Yesterday's Embers (Clayburn Novels Book 3) Read online

  “Thanks, hon. I feel good.” Angie glanced at the clock. “The baby’s sleeping, but you can go get her if you want. It’s about time for her to nurse anyway.”

  Mickey washed her hands at the sink and headed back to the nursery. She’d held Rick and Angie’s little girl in the hospital two weeks ago, but she was eager to get her hands on the little doll again.

  The nursery smelled of baby powder and Lysol. Angie was a bit of a neat freak. Mickey approached the crib and peeked over the bumpered rail. The sight of the sleeping infant took her breath away. She didn’t know why the wonder never dimmed, but it had been this way with her and babies as far back as she could remember.

  She picked up the sleeping bundle and cradled her in front of her body so she could inspect every dainty feature. In just two weeks the baby had changed so much. The scrunchy, red-faced newborn had become a picture book beauty. Their first girl, she would be spoiled rotten—like Mickey had been. She smiled at the affinity she shared with this little angel.

  Emerald, they’d named her. Mickey liked it, but already in the hospital Rick was shortening it to Emmy. Her flawless olive skin was touched with gold, and long dark lashes lay against her pudgy cheeks.

  She squirmed and puckered her lips. She was perfect. So perfect, it moved Mickey to tears. But there was regret—and fear—mixed in those tears as well. Would she ever hold a child of her own? Would God ever grant her the one dream she’d clung to since she was a little girl?

  God had been kind to allow many, many children in her life in the form of her precious nieces and nephews and with the daycare. Doug’s children had become extra special to her over the past few weeks. She glanced up at the pink rosebud clock on the nursery wall. They were probably leaving for the bowling alley about now. She missed them. Felt like she was missing out.

  She knew her friendship with Doug and his kids was a gift from God. But it wasn’t the same. She longed to carry a baby inside her, feel it grow. Unlike some women, she’d never dreaded the prospect of childbirth. She wanted to feel the pain of pushing a child into the world. She wanted to nurse babies at her breasts and watch them change and grow from the day they were born. Maybe she was selfish for allowing nothing less in her dreams. But surely God hadn’t created her to be a woman with such strong maternal desires, only to withhold the fulfillment of them from her.

  Still, as her thirty-first birthday loomed only a few pages away on the calendar, she couldn’t help feeling on the edge of a quiet panic.

  Emmy wriggled and stretched, and Mickey snuggled her close. The feelings it triggered inside her, holding this new little life, had to be physical, hormonal. Oh, please, God. I want to hold my own baby someday. Please… Again, the tears flowed.

  “Mick?”

  Rick’s voice startled her. She swiped at her damp cheek with one hand.

  “Dinner’s almost—Hey…why the tears?” He touched her arm. “You okay?”

  She inhaled deeply and let out a shaky breath. “I’m fine.” She could never hide anything from her big brother. “Your daughter is so beautiful…that’s all.”

  He cocked his head, as if trying to decide if she was telling the truth. Apparently she fooled him because he turned his eyes on his daughter. “We made a pretty one, didn’t we?”

  “You did. But, um…I think Angie gets all the credit for the pretty part.”

  The baby stirred in her arms. Mickey hitched her up over her shoulder, and Emmy let out a very unladylike burp.

  Mickey giggled. “That, she inherited from her dad.”

  Laughing, Rick puffed out his chest. He slung an arm around her and the baby. “Let’s go check out that barbecue.”

  She followed him, grateful for the diversion.

  Kayeleigh slurped the last of her Diet Coke and slouched down in the ratty velvet seat in the dark theater. They finally got a Sunday without stupid Miss Valdez tagging along, and Dad had spent the entire day moping around like he’d lost his best friend or something.

  Okay, she had to admit she was kind of sorry she and Landon had talked Dad into going to some lame kids’ movie instead of going bowling like usual. She was getting pretty good at the sport if she did say so herself. And she’d read in Rudi’s Seventeen magazine just yesterday that it was good exercise, too. She could already tell she’d lost a little weight. See if Lisa Breck called her “Chunkola” behind her back now.

  Bowling would have been fun with only Dad. Maybe then he would have said two words to her instead of being all googly-eyes over Miss Valdez.

  She’d worked up the courage to talk to Rudi about it last week, and her best friend had said something she hadn’t thought about. “Your dad’s probably awfully lonely, without…you know…your mom.”

  “What? Rudi, think about it. He’s got five of us there almost all the time. How could he be lonely?”

  Rudi had looked at her like she was crazy. “Are you ever lonely, Kayeleigh? Even with everybody else in the house?”

  At first Rudi’s question made her mad, but after she thought about it for a while, she could sort of see where she was coming from. The thing that got to her was: what if Mom could see them? She’d heard a lot of different stuff about heaven, and some of it made it sound like people in heaven could see down here on earth. She was pretty sure Mom wouldn’t be happy about the way Dad looked at Miss Valdez. Or the way Miss Valdez touched him when she didn’t think anyone was looking.

  Rudi’s dad had died when she was a baby, and her mom had married again. Howie wasn’t like a stepfather to her because he was the only dad she remembered. So…maybe after you’d been in heaven awhile you didn’t care so much if your wife or husband started liking somebody else.

  It was all too confusing. She blew out a breath and tried to turn off her mind and concentrate on the movie. There were some funny parts, but it was pretty lame. From two seats away, Landon shot her a dirty look. He was getting to be a real pain…except when Miss Valdez was around. Then he suddenly turned into a perfect angel, and Miss Valdez treated him like he was God’s gift to the world.

  The surround-sound music swelled, and she focused on the movie screen. The cartoon characters were singing. It was a sad melody, and too late, she realized they were singing about trying to find their mother. She knew from the previews that the mother was dead. Dad had tried to talk them into a different movie, but she and Landon and the twins outvoted him. Now she was sorry. She snuck a glance at the twins. They wore identical gap-mouthed expressions. Kayeleigh looked at Dad, figuring he’d be watching the twins and Landon, worried the scene was too sad for them.

  But his eyes were on the screen, too. Except he wasn’t really watching. Her heart lurched. He was crying. The fancy dim lights on the walls of the theater reflected off the streaks running down his cheeks. He didn’t know she was watching. She’d tried to forget that night, right after Mom died, when she’d come downstairs to find him rocking Harley and crying like a baby. Even though it had torn her apart to see that, she understood it. He’d lost Mom. Why wouldn’t he cry—even if he was a grown man? But why was he crying now? Mom and Rachel had been gone for a long time now…months. Even she hardly cried about it anymore.

  Truth was, sometimes when she tried to remember them, she couldn’t. She couldn’t remember how Rachel’s voice sounded exactly, or Mom’s. That scared her. What if she died? Would everybody forget about her, too?

  Dad sniffed and swiped at his cheek with one hand. It was obvious he didn’t know she was watching him. She felt her throat start to close. Tears pushed at her eyelids. No. No. Think of something else. Don’t cry. Why did Dad have to go and make her feel like this? Why couldn’t they just forget what had happened?

  She forced herself to concentrate on the movie, but the story about a little boy who was searching for his mother defeated the purpose. She pried the lid off her Diet Coke and used the straw to scoop ice into her mouth. The cold felt good against the tightness in her throat. According to Rudi’s Seventeen magazine, ice didn’t have any
calories at all. She could chew it until her teeth hurt, and maybe even burn up a few calories in the process.

  She turned slightly in her seat so she couldn’t see Dad from the corner of her eye. Working to get another portion of ice into her mouth, she let the movie’s soundtrack fade into the background.

  Chapter 19

  “I’m sorry I’m so late.” Doug stood in the middle of Harriet’s dining room, trying for a posture that demonstrated appropriate remorse.

  But when he looked up, her dour expression hadn’t changed. She took in a breath as if she were going to say something. Instead, she folded her arms over her chest and shook her head as if she could hardly believe he’d dared to be half an hour late.

  “I…I don’t think I’ll need you to watch the kids again until later in the week. Maybe Friday night? Would that work?”

  “Friday night?” Her eyes narrowed. “What’s going on then?”

  “Nothing much.” He turned toward the living room, where the kids were watching some nature show on TV. “I thought I might…go out.” His attempt to backpedal crashed, and he could see Harriet reading his mind.

  “You’re taking that Valdez girl out again.”

  He didn’t deny it but merely nodded, working to keep his tone casual. “We thought we might go see a movie or something.” The “we” part wasn’t exactly true. He hadn’t gotten up the nerve to call Mickey and ask her out yet. “I wanted to take her to dinner…as a thank-you for all the extra time she’s spent with the kids.”

  He regretted the words before they passed his lips. Mickey hadn’t given a tenth of the time to the kids that Kaye’s mother had, and he was more likely to ask Harriet to cook dinner than to invite her out to a restaurant. He made a mental note to remedy that in the near future. But they were her grandkids, after all. And she claimed she wanted to spend time with them.

  Besides, for as long as Kaye’s dad had been gone—probably close to ten years now—he’d helped Harriet with repairs around the house. Mowed her lawn in the summertime, looked after her house while she was in Florida, and shoveled snow off her driveway any time she happened to be in Kansas during the winter. Not to mention he’d had the kids full-time while Kaye stayed with her mother for a week after Harriet’s gall bladder surgery a few years ago. It seemed like it had been a fair exchange.

  Until now, with Harriet staring him down.

  She unfolded her arms and fiddled with the edge of the crocheted cloth on the dining room table. “I didn’t want to say anything until now, Douglas, but I think it’s time I tell you.”

  He waited, curious about what was coming.

  “I’m moving to Florida. At the end of the month.”

  “Moving? This month? You don’t mean for good?”

  She gave a firm nod. “I’m listing my house and moving to Florida. Permanently.”

  He hadn’t seen this coming. It took him a minute to find his voice. “But…the kids. What happened to all your talk about moving back here full-time? I thought you were at least planning on being here to watch them once school is out.”

  “I’ll come visit the children. And maybe they can take turns coming out to Florida to spend a week or two with me.”

  Over my dead body. “This isn’t a very good time to be selling a house. You know what the market’s like right now. And the kids need their grandmother more than ever now, not to mention it’s––”

  “I’ve thought about this a good deal, Douglas. It’s simply too difficult. There are too many things here I’d rather not be reminded of. I see what’s happening with you and that Valdez girl.” Her features softened and her voice became pensive. “I know you need to get on with your life. I’m not so narrow-minded that I can’t understand that. But I thought you might at least wait a proper period of time before you started this…dating again.”

  “I’m not dating, Har––”

  She held up a hand that closed his mouth. “Tell yourself that all you like, Douglas. Everybody in Clayburn has a different opinion.”

  Was it true? Had people really started seeing him and Mickey as a couple? But remembering how he’d danced with Mickey in front of half the town at Jack and Vienne’s wedding, he realized he had nobody to blame but himself if rumors were flying.

  A couple of times they’d run into people from Clayburn while they were in Salina with the kids, but surely this town wasn’t so starved for news that folks ran home from a Doug-and-Mickey sighting and started phoning the prayer/gossip chains.

  “It’s obvious you don’t really need me anymore.” Harriet’s strident voice interrupted his thoughts. “The kids will be fine.”

  “No. They won’t. What will I do this summer? That’s when the kids need you most, Harriet.” It was when he needed her most. He and Kaye had breathed a sigh of relief each summer when Harriet watched the kids and they got a reprieve from the daycare bill for a couple of months.

  “The daycare is open all summer. Let that Valdez girl take care of them if she’s so fond of you.”

  “Would you stop calling her that?” He willed his voice down an octave. “Her name is Mickey.”

  Harriet bowed her head in what Doug took for an apology. But the set of her jaw told him she’d made up her mind. “Kayeleigh’s almost a teenager. She’ll be old enough to babysit come summer.”

  “I wouldn’t saddle her with that kind of responsibility. Especially after what happened…”

  “I’m not telling you what to do, Douglas. I have no doubt you’ll figure something out. But I’m sorry. It’s too hard.” Her face softened, and she looked up at him with eyes brimming. “It’s not just…Mickey. It’s Kaye, Doug. It’s too hard for me to be here with all the memories of her. I’ll visit when I can, but I can’t stay here.” She moved toward the living room and beckoned the kids. “Kayeleigh, your dad’s here. Come on, kids. Turn off the TV, and run and get your jackets.”

  Panic swelled Doug’s throat. End of discussion? Harriet was leaving…leaving him in the lurch. And blaming it—in part anyway—on his friendship with Mickey. A purely platonic friendship. The thought stalled him, and he set it aside to deal with later. But platonic or not, Harriet had no right to decide his life for him. He’d been counting on her help with the kids when summer came.

  He avoided her eyes and herded the kids out to the car. Pulling out of her driveway, he fought the childish temptation to lay rubber on the highway in front of Harriet’s house.

  “What’s the matter, Daddy?” Sadie’s worried face stared back at him in the rearview mirror.

  “Nothing, sweetie. I’m…thinking about what to make for supper.”

  “Dairy Barn!” Landon yelled from the backseat.

  “Not tonight. We’ve been doing that too much lately.”

  “You’re not gonna try to cook, are you?” Sarah said.

  Any other night he might have laughed at the quartet of scrunched-up faces reflected in the mirror. But with the prospect of a thousand nights of trying to come up with something for supper, he suddenly felt overwhelmed.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Kayeleigh said. “I’m not eating anyway.”

  He couldn’t ignore that. “You didn’t eat last night either. Do you feel okay?”

  “I ate at Grandma’s.”

  Doug looked over at her, a question in his gaze, but Kayeleigh avoided his eyes and turned to stare out the window.

  “That was only a snack, Kayeleigh,” Sadie challenged. “Besides, you didn’t even eat yours.” Her voice kicked into tattletale mode. “Grandma made chocolate chip cookies, and Kayeleigh gave hers to me and Sarah.

  “So now you’re telling on me for sharing? Nice, Sadie. Real nice.”

  An alarm went off in the back of Doug’s mind. He’d written off Kayeleigh’s eating habits to impending adolescence. But looking at her sitting beside him now, in spite of the fact that she was developing a womanly figure at an alarming rate, he thought her arms looked a little thin. Maybe it was just that he’d only seen her in thick sweatshirts
all winter. Since she was a baby, Kayeleigh had been a little on the pudgy side. He’d worried about the teasing she might face, but Kaye always said she’d outgrow it when she hit puberty. Maybe watching what she ate now was part of that.

  Puberty. Now there was a terrifying thought.

  He shut off the warning bells and concentrated on the road. And on how he was going to turn a refrigerator full of moldy leftovers and half-empty cartons and bottles into something he could call supper. Dairy Barn was sounding pretty good. Maybe he’d drive through tonight, and then Sunday they could eat someplace nice. Except Sunday was Easter, and Mickey would probably go to her brother’s house. All the more reason to ask her about going to a movie Friday night.

  Of course, Harriet hadn’t exactly agreed to babysit. But maybe she was right—maybe Kayeleigh was old enough to watch the kids for two or three hours if he was only twenty minutes away.

  He hadn’t talked to Mickey in over a week. He’d been in the field late almost every night and either Harriet had picked up the kids from daycare, or Mickey had gone home by the time he got there. She’d bowed out of last Sunday’s trip to Salina. Said she was going to mass with her brothers and a family dinner afterward. But now he wondered. Was she giving him the brush-off and he didn’t even recognize it?

  Come to think of it, he’d tried to call her on Wednesday night and got no answer. As far as he knew, she didn’t go to church on Wednesday nights. But everything had seemed fine when he’d talked to her on Monday.

  They hadn’t exactly discussed what had happened between them, but judging by their brief exchanges, something had changed in the way she responded to him. Something good, he thought. But maybe he only imagined that she was friendlier. A little flirty even.

  But it had been a long time since he’d been in the world of singles. Maybe he just didn’t recognize a brush-off when it smacked him upside the head.

  Maybe she wasn’t even aware that he’d actually planted a kiss in her hair that night on her deck. Still, remembering that night, he thought otherwise. And he hadn’t imagined that she’d responded to him. Physically. He pushed away thoughts that took his mind places it didn’t need to go.