Love Starts with Elle (31 page)
Yeah, so much for her promises to keep it low key.
Dropping her keys and purse on the work table, Elle surveyed the studio, not sure what to do next or where to begin. Her Wal-Mart laundry bags lined the short wall by the bathroom. Clean clothes were gradually moving to a new dirty pile. Why she didn’t break down and find the laundry baskets in the garage remained a mystery.
Snapping on the AC, Elle popped open the fridge for a bottle of water. The futon looked inviting. Maybe a morning nap was in order. Clearly this was going to be one of those what-to-do, end-up-doing-nothing days.
Elle peered out the window into the yard wishing she had a pool. A quick dip later in the afternoon would be nice. Or she could drive over to Mama and Daddy’s, or Sara Beth’s. When she did, she ended up hanging out too long, staying for supper, watching TV, shooting the day all to pieces.
She’d become a full-blooded bohemian.
Clearly you have too much
time if you’re standing here dissecting an afternoon of swimming.
Deciding to work instead of surrendering to laziness, she set out her palette and the
Memory Book
painting she’d started a few days ago. She’d read a verse in the Old Testament about God listening to conversations and writing things down. Terrifying? Yes, but fascinating. One morning in prayer, she had a flash image of words one might find in God’s memory books so she decided to put it to canvas.
“Isn’t God good?”
“Jesus loves you, friend.”
“Here, have this cup of cold water.”
“Please, take this twenty. It’s not much, but I hope it helps.”
“I forgive you.”
With her palette knife, she began mixing colors, but when a car door sounded, she peered out the window. Heath?
Danny Simmons.
He caught her gazing and motioned for permission to come up.
Opening the door, Elle waited.
“Morning, Elle.” Danny’s tan was accented by a stiff, white Ralph Lauren polo.
“How’re you, Danny?” Elle motioned to the stool by the work table. A fight-or-flight decision flickered behind his eyes. Could he finish what he was about to start? “It’s okay, I don’t bite.”
He perched on the stool. “You haven’t heard why I’m here yet.”
Crossing her arms, Elle leaned against the table. “Why are you here?”
“I want to marry your sister.”
She gauged his sincerity. “Why are you telling me?”
“Because I want you to talk to her, convince her it’s the right thing. She turns me down every time I ask her.”
“Forget it, Danny. I’m not going to talk her into marrying you. If she’s turning you down, she must have a reason. You might consider moving on.”
The light in the room shifted as the sun moved behind a cloud. The AC hummed like a good AC unit.
“I’ve watched you, Elle. Julianne respects and listens to you.”
Elle squinted at him. “She never listens to me.”
“There’s more to this story than Julianne and me.” Danny held up a single finger.
Elle eased her arms down to her side. The resonance in his voice captured her attention. “And what would that one be?”
“Rio’s mine, Elle.” No hesitation, no door for questions.
“Rio is yours? As in—”
“I’m her father.”
“You’re Rio’s daddy?” It seemed insane, ludicrous. Of all the possible Danny Simmons confessions Elle could’ve conjured up, being Rio’s daddy was not one of them.
“I want to get this out in the open, marry Julianne, and be a family. Rio calls me Mr. Danny. My own daughter . . . Mr. Danny.”
She stared. “I-I can’t believe it. You?”
“Yes, me.”
Elle walked around her easel, hand pressed to the back of her neck. She looked back at him. “This is unbelievable. Rio’s daddy? How?”
“We met, connected, one thing led to another . . . Do you need more, or do you get the picture?”
“I get it.”
“So, are you going to help me or not?” The desperation in his eyes leaked out in his voice.
“If she’s yours, where have you been the past four years?”
“On the outside looking in. Julianne stiff-armed me until this year. I finally wore her down.”
“Why don’t you man up and talk to Daddy?”
He arched his back a little with a sarcastic nose-laugh. “She’d kill me. You don’t think I’ve tried every possible angle. Sorry to tell you, but you’re my last resort.”
“Good to know.”
Danny slid off the stool and paced a little. “Elle, I’m forty-eight and divorced. My ex hates me and sees to it my kids do too, except when they need money. I have a chance to right some wrongs, do something good for two people I love more than my own breath.”
He regarded Elle for a moment. “Do whatever you think is best, but I’d be forever indebted if you could help me.”
“You overestimate my influence.”
“I hear you’re a praying woman. If you don’t have the influence, perhaps He does.”
He heard she was a praying woman?
“Perhaps.”
“Thanks, Elle.” Danny exited the studio without looking back.
From her window, she watched him go, feeling for the first time the longing of his heart.
“My own daughter calls me Mr. Danny.”
Julianne’s was busy when Elle entered the salon. The bell on the door announced her arrival. “What are you doing here?” Julianne clicked on the shears to shave the neck of the man sitting in her chair.
“Came to see you.” Maybe she should’ve waited until the salon closed, but hanging around the studio thinking of Danny’s confession had stoked a fire in Elle’s belly. She tried to settle down and paint, but when she rehearsed confronting Julianne for the hundredth time, she decided to talk to her in person.
“Afternoon, Elle,” Mrs. Pratt called over her shoulder from where Lacy polished her nails. “I hear Jeremiah’s back in your life.”
Julianne ducked her embarrassed cheeks behind her client’s head.
Big mouth. Talk about your own life if you want to gossip.
Maybe coming in during business hours to confront her wasn’t such a good idea.
“He is, Mrs. Pratt.” It’s all the woman needed to know.
Julianne finished up with her customer, a young man dressed as a civilian but with the strut of a marine. She thanked him for coming by, then reached for the broom. “What’s up, sister dear?”
“Can I talk to you? In private?” Elle motioned to the break/storage room.
“Sounds serious.” Julianne swept brown hair into a dust pan. “Let me check on Miss Dora’s set first.” She walked over to the dryers, lifted the hood, felt the curlers, then told the woman five more minutes.
In the back room, Elle sniffed around the last of the morning donuts, but decided against eating one.
Jules yanked open the fridge. “Now that I have my own business, I can’t imagine how you sold the gallery.”
“Love is blind.”
“Maybe, but it shouldn’t make you stupid.” Julianne pulled out a bottle of water, letting the door swing shut. “What’s wrong? Is it Jeremiah?” She grabbed a basket of towels off the dryer. “I’m going to say this straight up, Elle. I know SB, MJ, and Candace agree—the man doesn’t deserve you. Do you really want to be married to him after what he did?”
“People make mistakes, Jules.”
“Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”
“Is that why you won’t tell Mama and Daddy about Danny?”
Julianne didn’t flinch, but folded a towel, tucking her red lips into a tight line. “I don’t know why they have to know who I’m dating—”
“He told me.”
“Told you what?” Julianne snapped another towel from the basket. “Danny Simmons is used to getting what he wants and it burns my hide to have him sneaking around to the family, talking about my business.”
“He seems to think Rio is his business.” Elle picked up a towel to fold, keeping her voice low.
I’m on your side.
Julianne thrust a folded towel onto the pile with such force the stack toppled to the floor. She swore as she stooped to pick them up. “Now I have to wash them all over again.”
“The floor looks clean to me. Isn’t there a five-second rule?”
“No, there’s not.” Julianne shoved Elle aside and tossed the fallen towels into the machine.
“Is he Rio’s daddy?”
“You with your questions.” She measured out detergent and poured it in, slamming down the lid.
“The irony is killing me, Jules. You won’t use a towel on a customer that hit a clean floor for two seconds, but you’re willing to let your family and friends believe Rio came from a one-night stand?”
“Towels and my personal affairs do not equate.” She trembled as she reached for the remainders in the basket.
“Jules.” Elle grabbed her hands. “Is it true?”
A light knock against the door and Lacy called, “Julianne, your four o’clock arrived.”
“Thanks, I’ll be right out.” Julianne eyed Elle, control replacing the tremors. “So what if he is?”
Why did she make everything so hard? “Then you can come clean, get married, move out of the dump you call home. Rio can have a daddy, Jules.”
“It’s not that simple.”
Elle smacked her hand down on the washing machine. Her bracelets clanked against the metal. “Why not? Why is everything so complicated? Do you know how relieved Daddy and Mama would be? Maybe a little weird about the age thing and the fact that Danny is Daddy’s friend and all, but, Jules, they’d be elated.”
Steely brown eyes held on to Julianne’s resolve. Elle knew her sister’s cloaked confession did not mean one brick in her wall had come down. “I’m not telling anyone anything. And you’re still under our pinky oath.”
“I’m sorry, that’s not good enough. Jules, you best give me a reason why you won’t come clean on this. You have a wonderful man who loves you and longs to do the right thing.”
“I have a customer.” Julianne stepped around Elle.
“Do not go out that door, Jules.”
With a desperate sigh, Julianne fell against the door, holding her head high, fixing her eyes on some point beyond Elle. “You want a reason? You think this is so cut and dried, black and white? Just confess, Jules, all your problems will be solved. No, they won’t. Nothing can remove the shame. I’m ashamed, Elle, and it physically hurts to think about it.” Her terse words flew like arrows.
“You’re not the first woman to have a baby out of wedlock.” Elle tread with a light step.
Julianne’s eyes glistened as she absently bit her bottom lip. “He’s been divorced three years. Rio is four.”
Elle crossed her arms in an academic way, as if she’d just grasped the law of entropy. “Okay, a small complication—”
“Small complication? You think I’m going to waltz into Truman and Lady Garvey’s house and confess their foolish and stupid daughter had an affair with a married man? I won’t do it. It was bad enough telling them I was pregnant. Every time I’m with them, I feel their disappointment.”
“Don’t see them through your guilt, Jules. They love you; they’re proud of you. They strutted around here like peacocks at your grand opening.”
“Okay, maybe the ordeal of their daughter having a baby out of wedlock has passed. Besides, it’s happened to half their friends. It’s not so shameful anymore, but, Elle, if I start letting on that Danny Simmons is Rio’s daddy . . .” She snatched a tissue from a nearby box and blotted under her eyes. “I won’t do it, not to them. Danny can live with it.”
“Do you love him? What if this isn’t about you or Danny or Mama and Daddy. Could it be about Rio and what’s best for her?”
“What’s best for her is what I say. Danny isn’t leaving me many options, Elle. If I’m with him, the truth has to come out. He won’t have it any other way. He’s tired of being in the background and frankly, I don’t blame him. But, Elle, this is one valley our love can’t cross.”
“Not even for Rio?”
Julianne lowered her eyes, shaking her head. “It sounds simple, but—” A single tear dangled from her chin. She wiped it away with the back of her hand. “Imagining the look on their faces as they hear one of their adorable offspring willingly carried on with a married man, one of Daddy’s friends, no less, is the stuff of nightmares.”
Lacy knocked again. “Are you coming? He says he’s in a hurry.”
“Be right out, Lace.”
How had Jules borne this alone for so long? Elle would’ve cracked under the pressure. “At the risk of sounding like a hundred-year-old hymn, I think I know someone who can take away your burden of guilt and shame.”
“I’ve prayed, Elle, if that’s what you mean.” Julianne checked her makeup in the mirror before easing open the door. “Maybe some of us are just destined to be shackled by a heavy burden.”
Since his conversation with Nate, Heath’s novel determination suffered. He’d not touched his laptop today since checking e-mail before driving TL to school.
Should he continue to pen a book no one would ever read? A real artist would say yes. Art for art’s sake. Elle seemed willing to create work no one would ever see. But her issues were different from his. She was insecure. He was efficient.
Maybe it was Heath’s practical side. Or his ego. But if he worked his backside off preparing a case, writing a book, or carving an angel out of a tree stump, somebody had better benefit from it.
So maybe it was back to Manhattan and his Central Park apartment with a cleaning service and take out. He’d finish Chet and Kelly’s story on the weekends, see if Nate could land it a home.
Lately, he missed waking up in the morning with a distinct sense of purpose, reviewing case details as he showered, reading briefs on his train ride downtown. And the other night he’d had a craving for the kabobs served by the Indian place on the corner of Lexington and 49th.
Plopping down on the couch, he reached for the remote, surfed a few channels, then clicked the TV off. He was restless. Ready to move on with his life.
When he’d moved down to St. Helena, he’d wanted to forget himself, get lost in something that had no ties to Ava. But nearing the anniversary of her death, he was ready to be found.
Wandering out to the screen porch, he eased down into the iron rocker and listened to the melody of the creek.
Maybe writing a book didn’t matter as much as healing and closing those final doors of grief. Looking back, he’d done well. Only one door remained. The letter.
