Hearts Divided (Cedar Cove #5.5)(72)

“Wrong?”

“Yes.” It was so clear to her. How could it not be to him? But it obviously wasn’t. A new darkness shadowed his eyes. It looked like sadness, she thought. Loneliness. He didn’t agree with what she was saying. And yet, it seemed, he wasn’t going to argue the point. Maybe, if she quit arguing, he’d explain. “Why would he hide what he was feeling?”

“Because he loves her. He wants to protect her, Elizabeth. Her—and them. The love they share.”

“You’re saying he did something in combat that would make her love him less—or stop loving him at all? Because if so, I don’t believe it. Granddad would never, ever, have committed the kind of atrocity that…Never.”

“You’re right,” Nick said. “He wouldn’t have. He’d have died first. You know that. I know that. And he trusts that your grandmother will know it, too. War can’t change a man like Charles MacKenzie, Elizabeth. Not even war can do that.”

Elizabeth heard in Nick’s voice the same emotion she’d heard in Granddad’s when he spoke of Nick. She couldn’t define it. But it was solemn. Important. And very deep. Gram had said the two were alike. And close, Elizabeth realized. Bonded in some special—reverent—way. Maybe Granddad had told Nick about the letters, what he’d shared and hadn’t shared with Clara…and why. Or maybe Nick was only guessing.

Either way, Nick seemed to know.

“You’re not going to find any premeditated betrayal here.”

Nick gestured toward the letters as he spoke. Here referred, of course, to what Charles had written to his love. And yet, for a crazy unsettling moment, it felt as if here—where there was no betrayal—was anyplace she happened to be. With Nick.

“No betrayal,” she murmured. “But you said Granddad wants to protect Gram. And them.”

“He needs to believe that the world he knew before he went to war still exists. That’s the world he’s fighting for, where a girl climbs down a tree to meet the boy she loves, and you don’t have to strain to hear an owl above the sounds of mortar and the cries of wounded men. That’s why he’s fighting, Elizabeth, to protect that innocence, that ideal.”

“So when he writes about Gram being beside him, he’s not bringing her to war with him.”

“No,” Nick said softly, “he’s going home.”

Home felt like here. Crazy. Except, in his blue-gray eyes, the sadness—and the loneliness—were gone.

What filled the void was so unsettling, in a giddy, glorious way, that she turned from him…and started babbling.

“Maybe we should look at your color schemes. Not that I’m going to make any suggestions. In fact, don’t let me. I’d never have come up with the choices you made for Gram’s kitchen, and they’re wonderful…”

“She’s going to love these.” Elizabeth’s assertion, made thirty minutes later, was a grateful one. “The colors you’ve chosen are so cheerful. Just walking from room to room will make her smile.”

“I hope so,” Nick said. “Assuming she can see them.”

“She’s having trouble with her vision?” Elizabeth frowned. “She didn’t say anything about it.”

“I’m not so sure she would, even if she knew.”

He was right, of course. Gram wasn’t one to complain. “She doesn’t know?”

“She’s aware that her vision isn’t what it used to be. But if it’s what I think it is—cataracts—the impairment has come on so gradually she’s adapted to the changes without realizing how significant they are.”

“But you think they’re significant.”

“Very, and probably have been for a while. But because she has adapted, it’s only been three weeks since I first began to wonder.”

“What made you wonder?”

“Because of what happened when she looked at the sky on a crystal-clear night. She grabbed my arm and pointed to the moon. She was alarmed by what she saw, didn’t know what it was. I thought she was confused. But as I was deciding how to suggest that to her, she began to describe what she was seeing. An immense sphere of light, she said, bright and glaring. A UFO, she thought, and was stunned I wasn’t remarking on it, too. When I told her all I saw was the moon, she tilted her head, changing the angle of the incoming light and, with a laugh, chalked it up to her eyes playing tricks on her.”

“But it wasn’t.”

“No. I did a little reading online and began to notice other things. Her reaction to oncoming headlights, for instance. She squints at them and, sometimes, she even recoils.”

“I didn’t think she drove at night.”

“She doesn’t, and hasn’t for a while. But she’s been a passenger in my truck. I’ve made a point of being a passenger in her car, too, during the day. She’s okay if the ambient light is good and it’s a familiar route. She’s a careful driver. Cautious.”

“But if her overall vision is significantly impaired…What else have you noticed?”

“She doesn’t read the way she used to. Not for pleasure.”

“Or,” Elizabeth said, “maintain what was once a daily e-mail correspondence with Winifred.”