Heather stiffened. “It hasn’t come up. Truthfully, we barely exchange a dozen words when I drop Mick off to spend the day with him. I haven’t even told him I’ve moved here. He reaches me on my cell phone when he needs to, so it’s not as if it really matters where I’ve settled. I suppose if I’d run off to California, he might have a legitimate complaint, but I’m barely an hour away. Nothing’s changed in terms of his schedule to see little Mick.”
Megan looked distressed by her response. “Oh, Heather, you need to tell him,” she said. “And you need to do it before he comes home for a visit and discovers it for himself or before someone else in the family blabs. He’ll be furious that you’ve kept it from him.”
Heather shrugged. “It’ll just be one more thing to add to the list. He’s already angry that I refused to move back in. To be honest, he wasn’t all that happy when I insisted on keeping little Mick with me after I’d left him here with you while I was trying to sort through things and get my head on straight. He apparently thought the arrangement was going to be permanent.”
“There’s no question that he liked having the baby here with him and the rest of the family,” Megan acknowledged. “We all did. But I think everyone except Connor understood it was only temporary.”
Heather regarded her with sorrow. “Sometimes I think I’m destined to keep making things worse between Connor and me. If we talk at all, we’re at odds over everything.”
Megan smiled at that. “It’s only awkward right now because you won’t give him what he wants—an unconditional commitment that doesn’t include marriage. He has to learn that he can’t always have things on his own terms.”
“But aren’t I doing the same thing, expecting to have things on my terms?” Heather asked.
Megan regarded her thoughtfully. “I suppose that’s true. Maybe it’s just because I think you’re the one who’s right that I’m not blaming any of this standoff on you. I think two people who love each other and have a child together ought to at least try marriage, that they ought to be fighting to make it work.”
She sighed. “Goodness knows, I spent years trying to make things work with Mick before I took the drastic step of leaving. Even in hindsight, I don’t think I had a choice by then, though I know I should have handled things differently and much better where all of our children were concerned. I still regret that, and I’d never have forgiven myself if I’d simply run at the first sign of trouble, rather than leaving as a last resort.”
Heather grinned at her. “But here you are, together again. Happy endings still happen. Why can’t Connor see that, especially when it’s right in front of his face?”
“I fear it’s because he doesn’t have a romantic bone in his body,” Megan replied sorrowfully. “He’s become cynical when it comes to love. Mick and I did that to him, and that job of his—dealing with bitter divorces every single day—has reaffirmed his jaded views.”
“Then what makes you think he’ll ever come around?” Heather asked. “Because I am a romantic,” Megan said, smiling. “I believe in the power of love. And I know how deeply he cares about the people he has let into his heart—his sisters and his brother, his grandmother, even Mick when they’re not battling over one thing or another.”
“I saw that side of him, too, or thought I did,” Heather said softly, though her voice lacked the conviction of Megan’s.
“Then don’t give up on Connor,” Megan advised. “He’ll find his way back to you. I believe that, too.”
As much as she admired the older woman and respected her opinions, Heather wished she could share Megan’s faith where Connor was concerned. So far she hadn’t seen even the tiniest chink in his well-established armor. He was dead-set against letting emotion overrule his very stubborn head, at least when it came to her.
* * *
Connor stood in the middle of his townhouse in Baltimore and wondered why it no longer felt like home. The furniture he and Heather had chosen was still in place. She’d taken nothing when she left, and yet without her the place felt empty. The kitchen cupboards were filled with dishes, the refrigerator stocked with food, albeit mostly of the frozen variety. In fact, despite her departure several months ago, Heather’s touch was everywhere, right down to the framed photos of his son scattered over just about every surface.
Heather’s glowing face beamed back at him from many of them, as well. It always made his heart catch when he caught an unexpected glimpse of her. She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever known, inside and out. Most people saw the shining blond hair, hazel eyes and delicate features and focused on those, but he knew she had the most generous heart on earth. She’d put up with him long enough to prove she was a saint.
And then she’d gone. Just like that, on Thanksgiving Day while he’d been out nursing his wounds over a glass of Irish whisky with a couple of buddies, decrying his parents’ plan to remarry, Heather had packed up their son and left. To add to his dismay, she’d dropped the baby off on his parents’ doorstep, dragging both Mick and Megan into the middle of the drama. Connor wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to forgive her for that.
Disgruntled just by the thought of the humiliation he’d felt having to go home to Chesapeake Shores and explain himself to the mother from whom he’d been estranged for years, he poured himself another glass of Irish whisky. He went into his
