She gazed at the hollow-eyed face in the mirror. Pitiful. But every tear she shed here at the campground was a tear she wouldn't have to shed when she got back to the city. This was her time to mourn. She didn't intend to make a career out of being miserable, but she wouldn't beat herself up for hiding out, either. She'd fallen in love with a man who was incapable of loving her back. If a woman couldn't cry about that, she didn't have a heart.
Turning away, she snagged her hair into a ponytail, then slipped into jeans and sneakers, along with the warm sweater she'd borrowed from Molly's closet. She let herself out through the back door. The storm had finally blown off, and her breath made frosty clouds in the cold, clean air as she walked down the path to the lake. The soggy carpet of leaves sucked at her sneakers, and the trees dripped on her head, but seeing the lake in the early morning lifted her spirits, and she didn't care if she got wet.
Coming up here had been a good decision. Heath was a powerful salesman, and he saw every obstacle as a challenge. He'd be gunning for her when she got back, trying to convince her she should be satisfied with the place he wanted to relegate her to in his life-behind his clients and his meetings, his phone calls and his grueling ambition. She couldn't return until she had all her defenses firmly in place.
Fingers of mist rose from the water, and a pair of snow-white egrets fed near the bank. Through the weight of her sadness, she struggled to find a few moments of peace. Five months ago, she might have settled for Heath's emotional leftovers, but not now. Now, she knew she deserved better. For the first time in her life, she had a clear vision of who she was and what she wanted from her life. She was proud of everything she'd accomplished with Perfect for You, proud of building something good. But she was even more proud of herself for refusing to accept second best from Heath. She deserved to love openly and joyously-no holds barred-and to be loved the same way in return. With Heath, that wouldn't be possible. As she turned away from the lake, she knew she'd done the right thing. For now, that was her only comfort.
When she reached the B &B, she pitched in to help. As the guests began filling the dining room, she poured coffee, fetched baskets of warm muffins, replenished the serving dishes on the sideboard, and even managed to crack a joke. By nine o'clock, the dining room had emptied out, and she set off back toward the cottage. Before she took her bath, she'd make her business calls. A master executive had taught her the value of personal contact, and she had clients who depended on her.
Ironic how much she'd learned from Heath, including the importance of following her own vision instead of someone else's. Perfect for You would never make her rich, but bringing people together was what she'd been born to do. All kinds of people. Not just the beautiful and accomplished, but the awkward and insecure, the hapless and obtuse. And not only the young. Unprofitable or not, she could never abandon her seniors. Being a matchmaker was messy, unpredictable, and demanding, but she loved it.
She reached the deserted beach and paused for a moment.
Pulling her sweater closer, she walked out onto the dock. The lake was quiet without its summer visitors, and the memories of the night she and Heath had danced in the sand washed over her. She sat down at the end and drew her knees to her chest. Twice she'd fallen for damaged men. But not ever again.
Footsteps sounded on the dock behind her. One of the guests. She pressed her wet cheek to her knee, blotting her tears.
"Hello, sweetheart."
Her head came up, and her heart lurched. He'd found her. She should have known.
"I used your toothbrush," he said from behind her. "I was going to use your razor until I figured out there wasn't any hot water." His voice sounded rusty, as if he hadn't spoken for a while.
Slowly she turned. Her eyes widened in shock. He was mismatched, unkempt, and unshaven. Beneath a ratty red wind-breaker, he wore a faded orange T-shirt and navy slacks that looked as though he'd slept in them. He held a bunch of Disney balloons in his hand. Goofy had deflated and hung against his leg, but he didn't seem to notice. Between the balloons and his dishevelment, he should have looked ridiculous. But with the polished veneer he'd worked so hard to obtain stripped away, she felt even more threatened.
"You shouldn't have come here," she heard herself say. "This is a waste of time."
He cocked his head and gave her his huckster's smile. "Hey, this is supposed to be like in Jerry Maguire. Remember? 'You had me at hello.'"
"Skinny women are pushovers."
His phony charm evaporated like the helium in the Goofy balloon. He shrugged, took a step closer. "My real name's Harley. Harley D. Campione. Take a guess what the D stands for?"
He'd mow her down if she didn't keep swinging. "Dumb ass?"
"It stands for Davidson. Harley Davidson Campione. How do you like that? My old man loved a good joke, as long as it wasn't on him."
She wouldn't let him play on her sympathies. "Go away, Harley. We've both said everything we needed to."
He stuffed his free hand in the pocket of his windbreaker. "I used to fall in love with his girlfriends. He was a good-looking guy, and he knew how to turn on the charm when he felt like it, so there was a whole slew of them. Every time he brought a new one home, I let myself believe she'd be the one who'd stick, that finally he'd settle down and act like a father. There was this one woman… Carol. She made noodles from scratch. Rolled the dough out with a pop bottle and let me cut it into these little strips. Best thing I ever tasted in my life. Another-her name was Erin-she'd drive me wherever I wanted to go. She forged his name on a permission slip so I could play Pop Warner football. When she left, I lost my ride, and I had to walk four miles to practice if nobody picked me up on the highway. That turned out to be a good thing, though. I ended up with a lot more endurance than the other guys. I wasn't the strongest, and I wasn't the fastest, but I never gave up, and that was a powerful life lesson."
"Sometimes knowing when to give up is the real test of character."
She might as well not have spoken. "Joyce, she taught me how to smoke and a few other things she shouldn't have, but she had some problems, and I try not to hold it against her."
"It's too late for this."
"The thing is…" He looked at the dock, not at her, and studied the boards at his feet. "Sooner or later, every one of those women I loved left. I don't know. Maybe I wouldn't be where I am today if one of them had stuck." As he gazed back up at her, his old belligerence returned. "I learned early on that nobody was going to hand me anything. It made me tough."
But no tougher than she was. She steeled herself and rose to her feet. "You deserved a better childhood, but I can't change what happened. Those years shaped who you are. I can't fix that. And I can't fix you."
"I don't need to be fixed anymore. That job's already been done. I love you, Annabelle."
The pain was nearly more than she could bear. He was only saying what he knew she wanted to hear, and she didn't believe him, not for a second. His words were carefully calculated, chosen for the sole purpose of closing a deal. "No, you really don't," she managed. "You just hate not getting your way."
"It's not that."
"Winning is everything to you. The joy of the kill is your life's blood."
"Not when it comes to you."
"Don't do this! It's cruel. You know who you are." Her eyes filled with tears. "But I know who I am, too. I'm a woman who won't settle for second place. I want the best," she said softly. "And you're not it."
He looked as though she'd slapped him. Despite her own pain, she hadn't wanted to hurt him, but one of them needed to speak the truth. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I won't spend my life waiting around for your leftovers. This time persistence isn't going to get the job done."