35. Now #2
My shoulders sag. I want to lie to her but I can’t, not when she’s asking me outright. “It wasn’t. I’m so sorry. I’d have told you if I could have. Grady said he’d pin what happened on Luke if I said a word.”
She’s quiet for a long moment. “I think I already knew. Not about that night on the beach. But I’ve found things, in the house, on his computer and his phone.
He always had an excuse, but…I think I sort of knew.
” She laughs quietly, to herself. “You know who I think he might have really loved? Danny. I never understood why he hated you so much, right from the beginning. And it was always Danny he wanted to be around, back then. Not me.”
Of course. I’m not sure why it never occurred to me before—the way he hated me from the start, how I never understood why he always wanted to hang out with us.
Him suggesting he and Danny could run the church together after the pastor’s heart attack.
And then, apparently, going out of his way to keep Danny here .
“So what will you do?” I ask.
“She’ll come home with me, of course,” says Donna.
“I’m going to need some help. We fired Hilary, you know.
She allowed Cash to attend—a man who’d assaulted you, our biggest donor.
She hardly seems like the kind of person we’d want making decisions for our kids.
Now, Libby, if you don’t mind driving me home, I’d be grateful.
Juliet, can I persuade you to leave with us? It could be hours still.”
I want to make sure he actually gets out. That nothing else goes wrong. “I’d like to stay…unless you think he won’t want me here?”
She tilts her head. “Why wouldn’t he want you here?”
So many reasons. Starting with the fact that he just spent the night in jail because of me. “I told so many lies, Donna,” I whisper. “I lied to you, but I lied to him even more. And I hurt him. Again and again.”
She pulls my hand away and tucks it into her own. “Honey, you did it for him. He’s going to understand that. And he’s going to understand it was the wisest thing you could have done.”
I swallow. “It wasn’t though…I mean, it was all for nothing. I probably just made it worse.”
She smiles. “Could you have gotten one hot-shot attorney, much less two of them, seven years ago? Could you have afforded any kind of attorney back then, either of you? I’d have been in no condition to help, and Luke would have lost all his sponsors no matter what we did.
How can you possibly say it’s for nothing? ”
I bite my lip. “I just have a feeling it’s not going to work out.”
“Juliet, you don’t have that feeling because it’s not going to work out. You have that feeling because you still don’t believe you deserve a happy ending. Just this once, for me, have a little faith.”
I rise and hug her for a very long time. People are the thing that will grind your trust down to nothing. But they’re also how you to discover a small seed of something inside yourself again, something soft and hopeful and full of love, something that will grow.
I felt that once. And tonight, Donna’s helped me see it’s still there.
I hug Libby, and the two of them start walking away, but then Donna turns, her eyes twinkling.
“Oh, and, Juliet, when he’s released and it all works out just the way I said, take a day or two, will you?
We’ve still got that room at the hotel, after all.
I’ll see you both once you’ve gotten some rest.” And then Donna, the former pastor’s wife, winks at me.
And Libby, the current pastor’s wife, stands behind her with wide eyes, mouthing, “ Oh my God ”… before she gives me a thumbs up.
* * *
The station is relatively quiet over the next few hours. I feel ridiculously conspicuous in this red satin dress but eventually doze off and dream of Luke curled up against me.
“This is the most uncomfortable hammock I’ve ever laid on,” I tell him.
“It’s not too late. We can still go to Paris.”
I press my lips to his neck. He smells, oddly, like Windex. “I think we just need to buy a new hammock.”
“Jules,” he says, but it isn’t dream Luke. It’s real Luke. My eyes blink open to find myself splayed over two chairs, him kneeling in front of me.
His face is drawn, his jaw locked hard. He spent the night in prison because of me, and I wonder if he spent it dwelling on just how much he’s suffered at my hands, year after year.
He had to watch me agree to marry Danny after I told him I’d run away with him, after years of wanting me from afar and doing anything he could to take care of me.
And then he had to watch me walk away, acting as if he’d never mattered in the first place.
“Come on,” he says, rising.
I stumble to my feet and follow him outside, blinking into the too-bright sun. He walks around to the side of the station and I follow, my stomach sinking fast.
He’s staring at his phone. It feels intentional, as if he’s doing it simply to shut me out.
“Luke?” I touch his elbow. “I—”
“This is our car,” he says, as if I hadn’t spoken, nodding at a Kia swinging into the parking lot.
His voice is cold, distant. He’s treating me like a woman who broke his heart, or nearly got him charged with murder, or who spent seven years lying to him.
And I’m all those things, so why shouldn’t he?
I swallow hard as I slide into the back seat.
“The Obsidian?” the driver asks.
Luke nods, staring out the window, his jaw still clenched. “Yeah. Thanks.”
The driver glances at us in the mirror, his eyes widening with recognition when they meet mine. I can just imagine what kind of story this will turn into, if it isn’t already a huge story, and I no longer care. I just need to know where we stand.
“Luke,” I whisper, “can we talk?”
His eyes close. Even the sound of my voice is unbearable to him.
“Not here,” he hisses, never looking my way.
We continue in silence, through neighborhoods where children are walking to the bus stop and through some town where people stand twelve-deep in line for coffee before we finally turn toward the beach.
Donna was wrong. He isn’t going to forgive me. I press my face into my hands and take deep breaths through my fingers. How will I survive the next few days? How will I survive the next years, the next decades?
“We’re here,” Luke says as a valet opens his door.
I step out after him, ignoring the stares as I follow him into the lobby. He keeps moving, straight to the elevator, and it’s only when we’re both inside that he finally looks at me.
His mouth opens and he shakes his head, saying nothing.
We get to the suite. I walk in and he follows, letting the door slam behind him.
My eyes fill as I turn to him. “Luke, I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.”
He pulls off his jacket and throws it on the couch, tugs the already loosened bow tie free. And then he presses his hands to his forehead before sliding them into his hair. “Jesus fucking Christ, Juliet. What the fuck ?”
I brush at the tears that have begun to fall. “I know. I know. I’m so sorry.”
He stares at me, his eyes bright with rage. “Do you have any idea what I’ve been through? Do you have any idea what the past seven years have been like, trying to get over you?”
Grief strangles me. I can’t even reply, but simply press a hand to my throat.
“You know what I did after you walked away at Danny’s funeral?” he demands. “I drove back to that fucking cliff, planning to jump.”
I inhale, sharp and fast. I knew he’d been hurt by what I did, but my God, if he’d jumped…
“I thought and thought, and only two things kept me from doing it—the fact that it would hurt Donna and the possibility that you’d come to your senses.”
“Luke, I thought I was doing what was—”
“I waited for you to come back to me for years , Juliet!” he shouts, starting to pace. “That’s how long it took to convince me it was done. And it was all a lie ? Why didn’t you just tell me?”
I dig my hands into my hair. “Because you wouldn’t have gone along with it if you knew!
You’d have confronted Grady, you’d have gone to the police, you’d have fucked it all up, and even if you didn’t wind up in prison, you’d have lost every sponsorship you had!
I had to do it. Surfing meant everything to you. ”
He stops pacing and stares at me, his nostrils flaring. “No, you meant everything to me. Surfing’s just what I do for a living.”
I lean against the wall behind me. He thinks I messed up and maybe I did. Or maybe I kept him out of jail. I can’t take any of it back, so all that’s left is to make sure he knows the truth before he walks away.
“I wanted you to be happy more than I’ve ever wanted anything for myself.
If you think the past seven years weren’t awful for me, then you don’t understand this at all.
” My voice breaks. “If you think the past seven years haven’t killed me, then you can’t possibly love me the way I love you, the way I’ve loved you since you first walked into the diner, because when you love someone like that, yes, you’ll fucking lie to him and for him—”
My words die off as he closes the distance between us, pinning me to the wall with his hands framing my face. “Don’t try to tell a man who’s waited ten years for you that you love him more .”
His mouth lands on mine, then, hard and soft at once, angry and gentle. I hold onto his waist just to maintain my balance, just to keep from losing myself or sliding to the floor.
He needs to shave. I need to shower. But I’m wrenching his belt loose and he’s unzipping my dress.
“I’m so fucking mad at you right now,” he says, his hand fisting my hair to jerk my head up to his, “and I’ve also never loved you more.”
His mouth returns to mine, and I get it, at last. He’s going to forgive me. He was always going to forgive me. I can be flawed, I can do terrible things, and his love for me will always be bigger than that.
He groans as I reach into his boxers and wrap my hand around him. “Bed,” he demands, unclasping my bra.