The Family Solution

The Family Solution

Bobby Hutchinson

www.millsandboon.co.uk

My thanks to Paul Eviston in Vancouver and

Bruce Gilmar in Sparwood for real estate

information—and for both leading me gently to

two signs that said Sold.

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

PROLOGUE

BELLA JANE MONROE TURNED thirty-seven on October 9.

As consciousness slowly dawned, she had no presentiment that this was the morning her life would change. She simply woke up feeling guilty and remembering too late one of her mother’s favorite sayings—which of course Mae Howard had never applied to her own short-lived marriage.

Never go to be bed angry with your husband. Disregarding the source, the advice was solid. Why, Bella wondered, did she only remember good advice after the fact?

Last night she’d been mad enough at Gordon to want to smack him with something heavy. But she wasn’t really the violent type, except in her imagination. If she wasn’t a fighter, however, then neither was she a lover. She’d come to the conclusion during the past year that she didn’t love Gordon any more, which made her feel sad and guilty, and was probably at the root of the problems between them.

Certainly she’d loved him sixteen years ago, when they were married. At least, she was pretty sure she had loved him, even if she wasn’t sure exactly when she’d stopped. She was clearer about why, but then she’d made promises that long-ago day—vows that had to do with other things than love.

There was honor, and sickness and health, and worldly goods, not to mention the kids. She was determined that Josh and Kelsey would not grow up the way she had, in a single-parent home. And there was loyalty. Bella prided herself on being loyal.

She opened her eyes, yawned and stretched. Her back was still turned to Gordon’s side of the king-size bed, the way it had been when she finally got to sleep. She squinted at the clock and did a double take. Eight forty-seven? Holy crap. The alarm hadn’t gone off.

The kids would be late for school. Monroe’s Hardware wouldn’t open on time. Bella groaned and sat up, registering the odd fact that Gordon wasn’t snoring beside her. In fact, he wasn’t in bed at all, which was a shocker. For the past six months, ever since the business had started going south, he’d refused to get up before ten, which meant she had to drive Kelsey and Josh to school and open the store. It was that and a dozen other irritations that had driven Bella to confront him the night before.

Attack him, actually—be honest here, Bella. The discussion had started over something basic. As long as Gordon wasn’t working at the store, Bella thought he could at least figure out something for dinner and make an attempt to have it on the table when the kids got home.

And somehow the whole thing had rapidly escalated into World War III, ending only when he made his standard retreat into stone-cold silence.

She felt a little sick, remembering it. What if Josh and Kelsey had overheard? Teenagers had enough to contend with, without hearing their parents have a meltdown.

A chill October breeze drifted in the open window. The room was freezing, the damp Vancouver air filled with the promise of rain.

Bella dragged herself out of bed, shivering as she slammed the window shut. A piece of yellow lined paper fluttered off Gordon’s pillow and landed on the floor. She leaned over and picked it up, one hand pressed against the front of her flannel nightgown in an effort to stay warm. Just for an instant, hope flickered. Gordon had never in living memory admitted he was wrong or said he was sorry. Maybe this time…

“I’m taking off,” she read. “You and the kids will be better off without me. I’m sorry about the Volvo and the money in the savings account, but I need them. In return I’ve signed the house and store over to you—power of attorney is on my desk. Tell the kids I love them. G.”

Bella read the note twice, and then a third time, slower, as if it had been written in a foreign language. When the words finally started to make sense, her heart was thudding against her ribs and she heard herself begin to moan.

Her legs buckled, and she sank to her knees on the carpet. Rocking back and forth, she crumpled the note into a ball and threw it across the room.

Betrayal, abandonment, rage—terror. The feelings of desperation poured through her.

She grabbed the neck of her nightgown with both hands and pulled as hard as she could, until the soft fabric tore all the way to the hem, then she ripped it crosswise. She wished it was Gordon’s heart she’d just dispatched, but it felt so much more like her own.

CHAPTER ONE

HANDS TREMBLING FROM too much caffeine and not enough sleep, Bella sipped yet another mug of coffee and tried to figure out how to balance a stepladder halfway up the stairs.

It was Sunday morning, ten days, two hours and seventeen minutes since she’d first read The Letter, and when the doorbell rang, relief and anticipation replaced the anxiety that generally sat like a rock in the middle of her chest.

Niki was early, bless her heart. Desperate to unload the newest details of her life into the sympathetic ears of her best friend, Bella hurried to the door and threw it open.

“Morning, Ms. Monroe.”

The man on her makeshift front steps was of medium height, of medium weight and with more than medium shoulders, and she’d seen him somewhere before. He had nice eyes, and his broken nose gave his handsome features character. He wore jeans and a denim jacket lined with sheepskin, and the fact that he wasn’t dressed in a suit like the other real-estate people she’d encountered in the past week misled Bella, but only until he began to speak.

“I’m Charlie Fredricks. We met the day you came by the real-estate office? You spoke with my brother, Rick.” He smiled and extended a large hand, which he obviously intended for her to shake.

Bella tried to swallow her fierce disappointment, and then gave up the attempt to control her temper, which, according to her mother, she’d inherited from her absentee father.

What was it with the men in her life?

“It’s Sunday. You do realize that? You people are driving me nuts. I have more work than there are hours in the day. Emotionally, I’m a wreck. I’ve explained to about 227 other real-estate idiots from your office why I can’t afford your rip-off commissions, and I’m sick to death of being hounded this way.”

Somehow forgetting the heavy mug in her hand, she swung an arm to slam the door. Hot coffee flew—some of it hitting her hand. She swore and the stoneware mug went flying, connecting with Charlie Fredricks’s forehead with surprising force.

He groaned and staggered backward. The mug fell on the step and shattered. Bella watched in horror as blood trickled down his forehead, even as the coffee stains were spreading across his chest.

“Damn it all to hell,” she muttered.

Her hand stung. Would he sue? The thought of a lawsuit on top of everything else made her want to throw herself on the rug and sob. But instead, Bella drew a breath and took hold of his denim jacket.

“Get in here—you’re bleeding.” She led him inside and closed the door. “I didn’t mean to hit you—honestly! I was just closing the door, and I forgot I had coffee in my hand!”

“Closing the door right in my face.” He rubbed the sleeve of his jacket across his forehead to staunch the blood that was dripping all over her beige carpet. “I didn’t think I’d need hazard insurance on this job.”

“Think you could try not to bleed on the rug?” She led the way into the kitchen and pointed at a stool. “Sit down and I’ll get something to put on that.” She rummaged in a kitchen drawer and came up with a clean dishcloth, which she ran under cold water and then pressed, none too gently, against his forehead.

“Now sit there while I find my first-aid stuff.” For that, she had to go upstairs, since there was nothing in the downstairs lavatory except roughed-in plumbing, thanks to her layabout poor excuse of a husband, Gordon.

“Lazy, good-for-nothing…” she muttered, stomping up the stairs.

From behind Josh’s bedroom door came the sound of his Xbox.

From behind Kelsey’s came the steady, irate hum of complaining, as she no doubt filled in a friend on the subject of her awful mother. And all Bella had done to them today was ask them to help with the painting.

She grabbed antiseptic and Band-Aids and headed back down, but when she got to the kitchen, Charlie What’s-his-name wasn’t there. She found him in the living room, holding a family photo he’d taken from the fireplace mantel. His jacket was off, and she could see that his blue T-shirt was dotted with spots of crimson.

“Good-looking youngsters. How old are they?”

“Fifteen and thirteen. Give me that.” It slipped as she set it facedown on the exposed bricks, shattering the glass, and that felt like the final straw to Bella. “Look, Charlie Fredricks, no one invited you to wander around my house and poke into my things,” she said. “You’re getting blood all over the house. I’ll have to have the carpets cleaned and I can’t afford it. Go and sit down, so I can do something about your head, and then you’re leaving.”

He said quietly, “As a first-aid person, you don’t exactly inspire confidence, you know that, Ms. Monroe?” But then he ambled back to the kitchen and sat on the stool she pointed at.

Bella doused a cotton ball with antiseptic and pressed it firmly against the cut.

He flinched, but didn’t say anything.

His hair was a dark chocolate-brown, thick, wavy and a little too long, and it fell onto his forehead and got in the way, so that she had to keep shoving it aside. His eyes were an unusual combination of gray and green, and his eyelashes were kind of nice, she thought, in spite of herself. She pressed a second helping of antiseptic onto the gash.

“Ouch. Owww. Damn it, lady, your bedside manner could stand some work. I didn’t ask you to bash me, you know.”

“And I don’t remember asking you to come to my door and harass me, either.” She opened a Band-Aid and tried to cover the gash. “This little cut is too big for a bandage. I need tape and gauze,” she muttered. “You sit right there until I get back. No nosing around my house.”

“Man, you’re tough,” he commented as she headed back up the stairs. “And I thought my ex was difficult.”

“Yeah, well, maybe she had reasons.”

“Mom?” Kelsey stood in the bedroom doorway. “Can I go to the afternoon movie with Brittany? Her dad’s going to drive us and pick us up after.”

“I thought you were supposed to help me paint.”

“Auntie Niki’s coming to help you. You don’t need me. Please, Mom?”

Josh’s door opened. “If she gets to go, so do I.” At fifteen, his voice was cracking. Most of the time, Bella found it endearing and sad—her baby was growing up. Today, she just felt exasperated.

“I keep telling you two, there’s no money for the mall or movies.”

“Nana gave us money.”

Bella might have known. Her mother doted on her grandchildren.

“How come you didn’t tell me?”

“She said it was our little secret,” Kelsey said. “She said with Dad away we needed some mad money, to do whatever we wanted. And I want to go to the matinee.”

What was the point in trying to make them work? Bella was up against Mae and a united teenage front.

“So go,” she said sharply. “Just get out of my sight. And make sure you’re back here by suppertime.” Even as she snapped at them, she knew it wasn’t fair to be so short-tempered, but anger was just about the only thing that kept the tears at bay these days. And she couldn’t afford to cry much more.

The kids must have been prepared, because they were both down the steps and out the door before Bella could make it to the first-aid drawer.

Downstairs, she cut gauze and tape and finally sorted out Charlie’s head.

“Your kids were in a real hurry to get out of here,” he noted.

She gave him a killer look.

“Not that I blame them,” he added. He pointed at the ladder in the hall. “Guess they don’t like painting, either, huh?”

“Guess not.” She rolled up the gauze and snapped the tape container back together. “That’s it, you’re mended. Heads always bleed a lot. It’s barely a scratch. You’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, I’ve noticed that myself. About heads bleeding. I suppose you’ve patched up a lot of cuts in your time, huh?”

“A fair number.” She picked up his jacket and handed it to him. “Sorry about the coffee mug.”

“You’re not a believer in western hospitality, I take it?”

The doorbell rang and Bella went to answer it.

“Hey, how’s it going?” Niki took off her vintage fur and draped it on the coat rack, then gave Bella a hug that almost cracked her ribs. Niki’s shoulder-length blond hair had a lavender streak this week and her breasts spilled beguilingly out of the low neckline of her scarlet knit dress. “No word from the scumbag, I take it?”

Bella shook her head, frowned and jerked a thumb in the direction of her battered guest.

Niki raised her eyebrows and walked into the kitchen. “Well, hello there. I thought for a second you were Bella’s soon-to-be ex, and I was about to give you a choice piece of my mind.”

“No need for that—the lady of the house and I have already gone down that road. I’m Charlie, by the way. How do you do?” He extended a hand, and Niki took it in both of hers, turning it palm up and studying it closely.

“I’m Niki, seeing as how we’re only doing first names. Wow, that’s some long life line you’ve got there.”

“Oh, yeah? Wish I’d known that when bad guys were shooting at me.”

Bella was sure he was looking down the front of Niki’s dress. She needed to get him the hell out of here.

“You a drug dealer?” Niki sounded fascinated.

“Nothing so romantic. I was a cop.”

“Was?”

Bella was trying to give Niki the signal to lay off her questions, but of course her friend wasn’t paying any attention. Niki never did, if there was an attractive man in the vicinity. Bella knew it was all just show, since Niki was devoted to her husband, Tom. But the guys her friend hit on for fun didn’t know that.

“I moved on. Now I’m in real estate.”

“So you’re going to sell Bella’s house for her?”

“No, he most emphatically is not going to,” Bella snapped. “I’m selling it myself. You remember—you were the one who told me to, Niki. You said your uncle Giovanni would have helped me figure out a price, except—”

“Except he’s got Alzheimer’s,” Niki interrupted. “I know, I know. We agreed you’d sell it yourself.”

“There you have it.” He shrugged. “You ladies for sure know your own minds.”

“Have to be on the ball when you’re a woman.” Niki pointed at the tape and gauze. “What happened to your head?”

“Ms. Monroe and I were having a few words and she chucked a mug at me.”

“Go, Bella.” Niki gave her a thumbs-up. “Repressed anger leads to illness, and you don’t want that.”

“It was an accident.” Bella scowled at Charlie. “You don’t have a concussion, and I patched you up. So you can go now.”

Niki went over to him and stroked her finger over his bandaged wound. “Did you know she got a big chunk of your hair trapped inside the tape? Here, let me fix that for you.”

“Niki, for cripes sake, lay off, would you? You can’t take him home—Tom won’t like it.”

Niki sighed dramatically. “Sometimes marriage is very limiting.” She undid the tape and tenderly freed the hair. “You married, Charlie?”

“Divorced.”

“Kids?”

“One daughter. Emma’s twenty.”

“Which makes you what, forty something? You don’t look forty something.” Niki gave him a serious look as she patted the bandage back in place. “You don’t look a day over thirty. Eight.”

“Forty-four.” He grinned, obviously pleased with his view down the front of Niki’s dress. He had a pirate’s grin, Bella thought. That is, if pirates had good dental plans. But then, real-estate salesmen were pirates, weren’t they?

He said, “To misquote a famous lady, this is what forty-four looks like.”

Niki nodded. “Good old Germaine. What’s become of her, anyway?”

“She got herself married,” Bella said. “And there went another feminist.”

“Oh, marriage is no deterrent to feminism,” Niki said. Finished with her Florence Nightingale act, she wandered over to the cupboard and took down two mugs. “What’s your daughter’s name again, Charlie?”

“Emma. She’s in her second year at the University of British Columbia and she wants to be a doctor.”

“That’s encouraging. We need more women doctors, don’t we, Bella? There are some things only a woman understands.” Niki filled the mugs with coffee and handed him one.

“He can’t stay,” Bella said, reaching for the mug a moment too late. He eluded her and took a hefty sip.

“I’m not in any hurry,” he said. “Good coffee. Got any cream?”

Niki got a box out of the fridge, adding some cream to her own coffee before she handed it to him. She got two spoons out and gave one to him. They stirred companionably.

She said, “So what kind of career move is that, going from copping to real estate?”

“Not lateral, I’ll tell you that.” For the first time, Bella could sense he was uneasy. His grin faltered. “So what do you do, Niki?”

“Hair. Nails. On really bad days, bikini waxing.” She shuddered. “Yuck. And on the other end of the scale, brows and lashes. Didn’t you like being a cop?”

Bella gave up and waited for his answer. Trying to stop Niki was like trying to stop a tank. She’d just roll on until he’d told her everything she wanted to know.

“I liked it fine. It was just time for a career move.”

Niki nodded. “Midlife crisis, huh?”

“I guess you could call it that.” He downed the rest of his coffee in one long gulp and got to his feet. “I hate to drink and run, but duty calls.” He gave Bella a wink. “I know you’re dying for me to stay, but I have other unfortunate souls to harass.”

“Important work. Don’t let us keep you.” She was on her feet in an instant.

“Interesting meeting you again, Ms. Monroe. A real pleasure, Niki.”

“Likewise.” She gave him a seductive smile. “And for God’s sake, call her Bella. Ms. Monroe smacks way too much of Marilyn, and we don’t need that much drama when we’re trying to clean up a house.”

Niki paid absolutely no attention to Bella’s glares, and fluttered her perfectly manicured hand at Charlie, who saluted and ambled toward the door.

Bella waited until it closed behind him before she got herself a fresh coffee and slumped on her stool.

“God spare me from any more real-estate vultures.”

“He said you knew him. Where from?”

“I made the colossal mistake the other day of going into Fredricks Real Estate, over on Dunbar. I thought they might give me some suggestions about selling this place myself, like what price to ask. Instead, they unleashed every salesperson in their office on me, all trying to change my mind and list with them. He’s just the latest one. And you weren’t exactly helpful. Why were you so friendly?”

Niki clucked her tongue. “Bella, Bella. You’re a single lady now and he’s a distinct maybe. He’s available, doesn’t strike me as a serial killer, doesn’t reek of liquor, has a job, good teeth and presumably other working body parts, to say nothing of a sense of humor. But you’ve got to change your attitude, honey. You catch more flies with sugar, my dear old Granny Ruthie used to say.”

“You didn’t have a dear old granny. Ruthie was a mean old woman who used to dose us with that awful worm medicine and send us out to buy her cigarettes, remember? She never even let us keep the change. We hated her.”

“Figure of speech. That weasel in the corner store sold them to us, too. He’d never get away with that these days. What I’m trying to get across to you, sweetie, is that you’re not going to find eligible men hanging off lilac bushes, y’know. You have to be a little friendlier. Men like friendlier. And sexy. I don’t want to criticize, but that paint all over your arms and neck doesn’t do a thing for you—it’s in your hair, too. Come over and collect your birthday present, because you need a new do. And at the moment, you’re bordering on anorexic. Aren’t you eating?”

Bella put her cup down—one accident a day with coffee was enough. She leaned toward her friend. “Niki. Read my lips. Gordon left me ten days ago, I have debts you wouldn’t believe, my kids are acting out, to put it mildly and my mother is threatening to arrive at the door any minute.”

“I thought Mae was happy over there in Blue Hair Haven, or whatever it’s called.”

“She was, until I told her about Gordon. Now she doesn’t think I’m capable of raising Josh and Kelsey on my own, and figures we ought to pool resources, seeing that we’re both abandoned women. As if I need any more suggestions about decorating and single parenting, or snide remarks about how I drove Gordon away by being a short-tempered shrew.”

Niki shook her head. “You? Testy, maybe. What did she give you for your birthday?” Mae’s inappropriate gifts had always made them both laugh.

“She outdid herself.” Bella opened the catch-all drawer and pulled out a thick book. “Ta-da.”

Niki took it. The Dummy’s Guide to Living Well? She snorted, and then erupted into giggles. “She has outdone herself this time.”

Bella had to smile. “I thought so. The Dummy’s Guide to Poverty might have been a wiser choice.” She grew sober, remembering how close she was to bankruptcy. “I had no idea how much in debt we are. Gordon was an accountant, and he was supposed to be managing the money. Instead, he’d let the house mortgage lapse, the lease on the store is three months in arrears and our overdraft is maxed out. The business is in the toilet, and there’s nothing to do but shut it down. I have to somehow sell off what stock I can and get this place in good enough shape to sell. And I have to do it all fast, because I have no money.”

“You didn’t tell Charlie boy that, I hope? Because guys tend to get a wee bit nervous if you mention money right off the bat.”

“Of course I didn’t.” Actually, Bella wasn’t too sure what she’d said to him. She was pretty much nuts these days, and not responsible for what came out of her mouth. “Anyhow, there is no way I want anything to do with another man unless he’s a filthy rich plumber slash handyman slash landscape gardener, who loves to paint and has his own home.” She ran out of breath and gulped. “So no more men. Not now, and probably not ever.”

Niki wasn’t impressed. “You’ll change your mind. Your libido will kick in, and when it does you’ll remember this hunky real-estate cop and regret the way you acted.”

“Not in this lifetime. Now, are you going to help me paint and let me whine some more about my problems, or are you just going to keep lecturing me about hormones?”

“Whine away. And do you have something truly awful—like what you’re wearing—that I can change into? Because I don’t want to get paint on this dress. It’s pretty hot, and it’s going to drive Tom crazy. I just bought it at the New to You on Dunbar. This end of town is a gold mine for expensive secondhand clothes.”