The Heart's Game (The Kelly Brothers, Book 4)

by Crista McHugh

  But for the next nine months, it would be hers.

  ***

  Jenny parked her car in front of the white split-level home in Tacoma’s Stadium District and groaned when she spotted the gold Lexus sitting in the driveway. Dì Tam, her mother’s sister, was back from visiting family in Vietnam. That usually meant a chunk of the conversation would revolve around why Jenny wasn’t married yet, followed by Tam suggesting some good Vietnamese men for her to marry.

  What were they going to say when they learned she was pregnant?

  She would’ve chuckled if it weren’t for the fear she’d have both her mother and her aunt chewing her out for at least an hour.

  The smell of cha gio frying greeted her when she opened the front door, along with the shrill conversation between her mother and aunt from the kitchen. Jenny listened long enough to realize they were gossiping about people they’d grown up with and decided it would be better if she didn’t interrupt them. She tiptoed downstairs to the cool quiet of the basement. “Hi, Dad.”

  Her father stopped tinkering with the old motherboard long enough to lean into her hug. “Hi, Jenny. Does your mother know you’re here?”

  “Nope.”

  “Smart girl.” He went back to the motherboard, his soldering iron in hand. “Think you can help me with this? Tam brought me this broken laptop and expects me to fix it.”

  She pulled up a stool and studied the intricate wires and circuits. She’d lost count of how many hours she’d spent at her father’s side learning about computers. It was where she discovered her love for electrical engineering and what led her to follow in her father’s footsteps. “What have you ruled out?”

  “I think this diode overheated.” He pointed the blackened blob of metal near the processor.

  “And I’m sure that antiquated RAM isn’t helping.” She pulled it out and held it up to the light. “Does Tam realize it would be cheaper to buy a new laptop than try to bring this one into the twenty-first century?”

  Her father chuckled. “But then she’d have to buy a new one when she can get me to fix this one for free.” He picked up the broken diode with a pair of tweezers. “Can you grab me a half-amp diode from over there?”

  She fished through the tiny bins of circuit board parts until she found the diode he wanted. “Did Jason tell you what he and Mike were doing today?”

  “Nope. Just something about meeting with an interior decorator. I don’t know why. They just got finished renovating that house on Mercer Island.” He leaned back over the motherboard and started soldering the new diode into place.

  She took a deep breath. “So they didn’t tell you about our plan?”

  “What plan?” he asked, never looking up from his work. “Are you moving in with them or something?”

  “No, not that.” She released her breath and wondered if she should spill the beans to her father first.

  But before she had a chance, the basement door banged open. “Hue, are you down there?” her mother called from the top of the stairs.

  She inwardly groaned. So much for avoiding detection. If there was ever a need for a cloaking device, it was now. Her mother was like a Klingon. No mercy for the weak. “Yes, Mom.”

  “Why didn’t you come to the kitchen to say hello to me and your Dì Tam?”

  Jenny shared a glance with her father as if the answer was obvious.

  Her father chuckled and nodded toward the stairs. “Go on. I’ll be up in a few minutes.”

  He didn’t have to add that it would be to rescue her. Her parents were the living embodiment of the old saying about opposites attracting. Or, to take the Asian slant on it, yin and yang. Her father was calm and quiet, a man of few words with a Zen-like outlook on life. He firmly believed in serenely accepting what he’d been given and finding the positive in it.

  Her mother, on the other hand, was like a swirling typhoon. Always moving. Always talking. Always wanting change. Instead of being content with what she had, she was always reaching for something newer, bigger, better. But it was her drive and seemingly endless energy that allowed their family to rise from their humble beginnings to the middle class life they enjoyed now. When she and her husband moved to the US from Vietnam forty years ago, they were newly married teenagers with only a basic understanding of English and barely enough money to pay for the evening’s meal. Jenny’s mom worked long hours, first as a seamstress and then in a nail salon, while her father got his engineering degree on a student visa. Now that her mom no longer needed to work, her time was spent meddling in her children’s lives.

  Jenny climbed the stairs and was met with a disapproving frown.

  “What are you wearing?” her mother asked.

  Jenny looked down at her T-shirt that read “Resistance is Futile (if <1 ohm)” and grinned. “Engineering joke.”

  “I told you to dress nicely.”

  “It’s too hot to dress nicely.” Especially when her parents lived in a house without air conditioning. After she’d managed to pull herself together this morning, she’d opted for comfort. A favorite tee, broken-in shorts, and flip-flops were the order of the day.

  “You didn’t even paint your nails.” Her mother pointed at her feet and started jabbering in Vietnamese to Dì Tam about how children were lazy these days. “Go to your room. I have clothes for you.”

  Jenny knew better than to argue as her mother pushed her down the hall to the room where she’d spent her teen years. Little had changed since then. Math and science trophies filled the top shelf of the bookcase, with rows of thick fantasy and science fiction novels below. A Mystery Science Theater 3000 poster with curling edges still hung on her wall between a Star Wars one and an autographed Jean-Luc Picard photo.

  But lying draped over the bed was a bright pink áo dài.

  She could already feel the tight confines of the dress squeezing her chest. “You’re not expecting me to wear that, are you?”

  “Dì Tam brought that back from Vietnam for you,” her mother said with a heavy dose of guilt.

  Jenny wrinkled her nose. “But it’s pink.”

  “You look good in pink.”

  “Mom, how many times do I have to tell you that I don’t like pink?”

  “And that is why you don’t have a husband.” Her mother gave an exasperated sigh and shoved a bottle of pink nail polish into Jenny’s hand. “At least paint your toes before dinner. We’ll have a guest.”

  A mix of both English and Vietnamese curses formed on the tip of her tongue, but she bit them back like an obedient daughter. It was the thin line she always walked with her mother. She didn’t want to completely rebel, but at the same time, she refused to be the demure daughter her mother wanted her to be. She’d paint her toes if that would appease her, but she drew the line at wearing the áo dài for a dinner guest. This was a family dinner, not a formal event.

  When she reemerged from her bedroom ten minutes later, her aunt was gone. “Where did Dì Tam go?”

  “To get some last minute things.” Her mother forced a pair of bamboo chopsticks into her hand. “Here, stir the bún.”

  Minding the boiling pot of vermicelli rice noodles was probably the only thing her mother trusted her to do in the kitchen. Too many hours in the basement equated to not enough time in the kitchen learning the intricacies of traditional Vietnamese cuisine. Jason was a far better cook than she was, and she suspected as soon as her brother arrived, he’d be recruited to assist their mom with the bánh bột lọc lá.

  Jenny tested the noodles for doneness and moved the pot over the sink to drain them. After rinsing them off with cold water, she turned to her mom. “Anything else?”

  “Yes, you can go back to your room and change your clothes,” she replied without pausing from wrapping the shrimp filled dumplings in banana leaves.

  “Not happening.”

  Thankfully, the front door opened before an argument erupted between them. “Hi, Mom,” Jason called from the entryway. He appeared a few seconds later in the k
itchen to place a kiss on their mother’s cheek. “It looks like a feast here. What’s the occasion?”

  He slid his gaze toward Jenny, silently asking if she’d shared their good news yet.

  She shook her head as their mom answered, “Tam is back from Vietnam.”

  “And is that the reason you asked if I could leave Mike at home?” Disappointment mixed with a touch of anger laced his words. Although Jason was their mom’s favorite, she’d never truly accepted his sexual preferences and only begrudgingly attended his wedding to Mike last year.

  “Too many Vietnamese here,” their mom replied without looking up from her work. “He’d feel like an outsider.”

  “Not if you spoke English around him. I’m trying to teach him, but there’s only so much he understands.” He moved from the kitchen island where their mother was preparing the bánh and jerked his head toward the backyard, signaling Jenny was free from kitchen duty. “Let me help you with these, Má.”

  Jenny ran for the door before her mother found another reason to nag her and found Mike leaning against the deck, looking cool and collected in a pale yellow polo and pastel plaid shorts with a beer in his hand and a smug smile on his face. He offered her a soda pop from the ice chest beside him.

  “You came anyway, huh?”

  “One day your mother will succumb to my charms and good looks.” He glanced down at her feet. “She made you do your toes again.”

  “As always.” She opened the can of pop, but paused before she took a drink. “Do you think it’s safe for me to drink this?”

  “It’s caffeine free and made with real sugar.” He took a long drink from his beer. “Any reason why your mom asked me not to come tonight?”

  “I have a sneaking suspicion it has something to do with Tam.”

  “She’s back?”

  Jenny nodded and took a sip of the pomegranate soda. “And I’m fully prepared for the matchmaking efforts.”

  “Just tell them you’re gay,” he teased with a wink. “That worked for Jason.”

  She laughed and leaned against Mike, enjoying the cool breeze that blew in from the water a few blocks away. “I have a feeling our news will have the same effect.”

  “Nervous?”

  “ ‘Nervous’ doesn’t begin to describe it.”

  Her father joined them and fetched a beer from the chest. “Fixed it.”

  “Dì Tam will be so happy.”

  Her father nodded and flicked his gaze over her outfit. “So you didn’t change your clothes?”

  “Nope.”

  “Good girl. I like that T-shirt.”

  As an electrical engineer, he would. At least she had her father’s approval.

  Her father then started talking to Mike about his latest case. Both Jason and Mike were lawyers and worked at the same firm, although in different fields. Jason’s expertise was in the field of environmental law, while Mike was a corporate litigator who handled the cases for some of the biggest businesses in Seattle. He divulged what he could, mainly that people were stupid, but steered the conversation toward the upcoming Seahawks season and how they’d defend their Super Bowl title.

  Half an hour later, Jason joined them outside. “I’ve officially been banned from the kitchen.” He took a beer from Mike and wrapped his arm around his husband’s waist.

  The list of reasons why was a mile long, from tampering with their mother’s secret recipes to bringing Mike to dinner. “What for?” she asked.

  “This time, for suggesting that you were quite capable of finding your own husband.” He swirled the beer in his bottle. “I have the sneaking suspicion Tam left to fetch a potential groom for you.”

  They turned to their father, who merely shrugged in confirmation.

  “Damn it!” Jenny slammed her can of soda down on the nearby patio table. “She knows better than to try that shit with me.”

  Jason took her hands and waited for her to calm down. “It’ll be okay, Jenny. We’ve got this. Just sit between me and Dad, and we’ll get through dinner without too much indigestion.”

  The front door opened again, this time with Tam proclaiming her arrival. Mom followed with the call for them to come in for dinner.

  Sure enough, when they got to the table, there was a slender, well-dressed man in a dark suit standing next to Dì Tam. Her aunt gave her a strained smile and said in Vietnamese, “Hue, I’d like for you to meet Duong. He’s from the same village your mother and I grew up in.”

  Jenny matched her aunt’s smile, trying to not wince at the use of her Vietnamese name, and replied in English, “Nice to meet you, Duong.”

  Before her aunt could suggest she sit next to the potential bridegroom, Jason and Mike flanked her and pulled out the chair between them. “Let’s have a seat and enjoy the delicious food Ma and Dì Tam made,” her brother said.

  Jenny sank into the chair and watched the frown deepen on their guest’s face as he took in her appearance. No doubt he was promised a modest, quiet woman, not the sloppy girl in cutoffs and flip-flops. But it didn’t matter. One way or another, he’d end up like the previous suitors her mom and aunt had tried to pair her up with.

  Dinner was a tense affair. The conversation was mostly in Vietnamese, despite her and Jason’s efforts to steer it back into English so Mike could follow along. Their guest’s tight lipped disapproval only deepened with each course. He only spoke to Dì Tam or her parents and stiffened when he finally realized that Mike was Jason’s husband. By the time they got to the bánh bò for dessert, he appeared to be forcing himself to endure their company.

  That was when the matchmaking pitch began.

  “Hue is an engineer,” Tam started. “She makes very good money working for Microsoft and has her own home.”

  Which was code for “She’s rich and has a place that could hold plenty of relatives.” Jenny’s cheeks burned, and she played with the sweet, flaky cake in front of her.

  Duong nodded, some of the boredom vanishing from his eyes.

  “Hue, Duong comes from a very old and respected family back home. He would make you a good husband.”

  Her stomach knotted, and she set her fork down. Time to let her aunt down gently. “I’m flattered he would consider me, but I’m not looking for a husband right now.”

  “But hue, you should get married before you get too old. You’re already twenty-six.”

  “I’m thirty, Dì Tam.”

  Duong’s eyes widened, and he turned to her aunt and said in a hushed hiss that he’d been told she was younger. The plot became clearer as the whispered conversation continued. He’d only agreed to meet her because she was a US citizen, and her confidence took another blow. She was nothing more than a green card to him, and even then, he was questioning whether or not she was worth it. She was too skinny, too slovenly, too outspoken. Embarrassment swirled inside her chest, bleeding out in her flushed cheeks until she could no longer bear it.

  “I’m pregnant,” she announced to everyone at the table.

  Her mother and aunt wore matching wide-eyed, open-mouthed expressions of shock, but Duong managed to clamp his jaw shut.

  “Are you just saying that to be difficult?” her mother asked.

  Jenny shook her head and crossed her arms over her stomach. “I’m pregnant, and it’s Mike’s child.”

  That was the breaking point. Duong threw his napkin on the table and pushed his chair back in a huff, calling her a slew of insults that implied she had loose morals. Her mother and aunt rose with him, trying to convince him otherwise, but he was already headed for the door. The two women chased after him into the front yard, the slamming door finally silencing their pleas.

  Jenny continued to stare at her half-eaten dessert and waited for her father to reprimand her.

  Instead, he asked, “Was this the news you wanted to share?”

  She nodded, unable to read his reaction from the tone of his voice.

  Jason wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “A few months ago, Mike and I asked Jenny
if she’d consider being a surrogate for us since she’d be able to give us the closest thing to our own child. She agreed, and we just found out this morning that she’s pregnant.”

  Her father leaned back in his chair, his chin in his hand. “And you slept with Mike?”

  Mike coughed and cleared his throat. “Actually, we did artificial insemination. I love Jason too much to cheat on him, especially with a woman.”

  “My confidence is really taking a nosedive here,” she rebutted, her voice dry with sarcasm.

  Mike placed a kiss on her temple. “I didn’t mean it that way, Jenny. Next to my mama, you’re the only woman I love.”

  Her father continued to mull over the information for another minute before nodding. “Then it is happy news. Congratulations.”

  Her father’s calm acceptance contrasted with the banging of the front door and her mother’s livid expression when she returned to the dining room. “I can’t believe you would sabotage everything Tam and I worked so hard for. You had a man willing to marry you, and you had to announce that you’re a slut who slept with your brother’s husband. You have disgraced our family. Now you will never find a man who’ll want to marry you.”

  She then ran toward her bedroom and slammed the door. Loud wails echoed through the house, and her father rose from the table with a heavy sigh. “I’ll go talk to her. Once she realizes she’ll finally be a grandmother, she’ll be happy.”

  Jenny remained at the table, waiting for her parents to reappear, but her mother’s angry shouts continued to come from the bedroom. After ten minutes passed, she decided it was time to leave. “I’m going home.”

  Jason and Mike nodded, holding hands as they stood, and followed her. “Just give Mom time,” her brother said quietly. “Like Dad said, once it sinks in that she’ll have a grandchild, she’ll come around.”

  “I hope so.”

  But the sinking feeling in her gut warned her it would be a long time before her mother let her forget about this. She’d managed to make her brother and Mike happy, but she’d never felt more miserable in her life.