Well Matched (Well Met #3)(49)

Once the ceremony was over, parents and children mingled on the football field along with the faculty, no one quite wanting the morning to end. My original plan had been to stay in my seat, maybe find Emily if I was feeling outgoing, but otherwise wait for Caitlin to be ready to go home. She had an afternoon of graduation-party hopping with her friends planned, so my job today was almost done.

But of course my plan had changed. I was with Mitch now, and he wasn’t going to let me lurk in the back of anything. Instead he stuck by my side as we wove our way through the crowd to my daughter. On the way, though, I apparently needed to meet every teacher who had ever taught Caitlin at Willow Creek High. The weird guilty feeling I had, meeting these important people in her life so late in the proceedings, faded relatively quickly. I wasn’t the only working mother they’d encountered, each of them assured me. And all of them seemed to give me bonus points for raising Caitlin as a single mother. This . . . surprised me. Hadn’t Robert gotten to them first, last night? I’d expected him to have won them all over.

Eventually I caught up with Caitlin. Emily and Simon had gotten to her first, and her face was animated as she talked to them. Then she saw me, and her smile got even wider.

“Mom!” She waved enthusiastically, and my heart swelled.

“Congratulations, honey!” I caught her up in a hug. I couldn’t put into words how proud I was. I loved every little thing about this moment: the way my hands slipped on the cheap polyester fabric of her graduation gown, the way she was taller than me now so I had to lift a little onto my toes to hug her. Her hair was down, hanging in long, dark curls that were going slightly frizzy in the heat, and I’m sure my blowout was starting to suffer the same way.

I adjusted her mortarboard, because that was something that moms did, and I caught her eyes widening just slightly as she looked over my right shoulder.

“Oh! Hi!” Her voice was full of false cheer bordering on manic. Her eyes darted back to me, and at first I didn’t look. I didn’t need to. I didn’t want to.

But I had to, didn’t I?

So it was with a sense of resignation that I turned around and found myself face-to-face with Robert. To his credit he looked like I felt: prepared for this eventual encounter, but still startled when the moment arrived.

“April?” A tentative smile lifted his face, and rage swept through me. No. You don’t get to smile at me like that after all these years. I took a step backwards and Mitch’s hand was there, warm and strong at the small of my back. Where had he come from? Didn’t matter. He was here now, and if I’d leaned back more, he would have held me up.

“Robert. Hi.” I sounded . . . normal. My voice only shook a little as my eyes cataloged all the ways the man in front of me had aged. Just like when I’d seen him last night from a distance, those changes had been mostly good. But looking at him made me feel the passage of time acutely. We’d both grown older, but not together. Like we’d thought we would.

“You look great.” He moved infinitesimally toward me, almost a twitch, like he was going in for a hug. I wasn’t ready for that and so rocked back, shifting my weight, and would you look at that, I was right. Mitch held me up. His hand pressed harder into my back, then slid to rest around my waist. Giving me a united front to present.

“Thanks,” I said with a confidence I didn’t feel. “So do you.” It killed me to give him that compliment, but what the hell.

“Thanks. Been a long time.” Robert slid his left hand down his tie, smoothing it, and a gold band glinted on his wedding finger. So he’d remarried. Well, of course he had; we’d split up so long ago. Had he changed his mind about kids over the years? Did he have another family after he’d thrown Cait and me over? My breathing grew deeper, labored in my chest. Panic was starting to take over again, that same panic that had sent me out of the reception hall last night. I couldn’t let Caitlin see me like this.

But a quick glance over my shoulder showed me that she’d moved away, walking down the football field, with Emily and Simon. Giving Robert and me a little privacy for this auspicious meeting. I wasn’t sure if that made my whole panic situation better or worse.

But Mitch had no such intentions of giving me privacy. He shifted closer, his arm tightening around me, until Robert was all but forced to acknowledge him. “Oh. Sorry.” Robert extended his hand. “Robert Daugherty.”

Mitch met his handshake firmly, tucking me even closer as he did so, like I was in need of defending. Maybe I was. “Mitch Malone. Nice to meet you, Bob.” My lips twitched at Mitch’s use of a nickname, and I fought to keep a neutral expression. Also, Mitch’s voice had gone very deep. Very masculine. He was playing this up, and I couldn’t help but feel grateful. This encounter would have sent me sinking into the forty-yard line of this football field if I’d had to do it alone.

Robert pressed his lips together, but apparently decided against correcting Mitch. “I was just going to say hi to Caitlin, if that’s all right. Congratulate her on winning an award; that’s pretty great, isn’t it?”

“It is.” This was ridiculous; the two of us making awkward small talk about the child we’d created together. But what else did we have to talk about? “I’m very proud of her.”

“You should be.” His gaze lingered in our daughter’s direction. “You did an amazing job with her, April. Everyone I’ve met here has said that.”