About Last Night.... Michele Dunaway
do not go to family Easter dinners.”
“I thought you were my friend.” Shane sat there a long moment. “I even shared my personal journals with you. I’d never before let anyone see what I’d written.”
He had shared with her, and early in their work relationship, Lindy, starry-eyed with love, had let herself get too close to Shane. Her stomach churned as she remembered.
In one journal, Shane had written about the pain of losing a girl he’d fallen in love with at camp, the summer between fifth and sixth grade. Their love had been that sweet innocent kind between two shy people who hardly talk, yet somehow they know they are meant for each other. How Shane had looked forward to seeing her the next year, only to discover upon his arrival that she was on the charter bus pulling away. Years later, Shane still remembered the way she’d pressed her hand against the dirty glass as she disappeared forever from his view.
Yes, Shane had shared his journals with Lindy, and that day one thing had become certain to Lindy—she could never compete with what Shane envisioned his perfect love to be. Lindy would never be enough—never be the one.
But she’d stayed at her job, mostly because she hadn’t had the courage to stay away, becoming daily too attached, falling too hard for the man she cared way too much for, who could never feel the same way in return. But last night she’d well and truly crossed the line, and it gave her a raw, untapped strength. She hated hurting him with her next words, but in the long run it was for the best that a space be placed between them.
“You don’t pay your friends,” Lindy pointed out.
Shane shook his head, sending his blond hair falling forward across his eyebrow. “That argument is weak, Lindy. Weak. I can see I made a mistake worrying about you. That’s something friends would do.”
He stood up, his features etched with frustration as if he’d bitten bitter fruit. Lindy’s fingers longed to smooth away the lines her words had caused. She knew she’d sucker punched him.
First his parents had forgotten his birthday, and now she’d effectively killed their friendship. But her one-sided relationship with him had to stop. She’d known him too long and knew he’d never find that elusive woman he wanted. She couldn’t keep on loving him and remain sane. She had to let him go, even if it was the hardest thing she’d ever do.
“I’m sorry,” she said as Shane put his hand on the doorknob. Even to her own ears her apology sounded lame.
He gave her one last look. “You’re a great assistant, Lindy. Even though you don’t think I really work for a living, I do have some responsibilities. So, I’ll see you Monday morning. You are still planning on showing up, aren’t you?”
There it was. The perfect opportunity to get out professionally, even if it meant taking a pay cut. She’d already indicated she was leaving. Now all Lindy had to cement it was say, “but only until I find another job.” She opened her mouth, but the words finalizing her break with Shane refused to come.
“Monday morning,” Lindy agreed with a nod. She couldn’t look him in the eye, and instead stared at the floor.
The door clicked when he shut it behind him. Then—and only then—did Lindy look up. She stared at the door to her apartment. It desperately needed a fresh coat of paint.
“I’m thinking about paint.” Tears watered her eyes and rivered their way down to wet her cheeks. The opportunity had presented itself, but she hadn’t walked away. Would she ever be able to let Shane Jacobsen out of her life? Fool! Fool! Fool! She again resolved to seriously look for a new job come Monday.
Her home phone rang and Lindy picked it up. “Shane?”
“Is this Lindy Brinks?”
Disappointment mixed with relief. “Speaking.”
“I’m calling about your pizza. We’ve had some oven problems and it’s going to be at least another half hour before we can deliver it. We’re very sorry for the inconvenience. We’ll include a coupon for a free pizza the next time you order. You still want it, right?”
“Sure, send it.” She hung up the phone, a dark depression settling over her. Shane was like the pizza. She still wanted him, but it certainly wasn’t worth the trouble anymore. Too bad she was still hungry.
Chapter Two
“So where’s Lindy?”
“Greetings to you, too,” Shane said as he stepped through the front door of his grandfather’s massive Ladue manse. “Lindy sends her regrets. She can’t make it.”
“Why?” Grandpa Joe’s eyes narrowed and he stroked his white beard thoughtfully. “With her parents on opposite coasts, she doesn’t have any family here. Did she go out of town?”
“Lindy’s in town and I don’t know why she didn’t come,” Shane replied. “She said she had other plans. Besides, I’m her employer, not her keeper.”
Grandpa Joe’s snow-white eyebrows arched. “It sounds like you two have had a spat.”
Was that what had happened yesterday? A spat? Shane considered Grandpa Joe’s antiquated word. In all honesty, even though he’d been thinking about it nonstop, Shane still didn’t know quite what had happened. Even writing in his journal about the weekend’s events hadn’t given him any perspective.
Lindy, good old Lindy who had never once complained about her job, had suddenly hit him between the eyes with what she would and would not do. She was his employee, she’d declared, not his friend. If she’d remain his employee at all.
That still stung. And yes, he’d had to admit to himself in the past twenty-two hours that perhaps he had taken her for granted, that he’d considered her a friend, a sounding board. Perhaps he’d been wrong to have been so free with his confidences and personal requests. But he and Lindy had worked so well together, and never once had she complained.
Shane shifted his weight and followed his grandfather into the huge great room. The rest of the family had already arrived. “Shane!” His half sister Bethany came over and gave him a quick kiss on his cheek. “How are you? I feel like I haven’t seen you in ages.”
They probably hadn’t talked in ages, Shane thought. Older than him by five years, Bethany, his mother’s daughter from her first marriage, was busy with her successful pediatric practice, her own two children, and her husband.
“So did you have a good birthday? Twenty-five now.” Bethany shook her head. “I can’t believe that in a few months I’ll turn thirty and that Olivia and Nick will hit that three-o mark just a few months after me.”
Shane glanced around the room, seeing his cousin Harry, his wife Megan, and Bethany’s clan. Shane’s half brother, his dad’s son by his first marriage, though, was strangely absent. “Speaking of, where is Nick?”
“He stayed in Chicago,” his half sister Olivia said as she approached. She leaned toward her younger sibling and said conspiratorially, “Word has it that Grandpa Joe isn’t too pleased with my twin brother. And Claire’s in Aruba on a much-needed vacation so she’s forgiven. But Nick’s not.”
“Ah, then maybe the heat will be off me for once,” Shane said.
Olivia’s blue eyes twinkled mischievously. “I doubt that. You know how gossip runs in this family. It’s all over that you had a pretty good party Friday night. Glad it was you and not me. So tell me, have you recovered?”
“All but my memory,” Shane admitted. Thankfully it was a cool night and the turtleneck he wore hid the telltale mark. “I even cleaned up some so that Cleo won’t throw a fit.”
“A wise move,” Olivia said. “Did Sara and Dad ever call?”
“Yeah, this afternoon. Of course it was like 7:00 a.m. Australian time, and of course Monday there.”