RSVP...Baby

by Pamela Browning

  At the other end of the pool, Bianca caught a glimpse of a small upflung hand in the middle of the maelstrom created by Lambie’s flailing strokes. Her head swung around as her eyes scanned the surface of the pool searching for Fawn. But Fawn wasn’t there.

  Bianca bolted upright. If not swimming, Fawn should be clinging to the side of the pool. And no one was at that end of the pool—only Lambie, isolated in a patch of turbulent water, his expression one of sheer terror. Something was wrong, terribly wrong.

  She shot out of her seat, but Neill was there first. It took him only a few well-measured and swift strokes to reach the boy, and as he did, Bianca saw Fawn’s face surface immediately below Lambie’s.

  As Bianca ran, Neill pulled the two children apart, and only then did Bianca see what had happened. Lambie had latched onto Fawn and yanked her under.

  “Easy,” Neill said to Lambie, who was clinging to his neck and crying unintelligibly. With his free arm, Neill eased Fawn over to the side of the pool where she clung gasping.

  Bianca jumped into the pool beside Fawn. “Are you okay?” she asked.

  “I was—swimming and—Lambie grabbed me. He—pushed me under. I couldn’t breathe.”

  Neill, still holding Lambie, said quietly to Bianca, “Lambie panicked. He grabbed onto the first person he saw, and it happened to be Fawn.”

  The lifeguard, looking frantic, bore down upon them. “Is everything okay? I only looked away for a minute—”

  “That’s all it takes,” Neill said sternly.

  “Let’s get you out of the pool, Fawn,” Bianca said while Neill continued his lecture to the lifeguard. At that moment Rhonda clattered up, clearly beside herself. “I saw it. I saw it all! I thought my Fawn was going to drown, and she would have if it hadn’t been for Neill.” Her face was ashen.

  By this time, Bianca had led Fawn up the steps of the pool. Rhonda bent and embraced her child, kissing her wet face, smoothing her hair off her brow, murmuring solicitously.

  Neill, now that the chastened lifeguard had returned to his post, was working to calm the still-distraught Lambie. “It’s okay, sport. Fawn’s fine, but that was a dangerous thing you did. You’ve got to be more careful around water.”

  “I know,” Lambie wailed. “Fawn, I didn’t mean to hurt you. I got scared.”

  Rhonda, calmer now, said quietly, “I hate to think what might have happened if it hadn’t been for you, Neill. I can’t tell you how much this means to me.”

  A woman who had noticed the action in the pool walked up and congratulated Neill.

  “That was a fine thing you did. No one else was watching the kids. The little girl might have drowned.”

  “I’d better take both kids back to the hotel. That’s enough swimming for all of us for one day,” Rhonda said.

  “I’ll go with you,” Neill said. “Hey, maybe what we all really need is an ice-cream cone. I know someone in the kitchen of the hotel who makes the best ones ever. What flavor does everyone want?”

  “Chocolate!” said Fawn, now recovered from her ordeal.

  “Strawberry bubble gum banana!” said Lambie.

  “Bianca?” said Neill.

  The incident had shaken Bianca to the core. There had been so many people around, and yet in seconds, with everyone’s attention diverted by the diver, the kids could have drowned. It made her own daughter’s life seem all the more precious to her, and she wanted nothing so much as to hold Tia in her arms.

  “I—I don’t think so,” Bianca said.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Positive.”

  “I want to talk to you.” Neill’s eyes locked with hers for one interminable moment, and then, still carrying Lambie, he followed Rhonda out of the pool area.

  Bianca knew without a doubt that there would be no avoiding a confrontation. The question she couldn’t help asking herself was, if Neill were to find out that he was Tia’s father, would he be delighted to know that he was capable of fathering a child?

  “HEY! Aren’t you Bianca?”

  Bianca, who had showered and changed into a light summer dress after leaving the pool, was passing through a fringe of trees on the way to the Ofstetlers’ an hour or so later when she was hailed by a woman’s voice from behind the Folly. She stopped in her tracks and shaded her eyes against the glare of the setting sun.

  A head followed by a body popped around a corner of jagged masonry. The head wore long thick curly reddish hair; the body wore a scooped-neck smock made of cmshed velvet. The zany effect was something like Little Lord Fauntleroy meets Knute Rockne, but Bianca had to admit that it was stylish—very stylish. This was one of the friends Lizzie Muldoon had brought to the wedding.

  “I’m Saffron Schrempf. This is my brother Storm.” The woman, smiling affably, held out her hand.

  “I’m happy to meet you,” Bianca said. She couldn’t help staring at Storm Even at long range, he’d been an amazingly fine physical specimen with those bulging biceps and undulating pectorals. Close up, with those assets spiffily displayed in a skintight white T-shirt, he was spectacular.

  “Isn’t this wedding a hoot?” he said. “You’d think Genevieve Knox walks around with an iron rod up her—”

  “Storm,” Saffron said warningly.

  “You agree with me,” Storm said, sounding slightly miffed

  Bianca suppressed a smile. “So do a few other people in this wedding party,” she said. “What do you think of Swan’s Folly?” she asked brightly.

  “Pretty fancy place. I’m going back to the hotel and steam my dress for the bachelorette party tonight,” Saffron said. “And I need to talk to Zurik.” With a grin and a wave, Saffron set off in the direction of the hotel.

  “Who’s Zurik?” Bianca asked Storm.

  “Alexander Zurik. A painter of the artsy-smartsy school. Lizzie hired him to paint a portrait of Caroline and Eric as a wedding present, but he hasn’t finished it yet and came along with us to soak up wedding vibes.”

  “Oh, well...that’s nice . . . If you’ll excuse me,” she said, turning resolutely toward the light-stippled path beneath the trees.

  “Mind if I walk along with you?” Storm beamed his brilliant smile in her direction, revealing two rows of perfectly capped teeth. She nodded and Storm fell into step beside her. He regarded her seriously. “Have you heard the rumors about a jewel thief?” he asked.

  “Jewel thief? At Swan’s Folly?”

  “That’s what I heard. Rumors are flying. ’Course, I think it’s a reaction to all this security at the hotel, you know, because it’s a society wedding and the guests could be an easy mark. I heard somebody’s going into peoples’ rooms and dumping their jewelry out on the bed, but the funny thing is, nothing’s missing.”

  “Neill did mention something about a burglary before he arrived.”

  “And get this—Caroline’s mother keeps rattling on about kidnappers.”

  “What with the person who’s going into rooms looking at jewelry, I’m not surprised Gen has jacked up security.”

  “Yeah, that Genevieve, she’s a case, all right.”

  “Well, Storm, I couldn’t agree with you more,” Bianca said, wondering how to get rid of Storm before they reached the Ofstetlers’ house. They hadn’t yet arrived at the point where the path forked in that direction, but they would soon.

  “Yoo-hoo! Storm! Bianca!” As they rounded the bend and emerged from the sheltering trees, they saw Winnie in a small rowboat skimming slowly across the pond. She shipped the oars and began to wave strenuously, threatening to sink the boat.

  “Would you two like to take the boat out next?” fluted Winnie in her high clear voice. “I’m going to shove it up on the bank over there when I’m through.”

  “No, thanks. It’s getting late,” Bianca answered.

  “Storm, maybe you and I should paddle around for a while.” Winnie treated him to her trademark eyelash flutter.

  “Not me, Winnie,” he called back. Thankfully, before she could speak to the
m again, he and Bianca put several willow trees between them and the woman in the boat.

  “So anyway, Bianca, it was nice to meet you. I think I’ll check out the stables.” Storm treated her to a fascinating ripple of his fabulous chest muscles and speeded up along the path, humming tunelessly as he left her behind.

  Bianca was eager to see Tia, and maybe if she hurried, there’d be time to take the baby for a walk in her pram. She wouldn’t head in the direction of the hotel; instead she’d explore the old apple orchard behind the Ofstetlers’ house. There, at least, she’d be unlikely to run into Neill or anyone else from the wedding party.

  Chapter Seven

  After treating the kids to ice cream, Neill felt at loose ends. He went to Bianca’s room and knocked on the door, but if she was in there, she wasn’t answering.

  Maybe she was out with the baby. He wondered where the baby-sitter lived. He thought of asking at the front desk, but he didn’t want to create any problems for Bianca, who had gone to such great lengths to keep the baby out of sight.

  Neill understood Bianca’s thinking, or at least he thought he did. Genevieve, who prided herself on being able to recite chapter and verse of Miss Primm’s Proper Etiquette Book, would take a dim view of anyone who chose to become a single mother, especially Bianca. Genevieve would take an even dimmer view of her bringing a baby to Caroline’s wedding. Also, Genevieve would probably see the move as an attempt on Bianca’s part to upstage Caroline.

  And then there was Eric. He wouldn’t want the baby around, either, especially if it was his child. Neill had begun to harbor the thought that the trouble between Eric and Caroline had to do with Bianca and her baby. He tried to push the idea away, but it niggled at the edges of his mind.

  Like most of the other single male members of the wedding party, Neill was lodged in one of several picturesque small houses across the pond from the main hotel. When he couldn’t find Bianca, he went to his lodging, cozily named Mulberry Cottage, and jumped in the shower, where he continued what might be a pointless conversation with himself.

  Was Tia Eric’s child? It was possible. Neill didn’t know how to estimate a baby’s age, but if Eric and Bianca had been together a year ago, it was possible for their child to be three months old. The baby didn’t look as if she could sit up yet. How old did they have to be to sit up? At the same time that his mind was grappling with these questions, it struck him that Bianca would have to have a lot of gall to bring a child whom Eric had fathered to his wedding. He didn’t think even Bianca had that much chutzpah.

  Which opened up another possibility. Maybe Tia wasn’t Eric’s child. Maybe she was...his.

  The thought caused him to drop the soap. He picked it up, letting the warm water spill down his chest and across his thighs, staring at the shampoo bottle on the shower ledge as if he’d never seen one before.

  No. Tia couldn’t be his child. It was impossible.

  But was it? He and Bianca had made love. It had only happened one time, but it only took once to make a baby.

  In his case, though, it was hard to believe that he could have fathered a child. Years ago, after the mumps he’d contracted in college, he’d wanted to know if he was capable, and his sperm count had tested so low that his doctor had deemed it extremely unlikely that Neill could impregnate anyone.

  After he’d learned that fatherhood, for him, was only a remote possibility, Neill had felt depressed and dejected, but later it seemed appropriate since he wouldn’t be such a great candidate for fatherhood anyway.

  His sperm count hadn’t been nonexistent. It had been low. Very low. But...?

  But.

  Maybe the baby wasn’t his. For all he knew, Bianca could have a boyfriend in Paris or Rome. Or even a husband. She’d been talking to someone named Vittorio on the phone when he’d gone by her room to pick her up for their tennis game.

  Wouldn’t Eric know if Bianca was involved with someone? Maybe not. Until this week, Eric and Bianca hadn’t talked for a year. Maybe Vittorio was the reason. But why were Eric and Caroline barely speaking? Did that have something to do with Bianca, too?

  Neill turned off the water and wrapped a towel around himself before he stepped out of the tub. For a long time he stood dripping on the bathroom floor, lost in thought as another mood stole in. It was too early to identify it, but it had something to do with Bianca and another man. He didn’t like to think of her with Eric, but at least it would make sense. What Neill downright couldn’t stand was the idea of her with some other guy. Vittorio. A playboy, no doubt. Someone who was only interested in her money and who wouldn’t marry her.

  Good thing the guy hadn’t come with her. He, Neill, might feel honor-bound to flatten him. And, of course, that was exactly the kind of thing you’d expect at a Bellamy wedding, where anything could happen—and usually did.

  BIANCA PUSHED the pram through a tangle of grass that had grown up in the largely unattended apple orchard and tried to think. It didn’t help that Tia was fussy and refused her pacifier or that her diaper needed to be changed in midstroll. While Bianca was fastening the diaper and chattering distractedly to Tia to take the baby’s mind off being uncomfortable, she couldn’t avoid the thought that this year at Swan’s Folly was certainly a lot different from last year at Swan’s Folly. Or was it the same?

  But last year! Last year had taken on a dreamlike quality in her memory. Bianca remembered how, after she’d stood for a moment on the bridge after leaving the engagement party where Genevieve had verbally attacked her, a breeze had sprung up, wafting with it the fragrance of lilacs. She’d walked slowly across to the shady area where the gazebo stood, and she’d found a bench in the shadows of the lilac bushes where she had slumped dejectedly, her hands covering her face. She couldn’t help it; she’d dissolved into sobs. Genevieve had been so wrong. Bianca had never loved Eric, not in a romantic way. It had always been Neill who had fascinated her, titillated her—and ignored her.

  Not that anyone knew how she felt about Neill. Eric would have made her feel ridiculous by hooting in amazement and disbelief if she’d told him she was madly in love with his big brother. Eric would have never let her forget that she’d told him, either. Ursula hadn’t known, mostly because Bianca was sure she’d have confided in Vivian that her daughter was infatuated with Viv’s son. And Viv might have told Neill, who would have pegged her for what she was, a silly girl in the throes of a teenage crush. On the night of Caroline and Eric’s engagement party, she’d still felt like that teenage girl even though by most people’s standards she was a sophisticated woman of the world.

  On that night when she and Neill had ended up in the gazebo... Neill had startled her, coming upon her silently as she sat sobbing on the bench.

  “Bianca?”

  He had spoken so softly at first that she hadn’t thought she’d heard him at all. Still, she’d know his voice anywhere She lifted her face, tearstained and flushed, and looked directly into Neill Bellamy’s eyes.

  Glowing in the darkness, warm and tender in their gaze, they held a compassion that she had never noticed there before and had not considered to be a component of his personality.

  “Neill, what—what are you doing here?” she stammered

  “I saw you leave and I came to see if you’re all right.” He moved closer so that his face, silhouetted against the moonlit Folly in the distance, became dark and enigmatic. She shivered, but not from the cold. It was because he was so close, only an arm’s length away. And then he was closer because he joined her on the bench, which was so narrow that their thighs touched A pulse started to beat in her throat.

  “If it helps, I think you were right to get out of there,” he said.

  She glanced over at him and managed a smile through her tears. “Thanks. Eric and I didn’t mean to cause a problem this afternoon.”

  “Genevieve’s a nutcase. Everybody knows it,” he said quietly.

  Carefully blank-faced, Bianca said, “I wish you hadn’t left the party because of me.
”

  “I was ready. Hainsworth was preparing to offer another lengthy toast.”

  “And Genevieve?”

  “Popping tranquilizers. As usual. Are you cold, Bianca? You’re shivering.”

  She was trembling. She drew a deep breath, but it didn’t quell the yearning that curled up from deep inside her, perhaps from the depths of her very soul.

  “I’m warm enough,” she said truthfully, but Neill slid a comforting arm around her shoulders anyway. The fabric of his jacket felt so good against her bare skin; she had worn a dress with slim straps and a gauzy full skirt that showed the outline of her legs when she stood in the light. Now the dress seemed heavy and weighted as well as too tight in the bodice. She felt a warm flush rising from her breasts to her throat, and she swallowed, hoping he didn’t hear her.

  The moon slipped out from beneath a cloud, spilling silvery light over the lilacs. Nearby a bird uttered a muffled cry, and Bianca wondered if it was one of the swans. She didn’t know much about swans, how they sounded, where they lived when they weren’t paddling serenely around the pond, how they mated. She imagined that swans would merge in a mighty rush of wings amid a turbulence of air but graceful all the same.

  While she was thinking about the swans, Neill touched her cheek. “Tears,” he said

  She reached up to wipe away the moisture, and her hand met his. At his touch, she jumped as if startled, but he only twined his fingers through hers and smiled. “There’s another way to get rid of those tears,” he said, and as she held her breath, hardly daring to believe this was happening, his lips descended, his breath warm upon her wet face. He touched his lips gently to her cheek, and she must have moaned because he said, “Shh,” and she did.