Willow Brook Road

by Sherryl Woods

  Sure enough, several cars pulled into spaces along the street and men he’d met just yesterday, plus Mack and Kevin and even Mick, piled out of them. For the next twenty minutes or so, all he did was direct traffic to various rooms.

  “I don’t know what to say,” he told them when the furniture and boxes of pots and pans and dishes had been unloaded. “This is way above and beyond.”

  “All things that should be put to good use,” Mick said. “Now all you need is a woman’s touch and you’ll have yourself a very nice home.”

  “Which is exactly why I’m going to stick around and put things in their proper places,” Susie said brightly. “Plus I have a few more little things in the truck that will brighten things up.”

  “Susie, you’ve already done more than enough,” Sam said. “Rounding all of this up and getting the paperwork in order so quickly—you’ve been a real godsend.”

  “Absolutely,” Mick said. “You just leave the rest of this to Carrie. She has a good eye for details.”

  Sam couldn’t read the expression that washed over Susie’s face, but Mack was at her side in an instant. “Sam’s right, sweetheart. What you’ve done here is amazing, but let him figure out the rest. I’m sure Bobby will want to have a say, too.”

  “You can bet on that,” Sam said.

  “I picked up a few toys for him,” Susie said stiffly. “Can I at least leave those?”

  “Of course,” Mack said quickly. “Are they in the cab of the truck? I’ll get them.”

  As the other men waved goodbye and headed out, Susie stood beside Sam, her shoulders hunched, her face downcast. Sam could tell she was upset, but figuring out exactly why was beyond him.

  “I really do appreciate everything you’ve done,” he told her again. “This situation could have been so much harder and you’ve made it painless.”

  “I just wanted to help any way I could,” she said, lifting her chin until their gazes caught.

  Something in her tone left Sam puzzled. “I know that.” Had someone suggested otherwise? Before he could ask, Mack was back with bags of toys for Bobby. Sam could only stare.

  “Wow! Did you buy out the store?”

  She gave him a sheepish grin. “I might have gotten a little carried away. Once I got started, I was having so much fun, I couldn’t seem to stop. Please don’t ask me to take them back.”

  Sam had been about to do just that, but at a subtle shake of Mack’s head, he said only, “I was going to suggest that I put them into a closet and that you come back later and give them to Bobby yourself. You deserve the reward of seeing his face light up when he sees everything.”

  At that Susie’s expression finally brightened. “You wouldn’t mind?”

  “Not at all. I’m planning to get back from work in time to be here when Bobby gets home from school. Do you want to stop by around four? Mack, you, too?”

  “Sure,” Mack said awfully quickly. “We wouldn’t miss it, would we, Suze?”

  “We’ll see you at four,” Susie promised.

  “Well, I’ll see you at the office a lot sooner than that,” Mack said.

  “On my way,” Sam promised and watched the two of them leave.

  He still had the sense that despite the generosity behind everything that had happened here this morning, there was an undertone of something he was missing. And whatever it was, it seemed to have left a lot of people on edge.

  16

  Carrie was taking Jackson for a walk in his stroller Monday afternoon when she spotted Mack and Susie pulling into Sam’s driveway. She was about to make a U-turn and go back home, when Bobby spotted her and came running across the lawn, shouting her name. Susie’s head snapped around, Mack winced and Carrie wished the ground would open up and swallow her.

  “Stop it!” she muttered under her breath. After all, this was her neighborhood. She had a perfect right to take a walk on this street. Plastering a smile on her face, she called out a greeting to Bobby.

  “There’s a surprise for me at the house,” Bobby told her excitedly when he reached her. “Sam won’t tell, but I’m gonna find out in a minute. You wanna see? Maybe Jackson would like it, too.”

  She glanced in Sam’s direction for guidance and he nodded. “Absolutely,” she told Bobby. “Let’s see what this amazing surprise might be.”

  On her way to the house, she managed a civilized greeting for her cousin and Mack, but she could tell by the look in Susie’s eyes that she was unhappy with the addition to the celebration, whatever it was. On any other day, maybe Carrie would have been more sensitive and made herself scarce, but after overhearing Susie’s accusations yesterday, she wasn’t about to do that. O’Briens didn’t hide. Of course, what they eventually did was speak their minds, and she wasn’t quite ready to do that, either, especially not in front of an audience.

  At the front door, Carrie paused in amazement. “You have furniture!” The living room had been transformed from an empty shell practically overnight into a charming, cozy room with the addition of a sofa, chair and tables she’d last seen in Susie’s apartment before she and Mack had built their home on Beach Lane.

  “Yes, but that’s not the surprise,” Bobby told her. “Sam says it’s something else, something just for me.”

  Carrie glanced at her cousin. “I heard you were gathering up things for Sam’s house. You did a great job. This looks wonderful.”

  “Thanks,” Susie said tightly.

  “She also picked up a few things she thought Bobby might like,” Sam said. He pointed toward a closet. “Check in there, pal.”

  Bobby raced across the living room and threw open the door. His eyes widened even as he gave a whoop of delight. “For me? All of it?”

  “That’s what I hear,” Sam said. “This is all Susie’s doing, so be sure you thank her.”

  As Bobby started bringing out bags and investigating the contents, there were more whoops and gasps. Even Carrie was a little in awe of the magnitude of Susie’s generosity.

  Bobby paused midway through checking out his unexpected haul and threw his arms around Susie. “Thank you, thank you!”

  “You really did go above and beyond, yet again,” Sam said, clearly taken aback.

  Susie’s face flushed. “I just wanted him to feel at home here. I was pretty sure you’d left a lot of things behind in storage and I thought new might be nice, anyway. Sort of a fresh start.”

  “That was really thoughtful,” Mack told her, giving her hand a squeeze.

  “It was,” Carrie agreed, though she suspected she and Mack both understood there was a lot more behind the magnanimous gesture. Susie, with all the best intentions in the world, was trying to buy Bobby’s affections and fill the void in her heart.

  Carrie could understand all that. She could sympathize, knowing how Susie had been counting on the adoption that had fallen through at the very last minute. What she was having a hard time with was Susie trying to cast her as the bad guy because she was forming a bond with Bobby and Sam, too.

  “How about something to drink?” Sam suggested, getting to his feet. “I have sodas, beer, water.”

  “I should probably go,” Carrie said. “I need to get Jackson over to Noah’s.”

  She saw the undisguised relief in Susie’s eyes as she spoke. Sam didn’t argue, but he did walk her to the door. Outside he studied her, his expression puzzled.

  “What happened just now?”

  She looked into his eyes. “No idea what you mean.”

  “The tension in there was so thick I could have cut it with a knife. Are you and Susie fighting about something?”

  “No,” she said. And that much was true. They hadn’t exchanged a single harsh word with each other. But those blasted battle lines had been drawn just the same. She wondered if things between her and her cousin would ever be the same. The irony was that they both knew Susie was madly in love with her husband, so it wasn’t as if they were fighting over the same man. No, the battle was for the heart of a little boy, who n
eeded all the love he could get from both of them and anyone else in this new world to which he was adapting.

  * * *

  After delivering Jackson to Noah, Carrie couldn’t bring herself to go back to her empty house. If she discovered that Susie and Mack were still hanging out at Sam’s, her sour mood would sink even lower. Instead, she headed to O’Brien’s, though she wondered if that was a good choice. This was hardly a problem she could dump in Luke’s lap. Susie was his sister.

  Fortunately the pub was already busy and there were no seats at the bar, so she found a table in a corner near the front window and settled in with a glass of wine. With the view of the bay across the street, it was surprisingly soothing. There was time to listen to her own thoughts...about the day care, about her cousin and, of course, about Sam. Individually she could have coped with any one thing, but combined? Was she destined to make a bad decision about any one of them, just because she was too busy to think things through? All were too important for missteps.

  She’d been there less than half an hour with no resolution to any of her dilemmas and was debating ordering dinner, when she looked up and found Sam by her table.

  “Interested in company?” he asked.

  “Sure,” she said, then glanced around. “Where’s Bobby?”

  “Susie and Mack are at the house with him. He didn’t want to leave his haul of toys, so they offered to hang out.”

  “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” she asked, then winced. “Sorry. Not my business.”

  Sam reached across the table and took her hand. “Carrie, what’s going on? That’s the second time I’ve picked up on some sort of tension between you and Susie. You carefully avoided giving me a straight answer earlier. How about now?”

  She debated brushing off his observation for a second time, but couldn’t quite bring herself to do it. This was a man she might want to have a future of some kind with. Lying or even hedging was no way to move forward.

  “Okay, maybe there is an issue,” she conceded, then added earnestly, “but it’s not my doing.” She hesitated, still not convinced she wanted to air this particular bit of family laundry.

  Sam didn’t press. He ordered an ale, then watched her and waited. When Carrie realized he apparently had an endless supply of patience to go along with his keen powers of observation, she continued.

  “Did you know that Mack and Susie were in the process of adopting?”

  He nodded. “Mack mentioned how excited they were.”

  “Well, the baby, a girl, was born a few weeks ago, but the mom backed out of the adoption.”

  Sam looked shocked. “Can she do that?”

  “Apparently.”

  “That must have been heartbreaking,” he said. “But what does it have to do with you?”

  “It shouldn’t have a thing in the world to do with me,” she said. “But you brought Bobby to town around the same time. Susie’s apparently focusing all that love she was so desperate to give a new baby on Bobby now.”

  Sam looked momentarily stunned, then nodded slowly as understanding dawned. “A lot of things suddenly make sense to me. The very first day Mack brought her by to see Bobby, he was clearly worried. He thought she was going to get a little carried away, didn’t he?”

  “More than likely.”

  “And those toys she picked out. That’s part of her attempt to be a part of Bobby’s life,” he concluded.

  “I’d say so.”

  “Is it more than that? Is she waiting for me to screw up, so she can take legal action or something?”

  Carrie was stunned by that possibility. “Of course not,” she said, then hesitated. “Honestly, I don’t know what she’s likely to do. She’s not thinking clearly right now. I’m trying to make allowances for that myself.”

  “Because you’re somehow caught up in whatever’s going on with her,” he concluded. “But how? I still don’t see the connection.”

  She smiled. Typical male, oblivious to any nuances when it came to women. “Don’t you see? She thinks I’m in her way, because you and I have gotten to be friends. You’ve turned to me a couple of times when you needed help with Bobby.”

  “But that’s crazy,” Sam said at once. “She’s married to my boss, happily as near as I can tell.”

  “Sam, it’s not about you. It’s about my relationship with Bobby or the access that my friendship with you has given me to him.”

  “Oh, boy,” Sam murmured.

  “See what I mean about how complicated things have suddenly become?” She noticed the worry building in his eyes and knew she had to offset any panic she might inadvertently have caused. “Susie’s really a good person. She’s just going through a truly terrible time. You don’t have to worry about Bobby or anything like that. He’s in perfectly good hands, especially with Mack there. And it can’t hurt, having so many people caring about him, right?”

  “I suppose not,” he agreed, though he still looked concerned.

  “You’re thinking you should rush right home, aren’t you?”

  “Should I? Is the fact that I left to see you going to go on some list she’s keeping of my questionable parenting?”

  “You have to trust your instincts, but mine are telling me that all Susie wants is to spend time with Bobby and to have a relationship with him. You’ll have to watch that the attachment doesn’t get too intense or that she doesn’t go overboard with the presents again, but beyond that, the Susie I’ve known my whole life would never do anything to hurt anyone. And I can’t imagine her trying to take him from you, any more than I would have.”

  Sam gave her a wry look. “That remark I made at Shanna and Kevin’s house is going to come back to haunt me, isn’t it?”

  “It could come up from time to time,” she said, “when you need to be reminded about leaping to conclusions. Of course, I was guilty of the same thing where you were concerned. We’re okay now that we know each other better.”

  “You think this thing with Susie will eventually work itself out?”

  Carrie thought about that. She honestly couldn’t say. If Susie focused all her attention on Bobby and continued to refuse to consider another adoption, how healthy would that be? That was a question for someone a whole lot wiser than she was.

  “Eventually,” she said, though with more hope than conviction.

  “Maybe I’ll just touch base with Mack, see how things are going at the house,” Sam said. “It’s the first time I’ve left Bobby with anyone other than you. I’ll tell him that, so he doesn’t jump to the conclusion that I don’t trust him or Susie. Or figure out that you’ve filled me in.”

  “Good idea.”

  Sam made the call, looking more and more relieved as he listened to Mack’s responses. “If you’re sure things are under control. I might stick around the pub and have dinner with Carrie. Do you mind?” He listened intently, then smiled. “Sure, order a pizza. That’s Bobby’s favorite, so that would be great. Thanks.”

  He disconnected the call, put the phone back in his pocket, then focused on her. “Looks as if we can finally have that date. Maybe I should be thanking Susie, instead of worrying about her.”

  “I let you join me,” Carrie reminded him. “Nothing was said about dinner or a date.”

  A sparkle lit Sam’s eyes. “Carrie, would you like to have dinner with me? Then I can walk you home after, maybe even steal a kiss at your front door. That seems like a reasonable first date.”

  “Mighty big plans,” she commented.

  “A first step,” he corrected. “The big plans are for much later.”

  “And what if I don’t kiss on the first date?”

  “I’ll see if I can change your mind. I can be pretty persuasive when I put my mind to it.”

  “An interesting challenge. So, what’s the timetable for these big plans of yours?”

  “I was thinking down the road a day or two at least,” he said, chuckling. “But I’m a guy. I’m happy to speed the process along.”

 
Carrie laughed, but she had a little trouble catching her breath. She liked where this seemed to be heading. The old wisdom seemed to be true; the right man sometimes did come along just when a person stopped looking.

  Sam’s expression sobered. “So, what’s the decision? Will you join me for dinner and whatever comes after?”

  “Let’s start with dinner and see how it goes.”

  He reached for her hand and held it. “I think it’s going to go very well.”

  Carrie couldn’t seem to stop herself from nodding in agreement. For an evening that had started out fraught with tension, it was definitely turning around into something very intriguing.

  * * *

  Sam listened to Carrie going on and on about her plans for the day-care center. Her enthusiasm was contagious. He could envision exactly what it was going to look like when renovations were completed and what the children in her care would be doing every minute of the day.

  She stopped for breath. “I’m boring you to tears, aren’t I?”

  “Absolutely not. It’s wonderful to see you so caught up in your plans. You’ve obviously found your passion. From what you told me when we met, it’s something you were struggling with.”

  “I truly think I have,” she said. She glanced at the untouched food on her plate. “Of course, because I’ve been talking so much, my food’s gone cold. How about you? Tell me about your passion, while I eat. Was web design it for you from the very beginning, the thing you knew you were meant to do?”

  “Not entirely,” Sam admitted. “It was a career I knew I could take anywhere I wanted to live. Whether I have one client like the newspaper or fifty clients all over the world, I can do the work wherever I go.”

  “So it’s more a convenience than a passion?”

  “That probably makes it sound a little more calculating than I meant to. I love the work. I always enjoyed art and design and the tech stuff came easily to me. The web side of design just seemed to be a natural fit for my passion and for my desire to be footloose and travel. And these days there’s a huge demand for what I do. Newspapers are in transition. Eventually they’ll be mostly online. Everybody wants an online presence for their business.”