Читать книгу Single Dad's Christmas Miracle - SUSAN MEIER, Susan Meier - Страница 11

CHAPTER THREE

JACK REMINDED ALTHEA that Teagan was too small to ride in a car without a safety seat, so they grabbed the extra one from the garage and installed it in her little red car.

The whole time they worked, Althea kept glancing back at Teagan, hoping for her to speak. Clearly excited at the prospect of getting out of the house, the little girl jumped from foot to foot. Her eyes glowed. Her smile could light the garage. But she never said a word.

As they rode down the hill, Jack chatted happily, filling her chest with the light airy feeling that comes from pleasing another person. She’d figured out he needed to get out of the house, she just hadn’t realized how badly. It was a stroke of luck that she needed a coat and boots.

She parked in front of one of the meters, fed it enough to give them an hour for shopping and turned the kids in the direction of the town’s general store.

In a shop stocked for winter in the mountains, she immediately found a coat and boots. The light blue jacket, black mittens and black boots she tried on not only fit, they were cute. But because she found them so quickly, their trip into town was ending too soon.

So, wearing her new coat and boots, she herded the kids across the street, telling them she wanted to see more of the town. About halfway down, she got her second lucky break of the morning: a Santa Shop.

There was nothing like seeing decorations, talking about gifts and sharing secret gift wishes to perk up children.

“Why don’t we take a peek inside?”

Jack’s face scrunched in confusion. “You want to go into a Santa Shop?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Why not?”

“Because we don’t decorate until Christmas Eve?”

She took Teagan’s hand. “Well, maybe we should change that this year and do some decorating beforehand?”

Teagan blinked up at her silently. It wasn’t much, but she suspected eye contact was a big step for Teagan.

Jack shook his head. “If Dad hates us decorating early, I’m telling him it was all your idea.”

“Good. Fine. Because it is my idea. And if he loves it I’ll get all the credit.”

When they reached the shop door, Jack held it open like a perfect gentleman. The scents of cinnamon, apples and bayberry wafted out to them. Old-fashioned wooden tables held rows of toy soldiers. Model trains chugged in circles around miniature towns. Ceramic villages took up another two rows. Evergreen wreaths hung on the back walls beside bundles of tinsel.

“I can’t afford much,” she told the kids, “but we’re four weeks away from Christmas. The least we should get today is a wreath for the door. Then we’ll come back every week and get something new.”

Jack faced her. “You want us to pick out the wreath?”

“Sure. It’s for your house. Your Christmas.”

He stood in front of her, looking totally puzzled.

“I thought you said you decorated on Christmas Eve?”

“We do. But we only put up a tree. Dad says it’s enough.”

“Well, sure it’s enough,” she agreed, not wanting to undermine his dad or make him look bad. “But starting today and doing a little something every week to the house, a little something to remind us that in a few weeks we’ll get presents and drink hot cocoa by the fire and eat peppermint sticks—well, that’ll just make everything extra special.”

Jack laughed lightly. “I think you’re expecting a lot from a wreath.”

Holding Teagan’s hand, she headed for the wreaths. “You’ll see. Maybe not this week but next week it will all start to sink in and then we’ll have Christmas spirit all over the place.”

Following a few feet behind her, Jack laughed.

Althea’s spirits soared. Teagan might not be talking but she was happy. And Jack was laughing. Once they got the wreath, they could go home and start his lessons.

* * *

Around eleven o’clock, Clark began to get antsy. He’d been so focused on how much work he’d missed because of Mrs. Alwine that he hadn’t thought through leaving the kids that morning.

Technically, Althea wasn’t a total stranger. She was a friend of a friend. That was how she’d gotten wind of the job and why he’d agreed to interview her. Yes, he’d checked her references. But he didn’t know her. And he’d left his kids with her.

He fished his cell phone out of his jacket pocket and hit the speed dial number for his home phone. It rang the usual four times before it went to voice mail.

He sucked in a breath. She could be in the bathroom. Or she might have turned off the ringer of the phone in the den for Jack’s studying.

Or she could have kidnapped his kids.

He groaned internally, telling himself not to think like that, and rummaged around on his desk for the sheet of paper with her cell phone number on it.

When he finally found it, he punched in the digits and waited through five rings before it, too, went to voice mail.

He tossed his cell phone to the desk, telling himself not to be paranoid. But his situation was unusual. There was a reason he lived on a secluded mountaintop. A reason he hid his kids. Even discounting the possibility that someone might kidnap them because he was a wealthy man who could pay a ransom, lots of people were curious about Teagan.

He cursed, shot off his chair and grabbed his top coat. Walking through his assistant’s office, he said, “I’m going home,” and strode out to his SUV.

Even wanting to get to his house as quickly as possible, he made a loop around town and headed up the mountain. As his SUV rolled to a stop in front of the garage, his chest tightened. Althea’s car was gone.

Frantic, he flew up the porch steps and into the foyer, calling the kids’ names. No answer. Nothing but the eerie echo of his own words came back to him. Crazy clip-clopped into the foyer, nudging her nose against Clark’s hand for a pat on the top of her head.

Clark stooped to pet the nuzzling dog, but his mind jumped back to the day he’d gotten the call about his wife. He’d come home from a business trip to a cold, empty house and had no idea where his kids were, let alone his wife. Then the phone had rung and he’d gotten the news that his wife was dead and his kids were with her parents.

He broke out in a cold sweat.

Cold, empty houses were never good news.

And with a guy in town who might suspect he was Teagan’s father, a guy crazy enough to throw himself over Clark’s wife’s casket and wail—not worried about gossip or consequences—Clark couldn’t take any chances Brice Matthews would see Teagan.

Even if the kids were safe with Althea, that didn’t mean they were safe from Brice.

He pulled out his cell phone and dialed 9-1-1.

* * *

Though they purchased a wreath and secured it in her trunk, Althea took the kids around town to visit a few more shops and scope out potential decorations they’d buy in the following weeks. Now that she’d talked Jack into decorating the house for Christmas, she wanted to see her options.

They had just walked out of the last shop, laughing as they ate ice cream, even though it was freezing out, when two policemen rushed them.

One policeman grabbed Jack and Teagan. The other backed her into the shop wall.

“Are you Althea Johnson?”

“Yes?”

Teagan began to cry. Jack tried to squirm out of the officer’s hold. “Let go of me.”

“And these children are Jack and Teagan Beaumont?”

“Yes.”

“We have a report that you took these kids from their home.”

“I’m their babysitter. We came to town to look for a coat and boots for me.” She motioned to her brand-new blue jacket and still shiny black boots. “Call their dad. He’ll tell you I’m their babysitter.”

“He’s the one who filed the report.”

Clark’s SUV slid to a stop in front of the sidewalk. He bounded out and raced over, grabbing Teagan from the officer and then pulling Jack under his arm protectively. “Are you guys okay?”

Jack looked at him as if he were crazy. “We were fine until you called the police on us.”

Teagan buried her face in her father’s neck. Clark’s expression hardened. “Teagan is not fine.”

“She was,” Jack insisted. “She was laughing.”

Standing on tiptoes to see over the policeman’s shoulder, Althea shouted, “She was. We were having fun.”

“You were supposed to be home!”

“We were on our way home to start Jack’s lessons. We had plenty of time. We just shifted our schedule.” She pointed at her jacket. “I needed a coat. And boots.” She held up her foot, displaying one of her new boots. “Remember?”

The policeman holding her back faced Clark. “So what’s going on here?”

“We were just shopping!” Jack spat. “But I get it! He doesn’t ever want us doing anything that might even remotely be fun.” He shrugged out from beneath his dad’s hold and headed for the SUV. “Take us home. Put us back in jail.”

Saddened for Jack, Althea swallowed, glanced at Clark, then pressed her lips together.

A mixture of horror and confusion played across Clark’s face. As if finally putting it all together in his head, he stepped back. “Oh, my God.”

He looked from Jack who stood beside his SUV to Teagan in his arms to Althea still backed up against the shop wall, and scrubbed his hand across his mouth. “Oh, my God. I’m so sorry.”

The policeman released Althea. “So everything’s good?”

Althea forced a smile. She didn’t know whether to be angry with herself for not letting Clark know she was taking the kids shopping, annoyed with him for being so damned paranoid, or to feel sorry for him.

In the end, she decided to feel sorry for him. He’d lost his wife. He didn’t want to lose his kids, too. She got it. “Everything’s fine. Really. Let me get them home.”

* * *

The policeman looked to Clark for confirmation. He nodded. “I’m sorry. I panicked.” He nearly said, “Ever since my wife’s death I’ve been panicky,” but he knew that would only make him look like an idiot. God knew it made him feel like an idiot. So he said nothing.

The two policemen walked back to their car. Althea ambled over, looking warm and snuggly in her new blue coat and black mittens. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

He put his head back, closed his eyes. He’d just had her nabbed by the cops and she was asking him if he was okay? “I should be asking you that. I’m so sorry.” He opened his eyes and forced himself to look at her. “You have the right to use whatever schedule you want.” He sucked in a breath. “But I don’t like the kids going into town without me. I wish you had called me before you left the house.”

“You’re right. I should have called you.” She pressed her hand to her chest. “That’s my mistake. I never thought to call. But I should have.”

She put her hand on his arm consolingly. “Let’s go home.”

He couldn’t believe she wanted to go with him. Were he in her shoes, he’d probably quit. But when he pulled his SUV off Main Street and onto the mountain road, she was right behind him. When he drove onto his lane, her little red car was in his rearview mirror. When he got out, she got out.

They walked into the echoing foyer with Teagan asleep on his arm. A dull sound rang in his ears, making his head pound. He’d never been so mortified.

Or so confused. Jack thought they lived in a jail? Teagan had laughed with an outsider?

Althea said, “Why don’t you put her on her bed and I’ll make us all some cocoa.”

Jack sniffed with disdain. “I don’t want any cocoa.”

All the control he thought he had slipped through his fingers like melted snow. “Good. You can go into the den and take a look at today’s lesson.”

“Whatever.”

He watched Jack stalk away and knew he’d handled that badly, but his head hurt and his thoughts swam like fish in a bowl. How had he gotten to this place?

He slid his gaze to Althea. “I don’t need any cocoa.”

“Bourbon then?”

A surprised laugh escaped. “Actually, bourbon sounds really good right now. But I’ll be fine. You go work with Jack.”

She shook her head. “Jack needs a minute. Forcing him to set things up on the computer by himself will be a good way to occupy him and give him some space.”

He took Teagan to her room and lingered over removing her coat and boots. There wasn’t any part of him that wanted to confide in anyone, let alone Jack’s teacher—a woman he was actually attracted to. But, more than that, he was mortified that he’d panicked. And not just panicked. He’d panicked publicly. He’d called the police when his kids were happily strolling down Main Street.

Of course, he hadn’t known that.

Still, a sensible man would have at least looked in the obvious places—

But a man who’d been blindsided by his wife’s death and double blindsided by her infidelity jumped to all kinds of conclusions.

When he couldn’t delay any longer, he walked downstairs. Hoping Althea had gone to the den to be with Jack, he turned right, into the living room, and there she stood in front of the discreet bar housed in a black built-in beside a huge window. She held a short glass with two fingers of bourbon.

She handed it to him. “Is neat good?”

He smiled. “I don’t sully whiskey with frozen water.”

She laughed. “Have a seat.”

He lowered himself to the gray sofa. “You’re going to quit, aren’t you?”

She sat on one of the two white club chairs across from him. A glass-and-chrome coffee table sat on the gray, white and black printed rug that connected the small conversation group in the big living room.

“I’m not going to quit.”

“I sent the police after you.”

“You were afraid.”

He downed his drink, savoring the soothing warmth as it ran down his throat. He rose to get another. “Right.”

“I saw the look on your face. You were terrified.”

He grabbed the bourbon bottle and poured.

“You’d thought I’d taken your kids. There has to be a reason you were so suspicious.”

“I was angry with myself for leaving the kids with someone I really didn’t know.”

“Maybe. But something pushed you to the point that you panicked rather than check things out.”

He sighed. This time he sipped the whiskey. There was no way in hell he’d recount his private failures to a stranger. A stranger he’d wronged no less.

“All right. You don’t want to talk. I get it. But I also see your kids are in trouble emotionally and so are you.”

He snorted in disgust. “Are you saying we all need therapy?”

“I’m saying you need to give yourself a break and need to give your kids a break. You’re overorganized. Your kids seem to feel they need to be super quiet to please you.”

Heat of shame filled him. The day before, he’d noticed that he’d been taking advantage of Mrs. Alwine. Was it such a big stretch to consider that he’d forced his kids to overbehave?

He ambled back to his seat. She rose from hers. “I can understand that you don’t want the help of a stranger. I’m also not a therapist. But I have spent six years with kids Jack’s age. I know they sass. I know they experiment with cursing. I know they sulk and whine and roll their eyes and in general make the lives of adults miserable. And Jack does a few of those things, but not often. He’s too concerned with pleasing you.” She sucked in a breath. “You have an opportunity here. It’s four weeks before Christmas. Four weeks when you can decorate together, tell him stories about Christmases past with his mom. Watch old Christmas movies. Make snowmen. Sled ride.”

He raised his gaze to meet hers.

“The choice is yours. Use Christmas to turn your family into a family again. Or let this go on. Pretend Teagan’s not talking is shyness. Pretend Jack’s simmering silence is part of being a twelve-year-old. And six years from now when Jack leaves home without a word of why, and with no intention of ever coming back, you’ll have no one to blame but yourself.”

Jack’s angry comment about living in prison rumbled through his brain. He was failing as a father and though he was loathe to talk about any of this, he’d be a fool if he didn’t realize he was drowning.

He blew his breath out, rubbed his hand across his mouth and finally decided he had no choice. He didn’t want his kids to hate him or to be unhappy. But he also didn’t want them going into town, and if the way to keep them home was to tell their current babysitter the whole story then maybe that’s what he had to do.

“The day my wife died, I came home from work to find the house empty and cold.”

“So when you came here today and found we’d gone, the empty house scared you?”

“Not as much as having the kids go to town.” He scrubbed his hands across his mouth again. He hated this. Hated his misery. His humiliation. But he did not want his kids in town. “My wife had been having an affair. Apparently for at least a year. Brice Matthews, one of our employees, showed up at the funeral overcome with grief and sobbed over her coffin. He called me every name in the book for not letting her go—not giving her a divorce—when she’d never asked for a divorce.”

“Oh, my God.” Clearly shocked, she sat again. “I’m so sorry.”

“That’s why I don’t want the kids in town.”

“Because of gossip?” She shook her head. “It’s been three years. Trust me. You can stop worrying. People aren’t that interested in anybody’s life.”

“Everybody’s interested in Teagan’s.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Teagan’s? Jack’s the one old enough to understand—” Then her mouth dropped open. “Oh, God. Teagan was only a few months old when your wife died and your wife had been having an affair.”

“For a year before she died.”

“You think people wonder if she’s yours?”

“I don’t think. I know lots wonder whether or not she’s really mine.”

“They’ve told you this?”

“No. But a few days after Carol’s death, people started looking at Teagan oddly. If I’d go to the grocery store with her in a carrier, everybody peeked in to see her. Some people were more obvious than others. It took me a while, but I realized everybody thought she was Brice’s child and they were looking at her to see if there was a resemblance.”

“That’s awful.” She shook her head again, as if marveling at the stupidity of some people. “I’m sorry.”

“That’s the second time you’ve said that.” He sniffed a laugh. “And I appreciate the sentiment. But you certainly weren’t at fault.”

“I know. But on behalf of crappy, unfair things that happen everywhere, I feel somebody has to say they’re sorry.”

He laughed again. His chest loosened. The knot in his stomach unwound.

Their gazes met and he smiled. “Thanks.”

“On behalf of crappy things everywhere, you’re welcome.”

“No. I meant thanks for listening.” He rubbed his hand along the back of his neck. “You’re the first person I’ve told this story to.” And he didn’t feel god-awful. He felt calm, almost normal. “Anyway, that’s why I don’t want the kids to go into town. I don’t want Teagan subjected to scrutiny or Jack to hear things about his mom he’s too young to understand.”

“Got it.” She rose, smiled briefly. “Jack’s probably got the computer up and running by now.”

With that she left the room, and he flopped back on the sleek gray sofa, looking at the gorgeously appointed living room in the house so well designed “perfect” was too small of a term to use to describe it. In the end, the “perfect” house had meant nothing. Absolutely nothing.

His wife had cheated. Her affair had started before Teagan was conceived. And if Brice Matthews ever figured that out, he might lose Teagan long before he lost Jack.

He sipped his bourbon and closed his eyes. His life was a mess and though he appreciated Althea’s suggestion about decorating, he didn’t think decorating for Christmas was going to change that.

But at least he knew Althea would keep the kids home now.