Нора Робертс - Bed of Roses

“There’s your moron.”

Emma nearly managed a smile at Mac’s disgusted tone. “I got the ‘caught him off guard, wasn’t expecting.’ Even the ‘caught me at a bad time.’ ”

“Oh my God.”

“That was before I told him I was in love with him, but it doesn’t matter. So I ended it, and I walked out. It hurts. I think it’s going to hurt a really long time.”

“He called,” Mac told her.

“I don’t want to talk to him.”

“Figured that. He wanted to make sure you were here, that you got home. I’m not taking his side, believe me, but he sounded pretty shaken up.”

“I don’t care. I don’t want to care. If I forgive him now, if I go back—settle for what he can give me—I’ll lose myself. I have to get over him first.” She curled up again. “I just need to get over him. I don’t want to see him or talk to him until I do. Or at least until I feel stronger.”

“Then you won’t. I’m going to reschedule your consults for tomorrow.”

“Oh, Parker—”

“You need a day off.”

“To wallow?”

“Yes. Now you need a long, hot bath, and we’re going to heat up that soup. Then after your second cry—there will be another.”

“Yeah.” Emma sighed. “There will.”

“After that, we’re going to tuck you into bed. You’re going to sleep until you wake up.”

“I’m still going to be in love with him when I wake up.”

“Yes,” Parker agreed.

“And it’s still going to hurt.”

“Yes.”

“But I’ll be a little bit stronger.”

“You will.”

“I’ll fix the bath. I have a formula.” Mac rose, then leaned over and kissed Emma’s cheek. “We’re all here.”

“I’ll take care of the soup, and I’ll ask Mrs. Grady to make a batch of her fabulous french fries. I know it’s a clichй.” Laurel gave Emma’s leg another squeeze. “But it’s a clichй for a reason.”

“Thanks.” She closed her eyes, reached for Parker’s hand when they were alone. “I knew you’d be here.”

“Always.”

“Oh, God. Parker. Oh, God, here comes the second one now.”

“It’s okay,” Parker soothed, and rubbed Emma’s back as she wept. “It’s okay.”

While Emma wept, Jack knocked on Del’s door. He had to do something or he’d drive over to Emma’s. If she hadn’t made it clear he wasn’t wanted—and she had—Mac had made it double.

Del pulled open the door. “What’s up? Jesus, Jack, you look like shit.”

“It goes with how I feel.”

Del’s brow creased. “Oh man, if you’re coming over here to cry in your beer over a fight with Emma—”

“It wasn’t a fight. Not . . . just a fight.”

Del took a harder look, stepped back. “Let’s have a beer.”

Jack shut the door behind him, then noticed Del’s jacket and tie. “You’re going out?”

“I was heading that way in a while. Get the beer. I have to make a call.”

“I should say it’s no big deal, it can wait. But I’m not going to.”

“Get the beer. I’ll be out in a minute.”

Jack got two beers and went out on the back deck. But instead of sitting he walked to the rail and stared out at the dark. He tried to remember if he’d ever felt this bad before. He decided other than waking up in the hospital with a concussion, a broken arm, and a couple of cracked ribs after a car wreck, the answer was no.

And even then, the seriously bad had been only physical.

No, he thought, he remembered feeling like this before, nearly exactly like this. Sick and baffled and confused. When his parents had sat him down, so civilized, to tell him they were getting a divorce.

You’re not to blame, they’d told him. We still love you, and always will. But . . .

In that moment his world had turned upside down. So why was this worse somehow? Why was it worse to realize that Emma could and would walk away from him? Could and would, he thought, because he’d made her feel less when he should have done everything in his power to make her feel more.

He heard the door open. “Thanks,” he said as Del came out. “Really.”

“I should say it’s no big deal, but I’m not going to.”

Jack managed a weak laugh. “God, Del, I fucked up. I fucked it up and I’m not even sure exactly how. But what I know is I hurt her. I really hurt her, so you’re welcome to kick my ass as promised. But you’ll have to wait until I’m finished doing it.”

“I can wait.”

“She said she’s in love with me.”

Del took a pull on his beer. “You’re not an idiot, Jack. Are you going to stand there and tell me you didn’t know?”

“Not completely, or altogether. It’s all just happened, and . . . No, I’m not an idiot, and I knew we were heading toward something. That. But then there’s this leap, and I’m flat-footed. Can’t keep up, can’t figure out how to deal with it, or what to say, and she’s so hurt, so hurt and pissed off she won’t give me a chance. She hardly ever gets mad. You know how she is. She hardly ever blows, and when she does, you don’t have a prayer.”

“Why did she blow?”

He went back for the beer, but still didn’t sit. “I had a pisser of a day, Del. I’m talking the kind of day that makes hell look like Disney World. I’m filthy and pissed off and have a motherfucker of a stress headache. I pull up, and she’s there. In the house.”

“I didn’t know you gave her a key. Major step for you, Cooke.”

“I didn’t. I hadn’t. She got it from Michelle.”

“Uh-oh. Infiltrated the front lines, did she?”

Jack stopped, stared. “Is that how I am? Come on.”

“It’s exactly how you are, with women.”

“And that makes me, what, a monster, a psycho?”

Del hitched a hip onto the deck rail. “No, a little phobic, maybe. So?”

“So, I’m filthy and my mood matches it, and she’s there. She’s made these pots for the deck. What are you laughing at?”

“Just imagining your shock and dismay.”

“Well, Jesus, she’s cooking, and there’s flowers, and the music’s blasting, and my head’s screaming. God, if I could rewind it, I would. I would. I’d never hurt her.”

“I know.”

“She’s hurt and pissed because . . . I’m being a prick. No question, but instead of having a fight, maybe yelling at each other for a while, clearing the air, it turns.” Because the headache wanted to bully its way back, Jack rubbed the cold bottle over his temple. “It turns and dives south. It’s how I don’t trust her, and she’s not welcome in my house. How she’s not going to settle. She’s in love with me, and she wants . . .”

“What does she want?”

“What do you think? Marriage, kids, the whole ball. I’m trying to keep up, trying to keep my head from just blasting off my shoulders and think, but she won’t give me time. She won’t let me deal with what she just said. She’s done with me, with us. I broke her heart. She cried. She’s crying.”

Her face flashed back into his mind until he was sick with regret. “I just want her to sit down, to wait a minute, and sit down. Just until I can get my breath, until I can think. She won’t. She told me to stay away from her. I’d rather she’d shot me than look at me the way she did when she told me to stay away from her.”

“Is that it?” Del asked after a moment.

“That’s not enough?”

“I asked you once before, and you didn’t answer. I’ll ask you again. Yes or no this time. Are you in love with her?”

“Okay.” He took a long drink of beer. “Yes. I guess it took an ass-kicking to shake it out of me, but yes. I’m in love with her. But—”

“Do you want to fix it?”

“I just said I was in love with her. Why wouldn’t I want to fix it?”

“You want to know how?”

“Goddamn it, Del.” He drank again. “Yes, since you’re so fucking smart. How do I fix it?”

“Crawl.”

Jack blew out a breath. “I can do that.”

He started crawling in the morning. He had the speech he’d edited, revised, and expanded most of the night in his head. The trick, as far as he could tell, would be getting her to listen to him.

She’d listen, he told himself as he turned into the Brown Estate. She was Emma. No one was more kind, more open-hearted, than Emma—and wasn’t that only one of the dozens of reasons he loved her?

He’d been an idiot, but she’d forgive him. She had to forgive him because . . . she was Emma.

Still his stomach clutched when he saw her car parked at the main house. She hadn’t gone home.

He wouldn’t just be facing her, he thought with genuine, back-sweating fear, but all of them. The four of them, with Mrs. Grady for backup.

They’d roast his balls.

He deserved it, no question. But, dear God, did it have to be the four of them? Fucking A.

“Strap it on, Cooke,” he muttered, and got out of the truck.

As he walked to the door, he wondered if the condemned walking the last mile experienced this same feeling of doom and dull terror.

“Get a grip, get a freaking grip. They can’t kill you.”

Maim possibly, verbally assault most definitely. But they couldn’t kill him.

He started to open the door out of habit, then realized as a persona non grata he wasn’t entitled. He rang the bell.

He thought he could get around Mrs. G. She liked him—really liked him. He could throw himself on her mercy, then . . .

Parker answered. No one, he thought, absolutely no one got around Parker Brown.

“Uh,” he said.

“Hello, Jack.”

“I want—need—to see Emma. To apologize for . . . everything. If I could talk to her for a few minutes and—”

“No.”

Such a small word, he thought, so coolly delivered. “Parker, I just want to—”

“No, Jack. She’s sleeping.”