Bare Devotion. Geri Krotow
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floor of the custom-built riverfront home.
Streaks of dried mud led the way from the living room to the French doors where the water had come in. Shadowed stains on the previously ivory cream walls indicated that the water had risen to at least eighteen inches, maybe even two feet, in the house.
Her and Henry’s dream home had drowned. Not unlike their hopes for a future together. Certainly her tears that first week after the wedding that never happened were enough to drown her crushed dreams. She thought she’d cried out all the pain of her broken heart, but as she gazed at the storm’s destruction, waves of anguish rushed up from her stomach and she turned around and ran back out of the house. The crepe myrtles had survived the storm, and she took shelter behind them as her morning sickness left her helpless until her stomach was emptied.
“Son of a bitch.” She ran a shaky hand across her forehead. “Nothing personal, baby. You’re sweet, don’t worry. Mommy’s just getting used to you is all.” Sweet Jesus and iced lemonade, she sounded like her grandmother. Grandma Edwina had made her opinion of Sonja marrying a “white gentleman” clear. “I’ll support whomever you choose, sweet girl, but you have to know that you’re making your life harder than it needs to be.”
Sonja had blown her maternal grandmother off, assigning the words to a generation that had marched on Selma. While Loving v. Virginia had been decided within two years of Selma, there was still such a long way to go, and Sonja’s grandmother never let her forget it. Grandma was as protective of her as could be and didn’t want to see Sonja risk the extra pain that an interracial marriage could bring.
Sonja had fallen for Henry as he had her—flat-out soul mate attraction. But the reaction from his parents was some kind of 1950s flashback. They thought the marriage was doomed before it started simply because Sonja was black. She’d been sad for Henry because she knew his relationship with his parents was going to suffer. Had suffered.
But had it been enough? She still wasn’t sure that if he’d drawn a firmer line with his folks she’d never have run.
The doubt and guilt that had scratched at her conscience after each altercation with Henry’s parents came screaming back, and she paused in her damaged house survey. Worry that she could be wrong; that it might be possible that somewhere underneath all of his wonderfulness Henry had at least the teeniest bit of bigoted asshole in him, like his folks. And guilt that she’d never mentioned any of the confrontations to him. They’d been almost non-events to her; racism wasn’t anything that surprised her. And the Boudreauxs were so subtle, their passive-aggressive skills so finely tuned, that it would have been hard to explain her point of view without coming off as having a huge chip on her shoulder.
The best bigots were like that. Cunning.
She stood under the large arched threshold into the great room, and the memory of Henry standing next to her at this spot, over which they’d hung the mistletoe last year, immediately shifted her morose thoughts to sadness.
Her parents had been thrilled she’d finally shown an interest in something besides law and studying. And they adored Henry. Their disappointment at her decision to not follow through with her vows had been keen, but they’d get over it. Especially when they found out they were going to be grandparents. Her sisters and brother had always been on board with her marrying Henry and were still sending her texts to “Quick, beg him to take you back.” They meant well, but their words were starting to wear.
The French doors opened up, and she breathed in the brackish breeze, allowed the strength of it to move across her face. Her hair was going to frizz to all get-out but what the hell? The wind helped her nausea. She had her hand on her nape, giving herself a massage as best she could, willing her stomach to settle. It wasn’t easy, seeing how the deck was strewn with debris that Henry obviously hadn’t taken the time to clear.
Or maybe he hadn’t come back, either?
A definite thud stiffened her spine and made her grip the door handles. She was alone in the house, vulnerable. If it was an unwelcome visitor she could escape from the back deck, over to their neighbor’s. As quietly as possible she turned around and looked into the living room, across to the open space’s huge granite-topped counter, to the kitchen. No one. Nothing. Maybe the wind had forced the front door open. But she’d closed it tight, she was certain.
“This is a far cry from the cathedral.” An unmistakable voice, the sexiest timbre on the planet, rocked her.
A startled gasp left her lips before she had a chance to even know she made the sound. She faced him, looked into the brilliant blue eyes whose look always felt like a caress. Right now it was more like a harsh slap of hail on her bare cheeks.
“I didn’t see your car in the drive so I thought it’d be okay to come in.” Her defensiveness surprised her. She’d practiced how she’d behave when she saw him again, and this was nothing like the detached air she’d hoped to project.
“Why wouldn’t it be okay? It’s your house, too.” Tall, lean, and with the lethal stare he usually reserved for his toughest courtroom cases, Henry stared at her from the foyer. As imperious as ever but without his usual air of humor. The self-deprecation that had endeared him to her. He wore his best attorney mask without any sign of the warmth she’d gotten too used to. He was guarded, prepared for battle.
She drank in his presence anyway. Glugged it down as if he were a tall glass of iced ginger ale, soothing her belly, easing the tight restrictive cords she’d wrapped her heart back together with.
He stepped into the living area, and sunlight from the open French doors reached him. His eyes seemed brighter than she remembered, more aquamarine, though at closer inspection they had shadows hanging over them. Clouding them.
“It’s impolite to stare, Sonja.”
She licked her dry lips. “Sorry. You startled me.”
His short laugh was surgically strategic as it knifed through her. “Oh, I believe you’re the one with the element of surprise under your belt. What’s next, Sonja, are you going to tell me you ran off to Vegas to marry someone else?”
“You know I didn’t.”
“Do I? Let’s go over the facts, shall we?”
She held up her hands. “No. No, Henry. I can’t.” She moved as if to walk past him but reconsidered. She didn’t want to risk coming close enough to touch him. Her fingers tingled with his nearness, and she didn’t trust herself to walk on by without reaching out to him. As much as her head knew they were done, that he wasn’t her prince on a horse, not even her life’s partner on a bayou dugout, her heart was not to be trusted.
“Can’t what, Sonja? Tell me why you felt you had to wait until the last possible minute to run out on me? Tell me why you led me on so long, right up to the goddamned altar, mind you, before you took off? Thanks for helping me tell our guests, by the way.” Henry’s words were harsh as he relaxed into his stance in the middle of the room. He’d shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans, and his open-collared long-sleeved shirt was rolled up to his forearms.
“Wait—aren’t you working? Why aren’t you in a suit?”
One side of his mouth lifted in challenge, and it was so much like the expression he gave her before he was about to go down on her that she wanted to weep with sorrow over her loss. She’d never feel the pressure of his most talented tongue on her again.
Buck up. You’re the one who ran.
“You’re not the only one who can change their mind, Sonja.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“You think you know everything about everyone. Even now, you’re looking at me like I’m crazy, standing here and not measuring up to what, who, you think I should be.” He pulled his hands out of his pockets and gestured at his attire. “Maybe I’m tired of all of the bullshit, Sonja. Not just you, not just the sham of a relationship we had, but of it all. I’m done playing the perfect corporate lawyer. I’m good enough at what I