by Brenda Novak
“Oh, my God!” She covered her face as if the truth was just too terrible. “I’m going to have your baby in seven months, and you’re fucking someone else!”
He felt terrible, knew she was in an untenable position and hated that he couldn’t solve the problem so no one would be hurt. “It’s not like that. There’s no guarantee we’ll wind up together. The relationship could fizzle in a few weeks or months, so please, don’t overreact.”
Her voice climbed even higher. “Overreact? I’m pregnant! That means I’ll have a baby in a few months. Your baby.”
Or Scott’s baby... That was what made this thing so difficult. “What I have going with Savanna is completely new—unexplained and uncategorized—which is why I haven’t said anything until now. It could turn out to be nothing.”
“Or you could wind up marrying her instead of me. What you have going with her has to be something, or we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”
He lifted his hands to indicate he didn’t know what more to say, because he didn’t. He felt sick that there didn’t seem to be a solution he could live with. He didn’t want to let Heather down, didn’t want to let his child down, either. That more than anything. And yet it felt wrong to quash that special thing he and Savanna seemed to have when they were together. He’d never felt anything like it before.
“You slept with her this weekend, while I was gone, didn’t you?”
“If I did, I did. Don’t try to call it cheating, because you know we’re not committed to each other right now.”
“That’s a yes,” she said, ignoring everything else. “That’s what’s causing this. If I hadn’t gone to my sister’s stupid birthday party, it never would’ve happened.”
“I didn’t sleep with her while you were gone. You were right to go to your sister’s party. It didn’t cost you anything.”
“But you saw Savanna...”
“It’s not as though I took her out behind your back! I helped her get a stove, and I saw her and her kids today at my mother’s barbecue.”
Heather’s eyes narrowed. “And how’d she get invited to that?”
She obviously thought she had him there, but he hadn’t invited Savanna. Eli had done it, not that Gavin was going to get that specific. “You know my mother. She learned I had a new neighbor and wanted to make her feel welcome.”
“I knew I shouldn’t have left.”
“This would’ve happened regardless.”
She wrung her hands. “But you said we were going to try again.”
He had tried, as hard as he could, but maybe something would change... “There’s still hope. Who knows what the future holds.”
“We’re having a baby together. I think I deserve something a little more certain than that.”
“The pregnancy came out of nowhere, and not while we were together. That changes things.”
“It doesn’t have to.”
Gavin blinked in surprise. “What are you talking about? You were dating someone else. You don’t even know which one of us is the father. Anyway, like I said, I can’t say if my relationship with Savanna will go anywhere.” After what Gordon had done, Savanna might not be able to trust again, not so soon. But Gavin wanted—needed—the chance to pursue what he felt. He’d been denied the close relationships most children had when they were young, so feeling as he did when he was around Savanna meant even more to him. What if he’d finally found what Eli had with Cora?
He’d begun to doubt that would ever happen for him.
“You want to be with her, even though I’m the one who’s having your baby...”
He almost said, You can’t even tell me it’s mine! but he’d already made that point, and she was only reacting to the hurt she felt. He couldn’t let himself get as emotional as she was or this would go even worse. “I want to be fair to both of you,” he reiterated.
“How can you be unfair to her? You don’t owe her anything!”
“She’s new here, could use a friend.”
“There are plenty of men in town who’d be happy to befriend her.”
“Heather...”
She stood. “And if I go back to Scott?”
He recalled Scott’s parting words the day he’d come to Gavin’s house—I don’t want your filthy bastard growing up in my house—and felt his muscles tighten. Was he essentially abandoning his child to the fate of having a bad stepparent? Someone who was unkind or unloving—like what he’d known growing up? Scott claimed he wouldn’t take Heather back, but that could have been said in the heat of the moment. Scott had always been there for her before.
Gavin couldn’t help wondering if he should’ve persevered, even though it was becoming so clear that he’d fail in the end. “Is that what you’re going to do?”
“Maybe I will!”
He caught her by the wrist. “Please don’t do anything rash, okay? If we play this by ear, take each day as it comes, maybe things will work out for us. I’m not ruling that out. I just... I wish we could be friends, for the moment, and see if more grows from that.”
“You mean you want me to be patient and wait around while you decide if you’d rather have the pretty redhead next door!”
He raised his voice for the first time, simply because she didn’t seem to be listening. “I don’t know what’s going to happen with Savanna!”
“And yet you want her more than you want your own child.”
“I need the time and space to figure out how I really feel.”
“You’re no better than Scott or anyone else!” She tried to hit him, but he caught her hand before she could land the blow.
“Heather—”
“I’ve been such a fool,” she said on a sob. “You don’t deserve the love I’ve offered you. All you’ve ever done is break my heart.”
He tried to stop her from leaving. She needed to calm down before she got behind the wheel, but she wouldn’t listen. She stormed out and nearly hit the fence with her SUV as she tore out of his drive.
“So much for trying to be honest,” he muttered, and let himself drop back on the couch.
23
Savanna had spotted Heather’s Pathfinder sitting in Gavin’s drive almost the first moment she turned down the narrow road that led to both their houses. As she drove past, she’d told herself to ignore it, that she shouldn’t have expected anything less, but the sight made her feel so low that when her brother called, she didn’t answer. She wasn’t sure she had the mental energy to pull off a conversation with Reese, not without him figuring out that something was wrong. And she was tired of constantly putting him in the position of having to encourage and console her. She wanted to return to her usual role as the big sister, and she felt confident she would’ve been on that path again at last if she hadn’t gotten involved with Gavin.
What made her sleep with someone she’d just met? She had one neighbor. Just one. And she’d had to take him to bed.
Even worse, she’d liked being with him, and now she couldn’t quit thinking of that night and the one where they’d made love up against his truck. If Branson hadn’t come into the house when he did today at the barbecue, she might’ve found herself with yet another memory like that—this one at Aiyana’s, no less!
“You’re screwed up, or there’s more to that rebound business than you’ve ever cared to believe,” she told herself. But when she’d first slept with Gavin, she hadn’t thought she was truly getting involved with him. She’d thought it would be an isolated event, a temporary escape. One night of companionship. One night of forgetting.
Why couldn’t either one of them seem to leave it at that?
Reese’s call transferred to her voice mail, but once she sent Branson to shower in the hall bathroom and Alia to shower in the master bath, she carried her phone out on the porch to listen to
his message.
“Hey, finals are over and I managed to do okay. I’m one step closer to becoming Dr. Pearce. This is such a long process. Anyway, call me, will you? We need to catch up.”
He’d been so busy with school and the new girl he’d been dating that she’d hardly heard from him since she moved to Silver Springs. He’d texted her a few times to check in, but she hadn’t called him nearly as often as before. She got the impression he thought she was going to be okay now that she was out of Nephi, that she was forging ahead with her life. And that was mostly true. He didn’t need to know the rest. She hadn’t wanted to disturb him if he was under pressure, or say anything that might let him know she was actually creating problems in this new place.
After summoning the mental wherewithal, she returned his call.
“There you are,” he said when he picked up.
“Sorry, I was at a swim party earlier and was trying to get the kids in the shower so they can wash the chlorine out of their hair.”
“A swim party, huh? You must be making friends.”
She would like to believe that Eli, Cora, Aiyana and Roger were now her friends, not to mention the others she’d met. They’d all been so nice. But they were still just acquaintances. Gavin was her only friend, and she wasn’t even sure she could call him that. People didn’t typically dream about making love with their friends, did they?
“Yeah, things are going well,” she said, which wasn’t a complete lie. The house was coming together. Thanks to what Gavin had done, and what James Glenn had accomplished, she now had all basic appliances, a sturdy new bridge over the creek, patches in the Sheetrock where bullets had created holes and several new lighting fixtures. She was shopping for new carpet, believed she’d soon find something she could afford. And she had more improvements scheduled in the next couple of weeks, including the dry rot repair Gavin had said he’d do next Saturday. On top of all that, Branson hadn’t wet the bed for several days, so he seemed to be doing better. It was only the possibility that Gordon had murdered Emma Ventnor, and that Savanna somehow needed to get that information out of him—and her love life, of course—that were giving her problems right now.
“Glad to hear it.”
“You coming out?” she asked.
“I can’t. Not right away. I have such a small window before classes start up again, and work is crazy. We’re short on bartenders, so I’m putting in a lot more hours than I’d like to be. Once they hire someone else, I’ll be able to fly over for a few days, though. Shouldn’t be too much longer.”
“No problem. I’d rather have the house further along, anyway, so you can see what it’s going to look like.”
“What’s left to do?”
“A fairly long list. I need to put on a new roof, for one, but we’ll be getting to the cosmetic stuff soon. That’s when it’ll get fun.”
“Do you have enough money?”
She’d have to get a job in a few months. No way could she take a year off as she’d hoped. Everything cost far more than she’d budgeted. But the kids would be in school by the time she had to find work, so she wouldn’t need to hire a babysitter, except for maybe a couple of hours after school, so that was good. “For now.”
“And you’re comfortable living out in the country?”
Thanks to Gavin, she was. She loved having him so close. Maybe she’d screwed up when she slept with him, but she figured she shouldn’t be too hard on herself. He had a way with women, a magnetism that wasn’t necessarily apparent at first glance but grabbed hold soon after. Besides, she’d needed someone, and he’d been there for her. The move would’ve been so much harder without him. “Yeah. I’m happy here, glad I came,” she said, which reminded her that she’d soon be traveling back to Nephi, so they talked about Emma Ventnor and what she hoped to accomplish when she visited Gordon.
Reese didn’t like what Sullivan had asked her to do any more than Gavin did, but she told her brother the same thing she’d told her neighbor: she didn’t feel as though she had any choice, not if there was any chance of recovering Emma, or even her body.
“You don’t really believe Gordon will screw up and say anything, do you?” Reese said. “He’s not stupid.”
“He’s definitely not stupid, but he should be feeling a measure of panic, which might make him reveal something he wouldn’t under normal circumstances. At least, that’s the logic. Sullivan thinks if I get him angry he won’t be watching what’s coming out of his mouth.”
“I’m not convinced such a small potential for success will be worth causing him to turn his hatred on you.”
“He could screw up,” she insisted. “Who knows? He’s out of his element, must be feeling some panic.”
“About whether or not he’ll be going to prison?”
“That, too. But he’s a bit antisocial to begin with. Doesn’t like being around people—hates a crowd, especially. Being crammed into such a small space with so many other men has to be a daily struggle for him. Think of the lack of privacy. He can’t even go to the bathroom without feeling as though he’s on display.”
“You’re assuming the stress of his situation will make the difference.”
“I’m not assuming. I’m hoping.”
“That’s not very likely.”
“I know,” she said. But what else could she do?
* * *
Gavin didn’t go to Savanna’s that night. He wanted to talk to her, felt as though he needed to talk to her, since he’d disappeared from the barbecue after that highly charged encounter in his old bedroom without even saying goodbye. She had to be wondering at his inconsistent behavior. But he had to gain some perspective on the situation first, had to make sure he hadn’t made a drastic mistake telling Heather he wasn’t ready to try again. He didn’t want to swing back and forth between the two like a wrecking ball. But duty warred so perfectly with desire that he felt torn in half. When duty got the better of him, he feared he’d never be able to live with himself for making the choice he’d made with Heather. When desire got the best of him, he believed he’d never really had a choice.
In an effort to quiet his mind, he played the guitar for a couple of hours, but even that didn’t have the soothing effect it normally did. I don’t want your filthy bastard growing up in my house... He kept hearing those words over and over in his head.
Was Heather at Scott’s right now, trying to make up with him? And would he let her? It was entirely possible that he’d just been talking when he came out to New Horizons...
Gavin feared he’d abandoned his child in all the ways that counted most—done the one thing he’d promised himself he would never do, and he couldn’t seem to get past it. Finally, he called Eli to see if his brother would meet him in town for a drink.
It was a Sunday night, and they both had to work in the morning. Gavin thought Eli would most likely decline, but he didn’t. He agreed to meet up in fifteen minutes, which was about as long as it would take Gavin to get to town.
“You okay?” Eli asked, coming up behind him at the Blue Suede Shoe.
Gavin was standing over the old-time jukebox, silently cursing the poor selection of songs. The bar featured live bands on the weekends, some of which were pretty good. Gavin had played here quite a few times. But there was no live music on Sundays. On Sundays and all the rest of the week, there was only the jukebox, with its sparse collection of country songs or Top 40 from a decade ago. He felt they should at least have more classic rock. “I’ve been better.”
“Did you get a drink?”
“Bought us both a whiskey when I came in. Bartender’s pouring them.”
“Great. So what’s going on?”
Gavin shot him a look. “What do you think’s going on?”
Clapping an arm around his shoulders, Eli guided him to a booth, where they both took a seat. They
could’ve sat almost anywhere; the place was empty except for a few diehards who played billiards in one corner.
“I like Savanna,” Eli said, jumping in without preamble. “If you have to choose between them, I say you choose her.”
“Two whiskeys!” the bartender called out.
Grateful for the reprieve, even though he was the one who’d called this meeting, Gavin got up to retrieve their drinks.
Once he returned, Eli took his glass but didn’t seem overly interested in drinking what was in it. “Not only is Savanna beautiful, she seems nice,” he said, trying to open the discussion again.
Gavin wasn’t nearly as ambivalent about the alcohol as his brother. He welcomed the burn of the whiskey as it traveled down his throat.
“Are you going to talk to me?” Eli asked, finally growing impatient. “Or are we just going to drink?”
“We’re just going to drink.” Sheer escape. No more mental torment. That sounded good to Gavin. “Do you think Cora will pick us up?”
Eli shot him a look. “I didn’t drag my ass out of the house tonight to get smashed, leave my vehicle here and wake up with a hangover tomorrow. I did it for you. Tell me what’s going on.”
Gavin couldn’t decide if he was willing to go into it, after all. He was suddenly loath to even think about Heather and the baby and what he’d done at the barbecue, but he felt bad for dragging Eli out of the house, so he made himself explain what’d happened with Heather, and once he got going it wasn’t as difficult as it seemed it would be to continue talking.
“You’re being too hard on yourself,” Eli said when he finished. “Ease up, okay? Wait and see what happens.”
“What if she goes back to Scott and together they try to make it difficult for me to spend time with my own child?”
“If you think she’d ever make it difficult for you to see your child—that she won’t care more about the child than getting revenge on you—she’s no one you want to marry, anyway.”
