Angels Everywhere - Debbie Macomber [181]
“I came for lunch.”
Of course. She reached for a pencil, prepared to take his order.
He read the printed menu that hung on the wall behind her. “I’ll have a pastrami on rye and a cup of coffee.”
She wrote down his order with trembling hands.
“Are you going to make it for me yourself?”
She nodded, avoiding eye contact. She wouldn’t be able to hide how pleased she was to see him again if she looked up.
“You didn’t phone,” he whispered just loudly enough for her to hear.
“Potato is the soup of the day,” she said.
“Hannah, look at me.”
“I can’t.”
“Why can’t you?”
She closed her eyes and braced herself “You shouldn’t have come here.”
“You don’t want my business?”
He was making this difficult.
“You’ve thought about contacting me, haven’t you?”
Again she didn’t answer. “Would you care for a bowl of soup with your sandwich?”
He didn’t respond for a number of seconds, and then, “The only thing I want is you, Hannah.”
“If you’ll take a number, I’ll have your lunch delivered.”
“Will you bring it?” he asked.
Her nod was nearly imperceptible. She saw the tension leave him and couldn’t keep from glancing up and offering him a quick smile. It took only a moment or more to finish compiling his sandwich. She carried that and a cup of coffee to his table and was pleased to note he sat as far away from the counter as possible.
“Thank you, Hannah,” he said when she placed the plate on the table. “Would you care to join me?”
“I can’t.” Her hands folded over the back of the chair across from him. She glanced over her shoulder, fearing her father would notice the two of them together.
“Is that your father?” Joshua asked, looking around her.
“Yes. Mom’s in the kitchen.”
“He doesn’t look like the kind of man who would force his daughter into a loveless marriage.”
“Joshua, please.”
He picked up the sandwich, and once again, Hannah looked back to make sure no one was watching her. “I sometimes walk by the pond in Central Park,” she whispered.
Joshua went still. “When?”
“I was thinking of taking a stroll there this afternoon.”
“In an hour?”
“Yes.”
Joshua’s handsome face broke into a wide grin. “I’ve always favored walking as an excellent form of exercise.”
Eleven
“Are you sure you’re up to this?” Trey asked Jenny for the third time since they’d boarded the ferry headed for Ellis Island.
“I wouldn’t have suggested sight-seeing if I wasn’t feeling better,” Jenny insisted. They stood and watched as the New York skyline began to fade into the distance. “I want you to visit Ellis Island,” she continued. “It’s an emotional experience, at least it was for me the first time I made the trip. I found my great-grandfather’s name there.”
“Your great-grandfather? How?”
“I looked his name up on the computer. It showed me the year he arrived from Germany and his age at the time. I felt as though I’d stumbled upon an open treasure chest, only this one contained a part of my heritage.”
“This was your mother’s grandfather?”
Jenny answered him with a quick nod. “Can you imagine packing everything you own in this world in a single suitcase?” she asked, awed by the raw courage and grit her great-grandfather had shown when he was little more than a teenager. “He came to America with nothing but his dreams and the desire for a new life.”
“Is that so unusual?” Trey asked.
“Of course it is,” she answered, feeling slightly offended that Trey didn’t recognize the fortitude and faith her great-grandfather had demonstrated. “He didn’t have an easy life here, you know. First off he didn’t speak the language, and although he was well educated he was forced into taking a menial job. For years he and my great-grandmother struggled to make a decent life for themselves and their family. I can’t tell you how much I admire them for that.”
“What you did, leaving Montana for a chance on Broadway, wasn’t all that different.”
“Me?” Jenny didn’t see the correlation. Of course there was the