“He came by around midnight, drunk as a skunk.” Gabe kept his voice low, but doubted anything short of an atomic blast would wake Arty.
“That’s not like him at all.” She sounded even more worried than before. “I assume he told you what’s going on?”
“Yeah. Sad stuff.”
“I can’t believe she kept all of this a secret. I should have realized something wasn’t right. I should have known she was upset about something. Maybe I could have prevented this. Maybe—”
“Louisa.” He said her name calmly but firmly. “It’s not your fault.”
“We’ve got to do something, Gabriel.”
“What can we do?”
“I don’t know. Talk sense into them, wave a magic wand over them, I don’t know. I feel so helpless.”
“Yeah, I know. But this is something they need to work out on their own.”
Gabe disconnected the call. Poor Sarah. He knew how much she’d wanted to be a mom. She’d been so good with Joey. She and Louisa used to talk nonstop about having their kids play together and grow up together. Now, it looked like neither woman’s dreams would come true.
Gabe sighed and popped the lens cap off his camera. With small strokes, he carefully whisked away minute particles of dust from the lens and viewfinder. Then he poured a sparing amount of the cleaner onto a special tissue made just for this purpose and wiped the glass surfaces gently but thoroughly.
Thinking of his friends’ troubled marriage naturally turned his thoughts to Louisa. He still couldn’t help feeling he’d come back to Seattle for a reason. Was there still hope for him and Louisa? He couldn’t help smiling at the thought, even though a lot of years had passed and a lot of painful memories and unresolved issues remained. He wasn’t a fool in thinking it would be easy—their relationship hadn’t been easy since they took it out of the friendship realm so many years ago. But he had something now that he hadn’t had back then. Sobriety.
Of course, he couldn’t forget about Evan.
Gabe frowned and gave the lens and viewfinder a final polishing with a dry tissue. He still couldn’t understand what Louisa saw in the man. He was so wrong for her. Evan lived in a penthouse, whereas she had always dreamed of an old farmhouse in the country. He didn’t want more children, whereas she had always wanted a full house. And this whole political game made Gabe uneasy. He didn’t think it was jealousy clouding his opinion or even that he thought the majority of politicians would sell out their own mothers to gain a vote. It was just too convenient for Payne that Senator Rhodes would be his future father-in-law. Too damned convenient.
No matter how much Louisa expostulated on Evan’s finer points, Gabe suspected the man wouldn’t be able to make her happy. Could he make her happy, though? He stood up and crossed to the window. Matchbox cars and ant-size people scurried along the street far below.
He’d made her happy once, he was sure of it. But that was before they’d had a constant struggle with money. Before her family had come between them.
Before the accident.
Chapter Eight
“I have an idea how we can help Sarah and Arty.”
Louisa clutched the receiver with shaking fingers. Why did just hearing Gabe’s voice scramble her insides, dance her pulse through her veins, send a persistent throbbing between her legs? “Oh, how?” Her voice sounded relatively normal, which was good. She shifted in her chair, needing to erase that last sensation. She straightened the artwork on her desk, lining up the corners, making everything neat and in order.
“Why don’t we meet for lunch to discuss it?”
The invitation didn’t sound suggestive, and Louisa knew she should be ashamed of herself for even thinking about herself and Gabe, when she should be more concerned with Sarah and Arty. “Just tell me now.” She didn’t need to see Gabe. Talking to him on the phone was hard enough.
“Arty’s going to be out of the shower any minute. I’d rather talk to you in person. In private.”
She was only meeting him to help her friends. No ulterior motive whatsoever. “Okay, fine.”
****
Gabe noticed Louisa the minute she turned the corner. She saw him, too—he could tell by the way her step faltered—but she kept her eyes averted as she walked toward him. Her hair was up in a loose twist, several curls trailing onto her white blouse. A flowing navy skirt stopped mid-calf to show off narrow ankles. He knew he shouldn’t stare, but she looked so good. Did he dare hope he might be able to win her back into his life?
They picked up their food and strolled along Alaskan Way, the street that hugged Seattle’s waterfront.
“So?” she said. “What’s your idea?”
“Arty told me he wanted to get out of town, go someplace away from family and friends where he could get his thoughts in order. He asked if I’d want to disappear with him for a few days.”
“And?”
“Well, I was thinking…maybe you could suggest the same to Sarah. And if you and I just happened to choose the same place to disappear to…” He lifted his brows suggestively.
A grin spread across her face. “Ooh, they’d be so mad at us.”
He shrugged. “What do you think?”
Her smile disappeared. “Wait a minute. That means I’d have to go too.”
“Yeah, so?”
“Gram’s 85th birthday party is on Sunday.”
“I’d get you back by then.”
“But…but…” She stared out at the road, at the passing cars. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Why not?”
“I just don’t.” Her little chin jutted out, and she readjusted her grip on the handle of her purse.
They found a free bench near the Seattle Aquarium and sat down to eat. He couldn’t keep his eyes off her as she dipped her French fries into the ketchup or sipped the root beer, her coral-tinted lips closing over the tip of the straw. He distinctively remembered those lips closing around something else.
Swallowing hard, he placed the fast food bag on his lap.
Louisa bit into her cheeseburger, gazing out across the pier to the waters of the Puget Sound. If Gabe didn’t stop staring at her, she was going to leave. The sun glinted off the white sails of a distant boat. Focusing on the blinding brightness for a few moments, she mentally prepared herself for the conversation ahead, knowing he wasn’t going to let the idea drop.
“Louisa.”
Here we go.
“Why isn’t it a good idea?”
“You know why.”
“Enlighten me.”
She sighed. “Gabriel, please. I can’t go away with you. It wouldn’t be right.” She brought the burger to her mouth.
“I think it would be. It would help Sarah and Arty.”
She finished chewing. “I’m not talking about them, and you know it. I’m talking about us.”
“So am I.”
She stopped with a fry halfway to her mouth. She blinked. “Y-you’re talking in riddles.”
“I think it would be good for us to get away for a few days, too. Together.”
She shook her head, needing to shake out all the sexy images that prospect created in her traitorous mind. “No.”
“Lou. It’s obvious there’s still something between us. I think we need to explore that.”
“There’s nothing between us. Nothing to explore.” She took another bite and chewed furiously.
“So, you’re saying you feel absolutely nothing for me.” He stopped eating, his half-eaten hamburger in its paper wrapper on the bench between them.
“Gabriel,” she started with a sigh. “Of course I feel something for you. We used to be married. I…used to love you.”
“Used to, Lou?” he asked, reaching across the space between them and tilting her chin up with his finger.
She turned her head and scooted further away from him before meeting his eyes again. “What are you trying to do? Did you think you could just reappear in my life after being gone so long and have
me fall back into your arms? Is that what you thought?”
Gabe stared across the water. “I didn’t expect it to be that easy, but yes. I guess that’s what I was beginning to hope.”
She pushed hair from her face only to have it blown back with the breeze. “Gabriel,” she said on an exasperated breath, not knowing what else to say. Knowing he wanted her back burned a slow path toward her heart.
He swiveled on the bench to face her, his left knee bent up on the seat. “When I first decided to attend the wedding, it wasn’t my intention to get you back. It really wasn’t. But the minute I saw you in that church, I knew we were meant to be together. I think I’ve always known that.”
A wave of pleasure and pain surged through her veins. “Then why did you leave me? If I was so right for you, how could you have left me like that?”
“Lou.” Her name was ragged on his breath.
He reached for her hand, but she yanked it away.
He leaned back into the wooden bench. “I thought you’d be better off without me. You didn’t need me, you had your family to lean on—”
She jumped to her feet. “That is just about the biggest crock of bullshit I’ve ever heard. You weren’t thinking about me. If you had been, you wouldn’t have left. And you sure as hell would’ve written or called at least once these past five years instead of just showing up last week hoping to pick up where you left off!” She knew tears streamed down her face, but she didn’t care. “How dare you?” Then, more softly on the end of a sob, “How dare you?”
Gabe watched her run across the pier. She stopped at a railing overlooking the water, her back to him.
Two elderly couples, tourists by the way the men were studying a map, glanced at her with open curiosity as they strolled past. Louisa’s gently heaving shoulders caused the women to look at her in concern.
After giving her a few moments to compose herself, Gabe crossed the wooden pier and joined her at the railing. He didn’t say anything, just leaned onto his elbows, watching the dark waters below, and waited for her to speak. A seagull mocked them from a nearby piling.
“I loved you. I loved you with all my heart,” she said softly. “I thought we’d spend the rest of our lives together. Then, after the accident, you up and left me.” She snapped her fingers. “Just like that.” Her shoulders heaved in a silent sob.
“It wasn’t just like that, Lou, and you know it.”
“I suppose I should have seen it coming because you’d made it very obvious that you didn’t want to be married to me anymore.”
“Why would you say something like that?”
“Because it’s true,” she insisted. “You were never home. You disappeared for hours at a time, and I had no idea where you were. And when you were home, you were drinking and wouldn’t talk to me. What was I supposed to think?”
Gabe sighed and lifted his face toward the sky. “People grieve differently. I needed my space, time to sort through everything alone. You needed people around you constantly. You needed your family.”
She made a derisive sound through her teeth. “It always comes back to that, doesn’t it? Even before the accident you resented the time I spent with them.”
“What I resented was the way they tried to come between us. Always pointing out my shortcomings, my bad traits. Like they were trying to turn you against me.”
“If my parents were coming between us, then you were coming between me and them. You never tried to get along with them, Gabriel. You never tried to make them your family.”
“And they didn’t try to make me part of theirs.”
A ferry horn blew in the distance. The big boat cut through the water toward the docks down the street. Gabe exhaled loudly. “I might have tried harder, Lou. I admit that. But I was so uncomfortable with them. I know how much they despised me.”
“They didn’t despise you. They just didn’t think you could make me happy.”
“They were obviously right, weren’t they?”
“I wasn’t the one who walked out.”
Maybe not physically. He shoved his fingers through his hair. “I don’t recall you begging me to stay.”
She turned her face away from him. “I shouldn’t have had to beg.”
The breeze moved through her hair, and she squinted into the falling sun. This back and forth bickering was going nowhere, just like the countless arguments they’d had before he left. “Louisa, I didn’t want to meet with you to rehash bad memories.”
A solitary tear crept down her cheek. “How can we not? It’s too much a part of our past.”
“We also had some good times.”
“Yes, we did. But you turned your back on those, too.” She wiped the tear away with the back of her hand. When she met his gaze, moisture rimmed her eyes and had herded her lashes into tiny spikes.
He hung his head between his arms, elbows resting on the railing. “Well, I’m back now. And no matter how much you deny it, both to me and to yourself, you still feel something for me.” She opened her mouth to speak, but he rushed on, “It’s not just that we used to be married. You feel it now. And you’re right, I turned my back on something special, something that happens once in a lifetime. These past five years I’ve come to realize I’ll never find anything close to what we shared. And from what I’ve seen, you haven’t found it either, no matter what you might say. We’re meant to be together, Lou.”
She breathed a tired sigh. “Even if I thought it could work—which I don’t—I can’t forget about Evan. You may not take my relationship with him seriously, but I do. I won’t leave him to risk another heartbreak with you. You promised me the moon once before, remember?”
He remembered. He glanced out at the water for a while, letting her words linger in his mind, letting this whole conversation settle within him. Louisa seemed to be doing the same thing, her eyes distant, her arms hugged tight across her chest.
He needed to touch her, however small, however fleeting. He reached over and grazed his finger down her arm. Her breath caught and a shudder swept through her. And he knew.
“It’s fate, Lou.”
She unfolded her arms and clenched the railing, her knuckles white. “I remember a similar conversation several years ago. But it was me who talked about fate. You said you didn’t believe in such nonsense.”
“I didn’t. In fact, I spent a long time trying to convince myself it didn’t exist. But I know now that it does. For you and me, at least.”
A tiny furrow appeared between her eyebrows. “And what brought you to this revelation?” Her voice held more than a trace of sarcasm. “And don’t talk to me about fate. Was it fate our son was killed? Was it fate for us to divorce?” She made an angry sound through her teeth. “I just don’t buy it.”
She pulled her arm away and started to walk along the pier. He quickly caught up to her. “Gabriel, you need to stop this,” she said in a shaky voice. “I’m marrying Evan, and there’s nothing you can do about it. You’re just lonely, maybe even a little jealous, so you’re trying to read things that aren’t there. I’ll always have a special place in my heart for you, but that’s all there is.” She forced herself to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry.”
He grabbed her arm again before she could move away from him. “That’s all there is, Lou?” His eyes were dark, intense.
She yanked her arm free and spun away, reaching the street without him coming after her. She paused and looked back. He stood on the stairs, his hands hanging limp at his sides. Good, he was going to drop all this nonsense. But as she watched, his hands curled into fists, and he took the stairs in one giant bound. She closed her eyes as he approached.
“Come away with me, Lou.”
She opened her eyes. “What?”
“You, me, Sarah, and Arty. Give me a few days to prove that we’re meant to be together. Then if you’re still convinced there’s nothing between us, I’ll walk out of your life. I’ll go back to Chicago, and you can marry Evan and live happily ever after.”
“Oh, Gabriel, this is ridiculous. You couldn’t convince me in a few days. You couldn’t convince me in—”
“Just the holiday weekend.”
She snatched her sunglasses from her purse and shoved them onto her nose. “I’ve already told you, there’s nothing between us except memories.”
“Then you’ve got nothing to lose.”
“Except for Evan. How in the world would I explain that to him?”
“You could try the truth.”
“What truth? All I’d be doing is jeopardizing my future with him. It wouldn’t be fair to him.”
“Is it fair to marry him when you have feelings for me? Doesn’t it tell you something that you’re considering my plan?”
Louisa took a deep breath. “I’m not considering anything. I will not give you the weekend, because this whole issue is ridiculous.” She tightened her grip around the handle of her purse, then lifted her chin to gaze haughtily at him.
“Not even for Sarah and Arty?”
She bit her lip, hating that he used her soft heart against her, but she would absolutely hold her ground on this one. She wouldn’t give in. “One issue has nothing to do with the other.” She spun on her heel and marched down Alaskan Way. Away from him.
“It’s fate, Lou!” he called after her.
She picked up her pace and refused to look back.
Chapter Nine
Louisa crumpled up the sketches she’d spent the past 30 minutes working on, and tossed it into the wastebasket beside her workstation. The floor around the receptacle was dotted with earlier discards.
She swore under her breath. It was like this every time she saw Gabe, all the memories—good and bad—collided inside her like a tidal wave crashing against a rocky shore.
And now he wanted to go away together for a few days? No way. She’d never get through it in once piece, even if the purpose was to help Sarah and Arty. She just didn’t think she could handle such a roller coaster of emotion.
After so many years, it shouldn’t still hurt so much. But she remembered the day Gabe left as if it happened yesterday. Their relationship had been rocky in the year after Joey’s death, but she always figured they’d work through the problems. They’d been spending more and more time apart. Gabe was never home. He’d been so intent on making something of himself professionally, he’d started neglecting her. The more time he spent at work, or the darkroom, or drinking, the more time she spent with her family. They were her salvation. She’d been so lonely.
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