Chapter 28
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Renthrow
Worry chews me up inside and makes every breath feel like a stake in my chest.
Faster. I need to go faster.
The world blurs outside my window as I drive at a speed that would rival Cordelia’s bike.
Keeping one eye on the road and the other on my navigation dashboard, I scroll my most-called numbers.
“Let me help,” Delia says.
“Thanks.” I exhale so loudly, it sounds like a whistle. “Can you call someone from the team?”
“Anyone in particular?”
“Doesn’t matter.” They’d all run to Gordie if I called, even Theilan and Watson. “The most recent on my call list.”
“That would be Max,” she notes.
I nod.
Cordelia presses the button, and the entire car fills with the sound of a phone ringing.
Max picks up on the fourth ring. “Renthrow?”
In the background, I hear the hiss of skates on ice. Max has been personally reviewing the tapes of the new trainees, and I assume that’s what he’s doing now.
“Max, I’m about an hour away from Lucky Falls, and I can’t reach Gordie or my mom. Can you drive by and check on—”
A beeping sound interrupts my words.
I look frantically at the screen and see that Mom is calling.
“I’ll call you back, Max.” I hang up without further explanation and answer Mom immediately. “Mom, I saw your call. Are you and Gordie okay?”
“Viking, why are you yelling? Of course! Everything is fine.” Laughter bubbles just beneath her voice. “Gordie and I are having pizza.”
“Pizza?” And then what? Did someone choke on pepperoni? Did they have to call an ambulance?
“We were cooking dinner, but we burnt the chicken horribly and decided to order out,” Mom explains.
As she speaks, the frantic screaming in my brain quiets. No one’s hurt. Gordie and Mom are okay. My shoulders unwind more and more, and my foot eases off the gas pedal.
“Then why did you call me, and why weren’t you answering the phone when I called back?”
“Gordie and I were watching The Price is Right while eating, and we didn’t hear the phone. Sorry, dear. Did we scare you?”
I rub my forehead. Rather than feel frustration at the false alarm, I feel nothing but relief. “I’m glad you two are okay.”
Mom laughs breezily. “How’s your date with Delia going? Having a nice time?”
I stiffen, becoming hyperaware of the beautiful woman in my passenger seat. “It was a business meeting, not a date.”
“Is that why you ransacked your closet and went through fifty combinations of shirts and shoes before you decided on what to wear?”
Horror flames to life in my chest, and I jolt forward, tapping at the navigation screen. “I’ll be home soon, Mom.”
“Okay, love you!”
I grunt in acknowledgment and kill the call.
Cordelia turns in her seat, her stare drilling into my face.
Shifting uncomfortably, I mumble, “Sounds like everything’s okay over there. I don’t have to drive like a madman now.”
“Renthrow.”
“Cordelia.”
“Really?”
“Really what?”
“Fifty outfits?”
“Mom over exaggerates.”
“How many suits do you have?”
“I have five shirts, five jackets, and five slacks in different colors.”
“That’s a lot.”
“It’s so I have something to wear for Gordie’s recitals.”
“I didn’t know small-town boys were so cultured.” Cordelia rests her elbow on the capsule between the driver and passenger seat.
I pretend to be engrossed by the highway. “Small-town boys have access to the internet. Same as the rest of the country.”
“Now I want to see your other outfits.”
“You didn’t like this one?”
“I loved this one. Blue looks good on you.”
“You’re teasing me.” But warmth expands in my veins.
“Are you blushing?” Cordelia teases.
“Focus on the road.”
“Me? I’m not the one driving.”
Max calls back at that moment. I tap the button next to my steering wheel and answer, “Hey, Max. It was a false alarm. They’re okay.”
“Too late, man. I’m pulling up in your driveway now.”
“You didn’t have to do that, but I appreciate it.”
“Yeah, yeah. I see Gordie waving. Dude, she’s got pizza! I was feeling some pizza tonight.”
Cordelia muffles her laughter behind her hand.
“You’re in luck because Mom will probably share. Thanks again, Max.”
I hang up and look over at Cordelia. “Seems I cut our dinner short for nothing.”
“You thought your daughter needed you. I totally understand.”
“Want to go back to the restaurant? Your friend might still be there.”
“It’s fine.” Cordelia fiddles with her purse. “What did you think about Brennon?”
“The truth?”
“Lie to me.” She chuckles.
I smile. “Honestly…”
“Honestly?”
“I don’t care for the guy.” I frown when I remember how that schmuck had looked at her. “But he seemed to care a lot about you.”
Her eyes twinkle. “Jealous?”
Yes. “What right do I have to be jealous?”
“You tell me.”
She’s playing games, and while I want to engage, I can also feel myself getting a tad too attached to her. It’d be best not to get too close.
“Want to listen to music?”
“Are you avoiding the conversation?”
I fiddle with the dial, and soft jazz fills the car, a genre more my style.
“You enjoyed giving Brennon the impression that we were dating,” she teases. “You can be honest.”
I glance over at her, noting the way the lampposts outside create art pieces of shadows and light against her high cheekbones. “You first.”
“What does that mean?”
“Who’s Gwen?”
It’s like a switch is flipped. The flirty energy fizzles into a somber one. Cordelia stares at her hands, and I instantly regret bringing up the topic.
“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” I say gently.
“I don’t want to,” she admits. “Not yet.”
“Okay,” I accept.
She swallows. “The truth is online. It’s not a secret. I just…find it hard to talk about it.”
“That’s okay.” I notice she’s shaking just like she did in the restaurant. The urge to hold her hand again rises in me, but I hesitate to touch her.
I don’t have the pretext of “revenge” this time. And though the two of us keep dancing on the edge of the line, I’m careful about crossing it.
Instead, I offer, “Want to know my deepest secret?”
The shaking stops, and she looks up at me, her eyes wide and curious.
“There’s a rumor about me wearing Hello Kitty boxers…”
Cordelia rolls her eyes and groans. “No way.”
“The rumors are true.”
She bursts out laughing, covering her face as her shoulders shake.
“It was a gift from Gordie,” I admit. “For Christmas. And you know the worst part?”
“I’m afraid to ask.”
“They’re a size too small.”
“Oh no.” She laughs again.
Adrenaline pumps through my veins. It’s like I commandeered the puck from a particularly aggressive winger, like I climbed a mountain. Cordelia is rarely this carefree. I love hearing her laugh, and I especially love making her laugh.
“That can’t count.” She shakes her head.
“What do you mean? I’d hate for this to get out.”
“Tell me a real secret. And maybe I’ll consider sharing mine.”
I consider it, driving quietly before I admit, “It was hard for me, coming back to town after my divorce.”
Cordelia settles into her chair, giving me room.
“I didn’t have a job lined up yet. Had to quit playing hockey for the team I was signed with. And I didn’t know how to raise a baby on my own. It felt like I’d crawled back to Lucky Falls with the word ‘failure’ painted on my forehead.”
“How did you handle it?”
“Moving back to Lucky Falls?”
“Getting divorced?”
“It ended amicably, but it was still a blow.” I choose my words carefully. “I proposed to someone I loved. I had already imagined a future with her, and I felt lost when that future disappeared from sight. Suddenly, I had to rebuild. And fast. Because I had a baby who depended on me.”
“I’m sorry,” Cordelia says.
“It’s okay. I wouldn’t trade Gordie for anything. It all happened the way it was supposed to.”
“I’ve been wondering…about Gordie’s mother and why she’s not…around.” Cordelia quickly adds, “You don’t have to answer that if you don’t want to.”
“I want to,” I admit softly.
Cordelia looks at me, touched.
And it feels like I crossed another line while trying to avoid it altogether.
“I mean, if you want to hear.”
“Of course, I do,” she says. “I’m just surprised that you’d want to confide in me.”
It doesn’t make sense to me either, but I…feel more at ease with her than with other women. Actually, it goes beyond ease. Some part of me wants to shake all my secrets out at this woman’s feet and have her touch the most hidden parts of me. I want to know her. I want her to know me.
I haven’t felt that way about anyone ever.
“I’ve always wanted a family,” I explain. “I grew up an only child, and it was tough not having a big family in a town like Lucky Falls. I was so jealous of my friends who had hundreds of cousins.”
I flick the indicator and merge into another lane.
“I swore that, in the future, I’d have lots of kids and close in-laws.
I wanted to host family barbecues and wreak chaos at family game night.
I pictured huge birthday parties for my kids and Christmas at my in-laws.
I wanted our families to fill the house, you know? ”
I can feel that her attention is locked on me, and she’s accepting every word from my mouth.
“When I met Gordie’s mom, she wasn’t as enthusiastic about kids as I was.
We aligned in every other one of our values, and she said she was open to changing her mind, so I convinced myself that she’d eventually see things my way.
And then she got pregnant, and that kind of… cemented her initial thoughts.”
“I’m sorry,” Cordelia whispers.
I shake my head. “Nothing to be sorry about. A woman is more than her reproductive organs. Personally, I think there’s nothing wrong with not wanting to have kids.
” I shake my head. “But having Gordie only amplified that our paths were different. After the divorce, I took Gordie back to my hometown while she focused on all the things she wanted to do to change the world.”
“And that was that? She just…never called.”
“She does, sometimes. When she can.”
“How often is that?”
“When she can,” I say again. “It’s a treat for Gordie when she does, and life goes on when she doesn’t.”
“You can’t be serious,” Cordelia snaps.
“Life is complicated. She’s doing the best she can, and I’m grateful to her.”
“Grateful?”
“Yeah.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“She wasn’t perfect, but neither was I. If I hadn’t been so immature, maybe I could have found a way to keep my marriage together.”
“You were presented with a choice between your wife and your daughter. What decision were you supposed to make?”
I blink as her voice climbs in volume. “Cordelia—”
“You’re this even-tempered, always prepared, ‘keep the kitchen sink in his back pocket’ guy.
I get that. But this? You have a right to be angry about this.
She ran away from Gordie. She basically abandoned her daughter.
When a man throws his family away, we call him a loser and a deadbeat.
Just because she’s a woman, doesn’t make it any different. ”
“Gordie’s mom is not a deadbeat,” I say firmly.
Maybe the words are a little too firm because Cordelia flinches and abruptly snaps her mouth shut.
I soften my tone. “She didn’t want kids. For her own reasons, she didn’t really like kids.” I glance pointedly at Cordelia who looks away in discomfort. “I’m the one who kept repeating how much I wanted them.”
Thinking back to that difficult time in my marriage, I add, “Gordie’s mom chose to go through with the pregnancy despite feeling the way she did, despite the risks to her body.
It’s enough that she gave me Gordie. It’s enough that I get to live every day with my little girl.
I don’t need anything more from her. She already gave me the best gift of all. ”
Cordelia folds her arms over her chest, staring at the “Welcome to Lucky Falls” sign. “Okay then.”
And it’s the last two words she says to me all night.