The Birth Mother

by Tara Taylor Quinn

  “Then I guess you ask me out again and see what happens.”

  “I’m getting kinda hungry for some red snapper.”

  “If that’s an invitation, the answer’s yes.”

  “Monday for lunch?”

  “Okay.”

  “Good. And, Jennifer?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You’re right to be cautious—about what people might want from you, I mean. See you Monday.”

  Jennifer held the phone long after the dial tone was humming in her ear. He understood. And she was in trouble. For the first time in her adult life she’d met a man she could fall in love with.

  But just how attracted would he be if he learned the truth about her? How much would he admire a woman who’d apparently once had the morals of an alley cat? Who’d been stupid enough to get pregnant?

  CHAPTER FIVE

  SOMETHING WAS WRONG with her—in the head. Nicki didn’t know what. She’d never been around a crazy person before to know what one was like. But she knew something was wrong. Nothing was fun anymore.

  She tossed aside the book she was reading and stared into space. The book was stupid. The kids in it had stupid problems. They spent all their time worrying about who their best friends were inviting to parties, and whether or not their moms were going to let them go to the movies with boys. Like any of that stuff really mattered. Nicki couldn’t believe she’d ever found books like that any good.

  She heard Uncle Bryan turn off the shower. As soon as he got ready, he was driving her to the mall to shop for summer clothes. He was making a really big deal out of it, taking the whole day, since it was Saturday, and even taking her out to a fancy lunch like her mother used to do when they came to the city to Christmas-shop. Nicki used to look forward to those trips for weeks, counting the days and making lists so she’d be sure not to forget anything. She used to love shopping.

  But not anymore. Shopping was stupid. Who cared about all the fancy stuff in the store windows? Clothes were clothes. They didn’t really matter. They didn’t stop things from happening. And what did she care if she looked good? There was nobody around to dress up for. Uncle Bryan mostly just wore jeans and T-shirts, and it didn’t matter to him if that was all she wore, too. Besides, dressing up was dumb. A waste of time. It wasn’t going to bring back her parents.

  “Ready to go, Nick?”

  Uncle Bryan came into the living room, still pulling on his shirt. His hair was wet, but already the long part was in its ponytail. Grandma would’ve had a fit if she could see it, but Nicki thought it was neat.

  “Yeah. I’ve got my list, just like you told me,” Nicki said, getting to her feet. She was going to try really hard to make herself have fun today. Uncle Bryan wanted her to, he was trying really hard to make the day good, and she so badly wanted to make him happy with her.

  He didn’t get it about what colors didn’t look good with her hair or which stores carried the nerdy clothes, but he was friendly with all the clerks, and Nicki didn’t mind shopping with him at all. He made her try on every outfit they picked, and then come out so he could see her in it. Which made her feel sort of special, even if he was only doing it because of her mother.

  She pulled on a baby T with a big daisy on the front and a pair of matching daisy shorts, and looked at herself in the dressing-room mirror. The outfit seemed okay, and she’d seen lots of girls at school wearing daisies lately. And it didn’t have any red or orange that would look bad with her hair. But still, she wasn’t sure if she looked geeky or not.

  She peeked out the door of the dressing room to make certain nobody but Uncle Bryan was out there, and then slipped out.

  “Is it comfortable?” He’d asked that same question with every outfit.

  “I guess.”

  “Well, I gotta tell you, Nick. You look wonderful in it. That top shows how slim you are, and the shorts make your legs look miles long.”

  Nicki blushed, but she felt like smiling.

  “But I don’t know,” Uncle Bryan continued, and her stomach tightened up again. “It might be a little old for you. Maybe you should wait a year or two before wearing those short shirts.”

  “Okay,” Nicki said, trying really hard to hide her disappointment.

  “You’re only eleven, Nick. We don’t want boys noticing how cute you are for a while yet.”

  Nicki nodded and went in to change. He didn’t have to worry. Boys didn’t notice her. But she didn’t feel so bad about not having the outfit if it was because Uncle Bryan thought she was cute.

  Uncle Bryan paid for her clothes, including a longer daisy T-shirt to go with the daisy shorts. She added the bag to her other packages and followed him out into the mall, wondering again what was wrong with her. She was glad to have all her new things. She just wasn’t excited about them. In the old days, when she’d come to the city to shop, she’d thought over and over again about each hew thing she got, pretending different places she was going to wear it. Sometimes she even got an excited feeling in her stomach that lasted for the whole day. But now they were just clothes, things she had to have.

  She saw a big advertisement in the mall for a Six Flags amusement park, and remembered the only time she’d been there, the time Uncle Bryan had taken her on the roller coaster and she’d thrown up. It had still been the very best time she’d ever had. She’d always wanted to go there for a whole week and spend nights in a hotel and everything. She knew Uncle Bryan would take her if she asked him to. But she didn’t want to go anymore. She didn’t see what was so fun about going upside down and throwing up. She’d been such a stupid little kid back then.

  They passed a drugstore, and Uncle Bryan stopped. “How about a chocolate bar to tide us over till lunch?” He named her favorite kind.

  “Okay,” Nicki said because he seemed so glad to get it for her. But it didn’t really sound too good.

  And neither did lunch when they finally finished their shopping later that afternoon. Uncle Bryan took her to the Mexican restaurant she used to beg to go to every time they came to Atlanta on a visit. And she ordered her usual burrito with extra beans, but it wasn’t hard at all to wait for it to come, and she ate it because she knew she had to, not because she really wanted it. She just didn’t feel hungry anymore. Besides, no matter how much she ate, it didn’t make the empty feeling inside her go away.

  Uncle Bryan was eating a steak, which the restaurant also had on the menu. He didn’t like Mexican food. “You haven’t mentioned your birth mother in a while, Nick. You giving up on her?”

  Nicki’s heart started to beat fast. “No. But you said you’d let me know when you found out something, and I didn’t want to nag you. Mom always used to say I nagged a lot and she’d get mad about it sometimes.”

  “So it still means as much to you that we find her?”

  Nicki nodded. It meant everything to her. She’d spent hours imagining what her other mother would be like, how their first meeting would go. Whenever thinking about her mom and dad, and never seeing them again, made her feel like she was just going to curl up and die, she’d think about finding her other mother, and the scared feeling would go away a little bit.

  Uncle Bryan was paying attention to his lunch again.

  “So have you found out anything?” Nicki hoped it wasn’t nagging to ask, since he’d brought up the subject.

  “Not yet, but they’re narrowing it down.” He put a big bite of steak in his mouth.

  Nicki put her fork down, too excited to eat any more. “Narrowing it down” had to mean they’d found out something. And if they’d found out something, they could probably find out more. So maybe there was a chance she’d know where her other mother was before Uncle Bryan wanted to get rid of her.

  Uncle Bryan was keeping her because he knew her mother and grandma would have wanted him to, but there were no real ties—no blood ties—to hold him to her when she started to bug him too much. And she would. She didn’t know when, and she hoped it would take longer because she was trying
very hard not to get in his way, but she knew that eventually he’d be climbing the walls. Not because he wanted to be that way, just because that was Uncle Bryan.

  “You remember the time when I was really little and I asked you if you had crabs in your pants?” she asked him. It made her feel better when she thought of those days.

  He grinned at her. For an uncle, he was really handsome.

  “Yeah, I remember. I wondered what Lori was telling you about me.”

  “You got really mad at her. I’ve never seen you and Mom yell at each other like that.”

  “And all because you had big ears and a little memory,” he said teasingly.

  “Can I help it if I didn’t know the difference between ants and crabs?” she asked.

  She’d been so happy in those days. She hadn’t even known how great it was—or that it could all go away so fast, either.

  And that was why she had to find her other mother. She needed to in case Uncle Bryan got tired of her before she was old enough to be on her own. Even if her other mother still didn’t want her, maybe she had an aunt or a grandma someplace who did.

  It had never bothered Nicki that she was adopted when she lived in Shallowbrook. Actually it had made her feel special because her mom and dad had picked her, her especially, to love. But Uncle Bryan hadn’t picked her. She’d been forced on him.

  There was another reason she had to find her other mother. Nicki had to know why that lady had given her away. Nicki hoped that she hadn’t meant to, that she, Nicki, had been taken away without her knowing it. She was afraid, sometimes, that Uncle Bryan thought about how it wasn’t fair that he had to keep her when even the woman who’d actually had her didn’t want her.

  She knew that he had to think it wasn’t fair, ‘cause Uncle Bryan hadn’t ever wanted any children, not even his own. She’d heard him arguing with Grandma about it the last time he’d come to Shallowbrook for vacation. Grandma was always wanting him to get married and give her some more grandchildren. And he’d said he wasn’t the marrying kind and he wouldn’t make a good father. Nicki thought he’d make the best dad ever next to her own, and she loved him as much as any kid ever loved a dad. She just wished he felt differently about wanting kids.

  JENNIFER CHATTED EASILY with him when he flew her to lunch on Monday. In fact, she spent the entire meal telling him about the celebrity tennis match she’d attended over the weekend. But her describing, in great detail, how two professional tennis players had faced off against each other with two professional basketball players partnering them wasn’t exactly what he’d had in mind when he’d encouraged her to open up to him.

  On the way back to her office, he’d asked her again about the television spots he wanted her to do with children. She’d still refused to do them, but he had a feeling she was weakening. The idea almost guaranteed success. And the more time he spent with Jennifer the more important it became to him to make her One Price campaign a success.

  But apart from the campaign, there was another reason he couldn’t let the idea die. She’d refused to do the commercials because she wasn’t good with kids. That worried him.

  Nicki was sound asleep when he got home that afternoon, but because she hadn’t slept well the night before, he didn’t wake her up for dinner. He spent the evening thinking about her birth mother, instead. The woman was perplexing. She seemed so up-front and honest, yet there were times when he sensed things simmering under her polished surface that he couldn’t begin to understand. She always appeared so together, but she had a past that wasn’t together at all. And what made him even more uncomfortable was how much she just plain intrigued him. Somehow he had to get her to relax enough to open up to him.

  The idea came to him Wednesday morning. A picnic. A quiet intimate lunch for two. And he knew just the spot—a lush green patch of land up on Stone Mountain. Telling Jacci to cancel his afternoon appointments, Bryan checked with Mrs. Baker to make certain his cheerful neighbor would be available in case Nicki had a problem at school, then dialed Jennifer’s private number.

  “Have you got anything comfortable to wear stashed at work?” he asked as soon as she picked up the line.

  “Bryan?” She sounded pleased to hear from him.

  “Uh-huh. I was thinking about kidnapping you for a couple of hours, but you’ll need to change out of that suit you’re wearing.”

  “How do you know I’m wearing a suit?”

  “Aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “See?”

  “Okay. Well, it just happens I do have a change of clothes here. I always keep some jeans handy in case I want to have dinner with Sam,” she said, sounding sassy, egging him on.

  “Who’s Sam?” He pretended to sound aggrieved.

  “Only the best mechanic I’ve ever met.”

  “And you have dinner with him often?”

  “Fairly often. Anything else you want to know?”

  “Yeah, why can’t you wear your suits for Sam?”

  “Because they might get greasy.”

  Bryan grinned. “Greasy?” He pictured a couple of black handprints on the derriere of the green linen suit she’d been wearing at lunch on Monday. “Jeez, Jennifer, have some class.”

  “Don’t get gross on me, Chambers. Sam’s almost seventy years old, and whenever we work on my car together, I bring him dinner.”

  That got him. “You work on your car?”

  “Guess I’m not so predictable, after all, huh?” she asked. He could tell she was laughing, though she had the grace to do so silently.

  He wanted to throttle her and kiss her at once. Except that she was Nicki’s mother.

  “Just change into those jeans. I’m on my way,” he said, and hung up.

  “IT’S BEEN YEARS since I’ve been here,” Jennifer said an hour later as he pulled into the west gate at Stone Mountain. He’d taken the sides and top off the Jeep, and strands of her auburn hair had pulled free of their twist and feathered her cheeks and neck.

  She was smiling—and beautiful.

  “Not too much time in the life of a busy executive to stop and smell the roses, huh?” he asked.

  “There probably should be. I just don’t slow down enough to find out.”

  He pulled around to the service drive that led to a big parking lot by the youth camping area. “Why not?”

  She’d made her way in a man’s world and he admired her for it. But didn’t she long for some of the things she’d passed up? Things like marriage and motherhood?

  She shrugged, and he sensed another of her vague answers on the tip of her tongue. And then she looked at him, really looked at him, her hazel eyes a little unsure.

  “I’m happiest when I’m busy,” she said.

  Bryan could understand that. He was, too.

  He pulled a blanket and the deli basket from behind his seat and led her into the park. He could hear children in the distance, yelling, laughing, having the times of their lives.

  She helped him spread out the blanket and divvy up the turkey and roast-beef sandwiches, chips and apples. He opened a couple of wine coolers.

  “I would’ve figured you for a beer man,” she said, taking a long swallow from the bottle he handed her.

  “Usually when I drink I go straight for the hard stuff, not that it happens often, but I was trying for a more romantic effect here.” He’d fought with himself when he’d purchased the bottles at the deli next door to his office. No matter how much she attracted him, he had no business pursuing a personal relationship with her. But he’d gone ahead and bought the wine, anyway.

  “Romance is good.” The sun-draped mountain was a perfect background for her smile.

  He stretched out across from her, taking a couple of sandwiches with him. “I wasn’t sure you took time for that, either.”

  “I don’t very often.”

  He was curiously glad to hear that.

  They ate and drank, the sound of trees and grasses rustling in the light breeze, just enough t
o mute the noises of the park, enveloping them in their own little world. Jennifer looked more relaxed than he’d ever seen her, and more beautiful.

  “This was a great idea,” she said halfway through her second sandwich.

  Looking across at her, feeling more content than he’d felt in a long time, Bryan had to remind himself of his reason for bringing her there.

  “I hoped you’d enjoy getting away. You work too much.”

  “I know.”

  “So why do you? Surely there are other ways to stay busy.” God, woman, tell me what I have to know before I fall for you and hurt us both.

  She put her sandwich down, turning to look up at the mountain. The chair lift taking visitors up one side of the mountain was visible from where they sat.

  “I’m in a man’s world, and I’ve always had the feeling that if I relax too much, if I let go for even a minute, I may lose it all.”

  He looked at her profile, the delicate features. What a contradiction she was. So feminine, yet so driven to succeed. “You’re talking about a multimillion-dollar empire!”

  She turned her head, looking straight at him. “And do you know how many men are just waiting for me to make that one mistake that’ll let them eat me alive?”

  “Then what made you get into the business to begin with, if you feel that way?”

  “I took it over from my parents.”

  “Couldn’t you have sold it, used the money to invest in something else?”

  “No, I couldn’t.” She shook her head, looking back at the mountain. “I needed to make a success of it, not sell it. I.needed to do it for them.”

  Bryan sat up. “Why?”

  “I was born late in their marriage. My mother was already in her forties and had thought herself beyond child-bearing age. They were good people and they loved me, but I was an intrusion in their lives, one they never really, wholeheartedly accepted.”

  Bryan thought of his own family, feeling the familiar pang as he remembered how close they’d all been. “It must have been rough growing up,” he said, thankful suddenly for Shallowbrook and the years of his youth.