Matchmakers Box Set: Matchmakers, Encore, Finding Hope (37 page)

“Tell me about your mother.” She tensed in his arms. He was calling Mandy her mother, and she didn’t consider her that.

“You know my mother.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Why? Sophia is the only mother I’ll claim.” Her tone was defensive.

“Listen.” He turned her so they would face each other. “You landed some heavy words on me. I wasn’t looking for love when I came here. I have never in my life considered getting married or having a family.” Her jaw clenched when he spoke. “Until I met you.”

“You’re just saying that because I was stupid enough to tell you I loved you.”

“I’m telling you that because it’s the truth. We said we’d each give a little. Now I’m asking you for a little. I want to know about your mother.”

She gave a little grunt and sipped on her hot chocolate. “What do you already know?”

He told her what Sophia had told him. Then what David had told him. Carissa decided they hadn’t left out too much except… “Both of them neglected to tell you she was a coke addict?”

She heard him let out a breath. “Yes, I guess they did.”

“She used my dad, lied to him and to me. She bounced me around for seven years, telling me he’d left us.” She snorted out a laugh. “Then when I find him, she moves her happy ass in.” She shook her head. “That stupid stunt she tried by slitting her wrists just messed up my life, not hers.”

He stroked his fingers through her hair. “You said once that the only good thing she did for you and your father was give you hope. What did that mean?”

She realized he hadn’t understood the statement at all. “As in Hope Kendal, my sister.”

“She gave you Hope?”

“Yes.” She twisted so that her head lay against his chest.

“That’s why you look alike. In the face, that is. Otherwise, you’re strikingly different. You’re dark and exotic, and she’s fair and soft.”

“Exotic?”

“Oh God, that hair, those eyes, the lips…” He laid a kiss on her neck. “Have you never looked in a mirror?”

“Thank you.” She let out an easy, light sigh. She sipped her cocoa and led into her story. “She came back when I was seventeen. The same year Sophia returned to us. In two weeks, I fell in love with Sophia and wanted her for my mother. She and my father mended ten years apart and fell in love again. And then Mandy showed up.” She felt him shift. “Mandy, my birth mother.”

“Right.”

“She was knocked up by some married man she’d had an affair with. She’d changed her name to Kendal and used the smooth line that she wanted her daughters to be together because she was dying. It worked on me like a charm, and it worked on Dad, too. He figured it was what he had to do. He told me once he was afraid that if he didn’t, I would take off with the baby.”

“Would you have?”

“I don’t know. I never had to make that decision. He decided she deserved a home. He decided that at the risk of losing Sophia again.”

“She didn’t want the baby?”

“Please…” she laughed. “She’d left with Pablo, and we figured she’d never come back. But if she did, Dad would already have Hope by then. What kind of woman is met with the story, ‘Hey my ex-lover had a kid. I’m going to raise it. Wanna be the mother?’ and decides to stay?”

“Sophia, obviously.”

“Well, she showed up just as Mandy went into labor. The look on her face when she heard him tell the paramedic that the baby was his…” She couldn’t even explain. She took the Saint Nicholas medal that lay on her chest always and pulled it back and forth on its chain.

“Your birth mother…”

“Died in labor. She never saw Hope. Everything went as planned. She had Dad’s name. He was named in her will as the person to get Hope. He was there, and his name is on her birth certificate. She is his daughter.”

“And she’s Sophia’s daughter.”

“Completely.” She smiled. “She adopted us both on the same day. I was three weeks shy of eighteen when she legally became my mother. It was one my proudest moments.”

“How long were they married before she legally became your mother?” His breath was soft in her ear.

“Three months.”

“She’s happy.”

“I don’t know if she has ever have been happier.” She continued sliding the medal back and forth on the chain across her neck.

“What is this?” He lifted the necklace with his fingers.

“It was my engagement gift.”

“Engagement?”

“Sophia asked me to be her daughter before she and Dad agreed to get married. Her mother had given it to her.”

“That’s precious.”

“I would like to think I’d give it to my child, but I plan to have at least four of them. So who would get it? I think I’ll give it to Hope when she turns ten. He’s the patron saint of children. He’ll keep her safe.”

Thomas cleared his throat and shifted in the chair. “You want four children?”

“I do.”

Carissa was fully aware of the awkward silence that fell between them. Marriage and children weren’t even a subject he could be a part of.

She couldn’t take away the pain and anger he felt from his childhood. She couldn’t replace old memories or make them go away. Suddenly she wondered if she could ever love him enough to make him feel worthy. If she tried, she might have to give up her own dreams. Was that worth the price of love?

They slept in one another’s arms. Things were in the open, though still touchy. They knew things about each other.

The school was coming together. They applied texture to the walls and installed the windows and doors. They would paint next, and then carpet and tile would be installed.

Carissa took on ten more students. Thomas started a theory class right in the study. Sophia even found she had three homeschooled students that wanted to learn cello, violin, and viola all at the same time. They made it work. It seemed like everything was coming together.

Halloween afternoon, Carissa had freed all her students to come another day. Thomas’s only student was Hope, and then, as promised, her sister would take her trick-or-treating.

“Hope, go up to my room and get your costume on,” Carissa called from the kitchen after she heard Thomas finish his lesson with her. “We’ll eat, and then we’ll go.”

“Okay.” She bounded up the stairs, and Thomas walked into the kitchen.

The aroma surrounded him as he wrapped his arms around Carissa’s waist and buried his face in her hair. “Fajitas? Can’t say I’ve ever had that at home.”

“Hmmm, one of my specialties.” She pecked him on the cheek.

They’d become comfortable. She refused to bring up the fact, again, that she’d fallen completely in love with him and he’d never reciprocated the words, but the feelings were there. She thought perhaps once the school was up and running, he’d ease up a bit. But for now, she’d settle for comfortable.

After dinner, Princess Hope stood at the door, her orange, plastic pumpkin primed with the four pieces of candy she’d already taken from Carissa’s bowl.

“Hurry!” she yelled up the stairs at her sister as Thomas walked around the corner. “She’s taking forever.”

“What is she doing?”

“Changing.”

“Changing?”

“Yeah, into her costume.”

“Oh.” He hadn’t realized she’d be dressing up. Suddenly fantasies of Super Girl or Wonder Woman filled his head. He’d seen many costumes at the store. There had been that little French maid outfit and the devil. He felt his cheeks warm with his thoughts. 

“Go get her,” Hope whined, and he laughed.

“Okay.”

Thomas hurried up the stairs and tapped on her door and opened it slowly.

Any fantasy of Wonder Woman was gone when he looked at her.

“Gypsy?”

“Every year I’m a gypsy, and Hope is a princess.”

“This is a sister thing, huh?” He moved behind her and moved the mass of black curls from her neck. Hidden under the curls were large, silver earrings. “I like your hair like this.”

“Do you?”

He pressed himself closer to her, and she let her body lean against his, feeling his intentions, and she smiled. “Thomas, I have to go beg neighbors for candy now.” She turned to him, the bangles on her arms clinking as she rose them behind his head. “Meet me at my parents’ house in two hours. Be nice to the kids, too.”

“You’re going to make me give out all that candy, aren’t you?”

“Yes, and don’t leave any. I open the bag one hour before people start knocking on the door so I don’t eat it all.”

“Maybe I’ll throw the bowl into the bag of the first kid and call it quits.”

“That isn’t going to get me home and into bed with you any faster.” She turned from him and grabbed up a shawl.

Thomas snagged her around the waist with his arm and pulled her to him. “Just tell me you won’t change out of this outfit. I’d really like to have my palm read.”

“I can tell you already what it says.” She smiled wide. “You’re trouble.”

“I won’t be any trouble at all if you let me take that outfit off of you myself.”

She lifted up on her toes, gave him a gentle kiss, and went on her way.

The next morning, Carissa zipped up her suitcase and carried it down the hall. Passing Thomas’s room, she noticed him sitting on his bed, his hands clasped in his lap. It was no secret. The trip to Chicago was weighing heavy on his mind. She wondered if perhaps she should go alone to purchase the school’s instruments.

She stopped at the door and looked in. “Are you all right?”

“I’ll be fine.” He blew out a breath. “You’re all ready to go?”

“Yeah, I’ll just get this in the car, and we can leave whenever you’re ready.” She inched into his room. “If you don’t want to go…”

“No. You didn’t run away when I told you my story. I won’t dismiss your trip. I just haven’t been back to Chicago since I was sixteen.” He let out a little laugh. “In fact, the only time Pablo performed there while I was with him, I faked a sickness so serious that he took me to the hospital. By the time I got there, I was so worked up they kept me.”

Carissa felt sick to her stomach that she could hurt him by just making him go with her. “I don’t want to cause you pain.”

“Carissa,” he looked up into her eyes, “I need to go, but I have a favor to ask.”

“Okay.” She stepped fully into the room and took his hands. “What?”

“I’ve never been to Sarah’s grave. Will you go with me?”

Her heart slammed in her chest. She knew just how big a step he was taking. They’d been living comfortably, and his request moved them beyond that comfort zone and into a trust zone that hadn’t yet existed. “I’d be honored.” She smiled and pulled him to his feet. “C’mon. I’m hankering for Chicago pizza for dinner. If we get out of here in the next hour, we can have it.”

He nodded, gathered his things, and they headed to Chicago.

Lunchtime found them at a truck stop in Des Moines. Thomas pushed his Dottie’s Special Pot Roast around the plate with his fork. Carissa all but licked the ketchup from her plate once the fries were gone and the hamburger she’d chosen were history.

“It looks like I’m going to get that pizza for dinner after all,” she said with a rise of her eyebrows, but Thomas’s eyes never shifted. “I’d also like to go to the American Girl store and get something special for Hope tomorrow.”

He only nodded.

Her heart ached for him. She felt she was dragging him along a painful journey, but she had to remind herself that he’d asked to go. After all, she’d offered him an out.

“Thomas,” she waited for his eyes to shift to hers, “really, we can find you a place to stay, and I can go on by myself.”

“I have to do this. I have to face it, Carissa. I cowered, and I ran.” He pushed his full plate out of his way and gathered her hands in his. “I don’t know what happened to my father or my mother after Sarah died.” He brushed his fingers through his hair and then settled them back onto Carissa’s hand. “She tried to call me once. My mother, that is. I was in Paris.”

Thomas squeezed his eyes tight. “Pierre was in the hospital there when she called. Pablo told her I didn’t want to talk to her ever.”

“How long ago was that?”

“About eighteen months ago, I guess.”

“Thomas, she was reaching out to you.”

“I know. I didn’t tell Pablo to end the call. He was…he was angry with me, and that was his way of letting me know.”

“We should find her. You could—”

“No.” He shook his head. “I let that part of my life go. I need to move on.”

When his eyes lifted to hers, she saw something and wished she could have captured it. His eyes sparkled. They’d actually sparkled, as if to tell her he was going to move on with his life and include her in it. She could have sworn the sparkle said I love you.

Heat rose in her cheeks, and she kept the smile that surfaced. Inside her heart flipped, her stomach clenched, and her mind buzzed. He loved her. It wouldn’t be long before he told her so.

Carissa walked out of the lobby of the motel with the door key in her hand. Thomas stood, propped against the car. He still looked to her like Jimmy Stewart. He was so talented, so beautiful, and always just a little out of place.

“Okay, we’re set. I got us a room with two beds.” She kept a straight face as she approached him and headed toward the trunk to retrieve her suitcase.

“Good. You kick in your sleep.”

“That’s not me, pal, that’s you!” The words flew from her mouth as a joke, but the realism of them hit her. “I’m sorry.”

“If you’re going to protect me for the rest of my life against my own feelings, it’s going to irritate me.” He moved to her and touched her cheek.

There was a positive statement there. “I want to protect you for the rest of our lives,” she added softly.

“I’m fine.” He brushed her lips with his. “Now, what time is your appointment tomorrow?” He kept his mouth hovered over hers.

“Eleven,” she said on a sigh.

“Good.” He scooped her up into his arms, cradling her against him. “What room?” he asked as he began carrying her toward the motel.

She laughed. “Put me down,” she protested, but then nuzzled her lips into his neck. “Room one forty seven.”

“Put the key in,” he instructed with urgency as he held her.