Chapter Twenty
“I need to get back to Heaven tomorrow morning and make sure about a few things for Saturday’s wedding,” she told him the following evening as they cleared their dinner dishes.
“Plus, I’m teaching a karate class in the afternoon, so I need to get to the dojo and warm up. I haven’t practiced in almost a week.”
The day had gone better than she’d thought it would.
Vera had been clearheaded, sweet and smiling when they’d entered her room that morning.
Unlike the previous time, she actually engaged with Charity, asking her a myriad of questions about her family Charity was happy to answer.
Sneaking a few glances at Kolby throughout the day, she’d noted he was much more relaxed.
The evidence he’d had a good night’s sleep covered him like a full body band aid.
The purple splotches under his eyes were fading, his skin had lost some of the sallowness he’d been wearing, even his posture was better.
Back straight, shoulders relaxed and in place, not sitting under his ears and filled with tension.
The nursing staff had allowed them to wheel Vera up to the rooftop conservatory, where they chatted as the midday sun streamed through the domed ceiling.
Watching the interaction between mother and son was eye-opening.
Vera was a teaser. A big one. With good-natured sarcasm, easy banter, and a mischievous smile, she had her hulky, manly-man son’s face coloring more times than Charity could count.
The fact he loved his mother was written all over him in the gentle way he helped her stand from the bed and transfer to the wheelchair, the solicitous manner he had when pouring her a glass of water, or even helping her back to bed once their visit was ending.
Nothing could have endeared him to Charity more than knowing and seeing firsthand the type of loving son he was. Even with their past struggles and her erratic mental history, Kolby was his mother’s champion in every way.
If she hadn’t already admitted to herself her crush had become something much deeper than a simple infatuation, seeing him with his mother would surely have tipped her emotions over that line.
All in all, Charity put the day in the win column.
“Okay. I’ll follow you back tomorrow afternoon. I know the Cameron’s want pictures of the rehearsal at the church and then the dinner afterward.”
“You going to be okay leaving your mama for a few days? Or, I guess more importantly, is she going to be okay with you being gone?”
“She should be. After today, I'm hopeful she's finally turned a corner.” He put the plate he’d dried into the cabinet above the stove, then folded the towel and slung it over the door handle. “The staff will assign someone to stay with her during the day shift.”
Charity wasn’t quick enough to lift her eyes from his butt back up to his face before he turned fully around. Her face heated when his eyebrows rose.
She averted her gaze, zeroing in on her phone, which she picked up just as it pinged.
TOM sailed across her screen.
“Something wrong” Kolby asked.
“N-No. Everything’s fine.” She placed the phone on the table, screen-side down.
“Your words say one thing, but your face tells another story.” He sat opposite her at the table and reached for her phone.
She placed her hand over it, nailing him with a glare. “Privacy. Ever heard of it?”
The corners of his lips quirked.
“I’m gonna take a stab in the dark and say you just got a text from Ted.”
“Tom,” she said and automatically cursed herself for jumping to the bait. “You did that on purpose.”
“So, I’m right?” he thrust his chin at her phone. “That was him?”
On a sigh, she nodded.
“What’s he want?”
“I don’t know because I haven’t listened to any of his messages.” The moment the words left her lips she cursed herself again.
Kolby’s face hardened. “How many times has he called?”
She shrugged. “A few.”
“How many, Charity?”
Her back snapped. “Don’t use that tone with me, O’Brian. I’m not a two-year-old.”
“No, you’re not.” He shook his head. In a gentler voice he asked, “Has he been bothering you with calls?”
“Not bothering, no. Just,” she flicked her hand in the air. “He probably wants to apologize. Liv told me he was very contrite about how he acted that afternoon when he just showed up, unannounced.”
“Why won’t you answer him?”
Telling him the truth, that she just didn’t want to and had hopes he’d get the unsaid message and quit calling her, sounded juvenile in her head. She could imagine saying the words aloud would sound even worse.
“Do you want to see him again?” he asked when she remained quiet.
“No. I told Liv I didn’t.”
“Maybe he needs to hear it straight from you.”
She knew he was right. Still...
“Look,” he rose and grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge. “I’m no fan of the guy, and I hate to give advice because I hate to get it, but if you really want closure with him, maybe the best thing to do would be to return his call.”
“Look at you.” She widened her eyes and tossed him a fake surprise express. “Closure? You sound like a relationship expert.”
“You’re only mocking me because you know I’m right.” He lifted the bottle to his lips and took a long pull from it.
Damn the man.
“My mother would say the same thing if she were here.” She blew out a breath and then dropped her head, cradling her chin in her propped palm.
“From everything you’ve told me about your mother, she’s a smart cookie.”
“The smartest.” Charity sighed, then picked up her phone. The four message alerts she received today from Tom spread across her screen with the times they’d come in. Debating with herself wasn’t something she enjoyed doing, especially when she knew the right answer wasn’t the answer she wanted.
“I’m gonna go pack up my stuff so I can leave right after lunch tomorrow,” he told her, tossing the now empty bottle into the recycling bin. “Thanks for dinner,” he added, dropping a kiss on the top of her head and squeezing her shoulder.
“It was just leftovers,” she said, staring at her screen.
“Tasted like a feast to me.”
When she was alone in the kitchen, she deliberated the pros and cons of calling Tom.
Pro: she wouldn’t appear rude by ignoring his calls, something she hated appearing. If she told Tom she no longer wanted to see him, he would have definitive closure, as Kolby suggested. Plus, it would give her a chance to tell him no hard feelings that things didn’t work out.
The cons: she didn’t want to talk to him because she was embarrassed about how their relationship ended.
If he was hurt, she didn’t want to be put in the position to apologize for causing it because it hadn’t been her fault.
That was all on him. The major reason she wanted to avoid speaking to him, though, was purely selfish: she’d never been good at breakups, preferring a clean, surgical break instead of a talking-things-out-and-coming-to-a-mutual-decision parting of the ways.
On a sigh, she dropped her head down on the table and dragged in a breath to calm her roiling stomach.
“You’ve never run from an argument in your life, Baby-Girl,” CarlieRae whispered in her ear. “Now’s not the time to start.”
Resigned to it, because her mother was, after all, right, Charity hit the icon next to Tom’s phone number and let it ring.
***
Two hours later, she’d washed her face, brushed her teeth, and slid into bed, her laptop and phone with her. She was just about to check her to-do list for the next day when a light tap at her closed door had her saying, “Come in.”
Kolby opened the door and peeked in.
“You all settled in for the night?”
She nodded, and he opened the door fully, but didn’t enter.
“You talk to Tanner?”
She pursed her lips. “You do that just to be obnoxious, don’t you?”
That darn smirk.
“More so,” his shoulder shifted, “because the guy is forgettable.”
She fought the urge to roll her eyes.
“So. Did you?”
“If you must know, Mr. Nosy, yes, I did.”
When she didn’t elaborate, he rolled a hand as he leaned back against the doorjamb. “And? How did it go?”
Why he was so invested in knowing was the first thing that popped into her head, so she asked.
His shrug wasn’t as noncommittal as it appeared.
“I just want to make sure you’re okay and that he’s not pressuring you.
And before you say you can take care of yourself,” he held up a hand.
She slammed her mouth shut because she had been just about to say that, so, double damn the man.
“I know you can, Charity. But it’s in my nature to worry about the people I care about. ”
This time she wouldn’t have been able to speak even if she wanted to.
He cared about her.
Cared.
A word that, once upon a few months ago, she would never have dreamed swam in his vocabulary concerning her.
Charity swallowed, her mouth filled with tumbleweed dust.
“Did you tell him you didn’t want to see him anymore?”
“I did.” Her voice was raw, the words barely a whisper in the air around them.
Something shifted in his eyes. They seemed lighter. Not in color, but as if a worry or a burden was lifted from them.
“And he was okay? With your decision, I mean?”
“Yes.”
She omitted the part where Tom said he was still willing to give their relationship another shot because he felt there was something special between them, something he hadn’t found with any other girl.
That was why he’d reacted as he had. He admitted to being jealous and felt Kolby was acting in a proprietary manner when it came to her, and that had him acting as he had.
She’d assured him that wasn’t the case at all. They were simply on a time schedule and the wedding, their work, had to come first.
Looking back now, she wondered if his assumption had been correct.
“Okay, well, good.” He dragged his hands through his hair and exhaled. “That’s good. He won’t be showing up, unannounced again, at the next wedding.”