Save the Date (32 page)

Clutching the package, she crossed the hall and stood before his door. Though this wasn’t a peace offering, she was about to be the big one and step over enemy lines.

She knocked softly, and when he didn’t answer after a moment, she pushed the door open.

His room was empty. Looking out his terrace, a light shone below on the beach. He must’ve gone down there to get some alone time. And she was about to interrupt it.

Lucy’s feet sank into the cool sand as she stepped off the narrow wooden boardwalk. The grass in the dunes whispered in the warm breeze as she headed toward Alex.

Chair slung back low, his hands rested on his stomach as he stared at the crackling fire in front of him. Her heart folded in half.

Alex spoke before she did. “My dad gave me Will’s Bible.”

Her toes dug into the sand as she settled into the seat beside him. “I can’t think of a more perfect gift.” The flames flickered, giving her a darkened view of his somber profile. The novelty of looking at him would never wear off. Years from now she’d see him on the cover of a magazine in the grocery checkout line and still think he was the most beautiful man she’d ever met. He was more elegant, even now in his khaki shorts and Warriors T-shirt, than she was in her best dress.

Lucy forced herself to focus on the job at hand. “I’m not here to apologize.”

His eyes fell on the blue-and-white package in her arms. “If that’s an explosive device, I’d ask that you’d at least spare the others.”

“You’re safe. For now.” She held it out, growing more uncertain with each passing second. “I didn’t want to give this to you in front of everyone. It’s nothing big. I mean, it’s just a little something I made, so it’s not some major thing or—”

“Lucy”—he took the gift from her bumbling hands—“you’re doing that thing again.”

“What?”

“That thing where you wave your inferiority complex around like an Olympic flag.”

Why had she come down here again? She should’ve just gone with instinct number two and headed straight to bed.

His fingers traveled under the seam and tape as he peeled open the layers of the package, taking special care as if it were a precious treasure. Wrapping paper removed, he lifted the lid of the box and looked inside.

Alex ran his hand over the raised letters of the photo album.
The Life of Will Sinclair
. His eyes lifted.

“Open it,” she whispered.

He stared at her a moment longer as if he might refuse. Finally, he flipped to the first page and then another. There was a picture of him and Will, toddlers on the beach. Will hanging from a tree as seven-year-old Alex stood below and laughed. The two boys in their blue high school graduation gowns.

He was only a quarter of the way through when he shut the book. Leaning his head back against the chair, his gaze searched hers. “I . . . I don’t know what to say.”

She shrugged. “It’s too dark to really see. I know it’s nothing, really. Just something—”

“Don’t—don’t do that.” He set the album in his chair and dropped to his knees in front of her. “It
is
something. You did this for me.” His voice was rough, questioning as his hands held hers. “How?”

The waves charged the beach only to slide back out again, and though the moon shone overhead, the warmth of the long-gone sun still heated Lucy’s skin. “Your mom helped me. I got her to e-mail me a ton of pictures. I’m sure it took her forever, so it’s a wonder she still likes me.”

“She adores you.” His gaze on hers was so intense, she wanted to look away. “How could anyone not?” And then he kissed her.

His lips touched hers with an urgency that threatened to swallow her whole. Lucy tasted salt as she wrapped her arms around his neck. He held on to her like a lifeline, as if she were a balm for his fractured heart. She was drowning in him and helpless to stop it. Didn’t even know if she wanted to.

Alex lifted his head.

Their eyes met. Breath's mingled.

His thumb swept across her bottom lip.

His heart beat beneath her palm.

Lucy’s pulse whipped wildly as he slid his hands down her arms and joined their hands. “Thank you, Lucy Wiltshire.”

“You’re welcome.”

“No one’s ever done something like that for me.”

The lantern cast shadows across his face, but she knew it was nothing compared to the ones draped over his soul. “Maybe in the next few days you can look at the rest of it.” She squeezed his hands. “You have an amazing family, Alex. They love you. And I know your brother did too. It’s so obvious in those pictures.”

He slowly nodded. “It’s hard to be around them right now.”

“Nobody’s asking you to earn your time here. Your brother wouldn’t want you to live your life like you’re being pursued by the hounds of hell.”

“I failed him, Lucy.”

“No, you didn’t. You’re your own person. You don’t have to save children and dodge mortar fire like him.”

“I just want to be more. I want my life to stand for something.”

“It does.” Releasing his hand, she trailed her fingers through the dark hair and cupped his face. “You’re a good man who’s doing good things. At what point are you going to be satisfied with that and give yourself permission to slow down?”

“I don’t know.” He shook his head. “I just know I can’t right now.”

There was nothing else she could say. Somehow his hurt had become hers, but he would have to be the one to accept the truth.
God, open his eyes
.

Alex cleared his throat as he moved away from her. “I have something for you too. Don’t go anywhere.” He jogged back to the house, leaving Lucy alone on the beach with her racing thoughts and the lulling waves.

A few minutes later he returned, his feet heavy on the sand. He carried a pink gift bag, stuffed at the top with plumes of tissue paper that shimmied in the wind.

Happiness was a fine wine, and Lucy drank it in. She made quick work of removing the paper and what she saw had tears brimming in her eyes.

Star Trek

Season Two: Episode 19

A Private Little War

“Oh.” It was an original script from the show. “Oh my.”

He tapped his finger on the cover page. “That right there is—”

“William Shatner’s signature!” She couldn’t catch her breath.

“You’re not going to pass out again, are you?”

She couldn’t stop looking at Alex. At the script. And back to Alex. “Where did you find this?”

“I have my ways.” His smile was lopsided as he shoved his hands into his pockets. “I tracked it down when your Leonard Nimoy picture got trashed.”

She sniffed the ocean air. “I love it.”

“Hey, none of that.” He brushed a tear away from her cheek. “You know I can’t stand that stuff.”

“This is . . . amazing. It’s Captain Kirk. It’s—”

Love.

It was love.

The words opened in her heart like a rusty trap.

Alex had become her friend, her champion. In some ways, he knew her better than Morgan. Certainly better than Matt. He had seen her at her best and worst. He made her laugh. Made her think.

But Alex was sports riddles and tuxedos. Designer suits and homes on the coast.

And she was none of those things.

Closing her eyes, Lucy cursed her stupidity. She adored a man who would never love her back. One who had an agenda that didn’t include a wife and family.

“Is something wrong?”

Yes
, she thought miserably as Alex pulled her close. Something was wrong.

She had gone and fallen in love with her fiancé.

Chapter Thirty-five

I
t was week-old meat loaf. A cloud of old lady perfume. Bug guts on the windshield. Love . . . was nauseating.

“For the second time, Lucy, I’m holding up two pictures. Which one is Representative Shively’s wife?”

Clare sat beside Lucy at the breakfast table, clutching her beloved flash cards. In a matter of minutes Alex would pick her up for church. Instead of the regular service, they were going to help with Chuck’s youth group. Alex had warned that the closer they got to the election, the less they’d see each other. It had been a week since they had left the beach. Enough time to dislodge this ridiculous notion that she was in love with him. She’d held this wild hope that the miserable thing she felt for Alex was nothing but a crush. Perhaps one could even label it an addiction. But no.

It was the big fat L word. And it hadn’t gone away.

“Lucy—”

“The one on the right.” She sighed and picked up her coffee mug.

“You may think this is juvenile, my dear, but these women are connected to very important allies for your intended.”

Well, she wasn’t going to marry him, so what was the point? Society functions had gotten much easier, though they still wore her down. This week she had even attended some with Clare, though it was pure drudgery when Alex wasn’t there. She just didn’t fit in with the political elite and wealthy highbrows of South Carolina. She was never going to be a sparkle.

“You did an excellent job at Tuesday’s fund-raiser.” Clare returned the pictures to the bottom of the stack on her lap. She’d been quizzing Lucy since Julian had served them pancakes and bacon. Forty-five minutes ago. “Except for mistaking Mrs. Peabody for her mother, you had an almost flawless night. Much improved.” Her hand reached out to pat Lucy’s. “Much improved.”

Lucy checked her watch. Alex wouldn’t arrive for another ten minutes. He was ever prompt, but never early. She missed his face. That scent that was his alone. And his laugh. He had called her every day, but instead of rushing to grab her phone like usual, she had often let it go to voice mail. The election was coming up, and they would soon part ways. He would ride off into the Congressional sunset, and she would go back to being a nonprofit worker and social misfit. It was time to put some boundaries between them and wean herself from the drug known as Alex Sinclair.

“Would you like to discuss your father?”

Lucy’s head lifted at Clare’s random question. She still resented the term
father
. It was a title that needed to be earned, and supplying the other half of her genes did not count for anything in her way of thinking.

“No.” Lucy’s tone was clipped. “I know all I need to.”

“I know you don’t owe me anything.” Clare’s face may have been retouched with a surgeon’s fairy wand, but right now she looked every bit of her seventy-six years. “But you owe it to yourself to forgive him. To let the bitterness go. And maybe . . . forgive me as well.”

There was too much in Lucy’s head screaming for attention.

“All I ask is that you don’t hate him,” Clare said. “He led a very spoiled, indulged life. I’m to blame for that.”

“No.” Lucy stood in her black heels. “You’re a wonderful person, Clare.” There. She’d said it. “You may not have let him fall on his face enough growing up, but at a certain point he had to take responsibility. He had many chances to reach out to me. But he didn’t. And it’s not your fault.”

“Do you really think I’m . . . wonderful?”

Lucy couldn’t bring herself to elaborate and give Clare the words she knew she needed to hear. “You are much improved.” Her lips curved in a small smile. “Much improved.”

“One day . . . I do hope you will forgive me.”

Lucy didn’t know what to say. In her head she had forgiven her, but there was such lingering bitterness in her heart. She and Clare had forged an unlikely alliance—lived together, worked together—but never quite crossed over into friendship.

Sniffing her regal nose, her grandmother brushed away the moment with a sweep of her hand. “Anyway, on to new business.”

“I know.” Lucy mentally pulled up her social calendar as she lifted her mug. “I have the literacy council tea on Tuesday and the rural cooperative event on Wednesday night.”

“That’s not what I want to discuss,” Clare said. “I want to talk about you and Alex. I’ve noticed some troubling developments this week.”

The coffee tasted bitter on her tongue. “There’s no trouble. No developments. No troubling developments.”

Clare’s thin eyebrow arched. “No matter what you think of me, I’m not blind. I’ve noticed that you’ve spent the majority of the week moping about. At first I thought you were missing your groom-to-be.” Her hawk-eyes pinned Lucy in place. “But then a little birdie informed me you weren’t taking Alex’s calls.”

“A little bird?” Lucy asked. “Or a snitch named Julian?” He could forget further invitations to the Hobbits’ meetings.

“I believe we covered the importance of discretion in week two,” Clare said. “I don’t reveal my sources.”

“There’s nothing wrong between me and Alex.”

“Something is amiss. Was there a fight? A misunderstanding? I only ask because it’s important that you two present a united, happy front. You may think you can fool the world, but you cannot.”

Actually, she thought they were doing a pretty good job.

“Has he hurt you?” Clare’s face was full of concern, and guilt squeezed Lucy’s conscience. “Because I simply won’t have it. He’s lucky to have you. You’re a diamond among gems, and any man should thank his lucky stars for you in his life.”

Now Lucy was the one taken aback. The look in Clare’s blue eyes was nothing less than fierce.

“I am not one to exaggerate,” she continued. “You are smart, kindhearted, and wonderful to those girls. Even though I don’t always approve of your reading material or lack of updos, I do believe Alex has the better end of the bargain.”

Lucy could hear the grandfather clock in the sitting room
dong
the half hour. “Don’t be silly.” The words wove through her heart, bringing as much ache as joy. She wanted to believe the picture Clare had painted.

“I do not jest. You are worthy of the finest man. Your mother raised a wonderful young woman, and it pains me to see you reject my praise.”

And Lucy realized Clare was right. The girls at Saving Grace didn’t even have one decent parent, but she had been blessed with a wonderful mother. Her mom had withheld a life-changing secret, but Lucy couldn’t hold that against her any longer. She would cherish the memory of her mom, who had done all she could to provide for Lucy— and protect her.