True believer - Nicholas Sparks [122]
“So you came by this morning to give me your side of the story?”
“No,” Gherkin said. “I came by to let you know all this was my idea. It wasn’t the town council’s, it wasn’t the folks’ who live here. Maybe I was wrong to do what I did. Maybe you don’t agree with it. But I did what I thought was right for this place and the people who live here. And all I ask is that when you do your story you keep in mind that no one else was involved. If you want to sacrifice me, I can live with that. And I think my daddy would understand.”
Without waiting for a response, Gherkin went back to his car, and it soon vanished into the fog.
With dawn turning the sky an overcast gray, Jeremy was helping Alvin load the last of the equipment when Lexie arrived.
She emerged from the car looking much the same as she did the first time he’d seen her, her violet eyes unreadable even as she met his gaze. In her hand was Gherkin’s diary. For a moment, they faced each other as if neither one knew what to say.
Alvin, standing near the open trunk, broke the silence.
“Good morning,” he said.
She forced a smile. “Hey, Alvin.”
“You’re up early.”
She shrugged, her eyes flashing back to Jeremy. Alvin looked from one to the other before motioning over his shoulder.
“I think I’ll give the room one last check,” he said, despite the fact that no one seemed to be paying attention.
When he was gone, Jeremy took a deep breath. “I didn’t think you’d come by,” he said.
“To be honest, I wasn’t sure I would, either.”
“I’m glad you did,” he said. The gray light reminded him of their walk on the beach near the lighthouse, and he felt with a twisting arc of pain how much he’d come to love her. Though his first instinct was to close the gap between them, her stiff posture kept him at a distance.
She nodded toward his car. “You’re packed up and ready to go, I see.”
“Yeah,” he said. “All packed up.”
“And you finished filming the lights?”
He hesitated, hating the banality of their conversation. “Did you really come here to talk about my work or whether my car is packed?”
“No,” she said. “I didn’t.”
“Why did you come, then?”
“To apologize for the way I treated you yesterday at the library. I shouldn’t have acted the way I did. It wasn’t fair to you.”
He gave a half-smile. “It’s okay,” he said. “I’ll get over it. And I’m sorry, too.”
She held up the diary. “I brought this for you. In case you wanted it.”
“I didn’t think you’d want me to use it.”
“I don’t,” she answered.
“Then why give it to me?”
“Because I should have told you about the diary passage and I don’t want you to think that anyone here is engaged in some cover-up. I can see how you might have thought the town was up to something, and this is a peace offering. But I want to assure you that it wasn’t some big scheme—”
“I know,” Jeremy interrupted. “The mayor came by this morning.”
She nodded, and her eyes dropped before rising to meet his again. In that instant, he thought she was going to say something, but whatever it was, she stopped herself. “Well, I guess that’s it,” she said, pushing her hands into her coat pockets. “I should probably let you finish up so you can be on your way. I’ve never been a fan of long good-byes.”
“So this is a good-bye?” he asked, trying to hold her gaze.
She looked almost sad as she tilted her head to the side. “It has to be, doesn’t it?”
“So that’s it, then? You just came by to tell me it’s over?” He ran his fingers roughly through his hair, frowning. “Don’t I have any say in the matter?”
Her voice was quiet when she answered. “We’ve been through all of this, Jeremy. I didn’t come here this morning to argue, and I didn’t come here to make you angry. I came because I was sorry about the way I treated you yesterday. And because I didn’t want you to think that the week meant nothing to me. It did.”
Her words felt like physical blows, and he struggled to speak. “But you’re intent on ending this.”
“I’m intent on being realistic about it,” she said.