The Noel Letters (The Noel Collection #4) - Richard Paul Evans Page 0,58

back at me as if suddenly awakened from a trance. “Are you spending tonight with Dylan?”

“No. We broke up.”

Wendy looked at me quizzically. “I thought things were going well.”

“They were. There was just… baggage, you know?” I lifted the envelope Wendy had just given me. “He won’t admit that he’s been writing the letters.”

Wendy looked at me for a moment, then said, “He didn’t write those letters.”

“What?”

“They’re from your father.”

“How are they from my father? And that’s definitely not his handwriting.”

“It’s Grace’s handwriting. She’s been sending them to you.”

The casualness with which she shared this angered me. “If you knew all along, why didn’t you tell me?”

“It wasn’t my place to tell you. Your father was reaching out to you the only way he could get you to listen.” She cocked her head to one side. “How did you not know they were from him? He wrote beautifully.”

The revelation angered me. “Every time you talk about him, you sound like you were in love.”

Wendy looked at me with amazement. “How can someone so smart be so dumb?” she said. “Of course I was in love with him. I always will be.”

Her confession stunned me. I had meant the comment as a slight. I didn’t really believe it was true. “Did he know how you felt?”

“Of course he did. We talked about it all the time. I wanted to marry him.”

My thoughts spun more wildly. “What did he say to that?”

I could see anger rise in her eyes. “He said he couldn’t take a wife that was his daughter’s age. I told him that it didn’t matter, but he said it would to you.” Her eyes narrowed. “I said, ‘Why do you care what she thinks? She doesn’t care what you think. All she cares about is herself.’ He didn’t even dispute it. He just walked out. I had to call him and apologize.” She shook her head. “And then he got sick.”

Her eyes welled, and she wiped away a tear. “I was with your father almost every day since I was fifteen. I was with him every day since he got sick. I held him as he lay dying. And do you know what he worried the most about during his last hours? You. It was always you. And you don’t even give a—” She stopped herself, her lip quivering. “His love to you was like giving pearls to swine. I think you’re pathetic.”

My face turned hot. All I could think to say was “You’re fired.”

An amused smirk crossed her face. “Listen, honey, I was only staying because your father asked me to.”

She took her key ring from her pocket, unhooked her store keys, and set them on the counter. “Good luck tomorrow,” she said facetiously. She walked to the front door, then suddenly stopped and looked around, likely for the last time.

It was only then that I fully realized what I had done. I had just banished her from her home. She turned back to me, her eyes wet and angry. “I stayed here to keep you from killing the thing he loved. But you kill everything you touch. I’m not surprised you lost your husband, your job, and now your boyfriend. You’re so consumed with yourself that you spread pain everywhere you go. My only consolation is that you’ll die alone.” Then she turned, unlocked the front door, and walked out into the falling snow.

Her words stung. I walked to the door and opened it, then ran around the side to where she was unlocking her car. I wanted to say something cruel, something to rebut all she had said, but, pathetically, all that came out was “I don’t know how to set the alarm.”

She just shook her head as she got into her car and drove away.

CHAPTER forty–nine

Words can be like X-rays if you use them properly—they’ll go through anything.

—Aldous Huxley

Wendy’s departure had left me breathless. Even as angry as I was, I knew I had done something horrible. I locked the front door then walked over to the alarm. I studied it for a few minutes before deciding I was more likely to set it off than set it, so I decided to just leave it alone and hope no one robbed us.

I looked down at the envelope I was still holding. There are things that need to be said, my father had said before I came back to Utah. I guess he had found a way to say them after all. It seemed obvious now