by Laura Parker
“That fear should have helped us. Why didn’t it?”
She paused just short of her right kneecap brushing the boot tip of his crossed leg. “I was furious that you had backed me into the position of considering divorce. My parents may not have taught me much but their example made me certain I didn’t want to follow in their footsteps collecting exes and alimony. Our marriage was supposed to be my only marriage.” She gazed down into his beautiful battered face and jackknifed right into the golden pools of his eyes. “You were supposed to love me forever, Jag, just as I loved you.”
She saw the sudden thaw in his eyes but his brain was still in charge.
“I ask you again, Halle. Why didn’t you stay and fight for our marriage?”
She hunched her shoulders. “Because I thought I’d lose. You keep a picture of Maria at your bedside. Why?”
His expression altered. “You went through my things?”
“I didn’t open any drawers or read any mail. I didn’t touch anything but the stack of books by your bed. The picture fell out by accident.” She made herself ask again. “Why do you still have a picture of Maria?”
“I have a picture of Ed,” he said flatly. “It reminds me of a time when I was happy, before I learned that loyalty should not be confused with pride. I should have known better than to think I could fix things for his.”
“And Maria?”
Joe shrugged, conceding her point. “Another lesson in caution. I never touched her after you and I met. Never. We had parted weeks before you and I ever met. She knew I wasn’t coming back. It never occurred to me to wonder how far she’d be willing to go to see to it that I paid for moving on.”
Halle nudged his boot by flexing her knee. “She made it plain to me the day we met that she considered you hers and that I was poaching. She wanted you back. She said she would get you sooner or later.”
Joe’s mouth hung slightly ajar. “You believed her?”
“Not then, not for a long time. Not really until the day after I locked you out and she called to tell me that, in future, if I wanted to find you, I should call her apartment.”
“You fell for the oldest trick in the book.”
Halle thought about that. If it had been her only mistake, she wouldn’t be here now. “It was my greatest fear. The pain made me sort of crazy. I loved you so much.”
“You got over it.” She watched his expression as he emotionally climbed the barrier of defense one more time. “You married Shipmann six months later.”
Halle winced. “Big mistake number two. When things began to change in our marriage I was bewildered, stunned, unable to act or think. My friends said I had asked for it, marrying a man too different from myself. I didn’t know how to handle the fights between us or how to stop my sense of loss each time you walked out in the middle of one.”
He looked as if she had inflicted a wound. “Couples fight, Halle. My parents occasionally had some real set-tos. But they got over it. They cooled down, came back together and made it work. They did whatever it took, compromised, revised their plans to accommodate mutual needs. That’s what couples do.”
What couples do. Not what couples did, past tense.
Was he still thinking of them in some parallel world where the past was part of their present? Hope began to palpitate within her compressed chest. If he could imagine that, she could hope.
Halle tried answering his grimness with a smile though it made her shiver. “You haven’t asked me why I came to east Texas.”
His gaze slipped down from her face, past her torso to her long, long legs. “Did you have a reason?”
“Yes. And I was right. There was someone I was running from.”
His gaze skipped back up to her face, the policeman on alert. “Who?”
“Myself. The day final divorce papers arrived in the mail for the second time in my life, I felt like a complete failure. It brought home to me what I feared most. That our breakup wasn’t your fault. It was mine.”
She knelt suddenly before him, balancing herself by placing her arms on top of his crossed leg. He didn’t pull away or seem to mind her touch. “I took everything out of my purse that had the Shipmann name on it—my ID card, credit cards, checkbook, everything. I felt this urgent need to be free of all trappings of that marriage. I withdrew cash from my bank account and set out—in a real sense running away—to find you.”
His gaze met hers, deepening with the emotion he had tried so hard to hold back. “Why?”
“I thought our marriage failed because we were too different. But I’d failed a second time with a man all my friends thought was perfect for me. I had to conclude that it was my fault both marriages failed. I wanted to know what was wrong with me. I suspected you could tell me. No matter what happened between us, I’ve always believed deep down that I could trust your judgment. Now that I’ve been with you again I know my second marriage failed because I never got over you.”
He shut his eyes as emotion spasmed across his face. “That’s easy for you to say now.”
“You think so?” She shook him lightly with her crossed arms, causing him to look at her. “I think it’s the hardest admission I’ve ever made. I didn’t tell you the truth about my returning memory because I had discovered a man so different from the one I divorced.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that you are strong, reliable, confident, if not happy—all the things our turbulent marriage had leached away. And then I saw in your eyes that you still had feelings for me. I didn’t want to spoil the possibility that we were falling in love again.”
“Is that what you think was going on here, resuscitation of a corpse?” He was backsliding, trying desperately to find footing, and feeling only shifting sand beneath his feet. “Did I look that needy to you?”
“Yes,” she whispered. “I was, am, as needy as you. That’s why I’ve stayed.”
“Don’t do me any favors. You tricked me into saying things and having feelings I’m not at all certain I want.” His voice was little more than a whisper but she knew he meant every word. “Loving and losing you once was painful enough. You were part of my past, a past I wanted to live down.”
Halle understood that. Even before her intuition began feeding her fragments of memory she had felt the need to protect herself from them coming too quickly and overwhelming her. “Do you remember Jamaica?”
Joe started. “Our honeymoon? What about it?”
“Your cologne brought it back.”
He glanced toward the bedroom door. “I don’t wear that cologne anymore. Haven’t for years.”
“Because I bought it for you. Like you gave these to me.” She reached up and touched one of the silver cows hooked through her ears. She saw his gaze go there, linger on the bits of metal while emotion tugged at his mouth.
“I’ve changed, Halle,” he said, spacing his words with little silences. “I’m more cautious. I don’t want to be hurt again. I still believe that the past is the past.”
She rubbed a palm along the smooth surface of the leg of his boot. “Does that include us?”
He shifted uncomfortably. “You’re trying to get me to admit to feelings I don’t trust.”
She tilted her head to one side but her gaze never faltered. “You wanted me. Last night. The day before.”
He shook his head. “It’s not about sex. It never was about sex with us and you know it. When you look at things realistically, we’re right back where we started, in paradise as long as real life doesn’t intrude.”
“You mean as long as we’re in Gap, Texas.”
“Right.” He nodded. “If you want to know if we have a second chance, stay in Gap with me.”
Halle shook her head. “I don’t think so. You aren’t living in Gap, you’re hiding from life here. If we are going to have a chance, we have to do so in the real world.”
He slumped deeper in his chair. “I’m not going back to New York, if that’s what you’re leading up
to. I guess I can’t expect that you will want to spend much time in Gap.”
“So what are you saying?”
Joe thought about his answer. Thought hard. “I’m saying it’s been nice. Fate or random chance has given us a chance to get back what we lost two years ago.” He reached out and caught her hand, enfolding it inside the embrace of his. “Our memories aren’t tainted anymore. We should consider ourselves luckier than most and move on.”
Halle smiled. “I never thought you were a coward, Joe Guinn.”
Amusement tugged harder at his mouth. “Maybe you overestimated me. I’m a realistic coward. I’m the guy who goes fishing every morning. I have nothing to offer you.”
“Is that a reason or an excuse?”
“It’s a fact. I never tried to be anything I’m not. I could never compete with your friends but when I met you, I had a job. I was respected. I was doing what I loved. I was satisfied with my little corner of the world. Everything has changed.”
“Everything? Your feelings, too?” She could see the pitched battle of conflicting emotions in him and knew, because she knew him, how he would answer.
“You can’t live on nothing.”
She turned her hand under his and squeezed his fingers hard. “You’ve been thinking about going back to school, do that.”
He sighed and rested his head against the chair back as if his struggle were over. “I’ve been daydreaming about a lot of things. But it takes cash to go to school and I can barely feed myself on what I make. I’m not complaining. I’m just saying that the way I live is living for one. One only.”
“I see.” Her gaze shifted past him for an instant. “I don’t accept that. Your financial status is something that can change.” She rose to her feet. “If you want it to.”
“Don’t you think—?” He shook his head and clamped his lips as if he had been about to give away the secret password to an outsider. “At least we’ve settled the past. That’s something.”
“Yes. Our past was something. Something good.”
He looked at her with the anguish of a man who feels he’s receiving a punishment he doesn’t deserve. Yet he was willing to accept it. “I suppose there’s nothing else to be said. I suppose this is goodbye.”
Halle could cheerfully have kicked him. Two years ago, she would have railed and wept and wounded herself with accusations which he would meet with his stony refusal to back down. This time, she held herself together with spit and nerve and hope. “Will you let me pay you for your services?”
“If you—” He caught himself. “No.”
“Okay,” She nodded, thinking more quickly than she ever had in her life. He had shown her the door. He felt backed in a corner. He wouldn’t back down. It wasn’t his nature. “Then there’s only one thing I want from you.”
He didn’t even ask what it was. Was he that afraid that it might be himself?
“I want to buy that picture from you.” She pointed at the bronco rider hanging above the TV.
His expression became suspicious. “Why?”
“I like it. Western and native American art’s my forte, remember? How much?”
“It’s not for sale. It belonged to my grandfather. He bought it at a farm auction in the thirties.”
“You’re just being stubborn. I bet you don’t know what color shirt the bronco rider is wearing.” She bent and quickly placed her hand over his eyes before he could glance at the picture. “I’ll bet you that picture that you can’t name his shirt color.”
Joe hesitated. “Red.”
“No, gray. Red bandanna.” She removed her hand and smiled cockily up into his face. “I win.”
“You always did,” he muttered.
“I’d like to pay you—”
He cut her off. “Halle, don’t make the last thing I say to you a string of four-letter words. Take the damned picture. It’s yours.”
“I might consider it a loan.”
“Consider it a farewell gift.”
“I’ll do you one better. I’ll give you free appraiser’s advice. Take that picture to Dallas and let someone tell you exactly what it’s worth.” She grabbed a handful of his hair. “You’ve got a future, Joseph Aloysius Guinn. It’s been staring you right in the face all the time. You just didn’t see it.”
She released him and straightened up. One thing she had never done was sell herself cheap. If he wanted her he was going to have to come after her.
“Now I’m going to take a shower, dress and then call whatever passes for a cab in this part of the country. I’m going to Dallas and then I’m going home. You know where to find me if you decide to rejoin the world.”
Joe watched her walk away, half in fear and all in love, and his guts twisted into pretzel shapes by his need for what he couldn’t have.
“This was really nice of you to drive me into Dallas, Lacey,” Halle said as they sat eating yogurt at a Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport terminal.
“You don’t have to keep doing that, thanking me,” Lacey replied. “I can use the money and like my dad said, we owe Joe a couple of favors.”
“Your parents were very kind to put me up last night. I really didn’t expect that.”
“You don’t know my mom or you would have expected nothing else. She thinks hospitality is the only form of civilized behavior left. I’m surprised she didn’t insist you stay a few days.”
Halle twirled a lock of her newly styled hair. “I must send her a thank-you for steering me to that salon. They did a remarkably good job.”
“I’ll say.” Lacey grinned. “If you weren’t already Joe’s lady I’d give him a run for the money.”
Halle smiled cryptically. She had tried to put a good face on her exit from Joe’s house, claiming when she called the McCreas on advice about how best to get to Dallas that Joe had had to go out of town on shortnotice business. The truth was he was gone when she came out of the shower. When he hadn’t shown up three hours later, she decided to take matters into her own hands.
The McCreas had been more than understanding, they’d been gracious. As for Mr. McCrea and Lacey, they’d already been to see their pastor and Mrs. McCrea said they were going to have a counselor from Dallas in to see them.
“That’s your flight they’re calling,” Lacey said as the loud speaker interrupted the canned music.
“I think you’re right. “Let’s go.” She rose, picked up her one bag which Lacey immediately took from her and turned to walk toward the gate.
Joe took the stairs two at a time. He had had trouble finding a parking space and cut it too short.
He lifted his battered straw cowboy hat from his eyes as he entered the terminal. The security line was thankfully short. Even so, he was loping toward the gate as the the final boarding call was announced. He was going to be too late. Hell!
At first the glare from the picture windows by the gate made it impossible for him to see any of the boarding passengers distinctly. And then he saw a figure standing at the back of the line. A woman, tall, slender with ash-blond hair drifting about her shoulders.
Joe had never begged anyone for anything in his life but he made bargains with every deity and form of fortune he could conceive of as he hurried toward her to let that be Halle.
She looked surprised when she noticed him coming toward her but then she turned fully and smiled.
He practically stepped on her toe before he halted in front of her. Yet his first words weren’t romantically conceived to please. “Your hair!”
Halle put a self-conscious hand to the fall by her left cheek. “I went to a salon here in Dallas. They stripped the darker dye off.”
Joe nodded and swallowed. “It’s...nice.”
“Thank you,” she said primly. “What brings you here?”
He grinned at her and his dimple had never looked better. “Unfinished business.”
He wanted to hold her, squeeze her, drag her away and tear their clothes off. He merely devoured her with his greedy eyes. “
You got any idea what a Remington goes for these days?”
Her eyes lit up. “I have a ballpark idea.”
“I didn’t. Jeez! And to think that fortune’s been hanging on the wall these fifty years collecting dust. Several parties are interested and the broker I’m dealing with has advanced me enough money to take the edge off my economy living plan. I can even afford to apply for graduate school tomorrow or the next day. Soon.”
“Oh, Joe, I’m so glad.” She bit her lip. “Really.”
“I’ve got more news. I’ve been offered a job.” He smirked. “Mr. McCrea offered it. I’m going to run his Dallas campaign headquarters. It will be temporary. But it’s a beginning.”
“Sounds like you’ve sorted a few things out.”
The thick-as-syrup heat in his brown eyes drew her like a fly. “I am beginning to.” He leaned in close to her until their bodies were all but touching. “Some things I’ve put behind me. Other’s I’ve tucked away in memory as lessons learned and wisdom gained.”
She swayed against him, her breasts brushing his shirtfront as she lifted her face to his. “What else is there?”
“Hope.” The fire in his eyes was melting her loneliness and lighting up every dark corner of her soul.
She fought for breath. “That’s a mighty dangerous word in this day and age.”
“Many people don’t believe in it,” he agreed.
“I’m not so worried about what other people think anymore,” she said as she reached up to rest her hand over his heart. “I think I’ve gotten past that.”
“Good for you.”
“Yeah,” she said, mimicking his western drawl of the word. “Good for me. I’ve also gotten past my prejudice about living in Texas. I’ve found quite a few things I like here. If I stayed, I might find a few more.” She smiled a sassy smile. “I’ve got my past back and you’ve got your future funded. There seems to be only one question left to be answered.”
His hands came up to frame her head, winnowing through the wheat blond hair as he found the shape of her skull with his fingers. “What would that be, sweetheart?”