Abby flipped through the rest of the pages, her expression increasingly incredulous. As soon as she’d turned the last page, she reached for her cell phone.
Trace put his hand over hers. “No. I’m not asking you to deal with this. I’ll handle Wes. I just need to know how you want me to proceed. Can I beat him to a pulp, or would you prefer that I go through nice, tidy legal channels?”
“You shouldn’t have to deal with him at all,” she said furiously. “This is outrageous.”
“Of course it is. He’s just blowing smoke because he’s scared to death he’s going to lose his close relationship with his daughters, especially if you decide to stay down here.”
“But I’m not—”
“You might,” he corrected. “But that’s a topic for another day.”
She sat back, looking stunned. “I thought Wes and I had settled things. Why would he do something this crazy now? Do you think he’s having some kind of breakdown? His behavior’s certainly erratic, that’s for sure. Or else he’s retaliating for my forcing him to give up the custody suit.”
Trace squeezed her hand. “His reasoning hardly matters. Let’s just assume it’s as simple as wanting to keep me away from his girls and, by extension, you.”
“But why?” she asked, looking perplexed. “We’ve been divorced for years.”
“But I’m the first real threat to the status quo who’s come along.”
“I suppose.”
“Here’s what I’m going to do. I’ve already booked a flight to New York for this evening and scheduled a meeting with my attorney for first thing in the morning. I promise you this will be handled by the end of the day tomorrow.” He met her gaze. “It does mean, though, that I won’t be here for the party tonight. I’m sorry. I know how important tonight is for you and for Jess.”
“Don’t worry about that, just take care of this. I could fly up with you.”
“No, you have way too much to do right here, and Jess would never forgive you if you miss this party.”
“I swear, I could kill Wes if he did something like this purely out of spite.”
“I’m more inclined to think it’s desperation. Bottom line, though, is that we’ll work it out between us. He knows that order’s not worth the paper it’s written on. There’s absolutely no legal justification for it. And with everything we know about him and Gabrielle, I think I can make him see reason. We’re holding all the cards, Abby.”
Abby still looked shaken when they got back to the inn. Trace kissed her long and hard to put some color back into her cheeks. “Stop worrying,” he commanded.
“How can I?”
“Focus on the party and think about what I have planned for you the next time we’re alone.”
She studied him with sudden interest. “Really? You have a plan?”
“Sweetheart, when it comes to you, I’ve had plans for years.”
He kissed her again, then left while that bemused smile was still on her lips and her eyes were sparkling with real anticipation.
23
W hen Abby walked back into the office at the inn, she was still seething over that idiotic restraining order that Wes had somehow manipulated a judge into signing. That had to be how he’d managed it, by asking for a favor from some golf buddy or client of the family conglomerate, because there was certainly no way he could have gotten it otherwise.
Muttering under her breath, she tossed her purse on her desk, then noticed Jess sitting in the shadows.
“Hey, is everything okay?” Abby asked.
“That’s what I’m wondering about,” Jess said, her expression surprisingly grim for a woman who was about to see her dream come true in just a few hours.
Already in a lousy mood, Abby lost patience. “I don’t have time for riddles. If something’s wrong, just tell me.”
“Why is number ten, our best room, showing up on the computer as reserved when I can’t find the name of the guest or a credit card number on file?”
Abby sucked in a deep breath. She’d counted on Jess not noticing that. Naturally, for once, her sister had paid attention to details. She should have had this conversation with her days ago, but she’d kept putting it off.
“I did that,” she said eventually.
“I guessed that much, since you’re the only other person who knows the reservation system, but why?”
Abby met her sister’s gaze. “I’ll explain but you have to promise to let me finish before you get upset.”
Jess’s gaze narrowed. “You’re not comping a room to Wes, are you?”
Abby was shocked she would even think such a thing, but of course Jess didn’t know about his latest stunt. “Absolutely not,” she told her sister. “Actually the room is for Mom. She’ll be here this afternoon.”
For a moment her sister sat there in apparently stunned silence. Then she was on her feet. “No!” she said emphatically, her fist hitting the desk. “Not in my inn. Why is she even coming back to town? Nobody wants her here.”
“I do,” Abby said quietly. “And if you’ll look past all these years of pent-up anger and hurt, I think you do, too.”
“No, I don’t,” Jess said fiercely. “When has she ever been here for me?”
“She tried, Jess. You know she did. You shut her out. How many times did she beg you to move to New York? She wanted you with her, Jess. She wanted all of us.”
“Oh, please,” Jess mocked. “If she’d wanted us there that badly, she would have made it happen.”
“Not if she could see how painful it would be for us to be uprooted from our home here,” Abby said quietly.
“She abandoned us,” Jess repeated stubbornly. “I’ve never understood how you’ve been able to forget all that.”
“I haven’t forgotten anything,” Abby said quietly. “And Dad should have insisted you go, at least for a visit, because she’s your mother. He was as much at fault as she was. I think it gave him some kind of perverse satisfaction to force her to come back here time after time if she wanted to spend any time at all with us.”
“Look, I know she was your mother until you were seventeen. She was mine until I was seven, and then she left. I don’t think she gets enough points to be called a mother after that.”
Abby had known this was going to be hard, but she hadn’t realized just how difficult Jess would make it. Her bitterness ran even deeper than Abby had realized. Not that she could blame her, but there had to be some way to use this occasion for these two people she loved to make peace.
“Sweetie, she’s coming here to support you. She’s reaching out. No one’s asking you to forgive her the second she walks in the door, but please just give her a chance.”
“Why should I?” Jess demanded. “This is my big night, and I don’t want her here.”
There was a gasp behind Abby and she whirled around to see Megan standing in the doorway, her expression filled with shock and dismay. Abby was on her feet at once. “Mom, she didn’t really mean that.”
“Yes, I did,” Jess said, though there was a faint hint of regret in her eyes. Despite her anger, she was too softhearted to deliberately hurt someone the way she’d just hurt Megan.
Abby scowled at her and turned back to Megan. “It’s going to be okay. We just need to spend some time together, all of us. We need to remember how to be a family.”<
br />
Megan shook her head, her gaze never leaving Jess’s face. It was as if she couldn’t get over the sight of this young woman whom she’d seen so rarely through the years. “No,” she said softly, her voice shaky. “I should go. Jess is right. I don’t belong here.”
Jess cast a hard look at Abby. “What were you thinking?” she muttered, then brushed past Megan and left the room.
Abby winced, but used her sister’s departure to draw Megan inside and lead her to a chair. “Don’t listen to her, Mom. I just sprang this on her. She needs time to calm down.”
Her mother gave her a rueful look. “I doubt I can stay till Christmas.”
Abby couldn’t manage to muster the grin her mother had obviously been hoping would break the tension. “It won’t take that long, I promise. I’ll have another talk with her. Please, stay.”
Megan looked torn. “I knew this was a bad idea when you first suggested it, but I wanted so badly to see everyone, I said yes anyway. Tell me, is Mick’s reaction going to be any better? Has he mellowed at all since I spoke to him?”
“He’s had time to digest the news,” Abby assured her. “I think he’ll be on good behavior.”
Megan sighed. “Well, that’s something, I suppose.”
“Then you’ll stay?”
“I really want to,” she said, her expression wistful.
“Then do it. I’ll show you to your room.” Abby grabbed her mother’s suitcase and carried it upstairs. There was no sign of Jess as they went, for which Abby was grateful. She had a hunch that one more scene would send Megan fleeing right back to New York.
Abby used the key to open the guest room door, then gave it to her mother. “This is the largest room we have. I think you’ll be comfortable in here. I’ve booked it for a week, in case you decide you want to stick around.”
Megan’s eyes widened with appreciation. “It’s really lovely. The decorator has excellent taste.”
“That’s all Jess,” Abby said. “You should tell her that when you see her.”
“I doubt she cares about my opinion.”
“Of course she does. She just doesn’t dare admit it, even to herself. Keep reaching out, Mom. If she rejects you a few times, well—”
“Maybe it’s what I deserve,” Megan said, completing the thought.
Abby started to argue, then opted for honest. “Yes, maybe it’s what you deserve.” She hugged her mother. “I think everything you need is in here. Nobody’s staffing the front desk till tomorrow, so call me on my cell if you discover something’s missing. The party’s at seven.”
Megan nodded, her expression somber. “I’m looking forward to it.” She said it with all the conviction of someone heading to death row.
Mick had been restless all day. He would have attributed it to worry about Jess and wanting to be sure nothing would go wrong on this night that meant so much to her, but he knew better. It was all about Megan. He hadn’t been able to get her out of his mind for days.
Normally he would have gone out to a job site to distract himself, but he’d made a vow to himself to stick close until after tonight’s party and tomorrow’s grand opening, just in case Jess or Abby needed his help with anything. Not that either of them were in the habit of turning to him, he thought with regret. He’d taught them years ago not to count on him.
When the silence started to get to him—or rather when his obvious agitation started to drive Gram crazy—she was the one who suggested he go for a walk on the beach. “You used to enjoy that,” she reminded him. “Back before you got so driven that you didn’t have time for the things that really matter.”
He grinned at her. “Leave it to you to turn a simple suggestion into a lecture on past sins.”
She laughed. “I have to sneak my points in when I can. Now, go. It’s making me nervous watching you pace up and down in my kitchen. I have to finish baking for the crowd who’ll still be here tomorrow morning. I expect Connor and Bree are going to want my cinnamon rolls for breakfast.” Her expression turned nostalgic. “It’ll be nice to have a full house again, won’t it, Mick?”
He nodded. “I wish Kevin were going to be here.”
Gram squeezed his shoulder. “He’ll be home soon. Let’s focus on that.”
“Getting him out of Iraq won’t happen soon enough for me.”
“Nor me.”
He bent down and kissed the top of his mother’s head. “I’ll get out from underfoot. You’re right. A walk on the beach sounds like the perfect way to clear my head.”
She studied him knowingly. “It’s filled with thoughts of Megan, isn’t it?”
He nodded, seeing no reason to deny it.
“That’s natural enough. I hope Abby knew what she was doing inviting her back here.”
Mick sighed. “I doubt she had any idea, but there’s no question her heart was in the right place. Abby’s always wanted this family to be at peace. I’m just not convinced we can pull that off in a couple of days.”
“Well, nothing beats a try—”
“But a failure,” Mick said, completing the familiar refrain. “I think Abby got her determination and optimism from you.”
“Maybe,” his mother said. “But she got her big heart from you.”
Mick wasn’t so sure about that. As he walked to the beach, he tried to remember the last time he’d let anyone get close, opened his heart to another person, even his kids. Megan’s departure had robbed him of his ability to trust or to love. Worse, he’d never been able to blame her for going. After all, in essence he’d gone first, taking job after job in places that required him to be gone for weeks, even months at a time. What sort of arrogance had made him think any woman would put up with that, even a wife as devoted as Megan had been?
He remembered with vivid clarity the way she’d looked on the day she’d told him she’d had enough. It had been on this very beach with the wind in her hair, color high in her cheeks and a depth of sorrow in her eyes that had almost brought him to his knees. He’d been about to beg her to change her mind when she’d touched a finger to his lips and shaken her head.
“It’s too late,” she’d said, her lapis-blue eyes welling with tears of regret. “You are who you are and I can’t ask or expect you to change.” Her hand slid to his cheek. “I’m so very proud of the work you’ve done. This town is a real community, just the way you envisioned it. I just wish you’d spent half as much time building our family. I love you, Mick, but I can’t stay here any longer. Bearing all the responsibility is smothering me.”
Back straight, chin high, she’d walked away from him then. Only because he knew her so well, loved her so much had he known that she walked away crying.
He’d shed plenty of tears of his own that night, alone in their bed because she’d already moved into a guest room after they’d argued yet again. He wasn’t too proud to admit it. He was, however, too proud or too stupid to go crawling after her the way he should have done. He hadn’t tried to stop her from getting into that taxi, either. That was the regret he’d live with till eternity.
He looked up then and, as if his thoughts had conjured her, he saw Megan a hundred yards ahead, walking toward him. The shock of seeing her again stopped him in his tracks and because she was looking down, watching the froth of waves against the sand, he had time to drink in the sight of her.
Her hair was much shorter than he’d ever seen her wear it, but it suited her face. The color in her cheeks was from the sun, not makeup, and her lips were coated with some kind of pale peach gloss th
at made them look ripe and tempting. Desire that had no business being part of their relationship now slammed into him. It was a shock to realize the attraction hadn’t died despite all the effort he’d put into killing all the good memories between them.
He dragged his gaze away from her face, noted the way her flowing pants and shirt molded themselves to her trim body courtesy of the wind. He was about to check to see if she still wore that kick-ass red polish on her toes when she glanced up and caught him staring.
Her tentative smile started, then faded. “Hello, Mick.”
He nodded, almost tongue-tied, which was the most ridiculous, unexpected thing that had ever happened to him. He’d won her heart by talking his fool head off.
There was a flash of hurt in her eyes at his silence, but her gaze held steady. “You knew I’d be here?”
Again, he nodded. “I’m…I’m glad you came.”
She lifted a disbelieving brow at that. “Really? You didn’t sound overjoyed when I called you to discuss it.”
He shrugged. “I’ve been persuaded it’s past time for you to be with your family on a special occasion.”
She laughed then, the light, merry sound washing over him, cheering him as did Gram’s glass windchime when it stirred in the breeze.
“Obviously Abby’s been busy talking both of us into something that may or may not be for the best,” she said. “Jess has already made her position clear. She’d like me to leave.”
Rather than relief, unexpected alarm flared. “But you’re not going, are you? She needs you here, Meggie.”
At the use of his old nickname for her, her expression faltered. “It’s been a long time since you’ve called me that.”
“I know. It seemed wrong, as if it belonged with happier times.” Uneasy with veering off onto personal terrain, he asked, “What did you think of the inn?”
“It’s absolutely stunning,” she said with enthusiasm. “Jess has excellent taste.”
The Inn at Eagle Point Page 35