“Aunt Millie created the secret code?” Julia’s smile unfurled with an extra dose of pride. Her Aunt Millie. Musician, mother, recluse…spy.
“Indeed. Once she put her heart into the effort, her energies and expertise became invaluable.” He raised a brow with his grin. “Though, I do believe Randolph had a bit to do with her decision. She’d have given up anything for their safety.” He gazed off into the distance. “And she did, didn’t she?”
“Do you mean to protect Rosalyn?”
“The baby? Yes.” He adjusted his wire-rimmed glasses. “When she discovered she was expecting their first child at the same time as Randolph was uncovered as a spy, they decided Amelia should disappear.”
Julia relaxed back into the chair with a sigh. She and Henry had guessed right. “And where better to go than the obscure and unknown world of Appalachia?”
“Exactly. Who would look for her in a place so remote, it’s almost mythical?” He rolled his chair nearer. “Which brings me to the reason we were never able to contact your aunt before her death regarding the discovery of her husband.”
Julia’s breath caught, and comprehension dawned. “Appalachia.” She whispered, sitting back to attention. “Even you didn’t know where she’d disappeared to?”
“As I said, she was a highly skilled spy and, after Randolph’s disappearance, the safety of their child became top priority. You see, at the time, there were many who would have used whatever means necessary to find Lucas.” One of his shaggy brows rose. “Anything, you understand. He knew valuable information regarding the war effort, so when his body wasn’t recovered, both sides assumed he was in hiding, and the only way to winkle him out of hiding—”
“Was to use his family.”
“Precisely.”
Which explains why Aunt Millie protected her story for so long.
“Your aunt kept her contact in London, but Mrs. Sterling was the only person who knew where Amelia was, so when Mrs. Sterling passed—an excellent spy in her own right—we had no way of notifying Amelia when we finally located Randolph’s remains.”
Julia soaked in the news, leaning closer, waiting for the ending of this seventy-year-old story. “You found…him?”
Dr. Porter’s expression softened. “Only ten years ago, among a tangle of forest and overgrowth in France, but yes. It is always an honor to finally discover one of our missing fallen.”
She didn’t understand why, but tears welled in her eyes. How could she grieve for a man she’d never known? Or maybe it was a mixture of joy and sorrow. The fact that her aunt and Lucas had lost each other for so long and now…now someone who cared knew the end of their story.
Julia’s gaze dropped to the box. “Did you find anything with him?”
“Yes. As you can imagine, many of his belongings were ruined from time and the elements, but a few things remained intact.” He offered the box to Julia. “Somehow, because of their location inside the downed plane or by an act of God.”
Despite a warning grunt from Rose, Julia slid the box’s lid back for a peek. She managed to glimpse a pair of gloves, a broken watch, and something that looked like a ring before Rose began a full-on cry.
“I see you need to care for your little one instead of investigating at present, but when you have time, I think you’ll find the letter most rewarding.”
Julia’s attention shot to his. A letter. From Lucas!
As if reading her mind, he continued. “It’s the letter most of our men have on them to give their next of kin should the worst occur. I find them the most potent because they realize the value of last words and lost time.”
Julia held his gaze, the gravity of this gift sinking deep. Rose’s cry grew louder, so Julia placed the lid back on the box and stood. “Thank you, Dr. Porter.”
“It was a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Jenkins. I’m happy these have finally found their home.”
∞ ∞ ∞
Henry attempted to make headway through the crowd, but a blockade of people hampered every step. Julia had texted him that she was running behind because of her visit to the National Archives, but he was determined to see her off, one way or another.
He’d stayed awake through the night, berating himself on his impulsive decision to purchase a house when Julia had no intention of joining him in England. Yes, his heart had been in the right place, but clearly, good intentions weren’t good enough to fix this problem. How had he been such a fool?
He caught sight of her at the security line, searching the crowds on tiptoe, and his body flooded with relief. He hadn’t missed her.
Her beautiful gaze lit when she found him, her smile drawing him forward like the opening strains of a favorite sonata.
“I’m sorry I almost missed you,” he breathed out once he’d reached her.
“I was late getting here anyway.” She glanced up at the departure screen. “I’m afraid we don’t have a lot of time.”
“We’ll make the time.”
Her gaze shot to his, questions darkening those sapphire hues.
Had he ruined it all? He touched her shoulder, drawing her gaze back to his, memorizing this moment and the senses surrounding it. They’d work through the distance, he was sure of it. Why, then, did he feel like he was going to lose her?
“Forgive me, once again.”
“Henry.” She closed in, shaking her head, watching his face. “It was the sweetest of gestures.”
“I hate that we’re parting on such a strained note.” His fingers, of their own accord, slipped a strand of her golden hair between them.
“Me too. I feel so torn.” Her attention, those piercing eyes, found his again, almost pleading. “Your place is here right now. I’m sure of that. With this job and your family.” She sighed, her gaze faltering. “Mine…mine isn’t. How do we fix this?”
He tugged her close and placed a kiss to Rose’s head. “My place is here.” He cupped her cheek. “Right here. With you, wherever that may be.”
Tears filled her eyes, but she pressed them closed, hiding her thoughts from him. She was wrestling with something, but he didn’t know how to help her. What was going on inside her heart? Don’t close me out, dove.
“Julia,” he whispered.
She leaned her forehead against his, saying nothing. Holding the moment in a suspension he couldn’t push into motion. What was she thinking? What did she need from him?
“I have to go.” The declaration seemed to rip from her, broken. “I’m sorry, Henry.” She rocked on tiptoe and placed a kiss to his lips, gaze holding his. “We’ll find a way, right?”
The fear in her voice shook him, and for the first time, he felt as if she were slipping to a place he couldn’t reach. “Of course we will.”
She stepped back into the line with Rose’s little face peeking out from the sling. He watched them until they made it to the far side of security and turned to find him across the rows of people. A sea of noise and motion and words unsaid separated them, and he almost jumped the barrier to wrap her in his arms and reassure her.
With a little wave and a sad smile, she was gone.
∞ ∞ ∞
Julia stared out the plane window, brushing back tears and grappling for a steady heart, but nothing took the ache away. How could her heart keep telling her to leave everything she’d known for a whole new world of unknown? Emotions weren’t trustworthy. No. She had to be sensible. And moving didn’t make any sense at all. Even after finishing school in December, she’d have plenty of reasons to stay near Pleasant Gap.
Why, then, did her stomach tangle through a nausea storm of “what ifs”? No, Lord. I’m not brave enough. I’m not strong enough to listen to my heart.
Rose stared up at her almost as if answering Julia’s unvoiced fear. But God is.
She smiled down at her sweet little girl, who immediately rewarded her with a toothless grin. Rose deserved a chance to enjoy the wonderful family Julia had known, right? A crazy decision like moving to England for the love of a
lifetime would alter Rose’s future forever.
I hold the future.
Julia closed her eyes against the reminder, the ache in her chest swelling into a painful knot. But if she let go…then what?
“Henry loves you, you know that?” She touched Rose’s little nose, and her daughter’s smile bloomed again. “He loves really well, doesn’t he? Enough to…make up for a whole family of love? Enough to upend our lives and risk everything?”
Her question shuddered out on a whisper. The white box sat beside her on an empty seat, beckoning her to abate her curiosity—or at the very least distract her thoughts. She raised the lid and skimmed her fingers over the brown leather gloves, worn and weary from use and misuse. The cracked glass face of the pocket watch revealed a foggy view of hours stuck in time. Eleven twenty-two. Had that been Lucas’s last moment? Last breath?
Her fingers smoothed over the glass face, then touched a golden chain stuck among some papers. She swallowed the growing emotions and tugged the chain loose to find it had been threaded through a wedding band. A sound like a whimper escaped her. How long had it been since anyone touched this? Saw this precious symbol of a short-lived marriage and a long-loved romance? An inscription on the inside of the ring caught in the overhead lamplight. Today and forever. Yours.
Rose cooed, grasping for the chain, and Julia pushed away a tear. “Everybody wants a love like that, don’t they, little one?”
A photo peeked from beneath the gloves. Julia slid it into view and almost started crying again. It was the same photo she’d found in Millie’s box of the three of them—Lucas, Millie, and their daughter. Lucas held a smiling Rosalyn in one arm, the other secured around his wife in a comfortable and intimate hold. Lucas and Rosalyn both looked toward the camera, but not Millie. Her attention focused solely on the pair beside her, showcasing a smile more brilliant than Julia ever remembered seeing on her aunt’s face.
Julia slipped her finger over the words on the wedding band as she surveyed the photo, her breath shaking out another sigh. They’d had such little time together but shared a remarkable love.
Julia pulled another photo from the box—a portrait of Millie, laughing. Julia could almost imagine Lucas staring at his bride, missing her, praying for her, rekindling the memory of her laugh to go along with the photo.
She swallowed another round of tears as she drew an envelope from the bottom of the box. Frayed, a little soiled, but surprisingly intact, just as Dr. Porter had said, the beautiful penmanship on the front held one name. Amelia.
Julia’s fingers paused, taking in the bittersweet moment like an intruder. Rose gave another contented coo for encouragement, playing with the musical duck Henry had bought her.
With a deep breath, Julia slipped open the sticky envelope and drew out a single page stained here and there with dampness and yellowed from time.
My darling,
If you are reading my letter, I have left this world behind for a different one, and my only regret is not having the opportunity to hold you again or to kiss the sweet cheek of our beautiful Rosalyn. We knew when we chose this path, or rather when it chose us, that sacrifices would be made, but none has been more grievous to me than distance. I have loved you from across oceans and through countless nights as I’ve never loved anyone.
Our hearts have always been entwined in such a divine way that when I close my eyes, I can almost hear your breath near me and feel your warmth against me. I close my eyes often to breech the miles, to dream of you.
I have loved you a lifetime in these years.
You are the strongest, most courageous person I’ve ever known, and you will be strong now—even now—my love. God knows the years you have yet to grace this world, but until we meet again, live, my darling. Live with risk and hope and courage enough for two, for I will be with you through this unbreakable love and the smile of our little girl. You have made my life worth every sacrifice, and I would do it all again to have benefited from basking in the affections of such a woman.
Know my last thoughts were of you and our little girl. Know my heart’s final beat drummed with love for you. Know the last word on my lips was your name.
I am sorry you must bear the dark days of grief, yet time is but a flicker in eternity and then we will be together again, my love. My only love.
Finally, there will be no distance. Only joy.
Today and forever yours,
Lucas
Julia’s fingers tightened around the paper. An ache squeezed between her ribs. Did Henry feel like this about the distance? Did he hurt like this? She pressed a palm against her mouth to catch her sob, but it sneaked out anyway.
“Are you okay, ma’am?”
Julia looked up into the face of a middle-aged flight attendant.
“Y-ye-yes…” The word jumped out of her like sob. She wiped her face, reaching for the side of the sweater she wore in lieu of tissues.
The flight attendant came to the rescue with an entire box.
“Thank y-you.” Julia sniffled and pulled out four, dabbing eyes that refused to stop leaking.
“Is there something I can do for you, ma’am? To give you some relief?”
Julia wiped at her face again, another ugly sob wracking her shoulders and shaking Rose into a grin. Poor thing. She didn’t know her mama was ugly crying in the middle of a plane. Julia raised her face to the woman. “Could you make a life-altering decision for me so I don’t have to?”
The flight attendant offered a sad smile. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. Life-altering decisions are above my pay-grade. But in my experience, most people know the answer already…they just don’t like it.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
“You can’t be serious.” Andrew stood on one side of Henry, Wes on the other, neither currently helpful. “You’ve wanted this job for years. I had it specifically designed for your skill-set, Henry.”
Henry paused folding another shirt to place in his suitcase, the weight of the decision slowing his actions. Drew had worked so hard. Henry pushed through the disappointment and guilt by reaching for another shirt. “I do appreciate your going to battle for me on this, Drew, and I’ll work until you find a replacement, but I…I have to leave.”
“You just purchased a house. What of that?”
“I’ll list it when I get back from the States. With the updates I’ve made, I’m certain someone will want it.”
“Perhaps you should take a little time. She only left yesterday,” Wes offered. “This is your dream job, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity you’ve worked for years to accomplish. Surely she understands that.”
“I watched my father work his dream job for twenty-five years”—Henry placed another shirt into his suitcase more quickly now, more certain— “and live in a loveless marriage filled with animosity and coldness. I saw how his job became less of a joy and more of an escape. What if home can become my joy and escape? I could perform any job with that sort of home.”
“I’d prefer both, if I had the choice.” Andrew picked up one of the trinkets on Henry’s shelf and studied it. “That is, if I ever marry, but the two of you aren’t making it appealing. Moving about the world, giving up perfectly good jobs, buying a house one day and selling it the next? No, not appealing at all.”
“You’re not your father.” Wes placed his palm on Henry’s shoulder. “You’re stronger than he was, and Julia most certainly is not your mother.”
Henry nodded. “I’m strong enough to realize that if my heart is where it needs to be, any job I find will suffice.”
“You don’t think Julia will come around, do you?” Wes nudged a hope Henry kindled but couldn’t hang onto.
“I’m not sure. But what I do know is, whether she does or not, I want to be with her. She and Rose are worth this sacrifice. Last night, as I prayed and begged for understanding, I realized that I don’t want a day to go by where Rose doesn’t know I’m there for her. I don’t want two or three years to pass and the only way she remembers me is
as a face on a screen. I don’t want Julia becoming so acquainted with doing things without me that she doesn’t hope I’ll show up to help. I want to be with them, and that has to be enough for me.”
“You’re up to your knees in it, aren’t you?” Andrew grimaced in a strange expression of half curiosity and half disgust. “I’m not certain whether to think you’re mad or the most honorable bloke I’ve ever known.”
“Or a little of both,” Wes added.
“Certainly not.” Henry shot his friend a weak smile and added another shirt to his bag.
“I know what it’s like to make this choice, Henry. You know I do.” Wes’s words softened, garnering Henry’s attention. “But what sort of job will you find in Pleasant Gap? Have you thought about this practically? Considered options?”
“I’ll find a way. Teach music. Give lessons. Learn to bake.”
“Learn to bake?” Andrew looked positively horrified. “Is that what love makes you do? Bake?”
Henry lips tipped at the memory of Julia in the kitchen at midnight, baking to relax enough to sleep. Learning to bake didn’t sound bad at all.
“If you do learn to bake, Henry, would you practice a chocolate trifle for me?” Andrew relaxed his shoulder against Henry’s dresser. “That alone may be worth your move to the States.”
He almost grinned. “I’ll only be gone a few days, so I can secure things with Julia then begin planning, but I’ll see you right. I won’t leave Visionary until you have a replacement.”
“I don’t doubt your word, Henry. Your clarity of mind, perhaps, but not your word.”
“Are you certain about this?”
Henry pressed his suitcase closed and met Wes’s gaze, relinquishing one dream to hold to another. “I am.”
Wes drew in a deep breath. “All right then, I’ll see you off.”
∞ ∞ ∞
“So, Henry’s mother wasn’t welcoming.”
“At all.” Julia moved around her mother’s kitchen, sorting through ingredients for chocolate chip cookies. Oh, how she needed to bake—to stir flour and sugar, knead dough and roll cookies—to help her process the crazy going on inside her chest. “But there was this one moment when she looked at Rose that I felt her anger held more…grief than anything else. Almost loneliness. It made me wonder if she’d ever had a daughter-figure in her life, you know?”
When You Look at Me (A Pleasant Gap Romance Book 2) Page 35