“I believe there’s great potential here, too,” Will concurred. “Problem is, I can’t do it alone.”
“You need an assistant.”
“Yes,” he agreed, “but I was foolish enough to fire the best one I’m likely to find.”
Miranda felt sure she hadn’t heard him correctly. “Are you saying you want me to come back?”
“You’re cantankerous, insubordinate and a lot of other things I could mention, but two days without you and I was ready to pull my hair out. Pride is a fine thing, but it only carries you so far—and I’ve reached my limit. I want you back. Would you be willing to let bygones be bygones and start over?”
“I think I could do that,” she said, struggling to hide her delight. The knot in her stomach unraveled and the tension eased from her shoulders. “We can talk.”
“That sounds like a good idea.” Will smiled.
And Miranda smiled back.
Ten
Sitting at her parents’ kitchen counter, Gloria Ashton watched her mother move briskly around, assembling a variety of bowls and wooden spoons. Gloria wasn’t sure what Corrie was making but it seemed to demand a lot of attention. The cookbook was propped open and a dozen ingredients were lined up on the counter.
Roy was in the living room reading the local paper and that, too, appeared to be completely captivating.
“Would you like more milk?” Corrie asked, nodding at Gloria’s half-empty glass.
“No, thanks.”
Gloria had first noticed the tension between Roy and Corrie a couple of weeks ago and tried to ignore it. She figured they’d resolve the problem, whatever it was, without interference from her or anyone else. But that didn’t seem to be the case.
“Is everything okay between you and Roy?” she finally asked. She’d decided just coming right out with it was better than pretending this uneasiness didn’t exist.
Roy rattled his paper and Corrie dropped an egg on the counter, breaking the shell. She tore off a paper towel and used it to shove the raw egg and broken shell directly into the kitchen sink. She turned on the water, ran the garbage disposal, then washed her hands, drying them on her apron.
“What was that, dear?” she asked as if she hadn’t heard the question.
“I asked if everything’s all right between you and Roy,” Gloria repeated.
Corrie stood on the other side of the counter, looking into the living room, where Roy sat with the newspaper hiding his face. “That’s something you need to ask your father,” she said in a starched voice.
Roy lowered the paper, stared into the kitchen, then resumed reading. He’d been at it a solid hour. Gloria assumed he’d read it from front to back twice over by now. The Tuesday editions were often the skimpiest of the week.
“Roy doesn’t seem to be in the mood to talk,” Gloria said. The fact that she’d only recently come into their lives had left her with an incomplete picture of Roy and Corrie’s relationship. She wasn’t sure how they handled disagreements. Her adoptive parents had been both verbal and demonstrative, arguing often and loudly. Roy seemed restrained, which might come from his training as a cop, while Corrie was the more voluble. This was the first serious argument she’d encountered; its duration surprised her.
“I saw Mack a few days ago,” Gloria said, making conversation. She hoped to put her mother at ease. If Corrie relaxed, perhaps she’d let down her guard and Gloria could get to the bottom of this.
“You did?”
“Yeah. He dropped off a baby name book and another couple of books on pregnancy. One of them I hadn’t heard of. Apparently it’s hot off the press.”
“Mack brought you books?” Corrie asked, then answered her own question. “Oh, they must be from Mary Jo.”
Gloria didn’t think so. “These looked brand-new. The spines hadn’t even been cracked.”
“Have you read them?”
“I’ve finished with the pregnancy books. Did you know the baby’s heart is already beating? Incredible, isn’t it?”
“Incredible is right.”
“Any news from Linnette?” Gloria knew her sister was overdue by a few days.
“She’s ready to have this baby anytime. My suitcase is packed. As soon as we hear from Pete, I’m heading to the airport.”
That explained why Corrie was cooking up a storm. She’d be joining her daughter and helping with her grandchild. She probably intended to freeze most of the meals she was preparing.
“Will you…” Gloria wasn’t sure she could find the courage to ask.
“Will I what?”
“Help me?”
“Gloria, of course I will!” Corrie said.
“I…I haven’t made any final decisions yet,” Gloria was quick to add. “I still might give the baby up for adoption. I was adopted into a loving home and I’d want my baby to know the same love I received from my adoptive parents.”
“Of course you would.”
Roy dropped the paper and let it rest on his lap. “The laws have changed since you were adopted, Gloria. These days the father has legal rights.”
It embarrassed Gloria to think about Chad. She’d rather keep him out of the picture, although that was neither practical nor ethical. Sooner or later she’d have to contact him….
Her father continued to look at her as if anticipating some response. “I don’t need to put the father’s name on the birth certificate,” she eventually said.
“Don’t you?” He arched both brows with the question.
“I could say the paternity’s unknown.”
“Yes, but is that fair to the father or your child? What if the baby has a medical issue at some point in his or her life and needs that information? Not only would you have cheated the father but also the baby. It’s something to think about.”
“Yes, it is,” Gloria murmured. And she had thought about it. In fact, she’d thought about little else.
Roy’s gaze locked with Corrie’s.
Corrie whirled around and yanked open the refrigerator door. “You had to bring that up, didn’t you? It wasn’t enough that you went behind my back but you—” She stopped abruptly.
Roy vaulted out of his chair with a speed that shocked Gloria.
“I’d like to remind you that I didn’t go behind your back. You, on the other hand,” he began, then floundered for words and finished with, “did.”
Gloria stared openmouthed at the two of them. “What in the world are you talking about?”
“Nothing.” Roy sat back in his recliner and snatched up the paper. It crackled as he jerked it open to the page he was supposedly reading.
“Not a thing,” Corrie told her, resuming her cooking.
Gloria noticed that her mother’s hands trembled and she had to pause, drawing in a deep breath.
“Maybe I should go,” Gloria said, fearing she was about to get caught in the undertow of whatever was wrong between them. Their disagreement was obviously something neither Roy nor Corrie wanted to discuss in front of her.
“Don’t, please,” Corrie said, and to Gloria’s astonishment, her mother’s eyes were bright with unshed tears.
Sliding off the stool, she walked around the counter and hugged her. Corrie felt small and fragile in her arms.
“Your father’s never forgiven me for not telling him about you until we were almost married. Unfortunately, it’s still a…a problem between us, even after all these years.”
“And I refuse to let history repeat itself,” Roy said. He tossed the paper aside and returned to the kitchen. “Have you told Chad about the baby?”
Gloria bristled. “No, and I don’t intend to…at least, not yet.” She felt that when she did tell him, she should know her own intentions. Adoption remained a viable option.
“Even after everything I’ve said.”
Gloria didn’t respond. She didn’t feel she had to make any decisions right that minute.
“I think you should tell our daughter what you did,” Corrie said angrily.
r /> “Fine, I will.”
“Tell me what?” Gloria asked, looking from Roy to Corrie and back again.
“Sweetheart,” Corrie said, reaching for Gloria’s hands. “Chad knows about the baby.”
The words went through Gloria with the force of a blow torch.
Gloria jerked her hands free of her mother’s. “Who told him?” Although she asked the question, she already knew the answer.
“I did.” Roy stepped forward and confronted her face-to-face. “You can hate me if you want, but I wasn’t going to let what happened to me happen to another man, especially if that man’s the father of my grandchild.”
Gloria felt the sudden need to sit down.
“Furthermore…”
“What else is there?” She wondered what other betrayal he was about to hit her with.
“Those books you’re reading didn’t come from Mack or Mary Jo.”
“Chad?”
“Yes,” Roy admitted.
“He gave them to you?”
“He asked me to deliver them, but Mack offered and Chad decided that might be best.”
She drew in a deep breath. “In other words, he didn’t want to give them to me himself.”
“Can you blame him?” Roy asked, none too gently. “You’ve hidden this from him for months. What did you expect?”
“Does he know the doctor wants to do an ultrasound?”
“Yes, Mack mentioned it.”
So Chad knew she was pregnant. She’d wanted to tell him, felt he had a right to know—and then she’d learned he was involved with someone else. The situation was complicated enough without adding another person. She’d concluded that it was better to wait until her own plans were clear. Only when she’d made a decision about the baby would she contact him. Telling him now seemed premature.
Her father disagreed with her, and he felt strongly enough to go behind her back.
“Gloria,” Corrie whispered. “I’m so sorry. I did everything I could to talk your father out of this.”
Gloria looked at Roy, who stared belligerently back at her.
“What…what did Chad say? When you told him, I mean.” She could barely get the question out.
“At first he was surprised.”
“And later?”
“Angry.” Roy didn’t try to soften the word. “Who wouldn’t be? He has a right to know he’s going to be a father.”
“Is…is he still seeing…her?” If Gloria had known the other woman’s name she’d forgotten it. As it was, she tried not to think about Chad at all, let alone Chad with that lovely blonde.
“You’ll have to ask him,” Roy said shortly.
The phone rang and for a moment everyone ignored it. Corrie was the first to move. She reached for the receiver while Gloria and Roy looked at each other with no sense of resolution between them.
“A boy…it’s a boy!” Corrie cried.
Roy tore his gaze away from Gloria and went to Corrie’s side. He placed his hands on her shoulders while she spoke excitedly into the receiver. “Yes, yes. I’ll phone you as soon as I’ve got the flight numbers and times.” Tears welled in her eyes. “Yes, yes, give Linnette my love and tell her how thrilled Roy and I are.”
She hung up, then threw her arms around Roy. “We have a grandson,” she said in a quavering voice. “Linnette had a boy. They’ve named him Gregory Paul.”
“Gregory Paul,” Roy repeated, nodding approvingly. “That’s a nice, solid name.”
“How’s Linnette?” Gloria asked.
“Fabulous. Pete said she was a real trouper. Gregory weighed over eight pounds and is almost twenty inches long.”
“He’s a big boy,” Roy said, smiling proudly. “Corrie, we have our first grandson.” His eyes shone with pleasure and they hugged each other tightly.
“That makes me an aunt for the second time,” Gloria whispered.
“Oh, my goodness, I’ve got to get on the internet and book my flight.” Corrie raced out of the kitchen.
“I’ll call Mack and Mary Jo and tell them,” Roy said, heading off in another direction.
“I can help,” Gloria offered. She glanced around the kitchen and got to work finishing the casserole Corrie had started. She was about to place it in the freezer when Roy came back.
“Corrie’s looking through her suitcase one final time.”
“She’s arranged her flight then?”
He nodded. “Before we end here, I wanted to be sure everything’s square between you and me.”
Gloria considered the question. “It’s square.”
“Good.”
That was all he said. Then Roy was back to his paper, looking more at peace than she’d seen him in a long while.
Gloria left about an hour later. She stopped at the grocery store on her way home; as she climbed out of her car she began to cry, standing there in the darkened lot, sobbing.
Gloria wasn’t easily given to tears. If anything, she kept her emotions hidden and rarely if ever revealed them to others.
The tears were an obvious reaction to the birth of her sister’s son, and to seeing how happy and excited Corrie and Roy were. That had to be it.
Only it was much more. Instinctively Gloria recognized that this went beyond the joy she felt for her sister.
This had to do with Chad.
Eleven
Thursday evening, feeling depressed, Bruce walked into the house and found Jolene working cheerfully in the kitchen.
“I’m making tacos for dinner,” she announced. “They’re your favorite, right?”
He tossed the mail on the kitchen counter and realized she was waiting for him to comment. “Sure,” he said without enthusiasm. His mind wasn’t on dinner but on what he’d just learned. He needed time to absorb this latest news about Rachel before he could deal with his daughter’s chatter. Until recently, he’d never noticed how much attention Jolene required.
“You’re late,” she said as she shredded cheese with unnecessary vigor. “I bet you went to the salon to talk to Rachel.” She paused and then added, “Again.”
He ignored the question in her voice, but that was exactly what he’d done.
“So how is Rachel?” Jolene asked.
Bruce doubted his daughter cared. He shrugged in response. Removing his jacket, he hung it in the closet and started down the hall.
“Dinner will be ready in ten minutes,” Jolene called after him.
“Okay.”
Bruce washed his hands and by the time he returned to the kitchen, Jolene had set the table and placed the serving dishes in the center.
Bruce pulled out a chair and sat down.
“Aren’t you going to say anything?” Jolene asked as if his silence had offended her. Her voice had a singsong quality that reminded him of when she was much younger.
“About what?”
“Dinner! I worked really hard on this and the least you could do is tell me I did a good job.”
Bruce looked at the table; it was obvious that she’d put some effort into this meal. “It’s very nice, Jolene. Thank you.”
Apparently pacified, she pulled out her own chair and sat down. Reaching for the platter of crisp taco shells, she took one and then passed it to him. “I had a good day at school.”
He smiled.
“How was work?”
“Okay.”
“Lindsey and I are going to a movie on Friday night. That’s okay, isn’t it?”
“Sure.”
“Can you pick us up when it’s over?”
He certainly didn’t have any plans for the evening. Not without Rachel. “Okay.”
“Great,” she said, all sunny and happy. “I’ll let Lindsey know. You met her mom, remember?”
“I’m afraid I don’t.”
“Yes, you do,” Jolene argued. “She was at the school picnic last year when—” She paused. “Maybe you didn’t,” she muttered, and paid an inordinate amount of attention to the taco she was busily assembling.
“Rachel went to the school picnic,” Bruce told her. He recalled how upset his wife had been afterward. Rachel hadn’t said much at the time, but Bruce could tell how miserable she’d felt. Jolene had acted in a rude and insulting manner, and while Rachel had downplayed his daughter’s behavior, she’d asked not to attend any more school functions without him. Bruce had agreed.
Every day, it seemed, he was reminded of how badly he’d failed both his wife and his daughter. The situation would never have gotten to this point if he’d realized how bad things were for Rachel and had stepped in earlier.
Father and daughter ate in silence. Bruce made an effort to eat, although he had no appetite. He did manage to force down one taco, but that wasn’t enough to satisfy his daughter.
“Have another, Dad,” she insisted, handing him the platter of taco shells.
“No, thanks, sweetie,” he said, pushing his plate aside. The lettuce had fallen out and spilled salsa ran across the white plate.
“What’s wrong with you?” Jolene snapped. “I made your favorite dinner and I tried to have a conversation with you, but you’re ignoring me and it isn’t fair.” Her voice shook slightly and her lower lip protruded.
Bruce rubbed his face with one hand. Now he had both Rachel and Jolene upset with him. It seemed nothing he did was right anymore. If only he knew how to set everything straight… .
“I’m sorry, Jolene,” he whispered. “I’m pretty depressed at the moment. I went to see Rachel and—”
Jolene leaped on the news, not allowing him to finish. “She’s being a witch, isn’t she? I bet she wouldn’t even talk to you.”
“No, that’s not—”
“Jane got mad at her the last time you were there, remember?”
What Bruce remembered was the scene Jolene had caused and how it had brought Jane out of the salon to chastise them all. Afterward he’d been asked not to return. He’d honestly tried to abide by the owner’s wishes, but he needed to talk to Rachel, to see her.
“Rachel no longer works at the salon,” Bruce said.
His announcement was followed by a stunned silence. “Rachel quit?”
“Apparently,” Bruce said, hardly able to fathom it. Rachel had worked at the salon for ten years. It was a second home; her clients were her friends, and the other staff members were like family.