Separate Bedrooms...?. Carole Halston

      “You’re going to hate me,” she declared.

      His expression grew stern as he studied her face. “I’m not going to hate you, whatever you’ve done. Or not done. I thought you were having Xavier over for dinner tonight to call off the wedding.”

      “He came, all right, but he didn’t eat dinner. He was too mad.”

      “You did break up with him?”

      “Actually he broke up with me.”

      The tension seemed to ebb from his body, and his slight frown smoothed out. “Either way, I’m glad to hear it.” He opened the door wide in a wordless invitation for her to come in.

      Cara had been inside the house on other occasions. She walked ahead of him into the living room and went over to perch on a man-size brown tweed sofa, which, like the worn brown leather recliner, was a castoff from his parents’ home. Cara had sat on the sofa in their den.

      Neil hadn’t brought any household belongings with him from Memphis when he moved back to Hammond following the death of his wife and son. He’d lived with Dean and Judith Griffin for a year, then bought this one-story brick house when they’d put their home up for sale, prior to relocating to Florida.

      “Would you like a beer or a soft drink?” Neil inquired. “That’s about all I have to offer you to drink, other than coffee or tea.”

      “Nothing, thanks. I just had iced tea at Mamma’s house.” The TV was playing. He’d obviously been watching a TV program.

      He looked thoughtful, registering the information that she’d come to see him after visiting her parents and Sophia.

      “Do you want to sit down?” Cara asked nervously, curbing the urge to blurt out a confession.

      “Sure.” Neil picked up the remote from the square wooden coffee table and clicked off the TV before he sat down on the sofa, too. “Okay. Out with it,” he said.

      She breathed in and breathed out. “You know that backup plan you gave me last night? That you would marry me, in a pinch?”

      “Yes.”

      “Well, I set it in motion. Not intentionally. I only meant to use the make-believe romance part, but my mother and Nonna jumped to conclusions.” Cara lifted her hands in a helpless gesture. “I didn’t have the heart to correct them. Here’s what happened.” She filled him in, talking fast and interjecting frequent apologies. “I’m so sorry,” she said once again when she’d run out of explanation.

      “Don’t take all the blame,” Neil chided her. He slid closer and put his arm around her shoulders and gave her a supportive hug. “I’m at fault, too, for putting on a show for Agnes Tanner at the restaurant. Dammit, I didn’t stop and think about the harmful consequences of egging her on. Thanks to me, your family has suffered embarrassment. And Xavier, too.”

      Cara might have known that Neil would assume his share of responsibility and more. Of all the people in the world, including her family, he was the person she could depend on most to stand behind her. Gratitude welled up that he hadn’t made her feel even worse than she already did. “Neither of us meant to hurt anybody,” she pointed out, laying her head on his shoulder.

      “You’re much too soft-hearted to do anything mean or spiteful,” he said stoutly in her defense.

      “But look at the awful mess I’ve gotten you into.”

      “We’ll get through it together.”

      Cara kissed him on the cheek, wordlessly telling him Thank you and I’m sorry.

      Neil hugged her close, and Cara hugged him back, feeling guilty over the fact that, despite the terrible predicament she’d created for them both, she was perfectly happy and content to be sitting there on his sofa in his living room. More content than she’d ever been when Roy embraced her during the brief period when they were engaged to be married. Safe and protected in Neil’s arms, it was difficult to muster anxiety and self-reproach. He’d always fostered the belief in her that everything would be okay.

      “I’m not much of an actor,” Neil said. “That’s what bothers me.” His troubled tone burst Cara’s bubble of well-being, reviving her regret over disrupting his life. She easily followed his train of thought: it wouldn’t be easy for him to act like her lover, when he’d been like a brother to her for so many years.

      “You fooled Agnes Tanner easily enough in the restaurant last night with your Casanova imitation,” she reminded him. The memory came back of how his playacting had affected Cara, arousing that tingle of delight. Would repetition of lover-like attentions dull the reaction, or would she experience it again and again? The question worried Cara. A lot. Later she would test it out, using her imagination. But not now. Not here with Neil.

      “Agnes is no challenge since, like most gossips, she seems to always be looking for the worst qualities in other human beings,” he was replying. “It’s a different matter with people who know us well, like Jimmy and Peewee.”

      “And Allison and Mary Ann…” Cara’s voice drifted off on a note of dismay as she added to the list of her co-workers, and his employees, at the store. “Gosh, I can’t stand the thought of deliberately misleading them, can you?” She raised her head as Neil’s arms loosened. He sat further apart from her until they were back in their original positions.

      “No, but we’ll have to.”

      “I should just go back to my parents’ house right now and tell them I just made up the whole thing, out of desperation.”

      “You can’t do that. Think about how disappointed Sophia will be.”

      Cara slumped lower as she visualized her grandmother’s reaction to the truth. The joy fading away and expectation dying. “You’re right,” she whispered. “I just can’t. It would be too cruel.”