by Holly Rayner
Marianne’s gaze searched his, and he couldn’t fathom what she was thinking. Cheering erupted from below as the players got into place, and the baseball game began. Jay and Marianne took turns picking at the food from their picnic and taking little bites, in between sneaking kisses as they snuggled close together.
It was everything Jay could have imagined and more.
“I like this a little more than a fancy restaurant,” she said.
“Oh yeah? So, this is what I should have led with, huh?” he asked.
She swatted his shoulder playfully.
“You should have started off with wanting to be a father. That’s the ticket to pretty much any single mother’s heart.”
Her tone had a teasing lilt to it, but there was something else. She tensed as she turned her attention from the game back to him.
“Are you serious about this? About us?” she asked.
He held her gaze and her hand, wanting her to know that what he spoke was the absolute truth.
“Of course I am,” he said. “I care very deeply about you, Marianne.”
It sounded strange, saying it out loud. It was something he knew to be true, but he’d had his feelings so twisted and convoluted that he wasn’t sure how to move forward, here. His parents had always said that honesty was the best path, but how could he follow their advice, given what was happening to him, now? He wouldn’t even be in this situation if it weren’t for their lie.
Perhaps he owed them a little bit for it. Without that falsehood, he never would have met Marianne. His life would have been all the sadder for it.
“I care for you, too,” she said, her little blush returning. “If we’re going to make a real go of this…I think it would be a good idea for you to meet my daughter.”
Jay knew just how big a gesture of trust that was. She was placing her heart in his hands, and it would be his duty not to harm it…or Zoe’s.
A few years ago, he would have been running for the hills. Now, sitting on that hill with her practically in his arms, he nodded.
“I would love nothing more,” he said.
An idea struck him, then.
“In fact,” he said, “Why don’t the three of us go to the zoo next weekend together? You said she liked animals, right?”
Marianne beamed at him, and her smile was like the sun.
“I think she’d love that. Great idea,” she said.
“Good. It’s all settled, then,” he said.
Another cheer erupted as a kid knocked a ball all the way past the outfielder’s head. As he ran the bases, Jay savored the sensation of holding Marianne close on a nice, sunny day.
Could his life get much better?
Chapter 16
Marianne
Marianne sighed as she wrapped her arms around her middle, staring out at the park. The midafternoon sun beamed down on them, and she hoped that her skin wasn’t burning beneath its bright rays.
Jay placed the last of their lunch in the basket and closed it up, hefting it on his arm as he stood next to her.
“Can I walk you to your car?” he asked.
She wished he wasn’t holding that basket, so that she could take his hand. She nodded, and together they walked down the hill in the direction of her little blue car. The walk seemed to pass by far too quickly. Marianne didn’t want to leave, but she knew that Zoe and her mother would be waiting, wondering how things went.
How could she begin to explain how wonderful she felt?
“Well, this is me,” she said, turning to face him.
Jay set the picnic basket down and stepped forward until he was close enough to loop his arms around her waist, pulling her in close. She rested her hands on his chest as she gazed up into his eyes.
“That was really lovely. Thank you,” she said.
He nodded, lifting her hand and pressing a whisper-soft kiss against her knuckles.
The man was beyond intoxicating. How was it that he’d been so unable to find love? He was romantic, handsome, and of course wealthy—though that didn’t matter so much to her. She imagined most other women put that first on their list, but his kindness mattered so much more.
Money would always come and go, but a person that could make you smile, that could fill your days with wonder…well.
That was priceless.
“I hope we can do it again sometime,” he said, lacing his fingers with hers.
“You bet,” she said, batting her eyelashes at him.
She was flirting! Openly and candidly flirting with a man who was far too handsome. As he gazed down at her with adoration in his eyes, she couldn’t quite think of any reason they couldn’t spend all of eternity together, warm in the comfort of this exact embrace.
If that was heaven, Marianne was ready to sign up there and then.
She felt the pull of motherhood…the need to get back to her daughter. Releasing her fingers, she lifted onto her toes and kissed him, the gesture growing more comfortable each time they locked lips.
He responded by tightening his grip around her and pulling her close, so that she pressed all the way against him. Between the heat of his body and the tenderness behind his kisses, Marianne was fit to be tied.
“On your left!”
A biker whizzed past them. Jay pulled Marianne close and leaned toward her car, but the spell was broken…at least, slightly.
“I really have to go,” she said, her voice laced with reluctance.
“I know,” he said, kissing the tip of her nose. She loved it when he did that.
“Drive safe, okay? I’ll be in touch,” he said.
“Okay,” she agreed.
One kiss from him left her completely out of breath, no matter how many times he pressed his lips to hers. There was a thrill she had never experienced, and she was like a woman stranded in a desert. Her thirst for Jay seemed to know no bounds.
She waved at him once more as she slid into the driver’s seat of her car and then pulled away. He watched her go, and she cast glances in the rearview mirror until she couldn’t see him anymore.
What a date!
Marianne rolled her window down and inhaled the fresh air that tousled her loose hair all around her face. She reached for the radio and turned to a station that usually played her favorite songs, then turned it all the way up.
She sang straight from her heart, all smiles, as she rode on what had to be cloud nine but was disguised as the highway all the way to her mother’s house. She had left Zoe with her mother for the afternoon, which wasn’t unusual, but it felt different, this time.
Marianne was changing.
She was growing into a woman that could believe in love again. Until that moment, she had never realized just how heavy the weight of the world had been on her shoulders. She felt as light as a feather, as though her car could shoot right into the sky and fly her to the moon.
Marianne was falling in love.
There was no other explanation for it. Jay was everything she could have asked for in a man and so much more. He made her laugh like she hadn’t laughed in so long. He was considerate and kind and his kisses were like fire to her soul.
And boy, did she want to burn.
Marianne turned the music down as she reached her mother’s driveway. She pulled up in front of the little white house and rolled up her window, fixing her tousled hair before she stepped out into the sunshine.
She hummed a little tune as she walked up the front porch steps and opened the door, which Elaine almost always kept unlocked.
“Mama!” she called.
“In the kitchen!” Elaine called back.
Marianne was still humming like a bluebird as she strolled into the kitchen, where she found her mother mixing a bowl of cookie dough.
“You sound chipper,” Elaine observed, focusing on her dough.
She rolled one little ball at a time, placing each on a cookie sheet in a row before she set two cookie sheets into a hot oven. Only then did she wipe her hands on a white apron and
truly look at her daughter.
She whistled.
“Well. Look at you,” Elaine said.
Marianne sat in a tall chair facing the kitchen island where Elaine was working. She couldn’t stop smiling as she shrugged.
“Look at me,” she said.
Elaine grabbed a wooden spoon and pointed it at her daughter’s face.
“That’s it, missy. You’re going to tell me who you are dating and what is going on between you two! I demand to know,” she said, jabbing the spoon a little closer.
Marianne’s euphoria died down a little at her mother’s demand. Perhaps it was time for her to confess. After all, she wouldn’t be able to conceal Jay’s identity forever, and once he met Zoe, she would blurt out his name immediately, and the jig would be up anyway.
Marianne decided to proceed with caution.
“Mama,” she said, “You have to promise not to get mad.”
That put her mother’s guard up. Elaine’s shoulders tightened and her eyelids narrowed as she considered her daughter.
“Why would I be mad, Marianne?” she asked.
Her tone was lethally cool, and Marianne knew she was about to walk into some sticky territory.
“Because the man I’ve been seeing is someone I don’t think you’d approve of,” Marianne said.
Elaine stared at her a moment as she worked to puzzle out Marianne’s riddle. After a moment, her eyes widened and her face blanched.
“No,” she whispered.
“I didn’t even tell you who,” Marianne protested.
“You are not dating Jay Parish. That is the only man I can think of that you would be scared to tell me about, because up until this moment, you and I have never had secrets from one another. I tried to let it go, thinking you just wanted to have some time to come to terms with dating on your own first, and that was your right, but please…tell me I’m wrong,” Elaine said.
Her knuckles were white as she gripped the wooden spoon, lowering it to her side. Marianne’s joy fled as she faced her mother. She’d thought about this conversation many times during so many restless nights. All of that planning dissolved, leaving her mind blank as she struggled to come up with an explanation that would appease her mother.
“It is Jay Parish,” she said, and, if it were possible, her mother’s coloring blanched a lighter shade. “But I have a good reason!”
“A good reason?” Elaine said, dropping the spoon on the counter entirely. The resounding thunk it made might as well have echoed through the entire house.
“You’re telling me you have a good reason to be dating the one man on Earth that is solely responsible for every hardship we have faced this past year? You think I don’t notice the worry on your face? That I haven’t seen you counting every penny in your ledgers? That your sadness hasn’t been a weight on my own soul, because I know that I am the reason for your despair?”
“Mama, please! You shouldn’t say that. You raised me, and I will always be here for you, no matter what.”
“And yet here you are, jumping into bed with the man who is the cause of every worry line on your beautiful face.”
“I haven’t jumped into bed with him,” Marianne said, anger flashing through her.
“Ah, well, it’s only a matter of time. I knew it. I knew the second you told me you were going to ask him for a loan that there would be consequences. Men like that do not help women without a price—her body, her soul, everything. And you’re paying it willingly!”
“If you would just calm down for one second, and let me explain…” Marianne said.
“Explain what? That my daughter felt the need to sell herself for her mother and child? And not only that, to the man that took the money in the first place? Marianne, I thought I taught you better than this!”
“It’s more complicated than that, Mama. Jay loses sleep every night over the retirement funds,” Marianne said.
Elaine scoffed.
“Oh, I’m sure. Lucky for him, he doesn’t need to lose sleep in a homeless shelter, like many of my poor colleagues!”
“He tried, Mama. He looked into compensating the workers for their lost wages, but to do that meant risking the entire company, and that means people like me losing my job. No matter what, someone loses,” Marianne said.
She couldn’t stand the sound of pleading in her voice, but she couldn’t help it. If only she could get her mother to see what she saw.
If only she could look past her own anger…she’d see that Jay wasn’t the villain. He was her hero.
“Is that the line he fed you?” Elaine asked, her voice sardonic. “How nice that the man knows the right things to say. If you think I believe for one minute that a billionaire like Jay Parish simply couldn’t afford to pay back his employees, then clearly, he’s fooled you beyond repair.”
“He’s doing his best! He’s a kind and charitable man…”
Elaine laughed, and it was an ugly sound. Her anger, her hurt, all of it was so apparent as she glowered at her daughter, her arms crossed.
“Oh, yes. You see him in every newspaper going to this or that charity benefit. This new gala for the poor. And yet, here we have sat for months with no relief. Where is that money going? Where is our charity?”
“It’s more complicated than that, Mama,” Marianne said.
“No, it’s not,” Elaine said. “He’s clearly manipulated you and now you have some form of Stockholm syndrome. Marianne, Jay Parish is an evil man. He has deprived hundreds of people their livelihoods. I don’t care if he feels bad about it…talk is cheap! What is he doing about it?”
A pang of doubt passed through Marianne. Yes, she had been with him at the charity benefit…that was to raise money for the sciences. While that was all well and good, wouldn’t it have spoken greater volumes for him to be finding charitable resources for those that were struggling without their retirement money?
“Yes, now you’re starting to see, thank God,” Elaine said.
Marianne’s eyes narrowed, and it was her turn to cross her arms at her mother.
“You don’t know the half of it. If you’d let me speak without being so judgmental, maybe you’d learn a thing or two!”
“You finally allow yourself to open up again and the first thing you do is ruin the rest of your life! How can you be so foolish, Marianne?”
“Why are y’all yelling?”
Marianne froze. She slowly turned to find Zoe in the doorway, standing with two dolls in her hands as she stared at them in confusion.
“We’re just having a discussion, honey,” Marianne said, trying to keep her tone soothing.
Zoe lifted a little eyebrow, taking them both in.
“No, you’re not. You’re fighting. Why?”
Marianne and Elaine exchanged a look, and in that unspoken exchange a momentary truce was made. They were mothers, after all, and they didn’t want Zoe to be exposed to the problems of the adult world.
At least, as much as they could help it.
“We need to get going, Zoe. Get your stuff, please.”
“Okay…” Zoe said, glancing between Marianne and her mother.
When neither said another word, Zoe stepped out of the kitchen, and Marianne moved to follow her. When she felt her mother’s hand on her arm, she stopped, but didn’t look back.
“You’re an adult, and I can’t stop you from doing what you want, but I have one word of warning, Marianne,” Elaine said.
Marianne waited, dread sinking down to her belly.
“Judge a man by his actions, not his words.”
With that, she released her hand and stepped back, leaving Marianne with cryptic thoughts that she didn’t want to sort through.
Not looking back, Marianne walked out of the kitchen and headed straight to the front door, where Zoe was waiting with her shoes and backpack on.
“Let’s go,” Marianne said.
She opened the door and ushered Zoe out, helping her into her backseat booster. Once she plopped back in the
driver’s seat, it took everything in her not to lay her head on the steering wheel and weep.
Was her mother right? Was all of this just some kind of act? Some game?
It couldn’t be. Jay was so gentle with her, so open and honest. He had his own demons, and being rich didn’t stop that from being true. Wealth hadn’t kept his parents alive. Wealth wasn’t protecting him from deportation.
If only her mother knew just what her arrangement really meant, maybe she wouldn’t be so dang condescending about it.
“Mama, are we going to go home?” Zoe asked.
“Yes, sweet pea. Sorry. Mama’s just got a lot on her mind.”
“It’ll be okay,” Zoe said. “I promise.”
Marianne cheered a little at that advice. Zoe had a way of doing that…and she was always right.
Everything would turn out just fine. It simply had to.
Chapter 17
Jay
Jay steepled his fingers as he pored over several late-afternoon reports. He did his level best to truly focus on the information in front of him, and for a while, he even succeeded.
Then, thoughts of her penetrated his mind’s eye, and just like that, he could think of nothing else.
It had been three days since their picnic date. He’d missed her every minute since. It was a strange feeling, though not entirely unwelcome. Jay was consumed by his craving for her, and it was on so many levels. Of course, she was beautiful, but she was so much more. He craved her presence, her conversation. Things that went so much deeper than the physical realm.
“I’m on my way out, sir,” Jeff said, peeking in the doorway. “Do you need anything before I go?”
Jay waved him off, feigning interest in the documents before him.
“I’m good. Enjoy your evening. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Sounds good,” Jeff said.
Jay continued to read the documents, trying to swat away thoughts of Marianne, when he realized his assistant had not actually departed from the doorway. When he glanced up, he watched as Jeff shifted from one foot to the other.