It's Never too Late

“Yeah. Okay.”

“Promise?” Let it go, Adrianna. Let him go.

“I’m not sure what you’re asking.” He was just kind of there. Not pulling away, but not engaging, either. “I can’t promise what I don’t know.”

“I...I’d just like to think that sometime in the future, there will be a future for us.”

“I’d like that, too.”

She had no idea what the words meant, but they felt good, just the same.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

SHE HAD TO GET OUT. Addy was at a breaking point and she knew it.

She was in love with Mark. Adrianna Keller, a woman he didn’t even know existed, was in love with him.

She might have been able to carry off sex without commitment but she couldn’t make love with duplicity.

And still...she needed Mark’s arms around her—needed to feel complete as only his body melding with hers could make her complete.

She needed him to be in love with her.

He didn’t even know who she was.

And when he found out...

Would he even give her a chance to explain? Mark, who prized honesty above all else, would feel as though she’d betrayed him. And she couldn’t blame him.

After spending a miserable Tuesday fighting with herself, she moved through the duplex Wednesday morning as if on autopilot. She’d missed class but hadn’t seen that there was any reason for her to attend.

Two of her four suitcases were packed with the winter clothes she’d brought just in case she’d be staying through Shelter Valley’s cooler season. She’d brought in the plastic bins from the storage shed assigned to her unit on the side of the building and put them in the spare bedroom. They’d hold the linens, toiletries and kitchen utensils she’d brought with her.

If Mark did let her explain, would he even like Adrianna? He’d befriended a woman in his same position—a first-year college student living in a rented duplex—not a juris doctorate graduate with her own law practice and a home in a nice neighborhood in one of the country’s premier cities.

She cleaned and packed and planned, and waited for Greg Richards to contact her. With a prepaid cell phone she’d called his number and hung up twice in a row—their prearranged signal to let him know that she needed to speak with him.

He’d find a way to get in touch with her without compromising her cover. If she’d had an emergency, her cover be damned; she’d dial 9-1-1.

She noticed the sheriff’s car in front of their house at a little past ten. And again a second time just after eleven. Figuring that he wanted her to drive outside of town again, she grabbed her keys and her purse, slipping her folder for Greg inside an oversize bag, stepped into her sandals and headed out.

“Psst.” Nonnie’s front door was open, leaving only the screen between her and the outside world. The older woman was sitting at the computer not far inside.

Addy couldn’t pretend she hadn’t heard her. “Did you need something?” she asked, peering through the screen door.

“You missed class.”

“Yes, I had some things to do here.”

“You sure you’re not sick? I made some chicken soup. I was planning to call in about half an hour ’case you was sleeping.”

An eighty-one-year-old woman with a debilitating disease had made her chicken soup because she thought she was sick. Tears sprang to her eyes and she blinked them away.

“I’m not sick,” she said. “But I would love some chicken soup. I’ve got an errand to run—can I stop in when I return?”

“Sure you can.” Nonnie turned back to the computer. “Did you sleep with him?”

She already had her back to the door. Almost didn’t turn around. But she suspected she’d just hear the question again when she came back for soup. Preferring a screen door between them, she simply said, “No,” and hurried down the steps.