by Brenda Novak
Ryan bit his lip, suddenly pensive. “Is that how it’s going to be with my dad?”
“SO WHAT DO YOU THINK?” Adam eyed Jenna over his second piece of pizza while Ryan was still finishing his first. Music played in the background of Fort Bragg’s Roundtable Pizza, mostly oldies mixed with a few modern rock songs, and the smell of baking bread and garlic permeated the air.
“I don’t know what to think. I feel kind of weird.” She was sitting across from him in an orange booth by a window that showed nothing but their own reflections because of the darkness outside. Ever since her father’s appearance just before lunch, Jenna had withdrawn inside herself. Adam thought it might help her sort through her feelings if she’d try to explain them, but he didn’t want to push her. Despite the false bravado she’d attempted at first, because of her tremendous pride, he remembered how badly her father had hurt her when her mother died.
“Was your father anything like you expected?”
She shook her head. “He seemed pathetic in a way. I think that’s the part I’m having the most trouble with.” She took a bite and chewed slowly as Ryan shoved his plate aside. “None of us live forever. I just hope I don’t have the regrets he has when I get to his age—if what I saw in his face was regret.”
“It was regret all right.”
“I’m stuffed,” Ryan announced.
Adam severed the string of cheese that stretched from the pan to his own plate as he took his third slice. “Already?”
“Maybe I’ll have more later.” The boy’s eyes darted to several video games that gleamed in the corner. He gave his mother a winning smile. “Can I have a quarter, Mom?”
Jenna got out her wallet and handed him a couple of quarters, and Adam tossed him a few more.
They both watched Ryan hurry gleefully away before resuming their conversation. “Do you think you’ll ever call him?” Adam asked.
With a shrug Jenna relinquished her pizza in favor of her Coke. “If it were just me, I wouldn’t. But I’m half tempted to see what Mr. Tottering’s like for Ryan’s sake. Ryan doesn’t have his father right now, and we were never close to Dennis’s parents. Dennis was born several years after their other kids and they were always a little…different. You remember them.”
“They kept to themselves. No one knew them very well.”
“Well, they still keep to themselves. So it might be nice for Ryan to have some extended family, supposing we could work through the awkwardness of the past. Not that I think my father deserves Ryan.”
“He doesn’t deserve you, either.” Adam studied her, wishing he could erase the strain he saw in her face. Between her father and Dennis, she’d been carrying a heavy emotional load for far too long. And now there was the baby, which had to weigh on her mind constantly. The protective urge he’d felt as a teenager reared up inside him again, the urge to take care of her. At least until she felt whole.
She gazed at him, her eyes deep and fathomless, then reached into her purse and passed him a letter.
“What’s this?”
“The latest from Dennis,” she said, nursing her drink. “He claims he’s going clean and sober.”
Adam unfolded the sheet of paper and quickly read Dennis’s letter. “Pretty typical for a man sitting in jail, drying out.”
“So you don’t think he means it this time?”
“Well, he might mean it, but…has he ever kept his promises before?”
She sighed. “Until he’s tempted by the next drink.”
“Then chances are you already know how long this will last.”
“Maybe going to jail changed him, woke him up to reality. He’s never been in trouble with the law before.”
Adam had his doubts that a few days in jail could reform the man he’d seen kicking the windows of the police car only a week earlier. And he didn’t like Dennis’s plea for a second chance. Adam got the impression Dennis had more in mind than just the opportunity to be a good father to Ryan. “You wouldn’t go back to him even if he cleaned up, would you?” he asked, keeping his eyes on his food so she wouldn’t see how much the answer meant to him.
“I don’t think so.”
Her voice, flat and somehow subdued, sent a shiver of alarm through Adam, and suddenly the pizza wasn’t sitting so well in his stomach. “You don’t seem very certain.”
She glanced toward the corner, where Ryan was still enthralled with the latest car-racing game. “What Ryan said after my father left really bothers me,” she admitted. “I don’t want to be selfish about this. I want to give my son what’s best for him. And this baby needs a father, too.”
“No child needs Dennis.”
A devilish smile curved her lips, and for the first time since Tottering’s visit, her eyes took on some of their usual sparkle. “You’re sounding rather vehement, as though you have a personal stake in all this.”
“I do, dammit! Do you think I’m playing around? God, Jenna, do you want me to swear a blood oath that I’ll never hurt you again? What would it take to convince you to trust me?”
“You could move back to Mendocino.”
The gentle suggestion hit with the impact of a hand grenade. Leaning back, Adam let the rest of his dinner go untouched. “So you want me to raise the white flag instead of you, is that it? Give up what I’ve worked so hard to achieve? Is this your way of taking revenge for my leaving in the first place?”
She grimaced. “That’s a pretty negative interpretation. I just thought maybe Mendocino could use a good attorney. It was a stupid idea really. Of course you wouldn’t want to leave your home.”
Gathering her purse, she slid out of the booth and went to collect Ryan as Adam stared after her. She didn’t understand how much he’d put into his career, how few men attained what he’d managed to achieve. He couldn’t walk away from what had taken fifteen years to build. She had no right to even ask.
But did he have any more right to expect her to move to San Francisco? To uproot Ryan again? And, if she did relocate, what was he willing to promise her? He wanted a relationship with Jenna, wanted to jump in and let the tide of their emotions dictate the future—but he was no less afraid of the undertow than she was.
He had dated some intelligent attractive women, yet he hadn’t been tempted to make a permanent commitment to any of them. Was there something wrong with him? Or was it simply the memory of the pain in Jenna’s eyes when he’d broken the one promise he had made that kept him from venturing down the same path again?
Cursing under his breath, Adam went to get a box for the leftover pizza. Damn Dennis and damn LeRoy Tottering. But most of all, damn himself for hurting any woman who ever got close to him.
JENNA FOCUSED on cutting several small pieces of antique blue glass for the bird window she was making and tried to ignore the emptiness that hung over the house. Ryan had gone to church with Mr. and Mrs. Durham, and Adam had headed home after breakfast. Though she’d rather not admit it, even privately, his going had left her with a lingering feeling of disappointment and regret. She kept telling herself that she and Adam were better off with the hundred miles from San Francisco to Mendocino between them. But then the memory of Adam on the beach or in the storage barn with his arms around her would intrude, and she’d remember how her body tingled every time he touched her.
Why wasn’t she one of those women who could have a casual affair? she wondered. Why not enjoy the physical elements of a relationship—the part Adam was so willing and capable of giving her—and turn off her emotional needs?
Jenna blew a wisp of hair out of her face and carefully separated the two pieces of glass she’d just scored. She knew the answer—for her, love went hand in hand with sex. She could no more separate them than she could take the salt out of seawater.
The phone rang, but she ignored it, knowing it would probably be Laura. She, Adam and Ryan had stopped by to visit her friend on their way home from the pizza parlor the night before, and Laura had winked and pinched Jenna until it was all Jenn
a could do to get Adam out of the house without his noticing. And Jenna didn’t want to hear Laura singing his praises now.
“We’re home, Mom! We’re back!”
Jenna turned to see Ryan burst through the door to her studio.
“How was church?” she asked.
Her son shrugged as if to say church was church, then paused in front of the drawing she’d made for the bird window. “Wow, this one’s really great! Are you going to finish it in time to take it to San Francisco?”
“That’s the plan. I want Mr. LeCourt to see a good variety of my work. What other pieces do you think I should take?”
Ryan circled the room, biting his lip in serious consideration as Mrs. Durham came through the door, puffing with exertion.
“You didn’t need to hike all the way back here. I would have come to the house,” Jenna said.
“No. I wanted to see what you’ve accomplished since my last visit. I’ve been bragging to all my friends at church that you’re going to be famous once that shop owner in San Francisco sees what you can do.”
Jenna laughed. “Thanks for the confidence, but Mr. LeCourt has only asked to see my work. He hasn’t agreed to sell it.”
“If he’s got a brain in his head, he’ll see what the rest of us see,” Mrs. Durham insisted. She joined Ryan in perusing the pieces Jenna had already finished. “It’s a good thing you’ve been working steadily. You have quite an inventory here.”
“I want to be prepared for the tourists once the rainy season’s over.”
“You won’t have to worry about tourists. These will all be gone by then.” Mrs. Durham put a hand on top of Ryan’s head. “You have quite a mother, young man.”
Ryan glanced at Jenna over his shoulder. “Do you think Adam likes her?”
Jenna coughed to hide her surprise and pretended to concentrate on making her next cut in the glass beneath her hands.
“Probably more than he wants to,” Mrs. Durham replied with a secretive smile. “Why?”
Ryan shrugged again. “Just wondering.”
ON WEDNESDAY, Dennis gladly stripped off the orange jumpsuit and donned his own clothes. He hadn’t noticed before how filthy they were, but he couldn’t miss the worn-in dirt and greasy splotches now. Before his arrest he’d been living out of his car and couldn’t remember the last time he’d done any laundry. Somehow he’d lost all perspective on the small everyday processes others took for granted as, more and more, the bottle became the center of his life.
I would have stopped drinking long before now if Jenna hadn’t left me. What had they taught him at all those AA meetings? That some people worked as a trigger? Well, Jenna was his trigger. But he couldn’t think about that. It made him angry, which made him want to punish her, which only chased her farther away. He could forgive her if she’d take him back. Somehow he had to break the vicious hold alcohol had over him, even when the thought of a drink made him dizzy with desire. Like right now…
Clamping a tight hold on the wayward craving, Dennis told himself he couldn’t touch the stuff. It was poison. It had destroyed his life. He’d promised Jenna he was going clean. What other choice did he have, really, unless he wanted to continue living the way he had for the past year?
Following a uniformed police officer from the small changing room, where he’d left the jumpsuit on the floor, he retrieved his wallet, checked for the sixty bucks he had there and shoved it in his pocket.
“Who’s going to take me back to Mendocino?” he asked.
“No one,” replied the deputy who was handling the paperwork involved in releasing him.
“But my car’s in Mendocino!”
“So?”
“That’s more than an hour and a half away. You can’t cart me clear the hell over here and just leave me high and dry.”
A wry smile twisted the man’s face, but he didn’t bother to look up. “Wanna bet? We do it all the time.”
Dennis clenched his fists in anger at the deputy’s indifference. Damn cops! They’d locked him up for ten days like he was some kind of common criminal, and for what? Because he’d tried to talk to his ex-wife? See his son? As if any of them wouldn’t have done the same! And now they were throwing him out on the street without so much as a bus ticket.
He needed a drink—just a small one to calm his nerves and help him think. He couldn’t expect to go dry without one last beer, one final hurrah. Jenna would never know. He’d rent a hotel room, shower and shave, wash his clothes—in the sink, if he had to—and appear decent and appealing when he went to Mendocino to pick up his car. If he was lucky, his letter had softened Jenna up enough so she’d let him see Ryan, which meant he’d get a few minutes with her, too.
And, if he was really lucky, he’d be able to convince her that this time he was changing for good.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
AT FOUR O’CLOCK Thursday morning Jenna gave up on sleep. She was too excited to stay in bed any longer. Shoving off the blankets, she pulled on a pair of sweats, laced up her tennis shoes and went to her studio, where she silently considered the few stained-glass windows she hadn’t already taped up with bubble wrap in preparation for her trip to San Francisco. Was she bringing the right ones? She’d chosen the lake surrounded by trees—the piece she’d just finished—a large, stone house on a promontory overlooking sea-battered rocks, a red-and-white-striped lighthouse against the backdrop of a raging storm and a Victorian garden. Would Mr. LeCourt like her work? Was he giving her a chance because she was Adam’s friend or because he’d truly liked the cove?
The nausea Jenna had struggled with over the past month or so made a weak threat, but she ignored it. For the most part her morning sickness had passed, and the tiredness of the second trimester had not yet set in. Physically she felt better than she had in a long time, especially as Dennis’s incarceration and subsequent remorse had left her feeling relatively safe. Perhaps her meeting with Mr. LeCourt would be the start of a new life for her. Perhaps she could now start moving more swiftly and surely toward a promising future.
The ringing of the telephone made Jenna jump. She scrambled to answer it because the same line rang in the house. Hoping to stop the noise before it woke everyone, she yanked the receiver to her ear for a breathy hello.
“Jenna?”
The tension in her body dissipated like the air from a popped balloon. Dennis had called her so many times at all hours of the night that she was afraid he’d already reverted to his old belligerent self. “Adam? What are you doing awake this time of morning?”
“I was afraid I’d miss you if I didn’t call early.”
She laughed. “It’s four o’clock! Don’t tell me you set your alarm just to wish me luck.”
“I didn’t have to set my alarm. I’ve been thinking about you for most of the night.”
The huskiness of his voice told her he was still in bed, and she pictured him as she’d seen him the night she’d entered his room when the police had come. Something stirred in the region of her belly, but she forced herself to think past it. “I hope it wasn’t a nightmare.”
“Hardly.” She could hear the laughter in his voice. “Are you going to come see me today?”
Jenna hesitated. She’d decided not to visit Adam, but refusing to stop by his office seemed ungrateful, considering that he’d gotten her the appointment in the first place. “You still want to have lunch?”
“If you’re interested.”
Unwilling maybe, but never uninterested. “I don’t know. It depends on how long everything takes. I don’t want to drive back to Mendocino after dark. My van hasn’t been running very well.”
“Maybe it’s time to get you a new car.”
“I can’t afford one yet. I have to save for the baby and—”
“Just come for a quick visit.” He sounded irritated, impatient.
“Adam, I don’t think our seeing each other is a very good idea.”
He swore under his breath. “That’s what you keep saying. And that’s
what I keep telling myself, but…”
“But what?”
“Nothing. Good luck with Harvey.”
Jenna sat and stared at the phone for several minutes after Adam hung up. If he wanted her to visit him so badly, why had he waited until now to call her? He’d left three days earlier and she hadn’t heard a word from him.
Drawing in a deep breath, she tried to put Adam out of her mind. She had a full exciting day ahead of her, and she wasn’t about to let old doubts and longings ruin it.
Frowning at a leaden sky that promised rain, she walked back to the house to shower. But before she stepped beneath the hot spray, she turned to study her naked reflection in the mirror.
She wasn’t showing yet. Other than a hard round knot the size of a fist just below her belly button, apparent only when she sucked in her stomach, there was no outward sign of her pregnancy. The dark half-moons below her eyes were nearly gone and her color was healthier than it had been a week ago. She planned to put up her hair and wear her brown suit and tortoiseshell jewelry. The outfit was understated yet professional, and its tailored lines made the most of her slender body.
Would Adam like it?
Jenna frowned at her thoughts. Somehow all roads returned to Adam Durham. But not today, she decided, growing more and more determined to get through her trip to San Francisco without succumbing to the urge to see him.
After her shower Jenna did her makeup, fixed her hair and changed into her suit. Then, with a quick mist of her favorite perfume, she went in to wake Ryan.
“Hey, sleepyhead. You ready to get up?”
Her son blinked against the light streaming in from her bedroom.
“What time is it?”
“Seven-thirty.”
“Where’s the sun?”
“It’s raining.”
“Oh.”
“I’ve got to go. Mr. and Mrs. Durham are a little later than usual this morning, but I think they’re starting to wake up. They’ll help you, but you need to get ready now so you’re not late for school.”
“Okay. Are you scared about your big meeting?”
