by Hope Ramsay
“This woman?”
“Brenda. She seems a bit…dowdy.”
Dylan let his gaze drift to Ella, who was playing something bright and lively that sounded like an old Irish jig. Her hair was falling out of its pins as she vigorously bowed the violin. She and her music made his heart sing. In fact, she looked a great deal like her mom right now, and it struck him that neither of them was dowdy.
They weren’t like Lauren or Tammy though. They didn’t wear designer dresses. They didn’t worry about their hair or their makeup much. They were down to earth. Like Aunt Brooklyn, who looked a whole lot like Mom, which made sense since they were sisters.
“Well,” Tammy said when he made no response to her cutting remark. “Her daughter is sort of cute in a hippy-dippy way. They certainly can play the violin. I suppose it’s a redeeming quality.”
Dylan turned, a nasty retort on the tip of his tongue. But right then, the chocolate fountain exploded.
* * *
One minute Ella had been playing “The Streets of Derry,” and then suddenly she became the victim of a…chocolate attack?
That wasn’t exactly the first thought that went through her head when a clump of congealed brown stuff hit her in the face and splattered over the violin’s fingerboard.
She may have screamed. Or at least gasped before she turned toward the chocolate fountain that had been behaving quite normally up until then. Jackie Scott had encamped near it and had been happily feeding himself copious quantities of chocolate-covered strawberries.
But now suddenly the fountain was having a meltdown, turning out big globs of congealed brown goo that looked like…well…She stood there stunned for a moment before someone in the room shouted, “Good god, that looks like poop.”
It did. And she was covered in it. She reached for a napkin and furiously began to wipe the stuff from the violin’s fingerboard. Thank God it hadn’t landed on the violin’s body. Almost anything could damage the varnish, and the sound of the instrument was all in the varnish. Dammit. The Holstein violin was her most prized possession. It had cost thousands of dollars, which she’d saved out of her gig money over the years.
People were starting to laugh. She turned to find them pointing at the fountain and her. She looked down. She had brown stuff all over herself. The dress was a total loss, although she hadn’t spent all that much money on it, so there was at least a small silver lining to this disaster.
She wanted to slink away from the demented fountain, especially after what Mom had said about her being in charge of everything. She’d get blamed for this disaster. She was certain of it.
She looked across the room. Dylan was standing with that woman. Holy hell, had she orchestrated this?
Sudden rage filled her. The woman had been standing across the room talking a mile a minute to Dylan. Had she been waiting for this to happen? She was smirking at Ella like the cat who’d swallowed the canary.
She wanted to scream at the woman for coming in here and messing everything up. But screaming wouldn’t fix the violin or her performance or the party, for that matter. She had to remain calm and figure out how to turn the fountain off. But even before that, she needed to get the alcohol wipes and cleaning cloths in her violin case and tend to her fiddle.
She turned away from the crowd, trying to swallow back her anger when, like some miracle, Dylan materialized at her elbow with a stack of napkins. He handed them over to her before turning around and yelling, “Someone find the staff from A Night to Remember and get that thing turned off.”
“The violin’s a mess,” she said, her voice as tiny as Granny’s. She was on the verge of tears. She clutched the instrument tighter. “And look at me. I’m not much better.”
“You’re beautiful.” He picked up her left hand and began wiping away the brown goop. He got most of it off her fingers, turned her hand palm up, and found a little glob on the inside of her wrist. Instead of wiping it away with the cloth, he leaned down and gently licked it off with his tongue.
The touch sent shivers through her, making her momentarily forget about the violin’s screwed-up fingerboard. A little hum escaped her throat, and she was about to melt into a big, sloppy puddle when Mom showed up looking pissed off.
She snatched her hand away. Had Mom seen him licking her wrist? Oh god, could this night get any worse?
“Oh my god, what have you done?” Mom turned on Dylan, evidently too distressed by the horrific scene of brown goo tumbling out of the fountain’s top like a poop machine to have noticed Dylan’s tongue on her wrist.
Dylan turned to stare at Mom, his face a study in cool determination. Jim had told him to stay away from Mom, and Ella hoped to hell he remembered that. But just in case he’d forgotten, she stepped between them. “Mom, the fountain isn’t Dylan’s fault.”
“No?” Mom seemed unconvinced.
Just then, Diane from A Night to Remember showed up and turned the fountain off. “I’m so sorry,” she said, her cheeks turning pink. “We’ll give you a full refund and pay for any damage. This usually only happens when water gets into the fountain. Water and chocolate don’t mix, I’m afraid.”
“Who would do such a thing?” Mom turned toward Dylan with an unfriendly glare.
“Oh my God,” Ella said, “I think I know what happened.”
“He did it, didn’t he? Or maybe that Tammy woman.”
Ella shook her head. “No. I think this was an accident. Jackie’s been hanging around the fountain all evening. How much do you want to bet he spilled some of his soda into the fountain? So really, you know, it’s my fault for insisting that he be added to the invitation list.”
“Are you all right?” Mom asked.
“I’m fine, but the violin’s a mess.”
Mom eyed the goop clinging to the instrument’s fingerboard. “We need to get that cleaned right away before it dries.” Ella followed Mom into the big stateroom where she and Dylan had kissed that one time, and where she’d left her violin case. “You go into the bathroom and clean yourself up. I’ll take care of the violin,” Mom said.
“Please don’t blame Dylan for the fountain.”
“Okay, but what about that Tammy woman?”
“I don’t think Dylan knew about her either. Please. Be nice to him.”
Mom blinked and then frowned. “What is this? Have you had a change of heart? You’ve come to his defense a couple of times tonight. When near as I can see, he left most of the work to you.”
“He didn’t, Mom. We did this together. And yes, I’ve decided that he’s okay. And, besides, we’re all one big family, right? We should soldier on as if nothing happened, okay?”
“You’re a better woman than I am,” she said, taking the violin from Ella’s hands. “I’d like to turn Dylan over my knee and give him a much-needed spanking.”
“Please don’t spank him. Even figuratively. Please try to get along with him, okay?” Ella said, then scooted into the tiny bathroom, thinking that spanking Dylan sounded like surprisingly kinky fun.
Oh boy, inappropriate thought alert. But she’d never get it out of her mind now. She was thoroughly wicked.
Or maybe on the brink of falling in love with him.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Brenda’s heart fluttered in her chest as she waved goodbye to the last of the guests. The corners of her mouth ached because she’d been fake-smiling since the moment Tammy Hansen set foot on the yacht. That woman was poison.
Thank goodness she had decided not to have a big reception on her wedding day because she didn’t need another party where she discovered that Jim had an old flame, or where the Methodists were warring with the Episcopalians, or where little Jackie Scott pulled another prank. Although the child insisted that he’d spilled his drink into the fountain by accident.
As engagement parties went, this one was a disaster from top to bottom, with the only exception that the fountain chose to delay its malfunction so that she and Ella could make it through the five-minute duo
without a single wrong note. For those five minutes, Brenda had been utterly happy.
“I think it went pretty well, all things considered,” Jim said as the last guests stepped up onto the pier and headed off toward the parking lot. “It was certainly a lovely evening, wasn’t it?”
She clamped down on her thoughts, her heart rocking like crazy in her chest. Jim always saw the bright side of things. He was a dewy-eyed optimist who could find the silver lining in every cloud. She loved him for it.
And thank the Lord Jim hadn’t tied himself to that Tammy woman. She’d been all over the boat gossiping with the Methodists about Jim’s decision to abandon Grace Church. To hear them talk, Brenda was evil incarnate for insisting on that.
When she’d done no such thing.
How had Jim managed to tune out all that nasty party gossip? When every word of it flayed Brenda until her emotions were raw.
Jim was such a good soul. She didn’t deserve him. And that worried her most of all. Everyone thought he was marrying beneath him. And maybe he was.
Now that the party was over, her heart should have been calming down, but instead, it was galloping away with her, leaving her winded and worried.
She needed a moment to regroup. To calm down. “I need to go down and get my purse from the—”
Dizziness hit her, and she stumbled sideways, her knees buckling. Then everything went black.
* * *
Dylan floored the Honda and sped over the bridge. The ambulance had a good head start on them because they’d taken Ella’s grandmother home first to await word on Brenda’s condition. She hadn’t gone willingly, but her quilting group friends had met them at the condo and were organizing a prayer session.
A long night in the ER seemed likely, after which Brenda would probably be admitted to the hospital. So prayer seemed like the order of the day.
Ella sat in the passenger’s seat, tears falling down her cheeks. “This is my fault,” she kept saying. But of course she wasn’t to blame. It was his fault for the way he’d been behaving for weeks.
“It’s going to be okay.” He used his bedside voice. “It’s going to be fine.”
“She’s my mother, for goodness’ sake. What if I lose her?”
Dylan shut up. He’d lost a mother. He understood her panic. It would be ten times worse to lose a mother suddenly, on the day of an engagement party, than to lose one after a long illness during which you had plenty of time to say goodbye.
Oh hell, it sucked to lose a parent any way.
He gripped the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white. Death was the ultimate enemy.
But Brenda wasn’t going to die. She’d lost consciousness, yes. And chances were, she’d had a cardiac episode of some kind. But she’d regained consciousness, and Dad had administered aspirin, and she hadn’t gone into cardiac arrest. So chances were good she’d live to see another day. But that didn’t change the suckiness of this situation.
He pulled into the hospital’s physician’s lot, which was much closer than the visitors’ lot. Ella bailed out of the car before he’d even set the brake. He grabbed his hospital ID from the glove box and chased after her. She’d taken a wrong turn across the parking lot, and he had to catch her and point her in the direction of the emergency room entrance. Like all hospitals originally built in the 1950s, this one had been added on to wherever space could be found. The result was a hodgepodge of buildings and entrances.
Brenda had already been taken into the ER, but Ella had to stop and speak to the gatekeeper at the intake desk before being allowed to go sit with her. And, as usual, the woman behind the desk wanted all of Brenda’s insurance information before Ella could go inside. Evidently, Dad hadn’t supplied it, even though he’d come in with the EMTs, no doubt because he’d flashed his hospital ID.
“I have no idea what her health insurance information is,” Ella said in a rising voice.
“No need to yell,” the woman at the desk said in a condescending voice that ticked Dylan off.
He whipped out his hospital ID card and flashed it at the woman. “She’s with me. We’ll get the information from the patient and be back.” He snagged Ella by the arm and pulled her toward the double doors that led to the ER.
“Is the patient one of yours?” the gatekeeper asked.
“No. She’s my stepmom.” He used his badge to unlock the doors and stepped into the organized chaos of the emergency room.
“Hallelujah,” Ella muttered, “you’ve finally accepted the inevitable.”
“What?”
“You called her your stepmom.”
“Oh, yeah, I did.”
They hurried down the row of cubicles and finally found Brenda. She was conscious and had a nasal cannula supplying supplemental oxygen. Her dress had been unbuttoned down the front to expose the EKG electrodes the EMTs had placed on her chest. She appeared pale, but her lips were nice and pink. He didn’t need to read the pulse oximeter output to know that her blood oxygen was within reasonable levels.
“Where’s Dad? Where’s the ER doc?” he asked.
“Jim’s talking to the doctor,” Brenda said, sounding winded, which was concerning. Did she have pulmonary edema? That could be serious. A sign of heart failure. She needed a cardiac ultrasound right away.
“I’ll be back,” Dylan said, and then hurried to the nurse’s station to check the telemetry data on Brenda’s heart and oxygen levels. She was in atrial fibrillation, and her blood pressure was low.
“Who’s the attending?” he demanded.
The ER nurse gave him an annoyed look. “Doctor Andrews. And your dad has already gone off to pester him, but a stroke came in five minutes before Ms. McMillan. In the meantime, the doc ordered IV digoxin and fluids as well as a cardiac ultrasound.”
In short, Brenda was relatively stable and was getting the appropriate care for a patient presenting with A-fib. He should stand down and go hold Ella’s hand, but he couldn’t do that in public, and besides, he wanted to make sure Dad was okay.
Dylan backed away and went in search of his father, finding him in a cubicle on the other side of the ER, assisting Dr. Andrews, who suddenly had his hands full with the stroke and a newly arrived patient suffering a compound fracture.
Suddenly, Dylan and his father found themselves stabilizing the fracture patient, who was bleeding pretty badly, while the on-call orthopedic surgeon was summoned. It took half an hour before they got back to Brenda’s cubicle, but by that time, she’d been whisked away for the cardiac ultrasound that Dr. Andrews had ordered. Ella was missing too, but Dylan figured she was probably back at reception providing health insurance information.
Dad collapsed onto the single hard chair in Brenda’s cubicle and dropped his head into his hands, then scrubbed at his unruly hair for a moment. Finally, he pressed his fingers into his eye sockets as if he was trying to hold back tears.
Dylan’s chest constricted. He hated it when people cried. But seeing Dad cry was more than he could bear. It took him back to an ancient memory of that night when he’d found Dad sobbing in the kitchen. It had been a few days after Mom’s funeral. The family had finally departed, and Dylan and Dad had been left alone in the house for the first night.
Seeing his father cry like that had rocked Dylan’s world. Up until that time, he’d been like every other ten-year-old, absolutely certain that Mom and Dad would always be there. That they would always keep him safe. That they would be available to comfort him and listen to him and take care of him.
But not that night. That night he’d learned that it could all come crashing down. And it had scared him silly. He didn’t know how to make Dad feel better that night. And because he was powerless to help his father, he’d run away from it.
He’d gone back to his bedroom and folded himself into a tiny ball and hid under his covers. He’d cried too, but in shame, not grief. He should have done something to comfort his father.
He’d promised himself the next morning that he would never
abandon his father again. Dad needed him, so he’d dedicated himself to being good for Dad. He’d learned stupid one-line jokes that he told all the time to make Dad laugh. He went fishing with Dad because it pleased him. And he’d never wanted to be anything other than a doctor because that’s what Dad wanted.
He’d given up Lauren so he could come back to Dad. Hell, he’d even tried to like Tammy because Dad seemed to like her.
But now Dad had found someone new. Someone he truly loved. And in a misguided attempt to keep Dad safe and happy, all Dylan had done was make things harder for him. Dylan needed to stop interfering in Dad’s love life. Now. And hadn’t Ella been telling him this from the get-go? Yes, she had.
“Dad?” he said, his voice cracking with emotion.
“I’m okay.” Dad sounded gruff as he brushed an errant tear from his cheek.
That single tear tore Dylan to shreds.
“She’s going to be okay,” Dylan said.
Dad nodded, his chin trembling. “I hope so. Because I don’t know what I’m going to do if I ever lose her.” He looked up at Dylan, his eyes glassy with unshed tears. “I know she’s turned everything upside down for you. I know this has been hard, but Brenda is exactly what I needed in my life. Son, I was in such a rut. I had forgotten what it was like to share the simplest things with someone, you know? Like walking on the beach or watching some British murder mystery, trying to figure out whodunit. It’s the little things that matter.” He wiped another tear from his eye and turned to look at the blank wall.
“I can’t lose her,” Dad continued a moment later. “I can’t go through that again. I love her so much. She makes the sun rise in the morning.” Dad sank his face in his hands, and his shoulders shook.
Dylan should go comfort him. At least say something. But he couldn’t do it. He was that little boy once again, who needed to run and hide from his father’s emotions. He couldn’t bear to be in that room. He had to get away.
So he slipped from the cubicle, intent on going outside and getting some air, but Ella intercepted him as she came down the hallway from the reception area carrying her mother’s wallet in her hand.
