Jumped (22 page)

“D'ya see this, Grady?” Beth wanted to lighten the mood. “She never used to cry before she met you.”

Grady shrugged, put his arm around his wife, and looked at her, affection radiating from his famous blue eyes. “It's what I do to women.” He looked at Beth. “Except usually I get paid for it, and they're watching me in a movie.”

That evening after dinner,
Beth and Mingo looked in on Finn, who had opted for a can of soup in the cottage over pizza at the house. She found him on the sofa, typing away.

“Do you want to come up? We're going to watch
National Velvet
in the movie room.”

Finn chuckled. “Grady, too?”

“That's the rumor. Last summer Solstice sprained her ankle pretending to ride in the Grand National. See? You're not the only one with an Aspen Creek leg injury.”

“That sounds a little too girly for a studly, manly man-stud like myself,” Finn said, stretching for effect. “I think I'll stay here and admire my sword.”

Beth laughed. “You've been doing that all day, haven't you?”

He arched an eyebrow. “Wouldn't you like to know?”

Good. Finn was in a good mood. She smiled. “I'll probably sleep up there tonight.”

“Okay.” He sounded cautious. “How'd your meeting and trail ride go?”

“Good. Really good. He thinks I should try to sell my line to a distributor.” If Finn was jealous, he hid it well. “I'll take you to the doctor tomorrow. Then we can go to Maroon Bells?”

“Yeah. That'd be great.”

“Do you want me to help you get ready for bed?”

“No, I'm pretty good at it now. You have fun with the girls. I've got plenty to keep me busy,” he said, indicating his computer. “And Bethany?”

“Yes?”

“If you want to see Cormier, you should. Not that you need my permission, but I was being an ass about it and I'm done.”

“All right.” She didn't know what else to say to that, so she left. She was a bit disappointed he hadn't flung his crutches down, hobbled to her, thrown himself at her feet, and begged her to stay.

The following morning while Finn saw the doctor, Beth's father called. She let it go to voice mail, then listened as soon as he'd ended the call.

“Beth, it's your father,” Tony Fanelli said. “How's my girl today? I told Mitch about your friend the architect and he'll send to you by email a list of his preferences for his house. This by no means is an indication that he will give your friend the job. He said he'd help your friend, but in the end, if the guy's no good, he's no good. Take care. Get a job. Bye.”

Beth listened to the message and sighed. It was so like her father to end on a down note. She suspected Uncle Mitch had said nothing of the kind, but Dad had to throw it in. Captain Buzzkill.

The Maroon Bells
weren't bells at all, but fourteeners—mountains at least fourteen thousand feet high—in the Elk Mountain range. The twin pyramids of Maroon Peak and North Maroon Peak held court a dozen miles outside Aspen. They were the supermodels of the Rockies, the most photographed mountains in North America, but Beth had never seen them in person.

Beth, Finn, and Mingo hiked the short distance from the parking lot to Maroon Lake. Walking was easier for Finn now, because the doctor had replaced the cast with a lighter, more streamlined brace. Finn found a smooth log to sit on that faced the stunning view.

“Damn,” Beth said. “They're just . . . beautiful. With the lake and everything, and the reflection? The snow in those stripes? It's so pretty, it looks fake, like those paintings in Chinese restaurants.”

“Hungry?” Finn asked. Mingo, looking hopeful, was lying next to the thermal bag that contained lunch.

“Always.”

“Harris threatened me with bodily harm if I canceled again. So here it is.” Finn then made a production of handing her: 1. a cornflower-blue linen napkin; 2. a plastic plate that looked like china; 3. a BLT made with applewood smoked bacon, arugula, heirloom tomatoes, and pesto mayonnaise on sourdough—Beth's favorite sandwich—gourmet-ed up and wrapped in butcher paper sealed with red wax; 4. a pickle; 5. a bunch of fat, firm red grapes; and 6. a can of Diet Coke. It was perfect. Finn took his sandwich out of the cooler and unwrapped it. His didn't have sealing wax.

Beth giggled. “Oh, wow, this is unbelievable. Thank you, Finn. Thank you, Harris! Should we text him a selfie?”

They looked at each other and simultaneously said, “Nah.”

Gorgeous food, mountains, man, and an adorable dog—it was an exceptional afternoon. She plopped the last grape into her mouth and pressed the napkin to her lips. She closed her eyes and inhaled. Scents of pine, fresh water, and earth suffused the air. “Mm, it even smells beautiful here.” She opened her eyes to find him staring at her. Not at the mountains or the lake, not the aspens, not the adorable dog at his feet. Her. She shook her head quizzically.

“You fit here,” Finn said. He was staring at her. “You are so beautiful, Bethany.”

“Thank you,” she said. This was kind of weird. Why was he telling her this?

He covered her knee with his big, capable palm and squeezed. Adrenaline zipped through her. He reached behind him and presented her with a plain white envelope. She tilted her head, eyes narrowed.

Finn, her occasionally arrogant ex-husband, looked sheepish. He gazed beyond her at the lake as he said, “I, uh, wrote you a letter. I wanted to tell you some things, and I needed to get the words right. I hope you don't mind.” Now he met her eyes.

“Okaaay,” Beth said. She opened it, removed the printed page, glanced at Finn.

And began to read.

13

Dear Bethany,

I'm writing this because I need to tell you how I feel and I'm afraid I'll botch it if I don't write it down. Here it all is, on paper, in black and white. I don't care what you think of me after reading this because I want you to know what's in my heart.

I love you. I told you this when we kayaked, but I am repeating it here. I have loved you since the summer we met (even though your father wanted to kill me).

Beth grinned at that.

You have been extraordinary, taking care of me, and I thank you. Everyone has been great, but I wouldn't feel as good as I do now if it were not for you.

Spending this time with you has meant more to me than I can say. I have missed you. I am going to pour my heart out here, Bethany. I want to be with you. Our divorce was a mistake. I was too rash and made a bad decision. I take a good amount of responsibility, but we both could have been more patient. We were stubborn and unyielding and this was partially because we were immature. I should have been more understanding of your career. I should have been more sensitive to what you wanted. At the time, I needed to live up to your expectations of what a husband should be, and it was important to me to make a good living for you because you were used to having money. The hitch was, with two jobs, I was never home. I understand why you didn't want to come home to our empty apartment. I understand why you threw yourself into your career. God knows I was doing the same, for different reasons.

When I think of my future, I see you in it. You are an extraordinary woman, the most remarkable woman I have ever known. I want another chance with you, if you will have me. Take some time to think about it. Let me know your decision when you arrive at it.

You have my heart. As always.

Finn

Beth finished reading and stared at the paper. Sunlight glared off of the white, making her squint. She hadn't thought to put her sunglasses on, partially because she liked being able to see the blue of Finn's eyes. Gone was the tranquility of the setting. Her heart was rattling her ribs. Her fingertips were a little numb. She inhaled, then exhaled.
Not only does Finn love me, he
wants to try again.

When the ringing in her ears had subsided, she said, “Finn. This is beautiful. I don't know what to say. I mean that; it's not a figure of speech, I really don't know what to say.”

Finn nodded slowly, almost mechanically.

Beth pressed her lips together as though she had just reapplied lipstick, then continued. “I don't know what I want. I can tell you that I've loved being with you, and I don't just mean the sex,” she said, with a nervous laugh. “It's like when it was good between us. It's been like that. But is it because there's no pressure? Is it because we're in this idyllic setting but we know it's not permanent, and we'll never have to deal with the mundane parts of being together long term? Paying bills, doing chores? Scheduling sex?”

Finn said, “I was never tired of you.”

She smiled and felt it tremble on her lips. “I wasn't tired of you, either. That's one thing we can say. We were never boring. But we were only married a year.”

His eyebrows went up and he nodded. “True
.
”

“By the way, I agree with you about us being too quick to split up. We didn't even go to marriage counseling. I don't know if we would've worked out, or if we
will
work out if we try again. But I think we were under so much pressure and we made decisions that weren't well thought out. I married you as quickly as I did in part to rebel against my dad because he didn't like you. Yes, I resented that you were working so much, but I realize now that you only did it to make money because you'd see the horses I was getting for clients on buying trips to Europe. I know you felt pressure to do the same for me. But I never held that against you. And I was unfair to you. I put my students before my marriage too many times. I was angry when you forced me to choose between helping that girl and going to dinner. I thought you were a bastard for doing that. But now I understand that, for you, it was the last straw. I had pushed you. You were alone most weekends while I was at horse shows. I didn't think it was a problem, and I honestly always thought I'd slow down. But I didn't. I kept putting it off. And I kept putting
you
off.”

She paused and looked to the Maroon Bells for courage to continue.

“In retrospect I realize I never took your requests seriously because . . . because I thought my job was more important because I worked with kids.”

She'd never admitted this even to herself.

Finn's eyes widened. It wasn't much, but she saw it. She had surprised him with this shameful insight as much as she'd surprised herself.

She sighed. “Wow. I buried that one. But it's true. I know I wasn't a psychiatrist for abused children or a pediatric cardiologist, but I thought it was more important than your work or going to pick out furniture with you or having dinner with your new boss.”

His lips parted as he took this in. His eyes were not so full of love as he said, “My job—my
jobs
—didn't matter because I didn't work with
kids
? The jobs I was working to make a better life for us?” He blew out a breath, then looked through her for a full two seconds. “Pardon my French, but that's fucked up.”

She nodded numbly. “Yeah. Yeah, it is. I resented you asking for my time. That's the real reason.” Beth trembled as she forced herself to look at him. “God, Finn, this is so ugly.” Tears prickled at her eyes and her nose felt hot.
How could I have thought this? I'm a terrible person.
She covered her mouth with her hand and sobbed as the tears flowed. “I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. It was an awful thing to think, and I didn't realize it then, or I didn't believe I could think something so awful.”

Finn was staring at his broken leg stretched out in front of him and tensing his jaw rhythmically. “But you did. And you wonder why I needed to prove myself?” He looked at her, misery and anger on his face. “You sided with your father.”

“No!” she said. “That wasn't it. He has nothing to do with this, although I can see how you'd think that. I used to accuse you of being arrogant, and I was a million times more arrogant than you ever were. I liked feeling important and like I was the only one who could help my students. And I compared myself to you and . . . And I had no right to. It was small of me.” She whispered, “It was awful of me.”

They sat in silence for several seconds, Finn's jaw still clenching away like a muscular metronome. She wished he'd say something.

Beth resisted the urge to talk just to fill the awkward silence. She deserved to feel a little discomfort after what she'd just admitted. She stared at Mingo, asleep at her feet.

At last, Finn spoke. “I'll say one thing. It all makes more sense now.”

“What?”

“Why you didn't fight more to stay together.”

“You didn't make it very inviting. I didn't think you wanted to be with me.”

“I didn't think you wanted to be with
me
.”

“We didn't communicate so well at that point.”

Finn exhaled sharply. “No.” He scratched his leg. “You weren't snobby in any other way. Even though you were with all those rich people all the time. I did not suspect this.”

Beth closed her eyes. “I know, Finn. I know. I wasn't snobby about stupid stuff. I was snobby about you, which was worse than anything.”

“For what it's worth, you did teach those kids life lessons. For some of them, you might have been the only one who didn't cater to them. Your job
was
important.”

“Stop being so bloody gracious!”

He tilted his head and looked at her. “What am I supposed to do, Bethany? Yell and scream? Throw something? It's water under the bridge. I don't know what to think right now. That was a body blow, but I'll adjust. Time heals all wounds and all that crap.”

Beth smoothed the letter between her palms. “Well, well, wasn't this fun? Sorry to mar such a gorgeous day playing true confessions.”

They barely spoke
during the drive back to Aspen Creek. Mingo slept on Finn's lap. Finn knew his letter had caused a seismic shift, then her revelation had caused another in the opposite direction. He wasn't sure if picking at these old wounds was good or bad.
We'll find out soon enough.

As Bethany's pickup rumbled up Aspen Creek's private drive, Grady, Amanda, Harris, Solstice, and Wave clustered next to the guest cottage. They waved as Bethany dropped Finn off, then parked in the eight-car garage attached to the house. Finn welcomed the distraction and forced a smile.
Put on a happy face, pal. You're a guest here.

Wave chattered while Mingo hopped and twirled near her sparkly pink sneakers and Ben bounded toward them in his springy, Portuguese water dog gait. Bethany said Ben would make a great dressage horse because his canter had so much expression, whatever that meant. Ben bounced around the trio and Finn ruffled the black curly hair atop the young dog's head.

Then Finn looked up and saw the reason for the gathering. It was a large stone fountain with a nude woman standing in a round basin, holding a platter aloft. Water flowed over the edge of the platter and into the basin.

“Wow. That's some fountain, kids,” Bethany said.

“That's just what we were thinking,” Harris said. “The ‘fountain,' part, not the ‘wow' part.”

“I like it,” Wave said.

“It's dorky,” Solstice said. The older girl stood apart from her sister and parents, leaning her tall, slender frame against the cottage. She flipped her brown hair that she'd inherited from her father behind one shoulder and stared at her cell phone.

“Hey,” Grady said to her, “No phone when you're with other people.”

“But Daaaad!”

“You know the rules. Either put it away or I take it,” Grady said. Solstice pouted, but slid the phone into the pocket of her shorts.

“Thank you,” he said. “Now you're polite again.”

Bethany walked around the fountain. “So, uh, this from Italy? It's very . . . artistic.”

“That's one word for it,” Harris said.

“
We
didn't buy it,” Amanda said.

Amanda, Bethany, Harris, and Grady looked at Finn. The dogs looked at him, too.

“Oh, no,” Finn said.

“The good news is, if someone stole your identity, we can limit the search to the legally blind,” Harris said.

“Here's the invoice.” Grady slid a folded yellow paper from a pocket of his cargo shorts and showed it to Finn. “What the hey,” Grady said, “Let's keep it. It's a conversation piece. Unless you want it.”

“No thank you. And you don't have to keep it. I'll return it.”

Grady said, “We'll keep it. She's kinda growing on me.”

“You can't be serious,” Harris said. “I won't be able to sleep, knowing this abomination is on the property.” He buried his beautiful face in his manicured hands. “Sweet fancy Moses, I'm surrounded by philistines.”