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The Unexpected
THE BRUNETTE CAME INTO THE coffee shop, clutching her purse to her chest and staggering along at a fast pace. She wasn’t heavy-set, by any means, but her ankles seemed to have the tendency to buckle, telling Sara that, despite being in her late forties to early fifties, she didn’t have much experience walking in high heels. The woman spotted them, and Sara smiled, doing her best to put the woman at ease.
She and Sean had decided upon a local Starbucks as the meeting place to conduct interviews for a live-in maid. They had been in their new house for a week and the basic upkeep took time they’d rather spend elsewhere. One example was Sara still hadn’t taken cooking lessons and she knew Sean wasn’t impressed by her existing culinary skills, judging by the way he’d fill his mouth and expel the sentiment, yum. He was trying to appease her.
“Hello? Mrs. and Mrs. McKinley?” The woman didn’t seem to pass Sean a second’s glance but kept her eyes glued to Sara.
“Please, Sara and Sean.” She gestured toward him then turned back to the woman. “You’re Angela?”
“Yes.” Angela shook Sara’s hand, but took a seat without reaching for Sean’s. As she sat, Angela ran a hand along the back of her skirt, her eyes never leaving Sara.
Sara smiled to suppress her uncomfortable feeling. “Tell us about yourself.”
“Oh, yes, I’m from Maine. Augusta.”
“Such a coincidence. I was born there.”
Angela didn’t say anything. Her eyes now drifted to Sean, but flicked back to the table.
Sara glanced at Sean, back to Angela. “So, I take it you have experience with keeping a house?” She had the resume in front of her but preferred to have all the candidates say it in their own words.
“Absolutely.” Angela threw in a brief smile that didn’t touch her eyes. “As you can tell, I’ve been around a bit. This year will mark my forty-eighth birthday.”
“Well, happy birthday.”
Angela’s eyes dropped to the table and lifted back up a few seconds later. “The last family I cleaned for was many years ago. What is it you want me to do for you?”
Sara thought back to their ad—was it not clear enough? She and Sean had gone over the details and had decided to sum up the responsibilities under the title house manager. Basically, they required someone to maintain the interior and to oversee other things that would need organizing on the property, such as pool and lawn maintenance.
“We need someone who’s good with everything,” Sean said. “We need a cook, a cleaner—ideally, someone who can handle all aspects of running a household.”
“Yes, well, I have that. I even had a child.” Angela glanced quickly at Sean.
“Very nice.” Sara’s tendency was to sympathize with people and relate to them, but Sean had told her that when it came to something like this, she had to distance herself. While she didn’t need to think of herself as above anyone, for a healthy work environment, their employee couldn’t feel they were best friends either. It could lead to problems down the road.
She looked at the resume that Angela had submitted and took an aspect from it. “It says here that you worked as a tutor for a couple years with a family in New York City.”
“Yes.” Angela’s eyes were flitting about the Starbucks, not resting on anyone, or anything, longer than a half a second. Her aura had escalated from uneasiness to jitteriness.
Sara glanced at Sean. She could tell by his eyes that he’d noticed the odd behavior as well. “Is today a good time?” Sara asked.
“Uh-huh.” Angela ran a quaking hand down her cheek, and let her arm return to her lap. She looked Sara in the eyes. “You’re so beautiful.”
The entire scenario should have had Sara asking their guest to leave, but there was something about this woman, but what, exactly, Sara didn’t know.
Sean went to get up, but Sara held her arm out.
Angela’s eyes shot to him, and then went back to Sara. “I lied.”
“You—”
The woman siphoned her bottom lip through her teeth and shook her head. “I’m not who you think I am. You’re here to meet someone to interview I take it. I just played along to get close to you. See, I need to talk to you.”
The current swirling in the woman’s eyes was electric—Sara couldn’t effectively read her.
Sean put a hand on Sara’s knee and she knew that he was about to step in and ask this woman, whoever she was, to leave.
“Why would you need to talk to me?” Sara asked. For some reason, this woman’s energy had Sara’s heart speeding up.
“Because my real name is Leslie Summers.”
“I’m still not sure what—”
“I’m your mother.”
Emotional Revelation
A WAVE OF CLAMMY NAUSEA blanketed Sara and made her light-headed. Her heart raced and her tongue went thick. “You’re my—”
No more words would come out and her chin quivered. Emotions threatened to break through her fortified damn.
Sean slid his chair closer to Sara and wrapped an arm around her, locking eyes with the woman. “I’m sure you can understand this is quite the shock.”
Sara’s hand covered her mouth, and she swiftly brushed the tip of her nose, hoping to stifle the cry that threatened to bubble out. A rogue tear fell down her cheek, and she brushed it away.
Her insides were a tangled knot. She struggled to breathe—was she breathing? She had to get herself together. She was in a public place and it felt like everyone’s eyes were on her. She looked around the coffee shop, only to find the patrons self-involved and paying her no attention.
She touched Sean’s hand on her shoulder. She was fine. She gazed back at the woman—her mother? Her ambivalent thoughts only heightened her trepidation. “So, you’re not here for the job?”
The woman shook her head, her eyes, also full of tears, never left Sara’s.
“Why wait so long? Why now?” The words rushed from her, with a life of their own. Hurt feelings mingled with ones of anger and betrayal. Did the woman only seek her out now because of the money?
Sean leaned forward, passing a glance to Sara. His mind must have been on the same line of thought. “I’m sure you can understand why we are hesitant to believe—”
The woman extended a photograph to Sean. It was of a young pregnant girl, standing in the sunlight, her hands on her stomach, smiling.
“This is you?” he asked.
She nodded. “A girlfriend of mine took it.”
Sara sat there listening to Sean and Leslie converse, as merely an observer. There were so many questions she had, explanations she needed. She’d always considered herself a forgiving soul, but faced with this, she found it hard to garner that level of selflessness.
“I got pregnant with Sara when I was fifteen. Getting rid of her was not my fault. My parents forced me to.”
“It still doesn’t explain why, after all this—”
Sara placed a hand on Sean’s. She appreciated what he was trying to do, but she would handle this her own way. “I’d like a DNA test.”
The request sounded callous to her ears, but why should she trust this person before her? She was essentially a stranger, claiming to be more, claiming to be family—and people would do as much for money.
“I understand. And I’m sorry if I upset you.” Leslie gathered the purse on her lap, pulling it closer to her chest, hugging it as if seeking comfort from it, or, at least, distraction with it.
“It’s just that we have an appointment right now,” Sara offered, even though the pain in this woman’s eyes deeply affected her.
“It doesn’t look as if she’s coming, darling,” Sean said.
“Well, then.” Sara hoped that Sean wouldn’t mind what she was about to propose, but, regardless, it was something she needed to do. While her heart wanted to eagerly accept this woman, her mind cautioned her.
She looked at Sean’s watch and noticed it was almost four thirty. Their appointment with Angela Banks had been for four. Sean was right. If she was coming, she would have been there by now. “I have an idea. That is, if it’s okay with you, darling.” She shifted in her seat to face him.
“Anything you’d like.”
Sara turned back to Leslie, looking into brown eyes that mirrored her own—gold flecks caught the light.
“How about you come around the house for dinner? Say, seven o’clock. We can talk and catch up.”
“I’d love to.” She smiled at them.
“All right. It’s a date.” Sara attempted to smile in return. She wasn’t sure if it showed, but inside she was such a mixture of emotion. Her long-lost mother had essentially returned from the dead.
Everything had gone wrong, from the moment she slipped her legs out of bed and fresh dog poop squashed between her toes—her lover’s stupid mutt. The only thing saving its life was the fact Brent was home. It was about time to kick both of them out.
If starting out like that wasn’t enough, she pushed through, only to have her nails snag her nylons, leaving her two choices—go without, or wear a pair that saw the waist mid-hip and the crotch mid-thigh. Sadly, the weather hadn’t warmed enough, so she ending up waddling to the bus stop, wrongly assuming the worse was behind her.
The overcast sky opened up and dumped rain over the city in a steady downpour. No umbrella and no bus shelter. She continued on, though, with her focus on a glass of bourbon when she returned home.
Finally, her persistence paid off and she was now in front of the coffee shop. The rain had stopped and left a clean smell to the air.
She ran her hands down her trench coat and tried to talk herself into a place of peace. She had made it, and she would go through with this. And to think, it had all started with a revelation of insight some might discount as simply being in the right place at the right time. She saw it as a calling—a strike of inspiration that beckoned for seizing.
She studied her reflection in the windows of Starbucks. Her long blond hair hung as tendrils, dangling lifelessly over her shoulders. She was tucking a strand behind an ear when her attention went beyond her image.
The McKinleys were there. Her heart sped up when she noticed them sitting across from a woman of about fifty.
Heat surged through her, saturating her cheeks, and obtaining a solid breath became difficult.
Who was moving in on her—something brushed her leg. She looked down to see a dog rubbing against her, wagging its tail.
“Shoo!”
Its owner, who trailed a few feet behind, gave the leash a tug, and her a stern look.
“Control your animal,” she said.
“Good day to you too, miss.”
The exhale she released couldn’t be described as anything less than a growl. People irritated her, and, at this moment specifically, it was the woman getting nice and cozy with the McKinleys. That woman had no idea who she was messing with.
Hasty Preparations
SEAN KNEW SARA’S HEART WAS jumping in before she listened to the warnings that would be going off in her head. But that was his Sara—always taking a leap before assessing the fall. He wasn’t just going to stand by and watch the woman he loved get hurt, though. The chances of this being her mother, after all these years, was hard to believe. Why resurface now if it wasn’t for the money? It seemed easier to accept that she was a fake, playing a role to stake a claim in their fortune.
While the DNA tests would confirm or deny whether she was, in fact, Sara’s biological mother, until then how much drama would Sara live through? Whether she verbalized it or not, he could tell by the subtle twist of her lips, the way she looked on this woman, that she wanted to believe this was her real mom. There was also a mess in Sara’s eyes, a swirl that, to him, spoke to guilt.
Sara hadn’t stopped moving since they got back to the house. She was hurrying around tidying up and preparing the meal.
On her way by this time, he took her hand to slow her stride, and he drew her in to him. “You can relax, darling. It will all work out.”
“I just want everything to be perfect.” Her eyes scanned his.
“And it will be.” He led her to a sofa in their sitting room. “Please, darling, sit and let’s talk.”
Her eyes sparked. “I know what you’re going to say.”
He tapped the tip of her nose. “You’ve always been sort of a mind reader, but—”
“You’re going to tell me to keep my head about me, to not rush to accept this woman as my mother.”
The way she stared into his eyes made him feel like he was the enemy. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
“And I appreciate that.” Her raised shoulders relaxed slightly, and her tone softened when she continued. “I know that you had a rough life, Sean. You lost your mother when you were nine, your father when you were a young adult. But I’ve never known my real parents.” She paused, and there was that flicker of guilt dancing across her eyes. “Jeannie and Leon are the world to me. They were there for me from the beginning and will always be Mom and Dad. But, if this woman is who she claims to be, well, this may sound silly, but I’ll feel I belong in this world.”
He wasn’t prepared for those words and they attacked him as if a thrown fist, hitting him dead in the heart.
She put her hand on his leg. “Darling, please, know that I love you with all my heart and soul.”
He nodded. No words would form.
“And that didn’t come out right. I know I belong because of you, because of Jeannie and Leon, but this is my chance to know where I came from. I have never had a blood relative all my life.”
The way her eyes misted as she spoke chipped away at the gnawing pain in his chest, somehow making his life experience seem less significant. Still, losing his mother had impacted him as a boy. He remembered the isolation, the separation from others his age when there were school outings. Even watching his friends unpack their boxed lunches, he knew their mothers had taken extra care. His dad had tried, bless his soul, but he was a man. He didn’t put the little cards in his lunch box telling him to smile, or reminding him that he was loved. While the boys who received these would blush from embarrassment, Sean would have traded spots with them in a heartbeat.
Yes, he knew grief, he knew heartache, he knew what it was like to be left in the world without a blood relative—but the latter not fully. He had his dad until he was nineteen and, to this day, he had his uncle Ray, although he lived in North Carolina.
He wanted to warn her to guard her heart, but seeing the look in her eyes, he couldn’t speak those words. “I’m happy for you.”
She leaned in and kissed him, then pulled back slowly. “I love you for that.”
He nodded and smiled. She had stolen his heart two years ag
o when he’d first met her, and with their spoken vows that bond had only solidified into concrete.
Sara tapped the couch and went to get up. “I better get that roast in the oven.”
“Roast?”
One of her brows arched slightly higher than the other, a smirk on her lips. “Yes, and I am fully capable of cooking it, you know.”
He raised his hands in surrender. “Hey, I never said that you weren’t.”
“Uh-huh.” She laughed as she pranced back to the kitchen.
Sean stayed on the couch, his heart wanting to accept Leslie, but his mind warring against the request. He would try to open up, for Sara’s sake, but there was a little voice inside his head that cautioned him to stay vigilant.
Cognac And Catching Up
“YOUR HOUSE IS BEAUTIFUL.” LESLIE smiled as she took in the room, her eyes going from the dark wood trim to the piano. “Do you play?”
Sara nodded. “But it’s been a long time. I won’t do that to your ears.”
“Nonsense. Please. I would be honored.”
They were in the sitting room that had sold Sara on the house. Of course, there were many things that she loved, from the kitchen to the large master suite, but somehow this intimate room made her feel at home.
She glanced at Sean, their earlier conversation coming to mind. She hoped that he took her words at the value at which she’d delivered them. She wanted to accept Leslie as her biological mother because she longed to know another person who shared her bloodline. Yet there was an intricate part of her that contrasted the ache of yearning—a warning signal that made her want to take notice. But the woman she had wondered about her entire life was sitting in front of her—wasn’t she? How could she dismiss this easily as fiction? She owed herself the opportunity to open up to what her life now afforded her. And, ironically, the woman had saved her the trouble. After Easter dinner and her conversation with Sean, she’d known she needed to find out about her birth mother. She needed to do so for many reasons, but the main one was to heal a patch on her heart.
Carolyn Arnold - McKinley 05 - Family is Murder Page 1
