuation.
She stopped in front of him, staring down at him with tears in her eyes. “I don’t know, Max. Maybe God needed me to walk on the wild side a bit so that when I came back to Him, I was wiser, more mature, and had learned my lesson.”
“Not to do drugs?”
Her expression fell to one of despair. “No, not to wander from His will for me. It was truly the loneliest time of my life. Even worse than thinking you’d found someone else.”
Words wouldn’t form in his mouth.
She plopped back on the bench beside him. “Don’t you think it’s foolish to blame God for what our mothers did to us? They’re the ones who lied and broke our trust.”
“Then how can you continue to live with her?” At this moment, he was seriously considering moving out of Pershing Plaza, just to get away from his mother’s interference. Especially now that he knew the truth.
“Because after the wreck and Daddy dying, her being in a wheelchair…well, I just felt sorry for her. She needed me.” Tears squeezed out the edges of her eyes and made tracks down her cheeks. “For the first time in my life, my mother needed me. I felt like I mattered.”
He wrapped an arm around her shoulders, pulling her tight against him as he fought his very, very strong dislike of Charla Renault. “You’ve always mattered to me, Ava. A lot.”
Moving on instinct—or was it memory?—he leaned forward and brushed his lips over each of her eyelids. Then he planted soft kisses down the bridge of her nose to the tip. His heart swelled in his chest until it felt like he would explode. Slowly, he lowered his mouth to hers.
It was like old times, but different. Slower. More cautious. Yet full of the emotions he’d never forgotten. He ended the kiss and rested his forehead against hers, putting them eye to eye.
“An awful lot.”
SIXTEEN
Ava’s first thought the next morning, as the sun filtered in through the windows, was of Max. He’d kissed her, bringing every feeling she thought she’d buried back to the surface. And she’d learned he’d totally lost his faith. Now she didn’t know what to feel.
On one hand, she could easily let herself fall right back in love with Max Pershing, and if she’d been reading the signals from him right, they could have a second chance at their happily
ever after. But when she’d rededicated her life to Christ, she’d vowed to not even date someone who didn’t share her faith. Oh, how tangled her life had become.
God, I could sure use a little guidance in everything down here.
She ran a finger over her bottom lip absentmindedly. Max had hijacked her dreams last night, leaving her fitful and anything but rested this morning. She kicked back the covers and padded to the bathroom. No time to get into an emotional tornado this morning. She had places to go, things to do. After she met with Jocelyn and Sam at the hotel’s coffee and beignets shop, she’d run into the Renault Corporation and grab the department reports.
The shower she raced through didn’t wash away the memory of Max’s kiss. Frustration mounting over her conflicting emotions, Ava dressed in a slick business suit, grabbed her planner and stomped down the stairs and out the front door. Good thing she’d parked her car in the circle instead of the garage.
She breezed into Café Au Lait, arriving at eight-thirty on the dot. The enticing aroma of full-flavored coffee and delectable beignets hovered in the air. Jocelyn stood and waved her over to the window table where she and Sam sat. As Ava wove through the breakfast crowd, a jolt of something unfamiliar hit her. Sam and Jocelyn looked so happy, so in love, so together. Her own single status ached within her.
Drat Max for kissing her and bringing all these old feelings up.
Jocelyn hugged her before she sat. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Just a lot on my mind.” Ava slipped out of her suit jacket and hung it on the back of the chair. She wondered why Jocelyn had to fall in love with the man trying to pin a murder on Max.
“Are you sure?” Jocelyn’s eyes were filled with kindness, and for a moment, Ava was sorely tempted to just tell her friend everything.
But this was about Jocelyn’s wedding. Her happiness. Her future. Ava smiled. “I’m fine. Early morning.”
The wedding plans were finalized as they drank the strong, chicory coffee and ate the donut concoction made famous in New Orleans. Ava made notes of things to have Cathy take care of for her, then assured Jocelyn that her wedding would be beautiful and special. Just like Jocelyn herself. Ava had just slipped her planner into her purse and prepared to say goodbye when MaryBeth entered the hotel’s café and rushed to their table.
