He seized the moment and joined in her teasing playfulness. "You'd be wrong. I'm the baby."
"You don't act like the baby."
He lifted his eyebrows. "I think that's a compliment, but I'm not sure."
"It's a compliment. I would imagine the baby boy in a family with three girls would certainly be spoiled, while the oldest would be a protector."
He took her hand again, this time giving it an affectionate squeeze. "That was definitely a compliment. Nate, the protector. I like it. It fits."
"Maybe." She looked up into his eyes, and he held her gaze, trying to see what lurked behind those big brown eyes. He wanted to know everything about her. He needed to know that she was the woman he thought she was. A woman he could trust. She didn't look away, either. It was as if she wanted him to search her, to see her, to know her. "You're a tough woman, CeCe," he said finally.
She lowered her eyes and resumed walking. "So I've been told."
"Do you really want to be?" he asked.
"Want to be what?"
He guessed she was stalling for time. Since they had walked a fair distance, he asked her if she'd like to walk back down the other side of the street. After her affirmative nod, he assisted her across the street, and they began the trek back through the downtown revelers to the Peachtree Plaza.
"So, are you really a tough woman?"
She shivered, and he knew it wasn't because of the weather. The July night was just right—not hot, or humid, and certainly not chilly. "I guess it depends on whom you ask."
"I'm asking you."
She seemed to think seriously before answering, and he appreciated the effort. Her answer was very important to him, though he couldn't really explain why. He just knew that it was. "Not with David," she said, "and not with Miss Brinson, but I can imagine that some people just getting to know me might find me tough. I'm probably not the easiest person to get to know." She cast him a sideways glance. "What do you think—am I really a tough woman?"
He was pleased with the honesty and openness of her answer. Deciding they both needed a break from the seriousness of the moment, he answered, "I don't think I should answer that one. I like your smiles a lot better than your frowns."
"I'm not that bad, and you do have to answer. You're an honest man, remember?"
"Ah, a woman with a memory. I'll have to remember that. Let's see, are you a tough woman?" There was an outdoor cafe up ahead, and he said, "Maybe we should sit down for the rest of this discussion. Do you mind?" She didn't, and he led her to the cafe and secured a table.
"Would you like something? Coffee or dessert?" the waiter asked.
Nate noticed the flicker of interest in CeCe's eyes at the mention of dessert and suggested the waiter bring them a dessert menu. After reviewing the appetizing list of sweets, they settled on the brownie ice cream pie, which they would share.
"I'm being really bad tonight," she said, leaning forward to rest her forearms on the table. "I'll have to exercise for a year to make up for this splurge."
After an admiring glance, he said, "I don't think one night will hurt you. You look pretty good to me."
She shot him a look that said she doubted his words. So she didn't take compliments well, he surmised. He wondered if she knew how appealing she was—toughness and all. Yes, CeCe was a tough woman, but he'd bet his life it was an external toughness that she used to protect the softness of her heart. She'd been hurt, and she wasn't going to be hurt again. He recognized the signs because he fought them in himself. He knew how hard it was to open yourself up to another person after you'd been burned badly.
"You still haven't answered my question," she said.
She'd been honest with him, and he could do no less for her. "You try to be tough, but you're a softie."
Her burst of laughter surprised him. When she would have spoken, the waiter interrupted them with their dessert. Nate moved his chair closer to hers—so close that her shoulder brushed against his arm—and enjoyed the muted sounds around them as they ate from the same bowl.
CeCe broke their silence. "I can't eat another bite." She placed her spoon on the table, sat back in her chair and watched him eat.
"I'm a growing boy," he explained, "so I'll just eat the rest of this."
"You know," she said after a few more minutes of shared silence, "I envy you, in a way. I'm an only child, and I've always wished for a brother or sister."
"And I spent a lot of my childhood dreaming of a world without sisters, or without sisters who took up all the bathroom time."
"So little brother couldn't go to the bathroom, huh?" she asked in a singsong voice usually reserved for little children under the age of two.
He polished off the last of the dessert and sighed. "I think we'd better leave that topic alone. Tell me about you. How did you get to Atlanta?"
The glint in her eyes suggested she'd rather continue teasing him, but when she spoke she honored his request for a change in topic. "I guess I was sort of like your friend Marvin. I went to Spelman and fell in love with Atlanta. I'm originally from a small town in Alabama about two hours from here. I love Atlanta because it's big enough to have all the conveniences of a big city, but its small neighborhoods give it a homey feel. I guess it has the best of both worlds."
He nodded his understanding, though he had the feeling there was a lot she wasn't telling him. He now regretted not being more forthcoming about himself with her. How could he expect her to open up to him when he hadn't done so with her? "Are your parents still in Alabama?" he asked, feeling comfortable exploring this area of her life since he'd shared about his family.
"And still living in the house where I grew up."
He picked up one of her hands for no particular reason and studied her fingers. "It must be great to pick up and drive to see your folks whenever you want," he said, wondering what he could learn about her from her recently manicured hand. "They must love being so close to their only grandson. My parents would probably move to a warmer climate if my sisters and their families weren't in the Chicago area. They could leave my sisters, but I don't think they can leave their grandchildren. I bet David has your parents wrapped around his little finger."
"Not exactly." She eased her hand from his grasp and rested it on the table. "My parents and I aren't very close."
"I'm sorry," he said, responding to the distress in her voice. He wasn't sure if it was his hand-holding or the discussion about her parents that had caused it. Maybe it had been both.
"So am I, but that's the way it is."
He placed his hand atop hers, which was now resting on the table, and squeezed. "But it doesn't have to stay that way. People and situations change."
"Maybe" was her only response.
I don't know what to say to her, Lord. I can see that she's hurting, but I don't know how to help. Show me what to do. Give me something to say. Nothing came, so Nate said nothing. When the waiter came back to clear their table, Nate suggested they head back to the Gala. CeCe agreed and they made their way back, her hand resting on his arm. She seemed lost in her thoughts, and he was wondering why her happiness meant so much to him.
* * *
CeCe was filled with apprehension as she walked beside Nate to her front door. She told herself that she was being silly, but she couldn't stop the feelings. The evening had been both wonderful and disappointing. It had been wonderful because Nate had been so attentive, and, for most of the time anyway, she'd been so relaxed in his presence. In spite of that, the evening was not without its disappointments. First, Nate hadn't been as forthcoming as she would have liked about his marriage and subsequent divorce. While she accepted his right to privacy and understood his need for it, she was still disappointed. She wanted to think he felt free to discuss it with her, which she knew was odd since she really didn't know him that well. But that was the point. She was beginning to feel that she knew him very well, and his refusal to discuss such an important part of his life made her wonder if she was reading too m
uch into their budding friendship.
Later, she'd been disappointed when he'd called her a tough woman. She thought she'd let her guard down tonight so that he could see beneath the tough exterior that she'd developed. Obviously, she hadn't. Then there was that business with him counting her fingers. All he'd done was hold her hand and count her fingers, but she'd had to ease her hand from his grasp because his touch felt too intimate. She must be losing her mind. Now they had to go through the ritual of ending their first evening out together. She didn't know whether to expect wonder or disappointment. She would rather not have to deal with either at this point.
"I've enjoyed your company, CeCe," Nate said as they walked up the three steps to the porch. "Do you have to go in now, or can we sit and talk for a while?" She could see his expectant face in the porch light Miss Brinson had left on for her. He pointed to the wooden swing to the left of the door. "Being from the North and all, I don't have much experience with porch swings."
She knew he'd chosen his words to calm her and to convince her to sit with him, but she was still hesitant to do so. "It's late—," she began.
Nate tugged on her hand and led her toward the swing. "It's not that late. Besides, I've been a perfect gentleman all night, and that's not going to change now. I wouldn't want Miss Brinson to come out here with a shotgun."
CeCe laughed and willingly followed his lead. Maybe they would end the evening on a note of wonder. "Do you make a joke out of everything?"
"I try my best to find humor in most situations," he said, sitting down and tugging again on her hand. She sat next to him. "If I took everything seriously, I'd probably be in a padded cell by now."
"Not you. I think you've led a charmed life," she teased.
He didn't immediately respond, but when he did there was no teasing in his voice. "Sure," he said, "I've led a charmed life, all right. That explains why my wife left me after living with me for only eighteen months and went back to her old boyfriend." As if the floodgates of his heart had opened, Nate shared with CeCe the details he had omitted earlier.
As she listened to his story, she realized that he held no bitterness toward his ex-wife. Disappointment, maybe, but not bitterness. She also detected guilt, an emotion with which she was very familiar.
"It's still hard for me to accept the role that I played in the failure of my marriage," he said. "It was easy to lay the blame at Naomi's feet because she was the one to leave and because she never made any attempt at reconciliation, but I've come to see that maybe it seemed to her that I left first. I was new in my solo practice and afraid of failing myself and her. I was so wrapped up in my practice and in having a family like the one I grew up in, that I didn't cherish my wife as I should have. That's a bitter pill to swallow."
"You must have loved her a lot," CeCe said, not expecting a response. She wondered how it would feel to be married to a man who felt about marriage the way Nate did. She couldn't imagine leaving such a man.
He squeezed her hand, and the concern in his eyes told her that his touch was meant to comfort both of them. "Yes, I loved her, but you know something? I don't remember the feeling. When she left me, I hurt all the time. I missed her. I was disappointed in myself, and I felt I had failed God. I can remember all those emotions, but I can't remember what it felt like to love her. Maybe it's because I spent more time with those emotions. We were together only eighteen months, she divorced me within a year after I moved here, and we'd been divorced three years before she remarried." The corners of his mouth turned up in a half smile. "You're the first woman I've been out with since Naomi. So if I'm rusty at this, you have to cut me some slack. That's me and my sob story. Tell me about you."
"What do you want to know?" she asked, though she knew the answer. He wanted to know about David's father. He'd asked her to tell him about herself twice already. Before, she'd held back because he had. She no longer had that excuse.
"What do you want to tell me?"
She breathed deeply. "I didn't expect to enjoy myself as much as I did this evening," she began. "I'm really glad you invited me."
He squeezed her hand. "I guess that means I wasn't that rusty."
She looked down at her hands. "Stop saying that. You weren't rusty at all. If anything, I'm the one who was rusty. I'm not good at this man-woman thing. I haven't been very successful with it."
"Well, that's the past. We're talking about now."
* * *
Nate tilted her chin up so he could look into her eyes. A part of him wondered if he was jumping off the deep end much too soon. What if this woman broke his heart? Would he be able to recover? He didn't have the answers to the questions, and right now the answers didn't seem that important. "I know I said this wasn't a date," he told her, "so I won't try to change it into one, but I'd like to see you again, CeCe. I'd like to get to know you and David and Miss Brinson. I don't know what the future holds for us, but there's something about you... My heart has opened to you. I didn't expect it and I didn't plan it, but that's what has happened. I told you about me and Naomi because what happened with her is so much a part of the man I am now. God was true to his word, as he always is, and he used the horror and pain of that situation for my good."
"In some ways," he continued, "Naomi leaving me worked out as a blessing because it served as a wake-up call. Until then, I'd been walking around like Samson with his hair cut off. I was shaking myself—going through the motions, thinking all was well with me and her, and with me and God—not realizing my ears had become dull to the voice of God. During the four years that Naomi and I were estranged, I learned again the power of prayer and the peace that only God can provide. I learned that nothing is more important than following God and being in his will. They weren't easy lessons, and I wish I could have learned them some other way, but I thank God that I learned them. And I pray that I won't have to learn them the hard way again."
He studied her open face and thought again that he could trust this woman. "If the Lord gives me another woman to love, I don't want to repeat the mistakes of the past. I've been honest and open with you because I want you to know where my heart is. I didn't go looking for you, CeCe Williams; you sorta dropped into my lap, so to speak. I don't want to walk away from you if you're supposed to be mine, but neither do I want to force myself where I don't belong. So before I go any further with this, I need to hear from you. I need to know if there's anybody else. I need to know if you think I'm off my rocker for talking to you this way."
She shook her head. Nate couldn't read the expression that flashed across her face. Was is relief? "I'm the tough woman, remember? There's nobody else."
"Is that because your heart belongs to somebody who's not around?"
She lowered her eyes and studied their clasped hands. "I haven't seen David's father since before David was born. I'd had a crush on him all my life. We saw each other during my junior year in college. I got pregnant, and he married somebody else. I took my baby and my broken heart and moved on." She raised her eyes to his. "End of story."
Nate pulled her into his arms and held her as a brother comforting a sister. He'd thought she wanted to cry, but as he held her she didn't allow one tear to drop. No, CeCe, he thought to himself, it's not the end of the story. Maybe the end of a chapter but definitely not the end of the story.
* * *
CeCe walked into the house mentally and emotionally exhausted but very, very happy. Nate wanted to see her again. Next Saturday after the employment workshop he was going to take her and David to his ball game. She was confident Nate was like no man she'd ever known. She didn't know any men who would have opened themselves to her the way Nate had done tonight. It had been scary because she'd known he would expect the same level of honesty from her. She wanted to give it—or at least she wanted to try.
She was glad Miss Brinson wasn't up because she didn't want to share the details of her evening yet. She wanted to savor it in her own mind. She tiptoed up the stairs and peered into David's bedroom. He
was sleeping peacefully. She walked into the room, a smile on her face, and straightened the bedcovers around him. She kissed his forehead and quietly left the room.
She felt the grin on her face as she made her way to her bedroom, closed the door, and turned on the light. Her eyes went directly to the letter propped prominently on her pillow. She should have torn it up before she left. Why had Miss Brinson done this? Her friend was being very obstinate about this issue, but then so was she.
CeCe picked up the envelope and turned it over in her hands a couple of times. Open it, CeCe. What harm can it do? She didn't open it, though. Instead she dropped down on the side of her bed and stared at it. There had been a time before David's birth and even immediately after when she would have welcomed this letter, but coming four years after David's birth was too late. How would she explain it to David? She'd written Eric's parents, told them she was concerned about the effect of their presence on David. She suggested that they wait until he was much older before trying to become a part of his life, but they wouldn't listen. They kept writing. They could continue to write, but she wasn't going to subject David to their whims, and she wasn't going to have him exposed to the biological father who didn't love him or want him. She might give in on a lot of issues, but on this one, she wasn't going to budge.
CeCe admitted that while David was her primary concern, she wasn't in any rush to spend time with Eric's parents herself, either. Being around them would only bring up unpleasant memories of a time in her life that she wanted to forget. She didn't want to go back to the place where she had been with Eric. She didn't like to remember herself that way. She much preferred to remember the girl she was before Eric and the woman she'd become after him. Her life was easily divided into two segments: pre-Eric and post-Eric, with the Eric interval totally wiped out.
She looked at the letter again. This time she shook her head as she ripped it into little pieces. As she threw it into her wastebasket, she remembered that she hadn't told Nate her position on premarital sex. They'd talked about everything else. She'd just have to talk to him about it the next time they were together. She wasn't interested in starting something that would only end in heartbreak because he expected more from her than she was willing to give. While she felt in her heart that Nate would agree with her and support her position, she still needed to discuss it openly so she could put it to rest for good.
Genesis House Inspirational Romance and Family Drama Boxed Set: 3-in-1 Page 10