by Aria Ford
“Me too,” she said gently.
We sat quietly for a while, then she stood. “I should go,” she said firmly.
“I suppose so,” I agreed. “I need to pack. I’m leaving at six.”
“Okay, auntie,” she said. She kissed me on the wrist and walked off. I sighed.
If only all of us had as much emotional intelligence as these kids do.
I sighed again and reached across for my suitcase. I did have to pack. I couldn’t just sit here caught in my sadness.
“Amelia?” I heard another knock on my door. This time it was my brother.
“Mm?” I asked. “Come in—I’m wearing clothes.”
Brett stuck his head round the door. “Oh yes. So you are. I just wanted to say I’m going to the store quickly if you need something? I think Reese is having her hair cut or something. Josh is in the attic with his racing cars. Carson is…I don’t know where, now I think of it.”
Good, I thought woodenly.
“I don’t need anything, Brett,” I said gently. “Thanks, though. I hope you’ll be back soon,” I added, checking my watch. It was 3:00 p.m.
“Of course I will, Mel,” he said softly. “I wouldn’t miss saying goodbye for anything.”
“Good.”
I waved as he left and carried on packing. My work was all done when I had another interruption.
Someone knocked on my door. It sounded urgent.
“Hello?” I called, my blood cold. What if it’s him? What do I say?
But it wasn’t. “Auntie!” Cayley called. “Come quick!”
I dropped my purse on the bed. “What?” I said, worried. I ran and opened the door. “What happened?”
“Auntie! We need some help! It’s Josh!”
I didn’t even think about it. I just ran.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Amelia
I ran behind Cayley up the hallway. Fortunately, we didn’t have to go far. We ran to Josh’s room and she shoved open the door.
“Josh!” I yelled. “What’s the matter? Are you hurt?”
The kids looked at each other, then at me. I supposed I must have looked quite a sight, with my hair loose and my cheeks flushed, eyes wild. They laughed, self-conscious.
“Sorry, auntie,” Cayley said apologetically. “I didn’t mean to worry you. It isn’t like a life-or-death.”
“Whew!” I sat down on the bed, not even thinking about the fact at first that Carson had been sleeping here all week. “Heck! Don’t do that to me again,” I said, hand on my chest. “I thought someone was injured.”
“Sorry, auntie,” Josh giggled, coming to sit next to me. “We were scared. You see, I lost the spare key. I think it’s in here somewhere. Dad will be so mad! Could you help us?”
“You want to look for it?”
“Please,” Cayley asked. “There are some places we can’t get to.”
“Okay,” I agreed. I bit my lip. Looking through Carson’s things for a second time in as many days would be awkward, but I supposed I could do it. Especially if the kids needed my help.
“I’ll do under the bed,” Josh said. “Cayley, will you do the drawers?”
“Okay,” Cayley agreed quickly. “Auntie, could you do the cupboard?”
“Okay,” I agreed. I set about searching the wardrobe. While I was looking, I saw an envelope on the floor of the wardrobe. I picked it up. I tensed when I saw a name on the front. “Carson”.
Oh, hell. I wanted to drop it like a burning ember. But something made me stay my hand.
I swallowed hard. If this was a card from Leona, I would know for sure. Thanks to the kids, I was standing in the middle of my brother’s son’s room, with a letter from the other woman in my hand. Should I open it?
Josh and Cayley were looking up at me expectantly.
“Open it, auntie,” Josh urged.
“I want to see what’s inside,” Cayley insisted.
I looked at them with amazement. Then I laughed. It was what I wanted to do anyhow, so why not let two naughty kids persuade me into it, after all? “Okay.”
I opened the envelope. Inside was, as I imagined there was, a Christmas card. It had a snowy mountain on the front with the suggestion of a sled flying over the top. Cute, I thought.
I opened the card.
“Dear Daddy,” I read aloud. “I am so excited about seeing you. Even though you can’t visit for Christmas, I am so happy. I’m so glad I can see you more often now. Wishing you the bestest everything. Your daughter, Leona.”
I dropped the card. Like a snowflake, it swooped and landed silently on the floor.
“She’s his daughter,” I whispered under my breath. I sat down on the bed, tears flowing down my cheeks, a smile on my lips. “She’s his daughter!”
The kids were smiling happily, and I drew them both into my arms and squeezed them close, collapsing back onto the bed. I tickled them both until they screamed for mercy, laughing helplessly in my arms.
“Oh, kids,” I sighed. “I am so happy. Right. Now, let’s put these things away, hey?”
“Okay, auntie,” Cayley said gravely. She winked at me. I laughed.
“Is it a secret?”
“Not really,” I told Josh gently. “I think we can talk about this one.”
“Oh,” Josh said, grinning. “Oh, good.”
I smiled. My whole mood was sunny. I wanted to run out into the freezing cold afternoon and kiss everyone I met, laughing and shouting. Carson wasn’t two-timing me with Leona. Leona was his daughter!
Another thought occurred to me: Was the person he was talking to on the phone his wife? But if he was still married, why was he spending Christmas with my brother? Why did his daughter say she wasn’t expecting him to be there? No, I decided, he was separated from his wife.
I was still grinning like an idiot and the kids were still laughing as we walked down into the sitting room together. We all sat down with an air of celebration. We were still sitting there, laughing and playing some complicated card game that none of us actually knew all the rules to, when I heard the front door open.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Carson
I came back with the scariest thing on my mind—the thought of seeing Amelia face-to-face. She was so down that I couldn’t bear seeing her and seeing how upset I had made her. I wiped my boots on the doormat and sneaked in.
“Uncle Carson!” Josh yelled as I walked past the door of the sitting room.
“Hi, Josh,” I called, pleased someone was happy to see me. I put my head around the door, grinning. Then I saw who else was there. Cayley and Amelia.
“Oh,” I said, brow furrowed. “Uh, excuse me.”
“No, Carson,” Amelia said. She looked me in the eye. “We have to talk.”
“Oh.” I swallowed. At this moment, the last thing I wanted to do was face her alone. But what did she want to talk about? “Okay,” I said quietly.
“Yes. We have to talk.” She walked past me and beckoned me after. I followed.
She led me upstairs. I thought for one tense moment we were going to her room, but instead we went to the study and shut the door. She looked up at me.
“Carson, I have something to say,” she said quietly. “I’m sorry.”
“Amelia, I…” I ran a hand over my head. This was hard. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I have so much to say sorry for. I guess I don’t know how to start,” I chuckled. I didn’t know where to start.
“No, Carson,” she insisted. “I have to say sorry. But first I have to ask something.”
“What?” I said, curiously.
“Why didn’t you let me know you were a father?”
“What?” I stared at her. “Amelia. Wait. How did you know? Was it Brett?”
“No,” I said. “I found out.”
I didn’t want to ask how. I didn’t know what to say at all, actually. What did she think about the fact that I had been married? That I was a father?
“Amelia, I…” I frowned, pausing. “Are you
mad about it?”
“Carson!” she laughed. She smiled in a way that made my heart thump. “Of course I’m not mad about it. Have you any idea…wait,” she said. “You don’t know what I thought, right?”
“No,” I said, honestly. I had no idea.
“I thought Leona was your girlfriend. That you were seeing someone else. Using me.”
“Amelia!” I was so astonished, I must have looked as if someone had just shot me. I closed my mouth and then hugged her. “My Amelia! How did you…I’m sorry!”
I buried my face in her hair, breathing in the rose scent of her. I couldn’t believe I had done that! No wonder she had been so mad at me! No wonder she had been aloof. Been ignoring me. “Amelia, I am so, so sorry.”
“Carson,” she laughed again, softer this time. “You don’t need to be sorry about anything. I’m sorry I suspected you. But really, you didn’t give me much opportunity for something else.”
I laughed. “I guess it looked awful,” I admitted. “Me going off, making calls, having commitments I didn’t talk about. Even being delayed! I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” she insisted. “Just don’t do it again.”
I looked at that wicked grin. My heart stopped.
“You mean, I might get an opportunity to do it again?” I asked hopefully. She laughed.
“I intend to give you ample opportunity. Just don’t take it.”
I felt a laugh well up inside me and when her arms came around me we were both chuckling helplessly. It didn’t seem possible. It was two days after Christmas and I was in the arms of the woman I had loved for ten years.
My mouth moved over hers and I kissed her, slowly and gently.
She sighed and her sigh against my lips made my entire body shiver with longing. I kissed her again, my fingers stroking the impossibly soft skin of her neck.
“Amelia,” I breathed. “My dear, sweet Amelia.”
She laughed as my mouth moved down to her neck, a delicious giggle that made my cock hard. I leaned against her and pushed her back, gentle but firm, against the wall. I could barely control my need for her now; my whole body was shuddering and my heart pounded in my chest.
“Amelia…” I whispered again into that sweet, fluffy hair. I kissed her again and my hands moved to lift the soft pullover she was wearing. She gasped in sweet delight. I kissed her as I lifted it, my fingers brushing against the soft skin of her chest.
“We shouldn’t…” she whispered. “What if someone comes up?”
“I’ll lock the door,” I replied. I went to the door and locked it. Then I came back to her.
“Carson,” she whispered to me. “My dear Carson.”
I lifted her sweater and felt the soft silk of her bra beneath my hands and then I lost all control. My hands were not my own as I unfastened her bra and moved my mouth to her breasts. I sucked those sweet, hard nipples and then slid my hands down her chest to the fastenings of her jeans.
In something approaching a frenzy, I unfastened them, then slid them down her legs. She was breathing in great, sobbing breaths as I removed her panties and put my mouth to her sex, kneeling before her.
“Carson,” she said as she stroked my hair. “Oh, Carson…”
I was intoxicated with her. My whole body was throbbing as I breathed in the sweet scent of her sex and then I could hold back no longer. I had to be inside her.
Standing, I undressed myself faster than I could have believed and pushed her back against the only blank wall in the office. Then I slid into her.
She was moaning and gasping as I thrust in her, again and again and…
“Oh!”
I came. I hadn’t expected to come so soon. It crashed over me like a wave and I leaned against her, my heart thudding, my mind blank.
She kissed me and I kissed her and even though I had just spent myself, I could feel my body already freshly aroused as I smelled her and felt her softness.
I looked down into those gentle blue eyes and kissed her brow. My heart melted.
“Amelia,” I whispered. “I love you.”
I knew now, that I always had.
“Oh, Carson,” she whispered back. “I love you too.”
CHAPTER THIRTY
Amelia
Later, we talked. I only had an hour before I left, but we had so much we had to discuss. We went to my bedroom and shut the door and lay down together. This time, though he was close, I wanted to spend the time discussing, not necessarily making love.
We had so many plans to make, and so little time in which to do it. I knew now that I had always wanted him. The reason I had not settled down was because my heart was not mine to give—it had always been his and always would.
“And so, dear?” I asked, looking into those lovely dark eyes.
“So?” he smiled, cupping my face with his hand. I was nestled into his shoulder, he was lying on his side and I on my back and my one hand held his, while his other stroked my skin. I smiled.
“So, what happens with us?” I stretched and he gasped as my breast brushed his arm.
“Well,” he said breathlessly, “a lot.”
I giggled. “Yes, a lot. But what?”
“Well,” he said, his lips making a mission down the side of my head and to my lips, then moving off again, “we make love, lots of it. But during that time I look for a job in Berkeley, and we maybe think of finding you a place big enough for actual people.”
I laughed. “My apartment is big enough for actual people,” I said crossly.
He smiled, that delightful grin that won my heart. “Yes. But I’d like to find something to share with you.”
I felt a strange sensation, like my heart melted. I blinked rapidly. “Carson…”
“Yes?”
“I do love you.”
He kissed my hair. “Me too.”
Later, we talked about other things. About how he was not as he was before the army. I knew that, and told him that it didn’t matter. He could trust me. He blinked back tears.
“I always thought…I wanted to be good enough for you, sweetheart,” he said quietly. “And when I got back, I thought…I thought I didn’t want to inflict myself on a girl like you.”
“Inflict! Carson! What?” she laughed. “If you had any idea how painful it was for me when you sent all those mixed messages…all I wanted was you.”
“Really?” he smiled, unsure.
“Carson!” I giggled. “I always wanted you.”
His eyes shut. I hadn’t noticed what long lashes he had before, funnily enough. When he looked back at me, his eyes were damp.
“I’m an asshole,” he said softly.
I giggled. “No, you aren’t. At least, not a big one.”
He roared with laughter. “Thank you, sweet. I’ll remember that.”
I smiled. “Seriously, Carson. I can’t believe your reason for staying away was to avoid hurting me. When I think of how you hurt me doing it!”
I closed my eyes again. I regretted that. Profoundly.
“I’m sorry.”
She smiled. “Carson, you know what?”
“What?”
“You have nothing to be sorry about.”
We said it together. We laughed. As he buried his face in my hair I felt my heart rise fit to bursting. I knew, then, how much I had always loved him. How this would be the start of so many wonderful memories. How much my life had changed this year.
“I love you,” I said, looking into his eyes. It was the truest thing I had ever said.
“I love you too,” he whispered.
We lay together, arms around each other and looked out of the window at the darkening sky.
After a moment, he moved so he could look into my eyes.
“I’m not going to lie, sweetheart. I will need help with…with all of it,” he said, waving a hand in a way that indicated the past: his memories, his pain, his suffering.
“I know,” I said, stroking his hair gently. “I understand. All I can
do is say I’m there for you.”
He sighed. “Thank you, Amelia.”
“You have nothing to thank me for,” I said softly. “I am honored to be part of all that.”
He smiled. “Thank you, dear.”
“Thank you.”
We lay there awhile, and the clock on the wall ticked softly. “You know,” I said after a long moment.
“I would love to meet your daughter.”
“Really?” he smiled. “I’d love for you to meet her.”
“How old is she?”
“Eight,” he said.
“She was born while you were away?”
“Mm,” he replied. “I met her a year later.”
“That must have been hard.”
“It was,” he agreed. “I think Macey couldn’t handle my being away. It’s no wonder she wanted rid of me.” He sighed.
“She did?” I asked. I guessed that was Leona’s mom.
“Well, she needed someone to be there. I couldn’t be.”
“Well, you’re still a good dad.” I said.
He smiled at me. “You think so?”
“I’m sure of it.” I had seen him with kids. I knew what an amazing father he could be.
“You…” he paused. “If she came to visit us, you wouldn’t mind?”
“No,” I said. I meant it. “She’s your child, dearest.”
“Amelia,” he smiled, kissing my hair. “I love you.”
“I love you too.”
We lay there awhile. I tried to imagine what his daughter might look like and then gave up. I would certainly meet her. I was curious. As much as I might have expected it to hurt—that he had married someone else—it didn’t. I understood the way these things happen. I also knew the past was the past. The present and the future were ours.
I smiled.
“What?” he asked.
“If you move to Berkeley, maybe you could work for the company.”
“Doing what, sweetheart?”
“Security?” I suggested. “It’s something we need a lot of.”
He frowned. I could tell he liked the idea. “It’s a thought,” he agreed.
