From Glowing Embers (24 page)

“You did the right thing.” This time her voice wasn’t steady. “At least for me. Was it right for you?”

“It was.”

“It’s been awkward. For you.” She looked at their hands. “And for Paige.”

He didn’t deny it. “We’re all adults.”

“Funny, sometimes I don’t feel very adult.”

His hand tightened around hers. “How do you feel?”

“Confused. Afraid. You made me face things I didn’t want to face. You made me feel things I never wanted to feel again.”

“You were right. It’s going to take time to put everything in perspective,” he said, as if trying to convince them both. “We’re both too raw not to feel confused.”

Julianna managed a smile when, oddly enough, what she wanted to do was cry. “We’ll put it in perspective, and we’ll go on the way we did before. Only now you’ll know I wish you well.’’ She lifted her eyes to meet his and thought of Paige’s plea to make the end of her relationship with Gray quick and clean. “And I do wish you well,” she added softly. “I wish you and Paige the happiness you and I never had a chance at.”

He didn’t look relieved. Instead he pulled her hand to his cheek. “I’m still a married man. Paige and I aren’t discussing our future until that changes.”

“That’ll change very soon. I won’t stand in your way, Gray. I don’t want anything from you. You must know that. The divorce will be easy to get.”

“You think it will be
easy
?”

She was surprised by his tone, a mixture of irony and pain. She was also surprised by her reaction, an astonishing surge of hope. “Won’t it be easy?”

“God no.”

“It’s been ten years. Surely we’re both used to not having a marriage. The divorce is a formality, nothing more.”

“Divorce is an end. We loved each other once.”

“That died with our daughter.”

“Did it?”

“Yes.”

He pulled her closer. “Did it?” he asked. “Can you remember exactly when it died? I can’t. I can remember when it began, and when I first recognized it. But, God help me, I can’t remember when love died.”

“Gray, no,” she said softly as his head bent toward hers. “This is going to make everything more difficult.”

“Could it possibly be more difficult?”

Despite her protests, Julianna knew she wanted this, too. When Gray found her mouth, her lips were already parted, expectant. Her hands rested on his shoulders, and as he pulled her closer, she stroked the back of his neck in tentative flutters. The rest of her protests remained unspoken.

Sometimes in dreams, where bitterness had been forgotten, she had remembered the feel of Gray’s lips on hers. She would awaken slowly, expecting to find him there, and then bitterness would return. Now she kissed him as she had kissed him so often in her dreams. Bitterness gone, her body’s sweet yearnings eclipsing doubt, she gave herself to him, and as she did, she realized that in spite of everything, a part of her had always been his.

And always would be.

She thought he sighed, and she knew his sadness came from the pain-pleasure of their reunion. How could something that felt so right hurt so much? How could each second bring them more pleasure as it also brought them closer to the kiss’s end?

She fought the inevitable by pressing against him, her breasts flattening against his chest, her fingers locking behind his head. He matched her desperation, sliding his hands down her back to settle them at her hips, positioning her so she was closer still.

Finally he tore his mouth from hers to cover her face with more kisses. She heard the ragged sound of his breathing and felt the rapid beat of his heart against her chest. The moan she heard was her own, a protest against his withdrawal, a protest against the Fates that had brought them together again, only to force them apart once more.

“No!” She clung to him, wanting the sweet oblivion of another kiss. She had a lifetime to face the loneliness and the what ifs. She did not want to start that lifetime now.

Gray pushed her head to his chest and held her as tightly as she held him. “I’ve never forgotten the way you felt in my arms.” He kissed the top of her head before he buried his face in her hair. “Never. I searched for you, Julianna. I hired people to search for you. I never forgot you.”

She hadn’t wanted to be found. Now she knew what a mistake that had been. “I moved every few months. I took different jobs everywhere I went, jobs no one else wanted. I was always looking over my shoulder, afraid you’d find me.”

“What were you afraid of? How could I have hurt you more?”

She clung to him, trying to make sense of his question. “I didn’t want you to find me,” she repeated.

“Why not?” Gently he pushed her away and lifted her chin so that their eyes were even. “What could I have done to you?”

She knew in that moment something she hadn’t known in all the years since she had packed one suitcase and left his parents’ house. Her eyes filled with tears, and she shook her head.

Gray wouldn’t accept her denial. “Tell me, Julianna. What were you afraid of?”

She couldn’t say the words. She knew they would choke her.

He said them for her. “In spite of everything, you still loved me when you left Granger Junction.”

She shook her head, but he was relentless. “You don’t want to believe it, not even now, but it’s true. You were afraid I’d ask you to stay out of pity, and you had too much pride to take a chance you might say yes.”

“I didn’t love you. I hated you.”

“You hated my father. Were you afraid of him?”

“No! He was a bastard, but I wasn’t afraid of him!”

“You could have faced him, but you couldn’t face me. You were afraid of love then, and you’ve been afraid of it ever since.”

“How do you know what I’m afraid of?” She tried to move away, but he held her.

“How many men have you loved?”

“Do you want a body count?” she asked angrily. “Shall we match lovers one for one?”

“Not lovers, damn it. Love. How many men have you loved?”

“How many women have
you
loved?” she countered without answering.

“There was a girl once,” he said, forcing his fingers apart so she was free. “She was all the sweetness and sunshine and warm-hearted devotion any man could ever ask for. Then, just as I realized what she meant to me, she was gone. Nothing I could do would bring her back.”

Julianna drew a shaky breath. “I loved a young man once. But the love turned into something else.”

“Pain, Julianna. Not hatred. If you had hated me, you wouldn’t have run. You ran because you loved me. The hatred came later.”

And now the hatred had fallen away like dead leaves in a storm. What a thin facade it had been to cover such a deep well of suffering. She dropped her head and closed her eyes. “It doesn’t matter. We’ve set each other free now.”

“I want to hear you say it.”

“Why?”

“I need to know. Can’t you give me that much?”

It seemed like little enough, yet she was frightened to say the words. She felt as if he were asking for something more. She opened her eyes and stared at her folded hands. “I didn’t hate you, not then. I was in such pain.”

“Did you still love me?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’ve never heard you lie before.”

Slowly she raised her eyes to his. She saw his pain, his questions, and she knew she couldn’t lie again.

“I loved you,” she whispered, tears welling in her eyes. “And I was so afraid you’d know it. I knew I couldn’t face your rejection. You would have been so kind, and it would have killed me, Gray. That would have been the thing that finally killed me.”

He looked stricken, although she knew he had already guessed the truth. His head moved from side to side in denial. “I sat at our daughter’s funeral, and I promised her I’d make you happy again. I promised Ellie that somehow, someday, I’d find a way to make you laugh again, and then I went home, and you were gone.”

“How could two people bring each other so much pain?”

“It wasn’t pain I felt when I kissed you.”

She knew that whatever his next words were to be, she couldn’t bear to hear them. They had come too far already. She got quickly to her feet. “You’ve fulfilled your promise to our daughter,” she said softly. “We’ve talked. You’ve explained.”

“The only laughter I’ve heard from you makes me want to cry.” Gray stood, too.

“I have my work, I have my friends. And now I understand the past. That’s much more than I ever thought I’d have.” She turned to go, but his hand on her arm stopped her.

“And love?”

She kept her face turned from his. “What did love ever bring me, Gray, that I’d want it in my life again?”

She felt his fingers tighten momentarily, then relax. Her arm was free. She left the room without looking back because she knew that if she did, she might not leave at all.

SOMETIME DURING THE
interminable night, Jody woke and began to cry. Outside, the wind howled frantically, a monster promising to devour everything in its path; inside, the bedroom was a velvet shroud smothering them both in the black terrors of the night. Murmuring encouragement, Julianna got up and found the candles she had taken as she had hurried from the living room, lighting one to penetrate the darkness. The flame wavered, a challenge to a draft that found its way through the sturdy walls, but the light comforted the little girl. She fell back asleep in minutes.

Julianna tucked the blanket more closely around Jody’s small body before she settled herself in an overstuffed chair near the table where the candle burned. The candle might comfort the little girl, but Julianna wasn’t comfortable letting it burn while they both slept.

Not that she’d been sleeping, anyway.

She had replayed her conversation with Gray until it was burned into her memory. Now she forced herself to think about Jody. The little girl would be gone soon, and the feel of a small warm body snuggled against her own would be nothing more than a memory.

In the last days Jody had taught her that she still wanted to be a mother. No matter how irrational or dangerous her longing, the longing for a child was still part of who she was.

Long ago she had learned not to reach for her heart’s desires, sure that the Fates would step in again and keep them just an arm’s length away. Even now she only rarely allowed herself to feel joy in her own accomplishments. She tried to feel nothing at all, cheating the Fates of their small victories.

But all along, from the moment she had packed a suitcase and escaped from the man she loved, who had she really cheated? The Fates, or herself?

What did she have to show for twenty-eight years?

And what did Gray have?

Who had been cheated?

She had been sure her defenses were as solid and sure as the house surrounding her, but now she knew that, like the house, her defenses were flawed. She only hoped the house was stronger than she was.

“Julianna?”

She opened her eyes at the whispered question, lifting her head to stare through the darkness at the wavering flame of a second candle protected by a man’s hand. “Gray?”

She watched as the flame moved closer to her chair. As he drew nearer, Gray came into focus.

“What’s wrong?” She stood, afraid they might wake Jody.

He spoke softly. “I’m afraid Eve’s made up her mind which island she wants. She’s heading right toward Oahu.”

She had suspected as much, but she was sorry to have it confirmed. “Where do they expect her to come ashore?”

“North of here, but I’m afraid we’re going to feel like she came just to see us.”

“I’ve felt that way since the first raindrop. Should we be getting ready?”

“We’ve done most of what we can. Now we just have to wait.”

“Why did you come to tell me, then?” She watched as the light moved lower. He set it on the table beside her own.

“I knew you wouldn’t be asleep. I wanted to be sure you were all right.”

“Jody was afraid of the dark.”

Gray nodded, touched by her devotion to the little girl. “And you know what that feels like, don’t you? Are you very frightened of the storm?”

She was surprised to realize she wasn’t, but not surprised that Gray would ask. “I was awake even before I got up to light the candle. But I’m okay.”

“Good.” Gray touched her shoulder. “Nothing’s going to happen to us. We’re up too high to flood, and as hurricanes go, this one’s small potatoes.”

“When is it due to hit?”

“Sometime between eight and nine. It’s four-thirty now. Do you want to stay here until Jody wakes up? Dillon thinks we should all wait out the worst of it in the den, and I’m inclined to agree.”

She thought of the cozy little room with few windows and nodded. They would feel safer together. “I’ll give her another hour or so, then I’ll get her up.”

Gray seemed reluctant to leave. “I feel like I’ve done this before.” He slid his hand down the length of her hair, lifting a thick lock and draping it over her shoulder. “Do you remember the night on Granger Inlet when we waited out the storm together?”

“Gray,” she warned, “we’re not alone.”

“Maybe not, but there’s more that has to be said.”

“Please, haven’t we said everything?”

“Not nearly everything.”

“Then we’ve said enough.”

“Not nearly enough. Not nearly the most important things.”

“This is no time—”

“Julianna, you can’t ignore what’s happening between us. Neither of us can.”

The room fell silent except for the fierce sound of the wind intensifying in a slow crescendo. Julianna didn’t even want to breathe.

“We can’t avoid this,” Gray said at last when it was clear she wasn’t going to answer him. “We can’t pretend we feel nothing.”

Once begun, her words conveyed her desperation. “As soon as you’re away from here you’ll feel differently.”

“If I go away and I still feel the same, what then?”

“What about Paige?”

He was silent. It was a question he had asked himself all through the long, sleepless night.

Julianna read his silence accurately. “There’s no room for you in my life,” she said, turning away.