That Night in Texas

by Eve Gaddy

  Gabe pulled her closer, kissed her hair. “You’re right. It’s not fair.”

  She leaned into him, accepting the comfort he offered. “I was so happy when I found out I was pregnant. And carrying the baby—” She laughed. “I know it’s cliché, but I really never felt better. We were both happy. Even though we’d been having problems, we both wanted the baby. I thought having a child would bring us closer. And she did. Or at least, I believed that she did.”

  But now, after all this time, Lana wasn’t so sure. Had she and Terence really grown closer, or was that just a fantasy she’d conjured to torment herself further? Everything would have been all right if only she hadn’t lost the baby…if only she’d never been raped. But maybe none of those things had caused them to separate. Maybe she and Terence had simply not been right for each other.

  Gabe said nothing, just kissed her hair again and tightened his arm around her. Rubbed a hand up her arm comfortingly.

  “I really believed we were going to make it. And then I—” Her throat closed up but she forced herself to continue. “I got an infection and had a miscarriage.” She could still feel the horror and despair, when, just weeks after the rape she went into labor and lost the baby. Her doctor had said the premature labor was caused by the infection. An infection most likely caused by the rape.

  “Wait a minute.” Looking at her, he frowned. “You’re not blaming yourself for the miscarriage, are you?”

  She didn’t answer. Because she did. If only she’d gotten security to walk with her that night…

  He pushed her chin up so she would look at him. “I don’t know much about pregnancies, but my sister Gail had a miscarriage scare. She didn’t lose the baby but she was afraid she would and was blaming herself because she had fallen. The doctor said it wasn’t her fault, that she couldn’t have caused it.”

  “It’s not the same. I can’t explain it.” Because as close as they’d become, she still couldn’t tell him about the rape. She didn’t know if she’d ever be able to.

  “You’re a doctor. You should know better than to blame yourself for something you couldn’t help. Women have miscarriages all the time for all sorts of reasons. It wasn’t your fault, Lana.”

  His voice was deep and so soothing. His hand caressing her cheek felt so gentle.

  “It wasn’t anyone’s fault, honey.”

  “I couldn’t protect her,” she said, choking back tears.

  If Gabe thought that was a strange thing to say, he didn’t comment. “Sometimes things just happen. And we don’t have a damn bit of control over them.” He smiled at her ruefully. “Don’t blame yourself for something you didn’t cause.”

  She sucked in a breath, determined not to cry. “I don’t. Most of the time. But Terence did.” He hadn’t said it in so many words. But he’d implied it in a thousand ways.

  “He was wrong. And he was a bastard to make you feel that way. He should have been supporting you, not making you feel worse.”

  She looked at him, wanting so much to believe him.

  “Is that why you divorced?”

  “Partly. We stuck it out for several months.” Until Terence made it clear he couldn’t get past any of it. “Of course, it didn’t help that he was having an affair with his therapist by then.”

  “That just proves he’s a dumb-ass,” Gabe said. “Any man who’d cheat on you has to be incredibly stupid.”

  That made her laugh, despite the grim story she’d told him. “Thanks.”

  He cupped her cheek with one hand. Looked deep into her eyes. His were dark brown and so full of warmth and compassion she could have drowned in them. Wanted to drown in them.

  “Terence was a fool to let you go,” he said, and kissed her.

  “DO YOU HAVE a preference on the wine? What do you like, white, red or pink?” Lana asked Gabe as they walked through the grocery store.

  “Whatever you want,” he said. He knew as much about wine as a minnow. Though he drank it willingly whenever someone else wanted it, he liked beer better.

  They were picking up something for dinner. Gabe had offered to grill some steaks. He didn’t cook a lot, but he could grill. He’d asked Lana if she wanted to go out but she’d refused, saying she’d rather cook something at her place.

  “What kind of steak do you like?” he asked her as they walked to the back of the store.

  “New York strip,” she said decisively.

  “I figured you for a filet mignon kind of woman.” Classy. Expensive.

  “Not me. I don’t like filets. They taste funny to me. Give me a strip any time.”

  She let him pick out a couple of good-looking strips and put them in the cart. He limped along with her as they headed to the wine section.

  “Since we’re having steaks, we’ll have a red, but I don’t know whether to get a Merlot or a Cabernet. Or maybe a Shiraz. What do you usually drink?”

  “Beer,” he said truthfully.

  She’d picked up a bottle and was reading the label, but at that she turned to look at him. “Don’t you like wine?”

  “It’s okay. I just don’t drink it much. So you get the kind you like. It doesn’t matter to me. I’ll have a glass of whatever you pick.”

  “All right, if you’re sure.” She frowned at the bottle in her hand. “I wonder if this is any good.”

  “Hello, Lana,” a man standing beside her said.

  Great, Gabe thought. Allen Paxton.

  “Randolph. Good to see you again.”

  “Allen, hi,” Lana said. “What are you doing here?”

  Gabe nodded at him, wondering that himself. The man had said he lived in Corpus Christi.

  “Stopped to pick up a bottle of wine. I have a date with a woman who lives here.”

  “Oh, well it’s nice to see you.”

  “That’s an excellent wine, by the way, especially for the price,” he said, gesturing at the bottle she held. “I heard you talking about it.”

  “Really? I haven’t had it. I usually drink California wines.”

  “The Australian wines are a bargain right now.”

  “I’ve had a few, but not many. I couldn’t decide between these two,” she said, pointing to another bottle.

  That’s all it took. The two of them started discussing wine in earnest then. The bouquet of this, the nuance of that. And then, for crying out loud, they started discussing corks. A cork was a cork, wasn’t it? Gabe stood there like a dummy while they chatted together like best buddies.

  He had no reason to dislike Allen Paxton. Except that he was a doctor and had infinitely more in common with Lana than Gabe ever would. He watched the guy critically. Obviously, Gabe hadn’t imagined that Paxton had the hots for Lana. He hadn’t taken his eyes off her the whole time they’d been talking.

  Gabe’s cell phone rang so he moved away to answer it. Lana and Dr. Knows Every Damn Thing About Wine were still yakking away.

  The caller was a prospective buyer, so Gabe made arrangements to show him the boat later that afternoon. A few minutes later he hung up and turned back and they were still talking. Good God, how much could you say about a stinking bottle of wine? “This is good” or “this sucks” ought to cover it.

  Finally they agreed on two. You’d think they’d just made the most monumental decision of their lives.

  “Thanks, Allen,” Lana said, placing the bottles in the bottom of the cart. “I appreciate the help.”

  “Sure. Let me know what you think.”

  “I’ll do that. Have fun,” she said as he walked off with a wave and a nod at Gabe.

  Gabe was jealous. Ridiculously, stupidly jealous over a conversation about wine, for crying out loud. He felt like a loser. She’s with you, not him, he reminded himself. And that’s what matters.

  “I thought we could have salad and French bread. Do you want potatoes with the steaks, too?” Lana asked, beginning to push the cart again.

  “I don’t care. Pick what you want.”

  She stopped and looked at h
im. “Is something wrong?”

  “No.” He shrugged. “Not really. That call I took was from someone wanting to see the boat. I told him I’d show it to him in an hour. Why don’t I take you back to your house and you can wait for me?”

  “How long will it take to show it?” She started walking again.

  “Depends. On whether he’s really interested or just jerking me around.”

  “I could come with you.”

  “No.”

  She didn’t say anything, just kept pushing the cart. He realized what his abrupt answer had sounded like the minute he saw the expression on her face. Damn, the last thing he’d wanted to do was to hurt her.

  “You don’t want to do that, Lana. It would just be boring for you.” Not to mention, whatever the result was, he was likely to be in a bad mood.

  “I didn’t mean to interfere,” she said. “I thought you might like some company, that’s all.” They had reached the vegetable aisle by now and she started picking up potatoes, studying them in great detail.

  He tried to explain. “The problem is, I don’t want to show it at all.” Didn’t want to show it, didn’t want to sell it, didn’t want to think about losing it. “Since I don’t have a choice, I have to do it alone.”

  Potato in hand, she looked at him with a sad smile. “I understand.”

  “It’s not you, Lana.”

  “I know.” She laid a hand over his that rested on top of the cane and squeezed. “Trust me, I do understand. Some things you just have to do yourself.”

  They finished shopping, had an argument over who would pay for the wine—which he won—and then he dropped her off at her house. Lana didn’t chatter on the way, letting him stew about what he was going to do. He kissed her goodbye and promised to come get her as soon as he finished at the marina.

  Assuming the guy showed up, one of three things could happen. He could make a bad offer, a decent offer or no offer at all. Gabe knew which of the three he was supposed to hope for, but that didn’t stop him from wishing it would be one of the other two. He knew it was futile, but he wasn’t ready to give up the dream. Worse, he wasn’t sure he ever would be.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “HOW DID IT GO?” Lana asked when she opened the door to Gabe late that afternoon.

  “It didn’t.” He came inside and followed her to the kitchen. “The guy was a no-show.” Although Gabe had realized nobody was coming after the first half hour, he’d hung around for a while just in case. He couldn’t afford to miss a possible sale.

  “Oh, Gabe, I’m sorry.” She squeezed his arm comfortingly. “I can’t believe someone would make an appointment and then not show up.”

  “Happens all the time. I’m beginning to wonder if I’m going to manage to sell El Jugador, period. Much less for a decent price.”

  “I’m sure you will,” she said.

  He shrugged, not wanting to talk about it anymore. He looked around the kitchen, noticing Lana had set the table and that the makings for salad were on the counter. “Why don’t I get the grill ready?”

  “All right. I’m going to microwave the potatoes and then finish them up in the oven. I wasn’t sure when you’d get back, so I thought I’d do them the fast way.”

  One thing he really liked about Lana was that he didn’t have to spell everything out. A lot of women wouldn’t have let go of the topic that easily.

  He went outside and cleaned the grill, then coated it with nonstick spray. When he came back in a few minutes later he asked, “How do you like your steak cooked?”

  “Medium rare.”

  “My kind of woman,” he said with a smile. Lana had put the steaks out along with some seasonings, so he sprinkled the spices on them. “You must cook out a lot. That’s a Cadillac of gas grills you’ve got there. It has every bell and whistle and then some.”

  She finished slicing tomatoes and tossed them in the salad bowl before looking at him. “No, I don’t use it much. I grill chicken on it sometimes, but that’s about all I use it for. I suppose I should barbecue more, but I don’t usually think about it.”

  “Why do you have the fancy grill, then?” He glanced outside and added, “It’s a beauty. It does everything but walk and talk.”

  A wry smile twisted her mouth. “I got most of the furniture and household things in the divorce settlement.”

  That smile said it all. “Including the grill. Let me guess, it was your ex’s pride and joy.”

  Nodding, she pulled the potatoes from the microwave and transferred them to the oven. “He adored it. He would have slept with it if he could.”

  He laughed at that. “I can think of better things to sleep with.”

  She smiled again reminiscently. “I know it was petty of me, but I thought he was going to cry when he realized the grill was included in my share.”

  “From what you said, he was a jerk. Serves him right. Besides, I’ll bet it cooks like a dream.”

  “I actually thought about letting him have it, but the day I moved out, his soon-to-be new wife came over. She said they needed it more than I did and she was sure I’d do the right thing. So naturally, I told her to forget it.Then she told me I was using the grill as a substitute for the husband whose interest I couldn’t keep.” She shrugged and started slicing mushrooms to add to the salad. “I felt like braining her with one of the tools.”

  “But you didn’t.”

  “No, I had a better idea. I had the movers load up that puppy then and there. The porch of my new apartment was small, and the grill barely fit, but at that point, I didn’t care. I’d have kept it if I’d had to put it in the living room.” Her brow furrowed. “Do you think that’s vindictive of me?”

  Gabe laughed. “No more than either one of them deserved, it sounds like. The new wife must be a nasty number. I thought she was a therapist. That’s cold, what she said to you.”

  Lana shrugged and tossed the salad. “She never liked me. We socialized some before their affair—at least, I think it was before. I always thought she had a thing for him. Turns out I was right.” Gabe picked up the plate of steaks and Lana followed him outside.

  They talked some more while they waited for the grill to heat, then he put the steaks on. His mind wasn’t really on the conversation. He was still brooding about the boat and the no-show. And the fact that if he did sell it, he didn’t know what he was going to do.

  “Want to talk about it?” Lana asked softly, pulling him out of his thoughts.

  “Talk about what?”

  “What you’re obviously thinking about. What you’ve been thinking about all night. Your boat.”

  “I wasn’t exactly thinking about the boat. I was having a career crisis.” He checked his watch. “The steaks are ready,” he said, putting them on the plate to carry them inside.

  “Still haven’t thought of anything you want to do?” she asked sympathetically.

  “Nope, not a clue,” he said, trying to sound cheerful as they sat.

  After they finished eating, they sat at the table and talked. Lana fiddled with her silverware, then looked at him and said, “Have you ever thought about teaching?”

  “No.” He laughed at that idea. “Teaching what?”

  “History.”

  His bedroom, he remembered. She’d been in his bedroom and found his secret. “Just because I like history doesn’t mean I could teach it. Besides, I never went to college, remember?”

  “You could go back, get a degree, teach.”

  He stared at her. She was serious. Was she just trying to help or was there more to it than that? He hadn’t thought Lana was the kind of woman who got involved with a man and immediately wanted to change him. Maybe he’d been wrong. “What part of ‘I hated school’ did you not understand?”

  Being cooped up in a building day after day, not only to earn a degree but then to sentence himself to that torture for the rest of his working life? Trying to teach a love of history to a bunch of kids, most of whom would never voluntarily open a history
book, much less read it. He’d lose his mind in the first month.

  “I saw your books, Gabe. You obviously love history. I just thought you might—”

  “Tell me something, Lana,” he interrupted. “Have you ever gone out with anyone before me who didn’t have a college degree?”

  She looked confused. “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “Answer the question.”

  She frowned, started to say something then shrugged. “No. But I still don’t see—”

  “I’m not going back to school. If that bothers you as much as it appears to, then maybe we’d better rethink this whole thing.”

  “Rethink—” She stared at him incredulously. “Are you dumping me?”

  “Other way around, I’d say.” He knew he was overreacting, but he couldn’t seem to help it.

  “You are. You’re dumping me over something ridiculous. I don’t believe this.”

  “I’m a fisherman. It’s what I do. It’s what I am. I’m not a teacher.” He pushed away from the table, got up and grabbed his cane so he could get away. He’d have given anything to be able to stride right out the front door, but that wasn’t possible. The best he could do was limp out.

  “Gabe.”

  She’d followed him into the room. He looked at her, thinking how classy she was, even when she was upset.

  “Earlier you said you loved me. Did you mean it?”

  He’d almost forgotten he’d admitted that. God, she was pretty. And sexy. And sweet. He was a fool. “I wouldn’t have said it if I hadn’t meant it.”

  She crossed the room to him. Put her hand on his arm and looked into his eyes. “Then don’t go. Stay with me. We’ll talk about it.”

  What else could he do when she looked at him like that? “Okay.” He went to the couch and sat. Lana sat beside him.

  “I can’t go back to school. It’s just not in me. I don’t want to teach. I don’t want to be inside day after day, trying to force a bunch of kids to learn in spite of themselves.”

  “All right.” Looking at him, she frowned. “It was only a suggestion, Gabe. That’s all.”