Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story 
Chapter or Story
Research Subject - by MMB
Chapter 3: Reactions
I still couldn't believe how my life could change SO fast.
Four months ago I was a published and award-winning research chemist on the final legs of a pharmaceutical research project that had taken me the better part of a year and a half to find solutions. I was independent, divorced, with an ex-husband I loathed who hung around too much and a daughter in med school over a hundred miles away. I had a mortgage, car payments, and no social life to speak of. I was miserable - I was lonely, and I missed my twin sister, killed a few years earlier by a drunk driver, desperately.
Three months ago, I applied to become a participant in a research project concerning surviving the loss of a twin. Two and a half months ago, I met Sydney - first as the final interviewer for that research project and then the next day as a fellow lonely human being and surviving twin. Two and half months ago, courtesy of a cold and rainy night and unfamiliar roads, I allowed myself a dalliance of a single night with that intriguing, gentle, intelligent and vulnerable man - a night the like of which I would dream about nightly for weeks thereafter. Two and half months ago I walked away from Sydney and our one beautiful night together and boarded a plane that took me back to my mortgage, my car payment, my ex-husband and my job.
Then, two weeks ago, I discovered that my night of dalliance had made me pregnant - a surprising and rarely celebrated development for a woman my age. Eleven days ago, my daughter weaseled the story out of me between my bouts of morning sickness. Ten days ago, she went behind my back and summoned Sydney to my side to take his share of responsibility for his unborn child. Far from being upset or distraught at the unexpected turn of events, he caught the next possible plane west. And so nine days ago, he re-entered my life completely determined that I would be apart of his life from then on no matter what, determined that I would return with him to Delaware. I was soon reminded of what I'd learned two and half months earlier - that he was a very hard man to refuse.
A week ago, I finished my project, handed in the report, and quit my job. Three days ago, Sydney and I were standing in front of a Justice of the Peace exchanging wedding vows, my daughter and my ex-boss beside us as witnesses. Yesterday, my house - completely empty - was turned over to a realtor to sell for me, and I got on a plane with my new husband to return to his home in Delaware.
And today I met with my new doctor, who reassured me that just because I had fallen and miscarried so long ago should be no reason to fear miscarrying again. The issue of most concern to him was my age and physical condition, and he'd address that by simply seeing me regularly once a week and making certain recommendations as to the diet he wanted me to follow. He did note my history of miscarriage in my chart for reference as things progressed, however, and then recommended that I continue to take things very easy for the duration, just in case.
Sydney was with me during the visit and then the examination, and his face upon hearing the sound of our baby's heartbeat for the first time was positively beatific. But then, he hadn't really stopped smiling since our trip to the Justice of the Peace, since he put that thin platinum band of small channel-set diamonds on my finger and changed my last name to his. I didn't think I'd stopped smiling either, except for when I experienced the pain of leaving my sweet girl Rene behind to head back to her med school studies as I headed East to a new home, a new family, a new life.
Now here I sat, warm and comfortable in my husband's arms, curled up next to him on his long leather couch in front of a warm fire he'd built for me to chase the Delaware winter chill away. It had been an exciting and tiring day, and the visit to the doctor had lifted my spirits some, even as it tired me coming on the heels of a long trip the day before. The boxes of things that I'd shipped to Delaware wouldn't be arriving for another few days at least, and most of my most personal items had already found new homes in the room I shared with Sydney now.
"When do you go back to work?" I asked, contented as always when he would stretch out his long and graceful fingers across my abdomen, embracing our child even as he tightened his hold about my shoulders.
"By all rights I should go back tomorrow," he replied, dropping all pretense of reading his psychiatric journal and depositing a kiss on my brow. "But I did speak for the possibility of two weeks, and I'm leaning toward taking the rest of that time off after all." I could hear the smile in his voice. "After all, technically I'm still on my honeymoon."
"When are you going to tell them about me and the peanut," I asked, motioning with my nose at the mantel and its collection of photographs. "Your son and your friends, I mean?"
I felt him take a deep breath. "I'll probably call Nicholas, my son, sometime this coming weekend. Jarod is..." He paused, searching evidently for the right words. "...very capable of finding out on his own. More than likely he'll be telling me about it rather than the other way around. I never know when he'll make contact - and it's been a very long time since he has."
"And..."
"Miss Parker?" I could feel him tense slightly. "I should probably call her in the morning - at least explain to her why I've been gone. I didn't have a chance to talk to her before I left." He pulled me closer to him.
I wrapped my arm around his middle. "What's the matter? Do you worry about her reaction?"
"She has a sharp tongue, and a very ... brusque ... personality. She's also never been very diplomatic, and can be very territorial when it comes to those she cares about." He kissed the tip of my ear. "Since her father's death, that territoriality has included me. She never really did learn to share. I don't want her over-stressing you now..."
"I think I can handle myself if I know that I have you behind me backing me up," I reassured him as I laid my head on his chest. "Anybody else?"
"Well," he said, relaxing again, "there's Broots and his daughter Debbie. They'll probably be delighted, and Debbie will most likely insist on being our offical babysitter. I should call them tomorrow too - Miss Parker, Broots and I at one time were on a project together "Three Musketeers"-style."
"Anybody else?"
"Hopefully not," he replied murkily. "Although there are a couple of people I'd just as soon stayed as far away from you and our peanut as possible. Mr. Raines, my direct superior, is not to be trusted - and I doubt he will be pleased at my suddenly having a life outside the Centre. Mr. Lyle is just downright dangerous - if he ever bothers you, I want you to call me. I don't ever want you alone with that man."
"Sydney," I pulled away to look at him. "What kind of place IS the Centre after all? I thought it was a think tank, where all kinds of scientific disciplines came together..."
He nodded. "Ideally, that's what it should be. In practice, however..." He looked down at me with an amazing expression of sadness. "I suppose you might as well hear it from me. There is a very dark side to the Centre, Cat, a very dangerous side to the research that is done there sometimes. For a very long time, I was blind to much of what went on there. I saw... things... no civilized man ever should... I've stood by... while..." He shook himself. "I've promised myself no more." He looked down into my wide and frightened eyes. "I'm frightening you."
"That you are!" I agreed. "You make them sound like feudal lords holding the power of life and death over their serfs. Are you going to be allowed to have a wife? A child?"
"Now, perhaps, I will," he replied, and his tone chilled me. "Do you remember me telling you that my son's mother and I never married?" I nodded. "The reason I never knew my son existed because the morning she found out she was pregnant, Michelle was told to leave the Centre and Delaware - never see me again or tell me about Nicholas - or I would be killed. She believed it and ran, never looking back." I shook my head - the very idea of this was almost beyond belief.
"Many things about my life have changed since those days, thank God - the project I was involved in has pretty much been closed down. So with my complete involvement in a Centre project no longer necessary, keeping such close control over my every move is no longer of such importance either. I'm working on the assumption that I can begin to actually live for a change, love someone without having to ask permission for a change. And I've stepped around them a bit by marrying you before we got back here - and I know about our peanut. They can't steal that from me again."
I stared at him. "Do they... Are they this controlling over other peoples' lives there? Miss Parker, Broots - have they..."
He wrapped his arms around me tightly and pressed his lips to my hair. "You really don't want to know the answer to that one, Cat. Yes, they have - and let's leave it at that. I intend to make arrangements so that somebody I trust will be able to help you those times I can't be here, taking you to your doctor's appointment, for example."
"I can drive too, you know," I complained. "I didn't marry you just to become a prisoner in my own home, Sydney. I'm used to being my own woman, doing what I wanted when I wanted..."
"I know that," he soothed gently. "But until things settle after the news breaks, I'm going to be taking no chances with your safety - and I'm going to have to ask for your indulgence in this for the time being. You and the peanut are my life now. I don't want any convenient accidents taking either of you away from me." He sounded almost fierce in his protectiveness.
I huddled into his arms, suddenly not feeling quite as secure as I had been. I now had a husband with an apparently dangerous job and sinister colleagues among the close friends. "You need to know," he continued in a softer voice, "that if they had found out about you, about our child, I couldn't have protected you from so far away. That's why we have to be here in Blue Cove together. I have resources here to keep you - us - safe." He held me to him tightly. "I love you so much..."
"I love you too..." I answered him. I did. I could no longer imagine my life without him in it - I just had never imagined all the other things that evidently accompanied him into my life.
As it worked out, Broots was the one to call Sydney that next afternoon. We were in what was now a guest room, taking stock of what all would need to be moved where in order for the room to become a nursery, when the phone rang. He patted me on the shoulder and told me to keep thinking while he sped to our room and picked up the receiver there. I could hear his voice easily. "This is Sydney..."
There was a pause, then, "Yes, I'm home, but I'm going to take the rest of my two weeks..." Then another pause, and, after several wordless hums of response, "Well, of course I don't mind, but why don't you and Debbie come over this evening for supper? I have someone I'd like you both to meet - and Debbie can get tutored in Chemistry after we eat." I moved to the door of our bedroom, and Sydney caught sight of me and raised his eyebrows as if in question. I nodded at him - my morning sickness had abated back to only popping up in the morning now, and I'd like the chance to begin learning where things were in the kitchen. He nodded at the voice in his ear. "Good. About six then? Fine. See you then."
"Debbie needs help in Chemistry, hmm?" I asked him as he rejoined me in the hallway.
"How good are you at tutoring the basics?" he asked in return.
I chuckled. "Rene made it to med school, didn't she?"
"Wasn't a whiz at Chemistry, like her mom?" The smile was wide and even-toothed again, just teasing me this time.
"Hated the math, actually." It was the truth. "But as long as we're taking a break from planning, you might as well call Miss Parker too - have her come for dinner as well. Might as well get all the important introductions over all at once."
His eyes widened. "You're a brave soul, Cat," he purred at me, then went back into the bedroom for the phone again.
"Miss Parker? This is..." There was a pause - obviously she had interrupted him. "No, I'm taking the rest of my two weeks, as a matter of fact." He listened with a wry face. "No, I didn't time this just to conflict with..." She interrupted him again, and I could see that now he was simply giving her the chance to vent sufficiently so that she would hear his eventual invitation. His expression was one of fond and indulgent patience - an almost paternal forbearance. I wasn't surprised - he HAD said that he sometimes forgot that she wasn't his, after all... This bodes well for you, peanut, I thought to the baby, and rubbed my hand over my tummy.
"Miss Parker, although I'd love to listen to the latest from your brother, I'm actually calling you to invite you to supper here this evening. There is someone here I'd like you to meet." His eyes widened, and then he smiled at me. Ah! Evidently he'd surprised his friend. "Yes. About six." He listened again. "Good. I'll see you then." He disconnected. "I hope you feel up to this..."
"I'm just hoping you have something in your freezer able to feed five people!" I smiled at him.
He did - a nice rolled roast that got popped immediately into the oven, to be accompanied by potatoes and some steamed carrots, with balled melon for dessert. With guests on their way for supper, plans for a nursery were put on temporary hold for the evening.
Broots turned out to be a very shy and likeable younger man, balding and obviously very intelligent. Debbie was a thoroughly teenaged daughter who reminded me so much of Rene at her age, with her long hair and infectious sparkling humor. The two doted on each other completely - it was a joy to see.
As was the stunned look on Broots' face when Sydney wrapped his arm around my shoulders and presented me as "my new wife, Cathy."
"Whoa! Syd!" Broots was gaping at his friend while he slowly put his hand out to me. "This IS a surprise." He looked back and forth between us for a while. "You've known each other long?"
"Not exactly." I was glad to let him explain while I got a hesitant hug from Debbie. "We met a number of months ago, and then kept in touch."
"Then what possessed you to get married all of a sudden?" Broots shook his head as if realizing that he wasn't getting the whole story.
"The fact that she became pregnant," Sydney said simply.
If I thought the balding father of a teenaged girl could drop his jaw any further, I was quickly convinced otherwise. As he recovered his wits, he tipped his head to one side and began to grin slowly. "You mean, you're..."
"Going to be a father? Yes," Sydney smiled at me as I gave Debbie's shoulders a gentle squeeze and let go.
"You're going to let me babysit, aren't you, Sydney?" Debbie began pleading almost at once.
"I can't think of anybody else I'd like to have the job more," I piped in. I'd have probably added a bit more, but the doorbell rang again right then.
"Sydney," I heard a smooth and sultry female voice say in low tones, and then I watched the absolutely stunningly beautiful brunette from the mantle picture step into the house as she deposited a careful kiss on my husband's cheek. She looked around her, at the Broots' - at me - with mild surprise. "I didn't realize this was a dinner party."
"It isn't, really," Sydney assured her as he closed the door behind her and took her coat. "I just wanted to introduce my best friends to someone very special to me." He took Miss Parker by the elbow and brought her over to face me. "This is my wife, Cathy. Cat, this is Miss Parker."
Obviously this woman had learned to hide her emotions well, because the only sign of her surprise was the stunned look in her eyes and one of those elegantly groomed eyebrows soaring higher than I'd ever seen one fly before. Slowly the hand came out, but the touch was brief, almost too brief. "So this is why you suddenly dropped everything and took two weeks' vacation out of the blue, eh Syd?" The grey eyes were taking my measure with calculating efficiency. "I didn't think you were even seeing anyone seriously." She rounded on Sydney with an almost accusatory tone. "So, the two weeks were for what... a honeymoon?"
"No," Sydney pointedly insisted in keeping his voice light and friendly. "Actually, it took several days just to convince her to marry me. We just got back two evenings ago."
"What was the hurry?" she asked now, her voice almost tauntingly insolent. "Or was this a shotgun wedding? What did you do, Sydney, get her pregnant?" She chuckled as if the very thought of that were an old and unpleasant joke.
"Miss Parker, please," I heard Broots exclaim defensively, and I decided in that moment that I liked that balding little man immensely. But I'd heard enough of Miss Parker for the moment, and didn't want to embarrass Sydney by losing my cool so soon after I met this woman.
"I think I'll go see to the supper," I told him quietly, and I'm sure my face told him everything he needed to know as to why I was beating a hasty retreat.
"I'll go with you," Debbie said in rapid agreement, casting a frankly disapproving look in Miss Parker's direction that was quite the change from the pleased expression of fondness that had come over her face as the woman had come through the door.
But the kitchen wasn't far enough away that I couldn't hear the explosive "What?!" that came not long after I vacated the front hallway.
I saw Debbie cringe, and I put my hand on her shoulder. "I don't think Miss Parker is very pleased about me," I ventured.
"She... takes a long time to warm up to people," the girl tried to put a better spin on the obvious displeasure. "You have to learn to ignore the barbs. Underneath, she can be a really nice..."
Her voice boomed through from the front again. "For Christ's sake, Syd, you're old enough to be a GRANDFATHER! What the Hell did you think you were doing?"
I stiffened angrily. How DARE she rail at my husband for having the temerity to live his own life? Who was SHE to tell him when he was too old to start a family? I felt Debbie's hand creep into mine, and I forced myself to smile down at this delightful young lady and take a deep breath to try to release the burgeoning dislike for the elegant and rude woman Sydney considered "like one of his own."
"You're kidding, right?" I asked tightly, looking down into her face which was growing more distressed by the moment. It wasn't fair - Sydney and I could defend ourselves, if it came to that; but the harsh words were hurting a complete innocent.
Her next statement was once more in that taunting and insolent tone. "Then again, I figured that after Nicholas, you'd forgotten what to do with that part of your anatomy anyway. I don't know whether I should be pleased or shocked to be mistaken."
That was what did it. Old friend of Sydney's or no, she'd just stepped past MY line. I hadn't been that angry since my last major argument with Jake, just before we separated. I squeezed Debbie's hand again for comfort, then stalked firmly and quickly from the kitchen. One look at Sydney, his expression filled with sad frustration, and I was straight up into her face.
"You know, I've known many people in my days on this planet, Miss Parker; but when it comes to rudeness, I've got to admit you take the cake. Your mother evidently never taught you the proper behavior to be expected of you when you're a guest in another's home..." I heard the elder Broots gasp, but was in no mood to ponder what taboo I'd violated. At this point, I really no longer cared. "...so I guess the job of teaching it to you, for good or ill, falls to me. You'd best listen closely, because I will not repeat the lesson. You do NOT ridicule a host in his own home after accepting an invitation to dine. You do NOT make disparaging remarks about your host's manhood or any other personal attribute in public - EVER; and in private only if you are truly on that intimate terms with the person." She may have been taller than I, but I think my attitude and audacity had taken her completely by surprise. "As far as I'm concerned, you owe Sydney a very large apology - and you can deliver that apology on your way out the door. I have no intent of sitting at a table with you now or anytime in the foreseeable future. Good evening, Miss Parker."
I was done - the emotional strain of rejecting one of Sydney's old and supposedly “dear” friends was becoming difficult to handle. I looked over at Sydney again. "I think I'll go upstairs and lie down for a bit," I told him, rising up on tiptoe to kiss a cheek. "Let me know when she's left, and I'll be glad to come down and serve the supper." I didn't give him a chance to reply, but turned on my heels and did as I had promised, giving a quick wave to Debbie in the dining room as I began up the stairs.
"Sydney, I..." I hear her begin, for once in a more reasonable and actually pleading tone.
"You know Miss Parker," Broots then spoke up with a soft and accusing voice, "sometimes you just don't know when to quit."
"Man!" Debbie chimed in, sounding thoroughly disgusted. "You were really mean." I heard her steps trotting back toward the kitchen.
"Here's your coat back, Miss Parker," I heard Sydney say finally in a very disappointed tone. "Cat's right - I don't think you're staying and eating with us tonight would be a good idea now."
"Syd..."
"Stop. You only get one chance to make a first impression, Parker. You might want to consider the one you made this evening. I'll see you Monday." I heard the door open. "Good night." It closed quietly and firmly.
That's when I fell to pieces. I made it to our bedroom and managed to get the door closed before I started to make any noise that would filter downstairs. I couldn't believe what I had just done - alienated one of my husband's “children.” What kind of wife was I?
I lay down on the bed and pulled the pillow up and around my face as I cried, wishing for the first time that I were back West with my mortgage and car payments and empty life. At least then I wouldn't have done damage to Sydney's relationships with those he'd known and loved for years. I knew better. I knew I knew better than that.
I heard the bedroom door open and close very gently, and then the bed dipped under his weight as he sat down beside me and stroked my hair. "I'm sorry for what happened, Cat. I suppose I should have broken the news to her before now, so she could have gotten used to the idea before..."
What could I say to him? As much as Miss Parker owed him an apology, so did I. "I'm so sorry," I managed finally. "You must hate me now..."
"Hush," he soothed, bending over me and kissing my cheek gently. "You were right to do what you did - it's high time somebody told her off royally when she climbs on her high horse like that. I know where it comes from, so I've never had the heart - and I suppose letting her constantly get away with it has led her to believe that it's OK to say such things to me." His thumb wiped at my tears. "I'm just sorry you had to be the one to do what I could never bring myself to do, and tonight of all times. But dry your tears and come down and join the rest of us now. Your supper smells superb and deserves our full attention."
"How can I face Broots and Debbie now..." I whispered, feeling thoroughly thrashed. "What must they think of me..."
"Actually," he smiled and wiped the next generation of tears from my face, "when I left them to come up here, they were a bit worried. I think they're frightened that Miss Parker's behavior might have put you off on them too - that you'll decide you don't want anything to do with THEM either."
"But I like THEM," I complained. "Broots is a complete gentleman, and Debbie is delightful. They're both very pleasant, kind people. I would never..."
"Then show them that's how you feel. C'mon now. The Ice Queen has been banished from the house for the evening, leaving the delicious food for us mere peons." His smile was deliberately wide and contagious, and I worked hard to return it. He recognized the effort and acknowledged it. "That's my girl," he purred, kissing me on the lips gently. "Let's go down and feed our guests now, shall we?"
As I sat up, he pulled a tissue from the box by the bed and handed it to me so that I could at least blow my nose and wipe the rest of the tears from my face. "I look a mess," I said simply, looking over the end of the bed at the round mirror above the chest of drawers.
"No you don't," he soothed, pulling me into his arms and holding me close for a short while. "As far as I'm concerned, you're the prettiest girl in town."
For some reason, the comment made me chuckle, then chuckle louder. "You're biased, you know," I told him as he rose and held a hand out to help me up.
"Nah," he shook his head and wrapped an arm around my shoulder. "I just have great taste."
Sydney was right - both of our remaining guests had very apprehensive looks on their faces when I came back down the stairs, Debbie in particular. "Are you mad?" she asked in a worried voice.
"Not at you, poppet," I answered her with a smile, and I meant it. I saw Broots' face relax some, and Debbie smiled hesitantly at me. I decided to deliberately banish the spectre of bad company with a slightly stronger approach. "Do you think I could get you to help me get the supper on the table?" Her smile got a little brighter, and she nodded at me.
Sydney moved past me toward the kitchen, and when I followed him to begin serving up the meal, I noticed that the fifth place at the table had simply vanished as if never set out. It took a few minutes for me to coax Debbie into regaining some of her carefree enthusiasm for life, but by the time we were sitting down to eat, everybody's mood had been mostly restored. Conversation flowed smoothly and with real comaraderie, and I found myself thoroughly enjoying getting to know these friends of my husband.
Later, Sydney shooed me from the kitchen so I could sit down with the girl and help her with her studies while he and Broots handled clean-up duties and then adjourned to the living room for a quiet game of chess. Debbie was like Rene - it was the math that was stymieing her - and she was attentive and quick to pick up the short cuts and procedures that I introduced her to that took some of the mystery out of the process.
Once the studying was finished, I saw that something else was on her mind. "What is it, poppet?" I asked quietly, figuring this was girl-talk time.
I was right. After a little prevarication, Debbie presented a situation that was developing between herself and some of her friends that, true to form, reminded me so much of some of the growing pains Rene had gone through. So I began to tell her about my daughter's situation and how it had resolved. After that, time flew - and when Broots came to find his daughter and take her home, he caught us blushing madly at some shared joke and laughing like hyenas.
Later, when all was quiet and locked up for the night, I lay cradled in Sydney's arms and allowed myself to ponder what had happened. "About Miss Parker..." I started.
"Forget her," he advised me, tightening his arms around me. "Broots and I discussed things, and we've decided that the two of us will simply continue the lesson you've started here at work. We've both put up with a great deal from her for a very long time - now, we have a reason to put a stop to it."
"Sydney, she's your..."
"That's just it," he kissed my forehead. "She's not - I told you I just keep forgetting that. Her mother, God rest her, was a good woman - a kind woman who would never have condoned her daughter's behavior tonight. The problem is that her mother died when she was quite young, and her father was a cold and calculating person who did his best to teach her to be exactly the same way - and, unfortunately, he succeeded." I felt him sigh against me. "I did what I could during those few months between Catherine's death and when Miss Parker was sent away to school - it just wasn't enough to counteract..."
"So it was HER mother that was the other Catherine you said you knew," I breathed out in surprise, and felt him nod. "And so my comment about her mother not teaching her manners was essentially hitting her blow the belt?"
"Perhaps, but you were completely innocent of any deliberate intent of doing so - which is far better than how you would have fared had if she'd known where YOU were vulnerable," Sydney reminded me, then shifted slightly against me. "But forget her. I was pleased to see how you and Debbie connected this evening. That's good - that child needs positive female role models in her life who care for her. Especially now, since Miss Parker has taken quite a dive in her estimation."
"Where's HER mother?"
Sydney sighed. "She could be in Atlantic City, Vegas, or Reno for all we know - the fact is the woman hasn't tried to contact her once since the custody hearing."
"Debbie reminds me of Rene at that age."
"I thought she might." He sounded thoroughly contented with the developments on that score.
I lay quietly for a moment, my mind tossing through things I still wasn't sure of. "What about this Jarod? Will he be disappointed or angry that we..."
"Jarod?" Sydney chuckled. "Quite the contrary. Jarod is a firm believer in family life. I doubt you'll have anything to worry about from him - except perhaps him popping in on you when you least expect it, and most likely when I'm NOT around. You can trust him, though - he would never hurt you."
I moved so that I could see his face in the moonlight. "But doesn't he want to see YOU anymore?"
"I honestly don't know," he answered me, and he sounded a little sad. "I haven't talked to him in a very long time."
That last was said with such a soul-wrenching sense of wistfulness that I reached up and stroked his cheek to comfort. In response, Sydney moved so that he could capture my lips with his, and then suddenly all thoughts of surrogate children, friends and other acquaintances evaporated from my mind. My entire being was captivated and enthralled by the sensations that his gentle and sensuous caresses and passionate kisses were evoking within me. His hands quickly found the bottom hem of my nightgown, and soon the garment had been drawn over my head and discarded - as had his pajamas. "God I love you," he growled down to me as he settled his weight on me and took possession of my body with gentle tenderness. And then, together in body and soul, we found new heights of ecstasy to explore.
When at last we were resting quietly in each other's arms again, I held onto him tightly. "I love you so much," I murmured to him softly. I did - I don't think I had ever loved anyone with quite the same, overwhelming devotion. And even as my eyes closed in sleep I found myself wondering at the turn of fate that had given me such a treasure.
We spent our next few days quietly - finalizing plans for transforming that guest room into a nursery and figuring out how and where to accommodate those belongings that were going to be arriving any day now. Friday night I found myself tutoring Debbie in Chemistry again - and this time, she had brought another schoolmate with her, equally flummoxed and confused. It was more challenging to try to get the concepts and techniques across to two adolescent minds that tended to bounce off each other with abandon, but I enjoyed the mental exercise completely.
Our weekend saw the delivery of boxes and those few pieces of heirloom furniture that I just couldn't bear to part with. Sydney and I methodically went through each room of the house, carefully finding new homes for these old friends of mine to nestle into - just as I was being carefully cushioned as I landed and was eased into this new home amid new friends and others.
Sydney also sat down and called Nicholas and gave him the news. He came away from that phone call with a Cheshire-like grin and told me that Nicholas had told him to tell me to expect him to come visit sometime in May, before the baby was born. It seemed he wanted to get to know me while I still could focus on something other than sleeping while the baby was. Knowing that Sydney's son now knew everything had seemed to be perfectly comfortable making room for me in his estimation made me relax - at least not all his children were so hard to get along with.
Sunday night, Sydney and I were invited to the Broots' home for dinner. And while Broots would never be qualified as a gourmet chef, he had a real flare for making a decent spaghetti sauce. We broke out a card deck after the table was cleared and the dishwasher loaded, and once more the hours sped by.
Then it was Monday, and Sydney roused early to get ready for work. While he showered and dressed, I made him the breakfast I'd learned he liked the best: toast and coffee. I earned one of his wide and even smiles when he came down to a steaming mug of coffee and two slices of toast done the way he liked them. "I could get VERY used to this," he quipped, leaning over to drop a kiss on my cheek and then taking his place at the table.
"Enjoy it while you can," I quipped back in a cautionary tone. "Once our peanut arrives, you may be back to shifting for yourself for at least a little while if peanut and I are both finally back asleep after a long and restless night, walking the floor." I looked at him, filling my eyes for the day. "I'm really going to miss you today - talking about getting used to things, I've gotten used to having you around all the time."
"And I'm not sure how late I'll be," he replied, tightening his hold on my hand. "A lot will depend on how much the Tower has piled on my plate while I was away. I've left my cell number and my office number by the phone in the foyer, in case you need to get in touch with me." He lifted my hand to his lips and kissed it gently. "It will be a very long day, and the best part will be coming home, I swear it."
I took a long shower once he had left, relaxing as the warm water flowed through my long hair. Feeling a little at loose ends, I decided to put on one of my husband's warm cashmere sweaters - the one I had taken home with me so long ago, as a matter of fact - and let myself feel warm and safe. I made myself some tea - both Sydney and my doctor had ordered me strictly to stay away from coffee - and settled back down at the kitchen table with the local newspaper.
It ended up being a cold and stormy day, and later in the afternoon I decided the house had chilled down about as much as I wanted it to. I had watched Sydney make a fire the last two evenings, so I knew now where he kept his wood and kindling. I cleaned out the ashes from the previous evening's warmth and had just begun laying the foundations of tonight's when the doorbell rang. I frowned - until I arrived, there normally wouldn't have been anybody home at this hour - and then went over to the door and peered out the little peephole.
A rather handsome younger man with blue-grey eyes dressed in an expensive-looking suit under a dark trench coat stood waiting patiently in the falling snow, occasionally glancing backwards over his shoulder. I very quietly slipped the security chain into place and then opened the door a crack. It was very cold outside indeed. "Yes?" I asked.
I could see that my having answered the door was not a surprise. "Here and I thought they were kidding when they said Sydney had brought home a bride," he said, then gave me a big and obviously forced smile. "Hi! My name is Lyle."
I struggled not to let my face betray my misgivings, for this was the one person Sydney had warned me most strongly against. "Yes? What can I do for you?"
"I'm a co-worker of your husband's," he tried again, his voice just a little less than boisterously happy. "May I come in?"
"May I ask your business?" I asked in return. "My husband is at the Centre, if you're looking for him..."
"No," he replied, and now the expression in those blue-grey eyes was decidedly cold and dangerous. "I just thought that you and I could get acquainted."
"Lyle!" I heard a low female voice snap angrily from the direction of the street, and then I saw Miss Parker stalk haughtily but carefully up the walk. "What the Hell are YOU doing here?"
I could see the look of intense frustration that crossed the man's face, and I felt a sudden wave of gratitude for the unexpected visit from the woman I'd essentially thrown out of the house days earlier. "Parker," Lyle sighed, and his voice didn't bother to hide his frustration. "Must you follow me everywhere I go?"
"Only when you end up going where I was intending to go," she snipped at him, moving up to the door and then with a very subtle movement putting herself between Lyle and the chain that was the only thing keeping me safe from this man. "And I ask again, what the Hell are you doing here?"
"Dad asked me to check up on a rumor going around the Centre today," he said finally, putting a hand to his hips. "Seems the rumor was true. Sydney DOES have a woman..."
"Her name's Cathy. So fine - now you've met her and you know the grapevine has it right. You can go back and tattle to Raines now." She matched him hand at the hip for hand at the hip.
"There's also a whisper about a baby..."
Miss Parker put herself in Lyle's face so fast I could barely follow the movement. "Now THAT is none of your damned business, nor Raines'."
"Parker... You know as well as I that..."
"What I know," she hissed at him, her voice soft and very, VERY lethal, "is that if anything happens to Cathy here, in ANY way, you will not like the consequences. Is that understood?" I stared. Was this woman actually defending me - after that disastrous moment a few days ago when I'd basically thrown her out of the house?
"Is that a threat, Sis?" Lyle asked with a grimace of bravado masquerading as a smile on his face. My God! These two were siblings?
"Just a promise," Miss Parker answered him in a firm voice, her words forming a cloud in the frozen air between them. "Now get lost!"
For a long moment, I wasn't sure if he was going to leave or not. The two of them seemed locked in a battle of the killer glares. Then, with apparent east and nonchalance, Lyle shrugged. "Nice to meet you, Cathy," he breezed around his sister at me, then shot her a frown. "See you back at the barn, Sis."
Miss Parker merely turned, hand still at her hip, and glared after him until he had climbed back into the back seat of an expensive black sedan and the husky man holding the door had climbed back behind the wheel. Then she turned to me. "Are you alright? Did he..."
"I'm fine," I answered, loosening the chain and opening the door, "although a little confused. What did he want with me?"
"Trust me, you DON'T want to know," she told me quickly.
"Yes, I DO," I insisted. "I want to know why Sydney having a wife or baby is such a terrible thing that you chew him out in his own house and now this... this... Lyle person..."
"Look," the tall brunette said, dropping the arrogance from her voice and filling it instead with simple worried concern, "You do NOT want to mix it up with Lyle, whatever you do. He's a very dangerous man, and God knows what he intended."
"Sydney told me to call him if ever he bothered me..."
"Well, at least Freud knew enough to warn you," she nodded, apparently with approval. "Don't forget that."
"Thank you," I suddenly remembered my manners. "You stood up for me, even though I was anything but hospitable to you the last time we met. Would you like to come in out of the cold?" I asked, standing aside and leaving room for her to step past me into the house.
"Thank you, no," she shook her head. "I just came by to apologize to you for my behavior the other night. You were right, I was incredibly rude to both you and Sydney." The grey eyes looked into mine with an almost unbelievably vulnerable expression in them, then fell away as if the contact were too painful to maintain. "Tell Sydney..."
I had the sudden intuition that I was finally meeting the real Miss Parker - the one Sydney kept forgetting wasn't his, and the one that Debbie herself had been expecting the other night with such pleasure. "Wait!" I reached out to her and grabbed a gloved hand before she had a chance to turn away. Those beautiful grey eyes rose up to meet mine again. "Come in, please?" I asked her again. "I think we both got off on the wrong foot the other night and deserve a chance to start over. Don't you?"
I could tell I'd surprised her again today by inviting her in at least as much as I had the other evening by standing up to her. I could also tell that, as much as she really wanted to accept the invitation, she wasn't sure she could. So I just pulled on the hand until she took first one step and then another and finally gave up and came the rest of the way in without any more urging. I closed and, with a memory of Lyle fresh in my mind, locked and chained the front door, took her coat and hung it on the nearby coat rack, then ushered her into the living room.
"I was just starting a fire," I explained as I knelt to finish what I'd started. "Have a seat." She sat down primly at the very end of the leather couch, folded her hands in her lap after removing her gloves and seemed as if preparing herself to be chastened. I decided that while I finished getting the fire lit, I would put her at ease as much as I could. We'd already had enough tension between us to last quite a while. "Have you spoken to Sydney today?" I asked her in a conversational tone.
She shook her head. "He isn't speaking to me," she said softly. "I can't say I blame him. I just never thought he..."
I frowned slightly. Obviously there had been a reason Sydney had treated her with kid gloves all this time, and I think I was seeing it at last. Miss Parker might be a very formidable person capable of intimidating with a mere glance, tending to use bravado and aggression as interactive mechanisms with those of weaker character, but all that was but a façade behind which hid a very insecure and lonely woman. "I'm sure he was just very busy. He is just back from vacation, you know," I offered, only to have her shake her head again.
"No, he was very careful to let me know that I wasn't welcome in the Sim Lab without having to say a word," she explained in that soft voice that had tears swimming in the far background. "I may be obtuse in many ways, but Sydney and I have always understood each other without need for..." She blinked twice and seemed to struggle to keep her voice steady. "Broots isn't speaking to me today either, for that matter," she admitted, glancing up at me guiltily. "I suppose Debbie will never speak to me again. I don't blame them either."
"Well, it isn't just to me that you need to apologize," I admitted with a very even and non-accusing frankness. "You did a pretty good job of stepping in it for the whole group that evening."
"I know." I think that soft admission made me hurt almost as much as it did her, and I realized that apologizing to me was, for her, far easier than speaking to any of the others. She had no real defenses against these people for whom she cared far more than she let on - their turning their backs on her would become a wound that would never heal if this wasn't addressed and settled very soon. I could already sense that she was poised to adopt her brittle façade of arrogant disdain and quietly die behind it a little bit every day. Indeed: "It's getting late; I really should go," she said quickly and rose to her feet nervously. "I just wanted to let you know that I feel very badly about..."
"Sit down," I told her firmly in my best mother-knows-best tone, pointing her back into her chair. "You're in no shape to go anywhere, and I'm not going to let you go out and get into a car accident on these icy roads. My husband would never forgive me if I let something happen to you on such a day."
To my surprise, she followed my instruction, but not without complaint. "But Sydney will be here soon..."
"I know," I replied, touching the lighter to the crumpled newspaper beneath the kindling, then moved the spark screen into place. "The sooner the better. You need to talk to him."
"But he doesn't want to..."
"He will," I reassured her as I rose to join her on the couch. "He loves you, very much, you know." I saw those grey eyes come up again in surprise. "Oh, come now! Surely you knew that."
She shook her head and returned to studying her hands in her lap. "After everything I've said to him all this time? I don't think so." She shook her head again, as if the idea were almost beyond understanding.
"Then I think that perhaps you don't understand my husband as much as you thought you did," I said gently, taking one of those impeccably groomed hands in mine. I could hear the garage door opener begin to grind, and so could she. I felt her pull against my hold on her, those grey eyes openly nervous. "It will be alright," I soothed her as the grinding stopped, then started again, signaling that my husband was home. I felt the hand suddenly turn in mine, and then she was holding onto me - for support, for strength.
Then he was coming through the kitchen, calling "Cat! Cat! Where are you?" with a concerned tone.
"I'm in here," I called back easily, giving Miss Parker's hand a gentle squeeze. "We have a guest, Sydney. Come say hello."
He came to a stop in the archway, and his eyes brushed over Miss Parker with more distance and coldness than I had ever imagined possible from him. "So I see," he said, his voice chilled. "Miss Parker..."
"She came to my defense when I had an unexpected visit from a Mr. Lyle a little while ago," I explained quickly, knowing that would start the thawing process. "I invited her in, and we've been talking for a while now. She has something she wants to tell you."
"Indeed!" His eyebrows climbed his forehead, and his expression, when he turned back to her, was less frosty. "Well, thank you for helping with Lyle," he said, his voice more even but still less than warm. "I hadn't expected him to come at her so quickly." Miss Parker glanced up at him, nodding acceptance of his thanks, and then looked back down at her hands in her lap. I saw him look over at me with questions obvious in his gaze.
I turned my gaze back to her and squeezed her hand again. "Come on," I urged her softly, "talk to him. Now's your chance." Then I looked up at my husband. "And you sit down and listen." His eyebrows climbed just a bit higher, but rather than question me, he simply found a spot in the easy chair closest to the two of us on the couch. I turned back to her and squeezed again. "Miss Parker?"
"I'm sorry, Sydney," she started in a voice so soft that I had to strain to hear her. I saw Sydney bend forward slightly to hear what she had to say too, and his movement made her flinch back toward me. "I was rude, and I abused your hospitality and insulted you and Cathy, whom I'd barely met. I..." I saw her look up at him guiltily, and I saw the last of the frost in his expression melt - but her glance had again been fleeting, and she suddenly pulled her hand from my keeping. "I should go now," she said, rising very quickly, but she paused before beginning her retreat. "I'm really sorry, Sydney. That's all I wanted to say."
"Parker," I heard him say in a soft voice, and then he rose as if to follow her if she decided to flee.
"I'll talk to Sam tomorrow about finding someone to stay with Cathy while you're at work," she continued, rubbing hard under her nose and refusing to look at him again. "If Lyle has stopped by once, you can be sure he'll try again. We'll need to make sure he never catches her alone again." Her grey eyes found mine, and I caught my breath at the defeat in them. "And I'll stay away from the Sim Lab from now on, I promise. You won't have to worry about me anymore. Good bye."
"Parker," Sydney called to her again and reached out to snag a hand as she began to move past him. "Stop. Wait."
"Don't, Sydney," she said in a wounded voice, looking down at where he was restraining her. "Please..."
"You can stay for supper, can't you?"
The expression she wore as she lifted her face to stare at him was completely stunned. He merely looked over at me. "I think there's a package of pork chops in the freezer that will take care of three," he said with eyes that begged for my indulgence, which I was more than happy to give, under the circumstances.
"I'm on it," I rose and moved past the two of them. I patted Miss Parker's arm on my way through, noticing that Sydney had yet to let go of her himself. "Sit down again and make yourself at home, my dear," I invited her with a smile. "Supper will be in about an hour. I think you two have some much-needed talking to do while I'm cooking."
I kept myself completely out of their way while I prepared the meal, although if I stopped and strained to hear, I could make out the sound of low voices - Sydney's accented baritone and her soft alto answering him - sometimes distressed, sometimes insistent, and sometimes almost broken. But at least they were speaking again, I smiled to myself as I puttered my way through preparing vegetables and salad and frying the chops and making gravy. I had a feeling it was the first time those two had talked - REALLY talked - in a very long time.
I was setting plates at the kitchen table when Sydney came in behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. "I don't know how you did it," he purred into my ear and kissed the back of my neck.
"Did what?" I decided obtuseness had its moments of virtue. "Where's Miss Parker?"
"Repairing the damage to her makeup, I think," he replied softly. "Heart to heart talks have a tendency to be hard on the mascara."
"Now I know why you never said anything," I told him, turning my head over my shoulder and kissing him on the nose before moving out of reach. "Did you two get everything out in the open?"
"Everything that was important," he answered, and his voice was warm. "Thank you."
"For what?"
"For giving her the chance to show you who she could be without slamming the door in her face," he followed me to the stove and turned me in his arms and held me close, "AND for getting me off the hook. Giving her the silent treatment today was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do." He leaned his cheek into my hair. "I can't tell you how glad I don't have to do it again tomorrow."
"But you got your message across," I reminded him, putting my arms around him too for a moment. "Earth to new daddy: sometimes being a parent ISN'T all lightness and joy."
"No wonder Rene turned out so well," he purred at me. "Peanut has quite the mother."
"Flatterer." I planted a smacker on his cheek for that one. "Go put some glasses out, will you? I have to tend these chops if you want them to stay edible..."
The Miss Parker that joined us for dinner that night was neither the brash harridan from days earlier, nor the wounded woman I had taken in out of the cold. Although a little hesitant at first to let down her guard completely, Sydney and I kept up a steady stream of light conversation between us that eventually drew her in and gave her cause to open up. I could see my husband's pure delight as she slowly moved from cautious monosyllabic comments to finally giving me an unassuming and genuinely warm smile as she responded in kind to some light banter I tossed at her. When he began laughing with her and reached out a hand to hers and squeezed it companionably, I couldn't help but catch my breath at her face as it gained the glow of child just handed its most desired treasure.
She insisted on helping me clean up while Sydney restocked the fire in the fireplace. After he had gone on into the living room, she put a gentle hand on my arm. "Thank you," she said with a very soft voice.
"What for?" I asked, curious what her answer to this question would be.
She thought for a moment. "My mom died when I was very young," she began as she stacked the plates and silver into the sink for rinsing, "and my father was always busy with work. Before I was sent away to school, whenever my father was too busy to be bothered with me, Sydney was always there. He has always been there for me." She glanced at me cautiously, then glanced up as if wary of his hearing this.
"It's OK," I told her with a tone of confidence as I took the rinsed dishes from her and stacked them in the dishwasher. "I can keep this between us."
She seemed relieved. "I've always kinda wished Sydney were my..." It seemed she couldn't finish the thought. I found I wasn't so much surprised at the wish, but rather that she had such trouble voicing it. She cleared her throat for a moment, then continued. "Anyway, when Sydney wouldn't speak to me today after throwing me out before, I thought I'd never be able to find a way to fix..." Her voice was getting uneven again. "You have to understand, Cathy. I always felt I came in second-best with Sydney because of Jarod. I was afraid that now, with you, and then a new baby, he wouldn't ever..."
"You thought he'd forget you - let you slip to the bottom of a longer list?"
"Something like that," she admitted, her face a bit red.
"I take it you know better now," I asked her, once more adopting my mother-knows-best tone of voice as I closed the dishwasher and set the controls.
"Yeah, I guess I do," she nodded slowly, and then the grey eyes came up to meet mine again. "Thanks."
I shook my head at her. "Love doesn't work that way."
"Sometimes it does," she told me in a stark voice that told me her fear was based upon experience. No wonder Sydney's cold shoulder had hurt her so badly.
"Aren't you two done YET?" Sydney spoke from just outside the kitchen door, then stepped through. "Here I've made a beautiful fire in the living room to keep the chill out, and my two favorite girls are still busy talking in the kitchen."
"We were just finishing up," I told him with a smile, moving confidently under one arm and getting my hug as my reward.
It took Miss Parker a little longer to find her way under his other arm - to realize that he was actually waiting for her to come to him too - but the look of contentment on her face when he pulled her close and she leaned into him was beyond priceless. It made my heart full the same way Rene's hugging him tightly as we boarded our plane had - in a my-family-is-complete-now, yours-mine-and-ours sort of way.
I leaned into my husband a little closer and put an arm around the woman he loved like a daughter. And I eventually felt her very hesitantly put her arm out to me to return the hug. My God, I thought, what am I in for when I meet Jarod? And I wondered how long it would be before I found out the answer to that one.
For now, however, I was content.
Chapter 3: Reactions
I still couldn't believe how my life could change SO fast.
Four months ago I was a published and award-winning research chemist on the final legs of a pharmaceutical research project that had taken me the better part of a year and a half to find solutions. I was independent, divorced, with an ex-husband I loathed who hung around too much and a daughter in med school over a hundred miles away. I had a mortgage, car payments, and no social life to speak of. I was miserable - I was lonely, and I missed my twin sister, killed a few years earlier by a drunk driver, desperately.
Three months ago, I applied to become a participant in a research project concerning surviving the loss of a twin. Two and a half months ago, I met Sydney - first as the final interviewer for that research project and then the next day as a fellow lonely human being and surviving twin. Two and half months ago, courtesy of a cold and rainy night and unfamiliar roads, I allowed myself a dalliance of a single night with that intriguing, gentle, intelligent and vulnerable man - a night the like of which I would dream about nightly for weeks thereafter. Two and half months ago I walked away from Sydney and our one beautiful night together and boarded a plane that took me back to my mortgage, my car payment, my ex-husband and my job.
Then, two weeks ago, I discovered that my night of dalliance had made me pregnant - a surprising and rarely celebrated development for a woman my age. Eleven days ago, my daughter weaseled the story out of me between my bouts of morning sickness. Ten days ago, she went behind my back and summoned Sydney to my side to take his share of responsibility for his unborn child. Far from being upset or distraught at the unexpected turn of events, he caught the next possible plane west. And so nine days ago, he re-entered my life completely determined that I would be apart of his life from then on no matter what, determined that I would return with him to Delaware. I was soon reminded of what I'd learned two and half months earlier - that he was a very hard man to refuse.
A week ago, I finished my project, handed in the report, and quit my job. Three days ago, Sydney and I were standing in front of a Justice of the Peace exchanging wedding vows, my daughter and my ex-boss beside us as witnesses. Yesterday, my house - completely empty - was turned over to a realtor to sell for me, and I got on a plane with my new husband to return to his home in Delaware.
And today I met with my new doctor, who reassured me that just because I had fallen and miscarried so long ago should be no reason to fear miscarrying again. The issue of most concern to him was my age and physical condition, and he'd address that by simply seeing me regularly once a week and making certain recommendations as to the diet he wanted me to follow. He did note my history of miscarriage in my chart for reference as things progressed, however, and then recommended that I continue to take things very easy for the duration, just in case.
Sydney was with me during the visit and then the examination, and his face upon hearing the sound of our baby's heartbeat for the first time was positively beatific. But then, he hadn't really stopped smiling since our trip to the Justice of the Peace, since he put that thin platinum band of small channel-set diamonds on my finger and changed my last name to his. I didn't think I'd stopped smiling either, except for when I experienced the pain of leaving my sweet girl Rene behind to head back to her med school studies as I headed East to a new home, a new family, a new life.
Now here I sat, warm and comfortable in my husband's arms, curled up next to him on his long leather couch in front of a warm fire he'd built for me to chase the Delaware winter chill away. It had been an exciting and tiring day, and the visit to the doctor had lifted my spirits some, even as it tired me coming on the heels of a long trip the day before. The boxes of things that I'd shipped to Delaware wouldn't be arriving for another few days at least, and most of my most personal items had already found new homes in the room I shared with Sydney now.
"When do you go back to work?" I asked, contented as always when he would stretch out his long and graceful fingers across my abdomen, embracing our child even as he tightened his hold about my shoulders.
"By all rights I should go back tomorrow," he replied, dropping all pretense of reading his psychiatric journal and depositing a kiss on my brow. "But I did speak for the possibility of two weeks, and I'm leaning toward taking the rest of that time off after all." I could hear the smile in his voice. "After all, technically I'm still on my honeymoon."
"When are you going to tell them about me and the peanut," I asked, motioning with my nose at the mantel and its collection of photographs. "Your son and your friends, I mean?"
I felt him take a deep breath. "I'll probably call Nicholas, my son, sometime this coming weekend. Jarod is..." He paused, searching evidently for the right words. "...very capable of finding out on his own. More than likely he'll be telling me about it rather than the other way around. I never know when he'll make contact - and it's been a very long time since he has."
"And..."
"Miss Parker?" I could feel him tense slightly. "I should probably call her in the morning - at least explain to her why I've been gone. I didn't have a chance to talk to her before I left." He pulled me closer to him.
I wrapped my arm around his middle. "What's the matter? Do you worry about her reaction?"
"She has a sharp tongue, and a very ... brusque ... personality. She's also never been very diplomatic, and can be very territorial when it comes to those she cares about." He kissed the tip of my ear. "Since her father's death, that territoriality has included me. She never really did learn to share. I don't want her over-stressing you now..."
"I think I can handle myself if I know that I have you behind me backing me up," I reassured him as I laid my head on his chest. "Anybody else?"
"Well," he said, relaxing again, "there's Broots and his daughter Debbie. They'll probably be delighted, and Debbie will most likely insist on being our offical babysitter. I should call them tomorrow too - Miss Parker, Broots and I at one time were on a project together "Three Musketeers"-style."
"Anybody else?"
"Hopefully not," he replied murkily. "Although there are a couple of people I'd just as soon stayed as far away from you and our peanut as possible. Mr. Raines, my direct superior, is not to be trusted - and I doubt he will be pleased at my suddenly having a life outside the Centre. Mr. Lyle is just downright dangerous - if he ever bothers you, I want you to call me. I don't ever want you alone with that man."
"Sydney," I pulled away to look at him. "What kind of place IS the Centre after all? I thought it was a think tank, where all kinds of scientific disciplines came together..."
He nodded. "Ideally, that's what it should be. In practice, however..." He looked down at me with an amazing expression of sadness. "I suppose you might as well hear it from me. There is a very dark side to the Centre, Cat, a very dangerous side to the research that is done there sometimes. For a very long time, I was blind to much of what went on there. I saw... things... no civilized man ever should... I've stood by... while..." He shook himself. "I've promised myself no more." He looked down into my wide and frightened eyes. "I'm frightening you."
"That you are!" I agreed. "You make them sound like feudal lords holding the power of life and death over their serfs. Are you going to be allowed to have a wife? A child?"
"Now, perhaps, I will," he replied, and his tone chilled me. "Do you remember me telling you that my son's mother and I never married?" I nodded. "The reason I never knew my son existed because the morning she found out she was pregnant, Michelle was told to leave the Centre and Delaware - never see me again or tell me about Nicholas - or I would be killed. She believed it and ran, never looking back." I shook my head - the very idea of this was almost beyond belief.
"Many things about my life have changed since those days, thank God - the project I was involved in has pretty much been closed down. So with my complete involvement in a Centre project no longer necessary, keeping such close control over my every move is no longer of such importance either. I'm working on the assumption that I can begin to actually live for a change, love someone without having to ask permission for a change. And I've stepped around them a bit by marrying you before we got back here - and I know about our peanut. They can't steal that from me again."
I stared at him. "Do they... Are they this controlling over other peoples' lives there? Miss Parker, Broots - have they..."
He wrapped his arms around me tightly and pressed his lips to my hair. "You really don't want to know the answer to that one, Cat. Yes, they have - and let's leave it at that. I intend to make arrangements so that somebody I trust will be able to help you those times I can't be here, taking you to your doctor's appointment, for example."
"I can drive too, you know," I complained. "I didn't marry you just to become a prisoner in my own home, Sydney. I'm used to being my own woman, doing what I wanted when I wanted..."
"I know that," he soothed gently. "But until things settle after the news breaks, I'm going to be taking no chances with your safety - and I'm going to have to ask for your indulgence in this for the time being. You and the peanut are my life now. I don't want any convenient accidents taking either of you away from me." He sounded almost fierce in his protectiveness.
I huddled into his arms, suddenly not feeling quite as secure as I had been. I now had a husband with an apparently dangerous job and sinister colleagues among the close friends. "You need to know," he continued in a softer voice, "that if they had found out about you, about our child, I couldn't have protected you from so far away. That's why we have to be here in Blue Cove together. I have resources here to keep you - us - safe." He held me to him tightly. "I love you so much..."
"I love you too..." I answered him. I did. I could no longer imagine my life without him in it - I just had never imagined all the other things that evidently accompanied him into my life.
As it worked out, Broots was the one to call Sydney that next afternoon. We were in what was now a guest room, taking stock of what all would need to be moved where in order for the room to become a nursery, when the phone rang. He patted me on the shoulder and told me to keep thinking while he sped to our room and picked up the receiver there. I could hear his voice easily. "This is Sydney..."
There was a pause, then, "Yes, I'm home, but I'm going to take the rest of my two weeks..." Then another pause, and, after several wordless hums of response, "Well, of course I don't mind, but why don't you and Debbie come over this evening for supper? I have someone I'd like you both to meet - and Debbie can get tutored in Chemistry after we eat." I moved to the door of our bedroom, and Sydney caught sight of me and raised his eyebrows as if in question. I nodded at him - my morning sickness had abated back to only popping up in the morning now, and I'd like the chance to begin learning where things were in the kitchen. He nodded at the voice in his ear. "Good. About six then? Fine. See you then."
"Debbie needs help in Chemistry, hmm?" I asked him as he rejoined me in the hallway.
"How good are you at tutoring the basics?" he asked in return.
I chuckled. "Rene made it to med school, didn't she?"
"Wasn't a whiz at Chemistry, like her mom?" The smile was wide and even-toothed again, just teasing me this time.
"Hated the math, actually." It was the truth. "But as long as we're taking a break from planning, you might as well call Miss Parker too - have her come for dinner as well. Might as well get all the important introductions over all at once."
His eyes widened. "You're a brave soul, Cat," he purred at me, then went back into the bedroom for the phone again.
"Miss Parker? This is..." There was a pause - obviously she had interrupted him. "No, I'm taking the rest of my two weeks, as a matter of fact." He listened with a wry face. "No, I didn't time this just to conflict with..." She interrupted him again, and I could see that now he was simply giving her the chance to vent sufficiently so that she would hear his eventual invitation. His expression was one of fond and indulgent patience - an almost paternal forbearance. I wasn't surprised - he HAD said that he sometimes forgot that she wasn't his, after all... This bodes well for you, peanut, I thought to the baby, and rubbed my hand over my tummy.
"Miss Parker, although I'd love to listen to the latest from your brother, I'm actually calling you to invite you to supper here this evening. There is someone here I'd like you to meet." His eyes widened, and then he smiled at me. Ah! Evidently he'd surprised his friend. "Yes. About six." He listened again. "Good. I'll see you then." He disconnected. "I hope you feel up to this..."
"I'm just hoping you have something in your freezer able to feed five people!" I smiled at him.
He did - a nice rolled roast that got popped immediately into the oven, to be accompanied by potatoes and some steamed carrots, with balled melon for dessert. With guests on their way for supper, plans for a nursery were put on temporary hold for the evening.
Broots turned out to be a very shy and likeable younger man, balding and obviously very intelligent. Debbie was a thoroughly teenaged daughter who reminded me so much of Rene at her age, with her long hair and infectious sparkling humor. The two doted on each other completely - it was a joy to see.
As was the stunned look on Broots' face when Sydney wrapped his arm around my shoulders and presented me as "my new wife, Cathy."
"Whoa! Syd!" Broots was gaping at his friend while he slowly put his hand out to me. "This IS a surprise." He looked back and forth between us for a while. "You've known each other long?"
"Not exactly." I was glad to let him explain while I got a hesitant hug from Debbie. "We met a number of months ago, and then kept in touch."
"Then what possessed you to get married all of a sudden?" Broots shook his head as if realizing that he wasn't getting the whole story.
"The fact that she became pregnant," Sydney said simply.
If I thought the balding father of a teenaged girl could drop his jaw any further, I was quickly convinced otherwise. As he recovered his wits, he tipped his head to one side and began to grin slowly. "You mean, you're..."
"Going to be a father? Yes," Sydney smiled at me as I gave Debbie's shoulders a gentle squeeze and let go.
"You're going to let me babysit, aren't you, Sydney?" Debbie began pleading almost at once.
"I can't think of anybody else I'd like to have the job more," I piped in. I'd have probably added a bit more, but the doorbell rang again right then.
"Sydney," I heard a smooth and sultry female voice say in low tones, and then I watched the absolutely stunningly beautiful brunette from the mantle picture step into the house as she deposited a careful kiss on my husband's cheek. She looked around her, at the Broots' - at me - with mild surprise. "I didn't realize this was a dinner party."
"It isn't, really," Sydney assured her as he closed the door behind her and took her coat. "I just wanted to introduce my best friends to someone very special to me." He took Miss Parker by the elbow and brought her over to face me. "This is my wife, Cathy. Cat, this is Miss Parker."
Obviously this woman had learned to hide her emotions well, because the only sign of her surprise was the stunned look in her eyes and one of those elegantly groomed eyebrows soaring higher than I'd ever seen one fly before. Slowly the hand came out, but the touch was brief, almost too brief. "So this is why you suddenly dropped everything and took two weeks' vacation out of the blue, eh Syd?" The grey eyes were taking my measure with calculating efficiency. "I didn't think you were even seeing anyone seriously." She rounded on Sydney with an almost accusatory tone. "So, the two weeks were for what... a honeymoon?"
"No," Sydney pointedly insisted in keeping his voice light and friendly. "Actually, it took several days just to convince her to marry me. We just got back two evenings ago."
"What was the hurry?" she asked now, her voice almost tauntingly insolent. "Or was this a shotgun wedding? What did you do, Sydney, get her pregnant?" She chuckled as if the very thought of that were an old and unpleasant joke.
"Miss Parker, please," I heard Broots exclaim defensively, and I decided in that moment that I liked that balding little man immensely. But I'd heard enough of Miss Parker for the moment, and didn't want to embarrass Sydney by losing my cool so soon after I met this woman.
"I think I'll go see to the supper," I told him quietly, and I'm sure my face told him everything he needed to know as to why I was beating a hasty retreat.
"I'll go with you," Debbie said in rapid agreement, casting a frankly disapproving look in Miss Parker's direction that was quite the change from the pleased expression of fondness that had come over her face as the woman had come through the door.
But the kitchen wasn't far enough away that I couldn't hear the explosive "What?!" that came not long after I vacated the front hallway.
I saw Debbie cringe, and I put my hand on her shoulder. "I don't think Miss Parker is very pleased about me," I ventured.
"She... takes a long time to warm up to people," the girl tried to put a better spin on the obvious displeasure. "You have to learn to ignore the barbs. Underneath, she can be a really nice..."
Her voice boomed through from the front again. "For Christ's sake, Syd, you're old enough to be a GRANDFATHER! What the Hell did you think you were doing?"
I stiffened angrily. How DARE she rail at my husband for having the temerity to live his own life? Who was SHE to tell him when he was too old to start a family? I felt Debbie's hand creep into mine, and I forced myself to smile down at this delightful young lady and take a deep breath to try to release the burgeoning dislike for the elegant and rude woman Sydney considered "like one of his own."
"You're kidding, right?" I asked tightly, looking down into her face which was growing more distressed by the moment. It wasn't fair - Sydney and I could defend ourselves, if it came to that; but the harsh words were hurting a complete innocent.
Her next statement was once more in that taunting and insolent tone. "Then again, I figured that after Nicholas, you'd forgotten what to do with that part of your anatomy anyway. I don't know whether I should be pleased or shocked to be mistaken."
That was what did it. Old friend of Sydney's or no, she'd just stepped past MY line. I hadn't been that angry since my last major argument with Jake, just before we separated. I squeezed Debbie's hand again for comfort, then stalked firmly and quickly from the kitchen. One look at Sydney, his expression filled with sad frustration, and I was straight up into her face.
"You know, I've known many people in my days on this planet, Miss Parker; but when it comes to rudeness, I've got to admit you take the cake. Your mother evidently never taught you the proper behavior to be expected of you when you're a guest in another's home..." I heard the elder Broots gasp, but was in no mood to ponder what taboo I'd violated. At this point, I really no longer cared. "...so I guess the job of teaching it to you, for good or ill, falls to me. You'd best listen closely, because I will not repeat the lesson. You do NOT ridicule a host in his own home after accepting an invitation to dine. You do NOT make disparaging remarks about your host's manhood or any other personal attribute in public - EVER; and in private only if you are truly on that intimate terms with the person." She may have been taller than I, but I think my attitude and audacity had taken her completely by surprise. "As far as I'm concerned, you owe Sydney a very large apology - and you can deliver that apology on your way out the door. I have no intent of sitting at a table with you now or anytime in the foreseeable future. Good evening, Miss Parker."
I was done - the emotional strain of rejecting one of Sydney's old and supposedly “dear” friends was becoming difficult to handle. I looked over at Sydney again. "I think I'll go upstairs and lie down for a bit," I told him, rising up on tiptoe to kiss a cheek. "Let me know when she's left, and I'll be glad to come down and serve the supper." I didn't give him a chance to reply, but turned on my heels and did as I had promised, giving a quick wave to Debbie in the dining room as I began up the stairs.
"Sydney, I..." I hear her begin, for once in a more reasonable and actually pleading tone.
"You know Miss Parker," Broots then spoke up with a soft and accusing voice, "sometimes you just don't know when to quit."
"Man!" Debbie chimed in, sounding thoroughly disgusted. "You were really mean." I heard her steps trotting back toward the kitchen.
"Here's your coat back, Miss Parker," I heard Sydney say finally in a very disappointed tone. "Cat's right - I don't think you're staying and eating with us tonight would be a good idea now."
"Syd..."
"Stop. You only get one chance to make a first impression, Parker. You might want to consider the one you made this evening. I'll see you Monday." I heard the door open. "Good night." It closed quietly and firmly.
That's when I fell to pieces. I made it to our bedroom and managed to get the door closed before I started to make any noise that would filter downstairs. I couldn't believe what I had just done - alienated one of my husband's “children.” What kind of wife was I?
I lay down on the bed and pulled the pillow up and around my face as I cried, wishing for the first time that I were back West with my mortgage and car payments and empty life. At least then I wouldn't have done damage to Sydney's relationships with those he'd known and loved for years. I knew better. I knew I knew better than that.
I heard the bedroom door open and close very gently, and then the bed dipped under his weight as he sat down beside me and stroked my hair. "I'm sorry for what happened, Cat. I suppose I should have broken the news to her before now, so she could have gotten used to the idea before..."
What could I say to him? As much as Miss Parker owed him an apology, so did I. "I'm so sorry," I managed finally. "You must hate me now..."
"Hush," he soothed, bending over me and kissing my cheek gently. "You were right to do what you did - it's high time somebody told her off royally when she climbs on her high horse like that. I know where it comes from, so I've never had the heart - and I suppose letting her constantly get away with it has led her to believe that it's OK to say such things to me." His thumb wiped at my tears. "I'm just sorry you had to be the one to do what I could never bring myself to do, and tonight of all times. But dry your tears and come down and join the rest of us now. Your supper smells superb and deserves our full attention."
"How can I face Broots and Debbie now..." I whispered, feeling thoroughly thrashed. "What must they think of me..."
"Actually," he smiled and wiped the next generation of tears from my face, "when I left them to come up here, they were a bit worried. I think they're frightened that Miss Parker's behavior might have put you off on them too - that you'll decide you don't want anything to do with THEM either."
"But I like THEM," I complained. "Broots is a complete gentleman, and Debbie is delightful. They're both very pleasant, kind people. I would never..."
"Then show them that's how you feel. C'mon now. The Ice Queen has been banished from the house for the evening, leaving the delicious food for us mere peons." His smile was deliberately wide and contagious, and I worked hard to return it. He recognized the effort and acknowledged it. "That's my girl," he purred, kissing me on the lips gently. "Let's go down and feed our guests now, shall we?"
As I sat up, he pulled a tissue from the box by the bed and handed it to me so that I could at least blow my nose and wipe the rest of the tears from my face. "I look a mess," I said simply, looking over the end of the bed at the round mirror above the chest of drawers.
"No you don't," he soothed, pulling me into his arms and holding me close for a short while. "As far as I'm concerned, you're the prettiest girl in town."
For some reason, the comment made me chuckle, then chuckle louder. "You're biased, you know," I told him as he rose and held a hand out to help me up.
"Nah," he shook his head and wrapped an arm around my shoulder. "I just have great taste."
Sydney was right - both of our remaining guests had very apprehensive looks on their faces when I came back down the stairs, Debbie in particular. "Are you mad?" she asked in a worried voice.
"Not at you, poppet," I answered her with a smile, and I meant it. I saw Broots' face relax some, and Debbie smiled hesitantly at me. I decided to deliberately banish the spectre of bad company with a slightly stronger approach. "Do you think I could get you to help me get the supper on the table?" Her smile got a little brighter, and she nodded at me.
Sydney moved past me toward the kitchen, and when I followed him to begin serving up the meal, I noticed that the fifth place at the table had simply vanished as if never set out. It took a few minutes for me to coax Debbie into regaining some of her carefree enthusiasm for life, but by the time we were sitting down to eat, everybody's mood had been mostly restored. Conversation flowed smoothly and with real comaraderie, and I found myself thoroughly enjoying getting to know these friends of my husband.
Later, Sydney shooed me from the kitchen so I could sit down with the girl and help her with her studies while he and Broots handled clean-up duties and then adjourned to the living room for a quiet game of chess. Debbie was like Rene - it was the math that was stymieing her - and she was attentive and quick to pick up the short cuts and procedures that I introduced her to that took some of the mystery out of the process.
Once the studying was finished, I saw that something else was on her mind. "What is it, poppet?" I asked quietly, figuring this was girl-talk time.
I was right. After a little prevarication, Debbie presented a situation that was developing between herself and some of her friends that, true to form, reminded me so much of some of the growing pains Rene had gone through. So I began to tell her about my daughter's situation and how it had resolved. After that, time flew - and when Broots came to find his daughter and take her home, he caught us blushing madly at some shared joke and laughing like hyenas.
Later, when all was quiet and locked up for the night, I lay cradled in Sydney's arms and allowed myself to ponder what had happened. "About Miss Parker..." I started.
"Forget her," he advised me, tightening his arms around me. "Broots and I discussed things, and we've decided that the two of us will simply continue the lesson you've started here at work. We've both put up with a great deal from her for a very long time - now, we have a reason to put a stop to it."
"Sydney, she's your..."
"That's just it," he kissed my forehead. "She's not - I told you I just keep forgetting that. Her mother, God rest her, was a good woman - a kind woman who would never have condoned her daughter's behavior tonight. The problem is that her mother died when she was quite young, and her father was a cold and calculating person who did his best to teach her to be exactly the same way - and, unfortunately, he succeeded." I felt him sigh against me. "I did what I could during those few months between Catherine's death and when Miss Parker was sent away to school - it just wasn't enough to counteract..."
"So it was HER mother that was the other Catherine you said you knew," I breathed out in surprise, and felt him nod. "And so my comment about her mother not teaching her manners was essentially hitting her blow the belt?"
"Perhaps, but you were completely innocent of any deliberate intent of doing so - which is far better than how you would have fared had if she'd known where YOU were vulnerable," Sydney reminded me, then shifted slightly against me. "But forget her. I was pleased to see how you and Debbie connected this evening. That's good - that child needs positive female role models in her life who care for her. Especially now, since Miss Parker has taken quite a dive in her estimation."
"Where's HER mother?"
Sydney sighed. "She could be in Atlantic City, Vegas, or Reno for all we know - the fact is the woman hasn't tried to contact her once since the custody hearing."
"Debbie reminds me of Rene at that age."
"I thought she might." He sounded thoroughly contented with the developments on that score.
I lay quietly for a moment, my mind tossing through things I still wasn't sure of. "What about this Jarod? Will he be disappointed or angry that we..."
"Jarod?" Sydney chuckled. "Quite the contrary. Jarod is a firm believer in family life. I doubt you'll have anything to worry about from him - except perhaps him popping in on you when you least expect it, and most likely when I'm NOT around. You can trust him, though - he would never hurt you."
I moved so that I could see his face in the moonlight. "But doesn't he want to see YOU anymore?"
"I honestly don't know," he answered me, and he sounded a little sad. "I haven't talked to him in a very long time."
That last was said with such a soul-wrenching sense of wistfulness that I reached up and stroked his cheek to comfort. In response, Sydney moved so that he could capture my lips with his, and then suddenly all thoughts of surrogate children, friends and other acquaintances evaporated from my mind. My entire being was captivated and enthralled by the sensations that his gentle and sensuous caresses and passionate kisses were evoking within me. His hands quickly found the bottom hem of my nightgown, and soon the garment had been drawn over my head and discarded - as had his pajamas. "God I love you," he growled down to me as he settled his weight on me and took possession of my body with gentle tenderness. And then, together in body and soul, we found new heights of ecstasy to explore.
When at last we were resting quietly in each other's arms again, I held onto him tightly. "I love you so much," I murmured to him softly. I did - I don't think I had ever loved anyone with quite the same, overwhelming devotion. And even as my eyes closed in sleep I found myself wondering at the turn of fate that had given me such a treasure.
We spent our next few days quietly - finalizing plans for transforming that guest room into a nursery and figuring out how and where to accommodate those belongings that were going to be arriving any day now. Friday night I found myself tutoring Debbie in Chemistry again - and this time, she had brought another schoolmate with her, equally flummoxed and confused. It was more challenging to try to get the concepts and techniques across to two adolescent minds that tended to bounce off each other with abandon, but I enjoyed the mental exercise completely.
Our weekend saw the delivery of boxes and those few pieces of heirloom furniture that I just couldn't bear to part with. Sydney and I methodically went through each room of the house, carefully finding new homes for these old friends of mine to nestle into - just as I was being carefully cushioned as I landed and was eased into this new home amid new friends and others.
Sydney also sat down and called Nicholas and gave him the news. He came away from that phone call with a Cheshire-like grin and told me that Nicholas had told him to tell me to expect him to come visit sometime in May, before the baby was born. It seemed he wanted to get to know me while I still could focus on something other than sleeping while the baby was. Knowing that Sydney's son now knew everything had seemed to be perfectly comfortable making room for me in his estimation made me relax - at least not all his children were so hard to get along with.
Sunday night, Sydney and I were invited to the Broots' home for dinner. And while Broots would never be qualified as a gourmet chef, he had a real flare for making a decent spaghetti sauce. We broke out a card deck after the table was cleared and the dishwasher loaded, and once more the hours sped by.
Then it was Monday, and Sydney roused early to get ready for work. While he showered and dressed, I made him the breakfast I'd learned he liked the best: toast and coffee. I earned one of his wide and even smiles when he came down to a steaming mug of coffee and two slices of toast done the way he liked them. "I could get VERY used to this," he quipped, leaning over to drop a kiss on my cheek and then taking his place at the table.
"Enjoy it while you can," I quipped back in a cautionary tone. "Once our peanut arrives, you may be back to shifting for yourself for at least a little while if peanut and I are both finally back asleep after a long and restless night, walking the floor." I looked at him, filling my eyes for the day. "I'm really going to miss you today - talking about getting used to things, I've gotten used to having you around all the time."
"And I'm not sure how late I'll be," he replied, tightening his hold on my hand. "A lot will depend on how much the Tower has piled on my plate while I was away. I've left my cell number and my office number by the phone in the foyer, in case you need to get in touch with me." He lifted my hand to his lips and kissed it gently. "It will be a very long day, and the best part will be coming home, I swear it."
I took a long shower once he had left, relaxing as the warm water flowed through my long hair. Feeling a little at loose ends, I decided to put on one of my husband's warm cashmere sweaters - the one I had taken home with me so long ago, as a matter of fact - and let myself feel warm and safe. I made myself some tea - both Sydney and my doctor had ordered me strictly to stay away from coffee - and settled back down at the kitchen table with the local newspaper.
It ended up being a cold and stormy day, and later in the afternoon I decided the house had chilled down about as much as I wanted it to. I had watched Sydney make a fire the last two evenings, so I knew now where he kept his wood and kindling. I cleaned out the ashes from the previous evening's warmth and had just begun laying the foundations of tonight's when the doorbell rang. I frowned - until I arrived, there normally wouldn't have been anybody home at this hour - and then went over to the door and peered out the little peephole.
A rather handsome younger man with blue-grey eyes dressed in an expensive-looking suit under a dark trench coat stood waiting patiently in the falling snow, occasionally glancing backwards over his shoulder. I very quietly slipped the security chain into place and then opened the door a crack. It was very cold outside indeed. "Yes?" I asked.
I could see that my having answered the door was not a surprise. "Here and I thought they were kidding when they said Sydney had brought home a bride," he said, then gave me a big and obviously forced smile. "Hi! My name is Lyle."
I struggled not to let my face betray my misgivings, for this was the one person Sydney had warned me most strongly against. "Yes? What can I do for you?"
"I'm a co-worker of your husband's," he tried again, his voice just a little less than boisterously happy. "May I come in?"
"May I ask your business?" I asked in return. "My husband is at the Centre, if you're looking for him..."
"No," he replied, and now the expression in those blue-grey eyes was decidedly cold and dangerous. "I just thought that you and I could get acquainted."
"Lyle!" I heard a low female voice snap angrily from the direction of the street, and then I saw Miss Parker stalk haughtily but carefully up the walk. "What the Hell are YOU doing here?"
I could see the look of intense frustration that crossed the man's face, and I felt a sudden wave of gratitude for the unexpected visit from the woman I'd essentially thrown out of the house days earlier. "Parker," Lyle sighed, and his voice didn't bother to hide his frustration. "Must you follow me everywhere I go?"
"Only when you end up going where I was intending to go," she snipped at him, moving up to the door and then with a very subtle movement putting herself between Lyle and the chain that was the only thing keeping me safe from this man. "And I ask again, what the Hell are you doing here?"
"Dad asked me to check up on a rumor going around the Centre today," he said finally, putting a hand to his hips. "Seems the rumor was true. Sydney DOES have a woman..."
"Her name's Cathy. So fine - now you've met her and you know the grapevine has it right. You can go back and tattle to Raines now." She matched him hand at the hip for hand at the hip.
"There's also a whisper about a baby..."
Miss Parker put herself in Lyle's face so fast I could barely follow the movement. "Now THAT is none of your damned business, nor Raines'."
"Parker... You know as well as I that..."
"What I know," she hissed at him, her voice soft and very, VERY lethal, "is that if anything happens to Cathy here, in ANY way, you will not like the consequences. Is that understood?" I stared. Was this woman actually defending me - after that disastrous moment a few days ago when I'd basically thrown her out of the house?
"Is that a threat, Sis?" Lyle asked with a grimace of bravado masquerading as a smile on his face. My God! These two were siblings?
"Just a promise," Miss Parker answered him in a firm voice, her words forming a cloud in the frozen air between them. "Now get lost!"
For a long moment, I wasn't sure if he was going to leave or not. The two of them seemed locked in a battle of the killer glares. Then, with apparent east and nonchalance, Lyle shrugged. "Nice to meet you, Cathy," he breezed around his sister at me, then shot her a frown. "See you back at the barn, Sis."
Miss Parker merely turned, hand still at her hip, and glared after him until he had climbed back into the back seat of an expensive black sedan and the husky man holding the door had climbed back behind the wheel. Then she turned to me. "Are you alright? Did he..."
"I'm fine," I answered, loosening the chain and opening the door, "although a little confused. What did he want with me?"
"Trust me, you DON'T want to know," she told me quickly.
"Yes, I DO," I insisted. "I want to know why Sydney having a wife or baby is such a terrible thing that you chew him out in his own house and now this... this... Lyle person..."
"Look," the tall brunette said, dropping the arrogance from her voice and filling it instead with simple worried concern, "You do NOT want to mix it up with Lyle, whatever you do. He's a very dangerous man, and God knows what he intended."
"Sydney told me to call him if ever he bothered me..."
"Well, at least Freud knew enough to warn you," she nodded, apparently with approval. "Don't forget that."
"Thank you," I suddenly remembered my manners. "You stood up for me, even though I was anything but hospitable to you the last time we met. Would you like to come in out of the cold?" I asked, standing aside and leaving room for her to step past me into the house.
"Thank you, no," she shook her head. "I just came by to apologize to you for my behavior the other night. You were right, I was incredibly rude to both you and Sydney." The grey eyes looked into mine with an almost unbelievably vulnerable expression in them, then fell away as if the contact were too painful to maintain. "Tell Sydney..."
I had the sudden intuition that I was finally meeting the real Miss Parker - the one Sydney kept forgetting wasn't his, and the one that Debbie herself had been expecting the other night with such pleasure. "Wait!" I reached out to her and grabbed a gloved hand before she had a chance to turn away. Those beautiful grey eyes rose up to meet mine again. "Come in, please?" I asked her again. "I think we both got off on the wrong foot the other night and deserve a chance to start over. Don't you?"
I could tell I'd surprised her again today by inviting her in at least as much as I had the other evening by standing up to her. I could also tell that, as much as she really wanted to accept the invitation, she wasn't sure she could. So I just pulled on the hand until she took first one step and then another and finally gave up and came the rest of the way in without any more urging. I closed and, with a memory of Lyle fresh in my mind, locked and chained the front door, took her coat and hung it on the nearby coat rack, then ushered her into the living room.
"I was just starting a fire," I explained as I knelt to finish what I'd started. "Have a seat." She sat down primly at the very end of the leather couch, folded her hands in her lap after removing her gloves and seemed as if preparing herself to be chastened. I decided that while I finished getting the fire lit, I would put her at ease as much as I could. We'd already had enough tension between us to last quite a while. "Have you spoken to Sydney today?" I asked her in a conversational tone.
She shook her head. "He isn't speaking to me," she said softly. "I can't say I blame him. I just never thought he..."
I frowned slightly. Obviously there had been a reason Sydney had treated her with kid gloves all this time, and I think I was seeing it at last. Miss Parker might be a very formidable person capable of intimidating with a mere glance, tending to use bravado and aggression as interactive mechanisms with those of weaker character, but all that was but a façade behind which hid a very insecure and lonely woman. "I'm sure he was just very busy. He is just back from vacation, you know," I offered, only to have her shake her head again.
"No, he was very careful to let me know that I wasn't welcome in the Sim Lab without having to say a word," she explained in that soft voice that had tears swimming in the far background. "I may be obtuse in many ways, but Sydney and I have always understood each other without need for..." She blinked twice and seemed to struggle to keep her voice steady. "Broots isn't speaking to me today either, for that matter," she admitted, glancing up at me guiltily. "I suppose Debbie will never speak to me again. I don't blame them either."
"Well, it isn't just to me that you need to apologize," I admitted with a very even and non-accusing frankness. "You did a pretty good job of stepping in it for the whole group that evening."
"I know." I think that soft admission made me hurt almost as much as it did her, and I realized that apologizing to me was, for her, far easier than speaking to any of the others. She had no real defenses against these people for whom she cared far more than she let on - their turning their backs on her would become a wound that would never heal if this wasn't addressed and settled very soon. I could already sense that she was poised to adopt her brittle façade of arrogant disdain and quietly die behind it a little bit every day. Indeed: "It's getting late; I really should go," she said quickly and rose to her feet nervously. "I just wanted to let you know that I feel very badly about..."
"Sit down," I told her firmly in my best mother-knows-best tone, pointing her back into her chair. "You're in no shape to go anywhere, and I'm not going to let you go out and get into a car accident on these icy roads. My husband would never forgive me if I let something happen to you on such a day."
To my surprise, she followed my instruction, but not without complaint. "But Sydney will be here soon..."
"I know," I replied, touching the lighter to the crumpled newspaper beneath the kindling, then moved the spark screen into place. "The sooner the better. You need to talk to him."
"But he doesn't want to..."
"He will," I reassured her as I rose to join her on the couch. "He loves you, very much, you know." I saw those grey eyes come up again in surprise. "Oh, come now! Surely you knew that."
She shook her head and returned to studying her hands in her lap. "After everything I've said to him all this time? I don't think so." She shook her head again, as if the idea were almost beyond understanding.
"Then I think that perhaps you don't understand my husband as much as you thought you did," I said gently, taking one of those impeccably groomed hands in mine. I could hear the garage door opener begin to grind, and so could she. I felt her pull against my hold on her, those grey eyes openly nervous. "It will be alright," I soothed her as the grinding stopped, then started again, signaling that my husband was home. I felt the hand suddenly turn in mine, and then she was holding onto me - for support, for strength.
Then he was coming through the kitchen, calling "Cat! Cat! Where are you?" with a concerned tone.
"I'm in here," I called back easily, giving Miss Parker's hand a gentle squeeze. "We have a guest, Sydney. Come say hello."
He came to a stop in the archway, and his eyes brushed over Miss Parker with more distance and coldness than I had ever imagined possible from him. "So I see," he said, his voice chilled. "Miss Parker..."
"She came to my defense when I had an unexpected visit from a Mr. Lyle a little while ago," I explained quickly, knowing that would start the thawing process. "I invited her in, and we've been talking for a while now. She has something she wants to tell you."
"Indeed!" His eyebrows climbed his forehead, and his expression, when he turned back to her, was less frosty. "Well, thank you for helping with Lyle," he said, his voice more even but still less than warm. "I hadn't expected him to come at her so quickly." Miss Parker glanced up at him, nodding acceptance of his thanks, and then looked back down at her hands in her lap. I saw him look over at me with questions obvious in his gaze.
I turned my gaze back to her and squeezed her hand again. "Come on," I urged her softly, "talk to him. Now's your chance." Then I looked up at my husband. "And you sit down and listen." His eyebrows climbed just a bit higher, but rather than question me, he simply found a spot in the easy chair closest to the two of us on the couch. I turned back to her and squeezed again. "Miss Parker?"
"I'm sorry, Sydney," she started in a voice so soft that I had to strain to hear her. I saw Sydney bend forward slightly to hear what she had to say too, and his movement made her flinch back toward me. "I was rude, and I abused your hospitality and insulted you and Cathy, whom I'd barely met. I..." I saw her look up at him guiltily, and I saw the last of the frost in his expression melt - but her glance had again been fleeting, and she suddenly pulled her hand from my keeping. "I should go now," she said, rising very quickly, but she paused before beginning her retreat. "I'm really sorry, Sydney. That's all I wanted to say."
"Parker," I heard him say in a soft voice, and then he rose as if to follow her if she decided to flee.
"I'll talk to Sam tomorrow about finding someone to stay with Cathy while you're at work," she continued, rubbing hard under her nose and refusing to look at him again. "If Lyle has stopped by once, you can be sure he'll try again. We'll need to make sure he never catches her alone again." Her grey eyes found mine, and I caught my breath at the defeat in them. "And I'll stay away from the Sim Lab from now on, I promise. You won't have to worry about me anymore. Good bye."
"Parker," Sydney called to her again and reached out to snag a hand as she began to move past him. "Stop. Wait."
"Don't, Sydney," she said in a wounded voice, looking down at where he was restraining her. "Please..."
"You can stay for supper, can't you?"
The expression she wore as she lifted her face to stare at him was completely stunned. He merely looked over at me. "I think there's a package of pork chops in the freezer that will take care of three," he said with eyes that begged for my indulgence, which I was more than happy to give, under the circumstances.
"I'm on it," I rose and moved past the two of them. I patted Miss Parker's arm on my way through, noticing that Sydney had yet to let go of her himself. "Sit down again and make yourself at home, my dear," I invited her with a smile. "Supper will be in about an hour. I think you two have some much-needed talking to do while I'm cooking."
I kept myself completely out of their way while I prepared the meal, although if I stopped and strained to hear, I could make out the sound of low voices - Sydney's accented baritone and her soft alto answering him - sometimes distressed, sometimes insistent, and sometimes almost broken. But at least they were speaking again, I smiled to myself as I puttered my way through preparing vegetables and salad and frying the chops and making gravy. I had a feeling it was the first time those two had talked - REALLY talked - in a very long time.
I was setting plates at the kitchen table when Sydney came in behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. "I don't know how you did it," he purred into my ear and kissed the back of my neck.
"Did what?" I decided obtuseness had its moments of virtue. "Where's Miss Parker?"
"Repairing the damage to her makeup, I think," he replied softly. "Heart to heart talks have a tendency to be hard on the mascara."
"Now I know why you never said anything," I told him, turning my head over my shoulder and kissing him on the nose before moving out of reach. "Did you two get everything out in the open?"
"Everything that was important," he answered, and his voice was warm. "Thank you."
"For what?"
"For giving her the chance to show you who she could be without slamming the door in her face," he followed me to the stove and turned me in his arms and held me close, "AND for getting me off the hook. Giving her the silent treatment today was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do." He leaned his cheek into my hair. "I can't tell you how glad I don't have to do it again tomorrow."
"But you got your message across," I reminded him, putting my arms around him too for a moment. "Earth to new daddy: sometimes being a parent ISN'T all lightness and joy."
"No wonder Rene turned out so well," he purred at me. "Peanut has quite the mother."
"Flatterer." I planted a smacker on his cheek for that one. "Go put some glasses out, will you? I have to tend these chops if you want them to stay edible..."
The Miss Parker that joined us for dinner that night was neither the brash harridan from days earlier, nor the wounded woman I had taken in out of the cold. Although a little hesitant at first to let down her guard completely, Sydney and I kept up a steady stream of light conversation between us that eventually drew her in and gave her cause to open up. I could see my husband's pure delight as she slowly moved from cautious monosyllabic comments to finally giving me an unassuming and genuinely warm smile as she responded in kind to some light banter I tossed at her. When he began laughing with her and reached out a hand to hers and squeezed it companionably, I couldn't help but catch my breath at her face as it gained the glow of child just handed its most desired treasure.
She insisted on helping me clean up while Sydney restocked the fire in the fireplace. After he had gone on into the living room, she put a gentle hand on my arm. "Thank you," she said with a very soft voice.
"What for?" I asked, curious what her answer to this question would be.
She thought for a moment. "My mom died when I was very young," she began as she stacked the plates and silver into the sink for rinsing, "and my father was always busy with work. Before I was sent away to school, whenever my father was too busy to be bothered with me, Sydney was always there. He has always been there for me." She glanced at me cautiously, then glanced up as if wary of his hearing this.
"It's OK," I told her with a tone of confidence as I took the rinsed dishes from her and stacked them in the dishwasher. "I can keep this between us."
She seemed relieved. "I've always kinda wished Sydney were my..." It seemed she couldn't finish the thought. I found I wasn't so much surprised at the wish, but rather that she had such trouble voicing it. She cleared her throat for a moment, then continued. "Anyway, when Sydney wouldn't speak to me today after throwing me out before, I thought I'd never be able to find a way to fix..." Her voice was getting uneven again. "You have to understand, Cathy. I always felt I came in second-best with Sydney because of Jarod. I was afraid that now, with you, and then a new baby, he wouldn't ever..."
"You thought he'd forget you - let you slip to the bottom of a longer list?"
"Something like that," she admitted, her face a bit red.
"I take it you know better now," I asked her, once more adopting my mother-knows-best tone of voice as I closed the dishwasher and set the controls.
"Yeah, I guess I do," she nodded slowly, and then the grey eyes came up to meet mine again. "Thanks."
I shook my head at her. "Love doesn't work that way."
"Sometimes it does," she told me in a stark voice that told me her fear was based upon experience. No wonder Sydney's cold shoulder had hurt her so badly.
"Aren't you two done YET?" Sydney spoke from just outside the kitchen door, then stepped through. "Here I've made a beautiful fire in the living room to keep the chill out, and my two favorite girls are still busy talking in the kitchen."
"We were just finishing up," I told him with a smile, moving confidently under one arm and getting my hug as my reward.
It took Miss Parker a little longer to find her way under his other arm - to realize that he was actually waiting for her to come to him too - but the look of contentment on her face when he pulled her close and she leaned into him was beyond priceless. It made my heart full the same way Rene's hugging him tightly as we boarded our plane had - in a my-family-is-complete-now, yours-mine-and-ours sort of way.
I leaned into my husband a little closer and put an arm around the woman he loved like a daughter. And I eventually felt her very hesitantly put her arm out to me to return the hug. My God, I thought, what am I in for when I meet Jarod? And I wondered how long it would be before I found out the answer to that one.
For now, however, I was content.
