right for each other come together, the most insurmountable obstacles can be conquered.”
“I’ve gotta go.”
“My, but you’re stubborn. It’s probably one of the reasons you’re so successful. You stick to what you decide to do, and do it. But in this case, you’re wrong. You’re making the biggest mistake of your life.”
“Usually, I go with my gut. This time, though, I made an intelligent decision, based on past and present experience-that’s all.”
“Maybe you should stick with your gut.”
“Not smart. She’s too good of an actress. She throws off my instincts.”
“Has this all been about revenge, then-about you wanting to get even with her for what happened fifteen years ago?”
“Hell, no.”
“Well, too bad, ’cause you’d sure be even with her if it was. You really hurt her this time. I haven’t seen her like this since she failed to carry your first child. It seems so unfair that here she is pregnant again, you both have a glorious second chance, but you’re walking out on her like before. You just about killed her last time.”
“I don’t need this.”
“I say you do. When you were in jail, Thurman found out she was pregnant and sent her away to New Orleans to have your baby. He didn’t want you or anybody else to know about the baby because he was afraid it might sway public opinion in your favor. There were people, even back then, who sided with you and didn’t like the way Thurman was using his pull to rush the due process of law.
“Did you know Summer tried to contact you shortly before she miscarried?”
“You’re not telling me anything I don’t already know.”
Viola ignored his protest. “Summer was inconsolable when she couldn’t find you. Finally, she felt that she had nowhere to go but back to New Orleans, and that’s where she lost the baby. Summer had the saddest little funeral for that child. Not that I could go. I was too busy tending to my dying daughter. When Summer finally came home to stay, she was different, changed.
“Then Anna, her mother, died. Summer blamed Thurman for everything that had happened, for the end of her mother’s remission, for losing you, for the death of the baby. She said she couldn’t live in this town with her memories, so she broke away from all of us and went to New York. That’s where she took bit parts while going to college in her spare time. I sent money. She worked herself to the bone in an effort to forget you. But she never could.”
“I had my own problems back then.”
The ancients and the wise say a man can learn the greatest truths of the universe in an instant. Suddenly, that was true for Zach. No sooner had he said those bitter words than his perspective shifted dramatically. All the pieces of the story he had imagined to be the truth about his love affair with Summer arranged themselves in a new and different order with a new and different meaning.
Had he been hurt and too bitter to consider what Summer had gone through? He had. And he hadn’t known the half of it. When she’d sought him out in Houston, how coldly he’d rejected her.
Just as he was rejecting her now.
All that had ever mattered was their love for each other. If they’d kept their focus on that, no one could have touched them.
The pain he felt was staggering. He’d hurt Summer terribly, more than Thurman ever had. Because he’d been stubbornly focused on his own grievances. And blind to hers.
The image of that single tear trickling down her beautiful face tugged at his heart. Why hadn’t he listened to his instinct and drawn her close and kissed her tears away?
“I’ve said my piece, so you can go now,” Viola said as she laid a gnarled hand on Silas, who purred in her lap.
For a long moment, Zach sat where he was, stunned. Without Summer beside him, he faced nothing but long years of emptiness. He would fill up his days with work, but the nights would be long and lonely. There would be no one to hold him in the darkness. No one to care about his failures or share his successes. He would be forever diminished without her love.
And he was throwing it all away.
“You have a plane to catch, don’t you?”
“Thank you for the cookies and tea,” he muttered mechanically, like someone in a dream.
He stared at the spot on the porch where he’d kissed Summer as a girl. She’d been so blushingly shy and lovely. When he’d kissed the woman in that same spot fifteen years later, she’d been hurt and defiant and in denial, but he’d seen into her heart and had fallen in love with her all over again.
He loved her.
He wasn’t going to stop loving her just because he willed himself to do so. His love for her was the truest and strongest part of him. By sending her and his child away, he faced the death of everything that would ever matter to him.
He had to make this right.
He needed Summer and their child.
Damn the press. Why hadn’t he seen that he should put her first, instead of his own damn ego? She’d carried his child and lost it while her mother had been gravely ill. The thought of her alone and pregnant again was excruciatingly unbearable. If anything happened to her or the baby because of his horrible cruelty, he would never forgive himself.
He had to take care of them. He had to find a way to protect them from the press instead of blaming Summer for the made-up headlines. And when he couldn’t protect them, he’d endure the media coverage… If only Summer would forgive him and take him back.
Thirteen
It was raining outside the theater, pouring. Not that Summer cared.
Opening nights were all about families and friends. Thus, her dressing room and bathroom overflowed with vivid bouquets of flowers, embossed cards from the greats and the near-greats and telegrams, as well. Everybody she remotely cared about was packed inside these two tiny rooms with her. Everybody except Zach, the one person who mattered most.
As she waited for her place to be called, her grandmother and brother sat to her left on her long couch, while her dresser, hairdresser and agent sat to the right. It was a tight squeeze, but Summer needed their support desperately because Zach wasn’t here.
She still felt raw and shaken from their breakup, and she’d kept people with her constantly so she wouldn’t break down when the press asked their prying questions.
She kept telling herself she needed to accept that he was gone so she could move on from this profound pain, but some part of her refused to believe he was out of her life forever. She kept hoping against hope for a miracle. He would relent and forgive her… And love her. She wanted this miracle more than ever, and not solely because she was carrying his child.
That’s why she was barely listening to the buzz around her, why she couldn’t stop staring past Gram toward the door, why she couldn’t stop hoping the door would open and she’d find him standing there. If only he’d walk in, take her in his arms and say everything was all right.
Then, only then, would she be whole and happy again. She didn’t want to get over him. She simply wanted him in her life, in her baby’s life, every day for the rest of her days. She wanted to wake up to his face on the pillow and go to sleep with the same vision, and she couldn’t seem to get past that heartfelt desire. So for days-or was it weeks, she’d lost count-she’d lingered in a dreadful suspended state of suffering.
She was an actress, so she hid her pain with brilliant smiles and quick laughter, but those who knew her weren’t fooled.
Suddenly, there was a roar in her ears, and she felt faint.
Summer closed her eyes and wished them all gone. She needed some alone time before the places were called
