Found: One Son

by Judith Arnold

  Michael shook his head. “I changed my mind. I want more than your forgiveness. We had something five years ago. Something important.”

  “Five years ago it was important. Now it’s dead.”

  “I don’t think so,” he said. He reached across the table and took her hand. Not to say grace this time, but to force her to acknowledge him physically. If he couldn’t persuade her with his words, perhaps he was hoping he could persuade her with his touch.

  Her body responded to the light pressure of his fingers around her hand, the warmth and strength of his clasp. Her heart responded even more strongly, more dangerously. This wasn’t simply being touched by a man. It was being touched by Michael Molina, and unwelcome desire flared inside her.

  She didn’t want to be touched by him in any way.

  “Emmie.” He moved his thumb against hers, gently, his eyes mesmerizing, so dark she could get lost in them. “What we had five years ago is very much alive today. His name is Jeffrey, and he’s my son.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  IT HAD BEEN QUITE an interesting afternoon. He’d looked at a few apartments-nothing had bowled him over—and then gone back to the hotel to check his messages. One was from detective Jack Tyrell.

  Michael had stared at the flashing light on his phone, pushing the pound button over and over to hear that one message: “Michael? This is Maggie’s brother Jack from Finders, Keepers and Tyrell Investigative. Give me a call. I’ve got something for you.”

  Five times: I’ve got something for you.

  Michael didn’t want to know what Jack had. The problem was, more than he didn’t want to know, he did want to know.

  Eventually he’d pushed the star button to delete the message. He’d stepped outside his room into the cool, humid air and wished he were still a smoker. This was exactly the kind of situation where a man needed to scorch his lungs.

  Instead he walked through the parking lot to the street and watched the traffic stream past the building. Across the way was the diner where he’d eaten breakfast that morning. He couldn’t stand the thought of eating supper there tonight. He’d much rather go to a nice restaurant-although he wouldn’t want to go alone.

  He wanted to go with Emmie. So they could talk—or he could shake her by the shoulders and demand to know why she hadn’t told him...

  Assuming there was something to tell.

  Of course there was something to tell. Jack Tyrell had said he had something.

  Gathering his courage, Michael had marched back to his room and punched in the phone number for Finders, Keepers. Maggie answered.

  “This is Michael Molina. I got a message from your brother Jack. Is he in?”

  “Oh—hi, Michael.” He’d tried to assess her voice. Startled? Dismayed? Excited? “Sure, let me transfer you to Jack’s office.”

  He’d heard a click, then a second click and Jack’s voice. “Hey, Michael-how are you?”

  “I don’t know,” Michael had answered truthfully. “You tell me.”

  “Your name is on the kid’s birth certificate,” Jack had said.

  Michael had become acutely conscious of the weight and shape of the telephone in his hand. Smooth plastic, cool and hard. He’d noticed the way the late-afternoon sun wrestled through the dampness, spilling a milky light through the window. He’d heard the syncopation of his heartbeat, practically felt the blood moving from chamber to chamber and out into his body.

  “You’re listed as the child’s father,” Jack had reiterated, as if unsure whether Michael had heard him the first time.

  Michael had heard him perfectly.

  “The boy was born at Beth Israel Hospital in Boston on February 14. Valentine’s Day.”

  Michael had felt oxygen passing through the membranes of his lungs and into his bloodstream. He’d felt the blood flow through the arteries to his brain, making his thoughts come in and out of focus with each pulse. He’d felt the blood in his extremities, keeping him alive-blood he shared with a little boy whose existence he hadn’t even known about three days ago.

  “Are you there?” Jack had asked.

  “I’m here.”

  “Okay. This is a big one, I know. Kind of a shock. I should have had Maggie tell you. She’s better at saying things the right way.”

  “There’s no right or wrong way to say this,” Michael had argued. “It just is.”

  “Well.” A long silence, then Jack asked, “Isthere anything I can do?”

  “Not right now.” Michael had tasted the saliva on his tongue. He’d felt the ends of his hair brush his nape. He’d been all physical sensation, as if his nerves were spiked, as if he were nothing but a bit of biological tissue, life itself, impulse and motion without reason or cause. “I’ll be in touch,” he’d muttered, then hung up.

  Jeffrey Kenyon is my son. The idea had circulated through his body with the oxygen in his blood. It had mirrored his heartbeat, throbbing inside his skull, filling his mouth with the words that defined this simple, profound truth.

  Just before he’d killed a man, he had created a new life. That morning in San Pablo, when he’d left Emmie’s bed forever, she’d been carrying his son. And he’d gone out and shot a man to death.

  There was a certain balance to it, he’d supposed. A certain gruesome symmetry.

  It had taken him an hour to calm down, to feel like himself again. He couldn’t face Emmie when he was so close to losing his mind. He had to be stable and focused for what was bound to be an even more difficult conversation than the one they’d had last night.

  Food might help. He had no idea why he’d chosen the fried chicken over burgers or a pizza. In retrospect, he wondered if perhaps there was a genetic reason. Somehow, subconsciously, he must have known Jeffrey would love drumsticks and mashed potatoes. There could be a psychic connection between father and son.

  Yet he had no idea how to relate to the boy. During dinner, as Jeffrey had prattled about all sorts of things Michael couldn’t begin to fathom, he’d wondered whether he should even say anything. What did he and Jeffrey have in common, besides DNA and a taste for fried chicken? Michael had no experience in fatherhood, other than his observations of his own father. But that had been different. His father had known him from birth. He’d been a constant presence in Michael’s life.

  What had Michael been in Jeffrey’s? Nothing.

  But he was the boy’s father. Emmie had listed him on the birth certificate. If she’d been willing to acknowledge his paternity, he would acknowledge it, too.

  They sat in her cheery yellow kitchen, facing each other across the table, just the two of them. Her face was ghostly pale, her eyes wide. And then, with such suddenness it was as if someone had twisted a faucet, she began to weep. She cupped her hands over her cheeks and eyes, bowed her head and shuddered. Sobs filled the room.

  He hadn’t expected her to be overjoyed when he confronted her with what he’d learned. She’d been so annoyed by his reappearance in her life he’d just assumed that this added link would annoy her, too. Annoyance he could handle.

  Not this heartbreaking grief, though.

  “Emmie.” He couldn’t bear to watch the tremors racking her shoulders, to hear the hushed, plaintive moans that escaped her. He was seated only a few feet away from her, but he might as well be back in California for all the distance that loomed between them.

  If it had taken enormous courage to return Jack Tyrell’s call that afternoon, it took twice as much courage to rise from his chair and circle the table to her. Gently, not wanting to alarm her, he supported her elbows with his hands and eased her to her feet. Then he wrapped his arms around her and drew her against him.

  She seemed to collapse into him, limp and boneless, as if her body had dissolved into tears. She wept until his shirt was damp. She swayed and sighed and her breath was wet against his neck.

  He wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting. Hostility, perhaps. She’d been plenty hostile to him so far; he wouldn’t have been surprised if she’d greeted h
is latest salvo with animosity or resistance. Or a stinging slap in the face. Or maybe denial. Since she’d gone out of her way to make sure he knew she wasn’t welcoming him back, she might have lied and insisted he wasn’t Jeffrey’s father.

  Or—less likely, but he’d hoped nevertheless—maybe she would smile and say, “Yes, he’s your child. Let’s figure out a way to make this work.”

  Or—least likely of all, but a man could dream—she would say, “I’m so glad you found us! Now we can be a real family!”

  Assuming he wanted to be part of this family. Once again he realized he knew less than nothing about how to get along with children. Was he supposed to coach Jeffrey in soccer? Take him fishing? Talk to him? What did a person talk to a four-year-old kid about? He had no idea.

  But if they were going to be a family, a four-year-old kid was the reason. If not for Jeffrey, this would just be about Emmie and Michael, two people who’d once meant something to each other a long time ago.

  They’d been good together in San Pablo, perfectly attuned to each other. He still remembered the first time they’d made love—with only their hands—and how astonishingly fulfilling it had been. And every other time after that. They’d been better than good.

  He hadn’t searched for her with sex in mind. But now that he had her body pressed to his, her head nestled beneath his, her lovely curves fitting against him, he wanted sex, too. He wanted to carry her to her bed and strip her naked and slide deep into her, feeling her hot and tight around him, feeling her come.

  Thinking about it made him hard. He shifted slightly so she wouldn’t notice his arousal, but she clung to him even more, shaking with sobs. She was probably too hysterical to realize what her nearness was doing to him, what effect her soft, womanly fragrance had on him, and the swells of her breasts pressing against his chest.

  He had loved her in San Pablo. It had been a crazy love, instantaneous, magical, totally illogical—but he’d believed that it could evolve into something real and lasting, something that would grow stronger each day until, at some undefined point, he and Emmie would no longer remember what life had been like without each other. With time, he’d been sure, that was the kind of love they could have had.

  But they’d been apart for so long. Like two strands that had once been coiled into an unbreakable cord, they’d since become uncoiled, separated back into single threads, and rebraiding the cord might be impossible. He hadn’t needed Maggie Tyrell’s admonishment to know that finding Emmie would offer no guarantees.

  Could he share Jeffrey with a woman who had made it quite clear that she loathed him? Could they be parents to that little boy together? He couldn’t ask her. She was crying too hard.

  “Emmie,” he whispered. Her hair was silk against his lips. He longed to kiss her so badly he could taste it.

  “I don’t want this,” she mumbled. He could barely make out the words. “I don’t. I don’t want you here, Michael.” Yet she held on to him, her hands clutching his sides, her face buried in the hollow of his neck.

  “I know.” He didn’t, really, but he thought the words might comfort her. If she stopped crying, they could talk about their situation. He needed to understand precisely what about this whole mess had her so upset—that he’d found out about Jeffrey., or that he was Jeffrey’s father, or that he’d killed Edouardo Cortez, or that he’d misrepresented himself to her in San Pablo... or that he was in her kitchen, embracing her and wanting her the way a starving man wanted bread. Or all of the above.

  He had to cool off. His nerves were bristling, his muscles tensing. He stroked his hands up and down her back in a consoling rhythm. He could feel the ridge of her spine through her blouse, and it made him want to slip the blouse off her shoulders, to lower his head to her breasts and kiss them. He had to will his hands not to cup her bottom and move her against him.

  She made a small, whimpering noise, deep in her throat, then shifted her head, slid her hands to his chest and nudged him back. When she leaned away, her cheeks were mottled, her eyelashes spiky from her tears. A true gentleman would have offered her his linen handkerchief, but Michael didn’t happen to have one. He reached around her for a paper napkin and handed it to her.

  She dabbed at her eyelids and cheeks. Her eyes continued to well up; every time she wiped a streak of moisture from her face, a tear fell and left a new one.

  “Mommy?” Jeffrey shouted from the doorway behind Michael. “Can I have cookies now?”

  Instinctively Michael shielded Emmie from her son. He didn’t think Jeffrey should see his mother falling apart like this.

  “Not yet,” she said in a weak, wavering voice.

  “What’sa matter? Mommy, are you okay?”

  Michael heard Jeffrey step into the room. Again acting on instinct, he gathered Emmie back into his arms and pulled her against him, hiding her face with his shoulder. “Your mom will tell you when it’s time for cookies,” he said brusquely.

  “How come she’s crying?” Jeffrey asked.

  “She had something in her eye,” Michael replied, assuring himself that it wasn’t a lie. She did have something in her eye: oceans of tears. “It hurt,” he added, knowing that that wasn’t a lie, either. Whatever had set Emmie off, she was hurting badly.

  “Is she gonna be all right? Mommy, are you gonna be all right?”

  Emmie leaned back and forced a smile before she peered past Michael’s shoulder to let his son see her. “I’ll be fine, Jeffrey,” she said hoarsely. “If you’d like, you can take three cookies and eat them while you watch TV.”

  “Really?” Jeffrey sounded ecstatic. Evidently the privilege of eating cookies in front of the television set was so thrilling that he forgot all about his mother’s emotional outburst.

  Michael released Emmie, giving her the chance to stand on her own. She watched as Jeffrey pulled three cookies out of a ceramic cookie jar shaped like a clown’s head. He put them on a plate and tore out of the room.

  Alone with her once more, Michael eyed her warily. She seemed more in control, her lower lip no longer trembling, her eyes still moist but not overflowing. She crossed to the sink and turned on the tap.

  He watched her splash water on her face, then dry herself with a paper towel. When she turned, she looked relatively composed. “I haven’t cried in five years,” she said.

  “Why not?”

  A lopsided smile tugged at her mouth. “Who had time? I was too busy earning a living and raising my son.”

  My son, he heard. Not our son. “Even with all that, you could have found time to cry if you needed to.”

  “Maybe I didn’t need to,” she said, though the sarcasm edging her tone indicated that she’d needed to plenty of times.

  “But you needed to now.”

  “Yes, I did. I don’t suppose it has anything to do with your being here, does it?” she asked, her smile turning ironic.

  He accepted the insult without letting it wound him. “I know you’re not happy with me,” he said, then smiled, too, realizing what an understatement that was. “But I am here, and we’ve got to work things out.”

  “There’s nothing to work out,” she retorted. “I’m Jeffrey’s mother. I’ve raised him. I’ve loved and guided and taught him, and we’ve gotten along fine in spite of everything. All you did was donate the sperm. That doesn’t make you a father, Michael.”

  He nodded, even though her honest words stung in a way her insults never could. “I haven’t been a father because I didn’t know I was a father,” he explained. “Didn’t it ever occur to you to inform me?”

  “You walked out on me,” she reminded him. “Obviously you weren’t interested in staying in touch. What should I have done? Hired a detective to find you?”

  “Didn’t you even want child support?”

  “I didn’t want anything from you,” she said with surprising vehemence.

  “And it doesn’t matter that I might have wanted to support my son?”

  “No,” she said bluntly. “I
t doesn’t.” She sighed, her smile gone, and crossed back to the table. Her wineglass was nearly empty, and she carried it to the refrigerator for a refill. “Do you want another beer?” she asked.

  Beer might make this conversation less painful. But he’d rather suffer the pain than drift through it feeling nothing.

  He shook his head and resumed his seat, waiting for her to return to the table with her refilled glass. She sipped, once again composed, her cheeks dry, her gaze reserved. He saw no sign of the emotions she’d vented just minutes ago, no sign of the vulnerable woman he’d been holding.

  “You need my help now,” he observed.

  “No, I don’t.”

  “You’re about to be forced out of this house because you can’t afford it.”

  A flicker of anger lit her eyes, and he counted it as a triumph. He’d rather have her furious than impassive and chilly. “We’ll figure something out,” she said tensely.

  “We—meaning you and Jeffrey? You aren’t going to raid his piggy bank, are you?”

  Another flicker, hotter than the first. He tried not to smile. “I’d be perfectly able to afford this house if I’d gone to my parents and begged for some money. Or if I’d started working sooner, or took a second job, or...I don’t know.” Her fire seemed to burn itself out, doused by remorse. “I couldn’t take a second job. I needed to spend whatever time I could with Jeffrey. A boy needs his mother. And a mother needs her son, too. I love him so much, I-” Her voice broke, and Michael braced himself for more tears. She didn’t cry, though. She took a deep breath, sipped some wine and managed another smile, so poignant it made him want to take her in his arms again and assure her that she didn’t have to act brave and tough to impress him. He was plenty impressed by what she’d accomplished on her own.

  “What would it take for you to be able to stay in this house?” he asked.

  “A down payment.” She relaxed in her chair, so slightly he wouldn’t have noticed if he hadn’t been watching her. Her shoulders seemed marginally less stiff, her jaw marginally less clenched with tension. “Before Jeffrey was born, I was able to find substitute teaching jobs, but they didn’t come with any health insurance. So his birth wiped out my savings. I did part-time subbing for another year and a half, until he was old enough to go to a preschool and I was able to land a job here in the Wilborough School District. I’ve managed to save a little money, but not much. Not enough to buy this house. My landlord wanted to sell it to me, and I can afford the monthly mortgage, but I don’t have enough for a down payment.”