Escape (25 page)

When he ended the call and sank back on the bed, I turned over to face him. He stared at the rafters for a minute, before turning his head on the pillow. His blue eyes were tired. “I missed an eight o’clock meeting.”

I refused to say I was sorry. “Were you planning on being there?”

“I was going to conference in.” He dropped an arm over his eyes. “It’s been a lousy week that way, thank you, Emily. I can’t sleep. The condo’s a sty. When I’m at work, I’m only—only half there.” He exhaled. “Mark’s an intuitive guy. He knows something’s up. I’d tell him—tell him what it is, if I knew.” Without moving his arm, he said, “They caught a coyote in Central Park last week.”

I gasped. “They didn’t kill it, did they?”

“No. Tranquilized it and relocated it. Who knows, maybe to somewhere near here. They figured it got lost and wandered into the city and didn’t know how to get out.”

Drawing on what Jude had taught me, I picked up the story. “So they dropped it off in a wooded place where it could get the food it needed to survive, only it couldn’t stay there. Coyotes are territorial, and this territory was full. So it moved on until it found space.” Amazing, the analogy. “I’ve seen my coyote here, James—I mean literally, I’ve seen her. She lets me watch her pups play.”

He got the message. Letting his arm fall away, he looked at me. “I can’t do small town, Emily. I came from one. I can’t go back.”

“I’m not asking you to. I don’t want to live here.”

“But something pulled you back.”

I tried to explain. “Think refuge, small ‘r.’ That’s what Bell Valley means to me. I was escaping that summer, too. LSATs, interviews, papers, exams—it had all just bunched together. When I first got here, I slept for three days straight.”

“Then or now?” he asked tiredly.

“Both. Well, not actually three days, but you know what I mean.”

“I sure do. There’s nothing else to do in places like this.”

“But there is,” I argued softly, more patient with James than with my dad on this score. “There are books and bikes and paths in the woods. There’s a farmers’ market every Saturday in July and August. And, yes, there’s the Refuge, which always needs help. And friends. I had
good
friends here.”

“And Jude.”

I let out a breath. “And Jude. He was my first serious guy. Like everything else that summer, he was different. Ask him about his career path, and he’d laugh in your face. Everything about him was irreverent. That fascinated me. I’ve never been irreverent in my life.”

“Until now,” James said, eyes sad, voice fading. “I just don’t know what to do with this, Em. And I’m so—so friggin’ tired.”

I leaned over and kissed him lightly, then watched him sleep until my stomach rumbled. Aching for coffee, I got dressed and slipped out. The kitchen was crowded. Vicki and Charlotte were doing stickers at the table, Rob stood on a ladder fiddling with a strip of molding, Lee was at the stove.

All eyes turned my way, curious and expectant, but much as there was solace in knowing they cared, I didn’t want to talk.

“He looked exhausted,” Vicki said when I touched her shoulder in passing.

“He’s burning the candle at both ends,” I agreed, and went on
into the dining room. Taking a tray from the stack designed for those sleeping in, I loaded it with coffee, juice, hard-boiled eggs, fruit, cherry-chocolate muffins, sticky buns, and maple oat scones.

“Woo-hoo,” Rob teased as I passed back through the kitchen, “breakfast in bed?”

“When he wakes up,” I sang, and slipped outside.

He woke up at noon and ate everything that I hadn’t eaten myself, even drank cold coffee—all without leaving the bed. The Red Fox wasn’t the White Elephant, where we had stayed while honeymooning in Nantucket, but breakfast in bed was breakfast in bed.

“She made all this,” he surmised.

I nodded.

He slid down and stretched out. “She’s good. She could make a bundle if she had her own place.”

“That was her dream. She was going to do it with her husband.”

He folded his hands on his belly, but they were tight. “So were we. And now here you are with Jude.”

“James,” I protested, but gently. “I chose
you
. And y’know what, you show up here looking half dead, and I
still
choose you. I have not once regretted marrying you.”

“You walked out on me.”

“On our life. I can’t take the time clock, the traffic, the shallowness, the
noise
. I love you, but I never see you. I’m not rejecting law, just the way I practice it. I’m not rejecting you, just the way our lives force us to be.”

Sliding down beside him, I pressed my face to his shoulder. He drew me closer. Reassured by the gesture, I waited for him to respond, but his breathing leveled.

“Must be a sedative in the air,” he murmured, and fell back to sleep.

I didn’t sleep, simply closed my eyes. I didn’t have to see to appreciate the warmth of his skin and the texture of his body, but what I felt just then was less arousal than a pleasant familiarity. It was gratitude that he had come and cared enough to listen, and even respect, yes, respect a work ethic that made him feel guilty for missing a meeting. It was also hope. He
had
missed that meeting, and he hadn’t balked at telling Mark that he wouldn’t be working today.

Bottom line? If James made me choose between returning to New York and divorce, I’d return to New York. What we had was too good to give up.

That said, I didn’t like the choice. There had to be a better one.

I was no closer to finding it when James woke again. It was nearly two. While he showered, I sat on the bench under the window, dreading the moment when he would climb in his rental car and head south. I was thinking that he hadn’t fawned over the BMW, and that that was a good sign, when another sign came.

He wore a clean pair of jeans low on his hips and was bare-chested and barefooted, scrubbing his hair with a towel when he said, “I might as well meet your friend Lee while I’m here. I want to hear the facts myself before I call Sean.”

The facts didn’t change. Lee told him the story much as she had told me. Naturally reticent, she didn’t ramble on, but responded to one question at a time, in the order he asked. And he was wonderful with her, patient and focused, as I’d known he would be. Interacting with people, be it clients, witnesses, or juries, was his strength. Even the depth of his voice lent something genuine to the meeting. Watching, listening, I was more convinced than ever that his current work
—our
work—was wrong.

At one point, when she was tense talking of her record, he relaxed
her by saying, “You didn’t learn to cook in prison. Those scones were amazing. Most are like lead, but not yours. What makes them so light?”

“Buttermilk,” she said shyly. “I tinker. It’s about getting the proportions right.”

“Well, Sean loves to eat, so bring muffins and he’ll be your slave forever. He’s a good guy. One of his high school pals spent a year behind bars on a negligent homicide conviction, so he gets the personal side of that. He does the trial work for a firm that handles major estates, and he’s already checked, there’s no conflict of interest.” He slid me a glance before telling Lee in an even gentler voice, “He’ll need a retainer. It’s the policy of the firm. Is there someone who can pay?”

“I can,” Amelia said from the door. I didn’t know how long she had been there, but assumed that if she was willing to take my husband’s recommendation, it had been a while. She would have seen his professionalism and sensed his skill.

James stood. After introducing himself, he said, “His name is Sean Alexander, and he’s with Henkel and Ames. Do you know the firm?”

“No,” Amelia said baldly.

“It’s a small, all-purpose firm with extensive resources and an impressive client list. You can check it out online.”

“We’ll do that,” she said in a tone that said she wasn’t about to take
his
word, which annoyed the hell out of me. Of
course
she would check it out; a shrewd businessman wouldn’t do any different, but she didn’t have to be abrasive about it.

James, bless him, remained unfazed. Mindful of who would be paying the bill, he didn’t quite turn his back on Amelia. But he was focused on Lee again, now with his phone out, accessing his contacts. He jotted down Sean’s number, then his own, and as he passed Lee the paper, ran through some of the things she should discuss with Sean. “He’s expecting your call,” he finally said. “If there’s a problem, let me know.”

“Tinkering,” I said a short time later, when we reached his car. “That’s it, y’know.” When he looked lost, I said, “Lee’s scones. She tinkers with the recipe until she gets the proportions right. That’s what I want to do, James. It’s not about dumping my life but adjusting the ingredients. And you’re right,” I said, seeing it clearly then but, more importantly, feeling confident enough about James to confess it. “Jude mattered to me once. Everything I’ve been since I left here is what he was
not
. He was an extreme. But so are we. I want something in the middle.”

Opening the door, James tossed his duffel in the passenger’s seat. Then, bracing his hands on the door frame, he hung his head.

“You liked Lee,” I argued. “I know you did. I saw something different back there in the kitchen. A calmness. A brief, deep satisfaction.”

“What you saw”—he angled his head to meet my gaze—“was me not repeating myself, because I’ve had enough sleep for a change.”

“Maybe, but not all.”

“She’s had a raw deal,” he rasped. “I’d have to be a piece of ice not to react to that.”

“A brief, deep satisfaction,” I repeated. “Funny how helping people brings that out in you. Do you get the same feeling at work?”

With a concessionary sigh, he straightened. “Come back, and we’ll find middle ground.”

I hugged myself. “If I go back, I’ll be swallowed up again. I shake just thinking about it.”

“Well, I can’t leave,” he insisted. “I could change my job—maybe—and we could sell the condo and buy something small in Brooklyn with a yard for the kids—but there aren’t any kids yet—have you thought about that?”

I felt a sharp little pang. “I’ve been escaping that, too.”

“What we were doing wasn’t working.”

“I know.” The next step involved medication whose possible side effects included headaches, nausea, cramps, even hot flashes, according to the websites I’d seen—and yes, I know, those are only
possible
side effects. Most women have no side effects at all. But how not to worry once you’ve read all that?

Getting pregnant was supposed to have been easy. It was what a woman’s body was
made
for. I had always
dreamed
of this.

Physically, though, I was now here and James there. “Things happen for a reason,” I thought, not realizing that I’d said it aloud until he shot back a response.

“What’s the reason here? We’re not supposed to be parents? We work too hard? We don’t have
time
for kids? That’s a crock of bull, and you know it, Emily.”

The force of his response was actually reassuring. He wanted kids as much as I did. But how to make it happen? I hugged myself tighter.

He stared at me, stared at the woods, stared at the car that wasn’t his. Then, with a grunt, he dug out his phone and his keys. “I gotta go. I’ll work while I drive.” He was halfway into the car when he climbed out again. His eyes were level. “I’ve come here twice. I’ve offered to start looking for a different job. It’s your turn now. What are you willing to give?”

I didn’t know. Idealism, friends, husband, law, time, taste, fun—I felt as though I had already given it all up back there. What of that life to keep? What to ditch? If life was about getting the recipe right, I had to figure out the ingredients before I could tinker with proportions. The problem, of course, was that I couldn’t do a test batch in the kitchen one afternoon.

“Think about it, Emily.” When he entered the car this time, it was for real. A minute later, the car was skirting the green. I watched until it turned a corner and was out of sight.

That was when Amelia approached.

Chapter 16