Chapter 2
Two
The video of Clare’s accident haunted Jack for months.
He’d wake up in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat and breathing hard because he had once again relived the horror of it in a dream.
It was the same thing every time—he saw the car coming toward her but couldn’t get to her in time to push her out of the way.
He was equally plagued by the questions of why she hadn’t moved and what she’d been thinking in that final life-changing instant before the car hit her.
After more than a year of waiting and hoping for some change in Clare’s condition, Frannie clued him in that the girls never brought their friends home anymore because their house had become a hospital staffed by round-the-clock nurses.
In light of this revelation, he’d made the unbearable decision to move Clare into a nearby place of her own, her care overseen by the same team of nurses.
Jack had taken the day after the move to wallow in his grief, but now he had no choice but to pull himself together.
Jamie had been running the architectural firm they owned for more than a year on his own, the girls needed their father, and he had to figure out what to do with the rest of his life.
While he’d much prefer to ignore all these pressing issues, he couldn’t do that any longer.
Standing in front of the mirror, he dragged a razor over his face for the first time in several days.
He went through the rote motions the way he did everything lately—out of necessity.
His face seemed a little thinner than it had been the last time he’d looked closely.
On the inside, he was totally numb. Would it always be this way?
From now on, would he go through life without feeling anything?
Without experiencing joy? Was that his fate?
As he started the water in the shower, his thoughts turned once again to Clare.
Since memories were all he had left of her, he allowed himself to revisit them often.
He vividly remembered the first time he ever saw her.
She’d been tending bar at the National Hotel on Block Island.
In constant motion, she’d been a whirling dervish of activity and banter and wit as she made drinks, washed glasses, talked to customers, rang up sales, and carried on a good-natured sparring match with the other two bartenders.
She’d looked then much as she did twenty years later: petite with unruly blonde hair and the most amazing blue eyes he’d ever seen.
From across the bar, she’d glared at him. “You got a problem, buddy?”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to stare. I’ve just never seen anyone get so much done in as little time as you do.”
Collecting abandoned glasses, she worked her way to his end of the bar. “I don’t let any grass grow. That’s why they ask me back every year.”
“You’ve worked here before? I don’t remember you.”
“This is my fifth summer. I bussed tables until I was old enough to bartend. Ready for a refill?”
He pushed his mug forward. “Heineken, please. Funny, I’m sure I’d remember you.”
“I’ll bet you say that to all the girls.” She winked and moved on to other customers.
Jack continued to watch her—without staring—while he ate dinner and drank another beer. The bar got busier, and though he’d planned to hit some of the island’s other hot spots, he was still there at last call.
“One more for the road?” she asked as she cleaned up discarded glasses and dishes.
Since he wasn’t driving, he said, “Sure, thanks.”
When she brought him the beer, he asked what she did the rest of the year.
“I teach third grade in Mystic.”
“I had you pegged as a college kid.”
She laughed. “Everyone always thinks I’m too young to be the teacher, but I’m going into my third year. What about you?” While they talked, she cleared off the bar, washed dishes, and ran credit cards.
“I’m an architect. Just finished graduate school last week. I’m taking a break before I go back to work.”
“I love architecture. I’ve always been interested in how buildings are designed and put together. It sounds like it would be a lot of fun.”
“It is.” He sipped the beer, trying to make it last so she would keep talking to him. “I’ve had the opportunity to work on some great projects, and I’ve got a couple of others waiting for me when I get back.”
She crooked a skeptical eyebrow. “If you just graduated, how is it you’ve already worked on such great stuff? Doesn’t that usually come after school?”
“I worked for a Boston firm while I was in grad school.”
“Where’d you go?”
“Berkeley and Harvard.”
She let out a low whistle. “Oh, well, don’t mind me, Harvard boy. La-di-da.”
“It’s just a school.”
“Yeah, right. Just a school we mere mortals couldn’t begin to aspire to. So what’ve you worked on? Anything I might’ve heard about?” Her pace slowed as the crowd filtered out to find after-hours fun elsewhere.
“The new symphony hall in Boston, for one.”
“Didn’t Neil Booth design that?”
Impressed, he looked at her with new appreciation. “You do pay attention. I work for Neil. My friend Jamie is his son.” He wasn’t sure why he told her that. He usually didn’t mention it since Jamie was sensitive about the advantages that came from being Neil’s son in their profession.
“Well, well. This just gets more and more interesting, doesn’t it?”
“Neil is a terrific guy. Very normal despite the fame.”
“I took an architecture class in college. I read a lot about his work.” She scooped up Jack’s empty glass.
As he got up to leave, he tried to recall the last time he’d enjoyed a conversation with a woman this much. Most of the women he met were either not interested in his work or totally self-absorbed. The tiny dynamo with the blonde hair and startling blue eyes was different.
“Could I walk you home, or do you have other plans?”
She studied him for a long time before she answered. “I don’t have any plans, but how do I know you aren’t a freak? We get a lot of freaks around here in the summer,” she said with a teasing grin. “Besides, I don’t even know your name.”
“It’s Jack Harrington.”
She made him suffer through a seemingly endless minute before she said, “I’ll go with you, Jack Harrington, but I still have another half hour or so here.”
“I’ll wait.” His heart skipped a beat, and somehow he knew everything was about to change.
The sting of shampoo in his eyes interrupted Jack’s remembrances. Rinsing off the soap, he realized he’d been in there a long time and shut off the shower.
He got dressed and straightened the messy room.
Stripping the sheets from the bed, he tossed them into the washer along with the clothes that had piled up the last few days.
After he remade the bed, he wandered outside to the deck.
With only the relentless pounding of the ocean below for company, Jack sat there until the sun began to dip toward the horizon, thinking about his daughters, the huge job his company had been awarded to build the Infinity Group’s Newport hotel, and the staggering list of things he needed to do to get his life in order.
First on the list was reconnecting with his kids.
He eventually wandered downstairs, where Frannie and the girls were about to sit down for dinner.
Frannie offered him a warm smile. “It’s good to see you.”
“I’m sorry I punched out yesterday. I just needed a little time.”
“I understand. We’re glad to see you, aren’t we, girls?”
Their replies were mostly mumbles: uh-huh, sure, I guess.
“Are you hungry?” Frannie asked.
“I could eat.”
“Great. Maggie, set another place, please.”
Jack felt like a visitor in the home he’d built largely with his own hands. Since the girls seemed to have nothing to say to him, he took the opportunity to study them, to really look at them for the first time in longer than he could remember.
Each of them had healthy tans from long days at the beach. While he hadn’t been paying attention, Jill and Kate had become young women, and Maggie had lost the baby fat in her cheeks.
Jill was sixteen and the image of him—tall and dark-haired with gray-blue eyes.
Kate, at fifteen, had Clare’s blonde hair and her shocking blue eyes, but was tall like him.
Ten-year-old Maggie was a combination of the two of them: Jack’s dark hair and Clare’s eyes.
He and Clare had always joked that they each had a “mini-me” and then, as a surprise, along came a “mini-we.”
He hadn’t thought about that in a long time, and the memory made him yearn for her.
His attempts to make conversation with the girls were greeted with one-word answers. Only Frannie seemed glad to have him there. Clearly, he had his work cut out for him.
“I’d like to go out to the island this weekend,” he said as they were finishing up.
“Have fun,” Jill said.
“I want you girls to come with me.”
They all spoke at once.
“I have plans.”
“Meghan’s sleepover is this weekend.”
“I’m babysitting.”
“I want you to come with me.” Making eye contact with each of them, he added, “It’s important.” He had no idea what he’d do if they refused.
His mother owned Haven Hill, a house on the island, and some of their happiest times together as a family had been spent there. Jack was counting on the house to work its magic and help him reconnect with his daughters.
“I think that’s a great idea, Jack,” Frannie said with a meaningful look at each girl. “Some time away together will be great for all of you.”
They never came right out and said they’d go, but they stopped protesting when Frannie weighed in.
Jack sent her a grateful smile.