And where had all of that fear landed her?
On a career path she couldn’t stand, living in a city she hated, way too far away from the man she loved. She’d let fear rule her life for years. She’d let fear wreak havoc on her dreams. In a shocking turn of events, fear had turned out to be stronger than ambition.
But not anymore.
Taking a deep breath, she lifted her chin and remembered Preston’s face that afternoon when he walked down the steps of the New York Public Library to find her waiting for him. That look of surprise. Of happiness and relief and…brand new love. He’d loved her so desperately even then. Had she any right to hope that she still had a place in his heart?
“Believe that you do,” she said softly. “Keep believing that you do until he tells you that you don’t. And even then…even then, Elise, hold on.”
She swallowed over the lump in her throat, grabbed her purse and the keys to her rental car and headed downstairs, praying she’d missed Jax. The last thing she wanted to do was drag her producer into her personal life or answer awkward questions about how she knew Preston.
As luck would have it, there were pastries on the kitchen counter and note from Jax saying that she hoped Elise was feeling better, she was leaving for L.A. for the next three days, and she’d be back on Thursday. Elise was to make herself at home, ask the housekeeper for anything she needed and call Jax with any concerns. Grabbing a cup of tea and a croissant for the road, Elise headed to her car.
As she drove into Philadelphia, Elise acknowledged that Preston had every right to be angry with her…and hurt…and cautious. She’d like to think that if she’d been less overwhelmed and more well-rested on that fateful L.A. morning, that she’d never have said such cruel things to Preston, but the reality was that after telling her that he understood and respected her fears, he’d all but demanded that she return to New York when The Awakening was over.
You’re not happy here. I can tell. Come home, Elise. Come home with me.
He’d played into all of her fears, and in retaliation, she’d struck out at him, hurting him deeply, placing the sort of distance between them that she’d regretted almost immediately.
Clenching her eyes shut for a moment at a stop light, she shifted her thoughts away from L.A. to the conversation that had preceded it two weeks earlier. Though many parts of that conversation had haunted her, there was one part that had circled in her head more than any others, keeping her up late at night, needling her and making her second-guess her decision to move out to L.A..
Preston had said:
As far as I knew, your Plan A never included Hollywood. You were already living your Plan A.
Reflecting on these words had helped Elise learn something significant about herself in the two years they’d been apart.
He was right.
She’d already been living her Plan A in New York. She was on her way to becoming a famous Broadway actress, which was the future she’d been working toward all her life. A career on the stage, with the energy of the audience feeding her performance and the lesser fame that accompanied a Broadway career allowing her to have a somewhat normal personal life. Plan B—Hollywood—had never been her dream, though it had offered her an escape from the pressures of her marriage under the guise of drive and ambition.
Once upon a time they’d both had a Plan A…but Preston’s had been ripped away, and Elise had done everything possible to kill her own.
Two years later, no longer blinded by enterprise, she knew what she’d had and grieved what she’d lost. She wasn’t afraid of anything anymore but living the rest of her life without her husband.
She wanted her Plan A back.
She wanted Broadway.
She wanted New York.
But most of all she wanted Preston.
It was time to ask his forgiveness.
***
Preston arrived at the office at eight o’clock as usual, but wasn’t able to get anything done. He kept glancing up at the clock, willing it to move faster, then slower, then faster. It was nine-thirty now, and his hands were sweating as he fidgeted with two paper clips on his desk, unfolding them and then trying to shape them back into their original form. There were still thirty minutes until she arrived, but he’d already taken out the divorce papers, then put them away and taken them out again. Looking at them for just a moment, he swept them off the desk and shoved them into the top middle drawer just as someone knocked on his office door.
“Come in.”
Preston’s secretary, Nicole, opened the door and peeked in.
“A Mrs. Winslow is here to see you.”
Preston frowned. “My mother?”
Nicole shook her head and opened the door a little wider to show Elise standing behind her.
Surprised, he sucked in a breath, rising to his feet.