The Last Snowfall by Kathleen Gilles Seidel

Author:Kathleen Gilles Seidel
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kensington
Published: 2019-02-09T16:42:36+00:00

Chapter 10

The rehab facility and a small nursing care unit were connected to the town’s two-story hospital by an enclosed hallway. Lacey always parked in the back corner of the hospital’s lot, leaving the better spaces for people who didn’t like to walk. In bad weather she cut through the hospital, going in and out its rear door. On spring days like this, she took the sidewalk that skirted the buildings.

She was used to seeing her Silverado parked by itself, but today a green pickup was next to it—Pete’s green pickup, the one with company plates. Pete himself was leaning against the tailgate, and Hex was sniffing around the nearby grassy strip. Pete must have come straight from the job site. His olive twill work pants were splattered with mud, although there was a clean spot at his thigh where his tool belt had been.

Lacey supposed that he had known what Mrs. Byrd was going to ask her.

She spoke brightly. “Your wife is coming out. You must be happy about that.”

“I hope she won’t be a burden to you.”

His tone was flat. He was looking past her shoulder. Well, crap. He didn’t want his wife to come.

Surely he wasn’t worried that she would say anything that would jeopardize his marriage. He had to know her better than that. And what was there to say? Even when he took a heavy box out of her arms, he was careful not to touch her.

No, Pete, no. You have to be happy that she is coming. This is a good thing for you. You need to stop thinking about me.

Even if he hadn’t been married, he would not have been the right man for her. He had a darkness, a heaviness about him that she didn’t need in her life. She needed sunlight.

I need Nate.

No, that was absurd. She did not need Nate Forrest. He understood nothing about her, nothing about how careful she felt she needed to be, nothing about what a burden it was to have student loans, nothing about what it was like to grow up with parents she couldn’t count on. Why would she ever need a man like that?

* * * *

Nate was coming on Friday evening, flying to Charleston from Oregon, where he had apparently been most recently. He was taking a shuttle to the county seat, and Pete was going to pick him up there. They would have dinner at the new Mexican restaurant. Pete asked Lacey if she would like to come. He was, Lacey knew, using Nate as an excuse to spend time alone with her.

She wanted to say no. She didn’t want to be alone in a car with Pete, and she certainly wasn’t eager to sit down and have dinner with Nate.

But wouldn’t it be for the best? In front of Pete, she and Nate would need to pretend that nothing had happened on the sofa bed during the snowstorm or that Nate hadn’t come back for a few hours on a Sunday afternoon.

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