by Sara Arden
Gina took pity on him. “No, Amanda Jane. It’s not your turn.”
“But I’ll be good.” Her little voice was full of hope.
“Yes, you’re always very good. So you can stay up very late tonight and then it will be your turn.”
The door clicked shut softly.
“Even if you’re not ready to meet her, she’s ready to meet you. You can meet us at the house tonight. Seven Sisters Road off Highway 5. Only house on the block.”
The part of him that was still a child himself wanted to run. He could just write her a check and he’d never have to face the scorching hope in that child’s face again. That was all she wanted from him, anyway.
For one horrible moment, he wondered what it would be like to have one moment of relief from this pain. Numbing this terror. He knew just what would do that for him, but he pushed it out of his head. He was afraid, but he didn’t want the numbness, not really. He just didn’t want to feel unworthy and he wouldn’t give those feelings validation by making them true, by making himself unworthy.
He wasn’t a boy. He wasn’t a child. He was a man. He’d reached for what he wanted with both hands and he’d gotten it. Now it was his job to protect it.
He nodded. “Thank you, Gina.”
She picked up the pen and with a heavy exhale, she scrawled her name and walked out of the room.
When he picked up the pen, it was still warm from her touch. He signed his name next to hers and with every stroke of ink on the page, he felt more confident about his decision.
Gray, however, wasn’t as sure.
As they walked out he said, “If you were going to let them ream you, why did you bother to call me?”
“I honestly don’t know. But I did the right thing.” He was resolute in that knowledge.
“Did you even read it? Did you know you’re paying for medical school?”
“I don’t care. I have it.” Reed shrugged. At the expression on Gray’s face, he added, “Things were different for us as kids.”
“This is the junkie’s sister? How do you know she’s not using?”
“Gina? Never. Not in a million years.” After setting eyes on her again, he knew that as sure as he knew he was breathing.
“This is going to end badly. I can see the explosions from here. This woman is going to take you for everything you’ve got.” He shook his head. “Do you want me to come with you tonight?” Gray asked, in a low tone, almost like he was telling a secret.
“To meet my daughter?” He shook his head. “No.”
“Why didn’t you meet her inside?”
“It just wasn’t right.” He was too afraid, the idea now a reality that scared the shit out of him. And Amanda Jane deserved better than his fear. She didn’t ask to come into the world. Didn’t ask for him to be her father. Didn’t ask for the hand she’d been dealt.
“I get that, man. I really do.” Gray clapped him on the back. “If you don’t need anything else, brother, I’m going to head back to the city.”
“No, I’m good. Thanks.” He supposed he was good—this was as good as it ever got for Reed Hollingsworth.
CHAPTER FIVE
“ARE YOU READY to get married yet?” Grams said into the phone when she answered it.
“No.” She didn’t bother to tell her grandmother about the meeting at Emma’s office. She probably already knew.
“That’s not what Marie Hart said. She told me that she saw you and Reed and his lawyer at Emma’s. Were you playing pinochle or planning your wedding?” Her grandmother seemed to think pinochle figured into everything.
She sighed with only the smallest bit of exasperation. “If you already knew, why did you ask?”
“Because you didn’t call me. Why don’t you bring Amanda Jane over and we’ll watch some movies, have popcorn, and maybe I’ll even bake cookies.”
“Reed’s coming over tonight.”
“Oh! Call me later.” Her grandmother hung up before she could say anything else.
She shook her head. Maudine had her cell phone attached to her head just like any teenager. Sometimes Gina felt as if she was the old woman and Maudine the grandchild, but only in the vaguest sense.
Gina suddenly had a craving for that ribbon candy. It reminded her of being a child, when things were good. When they were easy.
It had been strange to be sitting across from Reed in a conference room in Emma Grimes’s office.
Strange wasn’t the right word. Utterly insane might be a better description.
He’d switched faces again so easily it was hard to tell which one was real. The Reed who sat in front of her was the investment genius who got everything he wanted no matter who he had to crush to get it. This suit he wore looked like it cost more than a semester of her tuition. And he wanted her to know it.
She didn’t want to look at him like this, but she knew she should be grateful for the reminder. He could never be just Reed again.
Gina thought he’d been there to crush her, to take everything from her, but instead, he’d only given. He’d agreed to everything she wanted. His shark lawyer could’ve made this so hard, but it seemed like all he wanted was exactly what he said—to be a good parent. Giving her and Amanda Jane safety and security.
That wasn’t something she’d ever felt as though she had, so she didn’t quite know what to do with it. She wondered if he felt the same way or if he’d taken to his new life without ever looking back? She imagined the latter. She had to say if she was in his shoes, she’d do the same. She knew she was lucky to have had Maudine.
God, why had she invited him out to the house?
He’d be here any minute.
What was she thinking?
Well, besides that this was going to crash and burn? She sighed. This was the right thing to do. Not just for the financial support, but so that Amanda Jane never doubted she was loved, or that there were people in the world who wanted her. Who would keep her safe.
Gina took a deep breath. This was going to be her life. She might as well start getting used to it.
“Gina, my braids are too tight.” Amanda Jane squirmed underneath her hand.
“Sorry.” She loosened the length of woven hair. “He’s going to be here soon. And I know you won’t sit still then. Your hair won’t tangle if we do it before you sleep.”
“I like his face,” she said solemnly.
That was good because she looked just like him. Gina smiled at her. “Go on now.”
“I think you like his face, too. You get this funny expression when you look at him.”
She’d have to be more careful. “I do like his face.” Gina liked a lot more than his face. “We were friends a long time ago before you were born.”
“Do you think it’s true that he just didn’t want to be a daddy?” Amanda Jane cast her eyes down at her bare feet and wiggled her toes.
Gina didn’t want to lie to her, but she didn’t know the truth. “I don’t know, honey. But I can tell you that sometimes people make mistakes and we have to forgive them when they’re really sorry.”
“Do you think he likes my face?” Amanda Jane tilted her head up.
“How could anyone not like your face?”
She smiled. “You’re supposed to say that.”
“Yes, I am. But do you remember when I promised I’d always tell you the truth?”
“Even if I was ugly like Liza McCaully?”
Gina had to put her hand over her mouth to keep from laughing. “That’s not nice.”
“It’s not nice, but it’s true.” Amanda Jane nodded, her face serious.
“You can speak the truth without being mean, but yes, I would tell you the truth.”
Amanda Jane stuffed her feet into her slippers. “Okay, but now it’s time fo
r you to get ready.”
“I am ready.”
Amanda Jane shook her head. “Your jeans have a hole.” She stuck her finger in the hole and tickled Gina’s knee.
Gina squealed and grabbed her niece, tickling her in return. Amanda Jane giggled while she struggled to free herself.
“Did you brush your teeth?”
She nodded. “Did you brush yours?”
Gina found the tension draining out of her. “It’s not my bedtime yet.”
“No, but we should be pretty. You always told me when we meet new people we should smell good.”
“I’m brushing everything. Hair. Teeth.” She puckered her lips. “Mustache.”
Amanda Jane giggled. “Eww. Girls don’t have mustaches.”
“Some do, but that’s what laser hair removal is for.”
Amanda Jane nodded sagely as if she were the one handing out the advice.
Gina was brushing her hair when the screen door rattled against the framing under a heavy knock.
Amanda Jane squealed and her blue eyes lit up. “He’s here.”
Her heart ached for her. This was all so bittersweet.
Reed stood haloed in the yellow light as it cast bright warmth over the hard planes of his features. Her eyes were drawn to the square angles of his wide shoulders and the way the sleeves of his polo shirt stretched over his biceps.
Gina tried not to notice everything about him that turned her on because he wasn’t here for her. None of this was about her.
Even though her mouth had gone dry and the words she had died in her throat.
“Hey.”
It was such a simple word. He’d said it to her a million times, but this time it was devastating. Both because it was a reminder of times past and while it was spoken in his voice, her attention was once again drawn back to his body.
That and time had made him a stranger.
“Hey, yourself.” Also something she’d said a million times. It was strange and awkward.
“Come in? Apparently I need to change clothes. I have a hole in my jeans,” she babbled.
Ugh. She hated babbling. Men didn’t make her babble. She didn’t have time or room in her life to be a silly girl over any guy, especially not Amanda Jane’s father. Gina decided polo shirts were the devil. It was the shirt’s fault.
He nodded and stepped inside.
Amanda Jane tilted her head back to look up at him. He must seem like a giant to her.
That twisted something deep in her guts. That’s what a father should be. Every child should think that their father was some kind of invincible hero. She used to daydream about her own when she was little. Gina imagined him to be tall and strong and that her mother had somehow hidden them from him; that’s why he hadn’t come to rescue them.
But as she’d grown older, she’d realized it was just a fairy tale like any other and had no place in the realities of her life.
Inside, his presence was even more disconcerting. She hadn’t noticed it at the restaurant or in Emma’s office because it was filled with other people, but alone together, he dominated the space. He made her feel small and vulnerable without even trying.
Unfortunately, she was both intrigued and uncomfortable. It would all be so much easier to bear if she could get away from the intrigued part.
They eyed each other, both seeming to be wary, but unsure how to proceed.
“Hi.” Amanda Jane made her presence known.
Reed smiled at her, a genuine expression that completely changed his face. He wasn’t just the cute boy she’d crushed on. She was very aware that he was a man—a handsome, powerful man.
Not that it mattered. She tried to push her brain into EMT mode—where she looked at bodies clinically. Yet, there was still nothing clinical about her reaction to him.
“Gina-bee said you’re my daddy.”
Gina waited to see what he would say.
He nodded. “I am. Is that okay?”
“I think so. I like your face,” Amanda Jane confessed without the slightest bit of hesitation.
He sank down to his haunches, eye level with her. “I like your face, too.”
Gina was suddenly hyperaware of the house, the shabby state of things. She looked around the small farmhouse. She’d been happy here, but now that he was coming, Gina found it lacking. She saw every flaw in the molding, the tears in the screen on the front porch, the dilapidated fence posts, the scratches on the wood floors...
But this was also where Amanda Jane learned to crawl, the front yard was where she made mud pies, and those tears in the screens were from the feral cats she always left food and water for.
Even though it was a rental, so much of their lives were entwined in the place and if Reed didn’t like it, she didn’t care.
He came from worse than this and she wouldn’t dare let him judge her.
More important, she wouldn’t judge herself.
“Gina-bee said you would.”
“She knows me pretty well sometimes.”
Amanda Jane nodded solemnly. “She knows most everything.”
Gina blushed. “Not everything.”
Reed looked up at her. “Probably everything.”
Amanda Jane yawned. “You should have come earlier. Then you could read me a story.”
“I could read you one now,” he offered.
“Oh, no. I’ll get too excited and I won’t sleep. Story before bath. You could come tomorrow.” Amanda Jane looked down at her toes. “If you wanted to.”
Gina sighed. “I thought tomorrow was our day.”
“Please?”
“Honey, he might be busy. We’ll see, okay?” Gina didn’t want her to get her hopes up, didn’t want her to get too excited about something that might not happen.
Amanda Jane looked up at him and mouthed Frogfest.
Frogfest dated back to the first settlers in the area when masses of frogs would converge on the riverbank and low marshy areas around the river to mate and they’d sing a lively tune long into the night. If times had been lean, the frogs provided much needed sustenance during hardship. Although, the modern celebrations didn’t include as many frog dishes, but for the occasional vendors selling deep-fried frog legs.
Gina found herself inviting him along. She couldn’t resist the absolute joy on the girl’s face and they needed to get used to each other—Amanda Jane and Reed. It wouldn’t work if they were just suddenly flung into the same household.
“You could come.”
“I’d like that.”
They’d be playing happy little family. She wondered if there’d ever been a bigger lie.
“Good night,” the little girl chirped.
“Where are you going? I thought you wanted to stay up to meet him?” Gina asked, wondering if there was something wrong.
“The sooner I go to bed, the sooner it’s tomorrow. Frogfest. Funnel cake.”
“Funnel cake with frogs?” Reed teased her.
“That doesn’t sound good.”
“I don’t think so, either.” He shook his head.
“You should have tea on the porch. It’s my favorite thing to do at night.”
“You could come outside with us.”
“No. Frogfest,” she reiterated, as if he and Gina didn’t understand the importance of the word. “Can I have your phone to play a game before sleep?”
“Sure, honey.”
She ran off, taking Gina’s phone with her, presumably to bed.
“She doesn’t hesitate to ask for what she wants, does she?” Reed said as he watched after her.
“Emotionally, she doesn’t.” Having gone without as a child and been afraid to ask for anything, she didn’t want Amanda Jane to ever feel that way. She thought abo
ut her earlier observations, but she decided she didn’t need to drive the financial point home any harder. He got it. He understood. And he’d given her everything she asked for.
“That’s good.” Reed’s voice was brittle.
She swallowed hard. “Do you want a sweet tea? We can drink it on the porch.”
“Sure,” he agreed.
Gina poured him a glass of tea and they stepped back out into the night. She lit a citronella candle, happy to have something to do with her hands.
He seemed so out of place sitting there in her secondhand rocking chair in his khakis, his polo shirt and his expensive haircut.
She looked back out into the yard, the symphony song of frogs down by the pond serenading them and the flickering dance of fireflies in the dark space.
“You remember when we’d climb up on the roof of my mom’s trailer and hide?” he said, finally.
“Like they couldn’t hear us stomping around up there.”
“Or didn’t care.” Reed shrugged. “Still, those were the only moments of peace I knew then.”
“Do remember that trip to the Lake of the Ozarks?” Gina blurted.
Reed gave a self-deprecating laugh. “Yeah. That guy who had that houseboat...he was one guy my mother hooked up with who wasn’t a total scumbag. Too bad she was so far gone when she met him. Things might have been different. It’s kind of strange to know that she’s that woman for him, you know?”
“Like how all the guys besides him were that guy for you? The ones you thought were trash?”
She watched his face pale.
“I didn’t mean—”
He held up his hand. “No, it’s okay. I loved my mother, but that’s what we were.” He shrugged. “She managed to hold it together long enough to reel him in, but then when he saw what was underneath, he didn’t want any part of it. But who in their right mind would?”
“Still, it was a good trip, wasn’t it?”
“One of the best times in my life. One of the only good times I can remember.”
“I know it was for Crystal, too.” She hadn’t meant to bring up her sister. Gina wasn’t ready to talk about her, even though she knew at some point, they’d have to.