A Father's Quest (12 page)

Gloria? For a second, she tried to place the name as someone in personnel, but then it hit her: charge nurse for the full-care wing. “Oh, hi, Gloria, what can I do for you?”

“I was wondering—hoping, actually—that you could come over. Mrs. Galloway is extremely agitated this morning. She keeps asking for you. I honestly don’t know why. We called her son, but his line was busy. Do you know if he’s still in town?”

“Yes, but I believe he has business out of town and was planning to leave this morning. Should I give Mrs. Galloway a call?”

“You could try, but you know how some of the residents get with the phone. It might be even better if you could come and see her.”

“I’ll be there as quickly as I can, Gloria.”

As soon as she hung up, she sent Jonas a text message:

Meet me at Shadybrook.

Then she called a cab.

“Aren’t you a little young to be moving in?” Raul Lopez, the cabdriver who picked her up, asked when she pulled her overstuffed bag onto her lap and gave him her destination.

“Depends on who you ask,” she quipped.

Raul was a veteran cabbie, who probably knew more about the history—written and wishfully forgotten—of her hometown than anyone. “Mr. Lopez,” she said, sitting forward to rest one arm on the front seat. “Do you remember my mama?”

“Of course. Marlene was the nicest woman in town. She did my late wife’s hair, free of charge, a few days before she passed away. Came to the hospice. Told us, ‘Every woman wants to look her best in her casket and I simply don’t trust those undertakers to do this right.’”

Remy had no memory of that but she wasn’t surprised. She’d heard similar stories at her mother’s funeral. “I’m glad of that. She was kind and generous, but you’ll agree she had another sort of reputation, too.”

He chuckled, not unkindly. “Marlene did enjoy people. Men and women. For different reasons, mind you.”

She looked ahead. Shadybrook was only a few blocks away. “Do you remember hearing about her association with Charlotte Galloway’s husband? I believe his name was Merrill.”

The man thought a few seconds, then slowly shook his head. “Nope. That doesn’t ring a bell. I knew of the man, of course, but can’t say as I ever drove him in my cab. He was a car dealer, after all. But, truthfully, I can’t picture the two of them together.”

“Why not?”

“Miss Charlotte was your mama’s friend. Your mama would never have stabbed her friend in the heart. Never.”

Remy’s hand was shaking as she paid the man. She tipped him well, despite the fact she was sorry she’d ever opened her mouth. She’d asked; he answered. Did he tell her some fabulous, life-altering revelation? No, she realized, as she walked toward the brick building. No, he told her a truth she’d always known.

But if Jonas’s father was not one of her mother’s lovers, then why had Mama told them he was? “Why?”

“Why what?” a voice asked, startling her.

“Jonas.” She’d been so wrapped up in her thoughts she hadn’t even looked around.

“Yes, it’s me. Right where I’m supposed to be to meet you. May I take that bag for you?”

She relaxed her white-knuckle grip on the handle and held it out. “Thank you. Have you been inside?”

He nodded. “The nurse told me Mom woke up agitated, muttering about something she couldn’t make out. She wouldn’t eat breakfast and she tried to walk out the front door about an hour ago, insisting she needed to go see you.”

“Me? Why me?”

He made a “who knows?” gesture. “I’ll put this in the car and meet you inside. The nurse thought maybe you should talk to her alone to start out.”

“Is this holding you up? I know you wanted to get on the road.”

“It’s a ten-hour drive. We’re not going to get there before Mr. Franey leaves for the day, so no worries. Take your time.”

She might have appreciated his flexibility more if she wasn’t dreading this meeting.

“Miss Charlotte? It’s me, Remy Bouchard. I haven’t seen you in so long. How are you?”

The woman was sitting in a floral-print chair closest to the window that opened onto Shadybrook’s rose garden. She looked the same as the last time Remy had visited her—except for the nervous wringing of her hands and the pinched expression on her face. “Remy, child. You’re here. I told your mother you’d come.”

Remy glanced around, half-expecting to see her mother’s ghost wandering past. “Are you feeling okay, Miss Charlotte?” she asked, pulling up an embroidered footstool to sit on. “You look a little upset.”

“Well, who wouldn’t be? Kids these days. They don’t listen. They go off and do whatever they want—even if it’s not in their best interest.” She looked out the window, her hand worrying her chin, back and forth. “I nearly lost him once, you know. Marlene understood. She lost someone once, too.”

Remy had heard many elderly people in her care suddenly talk about events in their lives that left indelible impressions but meant nothing to the person listening. But she knew that wasn’t the case now. Charlotte had come close to losing her son when he was child. Who had her mother lost?

“They were too young. They had their whole lives ahead of them. A mother can’t sit back and watch her boy make a terrible mistake, can she?”

She’s talking about Jonas and me.

Charlotte looked down. “I did a terrible thing. I used my friend’s secret against her. She never wanted her girls to know the truth about that preacher man. He left town before he knew she was pregnant. Rolled up his tent and moved on. Never came back.”

Jessie, our father was a preacher, not Jonas’s dad.

“I’m sure Mama understood, Miss Charlotte. She wasn’t one to hold a grudge.” She waited half a heartbeat to find the courage to ask, “You don’t happen to remember his name, do you? The preacher man? The one she loved?”

The woman’s eyes closed and her head lolled back against the chair. Her body seemed to deflate like a blow-up doll with a slow leak. Remy checked her pulse. Slow and steady. The temporary short-circuit had passed, along with Remy’s link to her real father’s identity.

She put her hands on her knees and pushed to her feet. She felt a little wobbly, too, as though they’d traveled through the same time warp together. A movement at the corner of her eye alerted her to Jonas’s presence. His warm, strong fingers on her elbow helped anchor her to the present. She looked at him and tried to smile. “I think we might have wasted our money on that test.”

Miss Charlotte suddenly straightened. She looked at them both but with no spark of recognition. “Thomas Goodson. Good. Son,” she said, repeating the two words distinctly. “Marlene thought that meant she’d have a boy, but she had twin girls, instead.”

Remy left the room without saying goodbye to Charlotte. She took the side door—the same one she and Jonas had used the day before. She walked to the middle of the rose garden and stopped dead in her tracks.

Thomas Goodson.

She had a name. Thirty-two years after the fact. Maybe not the right name. The woman who gave it to her could barely remember her own name most days.

“Are you okay?”

She took a deep breath of rose-scented air and released it. “I don’t know. I think so.”

“Do you believe her?”

She debated a moment but, in the end, answered truthfully, “Yes. Do you?”

“I’m reserving judgment until the test results come back.”

So like him.

“Are you still up for going to Florida with me? I’d certainly understand if you changed your mind. I mean, now, instead of blaming your mother for ruining our lives, we get to blame my mother. Could this get any weirder?”

She flew to his side and shushed him with one finger pressed to his lips. “Never say that. Mama always said only a fool invites Fate to show you how crazy life can get.”

The look in his eyes made her heart go all fluttery.

She knew this was big. Important. Life-changing, for heaven’s sake. She might truly know the name of her father for the first time her in life. She needed to call Jessie. Get online. Try to find the man. What if he was still alive? Mama had died young. Her father might still be walking this earth and she could see him.

“Remy? You didn’t answer me. Do you want me to take you home? I would understand.”

What to do? She glanced toward where his car was parked in an unloading zone. The sun was angled so that the bright purple paint on the funny frame his daughter made for him caught her eye. Birdie.

Go.
She felt the answer in the same way she knew which dreams held meaning and which didn’t.

“Can I drive?”

His laugh was all guy. “Absolutely. If I’m dead, drunk or otherwise incapacitated.”

“Fine,” she said, marching toward the door with a bit of Scarlett O’Hara flair. “But I get to pick the music.”

Was she making a mistake by going with him? Maybe. Probably. Especially where her heart was concerned. But, she reminded herself, there was one other element in her dreams last night. One she hadn’t mentioned to Jonas when they talked.

When she bumped into the devil, he’d invited her to come with him. “Your father’s been looking for you. You want to meet him, don’t you? He’s just up the road a bit.”

She wasn’t a fool. She didn’t believe him, but now she wondered if
just up the road a bit
was exactly where she was supposed to be.

She’d already decided, out loud, that she wouldn’t mention the name Thomas Goodson to her sister until she had more information.

“Nothing? No Thomas Goodson?” he asked Remy, who was sitting on the bed next to his.

They’d discussed the necessity for two rooms and she’d agreed that the added cost was silly. “We’re adults. We’re not teenagers, anymore,” she said. “Just give me clean sheets and free Wi-Fi.”

She turned her laptop so he could see. The only word clearly visible was
Obituary
. He swallowed. “You found him?”

Her shoulders lifted and fell. “I found a Thomas Goodson. There are thousands.” She returned the screen her way. “This one is the right age, thereabouts, and he was a minister. But the obit doesn’t say anything about him ever being an itinerant preacher or living in Louisiana.”

“How long ago did he die?”

“Ten years ago.”

“Hmm. So, you’re still not going to call Jessie?”

Her lips pursed thoughtfully. “I don’t know.”

He closed his computer and turned on his side to face her, his elbow cocked to support his head. “Call her. She’s going to be pissed if you don’t.”

“Since when do you care how Jessie feels about anything?”

“She did me a very nice favor by putting me in touch with Leonard Franey. I owe her one.”

She let out a deep sigh. “I hate it when you’re right.” She pushed her laptop to the drab striped bedspread and reached for her phone. “I didn’t want to get her hopes up. Plus, it would have been really great to tell her I’d found him. After all these years… Wow, right?”

He rose and grabbed his windbreaker. “I’m gonna buy us some water to have in the car tomorrow. I’ll be back in a few.”

A lame excuse but he didn’t want to eavesdrop on her conversation, plus he needed the break. She’d been great. Cheerful, optimistic, even funny when she’d relate some outrageous story about her wild and wacky family.

Having her with him all day had saved him from going out of his head with worry. She’d kept his mind off all the worst-case scenarios that kept popping into his head. He didn’t know how she did it. Especially after his mother delivered her cryptic, potentially earth-shattering revelation that morning.

He had to get away from Remy for a few minutes because he needed to come to grips with the truth. He still loved Remy Bouchard. Always had. Admitting his feelings didn’t change the fact that he could never act on those feelings. He couldn’t fall down on his knees and beg her forgiveness for everything he and, apparently, his mother had done. He could only keep his distance and continue to exploit Remy’s gift, her goodness.

“Shit,” he swore, walking straight into the cool, evening breeze. He was the lowest of the low. Even offering to pay her had been a lame attempt to disguise the fact that he was using her. But what choice did he have? He had to find Birdie. Remy was part of this now. He couldn’t turn around, take her home and say goodbye. Not yet.

He bought a six-pack of water at the convenience store. While waiting to pay, his gaze fell on the condom display behind the counter. Temptation was an ugly, powerful force. He looked over his shoulder, half-expecting to see the devil grinning smugly. But, no, he was the only customer.

“Gimme a package of those, too,” he said, nodding behind the clerk.

He cursed his weakness all the way to the room. He almost threw away the vibrantly hued box. Finally, he convinced himself that he had the willpower to resist the temptation Remy presented simply by being herself, but on the impossibly remote chance he lost his mind and his self-control, then wasn’t it better to be prepared?

The compromise made perfect sense—until he opened the door of their motel room and he saw her.

Crying.

“Uh-oh. What happened?”

He set the bag near the closet and hurried across the room, shedding his jacket. “Remy? What’s wrong? Tell me. Is it Jessie? Did Mr. Franey call?”

She made a feathery motion with her fingers as if trying to blow away her tears, but her bottom lip continued to quiver—the same way Birdie’s did when she was trying not to cry. “It’s nothing. I’m f-fine. Well, I was until I heard Jessie’s voice. Then I sort of fell apart.”

He sat and put one arm around her. “I’m sorry. How did she take the news?”

She let her head fall against his shoulder. “She laughed, actually. She said it made perfect sense. A used-car salesman versus a preacher, they both were trying to sell you something.”

He let out a soft huff. “Well, that’s one way of looking at what happened.”

She grabbed a tissue from a box beside the bed and blew her nose, then she looked at him and asked, “Will you do me a favor?”

“Of course. Anything.”

“Sleep with me.”

His arm dropped like an anchor. “What?”

She pointed from his bed to hers. “Nothing sexual. I just feel very alone at the moment. If Jessie were here, I’d crawl in bed with her. But she isn’t here. And…and she has someone and I don’t.”

He could tell the tears were beginning to build again. He understood. Probably better than she could possibly imagine. He hugged her again. In support. “Sure. No problem.” He looked at the plastic bag in the corner. “Nothing sexual.”