“Amazing,” he said, but he didn’t sound that impressed.
That afternoon, they drove to the far side of Brunswick, to the HB Plantation, where they toured the farmhouse and grounds. The docent described the last owner of the rice plantation. Ophelia Dent was a successful businessperson, as well as a sophisticated, glamorous world traveler, and she attracted many offers of marriage. “But she rejected them all,” the docent said. “Had she married, the husband would have controlled her assets. Miss Ophelia was a bit of a feminist.”
Curt nudged Karen, who poked him back.
“We see that a lot,” the docent said.
After the plantation, they stopped for barbecue, sharing a dinner of juicy ribs. At one point he reached over and dabbed a bit of barbecue sauce from her chin, causing her to blush. “I eat like a hungry wolf,” she said. “It’s a bad habit.”
He crunched a French fry. “They say you can tell how much a woman enjoys sex from how she relishes a meal.”
The two of them were good together. Karen didn’t want that to end, but how would it work, long term? Her immediate future was in Savannah, but his career was in North Dakota. She doubted he’d want to start over, being only a few years from retirement. Lots of couples maintained long-distance relationships, though. Surely they could, too. At least for a while.
It could work. She would make it work.
That evening, they sat outside to watch the sunset. Karen’s phone beeped, indicating a text. She glanced at the display. It was Ben again.
“That your boyfriend?”
“No.” She put the phone away.
“That guy in Atlanta,” Curt said. “The one you were kissing on New Year’s.”
Karen stared at him. His jealousy was flattering for about five seconds. Then she thought about the logistics. How—and what—did he know?
Curt stared back. “It was in the paper. The social page of the Dickinson Press. I believe the headline was, ‘Local Girl Parties with Ted Natchez.’”
“Oh, no.” Aunt Marie would have seen it and all her friends and relatives in North Dakota. Not to mention the Dickinson clients she’d worked with, like Father Engel and the governor. Karen groaned. “It was nothing.”
“It looked like something.”
She sat quietly, gathering her thoughts. Although the past few days had deepened their relationship, they had no claims on each other. “Is there a problem?”
“Not at all. You’re a grown woman, free to do whatever you like. It’s not up to me to judge your private life.”
“And yet you are. How do you want to deal with this?”
He shrugged. “To be honest, I guess I’m not comfortable with the idea of you being with other men.”
“Okay,” Karen said. “Then what are you going to do about Maddie and Isabel?”
CHAPTER 34
CURT, GATHERING HIS thoughts, shifted in the beach chair. It creaked as if it might break. To the east, the full moon rose, its cold white light illuminating Karen’s face.
“You have Isabel’s picture at your house. I saw it our first night together. And Madison sent a text, suggesting I leave you alone.”
He figured Maddie must have gone through his phone contacts. “When did she text you?”
“A couple weeks ago. Right after New Year’s. Look, why don’t we leave it alone? You don’t have to explain. I was just angry for a moment. Your private life is none of my business.”
But he wanted it to be. He stood and held out his hand. “Let’s go for a walk.” He waited until she took it and allowed him to pull her to her feet. They fell in step along the shoreline.
“I met Isabel when I did a semester at the university in Barcelona. She worked in the bookstore. We went out a few times.” That was an understatement. Within days, he was living at her place, but Karen didn’t need to know that.
“You like her enough to have her picture on your desk.”
“And Maddie is one of my teaching assistants.”
“A student?” Karen stopped walking.
“She’s not a kid. She’s a doctoral candidate, and she’s in her twenties.”
“Your daughter’s age.”
He winced. “I had a midlife crisis. It lasted a few weeks.”
They walked in silence as Curt battled conflicting feelings of pride and embarrassment. Pride that he’d bedded such a hot young thing. Embarrassment because it had been hard for him to keep up. Yet his time with Maddie had made him appreciate Karen even more. They were contemporaries, and it deepened their relationship. He knew what he wanted. Curt slowed his pace. “I’m going back to Barcelona. They offered me a teaching assignment for a year.”
“Very cool for you.” She stuck her hands in her back pockets and gazed up the beach.
“Karen.” He took her by the shoulders. “Come to Spain with me.”
“How can I do that? I’m right on the verge of my business taking off.”
“Can’t you do some of your work remotely?”
“Some, not all.”
“You do most of it from a trailer on a Georgia island. Who would know if you were e-mailing them from Spain?”
“Part of the reason I’m here is because I go into Savannah weekly. Sure, some of it I could do remotely, but there’s the fact of being seen, being around town, meeting people, making connections, going to different offices and speaking with groups. It’s more complicated than you understand.” She shuffled her bare feet in the sand. “Which is why I put down a deposit on an office and apartment suite in Savannah. I’m selling my truck and trailer and moving at the end of the month.”
“When did you decide this? Ten minutes ago? Get your deposit back.”
“I’m tired of living like a transient. I need stability.”
“What do you think I’m offering you?” He ran a hand through his hair in frustration.
“A year in Spain, and then what? My work would dry up. At the end of the year, I’d have nothing.”
“You’d have us. Karen, think of it. We’ll eat tapas, swim in the Med, dance on Las Ramblas.”
She shook her head. “You make it sound so beautiful, Curt, and I’d love to, but I can’t do both.”
“So you’d choose work over me?”
“It’s more than just work. It’s my profession. I love what I do. I want to be successful again, make a ton of money, and ensure my future. I’ve spent most of the past year building the foundation. It’s just starting to take off, and you want me to toss it out the window so I can keep you company in Spain? What did you think I’d say?” She turned and walked away. The damp sand showed two trails of footprints in the moonlight: both of them coming out, and one going back.
Maybe it was really all about that guy, that rich asshole she’d danced with on New Year’s Eve. Karen was right. Curt didn’t understand. He picked up a piece of driftwood and hurled it into the surf. He trod the shoreline, up and back, thinking and arguing with himself. Pissed off, because now he saw that he was too late. He should have made his move sooner. Karen was driven and motivated—her energy was one of the things he loved about her. She wasn’t going to hang around waiting for him to make a move. She’d made hers.
He glared out at the ocean. The whole time she’d been on the road last summer with Frieda, he should have been telling her every night—every morning, too—how he felt. But he hadn’t. Curt set off down the moonlit beach, unsure he could salvage this mess.
A mile down the beach, he found a washed-up log and sat watching the starlit waves lap at the shore. He shouldn’t have been surprised. In a sense, Karen had left him once before, right after she finished college. She’d left for California before he had the chance to tell her how he felt. She’d gone on to marry someone else, and made a life for herself. He’d never expected another shot.
Curt glanced up as a voice reached him. A man and woman approached, talking softly in the darkness, and he felt the cold prospect of solitude settle over him. His wife had run off years ago, chasing after an
acting career, leaving him to raise their daughter alone. Curt was a good father. He doted on Erin, arranging his teaching schedule to accommodate her needs. He’d dated discretely, but he’d kept the women at arm’s length. Now he was free to create a new life for himself, and miracle of miracles, Karen was back.
Except she was poised to run off again.
Did she not care that much about him? Or was she so mad for money or recognition or ego or whatever the hell it was that she couldn’t tell how much he felt for her? He was offering love and security and a lifetime together. He rubbed his chin, feeling a spot where he’d hurried the razor.
His hand stopped. He hadn’t said anything of the sort. All he’d said was—
Curt stared down the beach, in the direction she’d fled. He needed to explain how he felt, to make it clear he loved her.
Back at the trailer, she was sitting in the beach chair, huddled against the damp, waiting for him. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t like fighting.”
“Let’s get married.”
Karen’s hand went to her throat. She stared at him without speaking and then rose. “I’m freezing.”
He followed her inside, where she got a bottle of water out of the refrigerator. Cracking the seal, she took a couple of gulps, looking at him while slowly twisting the cap back on. “You’re really asking me that?”
“Yes, I am.” He kissed her, tasting the water on her lips. He knew he couldn’t live without being able to wake up with her every morning for the rest of his life. When she broke away, her eyes were smoky with what he took to be desire.
He kissed her hand and held it to his chest. “How about tomorrow morning, we drive over to St. Simons Island and find a jeweler? I’ll buy you the biggest chunk of ice—”
“Curt.”
He stopped talking, gripped her hand harder. Felt her slipping away from him.
She looked into his eyes, her gaze steady. Loving. “I was married for almost thirty years. I’m only now learning to be alone.”
He scowled. “I’ve been there. It’s overrated.”
“I love being with you, but I love being able to get up every morning and decide what my day is going to look like. I like making decisions about my business, seeing what works, trying new things. My work consumes me at times. I lose track of time, and that’s fun for me. I can work into the wee hours, totally focused on what I’m doing, without feeling guilty about shortchanging the man in my life.”
He couldn’t believe she was that much in love with work, but worse than that was her assumption that he’d be dependent on her. “I don’t need babysitting. If we were together, you could do whatever you wanted. Why is that so hard for you to understand?”
She sat down on the couch. “This time of my life—it feels so rich, so promising. I don’t mean to exclude you from it, but if we were together, I would feel like I had to dial myself back, to make sure your needs were met. We’d be a couple, and it would be wrong for me to act like you weren’t there. So I couldn’t be as intense about what I want, or as single-minded.”
“It wouldn’t be like that at all.”
“It was in my first marriage, and that’s one of the reasons it failed.”
“I don’t want to go to Barcelona without you.”
Karen held out her hands. “See? It’s already happening. You want me with you in Spain so you don’t have to be alone.”
“I’m capable of finding company if I want to.”
“And I’m sure Isabel will be happy to see you.”
They glared at each other. Karen broke first. “I’m sorry. That was childish.”
“When I watched you walk away on the beach, I felt like it was thirty years ago and you were leaving me all over again.”
“I know, and I feel terribly guilty for that.”
He hugged her as they stood in the kitchen, silently holding each other. A gust of wind rocked the trailer. “We should have been together from the start.”
“But the minute I left for California, you married Janet,” Karen said.
“She wanted me, and you didn’t. You were gone before the ink dried on your diploma.”
“Let’s not fight. We did our best.” She continued in a soft voice. “When I went to California, I missed my family and friends. It was all so big and unfamiliar, but it was exciting, too. Like now, after all the turmoil, losing Mom and everything, I’m excited again. There’s still so much I want to accomplish.”
“Accomplish it with me. I could help you. I’m in great shape financially. I could give you a springboard.”
“I need to do it myself.”
“Nobody does it all on their own.” He studied her face. “I don’t even know why you invited me here.”
“I missed you.”
“Then marry me. Come to Spain.”
She groaned. “I can’t.”
“Karen, I can’t wait another lifetime. You have to trust somebody. Let it be me. You say you want security, but life is unpredictable. If we were together, we could help each other. Look out for each other. Don’t you want that?” He saw her struggle with it, pacing the kitchen, picking up the water bottle and putting it back down without drinking, staring out the window at the blackness beyond and her own reflection.
FOR A LONG WHILE, THEY sat together on the couch, not speaking. She felt as if her entire life had led her to this point, culminating in a choice between two passions: for him and for her work, and her great failure was that she couldn’t find a way to reconcile the two.
He sat forward, elbows on knees, staring across the room. It was almost midnight, but she didn’t want to be the first to go to bed. So she waited.
When she reached for the water, his arm shot out, and he took her by the wrist, turned her toward him, and kissed her, sweetly...then passionately. The fire rose in her belly, and she returned his kiss with the same fervor.
They dragged each other into bed, and their lovemaking was intense, fierce, and primal, but when she climaxed, she turned her face away so he couldn’t see her tears.
Later, she lay in the darkness, staring at the ceiling, the covers up to her chin. She could hear him breathing softly, and she wanted to put her hand on his back, press her face to his neck, and tell him how much she loved him. But she didn’t dare wake him. He would want more, and that, she couldn’t give him.
It was after two. In time with his breathing, she counted slowly backward from one hundred. Finally, she slept.
In the morning, she heard him stirring. “Curt.”
He leaned over and kissed her on the forehead. Then he rose, and the shower started. When he returned, toweling off, she said, “I’ll come visit you. We can do all those things you talked about.”
“I don’t think that would be a good idea.” He dressed and stuffed his things into a duffel bag. “For me, anyway. I’m sorry.”
“But what about in the future?”
“This is the future.” He hoisted the bag over his shoulder, looked at her, and shrugged. “Good-bye, Karen.”
She pressed her face into the pillow as the rumble of the Corvette faded in the distance.
CHAPTER 35
A LIGHT DRIZZLE STREAKED the windows of the Airstream. Karen stared out at the gray, monochrome world. The coffee tasted bitter this morning, or maybe it was her mood.
She tossed the coffee into the sink, but the brown liquid shot out the other side, coating the backsplash. Sighing, she reached for a dishcloth and attacked the mess. Today, she would sign the contract that would bind her to Savannah for a year. With any luck, longer. She was tired of living out of a trailer.
She needed a change. Needed to throw herself into her new life and try to forget about Curt. She’d hated the look of pain on his face last night. Hated the thought that it was all or nothing between them. He was gone, and that was his decision. She had made her own, and would learn to live with it.
Savannah would show her how to survive.
After meeting with the rental agent today,
Karen would return and pack up the Airstream. Tomorrow she would leave for Key Largo, to prepare the truck and trailer for sale. In the past three weeks, Fern and Belle had said little about Jessie’s plans or any new developments. Later this morning, Karen would call Jessie, ask about her progress toward moving out, and let her know they’d be roommates for a few days.
She filled the kitchen sink with soapy water while glancing at the sky for a break in the clouds, but the overcast remained. After washing all the dirty dishes, she got out her suitcases and folded whatever clothing and personal items she could. Then she cleaned the bathroom and straightened the living room. As much as she had enjoyed staying here in Jekyll Island, its ending cast a pall over the beauty of the experience.
She dressed and left for Savannah. On the highway, she phoned Jessie. After exchanging pleasantries, she got down to business. “I’ll be coming back to Key Largo tomorrow,” she said.
“Um, great.” Jessie sounded distracted. In the background, the baby cried. “You’re a few days early.”
“True, but I did say I’d be back the end of February. And you were going to find another place to live by March first, remember? Is that still workable?”
“Sure, no problem. Drive safely.” The call went dead.
Maybe it was the reception.
Karen stuck her phone in the cup holder. She felt anxious about the prospect of sharing such a small space with a woman and child she’d never met. On the other hand, it was only a few days. How bad could that be?
At the Savannah turnoff, Karen programmed her GPS app and meandered through the streets, familiarizing herself with the city’s layout. In a gentrified neighborhood shaded by live oak canopies, she parked in front of a two-story brownstone. Inside, the agent, an older woman in an expensive suit, greeted Karen with a warm smile. “There are four commercial units in this building, as well as two apartments on the second floor. Let’s look at the vacant office suite first.”
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