He found Julian on the front steps of the bed-and-breakfast, smoking a cigarette. He was wearing a T-shirt and jeans—the fool—and his whole body was shaking.
Liam skidded to a stop and jumped out of the car. “What in the hell were you thinking?”
Julian looked up. The cold was cruel to his face, leeched the color from his cheeks. “I had to see her. ”
Liam lost his hold on anger. Without it, he felt drained. There was a wealth of sadness in Julian’s blue eyes, a look of pure defeat. Of course he’d had to see her.
“She’s beautiful, Liam. The spitting image of Kayla, and when I looked at her … I couldn’t see anything of me. ”
Liam didn’t know what to say. He could tell that Julian had never really considered his daughter before, what it meant to have fathered a child. A young girl.
Julian took a last drag on his cigarette, then stabbed it out in a cushion of new snow. It hissed and sent up a thread of smoke. “I didn’t tell her. I can’t imagine I ever could. ”
Liam took a step forward. “Why not?”
“How could I make a man like you understand?” He sighed; a cloud of breath puddled in front of his face. “I break everything I touch. ” He tried to smile. “I think I’ve only just realized that. I don’t want to hurt J. C. ”
Liam felt as if he’d finally glimpsed something real in Julian, and he couldn’t help pitying the younger man.
Julian got slowly to his feet. “Don’t tell her, Liam. Please, don’t …”
Later Liam would wonder what had gotten to him, the sad regret in Julian’s eyes or his own fear of wounding Jacey’s tender heart. Whatever it was, he found himself saying, “Okay, Julian. ”
Chapter Seventeen
Julian sat by Kayla’s bedside, spoon-feeding her the stories of their life together. Finally he understood how momentous a blink would be—right now, he’d take any sign of life.
Her skin seemed to have gotten paler in the past twenty-four hours.
“Hey, Kay,” he said softly, scooting toward her. The chair legs made a horrific squeaking sound on the linoleum, and he was glad for the noise. Anything was better than this godawful silence.
He closed his eyes. It made it easier to slide into the past. In darkness he could remember the girl he’d fallen in love with. “I was thinking about the day I asked you to marry me. Do you remember that?”
It had been late in the autumn. The air in Sunville had been crisp and cold, and with every indrawn breath came the pungent scent of ripening apples. He hadn’t really meant to return to Kayla. When he had left her, after the movie finished shooting, he’d thought she was simply another notch in his bedpost, not unlike the French gymnast he’d slept with while he was in Paris shooting Bone Deep. But every hour away from Kayla had felt like a day, every day a month. To his shock, he’d found that he missed her.
And so he’d returned to that flea-bitten spot on God’s ass. He’d waited until it was closing time at the diner, until she was alone, and then, very quietly, he’d gone inside and stood by the jukebox …
“I’ll always remember the look of you, standing by the lunch counter, the way that ugly orange uniform clung to your body. The way my name sounded wrapped up in your voice …
“I could tell you were afraid to hope that I’d come back for you. I knew you were thinking about the price tag that came with a man like me. You said, ‘I’m not pregnant, if that’s what you came to find out. ’”
He almost smiled. “I remember wishing I was the kind of guy who would have come back to ask that question. I knew I should turn around and walk away, but I could feel it sparking between us again, that passion. I’d never been so scared, and somehow you knew that.
“I tried to tell you the truth about me. I told you I was no good for you, that I’d never been faithful to a woman in my life, but all you did was smile. So I told you everything, that I’d gone back to Hollywood and started reading scripts and doing interviews and talking to people … but I woke up in the morning and I thought of you. I went to bed at night, and I thought of you. I screwed other women, and I thought of you.
“I knew it would hurt you, but I told you anyway. I thought maybe it would keep me from saying the rest of it, that maybe you would throw me out and I’d have to leave you again. But you just stood there, smiling up at me, waiting.
“Do you remember what I said next?
“‘I don’t want to love you, Kayla. ’
“I knew you heard the word that mattered—don’t—but next to love, it seemed to have no power at all. I pulled the small velvet box out of my pocket and handed it to you. When you saw the diamond ring, you started to cry.
“I knelt down on one knee—remember that? It was the only time I’ve ever done that in my life. I knelt down and begged you to marry me. You took the ring and slipped it on your finger.
“I meant to say something romantic, but what I said was ‘If you’re smart, you’ll say no. ’”
He touched her hand. “I knew I would hurt you, Kay. Sooner or later. And I’m so damned sorry …”