Their Surprise Daddy
“She died.” Javier announced the words in a voice that showed a lack of understanding. “She might come back. She might not. Mimi doesn’t know.”
Lily leaned across the table, so serious. “No one can come back when they die, Javi. They have to go live with God in heaven and there’s no way back.”
The little guy’s face darkened. He stared at his sister and whispered, “She might come back, Lily. She might.”
Cruz’s chest went tight. Seeing Elina’s fate through the eyes of two innocent children, emotion gripped him.
They loved his mother.
The irony of that didn’t sit well, because he could look back and count the few happy times on his fingers. His mother had been a tough taskmaster, a woman overseeing a burgeoning business overlooking Canandaigua Lake, and nothing mattered more than her success. Her vineyard, her special events center, was straight out of the hills of Tuscany. Casa Blanca meant more to her than anything. More than her hardworking Latino husband, and certainly more than her only son.
But these children seemed bonded to her. Was it an act? Or had Rosa Maldonado changed?
He had no way of knowing, but he wasn’t about to let two innocents go through similar experiences. Not if she was still the tough, overbearing, money-solves-everything woman he remembered.
Rory slipped an arm around Javier and drew him close. “No matter what happens here on earth, God’s in heaven watching over us. Smiling down at us, wanting us to be happy and strong. And now your mama is there with him, loving you from up there. But here on earth, God has other folks to love you. Lily, Mimi, Cruz and me, just to name a few. You will always be our beloved little boy. That will never change, darling.”
The little guy nestled into the curve of her arm. “I know.” The two words came out in a whisper. “I just miss her, is all.”
Cruz’s eyes got misty.
Sadie saved the moment by slipping two plates of pancakes and scrambled eggs in front of the kids, then refilling the grown-ups’ mugs. “Rory, you sure I can’t get you somethin’, darlin’?”
Rory shook her head. “I’m fine, Sadie, thanks.”
“All right, sweetie.”
Sweetie. Darlin’. Sweet things... Cruz couldn’t remember the last time someone called him sweetie in New York. Probably never. Because why would they?
And yet it seemed real nice to hear those words here.
Lily knelt up on the booth’s seat to get a better vantage point on her food. Her first attempt at the eggs had them sliding to the floor quickly. Cruz handed her his spoon. “Try this. Eggs are slippery.”
“They are!” She accepted the spoon and didn’t seem to mind that he’d stirred his coffee with it. “And they jiggle. Jell-O jiggles, too. I like jiggly food.”
Rory laughed.
Cruz lifted his eyes to hers. “Jiggly food is funny?”
“My sister won’t eat food that jiggles. She says it’s unnerving. I’m happy to see Lily has no such qualms.”
“Did they sleep well?”
“As well as any of us could with a crazy day behind us and a new normal awaiting. I expect tonight will be better. Drew called and told me he offered you the carriage house apartment.”
“I’ll find a hotel as soon as I can, so I’m not inconveniencing anyone.” Cruz sipped his coffee. “No reason to make difficult circumstances more so.”
“Why stay somewhere else when you can stay there for free?” She looked puzzled, as if the idea of spending money worried her. So maybe she did like breakfast and couldn’t afford it, but sacrificed for the two kids.
Now he felt like a complete moron.
“I need internet access and there’s no air-conditioning.”
She sat back and looked distressed. “The window unit.”
“Excuse me?”
“Drew took it out last fall and stored it downstairs over the winter, and then they moved into their new house before it got hot. I forgot all about that, and I’m sure he did, too. Oh, Cruz.” She leaned forward, and looked honestly concerned. “You must have roasted.”
“I may have discovered a new scientific melting point.”
She laughed again, and when she did, the kids smiled. Her laugh made him feel like smiling, too, and that felt good and odd because the rigors of Manhattan didn’t often inspire laid-back conversation and smiles. “Listen, it would be silly of you to waste money on a hotel when I expect you’d like to get to know these guys better, right?”
He knew less than nothing about children which meant he’d be of little help. “I guess.”
“I’ll have our house Wi-Fi upgraded so you can access it in the apartment. They should probably be able to do that today. The air-conditioning unit cools off the whole place. Can you install it in the living room window or do you need help?”
How hard could it be? “I expect I can manage it.”
“If it’s too tricky or awkward, wait till I get home with these guys later. I’ll be glad to jump in.”
“Miss Wory, can I have more syrup?” Javier asked.
Cruz waited for her to say no. Every young mother he knew measured out anything sweet in minute doses, as if sugar had become the root of all evil.
“Of course you can!” Rory helped Javier with the little glass carafe, then reached for a second one. “Try this triple-berry syrup, too, Javi, on just a little corner here. Or you can dip a piece.”
“I wuv dipping!”
“Me, too.” She picked up a tiny piece of his pancake, dipped it in the dark purple syrup and popped it into her mouth. “Perfection.” She smiled at Lily, then Javier.
“Are you walking straight to school from here?” Cruz asked.
She nodded. “The White Church, actually, on Maple Avenue. They volunteered to house us in their basement this year.”
“Basement?” School in a basement didn’t sound like much fun.
She scrunched up her nose when she frowned. “We’re an itinerant program, which means we get shuffled from place to place every summer. Whatever church or school has extra space is where we’re assigned, so we’ve learned to bloom where we’re planted.”
“That’s a little rough.”
She shrugged. “It’s not ideal, but we manage to make do. When I’m planning, I make sure we’ve got so much to do, say and learn that the location becomes a nonproblem. I wasn’t able to get any prep work done yesterday, so we’re walking over early today. That way I can get things ready.”
“You do the morning sessions?”
She nodded. “Another teacher steps in to take the afternoon ones. That way we can cover for one another as needed.”
“What will the kids do in the afternoon?”
“Hang with me, I expect. Unless you have a better idea?”
He knew what he should say. He should offer to take the kids off her hands for the afternoon.
His phone signaled an incoming text, then another, and that made his decision easy. He had work. So did she. But hers was geared toward little kids. His wasn’t. He stood, determined to claim what time he could. “You can never get enough learning, can you?”
His answer disappointed her, but she didn’t seem surprised, which meant she expected him to be self-centered. Like mother, like son?
He bit back remorse because he recognized the pattern quite well, thank you.
“Enjoy your day,” she told him. “We’ll see you this afternoon. And if you need help with that AC unit, I’ll be home midday. Also, if you need Wi-Fi, you can hole up in one of the empty corners of Kate & Company, my mother’s event-planning business on The Square.”
He remembered the name well. Her mother’s business had used his parents’ classic villa and vineyard for many events when he was younger. “Your mom wouldn’t mind?”
“She’s retired, my sisters are handling the business and there’s an extra office on the first level. It’s small, but it’s cool and connected.”
Cool and connected.
The phrase sounded almost insulting, as if a good working environment was a bad thing.
He slipped his laptop into its leather case. His objective in Grace Haven was to get his mother out of legal jeopardy and arrange care for Elina’s children. It was the least he could do to repay Elina’s friendship.
After that he’d return back to life as he knew it. The life he’d been thrust into years ago, because being good was never good enough for Rosa Maldonado. Not when being the best dangled like the perfect cluster of Champagne grapes, just out of reach. He paid for his coffee, and her bill, too, then offered the kids a quick wave as he strode out the door.
He wasn’t sure why he was leaving, when he’d intended to hang out in there, drinking what had turned out to be really solid coffee and using their Wi-Fi. He walked back down the street, turned toward Creighton Landing and decided to install the AC unit sooner rather than later. Then he’d approach Drew’s wife at Kate & Company about leasing office space while he was here. Rory Gallagher hadn’t mentioned a price tag on her offer, but Cruz understood that nothing was free in the corporate world, and if he paid his way, there were fewer emotional entanglements to worry about. Keeping life unemotional had worked well so far. Cruz Maldonado had every intention of keeping things that way.
Chapter Three
Edgy, well-to-do and intent on working from dawn till dark.
Guys like Cruz Maldonado didn’t pause to smell the roses because they never looked down long enough to notice them. The guy wore his money-first mentality like Gucci armor, unsoftened by his heart-stopping good looks. His black hair was shaggy in the back, as if he was too busy to notice.
But Rory noticed right off, unfortunately, because the look worked for him and she had to remind herself that he was off-limits.
His complexion was the kind that tanned easily, although his hadn’t darkened appreciably and it was already midsummer. That meant he spent way too much time indoors.
Those gorgeous brown eyes, soulful but sharp, were brightened by hints of gold around the pupil. Thick, dark brows defined those eyes with a decisive arch. He was eye candy, all right, which Rory found annoying. And now he was going to be underfoot, tucked in their carriage house apartment because her brother-in-law Drew thought it was a good idea.
It was a horrible idea.
But smart, too, because with Kimberly’s baby due, Rory might have to help her sister Emily run the event-planning business their mother had built. Kimberly had taken on Kate & Co. a year ago as their father fought brain cancer in a Texas treatment center, but she’d need time off now and the girls had pledged support for one another while their father recovered.
“Miss Rory, you’re not hungry?” Lily settled her hand on Rory’s forearm. “Not even a little bit?”
“I’m not a breakfast eater, darling.”
“Mimi says we have to eat in the morning.” Javier stared at his almost full plate and frowned. “I weally like just playing in th-th-the morning.” A tiny stutter plagued him when he got nervous or tired. “I wike that the most.”
Rory sympathized completely. “We’ll have Sadie box that up and you can have it at snack time, okay?”
“Weally?” His face perked up. “You don’t mind?”
“Dude, I get really annoyed when people push food on me. I know when I’m hungry. I know when I’m not. We’re all different, right?”
“Sure!” He looked downright excited by the thought of having a choice in the matter.
Sadie came by just then. “I heard those words of wisdom and I’ll take care of that right now, darlins. Lily, I cannot believe you wolfed that down. You go, girl!”
“I love pancakes!” Lily almost sang the words. “And I love coming to fancy restaurants and having food, Sadie! Thank you for being so nice to us!”
“Oh, my sweet thing.” Sadie crossed back to the counter, flipped out a foam to-go box and came back to the table as more folks filtered in through the door. “It is my sincere pleasure to be nice to my customers.”
“It is?” Javier peeked up as if her words were really special.
“Indeed. I am not one to blow sunshine at anyone, my friend. If Sadie says it—” the robust woman put her hands on her hips and offered Javier a sage expression “—Sadie means it.”
“It’s my p-p-pleasure to come here, too.” Javier dimpled when he told her, clearly pleased. “It’s s-s-such a nice place, Sadie.”
“Oh, you precious little thing!” Sadie beamed at them, then started walking away.
Rory called her back. “Sadie, I need the check. Is it in your pocket?”
“No check today, honey. A kindly benefactor has taken care of it.”
Did she just say the check had been paid? The only person who’d gone near the cash register was Cruz. She didn’t need him to buy her breakfast; she wasn’t broke, she was financially challenged. She’d avoided a full-time teaching position because she had other plans, plans that were being threatened, yet again.
Sue Collingsworth stepped into the diner as they were sliding out of the booth. She looked totally put together, like always. A stab of guilt dredged up a wave of emotion inside Rory, exacerbated by current events with Lily and Javier.
She’d longed for Sue’s friendship in junior high. She’d have done anything to hang out with the cool crowd, the gorgeous girls who were always in the know about everything. She’d thought so much about looks and reputation back then that she’d sacrificed her one true friend: Millicent Rodriguez, the daughter of a Dominican maid at the elegant Lakeside Inn. They’d been inseparable as kids, romping down the beach, dashing back and forth between the stately inn and Rory’s house.
And then she’d messed it all up by wanting to be part of the cool crowd.
So young. So foolish. And utterly selfish.
She’d been accepted by the cool crowd, probably because her sister had been a pageant queen. But they’d shunned Millicent.
And so had she.
When her childhood friend ended up dead from a drug overdose fifteen months later, Rory had to face the consequences of her actions. Would Millicent have joined the drug crowd if Rory had stuck by her?
Probably not, and the truth of that had stayed with Rory all this time. Now it was her turn to make a difference, and her planned preschool and kindergarten would do just that.
“Rory.” Susan lifted two perfect brows slightly, almost as if pained to acknowledge her presence. “How are you?”
“Fine, thank you. And—”
“Miss Wory! I’ve got to go potty, bad!”
Susan noted the presence of the children as if suffering stomach pangs, and when Lily reached out a hand to touch the sparkles running from shoulder to hip on her dress, Susan stepped back to avoid contact.
She was a rude, insufferable person back then, and not much had changed, but Rory had followed her around like a needy pup. No more.
She stooped low to reassure the little fellow. “Well, let’s take care of that before we walk to school, okay, my friend?”
Javi did a dance-hop step of urgency, nodding.
“May I sit at the counter while you go?” Lily climbed onto one of the taller counter stools. “I can talk to Miss Sadie, and twirl!” She spun the seat around, laughing.
“Yes, but keep your feet tucked so people can get around you. And use your indoor voice, remember?”
Lily nodded, and put two hands over her mouth. “Got it,” she whispered, grinning.
Susan said nothing more.
Just as well. They really had nothing to say to one another beyond hello. She walked Javi to the restrooms, then afterward held his hand while they strolled toward the White Church.
She’d learned a harsh lesson at a young age.
She’d watched the well-to-do crowd hurt other kids’ feelings, and had done nothing to stop it. She’d watched them reject kids who didn’t have as much, then treat them as failures. And when Millicent succumbed to an overdose, Rory had understood the tragic results of inaction. When Lily revealed that her mother had gone to heaven, Rory had had a major wake-up call.
Rosa didn’t have legal guardianship, and the children’s paperwork had been misrepresented. As a teacher, she was required to be upfront and honest, which meant if these kids needed help, she’d be wrong to deny it to them.
If Rosa had obeyed the law, there would have been no mess to unravel, but she hadn’t and Rory had had no choice but to reveal the information to authorities two days ago.
“Miss Rory?”
“Yes, Lily?” She tipped her gaze down. Two sad brown eyes gazed up at her.
“Thank you for letting us stay with you.” She gripped Rory’s hand tighter in a show of emotion. “I would have been a little scared with someone else. Except Mimi,” she amended quietly. “But I don’t like being with strangers.”
“I don’t wike them, either.” Javier shook his head with boyish vehemence. “I just wike people I know.”
“And let us not grow weary of doing good...” Paul’s words, as he reminded the Galatians to keep heart. As Lily clung to one hand and Javier gripped the other, emotion welled within her. She would put their needs first, and somehow, someway, she’d finagle time to get the paperwork done and submitted to the state before the deadline. If it meant little sleep for a few weeks, well...
That was the sacrifice she’d have to make. As they walked south on Main Street, Flora Belker flagged her down. “Rory, got a minute?”
She didn’t, but she’d make time for Flora. Flora and Rory’s grandmother had been best friends since childhood, and when Grandma Gallagher came up to visit from her retirement spot on Florida’s Gulf Coast, she and Flora would sit, laugh and talk for hours. Flora missed Maddie Gallagher tremendously. “Of course I do! What’s up?”
“I am fit to be tied.” Flora had been watering her lawn, always lush and green and weed-free, but she turned the water off and braced her hands on her hips. “My brother is finally getting his way and the Belker block is going to go up for sale despite my objections.”
“He got your sister to agree?” The three Belkers had inherited the multibuilding estate years ago, but had never been able to agree on much of anything. While Leroy had wanted to sell, the ladies hadn’t, and Thelma had been staunchly opposed to any kind of change for years. “How’d he do that?”
“After all this time she’s gotten a bee in her bonnet about moving to a Florida retirement community not far from your grandparents. A significant cash settlement would help buy her way in, and while I say good for her, the thought of that property going to a stranger is just breaking my heart.”
She looked more angry than heartbroken, and Rory knew what it was like to be odd man out with siblings now and again. She made a face of regret, but said, “You knew you wouldn’t be able to hang on to it forever, Flora. And you’ve got this place.” Rory swept Flora’s stately nineteenth-century home an admiring look. “And you told me yourself that keeping up both places had gotten to be too much for you.”
“But that didn’t mean I wanted my family heritage sold out from under me,” the older woman retorted.
“Of course not.” Rory nodded, sympathetic, but then an idea occurred to her. An amazingly wonderful, brilliant idea. “Miss Flora, are you guys selling the property as one unit or would you consider subdividing?”
“Obviously I’m not in the know about anything because I didn’t agree with the notion of selling in the first place, but I don’t think they care how it gets sold as long as it does,” she declared. “I’m just beside myself, but that’s not a worry to either one of them, more’s the pity!”
Maddie Gallagher had been the softhearted one of the trio, Flora Belker the tough girl who stayed single all these years and Thelma Brown the happy-go-lucky one. They’d hung together for years, but with Maddie and Thelma both in Florida, Flora would be left behind, and that might be part of the angst. Still, if they would be willing to subdivide the commercially zoned property, the original Belker home was a quaint one-story set on a grassy slope, easily accessible from the road behind Main Street, ideal for a preschool.
She’d call Melanie Carson, a popular local Realtor and her mother’s good friend. If Melanie could put in an offer for part of the parcel, Miss Flora might not feel so bad about the changes. A former schoolteacher herself, she might actually like the idea of their old home becoming a preschool.
Either way, it was worth a shot, because finding commercially zoned available property in Grace Haven was next to impossible.
* * *
Cruz showed up at the White Church just before noon. He’d left his car parked in the Gallagher driveway, and walked the four blocks at a brisk pace. When he arrived at the intersection of Fourth and Maple, he was almost sorry the walk was done.
Canandaigua Lake lay beyond the church, forming a long, slim, water-filled valley between rolling, verdant hills, a picture-perfect pocket of Americana.
He walked a lot in Manhattan. Everyone did.
This was different. It smelled, looked and felt different, and the ever-present city sounds he blocked out so easily had been replaced by birds chirping, kids playing and young mothers chatting as they pushed strollers.
He’d taken a left at Broadway and ended up in the greeting-card setting he’d brushed off for years. Only it was way nicer than he’d remembered, but maybe his memories were tainted by family dynamics. He spotted a hand-printed pre-K sign with an arrow underneath, and followed it to the back entrance of the church. He went through the back door, and down the steps to the church basement.
He didn’t need an arrow to find Rory. Her voice filled the space, laughing and singing with the two kids. He almost wanted to hurry, but that would be silly. He wasn’t here to mess with her time frame, but to apologize for wrecking her AC unit.
“Cousin Cruz!” Lily spotted him from across the room.
Javier turned, grinned and waved. “You can have wunch wif us! We’re having peanut butter and jewwy, and Rory made the jewwy all by herself!”
“It’s really good,” Lily assured him.
Rory frowned at the clock, then him. “What did you do?”
“What makes you think I did something?”
“You have a guilty look about you.”
He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. He’d driven corporate moguls crazy with his unreadable face, but here in Grace Haven, it seemed he was an open book. “I may or may not have killed your air-conditioning unit.”
“Oops.” She grimaced and moved forward. “Are you all right?”
Her question caught him off guard. She didn’t ream him out or make fun of him. She went straight to making sure he was okay. “I’m fine. I just lost my grip on it while I was maneuvering it into place, and it fell.”
“Oh, dear. Not onto a person, did it? Because that would be bad.”
“A fairly old garbage can on the back side of the garage has just become scrap metal.”
She waved that off. “As long as it wasn’t anything living, it’s no biggie. But we need to get you a unit for that apartment. I know how hot it gets up there.”
“I bought one.”
“Really? So quick?” She handed Javier his sandwich, then a second one to Lily.
“At the strip mall near the thruway. That’s all new since I moved away. And the road is four lanes now, not two. And there’s a ton of new development outside the village.”
“And still a crazy amount of traffic to navigate through in the summer,” she noted.
“Is that why the town is thriving?” he asked.
She made a face, considering. “Tourism is at an all-time high. Vacationers, destination weddings, conventions, golf tournaments, holiday functions. With all the event centers overlooking the lakes, it’s pretty busy nine months of the year now. Our sleepy little town has come into its own.”
It was quite a change from what he remembered, but not in a bad way. He wasn’t one of those people who saw progress in a negative light, but he also knew not everyone shared his viewpoint. “Your sister’s place seemed busy, too. And she also seemed very pregnant.”
Rory laughed. “She is that.”
He held his phone up. “I kept this nearby. Just in case.”
“We’re all a little nervous and wonderfully excited,” she admitted. “There hasn’t been a baby in the family for ten years, since my niece Tee Tee was born. But I don’t expect you walked over here to chat about babies.”