Wind Chime Wedding (A Wind Chime Novel Book 2) (11 page)

Until Hayden had come along.

Her miracle child. The child she had given up hope of having so many years before. The child who, if he had come along earlier, would have been all his parents had needed.

Instead, they’d resorted to adoption. And they’d gotten Colin. Because power couples like Nick Foley and Lydia Vanzant needed at least one child to soften their image, to gain the respect of other hardworking mothers and fathers, to tap into those deep-rooted family values that lived in the hearts of so many U.S. voters.

The memories reached up through the floorboards, cold fingers of loneliness and bitter resentments. He tried to force them back, pushing them into the dark corner all SEALs saved for thoughts that no longer served them. He hadn’t come here to relive that time in his life, to remember how alone and unwanted he had once felt. It had been here, in this house, when he’d learned—for the first time, but certainly not the last—how easily he could be cast aside.

He had tried everything to win his mother’s love back after Hayden came along: getting straight A’s at school, excelling at every sport, joining all the clubs she encouraged him to, eventually getting accepted at the same Ivy League college she’d attended herself. But it had all been in vain.

The day Hayden had been born, he had ceased to exist in his mother’s eyes.

Turning his back on the woman who still stood in the doorway, he spotted the laptop sitting on the writing desk beneath the wide window overlooking the backyard. A single spreadsheet covered in numbers was open on the screen and the words, “Consolidation,” “Renovation,” and “Demolition” stood out in bold block letters at the top of the columns—words that could only have to do with one thing.

“I know you’re still angry with me, but if you need someone to attack, take it out on me,” Colin said. “Don’t take it out on Dad.”

“He asked for this.”

Colin turned. “How?”

“You think I don’t still have friends in his office? You think I don’t know about his decision to move funds allocated for education into a jobs program for veterans?”

Colin cursed under his breath. “I know you didn’t agree with the war, and you’re entitled to that opinion. But spending money on going to war and taking care of the men and women who served in it when they come home are two very different things. You can’t be against helping the people who fought for your freedom.”

“They should never have been over there in the first place.”

Colin struggled to control his temper. “The people who went overseas volunteered to go. They
wanted
to go. You can’t punish them for that. If Hayden was here, if
he
was the one standing here, asking you to support his friends when they came back home, you would be the one in Dad’s office right now, fighting to move funds from every other program in this state to help veterans.”

Grief and anger flashed through Lydia’s eyes. “But Hayden’s not here, is he? He’ll never be standing here. Because of you.”

Colin took a step toward her. “Hayden’s death was not my fault.”

“You knew he would follow in your footsteps,” Lydia accused. “He idolized you.”

“Hayden was eighteen when he enlisted.” Colin’s fingers curled into fists at his sides. “He was capable of making his own decisions.”

“You encouraged him.”

He hadn’t, Colin thought. He had tried to talk him out of it. But what was the point in arguing about it now? Hayden was gone and nothing either of them could say or do would ever bring him back.

“Sometimes,” Colin said, meeting his mother’s gaze across the room. “I think you wish I’d died instead of Hayden.”

“You’re right,” she said, opening the door. “I do.”

Curled up on
the sofa in her living room, Becca stared at the blank sheet of paper in her lap. It shouldn’t be this hard, she thought. All she needed were a few sentences, a few simple phrases that captured her feelings. She didn’t want to be overly gushy or use fancy flowery prose. Not when she had to say the words out loud, in front of over a hundred and fifty people.

She shuddered. How had she let this wedding get so big?

All she’d ever wanted was something simple, quiet, just family and a few close friends. She would have been perfectly happy to wake up on a pretty weekend morning, put on her mother’s wedding dress, walk across the street to Magnolia Harbor, have one of the boat captains marry her and Tom, and head over to the café for a celebratory lunch.

But once the planning had started, and Tom had begun adding people, the guest list had taken on a life of its own. At this rate, close to half of Tom’s law firm would be showing up.

Maybe that was why she was having so much trouble writing her vows.

It wasn’t a fear of public speaking. She’d gotten over her shyness of talking in front of large groups of people a long time ago. But she was used to talking to students, parents, and other teachers. She was used to talking about the curriculum, teaching methods, and plans for the next school year.

She was
not
used to talking about her feelings. She had never been very good at talking about her feelings, even with her closest friends, let alone in front of a crowd of people, many of whom she didn’t even know.

But it had been her idea that she and Tom write their own vows. It seemed so much more personal to say what was in your own heart rather than recite the canned script everyone else used.

Pressing the tip of her pen back to the paper, she scrawled, “Tom, I love you. I’ve loved you since we were sixteen. I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with you, to give you children, to grow old with you. I can’t wait for our lives together to finally begin.”

That was it, right?

That was all she had to say.

Simple. Honest. True.

A tug of uneasiness nagged at her as she reread the words. Something still felt off. Something…she couldn’t put her finger on.

A knock on her door had her pushing the notebook aside. “Come in,” she called, relieved by the interruption. It was probably her father, wanting to borrow some laundry detergent or coffee for the morning. Or maybe one of her students. She had told Luke to come over if he ever needed anything.

When whoever it was didn’t just walk in, as most of her friends and neighbors would without a second thought, she stood and crossed the room to the door, opening it. The last thing she expected was to find the man who’d been invading her every thought for the past few days filling her doorway.

“Colin,” she said, surprised. “Hi.” Glancing down at the oversized flannel shirt she was wearing over a thin tank top and cut off shorts, she quickly wrapped the plaid material around her midsection. “I wasn’t expecting company.”

“I should have called first.” His voice was low and deep. It rumbled through the quiet neighborhood streets.

“No. It’s fine. You didn’t need to call. My door is always open.” She stepped back, motioning for him to come in.

He walked inside, his gaze sweeping around her cluttered living room filled with wedding projects and packing boxes. Becca closed the door behind him, feeling suddenly self-conscious. Colin had never been to her house before. She imagined what it must look like through his eyes: the student artwork hanging on the walls, the antique knickknacks on the bookshelves, the hand-me-down furniture and mismatched lamps, the woven rugs covering worn wooden floorboards that squeaked when you stepped on them.

To her, everything about this house was cozy, comforting, familiar.

But she and Colin had come from very different backgrounds.

“I’m sorry about the mess.” Gathering up an armful of magazines from the seat of the leather chair across from the sofa, she gestured for him to sit.

He walked over to the chair, resting his hands on the back, but he didn’t sit.

Becca paused, noticing his tense expression for the first time. “Is everything all right?”

“No.”

Her brows drew together at the hard edge in his voice. The sun had set and dusk was settling over the island. Even with a few of the table lamps burning, the lighting was dim, making his features appear harder, his eyes an even deeper shade of blue.

She waited, watching him as the silence stretched on. She had never seen him like this before. He was usually so calm, so lighthearted, so quick to fill the silence with a question or a casually flirtatious comment. She could sense the restless energy rippling off him now, the anger simmering beneath the surface.

“I’m afraid I have some bad news,” he said finally.

Becca picked up the notebook she’d been using to work on her vows, quietly closing it and setting it on the table between them.

Colin’s hands tightened around the back of the chair. “The complication with the school I mentioned the other day might be a bigger problem than we thought.”

“It is…Lydia?” Becca asked.

He gazed back at her, obviously surprised that she knew.

“Shelley told me,” Becca explained. “She thinks your mother’s offering her services as a consultant to get back at your father.”

“She’s right.”

Becca’s heart sank. She had been hoping all day that Shelley had been wrong, or at least, if she hadn’t been, that Colin would be able to appeal to his mother on their behalf. The fact that he was here, in her house, bearing bad news, meant that he must not think he had any sway over her. “Are you close with your mother?”

“No.”

Maybe that was why he was so upset, Becca thought. “When was the last time you saw her?”

“A few hours ago.”

“I thought you said you weren’t close.”

“We’re not.” His gaze drifted over to the window. “I went to her house this afternoon for the first time…in a long time. I thought I might be able to reason with her.”

“It didn’t go well?” Becca ventured.

He shook his head.

She wished he would sit down. She wished he would tell her what was wrong. She couldn’t stand to see him like this. “Why aren’t you and your mother close?”

He looked away, saying nothing.

Unable to stop herself, she walked out from behind the coffee table and placed a hand on his arm, pulling him toward the chair. “Colin, please sit down. Talk to me.”

He didn’t move, but he did look at her. Becca’s breath caught when she saw the raw emotions in his eyes—grief, anger, pain. She could feel the warmth of his skin pulsing beneath her palm, a sharp contrast to those cool blue eyes and that calm exterior she had never seen a single crack in until now. The muscles in his arm flexed under her fingers, hard knots of tension, coiled, ready to spring.

Colin looked down, at where her fingers still rested on his arm, then back at her face. A new emotion swam into his eyes, a darker emotion, and his gaze flickered briefly down to her mouth.

Becca dropped her hand away from his arm, taking a step back. “I-I think I’ll make some tea. Or…coffee. Would you prefer coffee? Or something else? I don’t have any beer in the house, but I might have some sodas in the fridge…”

“Coffee’s fine.”

Coffee, Becca thought, walking quickly into the kitchen. Coffee would be good. She pulled the beans out of the freezer and padded across the floor in her bare feet to the coffee maker. She needed something to do with her hands, something to keep herself from touching him again.

Colin followed her into the kitchen. She was aware of him watching her as she ground the beans, filled the carafe with water, and fiddled with the buttons on the machine to adjust the settings. She tried not to notice the way her skin heated as his eyes tracked her across the kitchen.

Pressing the start button on the coffee maker, she turned to face him. “Is your father rethinking his offer to help us?”

Colin nodded. “He’s concerned that it will distract from the other issues in the campaign.”

Becca thought back to what Shelley had said earlier that day:
‘I think we should both be prepared for the fact that we might not win this battle. Our chances were never very good. Now, I think they might be even worse.’

“If your father isn’t going to make those calls to the board members, then there’s no reason Shelley should postpone her announcement until Friday.”