father had no intention of keeping his distance, however. He found Catherine when everyone was loading onto the buses and made sure they were on the same one as her.
Athena reminded herself that the situation was out of her hands as they settled into their seats behind Catherine and Denise. At least Catherine wasn’t a fortune hunter. Somehow, she didn’t find that consoling.
She did find it mildly consoling that Catherine was trying to stick close to her friend and not encourage Daddy. Of course it didn’t work. Denise got distracted with her men friends and Daddy and Catherine were soon walking side by side again as they all got off the bus and started for the castle.
Wars dating as far back as the 1600s along with two lightning strikes had taken their toll on Heidelberg Castle, but even though it was mostly a red stone ruin, it was worth touring. It offered an incredible view of the city below with the Neckar River ribboning its way through the city. Caught up in the beauty of it all, Athena set aside her concerns for her father and allowed herself a moment to take pictures.
“Take one of all of the old people, will you?” Denise asked her, handing over her phone.
“Sure,” Athena said.
They all posed, Denise and Catherine front and center, surrounded by the three men. Athena noticed Daddy had a hand on Catherine’s shoulder. Both of them were smiling. They could have been an old married couple celebrating an anniversary.
Athena’s heart cracked. There was no future for her father and Catherine. Catherine didn’t want one.
The crack widened as Athena thought about how much she missed her mother, how happy Mom and Daddy had been and how wrong it was that he was alone now. Life was about both loss and gain, but Athena was convinced that losing a mother was one of the largest losses of all. It filled you with pain and then, once the pain dulled, it filled you again, with loneliness.
It wasn’t hard to understand why her father so desperately wanted to find someone. Daughters could only staunch so much unhappiness. He’d come on this cruise on a quest, hoping to somehow heal a wounded heart, still trying to recover, and he had. But the woman he’d met would leave him even more miserable than he’d been before.
Athena handed back the phone to Denise, who looked at the picture and pronounced it good. “We don’t look too bad,” she told the others, and turned the phone so they could see.
“No, we don’t,” said Daddy. “Will you send that to me?” he asked Denise.
“Sure. What’s your email?”
Daddy passed it on. Then, as Denise was getting the other two men’s emails, he handed his phone to Athena. “One more, honey. Take one of Catherine and me.”
“Oh, no,” Catherine said, pulling away. “Let me take one of you and your daughter.”
Catherine really was a class act.
Athena tried for her happiest smile as they posed, but she knew it had never reached her eyes. A blizzard of emotions swirled inside her—unhappiness over the loss of her mother, guilt over her earlier attitude toward Catherine, worry about her father—and she half wished she’d never invited herself along on this trip.
Catherine handed Daddy’s phone back to him and was about to hurry off to start walking down the hill with Denise and Arnold and Charlie, but Daddy stopped her. “One more picture. Something to remember our time here.”
Catherine looked to Athena as if asking permission.
“A good idea,” Athena said. Let them have their moment. It would end soon enough.
She told herself the same thing when, once they were in town, they stopped in a little jewelry shop and Daddy bought both her and Catherine another charm, this one of the castle.
“Another memento,” he said, beaming at them.
“It’s very kind of you,” Catherine murmured. “It will be a lovely reminder of both of you.”
Yes, a class act.
* * *
Trevor’s brother planned to join up with him and Sophie after the castle tour, once the bus had unloaded them all in the city. Meanwhile, Trevor and Sophie trailed behind the kids during the tour, stopping like everyone else to take pictures in front of the fortress’s huge wine barrel, the largest in the world.
“This will be a fun post for Instagram,” she said as they walked away.
“So you’re on Instagram? Me, too.”
“Do you post lots of pictures of chocolate?” she asked.
“Of course.”
She did a search on her phone. Yep, there was Cupid’s Chocolates. “Oh, wow,” she