Chapter Twenty-One
“I enjoyed being with your family. I’ve met them both before but I’ve never sat down and talked to them. Laurel sure has her hands full with Cody and Katrina.”
“The kids are great, but being a single mother of a six-year-old boy and a four-year-old girl is really rough for Laurel. And she’s too damn stubborn to let Travis and me help much.”
Savannah started to say something but her cell rang. Recognizing her father’s ringtone, she froze.
“Aren’t you going to answer?” Harlan asked, glancing at her as he drove.
“It’s my father.” She didn’t want the rosy glow she’d had since the night before to go away. And she suspected once she talked to her father it would.
Harlan covered her hand and squeezed, but he didn’t speak. After all, what could he say?
Her phone rang again. She considered turning off the ringer but decided that was the coward’s way out. “Hello.”
“Hello, Savannah. This is your father.”
“I know.” She said nothing else, waiting for him to go on.
“I’d…I’d like to see you tonight, if I could.”
He sounded hesitant, even conciliatory, but she didn’t trust that. “I’m at Harlan’s. Or we will be shortly. Just a minute.” She muted the phone and said, “He wants to see me.”
“What do you want?”
“I want to see what he says. If it’s more of the same or…” She broke off and shrugged, trying not to hope he’d changed because she didn’t want to be disappointed when she found out he hadn’t.
“It’s up to you. Tell him to come by if you want.”
She turned the volume back on. “Give us half an hour and then come to Harlan’s apartment at the Wildcat Tower.” She gave him the apartment number. “You’ll have to ring us to meet you and bring you up.”
“All right. Thank you.”
“Dad? I won’t put up with any bullshit, so if that’s what you have in mind, don’t bother coming over.”
“I understand.”
Savannah hung up and looked at Harlan. “He didn’t sound like himself.”
“Is that a good or a bad thing?”
“I guess we’ll find out.”
Harlan went down to meet him and bring him up. When they entered the apartment she looked at Harlan to gauge his reaction, but he shrugged in answer to her unspoken question.
Her dad handed her a small wrapped package. “I wanted to give you your Christmas gift.”
“I have yours in the other room. I wasn’t sure we’d be seeing each other.”
“No, and that’s my fault. Can we sit down?”
“Do you want me to leave?” Harlan asked.
“No,” Savannah and her father answered in unison.
“No,” Randall continued as he sat in the chair and Harlan and Savannah took the couch. “Harlan needs to hear this too. Go ahead and open your present.”
Savannah tore off the wrapping paper and opened the slim box. Inside lay a gold necklace with a heart hanging from it. It wasn’t large, or fancy, or particularly expensive, she didn’t think. “This looks old.”
Randall nodded. “Yes, it was your mother’s. She would have wanted you to have it.”
“You’ve never given me any of Mother’s jewelry before.”
“No. She didn’t have a lot. I was just getting started when she died.” He appeared lost in thought. “I’ve never talked a lot about your mother. I should have, I realize. But losing her was…so hard and it hurt too much to talk about her. So I didn’t.
“When I met your mother, I fell head over heels in love with her. She was new to town. We were young, only in high school.” He looked at them both. “Like you two. Your mother was in love too. But not with me. She’d fallen for a boy from the Barrels. One everyone knew was bad news. But she wouldn’t hear a word against him.”
“Is that why you hated Harlan?”
“Let me finish. I’ll explain everything. Anyway, just like everyone thought, this boy broke her heart. I became her friend. Eventually, she came to love me and we married. She never said a word about him after we were together. But I always wondered what she’d have done if he’d asked for another chance, even years later.”
“What happened to him? Is he still here?”
“No. He left town. Last I heard he’d died of a drug overdose.”
“So you hated Harlan because of this guy? That’s what you tar and feather everyone from the Barrels with? Because this one guy was bad?”
“Because he broke your mother’s heart and I didn’t want the same thing to happen to you. It was too similar. I couldn’t bear to have you go through what your mother did.”
“You should have trusted me. Harlan would never have done that to me.”
Harlan hadn’t said a word and his expression was utterly inscrutable.
Savannah continued. “None of that explains why you’ve been so awful since Harlan returned. Couldn’t you have trusted me then? Wasn’t it obvious you’d been wrong about him?”
“I made a mistake, Savannah. And I owe you, and Harlan, an apology. But I didn’t understand just how wrong I had been until Harlan offered to take on my partners’ debt in the Serenity Valley project.” He looked at Harlan then. “You had every reason to hate me. In fact, I’m sure you do. But when you told me you’d stepped in because of Savannah, because you wanted her to be happy, I finally realized how wrong I’d been about you. Will you accept my apology?”
Savannah held her breath, watching Harlan.
“Yes, I will.” Harlan held out his hand and the men shook. “Especially since you’re going to be my father-in-law.”
Savannah held out her left hand. “We got engaged last night.” She wondered how sincere he’d been in his apologies, but he smiled and hugged her.
“Congratulations.” To Harlan he said, “You’re a lucky man.”
Harlan smiled and put his arm around Savannah. “Yes, I am.”
They talked for a while, even shared a toast. After her father left, Savannah said, “Did that really happen?”
“Yes. I have to say, I figured if he ever did come around it wouldn’t be for a long time. Probably not until he had a grandchild.”
“Do you want children?”
“Yes. With you.”
Her heart simply melted. “I do too.”
“Want to get married on New Year’s Eve?”
“Harlan, that’s not even a week away. We need more time.”
“Why? Do you want a big wedding?”
“No. It’s a second wedding for each of us. Small is fine. But we have to find a place to have it, first of all. And second, or maybe first, I need a dress.”
“Let’s have it at the Harwood Inn.”
“Oh, I love that idea. I’ll call tomorrow and see what they have available.”
“Problem solved.”
“Problem solved?” She patted his cheek. “You’re such a guy.”
“Guilty. And this guy has a great idea of how we need to celebrate our engagement.”
“I wonder what that would be?” she asked, wrapping her arms around his neck.
Harlan picked her up and carried her to the bedroom. “I bet you can guess.”
She smiled and kissed him before they fell on the bed.
*
“I can’t believe I’m getting married today,” Savannah said. “I was afraid the Harwood Inn wouldn’t have an opening for months.”
“Yes, funny how this weekend two weeks after New Year’s suddenly became available,” Rachel said.
“Like it was meant to be,” Avery said. “You’d better hurry. You’re supposed to walk down the aisle in twenty minutes.”
“And marry the hunk of burning love,” Rachel added.
“Stand still, Savannah,” Avery said firmly. “Let me put some more pins in your hair. It’s going to come down if you don’t stop squirming.”
“I need to see,” she said, craning her neck to see around her friends.
“You look beautiful,” Rachel said, but she and Avery moved away from the mirror.
Savannah had been afraid she wouldn’t find a dress she liked so close to the wedding date, but she’d lucked into one she loved. A short white dress with a flowing chiffon skirt just hitting her knees and a fitted satin and tulle V-neck bodice, the sheer three-quarter length lace sleeves baring her arms and shoulders. It was the perfect dress for her.
Savannah met her father at the door to the ballroom. “I’m glad you’re here,” she told him. She still hadn’t quite trusted that her father had changed but he’d been making a real effort to get along with Harlan.
“I wouldn’t have missed it,” he said, kissing her cheek. “You look beautiful, Savannah. So much like your mother.”
The music began and she walked in on her father’s arm. Harlan turned and their eyes met. She would never have believed that the man who had so thoroughly shattered her heart could have healed it so completely. He smiled as she reached him and in that smile she saw all the warmth and intimacy she would treasure for the rest of her life.
The End