Just Destiny (9 page)

“Jenny,” Ted called after her.

She continued walking toward the car as if it were her lifeline.

“Jenny.” Ted darted in front of her. Jenny pulled up short of running into him and stared at the hand he held up. She scrutinized at her maroon leather wallet as if she’d never seen it before. “You forgot this.”

Ted awkwardly pushed it at her. “Why don’t I drive you home?”

Jenny looked at Gabe’s son a long minute. Why did he have her wallet? She took her wallet and stuffed it in her purse before moving around him. Ted put an arm around her shoulders and guided her to the passenger’s side.

He held out his hand. “I’ll drive.”

She handed Ted the keys, and they set off with Alex and Judith leading the sad, short procession.

The ride home passed in a surreal blur. Ted drove through the darkening country roads and the light highway traffic with smooth confidence, reminding her of his father. If she looked at his hands only, she could almost pretend it was Gabe behind the wheel. Long slender fingers with short, clipped nails. Strong hands. Caring hands. She abruptly turned away, not wanting to encourage the fantasy.

Lip trembling and eyes stinging with welling tears, she watched the blurry landscape flash by. Gabe was gone. To pretend otherwise would be foolish and painful. Luckily, they didn’t need to pass the road where the accident had happened. Poor Ted tried to make conversation, but she even had trouble responding with monosyllabic answers.

Once home, Judith and the kids tried to persuade her to stay with them, at least until the funeral was over. Their concern touched Jenny. She wasn’t looking forward to staying alone in the house, but she gracefully declined their kind offer. There was no use putting it off.

With a brave smile, Jenny stood outside in the crisp night air and waved them away. She watched the headlights disappear and wrapped her arms tightly around her waist in a feeble attempt to ward off both the cold and the house full of memories that awaited her.

A high-pitched whine and yelp drew Jenny’s attention to a large shadow standing in the path between their and Steve’s houses. Ritz leaped forward, her golden coat glowing copper in the bright moonlight. Jenny wondered how long the man and canine had been standing there. She crouched down to ruffle the dog’s soft coat and inhale her dusty doggie scent.

Holding Ritz close, she buried her face in the dog’s neck, happy to have something solid and familiar to hang onto. Thrilled at her mistress’s return, Ritz squirmed out of her embrace and enthusiastically licked her face until she tipped Jenny backwards, plopping her onto her bottom in the middle of the drive. With a choked laugh, she pushed the dog away and took the hand Steve extended to her. He pulled Jenny off the ground, then released her.

Steve took in her appearance. With one unsteady finger, he gently brushed her tangled hair away from her face. His mouth opened and then he bowed his head and washed a hand across his face. He didn’t know what to say. He couldn’t imagine the depth of her loss. Jenny had loved Gabe so much. And Gabe had adored her. Jenny had basked and blossomed in Gabe’s love and approval. And now he was gone. She must be feeling so alone and empty.

Abruptly he turned from her and walked behind the house to the lawn overlooking the lake. The covered speedboat hung high over the glistening water, ready for winter. Waiting, yet prepared. There hadn’t been any preparation for the tragedy now confronting them. No warning at all. Hands on his hips, Steve’s shoulders rose and fell with his struggle for composure.

He felt Jenny behind him but couldn’t look at her—he needed a minute.
Get it together, Grant
. He swallowed hard and cleared his throat. “When’s the funeral?”

“Friday. Judith helped with the arrangements. She’s been really great.”

“Are the kids okay?”

This was good. She could talk about mundane facts. It helped push the pain aside. “They will be. Ted drove me home—which was a good thing. I’ve been in such a fog I’d probably have ended up in Canada.”

“I would have helped.” He sounded gruff, almost hurt.

“I know—but there was really nothing for you to do.”

Steve stared at the lake. “He didn’t suffer any, did he?” He alternately frowned and blinked, before sinking to the ground as if his legs could no longer support him.

Jenny looked at the top of Steve’s bent head through wide eyes. This strong man who’d endured so much—the precipitous end of his professional baseball career followed by the indignity of constantly having to prove he wasn’t a dumb jock. He’d fought it all with very little complaint, but now he sat crumpled in grief, brought down by the thought of his friend suffering a painful death.

“No.” She knelt next to him. “Gabe didn’t suffer at all. He never knew what hit him.”

Steve buried his face in tented arms, shutting out the world, alone in his pain. Jenny’s shaking hand hovered over his back before gently patting him. At her tentative touch he turned from her.

Jenny wrapped her arms loosely around him in an awkward hug. She rested her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes. She was tired. Bone deep tired. And he hurt so much, it radiated off him in waves, pulsing through him in an all too familiar rhythm.

Steve slipped his arms around her, seizing her waist in a grip of steel, making it impossible for Jenny to draw in a deep breath. They clung to each other for a long, calming minute, silently waiting for the grief to lessen.

These past miserable days she’d been so afraid, so alone. God, it felt good to be enclosed in strong male arms again. To feel comforted and secure. In his arms, she could pretend the nightmare of the past few days never occurred.

But it had. Heated and soaked by tears, Jenny peeled away. The cold autumn air chilled her as she inched back, suddenly self-conscious.

“Sorry.” Steve rolled to his feet and put a good yard between them.

Sorry for hugging her or sorry for crying in front of her? The bright moon highlighted the flush darkening his face. Steve thrust his hands in his pocket and scowled at the ground. Jenny slowly got to her feet. Great, now everything was weird between them. She couldn’t do
anything
right. She bit her bottom lip hard, then released it.

“Nothing to be sorry for.” And everything. “This sucks. It just…sucks.” She threaded shaky fingers through her hair in an impatient gesture. “It’s just—” She frowned and closed her eyes against the tears. “It’s just
so hard
.” She bowed her head, then whispered. “And I lost the baby.”

“What?”

She blinked up at him. “After the accident, I miscarried. I don’t know if it was the fall or the stress…they said it was most likely a chromosomal abnormality,” she shrugged. “Doesn’t matter why, it’s gone too.”

I’m such a failure. Everything I love leaves me
.

“Ahhh, com’ere.” Steve reached out and hauled her into his arms in a light grasp. With a hand at the back of her head, he pressed her tightly against his chest. His button dug into her cheek. “It’s all right. Cry. Let it out.”

Jenny wiped remnant tears from her eyes and ran a hand under her nose. Turning her head sideways, she stared at the darkened house she and Gabe had spent hours planning to remodel, sharing their lives, and talking about their dreams. They’d picked out every tile, every faucet, every paint color—everything—together. They’d debated and compromised over each piece of furniture. There was so much of them in that house. So many memories embedded in every wall, in the very air.

Jenny had thought their home would embrace and comfort her, making her feel safe, like wrapping herself in an ultrasoft blanket and reading a book in front of a fire on a blizzardy day, but now that she was here, it wasn’t that way at all. Those same memories felt like ghosts waiting to prey on her pain. Suddenly anguish and aching loneliness branched out from their home, reaching out with invisible stinging tentacles.

“I can’t go in there,” she whispered. “I thought I could.” She pulled away. Her eyes widened in panic as the words spewed out of her in a desperate, chaotic hurry. “It’s our—and I know I should—but I just can’t.” Her voice cracked.

“Hey, it’s okay. You don’t have to.”

“No. I have to.” She nodded. “Because he’ll—he’ll be—” She drew in a ragged breath. “I have to—” she spit out in between sobs. “Oh, God. He’s—not—there,” she wailed, clutching her stomach.

Steve caught Jenny as she crumpled. Scooping her up in his arms, he cradled her close like he’d done to Sophie a hundred times, and carried her into his house. Unlike his girlfriend’s daughter who always circled his neck with her chubby little arms, Jenny curled in on herself, lost in misery.

Moving into his family room, Steve pushed Ritz aside and settled on the leather couch. Jenny sat on his lap, coiled against his chest. Her sobs eventually quieted, but her breathing still sounded ragged, as if dragging the very life from her throat one rough, raw gasp at a time. He stroked her arm and brushed the damp hair from her face, wishing he could take on her agony.

“It’s okay. It’s okay, Jen. You’ll get through this.” He gulped. A lone tear seeped out the corner of his eye. “We’ll get through this.”

“I—I—,” she sobbed.

“I know. I know. It’s okay,” he murmured.

Her chest lifted in a big sigh. “I’m
so
tired.”

Looking at her bruised, closed eyes, he continued stroking her hair. “No doubt.”

“Don’t wanna be alone.” She rubbed her cheek against his chest as if snuggling into a pillow.

“You’re not alone. I’m here.” He patted her back. “Go to sleep, Jenny.”

Jenny sighed. Her body relaxed heavily against his chest and side as she drifted off to an exhausted slumber. Steve stared at her small hand, now lying over his heart. Her diamond engagement ring twinkled in the moonlight, mocking him. It seemed like she’d always held his heart in the palm of her hand. Pretty much from the very beginning.

As Jenny slept, he memorized every line of her face, determined to imprint this forbidden moment forever. He was engaged; they’d never be this close again. They shouldn’t be this close now—and wouldn’t be if grief and exhaustion hadn’t consumed her.

He should shift her off his lap and onto the couch. Put a little distance between them. He could tuck the afghan around her and she’d never miss him. He wouldn’t leave, just move to the chair—or the floor. The chair. That’s what he’d do.

After twenty minutes, Steve reached out and snagged the blanket his mother had knitted for his high school graduation from the back of the couch. Carefully settling it around her, he shifted under Jenny and gently pressed a feather-light kiss to the top of her head.

Just a few more minutes.

* * *

Early the next morning Jenny stretched, trying to ease the painful crick in her neck. She burrowed close to the hard chest, seeking the comforting warmth and steady heartbeat next to her ear. Ritz whined and licked her hand. Why hadn’t Gabe let her outside?

Jenny pried one arid eyelid back and looked around the room, frowning at the unfamiliar framed pictures on the mantel and the leather Lazy boy recliner with a picture book lying across the arm. Large white Reeboks, still knotted as if they’d been carelessly kicked off, rested under the glass coffee table. Steve’s family room.

Gabe’s accident. Leaving the hospital. Their empty house. Jenny inched away from a sleeping Steve, putting a few centimeters between their bodies. She carefully lifted her leg from across his. Last night came flooding back. The tears, the pain of loss…oh Lord—he’d carried her back here and held her until she’d fallen asleep—like a baby or…

Her eyes slowly widened, then she winced at the memories. A low moan of embarrassment started in her throat; she slapped a hand over her mouth. Shoot! She didn’t want to wake him. Slowly she rolled her head sideways, fearing she’d find him awake, watching her.

Steve slept inches away, sprawled on his back with one arm pinned behind her shoulder and the other thrown across his lean waist. With full lips slightly parted, he puffed out tiny breaths as he slept. Faint morning stubble bristled his jaw and upper lip, and a restless night mussed his light brown hair.

In the weak morning light none of the crushing sorrow or fear of being alone that tormented Jenny last night surfaced, making her feel foolish and threatened.

They’d cried together. He’d held her. Carried her. She closed her eyes and wished the memory away. How awkward. She was married for God’s sake and Steve was her friend. Steve was Gabe’s friend. It was weird. Wrong. It was wrong. She was wrong. Again.

Ritz licked her face and nudged her arm. Jenny patted her head and pushed her back.
I know you need to go out
. She slowly eased out of the crook of Steve’s arm and slid off the couch onto the floor. Not wanting him to miss her warmth, she quickly tucked the blanket around him before slipping from the room.

Like a teenager breaking curfew, she and Ritz snuck out the back door. She scanned the neighborhood for snoopy neighbors and the newspaper boy before running across the drive through the path to her own home.

In her bedroom, Jenny paused by Gabe’s side of the bed and the framed picture of them in Maui. One finger lightly traveled the cold glass above Gabe’s face. A roving photographer at the luau had snapped the photo of them. Gabe had surprised her with it on the last night of their honeymoon.

Their faces were softly illuminated by the firelight as they shared a tender look. They’d been so happy. Just being together had lit a comforting glow in her soul. Jenny sighed. Now she was cold, empty, and alone. And she deserved it. She’d snuffed out their glow, first with rash, harsh words and then last night’s…weakness.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out Gabe’s watch, warmed by the heat of her thigh. Holding it tightly she stroked the back. “I’m sorry.” She rubbed it harder as if she could erase her misdeed. “Sorry. Sorry. Sorry.”

No matter how innocent, she’d still fallen asleep with a man who wasn’t her husband. Even if it was just Steve, they’d been too close. Jenny wanted to scream at her stupidity; instead she carefully placed the watch on her nightstand and stripped her clothes off on the way to the bathroom.