Rachel’s appetite was gone, and she pushed her food around while Bruce finished his. He moved his empty plate aside. “This is bothering you, isn’t it?”
Bruce was stating the obvious, a typical male trait in her experience. Because she found it impossible to conceal her emotions, she simply nodded.
They left, and he followed her back to her rental house, parking at the curb. She unlocked the front door and let him inside. The first thing she noticed in the dark foyer was the red light flashing on her answering machine. Instead of listening to her messages, she turned on the house lights and drew the living room drapes, then brought out the DVD they’d selected.
While he put the disk in the slot, she poured them each a glass of wine. He liked the reds, especially merlot, and so did she. Tucking her legs under her, Rachel sat on the sofa. Bruce sat next to her.
The previews had just started when the phone rang. Unfolding her legs and setting her wineglass on the coffee table with a sigh, she hurried into the hallway to answer it. She wasn’t expecting any calls, but there was always the possibility that Jolene might be trying to get in touch with her father.
Using the remote, Bruce sped ahead to the movie portion and hit the pause button.
“Hello,” she said, slightly out of breath.
“Rachel, it’s Nate.”
“Nate?”
Bruce’s eyes flew to hers and she whirled around, unable to look at him while talking to another man. She instantly felt guilty, although she told herself there wasn’t a single reason she should.
“Thank heaven you’re home. I’ve been trying for the last half hour. Where were you? Damn, I wish you’d turn on your cell phone.”
“Did you call to yell at me?”
“No, no. I just want to know what the hell is going on.” His words were followed by a slight echo. “Why won’t you answer my e-mails?”
“I’ve already said everything I feel is necessary. I think we should end this right now.”
“Fine, whatever, but the least you can do is tell me why.”
Rachel didn’t want to talk about this now, especially with Bruce listening to every word.
“Is there someone else? It’s that Bruce guy, isn’t it?”
“No.”
“Did I do anything?”
“No.” She twisted the cord around her elbow.
“Do I have to play a guessing game with you?”
“No…I found out you’re Congressman Olsen’s son.”
Her announcement was met with a brief hesitation. “That’s a problem?”
“Yes!” she cried. “It’s a very big problem.” He needed to understand what that information had done to her. And if it wasn’t a problem, why hadn’t he told her himself, instead of leaving her to discover it on her own?
“Does this change who I am?”
“No,” she acknowledged reluctantly.
“Then I don’t see why it’s a problem.”
“I do,” she said. “You’re a congressman’s son and I work in a salon doing nails and hair.”
“What’s that got to do with anything?”
“If you don’t know, then I can’t explain it.”
“I’m Nate Olsen, a Warrant Officer in the United States Navy. Why can’t you accept that and that alone?”
“Because.”
“That doesn’t tell me anything.”
“Why did you enlist?” she demanded.
Her question seemed to take him off guard. “I had something to prove.”
“It’s the same with me, isn’t it? You’re using me in the same way.”
“No.”
“I’m just one more stone to throw at your father. I can just imagine what he’d think if he learned about me.”
“I don’t give a damn what he thinks.”
“Well, I do,” she said forcefully.
“Then you aren’t the woman I thought you were.”
She braced herself against the wall. “No, I guess I’m not.”
He didn’t have anything more to add, it seemed. She heard a soft goodbye, followed by a click. He’d disconnected. The phone droned in her ear, and a long moment passed before she replaced the receiver.
When she turned around, Bruce was standing in the doorway. “You okay?” he asked.
She was going to lie, to shrug it off, but couldn’t. “No, not really,” she finally said.
He slipped his arms around her for a gentle hug and she rested her head against his shoulder.
Thirty
“Jack!” Olivia complained, sitting on the end of their bed. “When are you going to start using that treadmill?” She hated to nag, but he’d been procrastinating ever since Christmas morning, when she’d unveiled her gift. Although he’d made an effort to look pleased, she’d seen the disappointment in his eyes.
“I will,” he said, sauntering out from the bathroom in his underwear. “Soon.”
“You promised to start last week.”
“I know, I know.” He had the resigned look of a convicted man on his way out of the courtroom and into jail. His eyes brightened. “I don’t have anything to wear.”
“Jack, you know darned well that I got you a pair of sweats. Don’t tell me you forgot, either.”
“I didn’t forget,” he admitted, “but I don’t feel right sweating in brand-new clothes.”
“Jack Griffin, that’s the most ridiculous excuse I’ve ever heard. Enough. Exercise.”
“Now?” he gasped.
“Now!”
“But I’ve got to get to the office.”
“Not until you’ve walked a mile, minimum.”
“A mile?”
“You’ll be too tired tonight after work.”
“I might not be,” he said hopefully, looking more than a little ridiculous as he pouted while standing in their bedroom wearing only his underwear and dark socks.
“You’re walking, Jack.”
Olivia was through listening to his excuses. The week following Christmas was too soon, Jack had said, but right after New Year’s, he’d be on that treadmill every morning. Olivia had foolishly believed him. It was already the second week of January and he had yet to plug it in. Olivia wasn’t leaving this room until he began walking.
“I’m actually not feeling that well.”
She rolled her eyes.
Grumbling under his breath, Jack opened his bottom drawer and pulled out the gray sweatpants and shirt. “I hope you’re happy,” he muttered as he returned to the bathroom.
“You’ll feel much better when you finish.”
“If I live.”
“Very funny,” she said. “Start slow and increase your speed gradually. Don’t overdo it,” she advised. He refused to look at her, but Olivia felt only mildly guilty when she followed him into the bathroom. “Grace and I complain every week about aerobics class, but we both feel good afterward. You will, too.”
“If you say so.” Jack sat on the edge of the bathtub to lace up his sneakers.
“Tell you what,” Olivia said. “I’ll make you breakfast while you’re walking.”
Jack smiled for the first time that morning. “Bacon, eggs, two slices of toast. Wheat,” he added, knowing she disapproved of white bread.
“Oatmeal.”
“Oatmeal,” he spewed back.
“With raisins, but only if you stop your complaining.”
The grumbling was back and, despite herself, Olivia laughed. He was being so childish about this.
“Call the office for me, would you?” he said as he walked back into the bedroom, giving her a list of instructions. One would think he was going to be away for a week instead of an hour. Standing in front of the treadmill, he stared at it, as if searching for one last chance to avoid this.
After a moment, he apparently reached a decision and plugged it in, then stepped onto the flatbed. Frowning at the display panel, he began pushing buttons.
“Don’t you want to read the instruction book first?” she suggested.
He ignored her. The machine made a loud humming noise and started moving, nearly throwing Jack off his feet. Olivia swallowed a hoot of laughter, knowing he wouldn’t appreciate her reaction.
Given no option but to move with the machine, he began walking. But after a few minutes, he was huffing and puffing, reconfirming the fact that he was in terrible shape. Olivia wanted to tell him to slow down, but she could see Jack wasn’t in a listening frame of mind.
Retreating to the kitchen, she heard the hum of the treadmill in the background as she put water on the stove to boil for his oatmeal. He might complain, but she noticed that he’d finished the entire bowl the last time she’d made it.
Next, she reached for the phone and called the newspaper office. When Steve Fullerton, the assistant editor, answered, she rattled off the instructions Jack had given her. By then, the water was bubbling and she added the oats and turned off the burner to let them cook slowly.
Wondering how Jack was doing, she went back to the bedroom. As she rounded the corner, she realized he’d quit already. He’d only been at it for fifteen minutes. She hoped that in time he’d increase his stamina. She also hoped it wouldn’t be a battle every morning the way it had been today.
When she entered the bedroom, Olivia found Jack sitting on the treadmill, dragging in deep breaths. His color was a sickly gray and he was sweating profusely.
“Jack?” she whispered and hurried toward him. “Jack? Jack, are you all right?”
He pressed his hand over his heart, shaking his head.
“I’m calling 9-1-1.”
“No,” he gasped. “I’ll be all right. In a minute.”
Olivia wouldn’t chance that. She ran into the kitchen and grabbed the phone. She punched out the three numbers.
“9-1-1 Emergency,” a woman’s voice answered.
“This is Judge Olivia Lockhart,” she said as authoritatively as she could. “I need an aid car at 16 Lighthouse Road. My husband is having a heart attack.” She heard the panic in her own voice but couldn’t restrain it. It felt as if her own heart was in danger of failing.
“Judge Lockhart, please stay on the line.”
“No—my husband needs me. Just hurry! In the name of God, please hurry.” She dropped the phone, remembering something she’d read months ago—that an aspirin might help a heart attack victim.
Her hands trembled as she took the aspirin bottle from the kitchen cabinet and shook it into the palm of her hand. Several tablets tumbled out and in her panic, she flung what she didn’t need onto the floor.
Jack looked bad when she returned, lying prone and gasping for air. “Jack, oh, Jack,” she sobbed. She managed to get him to swallow the aspirin. A siren wailed in the distance, and she ran to unlock the front door.
An aid car parked outside the house and two EMTs dashed toward the front steps, carrying their equipment. Olivia’s relief was so great she nearly sank to her knees.
From that point on, events blurred in her mind. Both men worked on Jack for the first few minutes. He was unconscious by then and for one horrifying second she thought he’d died. Terror gripped her. She couldn’t breathe. Before she’d even noticed what was happening, Jack had been loaded onto a gurney and transported to the aid car.