The Secret Daughter

by Catherine Spencer

  “What does it matter either way, Joe? You obviously didn’t lose much sleep over the whole business.”

  “Didn’t I?”

  A hundred yards or so ahead, the illuminated dome of the hotel reared into the night like a beacon. Why didn’t she run toward the refuge it promised? Why did she let his question provoke her into having the last word and thereby reveal the misery she was feeling? “Well, you’re married, aren’t you?” she said, flinging the rebuke in his face. “You’ve got two children, both already in school, which explains how you’ve been keeping busy since the last time I saw you. I’d call that getting on with your life without wasting too much time on regrets.”

  “And that upsets you, Imogen?”

  “Not in the slightest,” she said loftily, her bedraggled pride finally coming to the rescue. “Why in the world would it?”

  “I can’t imagine,” he said, a suggestion of sly humor in his voice. “Especially since I’m neither married nor the father of those boys you met.”

  “But Patsy said she’s their aunt, which makes you—oh, dear!” The laugh she manufactured to try to cover her embarrassment sounded pathetically like the bleating of a distraught sheep. “How very silly of me.”

  “Right,” he said, so smugly she could have slapped him. “I’m their uncle.”

  “Well, it was a natural enough mistake on my part,” she said, wishing she could disappear in a puff of smoke before she humiliated herself further. “Sean was a year behind me in school. It never occurred to me he’d be the one to settle down and get married so young.”

  “Wrong again, Imogen. He tied the knot with his high school sweetheart, Liz Baker, when they were nineteen, and Dennis was born six months later.”

  She’d had one shock too many in the past hour. That was the only excuse she could offer for her next incredibly tactless remark. “You mean, they had to get married?”

  The look he turned on her, half pity and half disgust, made her cringe. “We mortals who come from Lister’s Meadows tend to make mistakes like that, Imogen. Our animal appetites get the better of us—not that I’d expect someone of your refined sensibilities to understand that.”

  Oh, she understood—more than he’d ever know!

  But what good would it do to say so at this late date? Casting about for an escape from a situation growing more fraught with tension by the minute, she saw they’d finally drawn level with the Bnarwood’s entrance. Wanting nothing more than to rush up the steps and disappear through the front doors, she forced herself to observe the social niceties ingrained in her from birth. “Well, it was a pleasure seeing you, Joe, and I’ve enjoyed catching up on all your news. Perhaps we’ll run into each other again some time.”

  Any other man would have taken the hint, shaken the hand she extended and left. Not Joe Donnelly. He looked first at her hand, then at the floodlit facade of the hotel, before zeroing in on her face with that too-candid, too-observat gaze of his. “Are you telling me you’re staying at the Briarwood or just trying to get rid of me before someone you know sees the kind of company you’re keeping?”

  “I’m staying at the hotel.”

  “Why? What’s wrong with staying at home?”

  “My mother is away for a couple of days, and I didn’t want to put the staff out.”

  “Why did she go away when she knew you were coming?”

  “Because—” She stopped and drew a frustrated breath. “You ask too many questions, Joe Donnelly.”

  “I guess that means you aren’t going to let me buy you a drink while you fill me in on what you’ve been up to since we last saw each other?”

  “Thank you, no. It’s been a long day, and I’m rather tired.”

  “In other words, your life is none of my business.”

  She looked him straight in the eye. “As a matter of fact, it isn’t.”

  He held her gaze an uncomfortably long time. “Fine. Sorry I bothered you. It won’t happen again.”

  Then he did exactly what she’d wanted him to do—turned and strode back the way he’d come. Left her again, without so much as a backward glance. And she, fool that she was, felt her heart splinter a little, as if a piece of glass lodged there for years had suddenly broken loose.

  Her strength seemed to drain out through the soles of her feet. She sank to the edge of the hotel lawn, afraid she was going to faint. Apparently, so did a couple who passed her. “Looks as if she’s had one too many,” the woman remarked, giving her a wide berth.

  Imogen didn’t care. She had only one thought, to hide herself behind the closed door of her room before she confronted the emotions sweeping through her. Not shock. She was past that. And not the thunderstruck notion that, after all these years, she was still in love with Joe Donnelly. That was so clichéd as to be laughable.

  No, what terrified her was the feeling of having her back to the wall as destiny finally caught up with her. She had run for years. But in coming back to Rosemont, she had tempted fate too far, and it was about to demand a reckoning.

  The phone was ringing as she let herself into her room. It was Tanya, calling for an update.

  “You’re overtired,” she said, when Imogen tried to describe the foreboding gripping her. “It’s a long enough flight from Vancouver to Toronto, never mind the drive you had to face once you landed.”

  But Imogen remained unconvinced. She was realizing too late that it wasn’t possible to dig up selective parts of the past. It was an all-or-nothing undertaking, and she hadn’t bargained on that, at all.

  Patsy was stretched out on the couch, watching the eleven o’clock news, when Joe got home. “Hi,” she said, turning off the TV. “How was your evening?”

  “Just peachy!” He flung himself down beside her and scowled at the blank screen. “Did you get the boys home okay?”

  “Of course I got them home okay. What’s put you in such a lousy mood?”

  “I’m not in a lousy mood.”

  “You could have fooled me,” she said, subjecting him to uncomfortably close scrutiny.

  He squirmed under her gaze. “For Pete’s sake, stop looking at me as if I’ve just broken out in spots! I’m not one of your patients.”

  She let the silence spin out for a while, then said, “I gather your hot date with Imogen didn’t pan out.”

  “It wasn’t a date.”

  “Gee, you could have fooled me. The way you went racing after her, anyone would think—”

  “Can it, Patsy!”

  Her voice softened. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know she was that important to you.”

  “She’s not.” He slouched against the cushions and gazed at the ceiling. “It’s just that some things never change, no matter how much time goes by. I wasn’t good enough for Imogen Palmer in the old days and I should have known better than to think she’d spare me the time of day now. End of story.”

  “I think you’re selling both yourself and Imogen short. She was never a snob.”

  “Don’t give me that! You’ve only got to look at the way she was brought up by that mother of hers.”

  “Dad drinks,” Patsy pointed out, “but that doesn’t make us alcoholics.”

  “I know.” He blew out a sigh of frustration. “But let’s face it, Pats, the Imogen Palmers of this world stick to their own breed—corporate giants backed by old money.”

  “From everything you’ve told me, you’re not exactly subsisting on a pittance, either, Joe, and women have been falling at your feet ever since you started shaving. So what’s this really all about?”

  Guilt, that’s what. And shame. But he wasn’t about to open up that can of worms, not tonight and especially not with Patsy. “Damned if I know,” he said. “Could be that she’s involved with some other guy and not interested in shooting the breeze with—”

  “She’s not involved with anyone else. I know that for a fact because she told me so.”

  “Well, that proves my point then, doesn’t it? She’d rather be alone than spend any time wit
h someone like me.”

  Patsy gave him another of those annoyingly clinical looks. It stretched to a minute before, having finally arrived at some decision, she said, “I shouldn’t be telling you this and I wouldn’t if you weren’t the brother I adore despite his bullheadedness, but I happen to know that this ‘goddess’ of yours has feet of clay just like the rest of us. She didn’t leave town suddenly the summer after we graduated because the air didn’t agree with her—”

  “I know,” he said, cutting her off. “She went to some fancy finishing school in Switzerland, which also goes to prove my point.”

  “No, she didn’t. She was pregnant, and her mother sent her to live with relatives somewhere down near the U.S. border so no one here would find out.”

  When he’d first begun working with horses, a young stallion had kicked him in the ribs, only a glancing blow, fortunately, but at the time Joe thought his chest had caved in. He felt the same way now. “It’s not like you to spread ugly rumors, Pats.”

  “It’s no rumor, Joe. To make a bit of extra money, I worked part-time for Dr. Rush and Dr. Stevens all summer, filing medical records, and I saw her chart.”

  Sweat prickled the pores of his skin. Patsy had never been a gossip. Was it likely she’d be passing on information if she wasn’t sure of her facts?

  Still, he continued to deny it. “You’re mistaken,” he said. “Or else you’re mixing her up with someone else.”

  “No, I’m not.”

  “What makes you so sure? Plenty of girls get pregnant. Look at Liz.”

  “But not girls like Imogen Palmer, Joe. I mean, think about it. She hardly ever even dated, and when she did, the family chauffeur used to drive her and the boy to and from wherever they were going. Ian Lang bragged to everybody that the only reason he asked her out in grade eleven was so he’d get to ride in the back of that big black Mercedes.”

  “Ian Lang always was an ass.”

  “Yes.” Patsy had that look again, and it was pointing straight at him—again. “I know you won’t repeat what I’ve told you to anybody, Joe.”

  Wrong! There was one person he’d definitely be talking to.

  “It’s ancient history, after all, and no one else’s business.”

  Wrong again, Pats!

  “I only told you to rid you of this ridiculous inferiority complex you seem to have developed where Imogen’s concerned.”

  “Yeah. Sure. Who gives a damn, anyway?”

  He did! But he wasn’t about to let Patsy know.

  He made a big production of yawning. “I’m about ready to hit the sack.”

  “Me, too. Want anything before we turn in?”

  He wanted plenty—answers, mostly, but he’d make do with a stiff belt of bourbon for now. “I’ll pass, thanks. You go to bed, and I’ll let Taffy out for a run before I come up.”

  The back porch lay deep in shadow. Moonlight glinted off the bottle of Jack Daniels perched on the railing. Leaning against one of the posts supporting the roof, with Taffy, the dog he’d found abandoned by the side of the road ten years ago, at his feet, Joe stared at the strip of garden and wondered how everything could possibly remain so utterly untouched by the turmoil raging inside him.

  The sound of the courthouse clock striking midnight came faintly on the night air. Another nine hours at least before he could get any answers. How in hell was he supposed to fill the time between now and then?

  Taffy stirred in her sleep, whimpered groggily and twitched her arthritic old legs at the phantom rabbits chasing through her dreams. He knew all about dreams. They were what had got him through the time he’d served in Pavillion Amargo, the jail he’d been sent to after Coburn’s death.

  They’d met when he’d signed on with the crew of a sailboat being brought from Ecuador to San Diego. Like everyone else on board, Joe had recognized Coburn for the brute he was, but the trouble began on Ojo del Diablo, a Caribbean island where they dropped anchor to pick up fresh supplies.

  Coburn got in a drunken brawl and just about beat one of the locals to death. Joe stepped in to break things up, and Coburn fell and split his skull. Within minutes, the police were on the scene, he had blood on his hands, and there were two men lying in the gutter, one of them dead.

  Justice, he’d soon learned, was pretty basic in little banana republics, especially when one of their own was involved. Before he knew it, he was in the slammer and the rest of the crew had set sail.

  He survived the next months on memories of Rosemont Lake’s clear, unpolluted water, on the smell of clean sheets dried in the sun on his mother’s washing line, the taste of her apple pie still warm from the oven. Clichés every one, but they kept him from going mad.

  And sometimes, when the moans of other prisoners filled the night, he dreamed of Imogen in a long white dress, and how she clung to him and wept in his arms, and how he’d made her smile again. He’d wondered if she remembered him, if he’d live to see her again, if there would ever be another time when she’d turn to him. But never, in his wildest imaginings, had he thought he might have left her pregnant.

  Was that what he’d done? And if so, what had happened to the child?

  He drained his glass, grabbed the bottle and stepped quietly to the end of the porch where the old hammock hung. It was going to be a long night. He might as well make himself comfortable.

  Imogen was up and on the road by eight, her mind refreshed by sleep, her fears of the previous night washed away. It was seeing Joe Donnelly again that had done it. Being close enough to touch him. Of course she’d been shaken up. Who wouldn’t be?

  Still, she wasn’t about to take a chance on running into him again. She read in the local paper of an estate auction at a farm near Baysfield, a small market town about two hours’ drive away, and planned her escape.

  She arrived in Rosemont just after four, half a dozen gorgeous quilts on the seat next to her, and went straight to Deepdene. Her mother answered the door. And even after all those years apart, the best she could come up with by way of welcome was to say plaintively, “Oh, it’s you, Imogen.”

  Deciding such a tepid reception hardly warranted an offer to kiss her mother’s delicately rouged cheek, Imogen said, “Yes, Mother. How are you?”

  “Well, I’m...surprised. When Molly gave me your note, I hardly knew what to think.”

  Imogen suppressed a sigh. What had she expected? That the leading light of Rosemont society might have undergone a transformation and become suffused with such an uprush of maternal feeling she’d fling her arms around her only child and call for the fatted calf to be served for dinner? Hardly! On the other hand, the air of poised self-confidence that had been Suzanne’s trademark was missing. She seemed diffident, nervous almost.

  “Is it so surprising that, since I’m in town anyway, I should want to see you?” Imogen asked gently.

  “But why now, after so many years?”

  “Because there are matters to put right between us, Mother, and I’ve...missed you.”

  “Well,” Suzanne said doubtfully, “I suppose you’d better come in, then.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  IMOGEN followed her into the formal drawing room, where Suzanne always received visitors.

  “Would you care for some tea, Imogen?”

  “I’d love some. Do you still have it served in the sunroom?”

  “My daily ritual.” A small smile touched her mother’s face. “How nice that you remember.”

  “Of course I do. It was quite a shock yesterday to find you’d broken the habit.”

  Suzanne got up and fidgeted with the triple string of pearls around her neck. “Yesterday I had...an appointment.”

  Imogen saw suddenly that the years had not been kind to her mother. In fact, she looked positively unwell. “Have you been ill, Mother?”

  Affronted, Suzanne straightened her spine and cast Imogen a glare. “Certainly not. Why would you suppose such a thing?”

  “You seem a little tired.”

  “I hav
e been busy as, I am sure, have you.” She tagged the bellpull hanging beside the fireplace. “I’ll order tea, and you can tell me what you’ve been doing with yourself since you moved to the west coast. Are you still an interior decorator?”

  “Yes,” Imogen said, following her across the hall and into the huge solarium.

  “I’d have thought,” her mother said, perching on the edge of one of the sofas and crossing her still-elegant ankles, “that the trust fund from your father would have precluded the need for you to go out to work.”

  Her tone suggested that earning a living ranked only slightly above picking pockets.

  “I like to be busy, Mother, and I enjoy the work.”

  “Do you own the company, dear?”

  “No.”

  “How odd. I don’t believe a Palmer has ever worked for someone else. But then, you’ve never behaved quite as I expected.”

  “Especially not the summer I graduated from high school.”

  The maid wheeled in a brass tea trolley just then, and Imogen knew from Suzanne’s flared nostrils and raised brows that this particular topic of conversation was temporarily off-limits.

  She waited until they were alone again before pursuing the one subject she was determined to discuss. “I’m sure you’d prefer that I not bring this up, Mother, but I think you and I need to talk about that time.”

  “Why would you want to dig up history best forgotten?”

  “Because I lost more than a baby. I lost a mother, too. And you lost a daughter. And it strikes me as a terrible waste that we’ve let so much time go by without repairing the damage to our relationship.” She looked around the vast room. “This used to be my home. It’s part of me, of who I am. But this is the first time I’ve been back since you sent me to live with your cousin Amy.”

  “You could have come home again.” Suzanne hesitated before adding, “Afterward.”

  “But I stayed away to punish you, Mother, because for a long time I felt you had abandoned me when I needed you the most.”