Five Days Grace (33 page)

Still, he managed to wait her out, staying on the other side of that door. She came out dressed and composed, giving a little worried smile that he knew was a real effort for her at the time, but she did it. For him.

"Ahh, baby, I'm an idiot," he said.

"No, you're not.

"I am. I said it all wrong. Grace, I know how special this is. You are. We are together. Believe me, I get that. I feel it. I'm amazed by it and so grateful. I'm going to try not to say much more than that, because we've only known each other for three days. That doesn't even seem possible, but it's really only been three days."

She nodded.

"Yeah, so I'm trying here. I don't want to scare you off. We both know I'm not in a position to make long-term promises to any woman right now. Because of me. Not you. I have things I have to do. I have to put my body back together, my head, my career. But I want it. I want it all."

"Okay," she said softly, sadly.

"Remember when I told you about my brother and how crazy it would make him if one day, in some other life, I took you home to meet him and my parents? I can see that other life, Grace. I keep seeing it. You and me, together and so happy. I keep thinking about how we can make it work. Because I want that. I want all of it. I just... need some time."

Damn, he thought. Said too much.

But it really looked like she was more happy than scared now. At least, a little bit more on the happy side.

"You should do that. Take the time," she said. "All the time you need. We both should."

And that had to be the last thing he wanted to hear from her, even if he wasn't nearly ready to promise her anything because his life was such a fucking mess at the moment. He was afraid to even ask, but couldn't ignore it, either. "What does that mean, Grace?"

"I... That I... Can we take the boat out again?"

"Sure. If that's what you want." He'd promised her: whatever she wanted. He'd meant it. "Right now?"

She nodded. "Please. I liked it out on the water. It was nice. It was peaceful. I'm just... I need to think."

Which to him sounded nearly as bad as a woman coming to him, looking uneasy, and saying,
We need to talk
. Nothing good ever came of a conversation that began with those words.

But she needed to think, and she wanted to do it on the lake in the boat, so that's what they would do. Tink started whining the minute they headed down the path to the lake instead of up to the road. He whined like a baby, even worse than he had the first time, when they got within five feet of the boat, shooting them a look that seemed to ask how they could possibly betray him this way again.

"You can do it, baby," Grace told him, rubbing his big, silly head and then giving him a kiss on the snout.

And for her, he cried, but got in the boat.

They'd been out on the water for about fifteen minutes, Tink huddled against Grace, who was lying back in the boat staring at the sky, a hand of hers over the side of the boat, trailing along in the water, when she finally started to talk.

"I figured something out today. Did you ever know something, but not really know it? You had all the pieces to put it together, but it was something you didn't want to know or didn't want to believe? So you just kept going, not admitting it to yourself?"

"Sure. Intelligence work is like that at times. The clues are there, and once you piece them all together, it seems obvious—what it all means—and you can't believe it took you that long to figure it out. But it did. The answer's only obvious after you finally have it."

"Yes. Like that. I finally figured it out, and I feel so stupid."

"Something about us?" He had to force the words out.

"No. Luc. I thought I really knew him, because we were friends for so long. Three years before we ever fell in love. If that's what we even did. Honestly, I don't know anymore. I mean, I thought I loved him. I wouldn't have married him otherwise. But now, I just don't know."

Three years, and she still didn't think she really knew the guy?

She'd known Aidan for three days, so what kind of a chance could he possibly have?

And what kind of a man could be nothing but friends with her for three years? How could a man look at her and not want her? Much less really know her, the way a friend of three years would, and not see what an amazing woman she was?

The guy must have been a complete idiot.

"What did you figure out, Grace?" Aidan finally asked.

"It was like I was blinded by him. I only saw what I wanted to see, and I should have known better."

"Blinded?"

"He was perfect. Like a painting that you could study for hours, looking at every feature, every brush stroke, and thinking, it's perfect. His father was some kind of ancient French royalty, and Luc was just... dazzling, so sophisticated, completely out of reach as anything but a friend. But a good friend, funny, talented, charming. We were in art school together. I felt like such a silly American girl, who hadn't seen anything of the world, and he'd seen it all. He showed us all the quirky, amazing places that you only know about if you've lived in Europe your whole life. It was like he opened up a whole, new world to me."

Fuck.
Aidan took that like a kick in the gut.

Gorgeous pseudo-French-royalty? Rich, talented and showed her the world? How the hell could Aidan hope to compete with that? Even if the man was dead?

"I had a crush on him the whole time. He dated rich, aristocratic French women and models. Not just the ones who came and posed for our classes, but girls up on the runways in Paris and Milan."

Aidan held his tongue, barely. He'd take her over any fake woman any day.

"So, three years later, I was done with school. When we said good-bye, I thought I'd probably never see him again. But his mother's an American, and after she divorced his father and remarried, she moved back to the States. She's on the faculty at Windsor College. I hadn't been back six weeks when Luc called, from only a few hours' away, wanting to see me. And everything was different then."

The idiot had finally realized what he had in Grace? Only took him three years.

"He said he'd missed me, that he'd been an idiot and he loved me. It was like a dream come true. I was getting what I thought I wanted, and it didn't matter that we'd only been in love for a few months, because of the years we'd been friends. I thought we'd be together forever."

"What happened, honey?" Aidan asked finally.

"His mother was sick—cancer—and no one knew if she'd survive. Luc wanted her there for the wedding, and I understood that. I'd want my mother there, too. We got married right away. It was really hard on him, to see her sick. I don't think he'd ever faced anything that hard, and he needed me. I was glad that I could be there for him. My life had been perfect to that point, so easy, and I knew it. I tried to always be grateful for that, but maybe I wasn't grateful enough."

"No, baby. No. That's not why." He knew enough about the world to know that, at least. "Tell me the rest of it."

"His mother got better, but then his father died, completely unexpectedly, in a climbing accident in Nepal. Luc was stunned. Everyone was. On top of that, the man's finances were a mess. I didn't even think about money before we got married, didn't even ask. I didn't marry Luc for money. I just didn't think it would ever be an issue. Turns out Luc had been living off family money his whole life, and living very well. And it wasn't like he was poor after his father died, not by most anyone's standards. But it's never easy to earn a living as an artist, and it was a surprise to him, the idea of needing to earn a living."

Aidan swore under his breath. Stupid, selfish, irresponsible little shit. "So, life wasn't easy anymore, and he just didn't know how to handle that?"

"I guess so," she admitted.

"And he blamed you, when he wasn't happy anymore?"

She closed her eyes and said nothing.

"Yeah, if you're not happy, it's probably your wife's fault," Aidan went on. "Probably never occurred to him that the problem was with him. So he went out and started screwing someone else behind your back?"

She nodded. "I think that was basically it. It was like this crazy, sickening roller coaster, a whirlwind three years of bad and then worse, and then one day, he was gone. I kept thinking... things are going to get better. They're crazy-bad now, but things will get better. He'll be happy. I'll be able to make him happy—"

"It wasn't up to you to make him happy," Aidan said.

"I want to make you happy," she said, finally sitting up and facing him.

"Ahh, baby. That's who you are. You care about people other than yourself."

She nodded, looking so sad. "I didn't see it, and I feel so stupid now. How could I not see it? Who he really was? What he was really like?"

"You were in school, doing something you loved, and I'm sure you worked hard, knowing you. But it wasn't real life. You were happy, excited, seeing and doing so many new things. Anything bad happen in those three years?"

"No. I missed my family, but... No."

"It's easy to be someone's friend when everything's good, Grace. Anything bad happen to him in that time?"

"No."

"Then there's no way you could have known."

"I could have waited, not married him so quickly."

"Yeah, you could have. Easy to see that now. But everybody makes mistakes. I think you've beaten yourself up enough over this one. And you must have been so young when you first met him."

"Twenty-three."

She sighed, still looking so lost it was breaking Aidan's heart. "Twenty-three? That's nothing, Grace. You made a mistake. A painful one. I think you've paid dearly for it."

"You're right. It wasn't real, those three years in school. I thought it was, but it wasn't. I didn't know him in real life."

Yeah.
That's what he was afraid had been going on her head. "And earlier, with me, you started thinking that you don't really know me? Because you knew him for three, three and a half years before you married him, and you've only known me for three days, and this isn't real?"

"Not exactly. I mean, that was part of it. But mostly, I was lying there in your arms, feeling so good, so happy, and I thought... it's so easy with you. It feels so good. I was trying to remember... Did it feel like that with Luc in the beginning? I was excited. I was happy, but blinded by him, by my image of him. Because I think I really see you, and I know you. Or maybe I'm just looking deeper now, looking for something I didn't know to look for before or I didn't take the time to look for. I didn't... feel the way with Luc that I do with you. Why is that?"

Because I'm a better man
, Aidan thought, hoped. Did she see that? Believe it? He was a very different man and a better one, at least he was before his last tour in Afghanistan.

"Finally, I realized I feel safe with you," she said. "I don't think I ever really did with Luc. I see the strength in you, the patience, the determination, and I feel important to you and safe."

And, God, didn't that feel amazing? Like someone handing him the world on a platter. His heart felt like it was about to burst inside his chest, like the heavens had opened up and maybe there was a God and he didn't think Aidan was some hideous creature to torment and maim and abandon in a hell on earth overseas.

If he hadn't been sitting down in the boat, the feeling would have brought him to his knees. He needed to hold her. He needed it right then. "Come here, Grace. Be careful of the dog, because we don't want him to tip us over. But come here."

She scooted on her bottom and pivoted around. The dog watched every move she made with a panicked look on his face, somehow staying pressed against her side the whole way. She ended up sitting in the bottom of the boat, between Aidan's legs, leaning back against him, his arms around her, holding her, his chin resting on top of her head. He never wanted to let go.

"How could I marry a man I didn't even feel safe with?" she asked finally.

"Ahh, honey, I'm sorry, but it's done. He's gone, and that's not a mistake you'll ever make again. But I get that it worries you. I understand, if that's what you're trying to tell me."

"I'm saying, I didn't take that time before, the way I should have with Luc, and I can't make a mistake like that again. And I'm not saying you and I are a mistake. I think you and I are amazing together, but you said it. It's been three days. It feels like so much more..."

"Yes, it does."

"I don't want to mess this up, and I don't want to rush it. I mean, we rushed it. Parts of it. But I'm not sorry. Not at all. I just... I can't make a mistake again like I did with Luc."

With a man she married.

Aidan added that last little part himself, in his own head.

He wanted to be the man she married, the man she stayed with forever.

There.
He'd admitted it. At least to himself.

He took a breath, letting that settle in, the monumental rightness of it.

He had a million things to do to be ready for her, to be worthy of Grace loving him, marrying him, having kids with him, always feeling safe, loved, cherished by him. She needed time. He could certainly give her that. He'd give her anything she wanted. She wanted to do this right, and he did, too.