by Folsom, Tina
“Let me get the cab for you,” Daniel offered quickly and pulled his wallet from his pocket to pay the taxi driver.
Her mother let her eyes run over Daniel for the first time. An approving smile spread on her lips. “Well, at least somebody here knows how to treat the mother of the bride.”
Sabrina rolled her eyes. It appeared that Daniel had just passed Sabrina on her mother’s list of favorite people. Luckily, Sabrina didn’t care much. At least it would mean her mother would be appeased.
Daniel turned away from the taxi driver, who by the looks of it had received a generous tip, and put his wallet away.
“Mrs. Palmer, I’m Daniel, so nice to meet you.” He stretched out his hand to greet Sabrina’s mother.
“It’s Thorson actually. I took my maiden name after the divorce. But call me Ilene.”
“Ilene, we’re so sorry that we missed your arrival. Cell phone reception can be a bit sketchy around here.”
Daniel tossed Sabrina a conspiratorial look. Cell phone reception was perfectly adequate in the Hamptons. Sabrina smiled back. Daniel knew how to smooth-talk women, and it appeared that her mother had no defenses against his charm. Like mother like daughter.
“How was your trip?” Sabrina asked and reached for her hand luggage, while Daniel took the large suitcase, which appeared to contain not only the kitchen sink but also a ton of bricks if she interpreted Daniel’s facial expression correctly.
“The flight was fine. But honestly, it’s a hassle getting all the way out here from the airport. That train takes forever and stops at every hamlet.”
“For your return flight, we’ll drive you back to JFK,” Daniel offered quickly. “I’m sorry we weren’t able to arrange it this time, but there’s been so much to arrange in the last few days. I just wanted to make sure everything is set for your daughter’s perfect wedding.”
Sabrina’s mother chuckled, directing a coy smile at her future son-in-law. “Well, if you put it that way. Of course I want to make sure everything is perfect for my little Sabrina. Even if that means I’ll have to take a backseat.” She cast Sabrina a suffering look.
Sabrina bit her tongue. Her mother had never taken a backseat to anybody. And she wouldn’t start now. “Thanks, mom,” she said instead.
“Well, let’s get you settled.” Daniel motioned to the front door.
Before they reached it, a red convertible sports car pulled into the driveway, radio blaring. Everybody’s head turned toward it. Sabrina recognized her father’s dark head of hair immediately. Apparently he was still dying it, not being able to accept that he was going gray.
“Well, look at that,” her mother said quietly. “It appears that your father is still in the throes of his midlife crisis.”
Though her mother did have a point, Sabrina put her hand on her forearm. “Please be nice. I don’t want any fight to break out at my wedding.”
Outraged, her mother looked at her. “Don’t tell me that! Tell him! He’s the one who—”
“Please,” Sabrina interrupted. “Just this once. After the wedding you can fight all you want. I promise, I won’t interfere.” She would be on her honeymoon with Daniel and not care about the rest of the world, at least not for those two weeks.
Pasting a smile on her face, Sabrina set the carry-on luggage on the ground and walked to her father, who’d gotten out of the car. He greeted her with open arms, pulling her into a tight embrace.
“Hey, my little girl! Look at you! You’re all grown up now.” He pressed a kiss on her forehead. “Now where’s that man who’s stealing you from me?”
“I believe you’re talking about me, sir,” Daniel’s voice came from behind her.
“Nice to meet you, Daniel. I’m George.”
As the two men shook hands, her father’s gaze drifted past them and fell on her mother.
“I see your mother has already arrived.” He nodded in her direction. “Ilene.”
“George,” her mother responded with the same icy voice her father had employed.
“Where’s your luggage, George?” Daniel asked.
Her father turned toward the trunk of the sports car and opened it. “I’ve only got a small bag.” He tossed a pointed look at the large suitcase and the carry-on luggage of his ex-wife. “I always travel light.”
He lifted the bag out of the trunk and shut it. “But you know, if you don’t have any space in the house for me, I’m fine staying at a bed and breakfast down the road. I drove by a few. I’m sure I’ll find something.”
“Out of the question, Dad!” Sabrina insisted. “Besides, the house has six bedrooms, so it’s perfect. And it’ll make everything so much easier with driving to and fro.”
Her father smiled at her. “Well in that case, I don’t think I can refuse.”
Daniel motioned to the door. “Why don’t we go find my parents? I know they’re excited to meet both of you.” He smiled encouragingly at Sabrina’s mother and took her suitcase.
The front door was unlocked, and Daniel opened it and stepped inside, setting the luggage down in the foyer.
“Mom? Dad?” he called out toward the back of the house.
Sabrina entered with her mother, her father following them.
“Wow, what a huge house,” her mother exclaimed, looking around in awe.
Sabrina had grown up middle class, and their house in Northern California had been very nice, but couldn’t compete with the splendor of the Sinclair’s house. Her parents’ house had been a simple home; Daniel’s parents’ house was a mansion.
“Well, it looks like you’re marrying better than I did,” her mother remarked with a sideways glance to her ex-husband.
Sabrina was saved from commenting, when Raffaela and James appeared in the hallway.
“Oh my god!” Raffaela said, flustered. “We weren’t expecting you today. I’m so sorry. I must have gotten the dates wrong.” She wiped her hands on her apron and rushed toward Sabrina’s mother. “You must be Ilene. The resemblance between you and your daughter is remarkable. And if I didn’t know better, I’d say the two of you are sisters!”
Sabrina suppressed a chuckle when she exchanged a secretive glance with Daniel. Raffaela had a way of wrapping people around her little finger that melted all their defenses in an instant.
As their respective parents exchanged greetings, Daniel pulled her aside and wrapped his arm around her waist.
“Are we okay now?” he whispered into her ear.
She nodded, though she still had doubts. Everybody in the Hamptons knew about the article and thought her to be a call girl. How could she hide this from her parents? And while Daniel’s parents seemed to have accepted his explanation, her own parents might not be as understanding.
She could only hope that Daniel’s efforts to get the newspaper to retract the story and issue an apology would bear fruit. And fast. Preferably before the wedding. Or there would be no guests attending it.
Sabrina understood now why Raffaela was getting all these cancellations. Those guests had read the article and decided that they didn’t want to be associated with the Sinclair family anymore. And the incident in the lingerie store that Paul had rescued her from? The owner of the store had wanted her to leave not because she’d rubbed her cheek against the merchandise, but because she didn’t want a presumed call girl in her establishment. Sabrina was being shunned by the community that held the Sinclair family in such high regard.
Could she really do this to them? Go ahead with the wedding when it meant dragging their reputation into the mud?
Sabrina sighed and prayed silently that the story would be retracted swiftly and her reputation restored—and with it the reputation of her future in-laws. But if it didn’t happen, she had a choice to make.
15
“You can do this,” Holly encouraged her.
Sabrina took a deep breath and forced a smile on her face. She’d never been so nervous in her entire life. “There’s so much happening right now. Maybe this is not the
right time to find out.”
Holly shook her head and opened the entrance door to the brick building, holding it open for her. “Don’t stall. That’s just nerves talking. Now, come, let’s do this together.”
Pushing her shoulders back, Sabrina nodded. “I can do this.”
Then she walked inside and headed for the front desk, Holly by her side. “I’m Sabrina Palmer. I have a ten-thirty appointment with Dr. Chandra.”
“Good morning, Miss Palmer. Your insurance card please.”
Sabrina pulled her insurance card from her purse and handed it to the receptionist.
After the receptionist ticked a name off the list and ran her insurance card through her system, she reached for a clipboard, pinned two forms to it and handed it to Sabrina together with a pen. “Fill these out and bring them back when you’re finished.”
“Thanks.” Sabrina took the clipboard and turned toward the waiting area.
Both she and Holly sat down. While Holly reached for a glossy magazine with celebrities on the cover, Sabrina filled out the questionnaire as thoroughly as she could. Then she handed it back to the receptionist and sat back down.
Holly closed the magazine and leaned closer. “So, what are you gonna name her?”
Sabrina glanced around, looking at the other women in the waiting room and found one of them looking at her. Did this woman recognize her from the picture in the newspaper? Had she read the article? Sabrina sighed. How could she think about babies and a future with Daniel right now when there was so much chaos in her world?
“We don’t even know whether I’m pregnant,” she responded under her breath and looked back at her friend. “It could all be a false alarm. It happens all the time; you miss a period, because you’re under stress. And if anybody is under stress right now, then it’s I.”
Holly put a reassuring hand over hers. “Sweetheart, you need to learn to relax. Maybe I should take you to a spa for an afternoon.”
Sabrina rolled her eyes. “I don’t have time to relax. There’s still so much to do. And now that my parents are here, I have to play referee on top of it. Besides, my mother is still miffed at me for forgetting her arrival day.” She shook her head.
After consulting her cell phone, she’d had to admit that she’d indeed received her mother’s text message apprising her of her earlier arrival. Sabrina must have simply forgotten it. Could this mean that she was really pregnant? She’d once read that a woman’s short term memory suffered during pregnancy. And then there’d been the dizzy spells, and in the mornings she’d occasionally felt a little unwell. She wouldn’t classify it as morning sickness, just a sensitive stomach.
“The way things are right now, I’m not sure I’m ready to be a mother.”
Holly chuckled and shook her blonde locks. “You’ll do fine, and you know it.”
“Still, maybe this is not the best time.” Their gazes locked. “You know.”
Holly nodded.
Sabrina had had a talk with Holly the day she’d found out about the article, after Daniel had told her on the way home from the beach that both Tim and Holly knew about the article. After digging deeper, Daniel had also confessed that his parents were aware of the situation, but that he hadn’t told them the whole story. And once Sabrina had heard the sanitized version Daniel had dished up to his parents, she felt a tiny bit better. At least Daniel’s parents weren’t horrified. They actually thought that the way Tim and Holly had set up their blind date was cute, despite the fact that it was unorthodox. If only they knew the truth!
“Don’t worry, we’ve got it under control,” Holly assured her, leaning closer. “Tim, Daniel and I are working on a few things. Give it another day or two, and we’ll get the newspaper to retract the story and issue an apology.”
“Tell me what you’re doing.”
Holly shook her head, glancing around the waiting room, before looking back at Sabrina. “I can’t. Please, you just have to trust us. I just don’t want you to get all excited. You’ve got enough to worry about right now. Leave it up to the guys and me. We’ll take care of it.”
Sabrina couldn’t keep the frown off her face. “I would be less stressed if I knew what you’re trying to do. At least then I’d have some hope that this . . . this problem will go away. But just knowing that Audrey is behind all this makes me want to throw up.”
Holly patted her hand. “That’s just the morning sickness talking. Don’t worry about Audrey. She’ll get what she deserves. I’ll guarantee it.”
“Your word in God’s ear!”
When the door suddenly opened and brought with it a fresh breeze from the outside, Sabrina turned her head. She was surprised to see a man enter the OBGYN clinic—alone. Had he been a FedEx or a UPS delivery man, it wouldn’t have been unusual, but he wore an outfit that looked like he was about to go sailing.
He walked up to the reception desk and handed the receptionist a small gift bag, then talked to her in a low voice, too low for Sabrina to pick up the words. Though the blush on the receptionist’s face suggested that he was flirting with her. When the phone rang, the girl reluctantly answered it, and the man turned around.
Sabrina’s heart raced. She recognized the man immediately. It was Jay Bohannon, one of Daniel’s friends and one of the members of the Eternal Bachelors Club from which Daniel would be kicked out on his wedding day. Like Daniel’s other friends, he’d apparently driven down from New York a few days prior to the wedding.
Sabrina lowered her face and turned toward Holly, hoping that Jay wouldn’t see her. She didn’t want him to tell Daniel that he’d seen her at an OBGYN clinic, because even if it turned out that Sabrina was pregnant, she didn’t want to tell Daniel until their wedding night.
Holly stared into Jay’s direction, which wasn’t a huge surprise: she liked good looking men like any other living, breathing young woman.
“Yum,” Holly murmured under her breath.
“Don’t look!” Sabrina whispered.
Holly whipped her head to her. “Why not?”
“Sabrina Palmer?” the receptionist suddenly called her name, before Sabrina could answer her friend’s question.
Sabrina jumped up from her chair, her hands nervously brushing out the creases of her summer dress. Jay’s gaze snapped to her, and his mouth twisted into a broad smile.
“Sabrina!” he greeted her, walking toward her.
Sabrina caught the other women staring at her. Great! Now not only would everybody know who she was and connect her to the article in the New York Times, but they would also gossip about her meeting a handsome man at a women’s clinic. What else could go wrong?
“Hi, Jay,” she said hesitantly, stretching out her hand, but instead of shaking her hand, Jay pulled her into a brief hug. Well, he was a Southerner and they had met once before at a birthday party in the city. She couldn’t really push him away without making him think something was wrong.
“Fancy seeing you here,” he said lightly, then winked. “Guess Daniel will have his hands full very soon.”
“Uh . . . ” Sabrina glanced to the physician’s assistant who was waiting patiently at the door that led to the exam rooms.
Jay bent closer and winked at her. “Don’t worry, Daniel won’t hear it from me.” Then he grinned. “That is, if you introduce me to your friend here.” He motioned to Holly.
“Oh, Holly, this is Jay Bohannon, one of Daniel’s friends. Jay, my friend Holly Foster. She’ll be my bridesmaid.”
“Splendid!” Jay bent down to take Holly’s hand to press a kiss on it.
“Miss Parker?” the physician’s assistant called out again.
“Excuse me, please.”
With a last glance at Holly, Sabrina followed the girl and marched into the exam room she pointed out.
16
From the door to their en-suite bathroom, Sabrina watched as Daniel stepped out of the shower and reached for the towel. Drops of water were running down his hairless chest, traversing the ridges of his scu
lpted abdomen and disappearing in the dark thatch of hair that guarded his sex. Even in a relaxed state, his cock was magnificent. Her womb clenched at the thought of feeling him inside her. But this time the sensation was different. Because in her womb their child was growing. With their lovemaking they had created a new life.
When the physician had confirmed the pregnancy, she’d at first not known what to feel and how to react. But as the day had passed, she’d felt the joy about the news grow to monumental proportions. So much so that she wanted to shout it from the rooftops. But she wouldn’t.
This was a piece of news to be treasured. She didn’t want it to be tainted by the trouble the article in the newspaper had caused. No, this news deserved a platform of its own. She wanted to treat this as the gift it was. A gift for both her and Daniel. And there was one special time to share this gift with Daniel: on their wedding night. It would make everything perfect.
“What are you thinking of?” Daniel asked as he wrapped the towel around his lower half, depriving her of the sinful sight.
“Nothing.”
He walked toward her. “It’s your parents, isn’t it?”
She shrugged, glad that he’d guessed wrong. “They are who they are.”
“What went wrong between them?”
Sabrina smiled softly. “You mean what went right between them? Not a lot. I guess they had different ideas of what kind of life they wanted to lead. Mom always wanted to keep up with the Joneses. And Dad couldn’t care less as long as he could hang out with his buddies on Friday night and watch football the entire weekend. Mom wanted more. She used to be a very affectionate woman when I was little. But Dad wasn’t. He just wasn’t the cuddly type. I think Mom craved physical closeness. And he couldn’t give it to her. He wasn’t very demonstrative with his feelings. Don’t get me wrong; they must have had sex. After all, they had me.”
Daniel brushed his knuckles over her cheek. “It’s sad to see how things can go wrong between two people who once loved each other. They did love each other once, didn’t they?”
