Angels at the Table (Angels Everywhere #7)(38)

It was after eleven and Aren was watching TV when his doorbell chimed. His first thought was that it might be Lucie, but after checking the peephole he saw it wasn’t.

Opening the door, he found Josie standing there, pale and obviously upset. “Hey, what’s up?”

She ignored the question. “Can I come in for a minute?”

“Of course.” He ushered his sister inside and closed the door after her.

Josie collapsed onto his sofa and then sat on the very edge of the cushion. Reaching for a wadded-up tissue, she focused her attention on shredding it into small pieces.

“That must have been one heck of a movie,” he said, aiming for a comical slant.

“I … I didn’t go.”

“Why not?”

Instead of answering, she scrambled through her purse for a fresh tissue and then dabbed at the corner of each eye before blowing her nose. She sat up straighter and then squared her shoulders. “Guess who I ran into?” she asked, in a flippant tone.

“I’m guessing it wasn’t Santa and his elves.”

Her eyes narrowed as she glared at him. “No. I ran into Jack. Thankfully, I don’t think he saw me.”

“Jack who?”

“You’re not being funny, Aren. This isn’t a time for jokes. Can’t you see I’m upset?”

“All right, all right, sorry. So you saw Jack.”

“He wasn’t alone,” she added. By now her spine was as stiff as a mop handle. Pride, it appeared, was great for proper posture.

“Jack was with another woman?” Oh, that must have hurt.

Josie nodded and, relaxing her shoulders, reached for a fresh tissue. “Jack and this other woman were laughing and teasing each other, having the time of their lives. And here I was by myself, standing in line for a movie ticket.”

“Oh, Josie, I’m so sorry.” Aren wished now that he had gone with her, if for no other reason than moral support.

“I feel like such a loser.”

Aren sat down next to her and gave her arm a gentle squeeze. “You know that’s not true.”

“Maybe so, but that’s the way I felt. Here I am lonely and miserable and Jack—”

“And Jack has gotten on with his life.” Aren finished for her.

Josie made a weak effort to laugh. “Big time.”

“Was she pretty?”

His sister slammed him with a look that would have melted kryptonite. “What do you think?”

“Drop-dead gorgeous,” he muttered. Aren knew the feeling. Katie’s lover was a bodybuilder with muscles—speaking of kryptonite—Superman would have envied. The strongest muscles in Aren’s body were in his fingers from all the typing and texting. Compared to the man Katie dumped him for, Aren felt like the ninety-eight-pound weakling.

“I’m sorry, sis.” He did commiserate with her. “Can I get you anything?”

Josie raised her head. “What have you got?”

Unfortunately Aren had never been much of a drinker, so he didn’t keep alcohol in the apartment. “Beer, I think. If I had chocolate I’d offer that.”

“I don’t know, Aren. The way I feel right now there aren’t enough chocolate chip cookies in the world to get me through this.”

“So you still love him?” Actually the answer was fairly obvious, at least to him.

From the way she hesitated Aren could see that she held strong feelings for Jack, although she was reluctant to admit it. “I think I must. I thought I’d be able to put him out of my mind, but I was wrong.”

“Have you thought about contacting him?” That seemed an obvious solution to Aren.

Josie stared down at her hands and the crumbled tissues there. “Actually, I almost did tonight … right before I called you. That would have been a real hoot, wouldn’t it? Jack would have gotten a kick out of that, now that he’s dating Miss Universe.”

“Stop. You’re no slouch, Josie. You’re smart and attractive and well educated and—”

“Sure,” she scoffed, “you’d say that, seeing that we swam out of the same gene pool.”

Aren laughed. “I mean it. The way I see it, you’ve got two choices: you could either attempt to patch things up with Jack, or you could get on with your own life. The choice is yours.”

“Well, I’m not going to chase after Jack, that’s for sure.”

“Then you don’t love him. You simply don’t want him to find anyone else. You want him to pine after you the rest of his life.”

Her gaze shot to his and for a second she looked stricken by his comment. “That’s not the least bit true. I do care.”

“No, you don’t, especially if you’re willing to walk away.”

“He’s found someone else,” Josie argued.

“You don’t know that for sure,” he countered just as swiftly. “And if he did, so what? You care, too.”

“So what? Clearly you don’t understand the situation. I saw Jack with her and I can tell you right now, he wasn’t thinking about me the way I have been thinking about him.”

Aren figured they could argue about this all night and it wouldn’t do any good.

“All I’m saying, sis, is that if you have such strong feelings then let him know. If you don’t, then let it go. Do what you can to learn from the experience and walk away.”