Angel's Peak (16 page)

“She needs a mother and a father,” he stressed.

“She has them,” she answered. “There’s no way we can beat the stork—there’s no point in making a big mistake. Besides, you just want to make some plans so you can spend the night, and you can’t. Not tonight.”

He lifted one light brown brow. “You gonna tell me that wasn’t a real good night, last night? Because if I’m any judge, it worked for you.”

“Totally rocked my world,” she admitted. “I need some time for the rest. I just don’t take something like marriage lightly. If I do it, I’ll mean it, and I won’t change my mind. But I think you’d do it right now for all the wrong reasons.”

“Does this have anything to do with the guy you didn’t let stay last night?” he asked.

“My boyfriend?” she asked, smiling. She knew it was naughty to taunt him like that; she wasn’t thinking of T.J. as a boyfriend at the moment. “It would be nice of me to tell him if things change in my personal life. But until I have matters settled…”

“No, Franci, tell him matters are settled. You won’t be dating him!”

“And the woman who keeps calling you?”

“What woman?” he asked.

“Your phone keeps picking up text messages and voice mails. That has to be a woman.”

He took a deep breath. This didn’t seem like a good time to lie, just as he was trying to close a deal. “I dated this girl a few times back at Beale and I told her I wasn’t getting into a steady thing. When I went on leave, I told her we had to cool it because it wasn’t working for me, but she’s deaf. I thought when I left town for a couple of months she’d let it go, but she’s hounding me. I’m going to call her, Franci, and tell her I’m off the market. That I’m getting married. She won’t call anymore. Now, come on.”

“Poor thing,” Franci said. “She might be as sick in love with you as I was.”

“As you were?” he asked, a little frightened of the answer.

“And I said I’m not marrying you.”

“Okay, let me get this right—I suggested marriage and you said no?”

“How about that? What a shocker, huh?”

“Well, what the hell am I supposed to do? I thought that’s what I should do!”

“Okay, you still don’t get it. We don’t want to because you’re doing what you should. Listen carefully, Sean. I want you to be absolutely sure you want to commit to a life with me and Rosie, because you don’t have to marry me to have time with your daughter. She’s your daughter—I won’t get in the way of that. Though I have to admit, the way you suggested marriage really just knocked me off my feet.”

He would never admit it to anyone, but her refusal gave him an instant feeling of relief. He wasn’t ready to take it all on. But it would sure make things tidier if they could just do it the way it probably should be done.

He slid close to her and, before she could protest, pulled her right up against him. “You wanna get knocked off your feet, sweetheart? Because we both know we do that to each other.” He put a big hand around the back of her neck and ran his thumb from her earlobe to the hollow of her throat. Then he kissed that spot. “I want you with me, Franci. Tonight, and from now on.”

“Sean,” she said gravely, “when you rejected me four years ago, there were times I wondered if I’d lost my mind and my heart. The things we said to each other—I don’t want to risk a marriage like that. After we split and I moved to Santa Rosa, sometimes I grieved so badly I worried that I was hurting the baby with endless crying, sleepless nights, loss of appetite. I just can’t face something like that again.”

He ran a knuckle across her soft cheek. “Baby, I didn’t reject you. I wanted to be with you—I just had a hang-up with marriage.”

“Well, now the shoe’s on the other foot. Suck it up.”

Life would be made a lot simpler, Sean thought, if he could deliver the news to his mother along with a plan for a quick wedding. He made a lot of blunders, but he wasn’t quite stupid enough to admit that to Franci. Instead, he covered her mouth with his and moved over it with passion. He tongued open her lips, pulled her close against him, got hard. It was hell, but he broke away just long enough to say, “I’m gonna show you we need to be together tonight, Franci. When I’m done with you, there won’t be a doubt in your mind.” Then he went after her mouth again.

“Mooommmm-eeeee! What are you dooooo-ing?”

Sean broke away abruptly and turned scarlet. There, at the end of the couch, stood Rosie, her pajama bottoms and panties missing, Harry standing beside her, his tail wagging out of his tutu. Sean grabbed a throw pillow and held it over the bulge in his jeans, although there was no way Rosie would know what was going on with him.

“Kissing Sean,” Franci said very naturally. “Where are your pants?”

“I pooped! I called you to check if I wiped good, but you dint come!” And with that she turned her back on them, bent over at the waist to touch her toes and exposed her butt.

“Arrrggghhh,” Sean groaned, covering his eyes and sliding lower on the couch.

Franci chuckled and stood. “Okey-dokey, looks like you did a good job. I like it when you save the inspection for the bathroom, though,” Franci said. “Let’s get your bottoms on and back to bed.”

Sean collapsed against the couch and thought, I am not ready for this! How does a person get ready for this?

When Franci came back, she was laughing at him.

“Come on, stop it! The learning curve is really high here!” he complained.

“When we get right down to it, marriage would be the least of your adjustments.”

By the time Sean left Franci’s, it was getting late enough that he didn’t want to go back to Luke’s. He decided to head toward Sacramento and stop for the night at a clean, friendly looking motel along the way. He had just pulled into one such motel when his cell phone chimed.

Now, he thought, is as good a time as any to deal with Cindy, and he took the call, saying hello.

“Congratulations, man,” his brother Aiden said. “How about that, huh?”

“Uh, how about what, Aiden?” he asked cautiously.

“A little girl, I hear. Three and a half? Almost four?”

“Who told you?! How do you know that?”

“Who do you think? Luke. He said you caught up with Franci. He told me about the reason she bolted a few years ago. Bet you were surprised, huh?”

“I told that son of a bitch not to say anything yet!”

“I haven’t talked to Mom, so relax. You in Phoenix yet?”

“No, Aiden, I’m not even to the Sacramento airport! I just left Franci’s a few hours ago and stopped for the night. I’ll head there first thing in the morning. She doesn’t know I’m coming.”

“You’re not going to warn her?”

“Nope. Mom never leaves town without checking in with at least three of us, so worst case I wait around while she finishes a bridge game or round of golf. Thing is, I couldn’t head for Mom’s before I squared things with Rosie. I had to tell her who her father is.”

Aiden whistled. “How’d she take it.”

Sean thought for a second. “Truthfully? She wasn’t that impressed. She knew her daddy had a plane and she wants a ride. She took it right in stride, like she’d been expecting me to show up any second.”

“And you?” Aiden asked. “You take it in stride?”

“Aw, hell, it wore me out so bad I fell asleep on her little bed. Slept until the sun was down. After spending about three hours with her—eating her imaginary chicken and broccoli, reading books, picking up toys, talking about bikes and dogs and playmates at school—I was shot. She has these high heels she wears. She took some to school so her friend Jason could wear them, too.” He grumbled. “While I was asleep, she painted my face with magic markers…”

Aiden whooped with laughter.

“Yeah, you laugh. I’ll turn her loose on you.”

“I’d love that,” Aiden said. “When can I meet her?”

“Gimme some time, Aiden. I’m way behind the power curve here. I don’t know anything about kids, and there is so much to know. You have no idea.”

“She’s just a kid, Sean. Don’t overthink it. Enjoy her.”

“Did you know that when a little kid poops, you have to check their little butt to make sure they wiped it clean? Did you know that?”

Aiden chuckled. “Yes, Sean, I knew that.”

“Where the hell do you learn something like that?”

“I dated a woman with a couple of little kids. Haven’t you? Ever dated a single young mother?”

Sean was quiet for a moment. “Not really.”

“How can you not really date a young mother?”

“I’ve gone out with women with kids before, yeah. But I’ve never been around the kids. I have friends with kids, but I never paid attention to that stuff. I’m in way over my head.”

“Franci will help you with all that. How is Franci?”

“Cautious. I told her I thought we should get married and she told me to slow down—she wants to be sure it’s the right move.”

“Bullshit. She wants to be sure you’re in love with her. That you can be a lover and a family man. Don’t you know anything about women?”

“Not as much as I thought I did,” Sean admitted.

“My little brother the playboy,” Aiden said. “Time to take life a little more seriously, huh? I want to meet her. Rosie. Let me know the minute I can. And I’d love to see Franci again.”

“You know, just because Rosie took me in stride doesn’t mean the entire Riordan clan won’t be a little overwhelming for her,” Sean said. “Let’s not throw her in the deep end of the pool, huh?”

“Red hair and green eyes, I hear,” Aiden said. “Like Mom and Paddy and half our cousins. That must have been a shock.”

“The second I saw her, I knew. Plus, it couldn’t be anyone else’s kid—Franci and I were tight.” He paused. “Till we weren’t.”

“Well, lucky you—you get another chance. Call me after you talk to Mom. I can’t wait to hear how she likes this news.”

“About Mom…I’m going to tell her in person because she’s going to kill me and then she’s going to rush to California and throw herself on Rosie. I can’t let her do that, Aiden. What am I gonna do about Mom?”

“Reason with her,” Aiden said easily. “Just tell her she’ll meet Rosie very soon, but you have to introduce your very large, very excited, extended family one at a time after you work things out with Rosie’s mom. Be firm—she’ll be fine. Call me if you need me.”

“I’ll give you two thousand dollars to meet me in Phoenix and tell her for me.”

Aiden laughed. “Talk to you tomorrow, little brother. Good luck!”

Sean arrived in Phoenix before noon the next day. He rented a car and headed for his mother’s condo complex.

He remembered when she’d bought the place, almost ten years ago. They’d been born and raised in the Chicago suburbs, but after their father died twelve years ago, Maureen Riordan had had enough of harsh winters, especially when she had to face them alone. The boys were all devoted to her, but they were also all military and it wasn’t easy for them to be on call to help out their mom. The oldest was Luke, who back then had been in the army flying Blackhawks, and the baby of the family, Patrick, or Paddy as they called him, had just entered the naval academy. All of them had left home and visited their mother at the pleasure of Uncle Sam.

Maureen, as she was known to do, took matters into her own hands and found a condo in Phoenix. It was in a complex much like a resort—more the kind of place Sean might choose, and that had surprised him about his mom. There was a golf course, tennis courts, a community center, swimming pools and a hefty association fee. More importantly, there was no grass to cut or snow to shovel, and there were guaranteed friends. All she had to do was sign up for certain activities and she met people. Thus, Maureen had learned to play golf and tennis and had put her bridge-playing skills to the test.

On the outside, it probably seemed like the perfect life. A deeper look gave Sean the impression his mother was filling the days just to stay busy. He wondered if she had a true passion about any of the things she spent her time on.

The place had never seemed to fit her, in Sean’s mind. Their da, an electrician, had been a hard worker who’d earned a decent living, but they’d had five sons to raise. They had lived in a smallish three-bedroom house—three boys in one bedroom, two in another—on a tree-lined street on the outskirts of Chicago. The house had been forty years old the year Sean was born, and his parents had been mortgaged to their chins. When his father died, between insurance, retirement plans, Social Security and the sale of their home, Maureen was finally able to do whatever she pleased. So she moved her furniture into the small two-bedroom condo that had a Whirlpool tub in the master bath and, for the first time, a dishwasher, though she only had to run it once a week.

“I don’t know,” Sean had said. “It doesn’t feel like you.”

“It feels very low maintenance,” she had replied.

“You won’t have a vegetable garden.”

“I’ll buy my peas and tomatoes. Besides, I don’t necessarily have to stay here for life. I might find something I like better.”

“You might find a second husband.”

“Pah,” she scoffed. “It’s more likely one of you boys will find a wife and settle somewhere. And I might want to be nearby.”

“We’re all in the military! If we do find wives, we’ll be moving them around for twenty years!”

“Sean, if there’s one thing I’ve learned, you can count on things changing more than on them staying the same.”

In ten years, however, nothing had changed. And his mother’s traditional, homey furniture still looked awkward in the modern digs. Maureen had gone back to work a couple of times since moving here—twice for three years each—but at present she was retired. She had been a crackerjack administrative assistant and worked once for the police department and once for a brokerage firm. The boys all assumed boredom drove her to work and a need to relax drove her back home. If their dad hadn’t left her well-enough fixed, they’d been prepared to take care of her. Aiden, a navy doctor, was the one to watch over her most closely and he kept his brothers up to speed, when he wasn’t out to sea.

On the rare occasions that all five boys could visit at the same time, there were a couple of guest apartments at the complex that they could reserve—his mom’s place wasn’t large enough for big family gatherings. The kitchen seemed too small for a woman who loved to cook but, as she quickly pointed out, her cooking skills were not exactly in demand these days.