In a Book Club Far Away(59)
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Sophie
Adelaide had been right; Sophie had been saved by His at Night. As it was Sophie’s first romance novel, she hadn’t been sure how to approach it. She usually lifted her books to eye level when she read, but on her flight to Nassau, she’d kept the suggestive cover out of sight of the other passengers, especially while cramped in the middle seat.
But when she cracked the spine and read the first chapter, she was thrown right into its historical world despite her skepticism.
And damn, did that book take her out of her funk. It eased her worry as the miles between her and her daughters increased. She loved that she was able to hold the book with one hand and flip its pages with a thumb while she ate her peanuts.
She finished the book the first night she arrived in her father’s home, just in time to deal with her cousin and the death of a man she’d been estranged from. She felt entrenched in two worlds: Victorian England, where Lord Vere and Ellisande Edgerton of His at Night found their way to each other, and sunny, breezy Nassau, where she had to face strangers who were also family.
But just as Vere and Edgerton had to fake it to make it, Sophie did, too. For four days, she girded herself against the puzzled looks, the judgment, and the impending grief that would take her years to process, because it wasn’t going to happen in Nassau, where she couldn’t let her guard and emotions down. For four tortured days, only made better by her phone calls back to Millersville and a reread of the book, it became undeniable that family was born not of DNA but of connection and loyal love.
At her layover stop in Orlando, Sophie hit pay dirt after scouring through three different airport bookstores—she found one that had a shelf of romances. She didn’t read any of the back covers, but simply took a copy of each and stuffed them in every crevice of her carry-on. The tail end of deployment was still up ahead; the maddening wait was like senioritis in high school and college, but magnified to the nth degree. She would need all the love to pad her heart.
Her first night back, Sophie’s girls tutted and crawled all over her; they even checked in on her while she was in the shower. Travel exhaustion had settled in by the time her girls finally succumbed to slumber. It was glorious then, the silence. She hadn’t had any for at least a week. To sit there and do nothing—hear nothing but the hum of the light bulbs in her kitchen—was a sublime kind of luxury.
Until she couldn’t stand it anymore.
Sophie never could just sit.
So she cleaned her kitchen, though it was already immaculate—Adelaide and Regina had done everything perfectly and correctly. Still, the act of tidying calmed her nerves, so she wiped down her kitchen counters and cleaned out the fridge. She swept the linoleum and spot-cleaned her cabinets. And since it was almost the end of the month, she went to the computer to pull up her Excel spreadsheet of the bills that needed to be paid.
Her email was already opened, the in-box holding one new message. From Jasper.
Their emails had continued while she was in Nassau, and there, she’d clutched on to them like a life preserver in rough waters. Jasper understood the whole story; he had seen her attempt to deal with her family, from the guilt of being out of touch with them to the freedom resulting from the separation. And Jasper came through the best way he could. He’d encouraged her, emboldened her, become a true, real-life conscience as she muddled through her trip.
Sophie’s love for him had grown a hundredfold in four days.
And yet.
Her tummy turned with a tinge of sadness. Because now that the waters were still, she wished that the life preserver had been a rescue boat. She wished he had been there for her, physically by her side, throughout the entire ordeal.
It was no fault of his own—she knew this. Their love had been tested and proven like a diamond out of the rough—she knew this, too.
And yet.
Sophie clicked on the email to a three-line note.
Soph—
Lots of drama over here. Coming home with the advance party to take care of it. More later.
Glad you’re home. Love you.
—J
She sat up in her chair. Jasper was coming home, and early! Sophie looked left and right, around her living room, the redeployment list materializing in her head. She’d need to hit the grocery store for his favorite food, the Walmart for decorations, and… “Shit. I need a pedicure.”
But the rest of the email sank in.
Drama?
The mere mention of drama meant that there was an overwhelming amount of it.
And invariably, it had to involve someone they both knew.
Sophie shot off a quick email back and pushed down all her mixed feelings. There was a new timeline at hand, a new end date, and that took precedence.
Her baby was coming home.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Regina
“Who knew that redeployment would be so high-maintenance?” Regina said while on her back on a salon reclining chair at Total Spa Care at the Millersville mall. Above her was Janis Northrop, also a book clubber, though at the moment she was in full work mode as an esthetician.
“At least you get your man home early.” Janis applied warm wax to the undersides of Regina’s eyebrows. “And you got a quick salon appointment. In a couple of weeks, you wouldn’t have been as lucky to get an appointment anywhere near Fort Fairfax.”