Miracle Pie (11 page)

And if he asked so early, she would have to
say no.

Then she might tell him to ask her later,
when they knew each other better.

She turned and led the way inside, holding
the door wide for Happy to scamper in. Katie’s laptop was in the
office that her grandmother had used as a bedroom in her later
years, after her knees got too bad for her to make it to the bigger
bedroom upstairs.

Katie powered up her laptop then moved back
to let Gabe take over.

All this time, neither of them talked.
Anticipation built inside Katie.

When he brought up the video, she sat in her
chair and watched the credits while cheery music opened in the
background with a familiar voice saying pie names to a happy
tune.

“Is that you?” she asked.

One side of his mouth quirked up, one dimple
indented. “You notice I’m not really singing. I’ve got to save
money where I can.” He nodded at the screen. “It’s on.”

She shifted her gaze to the screen. As she
stared at her face, she covered her mouth with her cupped hands,
feeling her eyes open wide, laughing into her palms a couple
times.

She looked and sounded...different. Pretty.
Interesting. Funny.

The video stopped and she turned to look at
Gabe, her hands away from her face. Her mouth still in an O
shape.

“You liked it,” he said.

She laughed shakily and nodded. As soon as
he left, she would run to her dad’s house and show him.

“And look.” He pointed at the number on the
left side, just below the video. “It’s got eleven views
already.”

She shook her head. “Is that from you and
me?”

“Only the one from you counts. The rest are
other people.”

“By this evening everyone in the village
will have seen it.”

“The entire 629 population?”

“I don’t think the babies will watch it.”
She laughed and heard the notes of exhilaration. “Maybe the
toddlers.”

She stood, feeling euphoric, as if balloons
were attached to her heels. Another laugh bubbled out of her mouth,
and she launched herself at Gabe, her body meeting his, her arms
sweeping around him. He stumbled back, stopping against the wall.
She laughed, a different note in her voice now. Low and sultry. One
she’d never heard before.

His blue eyes darkened. The color of the sky
just before nightfall.

Her laughter stopped, the breath stuck in
her throat. She tilted her face and leaned forward, her lips
parted.

It was like coming home, and that’s when she
knew. Her Welcome Home Pie was for him.

Exultation filled her again. She would
remember this day always.

Then his hands curved around her upper arms
and tugged her away from his chest. His face...there was a blank
look on his face, his emotions shut down.

Her heart drummed inside her. Shock hit her.
She’d been so...

Stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

“Well...” She stepped back yet she still
felt the imprint of his hands on her arms as he’d pushed her away.
Rejected her. “I suppose you want to get back to Chicago.”

He frowned and looked down then up, his
shoulders squaring. She turned away from him. Whatever he had to
say, she didn’t want to hear.

He didn’t want her? Fine. Then he could get
out of her life. Without him, she would not wither and die. In
fact, she might even call a friend and go to Tomahawk on Saturday
night. Hit a bar or two.

“Don’t go.” His voice was low. Serious.

She snapped around. Did he think she was
going to fall apart just because he wanted her for only one night?
He was thinking of the wrong woman.

“This is my house,” she said. “I’m not the
one who needs to go anywhere. You are.”

“I’m doing this all wrong. It’s not what
you’re thinking.”

She crossed her arms. He didn’t have a clue
what she was thinking. Like wishing Happy were younger and would
sense her anger and hurt and bite him.

Though even when Happy was younger, that
wasn’t going to happen. She was too...happy.

“Then tell me what it is,” she said.

“When you were young, did you live in
Chicago?”

Her eyebrows contracted. “Have you been
talking to Linda Wegner? That was many years ago. I hardly remember
Chicago.”

“We might have known each other.”

Katie froze. The drumming of her heart
started again.
Oh no. Oh no. It couldn’t be.

“Right after my parents were divorced, when
I was five, I got pretty sick. Turned out I had leukemia. My mom
was working as a receptionist in a lawyer’s office. My dad’s
insurance paid most of the medical bills.”

He paused and looked at her, as if expecting
her to pick it up. She shook her head.
No, no, no.

“My babysitter was in the building,” he
continued. “She took care of a half dozen or so neighborhood kids.
The only one I remember was a thin little girl who used to sit and
talk to me. Who used to call me...” He stopped. Staring at her.
Compelling her to answer.

Tears welled up in her eyes, but she would
not cry in front of him. Would. Not. Cry.

“Angel Gabriel,” she whispered, and the
moisture in her eyes welled up over her bottom lid.

She turned her head. Not wanting him to
see.

He pulled her to him. Holding her close, as
if she were precious to him.

Chapter Seventeen

“I’m alive.” Gabe heard the huskiness his
voice even as he tried to sound casual. But nothing about this was
casual. Not now, and not then. “In perfect health. No need to
cry.”

Katie jerked out of his hold, and her chin
swept up an inch. The picture of a woman more inclined to punch him
in his stomach—or lower—than one who would cry.

Then she sighed and her shoulders relaxed.
She even smiled, though it came out looking sad. “So you are. You
were still in the hospital when my mother took me to my dad’s
house. I used to pray for you every night.”

He felt a twist in his chest. “We both went
through a bad time.”

“And we both made it.” She reached her hand
up as if to touch his cheek then pulled back.

His own right hand itched. He imagined
brushing her cheeks with his fingertips. Imagined cupping her face
with his fingers and palm. Imagined her leaning into his hand and
gazing into his eyes.

But his hand remained at his side, and he
curled his fingers. “I
have
to go to Chicago.”

The corners of her lips curved up, and her
eyes looked at him with such compassion and understanding that his
gut hurt. She stepped back. “You don’t have to go. You’re choosing
to go.”

He opened his mouth to protest, but she held
up her hand. “No explanations needed.”

“I just want to tell you—”

“Don’t.” She walked backward, shaking her
head. “Just don’t. I’m good with it.” She shrugged. “You’re not my
first merry-go-round ride.”

She turned and headed into the kitchen,
walking fast. He had the sense she was running from him. Running
from her feelings.

He wished to hell he could run from his.

Leaving Miracle was the right thing to do.
He could never stay and be happy. She could never leave and be
happy.

Yet he followed her, not ready to hop in his
car yet, as if he were leaving something undone.

When he entered the kitchen, she was putting
a box on the counter. She glanced over her shoulder at him. “I have
a pie for you. Don’t worry about traveling with it. It will be okay
without refrigeration.”

“What kind of pie?”

“Peach and apple.” She slid it in and he
watched her back, the tilt of her head, the way her hair brushed
the top of her shoulder blades and her jeans curved over her hips
and her ass.

He wiped his hand across his forehead. He
felt like he was fifteen again, staring at the
derrière
of
Miss Bernard, the French teacher who was a former Indianapolis
Colts cheerleader, as she wrote on the whiteboard. He and all the
other boys, the classroom thick with the ache of young male
appreciation.

The ache he felt now was multiplied too many
times to count.

Katie turned around with a smile that didn’t
match the dullness in her eyes, holding the pie box to him.
“Here.”

“I shouldn’t take it.”

“I made it for you.”

“Not the whole pie.”

One side of her smile curved down, and she
shrugged. “It happens often. I wake up and know what pie to
make.”

“That’s right. The pie talks to you.” He
smiled as if making a joke out of it. “The apple-peach pie just
appeared and said, ‘Make me.’”

Her smile dropped altogether, and she looked
at him out of somber eyes. “I don’t usually call it an apple-peach
pie.”

He held in his breath. Waiting for her to
continue. As if what she said next would tell him everything. The
wisdom of the world in the form of a pie.

“I call it my Goodbye Pie.” She shoved it at
him. “Whenever I make it, someone leaves.”

He took the pie box from her. “I’m coming
back. This is just temporary.”

“Don’t. Just...don’t. You should go now.”
Her lips twisted and her eyes...though they were dry now, her eyes
wept with sadness.

He stood there. Robbed of voice. Robbed of
action. The man who always thought of the right thing to do and say
stared at her as if she’d smacked him in the face with the pie
instead of putting it in his hands.

“Now.” She pitched her voice low and hard
and made it an order. “Now.”

His footsteps heavy, he headed toward the
door, robot-like. When he reached the back hall, he paused. “If
Rosa decides the videos are a good idea, you’ll still do them?”

“This is too complicated. I can’t deal with
it.” Her voice distant, she averted her eyes and turned her back to
him.

Feeling as if she’d slugged him in the
heart, he took two more steps and opened the back door.

He’d just found the woman of his dreams, and
she was all wrong for him.

And he for her.

There was only one thing to do. He stepped
outside, on autopilot, not feeling hurt, his emotions numb except
for the throb in his chest as if a hammer struck his heart with
every beat.

The storm door banged behind him, and he
headed toward his car. It was over. Life would go on. Time would
pass. He would find someone else. She would find someone else. And
this ache in his chest would go away.

Chapter Eighteen

“I hate men.” Rosa glared around her. In
Mo’s Place on a Friday night there were as many women and children
as men, but a few men jerked back and blinked wildly under her
glare, as if a laser beam had stung their foreheads.

Katie imagined that it would make Gabe
laugh. Then, as she’d done at least a hundred times since he’d left
two weeks ago, she told herself not to think of him.

“The hating men thing must be tough on you
with three sons,” she said.

“I don’t think of my boys as
men
.
They’ll always be my babies.”

Since two of Rosa’s babies were in their
twenties—and the oldest had asked Katie out just a few months
ago—she gazed down at the deep-fried perch on her plate. Not her
favorite but it was the best pick from the Friday Night fish fry
menu. Mo never tried to pass off his food as anything more than bar
dining. He’d bought the Amber Waves of Grain bar a couple months
ago, changed the name, expanded the menu, added a karaoke stage,
and was slowly turning it into a community gathering spot instead
of a place where mostly men drank beer, played darts, talked
loudly, and according to Linda Wegner, did other disgusting
things.

“So, have you heard from Gabe?” Rosa
wrinkled her nose at the fish and picked up a sweet potato French
fry. Mo’s was known for their sweet potato French fries and the
sweet potato pies. The fries were by Mo, the pies by Katie.

Katie swallowed a bite of perch before
answering. Her throat was tight and she had to take two gulps of
water to make it go down. “No.”

“I thought you two had something going
on.”

“He’s a city boy. I’m a country girl.”

“I think that was a song,” Rosa said.

Katie shrugged. “Life in songs usually ends
better than in real life.”

“In real life,” Rosa said, “husbands cheat
with a woman half your age and are too stupid to use birth
control.”

“In real life,” Katie said, “a man can make
love with you one night then leave you the next day.”

Rosa’s gaze flicked up to Katie. “Is that
what happened with you and Gabe?”

“Of course not.” This time Katie picked up
her wine and took a sip. When she finished, Rosa was giving her The
Stare. When Rosa gave The Stare, she reminded Katie of Mother
Nature. Lying to Mother Nature was not a good thing.

Katie sighed and shrugged. “Maybe.”

Rosa narrowed her eyes. “Men.” The word was
thick with dislike. “They’re pigs.”

“I don’t hate Gabe.” Katie took another sip
of wine. She missed Gabe, but it wasn’t the first time. A long time
ago—or so it seemed—she had missed the boy Gabe. For years, she
wondered what happened to him.

She had missed him more than she missed her
mother.

“You’re too nice,” Rosa said.

“I knew him before.”

Rosa stared at her, frozen in place with a
fry halfway to her mouth. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I didn’t find out until the morning he
left. It was in Chicago where I lived with my mother before she
dropped me off at Sam’s and said, ‘Guess what? Here’s your
daughter.’”

“Did she really?” Rosa’s eyes were big. “I
heard that story, but I thought it was exaggerated.”

“It’s kind of blurry. That’s about all I
remember.” But it wasn’t. She remembered Sam crouching so his long
face was level with hers, telling her she looked just like pictures
of his mom when she was Katie’s age, and he was happy to get to
know her. Then her grandmother was there, crying over her, hugging
her and saying how beautiful she was.