Authors: Loree Lough
As she silently debated the question of marrying Noah, she’d blamed her roller-coaster emotions on exhaustion, worry about Bobby, the shame and hurt and anger caused by what her father had done. And then the rational side of her brain would take over again. You can’t marry a man who doesn’t love you. And besides, he hasn’t brought it up since the snowstorm, anyway.
May as well give it to him straight, she decided. It’s the only way you can be sure this topic will never darken your doorstep again. She thought about where they were sitting, about where they’d been last time he brought up the idea of marriage. The subject will never darken
his
doorstep again.…“I’m an only child, y’know.”
“So I’ve heard.”
“My mom and dad were only children, too.”
She could tell by the furrows in his brow that he had
no idea where she was going with this line of thought. “I can empathize with that last Mohican, since I’m the only Mackenzie left—at least, the only one of
my
Mackenzies left—so this whole business of preserving my father’s reputation seems pointless. I mean, what sense does it make for you to replace the stolen money? It isn’t as if I have to protect his mother or mine or—”
“What about the children you’ll have someday? Don’t you intend to tell them about their grandfather? If I put the two hundred thousand back, they’ll never have to know.
No one
will have to know.”
“I’ll know,” she replied dully. “Besides, I’m nearly thirty years old. What’re—”
“You’re going to have children. Plenty of them. God doesn’t fill a woman to overflowing with natural-born nurturing tendencies unless He plans for her…plans to give her a passel of kids to spend all that love on.”
“I used to believe that would happen.” Another shrug. “But I was young and naive then. I believed a lot of impossible things.”
“Like what?”
“Oh, girl stuff mostly.”
“Girl stuff?”
“In five or six years, you’re going to know more about that than you ever dreamed possible!” She laughed. “Angie is going to turn into a teenager, and—”
Noah’s groaning chuckle silenced her…temporarily.
“She’s going to start talking about a handsome prince who’ll come along and whisk her off to a pretty little cottage in the woods,” she said wistfully, hands clasped beneath her chin, “where they’ll raise a whole slew of little princes and Angies.”
“You don’t believe it anymore?”
“No.”
“You sound awfully adamant.”
“I lived my whole life believing my father was a prince.” She gave a bitter little laugh. “And you know the old joke—‘turns out he was just a frog.’”
“That’s not really fair, is it?”
She thought about that for a minute, then shook her head. “Yeah, well,” she said, “princes don’t steal, now do they.” It was more a statement than a question, and Dara hoped he’d see it that way, let the subject drop, once and for all.
“So, you’re saying that just because your father made one mistake, you’ve given up all hope that the right man will come along, sweep you off your feet, give you that cottage and those kids.”
One
mistake? For all she knew, he had a whole secret life of crime going on behind her back. “That’s what I’m saying.”
Things weren’t going the way she’d planned. Not even close. She’d intended to come out here, let him know that no one held him responsible for Bobby’s accident. And what had happened, instead?
He
was comforting
her!
Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Noah was
trying
to console her, but his questions had, in effect, only served to make her more miserable than ever, because thinking about the futility of her fantasy was one thing, but putting it into words was something else entirely.
“Then there’s nothing to keep you from marrying me, is there?”
She replayed the question in her mind.
“You said that night—when I first introduced the idea—that you’d couldn’t marry a man you didn’t love.”
“That’s right.”
“Well, since you don’t believe the man exists whom you
could
love, why not marry me?” He paused. “You’d have half the dream, at least.”
“The cottage in the woods, you mean,” she said, nodding toward the house.
“If you were my wife, everything I have would be ours,” he corrected. “We could have a grand life.”
“Yeah,” she muttered, “two hundred grand.”
“This isn’t about the money, Dara.”
“Isn’t it?”
“No. It isn’t.” Clearing his throat, he continued. “Remember what I said about you that night when you got snowed in here?”
Dara hid her face in her hands. “I’m blushing just thinking about it.”
“Well, I meant every word. I mean it all a hundred times more now. I choose my friends carefully,” he repeated, “very carefully. And after what you’ve done for us these past few days, there isn’t a doubt in my mind—there’s no better friend in the world. And,” he said, forefinger pressing into her jeans-clad knee, “there’s
nobody
better for Angie and Bobby.” He cleared his throat. “Especially Bobby.”
You must really be losing it, Dara old girl, she thought, because this idea of his is starting to sound tempting. Very tempting.
“He needs a mom, now more than ever. The poor kid has always been scared of the dark.” Almost as an afterthought, he said, “Did you know he slept with a night-light before…before…”
She grabbed his wrist, squeezed it tight. “It wasn’t your fault, Noah! It was a freak accident. Period. So stop blaming yourself.”
“It’s more than the accident, and I think you know it.”
Sidling closer, she linked her fingers with his.
“It’s about everything…about the way I let Francine rule the roost, about the way I never questioned her disciplinary tactics. Don’t get me wrong—she was a good woman, a good mother. I know how much she loved those kids, but—”
“She loved you, too. I’ve seen the proof dozens of times, in every picture in your family room.”
“Yeah. I know.”
Could have fooled me, Dara told him silently. “Can I ask you a question, Noah?”
“You can ask. But I don’t seem to have very many answers these days.”
He was referring to the accident, losing his wife, a hundred other things that seemed indefinable, unexplainable. “Why are you always so hard on yourself?”
“Hard on myself! If I was hard on myself, a lot of the things that have happened…well, they wouldn’t have happened.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I always figured it was my duty to become a part of the rat race…to pay the bills, y’know? And it was Francine’s job to take care of…of practically everything else. ‘Man must work from sun to sun,’” he quoted, “‘but woman’s work…’”
Noah blew a stream of air through his teeth. “I was ‘Mr. Important Working Man.’ Didn’t have time to drive the kids to birthday parties and piano lessons.” He grunted. “I always had time for golf outings and fishing trips. Had plenty of time to make use of my Orioles season tickets.”
Another grunt. “God set it all in action thousands
of years ago. He intended for
man
to be the head of the house. And what did I do? Handed the job off to Francine. That’s what.”
A silent moment ticked by. “Wasn’t fair. Wasn’t right.”
“Maybe it wasn’t right,” Dara agreed, “but from everything I’ve heard about Francine, it sounds to me as if she
enjoyed
being in charge.”
“She
was
pretty good at it,” he admitted, a smile of fond remembrance collapsing into a shudder of embarrassment.
“And you were pretty good at supporting your family. Just look at this beautiful house. And what about the home you had in Pennsylvania? I’ve seen photographs…it was a virtual mansion!”
She rambled on. “The kids told me about the fun family vacations and all those luxurious, romantic places you took Francine, just the two of you. The way I hear it, she knows London as well as any Brit! And you bought her nearly every piece of expensive jewelry, every fur, every fancy car, she ever asked for, too. You couldn’t be in two places at one time, Noah. How were you supposed to provide everything she said she wanted without working long and hard?”
He chuckled softly. “Listen to you, defending me as though you’re my mom or something. Do you see what I mean? You’re a natural-born mother.” Then, suddenly serious, Noah shook his head. “But making excuses for my bad behavior doesn’t change anything.”
“
What
bad behavior? You were a model husband. You’re the perfect father.”
“Oh, yeah? Well, if I’m so perfect, how come my kids are so busy trying to be perfect that they’ve forgotten how to be kids? They get so little practice acting
their age that when they
do
cut loose a little, they don’t know how to behave.
That’s
why Bobby never told me when he fell—”
She gave his arm a gentle shake. “Stop it. I won’t listen to another word of this nonsense. You did the best you could under the circumstances. No one, not even God, could expect more of you than that.”
“
I
expect more. A whole
lot
more.”
Without warning, he turned, gripped her upper arms. “Say you’ll marry me, Dara. I know I can be the father those kids deserve…with you at my side.”
“You’re the father they deserve right now.”
Moonlight, reflected in his pale eyes, glittered like hard diamonds. He didn’t believe her, she knew, as evidenced by his furrowed brow and taut lips.
Noah had told her all about his days at St. Vincent’s. “I didn’t deserve a family,” he’d said, “so when Angie and Bobby came along, I just assumed they were God’s gifts to Francine.” His wife, he’d said, had earned them, because unlike him, she’d never committed a wrong in her life.
She made you believe you were good enough for her only when you were doling out gifts and trips and attention in hearty doses. And she turned your kids into walking, talking robots. How right was that? Dara thought, but said nothing.
Pain shimmered in his eyes, and Dara bit her lower lip, praying for God to show her a way to relieve his agony.
And then it. came to her.
She could marry him, and just as he’d suggested, be his helpmate. Then, day by day, she could show him proof that he was—and always had been—a wonderful, loving father, a wonderful loving
man.
And why not? Her Prince Charming wasn’t coming. Not now. Not ever. Because, as she’d told Noah, no such man existed. So why
not
marry him, do something honorable and worthwhile with the rest of her life? Because he’d been right: she
had
been good for Bobby and Angie, and she could be good for Noah, too. The Lord knows they’ve been good for you, she admitted; she’d never felt more wanted, more needed, in her life.
“All right, Noah,” she murmured. “I’ll marry you.”
He looked at her for a moment, as if unable to believe she’d said yes. When he pulled her to him, she felt him tremble. “Do you mean it?” he whispered into her ear.
Her arms went around him as if she’d been born to it, and the truth spilled from her lips. “I’ve never meant anything more.”
Noah held her at arm’s length, studied her face. “You won’t be sorry,” he said, smiling wider than she’d ever seen on his handsome face. “I’ll take good care of you. I promise.”
Tears sparkled in his eyes. Caused by joy? she wondered. Or regret at having been forced by circumstance to replace his beloved Francine with the daughter of a common thief? It didn’t matter. “I know you’ll take care of me, Noah. I’ll take good care of you, too.”
He threw back his head and laughed. “As if I didn’t know that already. Why, you’ve already spoiled me rotten in just this past week.”
“You ain’t seen nothin’ yet, Mr. Lucas,” she said. “I’m going to take such good care of you and Angie and Bobby you’ll wonder how you ever did without me!”
After a moment, he said, “I’m wondering that already.”
Something had happened as she’d looked into his shining, damp eyes, something that made her realize there was more, much more involved here than agreeing to this marriage of convenience.
She wanted to do all those things for Noah, in part because he deserved them, in part because she’d suddenly begun to hope that by doing them, she might be able to earn his love.
He hadn’t ridden into her life on a great white mount, and maybe his armor did have a few dings in it, but he was her prince nonetheless.
U
nceremoniously dropping the big dress box onto her bed, Dara kicked off her shoes and stepped into her slippers. According to the digital alarm, it was ninethirty. Feels more like midnight, she groused, heading for the kitchen.
She filled the teapot, and as she waited for the water to boil, Dara sorted through the day’s mail. She set aside the bills—one from the power company, another from the telephone carrier—and without so much as a glance at the assorted catalogs and sales brochures set them aside.
She tore open a few envelopes, had a cursory look inside. The public access television station wanted a donation. A candidate running for the House of Delegates wanted her vote. Two charities wanted her help in distributing pamphlets. A telemarketer wanted her assistance in performing a survey.
The plants wanted water, the furniture a good dusting and the carpets a thorough vacuuming. Even the
teapot wanted something from her, and she turned off the burner to still its insistent whistle.
She’d been spending every day at the Lucases’, making sure Dr. Tilley’s orders for Bobby’s care were followed to the letter. Under her conscientious, loving attention, he healed, and by the end of that first week, he was back at school, headacheless and carefree. Sensing he’d progress more quickly if she didn’t hover over him, Dara took it upon herself to organize the linen closet, straighten the pantry shelves, rearrange the furniture in the family room so that no matter where a person sat, the fire in the woodstove and the television set could be viewed without inducing a stiff neck. Between her twice-hourly checks on the boy, she’d polished the hardwood floors. Shampooed the carpets and upholstery. Waxed the kitchen cupboards. Washed the curtains.
On the way to their house in the morning, she stopped at a twenty-four-hour market for groceries. On the way back to her place, she’d dropped off Noah’s suits and sport coats at the dry cleaner’s.
She did all this because any day now, his address would be hers, too, a fact that compelled Dara to turn the big, newly built Victorian into a home for the four of them.
Two days and counting, she thought, spooning sugar into her mug. Two days until you’ll be Mrs. Noah Lucas.…
She tossed a tea bag on top of the sugar, drowned both with hot water and stirred, oblivious to the clink of metal against ceramic. The cinnamony scent of the tea wafted into her nostrils. Spicy apple had always been her mother’s favorite flavor.…
Smiling, she dropped the soggy tea bag into the trash
can, remembering it was one of her mother’s many habits, the worst of which—according to Jake—was her tendency to leave cold, wet tea bags on the countertop. It was the main point of contention between her parents. Actually, it was the
only
point of contention she could recall between them, though she supposed there were some issues they worked out in private.
She knew this much: whatever bound them together, heart to heart, that was what she wanted in her own marriage. Is that possible, she wondered, when you’re not marrying for love? And this is a marriage of convenience. Isn’t it?
Sighing, Dara remembered that those tea bags were the first things her father had talked about the morning after her funeral. “Lord,” he’d said, his voice soft and wistful, brown eyes misting with unshed tears, “what I wouldn’t give to have another cold, wet tea bag to complain about.…”
“I miss her, too,” Dara had said, hugging him.
Dara sipped her tea. Seems like only yesterday; could it really have been two years ago?
Glancing at the picture on the mantel of her parents on one of their many trips to London, tears filled her eyes. I miss you, too, Daddy, she thought. Oh, how I miss you.…
Dara carried her mug into the bedroom, placed it on the nightstand and stared at the shiny pink box on her bed. Inside it, wrapped in red tissue paper, lay the outfit she’d wear to her wedding. It was nothing fancy, just a simple two-piece suit, more than adequate to exchange vows in the pastor’s office.
The pastor’s office, she thought, grimacing.
She thought she’d accepted the fact that none of her dreams were going to come true. No Prince Charming.
No church filled with friends and relatives and flowers lining the altar steps. There’d be no white runner to lead her to the altar. Worst of all, she had no father to walk her down the aisle, no mother to turn in that first pew, teary-eyed and smiling, as Dara took her place beside her husband-to-be.
The stark mental picture reminded her of the last conversation she’d had with her mother.
During Anne’s last weeks—because she hadn’t been strong enough to do much else—Dara stopped by every evening on her way home from work, carrying a collection of slick fashion magazines in her arms. She’d lie beside her mother on the big rented hospital bed in her parents’ room. Heads and shoulders touching, giggling and rolling their eyes, they leafed through page after page of the latest fads.
They played Scissors, Paper, Rock to determine who’d keep the perfume samples—a practice that soon had Anne’s nightstand drawer filled to overflowing. Critiquing hairdos and makeup and commenting on the ultrathin models was a fun, stress-free activity that always seemed to brighten her mother’s wan features.
On the very afternoon of her mother’s death, Dara had tucked a brides’ magazine in with the others. If she could have predicted—as they made their way through the stack—that looking at white gowns and headdresses would make Anne cry, she’d have slipped it from the stack and hidden it for sure.
“Now, don’t get me wrong,” Anne had said, sniffing and blotting her eyes on a corner of the starched white sheet. “I love being married to your father. Always have. But if I had it to do over again, I would have listened to your grandmother. I would have exercised a little patience and waited for that nice church
wedding I’d always dreamed about.” Her voice, wispy and weak, faded as she struggled for each breath.
Dara had tried to convince her mother to conserve her energy, but telling the story seemed to calm her more than silence could have.
“Your dad was a lieutenant in those days.” Anne had smiled serenely. “A navy test pilot,” she whispered, closing her eyes. “Oh, how handsome he was in his flight suit.” She sighed. “The minute we learned he’d be shipping out for six months of sea duty, we decided to tie the knot, so I could start setting up house while he was gone. We ended up exchanging vows in the pastor’s office—me in my Sunday best, your dad in his dress uniform.”
They’d gone through it so many times it could have been a one-act play. “But, Mom,” Dara said, as if rehearsed, “if you
had
waited, you would have had six months less with Dad.”
Nodding weakly, her mother closed her eyes. “That’s true,” she’d whispered. “And every moment counts, especially now, doesn’t it?”
Her mother had gripped her hand then, forcing Dara to meet her eyes. “Oh, sweet girl, how I wish I could be at
your
wedding.”
“I’m just a few years shy of thirty, Mom,” she’d teased halfheartedly, “there isn’t much chance—”
“It’ll
happen.
” Anne’s voice, strong and sure, belied her condition. “You’ll see. Before you know it, when you least expect it, the man of your dreams will come into your life and—” She’d giggled softly, squeezing Dara’s hand. “Wear something pretty and feminine to your wedding. Do it for me, okay?”
Dara pushed the tissue paper aside, exposing the suit. Pretty and feminine enough for you, Mom? She leaped
from the bed, pressed the jacket to her torso and did a slow pirouette in front of her mirror. This wasn’t at all what you had in mind, was it? She could be certain, because Anne had opened the brides’ magazine and dog-eared a center page. “
This
is the kind of dress I want you to wear on your oh-so-special day,” she’d gushed.
Dara laid the jacket gently atop its matching skirt and stepped into her closet. There, in a discarded boot box on the lower shelf, lay that very magazine. She opened it to the page her mother had marked, flopped onto the bed beside her suit and smiled thinly.
The gown was made of creamy-white satin, and its sweetheart neckline and pirate sleeves were trimmed in tiny pearls. The train began at the tightly petaled rosette at the small of the waist and cascaded to the floor like a silken waterfall that came to rest in a puddle and stretched out for fifteen feet. The veil, made of dozens of yards of finely woven lace, gave a cloudlike illusion as it floated to the floor from the pearl-encrusted tiara.
Closing the periodical, Dara lay on her stomach, fingers skimming across the chalk-white wool. Tastefully elegant, the suit fitted as if it had been sewn exclusively for her. Its scalloped neckline and sleeves had been trimmed with tiny, opalescent buttons. She’d bought a narrow-brimmed milk-white hat to go with it, and after opening the round hatbox, Dara poked her finger into its stiff, open-weave veil that would hide her face until that magic moment.
“It isn’t what you wanted for me, Mom,” she whispered, folding the tissue over the suit, “but it’ll do…for the kind of ceremony we’ve planned.”
Planned? Ha! she thought, rolling onto her back. One hand lay under her pillow; the other rested atop the
tissue-covered wedding suit. The only thing planned about this wedding is that there will be a wedding at all!
She had hoped, once she’d agreed to become his wife, that Noah would make time somewhere in his schedule to talk about their future. Should she arrange a small reception at his house, so he could entertain employees and clients? Who would witness the exchange of vows in Pastor Williams’s cramped little office? Would there be a honeymoon?
He hadn’t discussed any of the details of life after the ceremony, either, except to say that since the children had grown so accustomed to their spacious house on Kingsway Drive, it would be best if Dara moved in with them, instead of the other way around.
It meant having to sell almost everything.
There was a bright side to that dark cloud: use the proceeds from the sale of her parents’ house and the condo to pay back the money Dad stole. She had no intention of letting Noah right her father’s wrong. What kind of life would they have if they started out he the great and generous “giver of things” and she the needy “taker.”
It wouldn’t be easy selling the two-bedroom condo she’d bought with a down payment from her first-year teaching, but it’d be a whole lot less painful than seeing the For Sale sign go up in front of the rambling manor house where she’d grown up.
Soon after her father died, Dara had packed up her parents’ personal belongings and put them in storage. Things that didn’t fit into her own condo had been given to friends or sold at ridiculously low prices to couples just starting out.
Her dad had been gone six months now, and she
hadn’t been in the house, not once, since opening it to let a young engaged couple take a look at the living room suite. The Victorian antiques Dara’s mother had collected over the years were worth easily ten times what the lovebirds paid for them. Remembering how her father felt about the mustard-colored velvet divan and two ornate, blue-green brocade side chairs made it easy to let them go so cheaply. “This place is starting to look like the back of a tinker’s wagon!” he’d complain. But her mother’s love for antiques outweighed his need for a simpler life, as evidenced by her continual additions to the outrageous collection.
Dara had been left with mixed feelings as she’d sold off the pieces that had so distressed her father—and so pleased her mother. She had easily found people whose appreciation for the gaudy stuff matched her mother’s own. She’d let it all go—lead-crystal lamps with silk shades, baroque candlesticks, sateen throw pillows, the elaborately carved cherry tables—for a song. “In your honor, Dad,” she’d whispered, watching the happy couple drive off pulling their overflowing rented trailer.
She’d decorated her own bright, airy rooms with an eclectic mix of plainness and color. Bright area rugs lay on well-scrubbed hardwood floors. Cream camelbacked sofas and chairs flanked the fireplace. Terracotta lamps with parchment shades sat on maple Shaker tables. Indoor trees and houseplants in brass kettles and wicker urns formed a natural curtain between her world and the bustling street outside. And it was all a one-of-a-kind backdrop for her lifelong collection of wolf figurines.
Except for the wolves, she would have to leave it all behind. But what did it matter? She had her memories, didn’t she?
“Oh, Daddy,” Dara whispered as tears filled her eyes, “if only I had known.…”
Known what? That his trip to England would kill him? That he’d be accused of a despicable crime afterward?
If he hadn’t stolen that money, Noah would never have proposed in the first place.
She’d been telling herself the only reason she’d agreed was that Noah needed her to keep another accident like the one that had nearly blinded Bobby from happening. But Dara knew in her heart that wasn’t true; he’d been doing a fine job taking care of his kids without her.
But if not for the missing two hundred thousand, if not to take care of the kids, then why
had
she agreed to marry him?
Dara gingerly fingered the pearly buttons on her wedding suit. Admit it, she thought, you want to marry him…because you love him.
Noah stood in Angie’s doorway, hands pocketed, and watched her sleep. The hallway light slanted into her room, illuminating her pixie-ish face. She’d pulled the covers up tight under her chin, tiny fingertips sticking out as she clutched at the satiny trim of her fuzzy pink blanket. She tried so hard, during her waking hours, to behave like a grown-up, but asleep, Angie was every bit a child…innocent, sweet, very much in need of a mother’s protection and care.
Soon, he told her silently, soon you’ll have it. Quietly, he pulled her door, leaving it open just enough so that he’d hear her if she called out in her sleep.
He walked down the carpeted hall and stepped softly into Bobby’s room. As usual, the boy had kicked off
his covers and lay on his side, hugging his knees to his chest. Noah eased the covers up carefully, so as not to wake him. The boy was safe and sound and sleeping peacefully. There was no reason to linger.