He looked both more boyish and more menacing in his dark hat and sweatshirt. She was struck once more by how unlike his public image he could look sometimes. She had decided that she liked this—that she knew a Dylan that no one else did. Or few people, anyway. Suzanne found herself standing there, unable to speak. She was torn between twin desires: one, to reach out and touch him, to press herself into him until he had no choice but to take her in his arms. The other: to run as fast as she could back to her car and never see him or think of him again.
No way through but forward, darlin’, she heard her dad say in her head. She took a deep breath. “I’ve been thinking about all the reasons that we shouldn’t be together,” she said, trying to control the shaking in her voice.
Dylan snorted. “Yes, that seems to be a favorite topic of yours,” he said. She thought maybe it was meant as a joke, but the bitter edge was hard to miss.
“I’ve spent my whole life cataloging reasons I should or shouldn’t be in a relationship. As you know, it never took much to convince me something wasn’t going to work. But with you, the list of what won’t work is long. I mean, longer than most.”
She held up the notebook as illustration. Dylan’s expression was one of scientific curiosity, rather than emotion. “For example?”
Suzanne felt awkward and childish, as though she’d brought him her diary to read to him how she felt. “Well, some we have already talked about. I’m older than you; you’re on the road all the time; the incredible volumes of women hanging on you at any given moment. But it’s more than that. Sometimes I’m ashamed of who I am and what I’ve done. I know how I feel when I know you’ve been with someone, how I feel when I think about Misty—”
“Suzanne,” he interrupted. But she shook her head, wiping a couple of stray tears.
“No, let me finish. It hurts me so much to think of that and I know it would hurt you to think of that horrible list on my dining room wall. I think underneath all of this,” she gestured at the house behind her, thinking of the parties she’d seen there, “you’re kind of a traditional guy. One day you’re going to want a traditional girl and marriage and babies. I’ve never wanted to get married, and I’ve always wanted to have a career.”
“And I love kids, but I have always felt like the world is a damn scary place to bring innocent children into. It even took me a while to get excited about Marci’s pregnancy. My own best friend. Plus, you’re still so young and on the road all the time, and…” She flipped through the notebook, trying to decipher her writing through the blurring of tears. “Well, I think maybe some of these are just Journey lyrics…Anyway, I think you get the idea.”
He chuckled. “So you came to explain why we shouldn’t be together?”
She shook her head. “No. I need to tell you something, but please don’t feel like you have to answer me now. It’s just something I need you to hear from me, face to face. Okay?”
“Okay,” he said seriously.
She held up one of the notebooks. “I made this stupid list this summer because I thought it would help me feel better about being away from you. It’s all true, and things probably would never work between us. There are a million reasons we shouldn’t be together. But I don’t want me being a coward to be one of them.
“Dylan, I drove all night to tell you that I’m in love with you. I have been for months. I don’t think I’ve ever said those words out loud before. I don’t know if that will mean anything to you at this point, and it’s okay if it doesn’t. I know we’ve hurt each other, and I’m sorry, and that we don’t make any sense together. If you don’t feel the same way, or if too much has happened, I will understand. No matter how you feel about me, I’m just grateful to have the chance to say that to another person.”
Suzanne forced herself to stop talking. Dylan’s face was set hard in a lack of expression, as though he were one of the queen’s guards in London. But there was some emotion brewing underneath, and she saw him swallow hard. “Thank you for saying that,” he said. “It means a lot to me.”
She waited, but he didn’t go on. Each passing second felt like a knife to her heart. She fought back tears, forcing herself to take deep breaths. You said it, she told herself, thinking about what her therapist might say. You came here and told him how you feel, and that was brave as hell. You can’t force him to return your feelings. Stand tall. You’ve owned your part and no one can take that away from you.
Still, she waited another moment to give him time to respond. Just in case. But his expression was stoic, though she thought the corners of his mouth may have been twitching, holding back some kind of feeling. She couldn’t tell what. But she would get no further answer from Dylan Burke today.
Gently, he prompted her. “And the second thing?”
She inhaled deeply, turning a page in her mind. Move on. “I need to borrow some money.”
Even his expert control over his responses couldn’t hide the surprise. “What?”
She sat in the chair across the table from him and slid the second notebook toward him. “Not borrow, actually. I need a donation. A big one.”
Chapter 27
A month later, Suzanne sat on an airplane bound for New York, feet drumming nervously. The man in the seat in front of her turned around and shot her a You-Aren’t-Seriously-Going-To-Do-That-The-Whole-Time look. It was mid-October, just four weeks after she’d begun implementing her plan, and to her utter astonishment she had been invited to appear on the popular morning show, American Breakfast. They had taken an interest in the Bonita Daniels Fallen Heroes Foundation, most likely because of Dylan’s very public involvement with it, and Suzanne was going to have a minute-long interview the next morning.
Originally, they had asked Chrysaline to be there, too, but Mary had flatly refused, and Suzanne understood. She felt protective of Chrysaline, too, especially since her mom’s death was barely two months past. It all felt fast and chaotic to Suzanne, and she was an adult whose grief was nothing compared with Chrys’s. So, she was going alone, but bringing some of Chrysaline’s best pieces with her, including a spectacular portrait of Bonita drawn from a snapshot, laughing at a family picnic.
The idea for the foundation was simple: filling in the gaps for kids who’d lost a law enforcement parent in the line of duty. Often, life insurance or collections from other officers helped these kids get their basic needs met, but things like college scholarships and special camps were still sometimes out of the question. And Suzanne wanted to do more than get them by; she wanted to help them find inspiration. To help them create the lives for themselves their parents had been working so hard to give them.
Even though Dylan never responded to her confession that she loved him, a pain that Suzanne was slowly beginning to tolerate, he had been immediately interested in helping Chrysaline and other kids. He woke Yvette up himself that morning on his deck, and had her get a substantial check to Suzanne to get the foundation started, and by the end of the week he’d convinced six other young celebrities to do the same. He was even talking about getting some other singers to donate live recordings of their music for a fundraiser album—the enormity of which project had sent Yvette chirping in circles for days.
Suzanne herself had put together the foundation’s board of directors, calling on the executives and managers whose parties she had planned for years, telling her personal story over and over, showing off Chrysaline’s artwork over lunches and happy hours. Recounting her humiliation at the hands of Penny and Gunnar was painful, but what was her pride compared with Chrysaline Daniels’ loss? Some of her old contacts were happy to help, others had to be cajoled or shamed into participation, but at the end of the day no one could say no to Suzanne.
They were planning a kickoff event for the foundation the following spring, putting Suzanne back in her old role as party planner, but this time with renewed energy and purpose. She had already made contact with 147 kids around the country, and there were many more she was trying to locate. The kids who want
ed to do so could donate artwork, writing, music, science projects, photographs, and other items to be auctioned or used in the promotional materials. She also had the kids and their guardians working on lists of things they wanted, needed, and dreamed about, so that Suzanne and the board could begin establishing a process for helping them.
The project was a mind-blowing undertaking, and she slept very little, but was happier than she had ever been. Even her parents were helping, and her dad beamed with pride when he’d report to her that he had secured a donation from an old colleague or convinced senator so-and-so to donate a flag flown over the Capitol building. He also served as her informal legal advisor until she could recruit a volunteer as general counsel for the board.
As for Dylan, Suzanne saw him in spurts. They talked on the phone about the foundation, and once or twice he came to meetings of the new board to help. Suzanne was not in favor of exploiting his celebrity status, but she found it hard to deny that when he took time out to attend a meeting, the board seemed to take their tasks very seriously. Perhaps coincidentally, no one had to rush out of a room to get back to work when Dylan was there.
When they talked on the phone, he rarely volunteered information about where he was. She knew he had been in Los Angeles some of the time, probably in talks about doing more films, but she had only deduced this by passing comments about the time zone or the weather. Other times he might be in Nashville or down the street in his Atlanta apartment—she could never be sure. Still, he seemed to think of her as a friend, and she did her best to accept it.
During the day, she accepted his friendship and help with a grateful heart. He had saved her life, and now he was making it possible for her to help others. To be in love was a gift, even if the person you loved could not return your feelings. She had friends: when she was lonely, she called Marci or Beth or Rebecca or Chad. She had occupation: the foundation kept her busy, and if she were sad or bored she painted. She sold a few more paintings, enough to pay her rent well into the spring.
Only in the quietest moments did she allow herself to feel the pangs of love. Like now, when she was strapped into an airplane seat and had flipped through the SkyMall catalog a hundred times. Or in the middle of the night when the bustle of the day had died down, when her paints were put away and she could no longer force herself to focus on today’s meeting or tomorrow’s to-do list. Only then did she allow herself to feel the hard, icy truth: this time she would be the one left behind.
If he wasn’t already, Dylan would be dating again soon, and she’d only be able to hide the truth from herself for so long. Eventually his commitment to the foundation would have to wane, too, as his career progressed and a new Misty or Gretchen—or a more widely-known conquest like a costar or duet partner—took his arm and pulled him back into the world where he belonged.
As the plane began its descent into New York, Suzanne wondered whether it might be time to start dating again. She didn’t want to start her old pattern of running through guys faster than she went through shampoo bottles, but she couldn’t pine away for Dylan forever, either. She decided to talk to her therapist about it next week.
#
She was awakened at 3:30 a.m. by an automated voice on the hotel phone. Suzanne rolled out of bed, muttering obscenities. She put Preparation H under her eyes like the beauty magazine she’d read had advised, and took a taxi to the TV studio as instructed. In the cab, she got a text from Marci, who was due in two weeks, still not sleeping, and was now so big she could barely get comfortable at any point in the day. Good Luck! We are Tivo-ing it just in case!
Suzanne hated the thought that she might miss the baby’s birth while she was out of town, but Jake had told her confidentially that he thought Marci was being overly optimistic that she would come early. Suzanne’s parents had wished her luck the night before. She had not heard from Dylan.
When she arrived at the studio, she was hustled to a chair where hair and makeup staff fussed over her for a few minutes. The producer, a short man with light red hair who wore jeans, a blazer and sneakers—and seemed far too young for this job—went over the plan. “You’re in a segment called ‘Meaningful Mornings.’ All about people who have found their passion helping others. It’s a short bit after the 8:30 news, so you have some time. Wish we could’ve interviewed the girl,” he said wistfully.
Yeah, I’ll bet you did. The tearful grief of a daughter who’s lost her mom is far better TV than a rich blonde woman creating a charity to help out. “Well, you got me instead,” Suzanne sang in an artificially sweet tone. He shrugged and left.
Suzanne flipped through the artwork she’d brought nervously and paced around in the tiny green room. A flat screen TV on the wall showed the live feed from the studio just a few yards away from where she stood. Nadia Spencer, one of the show’s two spunky female hosts, was cooking something with an excited little man who reminded Suzanne absurdly of a spider monkey. He jumped from station to station in the fake kitchen, mincing and shredding, throwing things into pans, pulling things out of the oven. Not a spider monkey, she decided. An elf. On crystal meth.
Nadia tasted whatever the finished product was that the elf had concocted, some kind of frittata, and looked at the camera with orgasmic happiness. “Scrumptious,” she said. “And healthy, too! Check out the recipe on our website. And when we come back, country superstar Dylan Burke talks to us about life on the road and his latest charity project.”
And there he was. They cut from the frittata elf to another part of the studio, where Dylan sat on what looked like a barstool, looking amazing in his jeans, crisp white Oxford shirt, and glasses. No camo hat. Behind him was a large window full of people waving into the studio from the street, some holding up signs or wearing silly hats. Suzanne noticed one of the signs said, “I ‘heart’ Dylan” in red duct tape.
Dylan smiled, half-laughing, at the camera as though the entire country had just said something endearingly funny. Suzanne smiled, too, at the TV in the green room. She was thoroughly confused by his being here, but his bemused charm was infectious. And she was, in fact, very happy to see him, no matter what the reason.
“You’re up,” said the producer suddenly, as the feed cut to a commercial for some kind of mop, which showed a woman in a ballerina outfit gracefully mopping her floors while classical music played in the background. “Follow me, please.”
Suzanne trailed him numbly out to the stage, her mouth dry and her feet heavy. Dylan had moved to an oversized sofa and was chatting easily with Nadia while the latter had her makeup touched up and sipped water held up by an assistant.
“Suzanne Henderson,” said the producer, bringing her forward to meet the anchor.
“Hamilton,” Suzanne and Dylan corrected simultaneously. Then Suzanne continued, “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Spencer.”
Nadia eyed them both for a second, and then extended her hand to Suzanne. “Nice to meet you, too,” she said. “Thanks for being here. This should be pretty easy, so don’t be nervous. Just answer the questions as though we’re two friends talking in a coffee shop. Whichever camera has the red light on is the one feeding live, but try not to pay attention to that. Act natural, be concise. Easy on the Southern accent, though, we don’t want people to think you’re stupid.”
“No,” Suzanne replied. “We wouldn’t want that.” By this time, she had been seated next to Dylan and he squeezed her hand lightly.
If the formidable little woman caught the sarcasm in Suzanne’s response, she ignored it. “Kevin!” she shouted and the red-haired producer jumped. “Are we coming straight from commercial or is Anne doing the lead-in?”
“What are you doing here?” Suzanne hissed at Dylan when it seemed no one was paying them direct attention.
“It’s a big day for us, Scarlett,” he whispered back. “I couldn’t let you do this alone. Now, just smile. And easy on that Southern accent.”
She managed to elbow him in the ribs and make it look as if she was simply shifting to adj
ust her suit jacket. “Ow!” he mouthed. You deserved that, she glared in response.
The commercial break felt shorter than Suzanne had anticipated. Suddenly there was a blur of bright lights and people shouting and signaling, and then they were on. Nadia was talking to the camera about Dylan and his career. “…In the music business since childhood…Four multi-platinum albums…Highest number of downloads on iTunes in a single week…Just back from one of the most successful summer tours in the business…”
She felt as though he was a stranger. Suzanne heard the list of achievements and knew that she had read most of them in articles or press releases months ago, but they felt alien to her, as did the man sitting next to her. Here was the same feeling she’d had back in Jake and Marci’s driveway months ago—like Dylan was two people. Only this time, instead of kissing Clark Kent in a driveway, she was sitting next to the untouchable Superman beneath the hot white lights of a television studio. She stole a glance as Nadia waxed on about his greatness, and saw that he looked perfectly relaxed. And why not? This was his world.
Nadia was still talking. “…Two years ago he was described by Entertainment Weekly as one of country music’s wild boys, and he has not failed to live up to that reputation, on stage at least. But today you’re here to talk about something else.” She turned to Dylan now and flashed a brilliant smile. “Good morning, thanks for joining us.”
“Thanks, Nadia,” he said in his juiciest drawl. “It’s always nice to see you at breakfast.” It would have sounded seedy coming from anyone else, but in her peripheral vision she saw that Dylan was wearing his most charming, lopsided grin, and that Nadia Spencer was genuinely laughing. The cameramen were also smiling, from what Suzanne could see.
“I mean, the frittata looks great,” Dylan went on, and then in an exaggerated Tennessee accent he added, “’Course, where I come from, we call them skillet taters.”
Regrets Only (Sequel to The Marriage Pact) Page 25