by Sherry Lewis
Was that why he’d let the rift between himself and Tracy get started? Was that why he’d continually failed at marriage and commitment? And why, deep down, the idea of trying again frightened him?
He thought so, and the realization left him feeling strangely liberated. All these years, he’d been trying to live up to an image. For the first time ever, he understood it was okay to be himself.
GABE SAT ALONE in his apartment. Silence surrounded him for the first time in a long time. It was late. He’d stayed too long at Sharon’s. But he hoped Tracy would forgive him. As a little girl, she would have forgiven him anything, but times had changed.
He dialed quickly and waited for someone to answer. Not surprisingly, Helene’s voice greeted him.
“Hello, Helene. It’s Gabe. Is Tracy still awake?”
“Yes. She’s doing homework.”
He knew Helene meant that to discourage him from interrupting her. But he didn’t let himself toss out an accusation the way he normally would. “I’d like to speak with her. I won’t keep her long.”
“She’s been waiting for you to call all evening.”
“I know. And I’m sorry.” He didn’t offer any excuses as he once would have. He said only, “Can I speak with her, please?”
She hesitated, but at least she didn’t argue. “All right. I’ll get her.”
He took a steadying breath and tried something he hadn’t tried in a long time. “Before you do, there’s something I want to talk with you about.”
“What?”
“For Tracy’s sake, I’d like us to try to be civil to each other.”
“Are you serious?”
“Very.” He leaned back against the couch. “We’ve been blaming each other for the divorce for a long time. I think it’s time we admitted we both had a hand in what happened. Maybe, if we can do that, Tracy won’t feel as if she has to choose between us.”
“I haven’t asked her to choose,” Helene said tersely.
He forced his voice to remain steady. “Neither have I—directly. But we have so much unresolved anger between us, I think she feels as if she has to choose.”
Helene didn’t say anything to that.
“Look,” he said gently. “We may always have issues between us, but we can’t let them affect Tracy any longer. It’s not fair to her.”
Another long silence stretched between them before she said, “I suppose you’re right. But I sure hate to admit it.”
He laughed, and his reaction surprised him. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d laughed at something Helene said. “Well, don’t worry,” he assured her. “I’m sure it won’t happen often.”
“I hope not.” She tried to sound irritated, but he could hear a smile in her voice. “Hold on. I’ll let her know you’re on the phone.”
Tracy picked up a minute later. “Dad?”
“Sorry I’m calling so late—”
“That’s okay. I wasn’t in bed yet. Do you want to know what I decided?”
“Yes, but I have something to say to you first. I want to apologize.”
“What for?”
“For being a lousy dad for the past few years.”
“You haven’t been a lousy dad.”
It was a token protest, and they both knew it. “I’ve been afraid of losing you, I guess. Afraid that you’d forget all about me out there in Oregon.”
“I’d never forget about you. How could I?”
He smiled with relief. “I have this habit—not a good one—of pushing people away. I think it’s because I want to keep them from hurting me.”
“I wouldn’t ever hurt you, Dad.”
“I know you wouldn’t, Trace. It’s not your fault. Having you so far away hurts. Not being able to see you as often as I’d like hurts. Sometimes people do stupid things trying to protect themselves. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” she said softly.
Tears stung his eyes. A lump the size of Alaska burned his throat. “I’d like to start changing things between us. That’s one of the reasons I want you to come to visit. But I need to be honest with you before you give me your answer. There’s someone I’d like you to meet while you’re here.”
“A girlfriend?”
“Yes, but this one’s different. Her name’s Sharon, and she has a couple of daughters about your age.”
“Are you getting married again?” She didn’t sound happy.
“I don’t know. It’s too early to think about that yet. We’ve just started seeing each other.”
“So, is this visit her idea?”
“No. In fact, she doesn’t even know I’ve asked you to come. This is between you and me, Trace. No one else.”
“Promise?”
“Yes, of course.”
She paused for several heart-stopping minutes. “I don’t think I want to meet her.”
Gabe tried not to sound disappointed. “All right. You wouldn’t have to meet her this time.” There’d be other times, he assured himself.
“Okay, then. I’ll come.”
Disappointment vanished. “That’s great. I’ll make reservations and mail you the tickets.”
“Does Grandma know I’m coming?”
“Not yet. I didn’t want to get her hopes up if you said no. But I’ll call her as soon as we hang up, okay?”
“Okay. And Dad?”
“Yeah, Trace?”
“You’ll keep your promise, won’t you?”
“Nothing will make me break it.” He paused, then added, “I love you, Tracy.”
“I love you, too.”
His heart soared, and he grinned as he replaced the receiver. Worry flickered when he thought about Sharon and the promise he’d made, but he pushed it aside. She had children of her own. Surely, she’d understand.
BATTLING A HEADACHE, Sharon stirred ground beef for dinner and watched Emilee frowning over an algebra problem at the dining-room table. Christa’s music—upbeat and almost frantic—drifted down from the upper level. Downstairs, Gabe’s power hammer accompanied the country music playing on his radio.
The hammer popped three times in rapid succession, then stopped. Sharon rubbed her forehead and stirred the ground beef once more. She found herself wishing for some peace and quiet, if only for a few minutes.
In the nearly two weeks since she and Gabe had decided to see each other, Emilee and Christa’s easy acceptance of him in their lives had left Sharon slightly off balance and more than a little worried. With the relationship so new and uncertain, she couldn’t let them get too attached to him. They’d had enough heartache.
She glanced at Emilee again and realized with a start she was watching her. “What’s wrong, Mom?”
“Nothing a little aspirin wouldn’t cure.”
Emilee accepted that without question. She made a face and leaned back in her chair. “I hate algebra.”
“Are you having trouble?”
“Yes. It’s all this stupid stuff about the distributive property. I just don’t get it.”
Sharon couldn’t even remember what the distributive property was, but she forced a confident smile. “Do you want some help?”
“No, it’s okay. I know you don’t like math.”
“That doesn’t matter. If we read the instructions, it might jog my memory.”
“I’ve read them,” Emilee whined. “And I still don’t get it.” She pushed away from the table and came to stand behind Sharon. “What are you making?”
“Aunt Dena’s casserole.”
“The one with the chow mein noodles on top? Cool. Do you want me to do it?”
Sharon scowled at her. “No. I want you to finish your homework.”
Emilee sighed and turned away. “Fine. But Gabe says sometimes if you walk away from a problem, it helps clear your mind.”
The pounding in Sharon’s head climbed another notch. “Gabe doesn’t know how often you try to get out of doing your algebra.” She started to turn down the burner just as Gabe’s footsteps sound
ed on the stairs.
Instead of worrying about dinner or algebra, she found herself watching the landing. He appeared a second later and, as always, the sight of him wiped everything else out of her mind. “Are you through for tonight?”
He propped one hand on his tool belt and tilted back the brim of his baseball cap to see her better. “No. I just have a couple of questions to ask you about the electrical and phone outlets. If you have a minute, I need you to show me exactly where you want them.”
Emilee popped up again. “I’ll come with you.”
“You’ve got homework to finish,” Sharon said, waving her back into her seat. And to Gabe, “Can it wait a few minutes? Emilee needs some help, and I still need to put the casserole in the oven.”
“Sure. Take your time.” He perched on a stool and settled in to watch. “Smells good.”
“It is good,” Emilee assured him. “You should stay for dinner. There’s always more than enough.”
Sharon peeled an onion and watched his reaction from beneath lowered lids. Maybe that’s why she kept holding back. She knew how he felt about domestic life—her life—and frankly, his attitude worried her. Of course, this new relationship was wonderful. More than wonderful. But with such fundamental differences between them, she couldn’t help wondering how long it would last.
Gabe stole a glance at Sharon and smiled slowly. “I’d love to stay…if it’s okay with your mom. Her cooking always smells good.”
“Of course it’s okay,” she said, positioning the onion on the chopping block. “We’d love to have you.”
Something flickered behind his eyes, but she didn’t let herself analyze it. “Well, then, I suppose the outlets can wait until after dinner. Do you want me to set the table?” He glanced at his hands and grimaced. “After I wash up, of course.”
“Not yet. Emilee still has to finish her algebra.”
Gabe disappeared into the bathroom and came back a minute later smelling of soap. “Algebra, huh?”
Emilee worked up a pathetic nod. “I hate it. I don’t get it, no matter how hard I try.”
Sharon waited for boredom or irritation to cross his face. Instead, he moved to the table and sat beside Emilee. “You want some help?”
Emilee’s forlorn expression faded. “Are you serious? You know about the distributive property?”
“Sure. Algebra’s really not that hard once you learn the tricks.”
As quickly as Emilee had turned down Sharon’s offer, she shoved the book toward Gabe and propped up her chin with both hands to listen. Sharon pushed down an unexpected flash of envy and told herself not to be ridiculous. She’d never been good at algebra. Emilee knew that; she didn’t want Sharon’s help.
Concentrating on her own work, she added the remaining ingredients to the casserole. Emilee blossomed under Gabe’s attention. And why not? Sharon couldn’t remember Nick ever helping the girls with homework. He’d always been too busy. Of course, they’d jump at the chance to have a father’s attention.
As if Gabe could feel her thinking about him, he glanced up and his lips curved into a slow, lopsided smile. Her heart skipped a beat. But even that couldn’t erase the growing knot of apprehension.
Gabe wasn’t the girls’ father, she reminded herself. Nor was he likely ever to be their stepfather. No matter how much she loved him, their future together was far from certain.
She dragged her gaze away and tried to pay attention to the vegetables. Once, she caught the hint of a frown on his face, but she didn’t let herself meet his gaze. And Emilee’s whoop of excitement at calculating a problem on her own dragged his attention away again.
“This is incredible,” she said, throwing her arms around Gabe’s neck and kissing his cheek. “I actually understand it. Mr. Hatcher will probably think I cheated.”
Gabe blushed deeply at the show of affection and his eyes glowed with pleasure. His patience with Emilee touched Sharon deeply at the same time the girl’s growing attachment to him frightened her. Didn’t he understand the kind of risk he was asking her to take by insinuating himself so fully into their lives?
Later, as they ate together, with the girls obviously enjoying the charade of them as a family, Sharon’s uneasiness grew. When Gabe hinted that someone needed to do the dishes—and they eagerly volunteered—Sharon battled another flash of irritation. And when he stopped Emilee from giving Raoul a scrap of meat from the table, she’d had enough.
“Go ahead, Emilee,” she said firmly. “A small piece of hamburger isn’t going to hurt Raoul.”
Emilee looked to Gabe for approval, and Sharon’s temper flared. She spooned a piece of hamburger from the casserole and dropped it into Raoul’s dish. “We’ve fed him scraps since he was a kitten.”
“You could make him sick,” Gabe said.
“We never feed him anything but meat and an occasional spoonful of ice cream,” she informed him, hunkering down beside Raoul’s dish and trying to maintain some control over the tension that seemed to be taking control of her.
“You can’t be this upset over the cat,” Gabe said. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m not upset,” she lied. “I’m just not going to stop feeding Raoul a piece of hamburger now and then just because you don’t approve.”
Behind her, one of the girls clanked a dish too hard on the counter. The water shut off suddenly. Even Raoul obviously sensed something amiss. Keeping his tail close, he skittered from the room and up the stairs.
Gabe’s eyes darkened. “You’re mad at me for that?”
“I’m not mad,” she snapped, but even she could hear the lie in her answer. She wrapped her arms tightly around herself and turned away. “It’s not the cat.”
“Then, what is it?”
She glanced at Emilee and Christa, who pretended to be fascinated with the dishes. “Maybe we should go into the other room.”
Gabe followed her into the living room and waited, silently, while she took a moment to pull herself together.
Strangely, that helped restore some of her common sense. Nick had hated waiting for her to sort through her emotions, and his snide comments had usually resulted in a screaming match. “I’m sorry,” she said at last. “I guess I’m just tense. Bad day.”
Gabe closed the distance between them and took her gently by the shoulders. “You weren’t tense a little while ago. Obviously, I did something to upset you. I’d like to know what it was.”
She didn’t know how to respond to that. Nick would have accepted her apology and dropped it there. “It’s not anything you did. Not really. But that whole thing with the homework and then dinner…” It wasn’t coming out right, but she didn’t know how to explain.
“You didn’t want me to help Emilee?”
“I did. I can’t even begin to tell you how much I appreciated it. Seeing her so pleased meant the world to me.”
“But?”
“But…” She took a deep breath and made herself go on. “But I don’t understand what’s happening. I thought you didn’t like this kind of life, yet here you are having dinner with the family, doing homework with the kids, assigning chores… If you’re trying to win over the kids, you can stop. They already adore you.”
His eyes darkened with concern. “Is that what you think I’m doing?”
“I don’t know.” She rubbed her arms briskly and put a little distance between them. She couldn’t think with him standing so close. “Sometimes I wonder if you’re just amusing yourself by playing house for a little while.”
“I’m not playing, Sharon. I’m trying to change.”
She listened for the first hint of anger. Surprisingly, she didn’t hear it. “Why?”
“Because I want to give this thing between us a fair shake, and I wish you would, too.”
“You don’t think I am?”
“I think you’re too afraid to give it a chance.” He moved closer and pulled her close.
Strength and comfort radiated from him, but Sharon resisted it. “I don�
��t want you to change for me. That would be asking for trouble.”
Gabe pressed a soft kiss to her forehead and another to her cheek. “I’m not doing it for you. I’m doing it for us.”
Us. Did he really mean there was an “us”? Or was she allowing her own hopes to color her interpretation?
Gabe studied her face for what felt like forever. His eyes bored into her. “I said something else wrong, didn’t I?”
“I just don’t want to rush into anything.”
“And you think I’m rushing?”
“I feel like I’m on a runaway train and there’s nothing I can do to stop it.”
He traced one finger along her cheek. “You can stop it anytime you want to, Sharon. I know it must be frightening to get involved with someone after being on your own for so long. If you think I’m moving too quickly, just say so.”
Relief made her feel weak. She sent him a grateful smile. “Really?”
“Absolutely. Just don’t run away from me.”
“I’m not running,” she whispered. “I’m just walking fast.”
“Then I’ll slow down.” He brushed another kiss to her forehead and moved away as if he intended to leave. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“Yes. Please.”
With one last smile, he left the room. She curled into the corner of the couch and listened to him say goodbye to the girls. Only when she heard the door shut behind him, did she dare to analyze her feelings. He was going to call her tomorrow. Part of her was filled with anticipation, but part—perhaps the larger part—was warning her that things were moving too fast. The bottom line was she didn’t trust her own judgment when it came to men. Gabe seemed almost perfect, but she’d been fooled before.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
STARTLED BY A KNOCK on her office door, Sharon set aside the stale sandwich she’d been munching while she graded term papers and tried to blink her eyes back into focus. “Yes? Who is it?”
The door opened and Liberty Young peered inside. She looked exhausted. Dark circles shadowed her red eyes and her usually fiery hair looked limp and lifeless. “Do you have a minute?”