Playing for Hearts

by Debra Kayn

  Everyone in the place seemed to know something big was going down.

  Crista glared over Shauna’s shoulder at the group of men who’d planted themselves on the other side of the lounge. A team, a force, they intimidated the whole town. That was the only reason the Quayside wasn’t full of customers on a Friday night. The group of males held the power, but the females weren’t out of options yet.

  “I’ll take out Juan. He’ll be easy, cause he’s under contract not to use his right arm.” Crista leaned into the table, completing the circle of women. “Plus, I’ve always wanted to knock him down a peg or two.”

  Diana formed a fist. “Let me have the dumb Russian. He somehow found out my phone number and won’t stop calling me.”

  “Dominic’s calling you?” Crista’s jaw dropped. “How? What?” Her mouth moved, but no sound came out.

  “Settle down.” Shauna patted Crista’s arm. “I don’t want you two fighting.”

  “Pshaw! She can have him. I’ve never met such an egotistical, uptight, little brained … dick in my life.” Diana shuddered.

  Kate caught Crista’s arm and pulled her back down in the chair. “Okay, listen you two, we need to ban together. Solidarity and all that crap. We can do this. With Jackson on our side, it’s five against five. I’m sorry, Shauna, but that leaves you to handle Grayson by yourself. Be strong. Be forceful. Be clever. If that doesn’t work, knee ’im in the balls.”

  She groaned. “I love you all, but I’m fine. I’m going to walk out the door and let you all get back to enjoying the night. If I knew Grayson would come here and scare off all the customers, I would’ve gone straight to the hotel and skipped girls’ night out. As it is, they’ll probably never let me come back to the lounge. So much for my great idea to try and gain everyone’s trust again.”

  “It’s not right that he’s following you around town,” Diana said. “He’s a bully.”

  “You’ve forgotten that this is how he’s always been.” She scooted her chair back. “I have a choice to react or rise above the situation. Since I spent my whole life reacting to everything he’s done, I’m attacking this in a healthy, mature, and calm way.”

  Kate smiled. “I’m impressed.”

  “Thank you.” She mustered a grin in return before turning to Crista. “I’m sorry about screwing up our last night together. I hope you’ll come back to Cottage Grove and visit soon.”

  Crista stood up and leaned across the table to hug Shauna. “I will. I’ll call you in a few days. I’ll be in Hawaii training for the next three weeks, but we’ll make plans.”

  Shauna stood up and hugged all of her friends, picked up her purse, and walked across the restaurant with her head held high. She tensed as she reached Grayson, Dominic, Bruce, Gary, and Juan, but to her relief none of them followed. She could only feel their stares heating up her backside as she walked past them out the front door.

  Outside in her car, she couldn’t help glancing in her rearview mirror, hoping Grayson would follow. By the time she arrived downtown and parked, she’d disgusted herself. No matter how hard she tried to move forward and concentrate on work, the truth was she wanted Grayson back. How sick was that?

  He’d betrayed her in the worst way possible. Embarrassing her in front of the whole town, using his wealth and power to drive the wedge that should’ve killed the love she had for him, and what does she do? She inwardly allows him to continue hurting her.

  What was it about her that caused people to want to run away? Her mom had thought nothing of leaving her own flesh and blood. Grayson hadn’t even done that. Instead, he’d paid for her ticket out of Cottage Grove, convinced her dad to lie to her for all these years, and in the end, he’d left her unhappy and broken. Even her heart hurt.

  I’ll survive, I always do. She hoped she wasn’t lying.

  Ignoring the stairs that she usually took to her room at the hotel, she rode the elevator up to the third floor. Tomorrow, she’d contact Harvey Whittle at Keystone Realty and Properties and see about renting a home with a nice yard. Right now having Blue to cuddle would be the best medicine.

  She hunted for her keycard in her purse, found it, and stopped when she looked up at her door. Her dad and mom flanked the wall, waiting for her. Great. Did they come to pour salt in her wounds or coddle her?

  “Hi, buddy. How are you doing?” Tony swept off his cap and clutched it in front of him.

  She glanced away from the worry in his eyes. “Exhausted. If you’ll excuse me, I’m going inside and making it an early night. I’m bushed.”

  Her dad looked unconvinced and more than determined. He steeled his gaze and gave her the look, shrinking her to a ten-year-old. She had to remind herself that he’d let Grayson send her away and kept his secret. The one man she relied on to love her no matter how foolish she acted had betrayed her.

  “Can we come in and talk with you? We won’t stay long, I promise.” Tony reached out and held Belinda’s hand. “Please?”

  She sighed and nodded, holding open the door and letting them enter her room. She pointed to the sofa for them to take a seat, set her purse on the table, and then perched on the remaining chair.

  “I should’ve told you a long time ago, but Grayson asked me to keep it secret.” Tony braced his elbows on his knees. “I’d love to tell you I honored his wishes because I wanted the best for you, and I knew I would never be able to afford to send you to college. But … ”

  She stared at the carpet, and remained silent. None of this meant much now, after the fact.

  “The truth is I was ashamed. I was embarrassed. I’d already failed as a husband, a father, and on a good day, I was happy if I managed to put food on the table and ask you how your day went.” Tony ran his forearm across his eyes. “As your dad, I wanted to be the one to give you an education, a chance to broaden your dreams. I was tired of watching you beat yourself up every time someone in town made a comment about your crush on Grayson. I guess a small part of me also wanted him to pay, because I felt Grayson owed you. He hurt my little girl.”

  At some point in his speech, Shauna saw what he’d gone through being a single father. She had put him through hell, there was no denying it. All her days running wild and free after her mom left had given her time to find attention wherever she could find it. She’d forced Grayson into the position of accepting her, faults and all. She’d brought trouble upon herself.

  “You did the best you could do, Dad. We both did.” She moved over and kneeled beside him. “The more outlandishly I acted, I knew you’d stop whatever you were doing and come save me. It wasn’t your fault. I don’t blame you.”

  Tony hugged her. She squeezed her eyes closed, washing the moisture from them.

  “I love you, buddy.” He sniffed, and she managed to laugh when he ruffled her hair.

  “I love you too.”

  “Shauna?” Belinda dabbed her cheek with Kleenex that she’d pulled out of her purse.

  She moved back to the chair. “I don’t mean to be rude, but there’s really nothing that needs to be said between us. I’ve accepted that you’re back in town and you’re part of my dad’s life, but I survived without a mother growing up, I certainly don’t need one now.”

  “Shauna.” Tony glanced over at Belinda. “Go on. Tell her.”

  “Dad, I — ”

  “No. You’ve forgiven me for letting Grayson pay for your schooling, but what Belinda has to say is something else that I must take responsibility for.” He leaned back. “Go on, honey. Tell her.”

  Nothing Belinda could say would change the fact that she’d left Shauna. She couldn’t even look her mother in the face. Belinda was not the woman she remembered.

  “I never wanted to be here, explaining what happened. To me, you’re my daughter and there are certain things that no mother should tell her child.” Belinda cleared her throat. “I forget that you’re all grown up and have your own problems you’re going through.”

  “This really isn’t necessary,” she said. />
  Belinda nodded. “You’re right. I could walk out the door and forget about excusing my behavior, but I’m afraid everything I’ve done will continue to affect you. Each of us has our reasons why we act the way we do, and I can’t tell you that I was wrong in leaving you, but I can tell you how sorry I am. I can’t go back, and I’m not sure I would change how I handled the situation even if I could.”

  “Well, that’s honesty.” Shauna snorted. “Let’s make both of us happy, and call it a night.”

  Belinda smiled, but her lips shook and the hand that she laid on her chest trembled. “You were always headstrong.”

  “Yeah, and that’s what gets me in trouble,” she muttered, as she picked at her thumbnail.

  “I left you and Tony because he’d slept with another woman.”

  Her mother could’ve told her aliens had kidnapped her, and she would’ve given her the benefit of the doubt, but an affair? No way. Not her dad. He’d never even dated during the thirteen years after Belinda left.

  “Are you really going to sit there and let her try to talk me into believing you cheated on her?” Shauna stared at her dad, waiting for him to tell his wife to stop.

  He shook his head. “It’s true. We were severely in debt after opening the body shop, and on the verge of bankruptcy. I’d gone out drinking and one thing led to another, and I cheated on your mom. I won’t go into details, but your mom found out and confronted me. I told her the truth. I was already losing everything, and felt I didn’t deserve her.”

  She blinked, absorbing the words but not understanding them. She wanted to scream, “What about me? What about your daughter? What about love?” Love wasn’t supposed to stop because people make mistakes. Her chin dropped to her chest. Isn’t that exactly what she let happen in her own life? Grayson had forgiven her for making his life difficult, and when she’d found out that he’d paid to send her away, she’d given up. Oh God, I’ve been so stupid.

  She raised her head and glanced back and forth from her mom to her dad. They gazed back, waiting for her to say something. Their faces said it all. They wanted her to give them her forgiveness. They wanted to heal and move on as a family.

  “You stayed away thirteen years,” she whispered.

  Belinda nodded. “I never planned on leaving you. I wanted to move away, get a job, an apartment, and come back for you.”

  “But you didn’t.”

  “No.” Belinda inhaled. “By the time I saved enough, I got sick and found out that I had cancer. Without insurance … ”

  Tony slipped her hand into his. “She didn’t want to come back and burden me with medical bills, and take money away from raising you.”

  “It’s okay, Tony. I can tell her.” Belinda’s voice came out stronger. “I obviously couldn’t work and have treatments at the same time, and my boss, who was struggling with caring for his elderly mother who had Alzheimer’s, suggested I move in with them and that way his mother would have a caregiver while he worked. He agreed to pay for my medical bills in exchange for the help I could give his mother. Before I had you, I was an RN, so I had the skills to help. Without money, I wouldn’t have been able to afford treatment.”

  Shauna took the time to study her mom. That explained the added wrinkles and the frailness she saw lining Belinda’s face. All the times she imagined her mother living it up, having no responsibilities, she’d really been fighting for her life and doing what she could not to take anything away from her daughter. She swallowed.

  “The cancer?” She frowned.

  “I’m in remission. It’s been two years. It’s come back three times in different parts of my body since the original diagnosis, but this is the longest I’ve gone cancer free.” Belinda patted Tony’s hand. “When my eighteen months scan came back clear, I called Tony and told him the whole story. I never stopped loving him, but I was scared. I didn’t want to come back only to have you witness me dying. There will always be a risk that I’ll develop more cancer, but I couldn’t stand to be away from my husband and daughter any longer.”

  “But he cheated on you.” Shauna rubbed her forehead. “How can you — ”

  “Loving someone can be a complicated situation. Humans make mistakes, and you can hate the situation, but still love the man.” Belinda reached for Shauna. “Like you, I acted before thinking or talking it over. Your father’s not to blame. We both are. I hope you can see through all our mistakes with you, and know that we love you. I want to know my daughter again. My beautiful and successful daughter that I thought about every single day I was gone.”

  A dam broke inside Shauna then and she flung herself into her mother’s arms. She sobbed, pressing her face against her chest. She smelled painfully familiar, a pleasant mix of roses and fresh laundry hanging outside on a warm fall day.

  Belinda held her close, while her dad reached over and stroked her hair. She closed her eyes and let the pain and hurt go.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  “Shauna — ”

  She disconnected the call, powered down the cell phone, and shoved it in her back pocket. A small sigh escaped as she slid miserably onto the chair at the kitchen table. After politely asking Grayson not to call, show up at the hotel, send messages, and to stop sending her flowers, her only option to get him to halt his campaign to talk with her was to completely ignore him.

  “Grayson again?” Tony passed her a bowl of chili.

  A week had gone by after learning the truth of why her mom had left and as promised, she’d joined her parents for dinner. She was still going through with her plan to find somewhere to rent, but she was glad for the safety net of having her parents close by to help her.

  She nodded. “I should change my phone number. Then Grayson won’t be able to call me all the time.”

  Tony sat down beside Belinda and reached for the soda crackers. “Would that have worked with you?”

  “What do you mean?” She stirred her food without taking a bite.

  He raised his brows. “You were pretty determined to get his attention. Think about all the things you did. You can’t fault a man for trying, especially after all the years he was more than lenient with you?”

  “Touché.” She groaned. “Maybe I should move away. I thought I could go through anything he put me through, and deal with all the talk from the town. I don’t think I can anymore.”

  “No.” Belinda reached across the table and caressed Shauna’s arm. “Don’t run. You’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”

  “It hurts. How can I be furious with Grayson, and still love him?” She laid her hands in her lap, wanting to curl up in a ball and forget about everything. “Listen to me. I even sound crazy to myself. Maybe I need a therapist.”

  Tony stepped behind her and wrapped his arms around her. “That’s love, buddy. Those who love us have the ability to hurt us the most, but you have to allow yourself to be vulnerable. That’s the only way you’ll experience love.”

  She patted her dad’s arm before standing up. “I’m going to walk back to the hotel. I have paperwork I need to go over. A developer contacted the building code department about the bare land out on Seventy-Eighth Street. They’re interested in building a strip mall.”

  “No kidding?” Tony chuckled. “Won’t that be something?”

  “Eat first.” Belinda pointed to the table. “You need to keep up your energy with all the work you do.”

  “I’m okay.” She smiled. “I’ll grab something at the hotel if I get hungry.”

  She kissed both of them, and walked out of the house. The two-mile stroll back to town would clear her head. She’d had a hard enough time concentrating lately, and maybe her mom was right. She had to put closure to her old dreams and focus on moving forward.

  At the end of the block, Jerry Tonk turned around from washing his car. She stopped at the edge of his driveway. “How are you, Mr. Tonk?”

  “It’s a good day. My arthritis won’t kill me. At least that’s what Doc Martin says.” He tossed the sud
sy mitt in the bucket. “Stop by and share some cookies with me soon.”

  “I’d love that,” she said.

  “Bring your young man, Grayson, with you too.” Jerry sprayed the suds off the fender.

  She waved, and continued on her way. There was no use explaining that there was no Grayson in her life. No one ever believed her.

  At the end of the street, she turned left. She stared straight ahead, but she could still see the tennis center out of her peripheral vision. When she’d set out to walk to her parents’ house, she knew she was putting herself in a direct path of catching a glimpse of Grayson. She would excuse her behavior as an old habit, but she’d be lying.

  There were a couple of ways she could remedy the situation. One was to pack a suitcase, hop on the soonest flight, and send herself clear across the world. She could move into a little chateau, somewhere that had no phone service and no one spoke English. The other choice would be to listen to what he had to say. She was tough. What was the worst that could happen?

  She picked up her pace. I should really consider moving.

  When was the last time she’d walked through town, along her old route, and past the school? She knew this road by heart. Had kicked rocks, sold lemonade, and crashed on her bike more times than she could count.

  Yet today her walk felt different. The houses a little more weather worn, the trees taller, and the asphalt dotted with potholes. She slowed down, and put her hands in her pockets. It wasn’t her surroundings that’d changed. It was her.

  She’d always had a purpose before. This road took her to the tennis center, and Grayson was always her reward at the end of the day. Every morning on the way to school, she’d wave to Grayson as he walked from his house to his lessons. On the weekends, she’d hang out, pretending to walk to town in the chance that Grayson was outside, and then she’d make an excuse to talk with him.