The Husband Hour(37)

“My parents were married for twenty-two years,” Emerson said. “Till death did they part, as promised in their vows.”

Lauren nodded, not sure where this was going.

“Now is the time to ask yourself if you are really prepared to make the same commitment,” he said.

“What? Of course.”

“Lauren, let’s be honest. You can barely handle being a hockey girlfriend. How will you be able to endure being a military wife?”

Lauren, floored, couldn’t think of a thing to say. At that point, Emerson was the only person other than Lauren and Rory who knew that Rory was planning to enlist. Lauren had made Rory promise not to tell anyone else until after their wedding. She didn’t want to worry her parents, didn’t want the specter of it hanging over the day. Lauren hated herself for her weakness, but a part of her wished Rory had also spared her the news until after the wedding. But that didn’t make her a bad person or a bad wife-to-be.

“I know you see yourself as some sort of surrogate father to Rory,” Lauren said, shaking. “But you’re not his father. And I’m going to be his wife. So don’t ever talk to me like that again.”

Emerson shook his head. “Fine. Have it your way. But next time there’s a problem—and we both know there will be—don’t come crying to me.”

Oh, how the damning judgment of Rory’s revered older brother had stung. Maybe on some level, she had taken it to heart. Maybe she hadn’t told Rory about the conversation because she’d been afraid Emerson was right.

Lauren shoved the box deeper in her closet and closed the door. He wasn’t right. Was he? It was so jumbled in her mind, what had happened versus her feelings about what had happened. All these years later, she still couldn’t make sense of it.

Matt Brio wanted the truth about Rory’s life and death. If Lauren was being honest with herself, so did she.

Had he spoken to Emerson? If so, what had her former brother-in-law said?

She paced back and forth, then finally reached for her phone and left Nora a message that she’d be late to work tomorrow.





Chapter Twenty-One



Matt woke to a loud mechanical grinding sound.

He groaned, regretting the last two—make it three—shots at Robert’s. And he hadn’t even managed to see Stephanie. All of the hangover, none of the payoff.

What the hell was that racket? He stumbled out of bed and looked outside. Henny was on the back deck, cutting wood planks with an electric saw. Not an ideal wake-up call, but he was overdue to talk to her anyway. She probably thought he was packing to leave or already gone.

Sure enough, when he unlatched the gate and walked out onto the deck, she was surprised.

“Oh! I thought you’d checked out. I didn’t see your car…”

“A hazard of a night out at Robert’s Place,” he said. “I probably have a hell of a ticket on my car over on Atlantic Avenue.”

“Oh, honey,” she said. “You’d best be getting yourself over there. Do you need a ride?”

“Thanks but I’ll walk over. I could use the exercise.” As his disastrous run yesterday morning had made more than clear. “Oh—I wanted to ask if I could extend my stay if I need to.”

She smiled. “I’d be happy to have you stay longer. It saves me from having to go back on that website. I do hate dealing with the Internet. Facebook? I just don’t get the appeal. Why would I talk to Nora on a website when I can just hop on over to her place?”

“I hear you,” Matt said, looking around at Henny’s work space. She had a professional-looking sander, a table covered with half a dozen paint containers, stencils, and sponges, and a smaller table holding piles of uniformly sized, smooth wooden planks. “So, do you sell these or what?”

“I do,” Henny said, smiling. “Have you been to Nora’s Café? I sell them there. You can buy ’em right off the wall.”

He nodded. “I liked the one about bacon.”

She laughed. “That was just something I said to myself in the kitchen one day. Ain’t no problem bacon can’t cure. That was before I started making the signs. After my husband passed, I was really feeling down. The only time I felt okay was when I went to church and the pastor would say something positive and I’d try to hold on to it. But a day or two later, I was back in a funk. So I started thinking of my own positive messages for myself. I’d write them on Post-its and leave them around the house. And it helped. So I wanted the messages to be more permanent and decorative. That’s when I started making these.”

“Well, they’re great. I might just have to buy one before I leave.”

“Sounds good to me! But don’t rush to go. Like I said, makes my life easier not having to fill the room again.”

Well, at least one person was happy to have him around.

“Oh, we have a visitor,” Henny said, waving to someone. He turned to see Lauren opening the gate.

A surge of hope broke through his hangover. Had something he said yesterday actually gotten through to her?

“I tried calling but you didn’t answer,” Lauren said to Henny. “Sorry to just show up like this. I was hoping to catch Matt before he left.”

“You two know each other?” Henny said, turning to him.