Instead, she was walking in with only two certainties. Despite all reason, some part of her still loved her father.
And the fact that she did left her so angry that she didn’t know what to do next.
She knew what he had done. Knew, thanks to her sisters, his reasons for doing it all. She’d heard him utter his apologies more times than she could count, and she had seen his persistence in trying to win them all back.
She knocked on the door, hard. She didn’t need any more excuses or explanations or apologies. But there was a hole inside her that she was pretty sure had something to do with Rob, and she’d be damned if she wasn’t going to try to figure out what had caused it.
Fuck it to hell. She might have to start believing some Freud after all.
Rob called to her to come in, so she opened the door and did so, slowly, hesitantly. She certainly hadn’t expected to find her father pouring eggs into a sizzling skillet.
“Hello.” He glanced her way so casually that anyone would think she popped in every day. “You have dinner yet? I’m making eggs and toast. Nothing fancy, but if you want some, I can—”
“Cheesy eggs?”
She didn’t know what made her say it. Lots of people put cheese in scrambled eggs. She knew that.
But from the way Rob paused as he grabbed a fistful of shredded cheddar, the hint of a smile he allowed to cross his face, she knew that this was significant.
“Yeah,” he said softly. “Cheesy eggs. With peepers.”
Peepers?
Like that, she was back in New Jersey, in the kitchen of the old house, just her and Daddy. He was chopping something to throw into the eggs. Peepers, he said, waving a slice of red pepper in her direction. They were going to make peep peep peep noises when they hit the pan. Just like the chickens that gave them the eggs. Then he handed her the slices of pepper and picked her up in one arm and sang, Jeepers creepers, where’d you get those peepers?, bouncing her up and down until she giggled and told him to stop because he was being silly.
“Tell me about being my father,” she whispered.
Rob frowned at the eggs bubbling in the pan. “Anything in particular?”
“No. Yes. I mean . . . everything.”
He rubbed the stubble on his jaw, slow, his fingers spread wide as if to sift through the memories.
“I almost missed seeing you being born,” he said. “Bet your mother never told you that one.”
“I can’t say that I ever asked.”
“I planned to be there for everything. We took all the classes, Neenee and me. Made your grandmother howl to think people had to take a class to learn how to have a baby. Guess that after having six kids she forgot what it was like the first time. Anyway, we were ready. Your mother had her bag packed and we practiced the breathing every night, and we thought we had this. I wasn’t mayor yet; I was still at the credit union, so we figured it would be easy enough to find me and get me to the hospital when the time came. We didn’t count on you having a mind of your own.” He inserted a knife under the eggs, letting the last bits of liquid run under to the hot pan. “You were almost three weeks early. Not a problem except your mother and I had thought it would be safe for me to go to a conference in Charlotte. One night. I was gonna fly both ways, I’d be gone less than twenty-four hours, and the doctor swore up and down that you were still cooking.” He shook his head. “So of course, at two that morning, I get a call from your mother. Her water broke.”
“I knew I was early. I never heard . . . this part.”
“Anyway, everything after that was a comedy of errors. The hotel had an airport shuttle but it didn’t run at that time of night. They had to call a cab, but the cabbie went to the wrong Hilton and there I was, waiting . . . and then the airport wasn’t even open when I got there. It was crazy. Remember, too, this was when cell phones were just getting popular, so I didn’t have an easy way to check in on her. Finally the poor airline gal showed up at the ticket counter and I practically threw myself across the desk, begging her to get me on her plane, any plane, whatever would get me home first.”
He laughed softly. “It took some shuffling, and they had to ask for someone to give up a seat for me, but I got on the first plane out. It was the longest flight of my life. Worse even than the one when they hauled me back from Costa Rica.”
Bree blinked. She had never thought about what that must have been like for him.
He tipped the eggs onto a waiting plate. “Anyway, long story short, I got there in the nick of time. Your mother was hitting the hard part. Transition. I walked in just in time for her to throw up all over me.”
If the smile on his face was any indication, he had never been so happy to be puked on in his life.
“Things moved fast after that. An hour, hour and a half after I walked into her room, you made your appearance. I remember your hand was tucked up beside your face, all curled up in a fist. It made things complicated for the doctor and I know your mother wasn’t too happy about it, but all I could think was that you were like a little Superman with one arm up and one arm down.” He chuckled as he carried his plate to the table. “That’s why you’re Sabrina, you know. You were supposed to be Elizabeth. But you had that hand up there, and for the first few days, every time you fell asleep you went back into that position, and we knew we had to give you a name that started with an S. You were our little Super Sabrina.”
Well, that explained why so many of her baby pictures showed her in Superman garb.
Rob sat across from her, the plate of eggs in the middle of the table, and pushed a fork in her direction. “From the moment I saw you, you were my little girl. My little Supergirl. You were the smartest, the prettiest, the funniest . . . I had no idea that any kid could be as much of a miracle as you were to us. Even after the others came along, and God knows we loved them all just like you, but you know, there was something . . . I guess it’s because you were the one who made me a father. With the others, no matter how much they were their own people, the big change was already behind us. You were always the one pushing us. Always the one making us change.” He speared a hunk of egg. “Usually, you were way ahead of us and we were the ones trying to play catch up. Just like from the time you were born.”
Bree wasn’t crying. She wasn’t. But something was seeping from her eyes. Not tears. More like . . . like she was leaking. Like a dam that had stood too long had finally been breached.
“There was no rest with you around, Sabrina Joy. You had us dancing from that first breath. You wanted to learn everything about the world and you wanted to know it right away, and we could never keep up with the questions. Your mother used to fall into bed at night and give me this list of things you asked her about. Usually I would fall asleep before she got to the end, because damn. You were curious.”
Bree poked her fork into the edge of a bit of egg and pushed it away to reveal the smidge of pepper within.
“I could tell you stories about the things you said and did from now until Christmas,” Rob said. “But here’s what it boils down to. I’ve done a lot with my life, most good, some bad. There’s a lot more I still hope to do. But nothing will ever mean as much as being a father. I know that’s probably impossible to believe, since I basically threw it all away but . . . well, you know what they say about not really knowing what you’ve got until it’s gone.” His voice dropped. “I knew I was blessed to be your father. I was never stupid enough to not understand that. But I didn’t know how much it meant to me, how . . . how essential it was, until it wasn’t part of me anymore.”
She wasn’t sure how much more she could process. She felt like someone had reached inside her and stirred, so nothing fit right anymore and nothing worked right anymore.
You are the author of your story, Bree.
“Did you really screw over Gordon James?”
For the first time since she’d walked in, Rob
seemed surprised. Not as much as she was, though.
“Who told you that?”
Oh crap. In her desperate grab for something, anything else, she had forgotten that Spence’s parents had kept everything quiet. There was no way in hell she wanted Rob to guess about her and Spence.
“I, um, heard a rumor.”
“There’s at least thirty different rumors about me swirling around this town. For the record, the only one that’s true is that I met OJ when we were both inside. But I haven’t heard anything about me and Gordie, and I’m surprised that of everything else you could have asked, that’s the one that came to mind.”
She scrabbled for something that would sound plausible. “I told you I’m writing a book. I’ve been doing interviews. People tell me things they wouldn’t say otherwise. Anonymously.”
The look on his face reminded her of the time she had shaved the cat as a kid and tried to blame it on Jenna.
“Plus, you know . . .” She breathed in deep. “He was your friend.”
“And you would like to think that I wouldn’t hurt my friend.”
God help her, but he was right again.
“Here’s the honest truth, Bree. I don’t know. I did give Gordie money. Right before the twins were born. He wanted to expand, I knew his business was solid, I thought it was a good investment. He started repaying me around the time everything was going downhill. It could have looked suspicious. We obviously lost touch while I was in Costa Rica, and then when I was in jail—well—he didn’t initiate any other communication. When I found out he moved so suddenly . . . I wondered.”
Wondering. There was a lot of that going around.
A wave of fatigue broke over her. She wasn’t going to be able to make sense of anything else, not tonight, and if she didn’t leave now, she wouldn’t dare drive herself home.
“I need to go.” She stood fast, sending the chair scraping over the linoleum floor. “I’m sorry to keep barging in on you.”
“Anytime.”
She nodded, throat tight, and walked stiffly to the door. She still didn’t like any of this, still had no idea what she was supposed to do next. But—maybe unreasonably—she didn’t feel quite as lost as when she’d arrived.
She had her hand on the door when he spoke again.
“Bree.”
She waited, not turning.
“When I was living in Costa Rica, for a while there, I lived in a place on a creek. There were trees that hung down on either side of the bank. Some of them were tall and grew up over the balcony of the place I was staying. There were monkeys that lived in those trees, a whole troop of them. Once a day, usually in the late afternoon, they would make their way up the creek, moving past my place. I’d be inside, trying to read or whatever, and I would hear this chattering and squealing. I’d go out, and there they were, swinging above me and around me, throwing things onto my balcony, making the branches sway and bringing everything to life. All of a sudden they filled the place. And then, just like that, they were gone.”
She turned toward him at last, forcing herself to see the longing in his face. “That’s what it was like to be your father, Bree. Like things were beautiful and peaceful, but then, all of a sudden, there was this . . . explosion of life that completely took over.” He sat back in the chair. “And then, just like that, it was gone.”
Chapter Thirteen
Spence woke the next morning with a crick in his neck and a plan in his head.
The reason for the crick became clear as soon as he figured out that, oh yeah, he was sleeping on the sofa, because . . . right . . . Livvy and Emma had used his bed. Because they’d slept over. Because she had finally kicked Carl to the curb.
Go, Livvy.
As for the plan . . . it wasn’t solid yet, but there was just enough of it floating through his brain to give him hope. If he just sat Bree down and explained things to her, told her that he would support taking over the fire hall even without the Rob factor . . .
A pair of small feet clad in giant R2-D2 slippers shuffled into his view. “Uncle Spence?”
“Yeah, Max?”
“Are my mom and dad gonna . . .” Max’s voice trailed off into an abyss that Spence wished he could fill with promises.
He knew he couldn’t. But what precisely he was supposed to say was beyond him.
“What did she say to you yesterday?” Spence knew, of course. He’d been in the room when she broke the news to the kids, had held Emma to his side and passed her tissues and rubbed Max’s back through the whole horrible scene. But he needed to know what Max remembered. Needed to have the boy say it out loud.
“She said her and Dad weren’t going to be together anymore.” Max wriggled his still-small butt onto the sofa. Spence scooched to give him more room. “She said Dad wouldn’t be living with us anymore.”
“That’s about how I remember it, too.”
“But I don’t want Daddy to live someplace else.”
It wasn’t the anguish behind the words that made Spence feel as if someone was shoving barbed picks into his heart. It was the Daddy.
The kids were so grown up, both of them. So desperate to be cool and mature. It had been a long time since he’d heard either of the kids call Carl that.
“We don’t always get what we want, buddy. I wish I could tell you different, but that’s the sucked-out way it is.”
“But who’s gonna be my Scout leader? And who’s gonna go to my soccer games? And I don’t want . . . I don’t wanna be the only guy in the house, you know? Mom and Emma, they’re great, but I . . .”
Max gulped hard. Spence rubbed his back softly.
“I’m pretty sure your dad will still want to be your Scout leader and go to your games and be at your school concerts and all that. Now maybe more than ever. He’s not going to stop being your dad, bud. That’s never going to change.” Unless Carl was boneheaded enough to pull a stunt like Bree’s father had done, but that, Spence knew, wasn’t going to happen. Much as he might wish otherwise.
“He won’t be living in the house but you’ll still see him and spend time with him. Maybe not right away, while your folks are still getting things sorted out, but soon. And then a lot. Your mom won’t want to keep you away from him. She knows how much you need him.”
“Then why is she making him leave?”
What was he supposed to say to that? How was he supposed to tell a kid who still thought kissing was gross that when it came to women, the father he adored was incapable of thinking with his upper head?
“Here’s the thing, Max. I know it feels like your mom is kind of the bad guy here, that she’s making your dad leave, but she’s not. He has been doing . . . things . . . for a long time now that hurt her.”
“You mean his girlfriends?”
“Yeah. Do you remember what your mom said, about this happening before?”
Max’s nod was small and reluctant.
“She gave your dad a lot of chances, buddy. She held on for a long time, hoping like hell that your dad would come to his senses. She put up with a lot of hurt, hoping things would get better. She didn’t want to do this.”
“So it’s his fault.”
“Yeah, buddy. It is. And I’m pretty sure he would tell you the same.” The tearful way Carl had pleaded for Livvy to change her mind was a good clue to that.
“So he knew he was doing something wrong, but he did it anyway?”
“Yeah.”
“But why? I mean, he’s married to Mom. He’s supposed to love her. Why did he have to go and mess it all up?”
Spence sighed and wished there had been a chance to grab coffee before diving into this. “I can’t answer that one, bud. But I can tell you that things are never as simple as they look from the outside. It’s easy for you and me to say, well, he shouldn’t have done that, and it’s true, he shouldn’t have. He made p
romises to your mom, serious ones, and he broke them. Over and over. But even though people know something is wrong, sometimes they still mess up.”
“Like when we were having our science test and we had a sub and she didn’t know that some of the answers were still up on the board but I saw them so I copied them?”
Oh, to be back in the days when cheating on a test was the ultimate sin. “Kind of like that, yeah. But a lot more serious.” Wait. Did that sound too casual? “Not that you should have done it,” he backpedaled. “In fact, you might want to tell your real teacher what happened and—”
“Nah. It was last year.”
Okay then.
“Listen to me, bud.” Spence sat up straighter and hugged Max close. “I’m going to be honest, because you’re old enough to hear the truth. Things are going to be hard for a while. Not all the time. In fact, there will be a lot more good times than you probably expect, because both your mom and dad are going to make sure that they keep things as easy for you guys as they can. But it’s still gonna suck. And there’s still going to be a lot of changes. And there’s going to be times when you’re going to feel like it’ll never get better, but I promise, it will. There’s going to come a day when it won’t feel strange to have your dad living someplace else. You’ll still wish he was with you, but you’ll adjust. And you’ll see that it’s still good.”
“How long will that take?”
“Can’t tell you. Sometimes it’ll feel like it’ll never happen. Sometimes you’ll feel like you can’t really remember it being any other way.”
Max swiped at the tears slipping down his cheeks. “I don’t want it to be like this.”
“Nobody does, buddy. But it is. We can’t change that.” Spence gave him another squeeze. “And listen, anytime you need to come hang with me, just say the word. I’m not your dad, but if, you know, there’s too much girl stuff going on, you can always come here. You and me and Furgus can cook some burgers and do guy stuff.”
Romancing the Rival Page 21
