Page 31 of One More Heartbeat
“Is it possible to send me the floor plans for next door so I can show them to Troy?” Troy was also a student of his, so Mr. Cartwright knows about Troy’s successful construction business.
“I can drop a copy off tomorrow. Does that work for you?”
“Thank you!”
He leaves, and I check the time. Two more hours until I told Garrett I would show up at his house. Two more hours until I find out what he needs to talk to me about.
And yes—I am curious what he has to tell me.
More than likely, his text was nothing more than a ploy to get me to help him with the Game Night snacks.
This wouldn’t be the first time he’s done that.
I doubt he’s heard yet the news about Joseph, and that’s why he wants to talk to me.
Or maybe he has.
Maybe he wants me to come over earlier so he can tell me that he told me so, he always thought something was off about Joseph.
11
GARRETT
The first summerKenda and I were a couple, I brought her to my parents’ house, eager for her to meet Mom and Dad. Naturally, they loved her. How could they not?
She spent the next two Christmases staying with me there, because she didn’t want to spend the holidays with her parents. She hadn’t told me much about them, but I got the idea her father was an asshole. Of course, Mom had been adamant—even if I was twenty at the time—Kenda and I would sleep in separate rooms. Right—as if that had stopped us from hooking up while under my parents’ roof.
We had snuggled on the porch love seat, our bodies buried under a pile of blankets, talking about our futures. I would attend law school after the Marines. She was going to be a great journalist, traveling war-torn countries. Right, I hadn’t exactly been thrilled with that. We had argued, heatedly, before I finally understood why she had to pursue her world-changing goal.
The love I felt for Kenda has faded, but the pain in my heart that she’s gone from this world is very real.
And now I have a daughter. A daughter who will grow up without her mother.
Each step toward my childhood home is like trudging through wetmud, my newly appointed single-father status and the looming book deadline sucking me down.
The front door swings open, and Mom’s smiling face meets mine. The once-brown waves of her shoulder-length hair are now gray, but despite that, she still resembles the woman who raised me. And that includes the jeans and light-blue T-shirt dusted with flour.
“Garrett, I wasn’t expecting you today.” She steps back, letting me into the house. “You’re just in time for your favorite double-chocolate cookies. They’re fresh from the oven.”
The smell of chocolate reaches me as I step onto the stoop, and I’m returned to a time when she made them whenever I’d had a bad day. I didn’t have to tell her something was upsetting me. She always knew.
I flash her a wan smile and step inside my childhood home. Memories of Kenda in this house make it difficult to fasten on a more convincing upward curve of my mouth.
A few specific memories sneak in, and a small, silent laugh fills my heart. Of her making out with me in the old treehouse that used to be in the backyard. It had been damn cold, but Kenda hadn’t cared. Of her unabashedly throwing her arms around my neck in front of my family after she opened her Christmas present from me. I had given her some pretty journals Zara had told me Kenda had been eyeing in a store.
Of her tiptoeing into my room late at night, looking adorably sleep ruffled, after having a bad dream.
I had kissed the memory of it out of her until she fell asleep in my arms.
Worry creases Mom’s brow. “Is something wrong, sweetheart?” She sweeps me into a hug, the top of her head barely meeting my shoulders.
I hug her back, relieved and happy this woman, who’d put up with my dumb ass growing up, is still part of my life. She has always been there for my brothers and me. Attended all our hockey games and practices. Supported all our decisions, including those I’m sure deep down she cringed at. The only exception was when she had temporarily, last year, disagreed with Troy’s choice of girlfriend, Jess, because of her past.
She releases me, the frown on her face still there. “What’s wrong?”
“Is Dad here? There’s something I need to talk to you both about.”
“He’s working in his study. Has some numbers he needed to crunch for a client and decided to do that here instead of at the office.”
