Kayla's Daddy

by Laura Bradford

  “Who else?” Mrs. Applewhite snapped.

  Phoebe walked around the pair and pulled the door open. “Yes. I did.”

  “Rude, I bet.”

  “I’m not sure I’d say rude, exactly. A little caught off guard, perhaps.”

  “I’d say rude.” Mrs. Applewhite nearly shoved Mr. Borden through the door in her usual brusque manner. “Rude is rude. And that young man is rude.”

  “It doesn’t matter much. The person I was really looking for wasn’t there.” Phoebe stepped onto the porch and inhaled deeply, enjoying the refreshing night air.

  “You’re talking gibberish, Phoebe. You just said you spoke to him. And you did ask me about Tate Williams, right?”

  Phoebe pulled out her scrunchie and let her hair tumble down her back. “It was just a miscommunication, that’s all. It was his dad I was looking for.”

  “Bart? Well, why didn’t you say so?” Mrs. Applewhite jutted her chin forward and eyed Phoebe curiously. “I could have spared you the displeasure of meeting Mr. Rude and sent you where you needed to go.”

  Phoebe stared at her neighbor. “You know how I can find Tate’s dad?”

  “Of course. Once a Quinton Laner, always a Quinton Laner. Unless you’re Tate Williams. Then you’re nothing.”

  TATE WILLIAMS LOOKED UP from his plans as Regina Melvey strode into his office, coffeepot in hand. In the five years he’d been with McDonald and Murphy, he’d never had a more efficient—intuitive—secretary than Regina.

  “Coffee, Mr. Williams?”

  Pushing back in his desk chair, he nodded, his cheeks briefly inflating with a frustrated exhalation. “Sounds great. I could use an artificial boost right about now.”

  “Still monkeying around with that new Dolanger office building?” Regina leaned over the desk and refilled his empty mug from the steaming pot. “It’s looked wonderful each of the last five times you’ve shown it to me.”

  Tate grinned at the fiftysomething woman, taking in the way her gray hair curled softly around her face in much the same way his mom’s had. “Point noted. But there’s something about the entrance area that’s just not clicking.”

  He motioned her over to the drafting table. “See? Right here.” He pointed at the area surrounding the main doorway. “It’s not jelling with the rest of the building.”

  Silence settled over the room as his secretary leaned over the sketch of the Dolanger Enterprises building and ran her fingers across the trouble spot. Finally, she spoke. “It feels closed up.”

  Closed up.

  “That’s it!” Tate reached up from his seat and cupped her face, pulling her toward him for a great big kiss on her forehead. “Regina, you are a genius.”

  “Moi?” she asked with mock surprise, one carefully manicured hand resting at her throat.

  Tate laughed. “Vous.”

  “Good. I’m glad. Now if it’s okay, I’m going to head out for the night. The dogs are probably tearing up the house.”

  He checked his watch. “Oh, Regina. I’m sorry. Why are you still here? You should have left hours ago.”

  She hoisted the coffeepot into the air. “You work late, I work late. We’re a team, remember?”

  How could he forget? Since the day she’d reported in as his secretary, Regina Melvey had become irreplaceable. In less than a week she’d managed to learn his subtle cues on everything from when quiet was preferred to those times when he needed a sounding board. In a matter of months she’d managed to become not only his righthand person at work, but also his friend. She knew about the various dates he’d gone on over the past few years, listened to the countless reasons why there was never a second. She’d been there with a box of tissues and an understanding shoulder when his mom passed away, and a listening ear when he’d hit his limit with his dad.

  He reached out and squeezed her hand gently. “If I get this partnership, you’ll get a raise.”

  “Raise, schmaise. If you get this partnership, you can buy me some flowers and a chocolate cake.”

  “You’re on.” He grinned as he watched her walk toward his office door, his mood brighter now that he knew how his sketch needed to be fixed.

  “Oh, and you can help me paint my porch,” she called over her shoulder as she stepped into the hall.

  Paint.

  It really shouldn’t have surprised him how fast that one word pulled his thoughts back to his lunchtime visitor. Not when he factored in how much he’d thought of her already that day.

  Her long, soft brown hair. Her khaki-green eyes. Her hesitant smile. Her beautiful lips. Her persistence.

  “Regina?”

  The woman stuck her head back in the doorway. “Yes, boss?”

  “Can I ask you something?”

  “Of course.”

  Tate ran a hand across his face and through his hair as he counted to ten under his breath. “You were close to your parents. Did you know much about their single years? You know, before they married and had you?”

  He felt her studying him as she seemed to weigh her answer. When she finally spoke, her voice was soft yet clear. “A little. But my parents were grade school sweethearts. They really didn’t have a life without each other.”

  “I see.”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Something happened today that made me wonder about my dad’s life before me. Before my mother. But it’s no big deal, I guess. Just a fleeting question.”

  The woman fingered the silver pendant hanging from a chain around her neck and hesitated briefly. “You could ask him, you know.”

  “No. I can’t.” Tate was anxious to put an end to a conversation he never should have started. “Hey, have fun with the dogs tonight.”

  “I will. But—” Regina gripped the coffeepot with both hands and shifted from foot to foot “—there’s something different about you since you came back from lunch.”

  “Different? How so?” he asked.

  “Well, I’ve heard you whistling a few times. Did something happen?”

  In addition to being the world’s best secretary, Regina was also amazingly perceptive when it came to people. So perceptive, in fact, she often sensed his mood before he did.

  He shrugged. “The only thing that happened over lunch—besides me not eating—was an unexpected delivery. Only it wasn’t for me. I felt kind of bad for her, though, because she seemed genuinely disappointed when I told her I wasn’t the right person.”

  “She?”

  “Yeah. She.”

  “Hmm.” The woman looked at him one more time, the curiosity in her eyes as tangible as the knowing smile on her face. “Was she pretty?”

  Uh-oh. He knew where this was going.

  “Yes.”

  “Friendly?”

  “Hard to tell. But I’d say genuine.”

  “Hmm,” Regina repeated.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “The whistling makes sense now.”

  He held up his hands, palms outward. “Whoa. Slow down there, Regina. I probably just had a song stuck in my head from the car. Besides, she had a baby with her. A little girl.”

  Regina’s left eyebrow cocked upward. “Did she have a ring?”

  He shook his head. He’d noticed the absence of a wedding band immediately. And he hadn’t missed the way she’d corrected him on his use of the word Mrs.

  “Maybe she was babysitting,” Regina offered.

  “No, it was hers.”

  “Okay. Maybe it was. Either way—” the secretary’s lips twitched—“you were whistling, boss.”

  Tate dropped his head into his hands.

  Regina laughed softly. “I won’t ask you anything more until that sketch is done. But when it is…”

  He peeked out from behind his hands. “Skedaddle, Regina.”

  “Yes, boss.” She stepped back into the hall, then stopped. “Oh, I called Shane Dolanger as you requested and confirmed your attendance at his party on Friday. His secretary said he’d be delighted.”


  “Thanks. I’ll be delighted, too—if I finish his plans.” Tate looked back at the sketch on his drafting table, already envisioning the changes he needed to make. Regina was right. It was the closed-up feeling that had been eating at him all afternoon. A wider appearance to the entranceway would create a more welcoming look. Draw people in. An essential component of any successful business.

  But even as he bent over the table for the umpteenth time that day, his sense of design was being overshadowed by one persistent thought.

  Regina was right. He had a ringless Phoebe Jennings on the brain.

  Chapter Three

  Phoebe couldn’t help but feel a sense of pride as she walked into her art room and noticed the jars of paint neatly organized on the shelf above her worktable. The assortment of colors, lined up like a row of infantry soldiers, was proof positive she’d really finished the portrait.

  She’d dropped it by Shane Dolanger’s office earlier in the day, but somehow its completion had seemed almost surreal—a familiar symptom of the postproject fog that rolled into her brain the second she finished an assignment.

  Phoebe grabbed her silver link watch from around the gooseneck lamp and fastened it to her wrist. Although a huge part of her wished she could retrieve Kayla from the Haskells’ and cuddle with her all night, there was another part—the one dubbed Probing Phoebe by her grandmother—that couldn’t wait to get to the Dolanger party. And it had nothing whatsoever to do with carrying trays of hors d’oeuvres through rooms the size of her whole house.

  Quite the contrary, in fact.

  It was about people’s reactions. Wealthy people’s reactions.

  To her art.

  She’d been raised by her grandmother to know people from opposite sides of the train tracks didn’t mix, that the discrepancies in upbringing and life experiences made it impossible to connect in any meaningful way. Phoebe had thought the notion was ludicrous until she’d ignored her grandmother’s warning and dated across the divide shortly after graduating from college. The result had been disastrous. With Kayla the biggest victim of all.

  But this was different. This wasn’t about human relationships. This was about ability and talent, hard work and perseverance. None of which were dictated by money.

  A gentle push on her ankle made her look down and smile.

  “Hey there, Boots.” Phoebe squatted down and ran a gentle hand across the calico tabby’s back. “I can’t pick you up, old guy, or I’ll get all furry. And we can’t have that at a West Cedarville party, can we?”

  The soulful yellow eyes blinked back at her.

  “Now I know what you’re thinking. You were Gram’s cat for far too long not to have been influenced by her notions. And you’re both right. It’s time to quit the serving job—I know that. But I couldn’t quit until after I’d finished the portrait, and I wouldn’t have felt right bailing without giving any notice. Besides, tonight was just too good to pass up. I mean, think about it…I’ll get to see my portrait on the wall of Shane Dolanger’s home. See how people react to it.” Phoebe stood, picking a few orange-and-white strands of hair from her sleeve.

  As much as she’d love to be the kind of person who didn’t need validation from others, she wasn’t. Artists rarely were. Accolades were food for the creative soul.

  Still, she knew it went beyond that this time. The Dolangers’ party had unparalleled potential to take that validation and translate it into paying jobs. Lots of them.

  That news of her success could eventually wind its way back to Doug’s family was simply the cherry on top.

  The chocolate-dipped cherry.

  Surrounded by the fluffiest whipped cream ever.

  Pulling the last of Boots’s hair from her clothes, Phoebe glanced around her studio one last time, let her eyes rest on the picture of Kayla near the upper left corner of her worktable. Kayla with her chubby cheeks, cherubic mouth and beautiful smile…

  Kayla.

  Phoebe hated spending another night away from her daughter, hated having to leave her at the Haskells’ yet again—their home alive with Kayla’s happy babbling while Phoebe’s was eerily quiet. But if there was any consolation at all, it was knowing tonight would be the last time. The paycheck from the Dolangers’ portrait would enable her to finally concentrate on her art—something she could do with Kayla by her side.

  A picture of Phoebe’s grandmother sat in a frame beside Kayla’s, and as she glanced at it, a familiar pang of hurt made it difficult to breathe. “I did it, Gram. I really and truly did it.”

  It was a day her grandmother had always believed would come. A day she’d first predicted when Phoebe had been barely ten years old.

  “You keep on painting, sweetheart. And you never give up. It’s how dreams come true.”

  Indeed.

  Kissing her fingertips softly, Phoebe brought them to the woman’s face, let them linger for the briefest of moments. “Thanks for believing in me, Gram.”

  With a flick of the overhead light switch, she made her way down the aging wooden staircase to the main floor, willing her heart to look forward. Gram was gone. There wasn’t anything Phoebe could do to change that. But she could enjoy her moment in the spotlight for both of them—even if it was from the shadows, with a serving tray in her hand.

  Stopping beside the antique table in the foyer, Phoebe fastened first the buttons at her left wrist and then the buttons at her right. The crisp white fabric of the blouse hugged her body well, as did the black dress pants the caterer required. A quick glance in the mirror above the table revealed a face that was a bit paler than she’d like, though that was understandable after spending nearly every waking hour of the past three weeks holed up in her art room. Except, of course, when she’d trekked out to Tate Williams’s house.

  Tate.

  As infuriating as the man had been, she couldn’t get him off her mind. Was she so desperate for male companionship she’d be lured by a handsome face and gorgeous body? Hadn’t she learned a thing from the experience with Doug?

  She pulled her purse onto the table and began rummaging for some blush. Though thoughts of Tate had just brought ample color to her cheeks, she noted.

  “Ugh. I’ve got Tate Williams on the brain,” Phoebe groaned as she dropped the colored powder back into her bag and reached, instead, for some mascara. As she unscrewed the cap, her gaze drifted from the mirror to the table, settled on the envelope she’d been trying desperately to ignore.

  It was just as she’d told the man’s son. Stories without endings drove her nuts. Always had. It was the single reason her grandmother had moved up bedtime preparations by a full thirty minutes when Phoebe was little. Books could not be closed midway. Not when she was listening.

  But her mission to deliver the letter to Tate’s father wasn’t just about endings and closure. It was also about regret. The kind of nagging regret she lived with on a daily basis, thanks to the many opportunities she’d missed, chances to tell her grandmother just how much she loved her before it was too late. At least whoever had sent the letter had tried to communicate.

  The chime of Gram’s grandfather clock at the end of the hallway snapped her attention back to the task at hand. “Okay, Boots, I’m leaving,” she called up the steps as she pulled her keys from her purse and strode toward the front door.

  She’d been pleased at how quickly the three of them had warmed to their new place. This town had been a welcome change from living with the memories locked in Gram’s old house. And little by little, it was beginning to feel like home. Partly because it was an older house, like Gram’s, and partly because the elderly neighbors she’d grown to love over the past six months provided a link of sorts to a woman she’d loved from the day she was born.

  She followed the side path to the driveway and hopped into the small blue Fiesta she’d purchased with what was left of Gram’s estate after paying the last of the medical bills. The engine purred to life and she backed slowly onto the street, watching for any of the
assortment of neighbors that lingered on the sidewalks prior to the dinner hour each evening.

  The drive to West Cedarville was slow going, with businesspeople heading home from work in anticipation of the weekend. It wasn’t hard to pick out who was heading where regardless of what direction they were driving. The cars themselves told the story. The smaller sedans and pickup trucks headed east. The expensive SUVs and luxury cars headed west. And in that instant Phoebe knew what it meant to swim upstream. Fiestas didn’t belong at this end of town. Not unless they were being driven by the maid. Or the gardener.

  Or maybe even the painter.

  She laughed to herself as she pulled into the Dolangers’s gated driveway and stopped at the intercom.

  “Yes?” The voice that emerged from the small, wall-mounted black box was crisp and efficient, if just a little bored.

  “Phoebe Jennings.”

  “Phoebe Jennings…” The voice trailed off, a pretty good indication the person was checking a list of some sort.

  “I’m one of the servers.”

  “One moment, let me check that list. Yes, here you are. I’ll buzz you through. Park off to the side and come through the back door. Do not access the circular drive in front.”

  She nodded automatically then maneuvered her car through the now-open wrought-iron gate. The side driveway wasn’t hard to locate; it was where the other Fiesta-like cars were parked. One for the maid, one for the gardener, one for the portrait spy.

  Once inside it didn’t take long for her to learn her duties, as well as the dos and don’ts of the evening—a list that stopped just shy of “don’t steal the silverware.” Not that it mattered. She couldn’t care less about the silverware or the china or any of the priceless knickknacks strewn throughout the palatial home.

  The only thing she cared about was in the hearth room.

  NO MATTER HOW MANY of these parties he attended on behalf of the firm, Tate never felt entirely comfortable. In fact, if he thought about it, he felt more like a run-of-the-mill goldfish in a Japanese koi pond.

  But it wasn’t the expensive cars lined up in the driveway that made him feel out of place—his sporty red Beemer held its own quite nicely. And it wasn’t the designer clothes his fellow guests would invariably be wearing—he had more than his fair share of Zenga shirts and slacks.