Digging In: A Novel(57)

“Trey?”

“Oh, no,” he said quickly. “Not him. Your next door neighbor, Bill Eckhardt.”

“Did he off his wife?”

He laughed, dug a Post-it note from his pocket, and stuck it to my kitchen table. On it he’d scrawled an address. Somewhere in New Mexico. “Nope, he did nothing of the sort. Noreen Eckhardt did disappear from Willow Falls sometime in the early seventies, but she lives in Santa Fe now. Definitely breathing.”

“Disappeared?”

“That might be overstating it. Left? Got outta Dodge?”

“She just left him?”

“Looks like it. I couldn’t find any record of divorce.”

“So he’s still married?”

“It’s not uncommon.”

“Oh. Yeah. I guess you’re right.”

“You sound disappointed.”

It was my turn to laugh. “No, I just thought the story would be more interesting.”

“You don’t know the story,” Sean said. “It might be very interesting.”

I wondered if I would ever hear it. Would it change my impression of Mr. Eckhardt or reinforce it? “Thanks for looking into it.”

“All part of the job.”

Silence. The kind that felt like it could preface something important.

Sean took a deep breath. “I didn’t just come over to discuss Mr. Eckhardt’s failed love life. I felt an overwhelming need to see your garden.”

“That sounds slightly inappropriate.”

That got a laugh. “Seriously. It’s peaceful, and my night was anything but. Can we go sit out there for a while?”

“Could you give me a minute to freshen up?”

“You look fine.”

I shrugged. “Okay. Let me grab you a cup of coffee first.”

“Paige,” he said, taking my hand. “I just want to see the garden. You don’t need to keep adding things to keep me interested. I am interested.”

“Okay,” I managed. Interest. I’d forgotten what it felt like to be on the receiving end of that. The scrutiny was uncomfortable and wonderful all at the same time. How much did he see? Just the surface or down deep? I’d never been someone to allow too much emotion to reach the surface, but the past two years had painfully carved new pathways through my brain and heart.

That gave me pause. The unfairness of it all.

Jesse’s death was making me a better person. As he’d done throughout our life together, he was still making sacrifices on my behalf. Sean would get a different Paige—slightly more empathetic, definitely more relaxed and open, and possibly more likeable. It just wasn’t fair.

We walked outside, and the morning sun caught the red in Sean’s hair, and I thought, I could get used to looking at that. He inhaled deeply and took in my haphazard mix of plants, all barely contained in their spaces, growing with an untamed wildness I’d come to truly appreciate.

“I like it out here,” was all he said. “Sometimes I feel like the older I get, the more I chase down moments like these.”

“Peaceful ones?”

“I guess that’s it,” he said with a slight shrug. “Growing up, I was the youngest of eight. My house was loud. My parents yelled all the time. If we wanted to be heard, we had to shriek above the rest. Do you have siblings?”

“I was an only child,” I said quietly. “My mom wasn’t equipped to have me, much less anyone else.”

Sean took my hand in his. “That sounds like a sad story. I see a lot of those, even in Willow Falls.”

“And how do you handle the sad stories?” I got flashes of my mom, cops at the door, my grandmother crying, bruises on my legs and arms, screaming, dirty fingernails, and blood. It wasn’t a way any child should grow up, and I was glad for a moment that Trey’s biggest problem, save losing his father, was getting up the courage to get behind the wheel of a car.

“I try to be kind,” he said after a moment. “But firm. Given the way I grew up, I’m pretty good at defusing problematic situations.”

I thought of how he’d handled Mr. Eckhardt’s fury. He was firm, but also respectful and even-keeled. “I can see that. You’re very good at what you do.”

The compliment made him obviously uncomfortable, and he shifted away, losing himself to the garden again.

“What does this mean to you, Paige? Have you worked it out yet, or are you acting on instinct?”

I wasn’t sure if he was talking about the garden or our possible coupledom. I decided my answer would be the same. “If I say instinct, would you think less of it? Of me?”

“Of course not. Some of the best choices in my life I made not because I carefully thought through the potential outcomes but because I trusted my gut. It’s okay to do that when that small part of your brain that you trust implicitly tells you to go for it.” He turned to me, the intensity in his eyes telling me what was coming. He put one strong hand on my shoulder, gave me a moment to stop him, and when I didn’t, leaned over and touched his lips to mine.

He moved slowly, conscious of my shyness. Jesse’s kiss had been the kiss of long-term love, of familiarity, of confidence in the future, of a comfort born of many years together. Sean’s touch was unfamiliar and . . . different. The differences kept me from telling him to stop. The strangeness of it offset some of the guilt. But then I thought about what Trey would think, and potential disappointment if it didn’t work out, and the sheer terror if it did. I could lose someone again. I could be left alone. I could— And then I heard Jesse’s voice in my head. He told me that it was okay to be new with someone and that growth was the natural by-product of change. He said I shouldn’t fight it or taint it with guilt or wish I’d been more like this new self with him, because it would discount the beauty of what we’d had. He said I should be open not only to life but also to love.