Close Match

by Jerald, Tracey

  I pull back just enough, and our eyes connect like magnets; a compelling mystery arcs between us. Even beyond the half-truths, it’s like he can see me. The real me—the Linnie that only a handful of people get to know. In my fright, I step back. I can’t find words, so I nod. He lingers a moment before stepping back to let Ev move in.

  “Should we exchange numbers?” he asks with some hesitation.

  Well, laughing is one way to regain whatever breath I seemed to have given to Montague Parrish. “I guess that would help.” I grin. Quickly, Ev and I exchange contact information.

  “I’ll text you when they call me back,” he promises.

  “Don’t be surprised if I’m already there,” I warn him. “It’s rare I get time to just putter in stores.”

  He lifts a hand cautiously and cups my cheek. I still. “I won’t be. Do you need a ride? We can drop you off along the way,” he offers.

  I shake my head. “I have transportation, but thank you.”

  His hand drops. “Of course. I’ll see you at lunch, then.” He turns and reaches for Char’s hand. The three of them start to walk into the Hamilton.

  I can’t leave it like this. “Ev?” I call out.

  He stops and turns. “Yes?”

  I take the few steps that span us and give him a gentle hug. “Thank you for asking me to come down. I know this wasn’t easy for you.”

  He drops Char’s hand to wrap his arms around me. We stand there for a moment in silence. “Linnie, if you knew what this moment means to me, you’d understand that I’m so overwhelmed I don’t know what to do.”

  “Then why don’t we take it one day at a time. See where this goes,” I suggest.

  “That sounds good. How about letting your father escort you back to your hotel? It’s a long walk and all.” He has this adorable, quirky sense of humor that just dives in and grabs my heart in the sweetest way.

  “I’d be honored.” He holds out his arm, and I let my father escort me into the lobby of the Hamilton before we finally part for the night.

  Twenty-Three

  Montague

  September

  “Well, I have good news for you, Ev. It appears you’ve slipped back into a chronic state.” Dr. Spellman’s voice arrogant voice holds a tinge of relief. “It gives us more time to find you a donor.”

  I’m about to speak up to let him know about Linnie when Ev shakes his head sharply at me. Frowning, I sit back in my chair and listen to Spellman. “I’d like you to keep taking the Imatinib, but let’s change the dosage back down to 400mg now that your bloodwork is showing an improvement.” Making some notes in Ev’s online computer record, he turns to ask, “How are you for pills?”

  Ev replies, “I have enough to last about another three weeks on the adjusted dose.”

  “I’ll order you some more.”

  I’m seething as I wait for Ev to wrap up his appointment. It’s a good thing my mother’s in the middle of a financial meeting. Otherwise, my fingers would be flying asking her what the fuck Ev’s doing?

  Soon, Spellman leaves, and I turn on my stepfather like he’s a hunk of juicy meat to a hungry lion. “Not here, Monty. Let’s go grab some food, and I’ll explain.”

  “You up to driving after, old man? Because I want a drink,” I snap.

  Sighing, he bends enough to tell me, “Yeah. You might need one.”

  Crap. Doing a quick mental inventory of the restaurants between here and Middleburg, I settle on Ford’s Fish Shack. I have a feeling a good dark and stormy plus a lobster roll might suit what Ev’s about to tell me. When I mention one of our favorite haunts, his face lights up. “Your mother hates the spice on their calamari,” he muses.

  “I know. Let’s go get some food, and you can tell me why you stopped me from telling Spellman about Linnie.” The look that crosses his face does nothing to encourage my appetite.

  For food.

  “Yeah. Let’s get settled. I’ll text Char the good news for when she’s done with her call and let her know we’ll be home in a while,” he agrees.

  I don’t let him see the way his capitulation affects me. We make our way down the halls after we stop to check out. Soon, we’re flying down US-50. I’m keeping an eye out for cops as there’s little traffic at this time of day and I can open up the car a little bit, a rarity around here.

  Besides, I want to get to Ford’s so I can find out what the hell is going through Ev’s head.

  * * *

  “What the hell do you mean you don’t plan on telling Linnie you’re sick?” I demand. A copper mug is set down next to me. Snatching it up with a muttered “Thanks,” I take a giant slug of the rum-and-ginger brew combination. Before the waitress can leave after putting Ev’s iced tea down, I stop her. “You might want to put in an order for another one of these.”

  Ev raises an eyebrow but even if he’s concerned, he doesn’t say anything. He knows the bomb he just dropped on me has rattled me to the core. We spent months trying to find someone who might be a match for him. Finally, we found someone—his daughter for Christ’s sake—and now he’s balking at the last fence. “Why? Can you tell me that at least?”

  Ev runs his finger in the water ring left by the glass on the wood table. “I don’t know if you’ll understand.”

  I lift my drink to my lips again, but before I take another large swallow, I bite out, “Try me.”

  He sighs. “Monty, you’ve known me for almost thirty years. You know the kind of person I am. Linnie’s met me twice? And the lunch we had alone wasn’t exactly easy on either of us.”

  Silently, I give him that. After his doctor’s appointment in August, Ev had lunch with Linnie in Tyson’s Corner. It was, per his description, awkward. “Linnie’s lost since the death of her mother. Her whole world’s been shaken,” Ev begins.

  And mine hasn’t? The thought flashes through my mind, bitterly. Finding out someone you love and respect may have less time than you anticipate is an insidious feeling that grabs you by the throat when you least expect it. I’m just about to speak when our calamari and my second drink arrive at the table. I tip my head back to drink as much of the first as I can before the ice starts to angle itself toward my face dangerously. “Here you go.” I hand the waitress my glass. Ignoring the flash of surprise on her face, I reach for one of the small plates. “So, you’re going to lie to your daughter instead?’

  Ev flinches at my words. “I wouldn’t call it that…”

  I interrupt him. “Of course you wouldn’t.”

  He gives me a narrow-eyed glare. “But until I get to know Linnie a little bit better, I feel like she needs to get to know me and not the me who’s ill.” He pops a piece of calamari into his mouth, chewing silently, something I’ve always appreciated since the sound of people eating drives me up a wall. I do the same.

  “I’m just going on record as I think you’re not giving her enough credit,” I state firmly before I pop my bite into my mouth.

  Ev swallows before dabbing his lips with his napkin. “So noted.” Reaching across the table, he places a firm hand on mine. “Monty, I get you’re pissed, but understand it’s my decision. I have time, and I’ve been given a huge gift. Maybe one day you’ll realize the importance of this, but I don’t want that woman to look back and think any part of her time with me was a mistake.”

  I open my mouth and immediately close it because I can see where he’d feel that way. This isn’t a stranger the system matched him with that he can coolly negotiate a deal with; this is a life that he helped to create. And despite not knowing it before fate and circumstance forced the issue, he’s already beginning to feel something deep inside for her.

  “It’s your decision, Ev,” I concede. “But soon, you’re going to have to answer her questions that you’re avoiding. All the questions about the medical health on your side of the family. It is why she reached out after all.”

  “I know.” His eyes remain steady on mine. “I just want some time.”

  I shore up on th
e inside, adding the weight of this additional burden to the others I carry. I don’t think it’s the right decision, but as Ev’s already declared, it’s not mine to make. “Then let’s toast to the fact you’re back in a chronic state.” Lifting my glass, I paste a smile on my face and clink my glass against his.

  A broad smile spreads across Ev’s face, causing a dimple to appear. Absently, I note it’s a dimple he shares with his daughter. I don’t point it out because this is the kind of discovery he should realize for himself.

  Over time.

  Time that he now has to get to know her.

  Twenty-Four

  Evangeline

  “You’re heading down to DC again?” Bristol flops back on my bed as I pack my weekender again.

  My shoulders droop slightly. “Yes. I have the next few days off, so I’m going to meet Ev in Alexandria. I figure this way we can do a few touristy things.” I don’t add on And we have something to talk about, but I don’t need to. Bristol knows my lunch with my biological father was pretty much an unmitigated disaster.

  With his family around to help ease the conversation burden, Everett Parrish is warm, if a little bit quiet. Without them, he’s nervous, anxious, and it was left up to me to find topics of conversation to cover our lunch together at Coastal Oaks. It was a good thing they had these fantastic little rolls that tasted more like donuts that I could stuff in my mouth otherwise I’m pretty confident I’d have run out of topics by the time our meal was over.

  But by the time I got back to New York, there was another warm email from him. I realized quickly, Ev’s just an introvert. With a little snort, it makes me wonder if he’d had a few to drink when he approached my mother all those years ago because I can’t imagine the man he is now would have caught the eye of Brielle Brogan. It isn’t that my father isn’t attractive, even now in his early sixties. He’s sporting the Richard Gere style about him. But if he couldn’t deal with my mother’s known outrageousness, I’m surprised they ever made it into bed to, well, create me.

  “What’s that laugh for?” Bristol rubs her hands over a slightly protruding stomach. Distracted, I sit, laying my hand on top of hers.

  “Next week we get to see another picture,” I murmur. Our fingers tangle on top of her little son or daughter resting inside.

  “I know. I hope he or she cooperates when it’s time so I can make plans.”

  I roll my eyes at that. “You know there’s a chance they could get the sex wrong,” I remind her.

  “If the baby is as…blessed… as Simon is, there’s no chance of that.”

  Immediately, I start making vomiting noises over the side of the bed. Bristol starts laughing before she says anxiously, “You promise no matter what you’ll be back for that, right?”

  “I swear to you, Bris, I’ll be here for every moment of your pregnancy you want me to be,” I vow.

  Calmer, she relaxes back against my pillows. “So, what’s in Alexandria? I’ve been to DC, but I’ve never been there.”

  “Honestly, when Ev suggested it, I had to look it up myself,” I admit. We both start giggling. “It’s on the waterfront, has a ton of shopping and restaurants, but looks like something out of the Revolutionary and Civil Wars.”

  Thoughtful, Bristol says, “I wonder if Simon would like it for a quick babymoon.”

  “What the hell is a babymoon?” I demand.

  “Oh, it’s a last-minute trip you take before the bundle of joy arrives.”

  “Sounds like an opportunity for the father to get some before his wife starts ignoring him,” I laugh.

  “It’s that too,” she agrees.

  We’re a mess of laughter and tears when the door to my penthouse opens and Simon calls out, “Do you know what a pain in the ass it is to walk through Fifth Avenue traffic holding three milkshakes as well as a sack of burgers?”

  Bristol, never one to put up with any crap, yells back, “Then you shouldn’t have got yourself one!”

  There’s silence from the other room. Simon has no comeback for that. He should have known better than to open his mouth against his smart-ass pregnant wife.

  I hold out my fist for Bristol to bump it. She does, before asking, “How many days are you staying?”

  “I agreed to three, but I have the option to fly back early since I’m chartering a jet,” I explain.

  She nods. “Then I’d leave about half of what you intend to pack home. Knowing you, you’re likely to find a store you love and buy it out.”

  Thoughtfully, I look at the outfits I’d planned on bringing. “Makes sense.” I begin to put hangers back into my massive walk-in closet. “But I’m taking all the shoes.”

  “Of course. You don’t want to be walking around in new shoes and get a blister,” she calls out, voice horrified.

  When I step back into my bedroom, the tension is gone from her face. “I’m just worried about you, Linnie. It’s wonderful you found your father, but I still feel like we know next to nothing about him. Maybe it’s the baby hormones, but I’m just concerned. You’re you. That makes you a target.”

  Sitting down next to her, I lean my dark head next to her blonde one. “I know. This weekend I will find out more to help ease your mind.”

  And my own. As much as I hate to admit it to Bristol, I relish the days off where I don’t have to act. Right now, when I spend time with my father, I’m not getting that break to be me, Linnie Brogan. I’m playing a role, so I hope I don’t trip up and tell him who I really am.

  * * *

  Old Town Alexandria is quite possibly one of the loveliest places I’ve ever been to. With its cobblestone streets and historic waterfront, it’s almost mind-boggling to think this little gem is only ten miles from the insanity of the nation’s capital. I mean, there’s even an adorable red trolley car that zips up and down King Street.

  Bristol was spot-on when she told me to leave half of my clothes at home. What we failed to take into account was I’d find a multitude of stores I’d buy out—much to Ev’s amusement—and I’d have to buy luggage to get all of my finds home with me. “Obviously, the communications business pays well,” he says when I come strolling out of Sara Campbell’s boutique with a garment bag over my shoulder.

  Blushing, I try to stammer out a reply, but all Ev does is lift the bag from me and say, “How about a bite to eat? You shop like Char does.”

  “How’s that?” I ask, truly curious.

  “Like all the stores are going to go out of business,” he says dryly.

  I laugh, heartily.

  We end up at Sonoma Cellar, a wine and tasting bistro. I order sparkling water, and Ev orders an iced tea. We decide to split the West Coast Cheese Plate to start. I begin fiddling with my utensils before I blurt out, “You don’t drink either?”

  Ev levels a solemn look on me. “No, I take some medication that alcohol interferes with, Linnie. I haven’t had a drink in several years.”

  My filter must have been left in New York because my inner thoughts just come flying out. “I saw you and Char and it makes complete sense. You two are like two halves of a whole.” His face softens. “But trying to picture you with Mom is an impossibility to me.”

  There’s a long pause between us. Suddenly, Ev begins to make a choking sound. “Ev?” Shit, did I just kill my biological father? “Damn, do you have any allergies? Do I need to call for help?” I’m practically hysterical.

  His choking erupts into a deep laugh that has him waving his hand in front of his face. “So, you thought your mother and I must have been drunk to have conceived you? That we were so different?”

  “The thought did cross my mind,” I admit. “Unfortunately, with Mom, it wouldn’t have been all that far-fetched back then.” That sobers him up as nothing else would.

  “What do you mean?” I don’t respond right away as the waitress arrives with our cheese board. My eyes widen at the size of it.

  “Um, Ev? Do our rooms have refrigerators?”

  Picking up a slice of toasted b
read, he slathers a creamy brie on it. “Dive in. And tell me what you meant about your mother.”

  Telling myself I’ll run an extra few miles on the treadmill tomorrow to make up for this, I do.

  By the end of it, Ev’s face is pale. To say he’s shaken when he realizes the woman he thought was a flamboyant bohemian was quite simply a very functioning alcoholic is an understatement.

  He’s rocked to his core to realize that for years a fond memory has been nothing more than an image, an act.

  And I’m the result of it.

  Twenty-Five

  Evangeline

  A few days later, I’m due to fly back home and more at ease with my father than I was before the trip started. Ev’s admitted a few of his own truths along the way. He’s not just some nobody; he’s a retired software mogul. He was thrown I didn’t recognize his name when Char first used it.

  “To be honest, Linnie, I kept thinking I’d get an email from you accusing me of lying to you,” he admitted last night at dinner. This was right before he invited me to come to stay at his farm in nearby Middleburg for as long as I want to get to know him and Char better.

  I told him then, I’d need to think about it, but all it took was a FaceTime to Bristol. She practically fell off her bed when I told her the truth. “He’s that Everett Parrish? Holy hell, Linnie, we handle some of his accounts.” Her voice was faint. “The man is worth millions—like maybe closer to billions.”

  “So, I take it that your concerns…”

  “Are completely eradicated. The man is responsible for some of the breakthroughs of the early days of the internet. He was doing the same thing we were with your identity.” Even over the Wi-Fi connection, I can see how stunned Bristol is.