Kitabı oku: «Adding to the Family», sayfa 3

He saw speculation enter her eyes, as if she were contemplating the same sort of images filling his mind at that moment. And then she smiled crookedly and shook her head, dropping her hand to her lap. “Maybe they were right to label you a troublemaker, after all. But as it happens, I’m not looking for trouble in my life just now.”

“Nor am I,” he said with a touch of regret. “So how about if we indulge in dessert, instead?”

She smiled at him from across the table. “Let’s make that a truly sinful dessert. Since it’s the only sin we’ll be committing tonight.”

Mark wasn’t so sure about that. Not if she counted the dreams he would undoubtedly have about her as sinful, which he had no doubt they would be.

Mark drove Miranda straight home after they finished dinner. He said nothing about seeing her again during the brief drive, and she assumed he considered this outing a one-time event.

She wasn’t sure what had prompted his invitation. Simple curiosity, perhaps. An impulsive gesture by a man who had been working too hard and spending too much time with preschoolers. She had found the evening both entertaining and illuminating. Who would have thought her accountant was a former bad boy?

Still, it was probably for the best if they kept their future encounters strictly business. Maybe Mark had been a rebel once, but he was Mr. Responsibility now. The most important women in his life were named Payton and Madison, and Miranda had no intention of competing with them for his attention.

No kids, she reminded herself. She had very good reasons for making that her number one rule when it came to dating.

He parked his family-sized SUV in an empty space at her apartment complex and turned off the engine. “I’ll walk you to your door.”

“I had a nice time tonight,” she told him as they ambled toward her ground-floor apartment. “Thank you for the dinner.”

“Was it really necessary for you to ask the restaurant staff to sing happy birthday to me when they delivered our desserts?”

She laughed at the embarrassment still lingering in his voice. “You must admit they were very enthusiastic about it. Their voices carried quite well, didn’t they?”

Mark groaned. “Much too well, actually. I was ready to sink beneath the table.”

She couldn’t resist reaching out to take his arm in a companionable manner. “You were so cute. Your face was as red as the cherries on your cheesecake.”

The wry look he slanted at her made her giggle, especially since his cheeks had turned a bit dark again. “I’m so glad you were entertained.”

So maybe this was their one and only date. Maybe they were a mismatched couple. Still, the night wasn’t quite over yet—and if it was their only outing together, they should definitely take a few memories away with them.

She paused in front of her door and turned to smile invitingly up at him. “There’s one more birthday tradition I haven’t taken care of yet.”

“Yeah?” He looked suddenly wary. “You don’t have a crowd of people waiting in the bushes to jump out and yell ‘surprise,’ do you?”

She laughed again and slid her hands up the front of his buttoned-down green shirt. “Actually I was thinking of the traditional birthday kiss.”

“Were you, now?”

Oh, yeah, he was interested. She could see it in his narrowed gray eyes.

“Mmm. Just a little taste—” she walked her fingers up his chest “—to see what it might be like—” she moved a step closer to him “—if things had been different for us.”

His mouth lowered slowly toward hers. “And what if that taste leaves me hungry for more?”

Their lips were almost close enough to meet when she murmured, “I’ve heard that self-denial builds character. But what harm can come from just a little taste?”

Their lips touched.

“Miss Martin? Miranda Martin?”

Both Mark and Miranda froze. And then Mark stepped back as Miranda turned to face the man who stood behind them on the sidewalk. The parking lot lights illuminated the hesitant expression on his broad, plain face.

“Yes, I’m Miranda Martin. Who are you?”

“My name is Jack Parsons. I’m an acquaintance of your sister’s.”

“Lisa?” Remembering the disturbing telephone call, Miranda felt her heart jump. “What’s wrong? Has something happened to her?”

“No, she’s okay. She wanted me to give you this.” The man held out an envelope, his big hand not quite steady. “And I have a delivery for you in my car.”

“A delivery?” Totally confused now, Miranda tilted her head to study him, trying without success to read the expression on the man’s face.

“Yeah. I’ll go get…I’ll be right back,” he stammered, moving backward.

Miranda turned to Mark. “This is weird, even for Lisa. I have no clue what’s going on.”

“I’ll hang around until you find out,” he said, frowning after the man who had interrupted them. “I’m not sure I trust that guy.”

Miranda wasn’t about to argue with him. She wasn’t sure she trusted the man, either, even if he did claim to be a friend of Lisa’s—or maybe because of that fact.

She was looking down at the envelope in her hand, tugging at the glued-down flap, when she heard Mark say in a rather odd voice, “Um, Miranda? Take a look at what the delivery is.”

She looked up at him, frowned at the strange expression on his face, and then turned to see what he was staring at so intently. Her own jaw dropped. “Oh, no.”

Jack Parsons was on his way back to her, dragging two large, wheeled suitcases behind him. And tagging behind those suitcases like little ducklings were a couple of sandy-haired boys with rumpled clothes and identical faces.

“No,” Miranda said again, more firmly this time. “Surely you aren’t…”

“Your sister asked me to bring them to you,” Jack said, setting the suitcases down and nodding toward the twins. “They aren’t any trouble. They’re kind of quiet, actually.”

Panic was beginning to build in her throat. She swallowed to clear her voice. “I don’t understand…”

“Lisa explained everything in her letter. She said you would understand after you read it. And she told me to tell you she’s sorry, and she thanks you for helping her. Now, I’ve got to go. I’ve got a long trip ahead of me tonight.”

“Wait a minute.” Miranda moved after him when he turned to walk away. “Where are you going? You aren’t just going to leave them here.”

Without slowing down, Jack looked over his shoulder. “Sorry, ma’am, but I’ve got to go. Read the letter from your sister. That’ll explain everything.”

Openmouthed in disbelief, Miranda watched the man climb behind the wheel of an extended cab pickup truck and drive away without even looking back. Only then did she turn, very slowly, to face the reality of two young, somber faces gazing expectantly up at her.

“Are you our aunt ’Randa?” one of the boys asked in a quavering voice while his twin hovered shyly behind him.

“Yes,” she answered in a near groan. “I suppose I am.” And heaven help them all, she almost added.

“We’d better get them inside while you read your letter,” Mark murmured, breaking into her momentary paralysis. “It’s cool out here tonight, and they aren’t even wearing jackets over those T-shirts.”

“Inside?” Miranda turned to him, feeling as though she were seeing him through a sudden fog. “My apartment?”

Apparently assessing the situation and deciding that someone had to take charge, he reached out his hand. “Give me your key. I’ll unlock the door.”

She shook her head in an effort to clear her muddled mind. She didn’t need anyone taking charge here, she assured herself. She had just needed a moment to recuperate from the shock. “I’ll do it.”

After opening the door, she reached in to turn on a light, then moved aside and motioned toward the boys. “Come on in. We’ll try to straighten this out.”

Mark dragged the suitcases in behind him as he entered. Miranda closed the door, then turned to find the twins still staring at her with those huge, unblinking brown eyes. “Uh, do you guys need anything?”

“He’s got to pee,” one of them said, pointing to the other.

She didn’t have a clue which boy was which. They looked so much alike she couldn’t imagine anyone being able to tell them apart. Not to mention that they hadn’t even been able to talk the last time she’d seen them.

“The bathroom is through there,” she said, pointing to the bedroom door. “Um, do you need any help?” If so, she was sending Mark, she decided. He had experience at this sort of thing, even if his kids were girls.

But the boy shook his head, turned and hurried toward the door as if he really couldn’t wait a moment longer. His twin continued to stare at Miranda.

“Okay,” she said after taking a deep breath. “I need to read this letter. You can go sit on the couch until your brother comes back,” she told him.

“I’ve got to pee, too.”

“Then go wait at the bathroom door until he’s finished and then you can both sit on the couch until we figure out what’s going on. And both of you wash your hands,” she called after him when he turned to follow his brother. It seemed like something she should say, since she seemed to be in charge of them at the moment, she thought with a gulp.

“Maybe it would be better if I leave now,” Mark suggested, making a slight movement toward the door. “This seems to be family business.”

She reached out to grab his sleeve. “Don’t you dare,” she told him, not even bothering to try to hide her desperation. “You can’t just walk away and leave me alone with them.”

He hesitated a moment, then nodded. “Read the letter, Miranda. Let’s find out what’s going on.”

She ripped into the envelope, hoping without much optimism that the contents would reveal that Lisa was on her way to pick up her sons. Maybe she had simply been detained for an hour or so, and she had asked her friend to bring the boys ahead for some reason. Lisa probably just needed another loan, and then she—and her twins—would be on their way to the next adventure, leaving Miranda contentedly alone in her tiny apartment and her comfortable, self-centered routines.

But she knew after reading only the first line of the brief letter that nothing would ever be quite the same after this. And she didn’t for the life of her know what she was going to do about it.

Chapter Four

Mark could tell by the look on Miranda’s face that the letter from her sister did not contain good news. “What does it say?”

Miranda’s amber eyes held a stunned expression when she looked up at him. “Lisa has gone into protective custody. She sent the boys to me because she can’t take them with her. Or to be more specific, she doesn’t want to take them. She says she’s tired of trying to be a good mother and failing miserably at it.”

“Oh, man.” The words were a groan as Mark pictured the two cute little boys in the next room who’d been deserted by their mother.

“Mark, she says she can’t ever see any of us again—that she knows things that could be detrimental to some very powerful people in the government, so in return for her cooperation and her future silence, she’s being given a new identity and a new start in a secret location. She got permission to send the boys to me, but I’m instructed never to try to find her or make contact with her at the risk of getting both her and me into big trouble.”

“Damn. What has she gotten herself into?”

“She’s pretty vague about it, but it has something to do with…with murder and racketeering. She blamed it all on a man, of course; said he got her into a dangerous situation against her better judgment. As if she has any better judgment,” she added bitterly. “And as if you can ever believe everything my sister says. She has a habit of wildly embroidering her stories.”

He heard the anger and disappointment in her voice, and he couldn’t blame her for either. The repercussions of Lisa’s poor judgment affected more people than just herself—most notably the two children who had just returned from the other room and now stood gazing somberly at Miranda.

She looked back at the towheaded duo with an expression of near panic. Mark couldn’t fault her for that, either. Anyone would be stunned to suddenly become responsible for five-year-old twins who were basically strangers. He would feel pretty much the same way—and he had experience at single parenthood. Miranda must feel completely out of her element.

One of the boys yawned and rubbed his eyes. Poor kids had to be wiped out—not to mention scared and confused. And since Miranda still seemed gripped by the paralysis of shock, someone needed to take charge here, at least until she recovered enough to think clearly.

“My name is Mark,” he told the boys. “I’m a friend of your aunt’s. What are your names?”

“I’m Kasey,” one of the boys replied. “This is Jamie.”

Mark tried hard to find any distinguishing feature between them, but as far as he could tell they were identical, right down to their white T-shirts, faded blue jeans and white-and-black sneakers.

“Have you boys had anything to eat?” he asked, earning a startled glance from Miranda—as if it had never occurred to her that children needed to be fed.

“Jack got us hamburgers,” the same boy who had spoken before replied. Kasey, Mark reminded himself. Jamie seemed to be the shyer of the two. As long as they remained standing exactly where they were, he knew which was which—but once they moved, he would be completely clueless again.

“Either of you want a drink of water or anything?”

They shook their heads, the movements so perfectly coordinated that Mark had the unsettling feeling he was seeing double. “Okay, then,” he said, “we need to find you a place to sleep. You both look tired.”

Jamie moved a step closer to his more-confident twin. Reading the body language, Mark assured him, “Don’t worry, you can stay close together. Maybe you can both sleep in your aunt’s bed for tonight and she can take the couch?”

Slowly coming back to coherence, Miranda nodded. “Yeah, we can do that for tonight.” She looked at Mark. “You can stay for a little while longer, can’t you? We need to talk after they’re in bed.”

She obviously needed advice, and since he was the only other adult around at the moment, it looked as though he was elected. Fortunately it wasn’t particularly late, since he had brought her straight home after dinner. “I’ll call Mrs. McSwaim and tell her I’ll be awhile yet. She won’t mind. I’m sure my kids are already in bed.”

Miranda gave him a wan smile of gratitude, then turned back to her nephews. “So, do you two have pajamas and toothbrushes in those suitcases?”

Two synchronized nods. Mark wondered if the boys were always this quiet, or were simply overwhelmed by being uprooted and left with strangers. He suspected the latter.

Miranda drew a deep breath, and he could see her usual spirit slowly begin to reassert itself. “Okay,” she said, “let’s get you guys into those pj’s.”

A short while later, Miranda watched her nephews climb into her bed. It was a queen-size bed, which took up most of the small bedroom, but she liked having plenty of room to stretch out while she slept.

The twins looked even smaller than before as they huddled in the center of the mattress. Considering everything, she supposed they were being brave and stoic about their circumstances, but the pallor of their faces and the expressions in their big brown eyes told her they were extremely shaken.

“Do either of you need anything else?” she asked as she lingered awkwardly beside the bed.

They shook their heads against the pillows.

“Well, then, I’ll be in the next room if you need anything. Oh, and this is the only bathroom in the apartment, so don’t be alarmed if you hear me moving around in there during the night, okay?”

Two more simultaneous nods.

“Okay.” This was so very weird. She took a step toward the door. “Good night.”

“Aunt ’Randa?”

The quiet little voice stopped her just as she reached for the light switch. She didn’t know who had spoken, but she guessed it was Kasey, since he seemed to do most of the talking for the duo. “Yes?”

“Could you leave the door open?”

Of course they were scared, she thought with a sudden rush of pity. The poor kids were in a strange place with a woman they barely knew. It was mind-boggling to realize that she was all they had at the moment. That she was totally responsible for their welfare.

Swallowing hard, she nodded and turned off the light, then stepped out of the room. She left the door ajar by a good three inches, so the light from the living room would spill into the bedroom, at least until after the boys were asleep.

Mark waited for her at the kitchen table. At her request, he had made a pot of decaffeinated coffee—not that she expected to get any sleep tonight even without the effects of caffeine.

“Did you call your baby-sitter?” she asked as she poured coffee into a mug. Mark already had a steaming cup in front of him.

“Yes. She’s my housekeeper. She lives only a couple of doors down from me, so it isn’t a problem for me to be a bit late. I’ll walk her home.”

“It must be convenient for you to have a housekeeper and nanny. Especially one who lives so close by.”

“It is. I used to do taxes for her and her husband. When her husband died last year, she didn’t want to sell her house, but she was lonely, and she had no family to turn to, so we worked out an arrangement. It has turned out very well for both of us.”

He really was a compulsive caregiver, Miranda thought as she took a seat at the little round table. Even when it came to hiring his household help, he was actually providing companionship and a little extra income for a lonely widow.

While taking in strays might be commonplace for Mark, it was hardly characteristic for Miranda. “What am I going to do with these boys?” she asked, hoping he would have a suggestion, since her own mind was pretty much devoid of ideas.

“First you should probably find out whatever you can about your sister’s situation.”

Miranda handed him her sister’s letter, which she had already read twice. “Maybe you should read this.”

He seemed a bit reluctant to unfold the page. “You’re sure? After all, this is your personal business.”

“You’re my accountant,” she said with a shrug. “There’s very little you don’t already know about me.”

“Financially, maybe. This is different.”

“Still, I’ve always valued your advice, and I would appreciate any you can offer me now.”

He hesitated a moment longer, then opened the letter and began to read silently.

Miranda could almost recite the words along with him. Her sister had starkly described the trouble she was in, laying the blame on someone else, and had then begged Miranda to take care of her twins.

It had taken this mess to make Lisa realize what a terrible mother she had been to them, she had written. Selfish and irresponsible and immature. Even if she could take them with her now, they deserved to be raised by someone more settled and responsible, like their aunt Miranda. Lisa needed to put her mistakes behind her—presumably including her twins among those mistakes—and start a new life for herself.

She had packed their birth certificates and immunization records in Kasey’s suitcase, she explained. They had been healthy children who rarely needed medical attention, so Miranda needn’t worry about that.

“The boys have no one else to turn to,” she had added. “Miranda, I know this is a lot to ask of you, but you won’t regret it. They’re good kids. And they’re your family.”

Family. Miranda grimaced as she repeated the word in her mind. It had never been a particularly sentimental concept for her, since her own had been so dysfunctional. The idealized image of loving, supportive parents was foreign to her. The only genuine love she had known as a child had come from her maternal grandmother, who had tried her best to compensate for the emotional neglect her granddaughters had received from their parents.

Her grandmother had died when Miranda was only ten. After that, there had been no one for her to turn to for emotional support except her older sister. And now Lisa had turned to her.

“This doesn’t sound good,” Mark murmured, refolding the letter.

“No. If she has already disappeared into the witness protection program, there’s little chance that I’ll ever be able to find her, right?”

“I have a client who’s an attorney. I’ll ask him to look into this as a favor to me. He owes me a few.”

“Thank you. I’d appreciate that. In the meantime, what am I going to do with these kids?”

“You don’t have to work tomorrow, do you?”

“No, I wasn’t planning to go in at all this weekend.”

“That’s good. That will give you time to make arrangements.”

“What sort of arrangements?”

“You’ll have to make plans for some sort of childcare while you’re working. And there are steps you need to take to have yourself named their legal guardian. My attorney friend can help you with that part, too. It’s clear from this letter that your sister is voluntarily giving up her parental rights.”

“Just wait a minute, Mark.” Aware of the partially opened bedroom door, she leaned closer to him, keeping her voice low. “I can’t be their legal guardian. Obviously I’m not set up to raise a couple of boys, even if that were something I wanted to take on.”

He hesitated a moment, then asked, “What about their father?”

She spread her hands, noting that they were unsteady. “I never even knew his name. And you can bet Lisa won’t tell us, even if we manage to find her. She said she promised him she would never contact him after he gave her the financial settlement.”

“Is there any way you could send them to your parents?”

She felt her expression harden. “Weren’t you paying attention when I told you about them? They won’t help. Nor would I ask them to. I’d rather give the kids to strangers than to send them into that cold, rigid, utterly dismal environment.”

“They’re really that bad?”

“Trust me. My father is a throwback to the Puritans. His word is law, and his laws are unbending. He has very specific ideas about how the world should be run, and about the role of women—which is to be quiet, submissive, dependent and obedient to men.”

“And your mother goes along with that?”

“My mother is content to have all her decisions made for her so she can drift along in a safe, comfortable, predictable world of her own. She’s borderline agoraphobic and rarely leaves the house. My grandmother said she was always like that—afraid of her own shadow and happiest when she had someone to handle every worrisome problem for her.

“She and my father are the perfect match, I suppose. Lisa and I just happened to inherit more of his nature than our mother’s, which didn’t please him at all. We weren’t content to be dutiful, submissive, undemanding daughters who would live at home until he found proper mates for us, if he ever did. That was what he expected from us, and he was furious that we had other plans. There’s no way I would send Lisa’s boys into that home to be raised with those twisted values.”

“Well, since you’ve ruled out everyone else, that just leaves you,” Mark said quietly. “Or the strangers you mentioned earlier.”

“Foster care?” she whispered.

He nodded. “I survived it. I suppose they will, too, if you can’t keep them yourself.”

For the first time since she had moved in, Miranda’s apartment seemed much too small to her. As if the walls were closing in, and all the air was escaping. As if she were caught in a trap. “How can I possibly keep them here? There’s barely room for me, much less a couple of kids. I’m not even sure my lease would allow them to live here with me.”

“This apartment is too small for them,” Mark agreed.

“And there’s my job. Sometimes I’m at the office as much as sixty hours a week. I go on business trips three or four times a year. I can’t afford a housekeeper and an overnight nanny, even if I had a bed for her to sleep in.”

“It would be expensive for you to take them in, though I could help you find a way to swing it financially. It would take most of your earnings, so you’d have very little left to put away in savings, but we could probably stash away a small amount each month.”

Her fingers tightened around her cup of untasted coffee. She had worked so hard for her money, equating her slowly building savings with independence and security. It had been so important to her never to be dependent on anyone else again.

“I can’t do this, Mark,” she murmured miserably. “I’m not qualified to raise a couple of kids. I don’t have the resources or the experience or the right personality for the job. It would be unfair to them to leave them with someone so completely clueless about kids.”

“Then that brings us back to the only other recourse. Foster care.” If there was any disapproval in his voice, Miranda couldn’t hear it, nor did she see any criticism in his expression. He seemed to be making an effort to stay completely nonjudgmental about this process, offering his services only as a sounding board for her decision making.

She swallowed hard. “Foster parents are carefully screened, aren’t they? Only the best and most caring homes are approved, right?”

“Ideally that would be true, of course. But since there are far more children in need of placement than there are qualified homes for them, it isn’t always the case. Still, I’m sure the social workers would find somewhere for Kasey and Jamie to go, even if it took a couple of attempts to find the right setting for them.”

She had a sudden mental picture of the boys being continuously uprooted and moved from place to place. She wondered if Mark had deliberately planted that image, despite his outward appearance of careful objectivity. “I can’t keep them, Mark.”

“You’re the only one who can make that decision, of course.”

She didn’t bother to ask what he would do in her situation. She had little doubt that he would simply make room for two more in his life and his household. That was what he did, who he was. A caregiver. Miranda had never aspired to take care of anyone but herself—with the occasional exception of helping out Lisa on a temporary and superficial basis.

“Maybe you should wait until Monday before you call anyone,” Mark suggested. “Weekends aren’t the best time to try to get help from the Department of Human Services.”

Even the thought of being responsible for a couple of five-year-olds for forty-eight hours made her nervous, but she supposed that was the least she could do for them. “All right. I’ll wait until Monday. I guess I can take Monday off to make arrangements for the boys. I have some personal days accumulated.”

“Mmm.”

She gave him a hard look, trying to determine if there was criticism in the sound he had made, but his expression was still closed to her. “Are there any suggestions you can offer in the meantime? Like what I’m supposed to do with a couple of five-year-olds for an entire weekend?”

“Make sure they eat three well-balanced meals a day. Have them brush their teeth and take their baths. Don’t let them play in the traffic or stick their fingers into open light sockets. Belt them into the back seat when you take them out in your car. What else do you need to know?”

She rolled her eyes. “What do I do with them when they aren’t eating or bathing—or trying to stick their fingers into light sockets?”

“You could take them to the park and let them play on the playground. Take them to a kids’ movie—my girls liked the one we saw the other night. Take them to Pizza ‘n’ Prizes and let them play the games there. There are plenty of things you can do.”

The mention of his girls gave her an idea. “Maybe we could all go to the park together? The twins could play with your girls. They would probably have a great time.”

“Coward.”

“Hey, I’m not denying it. I told you I don’t know anything about parenting.”

Mark nodded abruptly. “Okay. I don’t usually work Saturdays, anyway, once the worst part of tax season is over. We’ll take the kids to the park. Why don’t we meet at my place at three, after Madison’s nap?”

“Sounds good to me.” She had a feeling that she and the boys would all be relieved to see other people by then.

She walked him to the door, then put a hand on his arm to detain him when he moved to step through it. “Mark?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

“For the dinner? I enjoyed it.”

“So did I, but that isn’t what I was talking about. Thank you for helping me deal with all this tonight. I might have panicked when the boys were dumped on my doorstep had I been here alone. You were calm and practical and helpful, and I needed that.”

“You’re welcome.” He surprised her by reaching up to rub his thumb lightly across her lower lip. “Too bad they couldn’t have arrived a few minutes later, hmm?”

Remembering the kiss that had been interrupted before it began, she sighed lightly. Too bad, indeed. But now that they would be seeing each other again the next day—strictly as friends, of course—the time for a onetime, curiosity-satisfying kiss had passed.

“Too bad,” she agreed with a touch of regret she didn’t even try to hide from him. “Good night, Mark.”

He dropped his hand and stepped out of the apartment. She closed the door behind him, then looked toward the bedroom and drew a deep, shaky breath. Forty-eight hours, she reminded herself. She could handle this.

She would worry about Monday when it arrived.

An odd sound woke Miranda from her restless dozing on the living room couch. She lay still for a moment, wondering if she had been dreaming. But then she heard it again, a whimper coming from the bedroom.

She had worn a heavy, oversize T-shirt and dorm pants for sleeping, so she didn’t bother reaching for a robe when she tossed the light blanket aside and stood. Pushing her hair out of her face, she moved toward the bedroom.