Chasing Second Chances (13 page)

At his words, Kate suddenly remembered something she was still hiding something from him and wanting to be just as honest with him as he had been with her, no matter how difficult it was, she turned towards him, looking into his eyes. “Speaking of secrets, I have something to tell you.”

“I already know you were married once,” he said jokingly.

She grinned, then put on a serious expression. “I lied about the note.”

“What note?” he asked, eyebrows creased.

“The note I said had Evelyn’s name on it.”

“Oh. Then, how did you find about her?”

She took a deep breath. “Lloyd told me.”

“Lloyd?” He looked even more confused.

“Lloyd had someone investigate you,” she explained. “I think it was because he suspected that you might have a hand in kidnapping Lena and Jack.”

“He did?” Bryan frowned.

She paused, hesitating to tell him the rest of the story, but told herself he deserved to hear the whole truth. “There’s more.”

He looked at her expectantly.

“For a while, I suspected you, too,” she confessed, then added quickly, “But only because Lt. Paulson said a prescription drug was found in Charlene’s system and that Charlene’s jacket had the initials E. R. on them. I had no clue who Evelyn Rocher was—Lloyd only dropped the name—and so I started thinking that the two of you were somehow working together. Of course, I know now that I was wrong.” She looked into his eyes. “I should never have suspected you.”

For a moment, he was silent. Then, he shrugged. “I guess it’s just what I deserved for keeping my past a secret from you.”

“Like I said, it’s all behind us now,” she said, stroking his cheek. “From now on, there’ll be no more secrets between us.”

“No more secrets,” he agreed.

She snuggled into the crook of his shoulder, smiling. Sure, she had been through hell this past week, but at least, something good had come out of it, her relationship with Bryan stronger than ever. Now, if only she could get her children back, her life would be perfect.

“Don’t worry, Kate.” He hugged her, sensing her worry. “We’ll find them.”

She nodded but said nothing, the combination of the feelings of contentment and exhaustion making her feel suddenly sleepy. She closed her eyes, listening to the sound of his breathing and before she knew it, she fell asleep.

Chapter Seventeen

When Kate woke up, it was already dark and Bryan was gone. She did not realize his absence at first, the wonderful dream she just had keeping her in a haze even after she had opened her eyes. Only when its vestiges faded did she turn to her side, finding a note on Bryan’s pillow.

It read:

I’m so sorry to leave you. I was thinking of waking you up but you were sleeping so soundly. I got a call about a patient. It’s an emergency so I have to go but I’ll make it up to you when I get back.

Love you.

Kate frowned. She knew there was nothing she could do about it, though, and so she decided not to let it get her down. Instead, she recalled what had happened before she had fallen asleep, smiling at how her relationship with Bryan had progressed, and at the fact that there were no more secrets between them, something she knew few couples could claim.

But are there really no more secrets between you?
A voice seemed to speak out of nowhere.
Are you sure you’re not hiding anything more from him?

Unable to answer ‘yes’, she frowned again.

Right. There was still one more thing—the fact that she had kissed Lloyd back in Rapid City.

As she fixed up the mess she had made in Bryan’s apartment, she pondered if she should tell him about that small incident.

Small?

Yes, it was small, she told herself, insignificant even. In fact, it was something she had already forgotten, which was why she had not brought it up a while ago. After all, it was something that never should have happened, something she had not meant to happen.

But it did happen and so Bryan has the right to know about it.

Kate sighed. Why did that voice inside of her have to be right?

Yes, Bryan had to know if she was going to be true to her word, true to him. But if she did tell him, would he still trust her? Wouldn’t telling him only break the newfound trust they now had in each other?

He could just let it go. After all, you let his past with Evelyn Rocher go.

She highly doubted that. Evelyn, after all, was in the past. She was dead. Furthermore, Bryan had been with her long before he and Kate got together. On the other hand, Lloyd was very much alive, and the kiss she had shared with him had occurred while she was already with Bryan.

Bryan had kept his past with Evelyn a secret but the secret itself was no crime. She could not say the same for her own.

So you won’t tell him?

She thought about it some more. If she told Bryan, he would get hurt and their relationship would never be the same again. But if she didn’t tell him, she knew she would keep hurting inside. Besides, there was no guarantee he would never find out and when he eventually did, he would get even more hurt.

You have to tell him. You have to tell him even if he’ll get hurt, even if there’s a chance he’ll get angry and leave…

“All right, all right. I get it,” Kate spoke out loud, sighing. “Just shut up already.”

Even as she silenced the voice inside her, she knew she had to tell Bryan all about what had happened in Rapid City when he returned, and reluctantly, she decided she would. As much as she dreaded it, it was the right thing to do, the sooner the better.

She only hoped it would also be for the best.

* * * *

Trying to be optimistic, Kate finished cleaning up Bryan’s apartment and by the time she was done, it was already past eight and she was hungry. As she waited for a cab, she briefly wondered if she should pass by a restaurant and take out some food since she was too tired to cook but thinking that she still had some leftover pasta from the previous night that she could reheat and wanting to take a shower already, she went straight home.

The moment she stepped out of the cab and saw Lloyd’s BMW in the driveway, she regretted her decision. She had not expected Lloyd to be back home yet, though she supposed she should have expected it. More importantly, she did not want to talk to Lloyd, not after the last conversation they had over the phone and not right now when he was the cause of all her unease, and she was pretty sure a dialogue was inevitable if she stepped into the kitchen.

She sighed.

Oh well, there was no turning back now. She had made the wrong decision and she would simply have to live with the consequences.

Squaring her shoulders, she entered the house and as soon as she did, she caught a whiff of something tasty—something that smelled like soy and butter. And was that apple pie?

“Oh, good. You’re back.” Lloyd suddenly appeared from the kitchen, wearing her frilly, polka dot black and pink apron on top of his shirt and jeans, which now had a small brown splatter, and with one of her mitts covering his right hand. “I was beginning to think I would have to eat everything I cooked all by myself.”

She had meant to ignore him or to put on a disgruntled expression and avoid eye contact if ever they came face to face, but at the sight of him in her apron, the most laidback and ridiculous she had probably ever seen of him, she could not help but simply stare at him, eyes wide and lips slightly parted in surprise.

“You can cook?” she asked after a moment’s pause, that fact as surprising to her as the sight of him in an apron.

“I’ve managed to learn,” he admitted. “Would you care to try what I’ve prepared?”

“As long as it’s edible,” she found herself saying.

He grinned, then went to the dining table to pull out a chair for her. “Please wait a moment.”

Reluctantly, she sat down and after a minute, he came out of the kitchen with two plates. Just as she had suspected, he had prepared soy-braised chicken with buttered steamed vegetables, which not only looked edible but delicious, the sight of them nearly making her mouth water.

“I think they look edible enough,” he said as he took off the apron and sat across her. “And if they don’t, I can assure you that they taste better than they look.”

She said nothing, picking up her utensils so she could try the food. After the first two bites, she paused, unable to believe how good they tasted.

“Well?” Lloyd asked.

“They’re quite good,” she told him honestly after swallowing.

He smiled. “I’m glad you think so.”

“I’m just curious, though. Why?”

He looked at her. “Why I decided to learn how to cook or why I cooked dinner?”

“Both, I guess.” She took another mouthful.

“I decided to learn how to cook because I got tired of restaurant food,” he answered. “After we got divorced, I didn’t have anyone to cook for me except the cooks at the restaurant on the first floor of the apartment building and I got tired of their cooking after a while. Besides, I’d been wanting to try my hand at cooking for some time, and so I decided to finally take advantage of the opportunity.”

“You’d been wanting to learn how to cook?” she asked, surprised.

He nodded. “Even before we were married, but I guess I didn’t have the time and then we got married and you did all the cooking.”

She frowned. “You make it sound like I was a tyrant in the kitchen. You could have volunteered to cook, you know. I would have appreciated it.”

“I guess I was afraid to fail, too. I wanted you to keep thinking I was perfect, after all.”

She snorted.

“When I started cooking for myself, I wasn’t really too concerned about failing,” he went on. “So maybe that allowed me to learn more quickly.”

 “Maybe,” she agreed. “So you didn’t take any lessons? I’m sure you could have afforded getting private lessons from some famous chef.”

“I read up on the basics, bought some cookbooks for beginners. Then, as I cooked, I checked the net whenever I had questions, and I eventually learned,” he said. “I suppose that just goes to show that any human being can cook. It isn’t a talent, but more of instinct. We just have to harness it, hone it.”

“Wow, you sound like you’ve been cooking forever.”

He grinned. “As for why I cooked tonight, I decided I’d do it as a way of apologizing to you. I acted…spoke like a jerk on the phone and I upset you. That wasn’t my intention.”

She kept silent, not having expected the apology. So far, he had thrown her one surprise after another.

“I should never have tried to meddle with your relationship with Bryan. I should never even have asked someone to investigate him in the first place. As you said, I allowed my jealousy to cloud my thinking and I apologize. From now on, I’ll trust him as long as you trust him.”

Again, she said nothing, not knowing what to say.

“And as for me being jealous,” he continued. “I suppose that can’t be helped, but I’ve decided I’ll try to control it as much as possible and I won’t try to make advances at you anymore, or make any attempt to win you back. I realize I’ve been putting you in a difficult situation in the middle of an even more difficult one, and I don’t want to do that anymore. It was wrong of me to barge into your life and think that I still have a right to be in it. I still love you, Kate, but clearly I’ve lost my chance and so I’ve decided to let you go, to let you be happy.”

She looked at him in surprise, then down at her plate as she waited for the words to sink in and tried to sort out her thoughts. She should have been relieved, happy even that her life was going to be less complicated, that part of it was going back to the way it used to be. Why then, did she feel sad, disappointed?

You should just be grateful, Kate.

She met his gaze. “Thank you, Lloyd. It means a lot.”

He smiled at her. “So I take it my apology has been accepted?”

She, too, smiled, the fact that most of the sadness she had seen in his eyes earlier had disappeared making her heart feel less heavy. “Only if your apple pie tastes good.”

He chuckled as he got up from his chair. “Well, let’s see, shall we?”

He left for the kitchen and she sat, finishing her food quietly. She still felt a little sad, perhaps because she knew he didn’t really want to let her go, or because there was a selfish part of her that didn’t want him to. She knew, however, that what he did was right. He had chosen to respect her relationship with Bryan and so she should simply accept his decision and be happy with it just as he wanted her to be.

And she was happy.

She loved Bryan. There was no question about that. And now that Lloyd had decided to leave her alone, she was beginning to think there was no need to tell Bryan about the kiss she had shared with Lloyd. Lloyd was no longer a threat to them, after all, and so it made less sense for her to create a dent in what she and Bryan had built today. What was not broken, not even at the brink of breaking, did not need to be fixed.

You should still tell Bryan, you know.

“Oh, shut up,” she whispered. While that was probably true, there was no need to tell Bryan now. Perhaps someday, she would, but not now. Now, she would simply welcome the gifts she had been given – the gift of learning more about Bryan and feeling closer to him, and the gift of Lloyd letting her go so she could find happiness with the man she was currently with – and focus on finding her children.

Indeed, that was the only thing she should worry about.