No Perfect Hero(79)

I swear I could paint here for years and never capture it all, but part of me wants to try.

Right now, though, I’m content to sit on the little padded bench next to the pond and listen to Tara’s laughter as she swings higher and higher, kicking her feet.

Next to me, Ms. Wilma watches too, her hands folded in her lap with a courtly grace I’ve noticed Tara’s starting to emulate lately. “She’s a darling girl, isn’t she?” she says fondly. “You must be so proud.”

“I am,” I answer. “I’m just her aunt, but...ya know.”

“Nonsense, dear. There’s no such thing as just an aunt. Aunts are the mothers we wish we had when the ones we do have are being just a little unfair. They’re our best friends, our heroes, our confidantes, and the women we often want to grow up to be.”

I glance at her, lingering on the remote, warm look in her eyes. “Sounds like you had an aunt you idolized?”

“Oh, yes. My Aunt Nicolette. She was quite a fancy lady. A child of the Paris high life. She held these great balls that Gatsby would've envied, dressed up all in lace and entertaining in the finest hotels in New York.”

I blink. “You’re not from Heart’s Edge?”

“No, dear.” She flutters one slim hand to her throat, and that’s when I realize there’s a little old-fashioned silver locket nestled against the lace throat of her dress, so old it’s been worn into a perfect polish from years of loving handling. “My George came from Heart’s Edge. He swept through New York after the war and found me turning my ankles to the latest pretty tune, teasing all the boys. He decided right then and there he never wanted me to look at another man through my lashes but him.”

I laugh softly. “Sounds like his grandson takes a bit after him. When he decides something, there’s no swaying him.”

“Warren is quite a bit like his grandfather, indeed.” Her eyes soften. She reaches back to unclasp the locket, letting it spill into her palm, then gently opens it so I can see a handsome man in black and white.

His blunt jaw looks set just like Warren’s, the same rough and ready expression on his face, his smile just as arrogant, his hair a slick of black swept back neatly to match his crisp, old-fashioned Air Force uniform. “They’re both quite dapper, don’t you think?”

“I do.” I lean in, admiring Lawrence Ford. “Is it...okay to ask what happened?”

“Oh, it’s been years, darling. It doesn’t hurt to talk about it anymore.” But there’s a touch of loss, of heartbreak, in her voice, as she gazes down into that locket.

Then I wonder what it’s like to love someone so much that they live inside your every gesture and word, even long after they’re gone.

“My Lawrence was always a soldier. He couldn’t seem to shake it, even after the war in Europe ended. Every time they called him back for one patrol or another, he was always on the front lines. One day, his plane malfunctioned over the Bering Strait during routine exercises to keep the Russians at bay.” Her sigh is long and drawn, shaky. “They never found the wreckage, or his body.”

It’s not my story, not my loss...but my heart aches nevertheless, a sharp pang in my chest, both for her and for Warren. “I’m so sorry, Ms. Wilma.”

“That’s life. But I loved him while I had him, with everything in me—and that’s all that matters.” Her eyes gleam damp as she lifts her head, looking around the atrium with a smile that’s so beautiful, it hurts to see. “We built this atrium together. Sometimes I feel like I can still feel him here. Warren would come here so often as a boy, too. It’s like he knew the energy without even being told.”

“It’s absolutely beautiful. I’d have never imagined, from the outside.”

“We wanted it to be our secret place.” She chuckles, closing the locket and slipping the chain around her neck again, fiddling with the clasp. “Now that we’ve made the manor into a hotel, guests can enjoy the view, but only family are allowed inside.”

I wonder what it means that she’s let me and Tara here.

It almost feels like Ms. Wilma has adopted us, and I’m not sure what to think of that in the context of my relationship with Warren.

Last night, he’d come home with four different varieties of mushroom, just because he hadn’t known which one I wanted. And when I asked why he didn’t just text me and ask, the look on his face and the dumbfounded confusion had us both dissolving into laughter, then falling into each other’s arms.

Dinner was a bit late last night, but I don’t think either of us minded.

I look over. Ms. Wilma’s fumbling with the clasp, and I stand quickly, circling the bench.

“Let me,” I say, and she murmurs her thanks while I take the delicate chain and slip the clasp so that it locks securely around her neck again. “Thank you for letting us see this place. And thank you for caring for Tara so much while I’ve been busy.”

“You have no idea how happy it makes me to have a little girl around. It’s been a very long time.”

I know I shouldn’t ask. I know. Because I can’t get myself too wrapped up in this, can’t tell myself this is anything other than what it is, and yet...

“Was Jenna here often?” I venture tentatively, curling my hands against the back of the bench.