Free Reflections of Yesterday by Debbie Macomber Page B

search a lifetime and never experience what he had those years with Angie. With a vengeance, he jammed a gold cuff link into place.
    Dressed now, and ready for the office, Simon went to the kitchen and poured a cup of hot coffee. He glanced at his gold wristwatch. A thousand times he had questioned what a seventeen-year-old boy could know of love. Little, he admitted freely now, but enough to realize that if it wasn’t Angie in his arms, it wasn’t love. He emptied the coffee cup in the sink and moved to the garage. The red convertible seemed to smile at him. This weekend he’d see about starting her up again. For now he had to hurry or he would be late to the bank.
    He parked in his usual spot and jingled the car keys before putting them in his pocket.
    Once inside the bank, he began whistling as he walked across the large marble floor, drawing his assistant’s blank stare.
    “Good morning, Mr. Canfield.”
    “Morning, Mrs. Wilson,” he repeated cheerfully. Five people in the bank gaped in surprise.
    His secretary located Angie’s business number in Charleston. Simon had lost her once; he wasn’t going to make that mistake again. He loved Angie as much now as he had twelve years ago.
    His heart was pounding as he punched in the telephone number. She answered on the third ring.

Five
    The sharp corners of Angie’s mind were crowded with a thousand niggling thoughts. She should be thinking of Glenn, not Simon. She was home now and engaged to a wonderful man who loved her. And she loved Glenn in return, only … only things in Groves Point hadn’t turned out as she’d expected. She had hoped to find Simon married and happy, with a house full of rambunctious children. Instead she’d found a bitter, disillusioned man trapped in the same limbo that had held her prisoner all these years. She had traveled to Groves Point seeking release from the past. The trip had given her that and washed away the guilt that had plagued her from the moment she had accepted the money from Georgia Canfield. But with the release came another set of regrets. Simon.
    Determinedly she pushed thoughts of him to the back of her mind and zipped up the soft pink smock that hung from a hook in the back of her shop, Clay Pots. It had been named for her father, and he was proud of her small business venture. She hadn’t told Clay about her weekend trip. It was better that he never know. Her father had yet to learn that she had accepted Glenn’s proposal. The three of them were having dinner together Thursday night. Glenn and Angie planned to tell Clay then. Not that he’d be surprised.
    “Morning, Donna.”
    “Morning.” Donna was busy placing the cut flowers in the refrigerated compartment in the front of the shop and didn’t glance up.
    Angie’s one full-time employee worked the early shift and stopped on her way in to the shop to buy cut flowers direct from the wholesaler.
    “Angie.” Donna stuck her blond head around the glass case. “There was a phone call for you earlier. I left the name on your desk.”
    “Thanks.” Absently, Angie leafed through the orders for the day, dividing them between Donna and herself. Donna manned the counter in the morning and Angie took over in the afternoon.
    Her heartbeat came to an abrupt halt when she glanced at the pink slip on her desk. The note was brief:
Simon Canfield phoned, will try again later
.
    Every time the phone rang for the next four hours, Angie stiffened and prayed it wasn’tSimon. Everything had already been said. All Angie wanted to do was bury the hurts of the past and build a new life from the ashes of Groves Point. She couldn’t think of what to say to Simon or how to explain her feelings to him. It would sound ridiculous to shout at him that it wasn’t supposed to have happened this way. Erroneously, she had assumed him to be married and happy. She wanted to tuck him neatly into a private corner of her life, like a favorite book once treasured but now