The Bachelor's Sweetheart (6 page)

“And spend the other four days working on the details of the renovations, that is, until we begin the actual renovations. Then you'll be spending the other four days working on the renovations. Claire and I did you a favor making your decision for you.”

“You didn't make my decision. I was going to say yes anyway after I realized how much it means to Claire.” A two-second study of Josh's face showed none of the disappointment or jealousy she'd obviously imagined a few minutes ago. He had his brothers and guy friends and girl friends. He wouldn't care if she hung out with Claire and Nick.

He caught her lingering gaze and the corner of his mouth turned up. “Great.”

Her heart shrank. Now he had her wondering if she'd been trying too hard, smothering him in friendship. She'd done it before.

“Now,” he said, “I need a favor in return.” He nudged a box by the door with the toe of his work boot. “I trust your judgment.”

“Thanks. Now, your judgment sometimes...” She couldn't help teasing. His expression had turned so serious, so un-Josh-like, that it unsettled her more. She needed to restore her equilibrium.

“Hey,” he said.

“I'm kidding. What's up? A job opening?” She bit her lip and reached deep inside herself for the happiness she should feel for Josh if a work opportunity he wanted was in reach.

“No, it's about my father.”

Her gut twisted. She wasn't getting involved with him and his father.

“Jared and Connor are hounding me about going with them to see him.”

Her heart leaped with hope. Josh's voice held far less anger than last week.

“You really think I should go hear him out?”

All the hope seeped out. Josh needed to make this decision himself. It was far bigger than her agreeing to a blind date. He shouldn't depend on her to tell him what to do, no matter how strongly she felt he should meet with his father. Tessa clenched her hands, digging her fingernails into her palms. Her opinion was biased and selfish, and nothing good could come of sharing it with Josh. But she shared it anyway.

“Yes, I think you should hear your father out.”

Chapter Five

J
osh rammed his truck into second gear and tore onto the highway. Why had he let Tessa talk him into seeing his father? He gunned the gas, skipped from third to fifth gear and flew around the curve toward Ticonderoga to see a flashing sheriff's car with someone pulled over to the right. He tapped the brake to slow down to the fifty-five-mile-an-hour speed limit and adjusted his shades. Who was he kidding? Tessa hadn't talked him into anything. He'd asked her opinion and she'd given it, straight out, as she always did, whether she thought he'd like it or not. He'd made the decision to come, a decision he was regretting more with each mile he drove.

He cruised into Ticonderoga, welcoming the slower speed limit at the village line. The time on the bicentennial clock on Montcalm matched the time on the dashboard clock, six-forty, twenty minutes early for the meeting, with only five minutes' distance to cover. He refused to be the first one there. A coffee shop sign beckoned him, causing his stomach to alternately growl and clench. He hadn't eaten, couldn't face the old man on a full belly, and had downed the last of the hours old office coffee before he'd left work.

His father had done it again. Had him walking on eggshells. His queasiness had nothing to do with the stale coffee. Dear old Dad had reduced him to his teenage self, guts churning as his friend Marc Delacroix, Claire's twin, approached the house to drop him off after school. Never knowing what he'd find when he went in. Hoping he could clean up any mess before the school bus got there with Connor.

Josh jerked the truck into the motel lot and parked, looking around for Jared's truck or bike and Connor's car. When he didn't see either, he reached for his phone. He could use a pep talk from Tessa. The time glared at him. Six forty-eight. Tessa would be at the Majestic ready to start the movie. He didn't need Tessa. He didn't need anyone. Old instincts took over. He got out of the truck and strode across the parking lot, swinging open the lobby doors and glancing around for the elevator or stairs.

“Welcome to the Super 8,” the middle-aged woman behind the counter said. “Do you have a reservation?”

“No, I'm here to meet my fa—someone. Room 25.” Why had he given the room number?
Easy
. To waste time. He rubbed the sweat from his neck at his hairline.
What a wuss
.

“Mr. Donnelly. He was just here talking to me on his way back from supper. What a charmer.” She smiled and shook her head.

Dad certainly was, especially when he had a few drinks in him.

“Was he...never mind.” He'd find out soon enough if he'd been drinking. Yeah, it was good that he'd gotten here before Connor, although he wouldn't mind having Jared as backup and a possible voice of reason. Jared had mellowed a lot since he'd married Becca and started working with the kids at his motocross school.

“The elevator, stairs?”

“To the left. Wait.”

Josh stopped, nerves twitching. This was where the woman would tell him Dad's condition.

“You're one of his boys. I should have caught the resemblance.”

He sucked the raw taste from his mouth, wanting to disagree. But unfortunately, he and Jared did look like their father.

“Are you the motocross champion, pastor or—”

“No, I'm the other one. You said to the left?”

“Yes. He's so looking forward to seeing you guys.”

That made one of them
. “Thanks, uh, for the help.” Josh crossed the lobby in three long strides and stood out of the woman's sight in the hallway. He alternately pressed his fists together knuckle to knuckle in front of his chest and rolled his shoulders to get rid of the tension before he climbed the stairs to the second floor and his father's room. At the top, he heard the ding of the elevator and waited for the door to open. A couple stepped off and smiled at him as they headed to their room.

Heart thudding, Josh crossed the hall to room 25. He reached up and rapped the door twice, listening to the noises in the room for a drawer closing as his father stashed a bottle, feet shuffling, and holding his breath as he mentally counted the response time. The click of the door opening put him at attention.

“Joshua.”

He bristled. No one but his mother called him Joshua.

“Come in,” his father said in a voice uncomfortably close to his own.

Somehow, Dad seemed smaller than he remembered, although at twenty, Josh had been as tall as he was now. His hair was still thick and dark, except for a little white at the temples. He lacked the typical two days' growth on his square jaw, and the lines on his face were less pronounced.

“Let me take a look at you,” his father said. “It's been a long time, since before you went to Afghanistan.” He raised his hand as if expecting criticism from Josh. “My fault. I know. Have a seat.”

Josh inventoried the room as he weighed whether that was an invitation or a command. Bath and queen-size bed on the door side. Desk, couch—probably a pull-out—and two chairs on the far side near the window.

“I need to hit the latrine first. Coffee ran right through me.” Josh sniffed the air as he walked in front of his father. He didn't smell alcohol. In the bath, he quietly and efficiently inspected the cabinet under the counter—paper and cleaning supplies—and the tub behind the closed shower curtain for bottles. He smelled the glass on the sink back.

“Did I pass inspection?” his father asked when he returned.

Josh sat in one of the chairs and his father took the other one. “I don't care what you do.”

“But you were watching out for Connor. Your mother told me that you used to try to get home from school and run interference for me before Connor got off the school bus. Thanks.”

“I didn't do it for you,” Josh said, shooting for a rise out of his father.

“I know. You did it for your brother. Your mother also told me you've been doing some house flipping. When we were first married, I used to do some of that.”

He cracked his knuckles and got only a grimace from his father. Knuckle cracking had always been enough to set him off. Josh knew he was being juvenile, but he didn't care what the old man used to do or was doing now, for that matter, and he certainly didn't want to be compared to him. More than that, he couldn't take the cool, calm conversation. It fanned the small flame deep inside him that wanted his father to be sober, to have a normal relationship with him.

A sharp rap made them both turn toward the door. His father stood, crossed the room and looked out the peephole. Who would it be besides Jared or Connor? Or had he already hooked up with some of his old drinking buddies?

His dad opened the door. “Jared, Connor.”

Jared offered his hand as he stepped in. “Dad.”

Connor followed with his arms open. “Good to see you.” He hugged him.

Hugged him
. Connor sure was buying the amends, this whole recovering-alcoholic bit, lock, stock and barrel. Or maybe his baby brother had been too young to remember their father as anything but perpetually drunk. Josh and Jared remembered a dad who wasn't. He didn't know about Jared, but that made him even more resentful of what their father had become before he'd left them, what he still was as far as he was concerned.

“Come in, sit down. As you can see, Joshua is already here.”

Jared raised an eyebrow, the action shouting to Josh,
here first? And I wasn't sure you'd even show up
.

“Yeah. We've been talking about old times.” Josh pasted his best facsimile of a smile on his face before his older brother gave him and Dad the critical appraisal Josh expected.

“You guys want a drink?” his father asked.

Josh wasn't the only one who tensed. He hadn't been bold enough to check the small refrigerator by the bath.

His father didn't miss a beat. “Relax,” he said as if he'd made the comment on purpose to get a rise out of them. Or out of him. “I've got ice tea and Cokes.”

“Coke,” Jared and Connor said.

“What kind of tea?” Josh snapped out.

“It's not hard, if that's what you're asking,” his father said.

Josh didn't have to see his brothers' disapproval. The air crackled with it.

“No, I meant sweetened or unsweetened.” Josh pressed his lips tight.

“Sweetened.”

“I'll take tea.”

His father got the drinks and passed them out.

“Thanks,” Josh said, taking the frosty can and feeling his father's gaze on him as he looked at the alarm clock by the bed. He'd thought pulling out his phone to check the time would be too obvious.

“Sorry I got defensive about the drinks. I'm nervous,” his father said.

“We all are,” Jared assured him.

Josh figured challenging his brother's speaking for all of them wasn't in his best interest of getting out of there as quickly as possible.

Their father sat at the opposite end of the couch from Connor and crossed and uncrossed his ankle over his knee while he drummed the arm of the couch. “Like I said to you and Connor on the phone, as part of my program, I'm making amends to people I've hurt, wronged in the past. I saw your mother before I came back here and have been to court to have my death certificate rescinded. As a heads-up, your mother and I are going to divorce.”

“Got someone in the wings?” Josh asked.

His father sank into the couch.

Josh couldn't stop himself. “And as a heads-up to you, you're a little late to make your amends to Hope's mother or her grandmother.”

“I know.” His father studied his hands in his lap.

“Lay off him, Josh,” Connor said. “Let him talk.”

Their father lifted his head. “I don't have anyone waiting in the wings,” he said in a subdued voice. “But apparently your mother does.” His father cleared his throat. “Seems like a good guy. I met him while I was in Pennsylvania. Don't let on that I told you. They're planning to share their news in person.”

“Sorry, Dad,” Connor said.

“Sorry about what?” Josh shot to his feet. “After everything he did to Mom, what do you expect?”

“You always were her champion,” his father said.

“Someone had to be.” He glared at his father and Jared. “You all seem to be on a different wavelength than me. I think it's time I go.”

“Stay until I finish. Please. Everything you've said is right. That's why I'm here. I was a lousy husband and father.”

Josh eased back into his seat and took a slug of his tea, sloughing off the fleeting thought that he might be nearly as dependent on caffeine as the old man was on booze.

“I can't change the past. I can't make up for what you missed and I missed when you were boys, although I thank the Lord for giving me another opportunity with Hope. Jared and I are going to work something out.”

Hope. She's why Jared had talked with their father before tonight.
Josh pressed back into his chair. Jared wasn't totally abandoning their mutual distrust of their father by jumping on the New Jerry Donnelly bandwagon with two feet the way Connor had.

“I'd like to get to know you as men. From what I've heard around town you've grown to be pretty fine ones.”

“Thanks to Mom,” Josh added, in case his father was going to try to take any credit for the hard work it had taken all three of them to earn the respect they had in the community now as adults. Respect that would erode when their father fell off the wagon if he stuck around.

“Yes, all the credit goes to your mother and you guys. I'm not making excuses. I'm not expecting you to welcome me back with open arms, or even like me.”

His father's gaze traveled around the circle, resting a moment longer on him than on Jared and Connor. Josh shifted in the chair.

“You may not be able to believe it, but I've always loved you boys in my own dysfunctional way. I'm trying to make a new sober life for myself, and I'd like you in it. What I'm asking is if we can try to put the past behind us and get to know each other as we are now. Then we can make our personal judgments.”

Josh reached for his empty tea can on the low table between the chairs and the couch to avoid his father looking him in the eyes again.

“Would you like to pray on that?” Connor asked.

“Yes. And for the Lord to be with me tomorrow when I make my amends to Liz Whittan.”

Dad sure was playing his amends thing up big time. Liz was the local schoolteacher he and his friend had smashed into and crippled while driving drunk when Josh was in middle school.

“Dad, you know Sheriff Norton came clean about what really happened that night, that Bert Miller was driving, not you,” Jared said.

“Yeah, he sent your mother a letter. Guess he was making amends, too.”

“You probably could get reparation for the time you spent in jail for vehicular assault. It might help you make your new start,” Jared said.

So Jared was buying their father's new start facade?

“The only one who deserves reparation is Liz, and all I can give her is my sincere apology.”

“But you weren't driving,” Connor said.

“I didn't stop Bert from driving. How about that prayer?” He reached across the couch for Connor's hand and toward the chair for Josh's.

He accepted his father's clammy hand and took Jared's, completing the prayer circle. Sure, he could pray with him and accept that his father was back in Paradox, maybe to stay. He couldn't do anything about where his father chose to live. But he didn't have to believe anything else dear old Dad said. He'd learned too well that believing in his father only set him up for disappointment, or worse.

* * *

Tessa looked up from her e-reader to check on the movie. Neither the movie nor her book, a fast-paced romantic suspense that she'd generally be devouring, held her attention. Showing movies was boring work when you didn't have any company. She checked the time on her phone, wondering if Josh and his brothers were still with their father and whether he'd let her know how it went. She'd been as noncommittal as she could be when he'd texted her this afternoon that he'd decided to go. The situation hit too close to home and weighed heavy on her conscience. Her grandmother wouldn't say anything to him, but what if he found out about her some other way? She stood and tried to stretch out some of the tension that was knotting her muscles. What she needed was a good run, but it would be too dark after the movie finished and she closed up.