Blaine O’Connor on Fatherhood…

Dear Mickey,

I guess you could say I became your father twice—once when you were born, and once when you turned ten and your mother died. Those first ten years, I was more your friend than your dad. I got to see you so rarely that I wanted to make the very most of those precious times we shared. I didn’t want to mar those visits by telling you when to go to bed or to pick up your clothes. I just wanted to enjoy you and make you happy.

But suddenly you were mine, and I was your dad twenty-four hours a day. It became my responsibility to see to it that you grew up to be a fine young man. I don’t mind telling you that I really had my doubts about handling the job so well.

It didn’t help when your godmother came butting in, doing everything right, making me feel even more lost in this vast wonderland called fatherhood. But don’t worry, Mickey—I’ll figure this whole thing out. No bossy lady is going to tell me how to raise my kid. Who needs her, anyway?

From now on, it’ll be just us guys. Won’t that be great?

Love,

Dad

Father in the Making
Marie Ferrarella

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MARIE FERRARELLA

This USA TODAY bestselling and RITA® Award-winning author has written more than 150 novels for Silhouette Books, some under the name Marie Nicole. Her romances are beloved by fans worldwide. Visit her Web site at www.marieferrarella.com.

To Adrienne Macintosh and

brand-new relationships.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter One

He had no idea how to be a father. The very thought brought a nervous ripple to his digestive tract, though his smile remained fixed for Mickey’s benefit.

He knew all about being a friend. Over the years, he had pretty well perfected the part and derived a great deal of pleasure from it. As had Mickey. Mickey was all that mattered. He always had been.

But he hadn’t a clue how to be a father. Though his son was now ten years old, until this week Blaine O’Connor had never had to don the sober, heavy robes of fatherhood.

They were thrust on him without ceremony, without a whisper of a warning. They were pushed upon him as suddenly as they had been pulled out of his hands eleven years ago.

Then he hadn’t even been able to try them on for size. He’d found out sheerly by accident after the divorce papers had been filed that Diane was pregnant. Once he knew, Blaine had wanted to give the floundering marriage another try for the sake of the unborn child they had created. But Diane had refused to listen.

It gave her, he thought, a special sense of satisfaction to deny him that reconciliation. Almost as much satisfaction as when she refused to let him be present at his son’s birth. He’d been robbed of the joy of seeing his only child come into the world.

All because Diane had had no idea what the word trust meant.

Angry, hurt, Diane had attempted to completely force him out of Mickey’s world. Blaine hadn’t been allowed to make any decisions affecting the boy. And so, he’d had no training as a father, not even a dress rehearsal.

Blaine stepped out of a moving man’s way. The small-built, deceptively strong man lifted his end of the bed frame with its heavy oak headboard and carried it into the house with his partner. The house, with furniture coming and going, looked as if it had been hit by a hurricane.

Just like his life, Blaine thought.

It could have been a great deal worse. He looked toward his son sitting at the kitchen table. There couldn’t have been a more sweet-tempered boy on the face of God’s earth, Blaine thought. Mickey was methodically working his way around the peanut butter-and-jam sandwich his grandfather Jack—Blaine’s father-in-law—had made for him. He was biting off the crust before getting down to the heart of it.

Blaine crossed his arms before his chest as he watched Mickey. He could feel his heart swelling. His son. His. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.

Not that he had ever entertained negative thoughts about fatherhood. Just insecure ones. But Mickey was a good kid.

How hard could it be? he mused. After all, he’d been a boy himself once.

Blaine’s mouth curved. According to his mother, sister and any neighbor within a five-mile radius of his old home, he’d been a hellion for the first fourteen years of his life. Even later, as he matured, he’d gotten away with a great deal because of his looks.

Not that he had been bad, either, Blaine thought, just…lively.

Blaine grinned to himself.

The bottom line was that he had been nothing at all like Mickey.

Who was he kidding? Blaine thought as he crossed to the counter and poured a cup of coffee. Smiling at Mickey, he seated himself at the table opposite his son. He didn’t know the first thing about being a father. He didn’t understand Mickey’s needs or anything that was required in raising a sensitive little boy.

Those issues had been left in Diane’s hands. By Diane’s mandate. He’d bristled at the idea to begin with, but later he’d been relieved. The idea of disciplining, of ever having to say no to Mickey, made Blaine think of being the heavy. He was much better suited to the role of being the friend.

Diane had inadvertently done them a disservice, both him and Mickey. By taking complete control, she had left Blaine woefully unprepared for this unexpected turn of events.

She’d shut him out, Blaine knew, to get even with him. To pay him back for imagined wrongs that she was constantly conjuring up in a mind consumed with jealousy. Like the frightened child who saw ghosts in every darkened corner of her room, Diane saw indiscretions everywhere. She was positive of their existence, convicting Blaine because of his looks and his profession.

Diane had been pretty, like a wildflower growing in the meadow. But she had felt outclassed by the women who populated Blaine’s world. As a magazine photographer, Blaine had immortalized some of the world’s most beautiful women on the covers of popular magazines.

When they had first met, Diane had thought that his career was exciting, romantic and wondrously glamorous, even though he was only an apprentice at the time. By the time they divorced, she had considered it a sinful way of life that surrounded Blaine with temptation he was too weak to resist. She’d resented his work the way women resented their husband’s mistresses.

He had tried to reassure her every time a bout of insecurity seized her. But her tantrums had only grown worse and worse and the air would grow thick with the accusations of infidelity she would hurl at him.

And then the ultimatum had come. He could either have her, or his career. He couldn’t have both.

Blaine had never been one to be backed into a corner. Angry at her lack of trust, at the shallow view she had taken of his moral character, Blaine had chosen his career over his jealous wife.

He’d told himself he was better off without her, even though he still loved her. He couldn’t continue to endure the daily fights, the vile recriminations. Or the scenes when they were out in public.

But despite all of that, when he discovered from his father-in-law that Diane was carrying his baby, Blaine was willing to give his marriage one last try. He’d even entertained the idea of finding another career if that was what it took to reassure her.

He could have saved his breath. Diane had taken great delight in telling him what he could do with his “last try.”

He’d given her time, hoping she would change her mind. He had hoped all the way up to the moment the final divorce papers had arrived. It had been Jack who had called him from the hospital telling him he was the father of an eight-pound baby boy.

Blaine had been more than generous in the divorce settlement, making certain that his son would want for nothing. But his easygoing manner had changed when it came to visitation rights. Then he had hung on like a junkyard dog with the only bone in town, threatening to take Diane to court if necessary. She hadn’t wanted him to have any rights at all.

Once again, it had been Jack who had won her over and gotten Diane to acquiesce. Jack had argued that a boy needed to see his father, to have his father in his life, however cursorily.

Blaine had always gotten along with Jack. He’d always managed to get along with almost everyone. Except, it seemed, Diane. Diane, who saw nubile, scantily clad women in every closet, under every bed.

Diane, who had ruined what could have been a beautiful marriage. At least, beautiful was the way Blaine had once envisioned his marriage to be.

But now he knew better. He wasn’t destined for marriage.

Maybe the breakup had been half his fault, he thought now with a posthumous wave of guilt. Maybe he had been too friendly with his models, too outgoing, too enthusiastic about his work. For whatever reason, Diane had misconstrued, misunderstood and misread until the tiny fissures in their marriage had become major faults that brought about an earthquake.

There was no use going over old ground again. There would be no mending of any fences with Diane now. A cross-country trucker who had fallen asleep at the wheel had seen to that.

Blaine hadn’t been here for the news. Or the funeral. He’d come home three days ago from a shoot abroad and pressed the Play button on his answering machine, then gone numb at the knees as he listened. He had melted into a chair, staring in disbelief at the machine. He’d sat there a long time, staring.

Diane had been killed instantly.

All Blaine could think of, over and over again, was thank God Mickey hadn’t been with her. It was only later, after his brain had thawed out and after he’d called Jack to offer his condolences, that he’d wondered: What was he going to do now?

He had known once, or, in his naiveté, had thought he’d known. Ten years ago, Blaine had been all set to be a father, even though he had felt a little shaky at the prospect.

But since then he’d had a great deal of time to become more set in his ways, more entrenched in a bachelor life that was, by definition, solitary. He came and went as he pleased and thought nothing of picking up and going off on a shoot for weeks at a time. There wasn’t a plant in his apartment that needed watering, or a lonesome puppy to hand over to a helpful neighbor. There were no strings, no attachments in his life, save Mickey. And Diane had been responsible for him. Like the wind, Blaine could rustle in and out, leaving behind only a ripple.

But that was all changed now. The wind didn’t have a ten-year-old son to take care of.

Blaine looked over his steaming cup of coffee at Mickey. They hadn’t really talked very much since he had returned to Bedford. He’d held him and hugged him, but they hadn’t really talked. Not even today. There was something forebodingly solemn about Mickey that had Blaine at a loss as to what to say.

Blaine had been here all morning, directing the moving men who were bringing in his possessions and removing some of the pieces that Diane had bought after the divorce. Diane had left everything to Mickey, including the house. Though he would have preferred to remain on his own terrain, Blaine was moving into his son’s life rather than vice versa. He and Jack had discussed it and agreed that this way would be less unsettling than having Mickey move into his apartment, transferring schools and giving up friends at a time when he needed to be surrounded with the familiar.

What was going on in that little head? Blaine wondered. Mickey wasn’t what could be termed an outgoing boy by nature, but Diane’s death had made him so withdrawn, Blaine was concerned.

He studied the small, round face closely. “You okay?”

Mickey looked up at his father with rounded dark eyes that reminded Blaine of two shiny black marbles. His feet swung back and forth beneath the table like unsyncopated windshield wiper blades. One thin shoulder rose and fell as he continued to slowly chew his sandwich, as if he were thinking each bite through to its conclusion before taking the next.

“Yeah, I’m okay.”

This wasn’t easy for Blaine. Laughter had always been the hallmark of the times he and Mickey spent together. Deep-seated, darker emotions were part of a place Blaine had never ventured into with his son.

“Because if you’re not okay—” Blaine stumbled over his tongue, searching for the right words like a jeweler searching for the perfect stone. Blaine tried again, “If you want to talk about it, we can.”

There was just the tiniest hint of a cleft in the chin that Mickey raised, his eyes innocently puzzled. “It?” Mickey echoed quietly.

Blaine licked his lips, fervently wishing he was better at this. His talent was in framing photographs, not paragraphs.

He and Diane had gone from being lovers to being antagonists, but he had made certain that none of the animosity spilled over on Mickey. He’d never made derogatory statements about Diane when Mickey was with him. There had been no veiled vilifications or recriminations, no soft underhanded attempt to make Mickey choose sides. Mickey was too precious to taint with what had gone down between Diane and him. As far as Mickey knew, Blaine was as upset about his mother’s death as he was.

“Your mom’s—” Blaine searched for a euphemism, something he could use in place of that horrid five-letter word. But there was only one way to approach the issue. Honesty. “Death.”

Mickey’s black lashes swept his cheek as he looked down at his feet. He laid the remainder of his sandwich down on the plate. A small crescent was left.

“No,” Mickey said quietly. “I’m okay.”

The hell he was, Blaine thought. But all he could do was be here for him.

And love him, he thought.

Blaine reached across the table and squeezed his son’s hand. Mickey looked up, a faint, sad smile on his lips. There was love in the boy’s eyes, love granted without reservation, without qualifications.

God, he hoped he was up to this. He’d never had a responsibility before that even came close to equaling this.

“Hey, buddy,” the shorter of the two moving men called to Blaine from the hall. His biceps bulged as they strained to keep up his end of the bureau. As he stopped, he tilted it so that it was leaning into him. The burly man nodded at the piece of furniture, which appeared to be cradled against him like a sleeping child on his mother’s bosom. “You want this in the same place as the other piece?”

Blaine nodded vaguely. “Yes, put it in the master bedroom.” His mind wasn’t on his furniture. It was on his son.

They’d made this arrangement, he and Jack, because they both thought it best for Mickey. Jack, a retired police officer, was going to remain with them for at least a month to help out. But Jack had been more than willing to take the boy to his house if a transition period was needed. Mickey, when consulted, had opted to remain here. Little boys were known to change their minds, though.

Blaine leaned toward Mickey, creating an air of confidentiality. “Are you sure you didn’t want to stay with Grandpa for a while?”

Mickey wrapped his hands around the glass of milk before him, but he made no move to drink.

“You.” His voice was barely above a whisper. “I want to stay with you.” He swallowed before raising his eyes to his father’s face. Hope and fear chose their battleground there. “Unless you don’t want me.”

Blaine’s mug met the table surface with a thud as he rose from the chair. He circumvented the table to Mickey’s side. Leaning against the table, he placed his hands on the small shoulders.

“Don’t you ever, ever think that.”

His tone was far harsher than he believed himself capable of with Mickey. Harsh and choked with emotion. What sort of trash had Diane filled his son’s head with? he wondered angrily. Had she told the little boy his father didn’t care in order to make him choose sides? He might have refrained from making references about Diane in the boy’s presence, but Blaine knew that the arrangement had not been reciprocated by the small things the boy would occasionally let drop.

“I want you.” His eyes held his son’s. “I have always wanted you. I will always want you.” His voice softened. “Understand?”

Mickey blinked, then, slowly, the solemn expression on his face faded in intensity as he nodded. “Yes, I understand.”

Blaine released his son’s shoulders, aware that he might have been holding him a little too tightly.

“It’s not going to be easy,” Blaine said after a moment.

Easy? God, it was going to be downright hard, he thought, but he could manage it. He’d already taken the first major step. He’d moved back into the house. A house full of memories, not only for Mickey, but for him. It was here where he and Diane had begun their marriage. And here where it had died that awful, rainy Thursday night, when he had walked out for the last time.

She’d kept the house after the divorce for the same reason she had kept him away from Mickey as much as possible. To spite him because he had cared about it.

“But we’re going to manage,” Blaine promised Mickey now, with a great deal more certainty than he felt. “He—ck.” At the last moment, he switched the word that had naturally sprung to his lips. He was going to have to curb his language now, he thought. Another change. But Mickey was worth it. The boy was worth everything. “With Grandpa here to help out,” Blaine continued, “we’ll be just like the family on ‘My Three Sons.’” He laughed and amended, “Minus a couple of sons, of course.”

“Huh?” Mickey’s expression told Blaine that he had lost his way.

It took Blaine a moment to remember that Diane hadn’t allowed the boy to watch television. She’d called it a waste of time. Mickey had never had the opportunity to catch the classic sixties program in reruns.

“Never mind, that’ll be part of your education,” he promised. Between classic cartoons in syndication and selected other programs Blaine had already mentally earmarked for Mickey, the boy had a lot of catching up to do.

He cupped the boy’s cheek, the wonder of his new situation not fully registering, yet. He had a son depending on him now. Full time. It still took his breath away when he thought about it.

Blaine dropped his hand and straightened. As he took Mickey’s dish and his own drained coffee mug to the sink, he heard an unsettling thud coming from the general direction of the master bedroom. He winced and wondered if wood glue could rectify whatever had just happened.

He looked down at Mickey, who was shadowing his every step. “So, you’re sure you don’t want to talk about, uh, anything?”

“Sure,” Mickey echoed. He underlined his statement with a nod of his head.

Blaine wasn’t convinced. Mickey couldn’t be as calm as he appeared. Could he?

Having rinsed the plate without looking, Blaine placed it on the rack. “Well, I’m here for you if you do decide that you want to talk or—something.”

Blaine shoved his hands into his pockets as he went out to see how the movers were faring. God, he was going to make a mess of it, he thought with a wave of anxiety. He just knew it.

But Blaine knew that all he could do was place one foot in front of the other and pray that he didn’t step on anything.

She hated funerals, absolutely hated them.

Bridgette Rafanelli knew that it had been cowardly of her. But she hadn’t been able to make herself attend the funeral, even though Diane had been a friend.

No, Bridgette amended fiercely, because Diane had been a friend. There was something altogether spirit-shredding about listening to final words being said about a person who had been alive and vibrant only a few days ago.

She couldn’t go.

Funerals reminded her of when she had lost her mother. Then she had been forced to stand between her father and Nonna, listening to a white-haired priest saying words about someone she would never see again. Nonna had held on to her hand tightly, silently offering her a wealth of comfort. It hadn’t been enough. Bridgette remembered the church growing smaller and then disappearing. She had woken up on a cold, cracked leather sofa in the rectory, with her grandmother hovering over her.

Bridgette let out a long breath as she guided her car into a residential development. She might be short on courage when it came to standing and listening to eulogies, but she was long on compassion and love. Right now, Mickey O’Connor needed both.

There was a very special place in her heart for Mickey. With his dark, heart-melting looks and soulful black eyes, he looked exactly like photographs she’d seen of her uncle Gino when he was that age. Gino had only been two years older than Mickey when her father had left her with Nonna and him. That had been a year after Mama had died. Gino had been more like a big brother to her than an uncle. He’d brought a great deal of comfort and laughter into her life, as had Nonna.

It was time to pass on the favor.

She brought her white convertible to a stop at the curb. The driveway was blocked by a huge moving van. As she watched, two men in beige coveralls came out of the house, struggling with Diane’s four-poster bed.

Was Mickey moving away?

Her mouth hardened as she remembered things Diane had told her about her ex-husband. The rat probably couldn’t wait to sell her things and rent out the house. She thought of Mickey. He was so painfully shy. How was he going to adjust to so many changes?

By the time she approached the opened door and knocked on the jamb, Bridgette had accused, tried and convicted Blaine O’Connor of emotional child abuse.

Bridgette knocked again, fully expecting to look into Jack Robertson’s weathered face. Nonna had attended the funeral to lend her emotional support to Jack. She’d been seeing Jack socially for almost a year now, thanks to Bridgette’s introduction. Her grandmother had told her that Diane’s father was going to be staying with Mickey until some sort of final arrangements could be made.

Obviously they’d been made faster than either one of them had anticipated.

Nonna hadn’t mentioned that anyone else would be staying with Mickey. She certainly hadn’t mentioned a tall, broad-shouldered man in a faded blue shirt and even more faded blue jeans. He had silky dark hair and troubled green eyes as he looked down at her.

She knew who he was immediately.

He looked like Mickey, except for the eyes. And except for the fact that innocence that was so blatantly stamped on Mickey’s face had been chiseled out of Blaine’s.

Bridgette attempted to swallow the animosity that instantly sprang up to seize her by the throat as fragments of things Diane had told her swam through her mind. She succeeded only marginally.

If she was selling something, Blaine thought, this raven-haired woman was going about it all wrong. The scowl on her face would have a lesser man quaking in his shoes, even if he was innocent.

But Blaine was well versed in accusing looks. Diane had been a master at them.

“Yes?”

Bridgette squared her shoulders as she unconsciously ran a hand through her hair. It was a nervous habit Nonna chided her for.

“I’m here to see Mickey.”

The movers were approaching the house with Blaine’s fifty-inch television set. Instinctively, he grasped the unknown woman by the shoulders and maneuvered her out of the way. He managed to draw her momentarily into the house.

As she pulled back, he looked at her curiously, humor curving his mouth. “I know he’s a serious boy, but aren’t you a little old for him?”

Bridgette didn’t care for his cocky attitude, or the way he had handled her as if she were a chair, in the way. “Is there an age requirement for friends?”

He should have worn his parka for that one, he thought, a little amused at her retort. Pure frost. Who was she?

“No, of course not.”

With a photographer’s eye, he studied her for a moment. Blaine could envision her in a half dozen layouts. If the woman didn’t model, she should. The nice thing about photographs, he mused, was that you never heard the model’s voice. This one’s was low and throaty. And accusing as hell.

“Now that you’re in my house, would you mind if I asked who you are?”

His house? The man worked fast. “I’m Bridgette Rafanelli, Mickey’s music teacher.”

Another thing he wasn’t aware of, he thought. He wondered how long Mickey had been taking lessons. He had just assumed that the piano in the living room was for show. Diane had always enjoyed putting on airs.

There were so many things about Mickey that he didn’t know, he realized, frustration gnawing away at him.

Blaine extended his hand. “I’m Mickey’s father, Blaine O’Connor.”

Bridgette had every intention of ignoring his hand, but that would have made her as boorish as she knew he was. So instead, she thrust her hand into his and shook it tersely, then pulled it away, as if it were odious to touch him.

“I know.”

By her judgmental tone, Blaine surmised that she had heard about him from Diane and that whatever she had heard was decidedly unflattering.

“That makes you one up on me.” He slid his hands into his pockets as he kept one eye on the movers. He had no intention of allowing them to manhandle his set.

Blaine saw the frown on her mouth deepen. “I take it you were also a friend of Diane’s.”

“Yes.”

Whatever Diane had said must have been horrid. Her voice fairly dripped with acrimony. Blaine felt annoyance rising at being prejudged this way. He opened his mouth to ask her what her problem was when she strode past him, her eyes on the piano.

She pointed toward it. “Are you leaving the piano?”

He came up behind her. He was almost a foot taller, he thought. “Yes.”

“Good.” She looked around. The house appeared in a state of utter chaos. And Mickey was nowhere to be seen. She turned around to look at Blaine and nearly bumped into him. Space was at a premium and somehow, he seemed to take up all of it. “May I see Mickey?”

Attitude. The lady exuded attitude. The wrong kind of attitude and he’d had just about enough of it. Blaine folded his arms before him as he studied her. He took his time answering, enjoying the fact that his drawl apparently seemed to annoy her.

“You can if you tell me why you sound as if your tongue is a sword and I’m the pumice stone you’re determined to sharpen it on.”

Diane had said he was charming and Bridgette could see it, in a rough sort of way. That only intensified her adverse reaction to him. “Diane told me a great deal about you.”

Blaine’s easy gaze narrowed. “And you’ve decided that only pure gospel passed Diane’s lips.”

“I don’t see much to contradict her.” She gestured toward the movers. They were taking out Diane’s white marble-topped table. “You’re getting rid of her things.”

He didn’t see how this was any business of hers. “Just some of them. So that I can move mine in.”

She looked at him in surprise. “You’re moving in?”

He liked the way surprise rounded her mouth. It was an interesting mouth, he decided. Under other circumstances, perhaps even a tempting mouth. “To be with my son.” He emphasized each word.

For a moment, Blaine’s statement took some of the indignant wind out of her sails. Diane had maintained that Blaine wanted to have no part of his son. This was a twist she hadn’t expected.

“Blaine, I thought I’d take Mickey and run to the store.” A gravely voice boomed out, announcing Jack Robertson’s appearance. “You mind watching this four-legged nuisance while we’re gone?”

The dog in question, a three-year-old German shepherd named Spangles that had been a gift from Blaine, barked in protest, as if knowing he was under discussion.

Jack halted abruptly when he saw that his former son-in-law had company. Didn’t take the man long, Jack thought without resentment. What Blaine and Diane had had died a long time ago. He couldn’t be faulted for getting on with his life.

And then the woman turned around and Jack grinned broadly, his tanned face dissolving into creases and lines that Nonna had confided to Bridgette were “sexy.”

He put his hands out and took both of Bridgette’s in his. “Hello, Bridgette. We missed you at the funeral.”

Uncomfortable, Bridgette lifted a shoulder and then let it fall. She resisted the temptation of dragging a hand through her hair. She supposed that there was no excuse for not attending the funeral. She had even gone so far as to get dressed in a somber navy blue dress and gotten in behind the wheel of her car.

But at the end, she couldn’t bring herself to drive to the church. She couldn’t even turn on the ignition. If she wasn’t there for the service, for the interment, then some part of her could go on believing that Diane was still alive.

“Diane knew how I felt about funerals. She would have understood.” Bridgette placed her arms around the older man. “Jack, I’m so very sorry.”

He patted her shoulder, determined not to break down. It wasn’t the way he saw himself. Tears were for private moments when he was alone.

“Me, too, Bridgette. Me, too.”

The sad moment was dissolved as a high voice squealed. “Bridgette, you’re here.”

Bridgette just had time to step away from Jack before she found her waist engulfed as Mickey threw his arms around her.

She laughed as she hugged him to her. “I sure am, sweetheart.”

Blaine could only look on in awe. It was the most emotional display he’d seen from Mickey since the accident.

His eyes met Bridgette’s over Mickey’s head. There was just a trace of a smug smile on her lips.

Chapter Two

Bridgette held Mickey against her. She ached for him when she thought of what his young heart had to endure. Death was always difficult to cope with, but it seemed so much more brutal when it invaded the life of a child. More than anything, she wished that there was something she could do for him.

Without thinking, she stroked his hair, just the way she’d seen Diane do a hundred times before.

Mickey pulled away from her with a jerk, as if something had suddenly snapped shut within him. The impression wasn’t negated when Bridgette looked down at him. The friendliness was gone, wiped away like a chalk drawing on the sidewalk in the rain. In its place there was a somber cast in his eyes which brought a chill to her heart.

“Mickey?”

Hand extended, Bridgette took a step toward him, then stopped. She had the definite feeling that she was intruding.

Never forgetting what her own childhood was like, both the good and the bad, Bridgette prided herself on being instinctively good with children. It was a gift rather than something she had to nurture. She truly enjoyed their company and they sensed it and responded to her. Especially shy children like Mickey.

This reaction was something she was entirely unprepared for.

Mickey licked his lips and shrugged, his shoulders moving independently of each other. He looked uneasy, lost. Looking down at the floor, he shoved his hands deep into his pockets.

“I got my video game on pause,” he mumbled to the rug. “I can’t keep it that way or it’ll get ruined. That’s what Mom says. Said. I gotta go.”

Mickey turned and fled. Spangles followed like a four-legged shadow.

Bridgette could have sworn she’d heard Mickey’s voice crack, though his expression had remained frozen, unemotional. It was all the motivation she needed. But as she began to follow after him, a hand fell on her shoulder, preventing her.

Just barely suppressing her annoyance, she looked up at Blaine.

He waited a moment before he dropped his hand from her shoulder. “Maybe he just needs to work this out for himself.”

That would be the path he’d take, she thought. Noninterference. Translation: Do nothing, just as he had been doing all along. The man hadn’t a clue as to what Mickey needed.

“He’s ten years old. He doesn’t know how to work this out for himself,” she shot back. “What he needs is to be held.”

With the bearing of a man who knew an altercation in the making when he saw one, Jack physically placed himself between them. “What he needs is not to hear two adults arguing over him.”

Bridgette flushed as she turned toward Jack, embarrassed at having taken the safety latch off her temper. But she was a passionate woman who took each emotion she was experiencing to the limit.

Ignoring Blaine, she placed her hand on Jack’s arm. Comfort seemed to flow from her very fingertips. “I’m sorry, Jack. I guess my emotions just got the better of me.” She knew Jack understood. She wasn’t all that different from her grandmother. “Is there anything I can do for you or Mickey?”

Jack shook his head, a bittersweet smile on his lips. Bridgette meant well, but there wasn’t anything she could do. Nothing anyone could do, really.

“You can give us time, honey.” He patted the hand on his arm, knowing that she was in need of comfort herself. She’d lost a friend she’d cared about. “That’s the only thing that’s going to help. Time. Putting one foot in front of the other and getting from here to there.”

He was right. She knew that from experience. Still, she wished there was something she could do. Something that didn’t make her feel so useless, so frustrated. Especially when it involved Mickey.

Bridgette blew out a breath. “Well, if you think of anything, I’m here.” She looked in the direction that Mickey had gone.

She really didn’t have to say it, but it was nice to hear. “I know.” Jack fought back the clawing emotion that threatened to overwhelm him. Tears, he knew, were going to be a part of his life for a long time to come. But he refused to give in to them except in his room at night. So he forced a smile to his lips for everyone’s sake, including his own. “Tell Sophia I appreciated the casseroles. I didn’t really feel like cooking.”

If anyone could help him through this, Bridgette knew her grandmother could. Zestful and vivacious even though she was well through her fifth decade, Sophia Rafanelli had the enthusiasm for life of a woman one-third her age. Nonna had seen Bridgette through the darkest parts of her life.

“You can tell her yourself. She plans to come by this evening.”

Jack nodded, visibly brightening. “Great.” Emotion threatened to take hold of him. He thought he’d be better off alone just now. Jack edged his way to the hall. “I’ll see you later.”

Nonna would help Jack, Bridgette mused as the man left the room. But who or what was going to help Mickey?

The answer was plain. She was.

Bridgette took a step toward the hall, only to feel the same hand on her shoulder, laying a bit more heavily this time. Annoyance leapt up again. She glared at his hand as if it were a disembodied limb until he removed it.

The woman had a look that could ignite wet kindling, Blaine thought as he dropped his hand to his side. “I’d rather that you didn’t go there right now.”

There was no point in playing innocent. They both knew she meant to go to Mickey’s room. “Why?”

Blaine saw no reason to give her any explanations. “He’s my son,” he answered flatly.

It amazed Bridgette that he didn’t stumble over the word. It was certainly foreign enough to him. Everything that Diane had told her about him rose up at once, crowding her mind.

“That’s not a reason, that’s a fact.” Her eyes narrowed as she looked up at him. “One that didn’t seem to trouble you before.”

Blaine had no idea what this woman was talking about, nor why he even cared. But puzzles had always drawn him in. “Excuse me?”

Didn’t he care how all this affected Mickey? Hadn’t it occurred to him that Mickey had needed him before this day? “I don’t remember seeing you coming around.”

The woman’s gall took his breath away. She certainly outdistanced Diane when it came to nerve. “I didn’t know I was supposed to check in with you.”

Bridgette saw temper flaring in his eyes. Hers rose higher. It was fueled by her feelings for Mickey and by the indignities that Diane had confided she’d suffered. Bridgette was surprised that Blaine even had the nerve to show his face after all this time. Most of all, she was surprised that Jack wasn’t making plans to ride him out on a rail. But then, Jack had always been a very kind man.

“From what I gathered, it wouldn’t have been often.” Bridgette turned on her heel. She made it all the way across the threshold before Blaine grabbed her arm and turned her around to face him.

“Just a minute. I think I’d like a word with you.” The defiant look on her face made him think of a winter storm about to break. If she thought he was going to back off because of it, she was in for a surprise. “A very long word.”

“All right.” Bridgette pulled her arm away and then folded both in front of her. “I’m listening.” Not that anything he had to say would make a difference in the way she felt, she added silently.

She was pushing buttons that brought back scenes from his marriage. But Blaine held his ground instead of ignoring her and walking away. This wasn’t Diane. This was some crazy woman who thought she had a place in his son’s life. Why, he didn’t know.

“I don’t even really know who the hell you are, lady.”

Bridgette gave a short laugh. “I’m surprised Mickey didn’t say the same thing to you when you showed up, omitting the ‘lady’ part, of course.”

The word shrew leapt to his mind. But that wasn’t unexpected, seeing as how she and Diane had been friends.

“My son knows who I am.”

“Long-term memory, no doubt.”

Blaine curbed the very real desire to take her by the arms and shake her until she made some sense. “Did you come here to go a few rounds with me for some warped reason?”

The moving men were looking at them. They’d stopped working and were obviously very entertained by what was transpiring. Taking her by the arm, he ushered her none-too-gently back into the living room as he mentally cursed himself for losing his temper like this. He was an easygoing man who hardly ever raised his voice. Diane had been the only one who had ever made him shout.

Until now.

Hanging on to what was left of her temper, Bridgette waved a dismissive hand at Blaine.

“I didn’t even know you were here. I just came by to see how Jack and Mickey were doing.” She paused for a moment as she looked him squarely in the eye. “Mickey obviously isn’t doing very well.”

Exasperation shouted for release. Just who did she think she was, coming here and passing judgment? “His mother just died, what do you expect him to be? Practicing cartwheels for a circus act?” A loud noise in the background reminded him of the movers, as well as of Jack and Mickey. With effort, he lowered his voice again. “All things considered, he’s doing rather well.”

“Oh, really?”

She tossed her hair over her shoulder. The slight action looked like a challenge from where he stood. Her hands balled into fists at her waist didn’t do anything to dispel that impression.

“And just what is your definition of ‘well’?” The man was not only heartless, he was blind to boot, Bridgette thought.

For two cents, he’d gladly clip that raised chin of hers. “Not that it’s any business of yours, Ms. Fanelli—”

“Rafanelli,” she corrected tersely.

“Ms. Rafanelli,” he echoed in the same tone she’d used, “My definition of well is the way Mickey is handling it. He’s behaving calmly, like an adult.”

There were words for dunderheads like O’Connor, but she refrained from using them. She didn’t want Mickey hearing her swear. But she had to bite her lip, physically holding back the barrage. When she finally spoke, it was in a low, barely controlled voice.

“You probably missed this piece of information in your vast travels around the globe, but Mickey is only ten. He’s not supposed to act like an adult until he’s past puberty.” Her eyes washed over Blaine. The look in them was far from flattering, even though she wasn’t oblivious to the fact that he was a very good-looking man. “Of course, for some it’s a reversed process.”

He’d had enough of her sarcasm. “Look, I really don’t have time for this—”

That had been the excuse Diane said he always used when she called him, asking him to come see his son. “Don’t have time for very much except your work, do you?”

The image of wrapping his hands around her throat seemed to spring up out of nowhere. He wasn’t a violent man by nature. Nonetheless, it was a very pleasing image.

“Not that I really care about your opinion, but just what is that supposed to mean?” Before Bridgette could respond, he added, “For that matter, what are all of your sarcastic remarks supposed to mean?” It took a great deal to keep from lashing out at her. “You don’t even know me.”

That’s where he was wrong. Bridgette set her mouth hard. Diane had told her plenty about this man, the heartache he’d caused her, the pain. “I know enough.”

There was a steely look in his eyes. His tone dropped. It was harsh, devoid of emotion, as if it had all been spent. Or kept under lock and key. “From Diane.”

Blaine saw her raise her head, as if to defend the dead woman. Diane might be gone, but it seemed that her staff had been taken up by another. Even dead she knew how to make his life difficult. “Well, did it ever occur to you that perhaps she colored things a little? Or a lot, as the case may be.”

She wouldn’t have expected him to say anything else. But Bridgette had facts at her disposal. “You were in London for Christmas.”

The statement was worded like an accusation. “What does—?”

She didn’t let him finish. “And you were in the Philippines, doing layouts for the ever famous swimsuit issue for Mickey’s tenth birthday.”

That had been unavoidable. He’d been facing an ironclad deadline. But he had managed to call Mickey and talk to him at length. Only because Jack had answered the telephone. Had it been Diane, he would have never had the opportunity to talk to the boy. He and Mickey had celebrated the day a week later. Royally.

“Yes, but—”

She ignored his attempt at a protest. Nothing he could say would negate the facts. “On Mickey’s first birthday, you were—” She looked up at him innocently. “Where was it again?”

Blaine shoved his hands into his pockets much the way Mickey had. “Canada. Quebec.” He grounded out the answer through clenched teeth. He remembered being very lonely that day. He’d missed Mickey something fierce. “Is this a trial?”

It was a rhetorical question. She had obviously already convicted him and was leading him to the gallows.

She wished Jack hadn’t left. She felt better talking to him, not arguing with this biological miscreant. “No, I’m merely substantiating my point.”

Blaine’s expression hardened, hiding the anger boiling just beneath. “Which is?”

“That what Diane told me was true.”

Leave it to Diane to skip the part about how he made it up to Mickey. How he always found a way to make it up to Mickey. The nature of his work didn’t allow him the freedom to live like most men. That was both the beauty and the burden of his career. And even if he hadn’t had that career, there’d always been Diane to act as a stumbling block.

“Yes, but—”

Her eyes dared him to deny what she was saying. “There is no ‘but’ here, O’Connor. It’s either true or it’s not and you just said it was, thereby dismissing your earlier insinuation that Diane lied about you.”

Why he was even bothering to stand here, arguing with her, within earshot of his father-in-law and the movers, was beyond him. Maybe it was the fact that he had never managed to convince Diane that he was innocent that goaded him on to make her understand.

“Look, before you pass judgment on me—”

He had told her what she wanted to know and she didn’t care to stand around, listening to him attempt to talk his way out of it.

Her eyes were cold as they appraised him. She could see why Diane had fallen for him. He was tall, muscular and had a definite sexual air about him that would have been appealing if she didn’t know what she did about him.

“I’m not passing judgment. I couldn’t care less what you do or where you go. I do, however, care a great deal about Mickey.”

“Why?” She wasn’t a relative. He saw no reason for her to be so adamant about the boy.

She debated ignoring his question, then relented. “For a lot of reasons. For one, I’m his godmother.”

It took him a moment to assimilate her words. Diane had deliberately planned Mickey’s christening to take place while he was away. As always, he hadn’t found out about the ceremony until after the fact.

“You are?”

His ignorance of the fact didn’t surprise her. Diane had said he had cut himself off from his son’s life except for the mandatory child support payments. And even they were late in coming.

“Didn’t know that, either, did you?”

The tally against this man was adding up. He was an absentee father, just like her own had been. Oh, Carlo Rafanelli had been there physically, providing a roof over her head and food for her sustenance. But emotionally, where it counted, it was as if he didn’t exist. Or she didn’t. And when he had remarried, he had moved away, leaving her in Nonna’s care. In the end, he’d gone on with his life as if he’d never had a daughter at all.

Standing here, talking to this thickheaded, thick-skinned oaf, brought it all back to her.

Well, maybe she thought she had some right to interfere in Mickey’s welfare, but not in Blaine’s book. Especially not with that attitude. “As his godmother, it would have been your obligation to look after Mickey if both his parents were gone.”

It was on the tip of her tongue to say that they might as well have been for all the difference he made, but she bit it back.

There, he thought with a small measure of triumph, that seemed to have managed to shut her up. “As it happens, I’m very much alive and intend to take care of Mickey on my own.”

She had no idea why he was here—possibly to ease his conscience, or maybe just to sell off Diane’s furniture. But there was no doubt in her mind that the man Diane had told her about would soon be off somewhere. Without Mickey in tow. Seeing as how he was a philandering womanizer, that would probably be all to the good.

Bridgette nodded, making no attempt to hide her skepticism. “Fine. How?”

There seemed to be no end to this woman’s audacity. “Excuse me?”

“How?” she repeated, slowly mouthing the word as if she were talking to someone with greatly diminished mental capacities. “What are your plans for him?”

He had barely gotten his head together and accepted the facts that Diane was dead and that he was a full-time father and had to change his entire life around. Restructuring Mickey’s life was something he hadn’t gotten around to, yet.

Blaine waved his hand around in frustration. “Beyond sending him to school tomorrow, I haven’t thought that out, yet.”

She was forced to step out of the way and toward him as the movers brought in a rather scarred-looking credenza. As soon as she could, she moved aside. She didn’t like standing so close to him. There was too much charged tension in the air.

“So, you plan to live here with him?”

“Yes.” He nodded, then shrugged. That, too, was up in the air. “For now.”

He made it sound tentative. Mickey needed stability. He needed a lot of things, especially a loving father, but at the very least, he needed stability. O’Connor owed him that much. If he didn’t think so, he was badly mistaken. And Bridgette would be the one to show him.

“I think you should try to make life as normal as possible for him.”

That was exactly why he was moving in. So why was hearing it from her lips setting his teeth on edge? Right about now, if she said snow was white, he would be tempted to shout that it was black.

“What you think is completely irrelevant to me, Ms.—look, what’s your first name again?”

“Bridgette.” She didn’t want him calling her by her first name. She wanted their relationship to remain completely formal. “Ms. Rafanelli will do just fine.”

The absence of Ms. Rafanelli would do even better, he thought. It was time to get on with the rest of his life and get her out of here. He took her elbow. “Well, thanks for coming.”

Bridgette eluded his hold. “I’d like to say goodbye to Mickey.”

If he let her go, there was no telling when she would leave. “I’ll tell him for you.”

The hell he would, she thought.

“Thanks, but I’d rather do it myself.”

With that, she hurried down the hall before he attempted to forcibly eject her. She wouldn’t put it past him. Any man who could neglect a child was capable of almost anything.

Bridgette stopped just short of Mickey’s doorway. Singsong music was coming out of the room. The door was slightly ajar. She pushed it open slowly with her fingertips. Inside, Mickey was sitting on the floor in front of a small portable television set. He was as erect as if a ruler had been inserted under his hockey team T-shirt. Bridgette quietly slipped into the room.

Mickey didn’t even notice her presence. His eyes were focused on the colorful screen, his finger mechanically pumping the buttons on the control pad.

He didn’t seem to be in the room at all.

Cry, Mickey, cry.

On-screen, a tiny gnome in green livery was valiantly attempting to rescue an equally tiny princess in a far-off castle. The gnome kept falling into the moat. Each time he did, another one of his lives was lost.

“How many points do you have?” she asked softly.

Mickey didn’t bother to turn around. It was as if he’d known she was there all the time. Known and hadn’t reacted. “Nine hundred and three. But I’ve only got one life left.”

He usually played very well. And likely as not, he would ask her to join him. He made no such request today.

“Better be careful then.”

There was nothing left to say for the moment. Mickey had completely withdrawn into himself. Maybe Jack was right. Maybe Mickey did need a little time to himself first. “I’m going home now.”

Mickey nodded. The gnome fell into the moat again. The sign Game Over flashed. He started a new game.

She wanted to sweep him into her arms again. To hold him and rock him and let him cry his heart out. Stymied, she remained where she was.

“If you need anything, my telephone number is number three on the ReDial.” She’d helped Diane program it. Diane had always been so lost when it came to anything remotely complicated. “Call me anytime if you need to talk.”

Mickey nodded again. She knew he wouldn’t be calling. At least, not for a while.

Bridgette felt awkward. She had never felt awkward with a child before, but then, there was the aura of a third party in the room with them. Death made her feel uncomfortable and at a loss.

“Anyway,” she said, backing up toward the door, “I’ll see you tomorrow after school for lessons.”

“Okay,” he mumbled to his control pad.

Bridgette was desperate to get any sort of reaction from Mickey. It was as if that one moment when he’d first seen her had been a slip. She saw no trace of the boy she knew. “We can go over a new song.”

“Okay.”

She sighed inwardly and retreated. She’d try again tomorrow. “Bye.”

He glanced at her for a moment, a troubled, lost soul, before returning to his game. “’Bye.”

Feeling frustrated beyond words, Bridgette turned and walked directly into Blaine. He’d been standing right outside Mickey’s room, obviously listening to every word. Needing a target, she selected him.

Bridgette pushed Blaine away, trying not to notice that she had experienced a definite reaction to brushing up against his very hard body.

“Why are you hovering over me?” she whispered angrily as she stepped to the side so that Mickey couldn’t hear them.

He had a question of his own. “Why are you coming back tomorrow?”

She had a feeling that he’d like nothing better than to bar her from Mickey’s life. Fat chance.

“I already told you. Besides being his godmother, I’m also his piano teacher. We have a lesson tomorrow.” She was determined to give the boy some semblance of order within the chaos he found himself in. It was a given that this man wouldn’t.

“I’m canceling it. You don’t have to come by.” The last thing he needed while he was trying to establish a fuller relationship with Mickey was to have her around, sniping at him.

Oh, no, it wasn’t going to be that easy. It wasn’t going to be easy at all. Getting rid of her was going to be downright impossible, she promised him silently. She had an emotional stake in Mickey. For his sake and Diane’s, she intended to be around.

“I’m paid up through the end of the month,” she informed him as she crossed to the front door. “I’ll be back.” She paused in the doorway and looked at him over her shoulder. “Some of us still honor commitments.”

There was no denying the fact that the woman was gorgeous, just as there was no denying the fact that she was a shrew. A pity.

“And some of you need to be committed,” he muttered under his breath.

She grinned for the first time since she had entered. “Exactly. ‘Bye, Jack,” she called out. “I’m leaving.”

Not far away enough, Blaine thought as he closed the door firmly behind her.

Jack walked in, too late to say goodbye. He gathered by Blaine’s expression that the meeting with Bridgette had gone from bad to worse after he’d left the room. The fact amused him. “She’s something else, isn’t she?”

Blaine turned, then made an effort to regain his composure. “That’s putting it rather mildly.”

Jack laughed as he led the way into the kitchen. “You should see her grandmother.”

Blaine caught the fond note in Jack’s voice. Jack had been a widower for as long as he’d known him. He had never thought of the man as being interested in finding a romantic partner. He wondered if Jack was being taken advantage of.

“Anything like her?”

Jack took out two mugs from the cupboard and set them on the counter. The expression on his face belonged to that of a man years younger. “Yes. A warm, passionate woman who makes you glad you’re alive.”

Blaine shook his head as he watched Jack pour coffee into his mug. “Then she’s nothing at all like her granddaughter.”

Jack lowered himself into the kitchen chair, then took a tentative sip of his coffee. He studied his former son-in-law over the rim of his mug. “Bridgette was very close to Diane.”

Blaine had already gathered that. He joined Jack at the table. “She looks like she wants to get close to me, too.” He saw the quizzical look in Jack’s eyes. “With a hatchet.”

Though he loved his daughter, Jack had been very aware that Diane had had her shortcomings. “Diane might have told her a few things—”

Now there was an understatement. “If she had told Bridgette that I was the Boston Strangler and Bluebeard rolled up into one, I still would have had a warmer reception.”

Blaine didn’t know Bridgette the way he did. “Bridgette’s just worried about Mickey.”

“Well, so am I,” Blaine snapped. He realized that he was letting his own tension spill out. Maybe that was why he’d balked at what Bridgette said, as well. No, he amended, the woman had merited his reaction. But Jack didn’t.

He sighed, leaning back in his chair. “Jack, I have no idea how to be a father.”

Jack laughed softly under his breath. “When you find out, you can let the rest of us in on it.” Mentally, he postponed his trip to the store. It was time to walk Spangles. Mickey would probably enjoy that more. He rose stiffly and clamped a hand on Blaine’s shoulder. “Mostly it’s just flying by the seat of your pants and hoping you don’t crash-land.”

Blaine shook his head. That wasn’t the way he saw it. “My dad always seemed to know what to do, what to say. He was never at a loss in any situation.”

Then he’d be the first, Jack thought. “Your dad was just good at playacting. Fathers only pretend to know what they’re talking about.” He considered Blaine the son he’d never had. “Remember, every father was once a little boy. It’ll work out, Blaine. It’s just going to take time. If it makes you feel any better, I’ll hang around for as long as it takes for you to get comfortable with this.”

Blaine knew it was the coward’s way out, but right now, he wasn’t feeling all that brave about the situation. And talking to Bridgette had just made it worse. “Thanks, I appreciate that.”

Jack easily dismissed his thanks. “And don’t be too hard on Bridgette. She loves Mickey a lot.”

Why did he get this feeling that it was a competition between them? “So do I.”

Jack winked, amused at Blaine’s tone. “That gives you something in common.”

Blaine set his empty mug down and pretended to shiver. “Now that’s a scary thought.”

Jack laughed again. It was good to begin to feel alive again. He had three other daughters, but Diane had been his baby. Perhaps he had always favored her because, of all his children, she’d been the one who needed it most, the one with so many insecurities. For whatever the reason, he’d closed his eyes to a lot of her faults.

“After I walk Spangles, I’ll help you hook up your VCR.”

Blaine looked at him in surprise. “You know how to do that?”

Jack pretended to take umbrage at Blaine’s tone. “Hell, not everyone over fifty is a dinosaur.” He squinted a little as he focused on Blaine. “I could probably beat you at that video game as well.”

“Probably.” Blaine’s smile faded a little. “Jack?”

Jack took a box of dog biscuits out of the cupboard and pocketed one. Sometimes, Spangles had to be coaxed to head for home. “Yeah?”

Blaine knew he was lucky to have help at a time like this. “Thanks for being here.”

Gratitude always made him uncomfortable, as if he were wearing a scratchy sweater.

“My pleasure, Blaine, my pleasure.” And then he smiled. “I always did like you.”

Blaine nodded. “Too bad Diane didn’t.”

Jack nodded as he left the kitchen. “Yeah, too bad.”

Chapter Three

It seemed rather unusual to Blaine, with all the things he had on his mind, that he would actually find himself thinking of Bridgette. Yet there she was, thrusting herself into his thoughts like a commuter pushing her way through a crowded subway car to reach the door.

And not just once—he could have dealt with it if it had been just once. No, she popped up, unannounced, unwanted, unbidden, several times within the small space of half a day. Considering that they didn’t exactly hit it off on their first meeting, he couldn’t understand why this was happening.

It was enough to make a sane man crazy.

Blaine glanced at Mickey sitting beside him on the sofa. Dinner had long since been over and Jack had gone out with Bridgette’s grandmother, an attractive, vivacious woman who didn’t deserve the term grandmother or, in Blaine’s opinion, the ignoble honor of being related to Bridgette. That left the two of them alone in the house, if he didn’t count the dog. He knew that it was important to establish a solid routine for Mickey. But Blaine’s life had been anything but routine. It wasn’t easy for him, not only adjusting to but laying down a schedule of some sort.

Desperately casting about for a starting point, Blaine had gladly abandoned his unpacking and coaxed Mickey into watching a television program with him. It was a short, snappy sitcom aimed at the family.

Twenty minutes into the program, that show had cut to a commercial for skin cream. The woman caressing the pink jar had an exquisite complexion that would have rivaled Snow White’s.

The enticing pink hue that had crept up Bridgette’s cheek earlier that day flashed through Blaine’s mind like a bolt of lightning in a sudden summer thunderstorm.

He wondered what Diane had actually told her about him to bring about such an intense reaction from her. Whatever it was, it had to be a lie. He was going to have to set her straight.

Blaine sighed, annoyed with himself. Why did he even care what she thought? And why in heaven’s name was she preying on his mind with the tenacity of a carnivorous jackal?

The answer, he supposed, was simple enough if he thought about it. She was returning tomorrow and he didn’t want her to. The last thing he needed right now was recriminations or someone telling him what he was doing wrong. What he needed was someone to tell him what to do right.

He slanted a glance toward his son. Mickey had been sitting beside him on the sofa for the last half hour. He was staring straight ahead at the set, his expression devoid of any emotion. Spangles was parked at the boy’s feet, vainly waiting to be stroked.

Just as Blaine had vainly waited for a glimmer of a smile to appear on Mickey’s face at the on-screen antics of an utterly improbable family. Nothing remotely bearing a resemblance to a smile had creased his son’s lips.

Had Diane’s death completely wiped away Mickey’s feelings? No, he wasn’t going to accept that. He wasn’t certain how, but somehow, he was going to find a way to break through to Mickey.

But not today.

Blaine looked at his watch. It was getting late and was undoubtedly past Mickey’s bedtime. He’d never had the boy with him overnight. Even when he’d had the time, Diane hadn’t allowed it. They’d call it a night, he decided, and start fresh tomorrow.

“Ready for bed?”

Secretly, he hoped for a protest. Little boys always tried to wangle an extra ten minutes or so. It was inherent in their nature. Bedtime was something to be avoided at all costs, even if you were falling on your face, exhausted.

Mickey rose to his feet. Spangles gained his legs beside him. “Sure.”

It suddenly occurred to Blaine that the only spark of emotion he had seen his son display was when the boy had first seen Bridgette. It had gone out almost immediately, but it had been there.

That clinched it. If he listened, he could have sworn he heard a cell door clanging shut.

Bridgette was probably the key to unlocking what was boarded up inside of Mickey. Like it or not, he was going to have to put up with the woman for his son’s sake.

He didn’t like it.

He liked the fact that she was right even less. Right that this subdued manner in which Mickey was dealing with his mother’s death wasn’t good. Blaine readily admitted that he didn’t know much about children, but he knew that Mickey’s reaction just wasn’t natural. He hadn’t seen him shed a single tear, and Jack had told him that the boy had remained dry-eyed at the funeral, as well. Blaine knew Mickey had loved his mother and had been very close to her.

Blaine took Mickey’s hand. It curved, small and lifeless, within his. “Want me to tuck you in?”

“If you want to.”

A conversation with an apathetic, world-weary old man would have yielded more emotion. For a moment, Blaine thought of just retreating, just giving up. It would have been the easy way out.

But then Bridgette’s advice about Mickey’s needs echoed through his mind. Harped on it might have been a more apt description. Still, the point was that he wasn’t going to get anywhere with Mickey if he gave way and retreated.

He had to find a way to reach him, no matter what it took.

Mickey began to cross to the doorway. Blaine sat down on the coffee table in order to be at eye level with the boy. He placed his hands on Mickey’s small shoulders. Mickey turned to look at him. Maybe he could eventually reach him through physical contact.

“No,” Blaine contradicted. “What do you want? I would like to tuck you in, but I don’t want to do anything that might upset you.”

Diane had probably tucked him in hundreds of times and Blaine didn’t want to remind him of that. God, but this road he found himself on was so hard to navigate. He felt as if he were constantly losing ground.

Blaine searched his son’s face, looking to see if anything he was saying was registering.

“Mickey, you’re going to have to help me out here. I know I’m your dad.” Blaine’s mouth curved in a smile. “My name’s on your birth certificate, but that doesn’t mean I have the skills, the training to do this job right. I’ve never been the dad of a ten-year-old before. If I mess up, I want you to tell me.”

Mickey solemnly nodded his head up and down. “Sure, I’ll tell you.”

It was like talking to a glass of water, Blaine thought, frustrated. Releasing Mickey, he rose to his feet. “Okay, we’ll compromise. Why don’t you get ready and I’ll look in on you in a few minutes?”

He expected no protest this time and received none. Mickey left the room.

Behind him, credits were running over a scene of the family they’d been watching for the last half hour. All five people were tangled up in a huge group hug. Blaine pressed the On/Off button. The scene disappeared, folding itself up into a small, round blue dot before vanishing altogether.

He didn’t know why he had wasted his time and Mickey’s watching the show. Life wasn’t a half hour sitcom where problems were neatly resolved in twenty-three minutes—subplots even faster.

But he could wish for that, just this once.

Blaine ran a hand through his hair, upbraiding himself for being foolish. This was going to work out. It was just going to take time. Lots of it.

And some of it, he’d resigned himself, was going to have to be spent in Bridgette’s company. Starting at five tomorrow.

He wondered, as he walked down the hall to Mickey’s room several minutes later, if she was going to be coming by car or by broom.

The door to Mickey’s bedroom stood wide open. Light was flooding out into the hallway. Mickey was afraid of the dark and no paltry night-light adequately held the ghosts and haunts at bay. That was left up to a sixty-watt bulb. And Spangles.

When he looked in, Blaine saw that Mickey was already in bed and apparently asleep. Spangles was stretched out across the foot of the bed like a living black-and-tan accent rug. The German shepherd Blaine had given to his son for his seventh birthday raised his head slightly as Blaine walked in and approached the bed. He was Mickey’s dog all the way.

“Mick?” Blaine whispered softly.

Mickey made no response. Long lashes rested like dark crescents against his cheeks. His breathing was steady and rhythmic.

Blaine felt a mixture of disappointment and relief. He’d wanted another opportunity to talk with Mickey, but he had a gnawing feeling that no matter what he said, nothing would be changed. Not yet, at any rate.

He sighed. He was just going to have to be patient. Like a shot that had to be framed just so, things would fall into place, he promised himself. He loved Mickey too much for things not to work out.

Blaine patted the dog’s head as Spangles rested his muzzle on his paws. His large brown eyes were trained on Mickey.

“At least he feels he has you,” Blaine murmured to the dog. “That’s something.”

Withdrawing quietly from the room, Blaine didn’t see Mickey’s eyes opening. Nor did he see the endless well of sadness in them as Mickey turned toward the wall and the photograph of his mother hanging there.

Blaine realized that he had unconsciously been listening for the sound ever since he’d brought Mickey home from school: the sound of a car pulling up in his driveway. He’d been listening for it, anticipating it and dreading it all at the same time. When he finally heard it, Blaine glanced out the window toward the driveway. He was in time to see Bridgette getting out of her silver compact car.

Obviously her broom was in the shop, he thought.

Bracing himself, telling himself that this was for Mickey, Blaine was at the door when the doorbell rang. It sounded oddly like the bell at a boxing arena. Round two, he imagined. Still, if Mickey responded to her, Blaine supposed he could put up with the woman. In small, bite-size doses.

He opened the door and was surprised to note that she appeared somewhat uncomfortable. Now what? Did she have a bomb strapped to her, set to go off within five minutes, and was now wondering how to remain in his company until it detonated?

Bridgette raised her eyes to his. He looked larger than he had yesterday. Or maybe she just felt smaller. Bridgette wasn’t in her element.

She’d rehearsed the apology all during the drive over. In several different versions. No matter how she phrased it, the apology still sounded wrong. It wasn’t that apologies were foreign to her. She’d certainly done her share of apologizing in her life, mostly to Gino.

No, it was something else, something more. She just didn’t think that the man deserved an apology. In her estimation, he was still a poor excuse for a father, not to mention a wayward husband. The latter was based strictly on Diane’s say-so, but she had no reason to doubt her late best friend’s allegations. Why would Diane have lied to her?

Still she had promised Nonna to try to make friends with him, or at least to be civil for everyone’s sake, especially Mickey’s. Jack had confided to her grandmother last night that he felt Mickey was withdrawing into himself even more than he had first thought. She had seen evidence of that for herself firsthand.

And it was obvious that she couldn’t be there for Mickey, couldn’t help him, if she was busy fighting with his boor of a father.

No, no more recriminations, she upbraided herself just before she’d rung the bell. She’d promised. And, unlike some people, she thought, Blaine’s image coming to mind, she never broke a promise. Mickey was far more important to her than any feelings she might—

“Hello.”

The single word, warm, sexy and enveloping, put her instantly on her guard. Damn, but he did raise her hackles. And, if she were honest with herself, for more reasons than one.

With all her heart, Bridgette wished that Diane hadn’t confided in her to the extent that she had. Listening to the litany of complaints hadn’t enabled her to do anything for Diane. Recounting the tales hadn’t even been cathartic for her friend. Cataloguing Blaine’s faults had been neither cleansing nor helpful to her frame of mind. If anything, it had only depressed Diane.

And it certainly had gone a long way toward tainting her own view of the man, Bridgette thought.

Well, tainted or no, she had a promise to keep.

“Hello,” she echoed. Crossing the threshold, she looked about the living room. It was crowded with boxes, just as it had been yesterday. The man obviously moved fast only when it came to his women. “Is Mickey around?”

“In his room. With Spangles,” Blaine added in case she wanted to take him to task for some reason about leaving the boy alone. Blaine had no way of second-guessing what she would do or say and he wanted to avoid any scene whatsoever for Mickey’s sake.

“Good.” She wanted no witnesses to the scene she was about to play out. “I wanted to talk to you.”

“Oh, great,” he groaned as he shut the door. “Should I go get Jack to act as referee?”

She ignored his sarcastic question, or at least tried to. Bridgette took a deep breath as she turned around to face him.

She turned a little too quickly and her breasts brushed against Blaine. Surprised, he caught her by the shoulders to keep from throwing her off balance. The thought telegraphed itself through his system that touching her, touching any part of her, was a very pleasurable experience. One that, under other circumstances, he would have enjoyed exploring.

As it was, he was afraid of having his hands bitten off. He meant to drop them quickly to his sides, but something inherent within him prevented him from following through. Instead, he slowly slid his palms down the length of her arms before he finally backed away from her.

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.