“Stop saying that,” he said, his voice husky and deep. “It wasn’t just a nice fantasy. It was what I want the rest of my life to be like—us together, sharing the days, sharing the nights.”
Sherry’s heart cried out at the unfairness of it all. Why did they have to love each other, yet be so wrong for each other. “Please…don’t make this difficult. Just let me go.”
For a long moment they gazed at each other, then with a curt nod he turned and left the room, closing the door behind him.
With a strangled sob Sherry sat on the edge of the bed. She leaned down and picked up Clint’s T-shirt from the floor. She put it to her face and breathed deeply, anguish pressing heavily on her chest.
He loved her. She’d seen it in his eyes, felt it in his embrace, tasted it in each and every kiss they had shared. He loved her…and she had to walk away from that love.
She threw the shirt back on the floor and returned to her packing. How long would it hurt? How long would her love for Clint burn in her heart? How long before the pain finally faded, became more manageable?
Somehow, some way, fate had crossed their stars, letting them love each other, but not giving them the ingredients for happiness forever.
It wasn’t fair. But Sherry had learned a long time ago that life wasn’t fair.
It didn’t take her long to finish packing her things. When she’d finished, she picked up her purse and her suitcase and left the bedroom.
Clint sat on the sofa, shoulders sagging in defeat. He looked up when she came into the room. “So, you’re going,” he stated flatly.
“It’s time to go—time for both of us to move on with our lives.” Her words sounded pretentious, yet created a hollow ache deep within her. “I’ll call you,” she said, recognizing it was a lie.
“Yeah, I’ll see you around.” He didn’t move from his position.
Sherry hesitated a moment, wanting to say something, do something to make things better, but she knew there was nothing she could say, nothing she could do.
“Goodbye, Clint,” she said softly, then stepped out the front door and into the darkness of the night.
She placed her suitcase in the back seat of the car, then slid behind the steering wheel. She put the key in the ignition, but didn’t turn over the engine.
Instead she sat and stared at the house where for the past week she’d known happiness. It was a house just the right size for a family. And someday Clint would fill it with a wife and a baby or two.
She started her car and pulled away from the curb. When she looked in her rearview mirror, the house had disappeared, impossible to see amid the wash of her tears.
Chapter Nine
T he next ten days were a curious blend of tremendous joy and devastating despair for Sherry. She tried to keep herself busy, her mind occupied. She tried to ignore how empty her apartment felt, how utterly alone she felt. Silence had become her enemy, allowing in too many painful thoughts of Clint.
For the first couple of days, she spent her time working on résumés to send out. She hoped to get back on as a teacher in the Armordale Elementary School but decided to hedge her bets and apply to some of the surrounding school districts as well.
With her résumés complete and in the mail, she then unpacked all the boxes that held her books and teaching supplies. As she unpacked the items that symbolized her brief life as a teacher, she was reminded of how much she’d loved that work.
She unpacked notes and little gifts from students, mourning the loss of the past five years. She’d loved working with children, loved seeing their eyes light with understanding when she taught them a new concept. She’d loved sharing their lives and being their helpmate. Thankfully it wasn’t too late for her to go back to doing what she so loved.
With her positive new approach to work came no relief from the heartache of loving Clint. He was a song in her heart that would forever remain unsung, a lyrical poem that would never be written, and not a day went by that he wasn’t an ache deep inside her.
She hadn’t seen him for the past ten days, hadn’t spoken to him at all. She picked up the phone a dozen times a day, just wanting to hear his voice, just needing to say hello. But she never completed any of the calls.
She mourned not only the fact that he wouldn’t be her lover, would never be her husband, but also the fact that their friendship also had to be sacrificed for her own survival.
But today wasn’t the day to dwell on heartache. Today was a joyous occasion. Today she was going to become the godmother to Kathryn Elaine Jenkins.
She stared at her reflection in her dresser mirror, still unable to believe that fate had allowed her to remain an integral part in the life of the child she had grown to love.
Mandy Jenkins had returned to Armordale two days after the night she’d left. She’d come to tell Sherry that the man who had threatened her had been arrested and had confessed that he’d attempted to break into Clint’s house. With him safely behind bars, Mandy had decided to begin a new life in Armordale.
With no family, no real friends, she’d asked Sherry to be godmother, telling Sherry that she’d felt the love Sherry had for her daughter.
Sherry smiled, deciding that her peach-colored suit was a perfect choice for the day. Smart and chic, yet soft and sensual, the silky fabric clung to her curves without being tacky.
She turned away from the mirror and looked at her watch. She had a feeling more than half the town would be at church that morning to see little Kathryn baptized. In the week that Mandy and her daughter had claimed Armordale as home, the town had embraced the young mother and her smiling child.
Yes, it was a joyous day, with only one gray cloud on the horizon. Mandy had asked Clint to be Kathryn’s godfather.
Today, during the church service, Clint and Sherry would sit side by side, then during Kathryn’s baptism they would stand together and pledge their love and support for the little girl.
Somehow Sherry would have to survive being close to him, looking at him and smelling his familiar scent, and somehow she would hang on to her control.
She looked at her watch once again and realized it was time to go. She was both anticipating and dreading the day to come.
The church parking lot was already filling. Sherry found an empty space and parked her car. As she walked toward the church she nodded and waved to friends and neighbors.
Going to church was something else Sherry had allowed to fall out of her life. She’d been angry for so long—angry at fate and angry at God for her barrenness.
As she slid into the pew at the front, where Mandy had instructed her to sit, she embraced the familiar sights and smells.
Candles burned on the altar, and the floral arrangement sent its sweet fragrance into the air. Whispered murmurs of people greeting each other mingled with the soft organ music playing a familiar hymn.
Peace flooded through her, and she felt strong enough to handle anything…even Clint’s presence.
She smiled with delight as Mandy, holding a white-gowned Kathryn, sat down next to her. Kathryn grinned and held out chubby arms to Sherry. Sherry laughed and took the smiling little girl onto her lap.
“I can’t thank you enough for agreeing to this,” Mandy said. “I’ll rest easier each night knowing that if anything ever happens to me, Kathryn will have godparents who love her and will care for her.”
Sherry grabbed Mandy’s hand and squeezed. “Nothing is going to happen to you for many, many years to come. And thank you for sharing your daughter’s life, your daughter’s love with me.” Sherry smiled at the young woman, who over the past week had become a friend.
“You doing okay?” Mandy asked with a note of concern. In a brief, weak moment Sherry had confessed to the young woman her heartache over Clint. “I hope this won’t be, you know, too uncomfortable for you.”
Sherry smiled reassuringly. “Don’t worry. I’m fine, and nothing is going to spoil this day. Right sweet baby?” She kissed Kathryn on her chubby cheek, th
en laughed as the little girl clapped her hands together.
Both Sherry and Mandy looked up as Clint appeared before them. The strength Sherry was so certain would hold her in good stead, seeped out of her on a sigh.
He looked so tall, so handsome. He was clad in a navy suit with a crisp white shirt and his hair was neatly styled.
“Sherry…Mandy.” He greeted the two women with a nod, then squatted down in front of Kathryn. “And hello to you, little miss sunshine.”
Kathryn reached out to him and with a nod of assent from Sherry, he took the little girl from her arms. As he whispered in Kathryn’s ear, making her laugh, Sherry drank him in, gazing at each and every feature.
Although handsome as sin, he looked tired. Strain deepened the lines around his eyes and along the sides of his mouth.
As the organ music swelled, signaling the beginning of the service, Clint handed Kathryn back to her mother, then sat down next to Sherry.
Sherry tried to keep her thoughts focused on the sermon, but it was virtually impossible with Clint sitting so close to her she could feel the heat from his body. His scent surrounded her, making her heart ache with a renewed vengeance.
After the service she stood next to him and together they were recognized as the godparents to Kathryn Elaine Jenkins. The members of the congregation cheered, and then everyone began to spill out of the church and into the beautiful spring air.
As was customary, nobody hurried off, but rather the crowd lingered, greeting old friends, exchanging bits of gossip and enjoying the community spirit that prevailed all around.
Sherry stood with Clint, Mandy and Kathryn, accepting the well wishes of friends and neighbors. She and Clint exchanged looks of surprise as Walt Clary shuffled over to say hello, Betty Wade on his arm.
Clint nodded in greeting. “Betty…Walt…nice of the two of you to put your homicidal tendencies toward each other on hold long enough to attend church together.”
Walt snorted. “We made a truce. She’s going to try to train Rover.” He leaned closer to Clint and winked conspiratorially. “Although I got a feeling she’s trying to do a little training on me, too.”
“Don’t worry, Walt,” Clint said as he slapped the old man on the back. “I’ve heard tell that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.”
“That’s what you think,” Betty said with a wink of her own. She grabbed Walt’s arm. “Come on, Walt. You’re taking me out to lunch at the café.”
Sherry watched in amazement as the two walked away arm in arm. “I swear, I think I actually saw Walt smile,” she said.
Without warning, Clint took her by the arm and pulled her aside from everyone else. “Sherry…we need to talk. It’s important.”
She pulled her arm from his grasp, the simplest touch from him sheer torture. “We have nothing to talk about,” she objected.
“Please, take a drive with me. Just give me a few minutes of your time.” His eyes bored into hers, compelling, demanding and oddly vulnerable all at the same time. “Sherry, please…there are some things I need to tell you, some things I need to explain.”
She knew she should say no, that to go anywhere with him, to have any conversation with him was nothing short of madness. But he’d managed to intrigue her. Before she knew what she was doing, she nodded her assent.
Within minutes they were in his car, driving to the outskirts of town. “Where are we going?” she asked.
“To the lake,” he said.
A ringing note of dread resounded in Sherry’s stomach. The lake—the place where they had spent so many happy hours, the place where he had proposed to her so long ago.
She closed her eyes, wishing she were anywhere but here, knowing that nothing was ahead of her but more pain.
Clint drove slowly, trying to gather his thoughts before they got to the lake. In just a few minutes he intended to have the most painful discussion he’d ever had with anyone in his life.
He was going to explore pain he’d shoved in the deepest recesses of his mind, delve into a past that held incredible anguish.
But he hoped it would all be worth it. He would pay with his pain if it meant he and Sherry might somehow find a future together.
“Clint…I don’t think this is such a good idea,” she said, breaking into his reverie. “Why do we have to go to the lake? We could have talked at the church.”
“No, it has to be at the lake. That’s where it all began.” He cast her a quick glance. “That’s where I first told you I love you. It seems fitting that the lake is where we’ll finish it all.”
She sighed heavily. “Clint, we finished it the night I left your house.”
“No, we didn’t. Just trust me, I have some things to say that are important…things you have a right to know.”
They fell silent, and Clint could feel her tension filling the interior of the car. He cast her a surreptitious glance, and his heart expanded with his love for her.
She looked so beautiful. The peach-colored suit pulled matching color into her cheeks and deepened the green of her eyes. Her short hair was a curly cap of shiny strands, slightly tossed by the wind to give her a sexy, just-out-of-bed kind of look.
He tightened his grip on the steering wheel. He had no idea how she would react when he told her what he needed to say. Sherry had never liked people who lied, and for over the past five years Clint had lived a lie of sorts.
It was possible she would hear what he had to say and turn away, forever shutting him out of her life. Or it was possible with the secret out they might be able to build a life together after all. God, he hoped it was the latter. He didn’t want to live another day without her in his life.
He parked the car on the south side of the lake, in the exact same spot where they had always parked for an hour or two of quiet talk and necking.
When he shut off the engine, he rolled down his window and Sherry did the same, allowing a cross breeze of fresh, clean air to drift through the car.
With all his previous pondering, he still didn’t know exactly where to begin. He slid his seat back, released his seat belt, then turned to look at her, loving her with his eyes, hoping, praying she might love him back.
“These last ten days have been horrible for me,” he began. “I never knew my house could be so quiet—suffocatingly quiet.”
She nodded. “I know what you mean. My apartment feels the same way.” She folded her hands in her lap and stared straight ahead out the car window. “But that’s just because we got used to being together, and having Kathryn fill us up with laughter.”
Clint shook his head. “I’ll agree that Kathryn’s absence made a difference, but, Sherry, it was you I missed. I missed waking up each morning and knowing you were the first adult I was going to see. I missed sharing my first cup of coffee of the day with you sitting across from me at the table.”
He reached out and took her hand in his, forcing her to look at him. “In the past ten days I’ve missed you being the last person I see, the last person I talk to before I go to sleep.”
“Is this what was so important that you tell me?” She withdrew her hand from his.
“No, it’s not.” He drew a deep breath and raked a hand through his hair. For a long moment he stared out the window at the placid surface of the lake, once again seeking the right words to speak. “Sherry, my parents aren’t dead.”
She gasped and he turned to look at her once again. “What are you talking about? Of course your parents are dead. You told me they died in a car accident before you moved to Armordale.”
“My real parents died in a car accident when I was two. The people who actually raised me are alive and well and living in Kansas City.”
He watched the play of emotions on her face as she slowly digested his words. “You were adopted?” she finally asked.
He nodded. “I was three when Robert and Mary Graham adopted me. I was lucky, that’s what everyone told me, to be adopted by such a fine couple.” He tried to keep the bitterness out of
his voice, but couldn’t. “Robert owns a couple of banks, and Mary is devoted to her charity work. Oh yes, I was damned lucky to be adopted by such a prominent couple.”
The memories of his childhood rose up inside him, memories he’d spent his adult life trying to forget. He opened his car door, needing more fresh air than the windows could provide. “Let’s take a walk.” He got out of the car and waited for her to join him.
They began to walk around the edge of the lake where a graveled path had been provided by the city. “Clint…I don’t understand. Why did you lie about this? Why didn’t you just tell me you were adopted?”
The sun on his shoulders was warm, but the icy wind of unwanted memories ripped through him. “Because when I left Kansas City, I wanted to forget everything about those people and my childhood.”
“Was it that bad?” she whispered, her heart full of pain on his behalf.
He nodded curtly. “Not a day went by that they didn’t make me feel inadequate, that they didn’t remind me that they didn’t have to love me because I wasn’t their natural-born son. When I was bad, it was because I wasn’t really theirs. When I was good, it was due to their influence raising me above my innate badness.”
“Oh, Clint,” she replied softly, and reached for his hand.
He closed his eyes for a moment and allowed the warmth of her hand to assuage the pain of the child he had been. He opened his eyes to gaze at her, knowing his pain shone from his eyes. “Every day of my life I hated being adopted, hated how they made me feel I’d never be good enough. I grew up knowing that nothing I could do, nothing I could say would ever really make them love me because I hadn’t been born to them.”
“And that’s why you never wanted to adopt any children,” she said, understanding lighting her eyes. “You were afraid you’d do to an adopted child what was done to you.”
He offered her a bitter smile. “I learned my parenting skills from Mr. and Mrs. Dysfunctional. I not only didn’t want to adopt, I also never considered having children of my own.” He smoothed a hand through his hair. “They’re such fragile creatures and so easily wounded.”
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