Surprise Dad (5 page)

Colleen bustled up to them, bearing menus. “Table by the windows?”

“Great. Thanks,” Allie said.

“What’s your favorite thing here?” Lilah studied the menu, although she, like Allie, must have memorized it.

“The chocolate meringue pie,” Allie confessed, “but I guess I have to address the major food groups first.”

“Not necessarily.” Lilah gave her a mischievous look. “I’m discreet.”

“Unfortunately,” Allie said, “I’m hungry enough to have both.”

“Me, too,” Lilah said, settling back with a deep sigh. “It’s bad enough now. When school starts next week, by the time I’ve done the get-off-to-school-do-you-have-your-homework-lunch-money routine, I’ll feel as if I’d built a barn with my own two hands.”

“Omigosh,” Allie said, “that time I babysat, I didn’t ask about lunch money.”

“I strongly doubt anybody starved,” Lilah said, and then added, “although the population at our house shifts constantly, so for all I know, some poor, starved boy
wandered the wilderness for years eating fruits and berries, a pathetic bag of bones before—”

“Before Daniel found him and gave him his lunch money,” Allie said. She really liked Lilah.

“Exactly,” Lilah said, “so back to favorite things, I’m almost evangelistic about the grilled cheese with bacon and tomato, and my absolute favorite dessert is the coconut layer cake, so whatever you order, I’ll match you calorie for calorie.”

“The grilled cheese is my thing, too,” Allie said.

“We’re soul sisters. I knew it.”

Colleen appeared, not looking at all harried in spite of the fact that customers waited at the door, others had a finger lifted for more coffee, dessert, their check. “What’ll we have here?”

They gave her their order. “How’re things going?” Allie whispered to Colleen, “without Mike.”

“We don’t even miss him,” Colleen said as if she were reading from cue cards, then dashed to the kitchen like a rabbit on wheels.

“She’s lying,” Allie said. “They miss him.”

“I bet it killed him to leave,” Lilah said. “He was pretty sad last night. I could tell when he called.”

“I’m sure he was. The funeral of an old friend is always difficult.”

“Not that Mike would come right out with his feelings. You know how he is.”

Allie wasn’t at all sure she knew Mike. Or Mike’s brothers Daniel and Ian. She’d always sensed something secretive about them. They were so different. Mike with his reddish-brown hair and green eyes, Daniel so blond, and Ian, dark inside and out. More than that, their personalities were equally different, Mike so gregari
ous and funny, Ian so brooding, Daniel so sweet and caring.

For some reason, she suspected there was more to Mike’s attending the funeral than met the eye, but she didn’t know Lilah well enough to say so. Instead, she changed the subject. “I’m already having a good time working on the benefit,” she told Lilah. “Mike’s dreamed up a terrific menu, surprise, surprise, and I’m working on a color scheme.” She reached into her handbag and brought out a folder. “I want it to be just perfect. Here are some samples…”

Throughout the lunch, she and Lilah discussed details and specifics of the fundraiser, but they also had fun. Lilah was easy to talk to and had a wicked sense of humor.

When she said goodbye, Allie felt happy. Her move back to the valley was shaping up nicely. She had a salary coming in, a place to stay, and a volunteer job for as worthwhile a cause as there could possibly be.

O
N HIS WAY
to Boston, Mike observed the rules of the road, knowing he was tired and upset. During the entire trip, he brooded over the reasons his father might have had for writing this bizarre clause in his will, leaving his son in Mike’s care. It didn’t make any sense.

Driving in Boston didn’t leave much room for thought. He navigated rotaries, one-way streets and sardine-can traffic and at last made it to the funeral home where his father would be honored. Remembered, anyway. Mike couldn’t wait to see if anyone honored the old man.

After he parked in an overpriced garage, he put on his suit jacket and, properly somber-looking, entered the Sisters of Light Chapel of Rest prepared for anything except the possibility of missing a good night’s sleep at
the Boston Inn, where he’d booked a room at a price that staggered him.

He resented every dollar he’d spent on this trip, obeying the last command of a father who’d disowned him. His mother’s dollars had opened the diner. She, at least, had realized at last that he wasn’t the bad seed, just a kid too long neglected, a kid who’d been given his freedom too early, before he’d had time to sort out what that freedom could do for him in a positive way.

So freedom and reckless behavior had been one and the same to him until the night he stole his father’s car and crashed it through the plate-glass window of a local shop, and for the first time in his history of petty crimes, his father didn’t bail him out. That’s when he went to the correctional facility, which was the best thing that had ever happened to him, because he’d met Ian and Daniel there.

He entered the chapel, then halted when he saw the two closed caskets. Evan Howard had lived a life Mike knew nothing about. Maybe he’d changed. Maybe this new wife had been a gracious, warm and loving woman who’d convinced his father to forgive his prodigal son.

He’d never know.

He recognized no one at the funeral, but he hadn’t expected to. He sat down in an inconspicuous spot and waited for the mourners Evan Howard and his new wife had thought of as family to fill the front rows.

No one filed in. No family? No one else, no one who understood what a normal family was like, who would welcome Brian into their happy home?

The chapel was full, though. Business associates, almost certainly. Friends, probably. Bouquets packed the dais, topping and surrounding the coffins. A group of
young women sat together, some of them crying. Friends of Celine’s?

The service began. The minister pontificated for a while about what a wonderful wife, mother and daughter Celine had been…

So where were Celine’s parents? They ought to be fighting him for the guardianship of her child.

…and what a wonderful man Evan Howard had been. He actually said, “a fine man and a great humanitarian.”

One of the group of young women went to the podium to say what a wonderful friend Celine had been.

Two friends of Evan’s rose to say what a wonderful member of the community he had been, probably disappointed that the minister had already said, “a fine man and a great humanitarian.”

Both Celine and Evan had apparently been wonderful. During speeches from more business friends and golf buddies, Mike resisted the impulse to doze. At last it was over. Someone at the funeral had been Evan’s lawyer, but Mike didn’t stick around to find out who. He needed some serious sleep.

A
LLIE WAS
halfway down the block from the restaurant, still thinking what an open, friendly person Lilah was, when she realized she’d forgotten the folder containing the linen samples and her notes on the benefit dinner. She turned back and found herself wondering how Mike was doing. Losing an old friend could hurt, but funerals could also be stark reminders of one’s own short time on earth. When she reached the diner, she went directly to the table by the windows where she and Lilah had sat. The bright-red folder was gone.

No, it wasn’t. Colleen stood at the pass-through into the kitchen waving it at her.

Allie smiled and started toward her, but Colleen pointed to the counter and raced on to her duties.

She picked up the folder, and stayed a second to say hello to Barney and Maury. “Whoo,” she heard Barney say. “Everybody’s eating lunch today. I’m wiped out. I feel like an elephant’s sitting on my chest.”

It was the word
chest
that galvanized her into action. She darted toward the swinging door to the kitchen. She found Maury, wide-eyed, still holding his chef’s knife, staring at Barney, an unfamiliar Barney, whose face was gray and pinched.

She rushed toward Barney, with Maury right behind her. “Are you all right, Barney?” she asked calmly.

Instead of answering, he slumped to the floor.

“I’ll call 911,” Maury said in a scared, shaky voice, and Allie knelt beside Barney, checking vital signs with no equipment except her fingertips.

M
IKE WENT
straight to the hotel, checked in, lay down on the bed and slept for two hours.

He woke up hungry, called room service—to hell with the cost—and ordered a bacon cheeseburger with all the trimmings—to hell with gourmet food. While he waited for it, he decided to call the restaurant, because even in his worst moments, he couldn’t say “to hell with the restaurant.”

“Mike’s Diner,” said a lovely, familiar voice.

“Allie?” His heart thudded.

“Oh, Mike, I’m so sorry you called.”

“Well, thanks. Give it to me straight. What’s happened?”

She sighed. “Nothing for you to worry about until you get back.”

Mike froze, worry creeping up his spine. “What don’t I have to worry about until I get back.”

“Well, Barney had a—a spell of some sort and had to go to the hospital.”

“He had a heart attack, didn’t he?” Mike rested his head on his hands. He’d known Barney had been working too hard and hadn’t done a thing to stop him. Barney meant so much more to him than great burgers. He’d been like the father Mike had never had.

“He’ll be okay. Colleen’s holding the fort at the hospital and calling in with the news, Becky’s taken over the grill and the griddle, Maury’s filling the other orders and I’m waiting tables. We’ll have reinforcements by tomorrow morning.”

“I’m coming back. I’ll be there in—”

“No,” she said with a firmness that surprised him. “It looks as if you stayed up all night making things easy for Maury and Barney. Stay right there, and we’ll see you tomorrow night.”

He wanted to argue with her, but he did have the guardianship to deal with. He needed to get this bump in his life leveled as soon as possible. Reluctantly, he agreed to monitor the situation by phone. Room service arrived, he ate dinner with a glass of wine, then stretched out on the bed and was asleep within five minutes.

“M
IKE
?” Ritter stepped into the hallway, held out a hand and gave Mike a solemn look that he probably meant to be comforting. When Mike nodded, Ritter said, “Before we go in, I wanted you to know that Celine’s parents would be here to meet you, but it seems tragedy begat
tragedy. Her father had a cranial bleed soon after hearing the bad news, and even if he lives, her mother will have a full-time job taking care of him.”

So no parents, no grandparents. This kid wouldn’t have anybody but Mike.

Feeling even more weighed down by responsibility, Mike followed Ritter into the conference room. A handful of people were already seated around an oval walnut table, and a few more drifted in. Representatives of charities Evan had supported? Devoted household help?

A middle-aged woman, attractive but bitter-looking, joined the group. An ex-wife, maybe?

“We’re all here now,” Ritter said ponderously as he opened a document and began to read.

He read Celine’s will first. It was short and boilerplate, with no mention of her child. Next, Evan’s will. Gifts to several charities, as Mike had surmised. There were gifts to the devoted household help, most of whom cried when they heard the news. The bitter-looking woman had inherited a sum of money that made Mike’s head reel, probably a condition of their divorce.

Then Ritter cleared his throat. “‘In the event that a minor child or children of whom I am the father should survive both my death and their mother’s, I appoint Mike Foster, currently residing at—’” and his address and phone number followed “—as the guardian of that child or children and also appoint said Mike Foster as trustee of any trust funds of said child or children, to be used at said Mike Foster’s discretion.’”

So that was it. Without falling in love, without a mutual agreement with a wife to have a child, Mike had one, a child with trust funds.

The rest of the morning went by in a blur of signing
papers and at last, the trip with Ritter to the Howard house to pick up Brian Marshall Howard and take him home to LaRocque.

The “minor child” wasn’t a sad young boy. He was an eight-month-old baby.

Already panicked, Mike couldn’t breathe. He wouldn’t be like a big brother to this infant, he’d be like a father! What did he know about being a father?

Brian was half-asleep when the nanny—of course his father and Celine would have had a nanny—handed him over. Terrified, Mike peered down at the baby’s peaceful face, and Brian opened his eyes to gaze up at him.

They were green. Carroty red hair like Mike had when he was a child. Pale skin, the kind that freckled.

He looked just like Mike.

Mike parked his car behind the diner and shut off the engine. His nerves were shot. For what seemed like the thousandth time, he took a look at Brian.

His brother. His
baby
.

Throughout the trip, Mike had been afraid the baby would start crying, missing his parents, his nanny. Then, inexplicably, he’d find himself worrying when Brian was quiet for too long. Should he stop the car and check on him?

It had been a harrowing experience.

In the end, the kid had slept most of the trip, safe and sound in his car seat, which Mike thought could easily protect an astronaut during a launch, unaware of how much anxiety he was causing the man driving the car. He woke up once, making noises that did sound like the prelude to an all-out crying jag. In a panic, Mike had pulled into a rest area. One bottle and a clean diaper later, the upheaval had been resolved.

But now that the car had stopped moving, Brian was showing signs of waking. What a terrifying thought.

Mike should have gone across the river to Daniel’s house and asked—no, begged—Daniel and Lilah to rescue him. Pride had stopped him. Stupid, useless pride. He hadn’t wanted to look weak, look like this
was something he couldn’t handle. He’d been handling his own life since he’d been a teenager. A baby wasn’t going to throw him for a loop. At least, he hoped not.

Daniel and Lilah would be thrilled about Brian. Ian would give him that dark brooding look that said, “How in hell are you going to do this?”

Maury didn’t know Mike was bringing home a baby. He was already worried about the changes franchising would bring about. How would he feel about Brian? Talk about a major change.

Mike got out of the car and went around to the side door. When he opened it, Brian opened his eyes and took a look at his surroundings. Then he took a good look at Mike.

His eyes were big and round, but he didn’t look scared. Not knowing what else to do, Mike waved at him. Brian started waving his arms, too, and making burbling noises. Mike figured he’d better take him inside. Sooner or later, he had to face the music. The whole town was going to go crazy when they learned what had happened—a highly abridged version of what had happened.

He undid the many straps that held Brian in his car seat and picked him up. Brian settled immediately on Mike’s left hip.

“Okay, Brian,” he said on the way to the door, “I don’t know how many times you’ve been out in public, but we have to talk about certain matters of etiquette. Smile at everybody. It’s good business. No crying. No, um, bodily fluids on anybody’s clothes. Got it?”

Brian smiled at him. Even though he knew the baby didn’t understand what he was saying, it looked as if he intended to cooperate.

When he reached the back door of the diner, he pulled
a deep breath into his lungs for fortification, and then went inside. His heart sank when he saw a thin older man standing at the grill and realized it wasn’t Barney, but a stranger. Two more strangers were roaming around, too. But Maury was at the stove and Allie stood at the counter assembling salads. Looking at her, Mike’s knees seemed to melt.

“Is the spaghetti about ready?” Allie was calling out to Maury, but when she turned toward Maury, she saw him.

“Mike! Welcome—” then she saw Brian “—home,” she said on a gasp. She came directly to him—well, not to him but to Brian. “Who is this?” She gazed up at Mike, obviously stunned.

No more stunned than he was.

And no one had ever looked more stunned than Maury.

They’d noticed, both of them, the uncanny resemblance of this baby to him. He had to distract them. “I should have called ahead, but things happened too fast,” he said, looking straight at Maury. “My friend, the one whose funeral I went to, well, he left me a little something in his will and this is the little something. Someone, I should say.” He tried to sound amused, but failed.

“Oh, Mike,” Allie said, “he’s adorable.” Shocked or not, she seemed absolutely delighted that he’d brought home this human present from Boston. “What’s his name?”

“Brian.”

Maury still stood at the grill. He studied the baby for a moment, and then said to Mike, “He looks like you.”

No point in trying to distract them now. It was only
a matter of time before everybody noticed. “Amazing, isn’t it? Well, my friend looked a lot like me, too. People would ask if we were brothers.” Mike held his breath until he saw that Maury and Allie seemed satisfied with his answer.

Maury turned back to his work. “What will you do with him?”

Mike knew what the real question was—how will this interloper change things?

“I was asked to raise him. I’m his guardian, so I have to raise him. Somehow.” Almost as if he didn’t like the way Mike had explained the situation, Brian reached up and gave Mike’s collar a hard tug.

Allie saw it and smiled. “Well, it’s nice to meet you, Brian.” She did a mock curtsey, and for the first time in hours, Mike felt some of his tension ease.

He shifted Brian higher on his hip. “How’s Barney?”

Allie’s mouth twisted wryly. “Resting comfortably and doing as well as can be expected. That’s all the hospital staff will tell us.”

Mike sighed. “I’ll visit him as soon as I can. How are things going without him?”

She couldn’t seem to take her eyes off Brian. “Fine,” she said absentmindedly. “Becky is helping out in the kitchen and Colleen is covering out front,” Allie told him. “A few of their relatives,” she waved vaguely around the room, “have pitched in, too.”

“I appreciate what everybody’s done, and I’ll hire temporary help as soon as I…” Now that he had a baby to take care of, when would he find time to hire staff?

Allie stroked Brian’s cheek, and he gurgled appreciatively. “He’s so calm, when this has to be a major upheaval in his life.”

Mike looked down at Brian, who was examining the kitchen with bright, curious eyes. He was so small, so helpless. The tightness returned to Mike’s shoulders.

How was he going to take care of this child?

His panic increased when the back door swung open and Lilah, Daniel and Ian all peered through it. “We
had
to see him,” Lilah said.

“This is terrific,” Daniel said.

Ian raised his eyebrows.

Just the reactions Mike had predicted.

“What a precious baby,” Lilah said, rushing toward Brian with her arms outstretched.

“Well, let’s see who we’re adding to the family,” Daniel said easily. He lifted Brian off Mike’s hip. Mike stretched to the right, getting his balance back. What a relief.

“I want to hold him,” Lilah begged.

“Me, too,” Allie challenged her. “I saw him first.”

“Wait your turn, ladies,” Daniel said. “Hey, Brian,” he said, and Mike saw that Brian was smiling at Daniel and reaching out for his hair. “Meet the rest of your family. This is Maury,” and he went straight to the boy. “Maury is your new dad’s very best friend and right-hand man. You want to get on his good side.”

Mike saw Maury turn slowly from his chopping. “Hi, Brian,” he said awkwardly. Brian chuckled and reached out for Maury’s arm.

“I’m Uncle Daniel,” Daniel went on, “and this is Aunt Lilah.”

Brian gazed carefully at each face, as if there’d be a test later.

“You’ve met Allie, and this is Uncle Ian.” With a big smile, Daniel held the baby out to Ian, who accepted
him with a look of horror and held him at a distance. “Hey,” Ian said, “you like sheep?”

“My turn to hold him,” Allie said swiftly as she rescued both Brian and Ian.

“Darn, you’re fast,” Lilah grumbled. “How can we help you settle in?” she asked Mike.

He’d been watching Allie tickle Brian’s stomach, giggling along with him. “I have a bunch of his things in the car. They’re shipping a lot more. Man, I had no idea babies required so much stuff.
I
don’t have that much stuff.”

Lilah firmly removed Brian from Allie and started her own game with him, peek-a-boo. “Your brothers can unload the car, and you can figure out where to put all that
stuff
.”

Mike gave Allie a helpless look, and she laughed. “I’ll give them a hand,” she said. “I’m no good in the kitchen, anyway.”

Boy, it was good to be home. The last two days had been unnerving, and the only thing that had gotten him through them had been the knowledge that soon he’d be home, surrounded by family and friends.

Backup, that’s what he needed. With some help, it would all work out.

W
HEN A
desperate summons from the kitchen sent Allie racing downstairs to wait tables, Daniel, Ian and Lilah surrounded Mike.

“He looks a lot like you,” Ian said. “Too much.”

“I noticed,” Mike said grimly. “Maury noticed. Everybody will notice. That’ll get the gossip going.”

“We’ll deal with that later,” Daniel said, sounding more crisp than usual. “Why would your father have left you his child to raise?”

Mike sank onto a box of books and held his chin in his hands. “I’ve been trying to figure it out. I don’t think he really meant for me to raise him,” he said. “He didn’t know he and Brian’s mother were going to die.”

“Then why did he do it?” Ian persisted.

“All I can think of,” Mike said slowly, “is that he got a kick out of imagining me, twenty-five years from now, sitting in a lawyer’s office with my tongue hanging out, hoping for a big inheritance, and finding out he’d left me nothing.”

“But as you said, he didn’t know he was going to die,” Lilah argued, looking up from a box of clothes. “You’d have to like and trust someone implicitly to leave your child to him.”

“Oh, please,” Mike said. He suddenly felt so tired, more tired than he could ever remember being. The adrenaline that had gotten him through the last two days and safely home with Brian was all used up.

“It’s getting late. If you’ll help me figure out how to get Brian through one night, I’ll start organizing for real tomorrow morning after the breakfast rush. I need to visit Barney—” He halted. “I can’t visit Barney. I have a baby.”

Lilah patted him on the arm. “I’ll keep Brian for you while you see Barney. He’s doing fine, by the way. All he needs is a lot of rest before he comes back to work.”

“I’ll go to the grocery store,” Daniel said, checking his watch. “He came equipped with everything except food.”

“Anything for him to sleep in?”

“A sleeper with feet, yes. But he doesn’t have a crib.”

“We have a crib in the attic,” Daniel said.

“I’ll take care of that,” Ian said. “Any sheets with it?”

“He has sheets,” Lilah said. “Baby-blue linen.
Beautifully ironed
.”

Mike’s brothers groaned along with him.

“Go see Barney,” Daniel said. “We’ll have you all set up in a couple of hours.”

Mike sent his gaze toward each of them. “How am I going to do this?” He whispered the words.

“Nothing to it,” Daniel said, smiled at him and ran down the stairs.

“G
ET OUTTA HERE
and go run the restaurant.”

“Hello to you, too,” Mike said, and smiled at Barney.

It was hard for him to smile. Barney might be doing “as well as could be expected,” but he sure didn’t look good. Too quiet lying there in the sterile hospital room, nothing like the whirling dervish he was in the diner kitchen. His skin was gray, and his eyelids drooped. Seeing him this way was like having a knife stabbed into his heart, but he couldn’t let Barney know he was upset.

Hiding his feelings, he sat in a chair next to the bed and got into a relaxed position. “Doctors say you’re doing great.”

“I know I’m doing great,” Barney said. “What I want to know is when I can go back to work.”

“Pretty soon,” Mike said easily. “When you’re well. Don’t worry, I’m hiring some temporary people when I can get around to it. Your job will be waiting for you.”

“Who’s doing it now?” He actually sounded jealous.

“Maury’s at the grill, and some people I don’t know are helping out. Thank God I hired Allie.”

“Nice girl. Just like her mom.”

Mike noticed that Barney’s gruff voice had softened a little. But everybody had a soft spot for Allie.

He was wondering whether to tell Barney about Brian. He didn’t want to bring on another heart attack, but on the other hand, he didn’t want Barney hearing it from anybody else. “Um, I have a surprise for you, well, a surprise for everybody.”

“Boston baked beans?” Barney said hopefully.

“I have a baby.”

Barney looked at him with such shock that for a second Mike wondered if he should call a nurse. “A baby? A baby what? Dog? Cat?”

“Human,” Mike said, then recited once again his story about his old friend and his unexpected inheritance.

“Well, I’ll be,” Barney said. “A baby.” To Mike’s surprise, he actually smiled. “That’ll perk things up.”

“To say the least.” Mike felt relieved.

“How’s Maury taking it?”

“Okay. He’s a great kid.” He hoped it was true.

“Well, good.” Barney gave Mike a sly grin. “I hope you’re taking it the same way.”

His smile faded, and he suddenly looked so tired that Mike realized even this short conversation had worn the old guy out. He said his goodbyes, and as he stepped out the door, Elaine Hendricks stepped in, carrying a bouquet of flowers. “Elaine, good to see you.”

“Allie told me about Barney,” she said, looking embarrassed. “I know how busy you all are at the diner, so I decided to check on him and sit with him awhile.”

“That’s very kind of you,” Mike said.

“Oh, he’s asleep,” she whispered. “Maybe I…”

“No, I’m not,” Barney said, sounding as if just saying the words was an effort. “Just resting my eyes.”

Mike left them there together. Elaine Hendricks was a kind woman. She’d be kind to Allie whatever Allie decided to do. He was sure of it.

At home he found Daniel and Lilah on the floor with Brian crawling back and forth between them. They’d wrecked his tiny office to put a crib into it. Baby things were strewn everywhere. “Okay, the reinforcements have arrived,” he told them. “You two get home to your own kids.”

“Are you sure you can handle it?” Lilah asked.

“Of course he can,” Daniel said. “We’ll show you a couple of things…”