“How was the dinner?” he asked. “I’m assuming you did one of the private dinners.”
“Surreal,” she said. “Six courses. Too much wine. Way too much.”
Then he saw it: she was drunk. “Did you drive yourself?”
She put her arms out. “Cuff me.” But her eyes sparkled, and he felt tempted to kiss her wet lips.
“I’m driving you home,” he said.
“Party pooper,” she said. “Do you know what the Brits used to call spirits? Maybe still do, for all I know.”
“I’ve never been good at trivia,” Walt said. “Unless the chosen topic is forensics, dogs, or wildlife.”
“Courage,” she answered.
“Okay,” he said. He clawed at the knees of his pants, suddenly extremely uncomfortable.
“So I’m just going to say this whether you want to hear it or not, because I may never be like this around you again. Feeling my courage, that is. Carpe diem, and all that.”
“And all that,” he echoed.
Then she said nothing. His throat had constricted to the width of a cocktail straw. He was afraid to try to talk for fear he’d merely squeak.
“You listen, but do you hear?” She turned her head to face him, and he felt a jolt.
“I definitely hear,” he said. “I promise, I’ll hear whatever you have to say.”
“You were jealous tonight,” she said.
“Guilty.” Gail had complained he was never honest with her. He had vowed to not repeat that mistake. “I’m not exactly sure why.”
“It’s because we both feel this thing between us. You know that’s true. I feel it too, Walt. I’d love to go on pretending I don’t, because I don’t want to feel it, acknowledge it, but I do. And so do you, whether you’ll ever admit it or not, because I saw it on your face tonight at the tasting. It made the whole rest of my night a lie because it was all that I could think about. You… were all that I could think about, which was hardly fair to Roger.”
“You looked like you were having a good enough time.”
“You’re a better judge than that. I have no idea what Roger must have thought. But the point is… Well, that is the point, isn’t it? I don’t know what the point is, and there’s something sad about it taking way too many glasses of the best wine to convince me to say something about it. Especially when I don’t know what exactly it is I’m trying to say.”
Walt looked away from her, out to the empty street and the porch light on Mrs. Merimer’s cottage. He had a resuscitation kit in the back of the Cherokee. He wondered if she’d know how to use it on him. He felt as if he was going to blow a valve.
“You are going to say something, right?” Her voice sounded terrified.
He nodded, hoping that might do until his pulse leveled off.
“Say something, Walt.” She sounded dangerously close to being angry.
“I’m trying,” he managed to choke out.
“Don’t leave me hanging here. I don’t think I can take it. Tell me I didn’t just make a complete ass out of myself. Oh my God,” she said, leaning over with her head between her legs.
He tentatively reached out and rubbed her back. She was hot and damp.
She rushed forward then, grabbed the rail, and threw up into the lilacs.
He hurried to her and again placed his hand on her back.
“Okay?” he said.
“Do I look like I’m okay?” Fiona sounded as if she was crying. “Could I bother you for a paper towel?”
He hurried inside, composing what to say in order to rescue the moment. He did feel the same as she but hadn’t known it until she’d confronted him. He wasn’t sure he knew how to explain himself. Gail. Brandon. His two girls. The house.
He heard a car engine start.
He ran to the porch, the damp paper towel in hand.
Taillights.
A swarm of bugs were circling the porch’s yellow light, a light that was supposed to repel them. A dog barked a block away. A drip of the water fell from the paper towel striking the toe of his boot. A feeling of remorse overcame him, of loss, of missed opportunity. More water hit his boot, and he caught himself having squeezed the paper towel in his fist.
He turned and headed inside, straight to the phone.
The scent of lilacs was gone.
21
Squinting through the blinds of her hotel bedroom, Summer Sumner watched a Zamboni crawl across the ice of the lodge’s outdoor skating rink, leaving behind a wide swath of clean ice like a glistening silver ribbon, mirrorlike in the morning sunshine.
The bedside CD/iPod/clock radio read 10:34. A fairly typical rising time for her, but-and she was certain of this-unacceptable to her early-bird-gets-the-worm father. He’d have been up since five A.M. negotiating some deal with someone five time zones away. She felt sorry for him: he could never turn it off. She assumed that, even at the wine tasting the night before, he’d been talking up some film or television deal, a deal that would never get off the ground.
She wondered what he’d thought of the note she’d left him. Certainly, he’d seen it: she’d placed it front and center on the table just inside the door. Impossible to miss.
As she crossed the bedroom, she happened to glance into the living room and see her father’s laptop up and running on the desk, alongside a pile of papers and his BlackBerry. There was also some pocket change lying there and… his keys.
But he was nowhere to be seen.
She heard the toilet seat clunk down, the rustle of newspaper, and knew he’d be a while.
Wearing nothing but a T-shirt and briefs, she hurried across to the desk, nervously glancing back toward the suite’s powder room.
His key chain required unscrewing a tiny sleeve that sealed it shut. She squeezed and turned the sleeve, but it held tight. She tried again, and this time it gave. She spun the sleeve out of the way, then sorted quickly through the keys to find the strangely shaped one to the jet. She freed it and was screwing the sleeve back in place when his BlackBerry rang.
Summer heard the toilet flush.
Impossible! she thought, panicking.
“I’ll get it!” she called out, trying to buy herself an excuse for being caught hovering over his things.
He came out the door, fastening his belt.
“I’ve got it,” he said.
But she answered it.
“Hello?” she said.
Silence.
“Hello?”
Her father crossed the room.
“I’ve got it, Summer.”
“I’m calling for Teddy Sumner,” said a man’s voice.
She’d heard the caller’s voice before and tried to place it. Her father would be proud if she presented herself correctly.
“This is Summer speaking. Whom may I say is calling?”
Her father stood there, his hand out, wanting his phone.
“Is your father there?” The voice was vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t dredge up a face to go along with it.
She handed her father the BlackBerry.
“Thank you,” he said, though he didn’t mean it. He didn’t want her answering his calls.
“Sumner,” her father said into the phone, sliding down into the chair.
Summer stood there, her eyes on the key chain, which she’d set down, but not where she’d found it. She shuffled closer to her dad, putting herself between him and the keys, wanting the chance to slide them back toward where they belonged.
“This is a business call,” he said, cupping the phone, clearly wanting privacy.
Her hands behind her back, she moved the keys back in place.
“Sure,” she said, wondering what was up with him. He was constantly on the phone. He never gave a damn about what she overheard.
“We have a court in twenty minutes,” he said, wanting her out of the room.
“I know, Dad,” she said, heading back to her room, glancing at the keys on her way out to confirm that she’d left them where she’d found them. Gripped in her right hand was the key to the jet. As she shut the door to her room behind her, she was already celebrating her triumph.