“Don’t say it. Please,” I beg. I don’t need to hear the word lover come from her lips just now.
She accepts this with another blithe shrug.
“Where are they?” I ask in a whisper.
“You sound curious.”
“Oh, I’m insanely curious.”
“As any good domestic help does, they remain where they’re needed. Which means you would find them in the kitchen if you were gauche enough to snoop around in search of them.”
“You know how gauche I can be when given the opportunity.”
A smile twitches her lips, though the rest of her face stays still. “Tell me about your trip. I’ve wished all week to hear about it. Did you rest? Did you have a nice time? What about the wedding?”
I explain the ceremony and how nature threw everything but the kitchen sink at the happy couple.
She’s chuckles softly. “I’ve seen quite a few memorable ceremonies in my day, but that sounds like one for the record books. The bride must have been beside herself.”
“She took it in stride. Honestly, it was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen.”
She’s a sharp one. Woe to anyone who takes her age as a sign that she’s slowing down, even a tiny bit. Her brain is as fast as it ever was.
“Why do you sound so sad when you say it?”
“I do?”
“I do?” She bats her eyelashes.
“Oh, this is a new leaf you’re turning over. Mimicking me. Very mature.”
“Call it a rediscovery of my youthful charm.”
“I go out of town for a little while, and look what I come back to.”
Her eyes don’t reflect my smile. There’s a touch of sadness in them. “Why did you sound that way? What happened?”
“What usually happens. The same thing as always. Only this time, there were bookies and other unsavory characters involved.”
I didn’t come here today with the intention of telling her about Kellen—at least, not the bad things. It’s been a few days since I saw him at the hospital, and I’ve been doing my best to take a healthy, understanding view of the situation.
In other words, I don’t feel like talking about it.
But it’s too late for that now. I’ve already piqued her interest, and if there’s one thing I inherited from her—aside from the blue eyes and the icy stare—it’s the inability to be turned away once curiosity takes hold. I know there’s no hope of leaving the house unless I share at least the basics.
Which I do. Within reason.
There are certain things the woman doesn’t need to hear.
By the time I’m finished, she’s forgotten her tea and the sloppy sandwiches. She’s watching me, studying, anticipating. “And? Have you heard anything else about this young man? What’s to become of him?”
“I have no idea. Honestly, I’m not sure I want to know. Or whether I want to keep up with him.”
Her stern expression surprises me.
“Is that wrong?” I ask with a frown.
“Not necessarily, my dear. I do not sit in judgment over you, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
“That’s exactly what I’m thinking.”
“It isn’t so. I can’t blame you for refusing to keep up with this Kellen’s activities. Especially as he lied to you about his friend as a means of determining how you would react when he spoke the truth. I wonder how long he might have left you in the dark if he hadn’t been … discovered by the men searching for him.”
“Can I tell you something?”
“Always, dear.”
It takes a second since I want to make sure the tears threatening to take hold will stay where they are. Inside me, not on my cheeks.
Once I know I’ll be able to get through it, I whisper, “I don’t know if I did the right thing. Should I have stuck by him? Was it mean, deserting him like that?”
“Deserting him? After a quick dalliance and a few promises of the time you would spend together once you got home? Oh, don’t bother.” She snorts with a wave of her hand when I try to argue with her. “We are both women of the world, and heaven knows I’ve expressed my thoughts on sex and relationships with you on more than one occasion. Did you imagine you would shock me?”
“I don’t love talking about it with you, in case you’ve never noticed.”
“You write about it.”
“Not the same.”
She accepts this with a shrug. “Regardless, you owed him nothing. Friendship perhaps, and as far as I’m concerned, you have not reneged on that friendship. I know you. I know you would answer his call and lend an ear if need be.”
With that, she leans in. “My granddaughter is a smart girl. Sharp and wise and clever. She knows better than to become attached to someone with a problem like his. I don’t doubt how difficult it is for him. Brutal even. He has no control over it, not now. There is nothing wrong with turning away from someone whose weaknesses would drain you. Not only financially. Emotionally as well. That is not the formula for a happy or successful relationship, dear.”
“You sound like you know what you’re talking about,” I say it with a soft snicker, reaching for another sandwich. Sloppy or not, they’re tasty enough.
When I look her way again, I notice she isn’t smiling. She isn’t even looking at me, her gaze focused across the room.
Where a portrait of my grandfather hangs.
“Grandmother?” I follow her gaze to the portrait.
He’s always struck me as being powerful. Strong. Imperious even. She always speaks of him in glowing terms, talks about how much they loved each other. How no other man would ever compare.
Until Peter, no other man has ever lived up to her memory of her late husband.
Now, she doesn’t stare at his portrait with love in her eyes.
“I know what I’m talking about,” she murmurs. Her mouth is a crimson slash, lips drawn tight together.
“Grandmother, was he …”
She sits up a little straighter. Her hands are folded so tight; it has to be hurting her joints.
“It was not the sort of thing people spoke of in my day. If a man—or woman—had such a weakness or addiction, we didn’t speak of it outside our immediate families. And even then, I never spoke to my family of it. My parents would never …”
She turns her face away a little, toward the window. Is her chin quivering?
“It was the most helpless I’d ever felt in my life. There was nothing I could do. I was out of control of my life, my marriage. Our money. We could have well lost everything.”
After a deep, shaking breath, she adds, “I wouldn’t want that for you. Not for anything, dear. You have too much potential. Too much ahead of you.”
I can’t help but reach out and touch her hand. “I’m sorry you went through that.”
She pats my hand, taking another breath, and then she smiles. “That time is long over. Peter is a good man. Stable.”
“And he adores you, which happens to help a little.”
She lifts a shoulder. “It doesn’t hurt.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO