New Leaf (26 page)

Even in her sleep, Taffeta had her arms locked around her little girl. She apparently feared that the child might be snatched away from her again while she drifted in dreamland.
Well, old man, it looks like you’ll be sleeping alone tonight
. Barney didn’t mind. He was elated for Taffeta and would happily forgo having a bed partner for the entire week, if that was how it went.
All for a good cause
. It wasn’t every day that a mother and child were reunited after nearly two years.

Sighing, he walked through the house to turn off the lights, locked all the exterior doors to keep his wife feeling safe, and then made his way to his room. Stripping down to only his boxers, he climbed into bed, rolling onto his back with his arms folded under his head. He was still grinning when his eyes fell closed.

Sometime later, Barney awakened to the light touch of feminine hands on his belly. He rolled to gather his wife into his arms.

“You don’t need to worry about me, honey. I’m fine. Go back and enjoy being with Sarah.”

Her response was a deep kiss that would have
blown his socks off if he had been wearing any. He felt tears on her cheeks and cupped her face between his hands.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?”

“Nothing,” she whispered. “Everything is absolutely right. That’s why I’m crying.”

Barney kissed away the wet trails on her skin. “Well, that’s just plain silly.”

“No. You made this possible, Barney. If not for you, Sarah wouldn’t be here tonight. I never would have had the courage to face Cameron and Grace without you beside me.”

“I’ll be beside you as long as I have breath left in my body. I love you, Taffy. With everything I’ve got, I love you.”

As they made love, being careful not to make too much noise, Taffeta asked, “Are you still interested in giving Sarah a baby brother or sister?”

Barney whispered, “Damn straight. Are we on?”

“Absolutely. If we make a baby together tonight, it’ll be born next spring, probably in mid-April.”

“No protection, then. Watch out for swimmers because here they come.”

She sighed as he buried the length of himself into her warm, moist depths. “Oh, Barney, I love you so much. If I live to be a hundred, I don’t think I’ll ever find the words to tell you just how much.”

“You’ll never love me more than I love you,” he whispered.

He quickened the tempo, and neither of them spoke again as they sank together into a current of pleasure and gratified needs. Just before he went
over the edge with her, Barney fleetingly thought that they didn’t need to express their feelings for each other with words.

Not when they had
this
.

Taffeta detested courtrooms. The faint scents of disinfectant and furniture wax always floated on the air, and the people who sat in the spectator area behind her fidgeted, coughed, and whispered, creating a constant drone of noise. This was the day that she’d dreamed of for nearly three years and would hopefully end with her being granted sole custody of her daughter. Only what if it didn’t turn out that way? As dearly as she loved Barney and as happy as he’d made her, she knew he had no magic wand to make all her wishes come true.

A dull pain throbbed in her temple. Her lower back ached. Her ankles, formerly a normal size, now felt like melons ballooning over the tops of her shoes. She sighed and placed a protective hand over her swollen middle. The baby kicked just then, bumping some part of his body against her cupped palm. Barney said their boy was fated to be a soccer champion—or maybe a famous football player. Taffeta didn’t care what sport the child wanted to play; she just wished he’d stop practicing until after he was born.

The judge entered the room just then, and the court deputy boomed, “All rise.”

Easy for you to say, buster
, Taffeta thought crossly as she struggled up from her chair.
You aren’t almost nine months along
. Her distended belly bumped the edge of the table, and she knew Barney was grinning even though he sat out of her sight on the other side of the railing behind her. He loved everything about her pregnancy, even his late-night drives into Mystic Creek for the crazy foods she craved. Taffeta felt like a fat water buffalo and was pretty sure she looked like one, but Barney insisted that she’d never been more beautiful. The thought made her smile slightly as she watched the judge, an older man with gray hair and wire-frame glasses, take his seat at the bench.

Before examining the documents awaiting his perusal, he scanned the packed room. Taffeta knew what caused his puzzled frown. Barney’s whole family, Phillip’s parents, and a remarkable percentage of the population of Mystic Creek were present. This evening, Barney’s parents, Kate and Jeremiah, were throwing a huge celebration party in their backyard. Other men were bringing their barbecues to help feed the multitudes, and their wives were bringing side dishes. Taffeta only hoped that a ruling against her didn’t rain on their parade.

To the deputy, the judge muttered, “I thought this was a routine custody hearing, Rip. Do I have my wires crossed?”

The officer turned toward the bench. “There
are just a lot of family and friends present, Your Honor.”

The judge harrumphed, snapped his gaze back to the spectator gallery, and said, “Please be seated.”

Taffeta could no longer sit; she plopped.
I’m not really nervous,
she assured herself.
Nothing can go wrong
. Months ago, her child abuse conviction had been overturned by the Oregon Court of Appeals. Phillip had been arrested last month for perjury and drug dealing, and a week ago he had signed away all his rights as Sarah’s father in exchange for a million dollars from his dad to cover his forthcoming legal expenses. There was no way that the judge would deny Taffeta custody of her daughter today. As Barney kept saying, this hearing was a mere formality and the outcome was a slam dunk.

Even so, Taffeta’s pulse raced. Unlike Barney, she’d once been victimized by the justice system. Granted, Phillip had orchestrated that by lying through his teeth, but it was still difficult for Taffeta to trust that she would receive fair treatment.

The judge leafed through the paperwork. A buzzing sound filled Taffeta’s ears, and little spots danced in front of her eyes. For an awful moment, she thought she might faint. Instead she missed most of what the judge said, and her first indication that she’d been granted custody was when Barney came forward to curl an arm around her shoulders, bent low, and said, “Congratulations, Taffy. Didn’t I tell you it’d be a slam dunk?”

He helped her stand up and led her to the public seating area to be hugged and congratulated by
Kate and Jeremiah, Jeb and Amanda, Ben, Jonas, and both of his sisters. Townspeople hung back to give the Sterling family time to rejoice. Then a sea of smiling faces moved past Taffeta, and she shook countless hands. She felt like a bride in a receiving line.

The Sterlings left immediately to make the long drive back home to prepare for the bonfire party and barbecue. They planned three large fires to ward off the chill of April’s evening air, and everyone would have to wear coats, but there would be a celebration no matter what the weather was like. People in Mystic Creek were accustomed to braving the elements.

Weary beyond description, Taffeta leaned against Barney for support as she greeted even more people, many who had become good friends, others who were still total strangers. Barney knew everyone by name, of course.

When the courtroom finally emptied, Taffeta blearily focused on two individuals who had never left their seats in the very back row, Grace and Cameron Gentry. They beamed happy smiles at her, but Taffeta wondered if their expressions concealed pain. Unless Phillip’s expensive defense attorney pulled off the impossible, Grace and Cameron’s only son would soon be doing prison time. In addition to that, they had essentially just lost their granddaughter.

“I need to speak with them,” Taffeta said to Barney.

Lending her the support of his strong arm,
Barney guided her into the row just ahead of her ex-parents-in-law. Taffeta tried to lower herself gracefully onto the bench seat, but her tailbone panged as her posterior connected with the wood anyway. She hooked her arm over the back, bringing up one knee to brace herself as she met Grace’s and Cameron’s gazes.

“You look worse than I feel,” Grace said with a weak laugh. She had undergone triple-bypass surgery two weeks earlier, and according to what she’d told Taffeta over the phone, she still wasn’t allowed to do much of anything. “And I feel pretty awful.”

“I’m exhausted,” Taffeta confessed. “Mostly from nerves, I think. I was so afraid that the judge would deem me unfit to be Sarah’s mother.”

“Not a chance,” Cameron said. “I would have raised hell.”

“And been charged with contempt of court,” Grace reminded him.

Barney sat beside Taffeta, also turned sideways on the bench. “I would have gone to jail with you, Cameron,” he said with a laugh.

Taffeta loved Phillip’s parents. When Phillip had married her, she was terrified of them. What if they didn’t like her? What if they felt that she was unworthy to be Phillip’s wife? But never once had these people treated her with anything but kindness.

“I want you to know that I’ll accommodate you in every way I can so that you can maintain a strong relationship with Sarah,” Taffeta said to them. “Barney feels the same way I do about that. You are her
grandparents, and she should spend lots of time with you.”

Grace smiled through sudden tears. “We both know that you’ll make sure we see a lot of Sarah. And we’re looking forward to that. Cameron is dying to take her to Disneyland. But I’m afraid that will have to wait until midsummer. I should be recovered enough by then to keep up with her again.”

It was now mid-April, a little over a year since Taffeta’s shadow dance had brought Barney to knock on her apartment door. “That isn’t so long to wait,” Taffeta mused. “After the baby is born, maybe we can come back to Erickson for a visit.”

“What are you going to name him?” Cameron asked.

Barney injected, “I’m leaving it up to Taffy, my only stipulation being that he won’t be named after me.”

Taffeta felt less weary now that she was starting to relax, and she gave a genuine laugh. “I think Barnabas Asher Sterling is a fabulous name.”

Her husband gave her a long look.
“No,”
he said. “I wouldn’t curse a kid with that handle for a million dollars.” He grinned at Cameron. “I’d love to chat longer, but she’s tired, and I need to get her home. By the time we run by your place to collect our daughter and attend the celebration barbecue at my parents’ house, it’ll be late, and she’ll be dead on her feet. And,” he added, “she’s close to our due date, so getting her back home to be near her doctor is important.”

Cameron arched an eyebrow. “I understand that you’re going to adopt Sarah,” he said to Barney.

“God willing, yes. Taffy and I both think she should bear the same surname as all her siblings as she’s growing up. I hope you don’t mind that she’ll no longer go by Gentry.”

With a shake of his head, Cameron replied, “She’ll always be our granddaughter, no matter what name she goes by. And before we know it, she’ll get married and might change it anyway.”

“Not until she’s thirty,” Barney informed him. “I don’t plan to let her date until she’s twenty-nine.”

Grace chortled and then flattened her hand over her recently opened breastbone, grimacing at the pain. “Oh my. You caught me by surprise with that one.”

Just then, Taffeta caught movement from the corner of her eye and turned to see Tessa, the Gentrys’ housekeeper, enter the courtroom. Sarah stood beside her, grinning broadly.

“Hi, Mommy! Hi, Daddy! Tessa brought me here so I can go straight home with you!”

Cameron winked at Taffeta. “Her things are packed and in the trunk of our car. We thought it would be easier on you to take her home from here.”

Taffeta reached over the seat to squeeze Cameron’s hand. “You’re the best, Dad.”

Cameron blushed but smiled. “Music to my ears. I’ve lost a son, but apparently I’ve gained a daughter.”

Barney pushed erect and met Taffeta’s gaze. “I’ll go out with Tessa to get all Sarah’s stuff into my
truck. Until I get back, you can chat with Cameron and Grace.”

“Can I go help?” Sarah asked.

“Sure.” Barney exited the row and took hold of Sarah’s small hand. “You have to stand on the sidewalk while I carry stuff, though. No running out into the street.”

Smiling, Taffeta drew her gaze back to Cameron and Grace. “I grew up in foster homes. I’ve never clapped eyes on my mother or my father. I know that both of you have endured a great deal of pain over Phillip’s behavior, and I’ll understand if you’re not quite ready for this, but I’d love to be granted permission to call you Mom and Dad. I’d also like to think of you as my parents. As Sarah and our other children grow up, that will make things more normal for all of them. They’ll have grandparents on Barney’s side and grandparents on my side.” Taffeta paused, trying to read their expressions. “That doesn’t mean that Barney or I will expect you to treat our other kids as if they’re your actual grandchildren. He and I talked about it, and we’ll explain to our younger kids that Sarah is your real granddaughter, and they’re only grandchildren by marriage.”

Grace closed her eyes, and tears streamed down her cheeks. Cameron looked as if he was about to pucker up and cry, too. “Sweetheart, the instant Phillip brought you home, you became the daughter Grace and I were never able to have. We’re so sorry now that we turned our backs on you during your trial, or that we ever believed, even for a short time,
that you had harmed Sarah.” He swallowed, making his larynx bob. “We didn’t expect your forgiveness. And we certainly never expected you to still love us. Having you as our daughter now—well, we’d both be honored. Right, Grace?”

Grace lifted her tear-soaked lashes. “Absolutely right. But I have to correct you on one point, Taffeta. Cameron and I would never dream of treating your other children differently than we do Sarah! No matter how many kids you have, we’ll never take her somewhere and leave them behind.
Never
. We’ll love them all and feel privileged to have the chance!”

“We wanted a half dozen kids,” Cameron said. “But after Grace had Phillip, she couldn’t conceive again. We considered adoption, but—” He sighed and lifted his hands. “Phillip was a handful, even when he was little. Difficult beyond belief. We decided it wouldn’t be fair to bring other children into the mix.”

Taffeta wanted to lean over the back of the bench to hug both of them, but her belly was too large. “I love you guys, and I think all my children are going to be very lucky to have you in their lives. You need to come for the Fourth of July. Barney’s family does it up big. And you absolutely
can’t
miss Christmas! Sarah will love having you there, and little Barney will love it, too. He’ll be old enough to interact with you a little by then. There is nothing sweeter than a baby’s smile.”

Grace drew her eyebrows together in a frown. “You aren’t
really
going to name that baby
Barnabas, are you? What if he grows up and goes into local law enforcement like his father?”

Taffeta laughed. “If I named this child Barnabas, my husband would never forgive me. They do have a biblical theme for names in his family, though. Maybe I’ll name this little guy Moses.”

Caught off guard, Cameron snorted with laughter. Grace only smiled. “I sincerely hope you’re joking. Whether you’re my daughter or not, I’ll help Barney torture you if you name my grandson Moses.”

Taffeta feigned surprise. “You don’t
like
that name? I think it’s absolutely grand.” Then she relented. “It may be the wrong century for it, though. That said, old-fashioned names are in right now, and I think Moses is pretty cute.”

Just then Barney and Sarah returned. “I’ve got all her stuff loaded into the truck. We need to make tracks for home and get your legs elevated for a while before the party. Your ankles are twice their normal size.”

Taffeta struggled to her feet, made her way to the center aisle, and met Grace and Cameron there for farewell hugs. Sarah gently embraced her grandmother, careful not to hurt her, but she latched onto Cameron’s neck and refused to let go for a few seconds.

“We’ll see you again very soon,” Cameron assured the little girl. “And we’ll see you on video calls often. Those are always fun.”

Sarah finally let go of her grandfather. “I’ll show you our new puppy. Now that I’m going to live with
Mommy, my new daddy says we’re going to the Mystic Creek No-Kill Shelter to pick out a dog. He’ll be little at first, but someday he’ll be great big with long hair.”

Moments later, Taffeta and Barney left the courthouse, each of them holding Sarah’s hand. April had gifted them with sunshine instead of showers, and to Taffeta, it was like stepping outside into a shimmer of gold as they walked down the steps.