Romancing My Love (Love in Bloom: The Bradens) Contemporary Romance (13 page)

“May I ask how you lost your mother?” Henry asked.

She still hadn’t come up with an answer that would not incite pity, and she loathed the question too much to dwell on coming up with one now. “She had cancer, and I’m glad she’s someplace better now.”

Henry glanced up at Daphne and drew his thick white brows together. “I’m sorry to hear that. Were you young?”

She smiled. “It was almost two months ago.”  

“Oh, hon. That’s very recent. Are you sure you’re holding up okay?” Daphne asked.

And there was the pity again. “Yes, thank you. I’m really okay, actually.” She needed to change the subject to avoid becoming a charity case. “Do you have any children?”

They exchanged a painful glance of sadness and acceptance blended together.

“No, it’s just us,” Daphne answered.

The silence that followed was filled with the unanswered question,
By choice?
Rebecca sensed that they hated that question as much as she disliked questions about her mother’s death, so she let the silence settle in.

After dinner Rebecca helped clear the table. “Thank you for dinner, Henry. It was delicious.”

He nodded. “Did I hear you say you’re taking classes?”

“Not right now, but I only have two left before I get my business degree, and I hope to take them when I save enough money.”

“I worked in the business office of the newspaper plant. What do you want to do once you graduate?” He crossed his arms and looked at her with what she’d imagine a fatherly gaze would look like.

“I don’t know. I’m really good at negotiations and figuring things out, or at least in class I am. Practically? I’m just not sure. The things I want to do aren’t in line with just one aspect of business. I guess I hope that at some point I can get an entry-level job in a growing business and gain experience in several different areas and then sort it out. I worry I’ll get bored if I’m just crunching numbers, which is why I didn’t go into accounting, and I’m not a marketer, but I enjoy the marketing process.” She shrugged. “I guess the answer is that I’m not sure.”

He nodded again, which she was quickly learning was his standard response.

“And this boyfriend of yours? What does he do?”

Uh-oh.
She realized that she needed to talk to Pierce about how to answer those types of questions where his employees were concerned. Was it okay to tell them he owned the resort?

“He’s a real estate investor.” She began putting away the condiments from dinner, hoping she could shift the conversation away from Pierce.

“Did he know your mother?” Henry asked.

“No. Unfortunately, he didn’t.”

Henry nodded again before patting Daphne on the shoulder and disappearing into the den.

“Don’t mind him. He’s still coming to grips with his employment status, but he liked you. I can tell.”

Rebecca began washing the dishes. “It’s okay. He’s very nice.”

“He is, when he’s not trying to figure out how to handle a roommate after years of only the two of us. Move over, hon. I can do those. We have a pretty efficient agreement. Henry cooks and I do dishes. Besides, don’t you have a boyfriend to sext?” She shoved Rebecca out of the way and took over washing the dishes.

“Daphne, would you be offended if I spent the night at my boyfriend’s house sometimes? I don’t want to seem ungrateful, or have you and Henry think poorly of me.”

“Darlin’, you’re a beautiful young girl. Live your life. We’re providing a roof over your head, but you don’t need to report to us.”

Even with Daphne’s blessing, Rebecca couldn’t shake the feeling that at least tonight she should stay there. She’d felt Henry warming to her when they were talking, and she knew how embarrassing it was to have your life situation change dramatically. She thought making an effort toward him might lessen his discomfort of renting to her—and she needed the room.

She went back to her bedroom and called Pierce.

“Hey, babe. Are you on your way?”

He sounded so hopeful that she almost changed her mind. “Actually, would it be okay if I stayed here tonight and we got together tomorrow?”

Her stomach sank with the silence that followed.

“Is something wrong, Bec?”

“No. Not at all. It’s one of my roommates. He’s having a hard time, and I think talking might help.” She looked around the bedroom and knew that after spending three nights together, she was going to have a heck of a time sleeping without him.

“Want me to come there?”

“No. I’m sorry, Pierce. This place is relatively new to me, and I just need a night. Do you mind?”

“Whatever you need, babe. Tomorrow, then.”

The disappointment in his voice was palpable. “I’m sorry. I’m going to miss you like crazy.” Maybe she could talk with Henry and then go see Pierce.
Ugh
. What message would that send to Henry? Why did she care? Because she did care. That’s who she was. Henry was obviously going through a lot, and she was clearly an intruder into his world. Being someone who loved her privacy, she understood that completely. Rebecca wasn’t one to ignore someone else’s suffering. She and Pierce could go twenty-four hours without seeing each other, couldn’t they? She’d gone twenty-seven years without him in her life. Why now did one night alone seem torturous?

They made arrangements to meet tomorrow after work, and by the time they ended the call, Rebecca already missed him.

She grabbed the notebook that she used for her budget and headed into the den.

PIERCE PACED HIS living room, wondering who the guy was who could keep Rebecca from seeing him. He eyed the files from the meetings he’d had earlier today. He needed to review his notes and prepare for tomorrow. Maybe this was a blessing in disguise. He picked up the files and tried to wrap his mind around the issues in two of his West Coast properties. He spread the reports and spreadsheets on the coffee table and sat, elbows on knees, staring at them, but his mind drifted back to seeing Rebecca on the security camera while she was working. It was obvious that the customers loved her. She took a little more time with them than the other waitresses did, and she was attentive to their requests. He remembered what she’d said about her job at the bar.
He didn’t like us talking to the customers, and, well, I think people come into bars to unload…
And when he’d asked her about what other jobs she’d held, she’d said,
Caretaker.

He picked up a report, and a smile eased the tension in his jaw. Damn, was he ever blind to have gone straight down Jealousy Road. If there was a person going through a hard time, he had no doubt that Rebecca would never walk away. When he turned back to his files, it was with a clear head and a warm heart.

THE FIRST THING Rebecca did the next morning was reach for her phone. She was rewarded with a text from Pierce.
Hated waking up without you. Can’t wait to see you tonight. P.
She texted back,
I hated it more. Xox.
She hadn’t slept well, and until that minute, she’d written it off to being in a strange house, but the house didn’t feel strange at all this morning—she did, and she knew it was because she missed Pierce. And now her stomach was doing flips in anticipation of seeing him later that evening.

She dressed for the gym, then went into the kitchen and made coffee. Henry hadn’t said more than a handful of words to her the night before as he sat at his desk in the den working on something that had him mumbling under his breath while she worked on her budget. She hadn’t minded the quiet, and even though she’d missed Pierce when she went to bed, she was glad she’d stayed. When Henry had said good night to her, she could feel him warming to her. She’d stayed up later than Henry, working her budget over and over based on her new salary, and even with paying Mr. Fralin each week and paying off her mother’s remaining debts, she should be able to afford classes by the spring. The next item on her list was saving enough money to take her mother’s ashes back to Punta Allen, and she hoped she could save enough to do that by the holidays, assuming, of course, that she found an amazing travel deal.

Another day full of hope lay ahead.

She was going over her budget one last time, when Henry sauntered lazily into the kitchen wearing a robe pulled tight across his belly, a pair of striped pajamas beneath. His gray hair was matted in some places, sticking up in others. He had bags beneath his eyes, and Rebecca wondered if he hadn’t slept well. Then again, it wasn’t yet six. She was heading out to the gym in a few minutes, but she was glad to see him.

“Good morning.” Rebecca had always been a morning person. She woke up ready for whatever the day held, which probably was reinforced as her mother’s condition worsened, because she needed to be fully awake no matter what time her mother needed her.

“Morning.” He poured himself a cup of the coffee that Rebecca had made.

“I hope you don’t mind that I made coffee. I’ll buy some today to replace it.”

He sat down across from her. “It’s coffee, Rebecca. We can afford coffee.”

Darn it. She hadn’t meant it that way. “I’m sorry. I just meant—”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“I
do
worry about it, Henry. I’m not sure if Daphne told you or not, but…” She paused, feeling funny about revealing what she hadn’t even revealed to Pierce, but chances were pretty good that Daphne had already told Henry, and if anything, it might help ease his embarrassment. “I was living in my car for a few days before you rented me a room. I know what it feels like to have stability ripped out from under you and thrown so far away that you think you’ll never find your footing again.”

He scoffed, rubbed his tired eyes, and looked away.

“I’m sorry. It’s just that when you’ve had as much taken away from you as I have, you learn to recognize and separate the things that are a reflection of who you are and those that are caused by something out of your control. Believe me, for a control freak like me, that’s a hard realization.” She paused, giving him time to tell her to shut up if he’d like, and when he didn’t, she continued. “You were laid off.” She shrugged. “Economic times are tough right now, but you’re still the same man you were when you went to work every day.”

He locked a steely gaze on her, and Rebecca held her breath.

“That’s easy for a young gal like yourself to say. There aren’t many companies looking to hire an old man.” He leaned his elbows on the table. “What are you working on?”

She closed the notebook. “Just looking through my budget, forecasting the next few months.”

“Forecasting.” He raised his brows.

“I like to know where I stand.”

“Rebecca, if you don’t mind me asking, how did you end up living in your car? That seems…extreme.” He sat back and crossed his arms.

She met his stare. “Taking care of my mom ended up being a full-time job. She’d had a stroke near the end, and I had a hard time keeping a job.”

He lowered his chin and looked down his nose at her. “Did she have disability income?”

“Yes. She did. But she was only eighteen when she had me, and she was a single mother, so she never had the chance to make a career for herself. She was only earning thirty-four thousand a year when she went on disability. She took home only sixty percent of that, and since she didn’t pay for her own disability insurance premiums, she had to pay taxes on the income.”  It had been a harsh realization when the IRS notified her mother of back taxes that were due. Her mother hadn’t known that if she didn’t pay her own disability insurance premiums that she was responsible for paying taxes on the income she received. “Not to mention the never-ending medical bills.”

He shook his head. “They screw you every which way but sideways.”

“Yeah, well, we found that out the hard way. She didn’t realize that was the law until after she didn’t pay the taxes the first year. But in all honesty, she needed every penny of the income she earned, so even if she had known, she probably wouldn’t have paid the premiums. Disability insurance is one of those things that you don’t think about until you need it, and for her, it was too late at that point. It took the IRS about a year, but they came for their money, so I used my paychecks to help her pay off the taxes she owed and to pay for her medical expenses. Anyway, to make a long story short, without a job and with what we owed and everyday expenses, we couldn’t afford the apartment we lived in.”

His eyes filled with empathy, and Rebecca turned away with the painful memory of the days after her mother’s death, when every day felt terminal. Between waking up every day and having to accept that she’d never see her mother again and waiting for Mr. Fralin to turn her out on the streets, she’d been a nervous wreck.

“My landlord was really good to us. He let us stay for the last two months of her life, and then he let me stay for a few weeks to get myself in order.”
Through the fog of taking care of my mother’s things and learning to function again would be more accurate.
“But it wasn’t fair of me to stay in an apartment when he needed the income. I eventually found a job at a bar, and I knew it wouldn’t be long before I’d have enough money to find something cheaper, a room in a house like this, or something similar.”

“Weren’t you worried? A single woman like yourself living in your car?”

“Not in the way you’re thinking. I’m pretty good at self-defense. But I was embarrassed about it. I had a gym membership at Fitness Heaven, so I had a place to shower. It’s open twenty-four hours. As much as I knew I’d get out of the mess I was in, I was scared to death about people finding out. Let’s face it: Living in a car sounds bad. It sounds dirty.”

His gaze softened. “And then you got the job with Daph?”

She nodded. “Yeah. It was a miracle.”

He smoothed his robe over his chest, and an unexpected smile lifted his lips. “You give me hope, Rebecca.”

“I do?”

“Yes. I’ve tricked myself into believing that this is who I am and that I’ll never be the type of man who can take care of Daphne again.” He laughed under his breath. “Amazing what a little youth can do for you.”

“What do you mean?”

He shrugged. “Well, Rebecca, if you can come out of what you’ve endured with a smile on your face and hope that practically jumps off of your skin, then what the hell is a wise old bastard like me doing feeling sorry for himself? I’m going to borrow a little of your youthful exuberance and see if I can figure something out, too.

“Tell me something, Rebecca. This boyfriend of yours, is he a good guy? Because this is a racy town, and I’d hate for you to fall into something with a guy who isn’t worth his weight in salt.”

He’s the best guy
. “Yeah, he’s a good guy.”

He smiled as Daphne came into the kitchen. “Morning, Daph.”

Daphne kissed his cheek. “Good morning. Are you calling the bank today about the mortgage?”

“I’ll take care of it. Can we please not talk about that at the crack of dawn?”

Rebecca shifted her eyes away, uncomfortable with the tone of their conversation. The fact that they’d needed to rent a room had told her that they were having financial difficulties, but she didn’t need to be privy to the details. That would surely underscore Henry’s discomfort.

Daphne touched the top of his head. “You’re right. I’ll wait until the crack of lunch.” Her hand slid down his shoulder, and Henry reached up and squeezed it.

They spoke to and touched each other like nothing the other person could do could change their love, and it warmed Rebecca’s heart to witness such comfort. She was beginning to sense that she and Pierce might be headed in a similar direction, and although it was a little scary that it was all happening so fast, she hoped they were.

“Where are you off to so early, Rebecca?” Daphne asked.

“The gym. It’s good for my brain.”

“Did you sleep okay?”

Not really. I missed Pierce
. “Yeah. The bed’s wonderful.”
And lonely
.

As Rebecca walked away from the kitchen, she heard Henry say, “She has no one looking after her.” She stopped to listen, worried that he thought she couldn’t handle things on her own.

“Daph, I want to make sure this boyfriend of hers is good enough for her.”

“Oh, Henry. I knew you’d like her.”

With a smile on her lips, Rebecca gathered her clothes and gym bag and walked out the front door.