“Scott,” Ellie said, hoping to break the spell. “You have some explaining to do.”
“You’re right, I do,” he agreed, and advanced another step toward them.
When they’d met earlier that afternoon Ellie hadn’t had the chance to ask him more than a couple questions, but that wasn’t his fault. She had been overwhelmed by the fact she was talking to her father.
His gaze centered on Ellie. “Seeing you brought back a flash flood of memories of your mother and me.”
“I have questions that need to be answered,” Ellie said, and as far as she was concerned, there was no time like the present to get the answer to the most pressing one. “I need to know why you walked out on Mom and me. Why did you leave us the way you did?”
His face tightened, and he cast an accusing glare toward Ellie’s mother. “I didn’t walk out on either one of you.”
“Yes, you did. Mom said …” Ellie paused and looked at her mother, but her mother refused to meet her gaze. Virginia seemed to find something interesting at her feet that demanded her attention. “Mom?”
“I was given an ultimatum,” her father explained. “Your mother wanted me to take money from her family, which I refused to do. When I wouldn’t play ball with your grandfather, he had me fired and made sure my life was miserable.”
“Dad only wanted to help,” Virginia insisted, defending her father.
“No, he didn’t,” Scott argued just as heatedly. “He wanted to control us, mostly me. He’d had you wrapped around his finger, and when he found he couldn’t control me he retaliated. When I couldn’t take it any longer, I decided we had to move. I hoped you loved me enough to break away from your family.”
“And starve?”
“Ginny, for the love of heaven, we wouldn’t have starved. We had little more than each other, and for me that was enough, but apparently it wasn’t enough for you.”
“You can’t live on love,” Virginia said.
That sounded like something her grandparents would say, Ellie mused.
“We lived on love the first two years, and, yes, there were hard times. We rarely had more than a couple dimes in our pockets, but we survived and were better for it.”
“We did make it,” her mother agreed, “but it was hard, Scott. You worked two jobs and I rarely saw you. Ellie has no memories of you. All Dad wanted you to do was accept a loan.”
“A loan with so many strings attached that they felt like a noose around my neck.”
Ellie’s mother shook her head as if to dismiss the accusation. “It was your pride.”
Scott looked at her as if weary of the argument that was more than twenty years old. “What does it matter now? It’s all water under the bridge.”
“Yes,” Virginia agreed. “Water that’s long since washed out to sea.”
Ellie waited for her mother to bring up the letter she’d written shortly after her husband had moved out. Virginia didn’t, and in that instant Ellie knew why. It hurt her mother’s pride to disclose the fact that she’d reached out to her husband only to be rejected.
The silence grew thick, like fog rolling in off Puget Sound, circling the room.
“I have another question,” Ellie inserted, and it seemed both her parents were relieved to move forward.
“Yes?” her father said, looking to her expectantly.
“In fact, I had an entire list of questions I wanted to ask.” Ellie felt there was no time like now with both her parents in the room.
Scott grinned. He actually grinned. “You sounded so like your mother just now.”
“Ask your questions, Ellie,” Virginia insisted. “Perhaps we should all sit down. I asked Jo Marie to brew a pot of tea, which she did. I’ll pour.”
Scott took the big overstuffed chair while Ellie and her mother settled on the sofa. The tray with the teacups was on the coffee table. Her mother went into the kitchen and returned with a third cup, a mug this time. She poured the tea and handed the first cup to Ellie, the mug to Scott, and left the last cup for herself. They settled back and waited.
Ellie clenched her hand around the teacup. “First and foremost, I want to know why you never answered my mother’s letter.”
“Ellie,” her mother warned beneath her breath. Leaning forward, she set the teacup back on the saucer and then straightened and crossed her arms over her middle.
Scott frowned. “What letter?”
The question was met with silence. Apparently, her mother wasn’t willing to discuss the matter. Ellie felt no such restraint. “The one Mom mailed you shortly after you abandoned us.”
“You mean after I moved out?”
“However you want to phrase it!”
Virginia placed her hand on Ellie’s knee as if to say “Enough.”
Scott’s brow condensed into thick lines. “You wrote me a letter, Ginny? When?”
Her mother’s arms were wrapped so tightly around her middle Ellie wondered how she was able to breathe normally. “About a month after you left.”
Ellie had to strain to hear her mother. “A month, Mom?”
Virginia nodded.
“What did you say?” Scott asked gently.
“What does it matter? It’s just more water under the bridge, isn’t it?”
“No,” he argued, “it isn’t. This matters.”
Virginia pinched her lips together as if to let them both know she had no intention of revealing a single word of that letter.
“Mom only told me about it earlier today,” Ellie explained. “She wrote to tell you that she regretted everything and wanted you to come and get us.”
“Traitor,” Virginia whispered, for Ellie’s ears alone.
“Ginny, you wrote me?” He looked stunned. No one was that good an actor. Shock was written on every facial feature, but especially his eyes, which grew wide and intense.
“It wasn’t like I had your phone number.”
“You didn’t want the divorce?”
“No. I was distraught, and afterward I told my parents what I did. They assured me the divorce was for the best and that if you’d had a change of heart you would have responded. It was then that they convinced me to file.”
Ellie’s father set his mug down on the tray, and when he spoke every word was strong and distinct. “I never got a letter, Ginny. Once I was out of the rental house I never heard from you again.”
“But I … mailed it myself. I took it down to the neighbor’s house and put it in their mailbox instead of our own.”
“Mrs. Mullin?”
“Yes. How did you know?”
“My goodness, Ginny, your mother and Mrs. Mullin were thick as thieves. My guess is, she took her own mail out, found your letter, and then gave it to your mother, because, God as my witness, I never got it.”
“Would it have made a difference?” Virginia asked, her voice strong and defiant.
Scott didn’t hesitate. “It would have made all the difference in the world. I was miserable without you and Ellie. When you returned my letter …”
Her mother half rose from the sofa cushion. “What letter?”
“The letter you wrote ‘Return to Sender’ across and never opened.”
“But I didn’t do any such thing,” she protested. “I never saw a letter.” It sounded as if her mother was close to tears. “Every day I prayed I’d hear from you. The minute I got home from work the first thing I did was check the mail, hoping with all my heart that you would agree to give us another chance.”
No one needed to explain to Ellie what had happened. Her grandparents had interceded and neither her mother nor her father had gotten the opportunity to communicate with the other.
Both her parents looked at each other as if there was far more they needed to say, but Ellie had other questions she wanted to ask. “Not once in the entire time I was growing up did you ask to see me,” she blurted out. “I want to know why.”
“I don’t have a good excuse,” Scott said, his eyes revealing his pain, “an
d I’ll regret that for the rest of my life. When the divorce was final I heard from your mother’s attorney. He said if I made any effort to be part of your life your grandfather would drag me through every court in the land. I didn’t have the money to fight them, and so I didn’t try.”
“Why not later, when I was an adult?” she asked again, needing more than what he’d told her earlier. “Do you have an excuse for that?”
“No.” His answer was straight and to the point. “No excuse whatsoever. You’d lived nearly your entire life without me. I figured by this time you wouldn’t want to hear from me and that you probably hated me. Frankly, I couldn’t blame you. In a nutshell, I guess I was afraid.”
She pressed her hand to her chest. If only he knew how she’d hungered for a father.
Scott looked away and refused to meet her gaze, and yet every facial feature revealed his regret. “I didn’t want to disrupt your life. I could only imagine what your mother and grandparents had said to taint me in your eyes. Ellie, I thought after their indoctrination you wouldn’t want anything to do with me.”
“I didn’t hate you,” she whispered. She wanted to hate her father but found she couldn’t make herself do it.
“I came to take you to dinner,” her father continued. “But I’m here for another reason, too. I came because of Tom. He’s afraid he’s lost you and it’s devastated him. He realizes he should have told you who he was right away, but he kept putting it off and then it was too late and the chance to warn you was gone.”
“He destroyed my trust.” Ellie folded her arms in much the same way her mother had earlier. “I can’t see a relationship working for me and Tom. I wish I could, because I have genuine feelings for him, but I doubt I can get past what he did.”
“I want you to reconsider, Ellie,” her father urged.
“I don’t know that I can.” She didn’t want to discuss Tom. What was important was going home to Bend, to all that was familiar and comfortable. Then and only then could she analyze the events of this weekend and decide how best to deal with Tom’s deception.
It was almost as if Scott hadn’t heard her. His gaze remained focused on Virginia, and he couldn’t seem to stop looking at her.
“I didn’t know Ginny was here.”
“I only just arrived,” Ellie’s mother explained.
“I’m grateful you came … so grateful.”
“How so?” Virginia asked, blushing as she spoke.
“For the first time in over twenty years I have the chance to tell you how sorry I am that our marriage didn’t work out.”
Her mother’s returning smile was tentative and awkward, as if she wasn’t sure how to respond. Ellie read the same regret in her mother and realized that through all these years Virginia had remained in love with Scott Reynolds.
“You did a wonderful job raising our daughter,” Scott said, his voice low and intense. “Thank you for that.”
For several moments her mother struggled to speak. “That’s very kind of you, Scott.”
Her father turned his attention back to Ellie. “I wish you wouldn’t be so quick to judge. I know my stepson, and he’s a good man. He did this for me. He wanted to give me the chance to know you and so he arranged it as a surprise for us both, thinking that was the only way to bring us together.
“He would never have intentionally hurt you. If anything, I believe he fell deeply in love with you. He’s beating himself up over what’s happened, and I feel I’m the one to blame.”
“Go to him, Ellie,” her mother urged.
Ellie couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Mom?” After all the warnings her mother had issued about trusting men, this was completely out of character.
“Don’t make the same mistake I did and let pride get in the way.”
“Or the mistake I made in leaving you behind when I should have been fighting with every ounce of strength I possessed to be part of your life,” her father added.
“Go, Ellie, go to Tom.”
Her heart was shouting one thing and her stubbornness was saying something else entirely.
“Don’t live with regret the way I have,” her father urged.
“And I have,” her mother added.
Undecided still, Ellie stood and after a moment asked, “Where is he?”
Scott told her and then handed her his car keys. “You’ll need these.”
“She’s more accustomed to driving my car,” Virginia insisted, and hurried from the room, returning in a matter of seconds with her purse. She dug out her keys and handed them to Ellie.
“Will you two be all right while I’m away?” Ellie asked her parents, half joking.
“We’ll be fine,” her mother insisted.
“Yes, we will,” Scott agreed. “It seems we have a lot to discuss.”
Chapter 28
By the time Maggie had walked down the hill dragging her suitcase into Cedar Cove she’d managed to get her emotions under control and dry her eyes. She had purpose now. First things first. She’d need to find a way back to Yakima, to home, without her husband.
She paused and slowly exhaled. From now on she had to stop thinking of Roy as her husband. He wanted a divorce and she would give him one without putting up a fight. Pain gripped her, and she nearly stumbled forward. Her marriage was over. It’d been over when Roy had started the emotional affair with Katherine, only she’d been too stubborn and too much in love to realize it. It was easy to lay blame at his feet, but they were both at fault. They had failed each other. Her life revolved around their children and she’d ignored her husband’s needs. She’d been blind and foolish, but then Roy had, too. Her one hope was that they could get through the next year without coming to hate each other. Divorces could be messy; she would do her best to make sure bitterness wasn’t part of the dissolution of their marriage.
Once she was on Harbor Street, the main road through town, Maggie found a coffee shop called the Java Joint. Stepping up to the counter, she checked her purse, unsure of how much cash she had on her.
“Can I help you?” asked a young man with a name badge that identified him as Connor.
“I’d love a cup of herbal tea,” Maggie said, realizing she would need to alter her diet and avoid caffeine now that she was aware of this pregnancy.
“We’ve got several herbal teas to choose from,” Connor informed her cheerfully. “Go ahead and look over the list and make a selection.” He pointed to an upright menu that listed the names of several teas.
Maggie chose chamomile, hoping the tea would help calm her nerves.
“You just get to town?” Connor asked, eyeing her suitcase. “The shuttle bus stops close by, and people often come in for a cup of joe.”
Maggie wasn’t sure how to answer without inviting other questions. “Sort of.” She wasn’t interested in starting up a conversation with the teenager.
“Cedar Cove is a great town.” He rang up her order and then announced, “That’ll be a dollar fifty.”
Maggie slid a couple dollars across the counter.
Connor handed her back the change, and she noticed the tip jar was front and center and dropped a quarter inside.
“Thanks,” he said. “I’m saving up for college but decided all the tips I collect on weekends will go toward a ticket to a Seahawk football game. A guy’s got to have some fun, right?” As he spoke, he reached for a large insulated cup and filled it with steaming hot water and handed it to her, along with the tea bag.
The Java Joint had two other customers, and Maggie settled down in the back, away from the window. The other couple left, leaving her the sole occupant. She opened the tea bag and dipped it into the nearly boiling hot water, letting it steep. She liked her tea weak. Her thoughts wandered back to Roy and she was nearly overwhelmed with sadness. She was lost in her musings when Connor approached.
“You can put your used tea bag in this,” he said, and handed her a plastic spoon and a couple napkins.
“Oh, sure, thanks,” she mum
bled. Taking out the tea bag, she wrapped the string around the spoon and squeezed out as much of the liquid as she could. She tasted the tea and nearly burned her lips.
“Do you want ice chips?” Connor called from behind the counter. “That water can get really hot.”
The youth was apparently looking for something to keep himself occupied.
“No, thanks.”
“I make a mean latte if you’re looking for something to tide you over until dinnertime. The special of the day is salted-caramel mocha. It’s one of our best sellers.”
“Thanks, but no thanks.” Maggie wished she’d sat with her back to him, but to change places now would seem rude. Because she sat facing him and it was just the two of them, it seemed to encourage conversation. Maggie didn’t feel up to chatting.
After a few minutes, she tried her tea again.
“I’ve got to go to the back room for a few minutes,” Connor announced. “If anyone comes in, tell them to ring the bell on the counter.”
“Will do.” Peace at last, but then Maggie realized there was no peace for her. Not now, and probably not for a very long time.
She checked her cell phone and saw, thankfully, that it was fully charged. Logging on to the Internet, she scanned rental car agencies. Getting a car was sure to be cheaper than flying back to Yakima. Once home, she’d need to look into a number of matters. Her cousin Larry Morris was an attorney, and he’d help her through the divorce proceedings. It would be necessary for her to find employment outside the home, although finding a position now would be difficult, seeing that she’d need time off when she delivered this baby.
The baby.
Aborting the pregnancy sounded like a quick, easy solution, and for some it might be, but not for her. In reality, it would solve nearly everything. It might even help save her marriage for the time being, but it wouldn’t help for long. An abortion would be only a Band-Aid to what was really wrong with her and Roy’s marriage. For a moment, just a moment, she reconsidered. Maybe she could do it … maybe it would help. The thought didn’t last long, though. She knew it would be pointless, and she’d be riddled with guilt afterward. Maggie knew herself well enough to realize doing away with the pregnancy wasn’t the answer for her. Thankfully, Roy recognized the truth of that as much as she did.