Divided Hearts

by Carolyne Aarsen

  “All done.” He set the dirty plates beside her, and she didn’t even look up as she drained the sink and filled it again with hot water.

  “There’s a tea towel in the box on the table you can use to dry the dishes,” she said, pointing with her chin, still not looking at him.

  He found them and came back. While she poured the soap in, he flipped the towel over his shoulder and rolled up his sleeves.

  The movement caught Cory’s eye, and she glanced sidelong at him, disconcerted by the sight of his bared forearms, his shirt open at the neck. He looked casual, relaxed.

  Handsome.

  He caught her looking at him. “What?” he asked, taking a wet dish off the drain board.

  Cory shook her head, flustered at her foolish reaction. “I’m thinking of a joke,” she said, retreating to humor as a defense.

  “Spill.”

  “What do you call a smiling, courteous person at a lawyers’ convention?”

  Matthew was silent a moment. “I haven’t heard that one yet,” he said, his tone light. “I’ll bite.”

  “The caterer,” she said sweetly.

  “I’ll have to add it to my repertoire of lawyer jokes,” he replied.

  “Actually, there’s only two lawyer jokes,” she countered, thankful to be on the offensive. “All the rest are true.”

  “Okay, enough with that already. There are more lawyer jokes than there are lawyers. Let’s talk about something else.”

  Only there was nothing else to discuss. Their only interaction had been as opposing sides. The only time they had met socially was at prom, and even that memory was fraught with overtones.

  She blushed again, remembering her surprise and dismay when he had come as her friend Deirdre’s escort. Deirdre’s boyfriend, a senior, had taken ill so she asked Matthew to fill in. Cory’s date, also a senior, was supposed to meet her there, but when she arrived, he ditched her. So there she was, alone, fighting her discomfort around someone she had met before only in a courtroom. She on one side, he on the other.

  It didn’t help that he wore a tux and Deirdre wore a sparkly dress Cory knew had cost more than her own mother’s car, while she wore a dress she picked up at a thrift store.

  She felt out of place and self-conscious. To compensate, she drank too much, got snippy with him, and made all sorts of snide comments.

  Then she got sick in his car on the way home.

  She pushed that memory back. Not her best moment, and not something she needed to relive now. She had been young, foolish, and insecure.

  “Let’s talk about your work,” she said, feeling as if she had to take the offensive. “What else do you do, besides badger witnesses and cajole judges?”

  “I don’t spend a lot of time in the courtroom in high-drama trials,” he replied, ignoring her gibe. “A lot of my work is pretty mundane. I travel and sit in on hearings and read a lot of briefs, file papers at court. Prep work.”

  “What do you do for fun?” she asked.

  He gave no reply, and Cory glanced sidelong at him. He frowned at the dish he held, then looked at her again. “I don’t have any hobbies. I usually work until about nine o’clock. Sometimes I catch a movie. Sometimes I go straight to bed.”

  “What, no social life?” she said with mock surprise.

  “Not much of one.”

  “Your poor girlfriend.”

  “Yes, well, that’s probably the reason I don’t have one now.”

  Cory was surprised to hear that. And was surprised to find that the information gave her a little jolt. She would have thought someone like Matthew would have no problem holding on to a girl.

  “Doesn’t sound like much fun,” she couldn’t help but say.

  “I think you’re right,” he replied, his voice quiet.

  His admission surprised her. It didn’t sound like the Matthew McKnight who always projected an aura of intensity and dedication to his work.

  “What about you? What do you do for fun?” he asked.

  “Cater,” she replied with a quick grin. She was quite pleased with how easy she held her own. If she didn’t look at him too much, she could do it.

  “No, really. What do you do when you’re not working?”

  She shrugged. Truth to tell, her life didn’t sound much more exciting than his. Less, if she were honest.

  “I like going for long walks, as you’ve already discovered. I like sitting under trees and watching the leaves get blown by the wind.” She sighed. “I like reading and taking naps.”

  “Sounds delightfully uncomplicated.”

  Had she imagined that faint note of envy in his voice? Probably had. Her life was a dud compared to his. “Doesn’t take a degree to do it.”

  “How did you end up being a waitress?”

  Once again, she had to suppress that momentary shame interwoven with her dealings with Matthew. She had always worked, she reminded herself, had never needed handouts. “I started in high school and never tried anything else,” she said defensively. “Because Mom and I moved around a lot, it was hard to get anywhere in any career type job. Or go to school.” Now why did she have to say that? It sounded like whining, and her vague reference to moving gave him another question to ask.

  “Do you ever think about doing other things?”

  Cory’s hands slowed as she looked out the window above the sink, thinking, wondering if he thought she lacked ambition. “I’ve often wished I could go back to school,” she admitted. “I wouldn’t mind expanding this business, either. I like catering.”

  “What would you study if you went back to school?”

  “I don’t know. Anything. Science has always interested me.”

  “Yes. Physics and heat transfer.”

  Cory smiled at that.

  “How come you didn’t?” he continued.

  Their conversation was doomed, Cory thought as her thoughts diverted to reality. Her mother’s health was a factor, which was exacerbated by the constant moving as well as lawyers’ bills that took years to pay. Never receiving any of the money Zeke had always promised also made it difficult. Everything came back to Zeke, and she knew Matthew wouldn’t see him in anything but a favorable light. So she took the easy way out. “My mother’s fibromyalgia.”

  “What exactly is that?”

  “A type of neurotransmitter dysfunction. Nice expensive word for you,” she couldn’t help but add.

  “I’ll file that away along with the lawyer jokes.” He took another dish and wiped it. “What does that mean?”

  Cory scraped at a stubborn grease stain, wondering how to condense the pain her mother suffered, the relentlessness of the sickness into a few sentences. “It’s hard to describe. She has a lot of muscle pain, fatigue, headaches. If she keeps her life regular, we can manage it, but stress throws her off.”

  “How long has she had it?”

  “Twelve, thirteen years now. It seems to come and go. It wasn’t properly diagnosed until about five years ago. The doctor she saw when we lived in Edmonton told her she was a hypochondriac.”

  Cory gave him another quick glance. He wasn’t looking at her, but instead concentrated on the dish he was drying.

  “Is she able to work?”

  Tugging her lip between her teeth, Cory contemplated her answer. “She’s not been able to hold down a steady job for the past ten years,” she said, forcing down a feeling of shame. It made her mother sound lazy, which Zeke accused Joyce of each time he came to pick Cory up for a visit.

  “You’ve supported her all this time?”

  Cory was uncomfortable with his prying and wondered where he was headed—why he wanted to know about her mother now, when he had previously dismissed her far too easily.

  “We manage quite well. And I’ve never minded. She’s made a lot of sacrifices for me, as well.”

  “Zeke helped out, of course.”

  Back to Zeke. “My mother and I seldom saw money from Zeke,” she said through clenched teeth.

  “H
e had court-ordered support payments. Of course you would have seen the money.”

  “We saw checks, Matthew,” she said angrily. “Checks need to clear a bank account instead of bouncing in order to see actual dollars in said bank account.” She stopped herself, knowing where Matthew stood on that point. He didn’t want to believe her version of Zeke.

  His silence proved her right.

  “Anyhow, we didn’t get much help from him.”

  “I can’t believe that.”

  His relentless defense of Zeke made her blood boil.

  “Zeke really cared for you, you know,” Matthew continued, only adding to her tension.

  Cory couldn’t listen any longer. “Don’t,” she said harshly. “Don’t even start defending my stepfather to me. You’ve done a more than adequate job of that in court.”

  “But he told me often how much he missed you.”

  “The only thing he missed was trying to manipulate us.” Cory wished she hadn’t started this whole business. “I don’t want to talk about Zeke Smith anymore. He’s out of my life, and it’s over.”

  “It’s not over yet, Cory,” Matthew replied, his voice quiet, well modulated. “There’s one thing that you have to deal with.”

  She hated to admit it, but he had a beautiful voice. A slow drawl that could lull the listener into thinking that this was the most reasonable man on earth.

  “The will,” she said with a sigh.

  “If it is true that you have seen injustice at his hand, then see this as his way of making it up to you.”

  How guarded he was with his words. He gave them both an out with his careful language. “Maybe,” she said.

  “I think you should reconsider what you told me the other day. I think you should accept this. It’s a chance for you to realize some of your dreams.”

  Cory swallowed, then took a slow breath as she tried to imagine herself expanding the business and working for herself—a goal she had put away for some years now.

  “This could be a good thing, Cory,” Matthew continued, “A final blessing on your life.”

  Part of her wanted to acknowledge this as right, even as her more practical part held on to mistrust of the situation. “It might be,” she said, setting the last plate on the drain board.

  “I think it could be,” Matthew repeated.

  She drew in a deep breath, as if steadying the hopes that were even now rising in her. “If I follow through on this, what would be the next step?” As their eyes met, she felt the pull of his good looks. He smiled a crooked smile, the hint of a dimple on one side of his mouth. She felt an answering tug of attraction. “Not that I’ll do anything, mind you. I’m just curious.”

  “I bring you the papers, you sign them, and things get started.”

  “No surprises?” Cory asked.

  “Not unless some long-lost child comes forward with a will that Zeke wrote out by hand.”

  “Zeke didn’t have any other kids that my mother and I know of.”

  His smile became full-fledged, his head tilted to one side and Cory almost took a step backward at the force of Matthew’s charm directed solely at her.

  “It’s on the level, Cory. My dad took care of it all. If you don’t trust Zeke, I can tell you for sure that you can trust my father. He’s a good lawyer.”

  She thought a moment, unable to fight off the idea that maybe Matthew was right. Clifton was a good lawyer. Look what he had done for Zeke.

  “Okay,” she replied, fighting that breathless feeling that she was making a mistake. That she was basing her decision on a charming smile. “Bring them to the restaurant tomorrow, and we can do the deed.”

  Matthew’s smile faltered a moment, then he nodded. “Good enough. I’ll bring them first thing in the morning.”

  Cory turned back to the dishes, her feelings twisted around by the change in Matthew’s attitude toward her.

  He was a lawyer, trained to sway people to his point of view. People with more education than she had been moved to agree with him.

  She clung to the memories as if to remind herself of his steady defense of Zeke.

  Yet, she also had to believe Matthew was right. That the law would take care of her. Slowly, she felt her equilibrium return. Tomorrow she would sign the papers, and tomorrow Matthew would be on his way.

  Her life could get back to normal.

  But could it after seeing Matthew again?

  Chapter Five

  Matthew stood by his office window, hands in the pockets of his pants. Below him, the river meandered through the skyscrapers of Edmonton’s downtown area. The river drifted behind trees, filling the river valley, then sparkled in the spring sun. Since moving to this new office after his promotion two years ago, he seldom took time to look at the view.

  He had finally caught up on the work that had piled up while he was gone. But in that week and a half of working long, tedious nights to catch up, his thoughts kept drifting to Nathan’s offer. And Cory.

  He couldn’t forget the difference between the Stanleys’ relationship and his parents’. Couldn’t help but think it had much to do with the pace of each of their lives.

  He knew, deep inside, the largest attraction of Nathan’s proposal was living near Cory in Sweet Creek.

  Hard to know why she held his attention. She hadn’t courted it.

  Therein lay her charm, he supposed.

  Charm. He laughed. Hardly a word one would use with Cory. Straightforward was more like it. When he had come to the restaurant with the final documents for the will, she had signed them, made brief conversation, and then went back to work.

  It was as if the few moments they’d spent together in the Stanleys’ house hadn’t happened, and they were back to where they were before.

  He leaned back in his chair, thinking of Cory and their convoluted relationship, wondering if he was fooling himself if he thought anything would change.

  The only times they had seen each other was in the courtroom, in an antagonistic setting.

  Only one time had they met outside of the courtroom: his cousin Deirdre’s prom. She had asked him because her date was ill. He always had a soft spot for his cousin Deirdre, so he agreed.

  His mind easily drifted back to that night.

  When he came to pick up Deirdre, she had asked if he would mind giving a ride to a friend who was supposed to meet her date at prom.

  All Deirdre gave him was the address in a rundown part of the city, and it took them to a rundown block of apartments. Duct-taped, plastic lawn chairs sat on a parched lawn, which was bordered by a cracked and broken sidewalk. A piece of cardboard was taped to the window beside the dented, peeling door of the address Deirdre had given.

  He didn’t imagine Deirdre’s quick intake of breath, and he guessed that his cousin had never visited her friend at her home. And no wonder. If his aunt and uncle knew what kind of background this “friend” had, they would absolutely forbid Deirdre to hang out with her.

  When he found out the friend was Cory Smith, Zeke Smith’s stepdaughter, he struggled with his own mixed feelings. As he walked up the sidewalk, he wondered how Cory’s mother had let things go so far that they had to live in a dump like this. What were they doing with the money Zeke sent them every month?

  Cory answered the door. But this wasn’t the angry young woman he and his father saw in court every few months as they tried to enforce yet another court-appointed visit. That evening, her hair hung loose on her shoulders, soft and shining instead of pulled back in her habitual ponytail. Her brown lashes curled out with mascara, which deepened the hazel tints in her eyes. Her lips glistened. She had always been striking. Now her beauty took him off guard.

  But, she wasn’t happy to see him. At all. In fact, she was downright hostile. As she swished past him in a cloud of satin, he finally noticed her dress. A bouffant skirt with a snug bodice, topped with a filmy scarf. Scarlett O’Hara in bright pink. He figured her dress to be about five years out of style compared to the narrow, cling
ing sheath that Deirdre wore.

  He had wondered what possessed her to wear such an obviously out of style dress. Zeke had offered to buy her a dress. At their last court date, in Matthew’s presence, she’d told Zeke that she turned eighteen two days before graduation, and she wouldn’t have to take anything from him anymore.

  Zeke had been crushed at her implication, and again Matthew wondered why this girl was so cruel to his client.

  The first few minutes in the car were quiet, and then Deirdre turned to her friend. “I’m sorry I surprised you, Cory. I thought I would save you the trouble of walking all the way to school. Angela gave me your address. I didn’t...” Her voice trailed off.

  Matthew glanced at Cory in his rearview mirror, but her head was down. “That’s okay,” she said. “I appreciate you thinking of me.”

  Her quiet pardon caught Matthew off guard. It made her more vulnerable and more appealing.

  When they arrived at the convention center, a bevy of giddy girls descended on them, oohing and aahing over Matthew’s car and Deirdre’s dress and casting coy glances at Matthew himself. When Cory got out, there was a moment of awkward silence with some of the girls exchanging sly smirks. One even laughed.

  Matthew was angry and wanted to come to Cory’s side to encourage her, but she simply smiled an enigmatic smile and swirled off, presumably to find her date.

  The evening was the usual for graduation—high spirits and over indulgence. Matthew would have been bored but for Cory. He couldn’t keep his eyes off her. Wearing that ugly pink dress, she walked through the crowded room, smiling, laughing, and sure of herself despite the fact that some of the girls were laughing at her and poking fun of her dress.

  Intrigued, he asked her to dance.

  She turned, her smile disappearing, her narrowed eyes holding his and turned him down flat.

  The next time he saw her that evening, she was laughing hysterically, draped over a young man who looked as drunk as she was. Later, when Matthew was driving her home, she threw up in his car. She was humiliated and apologized endlessly, but he was annoyed with her behavior overall, and as a result, had been more brusque with her than he probably should have.