For His Little Girl

by Lucy Gordon

  "I was before I met you."

  He raised an eyebrow. "Well, there's no going back to that," he said wickedly, and kissed the end of her nose.

  Then he seemed to hesitate, his face close to hers, his eyes smiling. Her heartbeat became dangerously uneven as she realized that in a moment he would kiss her, perhaps lightly as he'd done in the studio, perhaps more deeply. And she wanted that so much. She didn't care about being sensible anymore. All the long, lonely years without him were an ache that could only be eased by being in his arms. His mouth was just the same-mobile, seductive, promising so much that his body would fulfil. Just one kiss. Just one-

  "Mom-Dad-"

  Luke stood up swiftly. At any other time Pippa would have been amused by the self-conscious smile he assumed. Now she could hardly contain her disappointment. When Luke returned to the kitchen, she stayed where she was, trying to believe it was for the best.

  What about all your good resolutions? You swore this wouldn't happen. Pull yourself together. You're a mother of a ten-year-old daughter, you're not a teenager. You're old enough to know better.

  After a while she got shakily to her feet and made her way back to the kitchen, where Luke was reading the details of the new creation into his computer, and Josie was sampling the product.

  It was late before they finished cooking three different stages of three dishes, but everyone was up early the next day, too excited to sleep. Luke packed everything up with reverent hands and drove slowly to the studio. His two employees were there before him. He was on hot coals as he relinquished his treasures into their hands, and it was only Josie's promise that, "I'll keep an eye on them, Daddy," that reconciled him to the parting.

  "And me," Pippa said, amused. "I'll look after them, too. Of course, I know I'm not up to Josie's standard, but-"

  "Sorry. Yes, please go with them, explain what's what. I'll go and have a word with Ritchie."

  As Pippa joined the little party marching in solemn procession to the kitchen, Ritchie bore down on Luke, all flags flying. "I just know these are going to be the best shows ever," he declared. "Sure you had some problems with new dishes, but I just know you're going to tell me it's all sorted out."

  "You mean you're scared I'm not," Luke said, reading this accurately. "No sweat, Ritchie. I invented two completely new recipes, with Josie's help."

  "Why, isn't that sweet!" Ritchie seemed almost overwhelmed.

  "I knew you'd love it. You're going to love the next bit even more. Josie comes on the show with me-star billing for the day. The next generation."

  "The next-" Ritchie blanched. "You mean you're going to tell people she's your kid?"

  "Sure I'm going to tell them. What's the point of having a kid if nobody knows?"

  "Well, pardon me, but nobody has known for the past few years. I don't recall your rushing to tell the world that you had a growing daughter."

  "Well, I'm telling the world now. It's a wonderful idea.''

  "I don't think so. I really don't think so."

  "She's going to wear an apron and chef's hat that match mine, and she'll look great in them."

  Ritchie took a deep breath and rallied his forces. His smile was ghastly. "Luke, baby, the chicks like to think you're available, know what I mean? Okay, we're all unmarried fathers these days-"

  "You, Ritch? Surely not?"

  Ritchie gulped. "You'd be surprised at some of the guys I could tell you about. But," he added, rushing on before Luke could make an issue of it, 'we don't have to parade it. You've got a reputation as a stud, and you've got to play up to it. When they eat your dishes, the guys tell themselves they can have a wild sex life like Luke Danton, and the chicks feel they've got Luke Danton in bed with them. I've seen some of those hot e-mails you get. And then you come out with a kid? It spoils your image. Get real. Get rid!''

  For the first time it occurred to Luke that he actively disliked Ritchie. In a colder voice than the producer had ever heard him use before he said,

  "It's lucky for you that Josie's out of earshot because if she'd heard that, you'd be in big trouble.She is my daughter, and she is coming on the show with me. Got it?"

  "Got it, got it!" Ritchie said.

  "Plus I want to change the running order. This show goes out first."

  "But that's the day after tomorrow."

  "Right. That way she'll get to see it before she leaves."

  Hope gleamed in the producer's eye. "She's leaving?"

  "Just do it, Ritch. And get it perfect."

  "Yes, yes, whatever you say. Get it perfect, put it on first. Tell all the world. Watch the ratings slump. Cut your throat. Oh, God, I wish I was dead! Derek, my inhaler!"

  Chapter Seven

  Josie was a smash on the show. She had one moment of camera nerves, but her father's arm about her shoulders solved that. Luke introduced her proudly, and then they were off.

  Each show was shot in over an hour, and then the best bits edited into half an hour. For the first forty minutes everything went swimmingly. They made the dips together, Luke the spicy one, Josie the bland one, but then disaster struck. Luke indicated to Josie to move both dips to another area. She lifted his first but her fingers were slippery. The next moment it had fallen to the floor with a crash. Luke surveyed the mess and a grin took over his face.

  "Whoops!" he said.

  "Sorry, Daddy!"

  He tweaked her hair. "You will be. You're going to make the replacement. Come on, tiger, you can do it. Remember what I showed you."

  She nodded and eagerly began assembling the ingredients, while the assistants scrabbled on the floor, cleaning up the mess. Everyone in the studio became intent on Josie, who frowned with concentration, hesitating until Luke said quietly, "That one," then going on confidently. He prompted her once more, and then she swept to the finish with an air of triumph, and her father led the applause. At the end of the show they took their bows together.

  Ritchie was almost sobbing with delight. "Wonderful! Wonderful! We'll keep that bit in the show. They'll love it."

  "You're singing a different tune," Luke observed wryly, but after that he let Ritchie off the hook.

  Father and daughter were euphoric all the way home and for the rest of the evening. A stills photographer had taken shot after shot of them that morning and had a set ready before they left the studio. At soon as they reached home Luke got to work scanning the best pictures into his computer and using them to update the Web site. Supper was Pippa's task, and for once she was able to enjoy herself in Luke's kitchen without him hovering nervously over her, since he was totally absorbed in writing new text, advertising the next show as the best ever, with a new star.

  Josie eagerly offered her help, and was thrilled at the result. But the day had tired her, and she made no protest when Pippa said it was bedtime. Luke came in with them and tucked her in.

  "Did you have a good time today, honey?"

  "Oh, Dad, it was the best! Do you think I could be a TV star?"

  "My girl can be anything she wants to be. Just name it."

  She considered. "I can't decide whether I want to be the greatest cook in the world, or the greatest TV star in the world, but maybe I'll be both-like you."

  He grinned. "Keep going. I can take a lot of that."

  He kissed her and joined Pippa in the doorway, slipping his arm about her before they left the room. She noticed that his smile faded at once.

  "Is something the matter, Luke?"

  He drew her away from Josie's door, and into the big room. "I'm thinking about a phone call I've got to make. My folks always watch the show, and if Josie's going to appear the day after tomorrow-" He floundered into silence, the picture of guilt.

  A monstrous suspicion grew in Pippa. "Luke, does your family know you have a daughter?''

  He shook his head. "Don't get mad at me. If I'd told Mom everything years ago, she'd have come down on me like a duck on a June bug."

  "That's nothing to what she's going to do now."

&n
bsp; "I know, I know. Look, I wish I'd done it but-"

  "But you did what was easiest, as always."

  "Lord, but you sound like her!"

  "I'm a mother, too. It comes with the territory."

  "Okay, so I've got to pick up the phone and explain before she sees the show."

  "Phone, nothing. You get over there and tell her to her face."

  He visibly paled. "You're crazy. You don't know my mom."

  "Are you a man or a mouse?''

  "A mouse! Definitely a mouse!"

  "Do it!"

  "Okay, okay!"

  "Now!"

  "Yes, ma'am!"

  He vanished, and a few minutes later Pippa heard the car being driven away. She wandered out onto the balcony and sat watching the sea. She knew a little about Luke's family. In England he'd shown her photographs of his parents, his younger brother, Zak, seventeen in those days, and his sister, Becky, fourteen. She'd seen the family resemblance that had lain not so much in features as the anarchic grins and the looks of healthy animals that lived as they pleased.

  She reckoned it would take Luke at least a couple of hours, but after only half an hour she saw his Porsche returning. Obviously nobody had been at home, she thought, and he'd come straight back. But then another car followed his into the drive, and an endless river of people streamed out. Aghast, Pippa realized that Luke had brought the family with him, and not willingly, either, if his helpless shrug up to her on the balcony was anything to go by.

  The next moment they were all pouring through the back door, and Pippa was emerging nervously to meet them. Luke's plump little mother surveyed her fiercely. "Are you Pippa?'' she demanded.

  "I…yes-" The rest was lost in a suffocating embrace. Pippa was half a head taller, but somehow Luke's mother still managed to engulf her.

  Then her husband, so tall that it was clear where Luke's height came from, and with a face made for laughter. He, too, hugged her, with a great roar of delight. Zak was the same as in his picture, a younger version of Luke, not quite so tall, a little heavier, but with the same smile and the same air of knowing the world was his for the taking. Becky had gray eyes full of humor, and a no-nonsense manner than Pippa took to at once.

  They were allowed only a moment before his mother shunted them aside and hugged Pippa again, saying, "We should have met long ago, but better late than never."

  "Yes," Pippa agreed, liking her instinctively.

  Luke made the mistake of putting himself forward. "Mom, why don't we-"

  She rounded on him. "Did anyone speak to you?"

  "No, Mom."

  "You speak when you're spoken to, and be grateful you're being spoken to at all."

  "Yes, Mom."

  Becky and Zak exchanged grins. Luke glared at them, but otherwise subsided meekly. Suddenly a silence fell. All heads turned to the kitchen door where Josie stood rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. Pippa was about to introduce her, but some instinct held her silent. She knew it had been a wise instinct, when Luke slipped his arm around his daughter's shoulders and said simply, "This is Josie. She's mine." He looked down at his daughter. "This is my family-your family now."

  Everyone was waiting for his mother's reaction, and it came quickly. The short woman and the tall child were almost at eye level. They surveyed each other. Then Josie gave her slow, gorgeous smile, and Luke's mom gasped.

  "Clarrie!" she cried. And burst into tears.

  "Who's Clarrie?" Pippa asked under cover of the commotion.

  "She was Mom's kid sister," Becky told her. "She died years ago. I've only seen pictures, but I guess there is a resemblance."

  She, too, was swept up in the introductions, then Zak, then his mom again, then dad. Pippa feared that Josie might find this overwhelming, but not for long. As she'd already proved in the television studio, the child had inherited her father's natural self-possession when "on show." Josie sorted her thoughts out fast, said, "I'd better get dressed," and vanished.

  Pippa followed her and took out some clean jeans and a T-shirt. "Are you all right, darling?''

  "Mom," Josie said, awed, "I've got grandparents."

  "Yes, you never had them before."

  "Isn't it great?"

  "Yes, darling, it's great."

  Luke was waiting as they emerged from the bedroom. "I'm sorry about this," he muttered. "I barely got the words out when they pounced on me and dragged me out to the car. I didn't even get the chance to call you first."

  "It's all right. I'm glad they've taken to her so well. And at least you're still in one piece."

  "I am now. But boy, the earful I got from Mom!"

  "And your father?"

  "No, he lets her do it for him."

  "It's nice that they're so pleased."

  "Are you kidding? This is their first grandchild. They're over the moon. Zak and Becky are pretty thrilled, too, because it takes the pressure off them to settle down and start breeding."

  Zak, who'd come out into the hall, grinned. "Trust my big brother to come to the rescue," he said. "Pippa, she's a great kid. We're all going to love her. And you."

  He followed this up with a hug. Pippa was glad the hall lighting was low so that they shouldn't see the sudden tears in her eyes. All these years she'd thought she knew what she was missing, but there was so much more that she'd never dreamed of. She surreptitiously wiped her eyes and went back to the kitchen with the other two.

  It seemed that Luke's dad would monopolize his new granddaughter. They were seated side by side at the bar, drinking milk shakes and talking nineteen to the dozen. Now and then one of the others would join in, only to be edged out by his dad. Luke's mother surveyed them with great satisfaction.

  "He's found someone his own age at last," she confided to Josie.

  Pippa soon saw that she was right. Between the man of sixty and the girl of ten there was a true meeting of minds. Pippa watched in fascination, beginning to understand Luke as never before.

  At that moment his dad's voice rose in horror. "You mean you've never been to Disneyland?"

  Wide-eyed, Josie shook her head. "Never," she said mournfully.

  "Josie," Pippa said, scandalized, "you stop playing Orphan Annie right now."

  "Don't spoil it for him," his wife said quickly. "He loves the place. Now he's got a cast-iron excuse. You wouldn't want to deprive him of it, would you?"

  "I guess not," Pippa said, dazed.

  In no time Disneyland became the agenda for next day. Zak and Becky had to work, but the other five would drive over to Anaheim. With that point settled the family departed, leaving Luke's house alarmingly quiet.

  Next day she, Luke and Josie drove over to his parents' house. His mom greeted Pippa and Josie as if they'd parted a year ago instead of a few hours, and she took Pippa aside. "I wanted to show you this," she said, holding out a photograph. "It was Clarrie."

  The picture was forty years old and taken by a very basic camera. Even so, Pippa was amazed at the likeness. She was used to thinking of Josie as resembling herself, but now she saw that the child's heart-shaped face was the same as the one in the picture. So, too, was the slight upward tilt of her nose.

  "It broke my heart when I lost her," Luke's mom confided. "Well, I guess I've kind of got her back now.''

  Pippa was shaken. She'd half suspected that the resemblance to Clarrie was an illusion, invented by Luke's mother. The discovery that it was real seemed to change everything in some subtle way. Josie really did belong in this family. She even looked different to Pippa's eyes.

  "I'm glad," she said.

  The older woman eyed her. "You look like a nice girl. How come you didn't want to marry my Luke?"

  "I-what's he been saying?"

  "He says he asked you to marry him and you said no. Isn't that true?"

  Pippa's jaw dropped. "Well, he's got a nerve," she said wrathfully. "He-I-well, yes, technically I suppose it's true, in a sort of way. But I could hear it in his voice that he was only asking out of duty-''
/>   "Duty? Luke?" echoed Luke's mother.

  "Well, there certainly wasn't any other reason. You should have heard how relieved he was when I refused!"

  His mother's eyes were kind and shrewd. "So, no meant yes, right?"

  "Right! At least, it would have been if he'd really wanted me, but we sort of had a deal-no strings, and so I, well, you know-"

  "Sure I know. He's my son. And his father's son, heaven help us all!"

  Pippa was breathing hard. "So he played the injured innocent, did he?"

  "And good!"

  "I can just hear him. 'Mom, I wanted to marry her, but she brushed me off.' I'm going to make him sorry he was born."

  "Hey, that's a mother's privilege. You wait in line."

  "No, you wait in line," Pippa said firmly. "The first bite belongs to me."

  His mother chuckled. "Be my guest."

  "Maisie, are you coming?" Dad called.

  "You hush up!" she told him. "I'm talking to my daughter-in-law."

  "Mrs. Danton-" Pippa said hurriedly.

  "Mom!"

  "Mom, I'm not-"

  "You are as far as I'm concerned," she declared, adding, with a belligerent eye on her son on the far side of the room, "and if some people had any sense, you would be."

  It was wonderful to be so accepted, but Pippa had seen the sudden alert look that came into Josie's face, and she took the first chance to mutter in Luke's ear, "Please don't let her talk like that. It might give Josie the wrong idea."

  "I can't help the way Mom talks."

  "You've got to. I don't want Josie thinking we might get married. Please, Luke, this is very important."

  "All right," he said, giving her a strange look.

  They made the trip to Anaheim in his father's car, with his mother sitting up front with him and the other three in the back. His dad was describing Disneyland to Josie, who was listening wide-eyed. Pippa sat quietly, trying to talk herself into a reasonable frame of mind, but it was hard after what she'd just heard.

  Oh, if she could only get Luke to herself for just five minutes! She would kick his shins, stamp on his toes, wring his neck and boil him in oil. And then she'd do something really painful. If she could only think of it. By the time they arrived, her temper had worked up a fine head of steam.