Page 116 of Not Part of the Plan
Too emotionally exhausted to make an excuse, Emma sat. They stared quietly out over the hills and creek, the green and the blues and browns.
“So are you having a freak out, too?” Emma asked, breaking the silence.
Phoebe laughed. “If you call talking to the dead a freak out, then yes.”
“John?” Emma asked. John Pierce was Phoebe’s first husband, the father of her sons. He’d died years before, and the hole in the family was still felt. They’d built this pavilion on the spot where they’d scattered his ashes.
Phoebe smiled sadly. “Yes. I come up here regularly to fill John in on what he’s missing out on. Not that he’s not hovering over us all and pulling strings, of course.”
“Of course.” Emma’s lips quirked.
“I was just filling him in on Reva and Caleb.”
“They’re really good kids,” Emma sighed.
“So are you and your sisters,” Phoebe said pointedly.
“Is that your way of leaving an opening for me to pour my heart out?”
Phoebe grinned, leaning back and resting her elbows on the table. “I’ve got nowhere to be.”
So Emma told her. The whole ugly story.
“The things he said to me,” she shook her head. “I just can’t believe someone who loves me would say those things.”
“Honey, I’m not going to give you advice because the person who knows what’s best for you is you. But I will tell you something that I think you need to hear.”
Phoebe grasped Emma’s hand and squeezed.
“Love is an incredibly beautiful thing. Love is the reason your father keeps a handwritten list of things for me to come here to tell John about. Because Franklin loves me so much that he doesn’t see me still loving John as a betrayal.”
Emma took a shuddery breath and laughed when a tear fell. “That’s my dad.”
“And that’s love. It can and should be the source of your greatest strength, not your biggest fear. Don’t forget that, Emma.”
Emma sniffled and took a breath. “You know, Phoebe, if I got to pick my mom, she would have been you.”
Phoebe pulled her into a hug. “Oh, sweetie. Now you’re going to make me mushy. I love you very much, and I want you to be happy and safe.”
“I love you, too,” Emma hiccupped.
“Do you want to come back to the house and drink a whole pitcher of margaritas?”
Emma laughed. “Thank you, but I think I need to walk and think some more.”
“Well, the offer stands. Anytime you need it,” Phoebe said.
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The walking helped her work back up to mad. It was a safer emotion than sad or hurt. And she was fairly certain Niko had earned her wrath. She replayed his words over and over again in her head.
How dare he?Emma fumed as she stalked through the field away from the brewery. How dare he presume to understand her. Just because she’d rejected him, he’d lashed out at her with ugly accusations. She’d been right all along to be reluctant getting involved with him.
She ignored the lovely warmth of the sunshine even as it coaxed her face upward and trudged on down the skinny dirt path that paralleled the pasture fences.
She should have listened to her instincts,Emma railed against herself. They’d always protected her before, but Nikolai had tunneled under her defenses only to plant a Trojan horse in her heart.
She wasn’t her mother, and she sure as hell wasn’t a coward. She was steady, stable. She didn’t run away.
