She didn’t know which struck her harder: his confidence or his candor. At first she was indignant, ready to battle him, to deny all he’d just claimed. The way he stared at her said Bring it. I’ll defend myself. But the power of the desire to sink her hands into his hair and yank his mouth to hers was so strong that her fingertips tingled. Fighting him and his words was pointless.
It was quite possible he knew her better than she knew herself. Maybe he always had. The thought was overwhelming.
“I don’t know if I’m ready to talk about it yet.” Was that her voice, shaking like that?
“It.” He was toneless. “‘It’ meaning what happened to us ten years ago? Or ‘it’ meaning what’s happening between us now?”
Denying the latter would be stupid; there was definitely something going on between them in the present day. Sure, it had begun when they were younger, but this yearning, this connection had aged too well. It was too delicious and she couldn’t stop drinking it.
But to tell him about her past now, to explain why she’d come to Gleann in the first place and then left so abruptly, meant talking about Mom. Her confrontation with Aimee last night and the sudden reappearance of their mother had left Jen too raw.
She knew there was a direct line drawn between the end of her and Leith’s relationship and what she’d never told him, but she wasn’t that eighteen-year-old. The reasons shouldn’t matter today.
“I’m not ignoring the old us, Leith. I promise. What we had, what happened, is here between us, no matter what we say. It will always be here, whether we talk about it directly or not.”
What exactly did he want out of this conversation? To pick up where they’d left off? To start something new? Didn’t he realize that both were impossible, even if they were desirable?
“I’m not quite sure what you want me to say,” she said. “Are you looking for a complete rehash of my last summer here? You want to relive the night I left, or our last phone call? Because I don’t. The memories are strong enough, thank you very much, and we’re different people now.” She glanced up to the slide tower. “Or are you looking for another make-out session up there?”
“That last one would be nice.” He went to the seesaw, set a massive boot on it, and sent the opposite end flying up. “You know what? I’m not exactly sure. I guess I just didn’t want you to pretend we never existed.”
“I’m not pretending. Not at all. I’m compartmentalizing. I thought you were the one pretending.”
“Maybe I was. But not anymore.”
In that moment, she realized that since they’d entered the park, she’d completely forgotten the true reason for her coming back to Gleann. Leith had consumed her thoughts, even for this short time. That scared her. Too many people—Aimee and Aunt Bev’s memory most of all—were relying on her to do good work here. She only ever did her best; nothing less was acceptable. And these were only the first few days of what she knew would be a massive amount of work.
Her phone rang and she pulled it out of her pocket. Gretchen.
“Ah, there it is,” Leith said wryly. “I was wondering if you’d had it surgically removed.”
“Hey, Gretchen,” she answered, throwing Leith a perturbed look. She moved away from the playground to talk to her assistant.
“How’s it going out there in the boonies?” Gretchen asked when they were done talking about preliminary items regarding Fashion Week.
“Fine. I feel like I’m still missing a few pieces, but they’ll come together.”
Right as she said it, she noticed Leith slowly walking down the length of his old caber, hands in his pockets, his profile set to the town. After Jen went back to the city, this was how she’d remember seeing him, as much a part of the town as his dad.
Mr. MacDougall. That was it.
“Gretchen, I gotta run.” She clicked off the phone and shoved it back into her pocket, then crossed to Leith.
He watched her approach, his shoulders less tense and his eyes warm. The sun hit him, bringing out the gold streaks in his hair, and she forced her voice to be steady in the presence of a man whose looks she’d correctly pinned as approaching godhood. “Hey. Have a question for you.”
“Shoot.” He smiled in the same relaxed way she’d once known—and loved—well.
She rubbed her hands together. “Remember those old photo albums your dad had? The ones from back in Scotland, showing all those games he competed in?”
The smile faltered. “Yeeeaaah.”
“You wouldn’t happen to still have them, would you?”
She wasn’t mistaken; he’d paled a bit. “I . . . think so.”
“I was wondering if I could look through them, get some ideas for here. You know, to ramp up the authenticity and get away from DeeDee’s fake castle.”
“That’s a good idea, actually.” He took a deep breath. Paused. “Sure. You can take a look at them.”
“Oh, great. Thanks. Are they packed into one of Mildred’s garages?”
“No, they’re, ah”—He began to stroke a finger down each side of his face, over and over again—“all at the house.”
“Which one of the three?”
He turned then to gaze across the park and down the narrow lane that swooped into the lowest part of Gleann, where Leith’s childhood home stood.
“Not Mildred’s house.” His voice turned distant. “Da’s house.”
Not my house. Not our house.
“Oh. You never mentioned you still had it.” She wondered why he wasn’t living there instead of in a strange old lady’s time warp.
“Yeah. I do.” He cleared his throat. “Why don’t we run back to Mildred’s and I’ll get the house key for you. You can let yourself into Da’s, take what you need.”
“Are you sure now’s a good time?”
“Now’s great, actually. But I’ll have to drop you off, if that’s okay. I think I might head out of town earlier than I’d originally planned. Get down to Connecticut with plenty of time before I meet with Rory tomorrow morning.”
“All right,” she said, but he was already walking away, and she knew something was up.
Chapter
9
“Yeah, sorry I can’t go in with you,” Leith told her as she sat next to him in his truck. He jabbed up the air conditioner, even though the cab was already Frigidaire cold. “I gotta get on the road if I want to make it to Stamford by tonight and find a motel.”
When he’d gone inside 740 Maple to grab the key to his father’s house, he’d also come out with a packed bag.
“It’s okay,” Jen said, while wondering who the hell this pale, fidgety guy was sitting next to her. “Tell me where the photo albums are again?”
He squinted through the windshield at the brick two-bedroom, one-car ranch house plunked at the foot of a steep hill. “Da kept all the stuff like that in the den. In the big hutch along the wall. Bottom shelves. Here.” He flipped open the glove compartment and took out a huge flashlight, slapping it in her palm. “You might need this.”
“Why?”
“No power.”
She opened her door and gracelessly finagled her way to the ground. One hand on the door handle, she peered back inside the truck. But Leith wasn’t looking at her. The house had him entranced.
“Thanks,” she said.
“Sure.” A stiff nod of the head.
“When will you be back?” As if she had any right to know, or any claim on him.
“Not sure.”
Alrighty then.
His thigh twitched and flexed, preparing to lift off the brake. She took the signal and shut the door. It was barely latched before he pulled away, tires grinding in the gravel driveway. When he hit the asphalt, he gunned it back up the hill, on his way out of Gleann. She watched him go until the truck was no more than an obnoxious lumbering sound filtering through the trees. When silence fell, she turned to the only house in this quiet, lovely part of the valley.