33 The Return of Bowie Bravo (4 page)

He’d just gotten it going good when he heard the front door open. He shut the door to the fireplace insert, hung the poker back on the stand and rose to his feet. The front door closed. Hesitant footsteps came closer. And stopped. He turned slowly to face the sturdy, handsome boy who stood in the arch to the foyer.

Still in his coat and hat, his rubber boots and backpack, the boy had Glory’s brown hair and big eyes. And the telltale Bravo cleft in his square chin. He took his time, looking Bowie up and down.

Bowie returned his stare. The only sound was the crackle of the newly revived fire at his back. For Bowie, in that wordless moment, the world seemed to shift on its axis. Everything came into sharper perspective. He saw what he’d already known in his mind. But now he saw it through his heart and whatever that thing was that might be called a soul. Only at that moment did he fully accept that he had a job to do here, a job he’d left undone for too long.

There was no way he could leave town. Not in the near future anyway.

“I know you,” the boy said at last, his mouth that was the same shape as the mouth Bowie saw when he looked in the mirror, curved in a sneer. “I’ve seen your pictures in Granny Chastity’s house. You’re the one they call my dad. But you’re
not
my dad. My dad died. And I hate you.”

Chapter Four

B
owie stared at the son who’d just said he hated him and tried to think of an acceptable reply.

There was none. Anything he said right then would only be so much crap.

Johnny didn’t wait for him to think up something meaningful. He demanded, “Where’s my mom?”

“She’s…resting.”

Johnny dropped the backpack down one arm. It plunked to the hardwood floor, although he still held it by a strap. “In her room?”

“That’s right.”

Hefting the pack, Johnny turned for the stairs.

“Wait.”

The boy whirled back. “Don’t you tell me what to do.”

Bowie almost smiled. It was the kind of thing he used to say a lot—and not only when he was six. He thought of his own mom, for some reason. Of Chastity’s calm, matter-of-fact approach to things. She used to be the only one with a chance of getting through to him. She never fought fire with fire. He said quietly, “Your sister was born this morning.”

The boy tried to keep sneering, but his eyes went wide. “Is my mom okay?”

“Your mom is fine. Resting, like I said. Your aunt Angie, your grandma Rose and your great-aunt Stella are with her.”

“What’s her name, the baby?”

“Serafina Teodora, but your mom calls her Sera.”

“I want to go up there. I want to see my mom and the baby.”

“Take off your coat and hat and boots first. And go quietly. Remember to knock.”

The boy did what he was told. He unzipped his jacket and took off his hat. Bowie marveled. At six, Johnny had more self-control than Bowie had possessed at twenty-six. The boy turned and left the archway.

Bowie didn’t follow. Getting too close so soon seemed like a bad idea.

From where he stood at the fireplace, Bowie had a clear view into the front hall. He watched Johnny set his pack at the base of the coat tree, hang his jacket on a low hook and put his boots side-by-side next to his pack.

In stocking feet, Johnny went up, not looking back. Once he disappeared from view, Bowie moved to the foot of the stairs. He heard Johnny knock on his mother’s door, a gentle, careful sort of knock.

And then he heard the door open and Mamma Rose’s voice. “Here’s our big boy.…”

Johnny said something. Bowie couldn’t make out the words. He heard the door click shut.

There was an easy chair by the fire. Bowie returned to the family room and sank into that chair. He sat and stared at the flames and waited for his son to come back downstairs.

It didn’t take all that long. Fifteen minutes, maybe, and he heard the light step descending.

Bowie stayed in the chair. He had the feeling that sudden moves on his part would not be appreciated. Better to continue to keep his distance for a while. He might even get lucky and the kid would come to him.

Doubtful, but you never knew. So he waited.

The light footfalls came closer. “My mom says I have to be nice to you.” The boy had stopped maybe six feet from Bowie’s chair. He’d put on a pair of tennis shoes while he was upstairs.

Aware of a strange tightness under his breastbone, Bowie drank in the sight of him. “Did you see your sister?”

Johnny nodded. “She’s pretty ugly. All red and wrinkled.”

“Most babies are like that. But personally, I think she’s gorgeous.”

“You maybe need glasses, huh?” Johnny tipped his dark head to the side, frowning. “Are you a drunk and a crazy man?”

Bowie wanted to laugh. He also felt the burn of a more painful emotion sting the back of his throat. “Not anymore,” he said. “But I used to be.”

The boy seemed to consider that answer. And then he shrugged. “Mom says I can have milk and two graham crackers and then do my homework.”

“Need any help with that?”

Johnny blew out a disgusted breath. “I’m not a
baby.
”

“Well, I’m here if you need anything.”

The look the kid gave him then was more puzzled than anything else. The big brown eyes said,
Why would I need anything from you?
And then he turned for the door to the kitchen.

Bowie should have left it alone then. He knew that. But somehow, he just had to say, “I’m going down the street to say hi to your grandma Chastity. Do you want to come with me?”

“No,” the boy said. He neither paused nor looked back.

What did you expect? He hates you, remember?

Once Johnny disappeared into the kitchen, Bowie got up and climbed the stairs. He knocked on the door to Glory’s room.

After a minute, Rose opened the door wide enough to put her head through the crack. She whispered, “Everything okay?”

“Just wanted you to know I’m going down to Ma’s. Back in an hour or so. Johnny’s in the kitchen.”

“You look good,” his mom said when she opened the door to him. “Healthy. Strong.”

She looked pretty much as he remembered her, tall and slim in khaki trousers, a button-down shirt and a thick wool cardigan. Her short brown hair had more gray than before, and the lines bracketing her mouth and fanning out from the corners of her dark eyes were etched deeper than they had been. She was a practical woman who took care of business and of those she loved.

She stepped aside and he went in, accepting the hug she offered, then pulling back, holding her by the shoulders as she beamed up at him.

He said, “Good to see you, Ma.”

“Take off your coat. Come on back.”

He shrugged out of his jacket and she hung it in the closet by the door.

The Sierra Star Bed and Breakfast was as he remembered it. Homey and welcoming. A couple of people he didn’t recognize sat on the sofa in the living room reading the town’s weekly paper,
The Sierra Times.
Guests. They glanced up and smiled as his mom led him to the kitchen, her private domain at the back of the house.

She offered lunch, but he told her he’d eaten. He shook his head when she raised the full coffeepot in his direction.

So she poured herself a cup and sat in the chair opposite him. “Serafina Teodora, huh? It’s a big name for a little baby.”

“After Matteo’s mother,” he said.

Chastity made a low sound. “The saintly Serafina, who made sure her son had no other women in his life until she was in the ground.”

“Come on, Ma, cut it out. I always liked Matteo. He was a fair man. Kind. And Glory and Johnny both thought the world of him.”

“Did I say a thing against him? Not I. I liked Matteo. He and I were friends.”

“I don’t remember that.”

“You were too busy getting into trouble to pay any attention to how often Matteo showed up around here.”

“Here? You mean at the Sierra Star?”

Chastity nodded. “Believe it or not, Matteo even confided in me back in the day. We shared some really good…talks.”

Bowie wondered what she was getting at. “What kind of ‘talks’?”

“Private ones.”

“Sheesh, Ma. Be a little mysterious, why don’t you?”

“It hardly matters now. What matters is that Glory was happy with him. And he was good to Johnny. Wanted to adopt him. Glory kept putting him off on the adoption question, though.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“See? There are real benefits to keeping in touch.”

He let the dig pass because he was still stuck back there with the idea that Matteo had wanted to adopt Johnny. Bowie wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Not surprised, really. And not particularly happy, either. “For Matteo to adopt my son, Glory would have had to come to me, to deal with me.”

His mom looked at him sideways. “I give her more credit. I say she knew it would be wrong to cut you out of Johnny’s life that way.”

“Maybe you forgot. She didn’t even give him my name.” On Johnny’s birth certificate, Glory had told Brett to put Dellazola as the last name.

“But she did put you down as the father, didn’t she?”

“Why are we talking about this, Ma?”

“You’d rather we discussed the weather? All right. It was snowing. Now it’s not.”

He laughed. “Smart-ass.”

“Don’t call your mother names.” Her old cat, Mr. Lucky, jumped into her lap. She scratched him under the chin. “People will think that you’re badly brought up.”

“I hate to break it to you, but I have a feeling they think that already.”

Her expression grew serious again. “You’ve got quite a job ahead of you.”

“I know it.”

“Not only with Johnny.” She stroked Mr. Lucky’s caramel-colored coat. “Glory’s got that big heart of hers hardened against you.”

“That’s not news—and it doesn’t matter, about Glory’s heart. It’s over between her and me. I just want to help her out if I can because I owe it to her. And because she’s the mother of my son.”

“Oh, come on, you don’t really believe that, do you? I certainly don’t.”

He reminded himself that his mother never did have her head screwed on straight when it came to love and romance. After all, she’d loved Blake Bravo. Loved him big time, and loved him long enough to give him four sons.

Chastity spoke again. “I know what you’re thinking. Stop.”

He said, “Glory loved her husband. I’m old news.”

His mom looked into her coffee cup, but then set it down without taking a sip. Mr. Lucky jumped from her lap and strutted off down the hall. “How long you here for?”

“As long as it takes to work things out with my son and to see that Glory’s back on her feet and managing okay with a new baby to look after.”

“I wouldn’t say she’s on her own. She can’t walk down the street without tripping over a relative.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Oh, yes, I do,” his mom said too sweetly. “Probably better than you.”

Back at Glory’s house, he found Mamma Rose at the cooktop in the kitchen with a very fussy Sera on her shoulder. “Stella and Glory had words,” she said with a shrug. “So Stell went home. Then Angie left, too. She’s got the boys and Brett to look after.” Angie and Brett had two sons—Jackson, who would be six in a couple of months, and Graham, who was two. Rose stirred a big pot of pasta sauce. “Johnny’s upstairs in his room.…” Sera let out a yelp, then yawned, then yelped some more. “Stir this,” she instructed. “I’ll take this baby back up to her mamma.”

“I’ll take her up,” he volunteered.

Rose sent him a doubtful look. “You sure?” He already had his arms out. “Well, you did deliver her. I guess you can manage to carry her upstairs well enough.” Rose handed over the tiny pink-blanketed bundle.

Sera was light as a breath of air. And still squalling—until he had his arms around her. Then she did that thing again, same as the moment she was born. She blinked and looked up at him and her mouth was a round little
O.

He grinned down at her. “Hey, how you doin’ there, Sera?”

Rose took the diaper off her shoulder and put it on his. “She likes you.”

Carefully, he lifted the tiny form and put her against his chest. She made a soft, cooing sound. And then she burped. He patted her on the back.

“Gently, now,” said Rose.

“Yes, ma’am.” He sent Glory’s mom a grin.

Rose asked the question that seemed to be on everyone’s mind. “How long you staying in town?”

“Not sure yet.”

Rose looked like she maybe wanted to say more, but she only told him, “Watch the baby’s head, now. She can’t hold it up by herself yet.”

He turned for the door to the stairs.

On the second floor, he saw that Glory’s door was closed. So was another one across the hall—Johnny’s room, he was reasonably certain. Because Sera was quiet in his arms, he was tempted to try Johnny’s door first, take the baby in there, maybe let her brother hold her for a minute.

And maybe make the first small step toward getting to know his son.

But first things first. He needed to talk to Glory, to try and settle a few things while he had the chance. Over the next few days, it was going to be a challenge getting her alone. The Dellazola women would be looking after her and Sera round-the-clock—which only proved what his mother had said. She had family to take care of her and he wasn’t really needed.

Didn’t matter. He would find ways to make himself useful. What mattered, he kept telling himself, was that he was here, finally. And he wasn’t going away until he’d righted all the things he’d made wrong.

He steadied Sera on his arm and gave Glory’s bedroom door a tap.

“It’s open,” she called.

He went in as she reached out and switched on the lamp. She lay in the bed, which was all made up now with clean sheets and blankets.

“Bowie,” she said grimly at the sight of him. Her expression asked the question she didn’t actually put into words.
You still here?
She sat up against the pillows. Her hair looked a little better, not quite so tangled and stringy, like maybe she’d run a comb through it a couple of times. She wore a soft blue pajama top. He didn’t know what she wore on the bottom because the blankets covered the lower half of her body. A white bassinet waited by the bed.