Christmas in Silver Springs

by Brenda Novak

  “What?” Tobias prompted.

  “That he thought I had more character than to fall into bed with the first guy I came across,” she mumbled.

  More convinced than ever that he’d overreached, Tobias felt a little sick inside. “Is that how you view what’s happened between us?” he asked.

  “No. Axel wants to characterize it as negatively as possible. That’s all.”

  “He’s never slept with anyone else? Just you? I mean, since he met you...”

  She wiped her cheeks. “Oh, there’ve been others. I have no idea how many, but I’m sure the number is getting up there. I’m beginning to think that’s why he wanted the divorce—so he wouldn’t have to feel guilty about lying to me all the time.”

  And now he was trying to make her feel tawdry and cheap? “He said what he did to punish you. You realize that.” Tobias had plenty of counseling sessions in prison, during which the psychologist talked about control issues and triggers and how people used them—or reacted to them.

  “Punish me for what?” she countered.

  “For daring to do what you want. He’d rather have you sitting around being miserable without him. He’s jealous.”

  “That’s what I keep telling myself, but it’s all so confusing and hurtful.” She closed her eyes as though she was summoning strength and calm. “I can’t seem to find a way out of it,” she said as she opened them again.

  Axel was finally coming to his senses and recognizing that he’d let something really great get away from him. He was acting as though he was ready to come back, but she probably wasn’t sure she could count on his loyalty or his fidelity, not after what she’d been through. No wonder she was confused.

  Tobias came to a stop at the light, his stomach churning as he realized what he had to say. “If you want to fix your relationship with him, now would be a good time.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Feeling as though he had an anvil sitting on his chest, he collected his resolve. “He’s obviously regretting the divorce.”

  “But it’s already final.”

  He tightened his hands on the steering wheel and forced himself to continue, to take this all the way. “That doesn’t mean you can’t fix things.” When she said nothing, he risked a glance at her. “I can drive you back to your sister’s, Harper. Really. Then you can call him and try to work things out. Is that what you want?”

  She didn’t respond. She just kept staring out the window, but fresh tears rolled down her cheeks. That answered his question right there, didn’t it? So why not make it easy on her? If Axel really wanted her back, reuniting was the perfect ending for her, exactly what she’d been hoping for all along.

  He thought of the moment he’d seen her in the coffee shop, staring off into space as Axel’s latest hit played over the sound system. Not only was she still in love with her ex, Axel was the father of her children.

  As difficult as this was, he had to back away.

  It was already time, he decided, even though he’d been hoping for much longer.

  Swallowing against the sudden tightness in his throat, he flipped on his signal so he could make a U-turn.

  “Where are we going?” she asked. This time he didn’t look over at her; he kept his eyes on the road. “I’m taking you back.”

  “No,” she said. “I don’t want to—to ruin tonight. To disappoint you.”

  “And I don’t want you going out with me just because you feel obligated.”

  “That’s not the only reason I’m going! I like being with you. I like everything about you.”

  She wouldn’t like the parts she didn’t know. “If Axel will treat you right, going back is the best thing for you. And now that he’s figuring out how badly he screwed up, maybe it’ll be different, better, in the future.”

  “You want me to go back to Axel?” she asked, her forehead furrowing in confusion.

  “No. Of course I don’t. But I do want you to be happy.” He swallowed, determined to plow on. “And if that’s what it takes...”

  She didn’t argue after that. She sat silently, rubbing her temples as though she had a headache while he drove back to her sister’s and came to a stop at the curb.

  “Thank you,” he said. “For the time we did spend together. I’ll never forget you.” He forced a smile even though it felt as though he could hardly breathe. “I hope you and the girls have the best Christmas ever.” He tried not to think of little Piper asking to sit on his lap. That wasn’t his child. She could never be his child, just as Harper could never be his wife.

  Reaching across her lap, he unlatched the door. But she didn’t get out right away. She caught his hand before he could withdraw it and brought it to her lips. “You are so different and refreshing and gorgeous and...and amazing in bed,” she blurted and kissed his hand before hopping to the ground, closing the door and hurrying to the house.

  Tobias watched until she disappeared inside. Then he drew a deep breath, trying to expand his rib cage to get rid of the terrible pressure on his heart.

  He’d done the right thing, he told himself as he drove off. It wasn’t fair to continue seeing her when she didn’t know the whole truth. He was only prolonging the inevitable, setting them both up for a fall.

  But doing the right thing had never felt so bad.

  * * *

  “Why are you back so soon?” Karoline said the moment she saw Harper.

  Harper set her purse on the kitchen counter, where her sister was cleaning. Karoline had been complaining that the kids had gotten the cupboards sticky when they decorated their gingerbread houses so she was scrubbing them down.

  “We decided that... Well, considering what’s going on with Axel, we realized we were crazy to get involved with each other.”

  “Get involved? You were just going out to dinner. Trying to have some fun while you’re here. Lord knows Axel’s been having a ball, traveling the world, making a fortune, being recognized and worshipped everywhere he goes. I won’t mention the groupies and what he’s likely doing with them.”

  Yes, she knew all of that. But this...connection with Tobias went much deeper than simply going to dinner and having some fun. Axel might be sleeping around, but there wasn’t any woman in particular he’d fallen in love with, or he wouldn’t be saying the things he was saying to her. He’d gotten drunk on his fame and demanded his freedom so he could fully explore it, had wanted to revel in the attention he was getting and all the women who were throwing themselves at him.

  It was different for Harper. She was starting to have feelings for Tobias. To think about him in ways that made her nervous. To want to be with him again—not only to make love but just to hang out, spend as much time with him as possible.

  She’d even started to wonder what he might be like as a stepfather, were they ever to get serious. Seeing Piper sitting on his lap as she walked into the living room had felt strange but not entirely unwelcome, and that rocked her to the core. With everything that’d happened since she met Tobias and with what was happening with Axel now, she felt torn. So she wasn’t making things easier for herself by getting to know Tobias; she was making them that much harder.

  “I like Tobias, Karoline,” she said softly.

  Her sister was bent over, cleaning a lower cabinet. “You already admitted that. And I can see why. He seems like a nice guy,” she responded as she scrubbed.

  “No, I mean I really like him.”

  Snapping up to her full height, Karoline turned to face her. “How is that possible? You barely know him!”

  Harper kept her gaze on her hands, which were toying with the strap of her purse. “Doesn’t matter. There’s something about him that... It’s hard to explain. I’m really attracted to him—so much that it isn’t fair to continue to see him if I’m even considering getting back with my husband.”

  “You’re kiddin
g me,” Karoline said. “You’re not saying you’re falling in love with him...”

  “I don’t know if I’d go that far, but...I feel something.” What she didn’t add was that maybe what she felt was her fault. She’d let their relationship become physical, which certainly didn’t help her keep things in perspective.

  “So your answer is to get back with Axel?” Karoline asked.

  “He’s my husband. The father of my children. We’ve already invested ten years in each other. I live near his family, not here. There are so many reasons.”

  “I understand that. But he’s not your husband anymore,” Karoline said.

  Harper slid onto a bar stool at the island. “Your own husband said that people sometimes lose sight of what’s important to them. That occasionally they need—maybe even deserve—a second chance.”

  Karoline’s eyebrows furrowed but, for a change, she didn’t immediately spout off. Instead, she started to clean with renewed vigor.

  “You don’t think Axel will straighten up and be a good husband?” Harper could tell her sister was holding back. “Like he was before?”

  With a frown, Karoline dropped her rag in the sink, dried her hands and came around the island to sit on the bar stool next to Harper’s. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “That’s the thing. Now that he’s broken my trust, I’m afraid of what he might do in the future, afraid he might hurt you again. You said it yourself at the Blue Suede Shoe. How can you trust him? Well, I feel the same. And there are other considerations.”

  “Like...”

  “What will you be thinking and feeling whenever he’s away from you? Are you willing to endure the long absences? Live the rest of your life in his shadow? Continue the outpouring of energy required to keep him up and happy and functioning?”

  Now it was Harper who didn’t have answers. Was she willing to dive right back into that situation? Would she be capable of keeping him up and happy and functioning if she couldn’t do it well enough before? Could she ever be fulfilled in that situation? She’d gone into salvage mode so quickly and worked so hard to save her marriage that she’d never really asked herself if things had changed so much since Axel’s band took off that she was no longer happy. “That’s what I need to figure out,” she said.

  “I’d also consider one other thing.”

  “And that is...”

  “Is he feeling sorry for himself right now, for what he may have lost—or for what he did to you and his children?”

  “Does it matter? He’s starting to press me to get back together.”

  “It would matter to me.” With a sigh she got up and went to reclaim her washcloth. “But you’re the only one who can make the decision. And I’ll support you no matter what you choose.”

  “Thank you,” Harper said. “I appreciate that. And now...I think I’ll go spend some time with the girls and then take a hot bath.”

  “Sounds like a good idea.”

  When the kids asked about her “date,” she just said Tobias had to go home early. Then she watched a Disney movie with Piper and Everly, ignoring her phone the entire time. She read several chapters of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone to them after that and lay down with them until they were asleep. But once she returned to her own room and took her phone from her pocket so she could strip down for her bath, she saw that she’d missed a slew of messages—all of them from Axel.

  I hate that you’re with him.

  Don’t you dare sleep with him again. I won’t take you back if you do.

  Who is this bastard? Our divorce wasn’t even final when he slept with you!

  How do you think the girls feel, seeing you with another man? Why are you confusing them like this?

  This is stupid, Harper. Where do you think it can go? You don’t even live there.

  And don’t tell me you’re considering moving there. My parents would freak out.

  Harper felt nauseous as she read those messages. Did she really want to go back to Axel and deal with more of this?

  She replayed her last conversation with Tobias as she finished undressing. You want me to go back to Axel?

  No. Of course I don’t, he’d said. But I do want you to be happy. And if that’s what it takes...

  One man was obviously way more sensitive to what she was feeling than the other.

  But she had her girls to think about.

  20

  Susan was working alone. Tobias had watched the store long enough to be convinced of that. And because it was cold out and getting late, she didn’t have many customers. He’d seen a few people park, get out and hurry in. But the last customer had left twenty minutes ago.

  He checked the time on his phone. She’d be closing soon. If he planned to talk to her tonight, he needed to make his move. Otherwise, she’d be locking up and heading out back to her car, and he didn’t want to scare her by approaching her in the alley behind the store.

  This was going to be ugly. He knew that. But he had to do it. What had been happening since Maddox married Jada wasn’t right, and Tobias was tired of feeling responsible for the pain they were suffering.

  Besides, after taking Harper back to her sister’s, he already felt terrible. Let Susan kick the shit out of him like she did that other time if it made her feel any better.

  Steeling himself for what the next few moments would hold, he got out, ducked his head in an effort to draw as little attention as possible and walked down to the store.

  The second the bell above the door sounded, Atticus’s mother glanced up. The color drained from her face and her eyes darted behind him, as if she was hoping Jada or someone else would be coming in with him.

  “It’s just me,” he said.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  All the things he’d rehearsed the past couple of hours suddenly got jammed in his throat. Nothing seemed adequate enough to persuade her to look at the situation the way he hoped she would. “I’d just like to say—”

  “I don’t want to hear it,” she snapped before he could get any further. “Now, get out.”

  Tobias was tempted to do exactly that. What could he really accomplish here? She hadn’t softened at all in the five months he’d been back in Silver Springs. There was nothing he could say that would soften her heart now.

  He turned, intending to walk out, but then he remembered the reason he’d come in the first place and pivoted back around to face her. “I’ll go in a second,” he said. “Once you’ve heard what I have to say.”

  “You’re trespassing. I’ll call the police if you don’t get out of here. This is my business. I have the right to refuse service to anyone.”

  “I’m not asking for service.” After clearing his throat, he dived into what he’d prepared. “Ms. Brooks, I understand how deeply you hate me. And I understand why. I’m not trying to talk you out of that or justify what I did. I deserve your hate, which is why I’ve never asked you to forgive me, and why I never will. But I do want to say—”

  It was difficult to continue with the way she was glaring at him. The malevolence in those eyes stabbed him like a steel sword. But she hadn’t moved to call the police, so he took a deep breath and pressed on.

  “How you’re treating Maddox and Jada isn’t fair. Maddox isn’t responsible for what happened to Atticus. I am. He just has the bad luck of being related to me. But if you’d only look at other aspects of who he is—the kind of principal he is at the school, the kind of husband he is to your daughter and the kind of father he is to Maya—I think you’ll have to agree that he’s not the monster you believe. Please don’t punish him for something he didn’t do and never dreamed would happen. And especially don’t punish Jada for loving him. All you’re doing is causing more pain and heartache.”

  “You, of all people, don’t get to lecture me on pain,” she ground out.

  “I’m
not lecturing you. I’m pleading with you—for their sake.”

  “You think I’m just going to let it all go? That you get to live your life being whole and healthy while my son wheels himself around in a chair because of you?”

  “You can hate me all you want,” he said. “You can give me dirty looks whenever we pull up to the same intersection like you did the other day. You can say whatever you want about me, scream at me, hit me. Do anything you want to me. Just, please, think about what you’re doing to your own family.”

  “How dare you come in here and try to make me feel as if I’m the one who’s done something wrong,” she said, but he lifted a hand before she could continue.

  “Where do you think all this hate will lead? You’ll destroy your own children with it if you’re not careful,” he said and walked out.

  * * *

  Harper spent the next four days completely focused on her girls, when they were home from school, and Axel, who, once he found out about her failed date with Tobias, sensed an opportunity to improve his position and apologized for “overreacting” and sending those upsetting texts. Harper could tell he sensed victory close at hand, because he began to call and text even more, and to send her funny memes and inside jokes. His mother called to say she’d talked to her son and was excited to hear that they were “considering working things out.” Rory and Gary, the lead guitarist in the band, had each thanked her for saving the tour. And the band’s manager was so grateful that Axel had calmed down he’d sent a flower arrangement only slightly less elaborate and expensive than the daily bouquets she’d begun to receive from Axel.

  We can make this work.

  We belong together.

  Don’t give up on us, babe.

  That was what each of the cards had said so far—all of them sweet and sentimental and encouraging. He was finally treating her as though she mattered to him, as though he was grateful for her and eager to see her again.