The Pieces We Keep

by Kristina McMorris

  She opened her mouth to say as much, but he leaned in and smothered the words with his lips. His hands rose to her face. He kissed her with power and wanting, and though she was first taken aback, any resistance quickly dropped away.

  On pure instinct she ran her fingers over the broadness of his chest and down the length of his shirt. At his hips, she lifted the pool of fabric and reached beneath, seeking the feel of his skin. His stomach muscles tightened and his breath slightly hitched. As he laid her down, his kisses moved to her neck. She caught a sound, vaguely, and dismissed it when his teeth grazed her ear. The pressure of his body set off a charge inside her. But it wasn’t just desire. It was more than that, a sensation she couldn’t describe.

  Not caring to try, she rolled her head to the side, an urging for his lips to follow the curves of her neck, to which he hastily complied. His hands had just grasped her sides, the vulnerable slope of her waist, when a voice sliced through the haze.

  “Sean, you in here?” a man called from below.

  They both froze, their breaths rough and heavy.

  “Sean?”

  “I’m here,” he answered, collecting his words. “I’m ... just finishing up. Meet you outside in a few.”

  “All righty.”

  Footsteps shuffled out the barn door.

  As reality returned to the loft, Sean’s body lingered over hers before he pulled back to sit up, giving her room to do the same.

  “Audra ... I, um ...”

  “Yeah,” she said. “I should go.”

  He nodded, looking as flustered as she felt. Once they stood, he gestured toward her. “Your, uh, shirt,” he said.

  Audra glanced over her shoulder and brushed hay from the back of her clothes and hair. “Thanks.”

  “Sure.”

  She pasted on a smile, her pulse not yet slowing. “I’ll see you around, then.”

  “Yeah ... right.”

  “Good,” she said. She went directly to the ladder and climbed down. She didn’t look up or reduce her pace until she was in her car, at which point she promptly zoomed toward home.

  For half the drive, Audra couldn’t stop smiling. She wouldn’t be surprised if a blush covered every inch of her skin. She was a teenager after her first make-out session, a game of Two Minutes in the Closet—except a hundred times more exhilarating, aided by experience, and without an ounce of awkwardness. If you subtracted the abrupt ending.

  And then she thought of Devon.

  Her husband.

  Her first love.

  Only a day ago, she had knelt at his grave, grieving his absence, cherishing his memories. Yet not once had he come to mind while Sean’s lips and hands were on her body. Recognizing this, she waited for a rush of guilt or betrayal, which she expected would always follow her encounters with another man.

  But it wasn’t there.

  The truth was, she felt alive and, in a way, liberated. As though the part of her that she had taken for dead had merely been asleep and was finally awake. Maybe later she would reflect on the day and feel differently, but not now. For now, she would relish the sensation, unconcerned of what it meant or where it would lead.

  Once parked at the apartment, most of the lot empty, she took a minute in her car to reset her nerves. Particles from the barn dotted her shirt. Tess’s advice flew back to her, about the need for a good old-fashioned roll in the hay, and Audra had to smile. She wiped off her shirt and pants. In the rearview mirror she checked for hay in her hair.

  That’s when she noticed a man in the reflection. Sunlight made his face difficult to see, but one thing was clear: He was headed straight for her car.

  54

  Out of the morning quiet came an inquiry from the person Vivian least expected.

  “Are you absolutely sure about this?” Luanne said pointedly. “Because if you’re not . . .”

  At the vanity, seated in her bathrobe, Vivian lowered the cardinal-red lipstick she was about to apply. She turned toward her roommate, who stood at the closet in her freshly buttoned dress.

  “Please, don’t get me wrong,” Luanne continued. “I adore the thought of calling you my sister. And I know it might be unfair of me to say anything, with the ceremony only hours away. It’s just that everything’s moved so fast. Especially given how much he’s been out of town.”

  Vivian admitted to her: “I do understand why you’d be concerned.”

  When Gene and Vivian announced the news right after the proposal, Luanne had smiled and bid them good wishes. There had been an uncertainty, however, underlying her manner. Not unlike the doubts that festered in Vivian. Still, the week had rolled on without dissent, until this moment.

  “This isn’t just about me, Viv.” Luanne took a step closer. “You haven’t even told your parents. Don’t you think they’ll be upset to have missed it?”

  “They’ll be fine–after a while. Besides, it’s best this way. I don’t want the fanfare of a big wedding and neither does your brother.” What’s more, an event like that would take months that Vivian could not afford to spare.

  “But shouldn’t your father at least give his blessing?”

  “Gene was going to ask him, but there’s no guarantee when my father will actually return. Then there’s the business of my parents not even being at the same house. Don’t you see? This helps avoid all of those issues.”

  “Well, yes. I suppose....”

  “Luanne, good grief. I thought you were overjoyed we became a couple.”

  “I was. I am. But still–”

  Vivian could not bear any more of this. “Gene and I are going to be happy together.” The declaration shot out with such potency, she wondered which of them she was trying more to convince.

  After a pause, Luanne gave a look of regret. “I’m sorry, Viv. I didn’t mean to imply that you wouldn’t be.”

  Vivian shook her head, bridling her emotions. “It’s okay. You were right, it has moved fast.” She shrugged and said, “We’re just eager to make it official and don’t see the point in waiting. The same as a lot of other couples these days.”

  Given the recent rash of deployment, sprints to the altar had become commonplace, even for people who had scarcely met. The fact that Gene was stationed in the States hadn’t stopped Vivian from using this rationale as a source of self-assurance.

  “We love each other, Luanne. We really do.”

  Though truth upheld the words, Vivian withdrew her gaze, fearing it would reveal more than she wished to share. As she busied herself with powder, Luanne slipped into a pair of heels and approached the vanity. She gave Vivian’s shoulder a tender squeeze.

  “I still need to pick up your bouquet,” Luanne said with notable lightness. “I’ll see you there?”

  Vivian smiled without turning. “See you there.”

  Some would say it was bad luck, letting Gene view her before the wedding. But Vivian had come to learn that in spite of one’s efforts–avoiding cracks, crossing fingers, flinging salt-most in life occurred with little control.

  The only element she could count on was the ease she would feel in Gene’s presence. This was the reason she had insisted he escort her to the courthouse. She knew she would need that comfort in order to carry on with the plan.

  And for a brief while, it worked.

  He stood at her door in his dashing dress uniform, his eyes glimmering beneath the bill of his hat. “Shall we?” he said with a smile, and offered the crook of his arm. He guided her to the waiting cab, carrying her suitcase for their hotel stay downtown. Packed among her clothing was a silken nightgown for what would be their first time together in that way.

  What she had not figured into the equation, however, was the intrusion of her conscience. For the better part of a week, it had stalked her from a distance. But here, en route to the courthouse, it was squeezed in like a third passenger. She could not ignore its existence. From her heightened awareness, each kindness from Gene transformed into a punishment. His compliments over her appearanc
e, on her wedding suit and Victory curls, were like lashes to her skin. He held her hand, and the sincerity of his touch burned through her thin ivory gloves.

  Were the sensations but a warning of what was to come?

  Months down the road, Gene would cradle the baby as Vivian lurked in the background, haunted by a secret. That was assuming, of course, the child’s birth would not have already exposed the truth-when gray-blue eyes, light-blond curls, and an early delivery shouted proof of another father.

  The faster the thoughts spun in her mind, the thicker the air became. She leaned closer to the open window, but the August humidity blocked any reprieve. She sought an escape, a means to break free.

  “Sir, could you pull over?” she said to the driver.

  “Sweetheart,” Gene said, “we still have several blocks to go.”

  “I need out. Now. Please.”

  He looked at her, befuddled, but affirmed her request with the cabbie. The instant they halted at the curb, Vivian jumped out and headed to nowhere in particular. It was as though she had blinked and the golden path of her life had twisted and darkened into a merciless maze.

  “Vivian, wait for me!” Gene called out. Travel bags in hand, he caught up to her near the fountain of a city park, where three children waded about, scavenging for pennies. When Gene turned her around, she jerked her eyes away.

  “Doll, what is it? Tell me what’s going on.”

  “I can’t. I can’t do it.” She cringed inside, disgusted by what she had almost done.

  “It’s all right,” he said. “We’ll just wait. We don’t have to rush.”

  “Gene, you don’t understand.”

  He studied her face, searching for clues, until a splash from the fountain hit his sleeve.

  “Come over here with me.” He guided her to a corner of the park and onto a shaded bench. He set their luggage down. As he sat beside her, a hot tear leaked down her cheek. She went to wipe it away, but he gently beat her to it.

  “Folks get cold feet all the time. Nothing to worry about.”

  “No,” she whispered. “That’s not it.”

  He hesitated, looking afraid to ask. “What, then?”

  If only he hadn’t surprised her with that proposal. She had been fully prepared to confess it all. After six weeks of his absence, trading only a handful of letters and phone calls, she could not have seen that coming. No girl in her right mind would have seen that coming.

  “Why did you ask me?” she said. She was desperate for the road map that had delivered them here, to pinpoint the wrong turns they had taken.

  His forehead creased, the pondering of a trick question. “Because I love you.”

  “We were apart for more than a month, you never even mention marriage, and the minute you come back you get down on one knee. Why?”

  He parted his lips to answer. Then he tucked them in, tight as wire. Gazing away from her, he sank into the bench.

  Finally, he said, “I’d made a mistake before. Years ago. I loved a girl, and she believed we’d get hitched one day. Have kids. Live happily ever after. Everybody around us did.”

  It was his old girlfriend, Helen. Vivian knew this without asking. The story of betrayal had never been more painfully significant.

  “I wasn’t sure, though, that I ever wanted to get married,” he said. “When I told her that, after years together, she pulled away for a while. One thing led to another and ... it didn’t work out. I realized too late that I should’ve explained more to her, so she’d have understood.”

  He shrugged a shoulder in a manner that was anything but nonchalant. “Thing of it is my old man was a decent guy-until he drank. Usually he’d just throw a fit, start breaking things. But one night my mom accidentally burnt a roast. Money was tight, and he exploded. I was at the table when he slapped her hard enough to knock her down. She caught the edge of the counter with the back of her head and wound up with four stitches. I was twelve. He never did it again, not that I know of anyway. But part of me never forgave myself for just sitting there, scared as hell in my seat, not defending her like I should have.”

  Vivian had never noticed how rarely Luanne talked about home. All those years, she had always seemed so sweet and carefree, no one in school would have imagined.

  Gene cleared his throat and turned to Vivian. “Point is, with me being away from you, and feeling a distance growing, I just . . .” He shook his head and clutched her hand on her lap. “I couldn’t risk losing you, Vivi. Not when I know we’re supposed to be together. I know it in my heart. And I have no doubt anymore about being a good husband. I’d take such good care of you, if you’d let me.”

  “Oh, Gene. I know you would....” Her tears were falling now in a stream she couldn’t slow, couldn’t stop. After what he had shared, her confession would gain another layer of cruelty. “That’s why there’s something you need to know.”

  He waited for her to go on, clearly recognizing her conflict as more than cold feet.

  Perhaps, to some extent, he would relate to her feeling of deep regret, of being unable to change the past but wanting direly to make things right.

  Vivian amassed the remnants of her courage, recalling a time she could now identify as both the beginning and the end. “I was living in London with my parents,” she said. “One day, I was at the market alone when the air-raid siren sounded. It was just a routine alarm. We had no idea-or at least I was too ignorant to realize how close we were to war. And how, because of it, my whole life would change.”

  A rivulet of sweat slid down her back. She shifted her vision to an unseen, distant spot. She could only complete the tale if not faced by Gene’s reaction, including the inevitable revelation that the “friend” from Germany she had asked him to help was actually Isaak.

  “At a vendor stand,” she said, “I knocked over a tomato. It landed on a man’s dress shoe, and when I looked up he was standing there. And he smiled at me.”

  From there, Vivian pressed on, covering the highlights of moments that had shaped her life for the past three years. Meeting Isaak at the London cinemas, the secrecy of their courtship and his family in Munich. His professor at the university, the information gleaned from her father, the letter at Euston Station. She described the reunion at Prospect Park, igniting confusion and fears, the resurrection of interred feelings. She spoke of Agent Daniel Gerard, the dealings of espionage that prohibited her from confiding in anyone, including Gene. And with a tightened throat, she detailed the legal dealings that had led to Isaak’s execution.

  “Before that, though,” she said, fighting the shake in her voice, “I went to his hotel room to deliver a message. I never meant for anything more to happen. I swear to God, I didn’t. I was certain it was over for us-whatever it was that he and I’d once had. After he died, I was going to move on with my life. With you. But then, weeks later, I was at work, and I fainted. And they sent me to the doctor, and . . . and I . . .”

  Struggling to finish, she angled toward Gene. She found his eyes lowering to her stomach, where her hands had unconsciously settled. He inhaled a sharp breath, and his neck trembled as though his head had become too heavy. He moved his jaw in several attempts to speak but failed.

  “I am so, so sorry. Gene, the last thing I ever meant to do was hurt you.”

  He rubbed his hand over his mouth. A bead of perspiration trailed from his temple, just below his hat. When his gaze slid toward her, it was clear he could not see her. He had succumbed to a daze she too often made her home.

  “I’d understand if you never wanted to see me again,” she told him. “But I pray that somehow you’ll find a way to forgive me.”

  An infinite beat passed before he rose woodenly, wordlessly from the bench.

  “Please,” she said, “don’t go yet.” She touched his sleeve, and he held there for a moment. If only he would look at her, he would see in her eyes and face how utterly sorry she was, how desperate she was to make it up to him.

  But he didn’t turn an inc
h. He merely walked away, abandoning his belongings, leaving her behind.

  55

  The man strode onward with purpose. Audra detected this even in her rearview mirror. But not until she’d stepped out of her car did she catch sight of his face, and astonishment grabbed hold.

  “What do you want, Robert?”

  He slowed his steps and came to rest a few yards away. He displayed his palms in a show of harmlessness, a great irony in that. “I came by hoping we could talk.”

  From the beginning, Russ had advised her that a potential settlement could be reached if both parties were willing to compromise. By now, it seemed an unfathomable option. “That’s not a good idea.”

  “I’m just asking for a few minutes. Then I promise to leave you be.”

  She suddenly wondered how he could have known when she’d be returning home. The timing struck her as too much of a coincidence. “Have you been following me?”

  “No. Of course not.”

  She had come to doubt any words from his mouth. Did he know where she’d been, what she had just done? The liberation of only moments ago instantly receded.

  “I’ve been sitting in the parking lot waiting for you. I knew you’d be here to meet Jack before long. I would’ve called first, but didn’t think you’d want to see me.”

  “And you would have been right.”

  The hurt that flashed in his eyes made her regret the snipe—though not entirely.

  She reminded herself what he and Meredith were attempting to steal from her life. “As you said, Jack will be home shortly. I’d rather you not be around then. If you have something to say to either of us, your lawyer can contact mine.”

  Leaving it at that, she snagged her purse from the car and shut and locked the door.