Second Chance Mom

by EMILIE ROSE

  He waded through the crowd and grabbed a clipboard and a release form. Returning, he handed them to Rachel. “Sign this and I’ll get her file. I’ll need the counselor’s name and fax number.”

  She scanned the pages, then signed. He made a point of brushing the back of her hand as he took the board back. His pulse and her breath hitched. He held her gaze long enough to see the hunger she couldn’t hide. Then he had to let her go or risk drawing attention to their exchange. “Give me a few minutes.”

  He retrieved Chastity’s file from the metal cabinet in the records room. It was thicker than he’d expected. Surely her recent mischief hadn’t added that many pages? Then he made his way to the teacher’s workroom, found an empty table and wrote up the fax cover sheet. He opened the file to select the necessary pages and put them in the proper order.

  The multi-sheet IEP form on top surprised him. Only learning disabled students had Individualized Education Plans. Hope had never mentioned Chastity having a problem. Neither had Pam or Jess.

  Dyslexia. The checked word jumped out at him as if it were lit by three-foot-tall neon letters. Chastity had dyslexia. He shook his head. It was a sad coincidence that she suffered from the same learning disability that had made his life miserable. But it meant he had something in common with the teen that he could use to work past her recent hostility.

  He flipped pages to learn more. Chastity had been diagnosed in second grade, which gave her a better chance of learning to cope than he’d had. His issues hadn’t been labeled until ninth. Her most recent yearly evaluation stated she struggled with reading—particularly reading aloud. That explained her issues with the new English teacher. Matt knew all about finding ways to distract others from his problems. Behavior was one.

  September. Chastity had been born in September. Something about that nagged at him as he sorted pages. Then he remembered Pam had been celebrating her newly discovered pregnancy when he’d come home for Christmas the year he’d met Rachel. It was memorable because she’d still been in college, and his parents had hit the roof fearing she wouldn’t finish.

  Jess had been born in July. That made her only a couple of months older than Chastity. But Hope had claimed she’d conceived Chastity on her honeymoon in the spring. How could that be true? He counted back in his head and didn’t like the answer, so he recalculated. Same answer. Hope had been single and living in Johnstonville nine months before Chastity’s birth.

  Just to be sure he wasn’t scrambling the numbers, he did the math a third time on paper. The hairs on the back of his neck prickled. He stared at the twelve month school calendar on the wall and recounted a fourth time, still not willing to trust his calculations since the numbers sometimes switched places on him. The dates still didn’t add up.

  Someone must have entered Chastity’s birth date incorrectly on the school forms. He flipped through the papers until he came to a copy of her birth certificate. He double-checked the date. There was no mistake.

  He scanned down. The father’s name was blank. Even if Hope’s husband had died, wouldn’t she have written in his name anyway if he’d fathered her child?

  What if he hadn’t? Could someone in Johnstonville be Chastity’s father? He didn’t recall Hope dating anyone. She’d always been at home when he and Rachel got together—hence Rachel having to sneak out. And Rachel had once claimed her sister was an old maid who lived for work and the church.

  Maybe Chastity had been born very, very early. But that would have left her on the borderline of not surviving. Hope had never mentioned prematurity, and every parent he knew who had a “miracle child” talked about those unforgettable terrifying weeks of neonatal intensive care.

  But if Chastity had been conceived in December... And Hope hadn’t been seeing anyone... His gut churned. Sweat beaded his brow and upper lip.

  No. Chastity was Hope’s daughter. Not Rachel’s. Or his. Even if she did look more like Rachel than Hope. The dyslexia was a coincidence. He and Rachel had used protection. Every time.

  Dyslexia was the most commonly diagnosed disorder. But it was usually inherited. Did Rachel have it? Or her father or grandfather?

  Images flashed through his mind like a strobe light. The photograph in Hope’s foyer of the Bishop family. Rachel and Chastity shared the same dark hair and chocolate-brown eyes. But so did Hope’s father and grandfather. Science had never been his strong suit, but he was pretty sure dark genes were dominant.

  He recalled Rachel at his family’s picnic watching Chastity with a look of intense anguish in her eyes. He’d assumed her pain was due to losing her sister.

  Then he remembered how irritable Hope had become each time one of Rachel’s letters arrived for Chastity. He’d thought it was jealousy over the way Chastity carried the letters around for days, reading them over and over, quoting her aunt. Why would Hope resent her sister for loving her child?

  Unless she was jealous of a bond she didn’t share with her daughter.

  Panic clawed up his throat. Could Chastity be his and Rachel’s? Had Hope, the most honest person he knew, lied? He wasn’t ready to believe that.

  He snatched up the file, then stalked back into the school foyer certain Rachel would think he was an idiot for the question he was about to ask. She looked up from the trophy case. He skimmed her slender frame. Had she carried his child?

  “My office. Now.”

  “Matt, that’s not a good idea,” she whispered.

  “You don’t want to have this conversation here.”

  Her eyes widened and filled with wariness, making him realize his tone had been...threatening. Without waiting to see if she’d follow, he strode toward the gym where they should have some measure of privacy. And he prayed, dear God, he prayed he’d jumbled up the details in his brain. He’d even welcome her laughing at his crazy idea.

  He unlocked his office door and gestured for Rachel to precede him. She entered with obvious reluctance. He shut the door, turned the lock.

  She stiffened. “What’s going on?”

  “Chastity has dyslexia.”

  She frowned. “She does?”

  Not the response he’d expected. “Yes. Do you?”

  “No.”

  “Did anyone else in your family?”

  “Not that I know of.” She seemed genuinely confused by the question. “Why does Chastity having a learning disability have you so bent out of shape? I’m sure the new school can accommodate her needs.”

  He hesitated. He’d hidden his imperfection for so long. No one knew the whole truth, that his inability to control his mind had led to the end of his career. “Because I have it. And it’s usually an inherited condition.”

  She didn’t scoff or laugh. Instead she went as still as a wild rabbit when it spots a predator. Her gaze slid toward the door.

  “Is she mine?” he forced past the ball of fear in his throat.

  She swallowed. The pulse in her neck fluttered frantically. A white line encircled her compressed lips, and the faintest of tremors overtook her body. “Why would you think that?”

  The quaver of her voice told him more than any words could. Rachel had something to hide. His heartbeat hammered his eardrums. His mouth dried. He slapped Chastity’s file onto his desk, shoved his fingers through his hair and scrambled to pull his thoughts together. He couldn’t sit down. He circled the room and Rachel like a wrestler on the mat does his opponent.

  “Chastity is my daughter. Isn’t she?”

  Rachel blanked her expression. This was the Rachel he’d seen by the ball field. Unnaturally calm in the midst of chaos.

  “Chastity is Hope’s daughter.”

  Carefully phrased, but not a yes or no. “Don’t lie to me. I saw her birth date.”

  He waited for her to tell him he was full of shit, and there was no way Chastity was his. But again, she didn’t
. He struggled to remain calm, to keep his game face on. Yelling wouldn’t get him answers.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you were pregnant?”

  She pushed back her hair with an unsteady hand, then she sighed and sank into the visitor chair in front of his desk.

  “Because you were Johnstonville’s golden boy with an amazing future ahead of you. I was a screwup. I’d lied about my age. I had a bad reputation and nothing to offer a baby. Or you.”

  Her revelation tackled him even though it was what he’d expected to hear.

  I have a child. A daughter. A teenage daughter.

  Reeling, he wanted to refute Rachel’s claims, but he couldn’t. He’d come home for spring break eager to see her again and find out why she hadn’t answered his letters. He’d found an empty house. She and Hope had moved away without leaving a forwarding address or phone number.

  He’d asked around, hoping to find anybody who knew where she’d gone, but all he’d heard were the stories of Rachel’s misdeeds and the lies about her promiscuity. The only way he could have proved them wrong would have been to confess they’d both been virgins when they slept together that first time in the barn. That information wouldn’t have helped her reputation any, so he’d kept his mouth shut.

  “We used protection. Did you tamper with it?”

  “No. God, no.” Her consternation looked real.

  “Chastity was your daughter. Our daughter. How could you give her away?”

  “I— We would have held you back,” she whispered with misery in her eyes.

  “That should have been my decision. Our decision, Rachel. One we made together.”

  “You were so excited about your future in football, the NFL scouts who’d been watching you, your dreams, and your dad living vicariously through you. How could I ruin that? For both of you.”

  She’d done a good job of justifying her bad decision. “How did Hope end up with our child?”

  She blinked at him, pain carving lines into her face. “She caught me throwing up and asked if I was pregnant. I told her there was no way. We’d been careful. She drove me out of town, bought a pregnancy test and made me use it in the store bathroom. It was positive. Hope was furious. On the ride home she said that I couldn’t stay in Johnstonville. My promiscuity would destroy her reputation. I had to leave before anyone found out. She gave me twenty-four hours to get out.

  “I was terrified and in shock. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t go back to my parents. Not only were they in a country where infant mortality was incredibly high, they would never forgive or accept me as an unwed mother-to-be. Like your family, they believed in abstinence until marriage.

  “I’d packed and was ready to walk out when Hope asked me where I was going and how I would provide for myself and a child when I didn’t have a job or even a high school diploma. I didn’t have any answers, but I was going to try. I knew terminating...wasn’t for me.

  “Hope pointed out that even if I finished high school, then I’d never find more than a minimum wage job. At that rate I wouldn’t make enough for rent, food and day care. And she was right. I wasn’t good enough for my own child.” He barely heard the last anguished words, but her sense of defeat came through loud and clear in her rounded shoulders and the downward curve of her mouth.

  “She offered to help me. She said we’d move away. She’d take a job elsewhere and see me through my pregnancy. But then I’d have to relinquish the baby. I agreed because I didn’t know what else to do. She chose Atlanta because she had a college friend at a big firm who could get her a job. Hope enrolled me in school and arranged for my medical care. Then I heard my baby’s heartbeat, felt her growing. I learned she was a little girl. I fell more in love with her every day, and I knew I couldn’t give her to strangers.”

  The tender expression on her face backed up her words.

  “In my last month of pregnancy Hope told me she had everything she’d ever wanted except for a family. She said I had the power to give her that if I’d let her adopt my baby. I rejected the idea immediately.”

  Rachel plucked at the seam of her pants. “But I didn’t know how I was going to provide for a child. I talked to Social Services, and it didn’t look good. And Hope... Hope didn’t let up on reminding me how unfair it would be to raise a child in poverty. She reminded me of the squalor we’d seen on our parents’ mission trips and of the sickly children.”

  His college ring bit into his finger. He didn’t like the scenario she was describing. Hope had always been kind and generous. She’d do anything for anyone, and he hadn’t believed she had a manipulative bone in her body. Had he been wrong?

  “Then my parents died. You have to understand, Matt. Hope got me out of the hellish, unstable life my parents had chosen. If not for her, I would have died in that village beside them. Plus, she’d bailed me out of one scrape right after another. And yet until she said she wanted my child she’d never asked for anything in return. Not money. Not thanks. Nothing.

  “She promised that if I relinquished the baby to her I would always be a part of my child’s life. I would get to see her grow up and be there for every birthday. So, as much as it broke my heart, after Chastity was born, I gave her to Hope. Because it was best for Chastity.” Her eyes pleaded for understanding.

  Matt had no name for the melee of emotions crushing his chest. “Did Hope know I was Chastity’s father?”

  “Yes. She guessed. You were the only guy I’d been seeing.”

  Betrayal lashed him. In his life he’d considered marrying two women. Rachel because he loved her, and Hope because he trusted her, believed they shared the same values and could build a decent life together.

  “Hope was the most honest person I know. Why should I believe you?”

  “I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t. I’m the villain in all of this.”

  He saw the anguish and honesty in her eyes, and he couldn’t disbelieve her no matter how badly he wanted to. His mind raced as he tried to sift the lies from the truth of everything Hope had told him.

  “Hope said she had conceived on her honeymoon and her husband died before she could change her name on all the legal documents.” Saying it aloud made the tale seem preposterous. How had he fallen for it? “There was never a husband or a cruise, was there?”

  Rachel studied her knotted fingers. “No.”

  He should have known. Hope hadn’t had an impetuous bone in her body. What a gullible fool he’d been. He paced the office. Anger boiled in his blood. He hadn’t been in love with Hope, but he’d believed she was the most kindhearted, God-fearing woman he’d ever known. How could he have been so wrong?

  “I can’t believe I never suspected. Chastity looks just like you,” he spat out in self-disgust.

  “She has your mouth and chin,” Rachel offered quietly. “I see you every time I look at her.”

  Matt sucked in a shocked breath and opened the file to look at the picture on Chastity’s student ID. His own features were right there in front of him. “How damned stupid am I?”

  “I’ve never known Hope to tell a lie other than this one. Her honesty is probably why no one questioned her story.”

  “This is one hell of a big one. She should have told me. You should have told me.”

  She shook her head. “We were kids, Matt. What kind of parents could we have been?”

  “I was twenty-one years old. Old enough to know that I wanted to marry you.”

  She gasped. “I didn’t know that. I thought I was just a vacation romance and that you’d forget about me as soon as you went back to school.”

  “How could you not know? I slept with you and I’d told you I’d been saving myself. Then I gushed on and on about you and us in my letters.” He’d poured his heart out like a lovesick sap.

  A confused frown puckered her brow. “What le
tters?”

  Her confusion seemed sincere. “I wrote you at least a dozen times, telling you how I felt and asking you to marry me as soon as you graduated. You never wrote back. And then Hope told me you’d moved on.”

  Her eyes darkened. “I never got any letters. And if I moved on, it was only to bury myself in my studies so I could forget what I’d done.”

  “Who else knows about Chastity?”

  “No one.”

  If she hadn’t gotten the letters, then that meant Hope had hidden them. She’d deliberately kept him and Rachel apart. Hope had kept Chastity from him.

  But then Hope had sought him out when he returned to Johnstonville. Them marrying had been her idea. Neither of them was getting any younger, and neither had found another to love, she’d said. And he’d come damned close to putting a ring on her finger.

  Hope had betrayed him. But so had Rachel.

  “I trusted her. And she lied to me.” The words cauterized his throat.

  “At least you’ve been able to spend time with your daughter, even if you didn’t know the truth. I only saw Chastity a couple of times a year to begin with and not at all in the past five years. That wasn’t what Hope had promised.”

  His brain snagged on one thing she’d said. “Hope and I started dating five years ago.”

  Rachel recoiled. “Well, I guess that tells me why she cut off the visits, doesn’t it?”

  The manipulative bitch. “When I moved home to take the coaching job, she approached me at church and suggested dinner. But Chastity and I didn’t spend that much time together. She usually stayed with Jess when Hope and I went out.”

  He ought to demand a paternity test, but he didn’t doubt Rachel. “Am I at least listed on her original birth certificate?”