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“Only a housewife?”
Annie shrugged as she dumped the potato on the counter and reached for another.
“That’s what I was.”
“Only a housewife,” he said, and laughed. “That’s a hell of a description for the woman who kept our home running smoothly, who raised our child, who entertained all the clowns I had to butter up while I was trying to get Cooper Construction moving.”
“I guess I wasted an awful lot of time in self-pity.”
“That’s not what I meant. If anybody wasted time, babe, it was me. I should have told you how proud I was of all the things you did. But I was too busy patting myself on the back, congratulating myself for building Cooper Construction into something bigger than my father had ever dreamed. Something that would...”
Something that would make you proud of me, he’d almost said, but he stopped himself just in time. It was too late to talk about that now.
“Well, what’s the difference?” he said briskly. “It’s all water under the bridge.” He concentrated on slicing the onions, and then he cleared his throat. “At least now I know that you didn’t take all those classes just to get away from me.”
“You weren’t home often enough for me to worry about getting away from you,” Annie said, a little stiffly.
“You could have had your degree by now,” he said, wisely deciding it was the better part of valor to avoid a minefield than to attempt to cross it. “If you’d taken a concentration in one area, I mean.”
“I don’t need it.” Annie peeled the last potato, put down her knife and wiped her hands on a towel. “All those horticulture courses paid off.” A note of pride crept into her voice. “Flowers by Annie is a success, Chase. I’ve had to hire more people, and I’m thinking of maybe trying my hand at landscape design.”
“That’s wonderful.”
“The truth is, I don’t think I ever really wanted a degree. The thought of taking a bunch of formal classes didn’t have any appeal. I just figured, well, I’d improve myself a little. Learn some stuff. You know.”
“You didn’t need improving,” Chase said. He knew he sounded angry, but he couldn’t help it. The only thing he didn’t know was whether he was angry at Annie or himself. Improve herself? His Annie?
“I did. I just had this high school education...”
Chase dropped his paring knife, clasped her shoulders and turned her to face him.
“You were the valedictorian of your graduating class, dammit! The only reason you didn’t go to college was because we got married, right after you graduated high school.”
“I know. But—”
“We talked about it, remember? We tried to figure out if we could both go to college and still get married, and we decided we’d never be able to afford that.” His mouth twisted. “So I went. You didn’t. You took those miserable jobs, flipping hamburgers—”
“First, I flipped fish filets,” Annie said with a shaky smile. “And then french fries. Hamburgers were a step up.”
“Dammit, Annie, you gave up what you could have had, for me. Don’t you think I know it?”
“I gave up nothing. I wanted to do it.”
“Whatever we had—whatever I have, today—I owe to you.”
“You don’t owe me anything, Chase. You never did. Don’t you understand?” Annie took a deep breath. “I didn’t want a college degree half as much as I wanted to marry you.”
“Yes.” Chase’s voice roughened. His hands slid up her throat and he buried them in her hair as he tilted her face to his. “That was all I could think of, too. Marrying you. Making you mine. So I did the selfish thing.”
“You didn’t!”
“I did, dammit!” His eyes searched her face, his gaze brushing her mouth before lifting again. “I let you give up your hopes and dreams so that I could have my dream.”
“It was important to you. Becoming an engineer, making a success of yourself....”
“My dream was to have you. Only you. And, once I did, to give you the things you’d missed out on when we first got married, because you’d had to make so many sacrifices.”
“They weren’t sacrifices,” Annie said, as the tears rose in her eyes. “I loved you, Chase. I wanted to help you succeed.”
“And I only wanted to make you proud of me.”
They fell silent.
If only I’d known, Annie thought...
If only I’d understood, Chase thought...
Was it too late? he wondered. Could you turn back the years? Could that be something this beautiful, confident woman in his arms might even want to do? She’d turned into someone else, his Annie, a stranger with a life of her own.
