by Kat Cantrell
Thankfully, he hadn’t even tried.
His mother cocked her head. “So, what? You’re done with Roz and thought you’d hang out with your mom for the rest of your life?”
“Sure. What’s wrong with that?”
He and his mother were a unit. The real kind. Maybe not peanut butter and jelly, but better because they’d been there for each other over the years when neither of them had anyone else. His mom would never reject him.
Nor did she have a life of her own with someone great who took care of her. Guilt swamped him as he wondered if he had something to do with that.
“For a Harris, you’re being a moron,” she said coolly. “I told you and Roz that my campaign was fine because I wanted to take that out of the equation.”
“Well, congrats. You did and now we have no reason to be married. What else would you have expected to be the outcome of that?”
“A marriage, Hendrix. A real one. I didn’t come up with the idea of you marrying Roz solely to save my campaign. It was a great benefit and I genuinely appreciate it. But I want to see you happy. She’s it for you, honey. I could see it in the photograph.”
“What you saw was chemistry,” he countered flatly before the hopeful part inside could latch onto the idea that he’d missed something crucial in this whole messy scenario. “We have it. In spades. But there’s nothing else there.”
“That’s ridiculous. You might have figured out a way to lie to yourself, but I have thirty years of practice in reading you. I saw you two together. I listened to Roz talk about you. There’s more.”
On his side. Sure. Not hers.
“Doesn’t matter,” he growled. “She’s out. She told me straight to my face that it was over. Unless you’re suggesting that I should resort to chaining her up in the basement, I have to accept that it’s indeed over. I wasn’t given a choice.”
Clearly exasperated, Helene fisted her hands on her hips and despite the fact that he’d been taller than her since he’d turned seventeen, she managed to tower over him. “So, let me get this straight. You told her that you were in love with her and that you might have married her to fix the scandal, but now you’d like to see what it looks like if you stay married because you want to. And she said ‘forget it, I’m out’?”
He shifted uncomfortably. How had his mother conjured up the perfect speech to describe the things in his heart when he couldn’t have spit out those words at gunpoint? “Yeah. Basically. Except not quite like that.”
Or at all like that. He hadn’t given her the opportunity to hear those things because it was better not to lay it all out. Saying that stuff out loud meant Roz could counter it easily. Who wanted that kind of outright rejection?
“You didn’t tell her, did you?” His mother’s gentle tone still had plenty of censure in it.
“I don’t deal well with rejection,” he mumbled.
“Call Channel Five. There’s a newsflash for you.”
Her sarcasm wasn’t lost on him. The fact that he hadn’t told Roz meant he never had to deal with it. Instead, he was hiding at his mother’s house.
He didn’t deal well with relationships, either. He’d spent the whole of his life yearning to belong and holding on with a death grip where he did eke out a place. Neither had led to a healthy balance.
“You don’t deal well with it because you have no experience with it. Plus it sucks,” she told him. “No one wants to stand in line to let another person hand out pain and misery. But sweetie, Roz makes you happy, not miserable. Why don’t you want to fight for that?”
“My father...” He swallowed. He hadn’t mentioned the bastard in probably fifteen years and he didn’t like doing it now, especially as his mother’s mouth tightened. “He didn’t even know me and he rejected me. How much worse would it be if I told Roz that I wanted to stay married and she said no anyway?”
“Let me ask you this. How bad does it hurt now?”
Horrifically bad. Worse than he’d allowed himself to admit. Talking about it wasn’t helping. “Pretty much like a constant stomach ache.”
She rubbed at his arm in that comforting way that only moms knew how to do. “That’s also what it will feel like if she says no. So you’d be no worse off. But if you tell her and she says yes, how much better will that feel? Also, you should remember that your father didn’t reject you. He rejected me. You didn’t even exist yet, not as a real live person he could look in the face and then say he didn’t want. You can’t let someone else’s mistakes cause you to make mistakes of your own.”
“You think letting Roz go is a mistake?” His gut was screaming yes at a million and five decibels, drowning out the very excellent points his mother was making.
“The important question is whether you think that. But I wouldn’t have encouraged you to marry her if I didn’t think she could be much more than a mechanism to fix a problem. I’m shocked you didn’t realize that already.” His mother’s voice broke unexpectedly and he glanced at her to see tears gathering in the corners of her eyes. “Just when you think your kid can’t surprise you... You really were doing this whole thing for me, weren’t you?”
He scowled. “Of course. Well, at first. You’re the only mom I have and you’re the greatest. Why wouldn’t I do anything you needed from me?”
It hadn’t hurt that marrying Roz on a temporary basis gave him the perfect excuse to avoid rejection. Too bad it hadn’t worked out that way.
“Good answer.” She grinned through her tears and then turned him toward the door with a little push. “Now I need you to go home and tell Roz to stop packing because you have important stuff to tell her. Do that for me and at some point in the future we’ll laugh about how you almost really screwed this up.”
His spirit lightened so fast that it made his head spin. She made something hard sound so easy. Hendrix took two steps toward the door and then stopped. “What if—”
“What-ifs are for losers who can’t carry the name Harris, sweetie. In other words, not you.” She hustled him toward the door in an almost comical one-two shuffle. “I didn’t raise a coward and I’m not going to be satisfied until I have grandbabies. So just keep that in mind.”
Babies. The same emotions reappeared that had flooded him back at the hospital when he’d had a small suspicion Roz might be sick for reasons that had nothing to do with clowns. That might have been the clincher. He was too far gone to do anything other than take his mother’s advice. “More favors? Marriage wasn’t enough for you?”
“That’s right. And more important, it’s not enough for you, either. Chop, chop. I have a brunch to get to.”
His mother closed the door behind him and he got all the way to his car before letting loose with the smile he’d been fighting. Helene Harris was one-of-a-kind. And so was his wife. He had to take a chance and tell her how he felt about her, or he’d never forgive himself. This was his best shot at being a part of something that made him happy and he’d given it a pass instead of fighting for it.
Hopefully, Roz was still at home so he could convince her to stay for reasons that had nothing to do with sex and everything to do with a promise of forever.
* * *
The moving company Roz had called made short work of transporting the boxes of clothes, shoes and other personal items she’d taken to Hendrix’s house. Good thing. She wasn’t in any mood to handle logistics right now.
Hendrix had left earlier, probably to go celebrate his forthcoming independence, and the fact that he was gone was good, too. She could leave without an extended goodbye that would likely yank more tears from her depths that she didn’t want to lose. The first and second crying jags of the morning had already depleted what small amount of energy she still had after packing the boxes.
What was wrong with her? There had never been a scenario where she wasn’t going to lose this marriage. Wh
y was it hitting her so hard? Because she hadn’t prepared properly for it to end? Maybe because it had ended so quickly, with almost no protest from the man she’d married, never mind that she’d stupidly begun to hope things might turn out differently.
That was the problem. She’d fallen into this bit of wonderful she’d found with Hendrix and forgotten it would soon vanish like so many other things in her life.
The moving truck pulled away from the front of Hendrix’s Oakwood home and there was nothing left for Roz to do except follow it to her loft. Except she couldn’t force herself to pull into the parking garage. She kept driving. The moving company had preauthorization with her building security and they were professionals who didn’t need a neurotic, weepy woman supervising them.
Clown-Around could always use more attention. The boost Helene had given the organization surpassed Roz’s wildest dreams. Becoming a Harris had launched her into a place that being a Carpenter had never touched. In more ways than one. The thought of how often she’d been touched as a Harris depressed her thoroughly.
The paperwork on her desk held zero appeal. She scouted around her tiny office for something else to do, finally landing in the supply closet. It could use organizing. All of the clown makeup and props had fallen into disarray after Helene had stopped by, and frankly, the last thing Roz had wanted to do was surround herself with the trappings that still held so many horrible memories.
But she was already so out of sorts that for once, the wigs lining overhead shelves and the multicolored outfits on hangers at her back didn’t bother her. They were just costumes. Easily donned and easily taken off. She grabbed one of the wigs and stuck it on her head.
See? Easy. Not scary. Just some fake curly hair in an outrageous color.
All at once, she sank to the ground and put her face in her hands as the sheer weight of everything overwhelmed her.
Clowns hadn’t taken her mother from her. Cancer had. For that matter, no one in a red nose had forced her father to stop caring about her—unless she was doing something he disapproved of, which he cared about plenty. Floppy shoes had done nothing to get her in trouble or bring down society’s censure over a racy photograph. She’d done all of that on her own.
Clowns weren’t the problem. She was. She’d assigned so much blame to the crappy hand fate had dealt her as a child that she’d practically let it ruin her life. It was only because luck had handed her Hendrix Harris on a silver platter that anything good had happened.
She didn’t want that to be over. She didn’t want to live each day scared to death to assign importance to the man she’d married. Most of all, she wanted to know what it felt like to know she could wake up each day next to someone who got her. Someone who loved her.
She’d been so busy looking for the hammer about to drop on her happiness that she hadn’t considered the possibility that there was no hammer. Hendrix had even said they could put off the divorce, yet she’d let herself become convinced it was better to get it over with rather than see what might happen if she stopped assuming the worst. Maybe they could have tried being married for a few more weeks and let things develop. Go a little deeper.
If only Hendrix was here, she’d tell him that’s what she wanted before she lost her nerve.
A chime sounded at the front door as someone pushed it open. Great. She’d forgotten to lock it again. She had to get better at remembering that or else move her offices to a more secure location. Anyone could wander in off the street.
But when she popped out of the closet, cell phone in hand in case she needed to dial 911, the nerves in her fingers went completely numb. The phone slipped from her grip and clattered to the parquet flooring.
As if she’d conjured him, Hendrix stood just inside the door, as gorgeous in a pair of jeans and a T-shirt as he was out of them. Because he had the same smile on his face regardless, the one that he was aiming at her now. The same one that had flushed through her on that dance floor at the Calypso Room a million years ago when she’d first caught sight of him.
“Hendrix Harris,” she’d murmured then. And now apparently, as she realized she’d spoken out loud.
“Rosalind Harris,” he returned easily, which was not even close to what he’d said to her that night in Vegas but almost made her swoon in a similar fashion. “I like what you’ve done with your hair.”
Her fingers flew to her head and met the clown wig. Oh, God. She started to pull it off and then defiantly dropped her hand. “I’m practicing.”
“To be a clown?”
She shook her head. “Facing down my shortcomings. How did you know I was here?”
Which was only the first of a whole slew of other questions, ones that she couldn’t seem to get out around the lump in her throat. Hendrix was so close that she could reach out and touch him. She almost did. But she’d given up that right because she was an idiot, clearly.
“I didn’t. I went to your loft first but the moving guys said they hadn’t seen you. So it was worth a shot to come here. I saw your car outside.”
“You were looking for me? That’s funny. I...” Need to tell you some things. But she had no idea how to take the first step. When she’d wished he was here so she could say what was in her heart, she hadn’t actually thought that would happen. He was so beautiful and smelled so delicious and familiar that her muscles had frozen. “You could have called.”
“I wasn’t sure what I was going to say. I, um, drove around a lot so I could practice.” His smile reappeared. “I guess we’re both doing that today.”
Oddly, the fact that he seemed nervous and unable to figure out how to navigate either melted her heart. And gave her the slimmest glimmer of insight that maybe she’d been completely wrong about everything. “Were you practicing something like, ‘watching my mom at the hospital made me realize I have a lifelong dream to be a clown’? Because that can be arranged.”
Instead of laughing or throwing out a joke of his own, he feathered a thumb across her cheek. “More like I messed up and let you pack all your stuff so you could leave me, when that’s not what I want.”
Her whole body froze. Except for her heart. That was beating a mile a minute as something bright fluttered through it. “It’s not?”
He shook his head once, never letting go of her gaze. “You’re my peanut butter and my jelly. Without you, I’ve got two useless pieces of bread that taste like sawdust. I want a chance to see what kind of marriage we can have without all the extra baggage. I mean, not to put too much pressure on you all at once.” He hesitated, looking so miserable that she feared he would stop saying these beautiful things. “I’m trying to say that I want—”
“I love you,” she blurted out. Oh, God. What was wrong with her that she couldn’t stop behaving like a dimwit when it came to this man? “Not that I’m trying to put pressure on you—”
“I love you, too,” he broke in and she was pretty sure the dazed look on his face was reflected on her own. “I’m changing my answer.”
“Because you’re a dimwit, too?” Maybe she should stop talking. “I mean, I’m a dimwit. Not you. I was scared that I was going to lose you—”
“No, you’re right,” he agreed readily. “I’m a complete and total dimwit. I have a problem with rejection so I try really hard to avoid it.”
“I wasn’t—I mean, I would never reject...” Except for when she’d told him she couldn’t stay. She should have stayed. What if he’d never come looking for her? She would have missed out on the best thing that had ever happened to her. “I messed up, too. A lot. I should have told you I was falling for you and that I didn’t want a divorce.”
Something tender filtered through his gaze. “Funny, that’s exactly what I practiced saying to you in the car as I drove around the whole of Raleigh. You stole my line.”
“So that’s it then? I don’t want a divorce, you don
’t want a divorce. We love each other and we’re staying married?” It sounded too good to be true, like a situation ripe for being ripped from her hands. Her pulse wobbled. This was the part where she had to calm down and face her fears like an adult who could handle her life. “I have a hard time trusting that all good things aren’t about to come to an instant end.”
She swallowed the rest, wishing he’d run true to form and interrupt her with his own revelations. But that didn’t happen. He did hold out his hand and when she clasped it, the way he squeezed back was better than any time he’d ever touched her, bar none. Because it was encouraging, accepting. A show of solidarity. I’m here and I’m not going anywhere, he said without saying a word.
That loosened her tongue fast. A multitude of emotions poured out as she explained how clowns and cancer and rebellion and marriage had all tumbled together in her head. How she wasn’t afraid any longer. She wrapped it up by pointing to the wig. “I’m inside my fears. Blasting them apart where they live. You gave me that. That, along with about a million other reasons, is why I can tell you I love you.”
Sure, she still didn’t want to lose him but she had absolute faith that if that ever did happen—regardless of the reason—she’d find a way to be okay.
“My turn.” Hendrix reached up and plucked the wig off of her head, then plopped it onto his own. “This is the approved method to work through all this stuff, right?”
She nodded as the tears spilled over. “You look like a dork.”
He just grinned and patted his red curly hair. “I look like a man who has finally figured out the key to dealing with the idiotic crap running through his head. I almost gave you up without a fight because I was convinced you were going to say thanks but no thanks if I brought up the things I was feeling. Color me shocked that you beat me to it.”
“Not sorry.”
“I’m just going to insist that you let me say ‘I love you’ first from now on.”