A Secret Identity (28 page)

Todd and I were silent as we walked from Aunt Lizzie’s room to the car a few minutes later. In fact, we didn’t talk until we pulled into the drive at Todd’s dad’s cottage.

“I have a question for you, Cara,” Todd finally said as he put the car in park.

I held my breath. I knew he had been almost as moved as I was by Aunt Lizzie’s story, and I couldn’t imagine what was bothering him.

“Why do you think Pop never tried to find his family? From what you’ve told me, you have a drive to know and understand your genetic heritage. Didn’t he have the same compulsion? And if not, why not?”

“I’ve wondered about that myself,” I said. “And I can only come up with one answer. He didn’t care where he came from.”

Todd frowned. “But he was a creative and imaginative person. Why wouldn’t he be curious about his birth family?”

“I don’t know exactly.” I searched for the right words to explain what was only a feeling. “Pop was very secure in himself. He was one of those people who are born confident. Most people have gaps in their self-confidence, some little chinks, some gigantic holes as big as the Grand Canyon. A few, though, seem born without that internal uncertainty. Because of this, they take life and mold it to their dreams without questioning their right to do so and without questioning their abilities. Pop was one of those. He never debated with himself about who he was. He always knew.”

“Does that make those people terribly difficult to live with?”

I had to admire his delicacy in how he worded his question. He asked about people who were extremely confident—a vague, amorphous collection of faceless beings rather than his real concern, my pop.

I nodded. “They can become very controlling and assume they know what’s best for the whole world. If these people don’t develop a heart for others and a heart for God, they can be very intimidating and calculating, very manipulative. If they don’t have people who are strong enough to challenge them on their attitudes and behavior, they can overwhelm others and not even recognize the pain they’ve caused. But they don’t need the holes in their lives filled because they don’t have holes.”

“And adoption searches are often ventures in hole filling.”

“Uh-huh. At least this search is for me. But Pop was confident that being a Bentley was great. He was confident that opening the first Bentley’s store was great. And he was confident that expanding the chain was great. And Ward is the same way. He doesn’t understand why I want to know about the Biemsderfers. He doesn’t feel the holes.”

“I thought that was because he saw family in terms of heart, not body and bone.”

I pushed some straggling hair back into my ponytail. “I see family in terms of heart too, but I also think it’s body and bone. And I feel the body and bone holes. Ward doesn’t. And apparently Pop didn’t either.”

Todd opened his car door and climbed reluctantly out. “Well, let’s go visit some body and bone.”

“Todd.” I laid a hand on his arm as we walked up the sidewalk. “There’s heart here too. You just need to learn how to see it.”

He looked at me skeptically but said nothing.

We knocked on Dr. Reasoner’s door just as we had a few nights ago. A slow steady shuffle sounded, and Dr. Reasoner appeared on the other side of the screen.

“Toddy.”

“Dad.”

I poked Todd in the ribs.

“Oh. Dad, you remember Cara Bentley, my client?”

“Ah,” he said. “Of course I remember the client. Come in. Come in.” He turned to walk back into the house, assuming we would follow.

I poked Todd in the ribs again. “You’ve got to stop introducing me as your client,” I hissed. “I’m beginning to think I’m going to get billed for all the extra hours we spend together.”

He turned a broad grin on me. “Of course you’re getting billed for all those hours. How else can I afford the cabin I want on a lake in Canada?”

I quirked an eyebrow. “If you think I’m paying so you can flee the country to get away from me, you’re much mistaken, guy.”

Suddenly Todd’s grin faded and his eyes darkened. He slipped his arm around my waist and bumped his hip against mine, lifting me clean off my feet. I made a little squeak of surprise. He spun me effortlessly until I was standing with my back against the side of the cottage. I could feel the bricks through my cream knit shirt. He placed a hand against the wall on either side of my head, trapping me. Not that I was trying to escape.

“Todd,” I said breathlessly. “Your father’s waiting.”

He ignored me. Well, he actually ignored what I said. Me he paid lots of attention to. He leaned over and kissed me.

As kisses go, I don’t know how it would rate on a scale of one to ten. I haven’t had lots of experience, so I can’t make a sound judgment. But I do know that as far as I was concerned, and I was, after all, the one who counted, I felt it all the way to my toes. I also realized very quickly that I had been under-writing my heroines’ responses to my heroes.

Todd drew back and gave a devastating smile. “I’ve been wanting to do that for some time now, probably since the day you gave me that ridiculous tie.”

“Really?” It was all I could do to get one word out.

His wonderful eyes glommed onto mine, and I saw all sorts of wonderful possibilities written there. “Really,” he said.

I looked at him a minute longer and then threw myself into his arms. “Again.”

A discreet cough pulled us apart. Arms still wrapped about each other, we turned to see Dr. Reasoner standing at the door watching us.

“Toddy,” he said conversationally, “I must insist you stop ravishing your client on my front porch. What will my neighbors think? I have, after all, a reputation to consider.” And he turned and walked inside.

I felt Todd stiffen. Glancing at him, I realized he thought his father was criticizing us.

“Todd, he was teasing,” I said softly.

Todd frowned. “Teasing?”

“Didn’t you see the twinkle in his eye?”

“Twinkle? In Dad’s eye?” He looked through the screen at his father’s retreating figure, trying to wrap his mind about this alien thought.

“Trust me on this,” I said, going up on tiptoe and kissing his cheek. “You’ll see.”

We sat in the same seats in the glassed-in porch that we had occupied on our last visit. I glanced with great interest at the end table beside my chair and saw that
Beowulf
was gone. So were
Great Expectations
and
Through the Looking Glass
. In their places and obviously read were
As the Deer
,
So My Soul
, and George Eliot’s
Silas Marner
.

“Wow,” I said, pointing. “You’ve got me in excellent company.”

“I must tell you, Cara, that I enjoyed your books very much. You have a distinctive and delightful style.”

If I weren’t already glowing like an incandescent bulb from Todd’s kiss, I would have from that compliment.

“Marci and Scott are memorable characters,” said Dr. Reasoner, professor of English and authority on literature who liked my books! “And you show their development as both humans and believers very realistically. You also develop their love in a delightful, thoughtful progression.”

“You have no idea what your words mean to me, Dr. Reasoner.” I hugged them to myself, metaphorically spinning like a top or, better yet, Maria as she serenaded the sky in
The Sound of Music
. I really wanted to ask him to write the wonderful words down so I’d have them forever, but it seemed a bit premature in our acquaintance to ask for endorsement copy. “Thank you very much.”

He nodded his head in acknowledgment. “I made one very interesting observation.” He glanced from me to Todd, who was following the conversation with great interest, and back to me. “You write about love as if you are acquainted with it.”

I felt myself blush, sitting here in front of Todd and under his father’s obviously assessing eye. “I’ve lived all my life observing it,” I managed.

Dr. Reasoner lifted an eyebrow in question, an expression I’d seen on his son’s face many times.

“My grandparents who raised me,” I explained. “Theirs was a great love affair.”

“So by observation you’ve been able to capture both the emotional and volitional aspects of love. I find that amazing.”

I blinked. “You do?”

“I do. Love is so difficult to define, to portray. You have captured the essence of what I think of as love.” He glanced hesitantly at Todd, as if he weren’t certain about speaking his mind in front of his son. “I know that while I was reading, I realized I hadn’t missed Catherine so much in years. You made me yearn again for what I thought I had forgotten.”

I must have looked distressed because he hurried to say, “It was a
good
missing, my dear. A bringing to mind of all the joy we shared.”

His eyes grew misty with reminiscence. “Catherine taught me that sharing love makes you more than you are alone. That’s how I know you got Marci and Scott right. They made each other more than they were alone.” He smiled. “Catherine taught me laughter, something I hadn’t known before her—or after her for that matter. When she died, my life lost its joy. I became the morose and melancholy man she had thus far prevented me from becoming.”

He glanced again at Todd, but he turned to speak to me. “I think it was hard on Toddy, the lack of laughter. I tried for his sake, but I didn’t know how to be other than I was…than I am. I’m afraid his growing up was shadows instead of sunshine, and I regret that more than I can possibly say.” He smiled sadly at me, as if he were asking my forgiveness.

Together he and I turned to Todd, who was sitting with his mouth hanging open, staring at his father. In a reversal of last night, I reached over and pushed his jaw shut. He blinked and looked at me. I rested my hand along his face for a moment, smiling at him, reminding him from my heart that there was much more than body and bone between him and his father. It was just that neither of them knew how to see it yet.

Again Dr. Reasoner turned from Todd to speak to me. “From the day Catherine died, I have prayed that Toddy would find his sunshine. I see his mother’s laughter in him, but I’ve never known how to release it. I can’t even talk with him much less make him laugh. Perhaps, Cara,” he said hopefully, “in you I’m seeing the answer to my prayer.”

I was overwhelmed by his words. Speechless, I stole a glance at Todd and saw he was as confounded as I.

“And now,” said Dr. Reasoner, slapping his legs briskly. “Let me get you two a bowl of ice cream.” And he rose and left the porch.

Todd watched his father leave, his face a study in conflicting emotions. Hope, disbelief, wonder, anger, bemusement, affection all flashed through his eyes. He looked at me and shook his head, unable to articulate what he was feeling. He reached for my hand and gripped it fiercely.

Ah, Lord, teach this man about heart and family. In fact
, and I glanced toward the kitchen,
teach both of them
.

“He prays for me!” Todd’s voice and face were full of wonder. “Like Madeleine and Lizzie prayed for your pop. I never knew he did that, never would have imagined it in a million years.”

I nodded. “One of the things I’ve grieved over most since Mom and Pop’s deaths is knowing that no one is praying for me with the same concern and commitment I’d taken for granted all my life.”

“You want someone to pray for you?” He ran a hand gently down my cheek. “I’ll pray for you.”

“Don’t say that lightly,” I said. “It’s too precious a promise.”

“And not one to be broken,” he agreed. “But praying for you will be easy. You’re the one with the hard job. You promised to pray for Amos and Jessica.”

“I know. I think it’s going to force me to stretch myself spiritually in ways I never foresaw.”

We sat silently for a few minutes. I could hear Dr. Reasoner opening and shutting the refrigerator and the cupboards. I heard the chink of dishes and the schuss of pretzels being poured into a basket.

“Cara, why did he tell you all those things instead of me?” Todd asked suddenly. There was hurt and a slight edge of anger in his tone.

I shrugged. “Because he knows me better?”

“What? He’s only seen you twice!”

“But he read my books. He’s seen into my heart.”

Todd looked at me skeptically.

“You’ll see what I mean if you ever get around to reading my stuff.”

“I am reading your stuff,” he said in a huff. “I’m halfway through
As the Deer
.”

“And don’t you feel you know me better by reading it?”

He took a moment, obviously trying to find an answer. “Well, I guess I know that you like Coke better than Pepsi because your characters always drink Coke.”

A burst of air escaped, half amusement, half frustration.

“Isn’t that what you meant?” he asked, his eyebrows drawn together.

“Not quite,” I said. “But knowing me isn’t the real issue here, is it? It’s how can you and your dad get to know each other.”

His shoulders dipped. “I haven’t figured that one out in thirty years.”

“Well, we’ll just have to work on that, won’t we?”

He raised his eyebrow and smiled. “We will?”

I raised my own eyebrow and smiled back. “We will. I’ll ask your father a question. He’ll answer. Then all you have to do is ask why. Now go help him carry the ice cream out.”

He blinked.

I jerked my head toward the door to the house. “Two hands, three bowls. And pretzels. Go.”

To my surprise, he went. To Dr. Reasoner’s surprise too, if the look on his face when they returned to the porch was any indication.

When we were eating our ice cream, I asked innocently, “Dr. Reasoner, aside from
As the Deer
and
So My Soul
, what has been your favorite book you’ve recently read?”

When he answered, I looked at Todd. For a minute he stared blankly back. Then he sat up straight and looked at his father.

“Why?”

Dr. Reasoner looked at him in surprise. “Why is it my favorite?”

Todd looked at me in a slight panic. I inclined my head ever so slightly.

“Yes,” Todd said. “Why is it your favorite?”