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“Saroyan didn’t even play football when he was at MGU. He was a math major.” O’Toole said math as if it were something ridiculous, like majoring in tiddlywinks. He didn’t seem to see the connection between Saroyan’s studies and his ability to buy and sell O’Toole ten times a day.
Tom drained his coffee and tilted his watch under the table. Fifteen more minutes of this, at least, before he could check his watch openly, gasp and imply that he’d been enjoying himself so much he’d lost track of the time.
Diplomat? Gymnast? Babysitter might be more accurate. Ego babysitter. He tried to tune out the little voice that said this was nothing a grown man should be doing for a living.
Suddenly, his cell phone began to vibrate. Apparently there was a God.
Giving O’Toole a “gosh, isn’t this annoying, just when we were having such a good time?” smile, Tom unclipped his phone and answered without even bothering to look at the caller ID. Ordinarily he screened, having just enough old girlfriends to be cautious, but right now he’d welcome a call from any one of them.
“This is Tom Beckham,” he said formally, already folding his napkin and crooking a finger to let the waiter know it was time for the check. Whoever really was on the other end of this telephone, as far as O’Toole was concerned, it was urgent firm business.
At first there was just silence. And then he heard a soft female voice.
“Tom?”
For about six tenths of a second he honestly didn’t recognize the voice. And then it hit him. Hit him hard.
It was Kelly.
An image rushed toward him, leapfrogging the years. An image of the two of them in a dark corner, laughing at first, and then touching, and then she was crying, and he was up against her, and she was kissing him and whispering his name, but crying, crying the whole time.
Her red-gold hair falling loose against the green satin of her dress, the fresh-apple smell of her, the salt of her tears on his lips, the insanity inside him.
“Tom? Are you there? It’s Kelly. Kelly Ralston…I mean Kelly Carpenter.”
“Yes,” he said. “I’m here. What’s wrong?”
Now that his mind was working again, he understood that something must have happened. Something bad. She hadn’t called him in ten years, though at first he had deluded himself that she might. No one from the wedding party had ever called him, except Mr. Mellon, who had actually come out to Atlanta ready to beat Tom, he’d said, until he no longer knew his own name and had to be fed with a straw.
“I—I don’t know if you heard,” she said, her voice still somber and husky. He wondered if she’d been crying again. Who made her cry these days?
“Heard what?”
“About Lillith. Lillith Griggs. I mean, she became Lillith Griggs, you knew she and Jacob got married, didn’t you?”
“Yes, I knew that.” He and Jacob had been good friends back in law school. Jacob still kept in touch, still wrote now and then, though of course he didn’t admit that to Lillith, who had, like Kelly, been one of Sophie’s bridesmaids and therefore subscribed to the official position that Tom Beckham was scum. “What about Lillith?”
“She was in a car accident. Three days ago.”
“Is she all right?”
“No.” A wretched pause. “She was killed.”
The waiter came over then and held a check for Tom to sign. He scrawled something, almost glad of the distraction. He needed time to absorb the news.
He hadn’t known Lillith well, but she’d always seemed much more…alive than most people. She was always the one laughing, playing practical jokes like wearing stiletto heels to the rehearsal so that the lineup by height suddenly seemed all wrong. She was a beauty and a brain and a class clown all in one. What kind of automobile accident had been savage enough to extinguish all that?
“I’m sorry to hear it,” he said carefully, glancing over at O’Toole, who was tonguing around in his empty drink, trying to hook a piece of ice and suck any lingering vodka from its surface. O’Toole met Tom’s gaze over the glass and frowned, pointing at the telephone.
Tom covered the mouthpiece with his palm.
“We’re done here, O’Toole,” he said, though he knew that those four words might well undo all the goodwill he’d spent the past hour building.
O’Toole put his glass down slowly, giving Tom an incredulous look. “Damn right we are,” he said. He tossed his napkin on the table, scraped his chair back loudly and walked away.
“Tom, are you still there?”
Tom took his hand off the telephone. “Yes. Sorry. How is Jacob?”
“He’s a mess,” Kelly said. “That’s why I’m calling. The funeral is tomorrow, and he asked me to let you know. He hopes you can come. I do, too. He needs a friend…and you seem to be the one he wants.”
It was subtle, but he could hear how inexplicable she found that fact to be.
“Okay,” he said.
There was another pause. “You’ll come?” She must have been expecting an argument.
“Yes,” he said. “Tell him I’ll be there. What time is the funeral?”
“One. We’re all meeting at the house and riding together. His house.” She took an audible breath. “But Tom…if I tell him you’re coming, if I get his hopes up, and then you—”
“I’ll be there.” He heard the doubt quivering in her silence. He couldn’t blame her. She couldn’t know that, since he’d left Cathedral Cove, he had never made a promise he didn’t keep. Of course, he made damn few promises.
“Kelly, I’m telling you I will be there. Have I ever lied to you?”
“No,” she said slowly. “Not to me.”
“Then trust me,” he said, and in spite of himself a wry note crept in. He could feel his tilted smile nudging at his lips. But come on. Had anyone on this earth ever spoken a more ironic sentence? “I’ll be there.”
KELLY KNEW BETTER than to trust Tom Beckham, so she couldn’t understand why she was so upset when he didn’t show up at the funeral home, or at the graveside service.
She was just mad at herself, that was all. She should never have told Jacob that Tom was coming. He had kept glancing over his shoulder at the service, and now that they were back at home, every time the door opened he looked up expectantly.
She stood in the kitchen, carefully pulling the plastic wrap off plates of deviled eggs and pans of meat loaf, and trying not to feel a little angry with Jacob, too.
But darn it. He had friends, lots of them. People who really cared about him, people who filled his house and his refrigerator, people who called and stopped by, who prayed at his side and cried at his side and loved Lily almost as much as he did.
Why weren’t they enough? Why did he need Tom Beckham, too?
Why did anyone need Tom Beckham?
The door opened, and to Kelly’s surprise a lovely blonde walked in, dressed in the most elegant little black funeral dress she’d ever seen. It was Samantha Mellon, Sophie’s little sister.
“Hi, Kelly,” Samantha said softly, brushing her long, silky hair back behind her shoulder and smiling. “They told me you were in here. I thought maybe I could help?”
Kelly stuffed the plastic into the trash can, wiped her hands on a towel, and reached out to give Samantha a hello hug. It was very sweet of her to come—and probably somewhat risky. Over the years, her mother and brother had developed an intractably hostile attitude toward every one of the young men and women who had been in Sophie’s wedding party.
As best Kelly could understand, Mrs. Mellon and Sebastian felt that the bridesmaids and groomsmen had all abandoned Sophie after she’d been jilted. True friends would have stuck by her, defended her. If they had, Sophie might never have ended up in an institution.
Was that true? Kelly’s memory of that time was clouded with misery and guilt. It was true that the friendships had ended when the wedding fell apart, but whose choice had that been? Had Sophie avoided them because they reminded her of a day so horrible she couldn’t bear to relive it? Or had they avoided her, the way you might instinctively avoid someone whose luck seemed to have turned spectacularly bad?
Some of them had tried to make contact in the weeks after Tom disappeared, Kelly was sure of that. But Sophie hadn’t been willing. Or maybe she just hadn’t been ready.
Maybe they should have tried harder.
Kelly hadn’t been able to try at all. A huge wall stood between them. She always wondered if Sophie knew about the night that Kelly and Tom had…
Just as she’d always wondered whether that night had played a part in the tragedy that came next.
But there was no one to ask. Tom was gone, and, soon after, Sophie was lost to them, too.
Kelly and Samantha hadn’t seen much of each other through the years—things would always be too awkward for that. But Kelly was still fond of her.
Suddenly she remembered what Lillith had been saying right before the accident. That Sophie had been let out again.
“Sam, Sophie didn’t come with you, did she?”
Samantha’s gray-blue eyes widened. “Of course not. Sophie is—” She hesitated. “She’s still in North Carolina.”
In North Carolina. Is that where the newest mental-health facility was? Over the past decade, if the grapevine could be trusted, Sophie had been in and out of five or six different resident institutions.
So did that mean Lillith had been wrong? Did that mean the light in the tower window hadn’t been Sophie after all?
“She hasn’t come home? I heard that she had.”
“No, she’s not up to being on her own right now. The doctor said, with the anniversary coming up so soon…” Samantha looked perplexed. “Who told you she was?”
“I think Lillith had heard it somewhere.”
Samantha shook her head sadly. “The gossips must be at it again. I think the anniversary always stirs things up, don’t you? But frankly, this terrible accident would be so hard for her. Just this once, I’m glad she’s not here.”
Kelly reached out and touched Samantha’s hand. Poor Sam. Now that Sebastian had married and moved to Raleigh, Sam was living alone at Coeur Volé with their mother, who had never been a picnic but who had become even more eccentric through the years.
Sam looked amazingly like Sophie these days. All the Mellon siblings looked similar—the lush blond hair, the deep-set eyes, the sex appeal and the elegance. Sebastian and Sophie had often been mistaken for twins. They were only a year apart and they had an intimacy that seemed almost preternatural, the kind you sometimes do see in twins.
Samantha was five years younger, and it wasn’t until she grew up that the striking Mellon looks displayed themselves. Now the only real difference was in the eyes. Sophie’s and Sebastian’s were a dramatic peacock blue, and they sparkled with an essence of danger, a flash of the untamable. Sam’s eyes were light, and her gaze was gentle, almost humble.
It made Kelly’s heart ache to look at her. This was what Sophie should have been.
“Well, anyway, I’d love some help,” Kelly said. “So many people have brought food. He’ll never eat it all, so we might as well use it up today.”
Samantha nodded and began efficiently stacking small sandwiches on a large silver plate. “He seems very weak,” she said. “It’s so terrible. It’s obviously broken his heart.”
“Yes.” Kelly blinked back moisture. This wasn’t her tragedy. This wasn’t her day to cry. But it was hard. A week ago she’d been in this kitchen drinking coffee with Lily from these same cups. “I suppose time will help. It’s still so new.”
“When I talked to him just now, he told me he was waiting for Tom Beckham.” Sam looked over at Kelly somberly. “Is that true, or is it just wishful thinking? I didn’t think we’d ever see Tom in Cathedral Cove again.”
Kelly sighed and slid the rest of the potato salad into the refrigerator. “I honestly don’t know,” she said. “He asked me to call Tom, and I did. Tom promised he’d be here, but—”
Samantha smiled ruefully. “But historically Tom’s promises haven’t really been worth much.”
“Right. You wouldn’t believe how distant he sounded on the phone when I told him about Lillith.”
She didn’t mention that it had taken her two hours to get up the nerve to dial the number, and when he’d answered she’d found that she needed to sit down, because her legs wouldn’t hold her.
“Ten years,” she said. “We hadn’t exchanged a single word in ten years. And yet, throughout the call his voice was completely bland and impersonal. He might as well have been talking to his secretary.”
Samantha lifted one graceful shoulder philosophically, as if to say what did you expect?
Good question. It made Kelly feel ridiculous to admit that she had expected more. In the private photo album of her heart, Tom Beckham had been the most-often-relived memory, in spite of the ache it always brought. She had about a dozen pictures that never seemed to fade: Tom in the gardens of Coeur Volé, with roses behind him and the river at his feet; Tom dancing with Sophie, tall and handsome in his tuxedo, with Sophie’s silver dress flashing rainbows as she twirled under the chandelier; Tom turning to Kelly in the darkness, fierce and full of hunger…
She was a fool. While she’d been wistfully fingering those images, she’d assumed that he, too, took them out now and then and remembered. But apparently he’d long since thrown them away. As she should have.
“I heard that you were behind her when it happened,” Samantha said suddenly. “I heard you were with her when she died.”
Kelly looked up. “Yes.”
“That must have been awful. I’m so sorry. But at least—at least she wasn’t alone at the end.”
“Yes.” Kelly had thought of that, but she wondered how much comfort she had really been. Lillith had seemed dazed, already moving away from the blood and the fog and the hissing car. Her cold hand had not responded to Kelly’s touch. Kelly had been just inches away, but in every way that mattered, Lillith had died alone anyhow. Perhaps everyone did.
“Was she still conscious? Did she say anything?”
Kelly closed her eyes. “I’m sorry, Sam, but if I keep talking about this, I’m going to fall apart, and Jacob doesn’t need that today.” She picked up the plate of deviled eggs and handed it to the other woman. “Let’s get the food out there, okay?”
“Of course. I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.” Samantha was embarrassed, her fair skin tinged with pink.
Kelly remembered how easy it used to be for Sophie to hurt Sam’s feelings. “Scram, brat,” Sophie would say, and Sam’s blue eyes would fill with tears. She had idolized her older siblings, and Sophie and Bastian had exploited that shamelessly.
“It’s okay,” Kelly said, giving Sam a warm smile. “Do you think you can grab that plate, too? Jacob doesn’t like meat loaf, so if it doesn’t get eaten today it’ll go to waste.”
“No problem.” Sam balanced both trays like a waitress, and Kelly took a deep breath and opened the kitchen door. She looked around, trying to locate Jacob in the crowd, which had swelled considerably while she was in the kitchen.
And then she saw him. He was at the door, shaking hands with a tall, dark, handsome stranger who wasn’t a stranger at all.
It was Tom Beckham.
CHAPTER FOUR
THE LIVING ROOM of the Griggs’ house was huge and airy, the perfect room for two energetic lawyers with a healthy combined income and a zest for entertaining.
One whole wall was ceiling-to-floor windows that overlooked a sunny bricked garden, and the ceiling was at least thirteen feet high.
Upstairs, there were three bedrooms, three luxurious bathrooms and a billiard room—which would soon have become a nursery. And of course the kitchen was terrific, but most of the square footage of the house was found in this one gracious room.
At the moment, though, it didn’t seem big enough. The minute Kelly recognized Tom at the door, she felt short of breath, as if the room didn’t hold enough air for the both of them.
Samantha seemed a little taken aback, too. She paused just in front of Kelly. “He did come,” she breathed. “I can’t believe it.”
