It meant…
Well, it meant pretty much all her problems in life were solved, except one.
Unfortunately, that was a problem money couldn’t solve.
Well, technically, it could solve that problem, but hiring a hit man was both immoral and illegal. Ever since her descent into hell started, a gruesome death was an option Lynn reserved for bad guys in her books
Cheaper than therapy and bail.
Once she had her carry-on and checked bag packed, including shorts she could wear to sleep in that would hide her scars from Terrie, she set them both by the front door, her purse on top. She plugged her phone into the charger and sat on the couch to watch TV and go through her e-mail once more. Her Kindle and laptop and iPad were all charged, too.
It wouldn’t surprise Lynn if the shuttle arrived way earlier than they’d originally stated it would. If Terrie had her way, she’d book it to be extremely early so they’d have plenty of time padding for anything that might happen.
It didn’t matter they were only going to a hotel in Clearwater for the night. Terrie would want them there early.
Lynn wouldn’t deny this was an adventure she was looking forward to. She wasn’t doing it just to make herself feel good, although that was a nice side benefit, being able to make a positive difference in someone’s life the way she was in Justin’s. She didn’t have a little brother. Being able to “adopt” both him and Rachel into her life felt…
Good.
Peaceful.
The pain in her heart and soul would never go away. Yet she knew Terrie and Mark were right, that she had to move on in the ways she could. She had to pull herself out of her shell and force herself to participate in life again, even if only as a spectator.
Sitting alone in her Evil Writing Lair of Evil and putting words on the screen about other people living their lives, or merely interacting with people through social media, wasn’t a life.
It was self-enforced loneliness, and yes, it only emphasized her pain.
It would hurt at first. Hurt like hell. Surviving Rachel and Andrew’s collaring had proven that.
But the only way through that hurt was through it, and she’d pulled back from life in the process of trying to avoid cleaning out that wound once and for all.
When it finally healed over in a healthy way, she’d have an emotional scar there to remind her what she’d survived, and it would have to do.
She fingered her collar. As far as she was concerned, she would always belong to Paul.
Always.
For now, trying to separate herself from that tangible reminder was too painful a step. She didn’t know if she’d ever be ready to take the step of removing her collar. And having a reminder of him helped, in some ways. Besides, it kept people from hitting on her at lifestyle gatherings, so that was always a bonus. But, more importantly, it helped her center and focus the way it had when they were together as a couple but not able to physically be together.
Something she had to be able to do if she was going to make a living.
Some people were blessed with the ability to escape into their work to distract them from whatever was going wrong with their lives, to get out of their minds.
Unfortunately, she spent her workdays going deep inside her mind. Just because she didn’t have to work now didn’t mean she wouldn’t. Writing was something she’d always done since she was a teenager, an escape from her real life. Even if she had a job flipping burgers or waiting tables, she would still write in her spare time. Writer was who she was, not what she did.
The winnings now meant she could dust off some of the projects she’d chipped away at over the years but had never thrown her full energies into because she knew they wouldn’t be profitable.
It didn’t matter now if they sold one copy or one million.
Freedom.
It tasted so fucking sweet. It didn’t fill the empty ache in her soul, the missing piece she’d always mourn.
It did, however, mean she could take her mind off many mundane concerns she’d had up until this point and gladly throw her energies into her “fun” writing.
Vinnie, sensing something was up, rubbed her body all over Lynn’s luggage until she picked the cat up.
“Don’t worry. Cali’s going to take good care of you while I’m gone. She promised to come over twice a day.”
That reminded Lynn to walk over and shut the door to her office and her bedroom to keep the cat out of there. That way, Cali wouldn’t have to hunt for her in case Vinnie decided to hide, although their meeting yesterday had gone well.
Vinnie purred in her arms.
“Maybe when I get back you and I can talk about adding another cat to our—wait, what the hell am I doing?” She stared into the cat’s eyes. “I’m trying to talk myself into becoming a crazy cat lady, is what I’m doing.”
“Meow.”
“Gee, thanks.” Lynn set her down on the back of the sofa.
* * * *
Paul had already made this drive twice before, losing his nerve just blocks away the previous times.
This time, he wouldn’t turn back.
It was a Sunday afternoon, so hopefully Lynn would be home and it wouldn’t be so early that he’d be waking her up.
When he reached the front gate at her condo complex, he pulled up to the directory box. With his finger trembling from too much stress, he punched in her four-digit access code from memory and hit the pound sign.
A long beep sounded before the gate started rolling open.
He wasn’t sure what he would have done if she had changed her code. He knew the four-digit code that people gave out to people for access, like repairmen or pizza delivery, but didn’t know if that had been changed or not.
He would have had to ring through her number for entrance if he couldn’t get in any other way. Although he could have waited at the box and followed a resident who drove in with their automatic sensor opening the gate.
He drove through the gate, his heart pounding as he wound around the quiet complex. The one-story units sat three to a building, and the neighbors on both side of Lynn had been snowbirds who lived there only from November until April, usually.
As he rounded the final corner and saw Lynn’s car parked in its usual spot, his nerves nearly fled.
Forcing himself to nut up, he pulled into the second spot for her unit, the one where he’d always parked. She wouldn’t recognize his car because it wasn’t the same one he’d driven before. The engine in his Dodge had died, and he’d ended up buying a Honda six months after he’d last seen her.
Paul wasn’t altogether sure he might not puke as he got out, locked his car, and slowly made his way up an achingly familiar sidewalk to her front door.
He stood there for a good minute, staring at the door, trying to figure out what the hell he was actually going to say to her. Finally, before he could lose his nerve, he reached out and rang the doorbell.
Chapter Nine
Yep, I knew it. Early.
Lynn was already laughing as she opened the door. “Ter, I knew you would—”
The words dried up, locked in her throat.
In her doorway stood a man her rational mind had tried to convince her she’d never set eyes on again in her life.
They must have stood there for at least a minute, neither of them speaking, before he finally broke the silence.
“Hi.”
She swallowed, tried to speak, fought the urge to throw up, and then tried again to talk. “Hi.”
Paul stood five inches taller than her at five eleven. His dark brown hair had a little more grey in it than it had the last time she’d seen him, his hazel eyes looked far sadder than she could ever remember them, and he’d gained about twenty pounds. He also no longer wore the goatee beard and mustache she’d loved so much.
But it was Him.
His gaze dropped to his feet. “Look, you have every right to scream and yell at me and order me to leave, and I will. But I needed to tell y
ou this in person. I’m sorry. Sarah and I are divorced. I moved out. It’s over between us. I don’t expect you to—”
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Terrie screamed as she ran up the walk.
Lynn found herself stepping between her best friend and the man who had the power to rip her heart out. Lynn was still trying to process what he’d said, the words he’d just now spoken to her.
Divorced?
“Terrie, don’t,” she begged. “Please.”
She tried to dodge around Lynn. “She’s finally starting to pick up the pieces of her life, and you show up now? Really? Get the hell out of here!”
“Terrie, please!”
“The driver’s waiting,” Terrie said, grabbing her. “Where’s your stuff. I’ll get it.”
“Can’t they wait for just a freaking minute?” She knew her friend wanted her away from Paul, and Lynn got it.
But the last thing she wanted to do was to leave now that He was in front of her.
“I-I’m sorry,” Paul said. “I didn’t mean to hold you up. I’m sorry.”
“Wait, please?” Lynn said.
* * * *
Paul desperately hoped Terrie hadn’t gotten a concealed carry permit in the time since he’d last seen her. From the look on her face, she’d gladly take jail time to put him six feet under the ground.
Not that he blamed her.
This was like a bad imitation of Cris’ return to Tilly’s life.
The irony was, back then, he’d been one of the ones who’d wanted to take a swing at Cris.
Now, being on the other end of it, he got it.
Then he froze when he saw what lay around Lynn’s neck.
Her collar.
She’s still wearing it.
He’d searched for a while before paying Rebecca to custom make it for him out of stainless rings, the weave and ring size he’d wanted. Something Lynn could keep on all the time, heavy enough to be more than a necklace, but light enough she could comfortably wear it.
“We have to go,” Terry said. “The driver’s waiting and has a flight of people he has to meet up at TIA after he drops us off.”
Lynn threw Terrie an aggravated look before returning her focus to him. “We’re flying up to South Dakota. We’re helping Justin move down.”
His heart fell. “Justin?”
“Yeah. He’s a really nice guy.”
“Nicer than you,” Terrie growled in his direction.
His heart wanted to stop. “Oh.” He forced himself not to start crying right there. “I’d better let you get going. If you ever feel like talking, my number’s the same.”
Terrie had hold of her arm now. “Yeah, yeah. Don’t hold your breath, asshole.”
He ignored her. “I’m sorry, Lynn. You were all right, and I’m so sorry. I wish I could take everything back, but I can’t. I just hope you can forgive me one day. I did the best I thought I could. I’m sorry. That’s all I wanted to say. I know I owe you way more than that, but I wanted to at least say it to you in person. I felt I owed you that much.”
He turned and fished his keys out of his pocket, forcing himself not to break into a run as he headed to his car.
When he got in, Lynn still stood in her doorway, staring at him, Terrie with a death grip on her arm.
He pulled out and forced himself not to look back.
Goddammit.
Maybe if he’d sought her out immediately, maybe if he’d…
He wiped at his eyes as he waited for the exit gate to roll open so he could escape.
All he wanted to do now was go home and get himself drunk and pass out.
Then he’d figure out what to do with his damn shell of a life after that.
* * * *
“Lynn, where’s your—”
“He’s divorced,” Lynn said, shock still settling in as she stared after where he’d driven away. “He said he’s divorced.”
“Yeah, I know he’s divorced. Where’s your stuff?”
She turned on Terrie, finally shaking free. “What? You knew? Since when?”
Now Terrie had the decency to turn red in the face. “I was looking up something online a few months back and happened to punch his name into the county clerk’s database and saw the filing. It wasn’t final when I saw it, though.”
Lynn blinked, staring. “You knew he’d filed for divorce and didn’t fucking tell me?”
“What the hell was I supposed to tell you, huh? I had no clue what was going on. It was all I could do to make you take in a few hundred calories every day. Okay? I wasn’t going to get your hopes up just for you to get crushed again. That’s what friends do. They shield the people they love from the raging shitstorms in their lives and try to keep them moving forward.”
Lynn stared at her for a long moment. “Were you ever going to tell me?”
Terrie straightened and ran a hand through her hair. “Honestly? No. Not unless I hunted the son of a bitch down myself first and asked him what the ever-lovin’ fuck. No way in hell was I going to expose you to him unless I knew for sure he wasn’t going to fucking finish killing you from the inside out. I love you, but honey, you’re killing yourself. Look at you. Why’d you lose all that weight, huh? You’re like a fucking bunch of goddamned bones. This isn’t healthy. Now where are your bags?”
“Inside the door,” Lynn said, numbly staring in the direction he’d driven. “Make sure Vinnie didn’t get out, please.”
“She’s over on the couch.” Terrie shoved Lynn’s purse and carry-on into her hands. Lynn heard the jingle of keys, and then the sound of the door slamming shut and Terry locking the deadbolt.
“Come on.” She had Lynn’s suitcase.
Numb, Lynn followed her.
* * * *
Lynn didn’t speak again until they were checked into the hotel not far from St. Pete-Clearwater International.
“How long have you known?” Lynn quietly asked.
Terrie wouldn’t meet her gaze. “Maybe three, four months,” she said. “He’d apparently filed for divorce a few months before I saw it, but the final orders weren’t in there. I was going to look at it again and follow up, but then all this happened.”
Terrie grabbed her by the shoulders. “You were finally starting to come back to us. I didn’t want to knock your legs out from under you again. What if they hadn’t gone through with it? What if they’d reconciled, huh? I was going to follow up after our trip and see if there were any updates.”
“Were you ever going to tell me?”
“Maybe. I don’t know. If I’d found out that, yes, he went through with it and divorced the woman, probably. Or if he showed up…which…obviously, he did.”
Lynn sank onto the bed, Terrie sitting next to her. “Please don’t be mad at me. Sweetie, we’re worried about you. All of us are. Let’s get through this trip, and then you can call him when we get back. Okay?”
Part of her wanted to do just that, take some time to process through the numbed pain she was struggling against right now.
Part of her wanted to call him right that minute.
Part of her wanted to curl up in a ball and cry.
Several times throughout the night, Lynn picked up her phone and thought about calling him or texting him, then put her phone down again.
The way he’d left…as if he was saying good-bye all over again.
Or…was he?
The next morning, she could barely function. What little sleep she’d managed had been plagued by dreams of Paul, of the sound of him sobbing as they’d held each other one last time before saying good-bye.
The last time she’d knelt in front of him, her forehead on his feet.
His feet.
Lynn numbly let Terrie shepherd her through their rushed departure from the hotel at way too early an hour, through the airport and check-in, onto their flight, into their seats.
Terrie tried to keep up a one-sided stream of conversation until the flight took off, and then Lynn closed her eyes and pretende
d to sleep.
Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Paul standing in her doorway, an answered prayer.
A dream come true.
Or was it another nightmare?
In Sioux Falls, Lynn stood waiting for the luggage conveyor belt to start moving while Terrie got their rental car. Staring at her phone, she thumbed through to a picture of her and Paul, a selfie of them together, smiling. She’d taken it at a park, where they’d gone to watch an outdoor concert one evening while Sarah was out of town at a conference with her women’s group from church.
They were both smiling, happy, at ease. A real smile from him, not the fake half smile he always wore in most pictures.
Even in the pictures from his and Sarah’s wedding.
It was the only picture she had of him wearing a real smile.
A truly happy smile.
It was a picture she’d cried countless gallons of tears over.
“Okay, we have wheels,” Terrie said as she walked over to her.
Lynn slid her phone back into her pocket. “Okay.”
Terrie let out a sigh. “You going to give me the silent treatment all week?” she asked.
Lynn finally turned and hugged her. “No, I get it,” she said. “I’m sorry.”
“I don’t want an apology from you,” Terrie said. “My feelings aren’t hurt. I want you to keep moving forward and making progress.” Her expression softened. “Talk to him when we get back. It’s nothing that can’t wait. Remember how happy you were when you talked about doing this for Justin?”
“Yeah.” True. Very true. She did want to help Justin.
Her fingers went to her collar, and she realized Paul had to have seen she still wore it.
Had to.
“Okay,” Terry said. “Let’s find the hotel and get checked in. Then we can drive down and meet up with Justin.”
“Okay. That sounds like a plan.” She forced a smile. “I’m just still in shock.”
“I know, sweetie. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. But now you know. Let’s not lose the progress you made. Promise?”