Redwood Bend (21 page)

When they disconnected, he closed his eyes for a moment and took a breath. She wouldn’t say it; she was afraid to say it. He could hardly blame her. Why would she pour more emotion into a situation that had no clear resolution?

He would think about that. Where he was going. And with whom.

Katie looked at the number she’d scribbled down. She could hear his voice in her head.
I miss you, Katie.
She lifted the folded tabloids from the kitchen counter and opened the one with Dylan kissing some blonde’s neck.

“You’ll be fine,” she said. And then with sarcasm she thought,
Be brave.

Conner couldn’t count the number of days he felt grateful for finding Leslie. Their lives had converged at probably the most challenging of times for both of them—he was in hiding and she was escaping from a painful divorce. Yet now, just a few months later, they were living together in this little town, at peace in their relationship, their complicated lives settled. He even had his sister and nephews close by, which gave him no small amount of comfort.

But all wasn’t cheery. Katie had grown quiet and distant. Well, he supposed that was to be expected—she’d had a fling with a guy who was just passing through and, unsurprisingly, he actually passed through. He was gone and she was left lonely. Again.

“Should I be worried about Katie?” he asked Les.

“Why? Because Dylan went to work?”

“Well…yeah, that. She seemed to be hanging tough for a while, but he’s been gone a couple of weeks and it’s like he took her sparkle with him.”

She grinned at him. “How many women did you have short relationships with over the years, Conner?”

“But this is Katie,” he said. “Unless she never mentioned it to me, I don’t think she’s had a guy she…”
slept with, laughed with a lot and who put a shine in her eyes…
“…liked a lot. Since Charlie. You know?”

“Why don’t you give her a call?” Leslie suggested. “See how she’s doing. Ask her if she wants to come over for ice cream. Or maybe we could bring the ice cream to her.”

So he did that, he called her. And then he went back to Leslie, a pained expression on his face, and said, “I’m going out to check on her. Andy said she’s in the bathtub. Crying. In the tub crying.”

Leslie shot to her feet. “Wait! Just wait. Grab the ice cream. We’ll both go. You can keep the boys busy and please, let me talk to Katie. I don’t think this is a job for a big brother.”

“Why not?” he asked indignantly. “I could hunt down the son of a bitch and beat the shit outta him.”

She stared at him coolly, her hands on her hips. “There you go—reason number one.”

Conner, not usually inclined to take orders from people, played it Leslie’s way. He grabbed the ice cream from the freezer and then drove a little too fast to his sister’s cabin. When they walked in and he went right to the kitchen to spoon up giant bowls for his nephews and himself, he was stopped short. “Les,” he said, pointing to some newspapers on the kitchen counter. “Isn’t this him? This is him!”

Leslie glanced at the papers. “Oh, man, this might be a little more complicated than I thought. I’ll explain after I talk to Katie. You and the boys go up to the loft and stay busy for a while. Play video games and chow down.”

Then she went to the bathroom. She knocked before she said, “I’m coming in.” And in she went.

Katie was mostly concealed by bubbles. Her hair was piled on her head, her body submerged, her eyes red and swollen, and when she saw Leslie, a new flood of tears escaped. She tried to catch them with the washcloth.

Leslie sat on the closed toilet lid. Though she wanted to cry with her, she forced herself to be cool. Both of them blubbering away wouldn’t help now. “What happened, Katie?”

“Nothing,” she said. “Nothing at all…”

“And yet…?”

“He left, as he said he had to do—he has to earn money somehow. He said he didn’t know when he’d see me again, that movies are a lot of work. I can’t compete with Hollywood. Why would I try?”

“Are we crying over that? Hollywood?”

“Or a picture in a tabloid of him kissing some woman’s neck?” Katie asked with a hiccup of emotion. “He called. He misses me, he says. By the picture I saw in one of those icky gossip papers, he doesn’t miss me that much.” She took a breath and gave her face a little scrub with the cloth. “Les, we didn’t have any kind of agreement that after me, there would never be another woman. He admits he’s that way. He wasn’t callous about it. In fact, he was almost self-effacing. He called himself a bad bet—he said I’d be better off.”

“Are you?” Leslie asked.

“I will be. I’m draining it out right now. The emotion…the disappointment…”

“Katie…”

“He might have left out a few details, but he never lied to me. There were things he didn’t tell me, but then there were a couple of things I didn’t tell him. In fact, one major thing.”

Leslie reached toward the tub and captured one escaping curl of Katie’s hair and tucked it behind her ear. “What, honey? What didn’t you tell him?”

“Oh,” she said, a fresh crop of tears rolling soundlessly down her cheeks. “That even though I didn’t want to and didn’t plan to, I fell a little bit in love with him. I knew better. I knew it wasn’t going to last. Because he didn’t want it to…”

“Sweetheart…”

“If my heart hurts right now, whose fault is that? Not his.”

“I could find ways to blame him.”

“No,” she said, “it’s not his fault. I made the classic female mistake. When I realized how good we were together, I thought his agenda would change. I thought being with me would
change
him. And I wasn’t kidding myself about how good we were. I was just kidding myself about the agenda.”

“There are so many things a man can do to ease the pain and disappointment.”

“Like promise to call?” Katie asked with an empty laugh. “Well, he did, and he was sweet, but it didn’t help. Or maybe he should swear he’ll be back when he won’t? Like give hope where there is clearly none? He’s right about one thing—once I get beyond this, I’ll be better off. Because I need a lot more in a man than someone who has no faith in his own ability to stick around. Loser,” she added, wiping a tear away.

“Um…why are you in the tub?” Leslie asked.

“The boys. They’re all rough and tumble and bad unless I cry, something I almost never do. It really bothers them if they see me cry. They’re such typical little men. They want to make it better.”

Leslie laughed. “I’ve given Conner a couple of test cries, usually associated with ovulation, and you’re right—men can’t just listen and comfort. They need it resolved in five minutes. You’re getting kind of pruny. Do you have a lot more crying to do?”

“I might, yeah. But maybe not for right now.”

“Katie? Has there been anyone since Charlie? I mean besides that dentist back in Vermont…”

“No,” she said, shaking her head and unplugging the tub drain with her toe. She reached for the towel and Leslie passed it. “I was considering the dentist because there wasn’t much chance he was going to make me cry like this. You have to have a real emotional investment in a man to cry your heart out when he dumps you or…or deploys. The dentist did make me cry for Charlie, though. The blandness of my relationship with the dentist made me long for the commitment and passion Charlie always had for me. I mean, Charlie definitely had his character flaws, but there’s just no substitute for knowing your man belongs to you completely. Oh, God, I missed that passion Charlie had for me.” She stood up and wrapped the towel around herself. “Be careful what you pray for.”

“Well,” Leslie said, standing up and reaching for the robe on the door hook. “You’ll forget Dylan in no time,” she said hopefully.

“Sure,” Katie said doubtfully. “Of course.”

Leslie held the terry robe for Katie and for a moment, in wordless communication, they shared the same thought—it didn’t matter if it was two weeks or two years. If the chemistry was powerful, if the heart shattered, healing was going to take time.

“Please take Conner home,” Katie said. “Thank you for letting me talk, but will you please get him out of here? And tell him I’m just not ready to go over this with him. Not right now.”

“Sure, I understand. You know, he only wants to help.”

“Yes, I know. And he’ll have a terrible time understanding that there’s nothing he can do for me.”

“Sure. Absolutely.” Then Leslie gave her a hug. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Please, call me if you need me sooner.”

“Of course I will.”

They talked softly for just a minute more, then Leslie left Katie alone.

Leslie found Conner pacing in the living room, a very agitated expression on his face. The second he saw her he pointed at the newspapers and said, “Are you going to explain this?”

“Yes, Conner. We’re going to leave now and I’ll tell you about it. Boys?” she yelled. Two little heads popped over the loft rail. “We’re going home now. Be nice to Mommy and stay out of her hair.”

“She crying some more?” Andy asked, his little eyebrows scrunched in concern.

“Not so much,” Leslie said. “But she might need quiet time. Be very sweet to her. Will you?”

They both nodded obediently and it made her smile. Those boys were going to grow up to take good care of their mother.

Once in Conner’s truck, the first order of business was to explain that Dylan Childress was no ordinary biker or pilot. He was an ex-star who’d built himself some kind of life in Montana, away from the cameras and press.

“Then what was he doing here?” Conner wanted to know.

“I’m not sure,” she told him. “Katie said he was looking at small airports around here to see if he could learn anything that would help his charter business, but she didn’t mention he was leaving here to return to movies until after he was gone. I think it was his sudden departure that came as a shock, even though he’d been warning her that he had to go soon. And she really liked him. And here’s the thing about women—we always say we’re up for that fling, that we don’t need commitment, and we’re always lying to ourselves.”

“Bull, I had flings…”

“I didn’t say you men were lying to yourselves…”

“I never heard from women that they were all upset!” Conner said defensively.

She looked at him sharply. “Don’t you have an ex-wife still pestering you from time to time?”

“Oh, her—well, that’s not the same thing. She never said she didn’t need commitment and she has problems.” He shook his head. “Katie is completely normal.” He glanced at Leslie. “Isn’t she?”

“She is,” Leslie confirmed. “And your completely normal sister kind of fell for the guy. It wasn’t part of the plan, but stuff like that happens. I guess he didn’t fall for her or maybe it wouldn’t have turned out the way it did.”

Conner growled.

“Really, Conner, I want to hate him, too. But as Katie said, it was an honest relationship—he never misled her. We didn’t get into it, but I don’t think she has any regrets. She’s just having the hurt right now. You have to let her get through it. You can’t fix it.”