A Father for Danny

by Janice Carter

  “Good for you. Did he say anything about the visit to Harbor House?”

  “He said I must feel bad about my own mother not knowing me anymore.”

  Sam placed a hand on his forearm. “In spite of his often contrary manner, I think Danny is a sensitive boy. Like his father,” she impulsively added.

  Chase put his hand on hers. “Thanks, Sam.”

  The mood was broken by a voice behind them. “Coffee’s ready,” Skye said, “but perhaps you’d prefer wine?”

  “I believe you two have already met,” Sam said.

  “Indeed we have,” said Chase solemnly, his gaze fixed on Skye. “And coffee’s fine with me.”

  Sam wondered if this meeting was a mistake. She was about to suggest opening the wine, after all, when Chase smiled and extended his right hand to Skye.

  “At least now I know whom I’m speaking to,” he said.

  “Oh, I think you were pretty quick figuring that one out before,” Skye said, shaking his hand.

  Sam breathed an inward sigh of relief.

  They settled into the living room with coffee and Skye got right to the point. “Sam’s filled me in on what you discussed with her, Chase. I told her that unless new evidence or information comes to light, the case probably won’t be reopened. So I’m not exactly sure what you two—or the three of us—can do.”

  While Sam appreciated her sister’s frankness, she was annoyed at the negative slant she was giving. “Let’s not rule out anything yet,” she quickly said.

  “Was there anyone else in the company besides this Nancy Wicks who suspected what was going on?”

  Chase shook his head. “It was—and likely still is—basically a small business. There were only a handful of people in the office.”

  “So your uncle and cousins were the only ones really running the business.” She thought for a moment. “It wouldn’t hurt to talk to the Wicks woman.”

  “Wasn’t that already done when the inquiry was going on?” Chase asked, reaching for one of the cookies on the plate that Sam had set on the coffee table.

  To Sam’s surprise, her sister blushed. “I didn’t know about her.” Then she added, “But I should have come back to question you.”

  “Yeah. Maybe it would have all come out right at the time, instead of thirteen years later.”

  There was no sound but the gentle crunch of cookie. Finally Sam could stand it no longer. “Look, there’s nothing to be gained by imagining what might have been or should have been done back then. Let’s work with what we know now.” She looked at Chase. “Would you be able to find Nancy?”

  “If she’s still at the same address, yes.”

  “Then we’ll start with her. Why don’t you confirm her address and we can go see her tomorrow. And, Skye, maybe you could find out if there have been any other inquiries or suspicions about Trade Winds since.”

  “Presumably they’d have been cross-referenced with the old file,” she said.

  “Still, there might be something somewhere.”

  “Maybe.”

  Sam glanced sharply at her sister. She obviously wasn’t pleased at the way things were moving along or simply didn’t like being told what to do.

  “There is one other matter,” Chase said.

  Both sisters looked at him.

  “When I came home two years ago, I found out that my mother had sold her share of the company to my uncle. I know she didn’t get what she ought to have and I argued with my uncle about it, but he basically told me the sale was final. I think my mother had already been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s by then, so…”

  “He took advantage of her,” interjected Sam. “Wouldn’t that make the sale invalid?”

  Skye sighed. “I think Chase would have to hire a lawyer to look into the details. Unless he has definite proof of wrongdoing.” She stood up. “I should go. Mom wants me to go shopping with her in the morning.”

  “Shopping?” Nina’s dislike of shopping was legendary in the family.

  “Yeah, go figure. I think there’s a man in her life.”

  Sam didn’t know if she was more shocked by this revelation than by the fact that Skye, who’d been home only a week, knew before she did. It also made her realize, sadly, how seldom she and her sister communicated.

  She walked her to the door, where Skye leaned forward to whisper, “Don’t forget what we talked about before Chase arrived. His part in this,” she said when Sam frowned.

  “And don’t you forget you promised to do some checking around.”

  “Watch yourself,” was all Skye said, closing the door behind her.

  Seething, Sam headed into the kitchen for the bottle of wine. “Would you like a glass of wine?” she called out.

  “Love to.”

  She spun around to find Chase standing in the doorway. “Heavens, you startled me. Here, you open it while I get the glasses.” She handed him the corkscrew, reached for two goblets in the cupboard above the sink and hastened into the living room. She couldn’t explain why she felt so nervous, but sensed it had a lot to do with her increasing change of mind when it came to Chase Sullivan.

  When he joined her, she was sitting in her chair, leafing through the file again. He sat on the couch. “Thank you,” she said as he poured the wine. “Can you think of anything else we could do?”

  “Hmm, yes, I can.”

  She raised her head. “I…uh…was talking about the case.”

  “Oh.” His gaze didn’t falter.

  Sam knew her face was red, but sipped her wine, pretending she hadn’t caught the nuance in his voice.

  After a moment he said, “Sorry, I didn’t mean that to come out like a bad line in an even worse movie. It’s just that our conversations always have to do with Danny or my past. I was thinking on my way over here that I really know little about you. Certainly not as much as you seem to know about me.”

  She looked straight at him and said, “I agree with you about the first point, but as for knowing a lot about you, I hardly know more than…well, more than my sister.”

  He cocked his head, clearly puzzled.

  “I mean,” she went on, discomfited by his stare, “what I know about you are facts. Things other people know—or could find out. Your history.”

  “My history,” he repeated softly. “Let’s not go there tonight. Tell me about your history—especially with your sister.” He reached for another cookie and settled back into the couch.

  “Not much to tell.” Sam shifted in her chair. “Identical twins raised by a single mother who is also a practising clinical psychologist.”

  “Divorced?”

  “Yep. When we were two. My father couldn’t take the impact of twins on his personal life.”

  “Do you have contact with him?”

  “None at all. I think he made a halfhearted attempt at maintaining contact for the first couple of years, but then he met someone else, started another family and so the story goes.”

  “Maybe it was better that way, being with only one parent, but someone whose love you never had any doubts about.” He folded his arms across his chest, looking disarmingly like a psychologist.

  Sam considered what he said. She’d never really looked at their abandonment by their father that way, but she saw that he was right. Nina had more than made up for a missing parent. “I suppose,” she murmured, drinking more wine and wishing he’d fasten his eyes somewhere else.

  “I gather you and your sister have a…well, I guess you could say a communication problem.”

  Sam’s laugh was derisive. “I guess you could say for sure. We look alike, but we’re very different.”

  He nodded. “That was my first impression when she came into my shop. Now I’m not so sure.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “I noticed when we were talking tonight that you and she seem to have some kind of mental connection. I can’t explain it. She’d say something and your body language signaled a reaction. Then you’d both look at each other at th
e same time. Am I making any sense?” He grinned suddenly, unfolding his arms and relaxing against the cushions. “Maybe it’s a twin thing.”

  “I’ve been edgy around Skye lately, so perhaps that’s what you’re seeing.”

  “Edgy?”

  “We had a falling-out some months ago,” she said dismissively, hoping he’d drop the matter. But no such luck.

  “What about? It’s none of my business, but I’m curious.” He leaned over to refill her wineglass, adding a bit more to his at the same time.

  All of a sudden, Sam found herself wanting to tell him about it. “The story behind the story really goes back to high school,” she said. “When we were in twelfth grade, I was dating a guy I didn’t really like all that much, but at the time, having a date seemed to be more important than who you were dating. My sister and I had this rivalry about, say, who would snag the first date for the monthly school dance, that sort of thing. Anyway, Skye and I had an argument one day about dates and I’m not sure which one of us suggested the idea or maybe it hit us both at the same time—that mental thing we had going, as you said. So we decided that the next time he asked me out, we’d trade places and see if we could fool him.”

  “Ah, the old switcheroo trick,” he said, raising an eyebrow.

  “Yes, and Skye was always a good actor, which is why I think she’s so good at undercover work. Anyway, the poor guy had no idea and was incredibly embarrassed when she finally told all. Especially after a rather heavy make-out session.”

  “Uh-oh.”

  “When she came home that night, we had a laugh about it, but I felt really guilty afterward and apologized to him the next day. He told me very bluntly what he thought of both of us and never asked either one of us out again. But the prank taught me something about respecting other people and I refused to use my twin-hood to play any more tricks again. Not even on our mother—because we’d done that as children. I made Skye promise never to pretend to be me and vice versa.” Sam paused to take another sip of wine.

  “So fast forward to last Christmas. I was engaged to be married to Todd—I’d been dating him for a while and I thought I loved him and he loved me. Skye was living in D.C. then, as she still is. We were all at my mother’s for dinner and I offered to do the dishes. Skye came into the kitchen as I was starting and said she’d take over, that I’d done a lot of the preparation so I should take a break. So I did. I joined my mother in the solarium—it’s across the patio from the kitchen. Todd had gone outside to get something from the car.”

  “I think I’m getting the picture.”

  “It was like a scene in a French farce. Fiancé mistakes twin, kisses the wrong one.”

  “But it was a bit more than a simple kiss,” he said quietly.

  She sighed. “Yes. So much so that I couldn’t forget about it—as my ex so diligently tried to persuade me to do.”

  After a moment, he asked, “And now?”

  Sam smiled. “Now I don’t even know what I saw in him.”

  He smiled back. “But you’re still angry at Skye.”

  “I’m not sure. I thought I was, but maybe I’m more angry at myself. That she obviously saw something in Todd I missed. That worries me.”

  “I gather you haven’t settled the matter with her, then.” He finished the last of his wine and set the glass on the coffee table.

  “No, though I want to. But we both seem to keep skirting around the whole thing. Or we argue about some trivial incident when…”

  “What you really want to say are all the things you never said at Christmas.”

  She nodded. There was nothing more to say. After a few seconds, she quietly asked, “More wine?”

  He looked at his watch. “Thanks, but I should get going. I’ve got an order to finish tomorrow and it’s getting late.”

  She felt a rush of disappointment, hoping her story hadn’t bored him or put him off completely. At the door, he paused and took hold of her hand.

  “Personally I can’t understand how any man could mistake you for your sister.” He pulled her closer, lowered his head and kissed her.

  His lips were soft, but demanded more than a chaste good-night kiss. Sam brought her arms up around his neck and held him against her, giving in to the warm, sweet rhythm of his body pressed into hers. When he pulled away, she sagged into him. He chuckled softly, steadying her with his hands.

  “Thanks for the history, Sam…and for other things I hope to share with you in time. Good night.” He closed the door behind him.

  Sam felt stunned. Her life had just taken a sharp turn in a very unexpected direction. She ran her tongue along her lips, still tasting him. She wanted the sensation to last as long as possible.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  SAM WAS AWAKENED by the buzz of the front door. She shot up, disoriented, and looked automatically at her clock-radio. Nine. In the morning. On Saturday. She groaned and fell back onto the pillow, but the caller persisted. She reached for the phone on her bedside table and connected to the person at the door.

  A muffled voice answered her sharp hello. High-pitched but assertive. When Sam repeated her “Who is it,” the caller shouted, “Danny!” She closed her eyes, wishing she was simply dreaming. She crawled out of bed, threw on a robe and waited, bleary-eyed.

  “It’s Saturday,” she said as she flung open the door. “Aren’t you supposed to be with Chase?”

  He brushed past her, his bad mood hunkering on his shoulders like a raven in an Edgar Allen Poe story. Sam stared speechlessly as he swept through the living room and kitchen, pausing outside the bathroom. Although his eyes darted toward the open bedroom door, he held back, obviously reluctant to cross that particular barrier.

  “Can I ask what the heck you’re doing?” she snapped.

  “Is he here?”

  “Who?”

  “Chase,” he said, looking her straight in the face.

  “And why would he be here?”

  For the first time, Danny faltered. Glancing away, he muttered, “He left a message at Minnie’s to say he couldn’t have me this weekend ’cause he had to finish an order or something.”

  Right. He’d mentioned that last night. “And?”

  His shoulders rose up and down under the oversize hoodie. “I thought maybe he was here, that’s all.”

  “But why would he be here?”

  Danny’s eyes widened, incredulous. “You two were really deep into it the other night when I stayed over. I thought…well…when I heard he was copping out on me, I thought maybe he was with you. You know.”

  Sam knew if she hadn’t been fantasizing about that very you know for part of the night, she’d have been far angrier at the suggestion than she was. She closed the door and moved past him to the kitchen. “Have you had breakfast? Want some orange juice or something?”

  “I’m not hungry and you can’t just change the subject, okay?”

  Sam spun around. “Listen, Danny. You wake me up on a Saturday morning—my sleep-in day—to accuse me of…” she sputtered, “whatever….”

  “Whatever.” He sneered. “Are you—”

  “No, I am not. I know what you were going to ask and although it’s absolutely none of your business and I can’t believe I’m explaining myself to a twelve-year-old boy, I will say once and for all, no. Satisfied?”

  He remained silent, but Sam noticed his stubborn chin relaxing a bit. He averted his face. “I was gonna say ‘dating.’”

  “Yeah, right,” she muttered. Then she caught his eye and grinned. “Why do I feel like my mother just barged in on me?”

  He might have smiled back, she figured, had she used any other word but mother. “I was serious about breakfast, Danny. Let’s have some juice first and then decide what we can cook up.” She went on into the kitchen before he could stop her. By the time she carried two tumblers of juice into the living room, he was slumped, legs sprawled out in front of him, on the couch. He took the juice with a mumble that Sam guessed was a thank-you and she sat acro
ss from him in her chair.

  She sipped her juice slowly, wondering what to say to him. Danny had definitely misinterpreted their quiet talk the other night in the kitchen while he slept—she thought—on the couch. And while her attitude toward Chase had changed drastically in the last week, she was only now beginning to realize that her feelings for him had changed, as well. A single kiss had certainly confirmed that. But it was only a kiss.

  The memory of Skye’s sheepish expression when Sam confronted her at Christmas rose in her mind. It was only a kiss, she’d said, with such dismissal Sam had wanted to strike her. Funny how little I care about that now.

  “So let me get this right. You thought your father and I were dating and that maybe he’d spent the night here.”

  Danny couldn’t meet her gaze. “Yeah,” he muttered into his glass.

  “Well, we’re not and he didn’t. Okay?”

  He shrugged.

  “Anyway,” she went on, imagining there might be a future possibility of that very scenario if his kiss was anything to go by, “would it be so terrible if we were?”

  Danny’s head shot up, his eyes narrowed. “Not terrible for you but maybe for me.”

  “Why?”

  “Oh, forget it. It doesn’t matter, anyway, now that I know what’s what.”

  “But it does matter because I can see you’re upset about it—or about something. Why don’t you tell me what’s bothering you?” She set her glass down on the table and leaned forward in her chair.

  Rather than answer, he concentrated on finishing his juice. When he did, he seemed to drift off, lost in thought, as he ran his fingertip along the rim of the empty glass.

  “Danny?” she prompted, softening her voice. “What is it?”

  He uttered an impatient sigh and looked as if he’d rather be anywhere else. “Now I see how silly it is, but I was thinking, what if you and Chase…you know, liked each other and wanted to get together. And that would be nice, I guess, for you, if it did happen.” He paused. “Even though it won’t, ’cause you’re not dating, anyway.” He stressed the last few words.