Family Matters (DiCarlo Brides book 4) (The DiCarlo Brides) (4 page)

She worked so much, and she shared a house with, well, only two other women now out of the original five. So there were a few extra rooms. But how would
they
feel about it? She hadn’t talked to anyone about the guardianship, but she would have to have a chat with Delphi and Jonquil tonight.

The terms of their father’s will made it impossible for her to move out—unless Alex found some freaky legal loophole he could twist. That would almost be freakier though, because it would mean her father anticipated something like this, which he totally couldn’t have.

“If you don’t want the bequest, turn it down,” Harrison suggested. “You don’t have to accept something just because someone wanted you to have it.”

“I can’t. You don’t turn down a kid.” There it was, in the open. Out loud. 

“Whoa.” He grabbed one of the elliptical’s handles, forcing her to slow down. “A kid? Someone died and left you their
kid
?”

“Yeah. Though I guess she’s technically my kid.” Giving up on fighting him—or was it herself?—she slowed her steps until they stopped. She closed her eyes for a moment to gather strength before turning to Harrison. This was the last thing she wanted to admit to him—of all people, why did it have to be him? Why was he always the one to show up when she felt the most vulnerable?

“She’s yours because they left her to you?” The tentative expression on his face made it clear he was trying not to presume, but sensed it was more than a legality. “And who left you a child? I knew something happened to friends in DC, but I didn’t realize you were
that
close.”

“My old neighbors. They were like family to me.” She grabbed a towel and mopped at her face. She hadn’t eaten enough dinner to have worked out that hard, and she knew it. She dismissed the thought with the idea that maybe there was some sliced turkey in the fridge—protein, low fat. It would be perfect. “Their daughter’s name is Cleo. Short for Cleome.”

It took Harrison a couple of seconds to answer. “Wait. Isn’t that a kind of flower?” he asked. All of the sisters’ names were some kind of flower or herb as horticulture had been one of her father’s passions—hotels and women being the other two. Apparently.

“Yeah. They let me pick the name and I chose that because it gave her a little piece of family history.” She should just come out with it, but had been keeping this a secret for so long, she was surprised at how hard it was to share.

His eyes narrowed and his words were careful. “Why did they let you pick their baby’s name?”

Rosemary sat on the nearby weight bench. “Because she was my baby. They adopted her.” Her voice was low and the words were painful to speak, but it was almost a relief when she got them out.

He sat beside her. “How old is she?”

“She’ll be ten in April.” Tears threatened, but Rosemary pushed them back. She couldn’t deal with them right now. “I don’t know what to do.” She covered her face with her hands. “I can’t believe they’re gone.”

His arm came around her, holding her close. “Hey, I know it’s rough. But you’ll be okay. You and Cleo. You’re one of the toughest people I know and you obviously love her.”

“How can I raise my daughter?” Words started tumbling out of her mouth without thought. “I work insane hours and share a house and we live in the middle of nowhere. She’s used to the city and this, my irritating friend, is not the city, in case you’ve never noticed. I don’t know anything about being a parent and what if child protective services looks at me and says no way? What happens to her then?”

He pulled her against his warm side, his voice was low and soothing. “Shh, one step at a time. When do you go to DC?”

“In the wee hours of the morning. The funeral’s the following day, just got word about it.” Her voice caught on a sob. “So fast. It’s all happening so fast. How do I... What am I doing? That girl deserves better than me. Cecelia was like the perfect mother, and I’m… not. Why do you think I let the Markhams adopt her in the first place?”

“Hey, a lot has happened for you in the past ten years. You’re going to be fine. You have a ton of family support here, and I bet Vince’s mom would love to add one more granddaughter to the mix—Hannah is about the same age, isn’t she—so you’ll have a grandma figure. And the rest of us will pull around you.” Hannah was Cami’s niece by marriage, and seriously adorable.

“Do you just come and go here as you please?” she asked, feeling awkward about him seeing her fall apart, and just now realizing that he didn’t belong.

“Delphi let me in. She directed me to the fridge, then told me you were down here if I wanted to harass you into something that resembled your own personality. She was worried.”

“Sure she was.” Rosemary chuckled. “You can always count on Delphi to make sure the most irritating person is directed straight to my side.” She softened the words by leaning her head against his shoulder for a few seconds. It was odd talking to him like this. Comforting, and taking comfort from guys hadn’t been on her to-do list since Cleo’s birth dad split. “Thank you for listening. I guess I better break it to the others that they’re getting a new roommate, and I have no idea when I’ll be back. I’m going to wake up from nightmares that the restaurant kitchen is going to fall apart without me.”

He laughed. “You probably need to pack if you’re going to make it onto the plane on time. And take a shower first.” He wrinkled his nose.

She balled up her fist and smacked him in the shoulder, though she didn’t put much effort behind it. “You’re such a jerk sometimes.” But she felt oddly better.

“If you need some support in DC—”

“Thanks, but I’ll be fine,” she cut him off. “Alex will help me through the paperwork and I need to put all of my focus on Cleo.” But she wanted someone to hold her hand. Someone besides Alex—who was in Chicago anyway, though he came to Juniper Ridge for visits at least once per month. The thought of facing her mother alone was enough to give her indigestion, but it was almost a guarantee considering she lived in the same neighborhood as the Markhams. Not that Rosemary would stop by when she was in DC, but she couldn’t completely ignore Wanda if she was in town for the better part of a week. Wanda wouldn’t allow that.

Settling things for Cleo was bound to be a messy, lengthy process. What did she tell the girl, anyway?

Harrison didn’t push, but he didn’t look very happy about her refusal, either.

Harrison left the bright, warm DiCarlo home to return to his quiet, dark, chilly cottage. He flipped on several lights, knowing Sage would get after him for wasting electricity, and turned on the television for company. Most of the time his empty place didn’t bother him much. He worked long hours, liked his privacy, and headed over to see Sage when he got lonely. It was one of the reasons he’d taken this job—because he wanted to be close to his sister.

He opened his fridge and pulled out bread, cold cuts and cheese. It had been a difficult day and he didn’t have the energy for cooking anything. He thought again of Rosemary coming out of Lana’s office earlier, of the warmth that radiated between them. He thought of Sage and Joel and how happy and content they seemed now. And then he looked at his empty house and felt alone.

It wasn’t a new feeling, so he refused to dwell on it. He’d made choices. There had been a woman a few year earlier who wanted to marry him, make a family, and he’d broken things off with her. He hadn’t wanted to—he’d been very tempted to propose and make that perfect nuclear family—mom, dad, kids. But it hadn’t been right and he hadn’t been able to convince himself otherwise.

Sometimes he thought he was still that sad little boy whose father ran off and who had watched his sister be loved and nurtured by two parents—even if George hadn’t been around much. He thought he’d gotten past it, but seeing Rosemary again, seeing her with her sisters and they way Lana and Blake were anticipating their baby’s birth seemed to increase his urge for family, to be connected and part of something more.

Tonight, when Rosemary talked about her daughter and becoming a parent, he’d felt that tug stronger than ever. Felt it for her.

Had he been crazy to offer her his support? He layered on the smoked ham and pushed it from his mind. That way lay madness—as he’d already found since his arrival in Juniper Ridge.

“Okay, what’s with the emergency meeting?” Jonquil asked as she set popcorn and chips on the coffee table in their sunken great room and hour later. The last of the sisters arrived only moments before and Rosemary refused to speak without them present, even if three no longer lived in the house. She didn’t want to have to go over any of this again, so handling all of their questions now was a must.

She was anxious about how everyone would take her news—especially Jonquil and Delphi. Harrison was the first person she’d told about Cleome in years—and she never would have mentioned her to any of them if it weren’t for her chance to regain custody now. Some things were best kept to oneself.

“Are you going to tell us why we’re here?” Delphi asked as she pulled out her earrings. “Not that losing your friends isn’t a big deal, but you didn’t call us all here to bare you soul.”

Rosemary had been lifting a glass of water to her mouth and was glad she hadn’t been drinking when she heard that—she might have inhaled a mouthful. As it was, it took a moment to answer. “You’re not as far off as you think.”

Sage patted Rosemary’s knee. “It’s okay, no one will give you trouble about what you’re going to say.”

“You sure about that?” Delphi asked, but the words were mild, more a tease than a real challenge. Sometimes it was hard to tell with her, though.

“Pretty sure.” Sage smiled, her dark gypsy features calm and supportive.

Rosemary nodded and plunged ahead. “I got pregnant when I was nineteen.”

Eyes bugged, breaths of surprise were drawn in and the room became quiet enough to hear Delphi’s earring hit the carpet. She scrambled to pull the pearl stud out of the deep pile and Rosemary couldn’t help but feel a little satisfaction that her announcement had thrown her cool-headed sister off-balance.

She continued. “There was this couple in my neighborhood—really sweet, friendly, let me come over all of the time. Cecelia taught me to cook. They couldn’t have kids of their own, so I offered to let them adopt my little girl. They were thrilled. Now they’re,” she had been planning to say
dead
in that matter-of-fact voice she had been using for the whole story, but couldn’t get it to come out of her throat. She changed her word choice and still had a waver in her voice when she spoke, “gone. It leaves my daughter, who is nine now, an orphan. This morning when the lawyer came to tell about them, he said the Markhams wanted me to become her guardian if something happened to them.”

More gasps, but Sage was right—no one gave her a hard time. Not yet, anyway.

“So you have to bring her back here, to live in our house.” Delphi’s face was blank, not giving away any hint of how she felt about it.

“I’d get a place of my own if it were an option, but thanks to Dad’s will, it’s not, so yeah, I’m going to have to bring her back here. I know that means you and Jonquil are going to be inconvenienced with the noise and mess, and giggling voices, but until September—”

“Right,” Jonquil said with a firm nod. “There are three empty bedrooms now. They all have private bathrooms and desks in them, so it’s not like she’s going to be taking over our private spaces. If we can deal with Lana the hot-water hog here for the first part of the year,” she paused to grin when Lana protested, “we can manage a nine-year-old.”

Rosemary nodded, feeling relief, even though she expected nothing less from Jonquil. She turned toward Delphi—the one who was more likely to object.

“I don’t see that there’s much choice.” The words were a little harsh, but the tone wasn’t. She spoke low and looked more sad than mad. “It’s not like you can turn down your kid. If you wanted to do that, you already would have and we wouldn’t have heard a word about it.”

“You don’t want Cleo here?” Rosemary asked, her heart clenching at the thought that Delphi might make it hard for Cleo.

“I don’t have a problem with it. And I’ll try not to be too big of a pain about it.” When Rosemary’s brows lifted high enough they must have been encroaching on her hairline, Delphi scowled. “She’s your little girl, which makes her every bit as much a part of this mess as the rest of us. You think I’m some monster that I can’t see she needs someone who cares about her? You do, right? Want her to move here? You never said it, but I’ve learned to read you a little.”