“Colleen, he’s never had a real relationship in his life.”
“Neither has Paulie,” she whispered hotly. “And wouldn’t it be nice to see first love work out for a change?”
He ignored that. “Leave him alone. Don’t manipulate him into a relationship he’s not ready for.”
“But men are simple creatures, Lucas dear, meant to be manipulated into doing what’s best for them.”
“Did you manipulate me into doing what was best?” His eyes were hot.
“No,” she hissed. “You’re my one failure. Ellen Forbes, on the other hand...she had you down cold.”
His eyes shut off, all that heat and anger instantly muted. “You’re wrong about that.”
“Yeah, sure, I’m wrong. You and she are like a Lifetime television movie. Boy from the wrong side of town marries billionaire’s daughter. Very romantic.”
“Don’t talk about her.”
That hurt—Lucas, defending his ex-wife. “Fine,” she muttered. “Either way, you underestimate your cousin. And Paulie, too. And me.”
“Oh, I’ve never underestimated you, hotshot.” He paused. “So you’re barreling ahead with this because you’re mad that I married Ellen?”
“No, Spaniard, your irritation is just a happy byproduct. I have good instincts about people, that’s all.”
“Use your instincts somewhere else.”
“In fact, you were the only man I’ve ever been wrong about. You and my dad.”
His jaw turned to iron, but he didn’t deny the comparison. Turned his eyes back to Joe.
“I have to go,” she said, standing. Yes. Time to make a regal exit.
Unfortunately, she tripped on the leg of the chair, landing on Joe, who woke up with a start (and a yelp). Lucas hauled her off his uncle and set her on her feet.
“Joe, I’m so sorry!” she said. “Are you okay? Did I bruise your kidneys?”
“Well, they don’t work anyway,” he said kindly.
“Any other body parts hurt? Spleen? Liver?”
“Don’t worry. I’m dying as it is.”
She bit her nail, then stopped. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay, sweetheart. Most fun I’ve had in weeks. I love your perfume.”
Lucas didn’t add his reassurance, she noted. “Feel better,” she said to Joe, leaning over to kiss his cheek.
“I already do.”
She smiled at him; well, she tried to. Hoped to God, she hadn’t hurt the poor guy.
“I’ll call you about dinner,” Lucas said as she left the room.
“The offer has been revoked,” she said. “See you soon, Joe.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THE AGE OF twenty-two is not generally celebrated as time of deep wisdom and calm, measured acts.
Almost as soon as she broke up with Lucas, Colleen regretted it.
But the thing about being right most of the time...it was hard to know what to do when you were wrong. If she’d been, that was because Colleen was kind of on the fence.
She knew one thing. Everything felt wrong without him.
At first, she’d just been furious. Life was going to hell on a lightning-speed roller coaster. Dad, Mom, Gail, a baby...and Lucas had lied to her, had played God, deciding what she should and shouldn’t know. What did that say? What if he kept other things from her? What else wasn’t he telling her? Say they did get married and he got a brain tumor. Would he keep that from her, too? Huh? Would he?
“Colleen, enough,” Connor groaned one night. He was done at the CIA and was working at Hugo’s. Colleen was still bartending at the Black Cat, but she’d come over on her dinner break because she wouldn’t eat the food at the Cat with a gun to the back of her head. “I can’t stand to hear this one more time. You broke up with him. If you want him back, call him. Okay? But I can’t listen to you and Mom complaining all the damn day!”
“Men. You disgust me.”
“Really? Is that why you were making out with that guy the other night?”
“Oh, please. That was nothing.” Colleen shifted, guilt squirming in her stomach. The guy in question was some dork from Ithaca and, yes, she’d flirted with him. And kissed him. And then told him that while he was cute and she was positive she’d regret it, she couldn’t go out with him (that is, have sex with him). Because that kiss had been totally meh.
Not like kissing Lucas, when the world seemed to stop, when the world seemed to smile, even, because they were so right together.
Then again, Lucas hadn’t been banging on her door, begging to get back in touch with her. One voice mail. One call to the house. That was it. So they were taking a break. Fine. Maybe it’d get his priorities straight. Maybe he’d miss her.
Maybe...and this was the thought that caused a cold tremor of fear to shake her heart...maybe he was relieved. She was, after all, his high school sweetheart. He’d said he wasn’t ready for marriage. Maybe...maybe like so many other men, her stupid father most certainly included, he wanted to see if there was someone else out there.
Because he sure didn’t try very hard to win her back. She hadn’t seen that coming.
Dad had moved in with Gail the Tail. He hired a divorce attorney and started proceedings, and Mom sobbed for twelve hours straight, and Colleen cried with her as the movers took her father’s things away, taking with them the memories of her happy childhood.
Connor hadn’t been as close with their dad as she had, but this had shaken him, too. Not just Mom’s distress, but Dad being so...pathetic. A hot young second wife. Another family. And in case that wasn’t enough, a convertible.
But despite that, she couldn’t stop loving her father. She was mad, embarrassed, furious...but when she heard his voice on the phone, or even when she saw him, sometimes, just for a second, she’d forget that he was the man who cheated on Mom, and she’d just remember Daddy. The man who taught her to ride a bike and sail a boat, who used to brush her hair when she was little, who read her stories, who let her stay up late and watch scary movies, then sat on her bed when she was afraid to go to sleep.
The Tail got a cushion-set diamond as big as a human eyeball, despite the fact that Mom and Dad weren’t even divorced. Dad had shown her the ring, for the love of God.
Oh, and they were having a girl.
Dad invited her over to the new place for dinner to meet his lover/fiancée. “I know you’re upset,” he said on the phone, and the thinly veiled impatience in his voice chilled her. “But, Colleen, enough. If you’re going to come over, and I hope you will, I’d appreciate some civility. Your mother is hysterical crying half the time and screaming the other half, Connor won’t speak to me, and I won’t put up with a guilt trip in my own home.”
It was almost a threat. Another wife; another home; another chance at fatherhood. Another daughter.
In other words, accept or be discarded.
She went to dinner.
The Tail herself answered the door wearing a cropped T-shirt and micro-shorts. Fantastic body, completely athletic and lean and perfectly muscled. Poor Mom. Gail’s red hair was pulled into a ponytail, and she looked dewy and innocent. And most horribly of all...young.
“Colleen, at last!” she cried, throwing her arms around her. “I’ve been dying to meet you!”
Colleen extricated herself. “How old are you?” she asked.
“I’m twenty-six.”
“Holy shit.”
“I know. We could be sisters.” Gail smiled, but her eyes remained cool. Her huge engagement ring flashed.
Dinner was excruciating. Dad was helpful in a way he never was with Mom. Gail waffled between Adorable Ingenue and Experienced Prostitute, biting her lower lip and shooting Dad come-fuck-me looks. Whenever she stood, she arched her back, shoved her nonexistent belly outward and made doe eyes, smitten with the Miracle of Life.
When Colleen got home, she was exhausted. Mom was waiting by the door. “Well? It’s just temporary, isn’t it? This can’t last. He’ll come to his senses. This is just a lapse in judgment.”
And that was maybe the worst part. Far worse than Mom’s occasional and very righteous anger was her hope.
“Mom, why would you even want him back?” Colleen said.
“Why? Because I love him. Because he’s the father of my two beautiful children.”
“And soon he’ll be the father of another beautiful child.” She sat down on the tired couch. “Gail has an engagement ring.”
Her mother’s face went white. “He won’t go through with it. He’s just having a midlife crisis, that’s all. Who even knows if Gail’s really pregnant? Or if she is, if it’s even Pete’s baby?”
The next day, Mom went to House of Hair a brunette with a few streaks of gray...and came back a redhead. Not only that, but her perfectly lovely blue eyes were looking awfully green lately, courtesy of her tinted contacts.
In other words, she looked like a wannabe Gail.
It made Colleen want to cry.
Mom called Dad six or seven times a day on flimsy excuses...“Pete, honey, I’m looking for the screwdriver. Can you come by when you get a second? Pete, do you remember where you put the car insurance papers? Pete, we should talk about the kids. Want to go to Hugo’s and see Connor?”
Colleen could only watch in sorrow and anger and misery.
She missed Lucas. God, she missed him.
But he’d lied to her. Lucas, who was so scrupulously honest and decent beneath his scruffy, South-Side tough-guy persona, had covered for her father. If only he’d told her about it, maybe she could’ve talked some sense into her father, because she and Dad, they were too smart for this.
And then Gail wouldn’t be pregnant right now. Mom wouldn’t be in schizophrenic divorce hell. Connor’s mouth wouldn’t be so tight, and half the town wouldn’t be clucking and gossiping over the O’Rourkes.
And maybe her father would still love her as much as he used to, if he didn’t have a replacement daughter on the way.
Maybe her family would still be intact.
It felt as if Lucas had taken that chance away.
But that didn’t keep her from missing him, his dark, steady eyes, his workingman hands and low, smoky voice. The feeling of his mouth, his slow smile, and yes, that little-boy-lost shadow that he still carried with him. His voice when he called her mía. Mine.
Of course she wanted to marry him, more than ever now. Her own family was screwed up beyond repair, but they could make a new family. They’d get married and have a relationship that was ten times better than what her parents had had. Lucas would have a home, a real home, and his sister and the girls could come stay for the holidays, and Connor would be in and out, and he and Lucas would be best friends, and they’d be able to handle anything life threw at them. Including her parents’ divorce and her impending sibling.
They were better together than they were apart. He needed her; she made him smile, she made him happy, she made him whole, and he did the same things for her.
It was possible, Colleen thought late at night, that she’d been a little...rash.
But pride kept her from calling him. She wanted that first move to come from him. He was the one who’d lied, and of course she’d forgive him. All he had to do was ask.
And then, one day, he was here. Finally.
It was July, and the town was hosting the Days of Wine and Roses, a garden tour/wine extravaganza. Colleen was helping at the Blue Heron booth; the Hollands had just hired Mom in the tasting room for the season, and thank God for that, since the job was at least a distraction. Faith was home for the summer and had been absolutely stalwart.
The whole town was out, the sun was shining, the green was covered in tents, and mason jars filled with roses adorned every table. Dogs and children ran around in the park across the street, and every business was offering goodies on the sidewalks.
