Page 119 of Cold Case, Warm Hearts

There was no excuse for any of it. He’d known the minute Dean had asked him to spy on her that it was wrong. He should have refused. He should never have led his uncle to believe…

“Why’d you do it?” Andrew asked.

Garrett’s phone rang.

Aspen? Maybe she’d changed her mind.

He slid it from his pocket, and his heart fell when he saw Deborah’s name. He was tempted to reject the call, but his aunt hadn’t done anything wrong. He answered with, “Hey.”

“I just want you to know,” Deborah said, “Dean doesn’t speak for me. I love you, and you will always have a place in my life. And whatever happened between you and your uncle, you’ll work it out. It’s going to be all right.”

“No. It’s not.”

“Garrett, sweetheart, he’s just?—”

“I’m not angry with you. You and I are good. Can I speak to him please?”

“He’s not really up for conversation.”

“Fine. Then go to where he is and put me on speakerphone.” Aspen had asked him to pass a message along. Maybe it would be the last thing he could do for her before she disappeared from his life forever.

“Hold on.” A few seconds passed before Deborah spoke again, her voice distant. “We’re both here.”

“Dean?”

His uncle grunted.

“You’re getting what you asked for. Aspen is leaving town.”

No response from Dean, but Deborah said, “Oh, sweetheart, I’m so sorry. I really?—”

“I have to go.” As an afterthought, he added, “Love you…both.” He ended the call without waiting for a response and tossed his phone onto the coffee table.

He dropped his head into his hands.

“She’s leaving town?” Andrew asked.

“Yup.”

Andrew’s previous question still hung between them. Garrett hated the answer. Hated facing the fear that drove him. “I agreed to pass along information to Dean at first because… Because I didn’t want to disappoint him. I didn’t want to risk…”

He hadn’t wanted to risk exactly what had happened. Rejection. Losing his uncle’s affection. “The thing that kills me…” Garrett looked up to see Andrew’s sympathy written on his face and had to squash the irritation that rose. “My uncle gave me an ultimatum tonight. Him or Aspen. I chose Aspen. So I lost him. And now I’ve lost her. And, in case that wasn’t enough, I’ve lost my job too. She fired me. So all the plans you and I made…”

Andrew had helped Garrett put together a business plan. The work that had gone into landing one big job, one that would provide him with lots of before-and-after pictures for his website, along with a glowing review—that had been Andrew’s brain child.

“I’ve lost everything.”

Andrew leaned forward. “Let’s not be melodramatic. You haven’t losteverything. You still have friends. You still have your church. You still have your skills. You’re not alone, and you never will be because you still have God.”

Small comfort in that moment, but Andrew was right.

“Of those three things you feel like youhavelost, your uncle, Aspen, and your job, which is the most important?”

The obvious answer was his uncle. His family. But Dean had asked him to make an impossible choice. Garrett had chosen wrong, according to Dean, and lost what he’d thought was the strongest relationship in his life.

It hadn’t been as rock solid as he’d believed.

The job mattered. If he ever wanted to be anything more than a glorified handyman, he needed someone to trust him with a big job. But there’d be another opportunity. If there wasn’t, he could live with that too.

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