seem happy. Their two boys are balls of fire. Mary Ellen says she goes to work just to get a break.”
“She looked great when I saw her. It might have been nice if you’d warned me she was seven months pregnant though. That was a bit of a shocker.”
“That woman has been pregnant almost constantly since I came back to town. I was the best man in their wedding, and I swear nine months to the day later Little Billy was born.”
Over coffee and tiramisu, J.T. filled her in on the rest of the townsfolk and their doings, who had married whom and who had moved away. As he told her stories of the ebb and flow of life in Dale, she realized she had no idea what went on in the lives of the people who lived in the apartment next door to her. If she dropped dead in her kitchen, the only ones who would notice would be the people she worked with. Okay, Sandra would miss her, but who else?
She shook off the maudlin thoughts. There was a reason she’d moved to New York City. She didn’t want everyone knowing her business. She was happy in her job and her life. Maybe she was surrounded by strangers, but at least they weren’t calling her trash or whore. No one knew how she’d grown up, nor did they care. There was a lot of freedom in that.
J.T. signaled for the check. Nadya thought about fighting him for it—her salary was easily double his—but one look from him and she leaned back. He might have changed a great deal over the years, but she was pretty sure his pride hadn’t decreased.
Nadya glanced around at the almost-empty restaurant as they were leaving and noticed it was close to midnight. Where had the time gone?
“Geez, time flies. You’d better get me to the hotel so you can get home. It’s a long ride back to Dale, especially at night.”
“I can handle it.” He held the door to the pickup truck open for her. As he walked around to the driver’s side, she wondered if he’d expected to spend the night with her. A little thrill zipped along her spine at the thought, but she tamped it down. That was one complication she didn’t need right now.
The drive to the hotel was a short one, and they passed it in companionable silence. J.T. had the radio tuned to a country station, but Nadya wasn’t paying any attention to it. Her focus was on the larger-than-life male next to her. J.T. seemed to fill all the space in the otherwise roomy cab. She could swear she felt the heat coming off him and smell the spiciness of his soap.
When he reached forward to turn up the volume on the radio, she startled slightly. “Do you recognize this song?” he asked.
Nadya listened for a minute. She hadn’t heard country in a long time. The song had been popular when they were in high school. “Is that ‘Fall into Me’? I haven’t heard that in years.”
“It was our prom song, remember?”
“I didn’t go to the prom.” She couldn’t afford a prom dress, and she refused to wear one of the hand-me-downs from the Goodwill.
“You didn’t miss much. The gym was decorated with about a thousand streamers that ended up all over the lawn. Most of the girls spent the night either in the bathroom fixing themselves or crying. The guys all stood around feeling stupid in their good suits. The most exciting part was when Tucker Brown puked on Principal Goodwin’s shoes.”
“Sounds like loads of fun.” Mary Ellen had said as much, except she’d added that her date tried to grope her in the car on the way there, then ignored her when she wouldn’t let him get to second base.
“Look, I know it’s none of my business, but I think you should see what your father had to say. Read his letter, let Hornblower do his lawyer bit and then make a decision. It isn’t going to matter to anyone but you what’s in that letter.”
“I don’t know. It just feels…weird.”
“Like you’d be betraying your mama?”
“Close, but not quite.” She couldn’t put her finger on exactly why she didn’t want to read that letter. “More like I’ve done fine so far—why should I mess up a good thing?”
“It’s your decision. Just know if you need some moral support, I’m around.” He pulled into a parking place at the hotel instead of just stopping by