Love Remains (36 page)

Tingles crawled up Zarah’s arm from the small circles Bobby made on the inside of her wrist with his thumb. “I worked with a therapist for years, and one of the main issues we worked on was forgiveness. The way he treated me was wrong, but I have to forgive him. We both have to forgive him for what he did to us. Or else it will stay with us forever.”

“We’ll work on it together.” He squeezed her hand then released it. “I promise.”

The server came by and refilled Bobby’s coffee. He took his time doctoring it with skim milk and artificial sweetener. “How did he find out? About us—if I didn’t tell him and you didn’t tell him, who did?”

“I started wondering if what my father told me about you was true seven years ago when Phoebe died. In the letter she wrote me before she…” Zarah always had a hard time calling it what it really had been. “Before she committed suicide, she admitted that she couldn’t live with the guilt of what she’d done. She was the one who told my—the general about us, and she’d never forgiven herself for getting me kicked out of the house. She wrote that she believed the cancer was God’s punishment and that she didn’t deserve the kindness, forgiveness, and love I’d shown her during my trips there to visit her while she was going through chemo. So she decided to die rather than continue to live with the guilt.”

Bobby’s jaw dropped. “Phoebe ratted us out?”

Zarah nodded. “Apparently our father suspected something was going on—for two sisters who hadn’t spent time together growing up if we could help it, I was going out to campus to ‘visit Phoebe’ far too often. He cornered her and told her he’d stop paying for everything—college, car, allowance—unless she told him the truth about who I was seeing behind his back. She’d always been Daddy’s girl—more than she was ever Zarah’s sister—with the way he set us up against each other.”

Shaking his head, Bobby picked up his coffee cup but didn’t drink from it. “That’s got to be tough, finding all that out when it was too
late to talk to her about it.”

“Too late to talk to her, but not too late to forgive her. What bothers me more is that she died not realizing that the cancer was just something that happened because of her genetics, not a punishment from God.” Zarah couldn’t help her lips from twisting into a wry smile. “And it’s not too late for me to realize that even if I don’t develop cancer, it doesn’t mean I’m going to turn out to be anything like my father.”

Bobby grinned at her. “That’s my girl. You know, even if you got cancer, it wouldn’t change the fact that…well, it wouldn’t change how I feel about you.”

Zarah’s face burned. “Thank you. I appreciate your saying that.”

“I’m not just saying it. I mean it.” He punctuated the soft but emphatic statement with a serious expression.

She finished off the tepid last sip of her latte and stretched her back, which popped in a couple of places. She couldn’t handle any more deep thoughts or conversation tonight. “What time does your flight leave tomorrow?”

“Eight in the morning. Yours?”

“Ten. So I guess we’re not on the same flight.” That would have been
too
convenient. She reached for the check to have it billed to her room, but Bobby stopped her, pressing her hand flat on the table.

“Dinner’s my treat.”

“But I can expense it.”

“I know. It’s still my treat.” He tucked the cash into the black padded folder. “Walk me to the door?”

“Okay.” She flung her wrap over her shoulder and handed Bobby his overcoat before following him out of the restaurant. She wished he’d take her hand or put his arm around her again, but he folded the coat over his near arm and walked a respectable distance to her side.

Just before the main doors, Bobby took her elbow and diverted her to a deserted sitting area.

“Zarah, there’s something I need to tell you. I’ve been—”

But what he had been, he apparently couldn’t say. His voice cut off and he stood there, his eyes searching hers.

How many years had she dreamed of this? Dreamed of standing close to him, gazing up into his eyes again, believing she might get that happy ending after all?

“You’ve been what?”

“I’ve been…thinking about you and praying for you ever since that day. Look”—he pulled his billfold out again—”I’ve even carried your picture around with me since…” Frowning, he started searching every compartment in the small wallet. “Where is it? It was here—I’ve kept it here ever since I left the service.”

The despair in his voice almost brought her another round of tears, but Zarah acted quickly to remedy that.

“Here.” She grabbed his phone from his belt holster, figured out how to activate the camera feature, and put her arm around his waist. She snapped a few pictures until she got one in which they were both smiling and both centered in the frame. “Now you have a new picture of me.”

He looked at the picture a moment longer, then returned the phone to its place. He settled his big hands on her shoulders. “You know, your father isn’t the only one who doesn’t deserve you.”

“Hmm.” She chuckled. “I know.”

He still looked like he had something he wanted to tell her, but then he shook his head and the moment passed. “I should really get going.”

“Probably. You have to be at the airport in just a little more than six hours to get checked in.” Tentatively, she reached her hands out and settled them on his waist—just so they’d be in position when he hugged her good-bye.

He would hug her good-bye, right?

“Zarah, I—oh, never mind.” He leaned toward her.

She moved forward and met him halfway. Their lips met. All the emotion and hesitancy of a first kiss, yet imbued with the longing, the
passion that came from a love put on hold. A love that had lingered over the years. A love that remained strong despite her father’s worst intentions at ending it.

A love that was meant to be.

Chapter 26

H
e’s been acting funny since he got home yesterday, and now I think I figured out why.” Lindy Patterson motioned with a nod of her head across the church vestibule to where her grandson stood on the perimeter of a knot of the singles—with Zarah Mitchell by his side, looking up at him with rapt attention as he bent to say something to her privately.

“I’ve only spoken on the phone with Zarah since she returned, but I was surprised to see how happy she looks this morning, given what happened with her father Friday.” Trina gave Lindy a pointed look.

Lindy clucked her tongue and shook her head. “That poor girl. But they were both in Washington. What if…?” She cast a significant gaze at their grandchildren and then looked at Trina again.

“He hasn’t said they saw each other, has he?”

“No. Has she?”

“No.” Trina crossed her arms. “One of us needs to find out. Look—Zarah’s walking off with Flannery. Now’s your chance to corner Robert. Tell him we’d like for the six of us to go to Sunday dinner together.”

“Done.” Lindy thrust her Bible and sermon-notes book into her best friend’s arms and hurried over to catch her grandson before he followed the dissipating singles’ group out the door. “Robert!”

He turned at her high-pitched call, grinning. “Hey, Mamm.” He even bent down so she could kiss his cheek.

“I was just talking to Katrina Breitinger. She suggested our families go for Sunday dinner together. We saw you and Zarah chatting, so we thought the two of you might like to join us.”

He put his arms around her and lifted her off the floor with his hug. “Nice try, Mamm. But Zarah and I already have plans.”

“Really?” Lindy bit her bottom lip in excitement.

“Really. We’re driving down to the Sam Davis House in Smyrna for some special exhibit they’re doing down there this weekend. But thanks for the thinly veiled offer.”

“So are you two…have you worked out your differences?” Lindy took his proffered arm as they made their way to the back of the foyer.

“Pretty much. There’s still one or two things we need to talk about before we can really figure out where it’s going, but we’ve managed to clear up a lot of things about the past so that we can move beyond them.”

She squeezed his arm. “Oh, I keep forgetting something.”

She reached into her handbag and withdrew the picture of Zarah she’d found in his shirt pocket a few weeks ago.

A smile of mixed pleasure and relief painted his face. “Where did you find this?”

“In your shirt pocket that one time you let me do laundry for you.”

“And you had it in your purse because…?” He ducked his chin and raised his eyebrows—the same way his father had always done to get under her skin.

“Because I put everything important in my pocketbook. That way I won’t lose it.” She pressed the photo into his hand. “Now, you know if there’s anything I can do…”

“I know. But not right now, thanks.” He glanced over the top of her head. “I think you need to go tell Mrs. Breitinger what I just told you, though. She looks fit to burst.”

Lindy glanced over her shoulder then laughed. “You’re right. I’ll go set her mind at ease. You kids have fun this afternoon.”

“Thanks, Mamm.”

Lindy returned to Trina and told her everything.

Trina’s blue eyes took on a triumphant gleam. “I have only one thing to say.”

“What’s that?” Lindy asked.

“Dum-dum-da-dum.”

Trina’s off-key rendition of the “Wedding March” echoed in Lindy’s head for the rest of the day.

Chapter 27

A
fter a wonderful afternoon on Sunday with Bobby, touring the Sam Davis house and grounds, then lingering over coffee, Zarah poured herself into work. Dennis insisted she didn’t need to put in eighty hours this week to make up for the forty—or more likely sixty—she’d missed last week, but her guilty conscience wouldn’t let her leave earlier than seven every evening. So when Bobby called Friday morning and insisted she meet him for lunch, she figured she could allow herself the indulgence.

She arrived at Chappy’s a few minutes before Bobby, which was good, since the hostess gave her an estimate of fifteen to twenty minutes for a table. Everyone standing near the door shivered and mumbled when he came in—as they did whenever anyone opened the door and allowed the cool autumn breeze in.

Bobby joined her and gave her a squeeze around the shoulders with one arm. They chatted about their week—about the hours they’d put in since getting back from DC.

At the table, Zarah didn’t even bother to open her menu. The server arrived with the water pitcher and asked them for their drink orders.

“Tea,” Zarah echoed Bobby. “And could you go ahead and put in
an order of fried green tomatoes for us?”

“I sure can, darlin’.” The waitress winked at her and hustled off toward the kitchen.

“Really? Fried green tomatoes?”

“Have you ever tried them?”

“Uh…when have you ever known me and tomatoes to play nicely together?”

“You have to at least try them. They’re fabulous. I got hooked on them a few years ago when I went down to Baton Rouge to speak at a Civil War symposium at LSU. And the ones they have here are actually better than the ones I had down there.”

“Okay. I’ll try them. But I’m reminding you now that I don’t like tomatoes.”

After they gave their lunch orders, Bobby returned the conversation to what she’d been saying before they were seated. Zarah explained as much as she could about her job, without going into great details so she wouldn’t bore him.

The appetizer arrived. Zarah picked up the small plate the waitress set in front of Bobby and put one of the fried disks of deliciousness onto it for him.

He eyed it speculatively.

“You promised you’d try it.”

With narrowed eyes, he cut a miniscule piece from the lightly battered slice of tomato. “You know I’m only doing this for you.”

Her heartstrings zinged. “I know.”

He carefully scraped the morsel off the tines of the fork with his teeth and closed his eyes while he chewed. His face eased from wrinkled nose and puckered lips to grudging acceptance. “It’s not as bad as I expected.”

Zarah speared the biggest slice and put it on her plate. “So you like it?”

“I didn’t say that.”