The Chesapeake Diaries Series 7-Book Bundle: Coming HOme, Home Again, Almost Home, Hometown Girl, Home for the Summer, The Long Way Home, At the River's Edge

by Stewart, Mariah

  “Oh, my, that is tasty.” Berry smiled broadly. “You never steer me wrong, Steffie. I’ll have a scoop of that in a sugar cone.”

  “Coming right up.” Steffie made the cone and passed it over.

  That left one person in the party still waiting to be served. Must not react, she cautioned. Must not let him know how rattled I am to see him. Must not act like it matters to me that that kid just called him Daddy.

  She took a deep breath and met Wade’s eyes as he stepped up to the counter. “Wade?”

  “How are you, Stef?”

  “I’m good. Yourself?”

  “Good.” He nodded.

  “Good. So, then, we’re both good. Now what can I get for you?” she asked with all the nonchalance she could muster. Just another customer, she told herself. He’s just another customer.

  “I guess I’ll have the same as you gave the boys. The chocolate stuff.”

  “Bowl? Cone?” she asked.

  “Cone’s good.”

  She kept her eyes averted from his until she completed his order and handed it to him. She lifted the cone over the counter and looked directly into his eyes without saying a word.

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.” She looked away for a moment, then looked back.

  He appeared about to say something else, but she didn’t give him the chance. What was there to say, she reasoned, after the little guy said “Daddy”?

  “Claire is at the cash register. She’ll ring you up.” She smiled her best smile then turned her attention to the man waiting in line behind Wade. “What can I get for you?”

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Wade hesitate, then move on to the cash register. She concentrated on her customer, then on the next one, and the next, until Wade and his family made their way to the door. She didn’t look up until she heard the bell ring, then stole a peek just in time to see his tanned arm pulling the door closed behind him.

  She took a deep breath, ignored the stab to her heart, and fixed a smile. “I can help the next person in line …”

  “He has a what?”

  Vanessa Keaton sat back on the sofa cushion, a puzzled expression on her face. If she’d been perturbed by Steffie’s late-night ringing of her doorbell, she gave no sign. After all, she and Stef were best friends, and as such, certain privileges were automatically granted.

  Besides, Stef had brought ice cream, several cartons containing the little bits left over at the end of the day.

  “A little boy. He looks like he’s about two, maybe younger. Tough for me to tell. I’m not around kids very often.” She dipped a spoon into the carton of pineapple macadamia fudge ripple. “Except, of course, the kids who come into the shop. But I never ask them how old they are.”

  “He has a son? Are you sure it’s his?”

  “Austin—that’s the little boy’s name—called Wade ‘Daddy.’ And when Wade picked him up, he said, ‘Daddy’s here,’ or something like that. Anyway, it was pretty damned clear that he’s the daddy.”

  “Who’s the mommy?” Vanessa peered into the carton, found it empty, and tossed it into the plastic trash bag she’d brought into the room for just that purpose.

  “That would be the big question.” Steffie shook her head. “I have no idea. But do I feel like the biggest idiot on the planet.”

  “Why should you? You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “Oh, no. Just sort of crawled all over him at your brother’s wedding a few months ago.”

  “I seem to recall he was doing an equal amount of crawling,” Vanessa pointed out. “So if anyone should feel like a jerk, it should be him.”

  Steffie snorted. “Guys don’t generally regret crawling.”

  “Seriously. Let’s look at the facts.” Vanessa repositioned herself on the sofa, her legs tucked under her. “Would you hand me the apple pecan if you’re finished with it?”

  Steffie passed the carton.

  “He knew that he was …” Vanessa scooped up a spoonful of ice cream. “What is he? Is he married?” She licked the spoon. “You don’t suppose he’s been married all this time, do you?”

  Steffie shook her head. “Wade can be a jerk, but I’ve never known him to be, you know, sneaky. Dishonest. Immoral.” She paused. “I’ve never known him to be that kind of a jerk. The kind of jerk who’d romance one woman while being married to another.” She took the carton back from Vanessa. “Then again … there is Austin.”

  “Maybe he and the baby’s mother were married at some point but are divorced now. Or maybe they never married. Maybe the baby was an accident. Maybe she—whoever she is—got pregnant by accident and decided to keep the baby. Then Wade, being a jerk though not an immoral one, would want to do the right thing if he was the father. He’d want to, you know, be a real father, don’t you think? He’d want to be part of the child’s life, right?”

  “I honestly don’t know what to think. Except that he’s known all along that he had this child and was obviously in a hitherto unknown-to-me relationship of some sort with someone else and yet spent hours priming me for a long night of bliss, which he then denied me of by leaving to catch a plane back to Texas.” Steffie began to steam all over again. “Back to Austin and his mommy.”

  “What is Grant saying?”

  “What?” Steffie frowned, her spoon stopped midway between her mouth and the carton.

  “Grant? Your brother?” Vanessa’s foot poked at Steffie’s. “The guy who is hot and heavy with Wade’s sister?”

  Steffie reached into her pocket, took out her cell phone, and speed-dialed a number. “If he knew about this all along and he didn’t tell me, I will kill him. What’s the word for it? Fratricide?”

  Steffie tapped impatient fingers on the phone.

  “He’s not picking up. Coward. I’ll bet he knows that Wade is here with this baby and that I’m going to find out about it and that I’m going to be pissed off.” She listened for a moment, then left a message for her brother. “All right, smart-ass. Want to tell now me why you didn’t bother to tell me before that Wade has a son?” She ended the call.

  “What’s the baby look like?” Vanessa placed another empty carton into the bag. “Is he cute?”

  “He is beyond cute,” Stef admitted. “Dark curly hair, big dark eyes.”

  “Really? Huh, that’s interesting,” Vanessa noted. “The MacGregors are all so fair.”

  “Maybe the baby’s mom is Italian or something. I’d be tempted to say Wade’s ‘baby mama,’ but I really hate that expression.” Steffie tossed her empty carton into the bag with Vanessa’s.

  “Me, too.”

  They sat in silence for a moment.

  “I think maybe he married this baby’s mother, Ness.”

  “Well, like I said before, they could be divorced. He didn’t have anyone with him at Scoop, right?”

  “She could have stayed back at the house. Oh, shit. Maybe she’s here in St. Dennis.” Stef picked up a throw pillow and held it over her face. “Everyone in town saw Wade and me together at Beck’s wedding. Everyone knows I have had the hots for him all my natural life. This is so humiliating, I could just—”

  Her pocket began to ring. She glanced at the caller ID before answering.

  “Grant? Are you prepared to spill everything you know? Because if not, prepare to die.”

  “Stef, I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about,” her brother told her. He sounded weary, but that wasn’t going to stop her from interrogating him.

  “Wade? Your honey’s brother?”

  “I know who Wade is, Stef.”

  “I want to know everything you know about this baby.”

  “What baby?”

  “Wade’s baby. Stop playing with me, Grant. It’s not funny.”

  “Stef. I’m tired, I drove for twelve hours straight today to take my daughter back to her mother in Ohio. I just dropped her off a couple of hours ago, and right now I feel like the sky is falling, okay? So don’t jerk me around. Just t
ell me what you’re talking about because I swear I don’t know.”

  “Oh, shit, that’s right. You took Paige back today.” Steffie winced. How could she have forgotten that he’d driven his daughter back to her mother—Grant’s ex-wife, Krista—so that Paige could start the school year after having spent the entire summer in St. Dennis? “I’m sorry. I know how much you wanted to keep her here, and I know how badly she wanted to stay.”

  “Yeah, so have mercy, okay, and tell me what this is all about.”

  She told him.

  “Are you sure the boy called Wade ‘Daddy’?”

  “Yes.”

  “Stef, I don’t know anything about this. I swear.”

  “Dallas didn’t tell you?”

  “I haven’t talked to her tonight. I left voice mail on her cell phone earlier, but you know her. Half the time she doesn’t even look at her phone unless she’s waiting for a business call. But Wade wasn’t there when I left yesterday, and she didn’t mention him at all last night, not even that he was coming home.”

  “Well, when you hear from her, will you find out what’s going on so you can tell me?”

  “Yeah, but I have a hard time believing that she wouldn’t have told me if Wade had a son. I think there’s some mistake.”

  “Yeah, well, when you figure out what it is, give me a call, okay?”

  “Sure.”

  “And, Grant?” Stef bit her bottom lip. “I’m really sorry about Paige. Was she all right? About going back, I mean?”

  “If you call not speaking to me once we crossed the Pennsylvania border into Ohio being ‘all right,’ then yeah, she’s fine with it.”

  “I’m really sorry.” She added, “I’ll miss her, too.”

  “Anything else, Stef? ’Cause I’m beat, and I want to get some sleep before I start the drive back in the morning.”

  “No, that was it.” She felt compelled to apologize one more time. “I’m sorry, Grant.”

  The call ended and she tossed the phone onto the sofa cushion and covered her face with her hands.

  “I am shallow beyond all belief. I got so caught up in my own little drama that I forgot about Grant driving Paige back today. He should never speak to me again. I am a colossal … I can’t even think of anything bad enough.”

  Vanessa rolled up a paper napkin and tossed it at Steffie, bouncing it off her head.

  “Fine. You’re the worst person ever born. Get over it.” Vanessa went into the kitchen and retrieved another carton from the freezer. “Plum tart.” She held up the carton. “I love it when you bring leftovers.”

  She took her seat again. “Look, Stef, if you’d realized that Grant was in Ohio and had just dropped off Paige and didn’t care about anyone’s feelings but your own, then yes, you would be a total bitch. But you didn’t, and Grant knows that you didn’t, so let it go.”

  “But I should have remembered something that important.” Steffie picked up the napkin and dropped it into the bag with the empties. “I was only thinking about myself.”

  “You’re allowed to do that sometimes, you know. Besides, you must have been really surprised when Wade came in with the kidlet.”

  “Shocked is more like it.”

  “I take it Grant didn’t know about Wade’s son, either.”

  Stef shook her head. “He said Dallas has never mentioned it—which is really odd, when you come to think about it. But he didn’t talk to her today. He left voice mail for her but hasn’t heard back yet.”

  “Strange that Dallas wouldn’t have told Grant something like that.” Vanessa appeared to ponder. “You’d almost think she didn’t know, either. But nah, Wade wouldn’t have kept something like that from his sister for two years, would he?”

  “I don’t know. I used to think I knew him pretty well. But now …” Steffie shrugged.

  “You’ve known Wade for a long time, right?”

  “Forever, it seems. He used to sail with Grant at the marina. They were on the same team for the races. I’ve had a crush on him since I was nine and he was thirteen.” She picked at an invisible piece of lint on her denim shorts. “When I was fifteen, I was at a sleepover at a friend’s house, and she had a Ouija board. We were playing around with it, asking it questions, like what were we going to be when we grew up, and who would we marry.” Her mouth slid into a half smile. “My answers were always the same. I was going to own my own ice-cream shop and I was going to marry Wade MacGregor.” She lowered her voice as if sharing her deepest, darkest secret. “That was my game plan. It’s all I ever really wanted. Make ice cream. Marry Wade, have a family, live happily ever after right here in my little town.”

  She went into the kitchen and sorted through the cartons until she found what she was looking for. She came back into the living room, holding up the container.

  “Peanut butter carob caramel. This was the test run. It’s fabulous, if I do say so myself.” She opened the carton and reached for her spoon. “So I got half of what I wished for. Some people never get that much. And I am grateful … why are you staring at me like that?”

  “I’m sorry.” Vanessa shook her head. “I’m still stuck back at the part where you said you wanted to marry Wade, have his babies, and live in St. Dennis forever.”

  “Doesn’t make me a bad person.” Steffie dug into the carton.

  “What it makes you is one big fat liar.”

  “What d’ you mean?” Steffie said indignantly.

  “Didn’t you tell me once that you’d die before you settled down like your sister did? That it was your worst nightmare to get married and settle into a routine?”

  “Into my sister’s routine. It’s her life I wouldn’t want to live. Her husband is Mr. Boredom. Evie is Mrs. Boredom.” She paused. “I can’t imagine life with Wade ever being boring.”

  “I’ll bet your sister feels the same way about her guy.”

  Steffie rolled her eyes. “Trust me. My brother-in-law is boring. They live on a farm in Iowa and raise organic vegetables.”

  “There are worse ways to live.”

  “Yeah. Like spending your life alone while all your friends find their soul mates and they get to live happily ever after,” Steffie grumbled. “Not that I’m not happy for you, finding Grady and falling in love.”

  Vanessa beamed. “Finding Grady was like … finding a gold bar in the bottom of a Cracker Jack box.”

  “Aw, Ness, that’s so sweet.” Steffie rolled her eyes again. “I’ll be happy to sell your grandkids ice cream when I’m a lonely old spinster, living in my little place somewhere with a menagerie of pets, tending my garden. You and I can get together once a week for tea and talk about the good old days. Except, oh, right … I won’t have had any.”

  Vanessa laughed.

  “You go sell that ‘poor lonely Stef the Spinster’ tale to someone who’ll buy it.” Still laughing, Vanessa leaned over and patted Steffie on the knee. “Maybe we should ask the Ouija. See what it has to say now.”

  “That would necessitate finding one at this hour.”

  “Which would require traveling all the way to my kitchen.” Vanessa stretched out the leg she’d been sitting on. “I found one in the attic when I moved in. I tried playing with it a little, but it doesn’t seem to work very well.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, I read somewhere that before you ask it anything that you want to know, anything personal, you’re supposed to ask it who your guide is. Your spirit guide. And it just kept spelling ‘D-A-Z.’ Who ever heard of a spirit named Daz?”

  “You mean, like dazzle?”

  “I guess.”

  “Who’d you do it with? Grady?” Without waiting for an answer, she grinned. “Maybe he was fooling with you.”

  Vanessa shook her head. “I had to do it by myself. Grady said it was a waste of time, so he wouldn’t do it.” Her eyes lit up. “Maybe I should run in and get it. You and I could—”

  “Not tonight.” Stef shook her head. “I need to get home and get to
sleep. I’m back in the shop at five tomorrow to make ice cream. The stuff I sell isn’t delivered by truck every day, like some people’s merchandise is.” She stood and stretched. “I promised Berry Eberle that I’d have something lemony for her tomorrow, and I have to get working on it.”

  “Think the way to a guy’s heart is through his great-aunt’s stomach?”

  “I’m afraid someone else has won his heart, Ness.” Stef shrugged and shoved her hands in her pockets.

  “Well, if I can’t sleep tonight, maybe I’ll see if I can get ‘Daz’ to tell me who that someone is.” Vanessa walked Stef to the front door and opened it. “If nothing else, you’ll know who the competition is.”

  Steffie shook her head. “There’s no competition. The game’s over. Someone else won, and I lost.”

  The sun had barely started to burn off the early-morning fog when Wade slipped quietly through the front door for a run along River Road toward the center of town. Once he hit Charles Street, he passed the occasional vacant storefront and noted several shops that he was pretty sure hadn’t been there during his last visit home: Sweetie Pies, a bakery, and The Checkered Cloth, which, according to the sign out front, closed every day at three. He slowed at the window of the upscale pet boutique, Bow-Wows and Meows.

  Did someone really think that was a good name?

  Only his need for exercise kept him from stopping and staring at the display. Galoshes. Hoodies. Party clothes. T-shirts with clever sayings.

  Halloween costumes. For dogs.

  Shaking his head, he continued on, the soles of his feet slapping softly on the concrete. Across the street, lined up like old friends, were places he remembered: the market, an art gallery, an antiques shop, a bookstore. Next came Bling, a relatively new classy women’s clothing and accessory shop, and Sips, which sold only beverages. On his right, Cuppachino, the coffee shop where the townies gathered every morning for news and gossip before going about their workday, had been the Coffee Corner when he was a kid, but served the same purpose. Upscale Café Lola was still owned by ninetysomething-year-old Lola, who continued to go to the docks every morning to select her fish for the day’s entrées. Petals and Posies, the flower shop on the corner of Charles Street and Kelly’s Point Road, was now run by the original owner’s daughter. Wade turned right at the florist and headed toward the Bay.