Kathleen O'Brien - The Vineyard of Hopes and Dreams

A vase of blue hydrangeas on the kitchen table, a casserole and a big glass pitcher of fresh milk in the refrigerator. Even a book or two on the end table.

The Eliots’ sensitive presence permeated the place—or at least it had this afternoon. It had been light outside, then, the storm passed and sunshine streaming in through the windows. A playful wind had teased the fluffy, October-brown heads of the grapevines.

But she’d lingered so long, coloring with Elena, that it was full night now. She shot a glance out the front window, where the silhouettes of trees moved darkly against the silvery sky, and thought of the still, empty rooms waiting for her.

She shook the feeling away. Dark or light, it was just a house. She would be fine.

The Eliots stood on the front porch and watched her walk up through the vineyard. She turned at the last minute, before the dip in the land would obscure the view, and waved merrily. She was fine. They waved back, and she thought she heard Elena call her name.

She waved again. She was fine.

Then she turned back toward the large, two-story adobe house, with its orange-tile roof and arched colonnades extending to either side like outstretched arms. Roland must have put some lights on timers, because several of the windows glowed, long rectangles of amber illumination that should have looked welcoming, but instead just looked unnatural, knowing, as she did, that no one was inside.

Weeds grew up at the edge of the rows of vines, making the path uneven. She kept her eyes on the ground and kept going, glad for a reason to ignore the strange tricks the moonlight played with the wire supports. In her peripheral vision, the metal winked randomly, giving the illusion that something moved among the leaves.

Ridiculous. She was fine. No matter how haunted the place might feel, she didn’t believe in ghosts. And even if she had believed, she wouldn’t give her father’s ghost the satisfaction of driving her out of the house again. He was gone. He had not found her, or Genevieve. Even her mother had died in peace. They had all officially survived him.

So that meant she was the one with the power now. She would sell his house, and his vines, and go back to Florida. She would never, ever think of him again. He would rot here, unloved and unmourned.

Hey, Dad, she thought, gathering her courage into one bitter burst of defiance as she neared the house. I’ll give you something to be afraid of.

But just as she put her foot on the first step of the porch stairs, a large, man-shaped form disengaged from the arches of the western colonnade. She froze in place, her hand foolishly at her throat.

Oddly, her first thought was—could it be Greg?

But that was silly. Why would Greg follow her here, all the way from Florida? He was a doctor. He was busy. People depended on him. Even though his behavior during their break-up had given her a mild case of the creeps, he wasn’t a fool. He wouldn’t chase after a woman who had already made it painfully clear that they were through.

“I’m sorry to come so late,” the man said politely. He continued to move forward, his steps silent on the tiled floor, until he emerged from the shadows. Moonbeams silvered one side of his face.

The light only confirmed what she already knew, from those few syllables of his husky voice. The man who waited here in the darkness wasn’t a ghost, and he wasn’t Greg.

Once again, she had come face-to-face with Colby Malone.

CHAPTER THREE

“I’M SORRY,” he repeated carefully, trying to give her time to adjust. “I didn’t mean to frighten you.”

“I wasn’t frightened,” she said.

But he knew that was a lie. Her face was white. She would naturally be twitchy, coming back here after so long, especially under these circumstances. And no woman alone in an isolated spot could possibly enjoy seeing a stranger emerge from the shadows.

Weird, thinking of himself as a “stranger.” But no other word applied anymore. Back when they were teenagers, he’d waited for her so many times, right in this very spot. Once, her face would have lit up to see him, and she would have leaped into his arms, their two bodies stumbling back into the shadows with urgent kisses but no words, so that no one inside the house would hear.

Now, she froze at the sound of his voice, as guarded as a doe confronted by the barrel of a rifle.

“What do you want?”

Okay. He hadn’t expected a warm welcome, and apparently he wasn’t going to get one.

“I know it’s late, and you must be tired. I was going to wait until tomorrow, to give you time to settle in. But—”

Her face remained impassive. “What do you want?”

“Just to talk. I hoped we could talk.”

“Wouldn’t the phone have been better?”

He tilted his head, appraising this pale, collected woman who bore only the most superficial resemblance to the girl he used to know. She still had on the gray flared skirt and short jacket she’d worn to the funeral, but it didn’t look rumpled even after all these hours. The Hayley he used to know was always dressed in bright colors, always dashing about, her pink cheeks looking slightly fevered, her golden hair flyaway and fabulous.

“I would have been glad to call,” he said reasonably. “Except, I don’t know your number, remember? If you left Sonoma tomorrow morning, I wouldn’t have any idea how to find you again. I don’t even know what name you answer to these days.”

That wasn’t an exaggeration. He knew what name her mother had been using when his investigator found her, a dozen or so years ago. But she’d moved again after that, and the second time he tried to find her, about six months ago, no one of that name existed.

Bottom line was, he didn’t know anything, not one single solitary thing, about her anymore. He hadn’t even been a hundred percent sure she was staying here at the vineyard house, until he’d seen the car with rental plates in the front drive.

Leaving the cemetery after her brush-off today hadn’t been easy. The gossip among the other locals attending the service had been that Hayley would be staying in town, at least long enough to settle up her father’s affairs. But who knew if that was really true? Who knew whether Hayley Watson might decide to disappear into the night all over again?

“Colby,” she began, then stopped. She folded her arms, tucking her hands under them, as if the night air had chilled her fingers. “I don’t want to be rude, but I really don’t think we have anything to talk about, do we? As you said, it’s been a very long time. We are both different people now, and the past— Well, it just isn’t very relevant anymore.”

He heard the dismissal in her voice. His pride bucked once, trying to throw him, trying to compel him to walk away. The past was dead to her? Irrelevant? Okay, fine. She meant nothing to him, either.

He choked off the inner voice. That was just the huffy and stupidly proud teenager inside him talking. He was disappointed to discover that, after all these years, remnants of that self-centered jackass still remained.

“Hayley,” he said, working hard to avoid sounding pushy or entitled. “I understand that you may well have nothing to say to me. But I have something I’d like to say to you.”

She wasn’t going for it. He could tell by the way her full lips tightened. “Colby, I—”

“Please,” he said. It wasn’t a word she—or anyone else—had often heard him utter. “I’ve owed you an apology for seventeen years, and I don’t want to lose this chance to make it now.”

She clearly hadn’t been expecting that. Her arms fell to her sides, as if suddenly limp with surprise. Her gaze scanned his face—though he had no idea what she searched for.