by Ami Weaver
Hannah sat back, stared. “Oh, Maggie.” She reached over and grasped Maggie’s fingers. Maggie closed her eyes as the tears pressed against her lids. She’d gone too far to back down now. “It was Lucy,” she said on a sob, and felt Hannah’s fingers go slack, then tighten.
“So you’re—” Hannah said slowly, and Maggie nodded as the tears poured down her face.
“Lucy’s half sister.” Guilt, pain and remorse pulsed through her.
“Does Josh—?” Hannah asked and shook her head. “I can see by your face it’s a no. Oh, Maggie, what were you thinking?”
There was no censure in her friend’s voice, but the words hit her hard. “I wanted to get to know Cody. And not, you know, hurt them. I didn’t know what it would do to them to show up out of the blue. I figured this was a safe way to do it. Especially since… Well, I know her mother never told her about my dad. Our dad.” She shredded a paper napkin, her nervous fingers working it to tiny pieces. She didn’t feel much better for the telling, knew she wouldn’t until she told Josh.
She knew, too, when she did she’d lose them both. Could she risk it? To lose her whole family? Her father and sister to death, her mother to bitterness. Josh not wanting anything to do with Lucy’s family. What a mess she’d created. The old saying was clearly true—the road to hell was certainly paved with good intentions.
“But,” Hannah prompted, her voice still gentle.
Maggie shrugged as a fresh wave of tears broke over her. Annoyed, she swiped them away. It was stupid to cry when she’d brought this on herself. “But there was Josh. And he was…well, he just was. Truthfully, I never considered him as part of the equation—Cody is my focus, Josh is my employer. Well, then we have this chemistry that’s been building. Last night we took this amazing walk in the snow and it was like we were in this bubble of magic. And we…well, you know. Even though I knew it was wrong and it could not work. But I just don’t know how to tell him.”
Hannah sat back and studied Maggie for a long minute. “What are you most afraid of?”
Maggie thought of the tenderness in the way he’d loved her last night and squeezed her eyes shut against the memory. “Losing the connection with Cody. Losing Josh.”
Hannah lifted her mug, set it down again. “You might lose them if you tell him. But if you don’t tell him, and he finds out anyway, you’ll lose them both for sure, Maggie. Is it worth the risk?”
Maggie locked her gaze on her friend’s. There was the question she was wrestling with her conscience over. Really, the answer didn’t matter—there was only one right answer and she knew what it was. “No. It’s gotten away from me.” Their relationship had grown so fast, blowing up like a midsummer thunderstorm.
Hannah sighed and nodded. “You’ve got a big mess here, honey. But I can see why you can’t get involved with him—or think you can’t. You’ve got to work through this. And you have to tell him. Sooner rather than later at this point.”
Panic swamped Maggie. “What do I do, just walk up and say, ‘Oh, by the way, I’m your sister-in-law?’”
Hannah shrugged. “However it comes out, is my guess. But what you’re building here is based on a lie of omission, even though you didn’t mean it to be. It’ll be easier to rebuild if you tell him before it goes much further.”
What Hannah said was absolutely true. Maggie knew that. She took a deep breath. “I will. But not until I can be sure I won’t lose Cody. He’s the reason I’m here. Hannah—” She paused, not sure how to ask her friend what she needed.
Hannah shook her head. “I won’t say a word, Maggie. It’s none of my business. But, sweetie? Don’t wait too long.” She reached over and squeezed Maggie’s hand. “I’m here if you need me. Good luck.”
Maggie knew all too well she’d need it.
* * *
When Ellen dropped off Cody, Maggie was reasonably composed. To Ellen’s credit, she didn’t ask any questions or even look too hard at Maggie.
Cody gave her a big hug when he came through the door. “Hi, Maggie.”
“Hi, buddy.” She squeezed him lightly. “You have fun?”
“Yeah. I got to stay up really late,” he said proudly.
“Really?” Maggie looked at Ellen, who smiled back.
“Nine-thirty. Practically midnight.”
Maggie laughed. “Especially when you’re four. Thank you for bringing him home.”
Ellen dropped one more kiss on Cody’s head. “No problem. I enjoy having him. He’s a joy.”
Maggie agreed. No matter how this all worked out, she was so very grateful for the opportunity to get to know him—and Ellen, too.
Cody went into the living room to take stock of the loot under the tree. He checked periodically for new gifts, which always made Maggie smile.
Ellen left without any leading comments or too much small talk. Maggie heaved a silent sigh of relief. Did she dare hope Ellen hadn’t picked up on the same vibes Hannah had?
God, she hoped not. Wouldn’t that be awkward?
With a little shudder, she went and sat on the floor by Cody, who was examining a red-wrapped package with great intensity.
“I know you just got home, but we need to do a little Christmas shopping for your daddy and Gramma. Why don’t you go to the bathroom and then we’ll head out?”
“‘Kay.” He gave the package one last shake. “Legos,” he announced. Maggie raised a brow and hid a smile.
“Really? How do you know?”
“It rattles,” he said and replaced the present reluctantly, then got up.
As Cody scampered off, she watched him go with both love and trepidation in her heart. She loved the little boy with all her heart. How could she leave him?
* * *
The trip across town only took a few minutes. She and Cody had just entered the craft store when Maggie’s cell phone rang. Digging through her purse, she pulled it out and frowned at the display. The number wasn’t familiar.
“Hello?” she asked, guiding Cody toward hand print craft kits.
A pause. Then, “Is this Maggie Thelan?” The woman’s voice was low, nervous.
“Yes. Who is this?” She didn’t want to be rude but her creep meter was ringing.
“It’s Jeanine. Jeanine Brooks.”
Maggie nearly dropped the phone. Lucy’s mother.
“I don’t know if you remember me, but—” Her voice faded away.
“I do. I do. Of course I do. How are you?” Oh, dear. She sounded like a Dr. Seuss book.
The woman ignored her. “Do you think— I mean would you be able to meet me tonight? In Long Lake? I know it’s short notice, but I’d like…well, to meet with you and that’s about halfway.” She finished in a rush, like she thought maybe she’d change her mind.
Maggie’s brain whirled. She’d left Jeanine her cell number the first time she’d contacted her. The older woman had obviously hung on to it for a year. She’d also been very, very clear on not wanting to talk to Maggie. What had changed?
“If you don’t want to, I understand,” Jeanine said quietly. “I wasn’t very nice to you the last time we talked.”
“No, that’s not it at all,” Maggie said hastily. “I can. I’d love to. What time?”
They settled on seven, which meant she’d have to leave almost as soon as Josh got home. She clicked the phone shut, excitement and trepidation warring in her belly. What would she tell him?
“Who was that?”
She managed a smile for Cody. “Just someone I need to talk to later. So, which of these kits should we get? Do you want to make a stone for your Gramma’s garden?”
Successfully distracted, Cody concentrated on the craft kits as she dropped her phone in her bag. She wished she could tell him who she was going to see. Cody didn’t know his maternal grandparents and while she wished things were different, it wasn’t her call.
Nerves skittered down her back. What did Jeanine want after rejecting Maggie so soundly a year ago?
* * *
&
nbsp; She told Josh she had an appointment, which was true. Thankfully, he didn’t ask her to elaborate. This also had the dubious benefit of getting her out of the house and away from him and all the leftover tensions from last night. They’d have to figure out how to deal with each other, but she couldn’t do it now.
Maggie arrived at the little restaurant Jeanine mentioned fifteen minutes early. She seated herself in a booth next to the window, both so she could keep an eye on the parking lot and for its semiprivate nature.
Nerves twisted in her belly and she barely touched the coffee the waitress brought her. Jeanine had been crystal clear in her refusal to meet with Maggie the first time she’d contacted the older woman. Maggie had assumed she was simply unable to deal with her daughter’s death and apologized for the intrusion into her life. She wasn’t sure what to think about the out-of-the-blue contact now.
A silver coupe turned in and parked. Maggie kept her eyes on the car until its door opened and a trim woman stepped out.
She wore a slim gray suit with a bright floral scarf at her neck. Her hair was clipped short, a light brown with golden highlights. When she entered the restaurant she scanned it, then her gaze landed on Maggie.
No smile of welcome, just a determined look as she crossed the room. The butterflies increased tempo in Maggie’s belly and she clasped her shaking hands in her lap for a moment.
“Hi, Jeanine,” she said, pleased her voice stayed steady.
“Maggie. Thanks for meeting me here,” she said.
“It’s no problem,” Maggie said as the waitress approached their table. She sat very still as the woman filled their cups. After she’d gone, Jeanine lifted her gaze to meet Maggie’s. In the other woman’s eyes Maggie saw pain and sorrow. She held her breath, afraid the wrong words would send Jeanine running.
“You look a little like her,” Jeanine said softly, almost to herself. “The dark hair, the eyes.” The pain sharpened in her eyes and caught at Maggie’s heart. “From your father, of course.”
Maggie didn’t know how to respond. Thank you seemed inappropriate somehow.
“I guess you are wondering why I asked you to meet me, after the last time,” she said with a ghost of a smile. “You caught me completely off guard. I didn’t know Frank had another daughter and truly I never thought of Lucy as having another family. I don’t know why,” she murmured, her gaze drifting off. “I just never did.”
She took an absent sip of coffee. Maggie didn’t speak, almost didn’t dare to breathe.
“I don’t know how much you know about Frank and me,” she continued. “We met before he met your mom. I know that. I—” Here, her voice faltered, and she paused to swallow. “I was having a rough patch with my husband. We’d been married for a couple years, and were kind of going in different directions. We were awfully young,” she murmured. “Right out of high school. We had no idea what being married was like.” She laughed. “Like playing house, I thought. He’d go to work, come home to a hot meal I cooked, while the little ones sat with shiny clean faces around the table. Not quite.”
As the story unfolded Maggie learned that, no, it hadn’t gone that way at all. Hugh worked late hours and came home long after the hot meal had cooled. They rarely ate together, rarely even slept in the same bed. Jeanine felt invisible to her husband, and panicky because the much-anticipated babies were not arriving. So, she’d gone out one night when her husband wasn’t home, and met Maggie’s father at a bar. They left together and Jeanine, terrified and guilt-stricken, seduced her husband that same night because she somehow knew Frank had gotten her pregnant.
“He didn’t know I was married,” Jeanine said. She lifted her gaze to meet Maggie’s. “It’s very important you know that. I ran into him a few weeks later and told him the truth. I told him I was pregnant. I knew he was the father because we knew my husband was unlikely to father any kids.”
She smiled a watery smile. “There was a chance he could, a very small chance. If it happened once it wasn’t likely to happen again. So he thought he’d had his one hit and was very happy. But when Lucy was born, she had Frank’s eyes. And nose. And no one in our families had hair that dark. Nothing my husband really noticed, you know. He swore she had the Brooks nose, for example. That was fine with me. And he adored her. She healed our marriage. Hugh started spending more time at home. I don’t think he ever suspected she wasn’t his.”
Jeanine raised her chin and met Maggie’s gaze squarely. “Hugh has no idea of my infidelity. I can’t be too sorry. Frank gave us Lucy.” Her voice broke. “And now she’s gone. I’m sorry you never had the chance to know her. But you never could, don’t you see? You never could, because it would have destroyed my marriage and our family.”
Sorrow filled Maggie. So many secrets. In the end, she and Lucy were the ones who were cheated. Still… She finally found her voice. “Did you ask my father not to say anything?”
Jeanine bit her lip. “I did. By that time he’d met your mom. It benefited both of us to do it my way.”
Maggie felt a little sick her father had let her sister go that easy.
Jeanine seemed to read her mind. “Don’t think less of Frank,” she said softly. “He was young, too. Madly in love with your mom. I saw them together a couple of times. He wasn’t ready to be a dad at that time. People grow and change, Maggie. Remember that. I look at it as he gave my husband and me an incredible gift.”
At what cost? Maybe if her father had let her mother in on the whole thing years ago, Maggie wouldn’t be in this situation now. Those choices were on her father, even if Maggie and her mother were paying the price.
“I don’t know what to say,” Maggie admitted. While she’d known the very bare bones of the story, she hadn’t been prepared for the whole thing. “I’m feeling a little overwhelmed right now.”
Jeanine laid her hands flat on the table, her eyes sad. “Of course you are. This is a story that played out more than thirty years ago, but to you it’s brand-new.”
Tears pricked Maggie’s eyes and she could only nod.
Jeanine reached into her purse, pulled out an envelope and slid it across the table. “These are copies of some of Lucy’s pictures. You have the right to know a bit about her, even if it never happened that you could meet in person. I’m sorry for that. I truly am.”
Maggie took the envelope, felt its heft in her hand. The story of a woman—her sister—in her hand. She did not open it, instead slid into her own purse.
When Jeanine spoke again, her words were whispered. “Can you—can you tell me how Cody is?”
Chapter Twelve
Maggie’s head came up in shock. “Why do you think I know?”
Jeanine closed her eyes. “I know you’re his nanny. A woman I know in town told me.”
Maggie recoiled. How did she handle this? And who knew who she was?
“I know all about secrets, Maggie,” Jeanine reminded her with a sad smile. “Yours is safe with me. The woman I know doesn’t know who you are. I will say my daughter was very unhappy in her marriage. Some of that was her personality—she was very impulsive and I don’t think they were ever really suited. A lot of it is on Josh. He wasn’t there for her.”
Maggie caught the thread of bitterness and tried to reconcile Jeanine’s words with the Josh she knew. “I’m sorry to hear that,” she said finally. She thought of Josh’s banked anger at this woman and her husband. “I’m not comfortable sharing anything about Cody. But I can say Josh is a wonderful father to Cody and he’s a very happy little boy.”
Jeanine nodded. “I understand. I just…wanted to know.”
Impulsively Maggie reached across the table and squeezed her hand. “You can call him,” she suggested. “Work it out. See Cody.”
Jeanine’s eyes brimmed with tears. “It’s not that easy. We exchanged terrible words.” Maggie saw her shudder. “Terrible words,” she repeated softly.
“I’m so sorry to hear that,” Maggie murmured. Cody was the loser in this game but it wa
sn’t her place to point that out to this woman. Her heart ached for all of them.
Jeanine opened her wallet and pulled out a ten. “Here. Pay the bill with this. I can’t stay. I just…can’t. I’m so very sorry, Maggie, that you never knew my girl, never could know her. She was a wonderful person. You would have loved her.”
Jeanine stood and looked at Maggie, regret etching her features. “And I think she would have loved you.”
* * *
Maggie sat very still as Jeanine left, emotions roiling in her heart. It all made sense now. Jeanine’s refusal to see her. What if Maggie resembled Lucy? How could she explain Maggie? What would it do to her husband and marriage if he knew the daughter he’d adored was not his? And really, if Josh let Maggie stay around, how could they have a relationship with Cody? Jeanine would need to come clean with her husband. It seemed Maggie had inadvertently forced the other woman’s hand. But the choice Jeanine had to make wasn’t on Maggie.
Tears burned in her throat, and she forced them down. She needed to talk to Kerry.
She paid the bill and left the restaurant with the precious envelope of pictures tucked in her purse. She would look at them at home, in the privacy of her own room.
As soon as she got in her car, she called Kerry. Her friend answered on the second ring.
“I met Lucy’s mom today,” she said without preamble.
She heard Kerry’s indrawn breath. “After she refused to see you?”
Maggie leaned her head back on the seat. “Yeah.” She filled her friend in on the details of the meeting.
“Wow,” Kerry said softly. “Just—wow.”
“I know. I don’t know if I feel any better,” Maggie murmured.
“But now you know about her. You learned a lot. It must at least partly explain why your father did what he did. It’s not easy to learn about a sister after you’ve already lost her.”
True. “She gave me pictures.” Maggie glanced at her purse. The envelope almost gave off an aura of its own.
