Rosewood Lane (Cedar Cove #2)(27)
“Oh, no.” When she could manage to speak, these were the first words that emerged.
“No?” Jon asked.
“Oh…no.”
“My ego’s taking something of a bruising here. Can’t you do better than that?”
“Jon.” She gave herself a moment to gather her composure. “That was—”
“Pretty damn wonderful if you ask me.”
“Yes…it was.” Maryellen couldn’t begin to explain to him why this was such a mistake.
“I’ve been wanting to do that all evening,” he said in a satisfied tone.
Arms dangling at her sides, Maryellen slumped against her car. It was still hard to breathe, and for some reason, she felt as if she was about to cry. “I think we need to talk.”
“We’ll talk,” Jon promised, kissing her again. She’d been half expecting it, and even though she was prepared this time, his touch devastated her, left her gasping with shock and pleasure.
“Soon,” he said as he eased his lips from hers. “All right?”
“Okay,” she agreed hoarsely, although she couldn’t recall what was going to happen “soon.”
Once secure and inside her car, she placed her hands on the steering wheel. She was trembling so badly she found it impossible to insert the key into the ignition. What had she done? What had she unleashed on them both?
Dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt, Grace started outside to look around the house and garage. She couldn’t delay winterizing her home any longer. Dan had always taken care of such chores; now, for the first time in her marriage, Grace would need to complete these unfamiliar tasks herself.
Thankfully, her son-in-law had stepped in whenever she’d required help. He’d shown her how to change the furnace filter, fixed a leaking faucet and repaired the dryer, but Grace couldn’t continue to rely on Paul, dear as he was. She had to learn to cope with these situations on her own.
The first thing she did was stare at the open garage door. For the last two weeks, the automatic door had refused to budge. Grace had managed to open it manually, but last evening it had stuck in the open position. It needed to be fixed before someone saw it as an invitation to rob her.
Standing in front of the garage, wearing Dan’s oversized gloves, hands on hips, Grace regarded the garage door like a dragon ready to roar down sulfur and fire upon her.
“Get a grip,” she muttered under her breath. “You can do this. You’ve done everything else—you can tackle a garage door, too.” Okay, first she had to find the manual and the necessary tools. Dan was always so proud of his workbench. He had every gadget imaginable. Yet he hadn’t taken a single one with him when he walked away. Like everything else about his disappearance, this baffled her.
Was this other woman so incredible, so amazing, that she provided for his every need? Or did the things that used to matter to him no longer mean anything? He’d left behind his clothes, his tools, even his wedding band. He’d taken nothing more than the clothes on his back.
Grace didn’t know where she’d find the manual. She thought Dan kept his various instruction books in a box somewhere in the garage. She saw a stack of boxes piled beneath the workbench; she slid the top one out. Kneeling on the concrete floor, she opened the lid. Instead of the manual, she found the thick woolen shirt she’d bought him last Christmas. She lifted it and gasped. The shirt had been shredded. It looked as though Dan had taken a pair of scissors to it and systematically cut the fifty-dollar shirt into strips. All that remained intact was the collar and cuffs.
Grace remembered asking Dan about the shirt, remembered him telling her it was his favorite, but she’d never seen him wear it. After a while, it had completely slipped her mind.
Another box revealed a second ugly surprise. Kelly had given Dan a highly touted book on World War II for his birthday. He’d thanked her profusely and said he’d read it. But he hadn’t. Instead it, too, had been destroyed, the pages ripped from the binding. Grace discovered two more boxes of his carnage. It was as though he’d planted them there for her to find. Dan couldn’t have shouted his hate more loudly had he been standing directly in front of her.
Shaken to the core, Grace discarded the boxes in the garbage and sat down on the back porch steps. Her first reaction was anger. How dare he do such a thing. How dare he! Then she felt the overwhelming urge to weep. Tears stung her eyes, but she refused to give in to them. She refused to hand her husband the power to reduce her to a sniveling, spineless weakling.
Buttercup joined her and seemed to sense Grace’s distress.
“What would make him do this?” she asked her golden retriever.
Buttercup looked up at her with big, soulful eyes.
“I don’t know either, girl. I just don’t know.” Needing to hold someone, Grace put her arms around the dog’s neck and buried her face in Buttercup’s fur.
She wasn’t sure how long she sat there, feeling intense anger, regret and simmering emotion. After a while she got to her feet. The garage door wasn’t going to fix itself.
In the process of digging through the neat stack of boxes, she eventually happened upon the manual. She flipped through it and quickly read over the information. The book offered suggestions for troubleshooting, which she studied in detail. Again and again she reminded herself that she could handle this.