Maggie sputtered a laugh. “You did?”
“Sue me.” She shot Maggie a pointed glare. “I thought you were trying to
prevent
pregnancy.”
A grin split Maggie’s face. “I know! Crazy, huh?”
“Is it?”
“Wild.” Maggie exhaled, letting her head fall back as the weight of her secret lifted from her shoulders. “So wild.”
Turning her head, she eyed her friend and attempted to gauge her reaction. Sheila’s face remained carefully impassive for a moment. Then a small smile twitched the corners of her lips.
“I thought you seemed happier,” she said at last.
“I am.” Maggie swallowed the lump in her throat and blinked back a scalding rush of tears, but emotion clogged her voice. “All I’ve ever wanted was a baby.”
Sheila’s brow puckered as she reached for Maggie’s hand. “Just a baby?”
A searing jolt zinged through Maggie’s body. Her fingers clenched her friend’s reflexively. She forced a smile and tried to extract her hand. “That’s all I need.” Sheila squeezed, holding fast to her hand. The smooth silk of her skin cooled the heat pooling in Maggie’s gut and calmed the nerves prickling her spine.
Weaving their fingers together, Sheila met Maggie’s gaze directly. “I’m happy for you.”
“Thank you.” An uncertain smile quivered on Maggie’s lips. “You never know what people are going to think.”
“Do you care?” Sheila asked, arching one eyebrow.
“I know I shouldn’t…”
“But it’s hard not to,” her friend concluded.
Another reassuring squeeze conveyed Sheila’s tacit approval, but Maggie knew she wouldn’t get off the hook so easily. She did her best not to squirm under intense scrutiny but failed. Wriggling into an upright position, she reached for her glass of wine. The tart flavor teased her tongue. The cool liquid slid down her parched throat. She closed her eyes, savoring the wine and waiting for the knockout blow.
“Who’s the guy?”
Maggie swallowed hard then rasped, “Tom.”
“Tom?”
Her head bobbed. “Tom. Tom Sullivan.”
“Tom Sullivan,” Sheila repeated in a bewildered tone. “Tom Sullivan?” Her voice rose. “My Tom Sullivan?”
The incredulous question struck Maggie like a blow. “
Your
Tom Sullivan?”
Sheila waved her concern away with a negligent sweep of her hand. “Not like that, you silly girl.” She snorted indelicately. “Though an old woman can dream,” she murmured, reaching for her wine glass. “I meant, the Tom Sullivan that I know and love.”
“Do you love him?” Maggie asked, curious about the seemingly close relationship between her friend and her lover.
The question was answered with an exaggerated eye roll and the bleat of the telephone. Sheila pried herself from the cushions. “That’ll be the doorman calling. Dinner is here.”
“So fast?”
“I order from a place right around the corner. Plus, I assume Christmas is not their busiest day.” Sheila answered the call. Satisfied that sustenance was on the way, she turned her full attention back to Maggie. “Please tell me Tom knows of your plan to conceive,” she ordered with an imperious lift of her brows.
“Of course! It was his idea.”
“Just checking.” Sheila made her way back to the couch. “Tom Sullivan,” she murmured. “You say it was his idea?”
Sheila’s incredulous tone made Maggie snicker. “I know, wild, but it was. Well, his participation in my plan, that is.”
“He’s a good man.” She offered her hand to Maggie.
Maggie nodded and slipped her hand into the older woman’s firm clasp. “I think so.”
The doorbell rang, and a brilliant smile lit Sheila’s dark eyes as she pulled Maggie from the depths of the sofa cushions. “Good. I’m glad you see it too.” Releasing Maggie’s hand, she hurried to the door. “Thank God I ordered extra egg rolls,” she called over her shoulder. “I’m going to want details. Lots and lots of juicy details!”
****
“And I told her she puts too much nutmeg in her coffeecake, but she never listens to me,” Katie Sullivan said with a sniff.
Tom stifled the smirk that threatened. Instead, he focused on the crumbs dotting the saucer in front of his mother. As usual, his mother insisted on blaming Tracy for Sean’s perceived baking failure. It was an old joke that Katie Sullivan never understood. His sister-in-law didn’t bake. Hell, the woman could barely boil water. Sean was the culinary genius of the family. Sean was the one who put too much nutmeg in the Christmas morning coffeecake Tom had brought from his brother’s house.
It was Sean who saved them from a lifetime of Hamburger Helper and tuna fish casserole, because even though Katie
Angelini
Sullivan was taught to cook like any good Italian girl, she didn’t feel compelled to share the gift of her talents with her growing boys. His mother never could see the point in slaving over a hot stove when there were soap operas to watch and neighborhood gossip to fuel. She certainly didn’t want to waste time fixing nutritious and delicious meals for her family when there was no man hanging around to compliment her superior parenting skills.
Tom sat back and crossed his arms over his chest as she pushed away from the stained and scarred
formica
table. He lowered his lashes to hide the laughter in his eyes as he shook his head. “That Tracy, she never learns.”
“She’s going to find herself without a husband if she doesn’t wise up soon.” She rinsed the saucer and fork she’d used and placed them in a plastic rack to dry. “Then what will she do?”
He rolled his eyes behind her back. “I imagine Tracy would be able to manage on her own.”
Katie Sullivan whirled, fixing him with an incredulous stare. “With three children? There’s no way. I could barely muddle through with the two of you after your father left. How could someone like Tracy possibly raise three children on her own? She doesn’t even cook.”
Tom bit the inside of his cheek to keep from snapping at her. “I don’t think we have to worry about Tracy and the kids. Sean would never let it come to that.”
“Sean.” The derisive snort that accompanied her younger son’s name had almost become another syllable over the years. “He’s just like your father.”
Wooden chair legs scraped the worn linoleum, causing her to jump. Tom ground his teeth as he pushed from the chair. “Shouldn’t you be getting ready for mass?” he asked, nodding to her faded housecoat and slippers. “We’ll be late.”
His mother glanced at the clock on the stove. “It’s already too late. We’ll have to wait and go to the four o’clock service this afternoon.”
“Ma—”
She held up one heavily veined hand to halt his protest. “You were the one who insisted on spending the morning at your brother’s house. You know the last morning mass is ten o’clock on holy days.”
The thought of spending the entire afternoon in the gloomy little bungalow where he grew up made his skin crawl. “I have to get back to the city.”
“It’s Christmas Day, Thomas. You’re not married, you have no family of your own. Why would you need to rush back to the city?” She pinned him with a piercing glare. “Have you met someone?”
Tom inhaled through his nose and clenched his teeth, determined not to flinch. “What? No.” He shook his head. “I have work to do, Ma. Big case. It’s been in all the papers.”
Katie Sullivan’s face softened into a smile so angelic one could almost forget she was anything but a sweet old woman. “I know you do, but surely you can take one day off with your mother.” She nodded to the seat he vacated. “Sit. I’ll make you something better than that awful coffeecake. We’ll have bacon and eggs, you can watch one of those football games they always show on Christmas Day, and then you can take me to mass.” She pulled a heavy skillet from the cabinet beside the stove. “It is a holy day of obligation, after all.”
He dropped into the seat, crossing his arms over his chest again and tucking his clenched fists into his armpits. “It sure is,” he grumbled, casting a longing glance at the kitchen door.
“I told Cecilia
Cogburn
that Mary Therese Murphy was as senile as an old stump.” Tom sat up a little straighter as she bustled from the stove to the fridge and back again. “Last week, at the golden jubilee luncheon she tried to tell us that she saw you cozied up with some redheaded hussy in a supermarket of all places!” She cracked an egg against the side of the skillet. “She tried to tell us it looked serious. How could it look serious? I said to her, ‘Mary Therese Murphy, my Tom is not serious about any woman, much less some tramp who fools around in the market.’ It made no sense.”
Tom bit back the defense that sprang to the tip of his tongue. Instead, he forced a laugh. “She said it looked serious? How does something like that
look
serious?”
His mother crowed, “Exactly!” Shaking her head, she cracked two more eggs in quick succession. “I mean, I’m your mother. I would know if you were getting serious with a woman.”
“Right.”
“And what would you be doing up in the north suburbs anyway? You’re a
southside
boy. And in a grocery store! It was too ridiculous.” She waved the notion away with a package of bacon. “Anyway, I hope that
Mairead
is keeping a close eye on her. You know how those old people get when their minds start to go.”
Tom fought the urge to point out that Katie Sullivan and Mary Therese Murphy were about the same age. Instead, he focused on a chip in the speckled
formica
in front of him. He dragged in a calming breath and rubbed the indentation with his thumbnail. “Right. Yeah, I hope Mari is taking good care of her,” he managed to mumble.
Another snort was chased by the sizzle of bacon hitting a hot skillet, and the fine hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. “I told that old bat, ‘My Tommy is too smart to get trapped by any woman. My Tommy is his own man. He’d never fall for some other woman…’ You know that Mari is probably getting divorced, right?”
Tom blinked, stunned by the abrupt segue. “She is?”
Katie bobbed her head. “You watch yourself. She’ll probably end up calling you to be her attorney, then she’ll fall in love with you.”
He forced a chuckle when she glanced back over her shoulder. “Not likely.”
“Oh, I know they all do. You’re just as handsome and successful as that fella who was the divorce lawyer on that show. But you’re smarter than him. You won’t get caught. You won’t get trapped. Not my Tommy.”
Chapter Fifteen
The lock’s tumblers
snicked
and clunked. The hinges squeaked when he opened the apartment door. Tom turned sideways and slipped through the opening, making a face as hinges sang out again. The poker game had run later than usual. Actually, the game ended at the usual time. It was the minor inquisition he faced after shooting off his mouth that made him late. Still, he thought he acquitted himself fairly well. The Oak Park Mafia had nothing on Tom Sullivan when it came to the verbal thrust and parry.
He toed off his shoes and crept through the darkened apartment like a cat burglar. By the time he reached the bathroom, his shirt was balled in his hands. Fred squatted in the bedroom doorway, blinking lazily when Tom paused in the hall. The feline’s silent reproach echoed off the darkened walls.
“Get in bed,” he whispered, nodding toward the bedroom.
The tip of the watch cat’s tail twitched and his purring motor cut out abruptly. He kept his piercing green gaze focused on Tom.
“She told Sheila!” His whispered justification sounded pathetic and he knew it. The fact that he was defending himself to a fat marmalade-colored cat didn’t make him feel any better, either. “And Tracy,” he added. Fred didn’t seem impressed. “I don’t care what you think. Sean’s my brother. I get to tell someone.”
He slipped into the bathroom and shut out the cat’s low growl of disapproval. Within seconds, his clothes lay strewn across the chilly ceramic tiles and the shower hissed to life. Tom stood under the spray, lathering his body with Maggie’s lemongrass soap and rehearsing his defense. Tipping his head back, he let the hot water trickle over his face. The weak spray barely raised a tingle on his scalp. He couldn’t quite fool himself into thinking Maggie would be more apt to be swayed by his justifications than Fred, but keeping their relationship secret was killing him.
He would claim that he just needed to tell Sean. After all, how could she blame him for wanting to share something so important with his only brother? Tom glanced down at the water pooling in his palm then shook his head. He shifted and the tiny pool seeped through his fingers.