Kitabı oku: «Daddy To Be Determined»

Chapter One

Ben Griffin lifted five-year-old Roxanne out of the bathtub and wrapped her in a thick blue towel. He sat on the closed lid of the john with her and helped her dry off. She had his dark eyes and hair, though hers hung in thick ringlets—when it wasn’t snarled in knots.

“I wanted to wash my hair,” she complained as she held tightly to Betsy, a small rag doll with black button eyes and a painted heart-shaped mouth. “Julie Callahan Griffin made that,” he used to remind himself when the pain of her loss had been so enormous he had to say her name or burst. The doll was never more than a hand’s span away from Roxie, awake or sleeping.

“We washed your hair yesterday,” Ben reminded her.

“Vannie gets to wash her hair every day,” she argued.

“Vannie has very short hair. And she blows it dry.” Vanessa was seven, and the decision to cut her hair had come at the end of the summer, when she’d returned from camp. She hadn’t explained why she wanted to cut her long, golden-brown hair, but she’d been adamant.

Since their mother had died a year and a half ago, Ben had done his best to allow them whatever was in his power and wouldn’t hurt them.

Roxie swung her head from side to side so that her long hair flew out. It would have slapped him in the face if he hadn’t drawn back.

She giggled, then declared, “I don’t want to cut my hair.”

“I don’t blame you,” he said, helping her into lavender flannel pajamas patterned with pink kittens and blue puppies. “It’s very pretty.”

“Can I wear lipstick to Marianne’s tomorrow?”

Marianne Beasley owned and operated the day care where Roxie spent several hours every day.

“Nope,” Ben replied. She asked this question every night. “Sorry.”

“Can I get my ears pierced?”

This was a new question. Having finished putting her pajamas on, he turned her toward him to look into her eyes. They were bright and frighteningly intelligent. “Do you even know what that is?”

“Yeah,” she said, pulling her little lobe out for him to see. “A lady sticks it with a needle and it doesn’t even hurt! She puts a little hole right there and you can wear different earrings in them every day.”

“No,” he said, knowing he had to say it firmly or she’d be cajoling him all night long. “You have to wait until you grow up a little more.”

She looked indignant. “I’m five! Paloma has pierced ears, and she’s only four!”

“I’m sorry. That’s the way it is.”

“Can I have ice cream before bed?”

He lifted her onto his hip and carried her downstairs, wondering if part of her strategy was to ask for the impossible, knowing she could bargain him down. Ice cream at night sometimes gave her a stomachache, but tonight he’d risk it in the interest of making her feel less deprived.

The telephone rang when he was halfway down the stairs.

“I’ll get it!” Vanessa shouted.

When he rounded the corner into the kitchen, he saw that she was already dressed for bed. She used his bathroom at night and always got herself ready without fuss. He wondered if she was the only second-grader in the world with a tidy sock drawer and clothes on hangers instead of all over her room.

He worried a little about her efficiency at such a tender age but reminded himself that Julie had been a stickler for tidiness and order. Vanessa came by it naturally.

“He’s right here, Grandma.” Vanessa put her hand over the mouthpiece and handed the telephone to him. “Grandma’s having trouble with a guest,” she whispered.

“Thank you.” He put Roxie on her feet. “Van, can you scoop up some ice cream for you and Roxie?”

She looked surprised. “At night?”

“Just tonight.”

“How come?”

“Because I said so.”

With a shrug, Vanessa pulled open the door of the side-by-side refrigerator and delved into the freezer at the bottom.

“Ha!” his mother said into his ear. “You used to get upset when I gave you that answer, and now you’re doing it. The best revenge is watching you become me.”

“Thanks to the gender difference,” he said, backing onto a stool near the counter, “that’ll only go so far. What’s up?”

“Well…” She made a small sound of distress. “I’m not entirely sure. Do you know Natalie Browning?”

“No,” he replied. He’d never been wild about his mother buying a seven-bedroom house and turning it into a bed-and-breakfast, inviting complete strangers to be locked in with her at night without benefit of any information about them except their names. “Why?”

“I think she’s a celebrity in the East. Her driver’s license says Philadelphia. When I asked her what brought her to Dancer’s Beach, she said something about needing to hide out from cameras and publicity.”

“Interesting.” He watched Vanessa struggle with the ice cream scoop, and was about to get up and help her when she went to the sink and ran it under the hot water. She tried again and the ice cream scooped out easily. He wondered if Julie had taught her that. What a kid. “Never heard of her.”

“Well, she arrived yesterday looking as though her only friend had died. And I haven’t seen her since, except peeking out from behind her door. Today I haven’t seen her at all.”

“Have you knocked? Or called?”

“She doesn’t answer.”

“Maybe she’s just sleeping.”

His mother sighed. “I think it’s worse than that. She had a terrible cold, so I mixed her a hot toddy with my apricot brandy. I left her the bottle, and I haven’t seen her or it since.”

“Sounds as though you have a guest on a bender, Mom. What do you want me to do?”

“I told her she could have that room for only one night. It’s reserved for a pair of honeymooners who are due in less than two hours. Would you…come and talk to her? Beautiful women always respond to handsome men.”

“Mom…” He groaned. She was always finding some excuse to introduce him to some young woman or get him invited to some event where single women would be present. Between her and Marianne Beasley, who came on to him at every opportunity, he was clutching his bachelorhood with both hands.

“It has nothing to do with that!” she said firmly. She’d always read his mind. He hated that she could still do it. “I’m simply trying to take care of a difficult matter in a discreet and civilized way. I don’t want to call the police or make a fuss, because she looks like a woman who’s had enough trouble, but if you’re too busy for me…”

“The girls are just out of the bath,” he pleaded, “and eating their snacks before bed.”

“I said that was fine,” she repeated stiffly. He could imagine her, wounded look in place on her carefully made up face, spiked white hair even spikier in her imagined state of neglect. “If you’re too busy, I’ll just—”

“We’ll be there.” He caved; it was inevitable. “Give me ten minutes.”

“You can have twelve,” she said. “Thank you, Ben.”

“Sure.” He hung up the phone. “Get your slippers and coats,” he said to the girls. “Put away the ice cream. We’re going to Grandma’s.”

They hurried to comply, and he had to smile as he watched them run upstairs. Coming home to Dancer’s Beach to give them a sense of family after Julie died had been a good idea. They loved their grandmother, who didn’t seem to persecute them the way she picked on him, and their Sunday evening dinners at the B-and-B were enjoyed by all of them.

He just hoped he survived the move. Leaving his work in Portland as a developer of high-density urban dwellings and purchasing the Bijou Theater Building in downtown Dancer’s Beach left him more time to be with the girls. However, their standard of living had taken a considerable dive, though he seemed to be the only one who noticed.

The old lodge-style house on a hill overlooking the town had been in serious need of repair. But, licensed in plumbing and wiring, he’d made short shrift of the major problems and was working slowly on giving the place a facelift.

He kept thinking he’d adjusted to life without Julie. Then Vanessa, who looked so much like her, would smile at him with an arched eyebrow, or Roxie would fold her arms in displeasure, and he was ambushed by old memories and ever-present longings.

He’d bought the house to keep him busy. Evenings after the girls had gone to bed were difficult, but Sundays were abominable. They’d always done special things on Sunday—picnics, sight-seeing, driving to the coast. With Saturday’s chores done and Monday’s responsibilities not yet upon them, they were particularly carefree.

Though the pace of his life had slowed considerably, Ben felt as though he never had a carefree moment anymore. He worried about the girls constantly, hoping he was giving them everything they needed, knowing it was impossible for a father to do so.

Slippers and coats on, Betsy tucked into Roxie’s pocket, the girls raced past him and out the door to the indigo van emblazoned with his logo and company name, Bijou Development.

He smiled as he followed in their wake. At least he didn’t have to worry about their physical well-being. He wished he could move that energetically.

LOUISE GRIFFIN’S bed-and-breakfast could only be described, Ben thought, as “country coordinates gone mad.” The living room, which flowed into the dining room, was wallpapered from ceiling to waist height in an all-over rose-and-ivy pattern that had a coordinating border of tightly clustered roses. Then a rose-and-green-striped paper swept down to the rose-colored baseboards.

Every room in the house was similarly decorated, though the motifs and colors were different. Every bedroom had coordinating papers and border, as well as bedding and curtains that also matched. Each bed had several sets of pillows, all mix and match, like something out of a linens ad.

Looking at them too long made him crazy, as though there was no room for free thought, and everything in the world had to coordinate with or match everything else.

But his mother loved it and apparently so did her guests. Ben did her books, and after only three years, she was doing very well.

The girls rushed into the kitchen, where his mother had a small table and a television. She stood at the counter, placing cookies on a plate, and they stopped briefly to greet her.

She leaned down to sweep them into her arms. Then she handed Roxie the plate and Vanessa two glasses of milk.

“You two eat up while your dad and I do business.”

“With the drunk guest?” Vanessa asked as Roxie ran over to the television.

“We don’t know that she’s drunk,” his mother admonished gently. “I’m just worried about her. Go on, now.”

Vanessa followed Roxie.

Ben waited for his mother in the kitchen doorway. She didn’t look like anybody’s mother. She was medium height and slender in velvety lavender top and slacks as coordinated as her rooms. A pendant with a large purple-and-green stone hung around her neck. She had short white hair that was moussed and spiked, and she wore more makeup than he thought she needed, but that wasn’t his call.

She liked to in-line skate in her free time, and was known occasionally to add gin to her Citrucel.

She’d never been a cuddly mother, but she’d always adored him, and what he’d lacked in hugs and snuggles, she’d made up for by being there for him every time he turned to her for help. When Julie died, Lulu had left a friend in charge of the B-and-B and come to stay with him for a month to help the girls and do all the paperwork chores, such as death certificates and insurance notifications, that he simply hadn’t had the heart for.

She’d cooked, too, though even Roxie had noticed that they ate a lot of egg dishes and fancy pancakes.

“Well, she has a bed-and-breakfast,” Vanessa had pointed out with surprising insight. “Breakfast is all she gets to cook.”

Lulu did seem worried as she hooked her arm in his now and led him into the dining room. Several guests occupied the living room and were in cheerful conversation about their respective vacations.

“I want to do this with a minimum of fuss,” she said quietly, smiling as one of the guests waved at her. “Miss Browning didn’t come down to breakfast and she was really under the weather yesterday.”

Ben nodded. “I understand that, Mom. I just don’t know why you think I’m the one to handle this.”

“Because you’re my troubleshooter. You fix everything around here.”

“But this is a person. Not a pipe or an electrical connection.”

“You were very good with Julie, and she was a complex, sometimes volatile woman.”

“I was married to Julie.”

“You’re good with everyone.” Lulu physically turned him toward the hallway and the stairs. “Just please make sure she’s okay, then explain that she has to leave. She’s in the Woodsy Cabin Room on the third floor. All the other guests on that floor are out. Her name’s Natalie!” she whispered after him.

Right. The Woodsy Cabin Room was the one with pine tree motif paper at the top, brown bears gamboling over the paper on the bottom, and the whole of it brought together by green border paper patterned with moose.

He had to be insane, Ben thought as he climbed two flights of stairs, to let his mom bully him into this. What did a man say to a strange woman clearly on a lost weekend?

He drew a breath, prayed that he would create as small a scene as possible, and knocked on the door.

He was surprised when it opened immediately. And he was quite literally rendered speechless by the woman who stood there. She wore only a red-and-black flannel shirt and red-toed boot socks. She was fairly tall, five-foot-nine or -ten, and her legs from the tail of her shirt to her ankles were something to behold—shapely, milky white and very, very long.

He dragged his eyes away abruptly, concentrating on his mission. But gazing into her face wasn’t easy on him, either. She had wide gray eyes that appeared a little vague, but were filled with an expression that mingled pain and sadness—two things with which he was very familiar. Her nose was small and came to a delicate—if red—point, her lips were nicely shaped but pale, her chin was gently rounded and her face was a perfect oval.

A short, unruly mop of golden-blond hair stood up in disarray. She peered at him with unfocused eyes. In the hand that held the door open was a small, flat box.

She looked like a cross between Michelle Pfeiffer and Jenna Elfman. Ben found himself touched by the look in her eyes. He couldn’t even think about her legs.

He forced himself to remember why he was here, and opened his mouth to speak.

But she asked abruptly, “Are you…the one?” She weaved a little as she peered at him more closely.

“Uh…the one?”

“The one,” she repeated, making a wide gesture with the box. It was apparently empty. “The one who’s going to finally get me pregnant.”

He completely lost his train of thought. He stared at her.

“’Cause Dori told me…” She leaned against the door and winced, rubbing her head. “But I thought it was a dream.” She spoke slowly, her voice slurred. “I just woke up. But I feel so…” She dropped the box and seemed to sink, about to fall.

He reached for the box instinctively and caught it, then grabbed for her and pushed her gently back toward the bed. Her hands clasped his arms and held on.

Her eyes looked into his, their gray depths almost lucid. He felt her tension in the grip of her fingers.

“You are him,” she whispered.

She looked so grave. What was she talking about? “Who?” he asked, lowering his voice unconsciously.

“The father of my baby,” she replied.

“I’m…Lulu’s son,” he said, pulling the edge of the coverlet over her knees.

“Lulu?”

“She owns this place.”

The woman looked around the room. “The…clinic?”

“No, this isn’t a clinic. You’re staying at a bed-and-breakfast.”

She frowned, apparently trying to absorb that. “Why?”

“I don’t know,” he replied. “You’ve been sick.” He held up the box and saw that it contained extra-strength cold medication. “I think you’ve had a cold.” He tossed the box at the bedside table and noted the empty toddy mug there. The brandy bottle stood beside it.

She fell back onto the mattress, then put a finger to her lips. “Sick. But…shh! Or they’ll report that I’m dying!”

He didn’t even try to understand what that meant. He reached for the bottle and held it up to the light. It was still mostly full, though he guessed even a small amount of brandy with strong cold medication could reduce someone to such a state.

“How many pills have you had?” he asked.

She put a hand to her head. “Um…five…eight. Not sure.”

“You should eat something,” he suggested. “Maybe drink some coffee.” He pulled the coverlet all the way over her. “I’ll go get—”

She caught his shirtsleeve with surprising strength, preventing him from straightening up. “I just want the baby,” she said. “Now. Before I…”

He guessed she’d been about to say, “Before I pass out,” because then she did just that.

“Oh boy,” Ben grumbled to himself as he placed a pillow under her head. She was crackers, but he probably was, too. After a year and a half of celibacy, making a baby with a gorgeous blonde didn’t sound half-bad.