Danielle Steel - The Ranch

“I'm taking the day off. If you're going back to New York, I want to be with you before you go,” and then with a sad look, he added, “I'll take you to the airport.” But after breakfast, they made love again, and had almost missed her plane by then. She could have made it if she'd leapt out of bed and dressed in a hurry, but she didn't want to. She wanted to stay. For a day, a week, the duration of his stay. Whatever it took. Maybe forever. And she said as much to him as they sat together in the bathtub.

“Will you stay?” he asked ever so gently, and when she nodded, he kissed her.

“All I have with me are cowboy boots and jeans, and about two proper city dresses.” She smiled at him and he looked happier than she'd ever seen him.

“You'll be all the rage in London. Do we have to have separate rooms?”

“No,” she said seriously, “but I still want to sell the apartment.” He thought it was a good idea too. It was time for them to move on, to heal, to find each other again, and with any luck at all, start over. He had every intention of making that happen, and he was grateful to her for letting him do it. He swore the nightmare of the past year would never happen again, and after all the talking they'd done, she believed him.

He said he wanted to take her out that afternoon, just for a walk, so he could be with her and talk to her, and remember how sweet it was to walk beside her. But he had to stop at his office first. He had promised his secretary when he called that he'd sign some papers. And Mary Stuart had said she would meet him in the lobby.

She dressed quietly, thinking of him, and the time they had shared, and she jotted the note with shaking hands once she was dressed. She was wearing a brown linen dress, which was the only other respectable dress she had brought to London, and her hair wasn't as neat as usual. She looked younger ad just a little bit disheveled. She had already told Bill that if she stayed, she had to go shopping. But she wasn't thinking of that now, she was thinking of him, the man who had ridden through the wildflowers with her in Wyoming.

She went downstairs and spoke to the concierge, and he said it was no problem to send it for her, although he reminded her that her husband had a private fax already set up in his office. But she preferred to do it with the concierge, she explained, and she gave him the fax number. She had written out two words, and her eyes filled with tears as she handed him the paper.

“It will go out immediately, madam,” he said, and she trembled at the pain it would cause, for both of them. But he had been wiser than she was. He had realized better than she had what might happen.

The paper said “Adieu, Arielle.” Nothing more. Just that. And she never mailed him her letter. There was no point now. That had been her promise to him. Just two words and no explanations.

“Ready for some air?” Bill asked when he came downstairs. He thought she seemed quiet again, and he was worried, and he saw when he looked at her that she'd been crying. They'd been in her room for nearly two days, but they had settled a lot of things, and he put his arms around her again right there in the lobby.

“It's okay, Stu… I swear it'll be all right… I love you.” But she hadn't been thinking of him. She'd been saying good-bye to a friend. And then, she took her husband's hand, and they walked out into the sunshine. The doorman watched them as they walked away, hand in hand, and he smiled. It was nice, and so rare, when you saw happy couples. Life seemed so easy for them. Or maybe they were just lucky.