Crossing Promises Read online

  “Taking the time to do something for yourself isn’t selfish,” Owen said, his eyes growing suddenly stormy despite the soft overhead light of his kitchen.

  The irony of it forced a joyless laugh past Cate’s lips. “I didn’t think so, either, not in that moment. It was the first time I’d ever really chosen what I wanted to do over what Lily had asked for. Don’t get me wrong,” she added, “I’m not a martyr. I spent my Saturdays in the kitchen. At least, I did whenever we didn’t have a practice or a birthday party or an activity to go to.”

  Which pretty much meant she got one Saturday a month to get right with the flour and butter and sugar, but she’d made it work. She’d had to. Her kitchen had been the only place where she wasn’t Brian’s wife or Lily’s mom or anyone other than herself, pure and simple. It had been the only place where she’d known how to breathe and just be.

  “But when I told Lily no, Brian got really angry,” Cate said, her breath shaking the slightest bit. She knew what was coming, what her memory would cough up next. God, she knew it by heart.

  Jesus, Cate. You’re putting your hobby in front of our kid? It’s just a batch of stupid bread. We’ll buy some on the way home if it means that much to you…

  “Angry,” Owen repeated. She caught the steel in his voice a heartbeat later, and immediately shook her head. Brian might have been a lot of things, but he’d never been hurtful in the physical sense.

  “I think mean is a better word. At least, when it came to me baking.”

  Owen frowned, his brows cinching together in obvious confusion. “I’m sorry. I don’t follow.”

  Cate’s pulse peppered her belly with dread. But she’d already poured half the story all over his kitchen floor. There wasn’t any practical reason to hold back now.

  “Just before graduation, I got a scholarship to the Culinary Arts Academy.”

  His lips parted, but nothing came out for a long second before he finally asked, “The one in Harrisonburg?”

  “Yeah. I knew it wouldn’t make me a celebrity chef.” She nearly laughed at the thought. “I mean, the academy is a great school, but the Shenandoah Valley is hardly New York or Chicago. I didn’t need all that, though. I just wanted my own bakery.” Her chest suddenly felt like there was a steel band around it, gripping tighter and tighter, and damn it, this shouldn’t be so hard to say after all this time. “But Brian wasn’t as...enthusiastic. He blew it off as a pipe dream. Joked that cookies were for bake sales, not businesses. Stuff like that. He made it really clear he thought culinary school was a waste of time and money, and that my owning a bakery one day was about the craziest thing he’d ever heard, including stories of Bigfoot and aliens at Roswell.”

  “I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead,” Owen said, sawing off each word. “But I didn’t realize Brian needed a lesson in proper manners.”

  Cate shrugged. She’d come to terms with this part of things long ago. “He was scared I’d leave Millhaven and never come back if I pursued baking, and, to be honest, the fear probably wasn’t unfounded. I’m not close with my parents. Nothing was tying me here, and I’d have had better luck opening a bakery in a bigger city like Harrisonburg or Charlottesville or Staunton. I cared about him, but culinary school…God, it held so many possibilities. And I wanted them all so badly.”

  “So you were going to go?” Owen asked.

  “Yes.” Cate nodded. “I hadn’t told Brian for sure, but I think he suspected. I had half my things packed in boxes when I found out I was pregnant with Lily.”

  She took a second for her conscience to slide between her ribs and squeeze. The first thing she’d felt when she’d seen that test turn bright, undeniable blue, had been dread. No. Not this, anything but this, and she’d never be able to erase that. Not even with the love that eventually came after and would never, ever come again.

  Cate cleared her throat. “So, obviously, I gave up my scholarship to get married to Brian instead. We made a good life together for our daughter, but he did everything he could to keep me from baking. Guilt trips, making fun and calling his meanness a ‘joke’. Promising we’d look into renting a space for something small here in Millhaven, then going back on his word. But I never stopped baking”—God, it had been her lifeline, her oxygen on some of those days, when Brian’s contempt was on full display—“and he never stopped hating it. On the day of the accident, we’d argued even before Lily asked about the movie. It was why I’d chosen such a difficult recipe to begin with, actually.”

  “What did you argue about?” Owen asked.

  “Brian wanted another baby.” Wanted probably wasn’t the best word, she knew. What he’d really wanted was more leverage over her, more reasons to keep her busy and out of their kitchen. He’d made that clear in the argument, even though she’d have said no regardless. A baby will keep you focused on what’s really important around here, he’d said, as if the sliver of stolen time she spent in the kitchen every month had been some sort of national threat. “He told me I was being self-centered because I didn’t want to have any more kids, and that I had no right to put baking first. The thing with Lily only made it worse. He said he wasn’t going to put up with my foolishness anymore, and he threatened to throw out the batch of dough I’d been working on.”

  Cate shivered. God, she could still hear the hiss of his words in her ear, the malicious bite of it would serve you right for being so selfish as fresh as if he’d just uttered it. “For the first time in my life, I snapped.”

  “That doesn’t seem unfounded,” Owen said quietly, and if anyone else had told her the same story, Cate probably would’ve agreed. Of course, this was her story. One she’d kicked into motion. One that drowned her in so much guilt that she couldn’t even open the drawer in her kitchen that held the trivet Lily had made for her without wanting to break down and cry.

  One she couldn’t undo.

  “I was just so angry,” Cate whispered. “I told Brian I was going to stay in the kitchen and finish the recipe I’d started, and that he wasn’t going to guilt me about it anymore. I said it was past time for him to make good on all those empty promises he’d made that I’d own a bakery one day, and that this time, I wouldn’t let him blow it off. The fight was the worst one we’d ever had,” she said, her heart beginning to thump faster behind the borrowed flannel of her shirt. You’re never going to have a bakery, Cate. A dream like that isn’t for you. Best to wake up and remember that. “It ended with him storming out to the movies with Lily. I stayed home, and, well, the rest is…the rest.”

  She let go of a shaky exhale, her heart climbing into her throat. Owen had asked her a question, and though she’d taken a roundabout path to get there, it still needed an answer. “I’ve played that day back in my head a million times. What if I’d given in and just said yes? Would Brian not have stormed out of the house so fast, into the path of that deer he’d had to swerve to try and avoid? What if I’d said no, we’ll all go tomorrow instead? Then it wouldn’t have been raining, and even if he’d had to swerve, the car wouldn’t have flipped over or smashed into that tree. Or”—hot tears filled Cate’s eyes, as they always did when she got to this what-if, the one she’d wondered in those early days if she’d truly deserved—“what if we’d all been in the car together, and I died instead of Brian or Lily? What if my daughter—”

  “Stop.”

  Owen’s hands were on her shoulders, his stubbled jaw unyielding and his eyes full of a brand of fire she’d never, ever seen before. “Your fight with Brian was terrible, yes, and the accident, even more so. But don’t do that to yourself.”

  In a white-hot instant, her guard came crashing down. “Why not? It’s my fault, Owen! I said no. I fought with Brian. I told him I wouldn’t leave the house. I yelled at him that if he wanted to take Lily to the movies so badly, they should just go. I’d never done anything like that before, ever. But I was so angry at him for pushing, for making me feel like a bad parent when I loved Lily so much, for continually belittling my dream—
God, for all of it—that I just snapped.”

  She started to cry at the same time Owen’s arms came around her, so honest and strong and right, and she selfishly soaked in the feel of him even though she knew she didn’t deserve it.

  “Don’t you see?” she asked into his shoulder, the words ragged in her throat. “That’s why I can’t have my own bakery now, and it’s why I don’t let myself feel good. How could I possibly have anything happy when I’m here and they’re not? When if I’d just done one thing differently—”

  “Cate.” Owen pulled back, cupping her face between his big, callused hands, holding her steady without force. “That accident wasn’t your fault.”

  “But—”

  “No.” He shook his head. His voice carried no heat, but the truth in the single word sent goose bumps over Cate’s skin. “You were mad—with good reason, I’ll add—and you got into an argument. But you didn’t put that deer in the road, and you didn’t make Brian swerve to miss it. That accident wasn’t your fault, and it’s past time for you to stop believing it was. I know you loved Lily, and that you were left behind.” Owen thumbed the tears, which were falling in earnest now, from her cheeks, his gaze never wavering, his words low and strong. “And that makes you feel guilty, but you are worthy of happiness. You’re talented and beautiful and smart as hell. You deserve to live your life.”

  Cate opened her mouth, primed to argue. But, oh, God, Owen’s hands felt so achingly good wiping away her tears, and when he said those words to her—the same words she’d adamantly denied for three long years—she realized the truth.

  He meant what he was saying. And she might not believe it on her own, but when he stood there in front of her, telling her she was worthy of pursuing her dream and feeling good, she began to think at least maybe it was possible.

  They stood there together, her crying and him silently dispatching every tear, for an amount of time Cate couldn’t measure, until finally, she nodded, shifting forward against his chest. Owen kissed the top of her head before parting from her wordlessly, moving to the sink to transfer the stock pot full of water to a burner on the stove. He finished preparing dinner, and she set the table in between long sips of wine. Eventually, they started talking about easy topics like what sort of books they both liked and their favorite flavor of ice cream, and when they sat down to eat twenty minutes later, some laughter threaded through the conversation, too.

  And Owen wasn’t wrong. His spaghetti and meatballs were the best thing Cate had ever tasted.

  She had two huge servings to prove it.

  20

  “Okay, jackass. You’ve been sitting over there, smiling like the cat that ate the canary for thirty minutes now. What gives?”

  Owen looked across the table at Lane, glad as hell they’d snared the corner booth at Clementine’s so no one could see the smile he was unable to keep from commandeering his mouth. He’d always been a terrible liar, mostly because he never saw the point, but since he’d also never been one to kiss and tell, he went with, “Nothing.”

  Hunter laughed, his cheeseburger halfway to his mouth. “Ah, here’s where I call bullshit. I know what he’s smiling about, and her name is Cate McAllister.”

  Owen’s heart took a whack at his rib cage, piñata-style. “Really? And what makes you think that?”

  “Uh, the fact that her car was at your house from dinnertime Saturday night until five-thirty this morning, and you were late to work for the first time in the history of mankind.”

  Lane coughed out a laugh that matched Hunter’s cocky I-dare-you-to-argue expression, and shit, Owen hated them both right now.

  “You’ve dragged your ass on plenty of Mondays. Besides, I was only ten minutes late, you dick,” he grumbled, but his smile had too much staying power to stick the words with the proper amount of grit.

  “Uh-huh.” Hunter lifted a brow, along with one corner of his mouth. “I told you a man can do a lot of things worthy of making him late in ten minutes.”

  Lane’s laugh grew loud enough to make the handful of people having dinner at Clementine’s look in their direction, and, yeah, this conversation needed a kill switch, stat.

  “Oh, for the love of…fine. Yes.” Owen dropped his voice to just above a whisper. “Cate spent the weekend at my house. Are you happy now?”

  “Not as happy as you, I bet,” Lane said, waggling his light blond brows before shoving a pair of fries into his mouth. But his buddy wasn’t the only one who could ration up some good-natured shit.

  “You’re one to talk, Sheriff. I overheard Amber Cassidy telling Billy Masterson at the co-op this morning that you and Daisy are practically attached at the hip now.”

  “I doubt that’s where they’re attached,” Hunter said, his smile losing some of its luster a heartbeat later at the warning look Lane shot in his direction.

  “Careful, wedding boy.” At Hunter’s lifted hands, Lane continued. “Anyhow, I’m not trying to hide the fact that Daisy and I have been spending time together. I like her.”

  “I like Cate, too.” Ah, hell, the words slipped out before Owen could stop them. Not that they weren’t true, but still… “We’re just kind of taking things slow and seeing where they lead.”

  It was one hell of an abridged version. After their talk in the kitchen, during which Owen had been alternately furious and heart sore, he and Cate had fallen into a rhythm that had surprised him with its ease. They’d talked and eaten, then talked some more, and when he’d taken her back up to his bedroom for a slower yet just-as-hot round of sex, then she’d stayed all day yesterday and until the tiny hours of this morning for more of the same, Owen had realized the truth. He did like Cate, maybe more than was good for him.

  Which meant he had to tread very carefully for both their sakes, because she’d made it wildly clear she wanted no strings attached.

  “Taking things easy to start out makes sense,” Hunter said, bringing Owen back to the quiet din of Clementine’s Diner, and, ah, the shot was too good to pass up.

  “Says the man who’s getting married in less than a month.”

  “Shut up.” His brother’s laugh took all the heat from the directive and sent a weird feeling through Owen’s gut. Yeah, Hunter had always been a goner for Emerson, even in the twelfth grade. But the look on his face right now was nothing short of pure love, and not the sappy, roses-are-red kind, either. This love was real, the kind their old man had had for their mother. The kind that lasted, like family and farm.

  The kind that Owen wanted, and Cate wasn’t interested in.

  “Speaking of which”—he took a long sip from the sweet tea in front of him in the hopes it would drown the sudden triple-knot in his throat. Talk about putting the cart before the horse. He and Cate hadn’t even been on an official date yet, for Chrissake—“we should probably get to planning some of these wedding logistics.”

  Hunter nodded. It was, after all, the main reason they’d decided to meet up on a Monday evening for dinner. “I s’pose you’re right. There’s a lot to get in order.”

  “Great,” Owen said, tamping down the last of the strange feeling in his chest. He had plenty of time to get from Point A to Point B, and Cate needed to go slow. Sure, he liked her. But he also couldn’t push her, or she’d shut him out. So, he did what he always did.

  He buckled down and got serious about what was in front of him.

  “One Cross Creek country wedding, coming right up.”

  Owen shook off the early morning chill in the air, heading into the main house with an empty Thermos and a big ol’ smile on his face. Yeah, he was running on a skimpy five hours of sleep, but after he’d come back from dinner with Hunter and Lane, he’d gotten a text from Cate. That had led to him shamelessly inviting her over, her quickly accepting, and them having incendiary sex on his living room couch because they hadn’t even been able to make it up the stairs to his bedroom. They’d had sex there later, too—good measure, and all. But in between, they’d finished the chocolate cake she’
d made over the weekend, laughing and talking about the details for Hunter’s wedding, and, as tired as he felt, Owen couldn’t think of one damn thing he’d rather trade sleep for than Cate McAllister.

  He was so tangled up in the thought that he didn’t realize the kitchen was occupied until he was a full three steps over the threshold.

  “Marley?” He blinked, wondering if he was seeing things. But nope, his sister was definitely standing at the kitchen island with a mixing bowl clutched to the chest of her pajama top and a look of pure shock on her face. “What are you doing down here so early?”

  “Nothing! Aren’t you supposed to be working, or something?” Her mouth pursed in a scowl of frustration, and, a second later, Owen realized why.

  “Are you baking brownies?”

  Marley held the mixing bowl possessively, but didn’t hesitate to look him dead in the eye. “No. Yes.” She huffed out a sigh. “I mean, it’s just some dumb recipe I found online, but…I don’t know, I wanted chocolate and it didn’t look so hard. So I thought, you know. I’d try it.”

  “At six thirty in the morning?” he asked, and damn, her frown was at expert levels today.

  “It’s the only time I can get any privacy in the kitchen. You guys are always having some family meal or another in here, celebrating another Thursday, or whatever.”

  Owen dug deep for his patience and miraculously found some. “If you want to use the kitchen for something, all you have to do is ask.” A beat passed, which Marley surprisingly didn’t fill with a caustic comeback, so he impulsively added, “And if you want to join us for one of those meals, all you have to do is show up.”

  “I wouldn’t want to intrude,” Marley said. There was a hint of truth beneath the serrated edges of her answer, and it made Owen proceed with care.

  He walked to the coffeepot like nothing-doing. “Well, that’s a relief, because you wouldn’t be. Like it or not, you are part of this family.”