Gone With the Witch (30 page)

"Well, 'I didn't see you `seeing' each other when 'I went
mind to mind with Storm. I'm not Superwoman. What I
did takes energy. I used our baby's cry to bring you to her, however I could. Aiden, don't look so guilty. You never loved me. I knew that. But between you and Storm, I've sometimes felt love—which
you
haven't faced yet. No surprise."

"Claudette, this is insane."

"Don't worry about it then. Pretend I dreamed it, if you want."

"I'll do that while you concentrate on getting better.”

“I'm tired, Aiden"

"Rest, then, but before you take a nap, we have to
talk."
Just this morning he'd wished he could make up to Claudette
for everything he'd put her through. "Marry me, Claudette.
Marry me and make me Becky's stepfather. You'll get well,
and we'll be a family."

"I don't think I have time to get married," Claudette
said.

"Nonsense, we don't need a fancy church wedding." He asked the floor nurse to call a priest. The poor old guy expected the last
ri
tes in this place, not a wedding, but he seemed up for the challenge once he spoke to Claudette's doctor. That made Aiden nervous, because the doctor wouldn't tell
him
anything, but if his conversation with the priest moved the wedding forward, so much the better.

The priest rubbed his chin. "I know a judge, no two,
who owe me, and ... today's a business day," he said,
thinking out loud. "Mr. McCloud, I'll arrange for you to
get your blood test here while I make a few phone calls."

A nurse came in to give him his blood test while
Claudette napped.

Later, one of the judges called, the priest told them, also
to speak to Claudette's doctor. Within the hour, a messen
ger arrived with a marriage license. The priest found a
doctor and nurse who would stand up for them when every
thing was in place.

The impossible became possible almost too easily.
There were circumstances at work here that Aiden didn't understand, and maybe it was best that he didn't.

Preparing for their wedding became surreal in that sterile hospital room, especially so soon after King and Har
mony's lavish affair, and considering the fact that Aiden
felt as if he was marrying the wrong woman.

His life was passing before his eyes. To keep from losing Becky, he needed to marry Claudette. By marrying
Claudette, he'd lose Storm. If he stayed with Storm instead
of Claudette, he'd lose Becky.

Only one choice.

He'd do anything in his power to keep Becky.

"You're doing this for our daughter," Claudette said. "I know that,
Aiden."

He sighed.
“And for you, Claudette.
You shouldn't have
gone through your pregnancy without me. It's past time I made it up to you—"

"Time has run out for that."

"But not for me to become our child's father. My
name's not on Becky's birth
certificate."

"Becky? Is that what my mother named her?" Claudette
smiled, the rattle in her breathing making Aiden nervous.

"I named my favo
ri
te doll Becky when I was a kid. Is
she pretty?"

"Becky's gorgeous. But Social Se
rv
ices is about to take her away and put her in foster care, because your mother's in a wheelchair. I'll take care of your mom. That'll be the easy part. Keeping Becky will be the hard part. Social Services
needs
proof that I'm her father."

"I can put it in writing, while I have the strength."

"Why didn't I think of that?" Because he was rattled out of his mind, that's why. A daughter he hadn't known about.
His ex back from the dead.
"Let's have you do that now
and get it notarized."

Aiden spoke to a nurse, got paper and a pen, and before long, a hospital worker arrived to notarize Claudette's statement naming him Becky's biological father.

When the priest finally opened his book for the ceremony, Claudette's smile outshone her pallor. She looked
almost radiant. He'd be a good husband. A good
father,
and
they'd all take care of Ginny.

Storm—he couldn't think about Storm. He'd failed
her ... except that, because he'd come here with her, she'd fulfilled her psychic mandate. This was good then. Good, he told himself.

Claudette squeezed his hand.

He could do this.

He could.

Chapter Forty-one

STORM went shopping for cat supplies first, and brought
everything back to Ginny's. Yes, she was putting off the in
evitable, and she knew it.

She got lost on the way to the nursing home twice, whether by mistake or on purpose, hard to know, but she did finally find the right place.

She rode the elevator up to the fourth floor, but she couldn't bring herself to get out, so she rode back down again. On the second trip, she got out on Claudette's floor.

"Can you direct me to Claudette Langley's room?" she asked at the nurses' station.

When she heard people talking in the room, Storm
stopped outside the door and stood at an angle so she could
see in but not be seen. Aiden stood beside Claudette's bed,
her hand in his, his other hand covering hers, cherishing
her.

Claudette looked like a cadaver—well, maybe that was being kind. She looked like a skeleton, her skin stretched tightly over her bones. Being in a coma for a year had changed her dramatically from the woman in the pictures at Ginny's to an emaciated being with gray streaks in her red hair, but that could easily be fixed.

Aiden gazed down at Claudette as if she was the only woman in the world. Storm knew the gaze well, and she mourned its loss.

Claudette looked up at him with so much love and adoration that Storm might have doubled over in pain, if she
weren't in such a public place. As it was, she held a hand to
her mouth, to keep her g
ri
ef from overflowing.

Someone else in the room spoke, and Storm stretched
her neck to see a ... priest, book open, stole around his
neck, standing on the opposite side of the bed with a doctor and nurse. "Will you, Claudette Ma
ri
e Langley, take Aiden
Archer McCloud
... ?"

Claudette's "I do" was heartfelt.

When it was Aiden's turn, he didn't answer ... until the priest asked him a second time.

Storm backed away, but not before she heard Aiden's soft, "I do."

She felt a mind-numbing paralysis.

The man she loved—Aiden, the independent, no-commitment type—was committing.

Storm turned and began to walk aimlessly.

She picked up speed when she saw a door marked
Stairs, and took it. In the stairwell, she shut the door behind
her and doubled over as she leaned against it.

Married.
Aiden was married.

She'd led him to his daughter, which led him to the woman he loved.

Insight and self-awareness hit her,
a recognition
of self
ishness. She'd told herself all along that she was looking
for Aiden's baby
for him,
but deep down, she'd wanted that
baby for herself.
For them.

She and Aiden had had nothing but a fling. No commit
ments; she'd known it from the beginning. Just because she
broke her promise and fell in love with him didn't mean
he'd fallen in love with her.

She'd tried not to. He'd annoyed the hell out of her with

his
quick-flight response. She'd managed pretty well to
keep it just sex, she thought ... until she watched him
falling for his daughter.

She'd been managing to fight that final tumble into
love, until she woke in the middle of the night to find him
watching Becky sleep, worrying about all the things a
good dad should. That's when she'd faced the truth. She loved him.

"Damn me for an idiot!" She shook herself from her misery and took the stairs to the parking lot.

She managed to find Ginny's house without getting lost,
a surprise, considering. Driving there was as close as she'd ever come to walking in her sleep. "Let me take you to the
nursing home," she said to Ginny as she entered the house.
"Claudette is awake and talking to
Aiden."

She wouldn't tell Ginny they were married. That was their news to share.

"No," Ginny said. "I'm not ready." She looked heart-
sore, terribly so.

"Then 'I have no need to stay," Storm said. "I'm going to
call for a car rental and see if they'll bring it here."

"For goodness sakes," Ginny said. "Take my car. I
haven't had a license in more than a year."

Storm came out of her fog with Ginny's words. "The
car's registered, right
? '
I mean I just drove
it."

"Of course."

"I'll buy it from you then. How much do you want?" Storm took out her checkbook.

Ginny put her hand on Storm's. "It's supposed to be
towed away later today. Here's the paperwork the towing
company asked for. I signed everything to turn it over to
the new owner. 'I just needed to fill in the owner's name, but
I didn't know the used car dealer's legal title. I'd rather put your name there."

Storm hugged the frail old woman. She was a sweetie, even if Storm didn't understand why she wouldn't see her
daughter. "Listen to me, Ginny. If you ever need anything,
here's my number, and you call me"

"I'll be fine, but you should stay. Aiden will need you when he gets back."

“Aiden will be too busy taking care of Claudette, Becky,
and you. He won't let you go to assisted living, but if for some reason you end up in a home somewhere down the
road, and you don't like it, call me, and I'll come and break
you out. My sisters and I have a big house in
Salem. You can have our grandmother's room. We didn't get to know her very well, and we missed that. She would have liked you. My sisters would, too."

"Aren't you sweet? I didn't know you had sisters."

"Hah. I came in a three-pack. There are two more
exactly
like me, as in identical. One's married and no longer
lives with us. 'I also have two half sisters. One is my fa
ther's only legitimate child. The other ... I
believe ..
.
needs
to be rescued. Did 'I tell you that we have a big
house? The walls s
tr
etch, and we like it best when it's
bulging at the seams. Call me. Now, do you still want me to
take the rest of Claudette's jewelry to sell in my shop?"

Once Storm packed everything, including the jewelry, she went into the nurse
ry
for a long, cuddly good-bye with
Becky, who called her Mama with a whimper as she
walked out the door. Storm could only hope that when her real mother came home, Becky would forget her.

Driving away from the
Langley house was almost as hard
as driving away from Aiden at the nursing home had been.

She'd had no idea that finding Aiden's baby could
change her life so radically. She hoped Ginny called. She hadn't been able to help Nana at the end, and she'd like a chance to make up for that with Ginny.