AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Huh?”
“Never mind. Take off your shirt,” Allie said.
“Here? Now?” he joked. “I’ll take mine off if you take off yours.” But there was no heat behind his words.
“Pretty brave talk now that my brother’s gone.”
Despite the swelling that was beginning to form, he managed a smile. He slipped off his jacket and pulled his T-shirt over his head and handed it to her. Allie wadded it up in a tight ball and placed it against his nose. She stood back and sighed. The blood was making her a little dizzy, but a shirtless Tom Donalan was just too pretty a sight to not admire. “We better put some ice on that before the swelling gets too bad.”
*~*~*
She drove the truck to his place but before she could get out, Tom opened his door. “Stay here, I’ll be right back.” He returned a few minutes later wearing a clean T-shirt and holding a frozen bag of peas against his nose. He motioned for her to scoot over into the passenger seat. “I can drive now.”
“Are you sure?” Allie gulped. Tom was right. What was she thinking? That she’d stay the night again? He drove her back to her brother’s house in silence and parked the car in the driveway.
More déjà vu. Just five nights ago they’d made this same drive. Parked in this same space “Have a safe trip home, Allie.”
It was a dismissal. A polite one to be sure, but one nevertheless. They’d already said their goodbyes. It wasn’t fair to him to drag things out any longer. But there was something Allie needed to know.
“Why did you let Zeke hit you?” she asked. “And why on earth didn’t you hit him back?”
“Hit him back?” He said it as if the idea had never occurred to him. “For the record, I didn’t let him hit me. He took me by surprise, but I would never have hit him back.”
“Why not?”
He turned and stared at her. “Because he’s your brother and—” He shook his head. “Never mind. Let’s just say, he’s right. I deserved it.” He paused a moment. “I’ve thought about what you said last night. And you’re right. I did have a responsibility to you.”
Allie stilled. “Tom—”
“Let me finish. I told you before that looking at you made me think of a time in my life that I wasn’t so proud of. But…that was only partially true. Looking at you makes me think of what my life could have been like if I hadn’t screwed up. Dad taught me early on that a man always pays for his mistakes. I thought by marrying Lauren, I was doing the right thing. But maybe what I did was the wrong thing. I don’t know.”
“I think you did the right thing,” she said softly, surprising both of them. “Henry is terrific, and who knows, Tom? You and I would have probably broken up eventually. That kind of situation would have put a lot of pressure on our relationship.”
He nodded slowly. “It wasn’t true, when I said I hadn’t thought about you these past twelve years. I thought about you a lot, Allie. But it always made me feel so damn guilty, so I had to shove it away. Compartmentalize it someplace where it wouldn’t interfere with the rest of my life. I thought it would be easy for you to get over me. I was a world class dick. It never occurred to me… The thing is, if it makes you feel any better, it wasn’t just you. My heart broke that night, too.”
If it made her feel any better? Maybe it should have, but it didn’t. It just made her sad all over again. But this time, anger didn’t follow. This time, she wanted to reach out and comfort him and tell him…
“Thank you, for everything,” she said instead. Then she opened the door and ran inside the house.
Allie packed up her bag and tossed it into the back seat of her VW bug. She said goodbye to Zeke and Mimi. Claire (thankfully) hugged Allie and made her promise to come back soon. Things were strained. No doubt about it. But there wasn’t anything she could do about that. She’d said her piece last night. It was up to Mimi and Zeke to fix things.
She took a right on Ocean Avenue. Leaving Whispering Bay always made her feel a little nostalgic. She couldn’t help wondering what she’d encounter the next time she came back for a visit. Would she run into Tom again? Would Mimi and Zeke still be together? How would Claire feel if her parents split up? Or Cameron? A part of her didn’t feel right leaving this time. There were too many unanswered questions. Too much woo-woo out in the universe. But what could she do to change anything? She had a life back in Tampa. Maybe it wasn’t a big life. But it was her life and it was high time to get back to it.
She stopped at The Bistro by the Beach to gra
b a cup of coffee. As usual, it was hopping. Saturday morning meant tourists, which meant business. Allie ordered a coffee and a bagel and was on her way out the door when she spotted Roger sitting alone at a table near the back window overlooking the water. It was a beautiful day. Clear, crisp and still cool. Tampa could wait a few minutes longer.
“Mind if I have this seat?” she asked, pointing to an empty chair.
“I thought you’d already left town.”
Knowing Roger, she took that as a yes, so she sat down and arranged her food on the table. “Nah, I had to find out who Concerned Citizen was first.”
He raised an eyebrow, clearly waiting for her to go on.
So Allie told him how it had been none other than Lauren Donalan who’d written that infamous letter, and how she and Mimi had tried to fix Allie up with Tom, and how Lauren had Buela’s old record player in her shop. If Roger found any part of the story incredulous, he didn’t show it.
“That’s one hell of a dating service,” he mused.
