Paris Rose (2 page)

“Something to eat, Lucy?” Nick asked.

“Yes, please,” she nodded, wondering how she’d swallow a single bite, the way her insides were churning.

Her ex handed her a hot dog, made just the way she loved, with rings of fried onions, juicy mushrooms, and plenty of ketchup. Had he remembered? It smelled delicious, but she had to force herself to take a bite and start chewing. The baby was so close she could have reached out and touched her downy skin, and Lucy tried with all her will not to look. But her gaze was drawn again and again to the baby girl.

Rosie was clad in a white dress sprigged with pink rosebuds and a matching pink sunbonnet. Little bow legs peeked from beneath the dress. She had big blue eyes, and she waved pudgy fists in the air, smiling all around. Lucy chewed her hot dog with great determination, managing to finish it, as she feigned interest in Sylvia’s chat about the Mediterranean cruise she and Tom had taken last summer.

Nick sat just a few feet away, chatting with his father, and Lucy longed to burrow into his arms and cry her heart out.

Rosie suddenly let out a plaintive wail. Angie leaned over and groped around in the diaper bag at her feet. “Uh oh, I left her pacifier inside,” she said. “Hold her a sec, would you?”

Lucy gave a soft gasp of surprise as the small body was plunked in her lap. Automatically, she clasped Rosie, and felt the warmth radiating from her, and wondered how it would feel to hold a baby close, to nestle with it and kiss it and know it was yours. What would such joy feel like?

Seated stiffly, Lucy held the tiny bundle at a distance, as if it was something distasteful. She didn’t dare do otherwise. Agony seared through her, and she looked up in a panic as the baby flailed dimpled fists furiously in the air, her toothless mouth opening wide in a high-pitched wail. When Nick came over, Lucy quickly handed him his niece and scrambled to her feet.

“I—I have to go,” she stammered. “’Bye, everyone.”

And she fled the back yard, wishing she could flee her memories just as easily.

****

Nick cleaned up after the barbecue. He’d said goodbye to his family, insisting he could manage fine by himself. The truth was, he needed to be alone with his thoughts for a while. There’d been a resounding silence after Lucy ran from the yard. Angie had emerged from the house with Rosie’s pacifier, looking around. “Where’s Lucy?”

“Aren’t you going to go after her, Nick?” Sylvia asked, her voice concerned.

“No, I’m not,” he’d replied shortly, handing Rosie to Angie. “Who wants another hot dog?”

Nobody did, and the party broke up before much longer, as if Lucy had cast a pall of painful memories over the proceedings. Damn her, he thought, as he loaded the dishwasher. Couldn’t she have chosen another house to renovate? Why the hell did she have to pick the one next door? They both needed to move on—didn’t she realize that?

He switched on the television and stared blankly at the screen, thinking of the terrified look on his ex’s face when she held Rosie, as if the tiny girl was an unexploded bomb. The memories, which he’d never managed to bury very deeply in the first place, rushed back at him. They’d planned to wait at least five years after their marriage to start a family, only it hadn’t turned out that way, and he’d been so stunned when she told him. Then his shock had dissolved into acceptance, and finally delight, awe, and anticipation.

Nick leaned back on the couch, closed his eyes and smiled, remembering Lucy turning the spare room into a nursery and how they’d bickered over baby names. She was just developing a little bump when without any warning at all, it was over.

Suddenly he stood and strode to the front door. Lucy needed him. She’d turned a deathly white holding Rosie, her face etched with pain, her eyes haunted. He reached the door, then stopped abruptly.

They were divorced, for God’s sake.

It wasn’t his business anymore what she needed or chose to do, or how she felt. It wasn’t his responsibility to comfort her.

“Shit,” he muttered, wanting to punch the wall, then wrenched open the door and strode outside anyway. He’d just make sure she was okay. It wouldn’t take five seconds.

After two rings of the doorbell, Lucy opened up. Her nose was bright red and her eyes swollen from crying, and Nick felt his insides turn to mush as he fought the urge to take her in his arms.

“You okay?”

She nodded. “I’m sorry I ruined your mom’s birthday.”

“You didn’t ruin anything.”

“I was just completely thrown to find myself holding a baby.” She shook her head. “Sorry.”

“Stop saying you’re sorry.”

“I avoid babies,” she said. “I avoid them like the plague.”

He didn’t reply. There was nothing to say.

She smiled at him tremulously. “Your parents are looking well.”

“Yeah.” He didn’t want to be drawn into chit-chat. It was time to leave. “You said you were in Paris?”
Where the hell did that come from?

Lucy nodded, her cheeks turning slightly pink.

“With your old boyfriend?”

“I was working in his restaurant.”

“Oh, how nice.” Bitterness welled up in Nick.

“Look, I know you don’t believe me, but he’s not my old boyfriend,” Lucy said wearily. “Jean-Luc never meant anything to me.”

“I know one thing—I’ll never trust you again.”

“Again?” She smiled wryly. “You never trusted me in the first place, or you’d have listened to my explanation.”

“Right—how unreasonable of me. I find my wife drunk and half-naked on a hotel bed with a guy—obviously they’re just discussing cooking techniques.”

Lucy’s face flamed. “I know it must have looked bad, but—”

Nick laughed again. “I know, I know. It was completely innocent, right?”

“I—I was just putting a stop to it,” she whispered. “I couldn’t let it happen, because it was you I needed.”

“So it was my fault?”

“No!”

“Why are we doing this again?” he asked, his voice stony. “It’s over between us and has been for a long time.”

Her eyes closed, as if trying to hold in tears. It didn’t work, and they spilled down her face. The urge Nick felt to reach out and take her in his arms, to reassure her that everything would be okay, angered him even further. He forced himself to turn and walk away.

“Nick!” she called after him, her voice filled with raw anguish. “Nick, please!”

He ignored her.

****

Lucy watched her ex-husband stride off, his body rigid with anger, before closing the door. It was hopeless. Never in a million years would Nick love her again. As she retreated to the family room and collapsed on the couch, she realized she was crying. Dexter hopped up to join her, and she pulled his small, furry body close, longing for comfort.

Memories pounded through her head, and she saw herself in the hotel room with Jean-Luc, her old friend from Paris. It had been such a shock bumping into him in the hotel lobby as she’d been grimly checking in, still furious Nick had refused to join her, saying he was too busy. Jean-Luc had smiled, his blue eyes widening in amazement, and Lucy felt some of her pain and anger begin to melt away.

Now she grabbed a tissue and blew her nose, accepting she’d pay the price of her mistake forever. Nothing had happened—she’d realized in time that she didn’t want Jean-Luc, didn’t want any man but her husband. But by then it was too late. Nick was at the door, and Lucy knew she’d never ever forget the look in his eyes as he’d taken in the scene.

“I’ve made such a mess of everything,” she moaned. “I’ve lost him, Dex.”

The little dog woofed gruffly and licked her nose.

“It’s just you and me, kiddo.”

Lucy gazed from the window as the sun began to set on the flower-scented summer day. It started the moment she miscarried her baby, she thought bleakly. Her dreams and hopes for the future had shriveled and died, one by one. Now there was nothing left to do but complete the renovations on the house and move on, accepting the fact that she’d destroyed her marriage and lost Nick’s love. Dexter snuggled against her tummy and nestled his head between her breasts, and Lucy stroked him, struggling to hold back another torrent of tears.

“Just you and me,” she whispered.

****

Relaxing with Lucy around was difficult, to put it mildly. Every time he left the house, Nick peered from the window to ensure she wasn’t out there, fetching her mail or just returning from a walk with her dog. Only when he was sure the coast was clear would he dash for his car. But even then his problems weren’t over. He thought of her constantly. In the mornings he’d wake imagining her curled up by his side, her golden hair tousled on the pillow, and he’d get hard remembering how it felt to pull her into his arms and everything that would come next. He’d see her in the shower, then drying off and stepping into her undies and how he’d always offer to help with her bra and she’d laugh and bat at him with it. Nick swallowed hard. She’d possessed bras in every color of the rainbow—pink, orange, red, zippy lime green with polka dots.

It was late and he needed some sleep. Instead he was standing around in his bathroom thinking about his ex-wife’s underwear. Annoyed, he finished brushing his teeth, replacing the toothbrush in its glass tumbler. It looked so lonely. Once, Lucy’s toothbrush had stood alongside, keeping it company. Nick shook his head angrily as he exited the bathroom, snapping off the light—he was being an idiot.

Giving his pillow a vicious punch, he climbed into bed. This was crazy.
She
was crazy if she thought he’d ever take her back. He’d never forget what he’d seen when Lucy opened that hotel door. Her hair was all mussed, her make-up smeared, and there’d been a man in the room, sprawled on the bed. Every time he thought about it, the shock still whacked him. Perhaps the craziest thing about it all was he believed nothing had actually happened. Lucy didn’t tell lies. Still he couldn’t forgive her for being with another guy, for even considering being unfaithful to him. Hell, it had been hard for him too, when they’d lost the baby, but he hadn’t started screwing around.

Determined to stop thinking about it, he turned on his side and reached to switch off the lamp, then tensed, his hand pausing in mid-air. He waited a moment, then shot out of bed when he heard another terrified female scream coming from next door.

Without even bothering to pull on his jeans, Nick bolted down the stairs and out of the house in his boxers. A few months ago, there’d been reports of a peeping Tom in the next town over. They’d never caught the guy. The cool night air brushed his skin, and he felt goose bumps as he pounded on Lucy’s door. The stupid little dog barked frantically. It occurred to Nick that someone could have broken in through a window, or the back door. She’d never paid much attention to security. Again he pounded on the door and yelled her name, hearing the hoarse desperation in his voice, imagining Lucy with a knife at her throat, helpless…

He heard hurried footsteps, and a moment later she appeared, her face white with terror, and catapulted into his arms.

“Nick!”

“Sweetheart, what happened?” He held her tightly, relief coursing through him, feeling the rapid beat of her heart against his chest.

“Oh, God!”

“It’s okay now.” She smelled of sunshine and strawberries. “Do we need to call the police?”

A shuddering sob escaped her as she clung to him.

“Lucy, what happened?”

Finally she looked up at him, her huge gray eyes filled with tears. “I—I was hungry and I decided to fix myself a sandwich. I opened the pantry door, and there he was, just sitting on top of the peanut butter jar looking at me, a huge gray mouse.”

“A mouse.”

“A huge one,” she shuddered, looking faint.

Nick nodded. Lucy had hated and feared mice with all her heart, ever since she’d moved into her first apartment in Paris. The place had been old and crumbling, but all Lucy saw as she paid the first month’s rent was ancient and charming. One morning, after spending hours the night before nibbling crackers and studying her cordon bleu manual in bed, she’d opened her eyes and come face to face with a mouse.

“Could you just help me make sure it’s gone?” she whispered.

A car going by slowed down, and Nick suddenly realized he was standing outside in nothing but a pair of shorts holding a woman in his arms. He quickly released her. Shivering, Lucy rubbed her bare arms and looked at him beseechingly.

“It’s probably gone by now,” he said, reluctantly following her into the house.

He’d been inside Miss Norwood’s home twice, once when the old lady wanted to give him some Christmas cookies, another time after rescuing one of her cats from a tree. Vaguely he remembered a musty smell, lots of dark paneling and green shag pile carpet. That was all gone. Lucy must have eliminated the wall between the living and dining rooms, because he stood in a wide open space with gleaming wood floors that looked funky and modern, yet at the same time comfy and inviting. Framed posters adorned the walls, and there was a chunky, bright orange lamp, bookshelves, a red couch, and a rug splashed with color. Somehow it all came together and worked beautifully.

He followed his ex into the kitchen, trying not to stare at her bottom which was clearly visible through the flimsy fabric of her nighty. She stopped and pointed cautiously to the pantry door, which stood ajar. Nick went to it and peered inside, seeing only extra virgin olive oil, peanut butter, canned tomatoes, and a jar of capers. He opened the doors beneath the sink and immediately spotted mouse droppings.