Anything for Her(95)

Her gaze reluctantly settled on the quilt frame. Would she be allowed to take one? She wouldn’t be able to own a quilt shop, but there was no reason she couldn’t continue to quilt and even sell her quilts.

In sudden panic she thought of the quilts hanging at the shop. She couldn’t leave them behind. She couldn’t! Tomorrow she’d bring them all home, in case. Of course, people would ask about the empty spaces on the wall, but she’d think of an explanation.

In the next second, Allie sagged into her chair. Why was she thinking about things? Every single thing she owned, even the quilts she’d lovingly hand-stitched, could be replaced. Things didn’t matter—people did. Nolan did.

Mom did.

Oh, God, oh, God, what am I going to do? she asked herself for the thousandth time. She wondered what her father and brother would tell her to do, if she was able to talk to them. But in the end, she knew her choice wasn’t the same as theirs had been. Neither had stayed behind because there had been a person he couldn’t bear to leave.

What if her vacillating had killed what Nolan felt for her? Even knowing how angry she was, even after she had walked away from him, he’d come back to ask her again to marry him. But, remembering the expression on his face when he left the last time, Allie knew he wouldn’t be back this time.

It was up to her now.

* * *

NOLAN STOOD IN the middle of his workshop and knew he wouldn’t be safe using power tools today. Looking around, he asked himself how he’d feel if he had to leave this workshop and everything it meant to him behind.

Was that what dancing had been for Allie, young as she was? Had it been the only thing she could imagine doing with her life? Had she felt as if she were meant to tie on toe shoes, train and suffer until she could fly?

From the minute Nolan had handled his first chunk of raw stone, he’d been fascinated. What if I was being forced to choose between this and a life with Allie?

I wouldn’t even hesitate, he realized with a strangely lightened heart. I could be satisfied doing something else. Carpentry, maybe. I could carve in wood. I could be happy, if I had Allie and Sean.

Would Allie have to give up quilting if she relocated with her mother? She’d lost so damn much already. He remembered her talking about how splintered she felt: Chloe, who was angry; Laura, bewildered and tongue-tied; Allie, who wasn’t allowed to acknowledge her other selves.

She had sounded so bleak when she said, Somehow I have to put myself back together, and I have no idea how.

What if Allie Wright, too, became another self she had to deny? He was part of this life, which would cease to exist for her.

When she was given a new background, would she be able to remember it? Would she even try, or would she give up?

Nolan felt a painful cramping in his chest. Would she ever be able to put herself back together?

My fault. I caused this.

I need to find a way to fix it.

Anna hadn’t been any help. Of course, he hadn’t been able to tell her the whole story. He’d admitted to having Allie’s background investigated and told his sister that Allie had found out.

“I can’t imagine a woman forgiving that,” Anna had said flatly. “Has it ever occurred to you that you’ve carried this thing with Mom a little too far?”

“It doesn’t bother you?”

“Sure it does, but not the same way.” The silence suggested she was thinking. “I don’t know why that is. I coped by deciding I wasn’t going to be anything like her.”

Nolan had had one of those lightbulb moments. “And I coped by deciding I wasn’t going to be anything like Dad.”

“Well, duh,” his sister said.

Call him dim-witted, but he’d never framed it in those terms before. I decided I would never tolerate lies. I would never gloss them over or enable someone else’s lies. Above all else, I would never lie to the people I love.

He’d known all that. He just hadn’t recognized that he was more outraged by the choices the man he called Dad had made than the ones his mother had made. For Anna, the reverse had been true.

“I’ve been...blindly rebelling,” he admitted to his sister. “The thing that kills me is, I knew Allie. I knew I could trust her, but I didn’t let myself.”

Like Sean, Anna had asked whether it was too late. He still didn’t know the answer.

How do I fix this?

Nolan looked at the clock hanging on the workshop wall and watched the second hand sweep inexorably around. The clock was literally ticking, he thought. Allie and her mother could be moved anytime. Tomorrow. Tonight.