C's Comeuppance: A Bone Cold--Alive novel (35 page)

“The one and same.”

“Ah, can we help you?”
“Mandy in there with you?”
“Uh, yes.” He heard more bouncing around and the girl’s voice closed in on him as if she were leaning over her date’s lap.

“Yes, C?”

“I need you to get Jemma for me. I don’t want to disturb your grandmother.” Or further incur her wrath. “I don’t know which window is your aunt’s to throw a rock at it.” But he’d have liked to have known. And he’d have thrown a very big rock.

“Sure.” He heard her whisper to her date.

“And, no, you won’t be right back,” he added as she appeared in front of the Bronco and started up the driveway. “Junior here is going home and you’re going to bed.”

She started to protest.

“Don’t even think about it, Mandy. Go get your aunt. Now.” He watched her disappear around the corner of the house, then pushed off the vehicle and leaned into the window to where he was nose to nose with the young man. “Now, personally, I have nothing against getting all you can get whenever you can. I’ve spent my life doing it. But let me tell you, boy, you’d better not be after more than you need here.” He braced himself on his arms and pushed himself back. “I’m going to give you the benefit of two decades of misspent screwing. I am thirty-five years old and I have nothing to show for my lifestyle but a bitter taste in my mouth and a hollow spot in the pit of my stomach. Do you have any idea what I am talking about?”

“Not really.”

“At least you’re honest.” He tapped at the top of the vehicle. “Now go home. You can always call her. I’ll bet she’ll have that phone wrapped under her chin so fast you won’t hear it ring.”

“Yes, sir.”

Mandy reappeared as the Bronco’s taillights turned the corner. She sighed. “She says she won’t come down and doesn’t want to see you. What happened?” She settled her hands on her hips and widened her stance. Had he seen that before or what? “Heather said you two were in the girls’ room together and you were both upset—”

He held up a hand to stop her. “I’m going to sit on the porch. You tell Jemma to come down or I’m coming up.”

“Oh, that won’t go over well. Grandmother will have a cow.”

“Then perhaps your aunt—” he stumbled over the word “—will come down.”

He had just found a regular rhythm on the porch swing when Mandy once again appeared at the door. A shadow hovered behind her and he rose as Jessie came out on the porch.

“Mr. Samuels, leave my property at once or I will call the police.”

He ignored the older woman. “Mandy, did you tell Jemma I’d be up if she wouldn’t be down?”

“Yes, but she’s locked her door.”

He started to the kitchen door.

“Mr. Samuels, I will call—”

“Mrs. Lovelace, call God for all I care. I am walking into this house and I am finding Jemma’s room. Now you or Mandy can tell me which one it is and it’ll save me a great deal of time plus the chance of disturbing your husband, something, trust me, that I do not want to do.”

“It’s at the top of the stairs. First door on the left,” Mandy blurted out.

He was through the door and up the stairs just as he heard the phone be picked up and Mandy’s pleas to her grandmother begin.

***

Jemma felt, as much as heard, the hurried, heavy tread on the stairs. He was taking the steps by two. The doorknob twisted, and he rapped lightly at the door. She’d be foolish to think he would continue so calmly. She shook another tissue out of the box and blew her nose as she twisted the lock.

She got as far as the end of the bed before he made it completely into the room. He locked it and oriented himself to the room, to the single light on the night table.

“Jem—”

She held her hand up as she continued walking away from him toward the window seat. She stood there and looked over the cafe curtains, noted her reflection in the glass, saw him standing behind her just beyond arm’s length.

“James Thomas promised he’d never move back here. He swore.” Her voice broke and the tears started again. That was all she’d done since she’d entered this room: cry. She’d turned a deaf ear to her mother’s voice at the door until Jessie had threatened to call the police to find C because obviously he’d hurt her. At that point, she’d opened the door and told her mother the truth. She’d watched Jessie shrivel before her eyes, watched her clutch her bathrobe about herself and walk wearily to her room.

“Jem—”

She held her hand up again. “No. You want to know it. You’ll know it all.” She swallowed and wiped at her eyes, which she tried to focus back on his reflection but she couldn’t. “Doree had been in an accident in high school that had broken her pelvis terribly. The docs had told her she might not have children and of course when she was seventeen, that was almost like having a license for sex. I doubt Doree thought too much about it until she’d been married a couple of years. Once they started wanting babies, it didn’t take long to figure out why they couldn’t. They were in California at the time at one of James Thomas’s starter-jobs. They’d told Mother and Daddy, not even Doree’s family in Georgia I don’t think, when I came slinking home with my wonderful news.”

She watched his reflection and he’d turned away from her.

“It didn’t take Mother long to get the logistics of this worked out. She’d save her daughter’s reputation
and
get her rightful grandchild and heir.

“We met in Denver in a lawyer’s conference room. Like two sides of a negotiation when we were really one family. Mother and Daddy and me on one side, James Thomas and Doree on the other. I saw Doree’s joy at my misfortune. She had just realized that having a baby was going to be important to her status in the wife-and-mother-sweepstakes of James Thomas’ career world. She was willing to promise me anything while my beloved brother knew he had me right where he wanted me. He could offer my child all the advantages of growing up in the family he or she would be born to.

“I don’t want to sound callous.” She searched the ceiling as if some answer would fall from of it. “James Thomas and Doree have been good parents to Mandy. I couldn’t have given her more and Mother—what did it matter to Mother as long as the child legitimately stayed in the family?

“But James Thomas swore they’d never move back. That was the one stipulation I put on him. I didn’t want to be reminded of what I’d given up. But, on the other hand,
I
didn’t want to raise her without a father when she could have the full package. I was trapped and he knew it.”

“He never lets you forget, does he? On the phone Wednesday he said he’d protected you before.”

“You’re right. He never lets me forget.” She was silent a moment. “They moved to Tulsa when Mandy was three and Dallas when she was five. He was circling nearer and nearer and with each move Mother was more delighted and I got more uneasy. Then when she was six, he got the opportunity for the bank presidency here, and I didn’t find out about it until Doree strolled in one fine morning looking for a house to buy.”

“What did you do?” He was standing at the foot of her bed, his arms draped around the bed poster, his forehead leaning against it, his eyes closed.

“I was furious. Told him so in person that night. It was too late, his contract signed. Like anything I could have said would have changed his mind. I just made sure he bought a house he’d have to stretch to pay for. Charged him full commission.”

C smiled, rubbed his forehead on the wood as if to ward off a headache.

“And then I got to watch Mandy grow up. Got to watch her call somebody else mommy. Got to be a peripheral.” She shut her eyes and a tear squeezed out and down her cheek. “Got to see her have what I couldn’t have given her—a father’s love.” Her voice dissolved into a whisper.

He raised his head, looked at her. “Does she know she’s adopted?”

“No.” She turned back toward the windows, wiped her cheek. “It was a big point of discussion and I still disagree with it.” She sighed. “In theory at least. Then I look at her or have someone tell me how strong the Morrow—that’s Mother’s maiden name—family resemblance is and then I know we’ve gotten away with it. She looks like she belongs.”

“Because she does.”

Jemma gave a quick nod. “Because she does.”

“Doree’s family?”
“Doree and James Thomas were still in California when Mandy was born and quite conveniently didn’t see her family for months at a time. Their first visit was to welcome the baby home from the hospital.” She tossed her head back. “On their infrequent visits, they’re always amazed at how much she favors James Thomas’s family. One Thanksgiving, Doree’s mother leans across the table and says, ‘Y’know, Doree, it’s like you didn’t have a thing to do with her.’ I thought Doree would pass out.”

He edged toward her and she held her breath as he circled her upper arms with his large hands, leaned over and kissed the arm he’d bruised in their journey down the hall.

“Don’t, Charles. You’re going to make me start crying even harder.”

“Then I’ll take half your tears.” He turned her into his arms. “And am I going to love you less because you had a child and did what you thought was best for her?” His eyes searched hers and his thumbs wiped the tears from her cheeks.

“Love?”

“Love.” He kissed her eyes closed, cradled her head under his chin. “I love you, Jemma. Just don’t ever lie to me. I can handle any truth.” He kissed the top of her head. “We can handle any truth.”

She was silent as she snaked her arms around him, clutched at his shirt back. “I’m sorry, Charles. But Mandy’s safety and security are so dependent on this particular lie. My first instinct is always to protect her.”

“And now it’ll be my instinct, too.”

“I had to tell Mother tonight. That you know. Otherwise, she was going to call the police when I came home and wouldn’t talk to her.”

“Just trying to protect
her
baby?”

“I suppose that’s one way to look at it.”

“She was threatening that again. No sirens have sounded so I guess Mandy talked her out of it.”

“She’d do anything for Mandy.”

“Lucky, lucky Mandy. Protected and loved more than any ten children.” He started a soft sway of their bodies, then abruptly stopped, pushed her away from him. “Pack another bag and let’s go to Norm’s for the night. I have to be with you.”

She looked up at him, rose to pull his head down and kiss him. “I have to be with you, too.” She held him close. “I love you.”

“We’re a matched pair then.” He broke her embrace. “Pack.”

“And when Norm comes home tomorrow, what do we say?”

“If he won’t let us stay for free, we’ll have to buy the place.” Her mouth dropped open. “That is the place you want, isn’t it? Norm’s?”

“How did you know?”
“The way you looked in the kitchen this morning. Like you belonged.”

“I think you could make me very happy.”

“Well, it won’t be easy.” He pointed in the general direction of her closet. She crossed to it and pulled a large tote from a shelf. “I’ve never known happiness at this level. I may not know what to do with myself. Or anyone else for that matter.”

“Fletch said you’d never be happy.”

“Mister Doom and Gloom. Mister Bottom Line. Mister They-Work-Better-Under-Pressure.” He stood with hands on hips. “If I didn’t need the rush of the stage and the music and singing with T, sometimes I think I’d just quit.”

“One crisis at a time, Charles. Tonight is my night.” She went into the bathroom and pulled down two sets of thick towels.

“Norm’s bathroom is fully equipped.” He watched her stuff them into the tote.

“If I’m spending a few nights at Norm’s, I need to raise the standards.” She looked around the room, reached for her pillows and set them by the tote. “You’re right, though. I can’t stay here anymore. Mother and I— Just too much has changed.” She started folding the double-wedding-ring quilt.

Eddie C watched her efficient movements. God, they were made for each other. She was as no-nonsense as he was, as committed to a cause for good or ill, as passionate. He had told her he wanted to be with her tonight and that was strictly the case. He had to be. He had to hold her, breathe her in, bury himself in her figuratively if not literally. Sex didn’t even enter into the equation.

On the other hand, there was another matter that needed to at least be introduced, and discussing it while she picked and chose her weekend wardrobe would get the burden of the idea onto the table. She needed to know where he stood about one very important detail.

“While you’re all angst-ridden, you might as well get used to something else.” He settled on the bed. She stopped folding a pair of jeans and raised her eyebrows. He took a deep breath. “I’m not living in Jinks like T does. Norm’s place is fine to have when we come back to visit. But I’m a West Coast boy.”

She measured her words. “What do you mean ‘when we come back to visit’?”

“What did it sound like?”
Damn!
There he was being defensive again!

“Charles, I can love you three ways to Sunday, but I’m not going to shack up with you in Hollywood.”

That wasn’t the reaction he expected. She was either being deliberately obtuse or he hadn’t made his intentions clear. Or both. “Husbands and wives usually live together. Even in my minimal experience, it works better that way.”

“Husbands?”
“You didn’t think we’d get married? You don’t want to?”
Wouldn’t that be a kicker?
Eddie C turned down twice in two weeks.
He’d need to find a hole to crawl into that he could pull in after himself.

She leaned on the dresser and fingered a pair of socks. “No and yes.”

She looked askance. “I don’t think that works out quite right.”

“So we’ll keep it simple.” Why was his heart beating an irregular tattoo? “Will you marry me?”

“Yes, but—”
“
But
?” Maybe he should have had a psychic reading or an astrology chart done.
But?
He’d really needed some warning here. Those damn fortune cookies had promised nothing but smooth sailing and a good time.

“There’s Daddy and the business and Mandy—”

He let out his breath. These problems he could solve. He held his fingers up and counted. “One, full time nurse. Two, sell the business to Carolyn. Three, babe, I’m so sorry, but she’s James Thomas’s.”