“Well, that’s not what she told me this morning. Look, Robbie, I’m sorry to ruin your plans, but it is only Thursday, and most people work the whole week . . . ”
“All right,” she said, sighing. “When do we leave?”
“First thing in the morning. Tell what’s his name that we’ll have you back in a couple of days, and he can bait your hook then.”
“Shut up, Evan,” she said.
“I’ll pick you up at seven in the morning.” He hung up.
Robin clicked the phone off. She was aware of Jake standing somewhere behind her, could feel his gaze boring through her.
Slowly, she turned around.
With his arms crossed over his chest and his weight on one cocked hip, he stared at her, waiting.
Robin could feel his displeasure emanating across the room. “Umm . . . that was Evan. We have to go to Minot.”
“When?”
“Tomorrow.”
A muscle in his jaw jumped. “It can’t wait?”
“No.”
“You’re certain.”
It was a statement, not a question, and it was clear that even if Robin wasn’t certain, he sure was. She sighed wearily. “Jake . . . it’s my job. I have to go.”
He clenched his jaw tighter, looked at the floor. “No, Robin, it’s not your job. It’s Evan. He doesn’t want you to be with me.” He lifted his gaze. “Don’t go. Call him back and tell him it will have to wait.”
She gave a little groan of indignant surprise. “You can’t be serious. This is my job, and this little trip of ours was a last-minute thing. Surely you can understand—”
“This little trip,” he repeated, rubbing the back of his neck. “I thought this little trip was important to us. I guess I really was the only one to understand that. But you know what? I’m tired of trying to understand. I’m done. We’re done.”
“What?” she said, her heart starting to race.
He dropped his hand from his neck. “It’s obvious to me that you are not going to commit to us and in fact, you’re going to work real hard to avoid it. Hey, no problem—I was the one who jumped off the high dive into this thing, not you. Oh well. Can’t win ‘em all.” He turned on his heel, started walking away.
“Wait, wait!” she cried. “What are you doing? Where are you going?”
“I told you, Peanut—I’m done. You are now free to move about the country.”
Panic. Sharp, choking panic. Jake really meant it—he really was going to walk out her door, for good. “Is that it?” she shouted angrily. “You come into my house and make love to me, and now you are leaving? Just like that?”
He stopped at the door, studied it for a moment. “No, not just like that.”
Hope trembled in her knees.
“There is one last thing—I wish you well.”
“You what?” she asked, confused.
He turned to her once more, his gaze desolate. “I wish you well. I can’t offer you anything else, baby, so I wish you well. Don’t you get it? I wish you big soft beds with clean sheets. I wish you warm fires on cold blustery nights and hammocks for spring days. I wish you Christmas trees and homemade cookies and fat puppies and sweet-smelling babies to make you smile. I wish you ice cream and thick green grass beneath your bare feet. I wish you butterflies when you jog and moonbeams at night and dreams that reach the stars and . . . and I wish you peace.”
Robin was unable to speak, unable to move; her hand fluttered helplessly to her throat.
Jake smiled sadly, shook his head. “I wish you well.” He turned and walked out of her door without looking back.
Chapter Thirty
Jake spent that night on the inside of several beer cans, making a pile at the foot of his armchair of all those not hurled against the wall. He tried, he really tried to figure out why he had, after thirty-eight years, fallen so hard and so deep for a man-eating woman. He had known it the minute he had clapped eves on her that she would never settle for the likes of him. Just as he had known that he couldn’t go up against her without coming away scarred.
But he hadn’t realized that Cole would come away scarred, too. “We’re not going fishing,” he said when Cole came bounding down the steps of his mom’s house.
Cole had stopped almost mid-stride. “Why?” he asked.
“Robin and I . . . it’s over, Cole.”
“Over?” the kid had scoffed. “Why? What did you do? Why did you make her leave?”
“I didn’t make her leave—look, it’s too complicated for you to understand—”
“Can’t you buy her a present or something?” he had demanded. “Can’t you fix it?”
“Look, Cole, I’m sorry, but we’re not going fishing.”
“Well, how come we have to go with her? Why can’t we just go?”
Jake had thought about that, but the truth was, he didn’t have the heart for it. “We just can’t. Maybe some other time.”
Cole’s face had turned red with fury—he had thrown down his overnight bag and turned his rage on Jake. “Good! I don’t want to go with you! You keep trying to be my dad or something, but you’re not! You’re nobody!” he had shouted at him, then run inside before Jake could say another word.