Page 103 of The Fault Between Us
Red braced for the worst. He was a failure, Claire deserved better. He hadn’t lived up to his promise to take care of his family. All of the things he had once believed but didn’t anymore.
Claire had changed all that.
She knew the worst about him, and she still loved him. When they got home—after that night of anguish when he thought he’d lost her and Jenny, and then chasing down Iris Henshaw—he told her about Dell and the sheds and going to jail. Turns out she knew most of it from Beth. “I’ve made mistakes, Claire.” He didn’t sugarcoat his past in Chicago, or how close he’d come to prison.
She didn’t shrink back from him, even with all that. But then he told her his greatest shame.
Admitting he’d never learned to read was the hardest thing he’d ever done, and he couldn’t even look at her for fear of what he’d see in her eyes. When he finally met her gaze, it was filled with love, and he thought his heart might burst with how that felt. She leaned in to kiss him. “Isn’t it a happy coincidence you married a schoolteacher?”
A coincidence? He’d thought marrying a schoolteacher was a cruel joke on him, but it wasn’t. It was part of God’s plan all along. Redwanted to keep kissing Claire then, but he had one last confession to make. “I made God a promise, Claire, if I found you.”
She frowned. “What kind of promise?”
“That I’d take you back home, to live in Willmar.” He had more to say, about Claire needing her family and how he’d been selfish, but she put a finger on his lips to stop him. Her brows pulled together. “Wearehome, Red. And if you think we’re going to live anywhere but right here in Riverside, you have another think coming.”
He didn’t argue with Claire when she used that tone. And after that, they didn’t talk any more.
Now, Red fixed his gaze across the water, at the mountains purpling in the dusk, and braced himself for whatever Daniel Reilly had to say.
Daniel studied the rippling water at their feet. “On the train out here, when I didn’t know if Claire was dead or alive—when I thought maybe all my girls might be gone—I had a lot of time to think.”
Red felt a trace of sympathy for the man. He knew how it felt to be helpless, thinking the worst and unable to do a thing about it.
“Red”—he picked up a rock from the shallow water at their feet—“my daughters are everything to me.” He rubbed the smooth stone in his hand, his voice dropping. “When you came along, I didn’t want to let Claire go—I didn’t knowhowto let her go.” He kept his eyes on the rock. “I wanted to hold on to her. Was that such a bad thing?”
Red didn’t figure the question was directed at him, so instead of answering he watched a hawk circle overhead and disappear into the dark shoulder of the mountain.
Daniel Reilly threw the rock into the river. “What I’m trying to say”—he finally turned to face Red—“is I didn’t want to lose her.”
Red thought about how much he loved Jenny, and how someday he’d face the same kind of heartache. It was right for Claire to separate from her father and make a family of her own, but that didn’t make it any less painful. He met the older man’s steel-gray eyes. “She’s still your daughter.”
Daniel Reilly grimaced and ran a hand through his shock of white hair, then met Red’s gaze. “I hope you can forgive me for what I said, in the church.”
Red remembered the humiliation burning through him as he stood at the front of the church waiting for Claire to walk down the aisle, hearing Daniel Reilly spit out in front of all the guests, “Don’t make the biggest mistake of your life, Claire.” Red’s heart had plummeted, the flame of hope—hope for love and a family and Claire—flickering out, leaving a cold emptiness in his chest.
Now the man was waiting for his forgiveness. “Daniel,” Red said, “I don’t hold it against you.” He couldn’t, because what happened in the moment after Daniel Reilly’s insult had relit Red’s hope to a blaze, and sealed his heart to Claire’s just as surely as the vows they would make: Claire, sure and confident and beautiful, her voice ringing out for everyone in the church to hear. “Dad, if you don’t walk me down the aisle, I’ll run down it without you.” And she did, racing toward him, her blue eyes locked on his. Ready to become Claire Wilder—and leaving her father standing alone at the back of the church.
Daniel Reilly’s steely eyes shone with tears in the fading light, and Red knew the man was remembering the same moment—the moment Claire had chosen Red. Then, one side of Daniel’s mouth quirked, and he shook his head. “She really is something, isn’t she?”
Red let out a breath. Something they could agree on. “She sure is.”
Daniel stuck out his hand to Red. “Can we start again?”
Red looked at his father-in-law’s outstretched hand. An offer of acceptance, and maybe even respect. It was a lot to live up to, but Red was ready to try. For Claire and for the family they would make together. He put his hand in Daniel’s.
It was a beginning.
Daniel turned to go back to the house, but Red stopped him. “Can I say something, Daniel, before we go in to see what kind of Jell-O concoction Claire has for dessert?” It was maybe overstepping, but he wasn’t going to run from what had to be said. For Claire, and for Bridget and Frannie.
“If you have to,” Daniel answered gruffly.
Red met his father-in-law’s eyes in the fading light. He’d seen how buried secrets hurt, how they festered in the dark. He knew now that talking about what was painful didn’t worsen the wound, but allowed it to heal. It was time for the Reilly family to talk about the past... about their mother. “Talk to your daughters, Daniel. Don’t let the past come between you.”
chapter 67:BRIDGET
“Don’t be such a worrywart.” Bridget watched Claire twist the dishcloth into a knot as Red and Dad walked down the trail to the river. “Red can handle himself.”
As usual, Frannie was shirking dish duty, sitting on the floor with Paul and playing with Jenny, but Bridget didn’t mind. It was nice not to be fighting with her. And Paul seemed to be a decent young man.
