by Dani Collins
“Now you’re speculating whose, aren’t you? Those sorts of mental pictures are best not drawn, young man. I usually destroy the evidence and never speak of it again.”
“So it’s not yours?”
“Zack.” She tried to laugh it off, but blushed as thoughts of swimming with L.C. floated across her imagination. “Why would you say that?”
“I heard you and Dad talking on the patio last night, then he went for a walk and came back wet.” He shrugged.
“And I left the kids alone? Sorry to disappoint. He must have seduced one of the seniors into skinny dipping.”
“That’s not as far-fetched as you might think,” he drawled, crouching and leaning to look toward the slurping sound of the clogged suction system.
Mercedes toed off her sandal and dangled her foot in the water. “Bea Faedre has a crush on him.” She also had a halitosis problem and walked with two canes.
“It’s the Fogarty curse. My grandfather warned me about it, but I never expected it to be like this.”
Mercedes didn’t bother hiding her amusement. “Are you saying all the men in your family have this problem of women throwing themselves at them?”
“Guys went after Auntie Paige, too.” He stood and picked up the tail of his shirt, swiping it across his sweating face.
Mercedes swallowed her laughter. “It must be quite a burden for you all.”
“It isn’t for Pops. He loves it. He’s slowing down though, living with a woman in Palm Springs. But Dad says Pops had to leave town to find someone he hadn’t already slept with. Dad tried to show a little restraint at different times, while he was married and when he was with April, but—”
“Who’s April?”
“What? Oh, um...” He looked around as though he’d said more than he’d intended. “She was, uh, they weren’t really married, just living together. It was a few years ago.” He scratched his hair. “You should really ask Dad about her.” With a more serious look, he lowered his hand. “Really. If you and Dad are...anything, you should really ask him about her and...everything.”
Everything?
He didn’t say any more. Looked uncomfortable. Kind of sad, actually. He swallowed and stared into the distance.
Okay. She wasn’t about to pump his son for L.C.’s private business even though the kid had ramped up her curiosity to max levels.
“What about you?” she asked, trying to pretend she wasn’t dying to know about April. “You knocking the girls away? What about Holly? Is she throwing herself at you?”
“No.” His humor returned with a rueful grin. “Not exactly. We text and chat on line, but she doesn’t want her dad to know we’re seeing each other.”
“Are you seeing her?”
“I cycled by her place a few days ago. She was in the yard, washing the car. We talked.”
“And?”
“And nothing. Why do you want to know?”
“I thought that’s what we were doing, being nosy about each other’s love lives.” She swung her leg like a pendulum, spattering gleaming dots on the tiles and his bare feet. “I don’t have one, by the way, so you’ll bear the weight of this conversation.”
“Really? Because I get the feeling you and Dad...” He cocked his head.
“I can’t help myself.” She lifted helpless palms. “It’s the Fogarty charm. But you’re right. Why go for your dad when I could make a play for the younger model?” She lunged forward a step, as if she were going to jump him.
Startled, Zack took a step, missed the edge of the deck and fell sideways, arms windmilling.
Water splashed her legs as Mercedes leapt back, hooting in surprise then doubling over laughing.
“I didn’t do that,” she cried, as he came up for air. “You did that and you needed to cool off anyway, Mr. Thinks He’s Such a Hot Tamale.” She ducked against the fence as Zack swung his arm back.
He didn’t fling water at her, halting the threat as his gaze focused beyond her shoulder. “Someone to see you,” he said, nodding.
Mercedes turned her head, certain he was setting her up, but a man about her own height stood back from the fence, hesitating to approach. He had an expensive look to him that went beyond the pale mustard-colored suit coat he had hooked over his shoulder. His moustache was precision trimmed, his sunglasses the kind racecar drivers wore.
“Mercedes Kimball?” His chin lifted a fraction. She suspected he’d been checking out her legs.
“Yes?”
“I’m David Tichler. Dayton’s father.”
Chapter 15
Her hand shook as she locked up the swimming pool again, leaving the sign in place to explain it was closed for repair. She gave Zack her keys. “If you could have your dad look at it as soon as possible, and maybe, um, grab the kids from Sunday school for me?” She checked her watch.
“Sure.” Zack hesitated and asked under his breath, “Are you okay?”
“I don’t know,” she said just as quietly. “Take them to my place.” She turned to David. “Why don’t I get us an iced tea and we can sit in the shade over there?” She pointed to a concrete table on the cantina patio. The seniors rarely used the hard benches, preferring their own softer lawn chairs beneath the palms.
“Thank you. I’d love something to drink,” David said.
Mercedes fetched the tall, frosted glasses and sat across from him.
“Everyone said it would be hot here, but I figured it was only spring...” He drank deeply. “But it’s hot.”
“It is,” she agreed, noting that Zack’s squelched prints were already gone. “I guess it’s still cool in...New England?”
“We’re in Vermont. I was transferred.”
“Ah.” She drew a line down the melting ice on her glass. “Porsha never really said what you did.”
“How is she?”
Mercedes drew in a deep breath, sitting straighter, smiling an apology for the truth. “I’m not sure. We haven’t heard from her recently. Were you hoping to see her?”
He scratched his hair. “I don’t know what I’m hoping. A social worker called, said she wanted me to arrange my payments to come to you, since you have custody of Dayton. I had business in California...”
She waited.
“It was my wife’s suggestion, actually, that I take this side trip and make sure he was okay. In a good place.”
“Your wife knows about him?” That was news.
“I told her a couple years ago, after our daughter was born. We had fertility problems at first so it—well, that’s what broke us up briefly. That’s how Porsha and I—” He cleared his throat. “I couldn’t tell Laura about him when we were reconciling. It would have killed her. But now, since this call, we’ve talked a lot about him.”
“You want him.” The shocking realization hit and the words came out dead, through numb lips. Her whole body went cold.
Dimly, she was aware of a distant pounding. Rapid footsteps growing louder. Turning her head, she saw L.C. sprint out of the parking lot, a huge crescent wrench in his hand. He paused when he saw her and his chest heaved. Zack came up behind him, still in his wet clothes, his cell phone in his hand.
L.C. held up a hand, warning Zack to stay back, and approached with purpose in his step, his gaze on the man across from her.
David scrambled to his feet. “Who the hell are you?”
“What’s wrong?” Mercedes asked, standing and moving in front of L.C.
He took her wrist and tried to drag her behind his back. “Zack said you were upset because the kids’ dad showed up.”
“Dayton’s,” she said, letting her forehead droop against his sweaty, upper arm. “This is Dayton’s father. A perfectly normal human being.” Unlike some people.
L.C. remained stiff, his hand firm on her wrist.
“It’s all right. Really.” She stroked his arm, peeled his grip from her wrist and pressed her own hand into it, palm to palm. Whispered, “Put down the wrench.”
He linked his fingers th
rough hers and tossed the wrench onto the lawn. “It’s all right,” he called to Zack. “You can go get them.”
Zack nodded and trotted away.
Mercedes tried to reassure David with a smile, but he kept his wary gaze on L.C.
L.C. tugged her forward as he reached for her melted iced tea. “This yours?”
At her nod, he drained it.
David cleared his throat. “As I was saying, I wanted to be sure Dayton was in a healthy situation.” Reprimand puckered his mouth as he raised his brows at Mercedes.
“Or you’ll do what?” L.C. asked, his breath hissing out as he lowered the glass.
Mercedes wiggled her fingers where they were twined with his, seeking release. “Please stop helping.”
“I want to know.” L.C. hung on, swirling the ice cubes.
David squared his shoulders. “Or I’ll take steps to remove him.”
For a long moment, Mercedes thought she might have to hold L.C. back. She stopped fighting his grip and clung.
“Good answer.” L.C. leaned forward to set the empty glass on the tabletop. “Zack said there’s a problem in the pool needs looking at. I’ll be right there if you need me.” He released her hand, picked up his crescent wrench and moseyed away.
God help her, she adored him.
“Who is that?” David asked quietly.
“My handyman.” She laughed privately at that. “We have a pool emergency. In this heat, we can’t have it shut down.” She watched L.C. come up against the locked gate. Before she could call out that Zack had the keys, he scaled the fence, vaulted over, and landed on his feet on the deck inside.
She stifled hysterical giggles, barely. So not the time to fall in love. She cleared her throat. “About Dayton...”
“Yes.” David smoothed the side of his hair. “Porsha never encouraged contact and I never pressed for it. As I said, I was trying to save my marriage. I didn’t realize—” He took off his glasses and cleaned them with a handkerchief. “Well, now that I have my daughter and realize what it means to be a father, what I’m missing.... My wife and I weren’t exactly sure what the situation was here.” And still weren’t, his tone and sliding glance toward L.C. said. “But I’d like to meet my son.”
“Today?” Mercedes reached for the support of the concrete table. Her gaze flickered to the pool where L.C. lay belly down on the deck, head almost touching the water as he peered beneath the overhanging lip.
“He’s on his way home, isn’t he?” David asked. “With that young man?”
“And his little sister, yes.”
“Dayton has a sister? I wasn’t sure. When you said ‘kids,’ I thought you might mean your own.”
“No,” Mercedes murmured and stifled a wistful sigh. “Porsha has a daughter. Ayjia.” She lifted her head to regard David. “What should I say to her, do you think, when she asks why her daddy hasn’t come to meet her today?”
She wasn’t asking, just venting the question that instantly tore a hole in her chest.
David stopped polishing his glasses. He set the glasses on his nose and tucked the handkerchief away with slow care. “I’m here with the best possible intentions.”
Mercedes believed him, but anger still rose up. Resentment and an intense, helpless sadness. “And you want to know whether Dayton is in a healthy situation. No. He’s not. Not really. Neither of them are. Their mom is—” She lifted a hand, at a loss. “Porsha is Porsha. She doesn’t always make good choices. But to lay this—you—on both of them, on top of what Porsha is doing? I can’t. And I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but don’t imagine for a second that I’ll let you have Dayton. I can’t split them up. It wouldn’t be right.”
David tucked his hands into his pockets. His cheeks sucked into hollow planes. “I understand.”
She eased her grip on the edge of the table, only realizing as the dull pain faded that she’d been trying to penetrate solid concrete with her fingernails.
“I’ll talk to Porsha about it,” she offered. “When things are back to normal. I’ll ask her to explain you to the kids.” Like there was a way to make them understand. “I’m not saying you should never meet him. Just not right now.”
David nodded, accepting her verdict. His respect for her decision got to her the way protests and head-on insistence wouldn’t have. He really did have Dayton’s best interest at heart.
“If you have an email or something, I could send you some photos,” she offered.
“Would you? I look at Porsha’s profile sometimes, but she doesn’t post many photos of him.”
Her newsfeed was mostly party shots, Mercedes knew. But the way David perked up, like a dog hearing the can opener, made her feel like an absolute, heartless bitch for not letting him meet Dayton. He would probably be very good for the boy. Just not right now. Not good for Ayjia.
“Of course. I have hundreds. I’ll send some tonight.” She accepted his card.
“Thank you.” He shook her hand and covered it with his empty one, warm and sincere.
“My pleasure.” She smiled until she heard the sound of a bicycle bell. Her heart dropped as Dayton flew out of the parking lot and skidded his bike to a stop beside the pool. “Hey, L.C. Is it fixed yet? I’m hot!”
Mercedes only caught a glimpse of David’s riveted expression before Ayjia distracted her.
“Auntie M, Auntie M!” Ayjia wobbled over on her bike, still dinging her bell. “I have to show you!”
Zack trotted alongside her, ready to catch her as she worked at mastering her lack of training wheels.
“There and back,” Mercedes said to Zack with a sugary smile. “Good job, as always.”
“I tried to keep them at the house, but she was too excited.”
“About what?” Mercedes asked the little girl.
Ayjia toppled her bike and rushed over. “Look, look!” She smiled to show her teeth and the gap on the bottom at the front.
“There’s a hole in your face.” Mercedes cupped the girl’s cheeks and felt a sudden urge to cry. She hadn’t known any of her teeth were loose. “I remember when that tooth came in. You cried non-stop for a week and then boom, there it was and you had the longest nap of your life.”
“It came out in a marshmallow! Mrs. Kilarny wrapped it in a tissue and Zack carried it home and it’s in his pocket. He says if we put it under my pillow when it’s time for bed, the tooth fairy will come.”
“Tooth fairy forgets,” Dayton said, standing on his pedals to cross the courtyard. “Come on, Ayjia. The pool’s still broken. We’ll have to play in the sprinkler like Zack said.” His gaze lifted briefly to David’s, then he turned his bike and would have started off again, but Mercedes stopped him, praying she had read David right.
“Dayton, come say hello to David. He wants to meet you. Maybe you can tell him how Sunday School went today.”
“And me?” Ayjia asked, leaning into Mercedes’s legs and tilting up her head. “Does he want to meet me, too?”
“Of course, hon.” Mercedes brushed Ayjia’s hair out of her eyes, aware of David swiping his hand on his thigh then crouching to hold it out to Dayton, offering to shake.
“I’m Jewish so I never went to Sunday School. What’s it like?”
“I hate it, but Auntie M says we have to go.” Dayton ignored the extended hand. “But I’m Jewish, aren’t I?” he asked Mercedes. “So how come I have to go?”
“You’re half Jewish,” she told him, silently pleading with David to stay silent.
“I’m Ayjia.” The little girl stepped forward, back arched, hand out. “I don’t mind shaking.”
“No, of course you don’t. You’re practically all grown up, having lost a tooth and everything,” David said with a catch in his voice. He gently shook her hand, giving her his attention despite the fact he obviously wanted to devour his son.
“I’ve lost three,” Dayton said. “And the tooth fairy always forgets. Mom just gives me a quarter. Come on, Ayjia.”
“Will you go
with Dayton, please?” Mercedes asked. “I’ll come down in a minute to help with your suit, okay?”
“‘kay.” Ayjia skipped to where Zack righted her bike. He gave her a nudge to get her started and she pedaled like crazy to catch up to the vanishing Dayton.
Zack followed at a jog, halting when L.C. said, “Hey.”
L.C. had been on his feet, watching while David spoke to the kids, but now looked ready to go back to pool repairs. “Set it up on the far side of the road, so they’ll be in the shade.”
Zack gave L.C. a thumb’s up and carried on.
“Thank you,” she said to David. “I know that must have been hard for you.”
“I have a photo from when I started school. It looks just like him. Just exactly like him.” The way his voice rasped, she thought he might be on the verge of tears behind his sunglasses.
“He started baseball yesterday. I’ll take some photos of his first game.”
“Thanks.” He picked up his jacket from the bench, closing his fist around it. “I’d really appreciate it if you’d stay in touch. Really.”
“I will. And I’m sorry. But you can see, can’t you, that right now all they’ve got is each other?”
“And you.” His mouth kicked up at the corner. With a nod toward the pool, he added, “And the pit bull.”
L.C. was flat on the floor, leveling the washer when he heard a knock on the back door. He ignored it, but it slid open a second later.
“L.C.”
Mercedes. He extended the leg on the right front another quarter inch, ignoring the way just the sound of her voice could make him tingle all over.
“Where are you?”
She came to the door of the laundry room like a gust of wind, restless and whirling, stirring him into heightened awareness.
“Dayton doesn’t want special help from Mrs. Garvey. Apparently she needs a really big fart so she can relax.”
“Did he overhear that? He wasn’t supposed to. And it was only because of the way her apology read.”
“You don’t think she was sincere?”
“Well—” He did, actually, and was still so dumbfounded he had been avoiding the woman, feeling weirdly self-conscious about the whole thing.
