That Chesapeake Summer (Chesapeake Diaries Book 9)

by Mariah Stewart

  Barbara Noonan’s house had a wide front porch flanked by some large flowering shrubs and a bay window on each corner. There was a magnolia tree in the front yard, and a long driveway that led to a carriage house. The lot was deep, and the house, while not as large as some of its neighbors, appeared to be fairly sizable and well maintained.

  Would I have grown up here if she had kept me?

  After realizing that her presence had not gone unnoticed by one of the neighbors, Jamie waved to the woman who was watching her and drove off. Her stomach reminded her that she hadn’t eaten since the early breakfast she and Dan had shared in her Princeton kitchen, so she headed for Blossoms.

  Most of the lunch crowd had come and gone, so Jamie had her choice of tables. She sat near a side window and tried to concentrate on writing in her notebook, but her head was too full of Dan on the one hand and Barbara on the other to write anything that made sense.

  The agony and the ecstasy, she reflected. The man who made her feel like a goddess and the woman who’d handed her off to strangers.

  WHEN IT WAS time for Jamie to go, Dan held her and said, “No matter what happens, you need to know that you belong here.”

  “Grace said something like that earlier.”

  “Grace knows things,” he reminded her with a smile. “Everyone knows she has the eye.”

  It was eight-thirty when Jamie parked directly in front of the yellow house and cut the engine. She checked to make sure there was a car in the driveway, then opened the door and got out. “Now or never,” she murmured, “so it’s gonna be now.”

  The walk to the front door seemed endless. Jamie’s feet felt as if they were made of brick, her head was pounding along with her heart, and her palms were sweating, but she put one foot in front of the other and climbed the steps to the front porch. She rang the doorbell before she lost her nerve, then stepped back. She heard footsteps across a hardwood floor before the door opened.

  “Oh. Jamie.” The color drained from Barbara’s face.

  “If this is a bad time . . .” Jamie took a few steps back.

  “Not at all. This is the very best time.” Barbara’s hand flew to her chest. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t expecting you to . . . I mean, so soon after I . . .” She cleared her throat. “Please. Come in.”

  Later, Jamie would recall that the front hall had lovely Oriental rugs on the floor and some nice paintings, but when she entered the Noonan home, she blocked out everything.

  “Oh, Jamie, you’re shaking.” Barbara reached for her hands and held them. “Come into the living room and sit down.”

  Jamie permitted herself to be led to a sofa. She sat and tried to remember the opening line she’d practiced over and over, but her mind had gone blank.

  “So you received the notice from the court,” Barbara was saying.

  Jamie nodded. “I knew before then. I mean, I knew who you were.”

  Barbara frowned. “How could you have known?”

  Jamie told her how she’d figured it out from the newspapers and the series of photos.

  “Clever girl.” Barbara smiled.

  “But just now you didn’t seem surprised. Did you know?”

  “I had suspicions.”

  “How did you . . . ?”

  “Little things. I saw the interview with Ford. There was your birthday. It just seemed like a sign, coming right on the heels of the letter from the court asking me to unseal your adoption records and your arrival in town. The only reason they’d ask is if someone is looking. Then there’s the way you bite your lip when you’re thinking—my sister, Angela, all over again. Your hairline—my mother. Little things.” She laughed self-consciously. “The shape of your eyebrows.” She lifted her bangs from her forehead. “Mine. But it isn’t enough that you know who I am. You need to know the whole story.”

  “I know you were sixteen, and I know you went to live with your grandmother in Pennsylvania, where I was born.”

  Holding Jamie’s hands, Barbara told her story, of how she and her boyfriend, a senior at Annapolis, had gotten carried away on prom night of her junior year. By the time she figured out she was pregnant, he’d graduated from the Naval Academy and shipped out for training. Her parents would not permit her to contact him, insisting that the only way out of the predicament was for her to disappear for a while, have the baby, and let some childless couple adopt it.

  “I was sixteen and terrified, and my parents were very controlling. There was no defying them in anything, never had been. I hated what I did, Jamie, but I’d been given no choice.”

  “I’m not judging you. I’d never judge you. You did the only thing you could do.” Jamie took a deep breath. “Did you ever tell him? Did he ever know about me?”

  Barbara shook her head. “He never did. The few times he came back to St. Dennis, I was never around, by design. My parents’ design, that is. I guess I could have managed to see him—he had relatives in town—but I couldn’t face him knowing what I’d done. I don’t doubt he’d have been relieved, frankly, had he known, but I couldn’t bear to tell him. A few years later, I heard he’d gotten married and eventually settled in Boston, where he’s from. There didn’t seem to be any point in telling him. It was so long ago, and he had his own life. I saw one of his cousins about five years ago, and he told me that he—your father—had died in a skiing accident.”

  “What was his name?”

  “Carl. Carl Davis.” Tears filled Barbara’s eyes and rolled down her cheeks. “I never stopped thinking about you and wondering how you were and if you were happy and if your parents were good to you and if your childhood . . .” She broke down and sobbed, her hands covering her face.

  “I had a wonderful childhood and wonderful parents.” Jamie rubbed Barbara’s shoulders and her back while the woman cried her heart out. “The best.”

  “Thank God. I prayed every night. Curtis said they were fine people, that he’d known them for years . . .”

  “My dad and Mr. Enright went to law school together.” Jamie related what she knew about the circumstances surrounding her adoption and, finally, about finding the letter.

  “You mean you just found out?” Barbara looked stunned.

  “I did.”

  “That must have been terrible, especially coming right on the heels of your mother’s death.”

  Jamie wasn’t oblivious to the fact that Barbara referred to your mother and your parents, and she was grateful that Barbara respected the Valentines’ place in Jamie’s life. It somehow eased Jamie past the knowledge that this was a meeting Lainey had never wanted to take place.

  “There’s so much I want to know. What kind of kid you were and what books you read, what you liked and what you didn’t like. Who your friends were and how you spent your time. What your favorite subjects were.” Barbara rolled her eyes. “Overwhelming, I know. You don’t have to talk about any of that.”

  “No, no, I’m fine with telling you. It’s just an awful lot. And I have questions, too.”

  “Of course you do.” Barbara shook her head. “You want to know about your family here. I have lots of photos . . .”

  “I’d love to see them.”

  “Come into the kitchen and I’ll make us some tea. I stopped at the bakery and picked up some cupcakes. I guess the universe was telling me to expect company.”

  Jamie followed Barbara into the kitchen, feeling that the meeting was somewhat surreal. They were chatting like old friends, not like mother and daughter who’d been separated for thirty-six years. Everyone has their own ways of coping with awkward situations, Jamie reminded herself.

  “When I was little—seven or eight—I wanted to be a famous horse trainer,” Jamie said as Barbara filled a kettle with water for tea.

  Barbara put the kettle on the burner and turned to Jamie with tears on her cheeks and asked in a very quiet voice, “Would it be too muc
h to ask if I could hug you?”

  “It’s not too much at all.” Jamie rose and, for the first time in her life, hugged the woman who had given birth to her. It was a hug meant to mend the emptiness of the years and to soothe a soul that had been tortured for every one of those years. In it, Jamie felt Barbara’s pain and the joy that their reunion brought.

  Barbara broke away and pulled a tissue from a box on the counter and wiped her face. “I’m sorry, Jamie. This day has been a long time coming—frankly, I didn’t believe it would ever come.” She blew her nose. “It’s just been so hard, waiting, wondering if you’d ever look for me, wondering what you’d think of me, worrying that you’d choose not to know me . . .”

  “I had the same fears,” Jamie told her. “I was afraid to come here tonight, even though I knew you’d signed the consent. I was afraid you’d wish I hadn’t made that request to the court to unseal the records.”

  “I’m only sorry you didn’t do it sooner,” Barbara said.

  “To tell you the truth, I don’t know that I would have while my parents were alive,” Jamie confessed. “Obviously, this meeting is something that my mother, in particular, would have been very upset about. I doubt I would have gone against her wishes.” The kettle began to whistle, and Barbara turned to the burner.

  “I understand.” Barbara poured two cups of tea and handed one to Jamie, then placed a white bakery box with a pink label reading Cupcake on the lid on the table.

  “Did you ever look for me?” Jamie heard herself ask.

  “No. I never did.” Barbara shook her head. “I didn’t think I had that right. And I felt so guilty about everything. When I left the hospital after you were born, my mother kept telling me to forget what happened. By the time you come back to St. Dennis and go back to school, you’ll have forgotten that this ever happened. And By Christmas, this will all seem like a bad dream, and like a bad dream, you will forget about it.” Barbara shook her head. “I never forgot, not for a moment.”

  They sat and talked until two in the morning, at which point Barbara insisted that Jamie spend the night in one of her spare bedrooms. It was too late to call Dan, and she wasn’t sure if the inn’s doors were all locked by then, so Jamie accepted the offer and dressed in a borrowed nightshirt, climbing into bed with so many emotions swirling around in her brain that she thought her head would crack open and everything she’d heard and said over the past evening would spill out.

  She and Barbara continued their conversation over breakfast—so many questions to ask and so much to learn. They discovered that they took their coffee the same way (artificial sweetener and half-and-half) and liked their toast the same way (medium toasty brown, light on the butter). Neither had ever liked breakfast cereal, and their favorite sandwich was turkey, avocado, and bacon on a croissant.

  Finally, reluctantly, Barbara had to leave to open her shop.

  “I know you’re going to want to keep this on the QT,” Jamie said as she was leaving for the inn.

  “I think that’s something we’ll need to talk about. For me, I don’t care who knows. I’ve kept this secret for so long, and I’m tired of secrets. But you might want to consider yourself. You’re well known, and you’ve built a career writing about how important it is to be truthful. How will your readers react if they think you’ve been less than honest with them? There are people who will accuse you of knowing all along that the life you talked about wasn’t true, that you made up these fictional parents who inspired you to a truthful life, all to sell books.”

  “You let me worry about my readers. You need to think about St. Dennis and the people who have known you all your life, what they’ll think and what they’ll say.”

  Barbara waved a hand dismissively. “At my age, I couldn’t care less. Besides, I am very proud of you. And I’d be just as proud if you were practicing law or training horses.” She smiled and patted Jamie on the back. “But we can discuss the whens and the wheres of making our relationship known, as long as you’re sure you want it known.”

  “I do want the truth known, but I want it done in such a way as to honor my parents,” Jamie told her.

  “I agree,” Barbara told her. “And we’ll work on the right way to do that. In the meantime”—she gave Jamie a quick hug goodbye—“I can’t thank you enough for coming here and for being so understanding and nonjudgmental and just so . . . so you. Your parents must have been extraordinary people to have raised such a remarkable young woman. I wish I’d known them. I wish I’d had the chance to thank them.”

  Chapter 19

  HOW’D it go with Barbara last night?” was the first thing Dan asked after Jamie opened the door to her new room at the inn and they went inside. “I was starting to get a little worried when you didn’t come back.”

  “No need to worry. It went well. Remarkably well. We started talking and talking, and one thing led to another, and the next thing I knew, it was two in the morning. Barbara suggested I stay in her guest room. Which made sense, since I didn’t know if you locked the doors at night.”

  “We lock at midnight. You can get out, but you have to ring the doorbell to get in. You could have called me. I’d have met you at the door.”

  “I figured you needed to get some sleep. You were awake as much as I was the other night, if you remember.”

  “I do.” He nodded. “Vividly. I am willing to pull all-nighters with you any time. Now would be good . . .”

  “Don’t you have to tuck your kids in?”

  “They’re teenagers. If they’re home, they’re in their rooms. Sometimes if I’m lucky, they’ll poke out long enough to say good night, but that’s a rare sighting these days.”

  “Still, shouldn’t they know where you are in case they need you?”

  “They have my cell number. They’ll call.” He lay back against the pillows on her bed. “In the meantime, I can tell you’re all amped up. Want to talk about it?”

  “It was surreal. Her talking about her family—my grandparents, my aunts and uncles and cousins I never knew I had. About my father and his family and why he never knew about me. About . . .” She sighed. “About the other part of my life that I never knew existed. It’s overwhelming. I think I heard too much at once, like overeating at a buffet and then having to digest it all.”

  “So where do you go from here?”

  “We agreed that the truth has to be put out there, but we’re not sure of the best way to do that.”

  “That’s a tough call. Barbara has a ton of family here in town—siblings and nieces and nephews. They’ll all have to be told, and some of them, I can assure you, won’t take the news kindly. Her father’s side of the family is more likely to accept the news—and you—graciously, but I wouldn’t expect the same from her mother’s side.”

  “That’s the impression I got from her. She said she’s willing to face them and doesn’t care what their reaction might be. I think there’s a fair amount of risk there, but it’s one she said she’s more than willing to face. I suppose after having something like this buried inside you for so long, being able to bring it into the light must be a tremendous relief.”

  “And you? How are you going to handle it?”

  “I guess I’ll discuss it with my agent, get her advice on how to publicly deal with it. My books have all had references to my parents, so everyone who’s read them knows how close I was to them. I don’t want rumors to start floating around, so I’ll have to address it head-on.” She chewed on a fingernail. “A preface in the next book might be the way to go. I’ll want to talk to Sis before I do anything, though.”

  “Your mother’s sister.”

  Jamie nodded. “I think I’m going to rent a car and drive to Caryville tomorrow. I need to talk to her, let her know what’s going on.”

  “How do you think she’ll take it?”

  “I think she’ll be relieved for me, that my search was
a success, but at the same time, I think she’s going to feel protective of my mother’s memory.” Jamie lifted his arm and snuggled in next to him.

  “When will you be back?” he asked, and in his voice, she heard a touch of fear that she wouldn’t return at all.

  “I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m going to do.” She owed it to him to be as straightforward as she could. “As much as I appreciated Barbara’s candor and her opening up to me and her offer to put our relationship out in the open, wanting a relationship with me, I haven’t had time to reflect on it all. I think I need to take some time on my own and sort through it all.”

  “Can you do that in Caryville, in the house you grew up in?”

  “My aunt is there, and she is all I have of my family. Of the family I grew up with. Besides, I promised I’d let her know what I found. I don’t know how she’s going to take the news. After that . . .”

  “After that, what?”

  She buried her face in his chest. “I guess maybe that’s when I’ll need to take some time to myself.”

  “I don’t suppose that time would be spent here.”

  “St. Dennis isn’t exactly neutral ground.”

  “Neither is Caryville.”

  “I didn’t say I was going to stay in Caryville. I just need to be there right now. My aunt and my mother were very close. I want her to understand that my having a relationship with Barbara doesn’t diminish the love I have for my mom and dad.” She studied his face and the changing expression. Finally, she said, “Okay, spill. What’s on your mind?”

  “I was just wondering, now that you found what you were looking for here, whether you’d be back.”

  “Of course I’ll be back.” She couldn’t believe he’d asked her that. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “It just seems like you have a lot of options besides St. Dennis. Caryville. Princeton. I’m just wondering where you’re going to land when the dust settles.” Dan’s phone began to ring, and he cursed softly under his breath. “Dan Sinclair,” he answered gruffly. “Okay. When? Can’t Mr. Wyler pick you guys up and drive you home?” Dan sighed. “All right. Give me ten minutes.” He slipped the phone back in his pocket. “Diana needs a ride home, and it’s my night to pick them up at Scoop, which I completely forgot.” He sat up, clearly unhappy with the way the evening was going.