She gazed down now with a sinking feeling in her stomach and an old, dull ache in her heart. The sight below wasn’t encouraging. Swollen by the storm, the river rushed and tumbled, carrying branches and other storm debris on its churning surface. “Maybe if I hurry, before the rain really starts falling again...”
“Sorry, Jen. That road’s always dangerous when it’s flooded. Dad and I talked about trying to get better drainage downhill, but the county hasn’t been in any hurry to address the problem. If I thought I could drive that little car of yours safely through the flood zone, I’d have the guys follow me down and I’d do it for you. But even as long as I’ve been coming up here, I wouldn’t risk your car or my life just to get you out a couple hours quicker.”
A few more raindrops trickled down her face and she glanced toward the cabin. “Then I guess we should go inside before we get soaked again.”
He released her arm, but didn’t immediately move away from her. Instead, he raised his hand to wipe her cheek with his thumb, his gaze locked with hers. “So,” he asked in a low, deep voice, “are you more anxious to run away from Avery or from me?”
She jerked away from his touch, then wished immediately that she’d been a little more discreet about it. “I’m not running away from either of you. I just...need to get out of this rain.”
With that, she turned and moved briskly toward the cabin, resisting an impulse to run.
“Jenny...”
Pretending not to hear him, she walked a little faster.
It seemed her grandmother had been right about this trip to the cabin being a bad idea. But then, her grandmother claimed to be right about a lot of things. Gran had always said Gavin would break Jenny’s heart. And now Gran claimed Thad and Jenny were the perfect match. She’d been right about the former. Maybe she was right about everythi
ng.
* * *
Jenny sat on the couch with a book she’d dug out of her bag, pretending to read in the glow of the fluorescent lantern next to her. She found the book dull as dishwater, but it was trendy among the social circles she and Thad moved in. It had been brought up during a dinner party last week, and she was the only woman there who couldn’t intelligently discuss the book’s theme. Thad had brushed off her chagrin later, telling her everyone should understand that her business kept her too busy for much reading time, but she’d made a mental note to try to stay more current. After all, there would be many more such gatherings in her future with Thad as he cultivated important connections among potential donors and supporters.
Being a political wife was a full-time job in itself, she’d murmured then with a nervous sigh. Thad hadn’t disagreed, but he’d squeezed her hand and told her he had no doubt she would be as successful in a political partnership as she had been in everything else she’d tackled.
Not that everything she’d ever attempted had been a success, she mused, glancing up from the book to study Gavin across the cabin through her lashes.
She ran a fingertip absently along the page she was trying to read and chewed lightly on her lower lip. One of the reasons she’d needed this time to consider Thad’s proposal was because she was so keenly aware of all the repercussions of accepting. How important it would be not to fail if she decided to take on the challenge. She wouldn’t be simply formalizing a relationship, adjusting to day-to-day life with a partner who shared her bed and her breakfast table. Marrying Thad would change everything in the life she had worked very hard to achieve. And while she could certainly see the rewards, she was also aware of what she would be giving up. Her self-assigned task this weekend had been to weigh those pros and cons and decide once and for all which path was best for her, even though she’d been fairly confident her answer would be yes.
She closed the book. She would read it. Eventually. It was just too hard to concentrate with insufficient light and the distracting noise coming from the other side of the room. Frankly, she was more interested in the men’s conversation.
Gavin and his friends sat around the table with beers and cards, playing poker while they waited for the rain to stop again. They had invited her to join them, but she’d declined. Aware that she was in the room, the men probably toned down the language a bit in their lively conversation. She’d smiled to herself when she heard a couple of quick substitutions for off-color adjectives. It didn’t take her long to deduce that J.T. was also in law enforcement, though he was a state trooper rather than a city cop like Gavin and Avery. Their anecdotes, like their language, were probably toned down for her benefit, but still she winced a few times at the reminders of the unpleasant situations the three officers and the emergency medical technician found themselves in on a regular basis. She couldn’t help thinking that this was a very different type of discussion than the ones Thad and his friends engaged in. She wasn’t judging, she assured herself, just noticing.
In addition to their work, they’d chatted about rowdy gatherings for barbecues and touch football games at various homes and parks, and about an upcoming charity baseball game between cops and firefighters that would apparently involve lots of beer and trash talk. They’d mentioned a patrolman who’d been hurt in a car crash during a high-speed pursuit, but was apparently recovering well. She bit her lip at the reminder that this cheerful, gregarious group willingly put their lives on the line every day in the course of their jobs. It was a brief glimpse of Gavin’s life now—perhaps of the life she’d have shared with him had they stayed together. Lively, communal, but always with that underlying edge of worry.
She set the book aside and wandered to the window. The rain had almost stopped, though the gray sky looked more like dusk than midafternoon. She turned from the window to find Gavin watching her from the table.
“Do you need anything?” he asked. “Want me to put the kettle on?”
“Thanks, but I can do it.” She forced a smile as she moved toward the stove. “I was just wondering how the road is looking down there.”
J.T. looked up from the phone in his hand. “I just checked the weather radar. Looks like the rain’s finally cleared. The flooding should start receding fairly quickly now. State and county police have been busy working wrecks all day, but it seems to be getting better out there.”
“Considering everything, it’s amazing we all have the weekend off,” Rob commented. “Can’t even remember the last time that happened.”
“So you decided to waste your day off cleaning up my property?” Gavin shook his head in skepticism.
Jenny saw his friends exchange quick glances, but Rob replied with a lazy chuckle and a shrug. “We owe you a few favors. Remember when you drove an hour and a half to help me out after that drunk ran a stop sign and hit my car in Brinkley? It wasn’t raining, but it was cold. Below-freezing cold. We nearly froze our, uh, body parts off before we arranged to have my car towed and unloaded my things from it. All while you were facing the graveyard shift that night.”
Gavin shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “That’s not...”
“You sat up with me at the hospital for three nights straight when my dad was sick last year,” J.T. joined in to add. “Brought me coffee and sandwiches, made calls for me, anything I needed. Mom was able to go home and get some rest because she knew you were keeping me company.”
“Guys...”
Speaking over Gavin’s embarrassed protest, Avery said flatly, “Truth is, we all owe you more than a few favors. Least we can do is to help you out here to keep you from doing any more damage to that shoulder.”
Jenny wondered if most of that exchange had been for her benefit. Just what had Avery said to Rob and J.T. while she and Gavin had lingered for a few moments outside earlier? Had he told them that she and Gavin had once dated, that he believed she’d broken up with Gavin because she hadn’t thought him good enough for her? Surely they didn’t feel they needed to defend Gavin’s character to her?