Just Desserts

by Jeannie Watt

  Layla rolled her eyes. “That’s your sister’s sweater.”

  Justin took a long look at the pale pink garment. “It is?”

  “Yeah. It is.” She folded her arms over her chest.

  The hand with the sweater dropped to his side and Justin went with the facts instead of a ploy. “I wanted to see you, so I didn’t really care whose sweater it was, but I did think it was yours. I thought I saw you wearing one like this.”

  “Mine is darker.”

  “Right.” He glanced down briefly, then back up at her. “I’ve been a jerk. I’m sorry and I’m worried about you.” Then he shifted his weight. Apologizing had never come easy for him, but he’d done it and he meant it. Now all he wanted was for her to tell him what the problem was, because it was driving him crazy.

  LAYLA DEBATED for all of two seconds, then said, “I’m being sued.”

  The words just came blurting out. Not because she wanted a shoulder to cry on or anything, but because it seemed counterproductive to alienate one of the few people who might actually understand what was going on—the guy who’d been involved in taking the materials from the school in the first place.

  “Sued?”

  “Manzanita Prep wants the lesson plans back. They’re calling them intellectual property.”

  “I thought they were yours. That you created them.”

  “They are mine,” Layla said adamantly. “But I have to prove I made them on my own time, and that’s going to cost money I could use for grad school.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know.” She wrapped her arms tightly around her stomach and refused to meet his eyes. “It’s killing me. I have this problem with authority. I kowtow too much.”

  “I know,” he said softly.

  “Authority is safe,” she said, still not looking at him, although she heard the creak of him mounting the first step. “I can tell myself that logically I’m in the right, but Justin…people like me aren’t supposed to get sued.”

  “What do you mean, people like you?” he asked, the next two steps creaking under his weight. He stopped on the last one so their heads were level, and when she turned, she could look into his remarkable green eyes.

  “People who follow rules. Bend over backward to follow rules. Follow rules even when they’re stupid and counterproductive.”

  “You do that?” he asked in mock surprise.

  She smiled. “Not anymore.” Their eyes held, and then she leaned forward so that their foreheads touched.

  But she didn’t kiss him. Because she knew from past experience exactly what would happen—he would kiss her back and then retreat, for her own blinking protection—and it frustrated the hell out of her.

  “I can’t figure out my relationship with you,” he muttered, clasping his hands at the back of her neck, their foreheads still touching.

  Her eyebrows went up. “I think you were pretty damned clear about it a couple days ago.”

  “No. I was clear about my limitations.”

  “Why do you have those limitations?” she asked. He leaned away, his hands still on her neck, but his expression had become unreadable, and she could feel the distance building between them. “Do you ever think you can move past them?” she asked in a low voice.

  She read the answer in his face before he said it. She stepped back and his hands dropped away.

  “We have a history, Justin. You can trust me.”

  “I know.” His mouth tightened briefly and then he leaned forward and kissed her lightly on the lips. She closed her eyes, resisting the urge to kiss him back.

  JUSTIN WALKED BACK to his car, heard Layla’s front door click shut behind him, and realized that he hated the sound. Hated doors and walls between them. Eden had been right about skipping steps because they knew each other well. But she’d been wrong about them knowing everything, and it was killing him.

  The unfortunate truth was that he was falling for Layla. Or had fallen for her somewhere along the line—probably before the awful date at Nia’s. Maybe even back in high school, when he’d quit picking on her.

  The frightening part was that he suspected, with her, he’d already edged past the bolting point of previous relationships without even realizing it. Somehow the feelings had sneaked up on him and they hadn’t even had sex.

  Which meant he’d been ignoring the warning signs, for some unfathomable reason, and letting himself slide into something that could well spell devastation in the future.

  It wasn’t that Justin was afraid to be happy…hell, who was he trying to kid? He was afraid to be happy, because the happier people made you, the more it hurt to lose them.

  It had hurt to lose his mom. Then his dad. It’d hurt to lose Rachel. And the baby…that was complicated.

  The bottom line was that he was flat-out done with loss.

  THIS IS CRAZY, Layla thought as she paced through her house. Let it go. Justin had made his decision. He wanted to go through life alone.

  He says that, and then he kisses you.

  She couldn’t let it go. She had a stake in this, too, whether he wanted to accept that or not.

  What would she have done three months ago? What would old Layla have done?

  Maintained distance, because she rarely took risks in personal relationships. Everything was plotted, planned, thought out. Very little left to chance… And then her boyfriend had taken up with her coworker.

  So much for old Layla.

  New Layla had taken a few chances—and had been knocked backward every time one of them involved Justin. But she was still whole. Still breathing and ready to fight another day.

  Therein was a lesson.

  She needed to find out the truth, because then she’d know where she stood. Her only concern, after nights of research into the matter, was what if she asked the question and he refused to answer?

  Then they truly had no chance at all to explore what she intuitively knew they could have between them, and she would be forced to accept that.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  JUSTIN WASN’T ENTIRELY surprised to hear the knock on his door that evening. There was no logical reason to expect Layla to show up after he’d brought her the wrong sweater; he simply knew it had to be her.

  He opened the door to find her standing there, her dark hair pulled into the ponytail she wore at the kitchen, her features set.

  He silently stepped back to allow her to come in, feeling a deep sense of premonition. The bad kind.

  “Want to sit down?”

  She shook her head. “No. I just have one question for you, and I’m asking it only because I think you need some moral support. You don’t have to answer, because, frankly, I have no right to ask.”

  His stomach instantly knotted. “Go ahead.”

  It took her a few seconds before she said quietly, “This is so personal, but…” She closed her eyes briefly. “I want to know if you and Rachel might have dealt with something that’s affecting your life now.”

  The bottom dropped out of his world. Just like that.

  He swallowed. Or tried to. “Why…?”

  Layla’s expression was pained, as if it hurt her to ask. “You dated Rachel,” she said quietly. “Something about her upset you. She disappeared from high school her senior year, when she was probably in the running to be valedictorian. You’ve been a wreck about Reggie’s baby scare.”

  “Quite the detective, aren’t you?” Every defense he owned had just snapped into place. “And I really don’t want to talk about this, Layla.”

  She swallowed. “The only reason I ask is because you won’t let yourself get attached to anyone. Ever.”

  “Been talking to my sister?” Of course she had. They talked all day long as they worked. “Maybe I just prefer being single.”

  “I never asked you not to be single. But after we discovered that we, well, hit it off, you backed away from me as if I were on fire.”

  He didn’t know what to say, so he settled for noth
ing. Talk about being broadsided.

  “It’s a classic sign of repressed grief,” she said. “Not getting attached.”

  His gaze shot up to hers. “You don’t have that psychology degree yet.”

  Her chin rose in that classic Layla I-know-what-I’m-talking-about expression. “No. But I can read online articles written by those who do have the degree.”

  “So what’s the cure, Dr. Taylor? If Rachel and I did have…what did you call it? Something to deal with?”

  She didn’t speak immediately, and when she did, her voice was gentle. “Learning to grieve properly.”

  “Grieve, you say?” What did she know about grieving about something like this? Something secret and unacknowledged. “My. So easy. And I’ve been making it so difficult all these years.”

  She stared at him, unimpressed by his sarcasm, but recognizing a confession when she heard one. He looked away.

  “I didn’t say it was easy,” she finally said.

  “Probably because you have no idea what it’s like to give up a kid and then spend the rest of your life regretting it. Wondering where he is. If he is.” He rubbed a hand over the tense muscles on the back of his neck, then dropped it again.

  “You have a child.”

  He didn’t dare look at her. “Maybe. I don’t even know if my son is alive or dead.” He cleared his throat, hoping to keep his voice from getting husky.

  “It was a closed adoption?”

  “Didn’t have a hell of a lot of choice. I asked my old man for help and he told me I’d made my bed and had to lie in it. Famous words from a guy who made his bed, made three kids, then refused to take care of them. I guess he thought I could just write it off, like he did.”

  Layla took a step forward, but must have read something in Justin’s face because she stopped and planted herself there, a few feet away from where he stood.

  “And you know what? I did write it off. I was relieved when Rachel chose adoption.”

  “You were eighteen.”

  “I… All I can tell you is that I abandoned my child. I hate not knowing anything about him. I think about him all the time.”

  “You’re sure it’s a him?”

  “It’s the only thing I do know. Rachel told me that much when she had the ultrasound. It was a closed adoption. We don’t know anything else, won’t be able to find out anything until he’s eighteen and might try to contact us. Or I might try to find him.” No, he’d definitely try to find him. “But what do you say then?” he asked. “How do you explain giving someone up?”

  “That you were young and scared?”

  “What if he has shitty parents? A rotten life? Think ‘young and scared’ is going to cut it?”

  “What if he’s had a great life?”

  “That’s all I can hope for. But not knowing sucks. Hard.”

  Layla pushed her hands into her pockets. “Are you in contact with Rachel?”

  “Haven’t heard from her since she left Reno.” He dropped his head for a moment. “I’ve tried to find her. Through schools and online searches. Nothing.”

  Layla nodded, and he was thankful she didn’t say anything. Didn’t flip a few platitudes about it being for the best or anything like that.

  “Are you ever going to be able to stop beating yourself up over this?”

  “Why would I want to?” he asked coldly.

  “Because ruining your life doesn’t help anyone else.”

  Okay. Maybe he’d been wrong about the platitudes.

  “Thanks, Layla. I’ll keep that in mind.”

  “Yes,” she said with a note of challenge. “You do that.”

  He looked up, ready to tell her that she couldn’t possibly understand, but something in her expression stopped him. Pain. She was hurting for him. Shit.

  “My sisters don’t know. I just couldn’t come up with a way to tell them back then, and after the baby was born, given away, well, it was even harder. So…I didn’t. And I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t, either.”

  “I won’t tell,” Layla said simply. She started toward the door, pausing before she opened it. “But if you ever need to talk…”

  Justin tried to look appreciative—his logical brain knew what she was offering. But the raw, scarred emotional side wasn’t sharing with anyone. “I hope you understand if I don’t take you up on your offer.”

  “I didn’t expect you to,” she said candidly. “Because I think you want to keep punishing yourself. But you don’t have to be alone in this if you choose not to be.”

  “No,” he said, “I will be alone in this.”

  “Because it’s easier than taking a risk?”

  “How in the hell am I supposed to answer that?”

  “There is no answer, Justin. Just a seemingly impossible situation.” Then she opened the door and walked out onto the landing without another word. He watched her disappear down the stairs, chin up, back stiff. Then he closed the door and went back to the sofa.

  FOR THE FIRST TIME in months Justin turned down a cake order, and for the first time ever, it was not because he was overbooked. He turned it down because he was having one hell of a time focusing—on anything.

  His secret was not secret.

  Layla knew. And because of that he felt…ashamed. As if he should have done more, although he wasn’t certain just what he could have done.

  But he could do something now. Maybe if he had some answers, he’d feel better. Whole again. Or as whole as he could hope for.

  He had to do something. Whatever he chose to do couldn’t be any worse than what he’d done up to now.

  Could he tell his sisters?

  He didn’t know. He’d broken trust by not confiding in them, and now… First he’d see if he could get some answers about the child’s well-being, and take it from there.

  He’d discovered from posts on the birth father site that he could send a letter to the adoptive family through the agency that had handled the adoption. They could either respond or not. The ball would be entirely in their court until his kid reached eighteen, but Justin had a deep need to send that letter. Explain to his son why he’d done what he’d done.

  But he couldn’t do that until he found the agency, and the only people who knew the name of it were Rachel and her parents.

  Of the two, Rachel was probably his best bet, but no amount of internet searching using her maiden name had turned her up.

  Justin paced through his condo, kicked a magazine out of his path, then bent to pick it up and slap it on the coffee table.

  Private detective.

  Police detective. His brother-in-law was a police detective.

  Justin stopped pacing, scrubbing a hand over the back of his neck as he considered. Nick would never need to know why. But if he blabbed to Eden, then she’d probably think along the same lines as Layla.

  Couldn’t risk it. Right now it seemed as if everyone was looking into his soul, prodding at his secrets. He opened his laptop and punched “adoptive detective” into a search engine. A few seconds later he had a list. He settled on the sofa and started visiting websites with the heavy feeling that he should have done this long, long ago.

  LESS THAN A WEEK. Five days. That was how long it’d taken the detective to nail down Rachel’s location in Virginia. She’d married young, attended college for two years and then dropped out. So much for her parents’ Ivy League dreams. Her husband was a lawyer and apparently brought in enough for the family to live comfortably.

  Justin had an address and a phone number.

  He did not have the name of the adoption agency, which was what his first objective had been. He’d go with the number.

  His hands literally shook as he punched it into the phone. A girl answered and Justin asked to speak to Rachel.

  “May I say who’s calling?”

  “Uh, yes. Tell her it’s Justin.”

  He’d thought about not identifying himself, trying to trick her into picking up the call, but he was going to be transpare
nt about this entire matter. Aboveboard. All he wanted was the name of the agency so that he could send a letter. After that he’d be out of Rachel’s life forever.

  His heart was pounding as he waited, wondering if she might just sever the phone connection, as she’d severed all other connections. When she answered, her voice was tremulous.