Waking Up in Charleston (20 page)

Larry inched closer to her, his attitude admirably protective. “Are you still mad at him?” he asked her, regarding Max with suspicion.

Amanda rested a hand on his shoulder. “We’re working on making things better,” she said.

“I’ll bet it’s ’cause he’s sick,” Susie guessed. “Mommy’s always extra nice to us when we’re sick.”

Max felt that odd sensation in his heart again, an old pain that had never really gone away. “Whatever the reason, I’m real glad of it, Susie. I’ve missed your mama.”

Susie crept closer, then held out her arms to be picked up. Max scooped her up and held her tight against his chest. To his astonishment, she gave his cheek a pat, just as Amanda used to do.

“It’s okay, Granddaddy. You can cry if you want. I cried my first day of school ’cause I missed her.”

Max felt the tears cascading down his cheeks and wasn’t the least bit ashamed of them. “Caleb, why don’t you go inside and tell Jessie we have company. I think she baked cookies today. I imagine a few won’t spoil Sunday dinner.”

“Cookies?” Susie asked, squirming to get down. “I’ll go with Mr. Caleb. He probably needs help.”

Max released her with regret, then smiled as she scampered inside ahead of Caleb, practically bouncing with excitement. His gaze sought Amanda’s. “I could always win you over with cookies, too.”

Her lips curved slightly, but the smile didn’t take. “I’m not as easily won over now,” she told him.

Max nodded. “I understand that.” He smiled at his grandsons. “What about you? You want to help with the cookies while your mom and I have a talk?”

“Sure,” Jimmy said at once, and raced inside, letting the screen door slam behind him.

“Larry?” he asked.

“I’m staying with my mom,” he said fiercely.

Max nodded. “That’s fine with me.”

Amanda, however, ruffled the boy’s hair. “It’s okay. You go on with the others. I’ll be fine.”

Larry’s gaze narrowed. “But
are
you still mad at him?” he asked again.

“I’m working on it,” she said.

“How come?” Larry asked.

“Because, no matter what, he is my father, just like I’m your mom. I hope if we ever have a fight, you’ll forgive me.”

Larry looked bewildered. “We have fights all the time.”

Amanda grinned. “Those are little disagreements,” she told him. “The one your granddaddy and I had was a humdinger.”

“Oh,” Larry said, still looking puzzled.

“You don’t need to understand,” she told him. “It’s between your granddaddy and me, and we’ll work it out. I want you to get to know him, okay?”

“I guess,” Larry agreed reluctantly.

“Go have some cookies and think about it,” Amanda encouraged. “And make sure Caleb doesn’t let Susie have too many, especially if Jessie made fried chicken for dinner.”

Larry grinned and looked at Max with the first less-than-hostile look since they’d arrived. “Susie gets sick and throws up,” he said happily. “You’d better watch out.”

Max laughed at the warning. “Good advice. I’ll be sure to stay out of her path if she has too many cookies, and between Jessie and Caleb, I imagine she will.”

Larry finally went inside, leaving Max alone with his daughter.

“Thank you,” he said, his voice thick with emotion.

“For what?”

“Bringing them out here. I know I probably don’t deserve it,” he said.

“Especially after that sneaky trick you played on Caleb Friday night,” she said.

Max shook his head. “He told you? I wondered if he would.”

“Caleb’s an honest man.”

“He is,” Max agreed, then grinned. “Something tells me he struggles with it from time to time.”

“Only when you swear him to secrecy,” Amanda retorted.

Max flushed guiltily. “Still, I don’t suppose the story was the first thing out of his mouth when he brought them home.”

“No, as a matter of fact, it wasn’t,” she admitted.

“Then there’s hope for him yet,” Max said approvingly.

Amanda frowned. “Let’s pray he doesn’t adopt your attitude toward honesty, that it’s something to be reserved only for those occasions it’s convenient.”

“You always been so concerned about honesty?”

“Of course.”

“Then how the devil did you let Bobby O’Leary get away with lying to you for so many years?”

Max knew as soon as the words were out of his mouth that he’d said exactly the wrong thing. He closed his eyes against the anger on Amanda’s face and tried to block out the heat in her voice.

“Saying things like that about my husband is no way to keep me here,” she said coldly. “Keep it up and your first visit with your grandchildren could be your last. I won’t have you criticizing their father, especially not when they might overhear you. They have no idea it was Bobby’s fault that things have been so difficult for us. I won’t have their memories of him tarnished by you out of spite.”

“You’re absolutely right,” Max said, hanging his head. “I should never have said such a thing when they could hear it. Children should never hear a harsh word spoken about their parents. I held to that when
you
were a child.”

Even before Max realized what he’d let slip, Amanda regarded him with a stunned expression. “Meaning what?”

“Forget I said that,” he muttered.

“No, how can I? I want to know what you meant.”

“Nothing,” he insisted. “I was just rambling on.”

“About what?” she demanded again. “You weren’t rambling, Daddy. You said exactly what you meant to say. What kind of harsh words did you keep to yourself when I was a child? Are you talking about my mother? Was there something about her you never told me? You always put her up on a pedestal, so I assumed she belonged there.”

Max cursed his stupidity. He’d kept the secret for more than thirty years, only to come close to blurting it out now when it could do even more damage.

“That’s exactly what a child should believe about her mother,” he said.

“But it was a lie?” she asked.

Max kept silent.

“Daddy, tell me,” Amanda demanded. “If there’s something I should know about my mother, then I want to hear it. I have a
right
to hear it.”

All the fight seemed to drain out of Max under Amanda’s condemning gaze. Maybe the damn secret wasn’t worth keeping anymore, but right this second he wished like hell it had died with him…or with his faltering memory, at any rate.

“I swear, Daddy, if you don’t speak up, I’ll…” Her voice faltered.

“You’ll what? Beat the truth out of me?” he asked, amused by her ferocity despite the disaster he’d set in motion. “Take the kids and leave? How will you learn anything if you’re not underfoot to nag me?”

“Oh, for pity’s sake, you’re impossible!” she snapped. “You probably made the whole thing up just to see if you could get me all stirred up.”

For a fleeting instant, he considered letting her believe that. It would be easier on both of them.

Then her expression changed. “But you didn’t do that, did you?”

God help him, he couldn’t see a way around the truth. “No,” he admitted. “I never should have gotten into this, not after all this time. It won’t do a bit of good.”

Amanda’s gaze remained steady as she waited, her hands clenched nervously in her lap as if she knew whatever was coming would shake her world forever. And it would. There was no question about that. That’s why Max had never had the nerve to tell her when she
was younger. He’d worked hard to give her an image of her mother that she could treasure.

“Okay, yes, it is about your mother,” he said quietly.

She nodded. “I figured that much,” she said impatiently.

“I loved her more than you can possibly imagine,” he said, his heart aching at the memory. “She was my life, at least till the day you were born.”

“The day she died,” Amanda whispered.

Max took a deep breath, then slowly shook his head. “No, Amanda. It didn’t happen like that.”

For a moment, she merely looked confused. When the implication registered, shock spread across her face. “What are you saying?” she asked weakly. “Did you…?”

He stared at her in confusion, then realized the leap she’d taken. “Did I what? Kill her? Is that what you’re thinking? Good God, Amanda, is that what you think of me?” He sighed, hurt to the quick. “I suppose you have reason enough to think I’m capable of anything, but no, nothing like that.”

“What, then?”

He had to brace himself to voice the truth. “Your mother’s not dead, Amanda,” he said slowly. “A few days after you were born, she left me.”

Amanda looked as if she might faint from the shock of his announcement. Max regarded her worriedly. “Are you okay?”

She stared at him incredulously. “My mother’s alive? Still?”

“Last I heard, yes,” Max said.

“And when was that?” she asked, disbelief and fury warring on her face.

Max winced. “A week or two ago,” he admitted, racked now with guilt over all the years of deception. “I’ve gotten a report once a month since the day she left.”

Amanda sat back, suddenly looking more bewildered than angry. “Why?”

“Why did she go or why did I keep it from you?”

“Both.”

“It’s a complicated story, but I suppose it can be boiled down to one thing. She wanted more excitement than I could give her.”

“She just walked away from me? From us?” Amanda sounded breathless. “Without a fight?”

“It was the deal we made. I insisted on a clean break, even though it tore me apart to do it. I couldn’t have her changing her mind every few weeks or months, turning our lives upside down. She wasn’t ready to be a mother, to give up all the dreams she’d had to stay here at Willow Bend.” He gave her a sad look. “She was a lot like Bobby, you see. She was a dreamer. She always wanted something that was just out of reach. I gave her everything she ever asked for—I would have given her the moon if I could have—but it was never enough. So I let her go off with someone she thought could make her happier.”

“She left with another man?”

He nodded, trying to hide his bitterness. Losing Margaret had been hard enough. Losing her to a no-account charmer who was destined to break her heart within a year had been a thousand times worse.

“Are you sure you didn’t send her away?” Amanda asked heatedly. “That sounds more like you.”

He shook his head, thinking of the day he’d watched
his beautiful Margaret go and how it had ripped out his heart. It was exactly like the day he’d lost Amanda. Worse in many ways, because it had set all these years of deception in motion.

“How dare you keep this from me?” Amanda demanded furiously now. “How dare you let me spend my whole life thinking my mother was dead?”

“I thought it was best,” he said simply.

“Best? How could it possibly have been best?”

“Wasn’t it better than knowing that you weren’t enough to keep her here?” he asked gently. “Knowing that I wasn’t enough was hard on me and I was a grown man. How could I put that kind of burden on a little girl?”

He watched as his words sank in and Amanda seemed to shrink right before his eyes. No question her heart was broken by a woman she’d never even known and a father who’d blurted out a truth best left unsaid for all eternity. He’d curse himself for that till the day he died.

“I’m sorry, darlin’ girl. I never should have told you,” he said.

Amanda looked at him with a mixture of hurt and contempt. “Yes, you should have,” she said quietly. “You just should have done it thirty years ago.”

A
manda felt as if her head were going to explode. Her mother was alive! All these years she had mourned someone she’d never even known. She’d pitied herself for not having a mother to bake cookies for her, to listen to her talk about school, to explain about her first period, to hold her when her first boyfriend broke her heart.

Instead, it had been Jessie who’d baked the cookies and listened and explained about becoming a woman. Max had been the one to hold her and let her tears soak his shirt. She’d had both of them, and it should have been more than enough.

But it hadn’t been. She’d longed for a mother. She’d even tried a time or two to pick out one for herself, but Max had been stubbornly resistant to her matchmaking schemes, even when it came to Jessie, already an integral part of their lives. Or maybe
especially
when it came to Jessie.

To discover now not only that her mother was alive but far from the idealized version her father had described made her feel sick inside. She looked at her father, fighting the all-consuming anger and renewed
sense of betrayal that was bitter on her tongue. She wanted desperately to lash out, but always in the back of her mind was the reminder that he was ill.

“Did you love her all this time?” she asked. “Is that why you never looked at anyone else?”

Max nodded. “Pitiful, isn’t it? That’s what I didn’t want for you, Amanda, an all-consuming love like the one you felt for Bobby, a man who was as unworthy as your mother.”

“But how?” she asked. “How could you go on loving her after what she’d done?”

He smiled at that. “You should know. A part of you still loves Bobby, doesn’t it? Love doesn’t die easily, even when you see the other person’s flaws. People are more than their failings, Amanda.”

His expression turned nostalgic. “Your mother was ten years younger than I. She was vital and amazing and beautiful. She captivated everyone who met her. Everything I ever told you about her was true. I just didn’t paint a complete picture. She was also selfish and immature. She wanted what she wanted when she wanted it, with little regard for the consequences. Under the right circumstances, that could be charming and impetuous. Under others, it was far less attractive. I recognized some of those same traits in Bobby and knew firsthand the damage they could cause. I know it wasn’t fair to judge him based on what had happened to me, but I couldn’t help it. I wanted to protect you from the same kind of mistake I’d made, one that nearly destroyed me.”

Amanda could hardly argue with his motives, now that she had a more complete picture, but none of that
made it right. And she couldn’t imagine anything that would make his lie about her mother okay.

“I should have known,” she said wearily. “It might have made all the difference.”

“Perhaps,” he conceded. “But you were my world and I didn’t want you to hurt the way I did when your mother left. I didn’t want you to make a rash decision and suffer as I had.”

“And yet I did suffer,” she told him. “Out of your desire to protect me, I never had a chance to know my mother and then I lost you and, in the end, I lost Bobby. How did that make anything better?”

“If I’d been able to see into the future, I’d have done things differently,” her father said.

She regarded him with skepticism. “Really?”

He gave her a wry smile, then shrugged. “No, probably not. I was convinced I knew what was best.”

Amanda fell silent, her thoughts whirling. Finally she met her father’s gaze. “Has my mother ever asked about me?”

He shook his head. “As I said before, that was our agreement. There was to be absolutely no contact, not with me directly, not with you, not with anyone in Charleston who might give away the secret. It was the price she agreed to pay for her freedom to go chasing after her lover. We had to come up with this whole elaborate plan to let her slip away from here so no one would know the truth. Everyone believed the story that she’d died after giving birth to you and that I’d taken her ashes back to Georgia for burial. If anyone questioned that, they never dared to mention it to me. In return, I paid her enough to live on comfortably for the rest of her life.”

“But why not just admit the truth, that she’d left you?” she asked, then shook her head. “Never mind. It was that Maxwell pride of yours, wasn’t it? You couldn’t just lose her. She had to be dead to everyone.”

“Something like that,” he admitted.

“And the man? What happened to him?”

Her father shrugged. “The allure wore off eventually, I suppose. They weren’t together more than a few months.”

“And you know that because you kept tabs on her,” Amanda said, “even though she wasn’t allowed to contact me.”

“I needed to know she was okay,” he said simply.

“And if she hadn’t been?” she asked curiously. “What would you have done? Would you have gone to her? Brought her home? Unraveled all the lies?”

His expression wilted at that. “I don’t know,” he said softly. “I have no idea. I suppose it’s just as well I never needed to find out. As near as I can tell, she’s had the life she wanted. She’s been content.”

“How could she be?” Amanda asked, bewildered, trying to imagine her own life if she’d simply abandoned her children and left them to someone else to raise. “What sort of woman leaves her daughter behind and never looks back? She must have had regrets.”

He sighed. “Perhaps she did, but she wasn’t like you, Amanda. Mothering wasn’t instinctive to her. She wanted to travel, meet new people, have new adventures. I had rashly promised her all of those things when I married her, but when I took too long giving them to her, she grew restless. My mistake was thinking she’d come to love this place as I do, that she’d settle down.”

Amanda felt completely overwhelmed. “I have so many questions, but I can’t think now. I need to go. If I take Caleb’s car, do you think you could make sure he and the kids get home?”

“Of course,” Max said without hesitation.

In fact, Amanda thought he seemed almost eager for her to go. Perhaps he needed time to himself, as well. His revelations seemed to have taken as much out of him as they had out of her.

“Should you be driving?” she asked belatedly. “If not…”

A few years ago, perhaps even a few months ago, Max would have railed at her doubts, but he seemed to accept them, which somehow made Amanda terribly sad.

“It’s okay,” he said without rancor. “Jessie will drive them.”

She studied him sorrowfully. “You know, I always thought Jessie was the one you really loved.”

“I know,” he said. “And in my own way, I suppose I do. She just had the misfortune to come along after my heart was already taken.” He shrugged, his expression resigned. “Things are better this way.”

“You all alone and Jessie just as miserable?” Amanda asked. “And my mother, who knows where? How is any of that better?”

“If I make Jessie’s life miserable now, just imagine what I could do if I were ever to marry her,” he said, his tone wry. “Besides, it wasn’t possible.”

“Why not?”

He gave her an impatient look. “Your mother’s still very much alive.”

It finally dawned on Amanda what he meant. “You never divorced?”

“How could we? Everyone thought she was dead. See what a complicated web we weave…?”

What Amanda saw was a man who’d made impossible choices and found a way to live with them. She just wasn’t sure quite yet whether she admired him or hated him because of it.

When Caleb and the children exited the house, he realized Amanda was gone and so was his car. Larry apparently noticed it at the same time. He whirled on his grandfather.

“What did you do to my mom? Why did she leave?” he asked Max, his fists balled up as if he wanted to strike out at this man who had the power to hurt his mother.

Caleb rested a hand on the boy’s shoulder, but he, too, regarded Max curiously. “Did something happen?”

“We talked, that’s all,” Max said defensively.

Caleb kept his gaze steady on the older man. There was more. He could tell it not only by Max’s tone, but it almost seemed as if new lines had been etched into his face.

“Kids, why don’t you all explore a little?” Caleb suggested. “Just stay within sight of the house.”

Jimmy could hardly wait to take off and Susie was right on his heels, but once again Larry hung back. Caleb hunkered down and looked into his eyes. “I’m sure your mom is just fine. You don’t need to worry about her.”

“But if he did something…” the boy began, casting an angry look at his grandfather.

“Then it will be up to him to fix it,” Caleb said. “Go keep an eye on your brother and sister, okay?”

He waited until Larry was out of earshot, before he turned to Max. “What happened?”

“You don’t need to worry about getting home,” Max said, avoiding the question. “I’ll have Jessie take you all.”

“A ride is the last thing I’m concerned about,” Caleb snapped. “What did you say to upset Amanda? You did upset her, didn’t you?”

Max suddenly looked defeated. “She’ll have to be the one to tell you,” he said. “If that’s what she wants to do.”

“Dammit, Max, the two of you were just starting to get close again,” he said, not even trying to hide his frustration. “You know how fragile this truce is.”

“Don’t you think I understand that, boy? I didn’t intend to open up this can of worms, but it happened and there’s not a blessed thing I can do about it now.” He regarded Caleb sadly. “Maybe you all should get on out of here. Go check on Amanda. She said she wanted to be alone, but something tells me she could use a friend about now.”

“I could be a better friend if I knew what was going on,” Caleb said.

“Then you’ll have to ask her,” Max repeated, struggling to his feet. “I’m tired. I’m going in to take a nap.”

Caleb tamped down his irritation and studied him worriedly. “Are you okay?”

Max gave him a resigned look. “I think we both know the answer to that, don’t we?”

Caleb watched him go inside. Just as the screen door
was about to close, Max caught it and looked back at Caleb. “Tell her I’m sorry, okay? About everything.”

Caleb nodded. “Sure.”

But first he had to learn what
everything
was. Something told him Amanda was going to be no more eager to talk about it than Max had been.

She wasn’t going to get rid of Caleb. Amanda could tell that from the set of his jaw and the way he’d ignored every one of her hints about being tired and tomorrow being a workday. More telling was the fact that he hadn’t said a single word about her abrupt disappearance from Max’s. No, he was saving that for after the kids were in bed. So far, she’d let them stay up a half hour past their bedtime just to avoid being alone with Caleb and all his questions.

Finally, she had no choice. She had to get the kids upstairs so they’d get a decent night’s sleep before school. She tried staring Caleb down. “Isn’t it time you were going?” she asked bluntly.

His mouth curved into a slight smile. “You’re not shaking me that easily, Amanda. We’re going to talk.”

“Does it have to be tonight?” she asked. She was emotionally wrung out. She wasn’t sure she had anything left for a conversation about Max’s devastating revelation.

Caleb studied her for an eternity before finally nodding. “Yes,” he said quietly. “I think it does. Otherwise, neither one of us will get any sleep.”

“Okay, fine,” she said irritably. “Give me a few minutes.”

“Why don’t I help you out?” he offered. “I’ll read the boys their bedtime story and you get Susie tucked in.”

Amanda was too tired to argue, so she nodded and let him lead the way down the hall. Susie had already given herself what passed for a bath. She was still covered in bubbles when she climbed out of the tub and her hair was curling damply against her cheeks. Amanda got her tucked in, then leaned down to brush a kiss across her forehead.

“’Night, baby.”

“’Night, Mama,” Susie said sleepily, then opened her eyes. “I like my grandpa.”

Despite her own heartache, Amanda smiled. “I’m glad.”

“Do you think if I told him I’d like it, he’d keep candy in his pockets?”

Tears stung Amanda’s eyes. “I imagine he would do anything in the world you asked of him,” she said. That’s what he’d done for her, anything she’d ever wanted. She needed to keep reminding herself of that, letting it balance out all the rest.

Only now she understood that it had been about more than his love for her. It had been about guilt. Out of his own stupid pride, he’d managed to deprive her of a mother. Of course, he would say that her mother hadn’t fought to keep her.

As she went back into the living room, she heard the low murmur of Caleb’s voice as he read the boys to sleep. He was so good with them. And he’d filled a huge gap in their lives, in
all
their lives. When she was at her lowest, she wished with all her heart that she could snuggle into his arms and let him take care of her, of them.

But she would never again rely on a man for her family’s security. The two she’d loved the most—her father
and Bobby—had let her down. From now on, she had only herself to count on. As much as she trusted Caleb, as much as she already relied on him, she wasn’t sure she could ever take that final leap of faith that he would always be there. And that hurt, because she did love him, more and more each day.

Admitting that surprised her. She’d tried so hard to pretend it wasn’t happening, but it had. It had snuck up on her despite all her defenses, thanks to his steadfast presence.

Caleb would never lie to her. He would never keep secrets from her, she assured herself, only to remember, of course, he already had. Worse, he, like Max, had done it in the name of love, in the name of protecting her. It wasn’t enough to keep her from loving him, apparently, but it was more than enough to make her wary.

When he joined her downstairs, she had just enough resolve left in her to look him in the eye. “Please go,” she begged him softly.

“We need to talk,” he repeated.

Amanda shook her head. “Not tonight. I can’t do it, Caleb. I don’t have the stomach for it.”