Читать книгу The Sweetest September - Liz Talley - Страница 11
ОглавлениеJOHN LED SHELBY up the steps of the house that had been his home for a decade, every nook and cranny known and loved despite the flaws. Inside, he quaked as much as Shelby did. Outside, he maintained a semblance of control. Like always.
Shelby was pregnant with his baby. Or at least she said she was. The irony of the situation rubbed him, bitter and biting.
Rebecca’s desire for the pitter-patter of little feet had been a driving force in their marriage for the past year of her life. With her death, the thought of children ceased to exist. And now, he’d gotten what he’d once desired so greatly...at the hands of a drunken hookup in a crappy bathroom off Hwy 5.
God had a sense of humor. Or maybe he didn’t. Maybe God liked to sucker punch John for the hell of it.
He pulled the screen door open, holding it with his boot as he turned the century-old iron doorknob and pushed inside.
His yellow Lab sat, tongue lolling, ready to greet him.
“Down, Bart.” John pushed the hairy beast with the generous kisses off his thigh and walked inside the cool darkness of the living room, turning right and escorting Shelby toward the kitchen. Bart followed after them, tail threatening the doodads on the low antique tables Rebecca had scattered throughout the foyer and formal dining room. He should pack them away, but something held him back.
It always did.
“You have a dog,” Shelby said like she’d never seen one.
“Yeah. This is Bart.” John released her hand and pulled out a chair in the kitchen. He didn’t know why he’d grabbed her hand to begin with. Maybe because for a moment she looked like a lost child and he hadn’t wanted her to run away. “Here. Sit. I’ll boil some water for tea.”
Bart sat, too. Right at Shelby’s feet. She patted the dog’s head, causing Bart to nudge her hand for more.
John never made tea because he always went for a beer at the end of a long day. In the pantry he found some boxes of herbal tea that had expired a few months before. Tea didn’t go bad, did it? Probably. But this would have to do.
He found the kettle and lit the flame on the stove, eyeing Shelby out of the corner of his eye. Her teeth had stopped chattering, and though she was pale, she looked less panicked.
The woman was almost too pretty, with flaxen hair likely achieved in a high-end salon. Wide blue eyes were framed by inky long eyelashes; high-rounded cheekbones and a mouth he remembered thinking belonged on a pinup girl. Plump and made for sex. Large breasts, nice legs and a waist that was still trim despite her pregnancy. A freaking Playboy Bunny of a woman.
God.
He filled the kettle at the sink and tried to figure out how to handle the situation. Shelby had seemed offended when he asked if she was certain the child she carried was his, but he had to ask, right? He knew nothing about her, and she’d seemed more than willing to pull that condom out of her purse that night.
Of course, it didn’t mean she was morally loose.
Morally loose? Jesus. He sounded like his father.
Stay away from those kind of girls, Johnny. No girl who gives it away is worth your name, and if you knock her up you’ll have to marry her.
So should he insist on a blood test? How did those work? Maybe the baby had to come first before they could test and that was months away. He didn’t know how to handle this situation. Hell, who really knew how to handle this situation? He felt like he’d fallen into a well and was treading water with no foothold on the slick walls, no way to heft himself up.
He focused on what he could control. “Looks like all I have is Apple Orchard or Peachy Keen.”
Shelby stopped petting Bart and the dog whined his displeasure. “Either, as long as it’s caffeine-free. I’m not supposed to have caffeine.”
John put the kettle on and stepped toward the back door, whistling for Bart to come. Reluctantly, the dog stood and waddled to the door. “Go tee-tee,” he said out of habit.
When he turned, Shelby had a weird look on her face. “Go tee-tee?”
He shrugged. “Started when he was a puppy. Somehow changing the term to piss seemed wrong.”
The kettle whistled, and John grabbed a cup, plunked in a tea bag and poured the water. Then he grabbed himself a beer. He’d allow himself only one, though he felt like he needed a six-pack to deal with the woman sitting at his kitchen table. But he needed to get back to the fields.
Pulling out the chair beside her, he slid the cup to her and cracked open his beer. “Feeling better?”
“Yes and no,” she said, lifting the tea and inhaling. Just like Rebecca. The memory punched him. “Thank you for the tea.”
“You’re welcome. So...I’d like to talk a bit more.”
“I assumed that’s why you made me come inside and drink this.” She didn’t look happy about his wanting to know more. What had she said? I told you. Now I’m done.
“So what are your immediate plans regarding the pregnancy?”
“Immediate plans? Go back to Seattle, break the news to my parents and find a permanent teaching job.” She fiddled with the teacup, bending a finger around the rim. Her nails were clipped short and painted a soft pink. Definitely a nice manicure.
“You’re a teacher?”
“I teach high school math. My last teaching assignment in Spain ended this past spring, and I didn’t come stateside in enough time to interview for a permanent position. It’s hard to pick one up midyear so I’ve been substituting in the Seattle school district on a part-time basis. The baby’s due in June, so I should be able to maintain a permanent position next year.”
“The baby’s due in June?”
“The due date’s June 24.”
“My birthday’s the eighteenth,” he said, wondering why the hell that even mattered. But even so, the image of a small bundle cradled in his arms appeared. A son with dark hair and fair skin, his little mouth doing that lip quivering thing as he cried annoyance at being taken from his mother’s arms.
“I know. I hired a private investigator to find you. I was fuzzy on your name.” Her bite of laughter was bitter and when she looked up he saw shame in her eyes.
“I remembered yours. Thought it was a pretty name.” He’d remembered her name, the way she smelled—like something sweet and expensive—and the small encouraging sounds she’d moaned as he pulled up her skirt.
He hadn’t wanted to remember, but on dark, lonely nights when he lay awake staring at the crack in the ceiling he needed to repair, he recalled Shelby and the way she’d felt against him. He hated himself for it.
For a few minutes, they each contemplated the enormity of the situation.
A baby. Good God.
“So,” she said. “I’m feeling a little better. I’m embarrassed I sort of freaked out. Guess it was everything built up. I’m not usually so...wimpy.” Her smile was embarrassed, almost pained. “I won’t keep you from your work.”
John cradled his beer in both hands. “Are you staying in town?”
“No, I’m going back home to Seattle tomorrow. Besides, staying in town a few days is what got me in trouble in the first place.” She gave a humorless chuckle.
“This is crazy,” he said.
“Yes, it is,” she agreed with a nod, “but it’s not the end of the world. I can deal.”
“I’d like it if you could stay at least a day or two,” he said, suddenly alarmed about the finality in her voice. Did she think she could drop this bomb and walk away...and he’d just go back to cutting cane like the news she’d brought was equal to “I sideswiped your mailbox” or “I accidentally broke your window.” This wasn’t something a person confessed to and then walked away. This was about a child...his child. “Just give me some time to wrap my mind around this and help you.”
“I don’t need your help,” she said, pushing the teacup away. “I’m not trying to interfere in your life. Just thought telling you about the pregnancy was the decent thing to do.”
“And that’s it? I get to know and that’s all?”
Shelby’s eyebrows knotted. “I didn’t think you...” She paused and looked hard at him. “You don’t have to do anything. I didn’t come here asking for money or a way out of this. I’m not a girl in trouble. This isn’t the ’50s or ’60s. I can take care of the baby myself. I’m financially secure and mentally stable...mostly.”
He made a face.
“I’m kidding,” she said, her complexion pinking, her eyes resuming a less-tragic glint. “I’m mentally stable.”
“But it’s my baby, too.” John set his beer aside and leveled her with the same look his father had used on him when he thought to take the easy way out. John wasn’t going away. If that’s what she’d thought, she’d been wrong.
She gave an exaggerated, slow nod. “Okay, so technically speaking, it’s your child, but you don’t have to be involved.”
“Too bad,” he said. “You came here to tell me I’m the father of the child you’re carrying. Did you really think I’d say ‘thanks for the info’ and go about my life as normal? What kind of man do you think I am?”
“I have no idea what kind of man you are,” she said, scooting her chair back, looking as if she might run for the back door. “I didn’t think you would—I never considered anything other than...” She knotted her brow, twisting her lips as if searching for the right way to say she didn’t want him to care.
“Doing the right thing?” he finished. “I believe that’s the way you put it. So why even tell me if you don’t want anything from me?”
“Because you have a right to know.”
“But not a say-so?”
“Why would you? You ran,” she said, looking up at him. “Remember? You left me in that bathroom, drunk, ashamed and...knocked up. Why on earth would I think you’re the kind of man who would stand with me? And why would I want you to?”
John felt as if she’d just hit him in the face with a wet dish towel. The kind of man who would run? Yeah. She wasn’t wrong. He’d been running for the past year...from his family, his friends and the grief that consumed him. The only thing he hadn’t run from was the incessant work he did in the fields as some kind of penance to his wife’s family. As if he could make up to Carla Stanton the loss of her daughter by keeping the Stanton legacy alive in some way. Rows of cane and this empty house were all he had left in his life. Even knowing how pathetic it was to close out the people who loved him hadn’t stopped him from soaking himself in work and regret. “Okay. I’ll give you that. I ran. I was a total dick. For that I apologize.”
Shelby’s sculpted eyebrows lifted. “Oh. Thank you for apologizing.”
“I know this is a hard situation. I’m not asking you to do anything other than stay a day or two so we can figure some things out together. Obviously, you’ve been carrying this burden by yourself. Maybe you could use my help. Maybe fate threw us together and gave us, uh, a baby for a reason. So whether you wanted me involved or not, I am.”
Shelby looked annoyed. “You’re making this complicated. It’s not. I’m pregnant. I’m having a baby. I’m making the decisions. You provided the sperm. Job over.”
“No. It’s not that simple and you know it. I’m not going away just because you want me to. You’re not being fair.”
“What? I’m being more than fair. I flew down to tell you. I didn’t have to do that.”
“But you did. It was the right thing to do, and you can’t legally keep me out of the child’s life. I’m the father. You said so yourself.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Why are you doing this? I live thousands of miles away. I can’t give you what you’re asking for.”
“Well, I’m not satisfied being a phantom figure who mails a check once a month. Is that what you thought I would do? Never want to see my child?”
Anger burgeoned in her eyes. “I shouldn’t have come.”
“But you did.”
“So you keep reminding me,” she said. “I only wanted to tell you about the baby. I didn’t want anything else from you...not even a check.”
“Too bad.” John stood and scooped up her cup. He walked to the counter and set the half-filled cup in the depths of the scarred farm sink. His feelings were twisted into a giant ball of so many emotions he couldn’t begin to identify them, but in the midst of the disappointment, regret and anger was something that surprised him.
Joy.
Seemed impossible, since he hadn’t felt an inkling of happiness in well over a year. But despite feeling out-and-out terror, inside John thrilled at the warm thought of a child in his life. “We made a mistake a few months back. Not you. Not me. We. Which means going forward is something we’ll do together.”
Shelby eyed the empty spot where her tea had been. “Why did you pick up my tea? And why do you think you have the right to decide anything about my future?”
John eyed the cup in the sink before turning back to her. “Sorry.”
She glared at him.
“You’re carrying something inside of you who is as much a part of me as you. You would deny me the right to know my own son or daughter?”
Shelby paled but said nothing.
For a few minutes, they stared at each other, once strangers with a compulsion...an urge to feel something that dark September night, now tied together by the tiny life growing within Shelby.
“I need to use your restroom before I head back to Baton Rouge,” Shelby said, her voice firm and teacherlike. She seemed set on ignoring his last question. As if she could make him go away.
John studied her, seeing too much or maybe not enough of the woman beneath the highlights and sophisticated clothes. The woman beneath the expensive leather boots and jewelry that probably cost more than his broken-down truck. This was a woman nothing like his wife. But this was a woman he wasn’t going to run from this time. He conceded the battle, but the fight wasn’t over. “Down the hall to your left.”
She stood up too quickly and hit the table with her thigh. His beer fell, emptying its contents on the table he’d inherited from his grandmother May Claire. He scooped the bottle from the table, droplets of yeasty beer mixing with the scent he remembered from that night long ago—a sultry warmth that belonged to a woman he’d never thought to see again.
A scent that belonged to a woman who carried a part of his future.
John grabbed a dish towel and wiped up the spilled beer, wishing he could fix his world as easily.
* * *
SHELBY WALKED QUICKLY down the dim hallway, looking for the bathroom...looking for an escape.
God, why had she come?
Of course, she knew why. She’d put herself in the shoes of a man who’d had a one-night stand and convinced herself she would at the very least want to know she had a child out there somewhere. Seemed ethical. The right thing to do.
But now she wished she hadn’t said anything.
I’m not satisfied being a phantom figure who mails a check once a month. So what did that mean?
All the doors on her left were closed. Shelby tried the first one, but it was an office, desk cluttered with paper and somehow lonely in the afternoon shadows dancing against the pale wall. Shelby closed that door and found the small bathroom next to it.
Twisting the antique crystal handle, Shelby closed herself in the narrow gray half bath and bolted the door. Silly, but she felt better having a locked door between her and the man she’d paid her ex-boyfriend’s sister-in-law three hundred dollars to find.
Irony was such a bitch.
The bathroom showed a woman’s touch. Embroidered antique towels hung on a ring and a pewter picture frame sat on the vanity. Shelby picked up the picture of the happy couple on the sugar-white beach. John was nearly unrecognizable with tan skin and a huge grin. The wife he held in his arms was small, brown and pretty in a wholesome way. Happy times for a couple that no longer existed.
Shelby set the picture down next to a small carving of a pelican perched in the corner. From the top of the pelican sprouted cattail and tumbling Spanish moss. The braided rug looked handmade in tones of blue and moss-green. Tasteful and simple. Most likely decorated by the woman in the picture.
Shelby sighed and ran water into the sink, blinking at herself in the mirror. She’d eaten her lipstick off long ago, but still looked much the same as she had earlier. She didn’t look like a half-panicked pregnant woman. She looked, well, prettier than normal if not a little pale after having to impart the news to the man clacking around in the kitchen, cleaning up her spill.
Cleaning up her spill.
Yeah. Story of Shelby’s life.
Stay a couple of days. Let me help you figure things out.
John’s offer was tempting to a degree. She had hated being back in Seattle. The summer had been long and rainy, spent waiting on Darby. Then fall had come, along with the news Darby was in love with his...well, wife. Things had unraveled and hadn’t gotten better. Her relationship with her parents was as strained as ever, so in one way not being in Seattle was fine, but she hadn’t wanted the complication of John in her life.
So why did you fly down here to Louisiana?
She had no delusions of some sort of relationship with John Beauchamp. God help her, but she’d had enough of emotionally unavailable men, and one look at the dossier prepared on him paired with the memory of his eyes that night, and Shelby knew he still loved his dead wife. And even if he were available, there would be no time for romance between pregnancy and her teaching career. Besides she hadn’t come down here wanting to be rescued. She’d meant it when she said she didn’t expect anything of him. She didn’t have a permanent job, but she had a solid bank account, and if all else failed, there was her inheritance. Money had never been an issue for her family.
No, coming down to Louisiana had allowed her to escape the reality of Seattle if only for a few days...and delay the ensuing disappointment and scandal she would heap on her accomplished family.
Again.
Once the black sheep, always the black sheep. She seemed destined to stay in the role she’d assumed long ago.
Sighing, Shelby hiked up her dress and tugged down her tights. Might as well—how had John put it? Oh, yeah. Tee-tee. Long drive back to Baton Rouge. She wasn’t staying here in Magnolia Bend any longer than she had to. If John wanted to talk about the future of their child, he’d have to—
Shelby’s last thought disappeared as she caught sight of the blood in the crotch of her brown ribbed tights.
She jerked her panties down and sank onto the porcelain toilet seat. Heavier smears of blood in her panties. Frantically, she grabbed some toilet paper and wiped.
More blood. Fresh.
Oh, God. She was bleeding.
Why had she climbed in that damn rattletrap mule? Bumping over those huge ruts in the field couldn’t have been good for the baby. And all this drama and stress hadn’t helped, either. She’d put her baby in jeopardy, and now she was having a miscarriage right there in a dead woman’s guest bathroom.
Jesus.
And suddenly she, who’d hated the life growing inside of her for nearly a month, who’d penciled in an abortion on her calendar, who didn’t even know the father of her baby beyond his birth date and occupation, knew beyond all else she wanted to keep the small miracle housed within her body.
She stood, tugged up her underwear and tights, squeezed her legs together as if that could stop the bleeding and called, “John!”
Shelby heard the pounding of his boots and slid the lock open, pushing back the door.
“What is it?” he asked, wiping his hands on a towel, looking alarmed.
“I’m bleeding,” she said, trying to stay calm despite the fear clogging her throat. Rough unshed tears made her hoarse.
John took her arm and pulled her gently from the bathroom. “It’s okay. I’m going to call Jamison French. He’s a doctor and one of my closest friends. He’s not far away.”
Shelby nodded, for the first time glad John stood beside her, glad to have someone to lean on. She didn’t want to need him, but her mind felt frozen and all she could think about was keeping the baby inside of her. “I’m scared.”
John escorted her to the chair she’d left moments ago and grabbed the cordless phone sitting on the kitchen counter. “I know you are, but I’m going to take care of you.”
Shelby sank into the chair and tried not to cry. She wanted to be strong, but at the moment doing so seemed impossible.
John barked some things into the phone, softening his tone with an apology. Shelby didn’t pay attention to who he talked to. She concentrated on telling her body to stop bleeding, to stop trying to eject the small life she’d glimpsed on the ultrasound.
“We’re going to my truck, okay?” John said, grabbing a set of keys. “Jamison’s at the hospital, but he’s going to meet us at his office. We’re going to go in the back door.”
“Oh, God,” Shelby breathed. “I didn’t want this to happen. Why is this happening?”
“It’s okay,” he breathed, helping her rise, smoothing her hair back.
“You say that a lot.”
“Maybe we’ll both believe it.”
Shelby closed her eyes. “I hope that’s true.”
John opened the back door, pushing Bart out of the way and flipping off the lights. “No matter what happens, Shelby, hold on to the thought everything will be okay. I’ve forgotten how to do that, but suddenly it feels pretty damn important.”
And when Shelby glanced over at him, she believed him...but that didn’t stop the fact she felt dampness in the crotch of her panties.
