As You Wish (30 page)
Patricia turned away from Ryan to hug Paul.
“Jeff taught me to bake cookies today.”
Jeff had given up his catering business to cook for them full time. He still did some catering out of their kitchen, most of it for events at Well Spring.
“Really? Are there any left?”
“Sam ate most of them.”
“I did not.”
“Settle down.” Ryan looked down the driveway. A car was approaching. “Sam, Paul, where’s Missy?”
“Cheerleading tryouts,” Sam scoffed. “She’s such a twit.”
“Sam,” Patricia said.
The car didn’t look like any of Missy’s friends. They hadn’t adopted the girl yet, but it was only a matter of time. “Are we expecting anyone?” Ryan asked.
“I’m not.” Patricia squinted down the driveway. “It’s David.”
“When did he trade in the Porsche?”
“The Audi is a much better vehicle,” Paul pointed out. “Much classier.”
Patricia looked up at Ryan and raised one eyebrow as if to ask,
Didn’t you know that?
Paul’s tone implied that a lot lately, but he was almost a teenager now too.
David parked behind Patricia’s car and climbed out. His wife Elise climbed out the other side. David’s gaze raked Ryan and Patricia, still assessing what he was missing. Ryan draped his arm around Patricia’s shoulders. She wouldn’t be going anywhere, certainly not with David, but every time Ryan saw him, it was a reminder of how close he’d come to losing her.
“Hi, Patricia, Ryan, boys.” David held up a folder. “I got that information you wanted.”
“Hi, guys,” Elise mumbled. Ryan always wondered if somewhere inside her she still felt like a waitress the way he still felt like the gardener.
“Hello, Elise, on your way to Columbus?” Patricia asked. David had won the state senator seat in the last election in no small part to Whitmer backing. Next stop was the governor’s mansion.
“Yeah, but I wanted to drop this off on the way.” David held out the folder. He was studying Patricia’s face, but Ryan didn’t know what he was looking for.
Patricia took the folder, but didn’t look in it. “Thank you, David.”
“Sorry it took so long, but the coroner’s office couldn’t locate them.”
“Thank you, David,” Patricia repeated.
“Oh. Sure. No problem. We should get going. It’s a long drive.” David backed away.
“I wanted to thank you again for all the help you’ve given me,” Elise said. “After all the trouble.”
“I was happy to do it. Really it wasn’t a problem,” Patricia told her.
Ryan wanted to snort. Not a problem? Two months, in the middle of planning two weddings, spent teaching Elise Bradley to be a socialite and politician’s wife, nothing? And then helping to plan and host her wedding almost immediately after he and Patricia got home from their honeymoon? For a while Ryan had been almost as jealous of Elise as he had been of David because she claimed so much of Patricia’s time.
“Come on, Elise,” David said, opening her door. “It’s a long drive. We won’t be home before dark already.”
“I just wanted you to know I appreciated it.”
“I know you do, Elise. Good-bye.” Patricia turned to Sam and Paul. “Where did you leave Aunt Beatrice and Uncle Dick?”
“Napping. It’s afternoon.”
“Why don’t you go wake them up and help them get ready for dinner?”
Finding Richard Harden had turned out to be the easiest step of the whole process. Open the phone book and look up the name. After he’d left Well Spring, he’d ridden the rails until he took work on the Cuyahoga National Parks WPA projects. After Pearl Harbor, he’d joined the army. When the war ended, he’d returned to Whitmer, married a woman who walked out on him after fifteen years, and then he’d settled down to wait for his phone to ring. Beatrice and Dick married in a very small private ceremony in the library.
Sam groaned as he dragged Paul away. “I’m going to grow up and write a book about how you adopted me to make me work for free. It’ll be a bestseller.”
“You can title it
Chores
,” Ryan called after him.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if he does write that book. I think he’s working on it now,” Patricia said, watching them walk away. “Hopefully it’ll be a guideline on how to be a good parent from the perspective of the child. Do you think we’re good parents?”
“What’s in the folder, Patricia?” Ryan asked.
“I think we’re good parents, but how do you tell until they’re grown up? We do have Mrs. Dudley and Jeff and Aunt Beatrice and Uncle Dick to help, I guess.”
“Patricia, what is in the folder?”
Patricia glanced up at him. She’d sent everyone away, and now she was hesitating. Why, after three years together did he still fear she would tell him she didn’t love him? Why, after three adoptions and one child of their own on the way, did he still worry she would one day announce she was bored and wanted a new toy?
Why was she still standing there with that folder in her hand, not looking at him?
“Is something wrong with the baby?” he asked hopefully. No, not hopefully, but at the moment that would be the smallest disaster he could imagine. As long as she still loved him, he could handle anything. Anything.
“No. The baby’s fine, silly. I just don’t know if you’re going to be upset.”
“About what?” Hellish anxiety clawed at him. Upset? What could she have done to upset him? Had an affair? Fallen in love with someone else?
“I had David find the coroner’s records on your mother.”
Ryan blinked. Nothing like that had ever entered his mind. This family had adopted him so completely he’d hardly thought of his mother in the past few years.
“You said that no one ever told you why she really died. I thought since the circumstances were unusual there would have been an autopsy, and if I could get the records, I could tell you what happened. Just so you’d know.”
“You did that for me?”
“I haven’t done much yet. David will do whatever I ask him to.”
Ryan sighed. Someday he hoped to get over the fear of losing her, but he supposed that made him a better husband. He couldn’t take her for granted because every day was a gift. “What does it say?”
Patricia opened the file and leafed through the pages. “Well, it looks like I guessed right when I told you it sounded like an aneurysm. Death caused by burst artery in the brain. Body donated to the Georgia College of Medicine. So after the autopsy, she was used as a teaching tool for doctors in training.” Patricia looked up. “They would have cremated her when they finished. If you want to find the ashes, we could have them brought here.”
Ryan looked at her. After she died, his mother’s body had taught people like Patricia to be better doctors. Somehow it felt like Patricia had met his mother, even though he knew Patricia hadn’t gone to the Georgia College of Medicine. “I don’t know. Can I think about it?”
“Sorry, I thought I would have time to look at the autopsy before I sprung it on you. I just thought you’d like to know.” Patricia bit her lip.
“I do, and I’m glad you did it, but I don’t want to see the pictures.”
She laughed, sounding relieved. “I wasn’t planning on having them framed.”
“Good.” Ryan gathered her into his arms again. He still couldn’t believe this woman loved him. This intelligent, beautiful, elegant, and ethereal creature loved him enough to think up ways to please him. Never in all his life had he imagined living the life he had now. No wonder he prayed every morning before he opened his eyes that it wasn’t all a dream. And every morning he opened them to the master suite of Well Spring manor, most days with Patricia stretching awake beside him and some with her on her way home from the hospital. He kissed her until his vision blurred, feeling the luscious curves of her body tucked into his.
“So,” she murmured when he released her. “Are you terribly busy, or are you up to a little game of Princess and Gardener tonight?”
She was also still the woman he’d discovered in the potting shed all those years ago. He smiled. “I don’t know, Princess. What did you have in mind?”
The sight of her wide smile made his whole body throb with desire. “I was thinking it might not be too late in the year for a visit to the secret garden.”
He nodded, trying to at least look firm and authoritative. “Is that what you thought? Well, I want to see you in the garden at eleven thirty sharp. And you know how I like to see you dressed, Princess.” He touched her bound hair.
“Yes, Master.” She looked at him with hooded eyes, a pretty, submissive flush spreading across her cheeks.
Loose Id Titles by Belle Maurice
As You Wish
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