Standing, watching, not daring to breathe, I crossed my fingers, hoping that he would make it. Moments later, he slid into home base. All the parents on the bench let out a cheer, as my son run had earned his team, the Bears, the one point they needed to take the lead against their biggest rivals, the Tigers. “Way to go, boy!”
Fox waved at me with the biggest grin on his face I’d ever seen. “I did it, Dad!”
“You did!” I knew I had to be beaming.
With a nod, he headed back into the dugout where his teammates gave him high-fives and pats on the back. He’d earned them too.
Taking my seat again, I looked over at the man sitting next to me, my Uncle James. He and my Aunt Nancy, who sat on the other side of him, always joined me to watch Fox’s games.
My mother and Aunt Nancy were sisters. I owed everything to Aunt Nancy and Uncle James. They’d done the biggest favor anyone could do for another person, and they’d done it for me. They’d found the girl I’d accidentally knocked up in high school and had adopted the baby.
If it hadn’t been for a friend of mine, Bess Peterson, who’d lived next door to the Larkin family, I wouldn’t have ever known that I’d gotten Zandra Larkin pregnant. Bess had overheard the awful shouting that had taken place when Zandra’s parents had found out that she was having a baby.
Zandra and Bess weren’t friends. Zandra was mostly a loner, probably because of her parents’ strict religious beliefs. Those beliefs were probably what had put them into panic mode, whisking their only child away a few weeks after Zandra and I had hooked up at a party one night.
I’d always thought Zandra, who was a year younger than me, was pretty. Her long, dark hair, deep blue eyes, and pretty pink lips had caught my attention more often than they hadn’t. But she was shy, reclusive, and kept to herself.
That one night at that party, which I’d found out one of her few friends had dragged her to, had given me the chance to get to know her. And boy, did I get to know her!
She didn’t give me her phone number before she left me that night in my friend’s bed. I fell asleep, and she took off without waking me up. It was the end of summer, so there wasn’t any school the next week. And knowing how strict her parents were, I wasn’t about to just show up at her house unannounced.
Everyone knew how strict her mother and father were. I was afraid I might get her into trouble if I just showed up. I planned on catching up with her when school was back in session. But I never got that chance.
It was Bess who came to me when school started again. She’d seen Zandra and me together at that party, and she was pretty sure that I’d been the one to do the deed that had put Zandra’s family in such turmoil.
It seemed that Zandra’s mother kept track of her periods, and when Zandra failed to start on time, she took her to the doctor. Bess told me that she overheard Zandra’s parents screaming that she wasn’t going to get to keep the baby and blaming her for ruining all of their lives. They repeatedly asked Zandra for the name of the boy she’d been with, but Zandra refused to tell them a thing.
Some other boys in that position might’ve counted themselves lucky that they didn’t have to deal with any of it. Instead, I went home and told my parents what I’d done. I told them that I knew Zandra had been a virgin before me. She’d told me so, and the fact that she’d bled told me she hadn’t lied about it.
I’d gotten her pregnant the very first time she’d ever had sex. Along with that, I shared the responsibility of her being taken away from her hometown. It wasn’t fair, and I knew that. I also knew it wasn’t fair to give our baby to strangers.
Mom had called her sister right away, knowing she had the connections that would make tracking the baby a possibility. Aunt Nancy and Uncle James did the investigative work, and our son was given to them in a closed adoption. Neither Zandra nor her family even knew the names of the people who adopted the boy. And they would never know it was my family who took him.
“Handing custody over to you was the best thing we could’ve ever done for Fox,” Uncle James said as he bumped his shoulder to mine. “We’re damn proud of you, Kane. We’re very proud of you for finishing your doctorate last year and earning that position at the clinic. Twenty-seven is pretty young to be so well established and settled down.”
“Well, Fox was all the incentive I needed to grow up quick.” I had to sigh as I watched my son cutting up with his teammates. “From the moment you guys brought him to see me when he was just a week old, I knew I would live my life for him. I just wanted to make sure I could be the father he deserves.”
I clapped my uncle on the back. “Thanks for always letting me be there with him, you guys. I can’t thank you enough for giving a seventeen-year-old kid the chance to prove that he could be a stand-up father. Letting me take custody of him and actually make him mine last year was a dream come true for me.”
“And for Fox,” Aunt Nancy added. “That kid has always loved you, Kane. It was only fair that he be with his biological father.”
Nodding, I thought about the fact that my aunt and uncle had decided from the start to have Fox call them aunt and uncle. They’d told him I was his father right from the start. It made things easier when I finally had a home to bring him to, making the transition a smooth one.
Fox knew the whole story, now that he was old enough. We never planned on hiding the truth from him, so it was just a matter of waiting until he could understand. His mother was only sixteen when she got pregnant. Her parents made her give him up, and we jumped in to make sure we never lost him.
“He’s looking more and more like his mom every day,” I commented as I looked at my son. “His dark hair is the exact same shade as hers was. And those freckles across his nose come from her too.”
Uncle James asked, “Do you think you’ll ever try to find her, Kane?”
Shaking my head, I answered him truthfully. “No. I have no idea if she wanted to give him away or not. The fact is she went along with the adoption—and a closed one, at that. She may have wanted it that way too. I won’t find her and tell her about something she may not want to hear about.”
Aunt Nancy had always leaned more toward contacting Zandra one day. “He just turned ten last week. Fox is a bright boy with tons of curiosity. I know he doesn’t talk to you about his mother nearly as much as he talks to me about her, but he does ask about her a lot. I think you should start thinking some more about finding her, Kane. It might be what’s best for Fox.”
Pushing my hand through my hair, I felt that nagging feeling coming over again. The feeling always lingered when I thought about the reality that Zandra might not want anything to do with our son, or me, for that matter.
“But what if she didn’t want him? It might have started out as her parents’ idea, but what if Zandra wanted to get rid of him too, in the end? How would she react then if I tried to pull her into his life when all she wanted was to be rid of him?”
Uncle James smiled at me with that expression of pure wisdom on his face. “What if she didn’t want to give him up and was only doing what her parents made her do? What if she’s still as shy as she was when she was sixteen and doesn’t have a clue how to find her son? What if she’s hurt by what she was made to do and thinks about him every day?”
God, the man knew how to pull at a person’s heartstrings!
Even still, I wasn’t sure about anything, other than that she had given him up in a closed adoption. No authority, other than her parents, had made her do that. “She could’ve told the adoption agency that her parents were making her give the baby up and that she didn’t want to.”
Aunt Nancy shook her head. “I was there when she gave him up, Kane. She had no idea I wasn’t a nurse, Kane, and that girl was heartbroken when I took that baby away from her that day. She told him that she loved him more than anything. She told him that she was sorry for what she was doing, but that he would have a much better life without her or her parents in it.”
Aunt Nancy had told
me this a million times. And as many times as I’d heard the story, I had never understood why Zandra would’ve gone through with giving him up if she truly loved him. And I’d never understood why she’d never tried to contact me about the pregnancy.
It wasn’t as if I was some lothario who had slept with countless girls. I’d never intended to just sleep with her and then drop her. I’d thought about her a lot after the party. I’d thought about how I would approach the shy girl when school was back in session, about how I would bring her out of her shell again, just as I was able to that night.
The fact that she never seemed to even try to get in touch with anyone, not even the few friends she’d had at school, had me thinking that she wanted to forget all about that part of her life.
I stayed in Charleston. With my parents’ help, plus my aunt and uncle’s, I raised Fox. Everyone we knew was aware that I was that boy’s father and that Zandra Larkin was his mother. Everyone. Even Zandra’s friends knew about it.
So why hadn’t Zandra ever tried to contact any of her friends?
Each one of the girls I talked to back then told me that Zandra had their phone numbers, though Zandra’s number was no longer in service after the move. And even at Fox’s tenth birthday party, one of his mother’s old friends stopped by to wish him a happy birthday and give him a present. She told him that if his mother were around, she’d be very proud of him. And she also told him that his mother was a very private and shy person, but she was sure that she still loved him, as she was also a very nice and loving person.
I recalled the smile that spread across my son’s face that day as he and his mother’s friend talked. He nodded. “I’m sure she does love me. I love her, and I don’t ’member meeting her ever in my life. But Aunt Nancy said that she held me for a little while before she had to say goodbye. And that she told me that she loved me too. I know that someday I’ll see her again. And then I’ll be old enough to ’member her.”
Most people seemed sure that one day Zandra would try to find Fox. I was one of the few who didn’t think that day would come at all. And I prayed that our son wouldn’t be hurt if the day he was so hopeful about never occurred.
And I wondered how I would react to her if she did come looking for him. Would I be angry with her?
As understanding as I’d tried to be about her situation, I had also been mad back then. Mad that she hadn’t told me what was happening. Mad that she’d planned to give our child to strangers. Mad that her parents thought they could take my son’s future into their own hands.
Zandra may have been intimidated and controlled by her parents, but I never would’ve let them control me too. I would’ve taken care of Zandra, had she told me about the situation.
Looking at the ground, I knew my thoughts weren’t healthy. I’d been a seventeen-year-old kid at that time. Zandra had been a minor; her parents had still been in control of her life.
In reality, I couldn’t have taken care of her. My parents could have and would have. But only if Zandra’s parents allowed that to happen. And we all knew that they would never have allowed that.
The sound of cheers pulled me out of my internal reverie, and I looked up. My son’s team had won the game. The boys were jumping up and down with triumphant joy.
“Looks like we’re going to get to go to a pizza party, Kane,” Uncle James said. We all got up to join the kids on the field to congratulate each one of them and to tell the kids on the other team that they’d played a great game too.
“We did it, Dad!” Fox shouted as he ran to me.
“You sure did, son!” Putting my arm around his narrow shoulders, I pulled him close to my side. “Your home run was the game-winner, too.”
“Hey, Fox, catch,” the coach called out.
He tossed the ball to Fox, who caught it easily. The smile he’d been wearing grew even bigger. “I get to keep the game ball?”
“It’s yours, kid,” his coach told him. “At the pizza party, you can get everyone to sign it for you.”
“I’ll get you a little case to keep it in, Fox,” Uncle James told him as he pulled him away from me to give him a hug.
“Man, this is like the best day ever!” Fox shouted as he held the ball up. “We won! Woohoo!”
Man, I bet his mother would love to see him like this.
Chapter 3
Zandra
“Cute outfit,” the manager of Mynt said as he looked me up and down. “Nice legs. It’s good to see you don’t mind putting them on display.” Wearing a short black leather skirt with a white button-down top, I had tied my shirt in a knot in front to show off my belly button piercing. I was the epitome of hot nightclub waitresses everywhere.
“Yeah. I’ve been doing this waitress thing since I turned eighteen. I’ve pretty much got it down pat now.” I pulled the long braid I’d put my hair in over my shoulder, stroking it as I looked into Rob’s gray eyes. His pupils got big, telling me he liked what he saw.
By now, I was used to having my body raked over by men’s eyes, and it didn’t bother me to be the center of attention. As long as the scrutiny came with a paycheck, I could suck it up.
Rob trailed his long fingers along one of my shoulders. His dark hair was parted low on the left side. Some type of product made it shiny, helping him keep it slicked back. He wasn’t my type at all. He was the kind of guy most people would call a guido—maybe not to his face, though.
“And how many years have you been doing this now?” he asked.
“Eight years.” Placing my hand on my hip, I defied him to say something about my age. Though I was still young and as fit as any one of the younger waitresses, I knew a lot of managers liked to stick to the under-twenty-five crowd when it came to their waitresses.
“Twenty-six,” he mused as his eyes met mine. His lips pulled up to one side. “Your body might not give it away, but you can see it in your eyes, Zandy.”
“Well, it’s a good thing no one will be looking at my eyes, then, isn’t it?” Sashaying my ass, I walked away from him, earning a wolf-whistle. The sound made me smile. That whistle meant money, and money was all I cared about.
“Does that mean she’s got the job, Rob?” Taylor chimed in.
I turned around to look at him as he answered. “If she can start tonight, she does.”
“I can.” Hurrying back to them, I found myself grabbed up by Taylor, and the two of us jumped up and down in our sky-high heels. “Yes!”
Now I had a nice apartment with a bedroom all to myself and a job that Taylor promised would make me lots of money. More money than what I’d been making in Chicago.
On the drive back to the apartment, the two of us chatted away excitedly about being able to work together again. Taylor stopped at a light then screamed, “Yes! Together again! We’re gonna rock Charleston, Zandy!”
“We rocked Chicago,” I agreed. “I know we can rock this place too.”
Looking to my left, I thought I recognized a guy from high school. That had been so long ago, it seemed. He looked right at me, gave me a wink, and then Taylor took off so fast that I didn’t get the chance to even wink back or see if he recognized me.
I was pretty sure he hadn’t. I no longer looked like the bookish, shy girl I’d been back then. Nearly eleven years had passed since I’d been in town, since I’d been that person. I didn’t expect anyone to recognize me.
And I prayed that one man, in particular, wouldn’t. If he was even still in the around—which I highly doubted.
The blue streaks in my hair would offer me a bit of protection, should I happen to encounter someone from my old life here. This hair choice was something I never would’ve done when I was a teenager. And I wore a lot of makeup now, too. It was what waitresses did. I didn’t make the rules; I just followed them.
Revealing clothes, too much makeup, hair that stood out—I was dressing for the job I wanted. And I was pretty certain not one of the people I’d known back then would come to the club I’d be working at. Even if the
y did, no one would ever think the sexy woman who waited on them was the same mousy junior from high school who’d left town without saying a word to anyone.
“Did it piss you off when Rob said he could see your age in your eyes, Zandy?” Taylor asked me as she drove too fast down the street.
“No.” I pulled a pair of dark sunglasses out of my purse and put them on. “I can see it too. There aren’t many ladies in my age group who still do this sort of thing. Being twenty-six, many women my age have already hung up their heels. And have replaced their Mustangs with minivans, yuck!” We laughed uproariously at my little joke, which wasn’t too much of a joke at all.
Taylor zoomed around a corner, making us both lean to one side, laughing like hell all the way. “So why haven’t you settled down, Zandy? I mean, you haven’t even dated any guy seriously. What’s up with you?”
Where to start?
Pain. Anguish. Guilt. Along with a healthy side of resentment and regret.
I’d never told anyone about my unexpected pregnancy, or any of the life-altering events that followed. Maybe it was time I did. Maybe talking about it would help me begin to heal from it. If anyone could truly heal from a thing like that.
Even though I wasn’t sure how Taylor would take it, I decided to spill my guts to her. “Dating would mean giving someone a chance to get close to me and taking a chance of falling in love. And when two people fall in love, they eventually decide to procreate. And I’ve done that already. It ended badly. And I don’t want to do it again.”
“You had a miscarriage?” she asked as she took another hard left.
The Nissan Altima felt like it had tilted onto only two wheels, making me scream with a mix of terror and excitement. “No! Shit, girl. You’re a crazy driver!”
“So I’ve been told.” She laughed menacingly, making me smile. I loved living dangerously. Why not live that way? What did I have to live for anyway? “So, no miscarriage. Did you lose the baby after it was born?” I could hear the sympathy in her voice, mixed with caution. Taylor knew me well enough to know that revealing so much about myself wasn’t easy for me.
Dirty Little Secret_A Secret Baby-Second Chance Romance Page 2
