Love Starts with Elle(7)
Rock’s soft laugh was one of speculative realization. “You make a point.”
“I rented a cottage by a creek down near Beaufort, South Carolina. Little area called St. Helena.”
Rock tightened his lips and nodded. “Sounds quaint.”
“My grandfather owned a place on Edisto Island in the eighties and nineties. My brother Mark and I used to run the creeks and rivers, building forts, playing soldiers. Granddad’s place is gone, but going back felt like a good place to start over.”
“Heath, Doc and Tom won’t let me hold your partnership for more than six months. Had to fight them for it. Best and worse thing I ever did was pair up with those two after Bill Gardner died. He was a great partner. Either way, I’m not calling the shots alone anymore.”
“I understand, Rock, and appreciate you going to bat for me.”
“I can’t imagine the small-town South Carolina life will suit you for long. You’re a New Yorker, a Yankee, and a lawyer.” Rock arched his foot so the back of his chocolate-brown loafers dangled from his heel. “What about your daughter? Her education?”
“She’s only four, Rock.”
“Are you telling me her name wasn’t put on a dozen elite pre-K lists five minutes after she was born? She should be enrolled by now, ready to start in the fall.”
Heath ran his hand around his neck, stretching to relieve the steady tension. “Geneva and St. Luke’s. But life changed, didn’t it? Took three people and ripped their lives apart. Right now, I just want to piece our lives back together. This move will be good, just the two of us in that cottage. No nanny, no sixty-hour work weeks.”
Rock pinched his eyebrows together. “You’ve only been working sixty hours? Had I known you’ve been slacking . . .”
It felt good to laugh. “This from the man who leaves every afternoon at four with his tennis bag. Yeah, don’t look surprised. I see you.”
Rock owned up. Besides the law, tennis was his passion. “Tell me, though, does the pain get better?”
“The good days are rare, but the bad days are fewer, if that makes sense. I feel in limbo and . . . disoriented. I walk down to the law library and forget what I wanted in there. I pour a glass of milk and find it hours later, untouched. The other morning I woke up, panicked, convinced I’d overslept for a contract-law exam.” Heath motioned to his packed closet. “Ten years I’ve been at this firm and all I’ve accumulated can be stored in boxes.”
“Can’t box all the cases you won. The people you’ve helped, your pro bono work.”
“Nor can I get back all the hours I spent working instead of being with Ava and Tracey-Love.”
“You’re being too hard on yourself. Ava invested in her career as much as you, Heath. If not more.”
Heath reached for a lone yellow pencil lying on his desk blotter. “Yeah, well, I can’t confront her about it now, can I?”
“No, you can’t.” Rock exhaled through his nose and slapped his hands against his thighs as he stood. “If I mentored you right, you have more than enough to live on.”
“Yes, there’s money.” Heath coughed, pressing his fist to his lips.
“Of course.” Rock paused with his hand on the door knob. “Six months, Heath. Remember.”
Heath tapped his forehead. “Got it right here.”
Rock left, shutting the door as he went. Heath stared out his twentieth-floor window. Manhattan had been his promised land thirteen years ago when he and Ava arrived after three years of Yale Law. But today his promised land felt like a barren desert.
A light snow began to fall between the Manhattan skyscrapers. Heath watched the miniscule flakes swirl past his window, knowing they’d melt in the city’s warmth before hitting the ground.
Catherine Perry, even Rock Calloway, had no concept of Heath’s expanding wasteland. If he didn’t leave this job, this city, and this place of memories behind, it would always be winter in his heart.
THREE
GG GALLERY
CLOSED
SOLD
BEAUFORT
March
The empty gallery felt cold and foreign, the bare walls echoing every word, bump, and scrape.
Elle purposefully ignored the big-hole in her chest as she boxed up Geoffrey Morley’s February show, the last she’d ever have in Beaufort, in GG Gallery.
She’d seen the gallery empty once before. The day she bought it. Then her gallery days were beginning instead of ending.
Change was hard. Even chosen change.
Julianne descended the loft stairs with a box in her hands. “Your paints.” She set them on the desk. She picked up a tube and twisted off the cap. “Are they still good?”
“Should be,” Elle said, dragging the last box across the floor to line up with the rest of the packages for FedEx. “Oils last awhile.”
Julianne replaced the cap and dropped the paint back into the box. “You should paint again, Elle. You do have a degree in fine arts, I believe. Studied in Florence.”
“Running a gallery took all my time.” Elle shrugged and walked around to the printer for a piece of paper.
“Are you going to open another gallery in Dallas?”
“Of course.” With a big black marker, Elle wrote on the blank paper, “Desk for Sale. Best Offer. See Inside,” then taped it to the front window.