Take a Chance on Me (21 page)

No child should see a parent disintegrate. No matter the reason why. Parents were required to be strong, capable, in control.

Her throat tightened. Tiger had wrapped his arms around her, breathing into her neck.

Okay, maybe there had been a few good parts to this date. After all, she couldn’t remember the last time someone had held on to her like this, so tight, as if they needed her. She breathed in his cotton-candy, sun-soaked body trembling in her arms. “It’s okay, Tiger. Shh. Your daddy’s fine.”

She looked at Darek then, fire in her eyes, hoping he could read her mind.

Get up. You’re scaring your son.

And worse,
Your mother-in-law is watching.

She glanced over to where Nan Holloway stared at Darek, her mouth open, not even bothering to conceal her horror.

Not such a great way to meet Felicity’s mother, perhaps. Ivy
had been washing Tiger’s hands in the fountain when the woman came up behind them and introduced herself. Tiger had flown into his grandmother’s arms as if in confirmation.

Felicity’s mother. Nan Holloway.

Hadn’t Darek said something about how she’d wanted to take Tiger from him?

And then this incident capped off what felt like one badly timed event after another.

Ivy should have just told him the truth right off, ripped the scab from the wound, dealt with the blood and gore. They’d get it over with, and he’d walk out of her life, stop wasting their time.

Unless Darek could forgive her . . . and it was that thought, and the way Tiger greeted her, that had silenced Ivy. Maybe three years was long enough to grow forgiveness in his heart. Maybe he’d listen to her story and realize . . . what, that she hadn’t meant to set Jensen free?

Although, really, how free could the man be?

Especially now, standing in the middle of the crowd, looking like he wanted to run.

Jensen looked at her. Then to Tiger. Back to her.

Like she had betrayed him.

He turned, pushing through the crowd, Claire on his heels.

Darek was just climbing to his feet. The man with the football emblem on his shirt helped him up. Patted him on the back as if Darek had simply fallen.

For once, she didn’t want to know the gory details.

Tiger still clung to her.

“Let me take him,” Nan said, so close to her that Ivy jumped. She crouched beside them and Ivy released Tiger into her arms—after
all, she had no right to him. But she ran her hand down his back as he clung to his grandmother, still crying.

“Shh,” Nan said, glaring at Darek.

He strode over to them, his mouth a grim line. He was breathing hard and almost looked as if he might cry, his eyes reddened.
She
nearly wanted to cry at the sick expression on his face.

“Give him to me, Nan,” Darek said.

But Nan picked Tiger up, holding him as he wrapped his legs around her waist. “I think you need to cool off, Darek,” she said with something just short of a snarl.

He took a breath, glancing at Ivy, then back to Nan. “I’m fine.”

But Nan wasn’t having it. “You’re not fine. Brawling in public? What’s next, Darek? First you show up on Sunday with Theo looking like he’s been dragged down the street by a pack of wild animals, and today, I see you wrestling like one! I’m not sure this is the kind of parent my grandson needs.”

Ivy saw a spark of heat in Darek’s eyes and just about put her hand on his arm.

“I know Felicity wouldn’t approve, God rest her soul. She’d be horrified to see how you’re behaving.”

“Maybe she should have been thinking about that before she decided to run out—” He clipped off his words.

But Nan looked like he’d struck her. “I know you never really loved my daughter, Darek. But she adored you, and don’t you dare go desecrating her memory! She was a good wife to you, a wonderful mother—”

“Nan, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

Nan seemed just short of snapping herself. She tightened her hold on Tiger, took a step back. “I’m taking Theo home with
me. I’ll get him cleaned up, feed him, and bring him back to you tomorrow.”

This time, Ivy did slip her hand onto Darek’s arm.

“No.”

“Darek, he’s upset—”

“I’m upset! Did you not see the man who killed your daughter playing with your grandson?”

His voice came out booming, and Tiger wrenched around in Nan’s arms, so much horror on his face that it made Ivy want to weep.

“Darek!” Nan snapped.

Tiger turned back to Nan, wrapped his arms tighter around her neck.

Darek winced. Gritted his teeth. Turned away.

His breaths rose and fell in his shoulders, and Ivy wanted to press her hand to his back. But suddenly, with Nan looking at her—the entire town looking at her—she had the sense that she might be a villain in this story.

Taking Felicity’s place.

The truth rushed up at her. Ivy didn’t belong here. She should leave. Now.

She couldn’t breathe.

Run. Away.

Her feet crunched on the rocks as she backed up, and the sound made Darek glance at her.

Please.
He said it with his eyes, the pain in them rooting her to the spot.
Don’t go.

Or maybe she just hoped he was saying that. Nevertheless, she stopped.

Darek slowly turned back to Nan, his shoulders rising and fall
ing. He rested his hand on Tiger’s back and said quietly, “Tomorrow. By noon.”

Nan seemed speechless for a moment. Then her voice dropped. “You’re doing the right thing, Darek.”

He nodded, nothing of agreement in his face, and bent to kiss Tiger on the cheek. “Be good for your grandma.”

Darek stood there as Nan walked away with Tiger, so much heartbreak in his eyes that Ivy couldn’t help but take his hand.

He didn’t look at her. Just wove his fingers together with hers.

“C’mon,” she said quietly. “I’ve had enough art for today.”

He said nothing as she led him up the street, past vendors, past the crowds. She wasn’t exactly sure where she might be going, and when they ended up at his truck parked outside her place, she thought he might simply leave her there.

Then, inexplicably, he turned to her. “I know I haven’t been very good company today. But—” he looked at his fingers still laced in hers—“would you be willing to have dinner with me?”

Dinner?

It’s getting late. I have to work tomorrow.
She should have said either of those things. Instead, she nodded.

Climbed into his truck. Rode beside him to Evergreen Resort. She knew exactly where Felicity had died now and found herself measuring the road as they drove silently around the curve.

Darek’s fists tightened on the steering wheel and he took a long breath.

Finally, when they reached the dirt road that led to the resort, he said, “I’m sorry.” He had his face glued to the road, but his words flickered in his expression.

“What happened?” Ivy said softly. “One minute you were standing there; the next, I return to find you on the ground with Jensen.”

“I don’t know.”

He pulled into the parking lot, now filled by the hotshots’ trucks and cars.

Darek sat there a moment, then looked at her. “Jensen killed my wife.”

She knew that, but hearing him say it felt so blunt, so raw, that the hurt registered on her face anyway.

“He was driving, and she was out for a run, and . . .” He closed his eyes, shaking his head. “I don’t want to talk about this.”

She swallowed, nodded, pretty sure this wasn’t the end of it.

Darek got out of the truck. “I have a couple steaks in the fridge, and my sister made some fresh bread yesterday. I’ll just be a moment.” He left her standing on the path while he disappeared inside his parents’ lodge home.

The woods trapped the heat, the scent from a lush blanket of pine needles, the wind filtering through the paper birch. She walked out past the lodge and saw a canoe pulled up to the beach, a pontoon boat at the dock. A crow called from a nearby perch.

“A man can forget up here,” Darek said behind her. He held a stainless steel bowl with a head of lettuce, tomato, red onion, and cucumber. From his fingers dangled a bag with a loaf of bread.

She took the bowl from him. Considered him a moment. “Or he can try.”

Darek tried a smile and then nodded, walking past her.

Ivy fell in step with him, their feet soft on the path. Roots crisscrossed the trail as it wound through the woods to his little house.

Darek set the fixings down at an outside table. “I’ll be right back.”

Ivy waited on the porch, looking out at the lake. What might it have been like to grow up here, at a place embedded with so
much peace? With legacy? With his family right down the trail, his name carved into the trees? This was Darek’s land—Evergreen.

He had no idea what it felt like to be uprooted.

Darek emerged from the house with a cutting board, plates, a couple knives, two napkin rolls with silverware, and two fresh steaks on a serving platter. On a second trip he brought a couple Cokes, salt and pepper, garlic, blue cheese salad dressing, setting it all on a table on his deck.

“That’s quite the place,” she said, gesturing across the lake.

He didn’t look up.

Oh, this might be a bad idea after all.

“Jensen Atwood lives over there, in that big house.” He unwrapped the steaks and turned to light the grill, a six-burner gas affair. It roared to life, and he turned down the heat, closed the hood. He stared at it for a moment; then, “We grew up together.”

“You and Jensen?”

“And Felicity and Claire. They were two years younger than us, so they were always a little off-limits. We spent every summer right there, out on that lake.” He pointed with his tongs. “We were best friends, even after he moved away.”

She picked up a knife, began to cut the cucumber into slices. “Why did he move?”

“His parents got divorced and his mother remarried. His father was bitter, moved him down to Minneapolis.” He salted the steaks. “Jensen hated it. He loved living here, and moving to the Cities tore his life apart. He came back every summer.”

She glanced at him, surprised at the lack of rancor in his voice.

“He was here the summers I was working on the hotshot team in Montana. Well, most of them. He came to Montana the first year, but . . . it didn’t work out.”

She reached for a tomato.

“I remember the year I came home for a visit during the summer, hearing rumors that he and Felicity were an item.” He took the onion, began to slice it. It came off in thin rounds. “I wasn’t surprised. He was always competing with me for something. Hockey. Grades. Felicity.”

“You and Felicity dated in high school?”

Darek blinked as if trying to fight off the sting of the onion. “No. Not really.” He looked away, widened his eyes. “Wow, these are strong.”

Ivy reached over to steal the onion from him and finished slicing. She’d never been susceptible to the power of onions.

He set down his knife. “We went to senior prom together—double-dated with Jensen and Claire. I think Felicity got it in her head then that we should be together, and . . . well, she came on pretty strong after that, and especially when I got back that summer, despite the fact that she was dating Jensen.” He lifted the hood on the grill, dropped the steaks on with the tongs. Seasoned them with garlic. “Not that I wasn’t willing.” He sighed. “You should probably know that Felicity and I weren’t married when Tiger was conceived.”

Ivy hadn’t expected that. But, well—

He looked at her then, something of pain in his eyes. “The truth was, I didn’t want to get married. I was angry at her—I felt like she trapped me.” He closed the hood, turned the heat down more. “I wasn’t exactly a great husband. I was angry and resentful and gone most of the time on the hotshot crew. I worked year-round back then, training when I wasn’t working for the forest service. No wonder she turned to Jensen.”

His words made her look up. “Did she and Jensen—?”

“I don’t know. After three years of thinking about it, I don’t think so, but at the time . . .”

That seemed so . . . forgiving for a man who had just tackled said nemesis in public. Ivy added the onion to the bowl. Picked up the lettuce and began to tear it with her hands.

He took a long breath, gazing toward the house across the lake. “Deep down, I was so angry at her, at life.” A muscle pulled in his jaw. “I accused Felicity of having an affair the night she . . .” He sighed. “I can’t believe I did that. I can still hear it sometimes, my own voice in my head telling me to stop. Telling me to just shut my mouth. But I can’t take the words back. I can’t stop the rush of accusations—so many of them. I blamed her for everything. For getting pregnant, for stealing my life. And she threw it right back at me. Told me that I should be more like Jensen. That he wouldn’t run out on her. That’s when I suggested that maybe she was looking for a do-over with the boy next door.”

Ivy had stopped tearing the lettuce and now just watched him deflate, wearing his defeat on his face.

“Sadly, she was right. Jensen was the kind of guy she could depend on. He’d always been that guy, and I knew it. Despite his parents’ broken marriage, Jensen was a guy who would have settled in Deep Haven, made a life with her. He’s small town at heart, and in a way, I stole Felicity from
him
.”

His words left her a little hollow, unsure how to respond. “Did he love her?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. He had a soft spot for Claire, but Felicity was always shiny and bright. She attracted all our attention.” He let out a wry chuckle. “Jensen was the best man at my shotgun wedding.”

“Shotgun?”

“No, not really, I guess. Although I’m sure Nan and George wished they had one, maybe to run me off.” He gave her the smallest smile.

She hesitated, then smiled back.

Behind him, smoke trickled from the grill. “The steaks!” He heaved open the lid. Smoke billowed out as he grabbed the meat, turned it.

“I hope you like your meat charred,” he said. “Sorry.”

I didn’t come for the food.
Not that she let herself say that, but as she watched him begin to toss the salad, she wanted to slide into his arms. Mold herself to him, taste his lips on hers.