Annie looked up from the book she was reading. “I’m here to marry your dad.” Then her eyes cut to Deek’s.
He had to look away. As he poured himself coffee, he said, “But she picked now for the wedding so she could be here for your birthday too, Ash. Isn’t that great?”
“Yeah.” He turned back to Annie. “Do you want to come see my room? I’ve made a bunch of new stuff. Like two dinosaur models and a volcano that really blows up. And maybe we could go to Papa G’s tonight? You love that place, right, Mom?”
Annie closed her book and huffed out a breath, but she stood to follow Asher. “Sure. That’d be great.”
Deek sipped his coffee as the sounds of Asher going on and on with excitement slowly faded as they climbed the stairs. His son was thrilled to have Annie home. And that was what he’d always wanted. So why did he feel so sick to his stomach?
He took his coffee into the study and sat behind his desk to call up his e-mail. About ten minutes later, Annie walked in and closed the door behind her. He’d been able to avoid her all morning, but it looked like it was show time. “Hey. That was quick.”
Annie sat down in the guest chair across from his desk. “I nodded and cooed, so he thinks I approved, but Deek, you buy him too many toys. It’s ridiculous. Do you know that the children in Peru that I’ve met are so poor, they don’t have real toys? Just makeshift pieces of junk they make up games with. You’re overcompensating for your own childhood.”
So now she was going to tell him how to be a parent? It took all he had to bite back the angry retort on his lips. “Maybe that’s true. But Asher’s bright. He needs to build and create things. He doesn’t have a TV or a video gaming system in his room like most kids his age.”
Annie rolled her eyes. “No. Just a whole arcade he can use whenever he wants.”
At the mention of the arcade, thoughts of Lori playing Pac-Man filled his mind. And then the confrontation afterward. He didn’t want any more fighting. “He’s not allowed in there unless he asks me first. And then it’s only for an hour at a time.”
“Well, as I was lying in bed alone last night, I thought of a plan. What if we start over after we’re married? Sell this house that I had no say in, earmark a million dollars in proceeds for the dig, and then use some of the equity to buy something more reasonable? Then maybe I could feel like it was my home too. And not be embarrassed to have my struggling scientist friends over.”
That sent a dagger straight through his heart. He’d spent hours designing the perfect home. For them. And he’d paid in cash, so it wasn’t like they couldn’t afford it. “Why should we have to look like we’re something we’re not?”
“Why do we have to flaunt our money in other people’s faces? I bet Lori loves this house, am I right?”
Annie’s question felt like a trap, but he didn’t know how to avoid it. “She said she’d never seen anything like it.”
“No surprise. She probably took one look and decided you were an easy mark.” Annie crossed her arms. “How could you have sold out and slept with someone like her, Deek?”
“How did I sell out?” He wasn’t going to deny he’d slept with Lori. He wasn’t ashamed of it.
“She’s one of those types who used to make fun of people like us in high school. The popular, pretty girls who all ran in a pack and peered down their noses at nerds and geeks. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten how that feels.”
He hadn’t forgotten and never would. It was why he tried so hard to be sure Asher never had to endure any of that. “Lori’s life hasn’t been easy, Annie. You’re making ridiculous assumptions. But maybe now is a good time to talk about that dig money. Do you want to go over the terms?”
“Fine. But I don’t see why we have to go into it all again. I said I’d marry you. Won’t that take care of the rest?”
“Your obvious excitement about getting married is warming my heart, Annie.”
Her head jerked back as if he’d slapped her. “Did you just use sarcasm? Or did the world just end?”
“Yes. I did.” Weirdly it made him proud. And grateful to Lori. She’d helped him recognize it a little better. “Now how many times a year are you going to agree to come home?”
As they hammered out the terms for the money, Deek’s mind kept wandering back to Lori. He hoped she’d be okay.
He missed her already.
Lori parked her car in front of the coffee shop where she was going to meet Mel Saturday afternoon. Tilting her head back, she struggled to hold her eyes open as she put more drops in to help with the redness from crying.
She was a mess. Her head hurt, her eyes were puffy, and her hair didn’t want to cooperate. It put her in a dark mood that she was grateful for. She’d probably need it to get through the discussion she wasn’t sure she wanted to have. She’d had enough heartache the night before watching Deek choose Annie, but Rachel had been right. Lori needed to find a way to move on, from Deek, Joe, and Mel. Fresh slate and all. Then maybe she’d be ready for a new relationship.
Rachel had asked again if she should come, but Lori was in just the right mood for a battle and didn’t need her sister to fight it for her. She stepped out of her car, threw her shoulders back, and reminded herself that no matter what happened, she was the one who’d been wronged. Not the other way around. Mel had better be contrite, or Lori was going to just leave. No use beating a dead horse.
Sounded good anyway. What she really needed to do was channel some of her sister’s hard-ass attitude. But then, that wasn’t her style and never would be. She was the nice girl who had been finishing last an awful lot lately.
The aroma of sugar and coffee made Lori’s stomach tighten with nausea as she entered the café and searched for Mel. Lori spotted her sitting at a table studying her phone. She watched her for a moment, until the flood of warmth from seeing someone she used to love with all her heart passed, then she crossed the busy little café. “Hi.”
Mel’s head shot up, and then she stood. “Hi. Thanks for meeting me, Lori. I ordered you a latte, the way you used to like. I hope that’s okay?” Mel held out a hand toward the chair across from hers.
“Thank you,” Lori said as she took a seat. She hadn’t noticed how much weight Mel had lost in the dark bistro when they’d run into each other before. And she’d aged a lot in the past two years. Hell, maybe Lori had aged that much too.
Mel sat too and then jumped right in. “First and foremost, I need to apologize to you, Lori. I am truly sick about what I did, and there was no excuse for it.” Mel huffed out a breath. “So, where to start, right?”
At least Mel was owning her actions. “We could just cut straight to that night.” And maybe get the meeting over with sooner. Lori’s stomach wasn’t feeling all that great all of a sudden.
Mel shook her head. “No. This started long before that.”
“What do you mean?” Lori’s heart banged double-time. Please don’t let Mel say that she and Joe had been having an affair for years. She didn’t know if she could take knowing that.
“It starts way back when Joe’s family moved into the house next to mine. It was the day I fell instantly in love with him, but he’d barely noticed me. Until my dad died, and because he was brought up by a single mom too, he started to come around more. To ask how I was. We had a special, private bond over our fathers we never told anyone else about.”
“That was when you guys were about fifteen, right? Why didn’t you ever tell me about that bond?” She and Mel had been best friends. They told each other everything.
Their coffee arrived, so Mel thanked the server and then waited until she was gone. “Because he told me the first day of school when I’d just met him, and we were walking home from the bus stop, that he’d met the girl he was going to marry one day. Said she was the prettiest girl he’d ever seen, and on top of it, she was the sweetest. Her name was Lori Caldwell and did I know her?”
“He told me that years later.” Lori’s eyes stung with tears over the sweet memory. “I’d forgo
tten that.”
“I knew I couldn’t ever tell Joe how I felt about him after that. He’d always said you and he were meant to be because what were the chances that he’d move next door to Lori’s best friend?”
Lori sipped her cinnamon latte. It was warm and delicious, soothing almost. “Yeah. Joe was always big on fate. And things happening for a reason.” She’d almost forgotten that about Joe too. She’d been so busy burying the bad memories that the nice ones had gotten buried too.
“Joe would come over after school sometimes, flop onto my bed, and ask me a million questions about you. He wanted to know everything, all your likes, and dislikes, along with the simple things like what your favorite flowers were, what kind of earrings you liked. Years later, I even helped him pick out your wedding ring, but he made me promise not to tell you. He wanted you to think he did that on his own. It was always so important for him to please you, Lori. He even told me that you two had finally slept together before you did. That’s how close he and I were back then.”
Lori took another sip from her cup. It was a little unsettling to know those two were that close, and she never knew. “So being my maid of honor was one of the worst days of your life?”
“Yes.” Tears formed in Mel’s eyes. “But I loved both of you enough to want to go through with it.”
And Mel had done it all with a smile. She’d gone above and beyond that day.
Mel added, “I was reminded of how much I still love you when I saw you at the restaurant the other day. I was so happy to see you. I’ve missed you so much, Lori. But I’m not asking you to forgive me. I still don’t forgive me. I just thought if you could hear the whole story, it might help you forgive Joe.”
The hardened part of her heart, where she’d sent the love she’d had for Mel and Joe, softened ever so slightly. “So what happened that night, Mel? Why, after so many years of friendship, would you betray me like that?”
Mel took a long drink from her cup as if it contained the courage she searched for. She knew Mel well enough to see all the subtle signs of nerves. The slight twitch in her left eye was always a giveaway.
Finally, Mel laid her cardboard cup down and studied it as she pushed it back and forth between her hands. “I flew into town that day because I had some news I didn’t want to tell you over the phone. Bad news. About my health. So when Emily got sick that evening, and you stayed home, I figured I’d come all that way, so I’d tell Joe and then let him tell you later.”
Honest concern, coupled with the changes in Mel’s appearance, made Lori ask, “What was the bad news?”
She looked up and said, “It was cancer,” before she went back to studying her cup again. “They’d only given me a thirty percent chance to live. Being Emily’s godmother, I felt you needed to know that I might not be around to take care of her if something happened to you guys, like was our plan.”
Lori hated to think of Mel battling cancer. But she still didn’t understand. “So how did dinner at the restaurant end up with Joe back in your hotel room?”
Mel shook her head and closed her eyes. “I’d told him about how sick I was during dinner. Joe was upset that he was going to be shipped out in a few days and afraid he’d never see me again. And I was feeling sorry for myself, so I asked if he’d come back with me for a nightcap to talk some more.” Mel looked up and met Lori’s gaze. “You know how comforting Joe could be. Made you feel like you could do anything if he were on your side?”
Lori nodded. He had been good at that. “What happened next?”
“We’d put a big dent in my mini bar by the time I was drunk enough to confess my feelings for him. And I told him I didn’t want to die not knowing what it was like to make love to him.”
The picture was forming clearly in Lori’s mind. Joe had always loved Mel. He seemed to feel responsible for her, like a brother would. But what they’d done that night had nothing to do with being siblings. “Okay. I get it. You don’t have to go on.”
Mel’s hand shot out, and she covered Lori’s. “It was my fault. I was the aggressor. He turned me down, but when I’d cried, he held me until I stopped. Then I think it turned into pity on his part. But afterward, when we both realized what we’d done, Joe sat on the edge of the bed holding his head in his hands and cried because he’d let you down. He told me he had to tell you before he shipped out. That it wasn’t fair to you to keep what we’d done a secret.”
Joe had confessed right away. The moment he’d walked in the door that night after he’d had to take a cab home because he’d been so drunk.
She wanted to get up and leave so badly. Hated seeing the scenario in her mind that Mel had painted. The thought of her and Joe and what they did that night in her hotel room. And the idea of Joe crying. He never cried. It made her heart ache even worse. “So what was your plan? Just ignore that it happened and go on pretending to be my best friend? I would never do that to you, Mel.”
“I know.” She shook her head. “I felt so awful about it, and I just wanted to spare you the heartache. But I couldn’t talk him out of it. He said he’d never lied to you and had to tell you. But I made Joe promise not to tell you about my cancer.”
“Why?”
“Because if you knew, you would have eventually forgiven me. That’s just the way you are, Lori. And because you are the most loyal person I’ve ever known, you probably would have insisted you take care of me during my treatments. And I didn’t deserve that. I moved back home with my mom during chemo. And then I’d read in the paper that Joe had been killed and I didn’t care if I lived anymore. But somehow I did.”
So Mel had been grieving too after Joe died. And had punished herself for her crime. That was just so… Mel-like. They both shared an overblown sense of duty to their family and friends.
She’d loved Mel almost as much as she loved Rachel. And like a sister, she probably would have forgiven her eventually. Especially under the circumstances.
Lori took another long sip to give herself time to wrap her head around it all. And suddenly realized how Mel must’ve felt about Joe. The same as she felt about Deek, and why she refused to fight for him and take away Asher’s mother, even though she knew Deek would be happier if she did.
Unobtainable love might be the worst kind of all. It sure felt like it at the moment, anyway. But as hard as that conversation had been to hear, her heart felt a little lighter knowing that Mel and Joe hadn’t set out to have an affair. And maybe she was a step closer to being able to forgive them for making a mistake. Neither had done it to hurt her, that had just been the byproduct. “So, how are you now? Are you better?”
She blinked as if surprised at the question. “Um, I’m in remission at the moment. The doctors won’t say I’m well until I pass the five-year mark, but they’re cautiously optimistic. Thank you for asking.”
“I’m hurt and upset with you, but I don’t hate you, Mel. I couldn’t ever do that even at my angriest moments. What the hell is wrong with me?”
“You suffer from an affliction called being genuinely nice. And I could tell you’d been crying before you got here. I hope I didn’t cause those tears.”
She and Mel really did know each other like sisters.
The honest concern in Mel’s eyes, and the reminder of the pain of the void in Lori’s life that had never been filled since Mel brought on the tears she’d been holding back for Deek. “I broke up with a great guy yesterday. I finally felt like I was going to be able to move on from Joe and find happiness again, but circumstances won’t let that happen. Got a few more minutes to hear about it?” If anyone would understand, she now knew it’d be Mel.
Her former best friend smiled for the first time all day. “It just so happens I do. Want another latte, or should we switch to wine?”
“Wine. And cake if they have it. This is a long story. And I haven’t forgiven you all the way, just to be clear.”
“Got it. So tell me about this guy.”
Deek sat across from Annie and Asher at Pap
a G’s as they waited for their food. He glanced over to the table where he’d sat last time with Lori and Emily, wishing they’d be there. It was a stupid thing to do, but they came to the restaurant often so that it could’ve happened. Too bad it hadn’t.
It was after that dinner with them that he’d come alive inside again, but he hadn’t even realized it then. It felt more like he was making a new friend, not that his heart had found a soulmate. One he’d never be able to talk to again.
It was depressing to think about.
About as depressing as when he and Annie had hammered out all the details for the dig money. They came to a formal agreement they’d both sign after the lawyer drew it up, outlining her visits home. If she broke the terms, the next installment of cash wouldn’t come. How sad was it that he’d had to put conditions in because he knew Annie would flake out of her visits home if he didn’t? All he could hope for was that by Annie coming home more often, she’d regain a connection with Asher and actually want to come home.
But he still had an even bigger decision to make about Annie. Where was he going to sleep later? It felt wrong to sleep with her, but she was going to be his wife, so he’d better figure it out.
He glanced Annie’s way as he sipped his soda. Asher was babbling on about how much he thought he should have a cell phone to her, but she wasn’t listening. She was too busy texting with someone. She’d been doing that all day.
He said, “Asher, knock it off. You’re not getting a cell phone.”
“Geez, Dad. I was just asking.”
Deek ran a hand down his face, searching for patience. He’d run out about four hours ago. “I don’t want to discuss it anymore tonight, okay?”
“Fine.” Asher pouted as he reached out to play with the pepper flake jar.
Deek hated when his son made messes with the condiments, but it was a battle he didn’t have the energy to fight. Maybe Annie could be the bad guy for a change.
When the food came, Annie finally laid her phone down. “I haven’t had pizza in forever.”
Matched For Love (Rocky Mountain Matchmaker Book 3) Page 15
