Lovely Girls(33)

I sat there, stunned, absorbing this. “But you have Genevieve’s number, don’t you? You said she called you.”

Joe nodded. “I do, back from when we were neighbors. And the photos came from a different number. But that wouldn’t be hard to pull off. She could have used a burner phone or texted it from an online account. You can register for one of those anonymously.”

Would Genevieve do that? I wondered. Would she break up someone else’s marriage out of revenge? And revenge for what? Joe’s ex-wife not being fun at a party? It seemed implausible. And yet . . . somehow not impossible.

“What do you think?” I asked. “Do you think Genevieve sent it to you?”

“I’m not sure how to answer that,” Joe said carefully. “I don’t have any proof that it was Genevieve. But I don’t think it would surprise me to learn that she did.”

I shook my head and took a sip of my wine. Was Genevieve capable of doing something so manipulative, so underhanded?

“If she did, that’s terrible. She interfered in your marriage.”

“No one made Kim cheat on me. That was her decision. I didn’t love finding out via an anonymous text, but it’s better than not finding out. I don’t regret getting divorced.”

“Do you regret getting married?” I blurted the words out before I had the chance to think them through. “I’m sorry, ignore that. It’s none of my business.”

“It’s okay, Kate. That’s kind of the point of dating, right? To get to know one another. And the answer is no, I don’t regret it. If I hadn’t married Kim, we wouldn’t have had Sean, and I can never wish him away. But looking back, Kim and I were never particularly well suited for one another.”

“How so?”

Joe spread his hands out in front of him. “The life of a chef isn’t always the easiest. I work long hours, including most nights. I thought owning my own restaurant would make things easier, but suddenly, I was running a business on top of the crazy hours. And that took a lot of my time and attention away from my family. I think Kim wants what she has now. A husband who’s home every night by six and who can go on out-of-town trips on the weekends.”

“You don’t sound bitter.”

“What’s the point? Our marriage didn’t work out, but I wish her the best.”

I nodded and took a sip of my wine. “I hope that’s how I would have felt. I hate to think that I would have wasted time being angry about the past.”

“Are you angry now?”

I considered this. Ed and I had grown so far apart, we couldn’t find a way to bridge the space between us. And by the time he died, I knew I couldn’t fix what was wrong between us. I doubted there was anything I could have done. Ed had had serious problems, and he certainly hadn’t had any interest in seeking help for himself.

“No,” I said. “I’m making my peace with the past.”

There was a sudden boom of thunder, and lightning lashed through the sky, so bright I had to blink. I could see a dark wall of rain moving in our direction.

“Maybe we should go inside,” Joe suggested.

I smiled. “I’m starving. I haven’t eaten all day.”

“We should remedy that immediately.”

Joe stood and held his hand out to me. I took it, and suddenly we were standing very close to one another. His hand touched my cheek, and I tipped my head back to look up at him. He was definitely an attractive man, I thought. And he had kind eyes. Joe leaned forward and gently pressed his lips lightly against mine.

And for the first time in a long time, I didn’t worry about anything at all.





CHAPTER TWENTY




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VIDEO DIARY OF ALEX TURNER



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SEPTEMBER 26

Alex sat outside, leaning back against a tree. Her face was red and beaded with sweat, and her hair was pulled back in a low ponytail.

Something seriously weird just happened.

Alex glanced around to make sure no one was close enough to overhear her.

We just had practice, and afterward, I asked Coach if I could speak to him alone. I mean, that was hard enough. I can barely look at him after seeing him and Daphne . . . well, whatever. He didn’t seem like he wanted to talk to me either. He said he was busy going over the stats for the next team we’re playing. But I told him I only needed a few minutes, so he finally agreed and told me to stop by his office. Which I just did.

I took a deep breath, braced myself, and told him, “I want to challenge Daphne for her spot on the tennis team.”

And Coach said, “I already put the lineup out for the next match.”

I said, “I know. But I want to challenge to be on the lineup for the match after that.”

And the whole time I was talking to him, Coach wouldn’t make eye contact with me. Instead, he was staring at the screen of his computer and just sort of occasionally glancing at me from the corner of his eye. And the whole time we were speaking, his leg was jiggling up and down, like he was nervous. I wonder . . .

Alex gasped, and her eyes widened.

Oh, my God. I wonder if Daphne told him I saw them together. That I have a video of them. Because Coach said he’d just put me in the next lineup and that I didn’t have to do the challenge. And then he told me he needed to get back to work, so I didn’t have a chance to ask any questions. I just left and came out here.