Bundle of Joy (29 page)

She looked at him, her pale brows arched in question. "You're welcome."

"I'm sure Caroline enjoyed meeting you."

"I have the feeling she was only slightly less surprised than you were, Charles."

"We--uh, we haven't gotten around to exchanging family histories yet."

"Still fighting your background?"

He shrugged. "Still living the way I want to."

She smiled.
"And so am I."

"That about says it all, doesn't it?" Thirty-five years of conflict summed up in two simple, declarative sentences.

She pressed a phone number on him. "Your Uncle Franklin's private number. Do call when you've set a christening date."

He nodded and tucked the card in the back pocket of his jeans. Might as well have the whole family on hand for the break-up.

"I like her, Charles," said his mother as she climbed into her limousine in front of the hospital. "Hold on to her."

"I'll try."

"Be happy," Jean said softly. "If you can manage that, the rest will fall into place."

He started to say something flip and juvenile, one of the pat phrases he'd fallen back on in the past but he saw the look in his mother's eyes, thought of Caroline and Erin and the whole mystical connection between families, and he leaned in the window of the limo and kissed her cheek.
"I'll call."

"Good," said his mother.

The limo driver nodded and, gunning the engine, zoomed down Witherspoon Street away from the hospital.

"Okay," said Charlie, watching the car disappear around the corner. "So now she knows." Caroline had met his mother. She'd seen the fancy clothes and the fancy jewelry and heard the fancy phrases Jean draped over her conversations like so much
tinsel. He was rich, but he was still Charlie Donohue, short order cook. Who cared what his background was? All that mattered was the future.

He chuckled as he stepped into the elevator and pressed the button for the maternity floor. Charlie Donohue, short order cook and heir to the fortune of the Donohues of Virginia--and points east.

Yeah, Caroline would see the humor in it.

#

Caroline could see them from the window of her hospital room. Charlie and his mother were talking intently, their dark heads pressed together. Talking about her, most likely. She could just imagine his mother's questions about her pedigree. Dear God, it was every bad dream she'd ever had. How dare he pretend to be a regular person when he was really anything but.

She pounced on him the second he stepped into her room. "You fraud."

He stopped halfway through the door. "What?"

"You fraud!" She socked him right in the center of his stomach.

"What the hell's gotten into you?" he asked. "I'm getting tired of being your punching bag."

She glared at him, enraged by his deception. "Your mother is rich."

"So what?"

"And I suppose you're rich, too?"

He grinned. Didn't he know he was taking his life in his hands? "Not according to my checking account."

"I met your mother, Charles. I saw those diamonds on her fingers."

"What does that have to do with me?"

"You come from money, don't you?"

"Is that a crime?"

"Go ahead, Charles, admit it. You were rich."

He straddled the straight-back chair next to the bed and looked up at her. "I was rich."

She socked him in the shoulder and didn't care that he looked like he wanted to sock her right back. "I can't believe you never told me."

"Would it have made a difference?"

"Yes...no. Oh, damn it, Charles. You're not the person you said you were."
And who are you to talk?
asked an annoying little voice.

"Who did I say I was?"

She eased herself down onto the edge of her bed, her incision tugging at her belly. He tried to help her but she brushed him away with sharp, choppy gestures.

"You said you'd been in the navy. You said you had some ratty old house in Rocky Hill. You said you were a short order cook. You said--"

"You've seen me frying burgers at O'Rourke's. I'd call that primary evidence." He recited his navy ID number and quoted his yearly property taxes. "I'll even show you my dogtags, if you want."

She wanted to hit him again.

"Don't even think about it," he warned. "I'm not entirely civilized."

"There you go again!" she cried, days of tension exploding inside her. "Jean said you went to prep school."

"Is that a crime?"

"Yes," she said. "It's a crime when you pretended you were a regular guy."

"What the hell does that mean? 'A regular guy?'"

"Regular guys don't go to prep schools."

"What else don't regular guys do?"

"You're making fun of me, Charles. I don't appreciate that."

"Look, you're working yourself up into a lather, Caroline. We have a lot in common, that's all. Why don't you get some sleep and we'll talk about it later."

"I don't want to go to sleep. I want to talk." Amazing how clearly you could speak through gritted teeth.

"I've heard of things like this," he said, foolishly pushing ahead. "Post-partum something or other."

"You say one word about hormones, and so help me I'll--"

"You'll do what? Divorce me?" He stood up and pushed the chair into the nightstand. The cork on his temper had finally blown and there was no turning back. "That's what this is all about, isn't it?" He stormed toward the door. "Don't worry, Caroline," he said over his shoulder. "As far as I'm concerned, the deal's still on."

"Good," said Caroline.

"Great," said Charlie.

"As soon as the baby is christened."

"Set the date," growled Charlie. "I'll be counting the days."

#

Erin was gaining weight. Her mother was losing it. The snows had stopped and the sun was shining. Caroline should have been a happy woman.

She wasn't.

What she was, was miserable.

As luck would have it, Dr. Burkheit released her from the hospital the day after her gigantic blow-up with Charlie. Erin, of course, had to stay on a bit longer. "Another five days at the most," said Dr. Burkheit. "She's doing splendidly."

It should have been one of the happiest days of their lives. Instead, that happiness was tempered with the knowledge that their time together was drawing to a close. Charlie drove her home in silence and after Sam arrived with one of her gourmet box lunches, he excused himself and went off to work at the bar.

"What's wrong?" asked Sam the minute the door closed behind him. "Did you two have a fight?"

"He's rich," said Caroline. "Can you believe it?"

"Charlie?" Sam started to laugh. "If you saw his house, you wouldn't say that."

Caroline told her best friend about Jean's visit.

"I don't believe it," said Sam.

"Neither did I," said Caroline. "But I saw it with my own eyes."

"You mean he was one of those snot-nosed rich kids with the fancy clothes and summer vacations in Europe?"

"Bingo," said Caroline.

Sam thought for a moment. "He must've fallen on hard times to end up working as a short order cook."

"Hah!" said Caroline. "He didn't fall on hard times. He joined the navy."

"That's great," said Sam, a big bright smile spreading across her face. "Now you can tell him all about yourself. Both of you were keeping secrets."

Caroline looked down at her hands. It was time for a new manicure.

"You
are
going to tell him all about yourself, aren't you?"

"Why?" asked Caroline. "What's the point?"

"Isn't that obvious?"

"Not to me." She rose from her chair, wincing at the tug from her C-section incision, and walked to the window. "We have nothing in
common, Sam."

"But he's exactly the kind of man you've been looking for, Carly. He has the looks and the family background--not to mention the fact that he's the father of your child. It's a match made in heaven."

"Carly." She sighed. "I haven't been called Carly in years."

"Did I call you that?" Sam smiled faintly. "I haven't thought of you as Carly in a long, long time."

"Seems like another person, doesn't it?"

"I don't know," said Sam. "I still see that little girl peeking through your glamorous facade from time to time."

Caroline said nothing.

Sam cleared her throat. "I don't know how to tell you this, but Charlie asked me to call your mom and tell her about the baby."

"Oh, God." She leaned her forehead against the glass. "What did she say?"

"I didn't reach her. I told one of your sisters-in-law and they said they'd pass on the message."

"Right," said Caroline. "I'm sure passing on the news is number one on the Gretchner to-do list." She turned from the window and faced Sam. "How did it all get so complicated?"

"If I had the answer to that, I'd be on
Oprah
, not sitting here in your fancy living room."

"I think it's too late for us now," said Caroline. "Too much has happened." Her anger with Charlie wasn't justified and she knew it. They'd studiously avoided discussion of family and past lives, but at least what he chose to share with her was on the up and up.

Not like her. She'd done too good a job of creating Caroline Bradley of Princeton. If she suddenly turned around and introduced Donohue to Carly, and to her past, how could he ever trust her? Like everyone else, he had bought the package in its entirety.

It hadn't mattered in the beginning, back when she'd believed their marriage would have more to do with law than love. She'd never expected him to become part of her heart, part of her life. How could she turn around and tell him that everything he believed her to be was false, a sham, part of a calculated attempt to be something she wasn't.

Admit it,
she thought after Sam left.
You liked it when you believed he was an average guy who made burgers for a living.
She'd never felt uncertain around Charlie, or uncomfortable, or out of her league. He didn't have a degree from Harvard or Yale or Princeton. He didn't speak French or spend summers in the Hamptons or Martha's Vineyard. Although he'd believed her to be one of the privileged few, Caroline had known the truth and the notion that she and Charlie had been cut from the same bolt of cloth had bound her more closely to him than she'd ever wanted to admit.

Now it was over. Charlie wasn't really the Charlie she'd married. And Caroline wasn't the elegant lady dressed in Chanel, but the poor kid from Rocky Hill with the second-hand clothes and the family who didn't care. All Caroline and Charlie had in common was their little girl and the memory of a few months when, for a
while, she'd believed she actually could have it all.

ii

A few days into the New Year, another blizzard swept over central New Jersey without warning and botched up plans to bring the baby home. Roads were impassable and would be until the snow stopped falling and Caroline thanked God she'd been expressing breast milk and supplying it to the nursery for Erin's night-time feedings. At least she knew her little girl was being cared for properly.

Charlie's truck was in the shop and he got stranded at the bar and opted to spend the night there. "You okay?" he asked when he telephoned around eleven.

"Fine," said Caroline.

"Enough food?"

"Plenty."

"Call Angela next door if you have any problems," said Charlie. "She said she'd be in all weekend."

"I will," said Caroline.

They said goodbye formally, stiffly, and Caroline hung up the receiver feeling sad and very alone.

#

That was on Friday. The christening was set for Sunday afternoon but it was anybody's guess if the weather would ease up enough to make their plans for a small party possible.

As it happened, the storm blew out to sea late Saturday morning and within hours the road crews were on duty, trying to dig the town out from under. Caroline stood beside her window, watching the maintenance crew struggle to clear the parking lot of her condominium complex. "Go away," she said out loud. If they didn't clear the roads, there couldn't be a christening. And if there wasn't a christening, Caroline and Charlie were still bound by their original deal. Other women managed to have husbands and babies both. Why on earth was a happy family life the one goal that continued to elude her?

She had her sports
car and her condo, her fancy dress shop and fancier friends. They'd once seemed so important to her, so vital to proving she'd made a success out of herself despite the odds.