Daisy's back in town

Chapter Twelve

Daisy laid Pippen on her mother's bed and partially closed the door behind her. His little world was chaotic andhe'd been so tired and cranky for the past few days. Daisy had taken him to the hospital to see Lily this morning,and he hadn't wanted to leave. He was scared and upset and had cried all the way home, finally falling asleep asthey pulled into the driveway. Her mother was still at the hospital with Lily, waiting for news from the doctorsas to when Lily might come home.

Daisy changed into her dark green tank top and khaki shorts. She swept her hair up off the back of her neck andsecured it with a big black claw. She was exhausted and in serious need of caffeine. She might have curled upbeside Pippen, but Nathan wasn't home and she didn't want to be asleep when he returned.

She moved down the stairs to the kitchen and grabbed a Coke out of the refrigerator. Nathan had stuck a note tothe refrigerator door with a little magnet in the shape of Texas. He wrote that he was out riding his skateboard.

The note didn't say when he'd be back, though. She had wanted to remind him that he needed to estimate whenhe'd be back, so she wouldn't worry so much.

This was Lovett, she reminded herself. There really wasn't that much to worry about. There weren't that manyplaces he could get into trouble, but if there was one thing she'd learned from having a boy, it was that if therewasn't trouble, they'd invent it. If there was a puddle, they'd jump in the middle of it. A rock, they'd throw it. ACoke can, they'd smash it. A bird, they'd pretend to shoot it. A handrail on a set of five or more cement steps,they'd ride it on a skateboard, fall and need stitches.

The doorbell rang as Daisy popped the top to her Coke. She took a long drink as she moved through the livingroom. A bowl of glass fruit sat on a wooden end table and she placed the can next to it. She opened the door andhalf expected to see Nathan playing a silly joke by making her answer the door. He was like that sometimes.

Wanting to be treated as an adult, yet at times acting like her little boy. But it wasn't her son.

Jack stood on her mother's porch, sunlight overhead. The shadow of his straw cowboy hat concealed the tophalf of his face. A little flutter tickled her chest and before she could think better of it, the corners of her lipsturned up. "Hey there."

"Are you alone?" he asked, and her smile fell at the flat tone in his voice and grim line of his mouth.

He knows, was her first thought, but just as quickly she dismissed the thought. He couldn't know. "Pippen's herebut he's asleep."

"Where is Nathan?"

Oh, God. The fluttering in her chest picked up a notch or two. "He's riding his skateboard."

He didn't wait for her to invite him in. "No. He's not," he said as he walked into the house, bringing with himthe scent of a warm Texas morning on his skin. He handed her Nathan's board as he passed.

She took it from him and held it against her breasts. A ribbed T-shirt hugged the muscles of Jack's arms andchest and made him appear bigger and badder than usual. "Where is he?"

He turned and looked at her for several nerve-racking moments before he said, "I don't know."

"How did you get this?"

"He came to see me this morning."

"He did?" Nathan's going to the garage wasn't a coincidence. It was a surprise, but not a real shock. Nathan wasthe kind of kid who jumped into things first and thought later. A lot like Jack had been.

"He left the board on his way out."

She didn't think that he'd said anything to Jack about being his biological child. Of course, it hadn't occurred toher that he'd ever show up at the garage on his own either. "What did he say?"

"He talked about Steven and about 'Monster Garage.'"

Maybe he doesn't know. Maybe he was being a hard-ass for a totally different reason. This was Jack, after all.

The king of hard-asses. "That's it?"

"I think he really came by to get a good look at me." He pushed up the brim of his straw hat and she got a goodlook at him. If the glittering rage in his green eyes hadn't removed all doubt about what he knew or suspected,the next words out of his mouth did. "I read Steven's letter."

Now she was shocked. "How did you get Steven's letter?"

"You left it Saturday."

Had she? She didn't remember. A lot had happened Saturday. "You just read it today?"

"I didn't want to read it at all." His voice was deadly calm when he said, "Tell me, Daisy. I want to hear you sayit. After all these years."

His veneer of calm did not fool her for a second. His anger rolled off him like heat waves rolling across asphalt.

Her speeding heart fell right to the pit of her stomach. She'd waited fifteen years for this moment. Knew it hadto happen at some point, and there was no other way to say it but, "He's your son, Jack."

His expression didn't change. "Does he know?"

"Yes. He's known most of his life."

"So, I'm the only one who wasn't told."

"Yes."

"Do you have any idea," he said in that same awful calm tone, "what I'd like to do to you?"

Yes, she had a pretty good idea. She didn't think Jack would hurt her, but she took a step back. "I was going totell you."

"Is that so?" One brow lifted up his forehead. "When?"

"The first night I saw you. I came to your house to tell you, but Gina was there. I told you I needed to speakwith you about something important. I told you that night and the night of Shay's wedding, and at the pizzaplace, and at Slims." Her face felt hot, and she took another step back and tossed the skateboard on her mother'sblue floral couch. "I came to the garage to tell you Saturday, but then ... Lily ran her car into Ronnie's livingroom. Which is why I guess I forgot all about leaving Steven's letter." She pulled the claw from the back of herhair and took a deep breath. He had a right to his anger. She should have told him years ago. She was a coward.

"That's why I'm in town. I'm here to tell you that you have a son."

His gaze locked with her. "He's fifteen."

She swept her hair back up, twisted it, and secured it once more. "Yes, he is."

"You're telling me fifteen years too goddamn late. You should have told me when you missed your first period."

He thought a moment then added, "Unless you didn't know whose it was back then."

"I knew." Now he was just being mean. "You were the first person I was ever with. How could you think such ahorrible thing?"

"Maybe because up until a few days before you married my best friend, you were having sex with me. How do Iknow that you weren't doing us both at the same time?"

"You know I wasn't. You're just being ugly now."

"You don't know ugly," he said and his temper finally rose to the surface. He took a step toward her and stareddown into her face. His eyes narrowed and the line of his jaw hardened. "You did the lowest thing a womancan do to a man. You had my child and kept him from me. I should have been there when he was born. I shouldhave been there to see hint To see him take his first steps and ride his first bike. I should have been there to hearhis first words, but I wasn't. Steven was, though. Steven got to hear him say Daddy, not me." He was deadserious when he added, "It's a good thing you're not a man, because I'd beat the hell out of you. I'd enjoy it, too."

One of the hardest things she'd ever done was stand there toe-to-toe with Jack and not take another step back orlook away from his angry eyes. "You have to understand that we never meant to hurt you. We both loved you."

"Bullshit."

"It's the truth."

"If that's what you do to people you love, I can't imagine what you have in store for people you hate."

Her head began to pound and she put a hand to her brow, but she didn't remove her gaze from his. "You have toremember what it was like between you and me back then. We were fighting and making up all the time. Thatfirst month, I was so scared, and I told myself I was just late. Then the second month I told myself not to thinkabout it, but by the third month, I had to face it." She dropped her hand. "Your parents had just died and youwere going through such a bad time. The night I came to tell you I was pregnant, you said you needed a breakfrom me. I didn't think you loved me anymore. I didn't know what to do." The backs of her eyes stung but sherefused to give in to tears. "I didn't have anyone to talk to about it but Steven. I went to him and he asked me tomarry him. He said he'd take care of me and my baby."

"You keep forgetting that the baby was mine. That I should have been told about it before the two of you ran offto Seattle."

"We talked about telling you, but we thought that if you knew, you'd want to marry me out of obligation, butJack, you were in no position to take care of me and a baby. You were only eighteen and already dealing withso much. It seemed like the only solution."

"No, it was the easy way out for you. Steven had money and I had nothing."

"That's not why I married him. You know that I always loved Steven. If you weren't so angry, you'd rememberthat you loved him too." She placed her hands on his bare arms. Jack might never forgive her, but she had tomake him understand. "I married him because I was scared. You didn't love me anymore, and I didn't knowwhat to do."

"How did it feel, Daisy?" His voice lowered, got rough and smooth at the same time. "How did it feel to getback at me for not loving you? Did taking my child make you feel good? Did it satisfy your revenge?"

"It wasn't about revenge."

He grabbed her wrists and removed her hands from his arms. "Did lying with Steven Monroe get me out of yourhead. Your heart? When you were with him, were you thinking of me??

"No!"

"Remembering how it used to be between us?" His voice lowered even further and he pinned her wrists behindher back. "How good it was." He pulled her up against his body and said against her temple, "How good it stillis."

The brim of his hat touched the top of her head. "Stop it, Jack."

"All those years, were the two of you laughing it up over what you'd done to me?"

"No, Jack. It wasn't like that. No one was laughing." Her heart knocked in her chest and she swallowed hard.

"Believe me. I know I should have told you sooner."

His voice got real quiet next to her ear when he asked, "Who's listed as daddy on that boy's birth certificate?"

"Steven."

He pulled back far enough to look into her face. "Goddamn you, Daisy."

"We thought it would be easier for him in school. I'm sorry"

"I don't give a flying fuck how sorry you are. Because it's not half as sorry as you're going to be."

"What do you mean?"

He set her back on her heels and slid his hands to her shoulders. "All those years ago when you chose Stevenover me because I was just a poor kid with grease on my hands, working in my daddy's garage that's not howthings are now. I'm not poor anymore, Daisy I can afford a real good lawyer, and if I have to, I'll fight you."

"There won't be a fight."

"I want to know my son."

"You can get to know him. I want you to. And when we leave -"

"When you leave," he interrupted. "He stays."

"That's ridiculous. He's not staying here with you. His home is with me. In Seattle."

"We'll see about that."

"I know you're angry. I don't blame you."

"Nice to know you don't blame me." He released her and turned to the door.

"I should have told you about Nathan years ago, but don't punish him because you're mad at me." She followedclose behind him to the front porch. "He's been through so much. He lost his dad and now this."

Jack turned around so fast she almost ran into his chest. "He didn't lose his dad. Steven Monroe wasn't hisfather."

Daisy wisely didn't point out that Nathan thought of Steven as his dad and had loved him. "Nathan's beenthrough a lot in the past few years. He needs a little peace. Some calm in his life." She didn't add that sheneeded it too. "I'll talk to him. See what he wants to do, and I'll call you."

"I'm not going to wait around for you to call me, Daisy Lee." He moved down the steps toward his Mustangparked at the curb. "After I talk to Nathan, I'll tell you how it's going to be," he said as he walked away, themorning sun shining down on his straw hat and his wide shoulders.

"Wait." She ran down the steps after him. "You can't talk to him alone. I'm his mother. He doesn't know you."

He walked around the front of the car then stuck his key in the driver's side door. "Whose fault is that?"

She looked at him from across the top of the car. "I should be there."

He looked back at her and laughed. "Like I should have been there for the past fifteen years?"

She grabbed the door handle to jump in his car but the door was locked. Then she remembered Pippen andrealized she couldn't go even if she forced her way into his car. "Nathan is my son. You can't exclude me."

"Get used to it."

"We can work this out. I know we can." She didn't know anything of the sort, but she was determined to keepthings from getting too ugly. "I should have told you. I know that, and except for handing over my son, I'll tryand make it up to you."

"How? On the trunk of a car?" He unlocked the Mustang's door. "Not interested."

So much for keeping things from getting too ugly.

Nathan sat with his back against the basketball pole at Lovett High. The backboard and hoop cast an oblongshadow on the court to the free-throw line.

He gazed across the football field to the tennis courts. He didn't like it here. He didn't know what he expectedTexas to look like, maybe like Montana. He and his dad had been to Montana once, but Texas wasn't like that.

Texas was flat. And hot. And brown.

Texas was nothing at all like Seattle.

He pushed with his feet and slid up the pole until he stood. He adjusted the chain around his neck and glanced atthe high school behind him. "High school," he scoffed. It wasn't even as big as the grade school he'd gone too.

They probably all wore cowboy boots and rode horses to school. Probably all listened to crappy country andwestern music and chewed tobacco. Probably nobody rode skateboards or listened to Korn or Weezer or playedSniper Fantasy for XBOX.

Nathan pulled up his pants and hardly noticed when they slipped back down his hips. Problems bigger than hisbaggy pants occupied his thoughts. He'd dropped his skateboard at Jack Parrish's garage, and then he'd run awaylike a big scared baby.

He really wished he hadn't done that, but the way Jack had grabbed his arm had freaked him out. And the wayhe'd looked and swore at him, too. One second they'd all been laughing, and in the next, Jack had grabbed himand stared at him so intensely, he'd about capped his pants. Nathan didn't know if Jack had figured it out in thatmoment, but by the look on his face, he thought maybe he had. Then before Nathan had even realized what hewas doing, he ran away like a little kid.

Jack probably thought he was a dork.

With a shrug of his shoulders he told himself he didn't care. His dad had told him lots of stories about Jack. Hemade him sound real cool, like someone Nathan would really like. But he didn't think he liked Jack. He likedBilly, though. Billy watched "Monster Garage." Billy was cool.

He picked up a rock and threw it hard against the backboard. It made a satisfying thwack, rebounded and almosthit him in the head. Obviously, his mom hadn't told Jack yet. Nathan had just assumed that she'd told himalready or he never would have walked into that garage today. After all, that's why she was here. To tell Jackabout him. At least, that's why she'd said she was coming here.

He moved back across the field toward the opening in the chain link fence. He was pretty mad at his mom, andfeeling really stupid. Plus, he had to figure out a way to get his board back. Maybe he'd just let Jack keep itbecause he really didn't want to walk back into the garage and ask for it back. Not now.

The grass beneath his black skater shoes squished and he figured the sprinklers had been on that morning.

Water droplets collected on the leather toes of his shoes and he watched them roll off. His mom should be backfrom the hospital by now. He had to tell her where he'd been. She'd probably get mad at him, but he didn't reallycare. The more he thought about it, the madder he got at her. If his mother had told Jack, or at least told Nathanthat she hadn't, he wouldn't have gone to the garage and made such a dick weed out of himself.

When he looked up, he noticed a girl walking toward him a few feet away on the other side of the fence.

Through the links he could see that she had shiny dark hair and smooth tan skin like she spent time sunbathing.

They met at the opening at the same time, and he stepped aside to let her go through first. Instead, she stoppedand stared at him.

"You're not from around here. I know most everyone, but I've never seen you," she said with a definite Texastwang, drawing out her words. She had big brown eyes, and beneath one arm she held poster board andconstruction paper.

"I live in Washington," he told her.

"Washington, D.C.?" She said it like his mother and grandmother did. Like there was an r in the word "wash."

She wore a blue T-shirt with the words Ambercrombie and Fitch in silver glittery letters. She was a prep, and hedidn't like preppie girls. Girls who shopped at Ambercrombie and Fitch and The Gap. Goodie-two-shoe girls.

"No. State."

"Are you here visitin' someone?"

No, he had no use for preppie girls... but she had the kind of lips that made him think of kissing. Which he'dbeen thinking about a lot lately. "Yeah, my grandma, Louella Brooks, and my aunt Lily." He'd kissed one girl inthe sixth grade, but he didn't think that counted.

A frown pulled at her brows. "Lily Darlington?"

"Yep."

"Ronnie's cousin Bull is married to my aunt Jessica." She laughed. "We're practically related."

He doubted that made them related at all. And what the heck kind of name was Bull? "What's your name?"

"Brandy Jo. What's yours?"

Despite being a prep and having a drawl, Brandy Jo was hot. The kind of hot that made his stomach feel fuzzyand his chest feel heavy and made him think about how complicated girls were. And it was at these times, whenhe was thinking about girls, that he missed his dad the most "Nathan," he answered. A guy just couldn't ask hismother about certain stuff.

She studied him a moment and her gaze lowered to his lip. "Did that hurt?"

He didn't have to ask her what she was talking about. "No," he answered and hoped his voice didn't crack. Hehated when that happened. "I'm getting a tattoo next."

Her big brown eyes rounded and he could tell she was impressed. "Your parents will let you?"

No. He'd have to get it without his mother knowing somehow. A few months ago they'd made a deal, he couldkeep his lip ring if he promised to never get a tattoo as long as he lived. He'd promised, but he figured he onlyhad to keep his word until he was eighteen and old enough to get one himself. Tattoos were cool. "Sure."

"Where?"

He pointed to his shoulder. "Right there. I don't know what I want yet, but when I do, I'm definitely getting atat."

"If I could get one, I think I'd get a little red heart on my hip."

Which Nathan thought was pretty lame and really girly. "That'd be cool." He dropped his gaze to the posterboards beneath her arm. "What are you doing with that stuff?"

"I'm gonna teach city-rec art classes to little kids this summer. It's gonna be a lot of fun, and I'll get paid five-seventy-five an hour."

Teaching art to little kids didn't sound like a lot of fun to Nathan, but getting paid five-seventy-five an hour wassweet. He quickly did the math in his head and figured that if a kid worked five hours a day, five days a week,he could make around five hundred and seventy dollars in one month. He could buy a lot of CDs or new boardtrucks with that kind of money.

A black Mustang pulled alongside the curb on the other side of the fence, and Nathan watched Jack Parrish getout. He pushed his cowboy hat up his forehead and gazed at Nathan over the top of the car. "You forgot yourboard at the garage."

Jack didn't look so scary this time, but the fuzzy feeling in Nathan's stomach got worse. Like when he rode theZipper too many times at the Puyallup fair. "Yeah."

Brandy Jo looked from Nathan to Jack then back again. "See ya around."

Nathan glanced at her. "Okay, see ya." As she walked away, he returned his attention to the man both his momand dad said was his biological father. As far as Nathan could see, he didn't look much like Jack.

"I took your skateboard to your grandmother's."

Nathan stepped through the opening in the fence and stood next to the passenger door. If the feeling didn't goaway, he was afraid he'd get sick. And he really didn't want to do that. "Was my mom home?"

"Yes. She and I talked." He rested a forearm on the top of the car "She said you've always known that I'm yourfather."

"Yeah." He swallowed past the lump forming in his throat. He didn't know why he felt so weird. It wasn't likehe cared what Jack thought. He'd gone to the garage earlier out of mild curiosity. That was it. He didn't carewhat anyone thought. "I've known."

"Well, I'm glad that at least she didn't he to you." Jack looked at the watch strapped around his wrist and tappedhis fingers three times on the top of the car. "Do you want a ride home?"

"Okay." Nathan waited for Jack to unlock the door, then he climbed inside. He sat in the soft beige leather seatand his stomach churned a little bit more. He didn't know what this car was worth, but a lot more than hismom's stupid minivan back in Seattle. That's for sure. "Is this a Shelby?"

"Yep. It's a nineteen-sixty-seven GT 500."

Nathan didn't know that much about Mustangs except that if you were going to have one, this was the one.

"What's the engine?" he asked as he shut the door.

"The original 428 Police Interceptor"

"Tight."

"I like it." Jack shifted, glanced behind him, then pulled back out onto the street.

"How fast will it go?"

"A hundred and thirty-two. Of course that's nothing compared to the Daytona. How fast did you say it wasclocked on the closed course?"

"Two hundred on the closed course. One-eighty right out of the showroom in nineteen sixty-nine."

Jack laughed and moved his hand from the steering wheel to shift again. "You know, Billy could use some helpwith that Barracuda that's in the shop. Since you're here for a while and going to own a Daytona someday, youmight want to give him a hand with that Hemi."

Was he kidding? Nathan would crap all over himself just to touch a Hemi. "That could be cool, I guess. But Idon't know how long I'm gonna be in town."

Jack looked over at him, the shadow of his hat fell across his nose. "We'll talk to your mom and see how longyou're going to be here." He turned his attention back to the road and shifted the big engine into third. "Ofcourse, just 'cause you're family doesn't mean we can pay you more than the other guys."

Pay? As in earn money working on a Hemi? He'd crap all over himself twice. Nathan looked down at the chainhanging from one loop of his pants. He cleared his throat and bobbed his head a few times. "Sweet."

"We'll start you out at seven-fifty an hour"

He tried to do the math in his head, but something that usually came pretty easy to him was impossible at themoment. "Okay."

"Nathan?"

He looked back across the car at Jack. "Yeah?"

"I should have known about you before today," he said, but he kept his gaze on the road.

Nathan agreed, but he didn't say so.

"If I had known, I would have been in your life. No one could have kept me out."

He didn't know what to say to that, so he kept quiet.

"Maybe while you're here, we could get to know each other."

"Cool"

"And if we don't get on each other's nerves too much, you could think about staying the summer."

The whole summer? In Loserville? No way.

"When the 'Cuda's done, I'm going to need someone to test-drive it for me. You think you could do that?"

He bit the inside of his lip ring to keep from smiling. Oh man! "I could do that."

"You got your driver's license, right?"

His excitement plummeted. "No, I'm only fifteen. You gotta be sixteen."

"Not in Texas. You can get it when you're fifteen."

"Really?"

"Yep. You have to have your license to test-drive the 'Cuda for me. It's company policy for insurance purposes.

That means you'd have to sign up for driver's education. That might take half the summer."

Since before Nathan could remember, he'd dreamed of the day he'd get his driver's license.

"You don't have to give me your answer today. Think it over and let me know."

If he stayed in Texas for the summer, he could get it early. Plus work on a Hemi and make serious bank. Headjusted the chain around his neck. "I'll have to ask my mom." And she wasn't going to like it one bit. She wasalways telling him no. She didn't want him to have fun or grow up. She wanted him to be bored and stay a littlekid forever. "I'll talk to her for you." "You would?" "Oh yeah." His smile showed his white teeth. "It will be mypleasure."