“March,” he said glumly. “She was on birth control, the patch. She claims it sometimes happens. But…”
Annajane was having a hard time catching her breath. It felt as though she’d been punched in the chest. She held up her hand, struggling to regain her composure. “I don’t want to hear this, Mason. It’s too personal.”
“My God,” he said, his voice breaking. “I never saw this coming.”
Annajane sat back in her chair, easing her hand out from beneath his. She folded her hands in her lap, just for something to do.
“So now what?”
“Celia knows I’m in love with you. But she doesn’t seem to care. She says she can’t raise a child by herself. Not that I would let her. Celia’s not really … maternal.” He straightened his shoulders. “This is my responsibility. I’ll just … have to figure out how to make it work.”
Annajane could only nod. She felt her eyes filling with tears and was sure that everyone in the room was watching them. She fumbled with her napkin and tried to push her chair away from the table. But the chair caught on the edge of the tablecloth, and her glass of wine tipped over, sending a rivulet of sauvignon blanc flowing across the table and into his lap. “Damn. I’m sorry,” she said, desperate for a way out. But her chair was stuck on the edge of a flagstone. “I need to leave. Right now. Please, Mason.”
He caught the waiter’s attention and asked for the check. In the car, he looked at her expectantly. “Where to? Pokey’s?”
“No,” Annajane said. “I don’t think so. I’ll just get a room at the Pinecone Motor Lodge.”
He frowned. “A motel? Come on, that’s crazy. I’ll take you back to my place; you can have the guest room. It’ll all be very circumspect. And if you’re worrying about Celia, don’t. She’s been staying over at Cherry Hill.”
“The Pinecone will be just fine for now,” Annajane said. “It’s under new management. It’s clean and it’s cheap, and that’s really all I require for right now.”
He gave it some thought. “That place is in the middle of nowhere. I don’t like the idea of you driving out there at night like this. At least let me follow you there.”
“Mason,” she said calmly. “You forget I’ve been single for five years. I’m used to traveling alone, driving places by myself, checking into motels by myself. I appreciate your concern, but this really is no big deal.”
“I don’t like the idea of you staying in a motel. It’s … seedy.”
“This isn’t really up to you,” Annajane pointed out.
“I’m following you out there,” he said, and the stubborn set of his jaw told her it was no use arguing.
* * *
The Pinecone Motor Lodge had been the only motel in Passcoe for as long as anybody could remember. Consisting of semicircle of a dozen small whitewashed frame cottages, it was set amid a thick grove of its namesake pine trees, and reached by a winding driveway leading off what had formerly been the main route into town.
Built in the postwar years as a tourist court, the Pinecone did a respectable business up until the 1980s, when the state built a bypass around it, traffic dwindled, and the Pinecone lost some of its luster. It changed hands a couple of times, then languished in foreclosure for two years, until a semiretired couple from Florida bought it to run as a hobby.
Mason had driven past the motel often in the past, duly noticing its slow deterioration. Now, though, he was relieved when his headlights revealed the changes brought about by two gay men and what must have cost several hundred thousand dollars.
The little cabins were gleaming white, with freshly painted dark green shutters with pine-tree-shaped cutouts. A neatly clipped boxwood hedge lined the front of each unit, and window boxes with perky red geraniums and trailing ivy flanked the doorways. Lanterns shone above every door, and on each miniature porch stood a pair of red-painted spring-back motel chairs.
She parked in front of a white bungalow with a small neon OFFICE sign. Mason pulled his car alongside hers. “Okay,” Annajane said, when he rolled down his window. “See? It’s perfectly respectable. You can go now.”
“Nuh-uh,” Mason said stubbornly. “Not til I see you safely inside.”
The look she gave him was bleak and full of despair. “Just go,” she said quietly. “Please?”
A small brass plaque on the office door requested that visitors RING BELL AFTER 10 PM. It was five past, so she hesitated, but then pushed the doorbell. A moment later, a lean man with a deep mahogany tan and a shiny bald head opened the door.
“Come on in,” he said, before she could ask about a room.
She found herself in a small entry hall. Her host, who was barefoot and dressed in a wildly flowered Hawaiian shirt and baggy white shorts, stepped behind a tall antique oak reception desk.
“I’d like a room, if you’ve got one,” Annajane said.
“One? I’ve got eight or nine,” he said. “You can have your pick.”
“Oh,” she said. “I’m sorry. Is business that slow?”
“Don’t mind me,” he said. “Thomas—that’s my partner—he says I’m a chronic complainer. Actually, business is a little better than we’d expected. We’ve been full every weekend this spring, and word is starting to get around about our little restoration project and the new management.”
“I’ve been hearing good things,” Annajane said.
“Just a single tonight?” he asked, peering over her shoulder out the window, where Mason sat patiently in his car.
She blushed. “Yes. My, uh, friend just wants to make sure I get checked in all right.”
“Ain’t none of my business,” he said airily. “We’re strictly don’t ask, don’t tell around here. Now. We’re an entirely smoke-free facility, but from the looks of you, I’d say you’re not a smoker anyway. Also, all the cottages have kitchenettes, with refrigerators and microwaves, a coffeepot, and toaster. But we also have a coffee hour here in the office-slash-reception area, from seven to nine every morning. We do fruit, and whatever kind of muffins Thomas feels like baking that day. And coffee and tea, of course.”
“How nice,” Annajane said.
He pushed the registration book toward her and turned to get a key. “Here you are,” he said, pushing an old-fashioned brass skeleton key with a silken red tassel hanging from it across the desktop. “You’ll be in unit six. It’s my favorite—so quiet, and there’s a pink rosebush just blooming its head off right outside your window. If you do decide to have company, there’s a new pullout sofa and a spare set of sheets and pillows in the top of your closet.”
“Fine,” Annajane said absentmindedly as she tried to remember her car’s license number. She handed him back the registration book, and he glanced down at it.
“Oh. You’re from Passcoe?” He peered at the book through the wire-frame glasses perched at the end of a long, bony nose.
“Yes,” she said. “I just sold my loft, downtown, and we had to close much quicker than I’d anticipated, so I’m sort of homeless for the moment.”
He nodded. “I can offer you our weekly rate, if you like. It’ll save you about twenty-five dollars a night.”
“All right,” she agreed. “I’m sort of in transition right now. I’m not really certain whether I’ll even decide to stay in town, or for how long.”
She opened her billfold, took out her credit card, and handed it to him.
“Annajane Hudgens,” he said, reading the charge plate aloud. He stuck out his hand, and she shook it. “Welcome home, Annajane. I’m Harold, and I run the place. Have you always lived in Passcoe?”
“Just about,” she said. “I’m a native.”
“You’re lucky to be from such a beautiful place. Thomas and I just love it here,” he confided. “As far as we’re concerned, you can have Miami.”
Annajane put the credit card away. “You might change your mind come February, when it’s fifteen degrees here, and in the eighties in Florida.”
“Never,” he declared. “Now,
don’t be a stranger. We’ll expect to see you in the morning for coffee.”
“Maybe,” she said. “I leave for work pretty early.”
“Where do you work?”
“Quixie. The soft drink company?”
“Quixie, we adore it! We’ve even been talking about buying cases of it, so we can put a bottle in every room. Guests love that kind of local stuff.”
“Let me know if you want to pursue that,” she said, ever the marketing professional. “I can get one of our sales reps to talk to you about adding the Pinecone to one of the regular routes.”
“Perfect!”
She picked up her key. “Good night, Harold.”
“Good night, Annajane.”
32
Mason kept watch until he felt certain Annajane was safely inside her unit at the Pinecone Motor Lodge. Finally, when he saw lights blink on inside the cabin, he reluctantly drove home.
Letha had left the porch light burning for him. He didn’t bother to drive around to the garage, instead parking by the front door and leaving his car there.
He went into the kitchen and saw that she’d left him a paper plate of food neatly covered with aluminum foil, which he dumped into the trash.
Stepping softly, he climbed the stairs to the second floor. He opened Sophie’s bedroom door and peeked inside. A pink-shaded nightlight shone from an outlet beside her bed, and he could see her blond curls spilling out on her pillow. Mason sat lightly on the edge of the bed and looked down at her. Five years ago, he’d been terrified at the idea of raising a baby. She’d been so tiny, so sickly, so helpless.
He’d been lucky to find Letha, who was Voncile’s sister-in-law and, like Voncile, a widow. She’d raised three of her own children and taken care of numerous grandchildren. She was as skinny as Voncile was stout, with improbably dyed frizzy red hair and pale blue eyes. Letha was calm and loving and untroubled by Sophie’s bouts of colic and sleeplessness. But even with Letha hovering nearby, Sophie seemed to prefer Mason’s presence to her nanny’s. For the first six months after he’d brought her home, he’d fallen asleep in a chair beside her crib more nights than he could count, with the fretful infant hugged tightly to his chest.
Mason wondered what Sophie’s reaction would be to having another baby supplant her in his affections. Sibling rivalry? And how would Celia treat Sophie after her own baby was born? She’d never really seemed the maternal type to him. He’d somehow managed to sublimate that during the short time they’d been dating. Celia was fun, she was lively, she was undeniably attractive, and undeniably attracted to him.
But there was an undercurrent there, a layer of dark and cold he could never pierce, and didn’t actually care to try.
Sophie stirred and he laid a hand on her back. Her face relaxed, and he felt himself responding in kind. He wound one of the silky corkscrew curls around his finger. Finding out about Sophie’s existence had been a shock, but now he couldn’t imagine his life without her. He had to believe that he would come to feel this way about Celia’s baby, too. Even if he knew he would never actually love her the way he’d always expected he would one day love the mother of his children. That love, Mason thought, belonged to another. To Annajane.
Sophie turned slightly, and the shift exposed her pocketbook, which she’d hidden beneath her bedsheet. It had been a birthday gift from Annajane last year and had quickly become his daughter’s most treasured possession, which she rarely let out of her sight. Whenever anything small disappeared around the house, they all knew to check Sophie’s pocketbook. She was especially fond of anything shiny. More than once he’d had to retrieve from the pink plastic purse a favorite silver Mont Blanc cartridge pen, various keys, and even a small antique sterling silver penknife that had been a high school graduation gift from his grandfather.
Soon now, he thought, they would have to discourage her unauthorized acquisitions. But for now, Sophie’s hoarding of trinkets was harmless. He leaned down, planted a kiss on the top of her head, and stood up. He was suddenly exhausted.
Inside the master suite, he placed his watch, wallet, and cell phone on the bathroom vanity. He brushed his teeth and stripped to his boxers, leaving his clothing in a heap on the floor, reverting to his messy bachelor habits.
Mason dropped onto his unmade bed and pulled the sheet up at the same time he glanced at the clock radio on the nightstand. It was just after 11:00 P.M. He bunched his pillow under his head. The pillowcase was warm! He turned on his side and a pair of sinuous bare arms wrapped around his own bare shoulders.
“Surprise!” Celia whispered.
“Jesus H.!” Mason exclaimed. He sat bolt upright in the bed and switched on the lamp. “What the hell are you doing here?”
Celia blinked rapidly. “For goodness sake,” she said, laughing. “It’s not like I broke in. I have a key, remember?”
She gave him a lazy smile and raised the hem of the sheet to show him that she was completely nude. “I didn’t think you’d mind,” she said, propping herself up on one elbow to give him an even better vantage point. She reached for his hand and placed it on her right breast.
He snatched it back.
“This isn’t funny, Celia,” he said.
Her eyes narrowed. “It’s not supposed to be funny, darling,” she said slowly. “It’s supposed to be a turn-on. Do you have any idea how many men fantasize about coming home and finding a nude blonde in their beds?”
“I am not one of those guys,” Mason said flatly.
She sat up in the bed, allowing the sheet to fall around her waist to give him a better understanding of the extent of her endowment. And she was admittedly gifted in that particular department. Celia’s breasts would probably be considered one of the seven wonders of the modern world to any other man with a pulse. But right now they didn’t do a thing for him. God help him. She parted her lips slightly and gave him a come-hither look that had once had an appalling effect on him. Now? Nada.
“Don’t do this,” he said.
“Do what?” She slid closer to him on the bed and casually rested her hand on his crotch. He jumped as though he’d been bitten by a rattlesnake.
He picked her hand up and dropped it onto the sheet. “That,” he said, frowning. “I’ve had a hell of a long day, and I am really not in the mood for this kind of a stunt.”
“It’s not a stunt,” she said, looking hurt. “I’m trying to remind you of why we got together in the first place. It’s been so long. I love you and I’ve missed you. Is that a crime?”
He shook his head. “Does Sophie know you’re here?”
“No,” she said. “She and Letha were both sound asleep when I let myself in an hour ago. Which reminds me. Where have you been all night? And don’t tell me you were at the office, because I checked, and your car was gone.” She leaned in closer and sniffed. “You’ve been drinking wine?”
“I was out,” Mason said. “Having dinner with Annajane.” Maybe, he thought, his mood black, if he infuriated her enough, Celia would leave.
“Oh Annajane,” Celia said with a dismissive shrug. “Did you tell her about the baby? Or are we going to let Bonnie Kelsey break the news to her?”
“She knows,” Mason said. He stood up, looked around, and saw where she’d neatly folded her clothes on the armchair at the foot of the bed. He snatched them up and threw them at her. “Come on, Celia. Get dressed. I don’t want Sophie to wake up and find you here.”
“Darling, please come back to bed and stop being such a prude,” Celia said, patting the mattress. “We’ve made love lots of times right here in this bed with her in the next room, and it never bothered you before.”
It actually had bothered him, he thought ruefully. But not enough to induce him to turn Celia out of his bed.
“I was a hypocrite,” Mason said. “That stops now.” He jerked his head in the direction of the door. “Please go.”
“And what if I won’t?” Celia said playfully. “Are you going to pick me up and bodily throw me out of
the house? With Sophie and Letha sleeping right next door?” She gave a look of mock horror.
Mason’s face hardened. He stomped into the bathroom and pulled on the clothes he’d just removed. He went back to the bedroom and sat on the armchair.
“Look,” he said. “Don’t make this any more difficult than it has to be. You and I are going to have to come to some kind of an arrangement.”
“I can’t wait to hear this,” Celia said. “Do explain.”
He hesitated. “I am willing to marry you, and be a father to our child. But that will be the extent of my obligation to you. I’m not in love with you, and I won’t pretend to be.”
She arched an eyebrow. “So … you’re telling me you’ll live with me, but you won’t make love to me?”
He recoiled for a moment. “If that’s how you choose to put it, yes.”
Celia laughed. “That’s so noble of you, Mason. So gentlemanly. And what if I tell you I don’t want to marry you under those conditions? In fact, what would you say if I told you I might decide not to have the baby after all?”
He felt his heart contract. “You wouldn’t do that,” Mason said. “Because that baby is the only hold you have over me.” He looked at her coolly. “I no longer kid myself that you’re infatuated with me. I realize you only got involved with me because you had some notion of a payday.”
“You have such a low opinion of yourself,” Celia said. “It never occurred to you I fell in love with you?”
“It did,” he admitted. “But then I realized what a fool I’ve been.”
She leaned forward. “I really do love you, you know. I could make you happy, if you’d let me.”
“Don’t insult my intelligence,” Mason said. “Just go, would you?”
Celia’s eyes blazed. “If I leave here tonight, Mason, it will be for good. I mean that. You won’t see me, or our child, again. Ever. You see, I’m an all-or-nothing kind of girl.”
It was the one threat he feared, the thing that had gnawed at his gut since the moment she’d told him about the baby. He knew Celia would think nothing of depriving the baby of a father, if it meant getting vengeance against him. The idea of her raising his child, his own flesh and blood, gave him a sick, terrifying feeling. He would do anything in his power to keep that from happening. And she knew that, of course.
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