The Widows of Sea Trail (The Widows of Sea Trail Trilogy)

by Jacqueline DeGroot

  I felt cheap and tarnished. I had been that man’s mistress, and as the pain of realization washed over me, I felt the tears coming hot and furious. I quickly spun around and headed back to the kitchen where I had left my purse. I was not going to stay here. I couldn’t stay here. My heart was breaking and I didn’t want an audience. The shock of seeing Matt with another woman had numbed me so that all I could hear was the low roar of everyone talking over each other, people laughing and carrying on and having a good time. Everyone, that was, except me. And quite possibly Matt, as the look on his face had been anything but happy. Was he worried at this very moment that I was going to call him out, go hysterical and create a scene? Well he needn’t worry, I was leaving.

  I moved to the sink to quickly wash my hands and then I grabbed a paper towel and faced away from the room to wipe at my tears. I had to have some semblance of normalcy and I had to get my composure back before I ran the gauntlet by the door to get out of here. People were streaming in like the tide, plopping dishes on the counter tops, stowing drinks in the fridge and calling out to each other from across the room. How was I going to get out of here?

  Then I felt hands on my shoulders and a soft breath at my ear. “I didn’t know you were going to be here. What a nice surprise.”

  Yeah, right. I didn’t say anything, I just froze to the spot, my hand on the counter just inches from my purse and my car keys. I wanted nothing more at that moment than to be out of there and back home.

  “What’s the matter? You feel tense.” You mean other than the fact that you’re here with your wife and I’m the other woman? Still, I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction.

  Then I felt his lips on my neck just below my ear. Some automatic reflex made my knees weaken, but my back steeled. How could he be doing this with his wife just twenty feet away?

  “I think you need a massage. Why are you so tense?” His lips traveled down my neck to my nape and back to my ear. “Why don’t we meet in the other room in the sauna in a few hours and I’ll give you a rub down to ease those tight muscles?” His lips against my ear sent little tingles all through me. Lord help me, it felt good to have his hands on me and his lips on my skin. But now it was sinful. He wasn’t mine and I wasn’t his. He had used me. And having no shame and apparently no fear, he wanted to keep doing it!

  His hands slid down my arms as he leaned over me and whispered. “I’ve missed you.”

  I just bet you have, I thought. You probably have a woman in Raleigh to run around with too!

  Suddenly there was a commotion in the other room and then people were shouting. I heard someone call Matt’s name and I felt him stiffen. Then I heard multiple voices shouting: “Get Matt, she’s having a seizure, Get Matt!”

  The next thing I knew he was around the counter and running toward a group of people fanned around a woman lying on the carpet. I saw him kneel on the floor beside his wife, cradling her upper body in his arms. He was mumbling something to a woman at his elbow, and then crooning softly to the woman whose eyes were now rolled back into her head, her body trembling as if shivering. The woman returned and handed something to Matt and he pushed it into his wife’s mouth. He cupped her head and kissed her temple over and over again. But from where I was standing, I couldn’t hear what he was saying.

  So I moved closer until I could hear Matt’s soft whispers. “You know I love you don’t you. Don’t know what I’d do without you. You’re my other half you know. C’mon baby, open your eyes for me.”

  Moments later she stopped trembling and her eyes fluttered open. Then as if the light hurt them she squeezed them shut and sagged visibly in his arms. I watched as he stood with her and marched to the door. Two men were holding it open and then they followed him out to the parking lot. I moved around to see out the door as did everyone else as he lifted her into the passenger seat of the Escalade. He belted her in and stood rubbing her face and talking to her before closing the door. A moment later he walked around the truck, got into the driver’s seat and drove off.

  I didn’t stay to hear the gossip or to hear the rehash of this woman’s plight. I grabbed my purse from the kitchen counter and ran out the door. This time I didn’t care who saw my tears. But no one had even noticed me leaving; they were all too busy discussing what had happened.

  Obviously Matt’s wife had seizures of some kind. He was ready for them, knew what to do, what to give her, and knew that afterward she would need to rest. He’d been so caring, so loving . . . I slammed my fist on the side of the steering wheel as I drove down Clubhouse Drive. He was supposed to care about me! He was supposed to be mine! How could he love someone like that and me not know! How could he do this to me?

  I was devastated. I was in incredible pain. Everything inside me hurt. This was grief all over again. And I now knew all the stages. This was where you experienced the shock. This was when you couldn’t accept what you were confronted with, this was when your heart broke and you were sure it would never be whole again. I cried as I pulled into the garage. I cried as I stomped into the house and slammed the door. And I cried as I packed my bag for Virginia. I needed my mother. And I needed her right now.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Running Scared Iwas almost to Rocky Mount before I realized that I’d left my favorite pizza pan and my Pampered Chef pizza cutter in the kitchen at the Pink Palace, and that I hadn’t eaten any dinner. The veggie pizza I had made was all but forgotten the moment I realized that Matt was married. I wondered who ended up drinking the bottle of wine I had opened just before Matt and his wife had arrived. Good God, his wife. I saw her collapsed body in his arms again and I sobbed out loud.

  I knew my kitchen utensils were safe, but that the wine was not. The homeowners don’t usually steal from each other, that was one thing that had never been a problem on the Plantation, until lately. But wine, well, wine was another matter. An open bottle was just one of those things that was always considered community property. If you took your hand off it, it was never safe.

  I rubbed Gimlet’s fur and stroked her soft ears as she snuggled in my lap sleeping. Although she was sound asleep, she was a comfort. She knew I was hurting and burrowed as close as she could get to my core; the part of me that was shaking as I moved from denial to anger trying to make sense of this mess.

  That I could have missed something as elementary as Matt being married floored me. Why did I never suspect? Why hadn’t Fred Abernethy warned me away, or hadn’t he known either? Surely he had suspected why I was asking about Matt. Had it been that one lone phrase he’d said early in our relationship that had convinced me that he could not possibly be spoken for, that simple statement that he’d never been in love? Was that what he had said? I thought back trying to remember where we were and exactly how he had phrased it. My old inspector’s ability to recall conversations verbatim came into play. Oh yes, we had just finished watching Ladyhawke, Navarre was holding his Isabeau, twirling her around in the church. He was delightfully happy and obviously madly in love. Matt had run his thumb alongside my jaw and asked, “What must it be like to love someone that way? Have you ever felt like that, been that happy?”

  “Yes,” I had whispered. “Until Stephen died I was that happy.”

  His eyes had looked out over my head to something in the distance and he had murmured, “I haven’t. I’ve never been fortunate enough to have anything come even close to that.” Then his eyes had come back to capture mine. And from that, I had taken him to mean he had never fallen in love, and hence, had never married.

  But clearly he had lied, as he obviously loved that woman named Deborah. So why be unfaithful? Could she be so sick they couldn’t have a physical relationship? I couldn’t imagine him being in a relationship where there was no sex.

  A part of my mind veered off and rationalized that maybe I was wrong, that I’d interpreted things incorrectly. Whether he loved her or not, he had pursued me. I was grasping for anything that would make sense, anything that would assure me that Matt
wasn’t lost to me after all. Six dates I mused, and look what it got me. With chagrin I shook my head at myself in the rearview mirror. Abell on the dash dinged and I took the next exit to get gas and to walk Gimlet.

  What a fool I’d been. What if he didn’t love her? I mean really, how many people married or stayed married for reasons other than love? I’d been told once that most men walking down the aisle would readily agree that lust was more a factor than love in their decision to tie the knot. Love was actually supposed to come after the marriage, and for a lot of couples, it did.

  So, if he hadn’t loved his wife, why had he married her? Was she wealthy? Had it been a financially advantageous marriage? He didn’t seem the type to let his wife have the reins that way, but what did I know? Had she become pregnant? Hell! It was then that I realized that I hadn’t even asked if he had kids! He never mentioned any, and me, assuming children were so important in one’s life, that surely if he had any, he would have talked about them.

  I shook my head as tears burned my eyes again. I was not going to cry anymore, damn it! But, hell, I was dumfounded. It was all sinking in. I had been his mistress. I had asked for nothing more than to be in his bed, or he in mine. My mind instantly flitted over all the scenarios, where we’d been each time we had made love. I sorted them quickly in my head. We’d been too eager, too filled with desire to actually make it to a bed most times. It was more like: on the beach, in his car, and then finally in a bed—my bed. In the bedroom I had shared with Stephen.

  He had never said he loved me. Could everything have been just about the sex? I pounded on the wheel then, mad as hell at Stephen. You knew! And you didn’t stop me! And Merlin! You knew this wasn’t true love! Arrrgh! I gave up and let the tears fall again.

  Many miles later when I took my exit off of Route 95 and snaked my way through Northern Virginia, I felt numbness crawling over me. The same numbness I had experienced when I had finally accepted the fact that Stephen had died and left me all alone. Now the wonderful love I had found with Matt, the love that was easing my sore heart and giving me new hope, was gone. One by one, each memory of our time together again ran through my mind and tortured me. As moments where we laughed and kissed and made love flashed through my mind, I sobbed. I was devastated not just for what I had lost but because I knew what I was in for, again. The heartache that would follow me everywhere I went and cleave as if it was a new part of me. I knew I would sink into depression, and that this time, it would last much longer since now I would be afraid to trust myself to let anyone else get close.

  Funny how every single conversation comes back to you at a time like this, every chance you’d had to clarify things from the beginning, to state your case or to bow out because things weren’t as they should be. The conversation we’d had at The Sugar Shack came back in its entirety, his comments about having seen a wedding band on my finger when he’d been systematically doing his “yea”ing or “nay”ing thing. I continually recalled things he had said to me, damning the knack I had to do this. I was even able to recall his inflections, his tone and his mesmerizing smile and soft sexy lips as he’d looked at me and said with all sincerity, “You were married. I saw a wedding ring on your finger. I liked you well enough, but I wasn’t willing to fight for you if you were married. Mind you, it’s not like there’s a shortage of available women around Washington.” He’d only been concerned whether I was married, not a thing was mentioned about whether or not he was. And I hadn’t even asked. It just hadn’t occurred to me that he would be. Fresh dread filled me, chilling my heart.

  How would I deal with Matt the next time I saw him? It would be foolhardy to think I wouldn’t run into him on the plantation. How was I going to look into that handsome face and not remember all that we had done together, all the places those lips had kissed, and the hunger that had been in his eyes whenever he had looked at me? How would I mumble a quick “hi,” and walk on? How would I protect my heart and keep him from knowing how badly he had hurt me? If he knew how gone on him I was, my humiliation would be even worse. I steeled my spine and told myself that he would never know. I would not let him know that this had not been just a casual affair for me. I would not let him know I had given him my heart before I had known he belonged to another. If he could treat what we’d had as just a fling, so could I!

  I pulled into the driveway of my mom and dad’s house and took a few minutes to compose myself and to blow my nose. This was just a surprise visit, I told myself, something I often did on the spur of the moment. Then I looked at the light on the radio panel and saw the clock. It was four in the morning. Hardly easy to pass this off as a lark. I debated about waiting until it was time for Dad to get up for work. I wondered how quiet I could be if I used my key and just snuck up to my room. But then I remembered the new alarm system they’d had installed, and of course, Gimlet who was already jumping up and down in her excitement, would no doubt run right up the stairs into Mom and Dad’s room and hop onto their bed. Unexpected, I could scare someone to death even without benefit of a blaring alarm. I used my cell phone and when Mom answered, I asked her to come down and let me in. I had to bite my tongue to keep from saying, “Look what your six dates did to me!” But it wasn’t her fault, and to my mind, it wasn’t mine either. It was just the way life had of turning out rotten lately.

  The moment I saw her, I broke down again, and the whole story came tumbling out amid tears and sobs that shook my body. Mom and Dad took turns holding me until I was finally able catch my breath and my breathing returned to normal. Then exhausted, I took a deep breath and fell asleep on the couch next to Mom and Gimlet.

  I spent two days being as miserable as I knew how. Moping around the house and refusing to go anywhere Mom suggested. The usual diversions, movies on DVD, stacks of books, every magazine known to man, and cookbooks placed in front of me designed to allure, were useless. I was determined to sulk. And sulk I did until I heard the doorbell ring.

  “Would you get that sweetie? I’ve got my hands up to the elbows in meatloaf,” Mom called from the kitchen. Dutifully, I made my way to the front door, leaning over to look through the side panel as I approached. I could see parts of a big black limousine parked at the curb. Hell!

  Before I could decide on an evasive tactic, Matt moved from being directly in front of the door to a position that allowed him to peer into the side panel. Our eyes met. I pulled my shoulders back, closed my eyes and took a deep breath. Then I took my time unlocking the locks and opening the door. Instead of inviting him in, I squeezed through the opening I had created and stood beside him on the porch. Ever the gentleman, he moved back to allow me room and I watched as his face changed from concerned to enraged. My discourtesy and unwelcoming attitude had instantly brought him to the conclusion that no family emergency had beckoned me.

  “Is there a reason why you left so suddenly?” His eyes narrowed and I saw them go steely with silver glints. His lips firmed and were unyielding as he bit out, “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

  “And just how did you manage to find me?”

  “I hired someone,” he said through gritted teeth. “Now I want to know what the hell’s going on, why did you leave and why haven’t you called?”

  “I obviously didn’t feel that I needed to or I would have.”

  “You didn’t feel you needed—” His hand raked through his hair and he turned away just as I thought he was going to reach out and hit something.

  He stepped off the stoop and briskly strode to his car. Instantly the driver’s door opened and Jax came around to open a rear door.

  When Matt was almost to the curb, he turned and looked back at me. “You know I didn’t need this right now. I’ve got factory workers up in arms; there are threats turning up in the mail, and now this. If all you wanted was sex, you should have told me.”

  The rear door was open now and as Jax held it for him, Matt slid in. It was quickly closed and Jax all but ran to get in and pull way.

  I stood o
n the stoop watching as the big sedan eased from the curb and drove down the street. At the stop sign a signal flicked before turning left and disappearing around the corner. I hugged my arms around my elbows and rocked back and forth before I heard the door open behind me.

  “That was him, huh?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good looking man.”

  “Mmmhmm. But somebody else found him first,” I murmured as I turned around and walked into my mother’s arms.

  What had he meant by that parting remark, “If all you wanted was sex, you should have told me?” Wasn’t that all he had wanted? If he’d wanted a long-term affair, how the hell did he think we could hide that on the plantation?

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Strange Coincidences The next day Mom took me to her hairdresser’s. It wasn’t so much that I needed a trim or that she needed a perm, but that I needed a babysitter. She was afraid to leave me alone right now. So I sat and watched as Debbie curled my mom’s tresses. Her shop was old fashioned, like something out of the sixties. It was in an addition to her house, joined on one side by the kitchen and on the other by the garage. With only two beauty chairs, it was an intimate place to say the least. I hated that her name was Debbie. Every time I said it I saw Matt’s wife collapsed on the floor.