He wasn’t surprised. Relieved, maybe. But not surprised. But then he said something that had rankled her conscience every day since. “Elaine told me it was time to tell you.” Something about the way he said her name made him sound a little too peppy. “She said I should call Dayne and tell him we all needed to face the facts—whether all of you ever spent time together or not.”
At that point Ashley almost forgot the reason she’d called. All she could think about, the only part of the conversation she walked away with was this: her father was getting advice from another woman, from Elaine Denning, the friend of her mother’s. Which was wrong when her mother hadn’t even been gone quite two years.
Ashley pursed her lips and blew out. There was too much on her mind to worry about Elaine. At least until after the Fourth. Her father wouldn’t be interested in the woman, anyway, would he? She was too quiet, at least from what Ashley remembered.
No, the references to Elaine couldn’t account for the gnawing in Ashley’s stomach, the way she couldn’t quite feel at ease lately. That was because their lakeside picnic was in just a few days, and Dayne still hadn’t called. And according to her last talk with Katy, he hadn’t contacted her either. Which was really the only explanation for how she’d been feeling lately.
She looked up at the sky and let the expanse of it loosen her tension. God . . . where is he, and what’s he thinking? He wants to meet us; he told me that. So why’s he so worried about us? We’ll be okay, right? And what about Katy? Nothing’s working out, so we need Your help, okay? Please.
The Lord’s comfort was always with her, especially when she talked to Him. But now there was something else too. Not so much an audible answer or even a Scripture came to mind but more of a knowing. As if God was trying to warn her of something she already knew deep within her. The knowing that Dayne wasn’t going to call or come to Bloomington.
And that despite everything Ashley had hoped for in the next few days, the sad reality was that they were all about to lose.
Dayne grabbed his bags from the limo driver and stood in line at curbside check-in. He wore the baseball cap with the blond hair for this trip too, and so far the paparazzi hadn’t figured out that he was on the move again. LAX was crowded, teaming with people heading out for tomorrow’s big Independence Day celebration.
It was time to put his list into action. But the things he needed to say and do couldn’t be done over the phone, so when the director gave them another three days off for the Fourth, Dayne was convinced. There could be no better time than now.
His disguise worked, and he boarded the plane without being recognized. The next six hours, during the change of planes in Denver and on into Indianapolis, he rehearsed exactly what he wanted to say.
God . . . give me the words. Nothing will be the same after today.
Verses from Ecclesiastes filled his heart, bits of wisdom about happiness and meaning and the transience of life. God would be with him; Dayne could feel His presence already. Whatever he needed to say, the words would be handed to him from the Holy Spirit. He was convinced of that much.
The conversations he needed to hold were private, nothing he wanted the press aware of. Like before, he rented an SUV using the name on his driver’s license—Allen Matthews. He couldn’t have asked for a nicer day, blue skies and a few puffy white clouds. The humidity was creeping up, but nothing could slow him down. Not with what he had to do.
After all the soul-searching and time on the beach, after his conversations with God and Bob Asher, and even after far too much time had passed, he was about to do the one thing he’d been dying to do: spend an afternoon with Katy Hart.
Missing her had become as common as breathing, a painful part of who he was these days. He wasn’t sure how he was going to walk back into her life—even for a day—and tell her the things on his heart. But he had to. Because he wasn’t living life for himself anymore. He was living life according to what mattered most. The aspects of his life that God had made clear that day on the Cancún beach were worth going after with every morning he was given from here on.
At three o’clock on July 3 Dayne pulled into the Flanigans’ driveway. He could hear his pounding heart. What if Katy didn’t want to see him? His surprising her this way would catch her off guard. Maybe she’d disagree with the things he wanted to say. He parked his SUV along the circle leading to the front door. The baseball cap was off, lying on the seat beside him. He took a quick breath, then climbed out and walked to the front door. He knocked, took a step back, and waited.
Whatever her response, he had to do this.
Jenny Flanigan opened the door and stifled a gasp.
Dayne Matthews was standing on her porch, looking like a terrified high school kid. “Hi.”
“Hi.” Jenny wiped her hands on her shorts. Jim and the kids were out back clearing weeds from the perimeter of their property, and she was making potato salad for tomorrow’s swim party at their house. “Is . . . is Katy expecting you?”
“No.” His expression was open and sincere. “There’s something I have to talk to her about, something I have to ask her.”
“Dayne.” Jenny laughed and caught her breath at the same time. She opened the door wider and motioned for him to come in. “You amaze me, flying in from Los Angeles to ask Katy a question.”
He stepped into the entryway and looked past Jenny, down the hall. “You don’t think she’ll be mad, do you?”
“Mad?” Jenny’s mind was racing. Katy had talked about Dayne and missed him every day since she’d returned from California. No matter how impossible a relationship with him seemed, no matter what the tabloids said or how difficult the last few weeks had been, Katy still couldn’t imagine having feelings for anyone else. Jenny kept all of that to herself and smiled at Dayne. “No, she wouldn’t be mad. But she’s not here.”
“She isn’t?”
“No.” Jenny tucked her hair behind her ears and felt a bit of potato salad on her cheek. Great. Dayne Matthews stops by, and she has food on her face. She wiped at both cheeks, just in case. “Katy’s at the theater. Going through props and costumes, taking stock for the fall season.”
A shadow of disappointment fell over Dayne’s expression but only for a moment. “Is she by herself?”
“I think so.” Jenny motioned to the kitchen. “Want me to call her cell?”
“No.” His answer was quick. “I . . . I wanted to surprise her.”
“Well, Dayne—” she grinned—“if you walk into the Bloomington Community Theater I have no doubt she’ll be surprised. Beyond surprised even.”
Dayne laughed and nodded to her. “Tell Jim and the kids I said hi.” He moved toward the door. “Maybe I’ll see you later today.”
“Okay.” Jenny was about to ask where Dayne was staying and how long he was in town, but Dayne was already halfway to his SUV.
“Thanks!” He waved once more, got into the driver’s seat, and drove off.
As Jenny stepped out on the porch, she smiled. The guy was crazy about Katy; anyone could see that. Now all they had to do was figure out a practical way to act on their feelings. If only he’d take a—
Her thoughts stopped cold. She watched his SUV drive out of sight. What had he said? There was something he had to ask her? Jenny’s lips parted, and she tried to imagine what kind of question Dayne might need to ask that would cause him to fly in from Los Angeles.
Chills ran down her arms and legs. A question? The two of them hadn’t been together since early May, and they’d had very few phone conversations since. He couldn’t be coming here—without warning—to ask her . . . to ask her that sort of question, could he?
Jenny’s enthusiasm faded. No, that couldn’t be it. They hadn’t figured out how to date, let alone how they could even consider taking that sort of major step. She bit her lip, disappointed. He probably wanted to ask her to come see him or to attend a movie premiere with him. Something like that.
A scene came to her mind, something from
an old movie An Officer and a Gentleman. The guy—Richard Gere—is finishing officer’s training, and the woman—Debra Winger—is working in a factory, same as her mother and grandmother before her. Every year officers would fall for women who worked at the factory, and every year those women had their hearts broken when the officers graduated and moved on. Always the guys said the same thing. No bridge could span the different lives.
But in the final scene, Gere graduates and heads straight for the factory. Wearing his white officer’s uniform, he marches through the rows of women hunched over dreary workstations, sweeps Debra Winger into his arms, and rides off with her on his motorcycle.
Jenny sighed. She walked back into the house and closed the door behind her. For a moment it had been nice to picture Katy in that kind of scene. Being swept off her feet by a guy whose world was so different from hers but who no longer cared. Because love really was enough. She smiled at herself, a sad sort of smile. Nah, that wasn’t why Dayne had come; it wasn’t why he was so eager to find Katy and ask her a question.
Scenes like that only happened in the movies.
The theater hadn’t been used for almost a month, so the first thing Katy did this afternoon was prop open the doors and slide up the windows. Warm, fresh air and sunshine streamed in, touching even the coldest places in her heart.
She had two months before the fall session with CKT and no real plans for the summer. She would visit other CKT offices around the country, of course, and work on next season’s lineup. They’d be doing Joseph, Cinderella, and Godspell, three shows that thrilled her creative team. None of them could wait for fall.
But what was she supposed to do until then?
One week she’d go back to Chicago and visit her parents, and another would be spent leading the kids in the overnight teen camp near Lake Michigan. But otherwise she would probably do what she’d been doing every day since she returned from California.
Missing Dayne Matthews.
He hadn’t called recently, so she had to assume he was sticking by his determination. Not only were their worlds too different for anything to come of their feelings for each other, but it was too dangerous. That had been the tipping point. Katy had spent enough time thinking through the situation to understand now. As long as it was only her privacy at stake, both of them had been willing to take chances.
But with the near accident that day as they left Pepperdine, the dangers of his life had become painfully clear. Between knife-wielding fans and paparazzi, Dayne probably couldn’t bear the thought of her getting hurt. Finishing things off were the weeks of abuse she’d taken in the tabloids. A few CKT parents still gave her distrusting looks or whispered when she passed by.
Of course he hadn’t called.
She walked up the stairs and off to the right of the stage, toward the prop room. It was a huge oversized closet, musty from years of use, and inside were the props they’d used for every show since they first began a few years ago. CKT rented the space for practically nothing, and Katy was glad. This way the props were readily available, and with a little imagination and lots of hard work, they could be transformed for just about any production.
Blocking the way as she opened the door was an eight-foot prelit Christmas tree, dusty and sagging on one side. It had been donated from the Shaffers and had been used in CKT’s production of Annie. She couldn’t look through the props unless she moved it. Katy sized it up. Another person would make the job much easier, but she had come alone. Now she had no choice.
“Okay,” she muttered, “here goes.” She heaved it from its place and dragged it out through the wings and onto the stage. It wasn’t as heavy as it looked, but the cobwebbed branches towered over her, and twice she nearly lost her balance. She was still dragging it when she heard footsteps near the back of the theater.
As she turned toward the noise, her foot slipped and all at once she fell backward and the tree came down squarely on top of her. Lying flat on her back, buried in Christmas tree branches, Katy couldn’t find her breath.
“Katy!” The voice was familiar, a man’s voice. Almost at the same time there was the sound of running footsteps.
Help . . . Katy tried to cry out, but she had no wind, nothing in her lungs. Panic surged inside her, but then she felt someone moving the tree off her. Whoever the man was, he was strong. In one single motion he lifted the tree and heaved it to the side.
That’s when Katy realized she had something in her eyes. Pine needles, maybe. Or dust or cobwebs. Even though the tree was off her, she couldn’t see. And she still could barely breathe, but she realized why. The fall had knocked the wind from her.
“Katy . . . are you okay?” The man’s voice was urgent, but still it was familiar. He almost sounded like . . . no, that wasn’t possible. The man took hold of her arm. “Katy, talk to me.”
“I’m . . .” She took small breaths through her mouth. “I’m okay.” The panic subsided, and she exhaled through pinched lips, forcing her lungs to work again. This time she drew a full breath, and she rubbed her eyes with her fists.
The man helped her to a sitting position, and finally she was able to blink her eyes open. Her vision was blurry at first, but then—over a few seconds—it cleared and, like a dream, she was looking into the handsome, terrified face of Dayne Matthews. She squinted, and for the first time she wondered if maybe she was hallucinating. Maybe she’d hit her head harder than she thought. She blinked twice more. “Dayne?”
He was crouched down, holding her arms so she wouldn’t fall back. “Did you black out?”
“No.” She felt something gritty in her mouth. More cobwebs, no doubt. “I’m fine, I just . . .” How must that have looked? Dayne walks into the theater, and there she is, dragging a Christmas tree across the stage in the heat of July, then falling hard onto her back while the tree literally swallows her whole. A series of giggles built in her, and she began to laugh. If only the paparazzi could’ve seen that. Her laughter grew stronger.
He stood and allowed a partial smile. “I’ll take that as a good sign.”
Between laughs she nodded. “I’m fine. Really.” She held out her hand, and he helped her to her feet. Only then did she notice how she looked. The falling tree had covered her with dirt. She dusted off her legs and her shorts, but she had to keep stopping. She was laughing too hard.
Her laughter must’ve been contagious, because he started to chuckle. “That’s what I like about you, Katy.” He moved closer, dusting off her arms and picking pine needles from her hair. “Never a dull moment.”
“I was pulling the . . .” She found a quick breath between bursts of laughter. “I must’ve looked ridiculous and then you were there and . . .” Her laughter faded.
Slowly, as if they could both hear the soundtrack switch to violins, the atmosphere changed and the moment felt magical.
Katy’s breath caught in her throat, and she searched his eyes. “Dayne—” she sounded breathless—“you . . . you came?”
His arm circled her waist, and he pulled her close. The thudding in their chests was so loud, so strong, in that instant it felt as if they shared the same heart. He brought his hand to her face and dusted a cobweb off her cheek. “I couldn’t stay away from you another minute.” His voice was a whisper, full of passion and fear and promise and hope.
Tears clouded her eyes and spilled onto her cheeks. She let her forehead fall against him, and her hands encircled his neck. “You’re really here.” She was still catching her breath from laughing so hard, but now—with Dayne here, with his arms around her, she felt like weeping. She lifted her chin, and her eyes met his. Like every time before, it was easy for her to see past what the world saw, as if she alone had been given access to the private inroads of his heart.
Dayne moved his hands to the small of her back and slid one up between her shoulder blades. The laughter was gone for him too. “How did I ever let you go?” He pressed his cheek to her hair, breathing the words against her ear.
Katy k
new what was coming, and she was helpless to stop it. Not that she wanted to, but what was the point? Why had he come at all? Yes, he was wonderful, and yes, she longed to be in this place, lost in his embrace, taken by his voice and his touch. But what sort of person was she to allow herself these feelings when he was only passing through town? The way he always only passed through her life?
Even so, being together like this they needed no words. The feelings between them were more consuming than any dose of common sense. And they only grew as he moved his lips to hers and kissed her. It wasn’t the kiss of reckless abandon, of passion without limits. Rather, it was tame and tentative, and it somehow held a promise that surprised her.
He eased back, lost in the moment. “I told you once before, but—” he smiled—“with a dozen cameras snapping pictures, it didn’t come out like I wanted.”
Again she could hardly believe he was here, how good it felt to be in his arms. Why was he doing this? Why had he even come, when moments like this would only prolong her heartache? She could no longer meet his eyes, no longer look into them without losing the battle to her tears. “Dayne . . . don’t.”
“Katy.” He lifted her chin. “Look at me . . . please.”
A long breath left her lips, a breath that seemed to come from the deepest parts of her soul. “It feels so right having you here.” Her chin quivered, but she managed to find her voice. “But, Dayne, why?” Frustration rang in her tone. “Why, when it’ll only be even harder when you go?”
“Ah, Katy.” He gave her a sad smile. “I’m so sorry I didn’t figure it out sooner.”
Figure it out sooner? What was he talking about? She swallowed the lump in her throat and tried to understand. “I don’t . . . What do you mean?”
Dayne took a half step backward and worked his fingers between hers. “My buddy Bob Asher asked me to make a list.” He gave her a slow smile. “A list of what mattered most to me. Then he told me to spend the rest of my life going after those things.”