Читать книгу Her Daughter's Father - Anna Adams - Страница 10

NARROWING HER EYES against the glare of the sun off polished chrome handles, India pushed through the drugstore doors and angled away from the soda fountain to the stocked shelves. She’d left her father cleaning the Tanners’ yard. He’d offered to drive her, but she’d taken the long way, hoping for a glimpse of Colleen.

India turned down the aisle of first-aid products. She’d never considered what she might do if the baby she’d handed over to Mother Angelica had grown into a fifteen-year-old in trouble. Though he obviously loved her, Jack couldn’t manage to keep Colleen from making one bad decision after another.

Were Colleen’s actions merely those of an average girl of fifteen?

India stopped in front of the bandages. Frustration made her shift on restless feet.

She picked up a tin of Band-Aids. Dinosaurs. Not one serious-looking box in the row. Teletubbies, dolls with big hair, birds with big hair, even soldier gargoyles hulking across adhesive battlefields, but not one plain Band-Aid. And no answers to her questions, either.

“Grandma, what about this one? Golden Auburn? How could Dad object to Golden Auburn?

India dropped the tin. As it rattled across the floor, she ducked after it. Colleen’s voice. She knew it with a mixture of delight and apprehension that clenched her stomach muscles. But “Grandma”? Colleen was playing hooky with her grandmother?

“Are you kidding? Your dad would throw Grandpa and me into the street.” The light voice paused. “Frankly, I couldn’t blame him. Absolutely no more hair color for you, Colleen.”

“Auburn, Grandma. A-U-B-U-R-N. Not burgundy this time.”

India rose slowly as Colleen inexorably turned her head.

“Trouble,” the older woman said, not noticing her granddaughter’s wandering attention. “T-R-O-U-B-L-E. Can you spell disaster? Put the dye back, and let’s go home.”

Recognition faded slowly to ambivalence in Colleen’s gaze. India nodded, relieved she wasn’t with Chris. Colleen lifted her chin in unwilling acknowledgment.

“I saw your father.” India spoke before she had time to think twice about whether she should. “He’s looking for you.”

At least four inches shorter than the girl by her side, Colleen’s grandmother also turned. A faint tint of lavender in her silvery hair hinted at Colleen’s love of color. She grabbed her granddaughter’s shoulder. “Oh, dear. I forgot the note. Did you speak to your teacher before you left? Did you ask for your assignment for tomorrow?”

Colleen grimaced. “I didn’t go to last period. My other teacher, Mrs. Denton, held us late. They never call parents, Grandma. I figured you’d give me a note tomorrow morning, and I’d straighten it out.”

The older woman hunched her tiny shoulders. “You might as well buy the dye. I’m swimming in soup now.” But as Colleen grabbed a box off the shelf, her grandma snatched it away. “Don’t you know a joke when you hear it? Let’s pay for the rest of this and—” She broke off as the miniature ship’s bell above the drugstore door clanged. “Uh-oh.”

By the time India turned, Jack had already seen Colleen. His relief, potent as India’s, seemed to confuse his daughter. India felt like a tennis spectator.

“Dad?” Colleen took the hair color from her grandmother and shoved it back onto the shelf. “I had a dentist’s appointment.”

Jack’s smile took India’s breath away. He looked so young, his wide mouth masculine and yet terribly tender.

“I forgot,” he said. “Your assistant principal called to say you’d missed your last period class. Thanks for taking her, Nettie.”

“I forgot the note. I’m sorry, Jack.”

He shook his head, a man who’d fought free of danger. “No problem.”

India sucked in a deep breath that somehow made Jack see her. For the slightest moment, they shared silent, heart-felt relief. Comforted and afraid all at the same time, India tried to withdraw. She had to get out of here before he began to wonder why Colleen mattered so much to her.

“Nettie, did Colleen introduce you to India?”

“Not yet, Dad.” Colleen’s exasperation sounded blessedly adolescent.

Jack seemed to agree. His grin widened. He walked toward India, only to narrow his gaze as he stared at her hand, still wrapped in the clean white cloth her father had produced from the depths of his truck. Her heart beat a strangely disturbing rhythm at his concern. She made an instinctive move for the door, but Jack blocked her way.

“Are you all right?” Spoken so close, the words skittered over her skin. Before she could answer, he wrapped his large hand around her forearm. Even through her dismay, she enjoyed the heat of his skin, the weight of his large, capable fingers.

No. This, most of all, wasn’t supposed to happen. She tried to pull away. “I’m fine.”

“Jack,” a bluff voice said, “good to see you out of the boatyard.” A burly man came out of the office behind the counter. He spelled S-A-F-E-T-Y to India.

“I just need these Band-Aids.” She brandished the dinosaur tin like a trophy.

The man looked at her, startled. “Yes, you do. Your hand is bleeding.”

Colleen and Nettie hurried around the shelves at the other end of the aisle. India ping-ponged back to Jack. “It’s already stopped. I only cut it.”

She wrenched away from his dark gaze, rationalizing her strange response to him. He knew things about Colleen that were forever lost to her. Little things, like her favorite ice cream. Big things, like the whys and wherefores of her belligerence toward him.

She tugged out of his grasp, but her arm felt cool where he’d touched her. Cupping her injured hand between her waist and the Band-Aids, she hurried to the counter. “How much are these?” She risked a last glance at Colleen, who stared back with curiosity.

Despite all her best intentions, India’s mouth curved. Gladness overwhelmed her as she memorized the girl’s sharp chin and soft cheeks, the graceful sweep of her poor distressed hair. Colleen smiled back, a real smile this time.

India’s insides crumpled.

Her daughter. The tiny infant she’d loved and longed for and entrusted to Mother Angelica. No longer a mystery, but flesh-and-blood real, and for once in a safe place. Colleen looked like a miracle.

“Wait, that cut’s dirty.” Impossibly oblivious to the longing India wore like a coat, Jack Stephens strode to her side. “Do you need stitches?”

She shook her head and dodged his reaching hand. “No.”

Nettie leaned in and gently plucked the edges of the cloth away. “It doesn’t look good, young lady.”

Jack covered the cut again and eased his shoulder in front of the older woman. “Careful, Nettie. You know how bleeding makes you queasy.” To India, he was all business again. “The clinic’s close. I’ll drive you.”

Though tempted, India came to her senses. She’d do a lot to snatch a few more minutes with Colleen, but in the end, it was too risky.

“I don’t need to go.” She dug change out of her pocket and waited for the man behind the counter to ring up her purchase. “I have to get back to Mr. Tanner’s house and help my dad.”

Jack explained to Nettie. “India and her father are painting the house.”

“Are you?” Nettie’s polite, old-fashioned manners deepened the burden of India’s lie.

“We’re almost finished, actually,” India blurted, unnerved enough to say the first thing she thought. “I guess we’ll head back to Virginia soon.”

“You want a bag for this?” The man behind the counter pushed the tin toward her.

“No, thanks.” She opened the lid and took out a large Band-Aid she managed to open with one hand and a little leverage from the other.

“Here, let me help you.” Jack took the Band-Aid from her and put it on the counter. “What do you have to clean her cut with, Al?”

The man passed Jack a small, square package that contained a medicated wipe. India pulled it from Jack’s fingers.

“I’ll do it.” She swabbed her cut, wincing as the treated wipe stung. Before she could reach for the Band-Aid again, Jack picked it up and peeled off its backing. His bemused smile set off loud alarms that clamored up and down her body. He’d never understand why she was so reluctant to accept his aid. Not if she could help it.

He smoothed the bandage over her palm with exquisite gentleness and a wry look at the dinosaur springing across the colorful background. “Nice ornithomimus. How do you suppose they print the whole name on there?” His roughened, callused fingers irritated her skin with pleasure and scattered her wits.

She pulled away. “Small dinosaur. Big Band-Aid.” This man was not just her daughter’s father. He was married to her daughter’s mother. She scooped up her tin. “Thank you again.”

So willing to lend aid to a stranger, Jack disconcerted her. She tugged at the strap of her overalls. Had she and her father stepped into another world when they’d crossed the long, low bridge to Arran Island? Or did people just naturally help each other in a small community? She flexed her sore hand.

“Can you drive?” Jack asked.

“I drove here.” She peered around him, though he seemed to take up half the room. “Goodbye, Colleen.” She had to mean it. She fought a lump in her throat. “Nice to meet you, Nettie.” Was Nettie Jack’s mother, or Mary’s? She’d never even know.

“WHERE’S INDIA FROM?” Nettie asked.

Colleen slid across the truck’s seat and bumped the rearview mirror out of place with her forehead.

“Are you okay?” Jack patted her head and readjusted the mirror. “I don’t know where she lives, Nettie. Maybe Virginia, since she said they were heading back there. I guess she and her father go where they find work. Al told me he remembers an ad they placed in the paper a month or so ago.”

“Oh no. Their business must be off.” Softhearted to a fault, Nettie leaned around Colleen. “And the only work they found here was the Tanners?”

Jack nodded, his attention split uncomfortably between Nettie and India’s image in his mind, her feminine, soft body lost in her overalls. Water blisters on her palms puzzled him. “I assume so.”

“Then you’ll have to find them something else,” Nettie said.

He almost hit the brakes. “You mean find another job for them?” His daughter’s amused expression caught his eye. “How am I supposed to find another house for them to paint?”

“You know everyone on this island. Whose house needs paint?”

Jack cast a glance at the bay on his side of the truck. Fishing didn’t provide the living it had for his father and his friends’ fathers. “Who can afford new paint?”

Nettie settled back in her seat. “Just go through each of your friends, Jack. You’ll come up with someone. A young girl like that, giving up her life to work for her father. Where is her mother anyway?”

“Maybe she likes to paint,” Colleen suggested.

“Do you like to work with your father?” Nettie made it sound like duty on a garbage scow.

Tense, Jack waited for Colleen’s response. She took her time.

“Well, no, not really.” She caught hold of his wrist, but quickly released it. Fifteen-year-olds must never show affection. “You don’t treat me like one of your employees, Dad. You always have to instruct me, like I’m a kid.”

Her explanation hurt his feelings as much as her first answer. “You’ve never worked the nets for me, Colleen. You’ve only sanded paint since we’ve had the boat out of the water. Did you know how to sand before I showed you?”

A mocking laugh gusted out of her mouth. “How hard is sanding? I can figure out how to push a piece of sandpaper back and forth.”

Jack tightened his hands on the wheel. “Let’s let this go for now. I’ve enjoyed the past hour with you, and I’d like to stretch it as far as we can.”

To his astonishment, Colleen laughed. A sweet, rich peal of laughter he’d known all her life. He grinned. Somewhere inside her lingered his little girl, the child who’d once firmly believed he knew all the answers.

“You know, Dad, Marcy’s mother has been after Mr. Shipp to paint their house.”

“Marcy?” Jack knew the girl. “How’s her eyebrow ring working out?”

“We’re talking about her house. Honest, the paint looks as bad as Mrs. Shipp says. Maybe we should stop by there.”

Her sincerity reeled him in. Jack nudged her shoulder, teasing. “All right, but I have to know one thing, and tell me the truth.” She looked so worried, he almost laughed. “Did Marcy pierce her own eyebrow?”

“Dad!” She shoved back, which apparently didn’t count as affection.

“All right, but your eyebrows are off-limits. Agreed?”

A FEW DAYS LATER, Colleen couldn’t remember the laughter she’d shared with her father. With one swift glance at him sanding the bow of the Sweet Mary, she dropped over the boatyard fence. Chris waited, engine running, behind a stand of trees that hid his car from her father. Boiling with resentment, Colleen slid into the passenger seat.

“What did he say to you?” Chris didn’t even wait for her to speak before he turned into the street.

Colleen twisted on the vinyl. “Everything. He just kept on. He said if they had nothing to teach me I’d be bored, but making straight A’s. Then he started on how I wouldn’t be able to get into a good college.”

Chris snorted. “How can he expect you to know what you want to do for the rest of your life? I’m eighteen, and I don’t know.”

Colleen held a careful silence. Her father wouldn’t be surprised to hear that. “He said I let you change me, that I’ve been different since you came along—like I needed you to tell me school is a waste of time.”

“Since I came along?” Chris’s derisive laugh raised prickles of discomfort along Colleen’s spine. He leaned over for a swift, hard kiss. “I don’t see a thing wrong with your attitude. Maybe I should talk to your dad, myself.”

“He’s not kidding, Chris. He really doesn’t like you.”

“Do I care?” Chris nosed the car to the curb. “He doesn’t have to like me as long as you do.”

Pretending to check the buckle on her boot, Colleen shifted away from Chris’s hand. Lately, when he touched her, he made sure she knew what he wanted and how hard he’d try to take it.

She edged another thin slice of space between them. “You could try more with Dad. My grandparents agree with him, and they all try to keep me from seeing you.”

Chris slammed his fist on the gearshift. “I’m tired of Jack Stephens. Who does he think he is? I heard the bank came sniffing around to see how much work he’s done on the repairs. He’s a deadbeat, Colleen.”

She might be mad at her dad, but Chris’s opinion made her madder at him. She shrank against the car door. “Don’t talk about him that way.”

Chris burned her with angry eyes. “I’ll bet you don’t tell him to shut up when he talks about how bad I am.”

“I didn’t say shut up.” She wrapped her palm around the door handle. “He is my father.”

Chris snatched a handful of her sweatshirt. “Maybe it’s time you picked one of us. Look at the way I treat you. Are you loyal to me or to a guy who acts like you’re a baby?”

Unwilling to admit Chris frightened her, even when he forced her to recognize her fear, Colleen tightened her hand on the door. “You want me to choose between you and my dad?”

“Yeah, between me and some guy who’ll be lucky to keep one of those old broken-down nets on his boat. He thinks he’s such a man.”

Colleen opened the door with a slow screech of metal against metal. “I called you because I needed to talk to you. You say you care about me.”

Chris softened his grip on her shirt, trying to turn his palm against her breast. “I say I love you.”

She shoved him away. “I’ve asked you not to do that.”

His pupils glittered. “Maybe you are a baby after all.” His voice hissed like a snake.

Truly afraid now, she slid backward out of the car. He laughed when she landed on the pavement on her bottom.

“Maybe I am a baby, but I’ll walk from here.” She scrambled to her feet, hauling her short skirt down. “Okay?”

“No, it’s not okay. Don’t act like this. You always try to ignore me when you’re mad. We’re just arguing.”

“I wanted to talk.”

“You want me to guess what you want. I know what I need.”

As if that settled everything, he pulled the door shut and drove off. Colleen stared after him, her legs shaking. He drank more than she ever let on, because he hated living in this small town where everyone knew his life inside and out. But Colleen didn’t think he’d had anything today.

He’d left her in the middle of the street, said terrible things about her father. And he’d tried to grope her again. Could her dad be right about Chris?

What had he meant by that crack about making him guess what she wanted? She’d told him, in every way she knew, not to touch her like that. And how was she supposed to tell anyone what she wanted if no one ever listened to her, anyway?

She turned toward the marina, more alone than ever. If only her mother hadn’t died. Colleen swallowed hard. Even after three years, she missed her mom, but she couldn’t talk to her dad about that, either. No matter how much she wanted him out of her business, she hated the look of pain that still came into his eyes when he didn’t think she noticed.

And Grandma. Poor Grandma needs someone to look after her more than I do. If only her mom…

At the top of the hill, Colleen paused. She’d meant to ask Chris to take her to the marina. Looking out at the water, at the sailboats bobbing all around her, she felt clearer, calmer. But today she missed her mother, and her mother had never liked the bay.

She’d resented the water like another woman who stole Colleen’s father away, and sometimes even Colleen had wondered why he’d worked such long hours. She scuffed her feet in the gravel at the edge of the road.

Her dad and mom had loved each other, but they’d had problems, like every other married couple she’d ever heard of. Her dad’s grief had been real after her mom died. Why did everyone believe she couldn’t see what went on around her?

Colleen hesitated on the road. She couldn’t go home. Grandma badgered almost as much as her father about grades. Maybe she’d go to the library. She’d entered her favorite picture of her mom in their exhibition of island families. They hadn’t sent it back yet, so maybe they’d used it. Her father certainly hadn’t missed it from the piano.

Too busy looking for signs she’d spent ten seconds alone with Chris, he couldn’t seem to see their problems went deeper than her choice of a boyfriend. Chris was right about one thing. He already saw her as a woman. She mattered to him, but her father still believed she was a baby. Because of his attitude, even strangers like India Stuart treated her like an infant.

India Stuart. A perfect match for Dad. A worrier who had no problem “helping” even though it meant butting into someone else’s life. Colleen scuffed her feet deliberately along the rough pavement. She tried to forget how scared she’d been of Chris. He’d been completely sober the day he’d driven her to thank India for her help, and he’d given her a lift even though he’d believed India ought to apologize to him for hitting his car. Nothing wrong with that.

NELL FISHER ROSE WITH INDIA and offered her hand across the desk. “I’m so glad you came in. I can’t convince my regular patrons they have time to read to the toddlers or shelve books, or even read back titles for me while I do inventory.”

India lifted her shoulders, uncomfortable with omissions in the picture she’d drawn for Nell. But she might learn more about Colleen here, and then she could go home as she’d told Nettie she was going to. “I’m glad you can use me.” They turned together to the door of Nell’s small office. “I’ll see you on Saturday morning at nine for the toddler’s story time?”

Already distracted by the unusual number of people crowding into the main room to see the historical society’s display of island family photos, Nell nodded. As she drifted away, India searched for Viveca Henderson.

Her landlady had invited her to see this exhibition. India had jumped, just at the off chance of seeing a photo of Colleen as a small girl, as an infant if Viveca could recognize her. But did she need any more regret? Because surely she would grieve even more if she stumbled on a record of Colleen’s life.

India found Viveca at the exact spot where she’d left her, a perfect vantage point. Viveca leaned into India’s shoulder and nodded at the young girl with honey hair who was disappearing around the first panel of photographs.

“That Stephens girl. Her father ought to worry more about her than about his boat.” Her voice rang tartly. “Are you ready, dear? How nice of you to help Nell out.” She held her vintage fifties skirt away from the crowd. “You know, I always liked Colleen until she started going around with that Chris Briggs.”

India no longer wanted to hear island gossip about Colleen. In fact, she bit gently at the inner skin of her cheeks to swallow a defensive response.

The first lady of the Seasider went on. “She’s making decisions she’ll regret one day.”

India curled her nails into her palms. The woman could be too right. Am I not living proof? Though she’d hoped for just this kind of opportunity, she couldn’t take it now. Instead, she wished she’d stayed home, where she’d never have known the townspeople had already begun to judge Colleen.

Small towns. They provided loving arms or bitter verdicts. No in-between in a small town.

Hoping to change the subject, India pointed at the first line of pictures, of women in crisp white shirtwaists and full skirts and men proudly flanking their fishing boats.

“Do any of these families still live here?”

Mrs. Henderson obliged. India cruised along at her side, only half taking in Captain Torquay and the shark he’d netted one day with his shrimp, or the Honorable Honoria Madison, the mayor’s wife who’d run away with a traveling milliner.

“No, Viveca, you’re wrong about Honoria. She was my great-great-great-aunt, and I happen to know….” A woman India didn’t know spoke up.

India ducked out of the conversation, impatient to see the later photos, the ones from the past fifteen years. She strolled through the panels, drinking in the good library air, flavored with old and new books and casually stored newspapers. She missed this world.

She turned a corner and saw Colleen. A study in concentration, the girl might have been completely alone. She saw nothing, appeared to hear nothing except memories suggested by the photo that held her attention.

Her look of utter loneliness drew India on reluctant feet. She’d been right to stop Chris from taking Colleen with him that night, but she was completely wrong to speak to her now, to intrude on the privacy her daughter had drawn around herself. Colleen could never be her child. And she couldn’t let herself forget that.

But Colleen didn’t notice her. Over the girl’s shoulder, India stared at the picture in its simple silver frame. A beautiful woman laughed with love at Jack as he curved his arm around her and smiled into the camera. Something about his smile…The vulnerable curve of his mouth sparked an uncomfortable pang in India’s heart, but the woman’s blissful face intrigued. Her blond hair, as pale as sea foam after a storm, clung to the woven shoulder of Jack’s sweater. Her eyes overflowed happiness.

Mary Stephens, at last. Ashamed of her involuntary envy, India pressed her hands to her belly. “Is she your mother, Colleen?”

As if India at her side didn’t surprise her, Colleen stretched her hand to the finely carved frame. Her eyes glowed, brilliant yet subdued, like light seeping past the door of a closed room. She rubbed one fingertip around the woman’s face.

“That’s Mom. She died three years ago.”