Chapter 38 #2
I nod. “It didn’t make a difference, though. Even knowing I could get hurt didn’t change how I felt. So I admitted it to him, still thinking we wouldn’t last. But he…”
“Looked back,” Abigail supplies.
“Yeah.” I smile. “He did. Has.”
“Here you ladies go.” The waiter returns, setting down two glasses filled with red liquid and garnished with celery and olives on the table, followed by a steaming plate of fries. “Anything else?”
“We’re all set, thanks,” Abigail replies.
Once the waiter is gone, she raises her drink and tilts it toward me. “Happy Thanksgiving, Lennon.”
Hastily, I pick up my glass. “Happy Thanksgiving, Mrs. Winters.”
She laughs. “Call me Abigail, please.”
I smile before sipping my drink. It’s good. Fresh and zesty, with a hint of spice. I can’t taste the alcohol at all.
“I took a journalism course my freshman year at Emory,” Abigail tells me as we dig into the fries.
“Really?”
She nods. “I decided pretty early on it wasn’t for me.
I probably should have dropped it, but I was raised to believe that the worst thing you could be called is a quitter.
So I stuck it out. Back then, I thought I’d have a few years on my own to try lots of things on for size.
I met Austin, he proposed, and I knew I’d never have a career. ”
“Did you want to?”
“I never thought about it. Richard was a rising political star; Caleb had just been born. It was easy to get swept up in being a Winters.”
“I’d imagine so,” I reply.
“You’ll find out soon.”
“Caleb and I are a long ways off from that,” I say quickly.
Abigail smiles. “Caleb and Austin don’t have much in common. Caleb’s grown up into twice the man Austin will ever be. But they’re both charming and persuasive. It might come sooner than you think.”
She laughs at my expression, then asks me another question about Clarkson. And shockingly, it feels…nice.
* * *
The bedroom door creaks open quietly. A few seconds later, the mattress dips. I roll over, blinking at Caleb.
Everyone was gone when Abigail and I returned to the chalet. Caleb was hanging out with Jake and Colt, the St. Jameses had headed into town, and Austin had a meeting.
I came upstairs and worked more on my essay for the Fulright Fellowship application. At some point, I fell asleep.
“Hey.”
“Hey.”
“You’re smiling,” he comments. “And your legs don’t look broken.” His hand runs up my leg, resting on the curve of my hip.
“We only went down the mountain once,” I confess. “But I survived.”
“Once? What time did you get back?”
I glance at my laptop. “About an hour ago.”
“You were gone for a while, then.”
“We went to a restaurant afterward.”
“Really?”
“Uh-huh. Your mom ate fries .”
Caleb chuckles. “Wow.”
“Also…she told me some stuff. About her and your dad.”
Up until this exact second, I hadn’t decided whether to tell Caleb about what his mom mentioned to me.
“What stuff?”
I pull in a deep breath. “She told me he cheated on her. With my mom.”
I’m expecting shock. Disgust. Anger. Not for him to calmly blink and say, “I know.”
“What? How?”
“I broke into the safe in his office once, sophomore year of high school. I was bored and we’d just had an argument.
There was an old receipt in there for some fancy jewelry.
And the delivery address was your family’s farm.
Pretty easy to do the math. I knew what their relationship was—is—like.
I’d be surprised if there haven’t been other women, honestly. ”
“So you knew that was why your mom disliked me so much?”
“I figured that was part of it,” he replies. “But don’t let her use this as some get-out-of-jail-free card, Len. You’re not responsible for what your mom got involved in. It should never have mattered in the first place.”
“Your mom thinks you don’t know.”
“She’s always wanted to pretend like we’re this perfect family. I knew it would hurt her, knowing I knew. So I’ve never said anything about it.”
“Were you ever going to tell me?” I ask.
“Probably not.”
“Why not?”
“It has nothing to do with us, Lennon.”
“We’re talking about our parents! It’s weird. Gross.”
“We’re totally on the same page there. But what does it change? Do you love me less?”
“Of course not.”
“Do you know what I’d say to your mom if I ever got to meet her when she was still alive?”
“Stop gambling at the track so your daughter and your father don’t end up broke?”
He chuckles. “No. I wouldn’t ask her about my dad, either. I’d thank her for being the person who brought you into this world.”
Heat floods my cheeks, and I look away from him. “For fuck’s sake, Caleb. You can’t just say stuff like that to me.”
Caleb’s always been far better at expressing his emotions than I am, but it’s moments like these when I realize just how far out of my league I am with him in the romance department. I have no idea where he gets it from. His parents certainly aren’t a model relationship.
Caleb laughs and rolls onto his back. I climb onto him, settling on the center of his chest and listening to the reassuring thud of his heart.
“Do you ever think about how far we’ve come?” I whisper.
“What do you mean?” Caleb murmurs back.
“I mean that the first time I saw you, I never thought we’d end up here. Never thought you’d be the person I’d be lying beside almost eight years later.”
“Yeah, I think about it,” he murmurs.
I close my eyes and snuggle closer.