Читать книгу The Baby Bind - Nikki Benjamin, Nikki Benjamin - Страница 7

Chapter Three

Charlotte stared at Sean, the echo of his last words resounding between them in the brightly lit kitchen, punctuated only by the still steady drumbeat of rain against the window above the sink.

She felt as if she’d just been treated to a wild, unwanted roller-coaster ride. The emotional ups and downs she’d experienced in the space of just a few minutes had taken her from hope to disappointment, joy to confusion, then to the final rattling halt of sad realization.

Charlotte had seen the way Sean’s expression had warmed and softened when he’d first allowed himself to look at the photograph of the little girl they’d been chosen to adopt. She had sensed, as well, the melting of his heart as he’d wordlessly acknowledged how eerily the child’s physical features resembled their own.

She had been so sure that he must have thought—as she had—that the toddler in the photo had been born halfway around the world, in answer to all her prayers, especially for them.

In all honesty, his reaction to the photograph had seemed to mirror hers so completely that Charlotte had been certain that Sean would be able to set aside his concerns about his ability to be a good father at last and gladly agree to pursue the adoption with her. He had to have seen, as she had, that here was the child she had been meant to mother. Here, indeed, was the child she had been meant to call her own.

But in the blink of an eye, he’d withdrawn into himself again, the lines and angles of his handsome face deepening. Having obviously reminded himself that by adopting a child he would also be taking on the burden of fatherhood— a burden he no longer wanted—he had visibly hardened his heart to her.

Charlotte had been ready to put away the photograph, to admit defeat and start the long drive back to Mayfair. Sean had always been a decisive man. Once his mind was made up, he rarely, if ever, changed it.

The six months he’d chosen to live in the New Orleans town house rather than with her in Mayfair were proof enough of how true that simple fact remained. Had she remembered how unwavering he could be several hours earlier as she stood beside her mailbox back home, she likely could have saved herself a lot of grief.

He had surprised her, though, with a one-two punch that had momentarily rendered her speechless. First he had offered to help her with the adoption in any way he could, sending a shaft of joyous hope straight to her heart. But then he had laid out his terms in such a cool, calm, businesslike manner that Charlotte had barely been able to swallow around the clog of anguish that lodged in her throat.

She knew that she shouldn’t have been all that surprised by the bargain Sean expected her to make with him. Six months ago he had stated very clearly how he’d felt about continuing their seemingly futile quest to conceive a child. He had also warned her only a few minutes ago that his feeling on the subject hadn’t changed.

But apparently Sean had made a decision regarding their marriage, as well. A firm decision, in fact, since he hadn’t given her any choice in the matter, had he?

He hadn’t said that she could either adopt the child or work with him to put their life together back on track again. He had simply offered to help her with the adoption, and then he’d said he would be filing for divorce.

Charlotte wasn’t sure what she would have done if Sean had actually asked her to choose between him and the child. She still loved him, just as she had almost since the first day she’d met him, and surely would until the day she died.

They had been so happy together for such a long time. He hadn’t been wrong back in June, either, when he’d insisted that they could be happy together again without the baby she’d been so desperate to have.

Only then she’d been in the midst of a hormone-induced emotional turmoil that hadn’t allowed her to see reason in anything he’d had to say to her.

No, Charlotte didn’t think she would have ended her marriage to Sean in exchange for the chance to have a child. But if their marriage was already over in his mind, as it certainly seemed to be, then she might as well do whatever she could to at least have the child she’d always wanted, and had always believed she was meant to have.

“I realize that my terms probably seem harsh to you,” Sean added, finally breaking the silence that had stretched between them so uncomfortably for the past few minutes.

Letting go of her wrist, he took a step back from the island that separated them and crossed his arms over his chest again. Charlotte saw in his stance a reflection of the brook-no-argument mentality he’d adopted six months ago, and allowed herself a small inner sigh of resignation.

No sense making things more difficult than they had to be. He was willing to give her some of what she wanted from him, some of what she needed. Why risk having him withdraw the offer he’d willingly made by voicing an all-or-nothing demand that he obviously didn’t have the heart to honor?

“No, not really, all things considered,” she replied, sitting on her stood again.

She tried to smile so that he would know she understood and accepted the decision he’d made, and harbored no ill will as a result. But she couldn’t be sure if she’d succeeded as he continued to eye her in a grim, uncompromising manner.

“I realize that I’m asking an awful lot of you,” she continued. “I want you to know how grateful I am that you’re going to help me. I also want you to know that I’ll try to make it as easy as possible for you to get through the whole…process—”

“Before we go any further here just tell me one thing, will you?” Sean cut in. “Did you move forward with this business of adopting a foreign baby after I left Mayfair back in June?”

“No, of course not,” she answered without hesitation, stung by the accusation of equivocation on her part underlying his question. “For the first few weeks after you left me, it was all I could do to get out of bed each morning. Then I had to focus as much energy as I possibly could on getting ready for the start of the school year.”

She paused and drew a quick, angry breath.

“I certainly wasn’t plotting to thwart you in any way,” she added. “I’m not that kind of person, and you, of all people, should know that by now. I wasn’t expecting to find this in my mailbox.” Charlotte tapped a hand on the envelope for emphasis, and tipped her chin up angrily. “But I am happy that I did, and I don’t intend to pretend otherwise.”

“I don’t expect you to.”

Typically, Sean didn’t attempt to defend his questioning of her or to backpedal even the slightest bit. But for just an instant, Charlotte was sure that she saw the merest flicker of hurt in his pale gray eyes.

Her response must have touched a nerve with him, as well. Though how exactly, she couldn’t really be sure. Unless he had meant to offer her an ultimatum earlier— either go forward with adopting the child or work together to save their marriage.

“I don’t suppose you’d consider—” Charlotte began, then looked away when his expression hardened again.

He hadn’t said that reconciliation was an option. In fact, he’d been quite firm about his intention to file for divorce once the adoption process had been completed.

“What?”

“Nothing,” she said, pushing away from the counter, envelope in hand.

“Is there anything else you’d like to know right now? Otherwise, I’ll just run upstairs, collect my clothes and head on back to Mayfair. We can discuss the adoption again in a few days—”

“You are not driving back to Mayfair tonight,” Sean said. “The weather has only gotten worse since you’ve been here, and that’s going to make it even more dangerous for you to be on the road than it was earlier, especially on the interstate.”

“I’ll be fine—” Charlotte assured him.

She didn’t really want to drive home tonight. But neither did she want to spend the night in the town house with her husband, knowing as she now did that their marriage was over.

“There’s also a lot more I want to know about this adoption business,” Sean added, riding over her feeble protest. “Do you have any idea of exactly what we’re going to have to do? Has the agency given you any information on where we’re supposed to go to collect the child and a specific time frame for doing so?”

Charlotte didn’t much care for the way he phrased his rapid-fire questions—adoption business, process, collecting of a child. He made it sound so cold, so…clinical—as if becoming the parents of the precious little girl in the photograph were just another transaction to be brokered as quickly and efficiently as possible.

But she also had to admit that he had a right to know up-front all that he would be required to do.

Unfortunately, Charlotte couldn’t provide him with the information he wanted in the same concise manner he’d just requested it, though she was sure most, if not all, of it was contained in the envelope.

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I haven’t had a chance to look through all of the paperwork the agency sent us.”

“All the more reason for you to spend the night here. That will give us a chance to sort through the packet together,” Sean said amenably enough, then added, “unless you’re ready to call it a night, in which case I don’t mind reading over the information on my own.”

Deftly outmaneuvered, Charlotte realized that Sean had given her two choices, neither of which would allow her to leave New Orleans that night.

Going through the adoption-agency information was going to take awhile, and according to the clock on the kitchen wall it was after ten o’clock already. She was barely alert enough to drive now, although with a little coffee she’d probably be good to go. But a couple of hours from now even coffee wouldn’t help her to stay awake during what would be a long, tedious drive in stormy weather.

The only way she could possibly get away that night would be to leave the envelope with Sean so he could review the contents on his own, and she certainly wasn’t prepared to do that.

“I suppose we might as well go over everything together,” she said at last, though not nearly as graciously as she should have.

“Would you like some coffee before we get started?” Sean offered with the benevolence of one who had triumphed.

“Yes, please.”

Charlotte sat on her stool again, making an effort to tamp down her irritation. How bad could spending one night in the guest room of the town house really be when it would also give her a chance to cement her new affiliation with her soon to be ex-husband?

Obviously, she was about to find out.

“Do you still take cream and sugar?”

“Do you still make coffee strong enough to hold a spoon upright?”

“Cream and sugar it is,” Sean acknowledged with the first hint of humor in his voice that she’d heard all evening.

Reminded of how charming he could be when he put his mind to it—as he was apt to do whenever he’d gotten his way—Charlotte was tempted to lower her guard just a little.

She was stuck in the town house with him for the night, so why not relax and enjoy the companionship Sean now seemed willing to offer her? With the rain still thundering down outside, the small kitchen, light and bright, provided a warm and cozy haven for the two of them.

Only by Sean’s choice they weren’t really a couple anymore—at least not in the same sense that they’d once been. If she allowed herself to pretend otherwise even for an evening, she knew that she would find it even more painful to face the reality awaiting her in the not-too- distant future.

Better to think of her husband as a business partner from now on, Charlotte warned herself as she took the sheaf of paperwork from the envelope and laid it out on the island countertop. A temporary partner with whom she would have dealings for only a short time before he walked out of her life for good.

“You’re looking just a mite grim all of a sudden,” Sean observed as he set two steaming mugs of café au lait on the counter, then sat on the stool across from her again. “Have you come upon something disturbing among all those papers from the adoption agency?”

“The number of forms alone that we’re supposed to complete is daunting,” Charlotte replied, glad to have something to use as a blind for her disquieting emotions.

She took a swallow of the hot, sweet, creamy coffee laced with chicory. Then she spread the various forms out in front of her, reading headings aloud as she turned them toward Sean for his perusal.

“To start, we need a written referral from the adoption agency in New Orleans, criminal background checks from the local and state police, and clearance from Immigration and Naturalization to bring the child into the country. Then we have to apply for approval from the adoption agency’s sister agency in Kazakhstan, as well as from the orphanage there. There’s also a form requesting a formal invitation from the orphanage to adopt the child and another one requesting a visa from the Kazakhstan government allowing us to travel to the city of Almaty where the orphanage is located.”

Charlotte risked a quick glance at her husband. She was afraid that the sheer volume of paperwork required to set the adoption process in motion would be enough to make him change his mind. Even with the agency’s help in assembling the necessary dossier—a service they offered that had been included in the fees she and Sean had already paid—the work involved would be time consuming.

Then they would have to spend approximately four weeks in Kazakhstan, meeting with agency and orphanage personnel and bonding with the child. Only after significant bonding between the adoptive parents and the child had occurred would their request for adoption be presented to the court and approval finally be given.

“They’re quite thorough, aren’t they?” Sean glanced at her, then focused on the forms again, adding, “That’s reassuring, at least to me.”

“Me, too,” Charlotte agreed, releasing with relief the breath she’d been holding.

Sean hadn’t sounded as if he’d been thinking about backing out of his end of the bargain they’d made…at least not yet.

“With so many checks and balances in place, once the adoption has been completed and we’re home again, there shouldn’t be any problem with anyone challenging our rights as the child’s parents,” he continued, surprising Charlotte with his use of we and our, and the plural parents.

Just a slip of the tongue, she told herself, trying hard not to get her hopes up again. But she had to admit that Sean wasn’t distancing himself nearly as much as he’d led her to believe he would earlier. Especially considering the fact that he wasn’t planning on sticking around to be a full-time, or even part-time, father once they’d finished with the business of adopting the child.

“That was one of the things that impressed me the most about the Robideaux Agency when we first began looking into the possibility of adopting a child,” Charlotte said. “They have an excellent and well-established reputation for setting up successful legal adoptions of healthy foreign children. They also provided us with a lengthy list of references from other adoptive parents who had used their services.”

Sean shot her a long, measuring look, his pale gray eyes seeming to assess her response in a calculating manner.

“You’ve certainly done your homework,” he drawled, his tone not altogether approving.

Charlotte’s initial response to his comment was to blink at him with a mixture of surprise and confusion. Then she realized he was once again inferring that she’d gone behind his back somehow by contacting the Robideaux Agency without his knowledge.

“Yes, I did,” she admitted, eyeing him narrowly as she barely controlled her anger. “But that was over a year ago when we first talked about the adoption option and we realized that at our age we had a better chance of adopting a baby from a foreign country. You told me then to be very careful not to get involved with a fly-by-night organization, and I was. In fact, I told you quite a lot about the Robideaux Agency before we had our first meeting with our counselor there, and it was my understanding that you approved of the way they handled their adoptions. Although I’m thinking that you must not have paid much attention to what I told you or you would have remembered it now.”

“There was a lot going on in our lives a year ago, Charlotte,” Sean retorted defensively. “My business had almost doubled as companies around the city and state began to see the need to increase their on-site security following the hurricane. You were in the midst of another round of fertility treatments then, too, and miserable most of the time as a result. You’d end up in tears during just about every conversation I tried to have with you—”

“Probably because you so obviously resented taking any of your precious time to actually listen to me,” Charlotte cut in, no longer able to hide her ire. “How was I supposed to respond when you were constantly rattling the change in your pockets, checking your watch or staring out the window like a condemned man hoping for a reprieve every time I turned to you for comfort?”

“All you talked about was how tired you were, how sick the drugs made you feel and how depressed you were. Then there were the twice-daily reports on how your temperature had either gone up or down, and how we had to schedule down to the exact minute when I’d next be expected to perform sexually. That was really something to anticipate, too,” he snapped sarcastically. “You lying in bed about as relaxed and willing as a terrified virgin, hands gripping the sheets—”

Charlotte looked away from him, remembering how her confidence in herself as a woman had dwindled more and more as one barren month followed another. Then, smiling ruefully, she shook her head as she spoke her next thought aloud.

“Then I find out that the whole time I’ve been beating myself up for my inability to get pregnant you actually weren’t all that thrilled about the prospect of fatherhood.”

“Not the whole time,” Sean insisted quietly.

“So I was only making a fool of myself for what—six to eight months before you finally spoke up? That’s such a relief to know,” Charlotte allowed, taking her own turn at sarcasm as she gathered the forms from the adoption agency and started to stuff them into the envelope.

“I never once thought you were making a fool of yourself, Charlotte,” Sean said, his tone softening unexpectedly at the same moment she felt the touch of his hand on her wrist. “But I was worried about you—the way you kept obsessing—”

“So you left me and now I’m all better,” Charlotte interrupted him bitterly as an unexpected rush of tears stung her eyes.

“Rehashing the past isn’t really getting us anywhere now, is it?”

Again Sean’s voice was surprisingly gentle.

“I have to agree, especially since we’ll be divorced by this time next year.” Forcing herself to get a grip on her roiling emotions, Charlotte met her husband’s gaze again. “But you’ve insinuated twice already that I’ve been less than honest with you about what I might have done to further our chances of adopting a child. I’m not going to sit by quietly and let you get away with it. I’ve always been truthful with you, Sean—always—and I swear to you that I always will be. But if you can’t, or won’t, trust me—”

“I do trust you,” he cut in, tightening his hold on her wrist just enough to help to make his point. “Obviously I jumped to some wrong conclusions earlier and I apologize.”

Charlotte eyed her husband skeptically for several moments. She was still more than a little angry with him, and she was deeply hurt, too. He could say that he hadn’t thought she’d made a fool of herself by trying so desperately to have a child that she’d been completely unaware of his true feelings. But that was how he’d made her feel six months ago and that was how she felt now.

Taking the time and energy necessary to nurse her grievances against him was a luxury, though—one she couldn’t afford at the moment. Sean’s offer to help her with the adoption had been tentatively made, at best. By continuing to behave toward him in a hostile manner, especially now that he’d eaten a small slice of humble pie, she might just cause him to withdraw that offer altogether.

“Just don’t do it again, okay?” she asked, still refusing to allow her gaze to waver.

“I won’t—I promise.” He finally let go of her wrist after another small, seemingly meant-to-be-affirming squeeze. Then he stood again, looking very weary all of a sudden. “I’d really like to read through the information from the adoption agency more closely, but right now I’m beat. Is there any chance we could pick up where we left off again in the morning, more cordially? I’m not sure how anxious you are to get back to Mayfair, or how you feel about missing a day of work. But I was thinking that since you’re already here, maybe we could try to set up an appointment to meet with our counselor at the agency sometime tomorrow, too.”

Exhaustion had been creeping up on Charlotte, as well, making her much more sensitive than she should have been. A good night’s sleep would better her mood quite a bit. Since she was going to have to spend the night in New Orleans, she didn’t have any great desire to rush back to Mayfair the next day, either.

What could it hurt to stay in the city tomorrow so that she and Sean could go over the paperwork together and, if possible, talk to their counselor at the agency? She might as well take advantage of his willingness to cooperate with her while she could.

“That sounds like a good idea to me. I’ll call the school district’s automated line before I go to bed tonight and arrange for a substitute to take my place tomorrow.”

“The more we can get down now, the better.”

“Yes, I agree.”

Sean smiled approvingly as Charlotte stood, too, the envelope in hand. She thought he would say something more or, at the very least, offer to go upstairs with her as he had earlier. But he stood with his hands in his pockets, apparently content to wait for her to make the next move.

“I guess I’ll call it a night, then,” she murmured after a few more moments of silence passed between them.

Feeling oddly out of place in the once familiar and much loved old town house, Charlotte turned to leave the kitchen, walking alone through the living/dining room to the staircase off the entryway.

She and Sean had shared so many happy times here together. They had visited the town house often, especially over weekends during the fall and winter months, so that they could enjoy the city’s various cultural events. But her memories of those days and nights were now bittersweet.

There would be no going back to the life they’d once had together. Sean had made sure she understood that, and she did. She could mourn the past and the loss of his love all she wanted, but it would gain her nothing in the end.

So she would look to the future, instead, where another kind of life awaited her, and another kind of love would fill the painful emptiness that now made her heart ache.

On her own in the guest room with the door politely shut, Charlotte called to arrange for a substitute to take over for her at the high school the next day. She washed her face and brushed her teeth, then turned back the serviceable navy-blue-and-white striped comforter on the bed, slipped beneath the blankets and switched off the lamp on the nightstand.

She could still hear the rain tapping against the window- panes, but more gently as the worst of the storm finally seemed to be over. The steady patter should have lulled her to sleep in short order. She was tired enough to want as well as to need the rest. But her mind still raced along too busily to shut down on her command.

Her own fault, she admitted, remembering how eagerly she had welcomed the mug of coffee Sean had set before her. Revved up by such a hearty dose of caffeine so late in the evening, she would likely toss and turn until dawn. That, in turn, would leave her at a distinct disadvantage when it was time for her to face her husband once again.

With a quiet sigh, Charlotte sat up in the bed and pushed aside the blankets. There was only one antidote she could think of for sleeplessness—a glass of warm milk dosed with a small shot of whiskey. She didn’t want to go downstairs again, especially if Sean was still in the kitchen. But suffering through a restless night would be much worse.

Still debating her alternatives, she switched on the lamp, then cocked her head to one side and looked up at the ceiling. From above came the muted sound of measured footsteps punctuated by a squeak or two as Sean walked across the floor. A few moments later, the pipes gurgled with running water and Charlotte made her decision.

She could run down to the kitchen, heat up some milk in the microwave oven, dose it with whiskey and be back in the guest room in a matter of minutes, all without Sean being any the wiser.

Feeling like a thief in the night despite her equal right to make herself at home in the town house, Charlotte crept down the hallway to the staircase. Ten minutes, at the most, and she’d be back in her bed, door shut, laughing at herself for being so apprehensive.

What was the worst that could happen to her, anyway— getting caught by her husband of ten years with the milk jug in one hand and the whiskey bottle in the other?

She made it to the kitchen without a problem, prepared her nightcap and was halfway across the living room, mug in hand, when she realized that she’d much rather sip her spiked milk curled up on one of the upholstered wing chairs tucked between the front windows.

The house was peacefully quiet, the darkness of the room broken only by the pale glow of gaslight coming through the slats of the wooden shutters. The intimate ambience suited her mood so much better than that of the sterile, unfamiliar guest room.

Soothed by the hot drink, Charlotte thought back over her conversation with Sean and the angry words they’d exchanged. He had been right when he’d said rehashing the past was a waste of time, as she’d acknowledged then. Still, she couldn’t help dwelling on some of the harsher accusations he’d made. Not only had they been very revealing; they had also held more validity than she liked to admit.

She hadn’t realized at the time that she’d been so hard to live with all those months she’d been trying to get pregnant. With Sean’s comments fresh in her mind, however, she could look back now and understand how problematic her self-involvement must have been for him.

She had always been successful at everything she’d ever attempted to do. But she had consistently failed at the one thing she’d always been meant to do. So caught up in her own misery had she been that she’d stopped being the fun- loving, affectionate, desirous and desirable wife, best friend and playmate Sean had loved. Instead she had become an intense, emotional, unhappy woman with a mission, not to be diverted in any way, shape or form.

But she had thought that Sean wanted a child as much as she did. She had been so driven, so demanding of herself and of him, because she’d assumed they had the same goal in mind.

If only Sean had said something sooner about how he really felt. If only he hadn’t just packed up and left her…

The tears that had threatened earlier began to trickle down Charlotte’s cheeks as she thought of all the mistakes she’d unknowingly made, and how fatal those mistakes had been to her marriage.

She had been so sure that all she needed was a child to make her life complete. Now she realized, much too late, that her quest had cost her the one thing she would have never willingly given up in exchange—the man she loved with all her heart and soul.