As he stepped onto the wharf and saw the fresh signage going up that read Melha Marina he stood there for a full minute, hands on his hips. The widest, most foolish grin split his face and refused to stop.
That’s why she’d taken the settlement. Of course, she hadn’t kept it. He couldn’t be happier that she had divorced him if that was why she’d done it.
He walked up to a building that was in the process of being returned to its original blue and white. Inside, a man about his age stood with a baby strapped to his chest like the kid was a smoke jumper and Zach the parachute.
Zach pointed out something on a drawing and gave a woman in a yellow hardhat instructions on finding the property line. When he rolled the drawing and handed it to the woman, they both turned to the open door where Leon stood.
His old friend’s surprised expression slammed shut. “Leon. What brings you here?”
Leon stepped aside to let the woman leave. “I’m looking for Tanja.” Obviously.
Zach stiffened. “Is the money not coming through again?”
“It’s through. Hers. Yours, I guess.” Leon glanced around the interior of the office where he had first met “Books.” Tanja had said something snappy to her brother, turning from a cabinet and going very coltish and still. The zing of attraction as she met Leon’s eyes had been so undeniable and visceral, he was still trying to breathe through the power of it today.
“It’s hers,” Zach said. “She wanted it for Dad. I agreed to run it.”
Leon dragged his attention back to Zach’s hostile glare. “Look. I know I owe you an apology. I sincerely regret that our deal fell apart. I don’t know if Tanja has explained—”
“What’s to explain?” Zach shrugged it off. “You warned me to wait until the money was yours, but I didn’t. Dad told me I was moving too fast. Even Books had concerns about how much debt I was racking up. I didn’t listen. I crashed and burned and it sucked, but live and learn, right?” He didn’t sound particularly bitter, just fatalistic.
“If that’s how you feel...” Leon grabbed the edge of the door. “Why do you hate my guts?”
“Because you broke my little sister’s heart, jackass. Twice.”
Tanja was half-heartedly reviewing three different job offers when there was a knock on her door at the bottom of the stairs.
She presumed it was Shonda, but her sister-in-law usually let herself in, calling hello as she came up. They were becoming like true sisters, confiding their new mother failures and triumphs, cuddling each other’s infants as often as their own.
Tanja veered minute by minute between so much happiness she could hardly contain it, and such a profound sadness it was all she could do to breathe. She was exhausted and heartbroken and determined to pick up the pieces and move on anyway.
Shonda didn’t appear, and another knock sounded.
Tanja rose and slipped down the stairs, glancing into Illi’s crib on her way. She was fast asleep, taking to her new home the way she’d taken to all the other changes she’d been through in her short life. She was such a little trouper.
The entrance foyer was only big enough to hold a shoe shelf and a rack of coat hooks. Tanja unlocked the door and backed into the corner as she opened it.
“Sorry, I thought it was op...” She trailed off as she saw it wasn’t Shonda on her stoop.
Her heart went into free fall.
How many times had she waited and yearned and willed for this to happen? Leon. Here. As recently as yesterday afternoon, when she’d left her divorce certificate in the fireproof cabinet at the marina, she had spared a moment to wish for him to appear and tell her this wasn’t what he wanted.
And she had told herself again to quit being a fool. He wasn’t coming. He was never coming.
But here he was, tall and lean, casually perfect in faded jeans and a light windbreaker. Fine sparkles of raindrops sat on his hair like glitter. His mirrored aviators accentuated his trimmed beard and stern mouth.
Her heart commenced hammering. Her whole being took the hit of being in his presence again. She wanted to throw herself into his arms and say, Yes, I’m still yours.
But he had never wanted her, not really. Not the way she needed to be wanted.
She thought about closing the door on him, she really did, but she could never shut out someone she loved no matter how badly they’d hurt her.
“Come out of the rain.” She stepped back so he could wipe his feet and follow her up the narrow staircase to the one-bedroom apartment over her brother’s detached garage.
“This is nice,” he said of the space with slanted ceilings, gabled windows, moss-green walls, and hardwood floors. The kitchen was galley style in a nook off the living area. It had a peninsula counter that jutted out to provide an eating area. It currently held her laptop and the job offers she’d been scrutinizing.
“Zach and Shonda were planning to rent it by the week to tourists, but they’re letting me use it until I find a job and figure out what I can afford.”
“You were supposed to use your settlement to buy a house—” His breath sucked in as he caught sight of the crib tucked behind the pony wall at the top of the stairs.
He took off his sunglasses as he moved to look down on Illi. Her little arms were thrown up beside her curly hair, a corner of the knit blanket tangled in the fingers of one hand.
“She’s growing,” he said softly, moving her huggy bear into her side before he adjusted the blanket. His face spasmed with naked emotion as he looked down on her.
It was the most heartbreakingly beautiful thing Tanja had ever seen.
That’s why he’s here, she realized with a hard swallow. She wouldn’t deny him time with Illi, either, even if it would cause her to feel jealous of her own daughter.
“Can I, um...” She had to clear her throat. “Can I make you some coffee?” She moved toward the kitchen.
“I miss you.” He spoke so softly she was certain he was talking to the baby.
She turned to see it, to be included in some small way in his quiet admission to a sleeping baby. She told herself she only wanted to see him crack and reveal his love for her daughter, but he wasn’t looking at Illi. He was looking at her.
The floor fell away and her entire being filled with helium. Not oxygen. No, there was not a bit of that in her right now.
“Both of you,” he said with anguish creasing his features. “I hate going home. It’s not a home anymore. But I don’t know how to ask you to come back and make it into one. I don’t know what I could say that would convince you.”
“You do,” she said faintly. The buoyant hope inside her butted up against the shadows of despair she’d had to make into friends. “You just don’t want to say it. And I understand why, but—”