by Alison Kent
Her glare grew heated. “I do not scream.”
He wasn’t going to argue, though they both knew the truth. But he did move to stand behind the room’s only chair, planting both hands on the headrest. “Sex is a part of life, Eva. And a big part of what we had... what we have... together. I’m not stupid. I know it’s not everything. But you can’t shrug it off as nothing. If it was nothing, it would be just as good with anyone else. For me, it never has been.”
He took the plunge. “I don’t think it has been for you either. But this is about more than sex. This is about you and me.” Frustration fought with fear. Both grabbed hard at his gut, twisted his nerves into knots. He tightened his hold on the back of the chair to keep from punching through the padded ticking.
He was only going to say this one time. Once was all he could manage. “I’m not asking you to compare. I’m only asking you to think, truly think about what we have. Don’t throw it away without giving it a chance. Because this time I won’t be back.”
Chapter Nineteen
“HE TALKED TO ZACK, Jan. He talked to Zack about sex.” Eva jerked at the tab on her Diet Coke. The cold soda fizzed through the opening in the aluminum can. She wished she had her own tab to pull. Such a practical way to release pent-up fizz. Hers was burning a hole in her stomach.
“So they talked.” Sitting at the Hollings’ breakfast table with Eva in the Sunday morning quiet, Jan readied ten more wooden craft sticks to glue onto David’s Texas history project. “This is a bad thing because?”
“Because Zack is my son. Not Carson’s.” And guiding Zack through life’s adult lessons was her responsibility. Not that of some interloper, even one who claimed good intentions. Why was this so hard to understand? And since when was Jan on Carson’s team?
Traitor.
The traitor snapped a stick in half lengthwise. “I’m assuming Carson has accepted the fact that he’s not Zack’s father.”
“Yes. He knows.”
“But—” Jan gestured with one of the split sticks. “He doesn’t know about your miscarriage.”
“No. He doesn’t know.” Eva wrapped cold fingers around an even colder can and groaned at the mess she’d made of her life. “I just wish that was the worst of it.”
“It gets worse? Wait.” Jan put both hands on the edge of the kitchen table and pushed back. “This calls for more than Diet Coke.”
Eva choked on the sip of soda she’d just swallowed. She waved a frantic hand. “Absolutely not. Alcohol has done nothing but get me in trouble lately.”
“Who said anything about alcohol? Good grief. It’s not even noon.” Jan rummaged through the contents of the cabinet beneath the kitchen bar, and emerged with a blender. “I was thinking more along the lines of coffee. And chocolate. Something smooth and creamy and cold.”
“Oh,” Eva answered, wondering what the combination of acid and sugar and caffeine would do to the ulcer on her ulcer. “I thought you were trying to get me drunk again.”
Jan delivered an arched look Eva’s way. “Excuse me? Who used my scotch to drown her troubles, sorrow, worries, and woes? Which, by the way, you should’ve shared with me years ago without benefit of alcohol because I’m your friend.”
“I know. I know. I should’ve shared a lot of things with a lot of people,” Eva mumbled. Her eyes hurt. Her temples were aching, and she’d had nothing to drink but the soda. The pressure of the truths she’d kept from Carson had inflated her head beyond the fill line. She closed her eyes and collapsed.
“Okay. That’s it.” Leaving the blender on the counter for the moment and relegating the Popsicle sticks and Play-Doh model of the Alamo to the far end of the table, Jan turned her full attention in Eva’s direction. “What big bad secret haven’t you told me?”
“When have I had time to talk to you about anything?” Stress rose to balance on the edge of hysteria. She really did need that pull tab. “If I’m not at Blooms, or at Zack’s ball games, I’m stuck working on his calendar shoots.” Slumping back in her chair, Eva added, “And every time I turn around, I run into the blight of Carson Brandt.”
“You know,” Jan began, sliding a knowing glance from beneath long tawny lashes. “You say his name like a woman with a hankering for his brand of blight.”
“Ha.” Eva slammed the soda can to the table, apologized, and mopped at the sloshed puddles with the paper towel her friend extended. “Hankering? Hardly. Like I need anything from that man.”
“Hmm. Judging by that color in your face, you don’t only need what that man has to offer, you’ve had what that man has to offer. And you want more.”
“Just goes to show that you shouldn’t judge a face by its color,” Eva bluffed, even as the blush of heat crawling up her throat blossomed into what was no doubt a shade of bright crimson.
“So. tell me.” Jan twisted a craft stick between forefinger and thumb, the movement mimicking her prurient smirk. “Is he as good as he used to be?”
“No.” Liar, liar. Pants on fire.
“No? You’ve got to be kidding. I’ve seen the man. You can’t tell me he doesn’t know how to use the motion of the ocean.” The craft stick undulated sensuously over imaginary waves.
Seasick. Eva would think about being seasick. That would keep her from thinking about Carson Brandt in bed. “What do you mean, you’ve seen him? When have you seen him?”
“I give up.” Jan tossed up the stick in frustration. It shipwrecked somewhere on her spotless ocean of blue floor tiles. “He’s been at your house every day for, what? Two weeks at the least.”
“Has not.” Eva cringed. Nice grade-school comeback. “It hasn’t been that long.”
“Not only that,” Jan continued, ignoring Eva’s denial and digging again into the bag of crafts for fresh supplies, “I saw him backing out of your driveway at the crack of dawn this morning. I said hello, waved. Asked him how he was enjoying our mild Texas spring weather.”
Well, crap. How many other neighbors had witnessed Carson’s covert departure? Eva narrowed both eyes. “What were you doing snooping around my driveway at the crack of dawn on a Sunday morning?
“Getting the paper. Gerald wasn’t up yet. At least he wasn’t out of bed yet. He was, uh, sleeping it off, so to speak.”
“Welcome to the club,” Eva mumbled. She’d spent half the morning recovering from her own after sex euphoric exhaustion.
“Aha!” Jan’s hand came down against the tabletop. “So he is better than he was before. I knew it.”
“Better than the twenty-one-year-old stud I knew in New York?” Parking both elbows on the table, Eva cradled her chin dreamily in her palms and gave all pretense of innocence. “Damn straight he is. Who needs a young stud when there are seasoned nearly forty-something studs to be had?”
Jan sighed and mirrored Eva’s pose. “It’s great, isn’t it? To have reached our peak and actually have a man who can perform and not just show up?”
Even in his earlier days, Carson had done more than just show up. Eva’d been too young to know that then. She knew it now and knew it well. He’d been right about the physical between them reaching spiritual heights.
“To dazzling performances,” she said, lifting her Diet Coke in a toast.
Shaking off her dreamy daze, Jan got back to work counting out sticks, using one as a pointer as she talked. “So, if he’s as good as you say he is, will you remind me again why you’re over here whining.”
Oh, yeah. Back to that. “Because he’s butting into my son’s life.”
“I see. He’s telling Zack things you’d rather Zack not be told? Is that it?”
“No. That’s not it.” Eva was beginning to regret running to her friend. Jan always made too much sense. “I mean, I wasn’t there for the conversation, so I don’t know exactly what was said.”
“But he told you what they talked about? When they talked about sex?”
“Only in the most general of terms.” What was the point of whining when her entire whine defense was
being picked apart? Eva felt like a hot-air balloon with a leak.
“Sheesh. I shoulda been a dentist. At least I’d’ve been paid for pulling teeth.”
“Okay. Okay.” Restless, Eva rose to make the coffee. She needed to stay busy, stay focused, stay sane. “They talked about Katie. And about responsibility. And about condoms.”
“Wow. I’m impressed. A man who knows how and when to best use his mouth. What on earth is the problem?”
Whoosh! Eva totally deflated. “I’m the one Zack’s supposed to talk to.”
“Eva. Just because you wiped his runny nose and taught him to tie his shoes doesn’t mean he’s going to talk to you about sex.”
Eva jammed the coffee scoop down in the can. “We’ve always been able to talk about anything.”
“But he’s not a little boy anymore. And you’re his mother.” Jan concentrated on beading a line of glue the length of one craft stick. “I don’t think either one of you would be very comfortable discussing his physical relationship with Katie.”
“He’s too young to have a physical relationship with Katie.” And even as she said it, Eva recognized the mother’s lie for the wishful thinking that it was.
“Face facts, Eva. As much as you may want to believe otherwise, he’s not too young. And you should be glad Zack has a man to talk to. Especially since Carson seems to be saying all the right things.”
“It’s not that what he’s saying is wrong. It’s just...”
“It’s just what?”
Eva wasn’t sure she could put her thoughts into words that would make sense to Jan. Or to anyone who didn’t know Carson like she did. “Okay. He sees what he thinks is a problem? He tries to fix it.”
“So far, so good.”
Shaking her head, Eva pressed on. “Not so good. It’s like talking with Zack. He didn’t stop to think that I, me, Zack’s mother,” she emphasized, tapping fingers to her chest. “That I might approach my son’s problems differently. This time our beliefs coincided. But next time ...”
The coffeemaker gurgled and steamed. Eva inhaled deeply of the aromatic brew. “Carson has this need to make things right. To make things perfect. He’s hard enough on himself as it is. I don’t need him filling Zack’s head with expectations so high they’re inhumanly possible to meet.
Yes, his advice to Zack was needed. And appreciated. But quite frankly, I can’t live through the sort of upheaval Carson would bring to my life. Not again.” Not when she wasn’t sure of his feelings. She had to be sure of his feelings. This time she had to be sure.
“Then don’t. Don’t get that involved.” Jan shrugged. “Call it a vacation fling and then be done with it.”
Leaning her elbows on the counter, Eva buried her face in her hands. It was too late and she knew it. When had her life become so complicated? “I can’t have a vacation fling. I can’t have him hanging around here getting closer to Zack.”
“I hate to say this, Eva. But Carson sounds like he could be a very good thing for Zack.” Jan gave up on the Alamo and turned in her chair to concentrate on Eva. “And good for you as well.”
“Zack doesn’t know about my past with Carson.”
“Why not go ahead and tell him? Not about the miscarriage, but the fact that you two were involved. What could it hurt for Zack to know?”
“Because he likes Carson. Because he talks to Carson. And because he doesn’t know not to tell Carson that I’m not his real mother.” There. The crux of the problem she’d danced around since entering the kitchen. She crossed her arms on the counter- top, beat her head against the X of her wrists, and groaned. Oh, what a tangled web we weave.
“This is where I’m lost,” Jan said. “Tell me again what house of cards would come tumbling down if Carson knew that you weren’t Zack’s mother.”
“Carson knows I’ve been pregnant. And if Zack’s not my son, then...” At Jan’s lifted brow, Eva added, “It was a small slip of the tongue and, trust me, I’ve been regretting my big mouth ever since.”
“Telling him you’ve been pregnant was not a lie.”
“Semantics. I definitely left him with the impression that I carried the pregnancy to term and then gave birth to Zack.”
“So tell him the truth.”
“And say what?” She gestured theatrically with one hand. “‘Oh, Carson, by the way. When I told you that I’d been pregnant? What I meant to say was that I’d been pregnant when I left New York, pregnant with your child, which I later miscarried. And oh, yeah, Zack is not my biological son.’”
Jan gave a considering nod. “It needs a little fine-tuning, but you’ve got the facts straight.”
“Oh, get real, Jan. I can’t say that to him.”
“Why not?”
“It’s been seventeen years. What good is it going to do to tell him now?”
“Have you enjoyed seeing him again? Have you even once, once, ”Jan emphasized, “during the time he’s been here thought what it might be like if he stayed?”
“Yes,” Eva whispered, admitting the elemental truth at last. Along with familiar anxiety, she experienced an overwhelming sense of rightness.
“Then that’s why you have to tell him. Face it, Eva. You’re still in love with the man. You’re too honest to go forward with this relationship without telling him. And you’re too gutsy to give up on him again.”
“I’m not gutsy. I’m flat out scared.” An understatement if she’d ever uttered one.
“Then consider your options.” Jan held up one finger. “You have the vacation fling and cross every appendage you have that Zack doesn’t say anything to Carson.”
“That would mean dogging the two of them every minute. I don’t have the time or the energy to do that.”
“Okay. Option number two.” A second finger went up. “You don’t see him again. You tell him you’ve given the matter some thought but you don’t see any way you two can make a go of this relationship. And then you tell him good-bye.”
“Won’t work.” Thank God.
“Because?”
“Because he won’t leave. Because he’s Carson. Which means he’ll make it his mission to convince me that there’s no way we can fail.” She sighed. “And because I’m not strong enough to deny him that chance.”
“Which means you love him.”
“I love him.”
The gentle look Jan bestowed might’ve been directed at a toddler owning up to a crayon mark on the wall. “Finally. Was that so hard?”
A smile tugged Eva’s mouth. She shrugged.
Jan rolled her eyes. “So, you ask him to stay. And agree to give it a try. A no-brainer decision, right?”
“I can’t,” she wailed miserably. “Don’t you see? To do that I have to tell him about the miscarriage. I have to tell him that Zack is not my son. He’ll hate me for being dishonest. And then I’ll lose him forever. Oh, Jan. What am I going to do?”
Jan took Eva by the shoulders and guided her back to her chair. “You’re going to sit there and come to your senses. And then you’re going to make the only sensible choice. Straight coffee? Or should I add an extra strong, extra rich dose of chocolate?”
Chapter Twenty
TWO NIGHTS LATER, EVA was as undecided as ever. I tell him. I tell him not. I stay with him. I stay with him not. I love him. I love him not.
The last wasn’t even a question. Days ago, Eva had accepted what she’d known all along to be true. There was no man in the world for her but Carson Brandt.
She had loved Zack’s father. Bobby Shelton had been a wonderful husband, a caring and attentive father. a tenderly passionate lover, a compassionate friend. Never, not once, had she questioned his love for her. Nor her love for him.
But he hadn’t caused her heart to beat faster, her skin to sing with the song of anticipation. He hadn’t made her smile at the sound of a car door slammed in the driveway. Or been the cause of a night wasted on bad TV for the chance to cuddle away the uninterrupted hours.
Carson did all the
se things and more. It was like they’d never been apart, they were so in tune with each other. Yet it was like they’d never known one before that day he’d walked into Blooms. And here all this time she’d thought her life had been so simple. So settled. When what it had been was staid and stale.
She slammed the door of the minivan and hit the electronic control panel, lowering the door and plunging the garage into a darkness redolent with strong chemicals and stronger exhaust. This was her home, where she was happy. Where she would remain happy if it killed her. She grounded herself in that reality before going inside.
Walking into her house to find Carson Brandt camped out on her sofa in front of the television, or stir-frying chicken in a wok on her stove, or sitting at the kitchen table going over studies with Zack had become so commonplace and so... comfortable, Eva would’ve been surprised to arrive home and find her house empty.
This evening it was only half empty. Carson sat alone behind the table in the breakfast nook. The only evidence of her son to be seen was his backpack weighted with textbooks sitting on the end of the kitchen counter. “What have you done with Zack?”
Carson looked up from the yellow legal pad and the outline of notes he’d penciled in a grid across the page. He gestured with his pencil toward the street. “You just missed him. He left with Katie and her mother. Something about a cheerleading tournament in San Antonio tomorrow.”
Eva set her purse on the counter next to the backpack and frowned. “I didn’t think they were leaving until later tonight.”
In fact, she knew the chaperones and the kids— both the competitors and their personal cheering sections, aka boyfriends—had plans to leave this evening and arrive in San Antonio around ten. Zack would be going with Katie and her parents even later, once Jim Crenshaw closed his diner at eleven.
“Seems there was a change of plans,” Carson said. “Katie called and wanted Zack to go early. I guess the Lake City squad isn’t competing until tomorrow afternoon, so the kids wanted to get in a night at Six Flags.” He erased the contents of one square. “l told Zack I didn’t think you’d mind if he went ahead.”