Emerald Windows (25 page)

Roxy laughed nervously and shook her head. “I can’t…really. It’s been a long time.”

“Come on, just a few steps,” he coaxed. “I’ll show you my painting if you do.”

Roxy wet her lips, looked up at him, and realized that the balls and chains she had felt weighing her down before she’d come out with Sonny tonight didn’t seem to be dragging her down just then. She felt light with him, and for a moment she was able to forget her fear and shame and guilt and heartache. For the moment, she just wanted to dance.

Roxy stepped back, stood on her toes, and did a soft pirouette, lowered into a
plié,
then ended in a delicate curtsy.

Sonny threw both hands over his heart and stepped back, grinning with delight. “Oh, Rox, you’ve got to start dancing again. That’s too nice to waste.”

Roxy bit her lip, wondering why she wasn’t embarrassed. “Thank you,” she whispered. “Now you have to keep your part of the bargain and show me your painting.”

“Okay,” Sonny said. “But my moves aren’t nearly as graceful as yours.”

They rode his motorcycle back to Sonny’s garage apartment, and Roxy knew he could feel her hand shaking as he held it and led her in. Something in her head warned her that she could be walking into trouble…that men could not be trusted…that they were all ruled by rampant hormones instead of the heart. But somewhere deep inside, instinct told her that Sonny was indeed different and that he could be trusted.

He turned on the light, robbing the room of its mystery, and closed the door behind him. “Ain’t much,” he said, “but it’s mine. At least, until my folks kick me out.”

Roxy smiled. “So, where’s the painting?”

Sonny lifted the spread on his bed, slid out the canvas lying face up on the floor beneath it. He held it up, its back to her, and assessed it himself one last time. Finally, reluctantly, he turned it around to show her.

Roxy stepped closer, surveying the detail of the house depicted there. There was a Norman Rockwell poignancy to the faces of the people around it, emotion in every stroke. “It’s got so much,” she whispered. “So many stories in this one little canvas. So many feelings.” She looked up at him, surprise in her eyes as she regarded him in a new light. “Sonny, have your parents seen this? I mean, really looked at it?”

“No, not really,” he said. “I mean, they saw it long enough to get mad, like I’d been growing pot in my bathroom or something. But I don’t think they took the time to
see
it.”

“They
have
to,” Roxy said. “Sonny, you have to make them. It’s wonderful. It reminds me of . .. family. When the family is young and colorful and bright. Before everything turns gray.”

“You think?”

“Yes. That painting shouldn’t be hidden.”

“Well, it’s not finished. But thanks, Rox. I appreciate it.”

He took a deep, shaky breath. “I’d better take you home,” he whispered with an affected grin.

Roxy looked at him, wide-eyed, surprised that he wouldn’t at least try to take advantage of the situation. The respect in his choice filled her with relief. “Yeah,” she whispered. “I’d better get home.”

Sonny took her hand and led her back to his motorcycle.

CHAPTER
   

M
ORNING LIGHT SHONE THROUGH
the windows in Brooke’s room the next day, offering new hope and an exhilarated feeling that something good was about to happen. Dressed and ready to pursue the finances needed to finish the windows, Brooke took the sculpture and sat down on her bed, holding it in her lap and stroking the smooth lines, quietly absorbing the feel of it for the last time.

She heard a knock and looked up to see Roxy standing in her doorway. “Hi,” she said.

“Hi.” They were both stiff, awkward. The fight they’d had the night before weighed on Brooke’s heart, making her regret that she had ever confronted her sister. Maybe she should have kept it to herself and tried to find covert ways of helping Roxy out of this hole she had dug for herself.

“Mom just told me about the committee’s decision,” Roxy said. “I’m really sorry. I know how hard you worked on those windows.”

Brooke’s eyes dropped to the sculpture. “We’ll pay you for the work you’ve done,” she said. “They did agree to compensate us for what we’ve already done.”

Roxy crossed her arms and looked at the floor. “That’s okay,” she said. “Just keep it.”

A moment of silence passed, but Roxy still lingered on the threshold of Brooke’s room.

“Did Mom also tell you that we’re going ahead with the project?” Brooke asked. “Without pay?”

“Yeah,” Roxy said. “But I don’t understand how you plan to raise the money.”

Brooke touched the fingertips of the man’s hand in the sculpture, placed her own hand over the woman’s. The thought of letting the piece go made her heart ache. “Nick said someone had offered him twenty-five thousand dollars for this,” she whispered. “That’ll get us started on the windows.”

“What?” Roxy stepped into the room. “Why would you sell that for the stupid people at that church? You’ll never get the money back, and the sculpture will go into strange hands, and the church members won’t even care.”

Tears emerged in Brooke’s eyes, and she looked up. “What else can I do?” she asked. “I’ve caught Nick’s vision for those windows. I feel right on the verge of so many things. I just have this feeling that working on the windows can change my life somehow. And I want to change it. I don’t think I can stand to go back to the way it was before, living day to day, never daring to look ahead. I feel like abandoning the windows now will leave us right back where we were seven years ago—with everything taken away from us because of one woman and her lies.”

“You’re in love with him, aren’t you?” Roxy asked.

Brooke set the sculpture down carefully and ambled to the window. The morning sunlight was shining on her parents’ back lawn. It warmed her face. “All I know is that I have a connection with Nick that I’ve never had with anyone else. Even in high school, I felt it so strong that it almost overwhelmed me. But I never acted on it, not once, and neither did he. He treated me just
the way a teacher should treat a student. If we don’t have these windows to do, I don’t know what will happen to us. I can’t stay here, and he probably won’t leave.” She turned around, faced her sister, bracing herself for her reproach, her disgust, her judgment. But this time there was none.

Roxy simply stood looking at her, a frown forming between her thin brows—a frown of deep concern—not of angry disapproval. “But, Brooke,” she whispered, “isn’t the sculpture just as important? He kept it all these years. He could have sold it himself.”

Brooke went back to the sculpture, picked it up, and held it as if it were alive. “These hands represent the beginning,” she said. “But I want more than just a beginning. I want a future.” She looked up at her sister, her mouth twitching in pain as she lifted her brows decisively. “I’m going to sell it today.”

Roxy swallowed, and her face softened, her expression as unguarded and sympathetic as Brooke had seen since she’d come home. “Can I come with you?” she asked.

Brooke tried to laugh, but her effort failed. “I’d really appreciate that,” she said, “because this is going to be one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.”

In that moment it seemed as if Roxy was her little sister again, anxious to join Brooke in whatever adventure she embarked on. Brooke crossed the distance between them and hugged Roxy in a way that she hadn’t done in seven years. Miraculously, Roxy hugged her back. In that hug, all the regrets and injustices and condemnations between them fell away, leaving just two sisters who desperately needed each other’s love.

CHAPTER
   

H
ELENA, THE GALLERY OWNER,
was busy with a client when Brooke and Roxy first arrived, so while they waited, Brooke led her sister to the wall where Nick’s work hung.

“He’s good, isn’t he?” Brooke whispered, holding the wrapped sculpture against her like a newborn baby.

Roxy hadn’t yet surrendered her grudge against Nick completely, so she nodded without saying a word.

Brooke leaned back against a corner of the wall and gazed at her sister’s sad eyes. “Roxy, I know you don’t like him,” she whispered, “because you think that directly or indirectly he’s responsible for a lot of the hurt in both our lives. But what you have to understand is that Nick was as much a victim as I was.”

Roxy settled her eyes on one painting, and Brooke could see that she made an honest effort to see, to feel the bright poignancy Nick had captured there. “I know about being a victim, Brooke,” she whispered.

“I know you do,” Brooke said quietly. “You’ve been a victim of my scandal, and now, you’re also a victim of a
married man who probably promised you the moon and the stars. But he’s married, Roxy, and no matter how you add that up, you come out shortchanged.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

Brooke watched Roxy step away, arms crossed defensively as she glanced at other pieces displayed in that portion of the gallery. “Just remember something,” Brooke said. “There’s someone out there for you, who has the same dreams, the same imagination, the same kind of soul. When you find that person, Roxy, you’ll understand how destructive this relationship is now.”

“I know it’s destructive,” Roxy said. “You’re not telling me anything new. I’m hoping not to see him anymore,” she said. “Really hoping.” She looked toward the gallery owner, who was walking her clients to the door, then moved her focus back to Brooke. A shred of a smile glimmered in her eyes. “Sonny’s nice, though.”

Brooke’s surprise at Roxy’s declaration not to see Abby Hemphill’s son anymore, as weak as it was, was usurped by this new development. “Yeah, Sonny’s real nice.”

Brooke smiled at her sister, praying that the enchantment she saw on her face meant that Roxy was allowing herself another chance to find the happiness she deserved.

But before Roxy said more, Helena was free and heading toward them.

“Sorry, darling,” she said, her voice loud now that they were alone in the gallery. “You’re Nick’s friend, aren’t you?” She took her hand and kissed her cheek, as if Brooke was a long lost friend. “That was one of my best clients. Didn’t find anything she wanted this trip, though. I could use some new pieces from him. Is he working on anything?”

“A few things,” Brooke said, not wanting to disappoint the anxious woman. “The stained-glass windows are his main priority right now, though.” She felt her heart pounding painfully, like that of a mother offering a child for adoption, at the moment of surrender. “I came to see if you’d be interested in buying something from me.”

“What, darling?”

Slowly, she uncovered
Infinity,
and the woman gasped.

“He—” Brooke’s voice faltered, and she swallowed. “He told me you like this. That you had made an offer on it.”

Helena’s face lit up as she drew in a deep, reverent breath. Carefully, she took the sculpture from Brooke and turned it over in her hands as if she knew its value vividly. “The sculpture he wouldn’t sell me!” she said. “I
begged
him for it.” She looked at Brooke, her eyes filled with a new respect. “He said it wasn’t his. You wouldn’t be the sculptor, would you?”

Brooke nodded and wondered if her face looked as pale and lifeless as it felt. “Yes, I am.”

“I see.” Helena inclined her head and offered her a knowing smile. “The last time you two were in, darling, I figured out that you were the woman in Nick’s past. Now I understand why he wouldn’t part with the sculpture. I thought his attachment to it was a little unusual. Especially when it wasn’t his own work. And honey, I offered him a
lot
of money.”

Brooke tried to ignore the comments regarding their relationship and seized the opportunity. “Does the offer still stand?” she asked, her voice suddenly hoarse.

“Does it ever!” Helena said. “I can write you a check right now.”

Brooke looked down at the sculpture and realized that it could fall into a stranger’s hands, someone who didn’t know the history, the pain, the heartache associated with those hands, who’d set it on their mantle somewhere and forget to dust it.