Abby moved off the desk and came around to stand between his legs. “You weren’t to blame for the disintegration of their marriage, Tad.” She put her arms around him and tilted her face up to his. “Just like I wasn’t to blame for the disintegration of my parents’ marriage.”
Tad wished he could believe that. He released the breath he’d been holding. “All I know is that I never want to feel like that again. Like my actions—deliberate or otherwise—robbed someone I love of the life they were meant to have or should have had.”
Abby paused. “Is that the way your parents felt?”
Tad shrugged and forced himself to be ruthlessly honest. “I think my parents resented me for not being able to protect Billy. I know I blame myself.” And always will. “I was faster than he was, older, more experienced. If it had been me bringing up the rear, I could have gotten myself out of the way. Him, too, probably.”
Tears flooded Abby’s eyes as they both thought about what a profound impact all this had had on his life. “You don’t know that,” she protested.
“Yeah, I do,” Tad said sadly, briefly closing his eyes. He pointed to his heart. “In here I do.” He paused, still struggling with his emotions. With effort he pulled himself together. “Anyway, seeing the bikes in the living room brought it all back.” The muscles in his jaw tensed.
Abby stepped away slightly and looked up at him. “I’ll get rid of them tomorrow,” she promised.
Tad touched a hand to her hair, burying his fingers in the silky softness. “I’d appreciate it.” He drew a long breath and looked deep into her eyes. “I can’t go back there, Abby.”
“I understand.” Abby caught his hand and kissed it.
A thoughtful silence fell between them.
“Sadie really understands how you feel about all this, doesn’t she?” Abby asked finally. “I mean, even if you haven’t discussed it.”
“Yeah. She knows me pretty well.” As Tad thought about his aunt, his mouth crooked up in an affection-laced smile. “That’s one of the reasons I wanted to come back to Blossom to finally settle down—so I could be near Aunt Sadie. We’re all the family each of us has now. Aside from you and me and the baby,” Tad amended hastily. “I wanted to build something real and lasting. I wanted to build the kind of life my parents and I might have had together if only we’d dealt with Billy’s death and the subsequent emotional fallout at the time. Because I know now that nothing is ever gained by putting off the inevitable or the painful.”
“I agree.” Abby thought of her parents’ many divorces, and the long-drawn-out falling-apart period that preceded each one. She sighed and linked hands with Tad again. “When it comes to something like that,” she agreed firmly, “procrastinating only makes it all the harder.”
“EVERYTHING OKAY with you and Tad?” Sadie asked Abby at work the next day.
Abby nodded and confided to Sadie with relief, “We had a serious talk last night.” She leaned forward to kiss Tad’s aunt on the cheek, wordlessly thanking her for what she’d done to bring the two of them together. “I understand everything now.”
“Good.” Sadie smiled and gave Abby a brief motherly hug in return. “He’s needed to talk to someone for a long time. I’m glad it was you.”
Before either could say anything else, the front door opened and Tim Grau, the owner of the Mighty Fine Restaurant walked in. Though he’d cleaned up the kitchen and managed once again to get an A rating from the health department, his business had been struggling since the salmonella outbreak in the summer. “Can I help you?” Cindy asked from behind the advertising counter.
“I’d like to talk to Tad.”
Tad came out of his glassed-in office just behind the bullpen. He shook Tim’s hand as if no ill words had ever passed between them. “What’s up?”
Tim’s cheeks reddened slightly as he met Tad’s eyes. “You know that idea you had last summer about me going the community-service route, instead of trying to sweep the scandal under the rug? Well, if the offer’s still open, I’m ready to try it now. It’s either that or close up shop altogether. So I’ll host free classes on safe food preparation at the restaurant if you all will write it up in the newspaper.”
Tad grinned. “The next issue soon enough for you?” he drawled.
While the two men went into Tad’s office to work out a publicity schedule for the event, Abby went back to work editing the article on fall tree planting. She was almost finished when a phone call came in for her. Listening, she could barely contain her excitement. “No, tomorrow afternoon will be fine. Yes, thanks.” She hung up the phone.
“Tomorrow will be fine for what?” Tad asked. He’d just shown Tim Grau out and was heading back to his office.
Abby drew a deep breath. “That was the headhunter I hired. Chicago Living magazine wants to interview me for a job as the Home Decorating editor. I’ve got an appointment set up for tomorrow afternoon. They’re leaving an airline ticket for me at the Asheville airport.”
The mixed emotions Abby half expected Tad to manifest never came. “Wow, that’s great,” Tad said, as the other staff looked on in confusion.
Yes, it was great, considering how long and hard she’d worked to make a career for herself in the magazine-publishing world, so why wasn’t she feeling a lot more excited? Abby wondered.
Aware of all eyes on her, she forced a smile and went on to reassure Tad brightly, “It’s okay for me to fly, by the way. I asked Dr. Ellison, and he said it was okay through the seventh month. And since I’m only six and a half months along...” Abby shrugged.
Tad nodded and everyone else went back to work. “Are you going to spend the night?” he asked.
“Yes. They’ve arranged for a hotel.” And maybe that was a good thing, Abby thought. Maybe that would give her time to think.
Tad touched her shoulder and kissed her cheek. His eyes were filled with kindness and understanding. “I wish you the best of luck,” he said, really seeming to mean it.
“Thanks,” Abby said softly. She pushed away an unexpected twinge of hurt. Tad was only being supportive and following the agreement they’d established at the outset of this pregnancy, Abby told herself firmly. He was not—as everyone else around her erroneously seemed to think—practically shoving her out the door.
“SO HOW’D IT GO?” Tad asked as he met Abby at the gate upon her return from Chicago two days later.
Abby made no effort to hide her disappointment. “Not well. I knew the minute they saw me and realized I was pregnant that I wasn’t going to get the job.”
“They didn’t know you were pregnant before you went?”
“The headhunter neglected to mention it,” Abby said dryly. “She said it shouldn’t have made any difference to them if they were really interested in my work. And she’s right. But you and I both know how things sometimes work in the real world. Some employers think pregnant women are not to be counted on.”
“I’m sorry.” Tad enveloped her in a comforting hug. He pressed a kiss into her hair. “I know you’ve been wanting to get back into magazine editing.”
“Yes, well—” Abby shrugged “—it’s probably for the best, anyway. Looking at the way the magazine was structured, I don’t think I would have been a good fit for that job in any case.” She just wished she hadn’t had to go all the way to Chicago and spend a night alone in a hotel room, away from Tad, especially if their time together really was—as it appeared—drawing to an end.
Tad helped her collect her suitcase at the baggage claim, then walked her out to the parking lot. “How do you feel? Was the traveling hard on you?”
“Not at all.” Abby waited for him to unlock the Jeep. “I feel fine, really. Physically I’m in great shape.”
It was how she felt emotionally that was the problem. She was relieved and depressed simultaneously. Tad and the baby were beginning to mean so much more to her than her career. Knowing that her career was the one thing that had always sustained her, through good and bad times, she cou
ldn’t help feeling that letting go of that ambition was almost an invitation to disaster.
And she continued to feel that way all that evening and into the next day. So much so that it was a relief when Tad surprised her by nixing dinner with her to go hang out at the local tavern for a bit and watch the Duke versus UNC football game on the big-screen TV.
Maybe, Abby thought pensively, a little irked to be ditched for a night out with the guys, another night apart was exactly what she and Tad needed.
“WELL, DON’T YOU LOOK like you just lost your best friend,” Doc Harlan said to Tad as he made room for him at the table where he was sitting.
“I second that!” Sonny remarked as he walked by, a plate of nachos in one hand, a beer in the other. “After the way you carried on while she was out of town, acting lonesome as all get-out,” Sonny teased, “I thought you’d be home with Abby tonight, cuddling like crazy.”
If only he could have been, Tad thought, as he reached for a handful of peanuts and began to shell them one by one. “Sadie’s got that surprise for her tonight, remember?”
“Oh, yeah. Cindy whispered something about it before she left the office.” Still chuckling, Sonny headed on over to the table where the just-out-of-college kids were sitting. “Enjoy your freedom!” Sonny called over his shoulder. “You sure won’t get much of it after your baby’s born.”
“That what has you feeling so blue?” Doc asked. He called the waiter over and ordered a plate of buffalo wings and a pitcher of beer. “The impending lack of freedom?”
Tad shook his head. He explained about the job interview, concluding miserably, “To be perfectly honest, I feel like I cost Abby the Chicago job. If it weren’t for the pregnancy, which as you have probably figured out by now wasn’t exactly planned...” Tad trailed off as a frosty pitcher of beer was put on the table. He poured a glass for Doc and himself.
Just then, UNC scored the first touchdown of the evening. Doc—a UNC med-school grad himself—signaled a thumbs-up, then waited for the backslapping and high fives to subside before responding to Tad. “Has Abby been complaining about being pregnant?”
“No.” Tad studied the bottom of his glass.
Doc broke open a peanut shell and shook two nuts out into the palm of his hand. “Does she seem at all unhappy about it?”
“Well, no,” Tad said as he, too, reached for a peanut and broke it open.
“Because she’s always seemed really happy about it to me,” Doc concurred.
“She is very happy about the baby,” Tad said quietly. “We both are.” Deliriously so.
Doc paused, clearly wanting to understand, as their family physician and a friend. “Then...?”
Tad drew a breath. Damn it all, he hated feeling guilty. He’d lived a certain way all his adult life because he’d never wanted to be responsible for anyone’s unhappiness and loss again, and yet here he was, up to his neck in soul-deep regret! He scowled. “It’s just that, career-wise, for Abby, the timing couldn’t be worse,” he grumbled.
“Let me tell you something, son,” Doc said as he refilled their glasses with beer. “My first two kids were born while I was in medical school.”
“That must’ve been rough.”
Doc grinned and nodded. “It was. I was working ungodly hours at the time. We were five hundred miles from either set of grandparents. And half the time, because I was at the hospital so much, my wife had to be mother and father both to our babies. But we learned something important from all that, Tad, something I’ve never hesitated to share with my patients and my own kids, as well. Babies don’t always come along at the best time, but once they do come along, you realize it is the best time.”
Doc gave Tad a moment to think about that, then slapped him on the back and continued compassionately, “This is all going to work out for the best, Tad. You’ll see. Once that baby is here, Abby’s not going to want to be anyplace but right here in Blossom with you.”
Tad hoped like heck that was so.
He didn’t know what he would do if Abby did move on and they ended up commuting and splitting custody of their child, as previously agreed.
“WELL, WHAT DO YOU think?” Sadie asked after they’d said goodbye to the last guest and Abby had returned to the living room to admire Sadie’s gift to her, Tad and the baby. “Did I or did I not pull off the biggest surprise thus far in your pregnancy?”
Aside from the actual conception? And the fact that every day she was falling more and more in love with her husband?
“You did great, Sadie.” Abby hugged her. Returning home from work that evening, sans Tad, Abby had walked into the house to a chorus of “Surprise!” and more gifts and good wishes than she could have imagined. In fact, hours later, she was still reeling from the enormity of it all. Not to mention the timing. Sadie had told her the shower wouldn’t be till well after Christmas, just to throw her off.
“I was completely bowled over both by the party and your gift to us,” Abby told Sadie gratefully. She leaned forward to give the diminutive older woman a hug. “The cradle is just...well, it’s incredible.”
Sadie smiled and hugged her back. “It’s a family heirloom. I always thought I’d be using it for my own children, but it didn’t turn out that way, largely because I kept waiting for everything to be perfect, and that kind of guarantee—the guarantee I wanted and needed at that time—never came.” Sadie paused to pick up some plates while Abby did the same.
“Consequently the chance to have a baby of my own passed me by. Although I did have children in my life, lots of them, in my teaching and in my nephews—Tad and his brother, Billy.”
“And now you have Raymond,” Abby said gently, knowing from having seen them together how much the two were beginning to mean to each other.
“Yes, I do. And I love him with all my heart.”
“Are you going to marry him?”
Sadie released a shaky breath. “To be perfectly honest, I don’t know. If it wasn’t for the nine-year age difference, I probably would.”
Abby carried another stack of plates into the kitchen. “You’re not going to let that stop you!”
Sadie smiled. “From loving him, no. From the possibility that he might have to spend a lot of his best years nursing me through the vagaries of old age, probably, yes.”
“Oh, Sadie—”
Sadie raised a quelling finger, then, as the two of them began to load the dishwasher, said, “Now don’t you feel sorry for me, Abby Kildaire McFarlane. Raymond and I have lots of good times ahead of us, not to mention a soon-to-arrive litter of the most unusual puppies.”
Abby thought about Buster and Belle. The two dogs had become as close as their masters. Abby grinned. “I’ll bet those puppies are going to be cute as can be.”
“I bet they will, too.” Clearly torn between speaking her mind and not interfering, Sadie finally said, “I know you’re feeling uncertain. Your marriage to Tad and the baby happened awfully fast. But that doesn’t mean you should value either any less.”
“Value what any less?” Tad asked, coming in through the back door. He’d walked home in the brisk November air. His cheeks were flushed, his hair wind-blown. As he shrugged out of his jacket and came close enough to give Abby a kiss, he smelled wintry and sexy and wonderful.
“You.” Abby grinned, enjoying the feel of the possessive arm he’d wrapped around her, and snuggled against him. “And the baby.”
“I was lecturing,” Sadie confessed with a twinkle in her eye. “One of the results of being a teacher for so long, I’m afraid. I feel duty bound to point out the meaning of all manner of things.”
Abby took Tad by the hand. “Come on. I want to show you what our friends and neighbors gave us.”
Later, after Sadie had left and Yvonne retired to her own room, Tad insisted he lock up while an exhausted Abby went on to bed. He found her in the bedroom, clad in her nightgown, pacing and rubbing her lower back. “Problem?”
“Just the normal aches and pains of pregn
ancy. My back aches after I’ve been sitting for long periods of time,” she explained.
“Maybe a back rub would help,” Tad suggested.
Willing to do just about anything to ease the discomfort, Abby lay on her side on the bed while Tad went to get her favorite skin lotion. “So what was Sadie really lecturing you on?” he asked as he kneaded the tension from her muscles with hands as warm and soothing as a hot bath.
Abby closed her eyes, loving the feel of his hands on her skin. It was one of many things that she would really miss if they ever parted. “She thinks I’ve got one foot out the door of this marriage,” Abby reported reluctantly.
Tad stopped what he was doing momentarily, then resumed his kneading with slow heavenly strokes. “Do you?”
Abby tried not to wince at the lack of emotion in his voice. “I can’t help but feel skittish, Tad,” she confided honestly. Aware the ache in her back was gone—to be replaced by one in her heart—she broke free and rolled to face Tad. He looked as if he felt as confused as she did about everything and yet wanted to understand. “After seeing my mother marry and divorce five times, my father marry and divorce six, I feel like I know all the warning signs of a marriage in distress and little else,” Abby told him softly. “I don’t want our baby to suffer through even one marital breakup.”
Tad nodded. “Can’t disagree with you there.”
“On the other hand—” Abby sighed regretfully “—I don’t know anything about the normal happy all-American family you see on TV, either.”
Tad rolled her away from him once again. “We’re doing fine, Abby.” His hands worked magic as they kneaded down her spine. “Between the two of us we’ll figure it all out.”
Abby didn’t know if it was hormones or what, but suddenly she was near tears as he began working his fingers across her shoulders and down her right arm. “There’s so much more to it than that.”
Make Room for Baby Page 15
