by Brenda Novak
“Do we have any choice?” her mother asked.
“I guess not, since I’ve already done it,” she said with a sigh. “But I’m an adult now. I feel like I should have the right to these answers. You know where you came from. Why can’t I?”
They didn’t answer.
“Still, I’d like your blessing, because I do love you and care about how you feel.” She stared at them both imploringly. “Please?” she said again.
“You’re my daughter. I don’t want to share you!” her mother burst out. “Especially with some...some saint I can’t compete with!”
Brad took Lilly in his arms and Cora stood so that she could hover over her mother and rub her back. “But that’s just it, Mom. You won’t have to compete. No one can threaten your place in my heart. Ever.”
“You’re down there with her, aren’t you?” Her mother’s words were muffled—they’d gone into her father’s shoulder—but Cora could understand them in spite of that.
“Only for the year.” She sought her father’s gaze and, when their eyes met, she could tell she’d managed to convince him, even if she hadn’t been able to completely assuage her mother’s fears.
“I want you to be happy,” he said. “We both do.”
“Then don’t be mad at me for this.”
“I don’t want Aiyana in our lives!” her mother insisted.
“Mom, you’d really like her—”
“That only makes it worse!”
“Give your mother some time to come to terms with this,” her father said softly, indicating that Cora should back down.
“Okay.” She checked the time on her phone. “It’s nearly two. I have to head back.”
Letting go of Brad, Lilly whipped around to face her. “You’re leaving? Now? But you can’t drive for two hours. You haven’t had any sleep!”
Cora wished Matt would’ve at least waited until the following weekend to sabotage her relationship with her parents. That slight adjustment in timing would’ve made it so much easier for her to recover. “I have a job, Mom. I have to teach.”
Her mother grabbed her and pulled her into a tight embrace. “Don’t go. I’m afraid you’ll fall asleep at the wheel and crash.”
“After such an emotional conversation, I’m pretty amped up. I’ll be fine.” Perhaps it would be hard to get through the day tomorrow, but she figured, with enough caffeine, she’d manage...
Her mother cupped her face. “So you really like Aiyana’s son? You told me he was intimidating.”
“I didn’t know him very well when I said that.”
“And now?”
She smiled. “I like him. I like him a lot.” Too much...
The promise of a possible romance seemed to check some of her mother’s more negative feelings. She’d been after Cora for some time to settle down and get married so they could have grandchildren, since it didn’t seem as if Ashton was in any hurry to provide them. “Will I get to meet him?”
“If you can be careful not to let on to what I’d rather they not know at this point...”
“I won’t say a word,” she promised. “That’s up to you.”
Cora slung her purse over one shoulder. “Then I’ll bring him home with me next time I come—if he’s available.”
Her mother sniffed and used the tissue in her hand to dry her face again. “Make sure he’s available,” she said.
Cora chuckled at her sulky words. “Okay. He’ll be my peace offering.”
* * *
Cora was just getting her purse to head to the cafeteria to meet Darci for lunch when Eli ducked into her room. “Hey,” he said. “How are you feeling?”
“Tired,” she admitted, but smiled, anyway. She loved the way he looked in the worn denim jeans and soft T-shirt he wore. Because he was so involved in the school’s athletics program—as well as caring for the school’s animals—unless he had a business meeting he dressed more casually than the other administrators she’d known. But he did such a good job helping Aiyana run the school, and he fit in so well with both the faculty and the students, no one questioned what he wore.
“You got back late?”
Although he’d tried calling her around one to see if she was safe, she hadn’t checked her phone until she was on the drive home and by then she felt it was too late to respond. “After four.”
“Then you’re running on almost no sleep.”
She covered a yawn as she checked the clock on the wall. “I’m halfway through the day. I can make it.”
He didn’t pull her into his arms and kiss her like she was hoping he would. When he stopped halfway to her and leaned one shoulder against the wall, she was shocked by the degree of her disappointment, which only alarmed her further.
“So...what’s going on?” he asked.
She busied herself straightening her desk so that she’d have a good excuse not to look at him. “What do you mean?”
“With your family. You seemed pretty upset when you ran out of the house yesterday.”
“It was nothing,” she said. “Just the usual stuff.”
When he made no rejoinder, she glanced up.
“Stuff that you don’t care to share with me.”
Cora caught her breath. Was she being unfair to continue keeping her secret? Part of her was tempted to tell him, to completely unburden herself and let it out. But she was too frightened by what could change. He meant so much to her—already. And she couldn’t begin to guess how it would affect Aiyana; she had no idea why Aiyana hadn’t wanted her in the first place.
Surely there would be a better time to try to explain her situation—and that “better” time always seemed to be later. “Matt called my mother and tried to make trouble for me.”
“By telling her you went home with me.”
She cleared her throat. “Yes.”
“And that caused a problem?”
“Matt and I were together for two years. She cares about him.”
“She’s hoping you’ll go back to him.”
Cora stacked some self-portraits she had yet to grade in the box of stuff she took home with her at the end of each day. “Not necessarily. It’s just that... I’ve only been here a month or so. She was concerned that I might be jeopardizing my job.” Part of what she said was true, at least. Her parents were concerned about what she was doing in Silver Springs—they were just concerned for different reasons than she’d given him so far.
“By hooking up with your boss.”
“Yes.”
“Does the fact that you’re on the rebound have anything to do with it?”
“I’m not on the rebound,” she said. “I’m over Matt.” Sadly, she was over him before she even broke up with him. “But we were together long enough that my mother wasn’t convinced of that. She expected us to get married one day.”
He pushed off the wall and came toward her. “Why didn’t you marry Matt? I bet he’d pop the question in a heartbeat if that was what you wanted.”
“I wasn’t ready. And I didn’t love him as much as I felt I should.”
He picked up the blown glass paperweight that had been an end-of-the-year thank-you gift from a class she’d substituted for and tossed it from hand to hand. “So did she calm down? Is everything okay?”
“Once I promised to bring you home for dinner.”
No longer interested in the paperweight, he put it down as he came around the desk to where she was standing.
“Are you still interested in visiting LA?” She arched her eyebrows in challenge as he drew close. He’d mentioned driving her home to see her folks when they were in bed together yesterday afternoon, but meeting her family said something a bit more in this context. They both understood she’d be bringing him home as “her new man.”
; Her skirt moved up to her thighs as he lifted her onto the desk and stood between her knees. “What do you think?” he asked and pressed his lips to hers in a hot, wet kiss.
His hand slid up under the silky material while his tongue mated with hers.
“Eli!” she gasped when his thumb found its way beneath her panties. “Not here!”
“Shh...it’s okay,” he whispered. “Give me two seconds. Everyone’s at lunch. Your back’s to the door, anyway. The worst anyone will think we’re doing is kissing.”
That was bad enough.
“Meet me at my place after school, okay?” he said as he found and stimulated her most sensitive spot.
She could hardly think straight. “You mean after dinner? You usually work until six.”
He ran his nose up her neck, breathing deeply. “Coach Sanders can get football practice started without me, for a change. I’ve got better things to do today.”
“That will be okay? He—” she moaned as a finger joined his thumb “—won’t mind?”
The way his pupils dilated and his body tensed made her worry he might try to take this further, but he didn’t. “He won’t mind. But you’re right. I’m only making this harder on both of us.” Pulling his hand away, he set her back on her feet as if he had to put her out of reach while he still had the presence of mind to do so. “I’ll come up with some excuse,” he said. “Then I’ll join him for the rest of practice and let you nap. Knowing you’re naked in my bed, waiting for me, will get me through the rest of the day.”
Which meant he’d also come home to her after. Whatever she’d started with Eli, it seemed to be accelerating very fast.
Chapter Eighteen
Cora enjoyed getting to know her students over the next several weeks, despite facing some difficulties when it came to Zack Headerly. With Aiyana’s help, she muddled through the challenge he presented and was actually glad for the opportunity to have something important to speak to her biological mother about. Trying to turn a specific boy around was a project they could work on and feel good about together.
The passing time brought other good things, too. She admired Aiyana more and more as the days went by, and she spent every extra minute she could with Eli. When they weren’t together, she looked forward to his calls, texts and lunchtime visits. He often stopped by her classroom if he could. And, true to her word, in early October she took him to meet her folks, which went over well, except they liked him enough that they grew more worried instead of less about what might happen when he found out she hadn’t been entirely truthful with him.
“That man’s in love with you,” Lilly would warn whenever they talked on the phone. But Cora would stubbornly refute that.
“He hasn’t said anything about love,” she’d argue. Although she longed to hear him speak those three words—had choked them back time and again herself—she was also sort of relieved. As long as he didn’t make that verbal commitment, she could justify what she was doing by pretending their relationship wasn’t that serious, that they were merely enjoying each other while she was in Silver Springs.
Jill agreed with her parents. “What do you mean he doesn’t love you?” she’d scoff. “Of course he does! Maybe he doesn’t come right out and say it, but he shows you in so many ways.”
Jill, who’d seen them together twice and heard all the details of their relationship over the phone, was right. Cora had his full attention whenever they were together. He never acted like he didn’t want to see her. They spent every night together, except for when he’d go out with his brothers or do something with his mother—or she was with Darci, Jill or her big brother, who met her in LA between trips to New York. Even when they split up for various commitments, he’d check in with her often and slip into bed with her after. In addition to all of that, he took her with him to Sunday dinner at Aiyana’s every week. He even invited her along when he did extracurricular activities with the students, all of whom had come to view them as a couple. Some jokingly called her Mrs. T—or warned any new student that he’d better not flirt with “Eli’s girl.”
It was Thanksgiving almost before she knew it, and she and Eli were trying to figure out how to split their time between both families, just like a married couple. They ended up doing Thanksgiving dinner with Aiyana, the Turner boys, Aiyana’s parents and one of her brothers—who were all so wonderful to meet—on Thursday and driving to LA to have dinner with her parents on Friday, since Ashton was hung up in New York and couldn’t get back until then, anyway.
“He’s quiet, but I love the way he looks at you,” her mother said as they finished cleaning up after the big meal. Although Eli had helped with the dishes, too, he was now in the living room, watching football with her father and brother.
“You’re making more of it than it really is,” she said. “We enjoy each other. But we know it’s only a short-term affair.”
Her mother stopped scrubbing the big roasting pan she’d used to cook the turkey. “You’re still planning on moving back at the end of the year?”
“Of course.”
“What about Aiyana?”
Cora did her best to act as though she had everything under control. “I’ve decided not to say anything—to just...let it go. That solves everything, right?”
“Does it?” she countered. “After everything you did to find her?”
Surprised that it was Lilly who was pressing the issue, Cora nibbled at her bottom lip. This almost sounded as if Lilly would encourage Cora to tell Aiyana the truth, even though doing so came with the obvious risk that Aiyana would accept Cora into her life and Lilly would no longer be Cora’s only mother. “She didn’t want me for a reason, or she wouldn’t have given me up. And she must not regret her decision because she hasn’t come searching for me.”
Lilly turned on the sprayer to rinse the suds from the pan. “You don’t know that she hasn’t tried. Do you?”
“She could’ve found me. I found her, didn’t I? And I had a lot less resources to work with.”
“Maybe she’s afraid you won’t be happy to see her—that she’ll disrupt your life. Or that she’ll be stepping on my toes.”
“I was facing similar questions and concerns, and I still fought to find her.”
“I know, but from what you’ve told me, she’s pretty focused on her work. Perhaps she will come looking for you someday when...when she’s not so busy.”
“I doubt it. Let’s face it, ‘busy’ is an excuse. If I weighed on her mind as heavily as she once weighed on mine, she would’ve acted by now. Instead, no one even seems to know that she ever had a child.” She stood on tiptoe to return a bowl she’d dried to the cupboard. “I guess, when you put all of that together, I have my answer. She still doesn’t want me. But...at least we’re friends. At least I know her. That fills in some of the blanks and helps to... I don’t know...anchor me in some way.” It especially helped that they thought well of each other. That was so huge, Cora couldn’t regret having gone to such great lengths to find Aiyana. Thanks to the sacrifices she’d made, she’d had the opportunity to meet her grandparents and her oldest uncle yesterday, all of whom had been so nice.
“But you haven’t been able to ask her about your father,” Lilly said. “Or learn why she put you up for adoption. Both of those questions were important to you.”
Those questions had helped fuel her curiosity, but she only had herself to blame for her current predicament. Although, in the beginning, her plan had seemed so clever, it had turned into a far-reaching lie that she was now hesitant to expose. “I’ve made such a mess of everything. I guess I deserve to remain in the dark. I should’ve been up front—with you, Dad and Aiyana—from the start. I was trying not to hurt anyone. I wanted to test the water first, but then I met Eli, and everything just...spiraled out of control.”
“Have you heard from Matt since he cal
led us?”
“To tattle on me?” She grimaced. “Yes. But just a couple of nasty texts.”
“He sent you some nasty texts?”
“Only after I called him a jerk for telling you guys,” she admitted.
“What’d he say?”
“That I’m not the woman he thought I was. Blah, blah, blah. He also said I should’ve told you to begin with. He’s right about that one.”
“But if you’d handled this any differently, if you hadn’t applied for a job there, you would never have gotten to know Eli. Maybe you would never even have met him.”
“That’s what Matt regrets,” Cora grumbled. “He’s mad that I’ve found someone else.”
Lilly, who’d wrung out the rag and started washing down the counters, turned to face her. “I think you should tell Eli, Cora.”
“About Aiyana?” She shook her head. “No. I’ve considered that many times, but I’m fairly certain she’s never told him that she ever had a baby. I don’t have the right to reveal something that personal about her life, in case...in case it will somehow hurt her or what she’s established.” She retrieved the dish towel she’d been using before and started drying the wineglasses. “Besides, if I tell him, he’ll feel like he has to share that information with Aiyana, for my sake if not hers, and I’d rather he not get involved, not be making those decisions for me.” She heard a soft ding as she set another cup on its bell-shaped top. “So, no matter how I look at the situation, it comes down to the same thing.”
“And that is...”
“I need to keep my mouth shut.”
Her mother pursed her lips. “What if your relationship with Eli continues to progress? What if someday he asks you to marry him?”
“He won’t,” she said.
“How do you know?”
“Because he’s a confirmed bachelor!”
A skeptical expression claimed her mother’s face. “Surely, he’ll want a family at some point.”
