A Perfectly Imperfect Match (Matchmaking Mamas) (21 page)

“Does that ‘last breath’ passage belong to the parent or the child?” she asked suspiciously.

“Either.” John took a sip of the one glass of red wine he allowed himself with his dinner. And then, just like that, he changed the subject. “You’ll never guess who called on me the other day.”

Since her father knew enough people to populate a small state, guessing who that “someone” had been could become a full-time project for the next year and a half. Rather than even try, she gamely asked, “Who?”

“That young man who threw his parents an anniversary party.”

Never in a million years would she have even thought to say Jared’s name. She stared at her father, nearly speechless.

Finally, she was able to utter, “You’re kidding.”

“I do kid on occasion,” Dr. Stephens admitted freely, “but this is not one of those occasions. He was worried about you, the young man,” he clarified. “Very worried. When he couldn’t find you, he went looking for me to find out if you were all right. A man like that,” he told his daughter, pinning her in place with a look, “is well worth knowing.” Finished with the menu, he set it off to the side. “We talked for a while. He seems like a very nice young man, Elizabeth. Decent and thoughtful,” he added, watching his daughter’s face for some sort of sign as to how she felt, although he was fairly certain he knew.

Avoiding his eyes, she stared at her napkin instead. “He is,” she told her father quietly.

“I see. And yet you have decided to pull a disappearing act on this young man because...?” he asked, waiting to hear what sort of an excuse she had come up with.

How could he even ask, after what she’d watched him go through all those years ago? And even now, he still elected to remain alone and not even so much as attempt dating another woman.

“Because I don’t want to get hurt, Dad, okay?” she fired back a bit testily.

He had done his homework, speaking to Theresa Manetti about the young man in question. Everything he had learned recently told him that the woman had made a very good choice when she’d recommended Jared Winterset as someone who would be good for his daughter and would always treat her well.

But for the sake of moving the situation along, he pretended to know nothing. “Then he didn’t treat you well,” he surmised.

She wasn’t about to lie. “No, he treated me very well.”

Her father went on to the next logical assumption. “But you just don’t like him.”

She lowered her eyes again, pretending to read the menu. “No, I do,” she admitted very softly, feeling fresh wounds beginning to open up again.

John put it all together for his daughter. “Then if he treats you well and you like him—and he obviously likes you after all the trouble he’s gone to in order to find me—I fail to see why you have suddenly decided to understudy Houdini.”

She closed her eyes for a moment, feeling tears of frustration gathering just beneath her lids. “Because I remember what you went through when Mom died, that’s why,” she answered hoarsely.

“You remember,” he repeated thoughtfully. “Then you also remember how having you and your brothers around gave me a reason to live, a reason to go on. And you also remember all the happy, rich moments that existed in our home when your mother was still alive, still well.” His voice welled with emotion. “I wouldn’t have traded one moment of that brief time together for a lifetime of uninspired tranquillity free of any gut-wrenching pain.”

The waiter approached their table, ready to take their orders, but John waved him back.

“Soon, but not yet,” he told the young man. Leaning over the table as the waiter retreated, he took Elizabeth’s hand in his own. “Oh, my darling daughter, you have no idea how incredibly fortunate I felt, finding your mother. And how very rare it is when two truly kindred souls actually manage to discover one another.

“If you and Jared
are
kindred souls, don’t turn your back on what you can have out of fear that it won’t last a lifetime. No matter how short a time it
does
last, I promise you, it will
fill
your lifetime.” A fond smile curved his mouth as he remembered his life back then. “Loving your mother made me feel alive for the first time in my life, and the short time I had with her gave me three wonderful children who make my life worth living,” he told her with her quiet emotion.

She swallowed hard, deeply moved by what her dad was saying, and nodded at him to continue.

“If I had only one wish for you, Elizabeth, it would be that you embrace what is there right in front of you and savor it for as long as you have it. Your heart will thank you for it.
Always.
”

And then he turned and signaled the waiter. The food server came alert and headed back to their table. “We’re ready to place our orders now,” he told the young man.

* * *

Okay, no question about it, Jared decided as he stopped what he was doing to listen again. He was definitely going crazy.

There really wasn’t any other conclusion for him to reach. Ever since Elizabeth had walked out on him—and there was no other way to view her sudden disappearing act once he knew she was all right—he’d tried to literally bury himself in his work. His goal was to keep so busy that he didn’t have time to dwell on the loneliness that was eating away at him.

Loneliness that had never existed before Elizabeth came into his life.

So maybe what he was hearing now, slaving away in his office after hours on another major national ad campaign, was just a product of his encroaching exhaustion.

Why else would he be hearing music when everything, except for the somewhat anemic heating unit, was shut down?

And not just music,
violin
music.

The kind that Elizabeth played.

You’d think at least his mind would be on his side instead of slowly driving him insane, unhinging him like this, he thought.

He sighed, abandoning his work and dragging both hands through his hair in abject frustration.

Maybe, he decided, he should just go home and get drunk, or try to erase Elizabeth from his mind for at least a few hours by popping a couple of sleeping pills to help him get some rest.

The only problem with that was that he didn’t
have
a couple of sleeping pills. He’d never had trouble sleeping before she’d upended his life.

All right, then, maybe if—

Damn it, that
did
sound so real. And so close.

To prove to himself that he was imagining all this, that there
was
no music, Jared pushed himself back from his desk.

Walking out of his glass-enclosed inner office, he threw open the outer door leading into the corridor.

That was when he stopped dead.

He was not only
hearing
things, but now he was
seeing
them as well.

Right?

Even though he knew she had to be a product of his overworked brain, he heard himself ask uncertainly, “Elizabeth?”

She’d stopped playing the moment the door had opened. It was very hard to play, she discovered, with your heart backed up in your throat.

“Hi,” she whispered in a barely audible voice. “Have any requests?”

“Yes,” he said, still not a hundred percent sure he wasn’t carrying on a conversation with some complex hallucination. “I want answers, like, what are you doing here?”

“Playing the violin.” The simple reply sounded almost flippant to her ear, so Elizabeth added, “Trying to make amends by serenading you.”

“Serenading me,” he echoed incredulously.

She nodded. “It’s really the only way I know to show you how very deeply sorry I am. I let the violin speak for me.”
And hope it’s enough,
she added silently.

Jared’s eyes never left hers. She could almost
feel
them delving into her soul. He was neither smiling nor frowning. His expression was entirely unreadable and that in turn made her feel very nervous.

It also made her think that she might have just willfully destroyed her chances of ever attaining paradise. Because, belatedly, she realized that was what life with him would have meant.

Paradise.

“I’d rather you spoke, not played,” he said.

It took her a long moment to find her courage. “I was afraid,” she finally told him after a beat. “I know it sounds stupid, but I was afraid,” she repeated. “Afraid I loved you too much, afraid that losing you would destroy me the way I thought losing my mother had destroyed my father.”

“I met your father,” he replied in a voice still devoid of any emotion. “He didn’t seem all that destroyed to me.”

“That’s because his love for my mother made him strong,” she explained. She hadn’t realized that before, but now, it seemed so obvious. How could she have missed that? “He told me that. He also said something to the effect that the precious moments he’d spent with my mother was worth far more than an entire lifetime of bland, cocooned safety. He advised me to seize what I was lucky enough to have—if I still have it,” she added, deliberately looking at Jared and waiting for him to tell her, one way or another, if her apology had come too late to do any good.

If she had hurt him too much to be forgiven.

Rather than answer her directly, Jared took her by the hand and led her back into his office.

Closing the door, still maintaining a distance between them, he began to speak. He started by bringing up the past, just as she had done.

“My father once told me that when he first saw my mother, he just knew. Knew that she was different. Knew that she was special. That she was, in effect, ‘the one.’ The one he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

“Until just recently, I thought it was just some nice little bedtime story he’d woven together for Megan and me when we were kids. A fairy-tale love story that had very little truth in it. But now I realize that it actually
can
happen. That sometimes, if you’re very, very lucky, lightning
does
strike you and your path actually
does
cross with the one you were meant to be with.
Destined
to be with,” he emphasized.

Elizabeth blew out a shaky breath. Part of her was more afraid than she’d ever been in her life. Afraid to hope that he was offering her everything she’d ever wanted. And still afraid in some deep part of herself that if he was saying what she hoped he was saying and she in turn said yes, that she
would
be leaving herself open to an entire world of hurt.

But practically, if she said no, if she suddenly still retreated and walked away in order to stay “protected,” how much less would she ache? How much less would she really hurt?

She suspected that the damage was already done.

This way, at least she would get to build up a stockpile of happy memories first, before she had her heart ripped out from her chest.

And who knew? Maybe she’d be even luckier and never feel the grief of death because she would be the first to go, not him.

It was risky, but there was at least a fighting chance of coming out ahead if she took a chance on love. At any rate, she’d be condemned to a life of eternal sorrow and regret if she continued to play it safe.

“So, what are you saying?” she asked. “That you want me back?”

“No, not ‘back.’ I never gave you up to begin with. I want you for forever, Elizabeth. I want you until the day one of us dies, and hopefully that won’t be for a very long time.” Well, he’d placed all his cards on the table. It was time to find out if he was destined to be a winner, or a loser. “What do you say?”

She felt as if she were dreaming.

But if she were dreaming, would she be trembling this way? Would her heart be overflowing with such incredible joy?

She ran her tongue along her lips before she answered, afraid they would stick together in midword. “You make it very hard to say no.”

“Lady, I’m going to make it impossible to say no,” he promised her firmly.

She couldn’t help teasing him, now that she finally realized that all her wishes could come true. “You know, in some states that’s called stalking.”

Unfazed, he countered with, “And in other states, it’s telling you that I’ll love you until the day I die.”

“You love me,” she repeated incredulously. That was the only logical upshot of all this, but she was having trouble fathoming the reason. After all, he really hadn’t said anything about having feelings for her before. On the contrary, he’d made it seem that if he couldn’t have the perfect relationship, he didn’t want any at all. “Why?”

“Because I’m into self-torture,” he said drily. “Why do you think?” he asked. When she didn’t answer, he told her. “Because even though you ran over my self-esteem with a steamroller, you are still the most exciting, the most intelligent, most wonderful woman I have ever known, and my life feels as if all the lights have gone out of the world whenever you’re not around.”

Oh God, how had she gotten to be so lucky? she wondered. “Yes!” she cried out loud.

“Yes?” Just what was she saying yes to? That she agreed with him, that she would stay with him, that she would marry him or that she knew she was the power source in his life?

“Yes,” she breathed again. “To everything. Most of all,” she said, weaving her arms around his neck, “yes to you.”

He smiled into her eyes, relieved and happier than he’d ever been. “I can live with that.”

“As long as you live with me, everything else is just icing,” she murmured.

“I’ve always had a weakness for icing,” he said just before he sealed his lips to hers.

* * * * *

Keep reading for an excerpt of
A Cold Creek Noel
by RaeAnne Thayne!