Someone to Watch Over Me (20 page)

Oh, yeah.
Why would he think she’d give that up just because she was no longer alive and well on planet Earth? He should have known better.

“You’re sure you’re okay?” Kathie asked.

“I’m sure.”

“And you really got rid of the dog?”

“Just temporarily.” At least, he hoped so.

“And Gwen?”

“I’m not done with Gwen.” He just had to convince her to give him another chance.

Relieved, his sisters calmed down. They talked some more, and eventually, they got up and did the group-hug thing. There were no more tears, thank goodness, but they did express more dismay over the progress he’d made in cleaning out their mother’s house and how everything was changing. Why did everything have to keep changing? Why couldn’t things just stay the same for a while?

His sisters got caught up in something else for a moment, and when they weren’t looking, he sneaked eggbeaters and ice-cream scoops into their purses. And when Kim left, for once, she didn’t go through the garbage bags
full of stuff, stacked neatly near the back porch, to save them from being carted away.

This definitely looked like progress.

When he was alone, his first thought was to rush over to Gwen’s and beg her to forgive him and to find a way to convince her it was possible for a man to change completely and that she could trust that, could trust her heart to him.

He wasn’t averse to making a sincere apology to a woman when he was wrong, and he was capable of admitting he was wrong. He just wasn’t a man who’d ever had his heart on the line when he had to go say he was wrong and beg for forgiveness.

He hadn’t ever needed so much to make a woman believe he was sincere and that he was actually capable of change, and to convince her that he now knew what he wanted, when it was so different from what he’d always wanted before.

How was he supposed to do that?

Got any ideas, Mom?

He stood there in the kitchen trying to juggle big, wooden spoons that were sticking out of a box of things to put in the estate sale. When the Bees had been here, and he’d tried to pawn some more stuff off on them, they’d told him to have a giant garage sale, and he’d offered them the profits from the sale, if they’d handle it. They’d happily agreed. But he still had to get everything sorted.

The keeper pile was still way too big.

When it came right down to it, there just wasn’t much a person left on this earth that truly mattered, once they were gone.

There was stuff…. Looking around his mother’s house, it was mostly just stuff. Oh, there were pictures and home movies he and his sisters would keep and always treasure,
a few little things here and there that brought up a wonderful memory of her, and some things that had been his father’s that meant something to him. But mostly, it was just things she’d accumulated that, without her, didn’t really mean anything.

Why she’d left him this dreary job…

Oh, Mom.

One of the wooden spoons landed with a solid smack against his forehead. Another bounced across the floor. He actually caught the third.

Suddenly he knew exactly why his mother had left him this dismal little task. He couldn’t believe it had taken him this long to figure it out.

She was smiling now, from wherever she was watching him, and he was certain she was watching.

Thanks, Mom. I love you.

He wasn’t quite sure how he should approach the other person he needed to be thanking.

Oh, his mother had taken them to church from the time they were born. And there’d been a time when he’d just accepted everything he heard there without questioning it, when he’d said his prayers at night and tried to be good, the way he thought God wanted kids to be.

And then he’d grown up and kind of drifted away from the church and from God, when he hadn’t really believed in anything and had blamed a lot of things on God, at the same time he was questioning whether God even existed.

Pretty funny, now that he thought about it—blaming things on Someone he claimed didn’t even exist.

Sorry about that.
That seemed as good a way to begin as any. His mother had always claimed prayers weren’t anything except having a little talk with God. That the only important thing was to be honest and open up your heart.

Just that?
Jax thought.
And he’d always been so good at that.

He was going to need some help here. That seemed like a good thing to add next.

I really don’t know what I’m doing here. And I feel like I’ve been so stupid…. So lost. And I can see now that You’ve been right there the whole time, waiting for me to figure this all out, and taking care of me and my family anyway….

Jax still didn’t know why his father had to go away when he was so young or why his mother had to leave, too, but he knew something else that seemed even more important now.

He realized that he didn’t have to have all the answers to those questions in order to believe. One didn’t seem to have a lot to do with the other anymore.

The important thing was that he’d never really lost his parents, and he’d never really been alone. He never would be.

That was what he believed without any doubts at all.

Just the way he believed that one of the greatest gifts God had ever brought him was a woman named Gwendolyn Moss.

Jax grinned.

I don’t think I deserve her, but I sure am grateful to have her in my life.

Assuming that she’d forgive him for the misery he’d put her through, including claiming all he’d wanted her for was to have someone to take his mother’s dog.

But she would forgive him. She had to.

When Jax finally came up with a plan and worked up his nerve to carry it out, he headed down the alley and found Romeo in Gwen’s backyard, sitting at Petunia’s feet, gazing up at her like a lovesick puppy. Jax couldn’t be sure, but it looked as if he was licking Petunia’s feet.

Jax shook his head and grinned. “How the mighty have fallen, huh, Romeo?”

He unlatched the gate and walked into the backyard. Petunia, all prettied up and trimmed and beribboned, gave him a smugly superior glance and then studiously ignored him, in favor of surveying the back porch.

“Okay, that kind of girl, are you? One who holds a grudge? Guess I can’t blame you. I wasn’t very nice to you.”

Jax heard footsteps and turned to the right and there was Gwen, coming around the side of the house with her arms wrapped around a big potted plant of some sort.

He went to her, took it from her and said, “Need some help?”

“Maybe.” She looked at him in much the same way Petunia had. Did the dog’s name really have to be Petunia? Surely there was something they could do about that.

“I work cheap,” he offered. “And I’m good at hauling around big, heavy things, digging in the dirt, pulling weeds, whatever you need.”

“You came here to work in my yard?”

“No, I came here because I thought I might talk you into taking a walk with me.” He took a breath and remembered the dogs, then made himself add, “You and the dogs.”

“That’s why you came to see me? Because you wanted company on a walk?”

“No. I came because I finally figured out some things, and I want to tell you about them at a certain place, a place that’s special to me.”

“Oh.”

She didn’t seem like she was getting ready to yell at him or anything. That was a plus. He figured she was entitled. She looked hurt and worried, and he’d probably made her
cry, something he just hated, but it seemed she was at least going to hear him out.

“Come with me,” he said. “I’ll beg if I have to.”

Okay, now she looked like she might cry.

“Don’t do that. Please,” he said, reaching for her so he could maybe stop those tears. He held her chin in his hand as she dipped her head down, and the moisture in her eyes glistened ominously.

He moved closer, settling her against him, easing his arms around her.

Curious how the whole world seemed to shift gently and unerringly into place as he did that.

He felt that he was coming home. Coming home to Gwen.

She laid her head against his shoulder, and her hands clutched at his sides, like she was afraid he was going to slip away from her at any minute, and she didn’t want him to go.

“I’m not running away from you,” he said. “Even if you do try to get rid of me.”

“Really?” she muttered, snuggling against him, her forehead pressed against the side of his neck.

“Promise.” He kissed her forehead, stood there and let himself absorb the wonderful feel of her in his arms, things seeming more right with his world than he’d ever thought they could be again. “I missed you.”

“I missed you, too.”

“I can be really stupid sometimes, Gwen.”

She laughed at that. “That’s what your sisters said.”

“My sisters?”

She nodded. “They came to see me.”

“To tell you I could be really stupid sometimes?”

“To tell me they thought they should get to know me better because they thought their brother was a mess over me. They were very nice,” she claimed, then looked vul
nerable again. “I didn’t know if they were reading you right or not.”

He gave her a gentle kiss, fought the urge to prolong it. First, they had some things to settle.

“How ’bout we walk and have a little talk?”

“Sure.” She managed to smile. “Just let me get Petunia’s leash.”

Miss Petunia perked right up at the sound of her name. A silly grin came across her furry face and she practically bounced after Gwen. Romeo trotted off after her, shooting Jax a haughty look that seemed to say,
I understand women so much better than you do.

“She’ll tear your heart out, Romeo,” he called out after the dog.

Gwen was back outside a moment later. “What was that?”

“Just a little friendly advice for the dog.”

Gwen looked skeptical but snapped on Petunia’s leash, ready to go. The little dog started yelping with excitement. Romeo did, too.

“They just love me, don’t they?” Jax said as they took off down the alley, Gwen holding Petunia’s leash, the dogs dancing around Jax and Gwen as they walked.

“Somehow, I don’t think you’re the big attraction for them,” Gwen claimed.

“No, really. They’re crazy about me. I just have one little…Well, it’s not a problem. Just a question. Where did you come up with the name Petunia?”

“They’re her favorite flower,” Gwen said with a completely straight face.

Jax grinned. “You mean, she came out of the Dumpster with a list of her likes and dislikes?”

“No. We were in the flower shop cleaning her up, and it just seemed like a dog found behind a flower shop—”

“You said you found her in the Dumpster behind the café,” he reminded her as he steered her and the parade of pooches down Maple Street and toward the park.

“Well, what was I supposed to do with that? I wasn’t going to name her Cheeseburger or BLT. We saved her and took her to the flower shop to clean her up, and it just seemed like a flower name would be appropriate, and there are lots of good flower names for little girls.”

“Petunia?”

“Well, there was Lily, Rose, Fern, Daisy. I really liked Daisy. But Petunia kept running up to the petunias in the big vases out front and playing hide-and-seek behind them. And if that isn’t a clear indication that she wanted to be named Petunia, I don’t know what is.”

“Rrruuuf!” Petunia said.

“See, she likes it,” Gwen said.

“Great.”

“Do you have a problem with that?”

“No. Not at all.” Petunia? He could just see him, another day, when they were in the same park, yelling,
Petunia, get over here right now.
Sure. That would work. “It’s just kind of…girlie.” That was the best argument he could make.

“Well, she’s a girl. A very pretty girl.”

“Yes, she is.”

The walk was a pleasant one. They must have passed a dozen different people they knew. It seemed everywhere someone was waving and smiling and looking generally pleased with the world.

Miss Petunia did a dainty little tail-swishing strut, and Romeo, her slave for life, followed in what seemed to be complete joy and awe of her. Every now and then he glanced back at Jax and Gwen with a big stupid grin on his face that seemed to say,
Isn’t she the greatest? Isn’t life grand!

Jax wondered if he had the same stupid grin on his face. He had a feeling he did.

He and Gwen and the dogs turned into the park and down one of the footpaths to the falls. Romeo, excited by the water, finally forgot about Petunia long enough to give an excited yelp, looking from the water to Jax and back to the water.

“No, Romeo. No swimming today.”

He whined his disappointment.

“He swims?” Gwen asked.

“Loves it. Loves going down the falls, too.”

“Romeo bodysurfs the falls?”

“Sure. It’s tradition. You can’t be an official Magnolia Falls resident without doing the falls.”

“I guess that means you have?”

“About a million times. The best ones are after a big rain—”

She grimaced. “Don’t tell me. Don’t.”

“I guess that means you’ve never gone over the falls?”

“No.”

“Gwen?” He shook his head. “This is serious. We’re going to have to do something about that.”

“Not today we’re not.”

“Okay. Not today. But come summer, you and me, right here.”

“We’re going to be here? Together? In the summer?”

He nodded.

“That would be more than your three-month limit.”

“Yeah. I guess we need to talk about that.” They’d reached one of the little stone benches beside the falls, under the biggest, oldest tree, and he said, “Sit with me. It’s nice here.”

Gwen sat on one side of the bench. Jax was just getting comfortable beside her when her dog jumped up on the
bench and plopped down between them. She turned to Jax and gave him a grin and then jumped up onto his lap, put her front paws on his chest and tried to lick him in the face.

Gwen laughed.

Romeo started whining pitifully, like a man who’d just had his heart broken by the love of his life.