A Mother's Love (5 page)

B
ACK IN HER ROOM AT
the bed-and-breakfast, Kyra stripped down to her bra and panties, tugged on a pair of loose yoga pants and a shirt and unrolled her mat.

Her emotions were all over the place—high and low, veering between anger and gratitude and sorrow and love.
And lust. Don't forget lust.

Yes, there was that, too. She needed grounding in her practice. Standing in mountain pose, the beginning of many standing poses, she settled her feet on the mat and centered her ribs and breathed in, then out. She brought herself to this moment,
this
practice. Breathe down to the low belly, back through the crown of the head. Center. Breathe.

Move.

With slow, methodical movements, she progressed through her practice—bending and twisting, balancing and standing. She let the turmoil of the past few days simply move through her, unleashed and unjudged. Blips of memory moved over her vision—Dylan's phone call, Emma's disapproval, the baby looking up at her.

Forward fold, downward dog, plank, cobra.

More blips: Dylan looking so stricken by the tree in the village; coming down to the beach; the baby cradled so comfortably in his arms as he sang to her.

It was only after she'd been practicing for nearly an hour that she realized she was weeping. Tears streamed down her face in a wash, rising from her belly and chest, leaking out of her eyes. Thoughts trickled through.

I am a mother.

Africa, I cannot even think of you yet,
she thought.

And:
I am afraid I might fall in love if I stay here very long.

Still she did not pause, simply continued her practice, breath and movement setting free the buried emotions. When it was done, she crawled up on the bed without even changing her clothes, tugged the duvet over her body and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

When she awoke, her single thought was very clear: she needed to get home soon. Take the baby and go before she got lost in the blue eyes of a dedicated charmer.

 

D
YLAN TUNED HIS FIDDLE
in the ancient old pub. Overhead, beams darkened by smoke and years and cooking held up the stucco ceiling. An equally dark bar was populated by locals, young and old, male and female, who came on Thursdays to hear old ballads and get misty-eyed over Celtic fiddle. Not a few women—young and not so young—were there to admire the singer, Wyn, with his long limbs and long blond hair. He wore breeches and a poet's shirt with flowing sleeves, the neck left open to show his nearly hairless chest. Dylan had no desire to wear a costume, but he admitted it didn't hurt the band to have Wyn so attired.

So far, there was no sign of Kyra. As he warmed up he kept an eye out for her. Maybe she'd fallen asleep, he told himself. Maybe she was exhausted from the challenging day.

Or maybe she was too shy to come in her by herself. The
thought had not occurred to him. With swift movements, he put his fiddle aside. “I'll be right back,” he said to Wyn and grabbed his coat from the rack, then headed out into the wet night. The B and B was only a little walk down the lane, but he was quite wet by the time he got there. The light was on in Kyra's room, he noticed as he went inside.

“Hello, Caroline,” he said to the small, dark woman who came out of the kitchen. “Mind if I nip upstairs to speak with your guest?”

Caroline waved a hand. “Go ahead. Aren't you supposed to be on stage by now?”

“In a minute.” He took the stairs two at a time, winding upward and upward through the dark to the door. He rapped firmly. “Kyra! It's Dylan.”

There wasn't a sound at all for a moment, and he was about to knock again, when she pulled open the door. She had on some loose cotton pants and a peasant blouse with a jumper over it. “Dylan, is something wrong?”

“No. But you can't stay in here tonight. You've got to come down to the pub to hear some Welsh singing.”

“I'm just tired,” she said, waving a hand. “And I'm not dressed.”

The light came from behind her, making a halo of her curls. He saw her eyes flicker to his mouth, touch his throat, fly away. “Take off that terrible jumper and put on some jeans and you'll be fine.”

She crossed her arms, moving backward. “No, thank you.”

Dylan inclined his head. “I'm not taking no for an answer.”

A ghost of a smile edged her lips. Shock. “You can't just say that!”

“I just did.” He crossed his arms. “They're waiting for me, you know.”

“Then go.”

He raised his chin. “Are you afraid of me, now, little Kyra?”

“No. How silly.”

Taking one step closer, he grinned. “I think you are. I think you're wondering if I'm going to kiss you again if you come out tonight.”

She rolled her eyes. “I can't believe you're actually saying these words, like some guy in a movie.”

“Life is better than the movies,” he said and chuckled, moving closer. “I won't kiss you if you don't want me to.”

“I don't want you to.”

“All right. Get dressed.”

“You're bossy!”

“Oldest child, remember?” he said with a wink and headed out. “I'll be waiting downstairs.”

 

T
HERE WAS NO WAY TO
get out of it. Kyra had the feeling that if she didn't get downstairs in a reasonable amount of time, Dylan would come right back up the stairs and carry her down himself. But her hands shook slightly as she tried to put on a little lipstick, and she nearly tripped over her jeans and killed herself as she tried to change clothes.

Chill,
she told herself. It was Africa's voice in her head, which was a very good thing. They had been so good for each other for so long Kyra almost didn't know how to function without her. Kyra was the brains, the logical one. Africa had been the social manager.

Africa wasn't here, and Kyra wasn't going to think about that now. Later, when she got the baby home, got things
settled, figured out what was next, then she could have a nice breakdown. Maybe, she thought, wrapping a paisley scarf around her neck, they could have a memorial service. On a beautiful overlook.

The idea made her feel sniffly again, and she refocused.
Pub. Dylan. Don't trip like an idiot going downstairs.

He waited by the door, chatting to the girl who ran the place. When he heard Kyra coming down the stairs, he looked up and grinned, taking her in from head to toe. “Beautiful,” he said.

“Thank you.”

“I'm on—” he glanced at his watch “—now.”

Wielding a big umbrella, he pulled Kyra close and they dashed up the street, hips bumping, water splashing over their feet. Ducking into the pub, Kyra smoothed her hair hopelessly. It was getting curlier and curlier by the minute. “I'm going to look like a sheep by the time I get out of this place,” she growled.

“Black sheep? I like the sound of that.”

She widened her eyes. “You are a terrible flirt.”

He grinned, that wicked, wicked twinkle back in his eye. “I thought I was pretty good.”

A voice from the front of the room yelled, “Jones! Chat her up later. We're waiting for you.”

Dylan took Kyra's arm just above the elbow, half proprietary, half comforting, and lifted a finger to the unseen caller. “Will you be comfortable at the bar? Or would you rather a table?”

Africa would say the bar, and Kyra saw a spot that looked right onto the stage. “I'm okay at the bar.”

“Have a beer. Enjoy yourself.”

Kyra nodded. Dylan left her and dashed toward the little
dais in the corner of the room to join a tall man, all brooding beauty and long hair, dressed like a troubadour. The lead singer, no doubt. Though maybe Dylan sang, too. He had a lovely voice. A stout man with a hat on stood with an enormous drum on his hip. Dylan hit the stage, grabbed a fiddle he plugged into a speaker, and without fanfare they began to play.

Kyra made her way to that empty spot by the bar and settled gingerly on a stool, her purse clutched in her lap. In her life she'd never gone much to clubs or bars, and this seemed heady and strange and—

Well, exciting. The lights were low and there was a crowd of ordinary-looking people—mothers and grandmotherly types mixed in with tattooed youth and men with caps on their heads and the usual couples. A little of the tension eased out of her body.

And there was Dylan, fiddling so gorgeously and with so much pleasure it was impossible not to smile. The singer, in his poet sleeves, glowered and glowed and danced like an enchanted being. The drummer flipped a baton of drumsticks back and forth so fast his hand was a blur, then slowed to pound dramatically, sweat beading up on his brow.

The bartender leaned in and yelled, “What'll you have?”

She looked wildly for some idea of what might be orderable and spied a tap. “Newcastle?”

“Half-pint, then?”

Kyra nodded. When it was delivered, she paid him by simply pulling out a five-pound note and putting it on the bar. He brought back change and went off to wait on someone else.

It felt like a victory to have ordered a beer in a faraway land, and to toast herself, she lifted the glass and took a deep swallow. It was delicious.

And on some level she knew this would be woven into the story she would tell the baby someday. That she'd come, fearful and shy, to have a beer and listen to a handsome man play Celtic songs.

Hard on the heels of that thought came a sense of wonder. She was in Wales! In a pub in a tiny village she had not even known existed before today, listening to music played by one of the most devastatingly sexy men she'd ever met.

How amazing!

As the music unwound the knots in her neck, more wonder slid into the places usually occupied by worry and fear. For most people, sitting here this way would not have seemed like so much, but Kyra had always been desperately shy. She'd never had a very large circle of friends. Her mother had passed on three years ago. It wasn't that Kyra was cold, but even as a child she'd been a little different, shy and too smart, and her mother had been odd, so she'd dressed Kyra in a very conservative way. In an ordinary American high school, she'd stood out in all the worst possible ways.

And look how the circle had turned. Now Kyra was the mother who had a daughter. And for Amanda, Kyra would do what her mother had not done: the baby would have a wide social net, full of time to meet people and discover hobbies. Dance lessons, perhaps. Or soccer. Or art. Or maybe she would even like computers.

She took a sip of her ale. A daughter!

It wasn't entirely real. It wasn't an entirely happy situation. At the heart of it, though, she felt a real glimmer of
something.

Onstage the trio dug into a reel, and the room went crazy. There was dancing, something like the Irish dances she'd
seen but not quite. The man next to her, ancient and jovial, leaned in and asked if she'd dance with him. She nearly refused before she remembered that she was supposed to be experiencing life. “I have no idea what I'm doing,” she said.

“You're American!” he said and laughed. “Come, lovely, and I'll give you a spin.'

Kyra waded into the midst of the villagers, wishing fiercely that Africa were here, that the whole thing hadn't come about for such a sad reason. A plucking pain fluttered around her chest, but with conviction she also knew that Africa would want Kyra to do exactly these things: wade into life, up to her neck.

So she danced and went back to her seat and drank of her ale, then watched Dylan some more. He flirted with everyone, but especially with her—or was that just her perception? At the break he brought his friends over to introduce them. “This is John,” he said, gesturing to the drummer.

He bowed and said something long and cheery that might as well have been Martian for all that Kyra understood. “Nice to meet you,” she said.

Dylan laughed. “He said you're a fine-looking woman and what are you doing with me?”

“Well, I'm—” she began, about to deny that she was here with him. But she was, wasn't she? “He's a charmer, isn't he? How could I refuse?”

The two laughed. At the edges of the circle, the singer gave her a look she assumed was meant to make her swoon, heavy-lidded and smoldering. “An American,” he said to Dylan. “Would have thought you'd learned your lesson about strange women.”

Something sharp and dark crossed Dylan's face, but he held to the smile. “This is Wyn,” he said. “And he's sure he's
the man of the hour at all hours, but he sings well enough that we put up with it.”

“Pay him no mind,” Wyn said, holding out a long white hand.

“I'm surprised you don't sing,” Kyra said to Dylan. “You have a beautiful voice.”

He threw an arm around her, murmuring quietly, “You're a gem, you know it?”

“So,” she said, “are you.”

D
YLAN SAID
, “C
OME
, my lovely, I'll walk you back to your room.”

“I'm sure I can find my way,” Kyra said. “It's only a block.”

The fan lines around his eyes crinkled. How was it even possible this man had never married? “I insist.”

She nodded. They stepped into the night, quiet and still, with a moon shining now through the clouds. The streets were wet, reflecting the cold light, and Kyra felt a shiver walk down her spine. For a moment she paused, listening. Far away was the sound of the sea, crashing on the rocks near the shore, but nothing else. A wisp of wind rustled her hair, and she pushed it out of her face.

And there was the tree again, so tall and broad and ancient. “I asked the innkeeper how old this tree is, and she said there is a painting that shows it standing in the churchyard more than three hundred years ago.”

He raised his eyes to the top of the tree. “Do you want to go sleep there tonight?”

Kyra shook her head with a smile, but, surprising even herself, she took his hand. “I do want to go stand under it again.”

Something flickered over his eyes before he said, “Okay.”

And there came that rustling on her nerves, rushing down her neck as if someone blew on it, a rippling awareness of her tongue in her mouth and the cloth on her arms and the shoes on her feet came back as they walked to the edge of the shadows cast by the tree. Next door was the churchyard, shadowy and ghostly with its tilted headstones.

Dylan stopped.

“Are you scared?”

He shook his head. “But I think I might break my promise if we go under there.”

“What promise?” she said, and before he could answer, she tugged him into the shadows, pulling him to the very center of the darkness. The air was hushed and smelled of rain and rich earth, and Dylan stepped forward, pressed her back against the trunk and pressed his body against hers.

“This promise,” he said and kissed her, putting his hands alongside her face, his index fingers touching the edges of her earlobes, his thumbs at the edges of her mouth. His mouth was hot and layered with texture—lip, teeth, tongue, chin with a whiskering scratch across her own.

She kissed him back, lifting hands to his cool, wavy hair, feeling their bodies press closer, thighs and bellies and chests, and again she thought of what it would be like to be bare with him. As if it were a reality, she shuddered, and he, sensing her response, made a deep noise and plunged deeper, one arm hauling her close, their tongues swirling and tangling and dancing.

He came up with a gasp. “I don't know what this is between us.”

“Me, either,” Kyra whispered and pulled him back to her, pushing her hands up beneath his jacket, tugging his shirt free in the back so she could touch his skin. Cells just below
the surface of her skin boiled up, bristling and hungry, and she made a soft sound when his hands skimmed down her arms, then back up again. Against her thigh she felt the thrust of his sex, and when his fingers slid under the neckline of her blouse, touching just the edges of her collarbone, she shuddered as violently as if he'd suckled a nipple.

It frightened her, and with a gasp she pulled back. “Wait. I don't know what we're doing here. I don't do this. I don't make out.”

He pulled upright, away. “No. I don't, either.”

In the very thin light making its way through the branches, he looked like something out of a dream—light skimmed the edge of his nose and his lower lip and his chin. Rakish and lost and lonely. In a panic, Kyra pulled away. “This is crazy. I don't want to do this.”

She turned and started walking away, her heart pounding. But at the edge of the dark shadow pool she paused and looked back at him. “Thank you for a lovely evening,” she said politely.

“Don't go yet,” he said roughly.

She took a step backward, pulling away from the tilt of his head, the promise in his voice—a promise not of sensual pleasure but of understanding. That was her great and terrible downfall and the thing she had learned about charming men: they traded in understanding, in a passion that was irresistible. Who didn't want to be the great love of a person's life? “I'm sorry,” she said and turned away from him.

He caught her arm. “Wait,” he said harshly. “Look at me.”

Kyra took a breath. Raised her eyes.

“This might be important,” he said, “this thing between us. I feel…like I know you. Like I've always known you.”

“Please, don't,” she whispered. “I just don't have any faith left in me. I'm sorry.” Gently she pulled out of his grasp and ran away.

 

O
VER THE NEXT FEW
days they fell into a pattern of activity. Kyra walked and did yoga on the beach before breakfast, then Dylan picked her up and they went to his mother's house, where Kyra absorbed the lessons of the older woman—how to bathe the baby, how to tell when she had gas or was hungry, how to listen for the differences in her cries.

In the afternoons the baby slept, and Dylan showed her the local sights. The ease between them never slipped, and it was sometimes difficult for Kyra to remember why she didn't let down her guard. She learned many things about him—that he was kind and well regarded. That he liked cartoons. That he never drank more than a single bottle of ale.

They returned to Emma's cottage for supper, and Kyra put the baby to bed while Emma rested and watched television.

On her sixth morning in Wales Kyra awakened to a sense of great clearheadedness and only then realized that she'd been feeling very jet-lagged. Of course she'd been clumsy and made mistakes and felt her judgment was not quite right. She walked on the beach early and came back to have a shower and her breakfast, telling herself that the lightness in her chest had nothing to do with Dylan and everything to do with little Tommie. Amanda? She wasn't sure yet.

And was that weird to not know what the baby's name was? Neither one felt quite right yet.

After a hearty breakfast of eggs and bacon—she didn't
eat the bacon, though she had to admit it smelled wonderful—she waited for Dylan in the foyer, reading a women's magazine full of short stories of a type she didn't see in America much anymore. Her mother had liked stories like this—simple stories with a heartwarming message about a woman and her life.

The minute Dylan stepped through the door, she caught his scent. She was reading an article about how to perfectly blanch almonds when that soft scent of sea and rain and man, so particular to him, wafted over her body like a hand. And despite her lectures to herself, despite her resolves, she was much too glad to see him.

“All right,” he said. This morning he wore a simple rugby shirt with white and blue stripes, and jeans. It made him look casual and prosperous at once, if it hadn't been for that rakish hair. Not so long as to be odd but long enough to be wild.

“Good morning,” she said, primly putting aside her magazine.

There was reserve between them this morning, the boiling kiss of the other night heavy in her mind. Maybe his, too, she thought. Or maybe he was thinking of her running away.

Outside, he said, “I thought what might be best is to take the baby out, away from my mother so you are not so nervous. We'll have a picnic, and you can have some time to get to know your daughter.”

He opened the door to his car, and Kyra spied a proper wicker basket in the backseat, next to the baby's car seat. Touched, she looked up at him. “Thank you.”

A shrug. “You should see a little of the coastline, at least. It's a beautiful place.”

“I walked on the sea this morning.”

“On the sea? Wish I'd seen that.”

She grinned. “Ha-ha.”

They headed out to the point where his mother lived. “Is this where you grew up?” Kyra asked. “It seems very small for a family.”

“It is, but we managed. There are a couple of rooms in the attic and we bunked together all right.”

The baby was lying quietly in her cradle when they came in. Kyra could hear her cooing, and the sound went right through her, settling deep in her ribs and heart.

Emma, however, was fast asleep on the couch, a soft snore coming from her open mouth. She looked gray with exhaustion. “Poor thing,” Kyra said very quietly and covered Emma with an afghan.

“She's worn-out,” Dylan said in an equally quiet tone. “I told her it would be too much.”

“I need to be here with the baby starting tonight,” Kyra said. “I can sleep on the couch if necessary. And your mother will still be here if I don't know what to do.”

“You won't have to sleep on the couch. There are beds.”

“Do you think she'll argue?”

He cast a tender gaze over his mother's prone form, then smiled at Kyra. “Probably. It's still the right thing.” He touched her shoulder. “Thank you.”

Kyra went to the cradle, and there was the baby. “Hello, sweetie,” she said quietly. And she knew it was probably too early for a true smile, but it seemed to her that the baby's face lit up, and if that wasn't the real thing, it was enough like one to make Kyra feel important. She touched the baby's tummy, patted the diaper as Emma seemed to do, and it felt dry and clean. The little feet and hands started moving happily, however, and Kyra laughed.

“She wants you to pick her up,” Dylan said.

Carefully Kyra scooped one hand beneath the baby's head and neck and one around her bottom and lifted. “Tada!” she said, bringing Tommie's face close to her own. She kissed her nose, smelled the sweetness of baby breath and the elegant, cool softness of baby skin. “Mmm, you are my sunshine, aren't you?”

“I think you've got the hang of it,” Dylan said.

The baby chortled, looking around for the source of that other voice, and Dylan came closer, cupped his big, dark hand around the small head. “So delicate,” he said. “So strong.”

He looked at Kyra and she looked back, and again it was as if she'd known him somewhere else. That familiarity washed over her like a song she could hum but couldn't sing.

Neither of them said anything. They simply stood there, close but not touching, for long moments, the baby making little noises of all kinds, her arms and legs pinwheeling until she accidentally got one in her mouth and made a loud “Lalalala!” that made both of the adults laugh.

Dylan moved first. “I'll put the kettle on.”

 

E
MMA WAS TOO TIRED
to argue about them taking the baby out. “We're just going to the point,” Dylan said. “Just a little picnic. A little bonding time for mother and baby.”

“Be careful the wind doesn't take her breath,” Emma said. “And remember that babies need another layer of clothing. If you have two, they need three.”

At last, when Emma had given them as many injunctions and warnings as she could remember, they took the baby outside and up the hill. Dylan carried the picnic basket.
Kyra carried the baby. They spread a blanket on the ground in a shady place, and Kyra settled Tommie on her back to look up at the trees. Immediately she started to coo.

“Oh, she likes that!” Dylan said. He took things out of the basket and put them on the blanket—cookies and cheese and bread and dark, long olives and pickles and various sliced vegetables in a plastic container.

“I'm not terribly hungry right now,” Kyra said.

“There's plenty of time.” He settled cross-legged on the blanket. “So tell me your story, Kyra Tierney,” he said.

She cocked her head. “The whole thing, from the first moment of birth to now?”

“No.” He broke a cookie in half and considered as he held one. “Tell me ten things you love.”

“Hmm.” With one hand on the baby's foot, she said, “The ocean, even though I never get to see it. My father and mother divorced when I was seven, but just before they split up we took a vacation to California, and I just loved the ocean.”

“That's a good one.”

“I think we need to trade, one for one, or it's going to make me feel stupid.”

“Lemon cake,” Dylan said with a boyish tilt to his head. “Lemon pound cake with a sugar glaze and a big mug of tea.”

“Okay. I love macaroni and cheese, the gooey, really-bad-for-you kind.”

“Who made it for you?”

“My mother. I didn't have any other family until I met Africa.” Her father had disappeared, another charming man who couldn't be trusted.

“Just you and your mother? Was it lonely?”

Kyra bowed her head, looking down at the baby's toes in her hand. “Yes. My mother never got over the divorce. She became extremely religious and—” She shook her head. “It was just sad.”

He put his hand on her calf. “Thank you for that one.”

“Your turn.”

“I loved Thomas Rhys,” he said and cleared his throat. “I don't remember him not being there, always. Best friends since we were old enough to speak. He had a big heart and a big, sunny smile and he fell in love with Africa on sight.”

“It was the same for her. She was so fickle at times, but she could be devoted. She was devoted to me. To yoga, to our business.” Kyra smiled. “I saved the e-mail she sent from London when she met Thomas. She said, ‘I met my husband today.'”

“Soul mates,” Dylan said.

“Maybe.”

“You don't believe in that?”

Kyra shrugged. “Not really.”

His eyes, neon-blue at their most subdued, suddenly grew even more vivid. “I
would
love to kiss you,” he said.

“That's not fair!”

He grinned. “No?”

“No.” She slapped his foot, pushed his hand off her calf. “I'm bonding with my baby, so don't go trying to horn in.”

Dylan laughed, and as if she loved the sound, the baby shrieked with happiness. “There, she thinks I'm quite clever. You should listen to her.”