From Ashes To Flames

by A. M. Hargrove

  It lasted until I opened my desk drawer to get something and there sat the DNA kit I’d ordered. When it arrived, I’d stuffed it in there, still not knowing what to do. Maybe it was time. Maybe today was the day. Maybe knowing would put an end to all of this.

  As I stared at it, time disappeared. My thoughts shifted back to Susannah and the day she told me she was pregnant with Aaron. I was overjoyed. After Kinsley, I was sure she hadn’t wanted another. With her travel schedule and how invested she was in her career, she always said only one. She loved her daughter. I never doubted that. But when the second pregnancy happened, she wasn’t happy about it.

  * * *

  “This is great. You know I’ve always wanted more than one.”

  “You have. Not me. I’m the one who has to carry it. This was unplanned, Grey.”

  “Yes, but you know how much I’ll help raising it. I’m not an absentee father.”

  “Grey, I didn’t mean to imply that. It’s just …”

  “What?”

  “I, uh, nothing.”

  * * *

  Thinking back to that conversation, was she trying to tell me something then? Or was I reading too much into it? I sat and stared at that stupid kit until Marin walked in and asked, “Have you figured it out yet?

  Did she suspect something?

  “What?” I practically yelled.

  Her eyes darted to me, and then the kit. It was plainly written on the box. DNA Paternity Testing Kit.

  “Um, the race. Are you okay?” Her tone was soft.

  When I didn’t answer, she asked, “What’s going on? I know it’s not my business and you can tell me to butt out, but you have a really crazy look on your face.”

  “Yeah, well, it’s not your business.”

  Both her hands shot up, palms facing me. “I get it.” She started backing away.

  “Wait.” She loved Aaron and maybe she could help me think things through. “You … I mean, are the kids up yet?”

  “No. They’re still sound asleep. Aaron will probably be down for another thirty and if Kinsley wakes up, she’ll come down wanting a snack.”

  I shook my head. “So, uh, do you mind if I ask you something?”

  She rested a hand on her hip. “Only if you want an honest answer because I’m not into blowing smoke up someone’s ass just because I think it’s what they want to hear.”

  “I already figured that out about you.”

  “What’s up? And I take it that it has something to do with what’s in your hands.”

  I was holding the box and turning it around and around. “Yeah. Take a seat.”

  She ran her forearm across her damp forehead after she sat down. I took a deep breath and launched into the sordid tale.

  “The day my wife died in that plane crash, I found out she’d been having an affair that had been going on for two years.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Marin

  * * *

  If a bomb had gone off in the room, I wouldn’t have heard it. My jaw sagged. “Say what?”

  “You heard me correctly. See, here’s the thing.” A pained look crossed his features as a cold stab wedged in my heart. “I don’t know if Aaron is my son.”

  “Hang on. You mean she wasn’t careful?”

  “I don’t know. She died, remember? I couldn’t ask her.”

  “But he has your eyes.”

  “Yeah, about that. The man she was seeing had eyes the same color.”

  The coldness pressed down until I didn’t know whether to cry or throw up. This was so sick. Who would do that? What kind of woman was she? I hated to speak ill of the dead but … then again, she didn’t exactly know she was going to die either. “Surely she would’ve been smarter than that?”

  He shrugged. “I never thought our marriage was terrible. Goes to show you how little I knew.” He’d always seemed so strong, so powerful, but at this moment he was quite the opposite. Sitting across from me was a broken, vulnerable man.

  I sat ramrod straight in the chair and mumbled, “Now it all makes sense. Why you’re so detached from him.”

  He hung his head … was it in shame? I didn’t know, nor did I care.

  “I swear I don’t mean to be that way. He’s such a beautiful child.”

  Leaning over his desk, I said, “So what will you do if you find out he’s not yours? Let the baby daddy have him?”

  He lifted his head. “Not possible. He died too.”

  “So why even bother? Why torture yourself?”

  His fingers dug deep grooves into his hair and it brought chills to my body. I didn’t understand. Aaron was innocent. Didn’t he see that? Anger spiked in me.

  “You have the most adorable son up there. DNA be damned. He’s your kid whether you choose to accept it or not. He’s sweet and precious beyond words. God has blessed you with two healthy kids. Let this go and allow him into your heart. I can promise you one thing. If you don’t, he’ll eventually recognize it and will grow up to resent you. Then one day when you have the balls to actually treat him like he’s yours, it’ll be too late. He’ll be lost to you. And the other thing—does it really matter either way? Answer that question. If you can honestly say yes, that you wouldn’t love him just the same, then give him up for adoption. There are couples all over the place that would give their right arms to have a kid like him. Hell, give him to me. I’ll gladly take him off your hands.”

  The misery staring back at me did nothing to soften me towards him. He was only wallowing in self-pity. Yeah, it sucked that his wife cheated on him. Yeah, it was terrible that she may or may not have considered the consequences. But control what you can. That ship had sailed. It was time to move on. My heart ached something fierce for that sweet, adorable child that was missing out on the affection and love from his father and I wasn’t going to back down on that.

  “You don’t understand.”

  “Oh, I do. I know what it feels like to be cheated on, but you have kids to think about. You need to bury those emotions and focus on them. They need you more than you need your self-pity.”

  “I’m not pitying myself.”

  “No?”

  He could lie to himself, but I wasn’t buying it. I grabbed that kit out of his hands.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m taking this.”

  “What will you do with it?”

  “I’m not going to tell you. That way you don’t have to worry about it anymore. Treat Aaron like your son, Grey. I’m not even kidding. You’ll lose him before you even had him.”

  I left in a hurry before he had a chance to say anything. And there was something else. I had called him by his first name. It was something I had never done before.

  Without looking back, I hurried up the steps and jumped in the shower. I didn’t have much time before Aaron woke up. And about the time I was getting dressed, I heard him cry. As I sped toward his room, I was surprised to hear the doctor’s voice from inside. He was in there talking to his son. Well, I’ll be damned. I’m not sure how long this would last, or if it even would at all, but I’d take it just the same. They needed to bond again because they sure as hell hadn’t spent time together since I’d started working here.

  I was in the process of sneaking away when Kinsley careened out of her room, yelling at the top of her lungs. “Marnie, I’m hungry.” She pushed past me into Aaron’s room and in the process, it caused me to stumble into his room too.

  Dr. West looked up at Kinsley’s voice, but his eyes landed on me instead. Fire simmered beneath their surface and my hand flew to my pulse as it felt like the wings of a hummingbird fluttering in my neck.

  “Daddy, you’re changing Aaron’s stinky. You never do that.”

  His gaze never left me as he answered, “Yes, I do, polka dot.”

  “Nah uh. Marnie does.” Then she skipped around the room announcing she needed a snack. “Come on, Marnie, let’s go find something.” She took my hand and tugged me along behind her. I could feel
Dr. West’s gaze scorch my skin as he watched us leave. I braved a quick glance over my shoulder and his hands had stilled in their task as he stared. Why was he doing that? I shivered in response as Kinsley dragged me along. I couldn’t get that intense look or the feeling of it out of my mind.

  We were standing in front of the refrigerator and Kinsley asked, “Well can I?”

  “Can you what?”

  “Have a Popsicle? A red one?”

  “That would be a no. You can have some fruit or carrots and celery, or half of a sandwich.” I was having a difficult time concentrating because of my burning curiosity over the way he gazed at me. Kinsley pouted for a bit but then decided on some apple with peanut butter. She was a big fan of that. I gave her a glass of milk to go along with it and had the same for myself. That’s how the doctor found us when he came down with Aaron.

  “I think the boy is hungry.” With those words, Aaron started kicking. But Kinsley said, “Nope. He wants to dance. See.” I only laughed at her.

  The rest of the day was sort of awkward until Dr. West said, “How about we go to dinner tonight?” Wait, what?

  “Yeah!” Kinsley yelled. Aaron kicked his legs and talked in his own language.

  “I think that’s a yeah for him too,” I said.

  “I need to put him down so he can run that kicking energy off,” Dr. West said.

  “Maybe we need to start him on some foot drills and punting. I’ve never seen anything like it. But then again, I don’t have many comparators,” I said.

  “He does seem to like to move them a lot.”

  “Constant motion,” I said.

  “He wants some clicky shoes,” Kinsley said.

  “I think you want some clicky shoes. And they’re called tap shoes. Or, I’m not sure what the Irish step dancers call them.” I quickly googled them. “This is interesting. I found they’re called hard shoes or jig shoes. The toe pieces and heels are made of fiberglass, so they produce better sound quality. That came from Wiki.” They gave me blank looks. “I thought you might want to know.”

  “Can I get some?” Kinsley asked.

  Dr. West answered, “Only if you’re going to take Irish step dancing lessons. And you have to practice.”

  “Can I?”

  “Ask Marin if she would mind taking you. And we’d need to see where they are held too, because if it’s too far, then no.”

  “Marnie, would you do it?”

  “Only if it’s not too far.” I found myself googling Irish step dancing lessons and found a dance studio that was only about fifteen minutes away.

  Dr. West asked, “Are you sure about this?”

  “Yes, but Kinsley, you have to go through a complete session. No dropping out. Okay?” I said.

  Her head whipped up and down so fast I couldn’t track it.

  “On Monday I’ll call them to see when I can enroll you. How does that sound?”

  “Oh, Marnie. Thank you.” She wrapped her arms around my hips and hugged me. “Now can we practice?”

  “Practice?”

  “You know? Our step dancing.”

  We? There wasn’t any we in this equation. “I’m not sure about that. You don’t know the first thing about it.”

  “We can try. Come on.”

  At that moment, I had a good idea of what it was like to be in the military. Kinsley ordered me around like a drill sergeant. “Marnie, move that table. Don’t forget the lamp. That chair’s in the way. Now the rug.”

  “I can’t move the rug. It’s way too big.”

  “How will we make those clicky sounds?”

  “We don’t have any clicky shoes to begin with, so it won’t matter.”

  “Oh, yeah. You gotta get that thing over there out of the way too.”

  “What thing?”

  She pointed to the big toy box. “That thing with all the toys.”

  “That’s clear on the other side of the room.”

  “But what if we crash into it?”

  “Wait a minute. I’m not dancing, you are,” I reminded her.

  “Yes, you are too. You’re gonna help. Now come on.” She tugged on my hand. “Just move it.”

  She won. There was no arguing with that girl.

  “Now get some dancing music for us.”

  Geesh. What else will she want? A five-piece band?

  I asked the little device in the room to bring up some Irish dance music. Thank God for that. Soon it was playing and Kinsley was dancing.

  “Come on Marnie, you gotta kick out your feet. Like this.”

  Swear to God, thought I was gonna die. I didn’t know what the fuck I was doing. I never did ballet, tap, or any kind of dance, and here she expected me to pull an Irish step dance routine out of my ass.

  So, my feet and legs did their best imitation of what I thought an Irish step dancer would do, only I immediately got scolded.

  “No, Marnie, you don’t move your arms. Like this. See?”

  I watched her and clamped my lips together. Her arms looked like they’d been stapled to her legs and her feet, well, I wasn’t quite sure what to say about those. It seemed one went north and the other went south. And not in a rhythmic way.

  “Now you do it.”

  “Oh, I’m not sure I can follow that.”

  “Pound your toe on the floor and then your heel and kick your legs out. Like this.”

  Good Lord, if I did that, I’d be in a wheelchair for life.

  “Okie dokie.” I went at it again and if someone recorded this, it could possibly go viral on YouTube on how to make an ass of yourself.

  When I finished, Kinsley said, “You don’t learn fast, Marnie. Maybe you should just wait ‘til we take lessons.”

  I wasn’t sure how I was going to break it to her, but there would be no we in the lessons. Hopefully, she would figure that out when I went to buy her clicky shoes.

  The couch was a welcoming reprieve, but as I went to take a seat, I noticed we’d had an audience. Dr. West stood there with a smirk on his face. How long had he been watching and why was he smiling like that? He looked like he carried some major secret. And I wanted to know what it was.

  Without thinking, I said, “Why don’t you give it a go? I think you could be the next superstar.”

  “Oh, I’ll pass. Seeing this little dance performance was plenty for me.” Then he waggled his brows. What the hell was that supposed to mean? Was the stodgy doctor making fun of me? My cheeks flamed as I turned to go and see where Aaron had gotten off to.

  “Aaron is fine. He’s right behind me if you didn’t notice.”

  I hadn’t. I was too busy trying to figure out what my employer was thinking. Then he had the nerve to shock me again.

  “I was wondering if you’d be interested in taking the kids to that amusement park tomorrow. You know the one with all the kiddie rides?”

  Who was this man? Had a good fairy invaded his body and taken over, because he sure was acting strange?

  “Uh, sure.”

  “I’m listening to your advice if you’re wondering.”

  “Oh.” My tongue must’ve disappeared because I was incapable of forming a single syllable.

  “Great. I was thinking we’d leave after we got home from church. Maybe around noon, if that’s okay?”

  He was asking me? And since when did he go to church?

  “That’ll be perfect. It’ll give me a chance to do my run for the day.” I winked at him and walked out, leaving him to ponder that.

  Chapter Twenty

  Greydon

  * * *

  Marin didn’t have a clue. She had gotten to me –gotten behind the walls, the same ones I’d vowed never to bring down. Not only that, she made me hard, so fucking hard, harder than I’d ever been for any woman. My showers were getting longer and longer each day. And my analytical brain wasn’t making any sense out of it. How could I be interested in someone who was sixteen years younger than me? Not to mention she was the complete opposite of Susannah, from her rainbo
w-colored hair to her clothing, which wasn’t anything close to designer labels. But there was something about her. Maybe it was her sass because damn if she didn’t have plenty of it. Or maybe it was the fact she loved my kids. Or had the nerve to stand up to me and didn’t care what I thought—or anybody else for that matter. It made me wonder how she’d acted when she’d taken Kinsley to school. Of course it was summer break now, but as I thought about it, when I went to that program, she’d been alone, no one within striking distance of her. It didn’t seem to bother her, but who knows. If that had been Susannah, she would’ve been holding court.

  The trip to the amusement park was a great idea. She handled the kids like an expert. When it came time for Kinsley to ride certain rides, she was adamant about her not going on one.

  “Absolutely not.”

  “But why, Marnie?”

  “You’ll be sick afterward. And I’m not comfortable with you getting off and throwing up.”

  I chuckled at their banter constantly. Kinsley was persistent as hell and did her best at working Marin over, but Marin was tough. When it came to the important things, she stood strong.

  “Marin is right, polka dot. That ride is way more than you can handle. Let’s go.”

  Marin added, “No more arguments on it or we can call it a day.”

  “What does call it a day mean?” Kinsley asked.

  “It means we’ll just go home.”

  “But I don’t want to call it a day and go home,” Kinsley said.

  “We won’t if you don’t argue with me,” Marin said.

  “Okayyy.”

  We walked around and took Aaron to the little helicopters. They strapped him in while Marin grilled the man about safety. It was clearly a ride for kids his age, as it claimed on the board up front, but she wasn’t satisfied until she saw how slow it went.