Their Last Second Chance Page 14

  Big mistake.

  What had she been thinking? She’d wanted to maintain distance, not close it. The guilt she’d been feeling about not telling Harris her real reasons for getting entangled with him tonight had quadrupled.

  She had thought about waking him up and pleading her case about the article again. In the end, she’d decided to write the article first, show it to him and let him see that her intentions were good. That she wasn’t out to exploit the Kingstons like that TV crew—she truly wanted to help them, too. She would include information about the fund-raising efforts, and if the article got picked up nationwide, it could mean a windfall for the family.

  Melanie sat down at her desk and began to write, scrawling across the legal pad as fast as her hand could move, filling in where she had left off before, fleshing it out, deepening the emotion. The story was a good one, and even as she berated herself again for sleeping with Harris last night, the more the words flowed, the happier she felt. She wrote about the candle falling, how one simple mistake had had a domino effect that changed so many lives. And then she wrote about how one man was setting out to reverse those changes and bring a family back together.

  When she was done, she skimmed the handwritten pages of the legal pad. Right now, there wasn’t a thing she wanted to change. She’d let it sit for a day or so and then run it by Harris before she typed it into the computer and sent it to Saul. Maybe ask him if it was okay to pitch the story to some national outlets, too.

  As dawn began to break, she remembered the information about John losing his company. Maybe she should include that, too—and maybe it would help increase business at the barbershop. People could understand someone who was down on their luck, who’d lost everything more than once and needed some help to get back on his feet.

  It took some determined googling, but a half hour later, Melanie hit on what she had been looking for. And when she saw a set of three very familiar letters in the headline of Local Machining Company Shuttered, she knew why Harris had kept the truth from her.

  And why he had lied last night.

  All the sweet emotion she’d felt in his arms disappeared. Harris hadn’t told her the truth—and she was pretty damned sure he hadn’t told John, either. The Kingstons were unlikely to be so kind to him if they knew he was part of the reason their business had been shut down.

  The clock ticked past nine. Melanie picked up her phone and made a couple calls, then took out her pen and added another paragraph. One that hurt her heart, and told her that the Harris who had broken up with her at eighteen was the same man today that he’d been then. Only a fool didn’t learn her lesson.

  She got dressed and headed out of the inn, hurrying past the kitchen in case Harris was up and eating breakfast. She’d made her mistake by sleeping with him. She wasn’t going to compound it by seeing him again. No, she had her story. She didn’t need anything from him ever again.

  Della and her sons were busy on the lawn of the inn, setting up for the fund-raiser tomorrow. They’d hung streamers from the deck and placed small tables on the thick grass. One long table at the back would hold silent auction items, and Jack Barlow was building a small stage for a local band to play on.

  Melanie gave the Barlows a wave. If she stayed and talked to them, chances were good that Harris would make an appearance. She’d cover the fund-raiser tomorrow, slip in and out for only as long as she needed to get enough for her article, and avoid him.

  And avoid what sleeping with him had awakened in her heart. Because her heart sure as hell wasn’t listening to her mind. No, her foolish heart was back in high school, all in love and imagining a forever future with Harris.

  Losing the baby had broken that dream. And when Harris thought she was cheating—and instead of being there to hold her and console her, he’d accused her and left—the broken pieces of the dream had shattered beyond repair. Ironic that he was the one hiding the truth today when that used to be her specialty.

  Until now. Until everything got more complicated, and Melanie got tired of covering her tracks. And avoiding the truth.

  She’d start with heading over to see Abby. After the other day, she wasn’t so sure Abby would talk to her, but she couldn’t leave this crevasse between them.

  Her sister was just coming down the porch stairs when Melanie pulled in. The boys weren’t home—probably at school—and Melanie could see Ma inside the still-open front door, gathering up her purse. “What are you doing here?” Abby asked.

  Melanie took a few steps closer, shading her eyes against the sun. “I don’t want to leave it like this, Abs. Look, I’m sorry I lied to you.”

  Abby threw up her hands. “You’ve done it all your life, Melanie. And every single time, I’ve covered for you. I kept thinking that one day, you’d grow up and get honest with yourself, with the people who love you. When you got that job and married Adam, I thought you finally had.” She shook her head. “But nothing’s changed.”

  “Everything has changed. I’ve changed.”

  Abby arched a brow.

  “I have,” Melanie insisted. But then she paused. Had she really? She thought of Abby’s words, and wondered if she was lying to herself now, too. She hadn’t been honest with Harris, not about the past, and not about the present. She had kept the truth about the status of her job and her marriage from her family. No one knew about the miscarriage and how that had devastated her. Maybe it was time to be more honest, by starting with being more present. “I want to help with the wedding, Abby. That’s why I’m here. You have to visit the florist today, right? And talk to the new caterer?”

  “I can do that with Ma.” If anything said I don’t want you around, choosing their mother for a shopping buddy did. Abby dug her keys out of her purse and unlocked her car. “I’ve got to go.”

  “Abby—”

  But her sister brushed past her and climbed into her car, then shut the door. A second later, Ma came down the stairs. “Your sister is very angry with you,” she said.

  “I got that.” Melanie let out a huff of frustration. She’d hoped this would go differently.

  “I have no idea why you would keep a secret like that,” Ma said.

  “Really? When all you’ve ever done is judge and criticize us?” Melanie shook her head. “I’ve done exactly one thing that you ever approved of, and that was marrying Adam. I can’t imagine why I’d sugarcoat the truth about the end of my marriage.”

  “That was more than sugarcoating, Melanie. That was full-on lying.” Her mother pursed her lips, then softened. “I am too critical of you girls. I just...I wanted more for you both than I had. It was never meant to hurt you.”

  It was probably as close to an apology as Melanie would ever get from her mother. “I was wrong for lying. I didn’t want to disappoint you or Abby, and I just kept thinking... I kept thinking I’d fix it all somehow and then it wouldn’t be a lie anymore when I said everything was fine.”

  “And now you’ve gone and ruined your sister’s wedding.” Ma flicked a glance at the car. “Maybe it’s about time you started thinking about other people first, and the ramifications of what you say—or write.”

  Her mother got in the car, and Abby backed out, driving over the grass to get past Melanie’s car. The two of them were gone a second later, leaving Melanie in the driveway. Alone.

  * * *

  The sound of an incoming text jerked Harris out of sleep. As he reached for the cell, he realized the bed was empty. Mellie was gone. Her pillow still held the impression of her head, but the sheets were cold. He checked his phone—no message from her. She’d sneaked out, without a word.

  He scrolled down to the new message. Meet me at the café in an hour, John had written. Nothing more. Harris replied with a yes, then got ready. The curtness of John’s text was odd. Very odd.

  An hour later, Harris was sitting at a back booth in the Good Eatin’ Café, a cup of
coffee growing cold before him. John swung in a few minutes late, nodding to people as he passed them before dropping into the booth across from Harris.

  John was a thin man, going prematurely bald. He had a two-day scruff of beard on his face, and he’d lost about ten pounds, but his eyes were clear and cold. He took off his ball cap and set it before him. “I thought you were my friend.”

  “I was. I am.” A stone sank in Harris’s gut. He knew, before John spoke, what the other man was going to say. How it would change everything.

  “Why is the man who put me out of business so eager to build me a new house? You feeling guilty about what you did?”

  Harris let out a long breath. He waved off the waitress. “Yeah. Very much so.”

  “You were the one who called my CFO and told him we were losing the contract with the truck manufacturer.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you knew that us losing that contract would also take away ninety-five percent of our business and annual revenues.”

  “Yes.”

  “And that I would have to lay off every single person in my company. Watch the women cry and the men beg, and hear these families suffer when their unemployment ran out or the new competitor you put in our place wouldn’t hire them?”

  “It wasn’t...” Harris sighed. “Yes.”

  “The new manufacturer actually charged more. Did you know that? In the end, it cost that automotive plant money to put us out of business. All those people lost their jobs. For what? For nothing. For you and your father to pad your wallets with a kickback from a family friend who wanted an in with the automotive industry and do a favor for some client.”

  “I was simply doing what I was told.” Except Harris could have refused. But he knew that in the end, his father would have had someone else ruin John’s business.

  “What am I now? Some charity case you can take on?”

  “No. You’re my penance.” Harris folded his hands and leaned forward. “I worked for my father for a couple years. It was the worst two years of my life. I thought if I did everything he asked me to do, he would be proud of me. He’d see that I was smart and capable. And he’d listen to my thoughts. Instead, he sent me out to do his dirty work. I shut down more companies than just yours, John. And every time, I felt horrible. But yours...” Harris shook his head. “I sat in my office for an hour that day before I made the call, looking at the pictures from the company picnic.”

  John nodded. “We had those on our website. Potluck, horseshoe games, even a potato sack race. Employees loved it.”

  “And I thought to myself, what am I doing? Why am I doing this? Why am I following the orders of a man I can’t stand?”

  “Yet you did it.”

  “In the end, I did. I called your CFO and delivered the news that you had lost the contract and were never getting it back. I ended up giving my notice to my father a few days later. Then, once I made some money from my building business, I started trying to find the people who were still down on their luck because of my father’s decisions, and my mistake in implementing them.” Harris ran a hand through his hair. The waitress nodded in their direction, but he shook his head. “I’m not going to make excuses. It was wrong. I was wrong. And all I’ve been trying to do ever since is make it right.”

  John considered this information for a while. He watched a couple stroll by outside, his gaze far from the table. “Do you know what happened that night? Why I was so drunk?”

  “The night of the fire?” Harris shook his head. “No.”

  John swiveled back to look at Harris. All the hurt and outrage shone in his eyes. “One of my former employees called me. She was desperate for a job, and was hoping I could help her. They’d lost their car, their home, had to pull their son out of college and go live in some crappy apartment in a cramped building. And you know what? I had nothing to give her. No advice. No help. I looked around at my house, a house we were on the verge of losing to foreclosure, and thought I had failed my employees, and more, failed my own family. My kids were going to lose everything, and we were going to end up like my employee, in some one-bedroom apartment in the city while I tried to find some kind of place that would employ a man in his forties who didn’t have much on his résumé besides a failed company and a few haircuts. I started drinking and kept right on drinking, because I was pissed and full of guilt and depressed about the whole thing. I never even noticed the candle.” He lifted his gaze now, his eyes filled with sorrow, not outrage. “But you were there, in an instant after the fire started.”

  Of all the people he had helped, no one had figured it out. They’d all thought of Harris as a nice guy, helpful, maybe a little generous with his time. He’d helped them all anonymously, and taken his satisfaction in the smiles on their faces. But the time for hiding the truth about his father, about Harris’s responsibility in all this, was over, consequences be damned. “When you called me that night, you were a mess. I just knew something had happened. I rushed over there and when I saw the flames...” Harris shrugged, a simple gesture that didn’t begin to cover for that horrifying moment when he’d thought the Kingstons were dead. “I’m glad I was there.”

  “I don’t want you to think for a moment that I’m not grateful for you saving my family,” John said. “I am. And for all you’re doing now. But I don’t want to be your charity case.”

  “You’re not. You are my friend, you really are.” Harris fiddled with the place mat. “I even felt guilty about that, you know? My mother died, and I was a wreck, and there you are, the man I put out of business, dragging me out of a bar and setting me straight. You told me something that night that has stayed with me.”

  “Me? I had some wisdom?” John scoffed. “My wife will disagree.”

  Harris chuckled. “Catherine thinks the sun rises on your head, and you know it. You told me once that feeling guilty about the past doesn’t make anything better. All it does is make the present miserable. The best thing to do is to be here now, for the people who love you and need you, and let the rest take care of itself.”

  John turned his baseball cap around and around in his hands for a long moment. He stared down at the red bill, the image of the Cardinals on the front. “And that’s what you’ve been doing with me and my family.”

  “Trying to.”

  “All right then.” John plopped the cap on his head. “I don’t like what you did to my company, but I am beyond grateful for what you did for my family. And if it’s not too much to ask, I have a few former employees who could use some work. Maybe they could come hang some Sheetrock or something.”

  Harris thought about this for a moment, then nodded. “They’ll need some training, of course, but if they worked for you, I’m sure they were great employees, who would work hard. If I can’t hire them all, I’ll find people who can. I wish I could do more.”

  “You saved my life and my family. I’d say that makes us square.” John slid out of the booth and got to his feet.

  “Before you go...how did you find out about all this?”

  John shrugged. “Some reporter called me this morning. Asked a few questions, and I put it together. Her name sounded familiar. I think I met her, out at the site. Melanie something?”

  Harris knew exactly who John meant. The one woman he thought he could trust. Turns out he’d been wrong. Again.

  * * *

  The fund-raiser was in full swing by the time Melanie arrived, notepad in hand. The band was the same one she’d heard at the Comeback Bar that first night, which made her think of Harris. And miss him, damn it.

  She’d had time to think about his connection to John Kingston over the last day or so. The shock had subsided, and with it, the anger that he hadn’t told her earlier. Once she gave herself some time to process—and put the pieces together—she’d realized that the pot who had told lies for a living had no business calling the kettle anything.
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  The fund-raiser was already busy, a good sign for the target financial goal. There were games for the kids—cornhole, lawn darts, a bounce house—and several tables of food and silent auction items. From what Melanie could see, most of the town had shown up. Saul was standing behind one of the food tables, handing out pretzels.

  The editor smiled when she approached. “Well, hello, Melanie.” He took a five-dollar bill from a teenager and exchanged it for a pretzel. “How’s my favorite writer?”

  “Great. I’m just about done getting what I need for the story on the fund-raiser. And, if you’re still interested, I have enough to write an article on what happened the night of the fire. I was going to type it up tonight and send it over to you.”

  Saul’s eyes widened. He turned away from the pretzels and lowered his voice. “You got Harris to talk to you? I hear he wouldn’t even talk to the TV people. He just kept saying the family had no comment and wanted the media to respect their privacy.”

  That wave of guilt hit her again. She had yet to tell Harris that she had written the story, that she was intending to have it published. “I interviewed Catherine Kingston, Colton Barlow and some of the people at the building event. Even got a couple quotes from John. Harris was more reluctant to talk to me, but he did. Some.”

  She had to tell Harris the truth before Saul printed the piece. He’d be mad, but she was sure that the media attention would bring in even more donations, which was a good thing. Surely he would see that and understand. The article she’d written had been fair, but honest.

  “Great! I’ll run it with the recap of the fund-raiser in the paper that comes out on Tuesday.”

  Tuesday? That was only three days away. She wanted to tell Saul no, that she wasn’t going to be ready by then.

  Because she wasn’t ready to tell Harris. The second she did, she risked him walking out of her life forever. And maybe that was the real reason she had stayed silent all this time—