A dim buzz sounded in Kelli’s ears as her blood picked up speed. “So Tiffany is Jason’s—” She couldn’t finish the sentence.
“He hasn’t mentioned her?” A blush stained Barb’s face. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“Why not?” Kelli was horrified to hear her voice come out loud and sharp. “Is he ashamed of her?”
Barb leaned across the table, her hand outstretched. “Oh, no. Not of Tiffany. Of course not.” She looked away, embarrassed. “But he probably is ashamed of his relationship with Tiffany’s mother. You see, they were never married.”
Jason had gotten a girl pregnant and hadn’t married her. They had a child, a daughter. Was that child the mistake he was going to tell her about tonight?
Kelli gulped against the gathering anger that knotted her throat until she could speak evenly. “Tell me what happened.”
The creases in Barb’s forehead deepened. “I don’t know if I should. Maybe you should talk to Jason.”
“You know what?” Kelli stood, half-ashamed of the loud way the chair scooted across the linoleum behind her. “I think I will.”
She recovered her composure enough to thank Barb again for coming to Nana’s rescue, and to peek into the bedroom to assure herself that Nana was still sleeping. She even managed to smile into Barb’s worried face before she left, promising to return later to check on Nana.
Once inside the car, she clutched the steering wheel with a white-knuckled grip. Jason had lied to her. Or, at the very least, deceived her. He had a child he hadn’t bothered to tell her about. Or had his daughter just slipped his mind, because obviously she wasn’t a priority in his life? Kelli’s jaw clenched as her fury swelled like floodwaters. This was almost like Lillian, who hadn’t bothered to tell anyone about her daughter. No, it was exactly like Lillian.
Well, Lillian was out of Kelli’s reach now. But Jason wasn’t.
Forcing herself to assume at least a semblance of calm so she wouldn’t be a danger on the road, Kelli drove with exaggerated care toward the zoo. Just wait until she got her hands on Mr. Jason Andover.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Jason pulled the CD out of the computer drive and slipped it into the sleeve in the front of the binder. He’d satisfied himself that all the procedures on animal handling were up to date and ready for the inspectors Friday. The animal care staff was ready, too. Some of them were young, but even so, they were the best in the business. He’d stack Cougar Bay’s keepers up against anyone, anywhere. There was no need to be anxious about this interim inspection. They’d sail through it with ease.
The door in the outer office slammed shut as he slid the binder back onto the shelf. He turned in time to see Kelli enter. A rush of pleasure washed over him. He hadn’t expected to see her until he picked her up for their dinner date.
At the fierce look on her face, his pleasure faded, along with the greeting he’d been about to voice. She stopped just inside his office, her eyes angry slits, her hands clenched into fists at her sides.
Uneasiness shafted through him. “What’s wrong? Is your grandmother okay?”
She didn’t acknowledge his question, but instead spoke in a deadly calm voice. “When were you planning to tell me about your daughter?”
Jason felt like a bug pinned to a velvet-covered board by her glare. With an effort, he crossed the two steps between them and reached for her arm to pull her farther inside the office. She jerked out of his grasp with an indrawn breath, as though his touch burned. His lips tightened. Fine, if that’s the way she wanted to play this. Moving with deliberate slowness, he closed the door. These walls weren’t exactly soundproof, but at least they provided a semblance of privacy. And he had a feeling this discussion was going to be very, very private.
When he’d seated himself in his desk chair and gestured for Kelli to sit as well—which she ignored—he forced himself to match her fake-calm tone. “That was what I wanted to talk about tonight.”
“So the big secret you were going to share, the mistake—” she spat the word “—was your daughter?”
“Of course not.” He worked hard to maintain an even tone. Not easy in the face of her anger. “The mistake was a drunken week in Daytona Beach with some of my old college buddies a few years ago.” He swallowed. This was not the way he’d planned to tell her about his jaded past. “Aimee was a sophomore at Embry-Riddle. I barely remembered meeting her until six weeks later when she called to tell me she was pregnant.” His face burned, but he managed not to duck his head. “She wanted me to marry her, but I refused.”
Kelli’s eyes narrowed to slits. “Why?”
Jason placed both hands in his lap and returned Kelli’s glare without flinching. “Because even though I wasn’t a Christian at the time, I believed marriage was a sacred commitment. I didn’t see how compounding one mistake with another would do either of us any good.”
“So you dumped her. Left her with the responsibility of raising your child on her own.”
He added a touch of volume to his voice. “I’ve supported Tiffany from day one.”
“You mean you’ve paid child support? Excuse me for not giving you credit for doing everything the law requires you to do.” Kelli folded her arms across her chest with a jerk. “How often do you see her?”
Now Jason did look away. “As often as I can. Once a month, if I’m able to get away from work. She lives two and a half hours away.”
“Two and a half hours? You drove that long to deliver a couple of stupid monkeys to another zoo! You can’t go to visit your own child more often than once a month?”
“You think it’s easy to sit there in Aimee’s living room with her glaring at me the whole time?” Appalled at the way his voice filled the tiny office, Jason resumed the calm tone. “Look, when Tiffany was a baby, Aimee wouldn’t let me take her anywhere, and I understood that. I didn’t know anything about taking care of an infant. And as she grew, Tiffany didn’t know me very well. Of course she wouldn’t want to go anywhere with a stranger.”
“You’re not a stranger. You’re her father.”
Jason acknowledged that with a nod. “But Aimee would just as soon I don’t come around. She says it confuses Tiffany to have two fathers. When she’s older—”
Kelli planted her hands on his desk and leaned over it until her face was a foot away from his. “When she’s older and realizes that her real father was too busy to be bothered with her, it’s going to hurt her more than you can possibly imagine.”
“She has a stepfather, and he’s good to her.” Jason hid a wince. It was a poor justification, and he hated the fact that he’d said it.
Curls flew with violence as Kelli shook her head. “I had Nana, and she was amazing. It doesn’t matter. She needs to know she’s a priority in her real father’s life. That she’s more important than a bunch of stupid zoo animals.”
Anger stirred in Jason. Kelli’s position was understandable, given her background, but this was Tiffany he was talking about. “Don’t put me in the place of your parents, Kelli. That’s not fair. Besides, you’re just as much a workaholic as I am. You’re holding down two jobs, for goodness’ sake, working all day and all night, too.”
“Don’t try to turn this around,” she snapped. “We’re not talking about me.”
“Aren’t we?” Jason stood and mimicked Kelli’s posture with his hands on the desk, his face inches from hers. “I think you’re putting me in your mother’s place, and yourself in Tiffany’s.” He lowered his voice and held her gaze with his. “Don’t do that, Kelli. This situation is totally different.”
She sucked in a breath, preparing to speak. Jason braced himself for another verbal barb, but in the next second she closed her mouth. Her anger drained, leaving her eyes dark with a deep sadness that sent an answering twist to his chest.
“I’m sorry, Jason.” Her whisper was almost inaudible. She backed away from him, shaking her head. “I can’t do this.”
As he watched her
go, his limbs grew heavy. He dropped into his chair, unable to shake the feeling that even though she might stay around for the rest of her six-month obligation, Kelli had just disappeared from his life forever. And she’d taken his last chance at happiness with her.
Was she right? Were his motives selfish? Was he taking the easy way out by bowing to Aimee’s wishes? Would Tiffany one day end up with the same pain hovering in her eyes that he’d seen in Kelli’s every time Lil’s name was mentioned?
He rocked backward in his chair. “Lord,” he whispered, “You know I love Tiffany. I wouldn’t hurt her for anything in the world. Maybe I ought to insist on spending time with her, whether Aimee likes it or not. Could You help me figure out what to do here?”
He didn’t have the nerve to voice his final request, because he had no faith that even God could override the finality in Kelli’s parting words.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“Gasira, target.”
Raul issued the command in his gravelly voice while holding a tennis ball up to the porcupine’s chain-link gate. The female porcupine obediently rose up on her back legs to press her nose against the fuzzy green ball, exposing her underside to her onlookers, just as the lion had done while Kelli watched earlier in the week. The exercise was completely unnecessary, in Kelli’s opinion, because Gasira and Baya were so friendly anyway. But everything was being done today for the benefit of the trio of inspectors walking through the zoo with clipboards and sharp eyes that noticed everything.
“Good girl,” Raul growled and thrust a carrot chunk through the gate. Gasira grabbed the treat, dropped to all fours and turned her quills toward her mate to protect it as she ate.
“Fine, fine,” said the female inspector, whose name Kelli had forgotten five seconds after being told it.
Jason, who was accompanying the officials on their rounds, smiled his approval at Raul. Kelli kept her eyes on the porcupines, determined to ignore her boss unless she absolutely couldn’t help it. But she couldn’t seem to stop herself from watching him in her peripheral vision. And she couldn’t stop the elated thrill she felt every time she was in his vicinity.
Cliff Reiker, the inspector whose name Kelli was unlikely to ever forget, made a quick note on his clipboard. “Next, I’d like to see a demonstration of the shift procedures with the western spotted skunk.”
“Of course.” Kelli had to hand it to Jason for keeping his voice completely even. “Raul, if you’ll—”
“No.” Reiker interrupted with a meaningful glance in Kelli’s direction. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to see her demonstrate the procedure.”
Heat burned in Kelli’s face as every eye turned her way.
“Uh, Kelli is officially still an assistant keeper,” Jason explained.
Raul threw up a hand to stop him from refusing Reiker’s request. “She can handle it.”
Confidence flooded his tone. Raul had seen this coming and made her practice shifting Felix over and over since she returned from Denver. Even so, the little skunk was still nervous around her and only cooperated about half the time. Battling nerves that fluttered in her belly, Kelli led the small troop through the building to the skunk exhibit, dodging children and parents along the way. The inspectors took up positions outside the glass, their bodies angled so they could see the panel inside. Raul pressed a small handful of chopped yams into her palm, and she grinned her thanks. Felix adored yams.
Her fingers trembled as she unlocked the access door. She tried not to think about the last time Reiker had been here and what he might do if she failed so miserably this time. As she slipped inside, Jason shifted his position, his gaze fixed on her. Before she could stop herself, she glanced at his face. He caught her eye, smiled and gave her a private wink that sent an answering tickle to her stomach. Later on she might be angry with herself for the rush of giddy pleasure that wink caused, but right now she took comfort in the boost to her confidence.
Inside the closet, she was surrounded by darkness. At least she remembered to shut the door this time; she hoped Reiker noticed. The small crate Felix shifted into was outlined in the dark, and she picked it up before opening the panel. Light sliced through the darkness. On the other side of the glass, five faces watched as she blinked and scanned the enclosure. Felix had run beneath the hollowed log that served as his den, his pointy nose twitching in her direction as he watched her cautiously.
“Hey, Felix.” She pitched her voice low and even added a little gravel so she sounded a bit more like Raul. “Don’t be nervous.”
She set the small crate inside the enclosure, directly in front of Felix’s log, and opened her hand so he could see the goodies she held. “Look what I have here. Yum, yum. Your favorite snack.”
With a toss, she placed the yams inside the crate. “Do me a favor, would you, buddy? Go on in. I promise you can come right back out again.”
Her breath caught in her chest, Kelli backed away. For a moment that seemed to stretch into hours, Felix did nothing. Then he inched out of his hiding place, nose twitching, shiny black eyes darting from her to the food. With a lurch, he scampered inside the crate. Through the opening in the side, Kelli saw him pick up a piece of yam and begin to eat. Heaving a huge sigh, she closed the crate’s metal door and latched it shut before glancing at her audience. All three inspectors were busy writing on their clipboards, but Jason and Raul both beamed at her. Raul shielded his hand with his body to give her a private thumbs-up.
She picked up the crate and peered through the side opening. “You were awesome, Felix. Good job.”
Then she set the crate back down, let the skunk out, and when Felix had returned to his den with the last piece of yam held firmly in his teeth, closed and locked the access panel.
Outside, Cliff Reiker greeted her with a wide smile. “Nice work, Miss Jackson.”
Relief wilted her tense muscles. “Thank you.”
She ignored Jason’s smile of congratulations, but acknowledged Raul’s grunt of approval with a grin.
The female inspector slid her pen beneath the clip on her board and dropped it to her side. “All right, that about does it. Unless either of you have something else you’d like to take a look at?”
Both men shook their heads. The group headed toward the exit, Kelli and Raul trailing behind them. Reiker hung back when the other two stepped outside. His gaze slid from Kelli to Jason.
“Everything looks good. I, uh, hope you understand that I had to report that incident.” He sounded almost apologetic.
“We understood.” Jason answered with confidence. “We weren’t concerned.”
“Good. You’ve got a great zoo here.” He nodded goodbye and followed his fellow inspectors outside.
Jason hung back. Kelli felt his gaze on her face, but she didn’t look at him. Instead, she watched the squirrel monkeys perform acrobatics on their tree in the nearest exhibit.
“Are you scheduled to work the weekend?” he asked Raul.
“Why?” Raul asked, eyes narrowed.
Jason lifted a shoulder. “I’m taking a couple of days off. Just wanted to make sure we’ve got all the bases covered.”
Raul grunted. “I’ll be here.” He jerked a head toward Kelli. “Her, too.”
Jason nodded. “All right. I’ll see you Monday, then.”
He disappeared through the door without another look in Kelli’s direction. When he’d gone, Raul stared after him.
“Can’t remember the last time that boy took a day off,” he muttered. Then he noticed Kelli. “You’re done here,” he told her gruffly and waved a hand in the direction Jason had gone. “Go help somebody else.” He peered at her from beneath his scraggly eyebrows. “But come back in the morning.”
She sketched a mock salute. “Aye-aye, sir.”
Outside in the sunshine, Kelli sidestepped around a pair of laughing girls on their way into the building. The triumph of her victory with Felix was starting to wear off, and the lingering sense of emptiness she’d battled for two days
threatened to return. She glanced at her watch. Four-thirty. In another half hour she could leave, arrive at Barb’s house in time to chat with Nana as she ate dinner in bed, and then head home to spend yet another night alone with the cat, working on her clients’ accounts. In the morning she’d get out of bed and follow exactly the same routine as today.
What is Jason doing this weekend?
The thought made her feet move faster, as though she could run away from the nagging sense of loss she felt every time he came to mind. It wouldn’t work; it never did. Still, she found herself speed-walking over the well-groomed pathways until she came to a halt at the place she found herself returning to over and over—the orangutan exhibit.
Cocoa was napping on her platform. Kelli waited until the family in the observation area left, then stepped up to the wall. She folded her hands and rested her arms on top of the concrete, and watched the slumbering ape. Jason’s words, uttered the last time she’d stood here with him, played over and over in her mind.
Is he right? Am I becoming bitter because I can’t forgive my mother for abandoning me?
Far below, water trickled in Cocoa’s moat. Childish laughter drifted to her from somewhere in the distance. Neither sound was enough to drown out her thoughts.
“I don’t want to be bitter, Lord,” she whispered. “But forgiving her is like excusing what she did, like saying it didn’t matter. And it does matter.”
Cocoa stirred on her platform. She rolled over, cast a glance in Kelli’s direction and then turned away again without performing any of her usual antics. Kelli smiled in spite of herself. Apparently an audience of one wasn’t enough to interrupt her nap. Kelli had grown fond of the orang since watching her enjoy the yellow piñata. She certainly was a crowd-pleaser, an important attribute for a zoo animal.
What had happened to the baby orang? Had he grown up happy and healthy with his foster mother, as Kelli had with Nana?
“Stop it,” she scolded herself. “I’m not an animal, and neither was my mother.”
A Daughter's Legacy Page 17
