I swallow, searching for my voice. “What are you doing here?”
I don’t mean for it to sound so unwelcome. I see the flicker of doubt in his gaze. I see it in the way he doesn’t move at all, standing rigidly in front of me, his hands held down at his sides.
I take a breath and try again. “Isn’t the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the recreation center happening today?”
“It was. I postponed it.”
I stare at him. “You postponed it . . . to come here?”
“I need to talk to you, Avery. I need—” He breaks off abruptly and rakes his hand over his scalp. “Ah, Christ. I just . . . needed to see you. Everything else can wait.”
Even the rec center, the dream he’s nurtured from concept to completion.
Could he actually mean that? The fact that he’s standing here leaves little room for doubt.
“Nick, you shouldn’t have done that. The rec center—”
“It will wait,” he insists. “As for things I shouldn’t have done, that’s a long list. I hoped we could talk about it.”
“Avery, is everything okay?” My mom steps beside me, cautious when she realizes it’s a man waiting outside.
“Mom, this is Nick.”
“Oh. Hello.” She scrutinizes him, her arm coming up around me as if to let me know I don’t have to face him alone if I’m not ready to.
“Pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Ross.” Nick gives her a subtle nod of greeting, and I notice that he chooses to refer to her by my father’s last name instead of Coyle, that of the unworthy monster she made the mistake of marrying after Daddy died. “I just drove up from New York. I was hoping I could speak to your daughter for a while.”
“It’s not me you need to ask.” Her frank response makes his mouth quirk in just the barest smile.
“Yes, ma’am,” he agrees. He glances back at me and I can see the hope in his eyes. I can see the fear in them too. “Avery, will you let me talk to you? Please.”
I reach for the cool metal latch of the screen door. “Let’s go for a walk.”
We end up at the lake on the wooden dock in back of the house. I’m not surprised my feet guide me there; I often did some of my clearest thinking sitting on the end of the long plank walkway with my toes dangling in the cold, dark water. I do that now, stepping out of my flip-flops and sinking down onto the sun-bleached wood.
Nick follows my lead, toeing off his Gucci loafers and cuffing the legs of his jeans before seating himself next to me. “You look a lot like your mom.”
I nod. “Everyone used to say that. She was so much prettier, though. She looked like an angel in the wedding pictures I have of her and my dad.”
“I’m sure she did.” Nick stares out at the water, a small, private smile curving his lips. “Is this the lake you used to visit with your grandfather?”
“This is it.” I mentioned the lake to him only once, sharing with him how I used to enjoy spending time on the water with Grandpa on his little sailboat. It’s surreal to be sitting next to Nick on this dock now, even if our reasons for being out here are less than ideal.
“I can see why this place is special to you. It’s so peaceful out here.”
I sigh, looking out over the glistening ripples that spread out before us. “No matter how hard things got for Mom and me, when we’d come out here to the lake it seemed like nothing bad could touch us. I never felt safer than when I was right here on my grandparents’ dock.”
“That’s something I never had growing up.”
His quiet admission draws my gaze to him. “You weren’t close with your grandparents?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
He shrugs, staring straight ahead yet at nothing in particular. “My mom’s parents were from up north. They had money, from what I understand. They didn’t approve of her marriage to my dad, but she was already pregnant with me so there wasn’t much they could say about it. Mom told me they cut her off soon after she informed them I was on the way.”
“What an awful thing for them to do. I’m sorry, Nick.”