I’m the first one to arrive at the nearly empty park. I stand a step inside the entrance, not far from one of the many fountains that dot the grass. At the far end of the park, a few kids are already riding the carousel, with their parents keeping step and holding them by their waists.
Only a minute passes before Guy appears at the entrance. He’s in jeans and a navy barn jacket, and his hair is still damp from his shower. In some ways it’s like the moment we met, Guy stepping onto the deck of the beach house in Rhode Island and me looking up, drawn by his forceful presence. And yet everything has changed between us.
Spotting me, Guy heads in my direction. As he moves closer, I see that the muscles in his face are tight, as if he’s fighting to contain his true emotions.
He murmurs hello and kisses me on the cheek. As his lips touch my face, they feel strangely unfamiliar, like someone pressing a raw chicken cutlet against my skin. It unsettles me even more.
“Why don’t we go someplace and grab coffee?” he says. “I’ve got a client lunch at one o’clock, but there’s plenty of time to talk before then.”
“I’d rather skip the coffee and talk here.”
“Bryn, what’s going on, for God’s sake? It’s barely sixty degrees out.”
“I just feel like being outside.” I nod toward a nearby bench, and he shrugs in resignation.
“Fine. You seem to be calling all the shots these days.”
“Is that what you think?”
“No, I misspoke.” His tone softens. “It’s only that I’ve been trying to see you and talk to you, and all I get are roadblocks.”
“Let’s talk now then.”
Guy takes a seat and stretches his arm across the back of the bench, and though I don’t sit close to him, the gesture still feels possessive, as if he wants me within his grasp. I can’t believe that the idea of his touch makes me nearly cringe now.
“Maycock filled me in on your interview with the cops,” he says. “It scared the hell out of me, but he told me you have tons of emails proving that you were at home on your laptop that night.”
“Hopefully, that will be enough.” I’m not here, though, to talk about Maycock. It’s Dallas, Texas, I’m interested in.
“I want to come home, Bryn. We need to put this whole ugly mess behind us.”
He reaches out and touches the hair by my temple ever so lightly with his hand. It’s something he’s always liked to do, particularly in the early months of our relationship. His fingers barely graze my skin, light as feathers, in a way that has always seemed both loving and erotic to me. For the first time, though, I see it as something else. Slick. It seems like the gesture of a man who wants to play me.
“I know about Dallas, Guy,” I say.
His hand freezes momentarily, and then he lowers it to his lap.
“What do you mean?” he asks, his voice totally neutral.
“You know exactly what I mean. The years you lived and worked there.”
He shifts his body ever so slightly. I try to read his eyes, but it’s tough. On such an overcast day, the slate blue has gone even darker, like the color of the sky right before dusk turns to night.
“And do you mind my asking who’s been telling you this?”
“What does it matter, Guy?”
His next move takes me aback. He sighs heavily and lets his body sink into the bench.
“I can’t tell you what a relief this is, Bryn. I’ve wanted you to know from the beginning about the time I lived there. It’s been this horrible cloud hanging over my head, eating away at me.”
Of all the scenarios I imagined, this was never one of them. That he’d cop to the truth immediately and try to evoke my sympathy.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because something happened when I was there. Something I’m gravely ashamed of, and I kept struggling to find the right words to convey it to you.”
“You embezzled money.”
He rears back, as if stung by the comment.
“For God’s sake, no. But I was accused of it. By this woman in the organization who’d been passed over earlier for the president’s job and had it out for me from the moment I arrived. I started to tell you once. Remember that weekend you came up here early last summer, right before the wedding? We drove up to Lake George and were wandering around the park, the one where they found remains of the old settlement. I said I had something I wanted to share, but before I had a chance, you had a call from your agent about an issue that needed to be addressed right away.”
I vaguely remember. There’d been a snafu with my UK publisher and I ended up stuck on a ten-minute call as we returned to the car. Later, when I asked Guy what he’d wanted to tell me, he said it had been about the settlement, nothing important.
“If you weren’t guilty, why flee the state?”