He watches me for a moment, silent.
I take that as acquiescence and say, “I was wrong not to believe you. I really would give anything to be able to take that back.”
“It was a long time ago, Jillie.”
“I was jealous,” I say, the words coming out so quickly that I realize I don’t want to give myself a chance not to be completely honest.
“You knew I wasn’t interested in her.”
“She had everything I didn’t.”
“Except me.”
The words are low and imbued with truth, and I only wish I could explain how I had been so stupid and gullible. “Angela had everything. She was the kind of girl who could—”
“She wasn’t the girl I wanted, Jillie.”
Deep down, I know this is the truth. What is it about me that could not accept that all those years ago? “Things would have been so different if I had believed you,” I say.
“We can’t rewrite history,” he says, and I’m surprised there’s no bitterness in the assertion.
“Can I ask you a question?”
He nods.
“That night we met on the road, you were angry at me about the article. You’re not angry now. Why?”
He scuffs the toe of his boot against the cobblestone floor, shoves his hands in the pockets of his jeans, looking down. “I guess I’ve come to believe that things happen to get us to the next place we need to be. I think I needed to come back. That’s what brought me here. And whatever’s going to come of it, well, I guess that remains to be seen.”
“You’re such a grown-up,” I say, smiling a little.
He laughs. “No one’s ever called me that before.”
We stare at each other for several long seconds. “You think this is where we’re both supposed to be for now?”
“I do.”
And somehow, I know he’s right.
47
Jillie
WE WORK AROUND the barn until it’s time for me to pick up the girls from school. I’m the last parent to arrive, and Kala’s expression is annoyed as she climbs into the back of the car, Corey’s nothing more than happiness to see me. I try to focus on that and ignore Kala’s disapproval, but as always, it’s the thing that’s not right that pricks at me.
“How was your day?” I direct to them both.
“Great,” Corey chimes out.
“Okay,” Kala mumbles.
“How was yours?” Corey asks, popping her seat belt into place.
“Good,” I say, deciding not to tell them about Lucille right now.
“What did you do?” Kala asks, sounding curious despite her posture of indifference.
“Tate and I worked on a to-do list for the barn.”
“Is there a lot?” Corey asks, fiddling with the air conditioner vents.
“Nothing we can’t handle.”
“It’s weird that we’re not going back to our real home,” Kala throws out in complete contradiction to how much she had wanted to leave there only a couple of days ago.
“I like it at Tate’s,” Corey says. “And besides, you’re the one who didn’t like Grandma always fussing at you. Now you don’t have to worry about that.”
I know Corey means well, but a glance in the rearview mirror shows me that Kala’s hurt over Judith’s constant criticism is still fresh and at the surface. She shrugs and says, “Lucky me.”
“Will we be able to bring our ponies to Tate’s barn?” Corey asks.
I really haven’t let myself think about this until now. I want to give them an honest answer, and the truth is I don’t think Judith will agree to letting the girls take them to Cross Country. “We’ll have to wait and see. Grandma’s not very happy with me right now, so it probably isn’t a good time to ask.”
“Why is she so mean to us?” Kala barks the question, but I hear the infusion of hurt in the words.
“Honey,” I say, meeting eyes with her in the mirror, “I wish had a simple answer for that. I think we just have to go on from here. Maybe one day, she’ll realize what she is missing out on.”
“And maybe by then,” Kala says, “it’ll be too late.”
48
Kala
SHE KNOWS IT’S not really their home, but despite the barb she had just thrown at her mom, Kala feels a deep sense of relief when the car stops in the driveway at Cross Country.
There’s something about the place that she finds comforting, peaceful, unlike the house where she grew up. There, for as long as she could remember, she’d always had this sense of not really belonging. Of not being what was expected, no matter how hard she tried.
The front door of the main house opens, and Tate steps outside. He waves at them and says, “Can y’all come in for a minute?”
“The girls should really get started on their homework,” her mom calls back.
“Just for a minute,” he says, and Kala notices what a nice smile he has, along with the fact that her mom is walking toward the front door. She and Corey follow, and as soon as they step inside the foyer, Kala notices a familiar smell coming from the kitchen.
“This way,” Tate says, and the three of them follow him down the long hallway. He steps aside as they enter the room, and there’s Lucille pulling a tray of cookies from the oven.
“Lucille!” Kala cries, running to throw her arms around the woman’s aproned waist. Corey follows, and they both engulf the housekeeper they have loved their entire lives in a tight hug.
“Lucille,” Kala’s mom repeats. “What are you—”
“Lucille is going to help out around here,” Tate says.
“He asked, and I accepted,” Lucille explains.
Kala looks at her mom, sees the tears rise in her eyes and slide down her cheeks. She has no idea what happened today while they were at school, but she is so happy to see Lucille that she starts to cry too.
“Now, now,” Lucille says, patting her back. “We’ve got a whole tray of cookies to eat before dinner. I think between the five of us, we should be able to get the job done.”
“With milk,” Tate says, pulling a carton from the refrigerator.
“Last one to get a cookie off that sheet is a rotten egg,” Lucille says.
And not a single one of them could be declared the loser.
49
Tate
I’M SITTING ON the front porch just after dark when I hear the door of the small house open. Through the dim light, I can make out Jillie’s figure walking up the pea gravel drive.
She spots me as she approaches the steps. “Hey.”
“Hey. Girls asleep?”
“Not yet. They’re watching a movie on Kala’s computer.”
“Have a seat,” I say, waving a hand at one of the deep-seat rockers.
She stays where she is though, on the other side of the porch rail. “How am I ever going to pay you back for what you’ve done?”
“I don’t want pay back.”
“Why did you hire Lucille?”
“It just seemed like an easy way to right a wrong.”
“But it was my wrong to right.”
“Does it matter who rights it, as long as it gets—”
“Don’t say righted,” she says, laughing a little.
“Okay, I won’t,” I say.
She walks onto the porch, takes the rocker beside me. “I’m creating a debt with you I’m never going to be able to repay,” she says.
“No debt.”
“Big debt.”
“Lucille will be a huge help around here.”
“I don’t deserve what you’re doing for me, Tate.”
“You don’t need to deserve it.”
“I think I do.”
I don’t say anything for several long seconds. When I do, my voice holds a note of vulnerability I wish I could do a better job of concealing. “It’s nice to make a little bit of difference in someone’s life.”
“It seems like you’ve done a lot of that.”
I shrug. “Sometimes,
I wonder if anything I’ve done in my career has meant a thing.”
“You wrote a bestselling novel.”
“Not sure I’m going to be able to repeat that.”
“Before that, you were a Navy SEAL. That’s pretty darn meaningful.”
“I thought it was, when I was going after it.”
“And now you don’t?”
I look off into the dark. “I saw enough bad stuff to know our country still needs defending. I’m glad I served. But I think a lot of Americans don’t realize that the wall between peace and chaos is made up of real men and women who risk their lives to keep it there. And that there’s a cost to that.”
“Were you ever scared?” she asks softly.
“Yes,” I say.
“I can’t really picture you scared.”
I don’t say anything for a good bit, remembering the hell-hot afternoon I’d come within a hair’s width of blowing myself up.
“Tell me,” Jillie says, reaching out to put her hand on the back of mine.
I’ve never told anyone else, have never let myself dwell on the memory.
The few times I have, panic attack blocks of concrete instantly dropped onto my chest. But Jillie’s hand anchors me, and I find myself letting the words come out. “We were at the end of a mission in this small town in Syria. Nearly everyone there had been killed by the time we got there. Landmines were everywhere. We were headed out when I saw this little girl standing in the doorway of a house that was missing its roof. She had a dog in her arms, and when she saw us, she started to run toward the Humvee. I knew she could step on a mine at any second. I made my buddy stop, and I just ran for her, praying with every step that we wouldn’t get blown up.”
“Oh, Tate, dear God. Did you get them?”
“Yeah.”
“Then how can you say your career hasn’t meant anything? You’re a hero, Tate.”
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “That day had a good ending. There were plenty that didn’t.”
“How do you not constantly think about the things you saw?”
“In places like that, you have to have a switch that you consciously turn on and off. It was a little like living in two different realities, but you couldn’t be in them both at the same time.”
“Have you tried writing about your time there?”
“I’m not sure I want to look at it that closely again.”
“Even if it helped others to see something that needs to change in the world?”
“Maybe I’m not that selfless.”
“I think you are.”
I stand and walk over to the porch railing, leaning forward and looking out into the night. “You always thought more of me than I deserved, Jillie.”
“Except the one time you needed me to see the truth,” she says, coming up to stand beside me.
I feel her arm brush mine, and something kicks to life inside my chest. I turn a little, not completely facing her when I say, “Jillie—”
“You deserved my loyalty,” she says softly.
“Bygones.”
She reaches out to press her hand against my face. “I didn’t even know to be afraid for you when you were in the military.”
“I wouldn’t have wanted you to be,” I say, looking down into her eyes.
“Someone needed to.”
“You had another life, Jillie.”
“I never stopped caring about you.”
“And I never stopped caring about you.”
We stand there for countless seconds, the admissions hanging in the air between us. I realize how many times I’ve thought about the fact that I would never kiss her again, and yet, here we are, just the two of us, desire a completely tangible thing.
“Do you want me to?” I ask, rubbing my thumb across her cheek.
“Yes,” she says, without a second of hesitation.
I take my time because when you’ve wanted something this long and never imagined you’d actually get it, you have no desire to waste a moment of its enjoyment.
The kiss is soft and reflective. We’ve been here before. And I remember why no one else’s kiss has ever affected me this way. This is Jillie. The girl I left behind. The girl I thought had lost her trust in me. I gather her up in my arms now and deepen the kiss until we are both completely beyond any need to pretend we haven’t both dreamed about this.
We kiss until I am at a point of losing all ability to hold back my own need for more. I bury my face in her neck, forcing my hands to stay at the small of her back.
“Don’t stop,” she says, in a voice filled with the kind of need that makes me want to pick her up right here and now and carry her upstairs to finish what we’ve started.
But I know it’s too soon. And I don’t want to mess this up.
“Jillie, you should go.”
She pulls back to look up at me with want-dazed eyes. “I don’t think I can.”
I draw in a deep breath and say, “One more second of you looking at me like that, and every gentlemanly intention I’m holding onto will be right out the window.”
She smiles a little at this. “You picked tonight to be a gentleman?”
“Hey,” I say, pushing my hand through the back of her hair and leaning down to give her another lingering kiss. “I don’t want to be a gentleman. The opposite in fact. But you have two confused little girls waiting for you, and I don’t want to add to that.”
As if the words push reason back to the forefront, Jillie steps aways from me, smoothing her hands across her hair and adjusting her shirt.
“You’re right. I must seem like—”
“The same girl I was never able to get enough of.”
“I’m anything but that,” she says.
“Through my eyes, you are.”
She holds my gaze for a few moments, then steps decisively back, brushing her hair away from her face and saying, “See you tomorrow, Tate.”
“‘Night, Jillie.” Watching her go, I wish I’d asked her to stay.
50
Jillie
I DON’T KNOW why I bothered to go to bed.
Between the tossing and turning and the mortification flowing like lava through my veins, I finally vault off the mattress just before sunrise. The only thing I can think of to dilute my misery is a run.
I pull on a T-shirt, shorts, and running shoes, then peek in at the girls who are still fast asleep. Outside, the late spring air feels wonderful. I decide to stay on the farm, heading for the edge of the largest pasture and running between the tree line and the tall grass in a strip that isn’t so grown up.
Twigs from the oak trees to my right break beneath my shoes, the cracking sound the only music to set my pace to. I breathe in a deep gulp of the clean, morning air and feel a bit of my regret from last night start to dissolve.
Maybe I hadn’t come across as entirely needy and desperate for a man’s touch. Maybe it’s only my imagination that has enhanced the details to HD quality.
I trip on a larger stick, catch myself, and slow my pace a bit. What in the world is Tate thinking this morning?
I’m pretty sure I know.
What kind of marriage did Jillie have?
Does she miss her husband so much that any man will do?
As soon as the question throws itself at me, I immediately reject it.
That’s not Tate.
Whatever it was that reignited between us last night had nothing to do with Jeffrey. Unfinished is unfinished. And Tate and I are definitely that.
I run to the far end of the first field, hang a ninety-degree left and sprint the first half of the fence-line. When my heart feels as if it’s going to beat itself out of my chest, I slow to a walk, dragging in air until my lungs quit screaming.
Unfinished. Unfinished. The word catches tempo with the pulse throbbing in my temples. And then guilt begins to thread its way beneath the rhythm, until it is the only note I hear.
My husband has been dead a year. How can I feel the way I felt last nig
ht? What kind of woman am I to act as if I’ve completely forgotten I’m a widow to a man who took his own life? Our marriage might not have evolved into a fairy-tale definition of perfection, but the last thing I want is for my daughters to think I’ve forgotten him.
It had taken Tate’s pulling away to make me remember this.
I feel my cheeks flush with a heat that has nothing to do with my run.
What would Kala and Corey think if they had seen us kissing on the porch last night?
It would feel like a betrayal to them. I know this without question, and I suddenly feel ashamed of myself for the picture I would have permanently painted in their memories.
The morning air starts to feel cool against the heat of my skin. I pick up my pace a bit and decide that I have to be my daughters’ mother before I am anything else. Tate has given me an opportunity to break free from a life I desperately wanted to escape. I want to live up to that opportunity and make a fresh start with my girls. That means putting away any ideas of Tate and me ever being anything other than partners on a temporary journey.
Something in the resolve lightens the weight on my heart. I definitely lost my head last night, and I’m not going to bother making excuses for myself. But starting this morning, today, my being here at Cross Country is going to be about a new life for me and the girls. Moving on. Beginning again.
51
Tate
LUCILLE MAKES THE best cup of coffee I’ve ever tasted. I’m telling her as much just as the back door off the kitchen opens, and Jillie sticks her head inside.
“Good morning,” she says, not quite meeting eyes with me.
“Morning,” Lucille says, looking over her shoulder from her spot in front of the stove. “Pancakes were the request for breakfast. You and the girls coming up?”
“Lucille said I could pick anything I liked,” I say, noticing Jillie’s long legs beneath the running shorts.
“I’m all sweaty,” she says, “and the girls are still asleep. Just wanted to see if you were here, Lucille.”
Fences: Smith Mountain Lake Series - Book Three Page 15