and then he’d left her. “What was his name?”
She gazed at me in confusion. “Who?”
“The guy you left me for,” I said, my chest burning with a mixture of pain and jealousy.
“It doesn’t matter now,” she said.
There was a perverse side of me that wanted to know everything. What did he look like? What had she seen in him that had made her leave our perfect life and run away with him? Had he been a better lover than me?
That last thought made me feel as if acid had been poured down my throat.
“How are your parents?” she asked.
“They are well,” I said. “Mother has mellowed since she became a grandmother.”
“I can’t imagine your mother as a grandmother,” she said. “Or mellowed.”
I searched her face and saw no traces of bitterness. She had every right to be after the way my family had treated her. They had rejected her when she had been so looking forward to being a part of a family.
I had toyed with that idea especially when Amy had insisted that there had to be another reason why she had left. That maybe she had left because of my family but that had made no sense. We had gotten married and things had been wonderful, more so when Chaz found her family.
There had been no other reason for her leaving except for the one she had expressed.
“Helen and her family are well too,” I said. As with Amy, Helen and I exchanged sporadic emails. I hadn’t told her the news yet.
“I miss them,” she said, her voice thick with emotion.
“I understood why you didn’t want contact with me but why them? Why lose your family and friends too?”
“Can we not talk about the past?” she asked after a moment. “Please?”
The anguish in her eyes was unmistakable. She had paid the price with her own heartbreak. Maybe it was time to permanently say goodbye to the past.
“It’s getting late.” Charlotte got up and carried the wine glasses to the kitchen.
When she returned, I was already on my feet. “What time should I come tomorrow morning?”
“Is ten thirty too early for you? Hannah, that’s my boss, reduced my hours and I’ll be starting work at eleven.”
“Ten thirty is a breeze. I’m a lawyer, remember? We’re used to starting work at crazy hours.”
She walked me out to the car and I noticed when we were outside that she was moving even slower than usual. As though she was scared of falling.
“Are you okay?” I asked her.
“Yes, I’m fine,” she said.
“If you like, you can use my car to go to work tomorrow morning,” I said to her.
“I’m not comfortable driving these days,” she said. “And I enjoy the walk to work and back home. It’s my ‘me time’.”
There were so many things about Charlotte that didn’t add up. She had loved driving in the past. How could that have changed in two years? I felt as if I was with her identical twin.
She lowered her gaze before looking at me again. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am. I was in a bit of a fix and worried sick about losing my job. Thank you, Alex. I don’t deserve your kindness.”
Her words made my emotions rise to the surface. “You’re welcome.” I kissed her cheek. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
There was one thing about Charlotte that had not changed. Her scent. I could be blindfolded and tell when Charlotte walked into a room. Her floral, musky scent followed me inside the car.
I waved goodbye and drove off, secure in the knowledge that I would be seeing her the following day. I whistled as I drove, something I never did back home in New York.
It was pathetic that the only woman who made me happy was the one who had dumped me for another man. Just knowing that I was easing her worries by helping her out made me feel ten feet tall.
I’d forgotten to mention to Charlotte that Amy had said she would surprise her one of these days. I didn’t hold out much hope though. Amy had gone to work for her family’s chain of restaurants in Cleveland after completing her culinary degree. I hoped that she would make it to come visit.
From what I’d seen of Charlotte’s life, she needed her old friends.
Despite Woodfield having the usual small-town warmth, she didn’t have particularly close friends. She hadn’t mentioned anyone and no one had come to visit her and Kayden.
It was a choice she had made. She was a