“I’ll go with you.”
“Not a great idea. You’re not on my father’s top-ten list,” she said. “Or my daughter’s, either.”
“I saw her yesterday at O’Malley’s,” he said. “She looks just like you.”
Her expression softened, and again he saw through the wall of self-defense she had constructed and caught a glimpse of the woman he remembered.
“She warned me about you.”
“She remembers me? She was just a kid.”
“Kids remember more than we give them credit for.”
“What did she say?”
“She’s afraid you’ll hurt me again.” She didn’t break the look passing between them. “I told her it was the other way around.”
“She didn’t believe you.”
“No, she didn’t. She’s had too much experience with the other side of that coin.”
A trio of nonknitting nurses joined the one with the bawdy laugh, followed quickly by a pair of doctors who nodded at them.
“That’s my father’s oncologist,” she said, pointing toward the younger of the pair.
“I shot a roll of film watching the other one prep for the delivery room,” he said.
“I’d better go,” she repeated. “I have to phone my sisters, try to track down my brother—”
“I’ll be at the lighthouse Monday afternoon around three o’clock. The Coast Guard is going to let me spend an hour photographing it from the inside. I want you to join me.”
She opened her mouth to tell him all the reasons why she wouldn’t show up, but he stopped her before she started.
“Don’t say anything. It’s up to you. Either way, I’ll be there at three.”
She looked at him for a long moment, and again he saw through the layers of defenses, through the pain, through the years that separated them, and for an instant he saw the woman he fell in love with. She could say what she wanted, but that woman still existed.
And if she didn’t, maybe he would get to know the woman who did.
“NOT YOU, GRAMMA,” Hannah said when Rose stood up and declared it was time for the child’s bedtime bath. “I want Kelly.”
Rose turned to her. “It’s a dirty job,” she said with a wink. “Feel like tackling it?”
Kelly pushed away from the table and stretched. “Only if there are bubbles involved.”
“Can Barbie take a bath, too?” Hannah asked.
“Only if she takes off her astronaut outfit before she gets into the tub,” Rose warned her granddaughter. “The last time Barbie took a bath, the plumber found a picture hat and a winter coat stuck in the pipes.”
“We’ll be careful,” Kelly promised.
Rose stood up and took off her glasses. “Poor Priscilla. She’s probably ready to burst. I think I’ll take a break from scrapbooking while you two are upstairs and take our girl for a walk.”
Rose went off in search of Maddy and Hannah’s toy poodle puppy while Hannah raced Kelly upstairs to one of the luxurious family bathrooms that would bring out the inner mermaid in even the most die-hard landlubber.
Hannah was a talker, and she chatted happily while Kelly ran the bath, adjusted the temperature, then added the kid-friendly bubbles and waited for them to froth up into a fragrant white mountain. Finally the little girl, Barbie, and an aging Jasmine action figure from Disney’s Aladdin were settled in the tub. Kelly pulled the dressing table chair closer and sat down to supervise.
The room was steamy and fragrant from the gardenia-scented bubbles, and the combination of the warmth and the soothingly sweet sound of Hannah’s happy chatter soon had Kelly drifting. The frothy bubble bath was strangely fitting, because all evening she had felt like she was in a bubble herself, safe and protected. That was part of The Candlelight’s charm. Warmth and comfort were programmed into every overstuffed chair, every crackling fireplace, every slice of chocolate mousse cake. The second she crossed the threshold that afternoon, everything else had dropped away, and she had felt less alone, less frightened of what lay ahead. Nothing beyond The Candlelight seemed real. Not that manic run to the mall. Not the big fat plus sign that confirmed her fears. Not lying to Seth and telling him they were in the clear, that there was no problem, no baby, no end to their dreams.
It was easy to just let go and drift, to pretend that she was exactly the same girl she had been this time last month or the month before and that her future was still golden.
And it would be golden again. She would do what she had to do and then pick up right where she had left off before this detour.
She loved her father, and she loved her Aunt Claire, but there was something special about being part of this family of women who had already welcomed her into their midst. Rose no longer scared her into silence. Sitting around that wonderful table piled high with their combined memories, Kelly had experienced a feeling of kinship that startled her. Rose’s sister Lucy treated her like one of her own nieces. Hannah charmed her out of her shoes. Even the colorful cousins felt like extended family.
Only Maddy seemed to remain just out of reach. Oh, she was warm and friendly and funny, but that was as far as it went with them. Sometimes Kelly had the feeling that they were standing on opposite sides of a very wide river, waiting for someone to come along and build a bridge between them. She had held her breath this morning when Maddy caught her buying the testing kit, sure that Maddy would confront her the way her Aunt Claire or any of her friends’ mothers would have done. But not Maddy. She had chatted on just like Hannah in the bathtub, like nothing unusual was going on.
Which was okay. Really. It wasn’t like Kelly blamed her or anything. Maddy wasn’t her mother. She wasn’t even her stepmother, not yet. She was just a really nice woman who didn’t want to take on the problems of a girl she barely knew. She had her own daughter to worry about, her own mother, a wedding to plan, her radio show, Cuppa, a million other things besides Kelly and her problems. If she didn’t want to get involved, she didn’t have to.
A mother had to listen to her daughter’s problems. A mother had to be there when her children needed her. A mother—
Look at her getting all sentimental and weepy just because she had spent the evening sorting through some faded photographs of people who were dead and gone.
You look very much like your mother . . . she was a beautiful girl.
“Are you crying?” Hannah’s voice cut into her thoughts.
“No, I’m not crying. I was resting my eyes.” Wasn’t that what older people always said to cover up everything from tears to catnaps?
“You’re supposed to be watching me.”
“I am watching you.”
“You can’t watch me with your eyes closed.”
“You’re right,” she said, forcing her lids into the upright position. “I’m sorry, Hannah.”
“My mommy wouldn’t close her eyes.”
She was probably right about that, too. There seemed to be a list somewhere out there in the universe of all the things mommies would and wouldn’t do, and every little girl had it memorized.
“Then I promise I won’t take my eyes off you, Hannah.” She made a silly bug-eyed face that propelled the little girl into a fit of bubble-fueled giggles but not before she saw the look of relief in her eyes.
“Okay,” Hannah said, once again restored to her rightful position as empress of all she surveyed. “That’s what my mommy would do.”
A lump formed in the back of her throat, hard and painful. At barely five years of age, Hannah already knew more about the secret world of mothers and daughters than Kelly ever would.
Chapter Twenty-one
COURTSHIP, OF COURSE, was the easy part. Both Maddy and Aidan knew that the magical spell that had embraced them for the last twenty-four hours in that room overlooking the ocean would vanish in the face of real life. That was a given. But they couldn’t help wishing they could delay the inevitable just a little bit longer.
Checkout time was noon. Maddy was sure she could
hear the clock ticking down the minutes as she and Aidan toweled off after one last interlude in that wondrous Jacuzzi.
“We really should get ourselves one of those,” Maddy said as she slipped into her jeans and zipped them up.
“You’ve seen my place. The bathrooms are the size of coat closets.”
“Then let’s move.”
“I thought we decided we were going to live in my house.”
“We also decided we were going to have ten kids and send them all to Princeton.” She wrapped her arms around him and pressed a kiss to his back. “This is called fantasy, O’Malley. Get with it.”
“I don’t need fantasies anymore,” he said. “Not since I found you.”
Pretty speeches didn’t come easily for the man she was going to marry. Those ten words were all of Shakespeare’s love sonnets rolled into one.
“I feel married to you now,” she whispered against his back. “I feel like last night was our wedding night.” The commitment to him, to their future together, was that strong.
He turned around and gathered her into his arms, and she had the sense of being exactly where she was meant to be, the one safe place in a world that shifted and changed beneath your feet. She knew his secrets now. She knew the effort it took for him to do things she took for granted. Anything she thought she’d known about the level of pain he dealt with on a daily basis had fallen far short of the truth. He had been afraid she would find him less of a man when she saw him as he was, but the truth was he was so much more than even she had dreamed.
She could see him with Hannah, helping to guide her toward adolescence, helping them all navigate the choppy waters of her teenage years, and she thanked God that she had found a man who valued the same things she valued, a man whose heart would expand to include everyone she loved. This wasn’t love the way she had envisioned it when she was in her twenties. When she first met Hannah’s father Tom, love had been an adventure. Watching the sunset from the balcony of Tom’s penthouse. Weekend trips to Vancouver. An uncertain future that seemed more like playing house than building a real life together.
What she had found with Aidan went far beyond what she had known with Tom, almost as if the experiences belonged to two different women.
Maybe they had. She had changed since returning home to New Jersey and her family. The urge to run when the going got tough was slowly being replaced by the need to stay where she was, to dig her roots a little deeper, to admit there was something wonderful about being part of a family, even when the family in question sometimes made you crazy.
She had finally decided what to do about Kelly, and she had Rose to thank. Her mother was right. She wasn’t doing anyone a favor by keeping her suspicions and worries to herself. Tomorrow evening she would sit down with Aidan and tell him what she knew, the plain facts without embellishment, and pray that she had been worried for nothing.
They checked out of their suite with just two minutes to spare, both of them reluctant to leave their secret hideaway but feeling the pull of home and children.
“Go ahead,” he said as they merged onto the Parkway headed south. “You know you want to.”
“You want to just as much as I do.”
“Yeah, but I can’t. I’m driving.”
“I know it’s ridiculous. Rosie would have called if there was anything we needed to know, but I can’t help myself.”
“If you didn’t do it, I would,” he said, and she burst into laughter.
She reached into her tote bag, pulled out her cell phone, then punched in her mother’s number. All she had to do was say hello. Rose took care of the rest.
“Our kids are okay,” she said to Aidan after she disconnected, “but Mike Meehan is in the hospital.”
She relayed the tale about Fritzie, the broken ankle, the minor surgery, the chemotherapy-connected complication.
“Sounds like Mike isn’t exactly being a model patient. Rosie said Claire’s having a tough time keeping him there. She called two of her sisters, but they’re not sure they can break free to help her out.”
“Her sisters only show up when there’s a will to be read,” Aidan said. Then, “Damn. That means she’s probably not going to work this afternoon.”
“And Barney Kurkowski was checked in. Smoke inhalation.”
Aidan flinched. When a firefighter got close to retirement, nobody rested easily until the day he hung up his gear and said good-bye.
This led to a flurry of phone calls to O’Malley’s that ended up with Aidan saying he’d take over Claire’s four o’clock spot.
“I forgot to tell you the juicy gossip Rose heard at Mass this morning. Gina took Crystal to that karaoke bar down near Wildwood and ended up getting herself tattooed.”
“What did she get, and where did she get it?”
“A triton’s horn, and it’s someplace you’re never going to see and live to talk about.”
“Sounds like they had a few too many margaritas. How the hell did they drive home?”
“Crystal panicked when Gee passed out on the way back to the bar. She called Peter Lassiter, and he drove down to get them.”
“That’ll look good on tape.”
“That’s exactly what I was thinking. She’s had a rough time of it lately with Joey being sick and all that trouble with her ex. She was just blowing off steam. I really hope they don’t use it in the documentary.” God knew her family had already provided them with enough material to run a weekly series for the next ten years. “Crystal swore it was an off-the-record night out but . . .”
“She’s not a kid, Maddy. She knew what she was doing when she went off with Crystal.”
“I know you’re right but—” She stopped midsentence and shook her head. Gina’s problems were better saved for another time. “Let’s declare a moratorium on the real world until we see the Welcome to Paradise Point sign bearing down on us. What do you say?”
“I say I like the way you think.” She felt the heat of his look in every secret part of her body. “Almost as much as I liked the way you—”
Now that was the kind of talk that made the miles fly by.
It was all beginning to seem real to her in a way it hadn’t before this weekend. Up until now it had all been about the wedding—what to wear, who to invite, where to hold it—and very little about the marriage, but that had all changed overnight. Suddenly she saw them not just as the giddy bride and groom on top of a spun-sugar wedding cake, but as a husband and wife with children to protect and a future to build, and it was as exhilarating as it was terrifying.
“What do you think Rosie will say when you tell her?”
“Shh,” Maddy said, holding her index finger to her lips. “I don’t want to think about it.”
“She’s not going to be happy.”
“No, she’s not. She thought a September wedding was too short notice. Late July is going to push her right over the edge.”
“Good thing we didn’t elope this morning.”
They had come very close, and only the fact that their daughters deserved an easier entry into living as a blended family had held them back. Waiting until September suddenly made no sense at all. They loved each other. They were well past the age of consent. They understood exactly what they were getting into and wanted to do it just the same. They also both knew that life came with no guarantees, and sometimes the smartest thing you could do was to follow your heart.
They had talked late into the night about anything and everything, and now, speeding down the Parkway, they picked up the threads and began to weave them into something real. Major issues like where they would live (Aidan’s house) and how many children they wanted to have together (they finally talked the number down to two) and whether or not they would raise them as practicing Catholics (to be determined) came together effortlessly in seamless agreement.
They talked about O’Malley’s. They talked about The Candlelight. They talked about her radio gig. He told her about his plans to go back to school and p
ursue the degree he had abandoned years ago. She told him that she wasn’t sure it was going to work out for her at Cuppa, that it was painfully clear she and his brother’s widow didn’t see the world through the same lens.
“You don’t have to like each other to work together,” he said. “All you have to do is stick around and make it work.”
“You make it sound like I’ve spent my life running away from things.” She let out a loud, theatrical sigh. “A girl runs away for ten or fifteen years and—boom!—she finds herself with a reputation.”
His silence went on a beat too long.
“Laugh,” she said. “You were supposed to laugh.”
“Stick around, no matter what,” he said. “You can run away from anyone else, but don’t run away from me.”
An odd little chill rippled up her spine at his words.
“As if that could happen,” she said, but she couldn’t help thinking about Kelly as she did.
AIDAN ASKED IF she wanted to stop in at the hospital with him and see how Mike Meehan was doing, but she begged off. She didn’t know Claire’s father well at all, and she was eager to get home and see Hannah.
“I’ll stop by tomorrow,” she said. “I’m sure he won’t miss me.”
Mike Meehan was one of those men who gathered friends the way squirrels gathered nuts in the fall. His room was probably crowded wall-to-wall with enough visitors to constitute a fire hazard.
Aidan pulled into the driveway behind the house and unloaded her bag. They laughed at the sound of Priscilla’s excited yapping as she scratched at the back door with insistent puppy claws.
“Rosie’s car is gone,” Maddy observed as he carried her bag into the house. The ever-watchful Priscilla greeted them with much tail-wagging, then galloped out to the yard to take care of business. “She and Hannah must have gone over to the hospital to see Mike.”
“There’s a note on the table,” Aidan said as he placed her bag near the doorway. He picked it up. “Hospital first, Gina’s second. She’ll be back around six.”
She wrapped her arms around him. “You mean we actually have the house to ourselves?”
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