Page 54 of The Art of Loving Lacy
She sent an email to her boss and let him know that things were going well and she was enjoying the assignment. Then she took a quick shower to clear her mind. Everywhere she looked, she saw Dane. She checked her phone for messages, but he hadn’t called or texted.Shoot.She had to stop thinking about him. Lacy took her phone out to the deck and called Danica.
“Hey, sis, how’s it going?” Danica asked.
“Great and sucky at the same time,” Lacy said. She flopped onto a deck chair.
“Give it to me straight,” Danica said.
“Oh, Dan. Dane’s wonderful. He’s so darn nice and, well, you know how he is. That’s not new. We agreed not to fall in love with each other, and now it’s all I can think of. He had to bail his friend out of jail and—”
“What?” Danica said.
“Yeah, remember I told you about his best friend, Rob? You saw the pics. I emailed them to you months ago.”
“Oh, yeah, the brown-haired shark hunter guy,” Danica said.
Lacy looked out at the water, remembering the other night when she’d found Dane sitting in the sand. She smiled at the memory.
“Yeah, well, he’s going through a rough patch with his wife and he’s a recovered alcoholic—well, he was. His wife left him, and he started drinking again. He started a fight and got picked up by the police. The whole thing was really sad. The guy’s in his forties, and he’s so broken over things with his wife. But Dane was so emotional. He’s always said that Rob was like a brother to him, and today I saw it. He was so careful with him. Protective. He even offered to go to AA meetings with him,” Lacy said.
“I think Dane’s a good guy, Lace. It sounds like he’s really trying all around, but I thought you were supposed to be learning about his business.”
“I am. He took me to the library, and he was so cute. He had all these books about sharks, and he wanted me to read them, to get familiar with the sharks. But, Danica, I’d stayed up all Sunday night reading about sharks for some stupid reason. Anyway, he took me to a new aquarium, and I pet a baby shark. You’d be so proud of me. I couldn’t go into the shark room, though. Totally freaked me out. I stood in the doorway, clinging to Dane’s arm,” Lacy said.
“No panic attack?”
“No, but I wasn’t in the room with them. I stood in the doorway.”
“That’s awesome, Lacy. That’s a big step, but don’t be surprised if you have another panic attack at some point. It would be surprising if you were able to desensitize yourself in a day,” Danica said.
“Oh, and he got advice on immersion therapy to help me through my fear.”
“Yeah, about that…”
“Danica Joy, please tell me that you did not do what I think you did.” Lacy was angry and overjoyed at the same time.
“I didn’t do anything but answer a phone call…and maybe give a little advice,” Danica admitted.
“He called you?” Now the picture was becoming clearer. “So you were the friend he mentioned. And you didn’t call me and tell me? How could you?”
“Lacy, if I had told you, you’d have been angry with me, and it’s obvious how you feel about him and how he feels about you. Besides, I did more than just give him advice. I told him that if he hurt you, Blake would kill him.”
She heard the smile in Danica’s voice. “That’s just great. So he went behind my back to mysister.” Lacy wanted to be furious at his sneakiness, but she couldn’t. No one would do what he did unless he really—Oh wow—loved her.
“Lace, not many guys would go that far. I was impressed,” Danica admitted.
Lacy sighed. “Yeah, I guess I am, too. He’s not like any other guy I know. That’s kind of what I wanted to ask you about. I’ve been thinking about everything, and I wonder if you might be right, that my panic attack wasn’t just about the shark. Could it really have been abouteverything? The shark, the memories, and the idea that after all that time I was finally with Dane? Could it have scared the crap out of me?” Lacy asked.
“It could have, but, Lace, you have to be careful. You can’t just assume you’ll be fine on a boat when he’s tagging. That’s really dangerous,” Danica reminded her.
“I’m not going tagging with him. Don’t worry. Danica?” Lacy asked.
“Yeah?”
“I really, really like him. I feel like all that time apart set us up to just fall in love the moment we saw each other face-to-face. I know that’s crazy.” Lacy leaned against the deck rail and ran her finger over the rough wooden edge.
“It’s not so crazy. You guys shared your lives. You just did it from afar. You shared your secrets, Lacy. You shared your hearts. So in a way, you did set yourselves up for just that,” Danica said.
“But shouldn’t I feel something about the fact that he was with other women during that time? How can someone be intimate with another person when they have feelings for someone else? I just don’t get that,” Lace admitted.
