by Opal Carew
He shook that gloriously sexy hair. “Not that. I meant that I trust you.”
Forget quivery thighs—it was a good thing he popped back in that window or he might’ve seen her knees give way. Trust? He trusted her?
Those were words she’d never even dared to hope to hear from anyone before because no one had ever cared enough to give a damn whether or not she was worthy of their trust.
She would do everything in her power to prove she was worthy of his.
***
“So how’s life with Todd?” Chloe asked as Jolie stacked the last tray of food in the industrial-sized fridge.
That Jolie kept her face in the cool air had absolutely nothing to do with the question. Really. She just had to make sure the trays weren’t crushing each other.
“Jolie?”
Chloe had known her too long.
Jolie shut the door, trying to keep the silly grin off her face. From the one on Chloe’s, she guessed she hadn’t succeeded. “It’s good.”
“Just good?”
“Okay, it’s pretty great.”
“From what Bella said, it looked a bit more than great. Pretty amazing and homey, I believe were her words.” Chloe cleared half a dozen cereal bowls from the butcher-block island.
“Homey?” That had a nice sound to it. “Hey, wait a minute. What were you two doing talking about me anyway?”
Chloe snorted. “Come on. Like we didn’t gab ourselves silly during Bella and Reese’s courtship.”
“If you can call it that with her stepmother causing such havoc.” Jolie handed her seven glasses with residual amounts of orange juice in them.
“Whatever. You’re changing the subject.” She wagged one of the glasses at Jolie like a club. “So, what gives?”
Jolie raised her hands in surrender. “What gives is that he’s wonderful, and, well, I think he’s ready to move beyond Trista.”
“With you?”
“Well, if not me, then someone else is in the kitchen making some pretty awesome meals.” And in his studio and bedroom making some pretty awesome memories, but those were Jolie’s and she wasn’t about to share.
“And you? I thought you were all about starting your own shop, giving yourself some financial freedom and control over your life?” Chloe closed the dishwasher, leaning against it.
“Loving him doesn’t stop me from doing that.” Jolie leaned against the island.
“Loving him?”
Wow. She could keep her head up when she said it and there were no twinges of trepidation in her tummy. “Yes. Love. I love him, Chloe.”
“And he loves you?”
“Well, he hasn’t said the words, but I think the sentiment is there. If not just yet, the possibility certainly isn’t sending him running for the hills.”
Chloe pushed off the dishwasher and leaned her hip on the island next to Jolie. “Are you okay with that, Jols? I mean, I know all about wishes and dreams. And how they don’t always work out.”
“What are you talking about? You’ve got this home, the girls. It’s what you’ve always wanted.” Jolie waved her hand in the general direction of the gingham-cushioned, ladder-back chairs.
“You’re forgetting the pain-in-my-butt developer who’s trying to take it out from under me, which would then throw the girls back into the system.” She shook her head and gave Jolie a hug. “I just don’t want you to get hurt, that’s all.”
“I thought you liked Todd?”
“I do.” Chloe straightened the placements on one side of the farm-style table. “I also remember him when his wife was alive. How much he loved her. I don’t know that he’s ever going to be able to feel that way about anyone else again and you deserve to have someone feel that way about you.”
Jolie fixed the placemats on the other side. “I’m not asking him to feel that way about me. Heck, I’m not asking him to feel anything about me. He did it on his own. And even if it’s different from what he felt for her, I can’t begrudge him the memories, those feelings. As long as his for me are true, I’m fine with that.”
They met at the head of the table. “But will it be enough?”
Jolie gripped the side rails of the chair. “Enough? Hello? If the man loves me, it’ll be more than I’ve ever expected. I’d thought what I’d read in books was an idealized version, but I see now, with him, it’s possible. I know I love him enough to want to give it a shot.”
“What happens if it falls apart on you?”
“Are you trying to make me sad?”
Chloe pulled out a chair, motioning to the one Jolie still had in a death grip.
Jolie pulled it out and sat down.
“No, Jols, I’m not trying to make you sad. But you have to admit, past experience does count for something. It’s not like we have some guardian angel hovering over us, making things right in our lives. I mean, if there’d ever been such a thing, I would’ve hoped it would’ve happened when we were kids when we needed that sort of thing, not as adults. I just don’t want you to get your hopes up.”
Jolie shook her head. “Too late, Chlo. My hopes are up and soaring right now. And the reason is Todd.”
Chloe studied her, care and love and worry in her eyes. But then she smiled and held Jolie’s hands. “Then I’m happy for you, Jols. I really am. I want it to work out for the two of you. There’s not another set of people I’d like more to see it happen to.”
“And you, Chloe. You’ll find your happily-ever-after someday.”
Chloe shrugged, her grin wry. “Yeah, we’ll see.”
Just then the girls walked in and the mood lightened as they regaled Chloe and Jolie with rope-swing incidents involving an oak tree, a creek, and a bank of mud with so much hilarity that Jolie was almost jealous of their childhood.
Almost, but not quite, because where she came from had led her here. And ending up with Todd was worth all the pain, loneliness, and heartache she’d endured.
***
After a couple hours at the grocery store, Jolie pulled into Todd’s driveway, picturing herself coming home to it—and him—for the rest of her life.
Oh, darn. That’s what she should’ve done with Annie and Tom. Not had them drift off with the tide into the sunset, but put them on the porch of their own home. A big farmhouse like Chloe’s with room for kids to run around, a big ol’ gnarled apple tree with a zillion branches to climb or hang a rope swing from or build a tree fort in. A fireplace big enough to stand in and roast marshmallows. And enough bedrooms for a full-size family of their own—and perhaps a few extras.
That was it. That was the ending they should have. She’d have to re-do the last part for Annie and Tom before she put it to rest permanently.
She bypassed the studio. She’d catch up with Todd once she fixed those last few pages. It was going to be great, just perfect. All she had to do was get it on paper.
She unloaded the groceries, putting only the cold stuff and champagne away, then bounded up the stairs to her room, running the ending scene through her mind. What they’d say, how they’d touch each other, the whole thing.
She skipped up to the landing, fingertips trailing off the railing onto the wall, tap-dancing with twitchy energy. She had to get this on paper. Her muse was bursting with it. She did a little hop-step to her room. One or two more, then she’d get the manuscript out and put the words that would finally finish her dream—
“Todd!”
In her room. On her bed…
But with an expression that was not the happy, I-can’t-wait-to-see-her look she wouldn’t lived to have seen.
He just sat there, looking at her without saying a word, and her chipper mood evaporated in the amount of time it took her to see—
Her notebook in his lap.
Oh.
No.
“ ‘A rose just waiting to bloom, the moment before the petals unfurl, one touch of the sun and you’ll burst into beauty,’ “ he read from the pages.
Her heart rate tripled.
&nbs
p; He flipped to the last page. “ ‘You never gave up on me,’ said Tom. “
Todd looked up with haunted eyes and threw the notebook to the floor.
“ ‘I always wondered what it would be like to be famous.’ “ His lips curled as he threw her words in her face. “Is that it, Jolie? Is that what you did this for? Did you think you could take my story—my life—and make it fodder for the tabloids? Earn your own fifteen minutes? A big fat bonus from some tabloid?”
He pushed himself off the bed and strode to the window.
Away from her.
“Was that what the photographer at The Midnight Maiden was all about? Did you call him? Tell him you managed to do what no one else had—got me to go out in public? Tell him where we’d be?”
His reflection in the window glowered at her.
She couldn’t even shake her head. Not in the face of what he’d just read. Anything she’d say now would look like a lie.
He turned around. “My God. I trusted you. I opened up parts of me I didn’t even know existed. Laid myself bare before you. All my pain.” He raked his hands through his hair, then jammed them to his hips. He exhaled and it resonated with disillusionment, pain. “You’re good, Jolie. You knew just how to do it. A cookbook. Ha. I can’t believe I suggested you write a book.”
“Todd, I…” She didn’t know what to say.
Not that he waited for her to say anything. “I want you to leave.”
The words… She should say something.
But she couldn’t.
“I want you to leave now, Jolie.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
She wanted to—
And then—
But—
…
Chapter Thirty-Five
She would have liked to have left his house with dignity and grace, but she didn’t.
She would’ve liked to have come up with a beautiful speech about how he’d inspired her and she was so in awe of him and respected him and would never use him—that she loved him—but she didn’t.
She would’ve liked to have come up with something serene and pithy and mature to explain the pages he’d held, but, again, she didn’t. She’d given up explaining herself a long time ago and old habits not only died hard, they sometimes didn’t die at all.
What she did do was something she was very good at. She’d clamped the tears behind her clenched teeth, straightened her rigid shoulders, taken all her clothes—few though they were—out of the closet and shoveled them into her bag, picked up the manuscript off the floor, and walked out the door and out of that life.
That fantasy life.
Because the man was utterly and truly right. Who did she think she was to take his most private pain and lay it out there for the world to see? Whether or not she was actually going to carry through with trying to publish it was irrelevant. His life and his love story were his, and if he chose to share them with her, she should have taken them for the gift they were and left it at that.
She pounded Melanie’s steering wheel and the car coughed and sputtered. Great. Someone else she was losing in her life. She pulled over to the side of the road and rested her head on the wheel.
How could she have been so stupid? So utterly blind to what it would do to him? It wasn’t like she hadn’t had a clue. “I trust you.” Hello? What did she think he meant? “I trust you to do a good job of portraying me as a grieving emotional wreck?”
God, she’d even left her apron and Boots there.
And once again she’d been proven right. Nothing lasted forever. She’d always known it and should have started believing it could.
The car got a little less sputtery and she was able to make it back to Chloe’s, the only place she could think to go within sputtering distance. Good thing, too, ’cause poor Melanie ended up coughing her last at the end of Chloe’s driveway.
Jolie dragged herself to the front door and Dakota, one of the girls, opened it.
“You okay, Jolie?” she asked.
Jolie didn’t even bother to hide the truth. The kid was fifteen and could spot a lie a mile off. “No. I need to borrow a couch for a while.”
It was a damned shame that a fifteen-year-old had an instant understanding of complete devastation and the wherewithal to point her to the closest sofa, no questions asked. But then, Jolie would have at her age as well.
None of the girls asked why she was back for the second time in less than two hours and, for that, she was grateful. They just went about their normal Sunday, taking care of their home, helping Chloe when she returned from food shopping.
Food shopping. Oh crud. She’d left all the groceries on Todd’s counter. Well, she’d put the cold stuff away. He wouldn’t have a problem—
Forget it.
Right. She had no business worrying about him anymore.
“Jolie,” Chloe called out from the kitchen, “you want to warm up one of those dinner trays Bella sent? We’re going to have one band of hungry workers once we get all this stuff put away.”
“Sure,” Jolie answered. Typical of Chloe. If she didn’t acknowledge the pain it’d go away.
Typical of all of them who’d dealt with shattered dreams on a daily basis. And it usually worked.
But not now. Because she was responsible for this pain. If only she’d thrown the damned thing away!
That said, she pulled herself off the sofa, rummaged through her bag for the notebook, and tossed it into the kitchen trashcan. The “Best” phase of her life was now over. Time to move on.
As she’d done a hundred times before.
***
Jonathan paced inside Raphael’s office, the twitch alive and not so well and thrumming on the side of his head. Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. He’d only been trying to help, but he’d ended up messing up worse than when he’d burned down Jolie’s apartment.
If only he’d let Jolie put the notebook away, but he’d known the ending wasn’t right.
If only he hadn’t kept pretending to nap to get Todd to leave the room. Who would have thought Todd would’ve tried to make friends with a “pitchfork wielding” cat?
If only he hadn’t knocked the manuscript when he’d leapt from the bed.
If only… if only… It seemed his career was one big series of “if only”s. And now Todd and Jolie were both alone and hurting because of him. Maybe he should ask for a transfer to the paperwork section of Heaven. He couldn’t screw that up.
“So, Jonathan, Angela tells me there’s a problem?” Raphael entered the room so silently Jonathan hadn’t had time to compose himself.
But he really needed the archangel’s guidance now. It didn’t matter how this looked on his personal record; he had to make this right for Jolie and Todd.
He removed his felt hat, clutching it to his chest. “Yes, sir. I, er, I ruined it for them, sir.”
“You?” Raphael took a seat by the window and motioned for Jonathan to do the same. “How could you do that? The only way would be with malice in your heart. Do you have that for them, Jonathan?”
“Oh, no, sir. Not at all. Why, I love all my Charges.”
“Then there is no problem, Jonathan, only obstacles.”
“But it’s a big obstacle, sir. You see, I—”
“No, Jonathan.” Raphael held up his hand. “No obstacle is too big for a Guardian. You have the goodness of the Spirit in you. You’ll find some way to make it right.”
“But how, sir? I’ve split them apart. I’ve ruined their trust in each other.”
“Jonathan, no one can ruin another’s trust in someone else. The doubt had to have already been there. What you must do is foster their belief in each other.”
“But how, sir?”
Raphael smiled and Jonathan felt the stress leave him. Raphael was always so good about instilling faith. Why, if he were everyone’s Guardian, there’d be no war in the mortal world. But such a job was too great a challenge even for an archangel.
“Trust your instincts, Jonathan. You brought t
hem together once, I know you can do it again. Go back to the basics. Use what you know about them to help them see the real person in each other.”
“The real person in each other?”
“Yes. Who they fell in love with. What they saw in that other person that fulfilled a need in them. Show them again what they’ve already seen and let their hearts guide them. That’s all any Guardian can do, Jonathan. We don’t make things happen. We facilitate them.”
Raphael rose, his magnificent presence such a comfort to an insecure initiate-in-training. “Come, Jonathan. I know you can bring them together once more.”
Jonathan stood. If the archangel believed in him then he’d be foolish to doubt his capabilities. If Raphael thought Jonathan could fix it, then he could.
He just had to figure out how.
“Thank you, sir, for your faith in me.” He settled his hat upon his head and straightened his shoulders. “I’ll make it right, sir.”
Raphael patted him on the back, leading him to the office door. “Of course you will, Jonathan. I never had any doubt.”
***
Raphael couldn’t keep the smile from his face after Jonathan left. The man was coming along well; he just needed some confidence.
Raphael waved his hand over his desk and Todd and Jolie’s file appeared. Thumbing through the notes, he saw the notation about “Boots” scrambling from the bed, accidentally knocking Jolie’s notebook to the floor.
He read Todd’s reaction to seeing his own words there.
Well, yes, Jonathan did have his work ahead of him, but the experience would be worth it in the end. It wasn’t often they had such hurting people to heal—two on one assignment, no less—but when Jonathan pulled this off, he’d feel so much better about himself.