by Kara Isaac
She stared at him, her heart doing strange things at the sight of the guy she had once loved sitting in her sister’s kitchen like he belonged there.
“I missed you, Allie.” His eyes bore into hers.
I’d stopped missing you.
The truth in the thought took her breath away. She hadn’t thought about it—hadn’t let herself think about it—since the day she’d found out about Julia. She’d told herself she couldn’t possibly miss someone who was the opposite of what she’d believed, all while ignoring her persistent longing for him. But it was the truth. At some point, she’d stopped missing him—so much so that seeing him sitting there just felt weird.
“I’m so sorry for what I did to you. I would do anything to change it, I hope you know that.” He held her eyes with his. “I know we can make this work.” He leaned forward, as if about to reach for her hand. She took a step back.
This time it didn’t feel like a hole had been ripped out of her heart, but out of the floor. This wasn’t happening. This was the stuff of fantasy and cheesy movies. How many times in the early days had she dreamt of something like this? Of the whole stupid thing being a huge mistake and them finding their way back together? But now that it was happening, she didn’t feel happy or even relieved. She felt nauseated.
The truth was, none of it had been a mistake. Just because the court had decided not to uphold his previous marriage on a technicality didn’t change the fact that Derek had lied about more things than she could count and broken her heart in more pieces than there were numbers.
“Say something.” His voice was pleading.
“What do you want me to say?” Her voice was totally controlled. Unlike her hands, which were spasming. She was having some kind of fit. She clasped them in front of her, nails digging into her palms.
“I don’t know. Just something. Anything.”
“You honestly think you can do what you did, waltz into the house, tell me you miss me, that you’re sorry, and I’m going to throw myself at you?” The harshness of her words startled even her. Simmer down, Allie. She had agreed to try and give things a chance, after all.
“No, of course not.” He placed his hands flat on the countertop. “That’s not what I thought at all. I know I have a long way to go to prove to you I’ve changed. I still can’t believe you’ve given me a chance to try and show you. I promise I’m not going to take it for granted.”
She sighed. The guy was trying. She had to give him that.
“Are you at least going to sit down?” He pulled out the stool next to his.
She looked everywhere except into his eyes. She’d always had a weakness for his slate-gray eyes. If she let herself gaze into them, she was going to be in big trouble. She gestured at her attire. “I have stuff to do, Derek. I need to get changed, cook dinner. We have plenty of time to talk later.”
“You look fine.” At least he didn’t say great, which would’ve been a big, fat lie, and she was done with those.
He stood up, walked around the counter until he was standing right in front of her. Tipping her chin with his fingers, he forced her to look into his eyes. “I need you to know this before one more second passes. I don’t want a divorce. I don’t want us dancing around in some kind of ‘maybe we’ll try to work it out, maybe we’ll get divorced’ thing. You’re the only woman I’ve ever loved. Please.” He took a deep breath. “I love you, Allie. I am still in love with you. I’ll do whatever it takes to prove it to you. Give you however long you need. To make this, us, work again.”
“Whatever it takes?” She repeated his words again. She didn’t know this Derek. This contrite, humbled guy. He was saying all the right words, but her heart still held too many scars from the searing hurt he’d wrought to be able to let it go.
“I couldn’t live with myself if I allowed what we had to be thrown away without fighting for it. For you.”
“I didn’t throw us away, Derek. You did, remember? When you married me after you had already married someone else.” Whatever the court had ruled, that was a fact. When she’d walked down the aisle, he hadn’t known whether he was still married or not. If Julia hadn’t hunted him down because she’d learned there was no record of their annulment, he never would have been caught.
“How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on, when in your heart, you begin to understand, there is no going back? There are some things that time cannot mend. Some hurts that go too deep . . . that have taken hold.” Frodo’s monologue from the end of the movie The Return of the King rolled across her.
“I know, Al.” She flinched. Why did he keep calling her that? The only man she wanted to hear that from was the one she was never going to see again.
“ . . . I can’t ever give you an adequate explanation. I just . . . I knew if I told you, it would hurt so badly and probably destroy us and I couldn’t do it.”
So instead he turned her into an accidental bigamist. Charming.
He stared at her, all troubled gray eyes and earnest expression. “I thought I was ready to let you go, if that was what you wanted. But seeing you again in Queenstown brought it all back. I forgot how good we were together. How much I love you.”
Against her better judgment, her heart started to hope. All she wanted to do was tell him it was okay and they could fix this. That it was going to be all right. The man was her husband, after all—for better or worse.
Her face obviously betrayed what she was feeling because his eyes lit up.
“Allie.”
All of the air had been sucked out of the room. She felt like she was suffocating. He said her name exactly the way he used to when he was kissing her—like all his hopes, dreams, and desires had all come true in her.
Except this time they didn’t have the same effect they used to. Instead, everything in her yearned for a different guy. The one with ocean-blue eyes she could happily drown in and a smile that made her knees buckle.
The one who never wanted to have anything to do with her ever again.
Placing a palm against Derek’s chest, she stopped him before he could come any closer. “I’m going to get changed. There are plenty of drinks in the fridge.”
Ducking around him, she forced her legs to walk out of the kitchen and up the stairs to her room.
She closed the door behind her and sank down on her bed. God, I can’t do this. It’s too hard.
She didn’t love her husband anymore. Maybe she never even had. Maybe she’d just been blinded by his charm and attention. By the guy every girl wanted, wanting her.
She didn’t want Derek, but she didn’t want a divorce. It was like the beginning of a bad joke.
Taking a deep breath, she tried her prayer again: God, all I want is to be free of Derek, so if making this work is Your will, then I need Your help. I can’t do it on my own.
She was a different person from the one she had been two years ago. The only way they had a chance at making this work was if she believed he was too. He’d promised he would come to church with her. The old Derek wouldn’t have gone near the place, so that was a start.
Sliding her bedside drawer open, she stared at her wedding ring that lay nestled in its box. She had meant those vows. Pledged them before God.
Closing the drawer, she stood up and lifted a blue wrap dress from her closet before padding toward the guest suite.
Time to let go of Jackson Gregory. She was a married woman and was going to do everything in her power to make it work because it was the right thing to do.
* * *
Half an hour later, Allie returned to the kitchen, hair blow-dried, makeup on, the bottom of her dress swishing around her knees.
The room smelled like an intoxicating blend of onions, garlic, and basil. Pausing in the doorway, she took in the scene. Derek stood over a simmering pot of pasta sauce, a glass of water beside him. Water, not beer
. That was different too. He even wore an apron, and there seemed to be the hint of a hum above the boiling and chopping.
In spite of her reservations, her spirits lifted.
Looking up, he broke into a smile when he saw her. “You look amazing.”
She couldn’t help but smile in return. “Thanks.” She walked toward him. “What can I do to help?”
He waved his hand toward the fridge. “Grab a drink. Sit. I’ve got it all under control.”
She turned on the oven for the bread as she walked toward the fridge. Taking out a bottle of apple juice, she poured herself a glass and added a few sprigs of mint from the plant sitting on Susannah’s windowsill.
Turning around, she found him staring at her.
“What?”
“I’d forgotten how beautiful you are.”
It was all a bit overwhelming. She busied herself with returning the juice and grabbing the items for the salad out of the vegetable drawer. She stayed for a couple of extra seconds, allowing the coolness of the interior to sweep over her.
Her shoulders loosened. This could be her life. There were plenty of girls who would give their right arm for this.
Bumping the door closed with her hip, she laid the pile of ingredients onto the countertop and removed a chopping board from the rack. Locating another knife and a salad bowl, she started dicing tomatoes.
The two of them worked in companionable silence for a few minutes, and with every passing second her frayed nerves relaxed.
“What kind of pasta did you want to do?” She looked up to see Derek lifting the lid off a boiling pot of water.
“There’s some fresh fettuccine in the fridge.” Allie turned to open the door and get it out, just as Derek’s hand also closed over the handle.
There was no denying something arched in the air between them. His fingers wrapped around hers and she looked up, finding herself caught in his gaze.
She forced herself to hold it, tried to shove away thoughts of the blue eyes she really wanted to be looking into.
“Allie, I . . .” His words faded as he reached up and caressed her cheek, then tugged some hair behind her ear.
All she had to do was move the smallest distance, give him the slightest indication, and it was clear what would happen next. Everything churned. Did she want this?
The churning kicked up a notch, but it wasn’t desire. So much for divine intervention. There was only one guy she wanted to kiss and it wasn’t her husband. “Der—” The sound of her phone ringing cut her off—not that she even knew what she planned to say.
She tugged her hand out from under his and walked to the sideboard, where her phone lay. Her heart thundered.
She picked it up and swiped, thankful for the excuse to gather her thoughts and quiet her emotions. “Hello?” Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Derek pull the fettuccine out of the fridge and head back toward the pot now threatening to boil over.
“Hi, can I speak to Allison Shire, please?” The woman’s tone was cultured.
“Speaking.”
“This is Deborah Moore. I’m an associate at White, Smith & Thompson. I’m so sorry it’s taken me so long to return your call. We’ve been trying to work through Mr. Kilpatrick’s files since his passing and it’s taken longer than we would’ve liked. And your message had us a little confused, so I wanted to double-check everything before I called, just in case there’d been a mistake on our part and we’d sent you the incorrect information.”
Her hands tightened around the phone as she turned her back to Derek. “Oh? How so?”
“Well, your message referred to papers you received from us notifying you of the court’s decision to decline your annulment petition.”
“That’s right.” Something propelled her to walk farther away from her husband. Rounding the other end of the island counter, she watched him as he turned down the gas and dropped the pasta into the water, seemingly oblivious to her conversation.
“That’s not correct. On the thirteenth of May, the court granted your petition on the basis of Mr. McKendrick being already married. We sent papers to you on the fourteenth to that effect.”
Granted your petition on the basis of Mr. McKendrick being already married. The words echoed in her head.
“So I’m not . . .” Her words trailed off, her mouth failing to form them.
“Married. No, legally you never have been. Would you like me to resend you the papers?”
“Actually, I’ll come in and collect them, if that’s okay.”
“Of course. I’ll leave a package for you at reception. We’re still in the process of unfreezing your assets, but that shouldn’t be more than a couple of weeks away. Your banking and investment accounts are all done. You should be receiving confirmation regarding them any day now. The house will probably take the longest because of all the paperwork involved.”
Allie struggled to process the information coming at her. She had money again. She wasn’t married. “That’s fine. Thank you.”
“I’m very sorry for whatever the misunderstanding was that occurred.”
Misunderstanding. Whatever there had been, a misunderstanding was not it. “Thank you. And thanks for calling.”
Pressing the END CALL button on the phone, she placed it carefully down on the sideboard. She was free—free! It had all been a lie, again. Somehow, Derek had gotten her copy of the papers and substituted them. For what?
Ice washed over her as she stared at her not-husband’s back. Had he already intercepted her new bank cards? Emptied her accounts? It wasn’t unthinkable, given that he must have somehow accessed the papers from her lawyers and replaced those with false ones.
Derek turned around and smiled. “Pasta will be done in a few minutes.”
She looked at the man who had almost brought her to ruin, again. Whatever memories, wistfulness, and wishful thinking had existed a few minutes before had disappeared like a vapor. “How long?”
His brow crinkled. “Three, maybe four minutes?”
He was still talking about pasta while she was watching her life unravel. Again. But this time she wasn’t going to run away. “No, how long did you honestly think you had before I would find out the truth? I mean, surely even you knew there was going to be a limit to how long you could intercept my mail and whatever else was required for me not to find out.”
He looked at her and with slow, deliberate moves turned around and twisted the knob for the pasta pot to the off position. She battled the urge to grab the metal container and dump its boiling contents over his head.
Turning back, he wiped his hands on a dishcloth and shrugged. “I figured I’d play it for as long as it lasted.”
His eyes were cold, his face hard. The facade of the repentant, besotted Derek from a few minutes ago well and truly gone.
“Why?”
“C’mon, Allie. You’re not that stupid. Why would a guy like me bother with a girl like you?”
All her internal organs started twisting around each other. “I’m going to take a flying guess your visa is due for renewal sometime soon and you need me for that . . .” She trailed off. Why did he want to stay in New Zealand so badly? Was there yet more she didn’t know about him? Some big reason he didn’t want to go back to England?
Her hands gripped the back of the bar stool he’d been sitting on. Then she remembered it wasn’t her problem anymore. Thank God. “And did you really think after everything, I’d let you near my money anytime soon? Even if I did think we were married?”
“I would’ve found a way. It had all been too easy so far.”
“Too easy . . .” She repeated his words stupidly.
He let out a laugh ringing with scorn. “Nothing to it. Once I found out what hotel you were staying at, it wasn’t too hard to flirt your room number out of the receptionist. I used that to pick up your mail,
swap the papers out, and give it back pretending to be another guest who’d gotten your mail by mistake, then sit back and watch you swallow it hook, line, and sinker.”
The guy standing opposite her might be incapable of genuine human decency but she had to admit he was fully deserving of the Oscar for Best Actor.
He picked up his jacket. “When I met that Jackson guy, I thought he might actually pose a challenge. An unexpected complication.” His face turned smug. “But even dispatching him wasn’t a problem. I almost felt sorry for the guy. He actually seemed to care about you.”
Everything started buzzing at the mention of Jackson.
She swayed, her grip on the stool the only thing holding her upright. This could not be happening. This is not happening, God.
“Oh dear. Don’t tell me I disrupted the path of true love. Don’t worry, Al.” Seriously. If he called her that one more time, she was going to punch him.
“ . . . I’m sure given much longer, he too would’ve worked out you’re nothing special.” His expression, tone, everything, openly mocked her. The guy was a sociopath. She’d had a lucky escape.
The thought cut through all of her confusion and panic. Her mind suddenly cleared and an eerie calmness flooded through her.
“Get out.” She managed to force the two words out.
He opened his mouth, but she held up her hand.
“Get. Out.” She took a few steps backward before she started looking for things to start throwing.
He walked toward the door. Pausing, he turned back and smirked. “It was always a long shot. I can’t believe I almost got away with it. Twice. How stupid can one per-son be?”
Suddenly, she was across the room, two years of pent-up rage and betrayal channeling through her fist and into his face. Derek’s expression spun through emotions like a roulette wheel as he stumbled back, hands over his nose.
Getting his balance back, he took his fingers away for a second. Enough to glimpse that they were covered in blood.
Not a single atom in her was sorry.
She shook out her throbbing hand, opening and closing her fingers. The movies never showed you how much actually punching someone hurt. The guy had one heck of a hard face; she’d give him that.