Dirty: The Complete Series (Secret Baby Romance Love Story) (55 page)

“Really?”

I hugged myself; standing still in the
cold was definitely a bad idea, but I couldn’t walk, talk, and listen at the
same time. “You were really talking about me and he really said those things?”

“Really and truly,” Jessica said. “I told
him to stop being such an idiot and actually talk to you about things if he had
worries.” After a moment I heard her laugh. “He’s red as a beet right now, you
should see it.”

“Okay, okay,” I said, laughing in spite of
myself. “I believe you are really and truly his sister.” I remembered that
Patrick had mentioned having a sister named Jessica—and he’d mentioned it more
than once. He wasn’t the only one who had managed to twist things around and
screw them up.

“I would love to meet you sometime soon,”
Jessica said cheerfully. “Whether or not my brother manages to make everything
up to you. I’ll get your contact details from him; maybe we can grab a coffee
sometime.”

“That would be great,” I said, shaking
from a mixture of cold and relief. I shook my head, smiling in embarrassment at
my outburst. I heard the background noise go louder again and then it quieted.

“So you see? I am absolutely not cheating
on you,” Patrick told me.

“I will admit that I might have jumped to
conclusions,” I said wryly. “But you seemed really familiar with her in the two
seconds I saw you together.”

“And I’ve been dropping the ball,” Patrick
admitted. “Jess is right about that, and you had every right to assume the
worst after the way I’ve been making everything weird and awkward.” I smiled
again and started walking slowly, making my way towards my car. I had to keep
moving or I’d become a Popsicle.

“I appreciate that,” I said. “Thank you
for taking the time to set me straight.”

“More than happy to do it,” Patrick told
me. “Now—you mentioned that your family is throwing a New Year’s Eve party? I’d
understand if you wanted to punish me for upsetting you—but I’d love to go with
you. Can I have my invitation back?”

I laughed. “It wouldn’t be fair of me to
keep it now that I know you’re just being a good brother,” I pointed out. “I’d
love to have you as my date to my parents’ New Year’s Eve party, if you don’t
have other plans.”

“None whatsoever; without you my New Year
would be depressing—I’d just sit on the couch watching the ball drop while
Landon sleeps and drink champagne out of a bottle.”

“This will be a lot better than that,” I
promised.

“Of course it will,” Patrick said. “If
you’re there, the whole house could go down in flames and it’d still be
better.”

 
I
laughed again. “I hope that doesn’t happen, but I’m glad that you can come with
me,” I told Patrick. I shivered as I approached my car, and I knew that no
matter how good it felt to hear his voice and to know that he wasn’t cheating
on me, that he was actually being as upfront as possible, I needed to get into
my car and out of the cold. “I have to hang up now,” I said. “I am freezing out
here and I need to get home with the things I just bought.”

“Okay,” Patrick said. “Get inside before
you freeze to death. Can I see you at the clinic tomorrow?” I thought about it;
I did have a shift at the clinic, and I was pretty sure than Landon had an
appointment.

“Absolutely,” I said. I smiled to myself,
thinking that just seeing Patrick in the office again would be great; it would
be good to get back to the way things had been before things got weird. “I’ll
be glad to see you.”

“Me too.”

I finished up the call and unlocked my car
door, climbing in and making sure none of the things I’d bought would shift
around too much when I drove home. I turned the car on and turned the heat up,
for a moment just sitting there and letting the air get warm enough to thaw me
out a little bit. I smiled to myself, more relieved than I would have thought
even possible by the fact that I hadn’t actually caught Patrick with some other
woman. Until I’d seen him in the café with his sister, I never would have
thought that Patrick was cheating on me. I had thought that things had gone
south, and that he’d lost interest—but nothing at all about the way that
Patrick treated me suggested that he was with someone else.

I felt a little bit embarrassed at the
fact that I’d rushed to such a drastic conclusion, especially since I should
have remembered that Patrick had siblings. If he had decided to be angry with
me for making the assumption that he was cheating, I couldn’t have blamed him.
I was glad though that Patrick had cleared the air between us; I wasn’t going
to let him go so easily in the future.

I pulled out of my parking spot and started
for home, thinking about the fact that for the first time in years, I was going
to have a date to my parents’ New Year’s Eve party. If anyone in my family or
amongst the family friends thought that I had been making Patrick up, they
would know the truth as soon as I came in with him. “Oh god—what am I going to
wear?” I almost turned back to go shopping for my dress, but decided that since
I had a few days before the party, I would wait and make a special trip for it.
I was exhausted from all of the stresses of the day, and I wanted to devote all
of my attention onto getting the right dress—something sexy, but not too sexy,
glittery without being tacky, something that would make me look amazing next to
Patrick.

I sang along with the stereo all the way
home, shaking my head every once in a while at the thought that I’d actually
assumed that Patrick was cheating on me. I didn’t know for sure if things would
work out between us in the long term, but at least talking to his sister told
me that he hadn’t lost interest; if I could trust her report, Patrick was
thinking about me a lot. I got back to my building and carried my bags up to my
apartment, thinking about how good it would be to see Patrick again and to know
that I had a date with him. I remembered my plans from when I’d gone to Lush
and decided that instead of taking a bath to comfort myself about my
possibly-single-again status, I’d take one to celebrate the fact that Patrick
and I were moving forward.

Chapter Two - Patrick

The coffee date with my sister, the text
message from Mackenzie, and the phone call after it lit a fire under my ass. I
wanted to make everything right with her, undo the mistakes I had made. As soon
as I got home from my date, I had started thinking about how I could make an
even bigger impression on Mack, to make a gesture to convince her that not only
was I not cheating on her, but I was serious about our relationship together.

“Landon, we’re going to make a stop on our
way to your session, so we need to get out of here a bit early,” I told my son,
watching as he pulled on some warmer clothes for the drive. I got a coat on and
took off my slippers to put on a decent pair of shoes.

“Where are we stopping?” Landon looked up
at me curiously, swinging his arms at his sides.

“We’re going to stop and get something for
Mack,” I told him. “Are you ready to hit the road?” Landon nodded, running to
the door and grabbing his scarf and gloves. I chuckled, thinking of where we
needed to go and how best to get to the shop and get what I needed before
Landon and I needed to be at his appointment; even for the sake of the surprise
I had in mind, I wasn’t about to be late to his session.

I had called three florist shops as soon
as I got up that morning to find which of them might have the flowers I was
looking for. I had remembered something that Mack had told me on the first
“real” date we’d been on, when I brought her a bouquet of flowers, and I
thought—I hoped—that it would be a good enough gesture to surprise her with
when I got to the appointment.

I helped Landon get into the car and
checked the time; I should have just enough time to get to the flower shop that
had confirmed it had what I wanted and then to the Kid Care clinic. I navigated
into the light—for Chicago—traffic, and smiled to myself. I remembered what
Jessica had said to Mack on the phone, and then what we’d talked about after.
Jess had been the one to give me the idea for how to try and make things right
with Mack before our date on New Year’s Eve. “Obviously, going to the party with
her is one thing,” she’d said, shrugging. “But before you let her show you off
to her family you need to actually make up for letting things get weird because
you were all in your own head about stuff.”

“You’re taking her side over mine?” I’d
asked her.

“Well duh—I know you. You’re a great guy,
but you totally did everything you could to try and make this end without it
being your fault.”

“It takes two people to destroy a
relationship,” I’d said, feeling more than a little defensive.

“That’s a lie,” Jess had told me. “It only
takes one person to ruin it and the other to walk away.” She had wagged her
finger at me. “What you need to do is make some kind of big, romantic gesture.
Something she wouldn’t expect but would love.”

“How am I going to do that?”

Jessica had shrugged. “Surprise her at
work or something. You know her better than I do. You should at least have some
idea of what she would like by now.”

At first I’d rejected the idea of
surprising Mackenzie at work; I knew how committed she was to being
professional while she was in the clinic. I didn’t want to embarrass her with
my surprise. But I remembered that most of the rest of the staff knew that I
had been on at least one or two dates with her; it wasn’t like it was a huge
secret. I made my way across town, looking for the florist shop that I wanted.
I spotted the sign with a block or so to go. “Do you want to come in with me
buddy?” I looked at Landon in the back seat.

“Where are we going?” Landon looked around
curiously.

“We’re going to stop and get Mack some
flowers.”

Landon let out an exited whoop.
 
“You want her to know you like her!” he
beamed at me. “You like Mack a lot, don’t you?”

“I do,” I said, nodding as I pulled off of
the road and into the parking area next to the florist. “Do you like her?”

“I like her,” Landon confirmed, nodding
eagerly. “She’s really nice.” I turned to look at him in the back seat as I put
the car in park and turned the engine off.

“How does this sound…I want to take Mack
to dinner with us tonight. We could wait for her shift to be over and then go
to
Ed Debevic’s
, before I drop you
off at Aunt Jess’.” I’d told Landon earlier in the day that I was going to let
him spend the night at his aunt’s house; Jess had suggested it when I had
tentatively decided to take Mack out to dinner if she was free after the
session.

“I get to go out with you and Mack?”
Landon’s eyes got big in his face and he grinned. “Awesome!”

“You’ve got to be on your best behavior at
the session and at the restaurant,” I told him. “But as long as you’re a good
guy, you can tag along. How does that sound?”

“I’ll be good! I swear,” Landon told me. I
grinned to myself.
If that doesn’t show
her I’m serious about this, then nothing will.

“All right. First I need you to help me
with some things.”

“Okay!” I unlocked the car and got out,
walking around to the back seat to help Landon out of the booster chair.

We went into the florist’s shop and I
spotted the woman I hoped I had talked to earlier in the day. “Hey,” I said,
letting Landon close the door behind us. “I called earlier to ask if you had
any peonies.” The woman’s eyes widened slightly in recognition and she grinned.

“I remember,” she said, coming out from
behind the counter. “It’s not the usual request for this time of year, but we
do actually have some in. They’re not as beautiful as the ones we get at the
beginning of summer, but they are still up to our standards.” She looked down
at Landon. “Do you want to help me wrap them up?”

“Yeah!” Landon practically jumped up and
down at the offer. I followed the florist to the back area of the shop, and saw
the flowers I’d requested; she’d set them aside when I called, and when I saw
them it was easier to understand why Mack loved them so much. The big bouquet
of peonies was just beginning to open, revealing fluffy cream-pink flowers that
looked delicate and intricate and strong all at once—just like Mack. The
florist gathered them up in her arms and trimmed the leaves from all but the
top of the stems, and I watched as Landon helped her wrap them up in ribbon and
plastic to keep them neat.

I paid for the flowers and thanked the
woman and hurried Landon back out to the car; we were going to be cutting it
close, but I hoped that we’d still be able to get to his session on time. I
wanted to surprise Mack—but I didn’t want to give her any more reasons to be
upset at me. I wove through traffic from the flower shop to the clinic, feeling
jittery and as nervous as I had the first time that I’d gotten Mack to meet
with me at the coffee shop.

“Okay, bud,” I said when I pulled into a
parking spot in the structure attached to the clinic. “One last thing I need
you to do for me. Think you’re up to it?”

“What is it?” Landon was fidgety with
excitement in the back seat.

“Take the flowers in for me, okay? I’ll be
right outside. You run in first with the flowers and tell Mack that they’re
from me, and then I’ll come in. How’s that sound?”

“Should I tell her you’re sorry?” Landon
grinned.

“Yes,” I said, smiling in spite of myself.
I was starting to get excited by my plan. I felt a flicker of doubt. I hoped
that Mack wouldn’t think that this was too much, that she wouldn’t be
embarrassed at the big gesture. “Tell her that I’m really sorry for how I’ve
messed things up. Can you do that?” I held out the bouquet to my son.

“I can do that!” Landon took the flowers
from me with a quick snatch.

“Be careful with them,” I told him
sharply. “It’d be terrible to hurt the flowers before you get them to her,
wouldn’t it?” Landon considered that question and then nodded.

I let him out of the car and watched him
race towards the front door of the clinic as fast as he could; his limp was
almost completely gone, and I thought that it was just as well that I’d managed
to luck into a chance to make things right with Mack when I had—Landon couldn’t
possibly have too many sessions left before Mack cleared him.

I locked up the car and waited for a
moment before following my son into the clinic. I opened the door and saw that
he had somehow managed to convince Mack to come out from the back right away.
She was standing frozen in shock, staring at the flowers, the sweetest smile on
her face that I had ever seen in my life. I strode from the door to where
Mackenzie and Landon stood, and she looked up from the bouquet, her eyes still
showing her shock. She shook her head, and smiled again. “You remembered.”

“I did,” I said, nodding. The other
members of the staff had gone quiet; everyone was watching us. “I know you wanted
to keep things professional whenever we’re here together, but I wanted to show
you how sorry I am that I let everything fall apart the way I did.”

“It’s—no, it’s fine,” Mack said quickly.
“I’m just so surprised you were able to get peonies…and that you brought them…”
She looked down at Landon and then looked at me again. “They’re beautiful.”

“That was the first part,” I said, smiling
still. “I was also wondering if you had any plans for after you get done with
work for the day.”

“No,” she said.

“Would you do Landon and me the honor of
coming to dinner with us? I know you have to do some more things after the
session is over, but we can wait for you.”

“You want to take me to dinner with you
and Landon?”

I chuckled at the sheer surprise in her
voice. “I do. And Landon wants to go out with us, too,” I said, reaching out
and fondling my son’s hair.

“Does that sound good to you?”

“It does,” Mack said. She buried her face
against the peony blooms and I saw her take a deep breath. “No one in this
office is ever going to let me live this down,” she told me, grinning wryly.
“But it is totally worth it.” She took another deep breath and I saw one of her
hands dart up to dash away a couple of what I hoped were happy tears. “Let’s
head to the back and I’ll put these in some water.” She looked down at Landon.
“We’ve wasted too much time on your session sport.”

“Let’s get to work then,” I agreed. “The
sooner we get started, the sooner we can meet you outside to go to dinner.”

The session itself went by faster than I
thought it would, and Landon was still brimming with energy by the time
Mackenzie told him he was done for the day; he hopped up and down while she and
I went through the motions of being professional, discussing his progress. She
told me that she thought that by the next week, she could re-evaluate his
condition and that she might be able to even move him down to once or twice per
week sessions for a few more weeks, and then discharge him to go about his life
as normal.

“I just need to do some paperwork and then
I can meet you outside,” Mack told me, glancing at the bouquet that she’d put
into a vase of water before we’d started the session. “I have a change of
clothes in my locker too, if you can wait for me.”

“You look beautiful no matter what you
wear,” I told her. The rest of the staff at the clinic had looked at us over
and over again during the session, grinning in a truly happy way.

“Give me maybe fifteen minutes, and I’ll
be right out,” Mack told me.

“Remember to take the flowers with you!”
Someone told her.

“I will,” Mack said, rolling her eyes.
“Hurry up and make your escape before someone finds the mistletoe from the
holiday party.” I laughed and made my retreat, leading Landon through the
waiting room and out to the car outside.

“What are you going to get at the
restaurant, buddy?” I asked my son while we settled in to wait for Mackenzie to
be able to leave the office.

“Mozzarella sticks!” I laughed at his
choice.

“You’re going to need more than that,” I
pointed out. We discussed the different things that he could make a dinner out
of, and fifteen minutes later—maybe a little less—I saw Mackenzie come out of
the building and head for the parking structure. She looked around and I honked
the horn to get her attention, rolling down my window. Mack started slightly at
the loudness of the car horn and then hurried over to my SUV, smiling and
carrying the flowers I’d gotten for her in the vase she’d put them in.

“They told me I could leave my car here if
I had to,” Mackenzie told me. “I have tomorrow off, I can take the bus up here
from my apartment.”

“Hurry up and get in before you freeze,” I
told her, unlocking the car door. Mackenzie handed me the flowers and then
hurried around to the passenger side, and I realized that she had taken the
time to change into a pair of jeans and a sweater under her big coat.

In minutes we were out in the Chicago
traffic. Mackenzie turned around, peering over the back of her seat to talk to
Landon. “Do you know where we’re going for dinner?”

“
Ed
Debevic’s
!” Landon exclaimed, looking pleased with himself that he had
managed to get the name out clearly.

“Oh? Awesome!” Mack glanced at me and
grinned. “That sounds like the perfect place for everyone to find something.”

“There’s another reason for it,” I told
her, licking my lips and stopping as smoothly as I could at a light. I looked
at Mack, wondering if I was overplaying my hand a little bit. “It’s the first
restaurant that Joanne and I took Landon to, a couple of months after he was
born.”

“Really?” Mack looked at me sharply for a
moment and then her expression softened. “I’m flattered.”

“Obviously Landon wasn’t eating actual
food then, and we went during their quiet hours instead of during the dinner
rush, but Joanne had been craving their chili fries ever since she’d
delivered.” I smiled, remembering that we’d put off going in the hope that we’d
be able to use it as our celebration of successful treatment of Joanne’s
cancer; instead, when it became clear that the treatment wasn’t going to work,
we’d stopped the chemo and gone that same night to the restaurant, bringing in
a sleeping infant and going to town on all of our favorite foods until we were
uncomfortably full.

“She seems to have been a woman with very
good taste,” Mack said.

“Dad says she had horrible taste—she
married him.”

I snorted, shaking my head at what Landon
felt the need to contribute to the conversation.

“That was a joke Bud,” I told my son.

“Well I think she must have been a
beautiful, wonderful woman,” Mack said, looking from me to Landon. “Your dad
has worked hard to make sure you’re growing up to be a good kid, but I think
your mom must have been great for him to be so successful.”

We arrived at the restaurant; it was just
starting to get busy, with people coming in as much for the warmth as to eat
dinner, and I was glad that we were able to get a table—and that Mack hadn’t
needed another fifteen minutes, though I would have given them to her if she’d
asked.

I ordered the mozzarella sticks that
Landon wanted, but under Mack’s influence, my son ordered pot roast instead of
his usual chicken strips, and when I asked him whether he’d eat the vegetables
if I got it for him, he just gave me a look that told me I was embarrassing
him. Mack ordered the meatloaf, and I got a burger.

I had worried more than a little that
Landon wouldn’t be up to behaving himself through dinner, with Mack there and
with the noisy atmosphere of a restaurant after being so hyped up from his PT
session; but he was polite, letting Mack and me talk, sticking with his
coloring or playing with one of the toys I’d let him bring with him into the
restaurant. Mack made a point of asking him about school, about soccer, all the
things that Landon loved.

By the time we ordered a dessert to share,
I had relaxed completely. Landon was perfectly fine with Mack outside of the
session, and Mack was able to handle my son just as well in a restaurant as she
did while she was putting him through physical therapy. Everyone was happy—most
of all me. “I just have to drop him off at my sister’s,” I told Mack.

“Can’t I stay with you guys?” Landon asked
from the back seat of the car.

“Not tonight bud,” I told him. “Mack and I
need a little time alone.” I looked over at the woman I loved and grinned.

“Maybe next time we all do dinner together
we can go home and you and I can work on that kite,” Mack suggested.
Immediately Landon was on board, and the whole way to my sister’s house that
was all he wanted to talk about. I couldn’t wait to get him to Jess’ place so that
I could be alone with Mack—it had been far, far too long since we’d been alone
together.