On the brink of tears, her mouth trembling dangerously, she turned abruptly and headed back to the house. As much as he wanted to, he couldn’t just let her go. With a growl, he headed for the house, too.
He found her in the kitchen. “Sarah.”
He had a ringing sense of déjà vu when she turned to him angrily and declared, “I’m not the issue, here. The two of you can’t decide which way to split this relationship the three of us have going. I think it’s because you don’t know what to do about each other. You love the Palmers, but you have to find Corie and Cassidy because they’re your family, too, and Ben wants to support you, but he’s afraid that if you find them, it’ll somehow intrude upon the Palmer family. I’m just a sort of symbol of the discord.” As she spun out her theory, she understood it for the first time. Or so she thought.
He shook his head slowly, hands on his hips. “I am not confusing you with whatever issues I have with Ben, except that he loves you. You’re a complete problem all by yourself. I love you—” there, he’d said it “—but you’re afraid to bring more risk into your life by having kids.”
His confession of love sent a thrill through her, but then she brought her focus back to the more important issue. “I’ve seen children suffer and die.”
“I have, too. Not in a hospital, but in war. Whatever pain comes with that is just a fact of life. Nobody gets to escape that.”
That wasn’t true. She’d been telling herself for more than a year that she was on the right track. She could escape. “I know what I’m doing.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Then how did you end up with two men in love with you?”
The question left her speechless.
He took a deep breath and conceded, “Okay, stupid question. Obviously not your fault that you’re so...”
Her breath was suspended as she waited for him to come up with the word.
“Everything,” he finally said.
She must have looked puzzled, because he seemed to feel obliged to explain. “Yes. Inadequate word. But whenever I think about what would make me happy in a woman...well, you have it all.”
Rattled to her core by that simple, humbling explanation, she felt compelled to resist it. “Shouldn’t you be thinking about what you would do to make a woman happy?”
“Same answer applies,” he said, spreading his arms helplessly. “Everything.”
His simple, generous answer slapped the fight right out of her.
“Gotta go,” he said. “Lots to do.”
He left, probably headed for his self-imposed exile in the carriage house.
Good. She wouldn’t have known what to do or say if he’d stayed.
CHAPTER NINE
JACK WORKED THE following two weeks as though the President and First Lady were arriving to take up residence in the carriage house. He left the installation of the new pedestal sink and the water-conserving john to the plumber, who brought the towel racks and toilet tissue holder his mother had ordered earlier. He did everything he could to avoid the main house and the two vases of hydrangea there, one in the middle of the kitchen table and the other on the fireplace mantel, obviously drying, as Sarah had explained.
He painted the walls the Caribbean blue his mother had chosen, and scoured catalogs looking for the “interesting” mirror she wanted. He found one while sitting on a stool pulled up to the kitchen counter in the carriage house, eating Chinese takeout and paging through the last catalog he had. He spotted a simple mirror trimmed in what looked like sliced glass bricks. He photographed the catalog item and sent it to his mother’s phone. And while he was at it, he photographed the newly installed john and sink and sent those, too.
He came back from his morning run the next day to find Ben standing in front of the carriage house door, a covered plate of what looked like a breakfast casserole balanced on the palm of his hand. He did not look happy, but then, he seldom did lately.
“Morning,” Jack said, rotating his shoulders as he pushed the door open. Apparently his usual cooldown was going to be interrupted. “What are you doing standing out here?” He gestured Ben inside, then followed him.
Ben went into the kitchen and put the plate on the counter. “Since you’re living here, it would be like walking into your house. I wouldn’t do that. Actually, Sarah saw you heading home and sent me over with this. She’s says all you’ve done is order takeout. Apparently she’s keeping tabs on you.”
In dark shorts and a gray bike shirt, Jack held both arms out to his sides. “Do I look food deprived to you?” He felt invigorated by the run, and all the heavy work to finish the carriage house was good for his body’s general condition. Apart from emotional confusion, he felt great.
Ben looked him over, his expression grudgingly approving. “No, you don’t. You make even a police academy graduate look flabby. But you know how she is about her promise to Mom, so please eat it or I’ll have to listen to more of how you and I are making her job impossible.”
“Sorry.”
“I hope so. Because now that you’re not there as a buffer, I get all the angst over why the three of us can’t get along, and all the news about her seniors and the talent show.” To illustrate, he leaned a hip against the counter and asked, “Did you know that Vinny and Margaret still aren’t speaking, and the first rehearsal with everyone is in two weeks?” Ben reached behind him to the utensil drawer, removed a fork and handed it to Jack. “And someone’s doing a Whitman reading and she’s worried about it. I’m not sure why that’s a problem.”
Jack took the fork. “Probably because it’s Jasper and he’s blind. I’m sure it’s a recitation rather than a reading.”
“Oh. Didn’t know that.” It seemed to offend him that Jack knew those details and he didn’t.
“I’m sorry you have to deal with Sarah’s distress. It’s better that I’m out of the way. Maybe you two can work it out if that’s what you want.”
Ben pinned him with a look. “I thought you wanted to work it out with her.”
He didn’t know what he wanted anymore. He was going mildly crazy back here, but he hadn’t had a nightmare since he’d been sleeping in the carriage house. Or since he hadn’t been around Sarah.
“I don’t know what I want,” he admitted, pulling the plastic off the plate of food. Wonderful aromas of sausage and cheese arose, along with that of roasted potatoes and scrambled eggs. “But since you do, you should have the chance.” He forked a bite of sausage with potato and groaned. It was delicious.
Ben turned to go. “Wild Men practice tonight in the church basement. Seven sharp. Be there, or I’ll come get you.”
* * *
SARAH COULDN’T STOP staring at the action on the stage. She sat beside Margie De Angelis in one of the folding chairs scattered around the basement of St. Peter’s by the Sea Catholic Church. Margie, who was married to Mario and very pregnant, did bookkeeping for the Coast Care office and was helping Sarah coordinate the talent-show lineup. Sarah knew her fairly well because in the few months Sarah had dated Ben, they’d all gone out together a couple of times.
Trina, a pudgy-cheeked toddler with dark hair and eyes, played with colorful plastic toys on a blanket at her feet. Margie and Mario expected their second baby in December.
“Aren’t they gorgeous?” Margie whispered, her brown eyes alight with affection and excitement as she watched the four men on the small stage. Her gaze was fastened on Mario, and Sarah couldn’t take her eyes off Jack. She told herself it was because she hadn’t seen much of him lately, and the tight jeans, casual jacket and mussy-hair look of the boy bands of the nineties had nothing to do with his appeal.
Jack, Ben and the De Angelis brothers had all been a little inhibited when they’d begun rehearsing, but responding to the cheers and good-natured harassment from f
riends and family, they were giving the performance of “Bye, Bye, Bye,” NSYNC’s famous hit, their over-the-top all.
Mario and Rico, both on guitar, flanked Ben and Jack. Jack had an impressive tenor voice as lead singer, while Ben supported with surprisingly good harmony. Maybe they weren’t destined for a Grammy, but they might be the act to beat at the talent show.
Jack’s voice hit a sour note and his companions began to smack him with rolled-up sheet music until everyone dissolved into laughter.
As they resumed their places to run through the number one more time, Margie stood and stepped over her daughter. “Sarah, I have to run to the restroom. Would you keep an eye on Trina? I promise I won’t be long.”
Before Sarah could say, “No. I never told you, but it hurts to even look at babies. I don’t want to. Please don’t make me,” Margie was gone.
Sarah expected the inevitable squeal of protest as Trina watched her mother go. But the toddler was apparently secure in the knowledge that her mother would be back. She smiled up at Sarah and handed her a purple plastic doughnut, one of half a dozen in graduated sizes and different colors that she was stacking on a plastic spindle.
“Thank you,” Sarah said, taking it from her. Trina stood and put her hands on Sarah’s knees and reclaimed the doughnut. Then she clutched Sarah’s skirt for balance and leaned down to grab an orange doughnut from the stack on the spindle. She gave it to Sarah and waited expectantly.
Concluding that she was expected to somehow entertain with it, Sarah put it on her index finger and twirled it. Trina was thrilled. Encouraged, Sarah spun it again, then put the tip of that finger against Trina’s arm so that the spinning doughnut tickled her until it stopped. Trina shrieked her pleasure, then handed Sarah the purple doughnut again.
Sarah held a doughnut in front of each eye and leaned toward Trina, whispering, “I see you, Trina. I see you!”
Trina climbed into Sarah’s lap and took possession of the doughnuts, holding them to Sarah’s eyes herself.
“You two are serious show pests,” Jack said, taking the chair beside them. “You being tested for glasses?”
Surprised by his sudden appearance, unsettled by his sexy good looks in his jacket and jeans, Sarah stammered, oddly breathless. “We...I...”
Trina, meanwhile, took one look at Jack and stretched out her arms toward him. Without hesitation, he circled her little torso with his hands and pulled her into his lap. To Sarah’s knowledge, this was the first time Trina had ever seen Jack. He laughed and said, “You gotta love a girl who knows what she wants—even if she’s only two.”
Trina looked interestedly into his face and then pushed her tiny index finger against his nose. To her delight, Jack made the sound of a horn. She pressed his nose again with the same result. Then, tiring of the game, she played with the Saint Christopher medal around his neck.
Jack met Sarah’s eyes. “I thought you didn’t want one of these,” he said, brushing the child’s hair out of her face.
“Her mother went to the restroom and asked me to watch her. She’s a cutie, isn’t she?”
“She is. To hear Mario talk about her, she’ll be going to Oxford next year.”
Sarah watched him nibble on Trina’s fingers as she grabbed his bottom lip. He finally had to disengage her fingers to avoid having his mouth reshaped. He winced as Trina grabbed his ears. “Easy there, Trina. I need those things.”
Mercifully, Mario arrived before Trina could relocate Jack’s ears. Trina went to him excitedly just as Margie returned.
“We’re going to Betty’s Burgers,” Mario said, tucking the baby onto his hip. “You guys want to join us? Rico and Ben are coming.”
Sarah opened her mouth to decline, but Jack caught her elbow and pulled her up with him as he got to his feet. “Sure. It’ll be fun. There’s nothing like onion rings at nine thirty at night to keep you up and working until morning.”
They followed Margie and Mario out, a raucous Rico, Ben and a few other police officers who’d come to harass Ben following behind.
“I have to be up in the morning,” Sarah said quietly.
“Then we’ll order you tapioca. I swear, you’re spending too much time with older people, Sarah. You need some night life.”
She laughed as she went to the borrowed RAV4. “And you’re in sad shape if you consider a family restaurant at nine thirty in the evening night life.”
He grinned and headed toward the truck he and Ben had come in. “Touché.”
Coming up behind him, Ben caught him by the collar and redirected him toward Sarah. “You have to bum a ride. Sam and Rico are coming with me.” Sam Wagner worked with Ben and was helping with the lighting for the show. He was in his forties, balding and handsome in an Ed Harris sort of way.
Jack turned to Ben suspiciously, but he was already climbing into the truck.
Sarah unlocked the doors, staring after Ben as Jack joined her. “I heard that. Was that Ben, trying to push us together?”
“Maybe. He probably thinks the more time you spend with me, the more inclined you’ll be to pick him.”
“Pick him for what?”
“For a husband. When and if you decide to have children.”
She blew out air inelegantly between her lips. “I think we should start a commune for dysfunctional people to just live together in platonic friendship for the rest of their lives.”
He shook his head at her mild indignation and let himself into the car. “Bad plan. You have to come up with something else.”
* * *
BETTY’S BURGERS WAS SPACIOUS, with booths along one side and tables and chairs in the middle and along a glass wall that looked out on the ocean. The hostess helped them push several tables together to accommodate their small crowd.
Jack’s friends all took turns entertaining Trina. She seemed to be most comfortable with Ben, who’d spent a lot of time with her parents. She settled into his arms when their food came. He put aside a french fry to cool for her while he gave her a sip of his cola.
Margie tried to take her, telling Ben, “You don’t have to entertain her. You should enjoy your—”
“We’re fine,” Ben said. “Eat up while you have the chance.”
Watching Ben with the little girl, Sarah knew without a doubt that he had to be a father one day. Jack, too, had been happy with the toddler on his lap. She, Sarah, was holding both men back from what they wanted out of life.
Looking around at the warm, lighthearted group of friends, she felt suddenly like an outsider. Or, possibly, like a child herself in a world of adults, as though, with all her fears, she wasn’t ready for the real world.
She sat a little straighter and nibbled on an onion ring. The fact that a woman didn’t want to be a mother was no longer a blight on her character, she told herself defensively. This was the twenty-first century. If someone didn’t want children for whatever reason, society had nothing to say about it. Parenthood should be a choice made after considerable thought.
Jack, sitting beside her, leaned close and said in her ear, “What is it? You’re frowning.”
“I’m just listening and watching. I’m fine.”
“Who are you watching?” he asked with teasing seriousness. “’Cause you know Mario and Rico are both taken. Ah.” He followed the direction of her gaze to Ben. He’d given another of his fries to Trina. She handed it back, pointing to the ketchup on his plate.
“Of course, ketchup,” Ben said, dipping the fry lightly in the red stuff and handing it carefully back to her. He looked up and noticed Sarah and Jack watching him. He arched an eyebrow in question.
“Nothing,” Sarah replied with a smile. “Just noticing how good a child looks on you.”
Mario jumped in. “Sarah had Trina earlier,” he said. “A child looks pretty good on her, too. If she can decide w
hich Palmer brother she wants.”
Margie gasped and elbowed him hard. “I swear to God, Mario. You have all the social smarts of a raccoon.”
“Oh, come on,” he said with no visible awareness of the discomfort he’d caused. “She was going with Ben, now she’s sitting with Jack. I didn’t mean anything. It was just...I don’t know, social commentary.”
Rico shook his head and said something under his breath in Italian. Ben covered Trina’s ears. “Hey, she probably understands.”
“You all know the Palmers hired me to cook for Ben and Jack while they’re in Arizona,” Sarah said into the embarrassing silence. She tried to smile as though nothing at all was wrong, while the truth was that Mario’s simple statement had said it all. “Then my apartment burned down. You know...the Bay Apartments’ fire?” Everyone nodded. “Ben invited me to stay with them since I have no family here and, at that moment, had nowhere else to go.”
“Why do you have to cook for them?” Sam asked. “Can’t they just eat ribs and Doritos for breakfast like the rest of us?”
The men cheered and the women made sounds of disgust, though they laughed.
“She’s also a nurse,” Margie said. “With Jack just back from Afghanistan and suffering from—” She stopped abruptly. She doubtless realized it wasn’t her job to share personal information about Jack.
“I came back physically healthy,” Jack finished for her, smiling into her worried expression. “But I was a little screwed up emotionally.” He looked around the table. “I’m among friends, I presume.”
“Not sure.” Mario stood and said, “We really should take a count. Raise your hands if—”
Margie yanked him back into his chair.
Everyone laughed, Jack included. “All right. Seriously. You all know what kind of childhood I had. Well, life at war has brought a lot of that back and I have trouble sleeping. Nightmares. My mom thinks good nutrition solves everything.”
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