Читать книгу Mixed Blessings - Cathy Marie Hake - Страница 12

The phone rang as Marie crossed the threshold. Too tired to care, Marie let go of Ricky’s hand and smiled wearily at her sister. “I don’t know how people commute long distances to work.”

Sandy gave her a sympathetic look, then glanced at the still-jangling phone and made a wry face. “You’d better answer that. Some guy named Peter has been calling every fifteen minutes for the last two hours. He’s frantic.”

“Great.” Marie rubbed her aching back as she headed for the phone. “Hello?”

“Marie! It’s eight forty-seven! You’ve been driving long past dark. What took you so long? Was there a problem?”

Her purse strap slid down from her shoulder, and Marie let her bag drop onto the battered, white kitchen counter with a muffled thump. Shoving her hair back from her forehead, she sighed, “We’re fine.”

“What took you so long?”

Peter’s voice sounded ragged with concern, but Marie didn’t want to think about him or his feelings at the moment. His parting words kept echoing in her head. You take good care of him until I can. All the way home, she’d worried that Peter meant to try to take Ricky away. She’d been so absorbed, she’d failed to look at the gauges and run out of gas.

“I said, we’re fine.”

“Thank heavens! Marie, your car is leaking oil. I saw a pool of fresh oil right where you were parked. I worried you broke down or something.”

“We made it home in one piece.”

“Good!” His sigh of relief flowed over the line.

Marie cleared her throat. “When I stopped to get gas, my license and cards were in the wrong places in my wallet.”

The line went silent.

“Mr. Hallock? I believe an answer is in order.” She could hear his steps as he paced back and forth on a hard surface someplace. The silence told her he was considering several possible explanations. That fact irked her. She wanted the truth.

“While you were in my house,” he said in a well-modulated tone, “the security officer did a search of the car and your purse. He copied your identification and put it back.”

I wanted him to be honest—but I also hoped he’d be honorable. Fatigue gave way to anger. “I’m so mad, I could spit nails! How dare you do such a thing!”

He made an impatient sound. “I didn’t have a choice! You have my son!”

“How am I supposed to respond to that?” She glanced behind herself to be sure Ricky wasn’t in the room. Taking care to lower her voice, she hissed, “Am I expected to scream that Ricky is mine, or do you want me to lay claim to Luke?”

Another silence ensued. Peter finally admitted, “That didn’t come out right. You were wise to leave. I’m starting to go nuts already, and I really don’t want anyone seeing me when I feel this out of control. I’m glad you got home safely. Good night, Marie.”

“Good night, Peter.” Marie hung up the phone.

“Oh, sis! It sounds bad.” Sandy’s eyes held consolation as she maneuvered her wheelchair closer. When her chair came to a halt, she pushed her headband back to restrain a fall of sun-bleached blond hair.

“I’ve opened Pandora’s box.”

“I told you to get a lawyer or a private investigator. You could have at least let one of the guys on the force run a sheet on Peter Hallock.”

Marie compressed her lips and tried to ignore the storm of emotions raging inside her. She hadn’t wanted to get anyone else involved. She didn’t have money to hire professional help, and it felt creepy to ask one of Jack’s old buddies to pull strings. Any number of them would have done so in a heartbeat. Now she wished she would have.

“What’s he—your real, biological son—like?”

Marie flopped down on her brown tweed couch. She gave Ricky a vague smile as he came out of the bathroom. “Go get your jammies, Rick. It’s bedtime.”

“So?” Sandy prompted as Ricky disappeared into his room.

“He’s beautiful, Sandy. Beautiful. His eyes are blue, but they’re shaped just like Jack’s. His mouth is, too. He looks like a cherub. He’s a few inches shorter than Ricky, but maybe a bit stockier.”

“What did they name him?”

“Luke.” She closed her eyes. “My day was a disaster. How was yours?”

“Rehab went well. They’re pushing me to join an independent living group. Do you think I’m ready?”

“I think you will be soon.” Marie accepted the race-car-printed flannel pajamas she’d made and helped Ricky into them. Ordinarily, he’d try to change all on his own, but after a long, trying day, he’d come out to seek her help and reassurance. She gave him an extra hug after she buttoned his shirt.

While Ricky stayed in the living room with them, she and Sandy took care to discuss Sandy’s future instead of the catastrophic events of the past week. Marie wanted to shield her son from as much of the ordeal as she could until the adults all managed to iron out the issues. She’d never imagined her sweet little tyke would be in the line of fire as he’d been today. The memory left her shaken—and more than willing to distract herself with the exciting prospects opening up for Sandy.

“My physical therapist said I’ve stabilized,” Sandy said as she whizzed in and out of the kitchen. She brought a pair of Red Delicious apples.

“You’ve worked hard,” Marie praised. “I’m really impressed by how much you can do.”

They discussed the merits of such a plan as they shared the apples with Ricky for a bedtime snack. Marie tucked him into his bed. He mumbled a nighttime prayer and fell asleep at once.

The minute Marie came back into the living room, Sandy demanded, “Okay. Now that he’s in bed, give me the scoop.”

“I’m in big trouble.” Marie sank onto the couch, stared straight ahead at the brick fireplace and sighed. “Peter Hallock is rattled. From what I gather, he’s an administrator at a hospital—powerful. Rich, too.” She took a deep breath and slowly let it out. “To top it off, he’s possessive. When I left, he told me to take good care of Ricky until he can.”

Sandy’s jaw dropped. “You have to be kidding me!”

“Nope.” Marie wearily propped her feet up on the coffee table.

“He’s nuts! What did you do?”

“I got out of there as fast as I could.”

“So he’s going to be ugly?”

“I can’t say. It wouldn’t be fair to judge that yet. Sandy, I’m just sick about it all. I know he is, too.”

“What’s his wife like?”

“He’s widowed.” Other than that fact, he hadn’t alluded even once to his wife. Marie tried to rub away her headache and wanted to pretend nothing had happened. “Let’s get you ready for bed. You know, I didn’t see Brent when I came in. I wanted to thank him for helping you.”

“I thanked him.”

Marie stopped and gave her sister a searching look. “Oh? That sounds interesting.”

Sandy grinned. “We thought so.”

“What are you telling me?”

“He asked me out to lunch after church. We’re going on a picnic. He said he’s tired of pretending to be my buddy. His kiss backed up that claim, too.”

“Wonderful!” Marie gave her a hug. “What will you wear?”

They chattered about that issue as Marie helped Sandy transfer from her wheelchair to bed. She’d learned all of the necessary skills to take care of Sandy since she’d hurt her back in a freak surfing accident. With the passage of time and rehabilitation, Sandy had regained most of the use of her arms. She needed to build up more muscle strength so she could move herself independently, but she was nearly to the point of being able to care for herself with a minimum of help.

Marie changed and crawled into the other bed in the same room. As she curled up under the blankets, she tried to block the image of a large, mahogany-haired man reaching for Ricky.

You take care of him until I can. Until I can… His words kept echoing in her mind. Marie shuddered and dragged the covers up higher.

She sensed Peter Hallock dearly loved children. The protective urge he’d shown at the outset with Luke now extended toward Ricky, too. What had he meant, the Hallocks are never losing another child? Had there been a kidnapping? A murder? Was Luke safe? Tired and worried as she felt, Marie didn’t sleep well.

Peter’s nerves stretched taut. Darlene took their baby when she left him; yesterday, as Marie left with Ricky, the landslide of feelings and memories nearly buried Peter. Peter tried to book a flight to Orange County last night, but the galling fact that John Wayne airport closed at ten each night foiled his plan. This morning’s whole flight down seemed to go in slow motion, and Peter got unaccountably impatient with the rental agency when his car wasn’t ready as promised.

He swerved and focused his attention on the road again. Marie had better be an easygoing hostess, because he was dropping in without warning. If he called again, he’d only put his foot in his mouth. He even missed the freeway turnoff to her place and needed to backtrack.

Marie lived in an older tract neighborhood where it looked like an unimaginative architect had taken a pair of cookie cutters to design only two floor plans. Places of this vintage invariably needed upkeep, but most carried the air of being well-tended.

Peter pulled up to the curb and gave the pink, purple and white flowers edging her yard an assessing look. The mailbox out in front of her house bore a shiny gold icthus. Instead of steps, a wooden ramp led to the front door. Painted along the widest side beam was a verse he recognized. “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” Clearly, yesterday’s lunchtime prayer wasn’t a mere ritual. Marie lived her faith. Good thing she does. Only God will be able to solve this for us.

He swept Luke out of the car seat, strode up the ramp and rang the doorbell.

Tired of being confined by the flight and his car seat, Luke wiggled. “Want down.”

“Okay.” Peter set him on the porch, and he immediately scampered off and grabbed for a marble-blue plastic ball that rested against the garage.

A young woman in a wheelchair opened the door. Her beaming smile and “Hi!” took Peter off guard. So did the sight of Marie, barefoot, in a pair of walking shorts and a cherry-red T-shirt. Oblivious to his arrival, she and Ricky screeched and giggled as she chased him into the corner with the hose attachment of a noisy vacuum cleaner. Peter’s uneasiness evaporated.

“Can I help you?”

He refocused on the woman in the wheelchair. She had to be Marie’s sister. Her wheelchair was one of the slick customized jobs, cueing him in to the fact that the injury to which Marie had alluded was significant and permanent. He cleared his throat. “I’m Peter Hallock. You must be Sandy.”

She’d already cocked her head and gazed at him suspiciously. The moment he confirmed his identity, her face grew wary. “I don’t think you should have come here, Mr. Hallock. Ricky is ours.”

He gave no reply. Marie switched off the vacuum. Though Ricky continued to shriek with glee, Peter noted Marie’s laughter died the moment she spied him. Her eyes narrowed and she studied him for a second before she quickly pivoted, as if to block his access to the little boy. Clearly, this mother was protecting her young. Peter wanted to protest—but in that moment, he realized he’d managed to scare her. He’d instilled in her the selfsame sickening fear he lived with—that someone was going to harm or take away a very precious child. The thought appalled him.

Marie patted her son on the backside. “Go to your room. Put away Noah and the animals. Mommy will come check on you in a minute.” She waited until Ricky obeyed and was safely out of sight before she walked to the door. “I’ll take care of this, Sandy.”

Her sister didn’t budge. She kept her chair in place as a barrier and looked like a bulldog. “You don’t have to talk to him.”

“I know I don’t.” Marie glanced over her shoulder, as if to reassure herself Ricky was safely out of reach, then turned back toward him. “Mr. Hallock, I’ll be hiring an attorney on Monday. You’ll be contacted thereafter. Do you have a lawyer yet?”

“I was hoping we could share an attorney.”

She gave him an incredulous look.

Sandy scoffed, “There’s a great idea. I can already see who would end up the victor.”

Marie put her hand on her sister’s shoulder. Was it a move to silence her, or to protect and side with her? “If you wait at the foot of the ramp, Mr. Hallock, I’ll get you a few pictures of Ricky.”

Peter noticed she still didn’t look him in the eye, and that bothered him. Sandy’s bitter words took him off guard, too. Still, he had no right to complain. He refocused his attention. “Luke, come back here!”

“Luke!” Marie’s face transformed at once. She scrambled past her sister and plowed down the ramp. She swung Luke in a big circle, then cuddled him close. Head tilted so she could rub her cheek in Luke’s soft hair and relish every last inch of contact, she turned her gaze to Peter. “You brought him!”

Peter felt a jumble of emotions. A stab of jealousy pierced him. Then, too, anger hit. How dare she think he’d leave Luke behind? Ah, but the wariness on her face had been replaced by sheer joy.

Something tugged on his shirt. Sandy laughed. “Hey, would you mind moving? That’s my nephew down there.”

Peter stepped aside. As Sandy rolled over the threshold, Marie brought Luke up the ramp. “Lookie, Luke! It’s Auntie Sandy!”

Luke grabbed fistfuls of Marie’s shirt and buried his face in her shoulder. Peter watched how Marie held him a bit more possessively. “It’s okay, punkin.” She smiled at Sandy. “He’s shy.”

“Compared to Ricky,” Sandy said, “anyone is shy.”

Peter felt relieved that they accepted Luke just as he was.

“Can I come out?” Ricky’s shout from the bedroom made them all laugh again.

The second Marie called her permission, Ricky rocketed out of his room and onto the porch. Peter caught him and held him tight. In that moment, every bit of doubt he’d held about coming south disappeared. He’d done the right thing.

“It’s getting kinda crowded,” Sandy said. “This porch isn’t made for family reunions.”

They went into the house and the joy suddenly dissipated, only to be replaced with awkwardness. For a brief pause, no one said a thing. Then, they all started to speak. “We didn’t—”

“I know—”

Marie and Peter both went silent as Sandy finished her statement. “Those kids look—” she hesitated as she looked from Peter to Marie, then finished “—like very good boys.”

Ricky poked himself on the chest a few times directly over a badge-shaped patch. “I’m a fireman!”

“You don’t got a hat,” Luke countered.

“I gots two.” Ricky wiggled, so Peter set him down. Luke followed suit, and they scrambled out of the room. Peter looked back at Marie and cleared his throat. “After you left, I got mad. Not at you—at Melway General. I called my lawyer. I’d like to discuss what he said.”

Sandy piped up, “How ’bout if I take the boys for a walk?”

Marie’s shoulders melted with obvious relief. “That would be great! Thanks.”

Ricky, wearing a plastic fire helmet, came back into the room. Luke trailed along behind him. Instead of a hat, he sported a toy tool belt. Peter wasn’t sure if Sandy could handle one kid, let alone two, but how could he diplomatically ask? He watched as Luke tentatively ran his hand over a wheel of her chair. Sandy didn’t reach for him. Instead, she leaned a bit closer and asked in a quiet, sweet voice, “I’m going to take Ricky to the park. He rides in my special chair with me. We’ll take a bag with juice and cookies. Do you want to come?”

Luke shook his head. Peter was secretly glad he did. Ricky grabbed a lumpy canvas bag from a nearby shelf. As he dragged it over, one of the straps caught Sandy’s foot and pulled it off her wheelchair’s footrest. “Hey, buster! No fishing in these waters.”

Ricky untangled the webbed strap, then hooked the bag over the handles of Sandy’s chair. His intense concentration struck Peter as both adorable and a sign of his intelligence.

Sandy tried to use her hands to tug her pant leg so she could lift her foot, but her shoe got stuck between the footrests. Peter knelt and slipped Sandy’s foot back in place. “Are you always this fun to be with?”

“Not by a long shot. Four months ago, I strongly contemplated suicide. Marie managed to keep me patched together and dragged me to church until I got my head screwed on straight. I decided landing in a wheelchair was a disaster, but it wasn’t the worst thing that ever happened. If anything, it made me take stock of my life and change things for the better. Marie made me face things and helped me get through. She’s got a knack for doing that.”

“You sisters are quite a twosome.”

“She’s the loyal one. I’m the deserter. After all, I’m leaving her with you right now.” Sandy straightened her clothes and looked at him intently. “Marie would eat ground glass before she ever left me with a guy who wanted my kid.”

Peter looked up at her somberly. “I’d never intentionally hurt either of them.”

“I know. Before I ever let Marie go, I called and had one of Jack’s friends on the force run a sheet on you. You came out totally clean.”

“Sandy!” Marie gasped.

“Hey, you can’t blame me! This guy could’ve been dangerous. I wasn’t willing to risk you or Ricky.” The little boy scrambled up onto Sandy’s lap. She dipped her head and rubbed her nose to his in an Eskimo kiss. “We’ll be back soon. Behave yourselves.” She set her wheelchair into motion.

As it rolled down the ramp, Ricky started making fire-engine siren sounds.

Peter turned to Marie and cocked a brow. “So she ran a check on me.”

“You had your security guard search my car and purse!”

“True.” He couldn’t quell a grin at her outrage. “Are we even?”

Marie shook her head adamantly. “Nothing, but nothing, is as bad as a purse search! Half of my life is in that bag!”

“I see…” he mused. He chuckled and couldn’t resist. “I think you lied about your height on the driver’s license. You’re at least two inches—”

She wheeled around. “I didn’t, but you looked!”

“Nope. Honest, I didn’t. I was tempted, but I didn’t. It was a stupid way of me trying to break the tension.” He forked his fingers through his hair. “This is all so unbelievable.”

The fire in her eyes went out and compassion replaced it. Quietly, she asked, “Would you and Luke care for some juice? Water?”

“Juice for him, please. Do you have any coffee?”

“I’m out of it right now. Sorry.”

“Okay. Juice will do.” He hefted Luke and ventured, “I’ll bet this little guy would rest if we laid him down. I gave him a decongestant so his ears would clear on the plane. It makes him sleepy, but he’s getting over another ear infection, so I didn’t have much of a choice.”

“Poor guy. Let’s tuck him into Ricky’s bed.” They coaxed Luke out of the tool belt and laid him down. As they left the bedroom, Marie said, “I’ve heard ear infections are brutal.”

“He’s had them constantly since birth. Hasn’t Ricky?”

She shook her head. “No, breastfed babies rarely get them.”

It took every shred of discipline to keep from zeroing in on her T-shirt. “You nursed my son?”

“My son. Or at least I thought he was.” She folded her arms across her chest and her cheeks turned the same cherry-red as her shirt. “Didn’t your wife want to?”

“My wife died as a result of a car accident. The doctors at Melway General delivered our child as a last-ditch effort.”

Marie gave him a startled look. “That’s why you were so adamant about not letting me go! I was pretty surprised.”

He nodded. “Probably. Some wounds don’t heal very easily.” His gaze slid over her face. “Your reaction to the guns yesterday was probably magnified because of how your husband died.”

“We’ve both stumbled onto each other’s vulnerabilities, haven’t we?”

“Let’s make allowances for that and try to start over.”

She nodded hesitantly.

“So tell me why Ricky is crazy about firefighters when your husband was a cop.”

“Sandy mail-ordered a costume and the truck for Christmas. It’s grown into a full-blown fascination. I bought a bunch of patches that look like badges and added them to his shirts just to save my sanity.”

They walked into the kitchen. Peter passed the round oak table and noted a dinky acrylic holder full of tiny, colorful paper strips. A pale blue one lay on the table. Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the earth. That Bible promise seemed particularly apropos. Ever since Marie’s revelation, he felt like he stood teetering on the edge of the safe, happy world he’d built for himself and his son. He needed to be reminded the Lord was with him—with them—in the midst of this earth-shattering mess.

“You mentioned consulting an attorney.” Marie took two green striped glasses from the cupboard. “So what happens next?”

“So far, we’re basing everything on simple blood type and deductive reasoning. We’ll undoubtedly have to have DNA testing done to confirm the boys were swapped. We could go the rapid route and have an answer back in a couple of days, but since things will get sticky, I’d rather spare the boys a second blood draw and have all of the specimens go through the full battery.”

“It sounds to me like you still aren’t convinced there was a switch.”

Peter frowned. “On the contrary. As far as I’m concerned, doing the lab work is a mere formality. I always thought Luke looked like my wife until you came along, Marie. Now I know he has to be yours. The similarity is stunning—just like the match between Ricky and me. Even a fool could plainly see whose child is whose.”

“But everyone else will demand proof.”

He nodded. “This week we’ll all have to get to a lab, but for the sake of streamlining things, I’m going to assume our suspicions are a confirmed fact.”

“Okay.” Her hand shook as she poured the orange juice. “I’ll have the doctor call in an order to the lab. Ricky and I can go after work on Monday.”

Peter had thought about having them all go in and getting the blood drawn at a clinic today, but he could see that wouldn’t be wise. He’d rattled her badly enough yesterday, and he still had something on the agenda that meant more to him at the present. He cleared his throat.

“Did you need something?”

“As a matter of fact, yes. I want to spend the weekend. I went crazy without Ricky last night.”

Marie gave him a stricken look. “You can’t get possessive like that, Peter.”

“He’s my son, Marie.”

“And Luke is my son.” Marie could see the strain in his eyes. She drew in a deep breath to steady her nerves and whispered a quick prayer for wisdom. She wanted her voice to stay strong, even though everything inside quivered like pudding. Quickly, before her words would quaver, she shoved his glass at him. “It’s practically tearing me apart, but I’m trying hard not to make any demands and to be scrupulously fair.”

“I think you ought to come live with me.”