Never Trust A Lady

“This isn’t quite what I expected,” Jane said, laughing nervously.

The woman walking beside her chuckled. It was a warm sound, to match her warm brown eyes, which glowed like fine old brandy when she smiled. “No, 1 suppose not.” She shook her head and sighed. “Tom always did lack a certain degree of…”

“Tact?” suggested Jane.

Emma Hostetler smiled. “Grace. When it comes to matters of the heart, Tom is, well, rather like a newborn foal trying out its legs for the first time. He had so little experience with love, you know, when he was growing up.”

“No,” said Jane, “I didn’t know.” She knew so little about the man she loved. Learning about him was still a new and exciting voyage of discovery, and every detail a small source of awe.

Emma sighed. “Oh, yes…his father was seldom there, of course, and his mother…” She paused and made a gesture, as if brushing away a fly. “Well. That’s for Tom to tell you. Let’s just say, I don’t know what might have happened to him if…”

“He hadn’t met your daughter…Jenny.”

Why doesn’t this hurt more? she wondered, lifting her face to the April sun, drawing in a deep breath filled with the smells of new grass, flowers…lilacs. This was his wife’s home, these were her parents. She’d felt so scared about coming here. But from the moment she’d met Emma Hostetler and her gaunt, twinkly-eyed, pipe-smoking, college-professor husband, Frank. she’d felt warm. Embraced. Accepted.

“He told me he loved her very much. I wonder if he’ll ever-” She stopped, and sighed.

Emma looked at her in surprise. “Of course he will. He loves you. Anyone can see that. Don’t tell me you didn’t know.”

Jane laughed a little and said, “Oh…well, I don’t know about that. He says…”

“If you’re waiting for Tom. to tell you,” Emma said dryly, stooping to clip a daffodil stern, “don’t hold your breath.” She dropped the flower into the basket on Jane’s arm and paused, turning to look up at the gracious Georgian house they’d left behind. Her face was gentle, and a little sad. “He never told Jenny, either, you know. I think maybe that’s why it’s been so hard for him to let her go.”

Jen …

Hawk stood in the upstairs corner bedroom that had been hers, looking down on the sweep of lawn and the gardens beyond. The casement windows were open to let in the soft April breezes, and the voices of the two women walking there drifted up to him like the lazy murmur of bees. As he watched, a low ripple of laughter seemed to stir across his auditory nerves like a playful sprite playing peekaboo with his memory.

You love her, Tom?

He took a deep breath, trying to ease the ache inside him.

Then why don’t you say it?

His jaw tightened and his eyes burned. He’d loved Jen…so much.

The laughter skirled like a breeze around the corners of his mind. He thought it sounded a trifle smug. Of course you did.

The air seemed full of pollen suddenly. He felt something building like a sneeze at the back of his throat, behind his eyelids. Because he’d never told her.

But I knew. I always knew.

“I’m always going to love you, Jen,” he whispered. “Always.”

I know that, too. And now you have someone else to love, as well

But can I? he wondered. He’d loved Jen, and then Jason. He didn’t know how to love someone else.

Of course you do, you dummy. I taught you, didn’t I?

To his surprise, Hawk found that he was smiling. He drew another long breath, and on its exhalation, heard the laughter go tumbling away like a butterfly dancing on a sunbeam, sending back a whisper.

It wouldn’t hurt to tell her, you know.

The breeze came through the window and touched his face like a blown kiss. And for a moment he thought he smelled lilacs…

“Oh, I love lilacs,” Jane said with a sigh. “I think they’re my favorite.”

Emma snipped a fat cluster and held it to her own nose for a moment before she handed it to her. “They were Jennifer’s favorite, too,” she said. And then, seeing the shadow that crossed Jane’s face, “What is it, dear?”

Ashamed, she shook her head and tried to laugh it off. But there was something about Emma… She took a deep breath and blurted out, “I’m not anything like her, you know. Tom says I’m not, even though…”

Emma laughed. “No, you and Jennifer are quite different. For one thing, she was an only child, and undoubtedly spoiled. But supremely self-confident. You…” She paused to give her a thoughtful look. “Life has treated you a bit more harshly, I think. You’re probably a little slower to trust.”

Trust. There was an ache in Jane’s throat. She rubbed it absently and murmured, “But he says I remind him of her. What if…”

“You’re wondering whether he only loves you because you remind him of Jenny.”

“Yes,” said Jane miserably.

Emma said nothing for a moment, while she added one more sprig of lilac to the overflowing flower basket. Then she stripped off her gloves and gently took Jane’s hand.

“Let me tell you how you’re like Tom’s wife,” she said as they walked together, back toward the house. “Let’s see…you’re independent, giving, passionate, compassionate. Warm. Very loving. All those things.” She took a deep breath and lifted her face, for a moment, to the morning sun, as if she somehow found it a comfort. “But where you’re most like her, I think, is that you have an enormous capacity for joy. Jenny had such enthusiasm for life. She brightened your spirits just by walking into a room. And so do you, dear, in your own way.” She gave Jane’s hand a squeeze and then released it. “Tom needs that. He needs you.” She laughed, that low, throaty chuckle that made her seem so much younger than she was. “Even though he may never tell you.”

“But…he does tell me,” Jane said, suddenly understanding. “In his own way…every single day. In little things he does. The way his face lights up when he sees me, as if he’s glad I’m there. Anyone can say it-I should know, my ex-husband used to say it all the time. But Tom makes me feel it. He makes me feel…loved.”

Yes…

Jane glanced at Emma. Had she spoken? It didn’t seem so. and yet the word seemed to hang in the air like the shimmer of sunshine, or the whisper of a breeze.

Up ahead, she could see Tom coming out of the house, with Frank Hostetler behind him. Even from this distance she could see that he was smiling his familiar lopsided smile. Her heart gave a great surge of gladness.

And Hawk’s heart answered, Yes! It was all he needed, all he’d been waiting for… searching for. That look. That sudden brightenting…the flash of light in her sea-gray eyes that always made him think of the joyous leap of dolphins toward the sun.

KATHLEEN CREIGHTON

has roots deep in the California soil, but has relocated to South Carolina. As a child, she enjoyed listening to old-timers’ tales, and her fascination with the past only deepened as she grew older. Today she says she is interested in everything-art, music, gardening, zoology, anthropology and history, but people are at the top of her list. She also has a lifelong passion for writing, and now combines her two loves in romance novels.

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