C's Comeuppance: A Bone Cold--Alive novel (37 page)

“You’ve been tested.”

“No.”

“Then, buddy, you don’t know.”

“When we were eventually taken to the doc, he said—”

“I don’t care what he said, C. I know who I’ve been with and you’re it!”

He crossed his arms and took a deep breath, decided on another tactic. “From what I understand, this is not usually a revelation to a woman. You’re bound to have suspected it. Why’d you break off the engagement?”

She took another sip of water. “I spotted that morning. Thought I was either mistaken or miscarrying.” She lifted her chin. “Turns out I was wrong on both counts.”

“So now you’ve been to a doctor.”

“Yes. A very discreet doctor.”

C studied the ceiling. “Abby, you have the absolute worst timing on earth.”

“So it’s all true about you and Miss May Apple?”

“Her name is Jemma Lovelace. And, yes, FYI, it’s all true.” He opened the bottle of water and drank it down. She watched him and finally he lowered his gaze to hers. “What about an abortion?”
“Thought you’d never ask. No, C. If that was the route I wanted to take, I wouldn’t be sitting here.”

“Do you love me, Abby?”
She didn’t hesitate. “No, C, I don’t.”

“And yet you’d marry me?”

“For the child. For the financial protection.”

“I’ll not marry you.”

“You’ll wish you had.”

“Will I?” He stood up and moved to the sink, leaned back against it. “I want DNA testing as soon as feasible. I’ll be happy to meet you at the doc’s Monday or Tuesday or in two weeks or two months. Whenever is safe for the baby.” He paused. “If it’s mine…” His voice trailed off. “Well, haven’t I been lucky all these years.” He muttered it to himself. “If it’s mine, I want on the birth certificate. I want joint custody. I’ll pay my half.”

“Half? C—”

“I’ll get my lawyers and you get yours. We’ll have Baby C divvied up so fast his little head will be spinning not knowing it he’s spending the night with your nanny or mine.”

“What about Miss Lake Trout? Don’t think she’ll move in?”

C sighed. What was Jemma thinking of this? Good Lord, he’d be doing good to see her again to explain. To plan…

The phone rang and C retrieved it, nodded and spoke the perfunctory answers to Norm. He hung up and looked at the kitchen wall clock. Abby had arrived twenty minutes ago.

Didn’t take long to trash a dream, did it?

Chapter Thirty-Two

J
emma couldn’t move from Carolyn’s chair. If someone entered the office, they’d see a woman bonded to the desk, her face set in a stone imitation of a real person. She had no breath, no life, no heart. Abby had walked out of the office and taken all that with her.

The phone had rung twice. She’d managed to flick her eyes to the Caller-ID display, see that one was the advertising department of the weekly paper and the other “caller unavailable.” She wasn’t about to rouse herself from her stupor for either one. She’d even have to think about answering Mandy.

Her future had just gone south, to hell in a bandbox. How many more bad clichés and euphemisms did she know? She searched her mind but tired of the exercise quickly.

C’s child. Wasn’t that what she was supposed to have? Granted, she was a bit old for a casual pregnancy. There would need to be tests and caution with an almost-first time mother just shy of her fortieth birthday. But lots of women were doing it now. Lots! And C had all the makings of a good father, she just knew he did. Buried under that false bravado and macho machinations beat the heart of a man who really just needed a good solid dose of love and care to show that he had the same in him. Jemma didn’t see the world through rose-colored glasses. It was not all going to be smooth sailing; the potential for backsliding was huge. But she was going to help him become the man he should have been all along.

Was going
. Those were the key words. Because now, she wasn’t going to be doing anything. His future was with the mother of his child.

Jemma leaned back in the chair and sought to come to terms with the idea of C and Abby married. It certainly hadn’t bothered her two weeks ago. She’d prayed for him to find himself elsewhere. She supposed there was the possibility he might not be the father. Well, she was sure they were working that out!

Was it fair to send Abby out there without warning him? She smiled to herself.
Fair
was a four-letter ‘F’ word and had nothing to do with the circumstances.

The phone rang again and she waited for the number to show. Norm’s. She had to face him eventually. Might as well be over the phone lines.

She couldn’t be as strong in person. In person, he’d look at her and she’d melt into his arms, and well, that would solve nothing. Jemma solved problems, and this one would be better out of the way quickly so she could go on with her life just like it was before Edward Charles Samuels moved into it.

***

C closed the door behind Abby and stared at the scuffed wooden living room floorboards. They looked like his grandmother’s, and if that were the case, then the wood would polish up beautifully. He’d need to tell Jemma, so they could move them to the new house, too.

What was he thinking? Jemma wouldn’t be moving into any new house with him. He doubted she’d even talk to him willingly. It would take an act of Congress, and no doubt Lyla’s help, before she’d agree to see him. Just what he didn’t need: to be beholden to his sister-in-law. Best to try and straighten this out himself. There was a solution to this monumental but not insurmountable problem, an idea just beyond his mental grasp.

There had to be.

He was trying to see this as a ‘good news, bad news’ proposition. On the good side: if Abby’s baby was his then he wasn’t sterile. All these years, he’d thought himself incapable of having children. Had that contributed to his licentious lifestyle? Would a lifetime of conquests somehow prove that he was a man’s man, even if incapable of fathering children? The bad news was self-explanatory: wrong mother.

And what a horrible irony for Jemma. He came to a dead stop in the pass through between kitchen and living area. She’d lost one child and now to lose a man she loved because of another woman’s child? How many backseat nightmares were there to be for her? But she didn’t have to lose him. He didn’t want her to lose him. There was a solution.

There had to be.

He reviewed his agreement with Abby. He’d promised to be available to her at noon on Monday. By that time, she was to know when it would be safe to test the baby for paternity. Until that time, until they conclusively knew the results, until then, he couldn’t promise Jemma anything.

But, God, she had to let him explain!

Norm was landing at two. He checked his watch: eleven forty-five. If they could have lunch together…

He picked up the phone. She answered on the fourth ring.

“Lake Country.” Her voice was nowhere near normal. C’s stomach tightened.

“Jemma. Abby just left.”

There was silence, although he could hear her breathing.

“Can—can we have lunch?”
“I—” He heard the slam of the door blinds in the office and Carolyn’s cheery “hello.”

“Jemma, please.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“You have to see me eventually.”

“Do I?”
“Yes.” He leaned his forehead on the back doorjamb and rubbed it against the wood. “It’s either that or come make bail when your mother has me arrested for breaking and entering tonight.”

“Please, C, don’t—”

“We can keep it public, but it would probably be better if it wasn’t.” She was silent so long, he had to say her name again. “Jemma, are you there?”
“Yes.”

He heard a difference in her tone. Was it resignation?

“I’ll get take-out and come to Norm’s.”

“That would be good.”

He replaced the receiver and for the first time since he was a child, Eddie C cried.

***

“Hungry?” C held the door open for her as Jemma briskly climbed the back steps at Norm’s. She carried three take-out sacks from the Lily Pond.

“I was when I ordered. Or, rather, nothing looked good so I bought a little of a lot.” She kept her voice even, her lips in a straight line. She preceded him into the kitchen and put the plastic sacks on the table. “There’s soup, mu shu pork, Dragon and Phoenix, egg rolls, fried rice.” She glanced at the coffeepot. “And you’ve made tea. However did you know where I’d go?”

“I figured we’re both the kind to retreat to the familiar.” He pulled plates, bowls, and utensils from the dish drainer.

Jemma looked at the containers of food. “Except I can’t eat.” Finally, she looked at him. Finally, she was able to make herself meet his gaze, see that his eyes were as hurt as hers. She touched her breastbone. “There’s a big lump stuck right here, Charles.” She choked a sob back down and shook her head at him when he made to touch her. “No. Holding you isn’t going to make this go away.”

“Holding you I can make that lump smaller.”

“Small lumps your business now?”
“Jemma, don’t be sarcastic.”

“I have to find a way to fight this. And I don’t know how.” She clutched at a kitchen chair and pulled it out, sat down. “Maybe a cup of tea.” She rubbed her forehead with the heel of her hand.

She heard the cascade of the pouring tea as he lifted the carafe and filled the cups, brought them to the table along with the dishes. The steam rose to her chin and she brushed at her eyes before picking it up and sipping.

“Go on and eat.”

“I can’t eat either.” He stared at her. “What do you want to do?”
“What is there to do? Is the baby yours?”
“Abby believes it is.”

“And you don’t?”
“I didn’t think I could have children until she told me this.”

“And you were going to tell me this when?”

“Before I left tomorrow. Before anything was public.” He gulped the tea and grimaced as the hot liquid burned his tongue and throat. He put the cup down. “It’s just one more part of the T-and-C-as-neglected-children story. Our parents were a little lax with the vaccinations and we got the mumps. I had the worse case.”

“Oh.” She didn’t let him finish. “But you never really knew if they affected you?”

“Just thought I did.”

“Would Abby lie?”

“To what end?”

“To get you back.”

“When paternity can be disproved so easily now?” He rolled his shoulders back and seemed to relax before her eyes. He took a deep breath. Whether it was talking to him about this or the hot tea, her lump was growing smaller, too. “No, Abby believes I am the father. I will proceed on that premise until we have proof otherwise.”

Jemma didn’t want to ask, but he didn’t seem to be volunteering the next piece of information. “And then?” It was supposed to be a whisper but came out as a squeak.

“Then we find a lawyer. Or two.”

“For—”

“For joint custody and parental rights.”

“Not a preacher?”
“I’m not marrying Abby.”

“And what does Abby think about this?”

He shrugged. “She wants marriage, but she’ll settle for—how did she put it?—my financial protection. Abs always did have a way with words.”

“You don’t think that for the sake of the child, you should marry her? At least live together for a two-parent home?”

“Those are interesting words from you. Why didn’t you look up Mandy’s father? Why didn’t you marry him?”

“I had no history with him. I didn’t love him. At least, you and Abby have history. At some point, you’ve each put your lips around the words ‘I love you.’”

“You’re a cruel woman.” He reached for the sacks, opening them until he found the soups. He popped the top on one, curled his lip, slid it to her, then poured the other into a cereal bowl. “Are two parents a guarantee of a safe and loving home? I don’t think so. T and I had two parents for ten years. Only got us misery.” He sipped the hot-and-sour soup, pursed his lips at its sharpness.

“What kind of mother will Abby make?”

“Lousy. It’ll be nannies and
au pairs
. But then, she can make the argument that I’ll make the world’s worst father. What kind of example do I have to follow?”

Jemma slowly picked up her soup container and drank from it.

“That’s nasty.”

“Well, we weren’t going to share.” She fished out a piece of wonton dough with her spoon and chewed it down. She studied the soup container and dug for the vegetables.

“I always thought I might make a good father. At least, a reasonable facsimile of one.” He laid the spoon down. “T and I would lie awake at night and we’d swear to each other that we’d be better parents than what we’d been given.” She looked up now and focused on his profile. He took a deep breath. “We told each other that we’d listen to our kids before we hit them, but we both knew that was a lie. There wasn’t going to be any hitting in our houses.” His voice softened. “Our homes.” He turned to her.

“That difference never really registered until I got to watch T and Lyla. He has a home with her, not just somewhere to sleep and eat and have sex. A home.” He breathed the word out like it was a revelation and Jemma set the soup container down. The lump was back in her chest. “He’s going to have it all, Jemma. It’s not that he doesn’t deserve it—he does. God knows he lived in hell far too long.” He pointed to himself. “And I let him live there. When he was high…” his eyes contemplated the ceiling “when he was high, he was magnificent. The music would just spill out of him, round and round, till he wore us out trying to keep up with him.” He licked his lips. “But sober? With love? With responsibility? With—God, I hate to admit this—with Lyla—his past dies with what he’s becoming. And, and I both hate his new self and treasure it. I see,” his eyes closed, “I see what I could be.”

He raised his gaze to her. “I want nothing but good for my brother. He wants the same for me.”

“He’s come through the fire.”

“Precisely.”

“But you’re still in it.”

“I thought I saw the light on the other side. Come to find out it was a freight train.”

“You owe it to your baby to make a try of it with Abby.”