Part 24 (1/2)
Why was he looking at her that way? ”Talking?”
”About what happened that day.” He reached out and wiped at a tear making its way down her cheek. ”Even if we can't go back, I want you to know what really happened.”
Kari nodded, terrified that somehow Ryan might have an explanation for what took place that far-off day. And if he did ... if the only reason the two of them weren't together today was some mistake ...
She couldn't bear to think about it.
He led her back to their seats. Then without waiting another moment, with a firm hold on her hand and an even firmer one on her heart, Ryan Taylor began to tell her a story she'd never heard before.
One that, had she heard it sooner, would have changed the course of her life.
207 CHAPTER nineteen
Elizabeth SAT ON THE LIVING-ROOM floor across from little Cole, helping him work a jigsaw puzzle. ”Look for the edge pieces, honey.” She held up a straight-edged piece. ”Like this. We have to find these first.”
John entered the room with two steaming cups of mint tea. Apple pie was baking in the oven, and the aromas mixed in a way that filled their home with warmth and peace. In the background, Kathy Troccoli sang about beauty for ashes. And as Elizabeth worked on the puzzle with her grandson, she realized her earlier fears were gone. In their place was a holy a.s.surance that somehow everything would work out.
The troubles with Brooke and Peter. The trials with Ashley. Her own health. And even the alarming fact that Kari and Ryan had been together all day. None of it seemed overwhelming now.
John's story had done it, of course-the way he wove Scripture into their conversation. That explained the peaceful feeling she'd had ever since. G.o.d had calmed the sea before, and he would do it again-whether it raged inside her heart or all around her.
208.
”Did Ashley say when she'd be back?” John sat in the closest chair and rested the hot mug on his knee.
”Cole's spending the night.” She gave John a knowing look, then smiled at the little boy. ”Five more minutes, and it's bedtime, okay, pumpkin?”
Cole nodded. ”I get to sleep over, right, Grammy? That's what my mommy said.”
”Yep, in your special bed. Billy Bear's already up there waiting for you.”
”Know what I dreamed about, Grammy?” ”What, honey?”
”I was making the hugest sand castle in the whole, wide world, and all the sudden a big shark came right up on the beach. Only know what, Grammy?”
”What?” Elizabeth made her eyes big.
”He was a nice shark, and he sat down beside me and helped me make the sand castle, and it was the bestest one I ever made.” The story went on to involve a variety of sea creatures and sudden storms and magic treasure. Elizabeth remembered that they had watched a nature special together a few days earlier. She marveled at how everything the little boy saw or heard became part of his reality.
”And know what happened then, Grammy?” Cole gathered himself to a standing position. He raised his hands high over his head. ”A big, tall daddy came out of the water and walked up to me. He told me he'd been gone a really lot of time, but now he wasn't going away anymore. And he said he loved me more than even the bestest little boys all over the whole wide world.”
Elizabeth blinked back tears and worked to find her voice. ”That's wonderful, sweetheart.”
They finished their puzzle, and Elizabeth and John walked the child upstairs.
”Can you carry me, Papa?” Cole reached his little-boy hands up to John, and Elizabeth's heart melted. At times like these it nearly strangled her to imagine Ashley's boy growing up without a father.
209 John scooped him up. ”You're my boy, Cole. Always and forever.”
Cole responded by laying his head on John's shoulder and wrapping his chubby arms around his neck. ”I wish I could sleep over every night.”
Elizabeth trailed behind, blinking back tears as she watched her husband kiss the child's cheek.
John's voice was choked when he answered, ”Me, too, son. Me too.”
They prayed together, tucked Billy Bear in beside Cole, and left with promises of pancakes in the morning. When they were downstairs, Elizabeth walked to the front room and stared out the window.
John was at her side instantly. ”They'll be back soon.” She smiled. ”How do you know which one it is tonight?” ”It's Kari. She's had the number-one worry spot for a while now.”
Her head tilted back against his chest. ”But it could be Ashley.”
”True.” ”Or both of them.” ”Absolutely.” ”Actually, I was thinking about Cole.”
Elizabeth felt her smile fade. She turned as John wrapped his arms around her. ”It breaks my heart to see him growing up without a dad.”
John kissed the top of her head. ”He's such a great little guy.” ”You know why, don't you?” She leaned up and wondered again at the depth of love she felt for John Baxter, a love that grew with each pa.s.sing year as if there were no limits to how she could feel about him.
”Why?” ”Because he has you, of course.” She smiled but knew he could read the seriousness in her voice. ”I thank G.o.d he has you, John.”
”Ashley tries.”
210 Elizabeth smiled in a tired sort of way. ”She has so much to learn about being a mother.”
He nodded. ”I watch Cole on the floor making puzzles and telling you his pretend stories about sharks and treasures and big, tall daddies, and I want to shake her and ask her, `Ashley, what are you doing tonight that could possibly be more important than being here with him?”'
Melody Blues was nearing the end of its first set at The Coffee House. Ashley Baxter and two of her friends sat at a back table, sipping mochas and comparing notes.
Her friends were nothing like her family, but they were loyal. And they didn't expect from Ashley anything that she wasn't willing to give. There was Anika, the Alaskan transplant who talked constantly about getting to New York and playing violin for a Broadway orchestra, and Billie, the art student who'd been saving for years to buy herself a summer in Europe. Since Ashley played the guitar and painted, the three of them fit well together. But beyond their shared artistic interests, they had something bigger in common.
Their discontentment with life.
Anika was twenty-three and divorced. Billie was living with a man twenty years her senior. And Ashley was pursued by a dozen guys every day but wanted nothing to do with any of them.
”Paris cured me of that,” she'd told her friends. And though they didn't know the details, they were two of the only people on earth who had any idea at all of what she meant.
As far as Ashley was concerned, it was none of anyone's business what had happened in Paris the year she was twenty-one. Well, it was fairly obvious that Cole had happened that year, but she wasn't telling anything more. Her parents and siblings could ask all they wanted; she had no intention of dredging up the details. Not for them or anyone else.
211 ”Hey, what's Cole doing tonight?” Anika caught Ashley's eye and stirred the whipped cream into her drink.
”The usual. Spoiled by Grandma from seven to eight. Spoiled by Grandpa from eight to nine.” She smiled, but her eyes felt soaked in a sadness she didn't quite understand. ”His favorite kind of night.”
Anika nodded and stared at the band. ”I should be home practicing. I'll never be famous if I spend every night listening to someone else make music.”
She launched into a comparison of off-Broadway musicals versus Broadway ones, and though Billie was immediately caught up in the interchange, trading ambiguous terms and meaningless opinions, Ashley wasn't in the mood.