CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Saturday, April 8
Andrew
Lombardi’s Steakhouse was warm and cozy on the rainy evening, the rich mahogany booths bathed in intimate sconce lights. As instructed, Andrew had driven up the rainy highway to a restaurant two towns north, their anonymity solidified with each passing mile.
Kathryn shrugged off her blazer and set it on the booth beside her. She tapped on her phone, frowned, then placed it face down on the table and scanned the wine menu. Andrew took in the way the light in the room made her skin glow. She wore a stack of bangles on one wrist and a heavy gold watch on the other. He pictured the girl he’d known all those years ago, with her bright laugh, her long, sun-kissed hair. This Kathryn was stiff; she appeared to carry herself with an air of confidence, even when the occasional signs of discomfort peeked through her strong exterior. From what he could tell, Kathryn surrounded herself with a safe cushion of isolation. Amy had been his second chance—why hadn’t Kathryn found hers?
“I’ll have the filet mignon with the Kona-coffee rub. Medium rare. Steamed vegetables and potatoes on the side.” Kathryn handed the waiter her menu. “And a glass of Silver Oak cab.”
“I’ll have the same. Medium, with an iced tea.”
When the waiter walked away, Kathryn recalibrated. “When did you stop drinking?”
Andrew folded his napkin onto his lap. “Twenty years sober next February.”
Kathryn’s eyes widened, a blush rising in her cheeks. “I can cancel my order—”
“Don’t worry about it, Kathryn. I’m fine. And when you’re meeting your estranged ex to discuss your secret love child, wine might be necessary.”
Kathryn stared at him. “Drew ...”
He let his smile break across his face, and Kathryn returned it, a spark of relief in her eyes, and her shoulders relaxed. The waiter brought her wine, and she held up her glass. “Well, cheers to that.” Andrew held his iced tea aloft, and they clinked glasses. Kathryn’s eyes drifted to the ceiling tiles above. “What is it with all the restaurants playing Frank Sinatra, like, exclusively?”
Andrew focused on the music floating above the din of the restaurant, grasping the bouncy tune, before the lyrics caught up with him: “The Way You Look Tonight.” He and Kathryn locked eyes. They remembered.
The first time he’d leaned in her ear and whispered I love you , they’d been dancing, the magic of “The Way You Look Tonight” swimming in the room. She’d stopped. They’d never said these words to each other before, and for a moment he thought he’d upset her.
“I love you, too, Andrew.” She had given an embarrassed smile before he kissed her.
Now Andrew looked at Kathryn across the table as he took in the memory, reliving the delicious magic of first love. He hadn’t felt anything that magical in twenty years. “We were something else, weren’t we?”
Kathryn’s gaze dropped to the table, and her smile fell. “We were. We were crazy about each other. But we were just kids; there was no way we could have known how everything would turn out.” Sadness lingered in her eyes.
The room bustled around them, and he saw it again: the weight of her decisions and how carefully she tried to conceal her regret. It was there, clear as day, always present, always hidden.
The waiter set their dishes on the table, steam rising between them, and they ate for a while, lost in their own thoughts.
“How are your parents?” Andrew asked. He’d gotten along with Kathryn’s family and still felt a sting at all his unreturned calls to their house.
“My dad passed away ten years ago.” She snapped her fingers. “Heart attack. Just like that.”
“I’m so sorry.” Andrew was genuinely surprised. His parents were alive and healthy, and he realized how fortunate he was.
“Thank you.” She straightened, set down her wineglass, composed herself. “My mom sold their house and moved to Naples. She got married again, which is so strange to me. But she’s happy. They live in one of those fifty-five-plus communities, and they play pickleball.” She shrugged. “And you?” Her words were clipped now. “How’s your family?”
“My parents are doing well. They’re retired. My brother moved to Myrtle Beach, and he has two boys.”
The previous fall, Andrew and Amy had gone to visit his brother, Timothy. On their first evening together, they had all gone down to the beach for an evening walk while Tim’s kids skidded across the waves on their boogie boards. At dusk, Tim had called out to his boys, and they’d charged at him, leaving their small footprints in the sand, and Tim had wrapped their squirming bodies in a giant rainbow beach towel. The image had hit Andrew like a slap, along with the realization that his younger brother was living the very life he’d planned with Kathryn, while he and Amy stood on the sidelines, spectators in dry-clean-only clothes she’d purchased for the trip.
“Andrew?” A man turned the corner, his voice jolting Andrew from his reverie.
A frantic heat spread from his chest to his face as the Rolodex in his mind spun, trying to place the man’s face and how he fit into his life, and whether he knew Amy.
“Charles?” Andrew asked as the man stepped into the intimate glow of light Andrew shared with Kathryn.
“How’s it going, stranger?” Andrew’s client, Charles, clapped a hand on Andrew’s shoulder. He wore a linen shirt with a busy palm-leaf print, his face pink from, presumably, too many rounds of golf and too much bourbon. He motioned to Kathryn. “So this is the missus?”
Andrew reached for his water glass as Charles extended his hand in Kathryn’s direction. Instead of a handshake, Charles kissed the top of Kathryn’s knuckles, his eyes tracing her clavicle, down the low-cut neckline of her dress. An ice chip lodged itself in the back of Andrew’s throat, leaving a white-hot trail of pain when he swallowed. Charles hadn’t met Amy, but if he did, how would Andrew explain the dinner with another woman? His thoughts spiraled, that familiar prickle in his fingertips.
“Just a friend. Kathryn.” Kathryn’s voice was laced with a jagged barb of warning. She was skilled at rebuffing lecherous men, Andrew noted.
“Well, I don’t want to interrupt your dinner.” Charles eyed Kathryn one last time. “It was good to see you, Andrew. Nice to meet you, Kathryn.”
Charles disappeared into the background of the restaurant.
“Sorry about that,” Andrew said, and a breath drained from him. “One of my clients.”
Kathryn gave a small nod. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, I just—we have to be careful.”
“Why?” Kathryn’s nearly empty wineglass was perched between her fingers. “We’re not doing anything wrong.”
“No, we’re not.” Andrew went back to his dinner, his appetite diminished. He could have told Amy he was taking a client out. But lying seemed worse than an omission. And he couldn’t shake the sticky-dirty feeling of watching Charles ogle Kathryn, that tickle of panic. “But I’m not ready to tell Amy about Max. About you.”
Kathryn considered, then gave a small nod. Andrew pushed his guilt aside. Kathryn was right—he could eat dinner with whomever he liked. Amy had never shown him a shred of jealousy. If he had dinner with a female friend, she’d never question him. So why did this feel like a dirty secret?
As he ate, he took in the way Kathryn’s graceful fingers held her fork. For a moment he pictured himself in a world where they didn’t need to jump when people like Charles interrupted their evening. This is my wife, Kathryn, he imagined saying, savoring the envy in Charles’s face. For a moment he allowed himself to exist in the place where they were a normal couple enjoying a night out, with twenty years of love and partnership between them.
He and Amy rarely went to dinner. They’d dated over breakfast, plates of chicken and waffles, Amy in her scrubs after a long shift. When Amy was home in the evenings, they basked in coziness. Now her schedule was so hectic, when she did eat breakfast in his presence, she ate oatmeal standing over the kitchen sink before she rushed off to work.
Andrew shook away the thought. “What’s a nineteen-year-old doing with a car like that?”
Kathryn took a deep breath as she prepared to answer. “Max inherited some money. And a month ago he found himself in need of new transportation.” Her voice was cold, with an edge of disdain. “He came home with that thing a few weeks back.” She gave a resigned shrug. “At least its safety features are top of the line.”
What Nick had said was true—Max was a spoiled rich kid. Kathryn’s father must have left him money, and Andrew imagined Max striding into the Audi dealership with cash; it was every teenage boy’s dream. “Lucky kid.”
Kathryn dabbed her lips with her napkin and didn’t elaborate.
Andrew remembered the way Kathryn had withdrawn when he’d pushed before, and he couldn’t risk driving her away again. He leaned forward and laid out his question carefully. “Did Max have any difficulties growing up?”
Kathryn’s eyes still held their trepidation from when she’d spoken of Max’s car, and she seemed to consider her answer carefully. “Yes.” Ice flushed Andrew’s veins. “He had a bit of a rough patch, and for a while his behavior was ... dangerous.” Kathryn’s tone shifted, and the color drained from her face. So what Nick had said was true. Then she rushed: “It was my fault; I sheltered him too much for too long.” Her cheeks glowed. “He’s better now, though some days speaking to him can feel like handling a live grenade.” Her words slowed. “Still, it’s like living in limbo. I’m waiting for him to do something, to make a choice. To go back to school, maybe.”
“But he’s better?” Andrew probed. Max’s haunted eyes in the swimming pool photos flashed again, and he swallowed the lump in his throat. Something had to have happened in Max’s life to affect him so deeply.
“Yes.” Kathryn’s shoulders slumped. Her voice was raw and honest. “I’m scared to push him. He’s old enough to make his own choices, but I don’t want anything to throw him off course.”
“You mean like meeting me?”
“Yes.” She turned the stem of her glass, rotating it in small degrees. “But I’ve been thinking.”
“Hmm?”
“Maybe if we approach it the right way, I could introduce the two of you. Someday. Right now I feel like if anything upsets him, it could end badly.” A ripple in her voice. “I’ve tried everything to get through to him, but he won’t listen to me. Maybe if he demonstrates a little more emotional maturity, you might be the person who can get him to take his life seriously.”
She held his eyes with hers, and something stirred inside him. Andrew had spent years blaming himself for Kathryn’s absence, punishing himself, and now he felt her open up just slightly, and he thought there might be a sliver of a chance he might learn why she’d omitted him from their lives.
Kathryn’s words held a loose promise of a future between them, in some form, and there was a beam of hope in this, too. Maybe she’d let him meet Max. And another spark: maybe it meant this dinner didn’t have to be the last time they’d see each other. “I’m here, Kathryn. Now that I know, I’m not going anywhere. I can’t. You understand that, don’t you?”
Kathryn considered his words. Then she cocked her head, a blush to her cheeks, and he saw the Kathryn he’d loved all those years ago. Andrew shoved aside a fresh wave of guilt, letting the nostalgic magic of their memory of the love they’d shared settle over their table like a cloud, blended with the taste of what their life could have been, and savored it all. Kathryn’s return to his life now held a hint of permanence, and he allowed an illicit excitement to creep into his heart. What he’d known for twenty years was true: their story wasn’t finished.