Michael's Father (Harlequin Super Romance)

by Melinda Curtis

  “Help me. She’s gone,” she choked out.

  Blake rushed to the bedside, stepping between Cori and her mother. “Sophia?” He checked her pulse. Cori leaned past him to watch. After several seconds, Blake lay Mama’s hand gently down on the bedspread, then took a few steps back, his eyes never leaving Mama’s face.

  “Do something,” Cori pleaded. Blake was always quick to speak, quick to react. Why wasn’t he doing anything? Mama hadn’t drawn a breath in over a minute.

  Blake regarded Cori silently with red-rimmed eyes.

  “Please.” Tears spilled over Cori’s cheeks. “She was just talking to me. She’s back. She came back….” Her voice trailed off as she realized Blake’s attention had shifted. He was looking at the paper next to the telephone. Cori found herself looking at it, as well.

  Yes, Blake always knew what to do. Cori felt ashamed for wanting him to go against Mama’s wishes. Keeping vigil at her bedside hadn’t been the same since Mama had come home from the hospital.

  Cori swallowed her grief and reached for the telephone. The plastic was cold and hard in her hand.

  Footsteps pounded on the back stairs. The steps were too quick to have been Maria’s.

  “Michael,” Cori whispered. She didn’t want him to see his grandmother like this. “Could you…” She couldn’t look at Blake, could only stare at the phone. Cori sniffed and tried again. “Could you take Michael to your house? I don’t want him to see this. Jen, too.”

  Not waiting for his answer or to watch him leave, Cori punched the three digits for emergency services. When the operator came on the line, she somehow managed to speak.

  “My mother just died.”

  When Cori hung up the phone a few minutes later after also calling Luke and her grandfather, she stared down at her mother, smoothed a stray lock of gray hair into place and then kissed Mama’s cheek.

  “Everything’s going to be okay, Mama.”

  CORI STUMBLED DOWN the hallway in her nightshirt to her mother’s room, half expecting to find her mother resting in bed, ready to be helped to the bathroom, yesterday’s events all part of a bad dream. Instead, she found Luke, sprawled across the small sofa, illuminated by the gray light of dawn creeping into the window. A quick glance to the empty bed, bedspread pulled up, pillows plump in their shams, confirmed her worst fears.

  Mama was gone.

  Luke stirred, stretched and groaned. Cori turned to find his heavy-lidded eyes upon her.

  “You could have slept in your own bed last night,” she commented, fighting the tears.

  “It just didn’t seem right.” He pulled himself upright, only to slouch beneath the blanket, tilting his head to the ceiling. “Nothing seems right.”

  “We were there for her at the end. It’s what she wanted.”

  Luke shook his head. “You were there for her. I was working, like always.”

  A sound at the door drew Cori’s attention. Her grandfather stood in the doorway, leaning on the doorknob and staring at Mama’s bed. He looked worse than Cori had ever seen him, pale and drained of energy. His clothes were wrinkled, as if he’d slept in them.

  “No one goes to work today,” Cori found herself saying sharply, blinking back the tears.

  Her grandfather looked at her through misty eyes. She’d never seen him cry.

  “No one goes to work for the next few days,” Cori repeated.

  Her grandfather gave a quick nod, swaying from the movement.

  Cori feared he would fall. “Luke, help me put him back to bed.”

  Fully expecting indignant protests, Cori was surprised when her grandfather said nothing. They each draped one of his arms over their shoulders, guided him back to his bedroom and then helped him into bed.

  Cori wondered if this would be the tragedy that finally broke him.

  SALVATORE DID NOT WANT to be in the Sonoma Hills Mausoleum. The floors were white marble, the walls were white marble and the urns were brass. Everything was starkly cold. Why had his darling Sophia wanted to spend the rest of eternity here?

  Salvatore sat in a folding chair facing the urn holding Sophia’s ashes. They should have spent more time together. But the business…. He lowered his head and blinked back his tears.

  Show no weakness.

  The pain was easier to bear when Salvatore lost himself. The priest’s voice droned oddly over him, his words hard to follow as they echoed through the place, weaving in and out of the fake birdsong that was piped in.

  Finally, the service came to an end. Salvatore shuffled into the receiving line, mumbling thanks to those who tried to speak to him. Their faces became a blur of white, held upright by stiff black tree trunks. He couldn’t begin to remember who had attended and who hadn’t. Perhaps, he thought in a moment of detachment, he shouldn’t have taken two pain pills at one time. Things might have seemed clearer then. More painful, but clearer.

  “I’ll get the car,” Lucas said from Salvatore’s right.

  Blake stood to Salvatore’s left. Corinne had been standing next to Lucas. She and Jennifer each held a hand of his great-grandson. Fine boy, that one. Truly a surprise.

  Salvatore swayed as he tried to focus on the small blur in black. What was the boy’s name? Matthew? Martin?

  Someone gripped his left arm. “Just a little longer,” Blake said. Such a steadfast, dependable man.

  Salvatore’s eyes drifted toward Corinne. He remembered a trip they’d taken one year to an event in San Francisco. The lights and decorations had been no match for the promise of Corinne’s beauty. A shame she’d chosen to leave the family. He could certainly use her strength and spirit now. Why was it she’d left? He couldn’t remember. It didn’t matter. She was family and should be home.

  He tried to tell her that, but his words sounded funny. Slurred.

  “What’s wrong with him?” Corinne stepped closer.

  “Nothing.” Salvatore waved her away, only to list to the right. Salvatore tried to tell Corinne again to stay, but even though he was saying “I want you to stay,” to his ears it sounded like he was saying “I wall you a play.” He moaned in frustration. Why couldn’t they understand him?

  Corinne steadied his other arm. “We need to call the doctor. Jennifer, see that tall man with the gray hair? Ask him to come see me, please.” Her voice rang out commandingly, just like that of a true Messina.

  Salvatore knew what he needed, and it wasn’t any doctor. He needed his family.

  CORI STEPPED OUT INTO the backyard just as the night began snatching the last bit of daylight, chilling the air. Hugging herself in her black wool dress, Cori walked across the paving stones toward the pool and the cushioned glider, her heels clicking in meaningless elegance.

  Upstairs Michael and Jennifer were watching cartoons in the pink room, while the last of the mourners quaffed their sorrows in the flower-filled living room. She’d left her grandfather sitting stony-faced between Luke and Blake, his apparent drug high wearing off. For all his threats about quitting, Blake had certainly rallied around her grandfather, rarely leaving his side during the past few days.

  Cori sank onto the swing, slid out of her shoes and tucked her feet beneath her. The trees shadowed the rapidly darkening sky. In the distance, Cori heard engines turning over and car doors closing behind those who’d paid their last respects to Sophia Sinclair.

  Cori leaned her head back and closed her eyes against the tears. Each of the past three nights numbed the pain of her loss a little more. Each morning she woke up thinking today it would be easier. And it was, until she’d read Mama’s papers that first morning and realized Mama wanted to be cremated, not buried. According to her grandfather, all Messinas earned a plot of land to ground them in the afterlife. It was a family tradition. Cori never would have convinced her grandfather to allow it if Blake hadn’t supported her.

  Then yesterday morning she’d gone through Mama’s address book and called her many friends and acquaintances to let them know today’s schedule. Yes, Mama’s suffering ha
d been brief, she’d told them. They’d like donations to the Cancer Society in lieu of flowers. This morning, when she’d found her grandfather standing in Mama’s doorway again, leaning on the knob with a sorrowful expression on his face, she’d almost collapsed to the floor. He was supposed to be the strong one.

  The one bright spot was that Pierce’s Disease had not been found in the vineyard. Yet. The glassy-winged sharpshooter they’d found was disease-free and no other hoppers had been found.

  The back door clicked open, then closed, followed by slow, heavy footsteps. Cori assumed it was Luke or some mourner seeking the solace of the night, which was fine, except that the footsteps headed her way. Cori hoped it was Luke. She really didn’t want to wear her gracious face anymore tonight.

  Cori opened her eyes and lifted her head, tracking the footsteps as they walked on the other side of the tall hedge and rounded the corner, until the man was silhouetted from the lights in the house.

  Blake. She’d recognize the outline of his frame anywhere.

  He paused and her heart skipped a painful beat. They hadn’t spoken alone since the day she’d told her grandfather Blake was Michael’s father.

  “How are you holding up?” he asked, walking closer.

  As he neared, she heard the creak of new leather. Silly, she thought, that he could walk silently in his work boots and not in dress shoes.

  “Fine.” It seemed like hundreds of people had asked her that same question today and she’d given them that one-word answer, a reassuring smile and directed them to the bar or buffet.

  Blake settled on the glider next to her, bringing the heat of his body into her space. She pulled her feet in tighter, while her heart told her to let them drift toward his warmth.

  “You wouldn’t tell me if you weren’t okay, would you.”

  “No.” She’d been trained to keep emotions inside. Public displays of affection were strictly forbidden. It’d been a tough battle to let her love for Michael show, to coo and cuddle her own baby in front of others.

  “That’s what I thought.” Blake looked down at his hands. “Would it kill you to be honest with me? To share your feelings with somebody?”

  There’d only been two people Cori had ever shared her emotions with—her mother and Blake. Now she had no one. She’d give anything to have a beer, or anything she could put in her hands to keep them occupied, to stop them from shaking and provide her with a social prop. “I have to hold it together.”

  “For who? I can see you’re stretched to your limit.”

  “For her.” The word nearly choked her. Quickly Cori added, “She was always so perfect. She knew the right thing to wear, who to invite, what to serve, what to say. How can I live up to that?”

  “You can’t.”

  “That’s right. Even you know I didn’t do her justice today.” She rubbed her long wool sleeves, trying vainly to warm herself up. “That eulogy. What was I thinking? Believing I had anything worth saying.”

  “Everyone was touched. You captured her warmth and humor by sharing those stories. I’d never heard them before and I felt it. People came away knowing you loved her, feeling your loss.”

  “I should have come back sooner.” Cori sniffed and wiped away a pocket of tears in the corner of her eye with one finger. They both knew why she hadn’t come back sooner.

  He had nothing to say to that.

  “All this time—” another sniffle “—I thought I wanted to come back here and be a part of this.” She struggled to fill her lungs with air. “But it’s really her. She was home. And now she’s gone.”

  And then she was crying. Cori reached into the cuff of her sleeve for a folded tissue, blew her nose and dabbed her wet cheeks, noticing that Blake didn’t offer her the solace of his shoulder or any words of comfort. The wedge of his rejection ripped her heart further. Suddenly, she wanted to hurt him.

  “It looks like you’re a part of the family now.” Then she blurted, “We’re leaving tomorrow morning.”

  “I want visitation,” Blake retorted just as swiftly, as if he’d anticipated where the conversation was going.

  “Fine.” Cori slid her feet back into her shoes, then stood with her back to him, needing that distance to protect her heart. “Every other weekend.”

  “I want to tell him I’m his father. He’ll take it better if we do it together.”

  Cori sniffed again rather than responding sarcastically to his phrasing. They were never going to be together. She’d always be alone. “We can tell him when you come down to L.A.”

  “Let’s tell him now.”

  “Not now. He’s just lost his grandmother.”

  “I can understand if you’re not up to it tonight. We will do it in the morning.” His tone rang uncompromisingly firm.

  “Fine. Right after breakfast.” Cori started to walk away, but paused at the hedge that hid her from the house, needing to set the record straight because her heart still yearned for his understanding. “I just want you to know that I told you about Michael that night because I was afraid Michael would have no one if something happened to me. I didn’t tell you because of any deal. I needed to know he’d be safe.” She confessed it all with her back to him, because she was a coward and didn’t want to see the contempt and disbelief on his face.

  When he didn’t immediately reply, she fled the night, back into the false security of the house.

  “WE’RE GOING HOME today, Mommy?”

  “Yes.” Over the past few days, Cori had packed away the mementos of her childhood. Now, as she bustled about the room folding, rolling and tucking clothes and other items into their suitcases, the pink room looked rather empty. She’d even found her diamond earrings hiding in plain sight on the desk. She’d thought those were lost forever. “When I’m done packing we’ll have some breakfast, then get on the road.”

  Luke had said his goodbyes an hour earlier before he’d left for work. She hadn’t spoken with her grandfather since the argument days earlier about Mama’s last wishes.

  Someone knocked on the door.

  “It’s Jennifer.” Michael hopped up to answer it. They’d become quite close over the past week. “Oh, hello.” Michael opened the door wider, a smile on his face.

  “Morning. I made pancakes for our goodbye breakfast.” Blake smiled down at his son, ignoring Cori. With circles under his eyes, he looked as worn out as Cori felt.

  Michael looked at Cori expectantly, as if the invitation had included her, which it hadn’t.

  “I’m just finishing up. Michael, why don’t you go down and start?” Cori didn’t have an appetite. She’d promised Blake they’d tell Michael today, but she wanted to postpone the inevitable just a little longer.

  Michael looked from one adult to the other. “I don’t like pancakes.” Michael plopped back down on his sleeping bag, suddenly reluctant to go.

  “Michael, that’s not true,” Cori said.

  “You never eat pancakes with us, Mommy,” Michael accused.

  Blake held up a hand to stop Cori from answering. “She’ll be right down.” Blake knelt next to Michael, who kept his eyes glued on the television.

  “No, thanks, sir.”

  Blake winced at being called “sir.” “They’re hot and the chocolate chips are melting,” Blake tempted, not giving up, but looking far from happy now.

  Zoop, zoop, zoop. Michael rubbed his feet over the sleeping bag, while casting a sideways glance at Blake. “The good chocolate chips?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Blake said, brightening.

  “Okay.” Michael stood up slowly. “But Mommy needs a goodbye breakfast, too.”

  “YOU MAKE THE BEST pancakes,” Michael said to Blake, his mouth full of his second one.

  “I’d like to make you pancakes every weekend.” It was true. He’d grown to love the little guy. It tore him apart to think he was leaving. Where Cori was concerned, he was numb, not letting himself feel anything. He’d given their love three chances. He couldn’t let himself risk his heart a
gain.

  “Down in L.A.?” Michael looked confused.

  “Or here.” They’d work out the logistics later, but Blake would see his son as often as possible. He’d take Cori to court to make it happen, if need be.

  Michael took a deep drink of milk that produced a white mustache. “We don’t live here.”

  Smiling, Blake handed him a paper napkin. “I’d like you to. Jen and I are going to miss you.”

  “We don’t live here,” he repeated patiently, as if Blake were the child and Michael the adult.

  “What if your dad lived here?” Blake was getting desperate. He knew Michael wanted a dad. Cori had said they’d tell him together this morning, but she’d told Blake a lot of things she didn’t mean. Time was running out.

  “Mommy says we can’t have one.”

  “I know, I know.” What was taking Cori so long? “But what if you could? What if…” Blake hesitated. He should wait. He knew he should. But his need to be acknowledged as Michael’s father outweighed his conscience. “What if I was your dad?”

  “You’re not. You’re my friend. Mom’s friend.” Michael frowned. “Sometimes.”

  “I am your father.” Blake’s heart sickened at the words, as if he were Darth Vader delivering the horrifying news to Luke Skywalker.

  “That’s not true. I don’t have a dad,” Michael said. He was breathing heavily and really working himself up. “I’m telling my mom. Mom!”

  “I’m here, baby.” Cori stepped out of the stairwell and hurried to Michael’s side, looking like a soccer mom, not an ice princess, in a pair of knit shorts and a pink T-shirt.

  Blake shifted uncomfortably in his chair and studied his sock-clad feet. He should have listened to his conscience. Telling Michael he was his father was shocking enough without the one person Michael had relied on his entire life present. What kind of a father was he?

  “He says he’s my daddy. I told you I didn’t want him for a daddy.” Michael glared at Blake, looking most similar to his great-grandfather at the moment, despite the ears.