Courting Disaster

by Joanne Pence

  Hannah frowned with worry, but then she nodded.

  As Angie and Stan walked down the hall, Stan paused at the nursery. “Let me take another quick look at Kaitlyn.”

  Baby Jones was sleeping, but that didn’t stop Stan from waving and making comical faces at her. “Can you believe I actually saw her being born? Being born! It was like…so amazing!”

  He stood so straight and stepped so high as they walked down the hall, Angie was surprised he didn’t bump his head on the ceiling.

  “I’m so glad you called me, Hannah. I was worried about you.” Dianne Randle’s matronly face was lined with concern. A woman of about fifty-five, she added no color to her short gray hair, and no makeup detracted from the piercing blue of her eyes. Her plump figure gave her a motherly air that Hannah, as well as many other young women, found comforting.

  “Thank you for coming,” Hannah said.

  “I checked all the files I could about the young man you told me about. Mr. Bonnette has no record that we’re aware of at Social Services, and I asked one of my contacts in the police department to check as well. He seems all right as far as that goes, but still, are you sure you can trust him? Not every sicko comes with a warning label, you know. Sometimes, they don’t have any until it’s too late.”

  The social worker’s question gave Hannah pause. Over the past month, Dianne had become a friend as well as the one who had guided her through the government blitz of paperwork needed to take part in California’s MediCal program. The sole benefit to Hannah’s low salary was access to free prenatal care, hospitalization for the baby’s birth, and afterward, Aid to Families with Dependent Children benefits.

  Hannah had first learned about the help Social Services gave to unwed mothers through her friend Shelly Farms. Shelly was a strange man—he dressed like one of the homeless, but he was smart, and knew a lot of good people. She’d gone to him when things started to go badly between her and Tyler, and he suggested she go to Social Services.

  When Tyler found out, he’d been furious. He insisted he’d take care of everything, but she’d grown wary of him. If it hadn’t have been for Shelly, she didn’t know how she would have gotten through this period. Lately, though, he’d stopped coming by the restaurant to visit her. She wondered why. He told her he’d always be there to help her, but he wasn’t. It both worried and confused her.

  Now Dianne was raising questions about another man Hannah had put her trust in.

  “Maybe you’re right,” she said. “I should know by now not to trust my judgment.”

  “Don’t write this new one off completely yet,” Dianne advised. “He might be exactly what you need. I take it your boyfriend Tyler knows nothing about this?”

  “Former boyfriend, and no, he doesn’t.”

  Dianne frowned. “We’re going to have to have a serious conversation about your life and where it’s going.”

  Hannah didn’t want to hear it. “Have you heard from Shelly lately?” she asked. “I haven’t seen him for days.”

  Dianne looked startled by the question. “You don’t know—” She stopped abruptly, then smiled and said, “You don’t know where he is and neither do I. Perhaps he’s simply out finding some lost souls to send me.” She stood and patted Hannah’s arm. “And I’m glad he does. Now, don’t worry so much. Forget about everything but you and that baby. No newspapers, hear? No TV unless it’s a comedy or love story. No depressing news stories, okay?”

  Hannah smiled. “Okay.”

  “Everything will be all right,” Dianne said, her eyes strangely sad. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”

  “Thank you,” Hannah said.

  Angie spent the entire evening from the moment Paavo picked her up until halfway through the dinner speculating about Stan, Hannah, and their relationship. She could tell he was becoming bored, and she didn’t blame him. Stan was one of his least favorite people, especially when he came to believe that Stan would have preferred to be the one engaged to Angie. She had to laugh at the idea of her and Stan, but Paavo was serious.

  He was a lot more interested in her story about a purple cake and a stripper. To her surprise, he was especially intrigued that both callers were women. He seemed lost in thought at that point, and hardly offered any commiseration as she talked about her poor luck at finding the restaurant or banquet hall where her party would be held.

  None of this, however, was the reason she’d wanted to go to dinner with him tonight, and it certainly wasn’t why she’d chosen Moose’s. The only problem was, she wasn’t sure how to get to what she really wanted to talk about. She decided to take a diversionary route.

  “What kind of engagement party have you always wanted?”

  He had just taken a mouthful of food and nearly choked on it. “Do you know how many engagement parties I’ve been to?”

  She shook her head.

  “None. Does that tell you anything?” She must have looked disappointed because he quickly added, “The only party I care about is ours—after the wedding is over. Engagement parties, bridal showers, the wedding reception, even a stag party—I’d gladly do without them. I want you to be my wife, Angie. The rest is so much…what’s the word? Frippery.”

  She swallowed hard, unsure whether to cry or to hug him.

  He took her hand and spoke. “Being engaged is, for me, a time to show the world that a beautiful, warm, loving woman has agreed to be my wife. I know you want a fancy party and a big wedding. They’re important to you, and for that reason alone, they’re important to me. But to tell you the truth,” he said, and she saw the smile in his blue eyes, “I’ll be glad when they’re over.”

  What more could she ask for? She half stood to reach him for a kiss. “You’re right,” she said when she sat back down. “I shouldn’t get so wrapped up in…fripperies.”

  “That’s not what I said at all,” he protested. “You should, because that’s part of what makes you the charming woman I love. But that doesn’t mean I should as well. Being engaged, being married, doesn’t mean we agree on everything, or are in lockstep, it means we respect each other’s opinions, and our differences. You love parties; I barely tolerate them.”

  She nodded. “That’s the way my parents have always been.”

  “That’s right.” His mouth turned down. “Your mother welcomed me with open arms; your father hates my guts.”

  “Even after you had lunch with him?” she asked. “Didn’t that help?”

  “We’re working on it,” he said. “But don’t put much hope there. If you can think of anything I should be doing, let me know.”

  “Become Italian,” she quipped.

  He wasn’t in the mood to laugh.

  “I don’t think there is anything,” she admitted, “because the problem isn’t you. When I was still living at home, I’d have a new date almost every week, it seemed, and the only ones he ever approved of were a couple of guys who were sons of friends of his. In both cases, I didn’t go out with either fellow a second time.”

  “So, it’s hopeless,” he murmured.

  “No, not at all. Mamma says he’ll come around in time. He already admits, to her, that I’m happy with you and that’s what matters most. He even admits, to her, that you’re a good man. The next step is to get him to admit those things to us. He’s a stubborn old coot, but his heart is in the right place.”

  “I suppose,” Paavo admitted. “But he’s an expert at hiding it.”

  Chapter 9

  “Wake up. Get the baby. We’re leaving.”

  Hannah opened her eyes to see Tyler Marsh standing over her. Fear gripped her. “What are you doing here?”

  “Let’s go,” he said.

  “I can’t just walk out of the hospital.” She clutched the blankets as if they could protect her from him.

  “Sure you can. No one’s able to hold you against your will. Is the kid a boy or girl?”

  She studied him, trying to determine if he was lying. If he’d looked in the nursery, he would have seen pi
nk ribbons on Kaitlyn’s crib. Or didn’t he care enough to look for his own child? Of course not. Why should that surprise her?

  She hated him even more than she thought possible. “It’s a boy.”

  “A son. Good. Don’t just lie there. Move.”

  “I’m not going,” she said.

  “Yes, you are.” He grabbed her arm and dragged her from the bed. “Where are your clothes? Get dressed!”

  She yanked her arm from him and backed away until the wall stopped her from going farther. “The baby can’t leave. There’s something wrong with his lungs. He’s in an incubator. He was very small.”

  His eyes narrowed as if trying to decide whether or not she was lying. “You said everything was going well, that the baby would be strong and healthy. Hell, woman, you got big as a house. How could the brat be a runt?”

  She felt tears threaten. How had she ever loved this man? “He’ll be fine as long as the congestion clears up and it doesn’t turn into pneumonia. He needs to stay in an incubator a few days.” She prayed that what she was saying made sense.

  He gripped her shoulders, lifting her to her toes, his face too close to hers. She turned her head, sickened by the sight of him, by the memories of all he’d once meant to her. “You’re lying again, aren’t you? We’re wasting time.” He shoved her, and she sprawled onto the bed.

  She scrambled over the mattress, trying to get far from him. “It’s not a lie. Believe me. The baby will be all right. In a couple of days we’ll go with you.”

  He paced, running long fingers through his hair. “What are you doing here anyway? Why aren’t you at that birthing clinic you talked about or SF General? How can you pay for a hospital like this?”

  “The maternity ward at SF General was full. They moved me here.”

  “Why didn’t you phone me?”

  “It…it happened so fast. I didn’t think I was in labor. I went to emergency because I felt sick, and they told me. How did you find me?”

  “You didn’t want me to, that’s for sure,” he growled.

  She sat up straight, taking deep breaths and trying to bring some semblance of sanity back to their relationship. “I was going to call as soon as the baby was healthy enough to leave.”

  “Sure.” He leaned toward her. “That’s why I had to call all over the city to find you, and couldn’t until I remembered that you often told people your name was Jones. Then I figured that if you were using a fake name, you’d probably left the city. On my third call, I found you.” With a quick movement, he clutched a handful of her hair, jerking her head close and forcing her to look him in the eye. “Now, why don’t I believe that you planned to tell me where you were?”

  Tears filled her eyes. “Of course I was going to tell you. Where else would I go?”

  He gave a hard tug on her hair, hurting her. “We made a deal. Don’t ever forget it. All this makes me very suspicious of you, Hannah.”

  “I’m not backing out of anything,” she cried, desperate for him to leave her alone. “Maybe the baby will be all right tomorrow. Come back then. I’ll talk to the doctor about letting him go home.”

  “Good girl.” His voice was low, almost a growl. “Very good girl.” Then he put his hand under her chin and tilted her head. He met her lips with his in a soft kiss, a loving kiss, the kind he used to give her when they first dated.

  Stunned, aching for the warmth and gentleness from him she’d once adored, she allowed it until she realized what a sick, lying bastard he was and pushed him hard away from her.

  He put his hands on his hips and smirked. “You’d better not be lying to me, Hannah. Remember that.”

  With the unspoken threat hanging in the air, he turned and swaggered from the room.

  Angie was sitting up in bed trying to figure out a word for YNNNAGOI when her cell phone rang. She should have been asleep already, but her conversation with Paavo had kept her awake. Once again, she’d turned to crossword puzzles and word jumbles in the newspaper. They helped her clear her mind of other things. They also had a tendency to make her sleepy. She was turning to them more and more these days.

  As she reached to answer the late-night phone call, the answer struck: ANNOYING.

  “This is Hannah,” a soft, timorous woman’s voice said.

  Hannah? She didn’t know any Hannah. Why would someone…Then she remembered. Stan’s friend. It was twelve-thirty in the morning. Had something happened to the baby? Why call her and not Stan? “Yes?” she said.

  “Angie, help me.”

  Angie tucked Hannah’s long brown hair under a blond wig. They were in the women’s room near the emergency entrance. Angie had parked her car there, rather than by the main door.

  Hannah wore one of Angie’s loose-fitting raincoats. The baby was under it, held by Hannah’s right arm while the left one was wrapped in paper towels. From a distance, it would look as if Angie were wheeling out a patient with a broken arm. The broken arm could explain the odd way Hannah sat in order to hold the baby against her.

  The head nurse had been unhappy about releasing the baby, but she had no choice when the mother demanded to leave.

  “I had no idea you were so clever, Angie,” Hannah said as she looked at herself in the mirror.

  “That’s not all.” Angie took out a pair of lightly tinted sunglasses and put them on Hannah. “In the dark, they’ll look like they’re for distance.”

  “No one would ever recognize me,” Hannah exclaimed.

  “That’s what you said you needed,” Angie replied doubtfully.

  “But what about you?” Hannah asked. “You’ve been to the restaurant. Tyler will recognize you.”

  Angie could have kicked herself. Here she’d prided herself on her fast thinking ever since getting Hannah’s distraught phone call, yet she’d forgotten something so basic. “I know!”

  In a supply room, she found a white cotton towel, wrapped it around her head to cover her hair, and pinned it against the nape of her neck.

  “Okay, we’re all set,” Angie said. “But before we leave the hospital, I want you to tell me why you’re so afraid of Tyler.”

  Hannah chewed her bottom lip. “I’ve told you. He’s crazy.”

  “He didn’t appear at all crazy to me, Hannah,” Angie said. Something about Hannah bothered her. She wanted to trust the woman, and yet—

  “I don’t want him to ever touch me or my baby!” Hannah cried.

  “My God! You think he might hurt a baby? Why?”

  “I can’t…I don’t want to go into that.” Hannah pressed her hand to her forehead. “It’ll be better for everyone if you don’t know.” She turned pleading brown eyes on Angie. “He’ll be back tomorrow. I’ve got to leave. Stan offered his apartment. If I could stay there just a day or two, that’s all the time I need. No one would find me there. I don’t want to go to LA with a baby this young.”

  When Hannah called, she said she’d contacted Angie because if the baby’s father was watching and Stan showed up in a taxi, Tyler would see who she left with. But he would never dream she was leaving in a Mercedes. With Angie, she and the baby would be safe.

  Angie had pondered a long time over calling Paavo or Stan about this. The more she thought about it, though, the more she believed that the two women could more easily leave the hospital unnoticed than if either man were with them.

  She didn’t know if she was doing the right thing or not, but Hannah had convinced her she’d leave the hospital that night with or without help.

  Angie hunched over, head bent, and pushed the wheelchair out of the hospital.

  Although the parking lot had a number of different exits, they all funneled onto the same roadway. On that street, Angie noticed someone sitting in a parked car, a dark, older American car of some sort.

  A shudder went through her as they passed it on their way out, and despite her better judgment, she headed toward the freeway faster than the speed limit allowed.

  Paavo was tossing and turning in bed, unable to slee
p as his conversation with Angie at dinner kept replaying in his head. He lived his life using logic and reason, and couldn’t stand her father’s stubbornness about him. It was both illogical and unreasonable. In short, it pissed him off.

  He threw back the covers and sat up. Sal’s words about taking care of the problem himself had troubled him all day. Maybe that was why he dressed, picked up his car keys, and left the house. For someone logical and reasonable, it was neither, but he drove in the direction of Elizabeth Schull’s apartment.

  As he neared her building, he could see, parked across the street from it, an old red Lincoln that took up half the block. Damn! he thought.

  He stopped and pulled into a parking space, then shut off his headlights. As his eyes adjusted to the dark, he could see that the Lincoln wasn’t empty. Sitting in it was none other than Sal Amalfi, watching the apartment. What was he up to?

  Paavo sighed. It was going to be a long night.

  When Stan opened the door to his apartment, the sight of his unexpected visitors vanquished any trace of sleepiness.

  Without a word, Angie shoved past him. Hannah, in a blond wig, gave him a wobbly smile and followed with the baby in her arms.

  “Hannah?” He gaped. “Why aren’t you still in the hospital? Angie—what’s going on?”

  Angie tossed the complimentary hospital bag with formula and diapers onto the sofa. “It’s a long story.”

  “What’s that?” His head swiveled from one woman to the other, and then to the strange paraphernalia on his sofa.

  Hannah looked ready to drop.

  “You need to lie down.” He held her arm to steady her. “The bedroom’s this way.”

  Angie was already ahead of him. While he stood in the doorway, holding Hannah’s arm, she found fresh sheets and remade his bed, then pushed a nightstand out of the way and shoved the bed against the wall. “That should do it,” she said.