Secrets Gone South (Crimson Romance)

by Pace, Alicia Hunter

  Lucy and Brantley Kincaid sat together on the exam table, entwined in each other’s arms, his blond head against her dark one.

  They were swinging their legs.

  “Oh!” Lucy squealed and they broke apart when Arabelle entered. Lucy was apple-cheeked and they were both smiling like their prize pig had won a blue ribbon at the fair. Brantley rose from the table but he didn’t stray too far from Lucy; he let his hand settle on the nape of her neck.

  “Hello, Lucy. Brantley,” Arabelle said. “Lucy, you look … well.”

  Lucy laughed. “Oh, I am! I’m almost a hundred percent sure I am!” And Brantley looked at her like she was the only thing in the world.

  “Then I’m a little confused,” Arabelle said, opening Lucy’s chart. “You had a physical with Dr. Vines, junior right before he retired and everything was perfect. Are you experiencing some kind of problem?”

  Lucy clapped her hands in front of her face. “I’m pregnant! Or I think I am.”

  Brantley let his arm slip around her shoulders. “We’re almost certain.”

  Arabelle closed Lucy’s chart and sat down on her stool. “I take it you two are happy about this?”

  In answer, Lucy and Brantley just laughed and nodded.

  In spite of the misery churning inside her, this kind of joy was contagious and Arabelle felt her smile bloom from the inside out. What if a world had existed where this could have been Will and her, so excited that Avery was coming? How different things would be.

  She banished the thought. She had a job to do. “Did you take a home pregnancy test, Lucy?”

  “Three!” Brantley answered for her but Lucy nodded. “All positive.”

  “Well, those things are very accurate. It’s a safe bet you’re pregnant. But, Lucy, you do realize this is a general practice. We don’t deliver babies. Do you not have an OB/GYN for your pap smears and such?”

  “I do,” Lucy said. “Dr. McGowan. But I couldn’t get in to see him until next week and I want a test today.”

  “I can do the tests,” Arabelle said, “but, as I said, the home tests are very accurate and—” She was about to say she didn’t see the point but stopped herself. Who was she to tell them what the point was? She couldn’t even run her own life.

  Brantley face went a little sober. “See, Arabelle, today would have been my mother’s birthday.” Lucy dropped her eyes and took Brantley’s hand. “Later today we’re going with my dad and grandmother to put flowers on her grave. Then we’re all going to dinner. We want to tell them then but we want to be absolutely sure.”

  Lucy and Brantley locked eyes and the love and compassion that passed between them squeezed Arabelle’s heart. Everyone knew how Brantley’s mother and grandfather had died in a horrific car wreck together when Brantley was a teenager. Arabelle remembered her parents driving up from Montgomery for the funeral. Clearly, Brantley still grieved and Lucy hurt for him. How had he gotten past such pain to find this happy life he had?

  “We’ve been hoping for this,” Lucy said and the sun broke out on her face again. “They would never say so but we know Miss Caroline and Charles are just holding their breath, waiting for this. It would be so special to tell them today.”

  “But we can’t give it to them and then have to take it back.” The joy was back in Brantley’s face again.

  Arabelle rose. “Then let’s get some blood and a urine sample. I’ll do a pelvic and then I’ll be able to tell you for certain what we all already know.”

  And though Lucy seemed to be only about three weeks along, Arabelle was able to confirm the news that they wanted so badly. She sent them away ecstatic, after admonishing Lucy to avoid rare meat, blue cheese, alcohol, and unpasteurized dairy products.

  Brantley and Lucy hugged her and then each other. “There are going to be so many people taking care of her that she’ll be sick of us all!” Brantley declared.

  How nice. Every pregnant woman needed a little taking care of, even the ones who felt great the entire time. Arabelle had not been one of those and she’d finally had to call Sheridan, who’d dropped everything to fly to Switzerland.

  She wished better for Lucy but, then, Lucy already had better.

  • • •

  “You’ve done what?” Luke came out of his chair.

  At lunchtime, Arabelle had driven to the woods and packed a bag for herself and Avery. She had been half hoping to run into Will but his truck was gone. When she’d picked up Avery after work she’d asked Lanie if she could come over. And here they were—she, Luke, and Lanie sitting in what had always been her father’s study, but was now Luke’s. The kids were playing in the next room.

  “I absolutely do not understand,” Luke said.

  That makes two of us, brother.

  Lanie sat beside Arabelle on the sofa, still wearing her lime green, gumdrop covered chef’s pants.

  “What did he do?” Luke demanded. “Did he hit you? I’ll kill him.”

  “Merciful heavens, Luke.” Even she could hear the weariness in her voice. “Don’t be a drama queen. Will didn’t do anything wrong. It simply wasn’t working out. We didn’t … suit.” She was making this up as she went. “You were right. We should have waited. Though we dated quite a while when I was in Atlanta, it’s not the same as living in the same town.”

  “But things seemed to be going well. When we all came over for the Super Bowl, the two of you seemed so together.” She’d thought so, too. Must have been the good sex. But sex did not pave the road to happy. “I’ll get that adoption vacated. It won’t be easy unless he wants it but I know people.”

  She was too drained for this. “I can assure you he does not want that and neither do I.”

  “Oh, come on, Arabelle! How long has he been a father to Avery? A month? Six weeks?”

  All Avery’s life, only he didn’t know. “So you would have sent Emma back after a month? She wouldn’t have mattered after such a short time? Or John Luke?”

  “That’s different,” Luke said.

  “Enough, Luke.” Lanie held up a hand. “Leave her alone. I know you want to take some kind of action because that’s who you are. But right now, we just need to let her be.”

  “I’ll start looking for a place to live right away,” she said.

  “You will not!” Lanie said.

  “Absolutely not,” Luke said. “This is your home, the same as it’s mine. We’ve told you from the first, you can stay here as long as you want.”

  “Anyway,” Lanie went on. “You don’t want to rush. You want to wait and see … ” She let her voice trail off but Arabelle got the meaning. Maybe this was temporary. Maybe they had just had a disagreement and would patch things up in a day or two, if not by bedtime.

  Well, Lanie could think that but Arabelle knew it wasn’t true.

  “There’s something else,” Arabelle said.

  Her brother and sister-in-law turned their eyes to her questioning.

  “Will texted me and he wants to drop by and tell Avery goodnight. I said it would be fine. He’s going to want to see Avery often and I’m all right with that. If you aren’t, I’ll have to move and soon.”

  Lanie nodded sympathetically but there was nothing in Luke’s face that led her to believe he was at all amenable. But he nodded and right now, that’s all she needed from him.

  “I should start dinner,” Lanie said, rising. “What can I help you with, Arabelle?”

  “Nothing. In fact, I’ll come help with dinner.”

  That caused a wave of sadness to go through her. Though Will almost always made breakfast, they had fallen into cooking dinner together. No danger of Luke helping Lanie. He couldn’t scramble an egg—though he would do dishes.

  “Not tonight,” Lanie said softly. “Why don’t you settle in?”

  “Good idea,” Luke said. “I’ll take kid duty.”

  There was really very little to settle but the thought of lying on her childhood bed right now was very appealing.

  “Thank you.”
>
  When she turned to go, Lanie and Luke enveloped her in a hug. All of a sudden she couldn’t breathe. Escape was all she wanted—to where she didn’t know.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  John Luke had been moved down the hall to Luke’s boyhood bedroom. When Arabelle offered to move the crib into her room so the baby furniture could be stored, Lanie had blushed and shook her head.

  “We aren’t going to break the nursery down just yet.”

  Arabelle’s head shot up. How much could she be expected to endure? Watching Lanie live Carrie’s life was hard enough. Did she have to be pregnant again, too?

  Having read her mind, Lanie shook her head. “I’m not pregnant. We don’t want to be right now. But when John Luke’s a little older, who knows? Meanwhile, we have plenty of bedrooms and it’s nice to have a crib available—especially now that Lucy has a baby coming. And Tolly and Nathan are planning children as soon as Kirby graduates year after next. Even if Luke and I don’t have another baby, the book club is always going to be in and out.”

  If they don’t die.

  But they were all perfectly healthy and, in the two weeks since Arabelle had been living here, they were always turning up to drink coffee, eat Lanie’s never-ending supply of chocolate, coo over Lucy, and—much to Arabelle’s disdain—offer her solace that she didn’t need.

  Why should she? The separation was just so civil, so polite.

  “If you don’t mind, I’d like to take Avery for the night. Feel free to come over before bedtime.”

  “Yes, of course. And I will stop by to kiss him goodnight. That’s very kind of you.”

  “It’s the least I can do. You’ve been great about letting me come over to play with him before bedtime.”

  Just yesterday, Arabelle had gone to the diner to pick up a sandwich because Will had said he was going to see Avery at lunchtime. And there they sat in the first booth.

  “Mama!” Avery had called out and clapped his hands. “Daddy give me dump trucks!”

  Will had never hesitated. “Join us.” He gestured to the empty seat across from them. So she had. She had thought the news would spread through town once the book club girls knew, but it hadn’t. Most of the town didn’t seem to know they were living apart.

  After a couple of days, Luke had even stopped giving Will the death stare when he came over to see Avery.

  “I don’t get it,” Luke had told her. “Will’s a good guy. It’s clear you love each other.”

  Ha! Spoken like a man in love.

  When she didn’t reply he went on. “How could the two of you get on so well if you didn’t love each other?”

  Because we never loved each other at all!

  Since Avery saw them both every day and they both put him to bed most nights, he seemed oblivious that anything in his life had changed. But how long would that last? The day was bound to come when Avery would know. What then? How many adjustments could one little boy be expected to make? And sooner or later, Will would find someone else. He’d probably get married again and Avery would have a stepmother.

  She wanted to shake herself for the melodrama wreaking havoc in her head and heart. There had been no mention of divorce yet, though that had to be coming.

  Still, she needed to find a place to live—a place where there was no revolving door of chipper women, no Luke looking at Lanie like she was the best ice cream in the case, and no Emma calling Lanie Mommy.

  She’d look for a place right after Avery’s birthday. Right now, she didn’t even much care what it was like as long as it could be a safe and permanent place for Avery.

  For her, it didn’t matter where her empty, lonely bed would be. It didn’t matter where she lived with her ghosts of Carrie and Sheridan. And Will.

  And to be sure, Will was a ghost. What might have been was just as dead as the friends of her heart.

  • • •

  Will drove to Sercey to escape his shop, the woods, and most of all that big empty prison of a house. He had thought the feeling would pass after a few days, had convinced himself that his woods would feel like a sanctuary again as soon as he got used to Arabelle and Avery being gone.

  But it wasn’t true. He was never going to get used to being without them. Oh, Avery had been there often enough. Arabelle had not denied him access to his son a single time. But he didn’t live there anymore.

  And neither did she. The woods brought no comfort and neither did his work. His workmanship hadn’t suffered—yet. His eye was critical enough to tell that. But there was no feeling anymore, no kinship with the wood. It was probably just a matter of time before the quality of his products suffered, before he was like every other woodworker who’d learned by rote and sold birdhouses at craft fairs. Then he’d have nothing.

  Who was he kidding? He didn’t have anything now, not like he’d imagined. The only diamond chips of the dust of his life were the times spent with Avery. Sure, right now Arabelle was being very generous but what would happen in a few years when Avery had friends, homework, and social activities? What would happen when Arabelle remarried? And she would. She’d find someone like her, someone she wanted.

  Sometimes he wished he hadn’t let them go, but what choice did he have? What kind of man would he be to keep her tied to him when she didn’t want to be?

  This morning, he’d gone to the farmhouse to pick up Avery to take him to the sitter. Arabelle hadn’t even pointed out the uselessness of that, since she drove right by on the way to work, that most days she left her car parked behind Heavenly Confections and walked to work. She’d just stood there with that sad smile on her face, with Avery perched on her hip while he explained what he wanted. Then she’d handed him over without hesitating.

  Maybe she was afraid he’d tell her secret or maybe she really did think it was good for Avery to be with him. Who the hell knew?

  He didn’t even know why he couldn’t forgive her. He only knew that bitterness lurked inside him and he couldn’t let Avery live with that. He knew what it did to a boy to live in an unhealthy home. Who knew what would have happened to him if the woods and his work had not rescued him?

  But he didn’t have that anymore.

  So after dropping Avery off, he’d gone to his shop and picked up the two sections of altar he’d built and headed to the church in Sercey, though that had not been his plan for the day. He’d finished Avery’s birthday present and he’d intended to start on the altar furniture.

  But his heart wasn’t in it. Still, it would please the church board to see progress with the altar. Just when had he gone into the business of pleasing boards of directors?

  The drive hadn’t taken long enough. He needed to kill more time. He and Arabelle had agreed to meet at the diner tonight so they could eat dinner with Avery and talk about the details of Avery’s birthday party. It was a long time until then. As he unloaded his tools, he promised himself he’d take time with the installation, be meticulous to the nth degree. Not that he wasn’t always.

  When he’d first inspected this property with Brantley, it had felt peaceful and positive. He didn’t feel that now. It wasn’t that he felt evil or even negativity. He just didn’t feel anything. As he sanded a bit off of an altar section in order to achieve a perfect fit, he thought if people knew what was running through his head, they’d think he was crazy. And he might be. For several days now, he’d felt like someone was watching him. He felt it now. He didn’t even look over his shoulder anymore.

  Maybe that feeling came from wishful thinking; maybe he was hoping Arabelle was watching, like she used to watch as he peeled off his clothes and walked into her arms.

  Damn. All he needed on top of being maudlin was to be horny. Too late.

  He backed off and surveyed his work. Not bad. He briefly considered calling the chairman of the board to see if he wanted to come down and see what he’d done. But he decided against it. Let them see it when they found it on their own. He wasn’t a little boy anxious for praise anymore.

  On the
way back to Merritt, the car behind him caught his eye. It looked like Aspen’s car, even had the pink Mardi Gras beads hanging from the rearview mirror. But it couldn’t be. She was in North Carolina. Or was it South Carolina? He couldn’t remember and it didn’t matter. Oh, well. The car turned off anyway.

  He turned on the radio and tried not to think about Arabelle.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Birthday party day. It was unseasonably cold for March in the south so there would be no bouncy house or outside picnic. So much had changed in a year. Arabelle supposed this would always be a bittersweet day. Two years ago she had handed Avery to Sheridan and last year Sheridan had still been alive. But was it so wrong for her to take joy in that, for the first time, she was with her child on his birthday as his mother? Wrong or not, she didn’t have time to languish in grief and guilt.

  When it became clear that the party would have to be inside, Will had insisted on hiring caterers, a puppeteer troupe to put on a giraffe-themed show, and someone to make balloon animals and do face painting. It was all too much but it was important to Will. No doubt the pictures would be great. There was a professional photographer coming.

  They had agreed that the farmhouse was the best place for the party. Because Gail Avery was not the kind of woman to choose between a screened in porch and a sunroom, concealed windows would slide up to cover the screens when the occasion called for it. To be sure it would be warm enough, Will had rented two outdoor heaters to supplement the big stone fireplace.

  In spite of the money Will had thrown at the event, there was plenty to do. The favor bags had to be put together, the caterers and entertainers would arrive soon and need direction, and Arabelle’s parents would be there by noon. She needed to warn Will that she hadn’t told them yet about their separation; it could wait until after the party.

  It had been hard to get the kids down for late morning naps but with a 2 P.M. birthday party, Arabelle and Lanie agreed it had to be done.

  “Emma might not go to sleep but she’s got to at least have some downtime,” Lanie had said.