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His face was stubborn but still heartbreakingly beautiful. But it was far more than that--it was his presence, his confidence, the strong emotions in his eyes. Why did they have to be having this conversation? Why did they have to be at each other's throats? It wasn't what she wanted, not at all.
Not when they'd loved each other so much, once upon a time...
"People who want to stay, stay," he insisted. "If you're tough enough, you find a way to make it work. And you know you've earned the right to be here."
There was a subtext there, she was sure of it, one that went something like, If you'd really loved me, you would have stayed.
Working to keep her focus on their debate over the condos rather than the emotions whipping between them, she said, "Are you even listening to yourself talking about how tough you have to be to stay? Instead of celebrating how hard it is to remain afloat here, why don't you try to make it easier for the people who elected you mayor?"
"One building leads to more," he insisted, "leads to problems you can't even begin to foresee. What I know for sure is that the people who stay are the ones who really love Summer Lake, just the way it is. They want to be able to swim in the lake, to know that it's clean, that too many boats and too many tourists haven't polluted it. They want to be able to hike in these mountains without facing bald hills logged to make a couple of bucks."
"Do you really think I'd bring in a company that would pollute the water or destroy the forests?"
"Everything we do has consequences, Sarah. Even if they're unintended."
She couldn't argue with him about that, not when one simple meeting with him was spinning off into lots of consequences, one after the other. "You want promises. I'll give them to you. I'll make sure the building is done by local people. That the money coming into Summer Lake stays here. And that the building process is totally green."
"I know all about your promises. Don't kid yourself. This is all about your career."
She gasped, actually sucked in a mouthful of air and choked on it. But even as her heart felt like it was drowning, her brain still desperately tried to stay above the waterline. "Wouldn't you rather have somebody involved who actually cares about Summer Lake?"
"You're right about that, at least. I'd like to be dealing with someone who cares about this town, someone who cares about more than just her latest deal."
Trying even harder to push down the hurt building up inside of her, to tell herself he couldn't really mean any of the things he was saying, she said, "My father always wished more people knew about this town. But at the end of the day, he supposed there wasn't enough here to bring them in. These small changes could be enough."
"Do you really sleep at night telling yourself these lies?"
Just like that, the hurt won. "How dare you tell me that there was nothing to talk about," she said in a voice made raw with the pain she could no longer fight back. "That there are no old wounds to heal between us, when all along you've been hating me with every single breath. When all along, you've been resenting every single second we spent together. When all along, you knew you'd never, ever forgive me for not giving up my entire life to come back here and take care of you and your sister."
She was up and out of the booth before he could stop her. She needed to get away from the horrible accusations he'd made. Needed to stop seeing the anger, the betrayal, the fury in his eyes as he looked at her as though she were a traitor who didn't understand him. He acted as though she had never understood him.
As though she hadn't loved him with every piece of her heart.
"Sarah." Her name was a breath of heated regret breaking through the cold fall night. "Wait!"
She heard his footfalls on the sidewalk behind her, but she didn't stop. But he was faster than she was, and at the end of Main Street where the grass began, his arms came around her waist, pulling her against him.
Oh God. That heat, the intense connection they'd always had with each other, pulled her into him despite herself, despite what he'd said in the bar, despite how he had said it.
"You caught me off guard," he said. "I shouldn't have said any of those things. I didn't mean to hurt you."
Every heartbeat was excruciating when she couldn't stop wishing for everything to be different. To be able to tell him how much she had missed him, that she'd thought about him every single day for ten years. To tell him what she was feeling now with his arms still around her, that she wanted nothing more than to lift her mouth to his and lose herself in his kiss. Lose herself in all of him and pretend nothing bad had ever happened.
"You were right," he said, still holding her so close that his words vibrated from his chest to hers. "We do need to talk about what happened."
"Not tonight." Not when she was feeling as weak as she ever had. She would need to be strong for that conversation. "Not now." She forced herself to pull out of Calvin's arms. "I need to go."
And this time, he let her.
*
Her mother was waiting up for her when she got home.
"Oh, honey, it's so good to see you!" Sarah had never needed her mom's hug more than she did right that second. "Your grandmother said that you were planning to stay for a few days this time. Is that true?"
"Actually, I'll probably be here a week at least. Maybe two." She took a deep breath before saying, "My new project is here in town. That's why I'm back, to oversee the development and building of some beautiful residences on the waterfront."
She waited for her mother's reaction, but although her eyes widened with surprise, Denise Bartow was the woman she had always been: thoughtful and quiet, gentle even when concerned. "That's big news. When did you begin this project?"
"Just a few days ago." She hurried to explain. "That's the only reason I haven't told you sooner. Because it just happened." She'd never asked her mother to give her opinion about a business
situation before. But suddenly, she needed one of the people she trusted most in the world to weigh in. "Do you think I'm wrong to even be thinking about building condos here, Mom?"
Her mother was silent for a long moment. "I don't know. The only thing I know for sure is that change is often hard. Good or bad."
That was when Sarah noticed how her usually vibrant blue eyes were smudged with dark circles. She knew how hard her father's death had been on her mom. One minute he'd been right beside her at an end-of-summer cocktail party, laughing with their friends--and the next he was gone, a heart attack taking him so suddenly. And utterly without warning, without giving anyone a chance to save him.
Calvin's parents' deaths had been just as unexpected. He had lost his mother first when she gave birth to Jordan and everything that could have gone wrong in the delivery did. One month later, his father pulled out a gun and shot himself. But Calvin had survived, had even told her how happy he was with his life tonight.
She and her mother would one day learn how to be happy again, wouldn't they?
Sarah felt her mother's hand on her arm. "Thank you for making your grandmother go see the doctor."
"What did Dr. Morris say?"
"That it's nothing a little rest won't take care of."
"Thank God. I was really worried about her today."
"I know. Fortunately, your grandmother is a very strong woman. One of the strongest I've ever known." Denise smiled. "And we both really appreciate you looking after the store. Especially on a Monday with the knitting group showing up."
Sarah had to laugh at herself for unknowingly wading into the biggest knitting night of the week at Summer Lake. "I was happy to do it. And everyone in the group was great." Well, most of them anyway. Catherine had been a little weird, but Sarah was trying not to take it personally.
Her mother looked fondly at her across the table. "You always had such a wonderful eye. The store used to look so much better after you rearranged things. I'm sure you've got a lot of ideas for us about how to make the place better."
Sarah frowned at her mother's strange compliment, considering she had always been a numbers girl and wasn't the least bit creative or artistic. "I was just a little girl playing with yarn back then, and the place looks great already. You know that." Despite her mother and grandmother not having any formal training in marketing or sales, everything from the layout to the displays to the selection was spot-on.
