“I'm glad you've come to some sort of place where you can accept the changes in your life and try to make the best of them, but that still doesn't make a good basis for our being married. It isn't why I'd want you to be married to me or why—”
It was Andrew who cut off her words this time. “There's more,” he said with a drop of his eyes to her middle.
“The baby isn't basis enough, either,” Delia said quietly.
“I'm telling you that I want you, Delia! That I want you,” he repeated more strongly.
But yet again she only shook her head.
“I'm in love with you!” he shouted then.
But to Delia it seemed like a last-ditch effort and it only brought more tears to her eyes. “Was that the big gun you were going to use if nothing else worked?”
He looked as if she'd hit him in a weak spot. And now it was Andrew who shook his head, whose eyes actually seemed more moist than they had a moment before. “It was the big gun I didn't want to trot out and have used to shoot me down if you didn't feel the same way. Which apparently you don't.”
Then he turned and walked out.
And when the tears in Delia's eyes began to stream down her face she wasn't sure if they were from the hurt he'd caused her, or the hurt she'd caused him.
Chapter Fifteen
“Breakfast in bed?” Delia said on Saturday morning when her brother knocked on the guest room door and then came in with a plate and a glass of milk.
“Your share of the donuts from last night—one chocolate glaze and one cake with white frosting and chocolate sprinkles. And milk to dunk them in,” Kyle answered, setting everything on her nightstand as Delia sat up against the headboard.
“What time is it?” she asked as she broke off a piece of the chocolate donut and tried to pretend she had an appetite for it when her stomach was still in too many knots to be hungry.
“It's a little after ten,” Kyle informed her.
“I slept till after ten in the morning?” Delia asked in astonishment. “I haven't done that since I was a teenager.”
“You were up until four,” he reminded, propping a hip on the edge of the mattress and settling in.
“So were you. And Janine.”
Kyle and his wife had kept a miserable Delia company as she cried until her eyes ached and rehashed her entire relationship with Andrew down to the last detail. Several times.
“Janine is still sleeping,” Kyle said. “K.C. got me up. But he's off on a playdate now and even though I probably should have let you go on snoozing, too, I wanted a few minutes alone with you. I have somethings to say.”
Her brother looked serious and reluctant to have this conversation, and that made Delia particularly curious. Ordinarily Kyle had no qualms about telling her anything.
“Okay,” Delia agreed. “Shoot.”
“Andrew has called here four times already this morning.”
Just the mention of Andrew's name made Delia drag her legs up so that her knees were almost to her chin. Then she wrapped her arms around the tent formed by the sheet and blanket, hugging her shins with both arms as if she needed protection.
“I hope you told him to go back to Chicago,” she said.
“He called, asked to speak to you, I said you were sleeping and he hung up. Each time.”
“So you didn't tell him to go back to Chicago.”
“No, I didn't,” Kyle said firmly. Then he glanced at the door he'd closed behind him when he'd come in, and said, “I've had Marta on the phone half a dozen times since Thursday so I know she blames herself and me for encouraging you to give Andrew a chance. She thinks he should be shot or beaten with a blunt object or something equally as dramatic. And I listened to Janine do the girlfriend thing all last night, rallying 'round, supporting everything you said—”
“Without you saying much at all,” Delia said, only realizing in retrospect that her brother had been unusually quiet.
“Without me saying much at all,” Kyle confirmed. “It seemed like last night you needed that whole girl thing kind of support so I stayed out of it. But I'm not so sure support for the way you're thinking about all this is what you need for the long run. Or that Marta and I were wrong in the first place.”
That surprised Delia.
It must have shown in her expression because before she said anything, Kyle continued. “Let's just say that I have a different perspective on this whole thing and I think you should hear it, too.”
“The male perspective?”
“I don't think it's male or female. I just seem to be seeing somethings that no one else is.”
“Okay. Like what?”
“Well, like I keep wondering what you expected from this guy?”
Delia's eyebrows arched. “What I expected from Andrew? Nothing.”
“I don't mean that the same way you do. I don't mean in the way of money or child support or something. I mean, what did you expect from him when it came to this whole situation and marriage and relationship? Did you think he wouldn't have any insecurities about it? Any doubts? Any misgivings? Any regrets? Because it seems like that's the direction you've been going and I think it's a mistake.”
Delia's surprise was mounting. “So you think I was wrong to react the way I did when I heard him say what he said on the phone Thursday morning?”
“I don't think there is any right or wrong. Yeah, I think what he said was hard to hear. Yeah, it stinks to find out that his family pushed him into marrying you to avoid a scandal. But the way I see it, you and Andrew both have two things going on and they're close to being the same two things. Even though you keep saying you're at different places in life because of the age gap.”
“We are at different places in life because of the age gap,” Delia insisted.
“You're both in a marriage—a first marriage—that came out of unusual circumstances. Age has nothing to do with that. And I'm here to shed some light on the similarities rather than supporting the disparities.”
“Okay,” Delia said again, unable to conceal the fact that she wasn't particularly happy with where her brother was headed with this.
“Look,” Kyle reasoned. “You and Andrew like each other, you're attracted to each other, you enjoy being together, there are feelings, undefined or not, but feelings for each other—that's the good side. The romantic side that everyone has been counting on to prevail, and it's true of you both.”
Delia confirmed that with silence and a slight, negligent shrug of only one shoulder.
But Kyle was undaunted and went on. “But this whole thing hasn't run a common course. You hooked up in a one-night stand that produced a baby. You accidentally met again, did a whirlwind courtship and got married. That's bound to come with fears and worries and concerns and regrets and the occasional freak-out when that stuff comes to the surface-that's the bad side. The second thing that's going on. For both of you. You, Dealie, have had a lot of your own fears and worries and concerns. But you seem to think that yours are warranted and his aren't.”
“You think I'm being unfair?”
“A little bit. This whole thing hasn't had the smoothest, most leisurely start—that's a given,” Kyle continued. “But consider this—Andrew only threatened to take off. And he made the threat to his brother, not to you. You're the one who actually did it. You're the one who's ready to throw in the towel on everything because you overheard Andrew say somethings that shouldn't have come as too much of a shock. Well, except for the family pressure part of it.”
“Not an insubstantial part of it,” Delia reminded. “The man married me because his family made him.”
“Come on. They may have pushed him or twisted his arm, but do you really believe that if he hated you, hated the whole idea, he would have gone through with it? Because I don't. He could have done a lot of other, honorable things to make it work out for everyone. He could have made arrangements with you for child support and visitation and been father to the baby no matter what. He could have gotten
you to agree to some kind of gag order to keep it quiet, if that's what it took to appease his family. Or he could have just said to hell with it all and literally gone to sell surfboards in Hawaii. But he didn't do any of that. And I think he didn't do any of that because of the side of him that's attracted to you and enjoys you and has feelings for you—and I'm betting he really does have feelings for you, that he loves you or he wouldn't have said that.”
“He might have,” Delia said, holding out because the more her brother talked, the more guilty she felt for her own part in this fiasco.
“He didn't,” Kyle said definitively. “And I'll tell you something else. I don't believe that without some pretty potent things going on in you, you would have spent that night with him in Tahiti or let him sweep you off your feet in the short time since your paths have crossed again. And then there's been this last week when you've been on cloud nine every time I've talked to you, and Marta said you were late to work every morning, and left early every evening—has that all been a sign that you don't really like the guy?”
Just the thought of the way she'd spent the past week made Delia feel flushed and she couldn't bring herself to answer her brother's question.
“Actions speak louder than words,” Kyle said then. “And consider this—along with the fact that it was you who bolted, you gave Andrew his own easy out. You left Chicago, you said you'd get an annulment or a divorce, that you wouldn't cause any more problems for Hanson Media Group. You left him scot-free. If that was what the guy wanted on any level, why did he chase you all the way here? Why did he take what you dished out last night and come back for more today? He had freedom in the palm of his hand and he didn't want it. So what it looks like to me is that it's really you running scared and regretting this more than it's Andrew.”
Kyle reached a hand to the top of her head and ruffled her already sleep-tousled hair in true brotherly fashion. “It's all right if that's the case,” he assured then. “I'm with you if knowing the truth behind this is too much to take and you've decided you want out. It just seems to me that there's more between you and Andrew than you're paying attention to. More that must be pretty intense to cause you to do things that you've never done before. And if there's really something there, maybe you shouldn't turn your back on it because you've had a freak-out of your own. Seems to me—”
Delia rolled her eyes at him. “A lot of things seem to you today.”
Kyle grinned and went on anyway. “Seems to me that if you've gone the 'give the guy a chance' route, you should really give the guy a chance, and not just bail on him before he can bail on you the way Peaches's younger men all bailed on her and on us.”
Delia flinched. “You think that's what I'm doing? A preemptive strike?”
Kyle shrugged this time. With both shoulders. “I'm not saying that Andrew hasn't given you cause. I'm just saying that unlike Peaches and her boy toys, you and Andrew might genuinely have something that could work.” Kyle leaned forward to nudge her legs with his shoulder. “And forget the whole age difference. Like I said, you're both basically at the same place anyway.”
“Tahiti, Chicago, now California,” she grumbled. “Every time we're in the same place I get into trouble.”
“Yeah, well, just don't blame the whole thing on the guy. You're in this, too,” her brother cajoled teasingly, lightening the tone.
“I knew this was a 'boys sticking together' thing,” she joked back as if he'd revealed himself.
Kyle sat up straight again. “Marta and Henry and Janine and I are with you no matter what-we just want you to be happy. But think it over. Seriously. And from more than your own perspective.”
Delia's brother got up and left the room then.
When he was gone and she was alone behind the closed door again, Delia dropped her forehead to her knees.
Had she bolted from Andrew before he could bolt from her? Was she the one doing the running? she asked herself.
It certainly wasn't a thrill to find out that Andrew had married her—or even presented the idea of marriage to her—because his family had made him. But had she used that as her bail-out clause? Her excuse to put an end to the bad side of things that Kyle had talked about—to put an end to all her own fears and worries about their age difference, about marrying someone she hardly knew, about whether or not she and Andrew really could have a future together?
When she considered it, she thought she actually might have done just that.
Because she had to admit to herself what she hadn't told anyone else in the last two days—that there was a secret part of her that had felt relieved that the worst had happened right away, before she'd gotten in any deeper.
But she knew she was already in pretty deep because with the exception of that secret part of her that felt relieved—and it was a very small part of her—she'd been miserable since making her decision to end things with Andrew. To call the marriage quits. And she knew that that wouldn't be true if Kyle wasn't also right about the fact that she had more feelings for Andrew than she wanted to admit.
The kind of feelings Andrew had revealed to her, and she had thrown back in his face.
“What a mess,” she muttered to herself.
But when she took her brother's advice and seriously and objectively thought about the way things had been between herself and Andrew—in Tahiti and since the minute they'd laid eyes on each other again—she couldn't deny that there honestly was something that drew them together. Something that was bigger than both of them. Something that ignored conventions. Something even more than the fact that they were having this baby.
She and Andrew connected. They clicked. No matterr what the difference was in their ages. No matter how uncommon were the circumstances that had brought them together. No matter how many worries and fears and concerns they each might be harboring. When they were in the other's company, when their eyes met, when their hands touched or their bodies even came close, everything else faded into insignificance.
And really, wasn't that what was important? That and the fact that somewhere along the way, genuine feelings had developed and grown?
“Feelings you threw in his face, you idiot,” she repeated to herself, aloud this time, but suffering even greater guilt and remorse for it.
Because yes, she realized that whatever it was that connected her and Andrew was what mattered most. They were what meant the marriage should be given a chance to survive. They were what meant that the baby should be born into it, raised in it.
And that was really what she wanted. Andrew. A future with Andrew. Regardless of how scary that might be when the insecurities and worries and concerns cropped up.
It was Andrew she wanted. Andrew she needed. Andrew she craved and desired and honestly thought was worth weathering everything else to have….
And then something just awful occurred to her.
What if Kyle was wrong about the reason behind Andrew's repeated phone calls? What if he was calling to say he was accepting her offer to give him his freedom? What if he was calling to say that he actually was flying off to Hawaii or somewhere even farther away?
Delia bolted upright. “Oh, you really could have blown it,” she moaned.
But maybe even if Andrew was calling to tell her the worst, she could still get to him, tell him she was sorry, that she loved him, too. Maybe she could stop him before it was too late….
Chapter Sixteen
As Delia stood outside of Andrew's hotel room an hour later she was so tense she could feel her heart pounding. Kyle had called hotels and motels near his house until he'd learned where Andrew was staying and had relayed the information to her. But now that she was there, Delia was terrified that when Andrew opened the door, she'd discover that he was packing his bags to leave.
Her confidence wasn't boosted by the fact that he hadn't called again after the four times her brother had told her about when he'd come into the guest room to wake her up. That didn't seem like a good sign and only encouraged her thinkin
g that Andrew was taking her up on her offer to cut him loose from the marriage.
But she'd never know for sure until she talked to him, she told herself, and so she finally forced a timid knock on the hotel room door.
Then she waited. And waited.
The door never opened.
She knocked harder, hoping that Andrew just hadn't heard the first one. But when there was again no answer her fear that he'd already left her behind grew and in response she dropped her forehead to a spot just below the gold 1346 that labeled the room.
“Delia?”
Startled, she jumped back from the door at the sound of her name from down the hallway.
A quick glance in that direction proved that she wasn't imagining it—Andrew was coming toward her. Looking freshly shaved and great in a pair of jeans and a bright yellow polo shirt that accentuated his broad shoulders.
“You're still here,” she said the first thing that popped into her head.
“Where else would I be?” he asked as he drew near and pulled out his room key.
Adrenaline only made her stress worse and Delia wished she hadn't said that. She didn't want to begin this by letting him know she thought he might have taken off for a faraway beach after all. It seemed like the wrong tone to set.
So thinking as fast as she could, she said, “I wasn't sure if you had to get back to Chicago right away or not.”
Andrew opened the door and then waited for her to go in ahead of him.
He seemed calm. Calmer than he'd been the evening before. Delia was afraid that didn't bode well for her cause. Maybe now that he'd accepted that his freedom would be restored, he was no longer as intense as he'd been when he'd shown up at Kyle's house trying to salvage their marriage.
Even though that possibility made her feel all the more awkward, she didn't know what to do except precede him into the hotel room anyway.
“You're not wondering why I'm here?” she asked as he followed her in and closed the door behind them.
“I'm just glad you are,” he answered quietly.
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