by Jessie Cooke
“And, well, I’m sure he’s told you . . . everything,” Nicky continued, and Bella nodded to that as well. “So, I felt like I should make this visit more official, I guess is the word for it.”
Bella settled back into her chair and balanced her elbows on the armrest. She brought her fingers together in a steeple that she placed on her lips as she waited for Nicky to keep speaking.
“I owe you an apology, Bella,” she said. “I know that in misleading Reece, I was also misleading you.” Nicky’s hand went to her head, and she brushed her blonde hair away from her face. “Christ, why is this so hard? We used to be such good friends, Bella.”
“That was before you decided to extort a man while you were stealing from him and aligning yourself back with Dave,” Bella pointed out.
“Dave has nothing to do with this,” Nicky said.
“He has everything to do with this,” Bella corrected.
“The plan was all my idea, Bella. From the very beginning. I never loved Reece. I loved his money. I loved the life I thought it would give me. I love Dave. Still do. Was I hurt by Dave? Hell, yeah, but I still loved him. When I found out I was pregnant, I honestly thought it was Reece’s. And then, I got the idea to tell him it was. I thought it would get me the life I wanted. I only took the money because I couldn’t get Reece to fall for me, so I knew he’d want to move on at some point in his life. I was afraid that when he did, he wouldn’t want anything to do with Hayley Jo either.”
“But you knew Hayley wasn’t his baby,” Bella argued.
“Not at first. Not when I first started stealing from him. I don’t even know if he knows how long I’ve been taking from him. First it was whatever I could find in his wallet. Then, in a moment of jealousy when I was looking for pictures of this other woman I was sure he was seeing, that’s when I came across some bank books—older ones, for accounts he’d opened up twelve and thirteen years ago. I figured it was in Hayley’s best interest.” Nicky looked Bella in the eyes. “Being a mom changes you, Bella. You find yourself doing things you never thought you would for your child, for the best interest of your child, no matter the cost for yourself.”
Bella lowered her hands into her lap and leaned forward across the desk. “Why are you here, Nicky?”
“I have no one else to turn to, Bella. I need help.”
“You’re right about that one.”
“My parents have practically disowned me—my father calls me a whore, and my mother has to sneak behind his back to see me and Hayley Jo. They don’t know she’s really Dave’s child or what I’ve really done. I can’t tell them. My father would most likely hire a lawyer, declare me an unfit mother, and take Hayley from me and raise her himself. . . and we all know how that would turn out.”
“I’ve already agreed to be Hayley’s godmother, Nicky. Reece has generously provided for her—and plans to still help with that. What more could you ask of us?”
“I need a job, Bella,” Nicky said, her head lowered as if she were speaking to her lap.
“A job?”
“I have to pay Reece back all the money I’ve stolen, and I want to do it right. I want to pay him even what he doesn’t know I took. I want to do my penance.”
“Where is the money? Don’t tell me you spent it all?”
“Some. Most of it I have, but he wants interest, and—like I said—I want to give him back everything I took. I can’t live with myself any more. I. . . I can’t be this kind of person and look my daughter in the eye and expect her to be better. I have to set the example. I want to be a better person for her sake.”
Bella leaned back into her chair again. “You should want to be a better person for your own sake, Nicky, but I’ll give you credit for making a change.”
“How did we get here, Bella?”
Bella heaved a sigh that pressed down onto her shoulders. “We’ve all done things we’re not proud of, Nicky. It’s the right thing to do—make them right, live honestly. Which means I need to tell you something.”
“What is it?”
Bella bit the side of her lip and took a deep breath. “Reece and I were together . . . while he was seeing you, long before the pregnancy.”
“What do you mean?”
“We met at a party, some big thing that some builders in Dallas were having. Christo was working the party. This was back when he did the body painting on the side. He needed an extra girl—someone had gotten sick or something, and he convinced me to help him out.”
“You let Christo paint your body? You waitressed in the nude?” Nicky couldn’t believe it.
Bella nodded. “It was crazy, I know, but I needed the cash, and honestly, you can hardly tell there aren’t any clothes. That’s how good he is at this. Anyway,” Bella waved her hand to the side. “There was this guy who was a real jerk, spilled his beer all over me, said some really douche-bag things. It upset me, but Reece came to my rescue, tried to help clean myself up, and . . . one thing led to another. I was so struck by his chivalry and just so vulnerable in the moment—not to mention those eyes of his—and, well, we ended up having sex in one of the offices.”
“You what?!” Nicky sprang to her feet.
Bella waved for her to sit back down, acting as if this sort of news was delivered every day. “We didn’t even know who the other person was. He was masked; I had a painted mask. It was a masquerade, for crying out loud. It was just the seductiveness of it all.”
“You had sex with a complete stranger?” Nicky asked incredulously.
“I know. Horrible,” Bella answered. “But no worse than having unprotected sex with her boss at the time, perhaps.”
Nicky didn’t bat an eyelash. “At least I knew who he was.”
“Well, maybe I didn’t want to know. At the time, I was okay with that. And then, I needed to know. I couldn’t stop thinking about him. And a few weeks later, the scenario repeated itself, only this time, he handed me his card afterward. When I saw who he was, I thought I would be sick to my stomach. You had just started dating him.”
“And all this time, you two have been playing behind my back?”
“NO,” Bella asserted. “I broke it off. I put distance between us, but Reece persisted. Sometimes fate has the final say, though, Nicky. When he found out you were pregnant, I came out here to Fort Worth, hoping to make it easier for us all.”
“And still, I knew nothing of this the entire time,” Nicky said.
“And so what? How much did you know that you kept from Reece? What does it all matter now? Look at how it’s played out, Nicky. Fate will have the final say.”
Nicky slouched down in her chair, her head in her hands. “Don’t I know it?” she mumbled. Suddenly, she sat up in her chair. “So, how about that job?”
“Are you kidding?” Bella asked surprised.
“Come on, Bella. That can be the way you pay me back.”
“Pay you back?”
“For the wrong you did me. Don’t you believe in karma? You could give me a job and then we call it even.”
“What makes you even think I can give you a job?”
“Look at this place. That little girl out there isn’t a real secretary. You’re moving back to Dallas. Who’s gonna manage this office?”
“Is that all you think I am—an office manager?”
“No, but I know that that is part of what you’re doing here.”
Bella closed her eyes and listened to herself breathe in and out twice before saying anything. Finally, she opened her eyes. “Let me see what I can do,” she said.
But deep down inside, Bella heard herself saying: “Fate will have the final say.”
Maybe Divine Designs was going to be born a little earlier than expected.
“What the hell am I supposed to do now?” Bella asked Reece, her eyes shooting arrows of fire.
“The same thing you were going to do—move back to Dallas, live with me, and build a life with me,” Reece said.
“How? How am I supposed to do that whe
n the man I thought I would be building my life with isn’t who I thought he was?”
He had told her . . . everything. He’d even started at the beginning, and she had soothed him and told him it was all water under the bridge when he confessed about his hiring her to redecorate his South Padre house; how he’d even planned to accost her there, the first weekend, and ended up giving away the gifts he’d bought to the cop that had stopped him for speeding.
He told her the details of hiring Christo, and she’d nodded and glanced at the portrait, telling him it was growing on her and despite its origins and the tainted history, it was a beautiful piece of original Christo Drake work.
And then he’d told her about Luke. How he’d hired him, and how Luke’s unexpected feelings for her had led him to hire Andrew, who had also developed feelings in spite of the job he was hired to do.
“What can I say,” Reece admitted, palms up in the air. “I guess you can try to manipulate people and situations, but in the end, love will find a way.”
“Love?” Bella whispered. “You paid people to do this, why do you call it love?”
“I didn’t pay them to develop feelings. I didn’t pay them to have sex with others. I paid them simply to pay another person some attention. To keep an eye on another person or develop a friendship with another person. I can’t pay someone to fall in love with another. Luke did it on his own, and from what Andrew’s telling me, he’s fallen for Luke now too. I merely paid them to be in the right place to end up falling in love. I thought I had the control, but obviously I didn’t. What is it you said you told Nicky: ‘Fate gets the final say’?”
“Unless you’re rich enough to try to manipulate it,” Bella spat. “I thought you were different than those people who thought that just because they had money meant they should control everyone and everything, but no. You are those people.”
Taking her hands into his, Reece tried to calm her ire. “Bella, no. I’m not that person. I admit, I used my money to do things I shouldn’t have, but it was all because I love you. I lost my head a little, especially when I thought I had lost you forever. When you heard about Nicky’s pregnancy and you left, I was afraid that I’d lost you forever. I hired Luke just to make sure that the door still stayed open.” He lowered his voice to a mumble. “I just didn’t count on him being the one to try and shut it on me for good.”
“I don’t even know who you are,” Bella whispered.
“Of course you do, Bella. It’s still me, only better.”
“Better?”
“I’m owning up here. I’ve really fucked up. I’m trying to make this right—the right way, not the wrong way, not with more dishonesty and manipulation, not trying to cover my tracks. Don’t you see that?”
Bella sat as still as a stone. She felt as cold, too. Try as she may, she couldn’t find within her heart a way to rectify herself to all Reece had just confessed.
“I love you, Bella. I want us to start our lives together with no secrets—everything out in the open. I want you to trust me completely. You deserve to know the truth, and you deserve to know why I did it all. It’s all because I love you.”
She blinked.
She swallowed.
She listened to her breath for six counts.
And then Bella calmly stood, smoothed her skirt with her hands, picked up her purse, and walked out the door.
The sound of its slamming echoed throughout their apartment.
83
Bella Ryan could feel the sun before she could see it. That was one of the experiences she remembered about her bedroom back home. People used to say it was better to be awakened slowly and softly with the daylight. Alarms were too abrupt; too jarring to the system. Better to let nature take her time to slowly seduce you awake, feel the sunlight kiss you lightly while the birds chirp a morning melody.
Today, however, Bella grumbled from deep within, cursed the penetrating sunlight, and wished for some darkening curtains. She wanted to stay inside all day and hide under the covers. She didn’t want to see anyone or talk to anyone, and the only sound she wanted to hear was the sound of her heartbeat in her ears and the gentle rise and fall of her own breath.
She tried it now—listening to her breath. She pulled in deeply, filling her lungs, and then let it out slowly, steadily, simply listening and feeling. Everyone always said things about breathing when times got hard or life got tense. How many songs did she know that centered around the mantra “just breathe?” How many flippant remarks were made to people when they began to get stressed? “Breathe, girl.” “Take a breath already.” “Chill out.”
She was beginning to feel calmer and less hateful towards the sun as she breathed. She began feeling grateful for the quiet and the fact that no one was disturbing her and that she could just lie here and breathe all day.
Then, as her luck would have it, a light knock on the door alerted her to the fact that most likely her day was not going to go the way she had in mind for herself. She rolled over and covered her head with the pillow hoping that whoever it was would take the hint and go away.
Her mother was relentless, though, and she was not easily deterred. Another knock and then Bella heard the familiar squeak of the bedroom door. She’d always hated that squeak. Bella swore her parents knew about it—she’d told them herself how much she hated it—but that they consciously never did anything to fix it. It was a reliable tattletale if she tried to sneak out of the house after they’d gone to bed (which she’d only tried once) or come in well past her curfew (which had happened a few times at least).
“Bellisima,” her mother cooed. “Bella Boo.”
Bella heard the rattle of dishes and peeked from underneath the pillow. Her mother was standing over her with a tray of pancakes and coffee, peering down at Bella as she had so many times before as she was growing up.
“I thought you might want some time to yourself,” her mother said as she eased herself onto the bed with the tray.
“Which explains why you’re here,” Bella grumbled.
“But that you might be hungry,” her mother finished.
Suddenly, Bella’s stomach growled, betraying Bella’s first thoughts of rejecting any and all visitors today, no matter what delicious temptations they may bring.
“What kind are they?” Bella asked, unable to help herself.
“Pumpkin spice,” her mom answered and sat the tray across Bella’s body. “I’m not going to stay,” her mom continued. “I just didn’t want you going hungry either.” She patted Bella’s leg. “And while it’s so good to have you home, I do hope you’ll feel okay about telling me more about what brought you home . . . when you’re ready of course.”
Bella pushed herself to a sitting position, tears springing to her eyes, and in spite of her best efforts not to talk about anything to anyone yet, she found herself telling her mother everything. Well, almost everything.
“And now I just don’t know what to do,” Bella said. “I couldn’t go back to Fort Worth; it didn’t feel right, and I was afraid that Reece would simply go there to get me. I didn’t want to stay in Dallas. Christo has his own life and marriage now. I just needed to go somewhere Reece wouldn’t get to so easily. And I just needed to be . . .”
“Home,” her mother finished. Gale Ryan reached for her daughter’s hand. “It’s fine, sweetheart. Sometimes, a person just needs to be home, with the people who love her no matter what.”
Bella’s tears spilled over onto her cheek. “No matter what?” she asked.
“No matter what,” Gale assured her. “Of course, your grandfather is already asking if you’re knocked up.”
Bella laughed through the tears. She could hear Jackson “Jack” Ryan’s raspy, loud voice between bites of stew meat asking if his granddaughter had returned the prodigal daughter and if she was “in the family way”. He tended to vacillate between that phrase and being knocked up when it came to pregnancy. No matter how hard her grandmother tried, Celia Ryan could not train the old coot. �
�Some horses are just not meant to be broken,” she used to say. “That, in many ways, is your grandpa.”
“Did you set the record straight for him, right?” Bella asked.
Gale shrugged. “I told him I didn’t think you were, but I didn’t know for sure, now did I?”
This was her mother’s way of getting information—a subtle, innocent and naïve asking.
“I’m not pregnant, Mom,” Bella said as she took a sip of the coffee, still hot.
“Well, there’s a part of me that is glad, but there’s a part of me that was kind of hoping,” she admitted.
“And bring shame on the Ryan family?” Bella asked. “You know Grandpa cannot abide a scandal, and that’s exactly what this would be.”
Her mother waved her hand as if she were shooing a fly. “Your cousin Vicky took care of that years ago, when she was pregnant with Bobby Jr. That’s all water under the bridge now.”
“Ah, but Vicky wasn’t the one who escaped to the big city, met a rich man, and then came back with her tail tucked between her legs, all mysterious-like,” Bella said as she cut into the pancakes and took a bite. They literally melted in her mouth, and she closed her eyes to savor the flavors of home.
“Well, you haven’t either as far as I’m concerned,” her mother said. She stood and walked over to the window to raise it, letting the cool morning air cleanse the room. She turned back to Bella. “Sometimes, a girl just needs her mother,” she said.
Bella smiled. It was true, and she was glad her mother understood so well, even though Bella felt she had explained so little.
Her mind raced to what had transpired over the past twenty-four hours: the revelations Reece had shared; her drive straight to Browning; her knocking on the door of her parents’ house, falling into her mother’s arms, and then being tucked in to her old twin-sized bed up in her old room. She had thought she would cry herself to sleep, but she was so tired, she didn’t even have the energy for that. The entire way, she’d listened to Loveline, a radio show where people call-in for advice. Though she thought about calling in, she never actually did, unsure of what she would really say and how she would ask for advice.
