Valentine's Dream: Love Changes Everything / Sweet Sensation / Made in Heaven

He leaned across the table. “How about, for starters, that I’m not making a fool of myself. That it’s not too late, or a big mistake.”

There was something poignant and vulnerable about his honesty.

“I’m a little nervous and confused, but I think you’re on to something,” Grace quietly confessed.

“It took three years for me to get up the courage to say something. I know you didn’t feel the same way.”

“Do you think Benson knew how you felt?” she asked, suddenly horrified at the thought.

“I would have broken off the friendship if I thought I couldn’t keep it to myself. I didn’t want to hurt Benson or you.”

She shook her head in amazement. “But to stay silent for all those years.”

“Until now,” Carter quietly reminded her.

“Is everything okay here?” The waiter’s overly cheerful voice broke into their mutual reflection and brought Grace and Carter back to the present. “Can I get you anything else?”

“No, this is good,” Carter reassured the young man. He glanced at Grace. “This is very good.”

By the time they left the restaurant, Grace felt as if everything had changed and the world looked different. She was giddy and disoriented, her head spinning with Carter’s revelations. She felt awkward and shy and exposed. Carter had tapped into something between them that she had only begun to question herself. But she wasn’t there, yet.

They left the restaurant, and he took her hand.

“Don’t say anything right now.”

“I can’t,” she agreed, bemused.

“I guess I could have planned this better. Maybe I should have said something sooner. Maybe waited until I’d already moved here. I hate that I have to leave you like this.”

Grace smiled kindly at him. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Carter, but I’m glad you have to go back to Chicago for a while.”

He looked a little grim, but stoic. “Got it.” He nodded.

She waited in numb silence while he hailed a cab for her and paid the driver to return her to her office. They faced each other suddenly like total strangers. But she finally realized how much courage it had taken for Carter to come forth with his feelings about her. And how much more it had taken for him to remain silent for eight years. Despite that spontaneous but electrifying encounter between them, Carter had never taken advantage of her. She stood before him now, appreciating and admiring the risk he’d taken. He had shown strength of character and had opened his heart. Could she do any less?

Grace took a tentative step toward Carter and raised her arms for a hug. It was gentle and comforting, and took them back to that time and place when the moment called for understanding.

“Have a safe trip,” Grace said softly. “Hurry back.”

* * *

“Thank you so much for understanding. I’m sorry I couldn’t give you more warning, but something came up, and I have to stay in the city a little longer this afternoon.”

Grace, on the phone with her babysitter, felt a little uneasy about having to change her children’s routine. It was rare that she was forced to rearrange her schedule and theirs, and it was always work-related, something that she had to accommodate when necessary. Yet going into emergency backup mode for Carter Morrison struck her as not only out of character, but pretty spur-of-the-moment. Her life was not geared to spontaneity, or to taking chances. Grace realized she was making concessions for him that she hadn’t made for any other man since Benson.

Why?

“I’ve already spoken with the children’s grandmother, and she’ll pick them up at your place at the time I normally would,” Grace informed the babysitter. “Here’s her name and phone number....”

Why not? she thought.

Because with Carter, she could talk about more than Playstation and Toy Story dolls, she thought, realizing how limited her vocabulary had become. Because he liked her kids, and they liked him. Because Madison had been asking when Carter was coming to play chess with him again. Was it because the myth that had been dispelled between them had allowed for another feeling to sneak in?

Now it could be said.

“Yes, everything will be back to normal tomorrow,” Grace assured the babysitter. “I’ll pick up the children after work as usual. Thanks so much. I’ll call my mother-in-law and let her know you’ll be expecting her. Bye.”

Grace sat forward in her chair, turning to her computer to finish an email. She was tired of trying to analyze her decision. What difference did it make? There was nothing to read between the lines as she made arrangements so she and Carter could see each other.

He was becoming a good friend. There was nothing wrong with having a good friend.

Right?

Grace had known exactly when he’d returned to New York. He’d called on his way up the New Jersey Turnpike to say he’d taken a year lease on one of the three apartments they’d seen together. He already had a phone number, had arranged for movers to arrive with his things, and had driven himself back in his Lexus.

He’d wasted no time in asking to see her.

Grace was breathless with anxiety. Was he moving too fast? Was this whirlwind of feelings more than friendship or curiosity? Or just a momentary apparition?

Carter’s phone call an hour earlier, asking if she could possibly stay late and meet with him, had not only caught her off guard but had stirred an odd anticipation. When she left work that afternoon at almost five-thirty, it was raining lightly. She walked briskly toward the subway only to realize that Carter was standing at the top of the entrance, under the protection of a large umbrella.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, sounding more annoyed than she’d intended.

“Waiting for you.”

“Afraid I’d get lost in the subway? Or that I’d stand you up?”

“Aren’t you glad I came to drive you in the comfort of my car, saving you the hassle?” he said, waving a hand to the Lexus parked near the corner.

“Yes,” Grace conceded as a gust of wind tried to tear her pocket umbrella from her hand.

The drive downtown was stop and go as the traffic was hampered by the weather and the usual insanity of rush hour in the city. He’d made reservations at B. Smith’s.

She realized that she was nervous to be with him—to the point of trembling. She crossed her legs after they were seated to keep her knees from jumping. Seeing Carter again after their parting conversation ten days earlier made Grace wonder what they could say to one another now. How they would behave. But the one surprising difference that she’d noticed at once was that she was glad to see Carter again.

He ordered glasses of champagne. They toasted his return to New York, finding an apartment, beginning a new life. But Grace realized it was a new start for her, as well. Then Carter proposed a second toast.

“Let’s hope the joys of the future will be strengthened by those of the past.”

She found his remark thoughtful and somehow profound. Grace had always thought of Benson with genuine feeling and warmth and regret, and without guilt she smiled at the man sitting opposite her. Grace began to relax in his company.

After they’d placed their order, Carter took a purple envelope from his pocket and slid it across the table to her.

He said nothing, offered no explanation and Grace stared at the envelope suspiciously. She did not ask what it might be; but her sudden rapid heartbeat and her flushed skin signaled that she’d reached her own conclusion.

“Does this have anything to do with Valentine’s Day? Because if it does, you’re a day early.”

He shook his head as he watched her. “To my way of thinking, I’m a few years late. Better late than never.”