The Welcome Home Garden Club (10 page)

Danny swiveled his head toward his mother, his eyelids lowered, dismissing Gideon. “Crockett invited us to the Rangers’ opening game. It’s the first Saturday in April. He’s already bought the tickets. Can we go?”

Crockett Goodnight. His half brother. Had he asked Danny to the game just to needle him? Right, you self-absorbed jerk. He didn’t trust Crockett any further than he could throw him, but that was being too suspicious. Shit, he didn’t know how to act anymore. He’d been in country for eight years. His hometown was more foreign to him than the Middle East. And his son was a total stranger.

“Don’t be rude. Say hello to Mr. Garza,” Caitlyn admonished.

The kid dipped his head, kicked the tile floor with the toe of his sneaker.

Gideon thought of the times his mother had forced him to be nice to her boyfriends. He’d hated it. Not that he was Caitlyn’s boyfriend. Not that she had a string of boyfriends. He knew her. She wasn’t like that.

Correction, the old Caitlyn wasn’t like that. He didn’t even know this woman.

No, she hadn’t changed that much. She’d always been true blue, the kind of woman a man could count on. The kind of woman he’d once needed to show him that all women were not fickle when it came to love.

“It’s okay,” Gideon said, even though inside him something withered.

Five minutes ago, he hadn’t even known he had a son, now he was a father. Funny, how parenthood worked. Everything changed in an instant. You didn’t want your kids to suffer the way you’d suffered. You wanted to spare them everything unpleasant. This new feeling was strange and yet wonderful. He tested it in his mind. Dad. Pop. Pa. Father.

It made him wonder then how his own father could deny who he was. In the end, of course, J. Foster had finally recognized him, but it had come years too late. Regret was a steamroller, flattening everything in its path. He was a screwed-up cliché. Loose mother, father who refused to accept him.

“Tell Mr. Garza hello,” Caitlyn insisted.

Gideon shook his head, narrowed his eyes, sent the silent message,
no
. He didn’t want the kid to feel obligated to be nice. That would only make the boy resent him more.

Danny snaked a quick glance at Gideon. “Hello,” he mumbled, then glanced back up at his mom. “So can we go with Crockett?”

Caitlyn shook her head. “You know I have to work on Saturdays.”

“Why can’t I go with him by myself?”

“Because you’re too young.”

“You treat me like a baby!” Danny shouted. “I’m not a baby. I’ll be eight in a couple of months.”

“Well, right now you’re certainly acting like a baby, throwing a temper tantrum.”

Danny folded his arms over his chest and scowled darkly.

Gideon felt a jolt clean to his toes. Danny’s gestures exactly mirrored his pout attitude when he’d been his age. Mad at the world and everyone in it. “I’ll take him.”

Where the words came from, he didn’t know. They just popped from his mouth, making promises he couldn’t keep.

Caitlyn met his eyes. “Are you sure?”

Spend the afternoon at the ballpark with his half brother whose inheritance he’d usurped and the son he hadn’t known he’d sired? That was one for the record books. He shrugged, tried to show he was game for anything. “Yes.”

Danny threw his hands in the air. The look of exasperated surprise on his face was so comical Gideon almost laughed. “Great, you won’t let me go alone with Crockett, but you’ll let me go with Crockett and some guy I don’t know?”

The kid had a point. He was sharp as a razor. Much smarter than Gideon had been at that age.

“Okay, you can go,” Caitlyn said, “but only if Mr. Garza goes with you.”

The scowl was back. “Who are you?” Danny asked.

It was the perfect opportunity to simply say,
Your dad
. But of course he couldn’t do it. Instead he opted for “An old friend of your mother’s. You can call me Gideon.”

“Well, you’re not my friend.”

He understood perfectly where the kid was coming from. He’d been in his shoes. He couldn’t blame him for his attitude. But neither could he deny the way it made him feel. Unwelcome, unwanted, on the outside peering in. The guy who’d never really belonged anywhere except in the army.

But Danny belonged. His great-great-great-great-grandparents had founded this town. You couldn’t get any more entrenched in Twilight than that. Here was something Gideon couldn’t relate to. What it was like to be part of a larger-than-life legacy.

And yet, your father was J. Foster Goodnight. Kin to Charles Goodnight, one of the key figures in Texas history. But that was different. He’d never been claimed as a Goodnight. Not until this morning.

“If you want to go to the game,” Caitlyn repeated, “it’s with Gideon or not at all. The choice is up to you.”

Danny jammed his hands in his pockets. The black cowlick, just like one Gideon had, stood up at the back of his head. “Yeah, okay, all right, he can come with us.”

Gideon didn’t know what to say, so he didn’t say anything. It looked like he had a date for the first Saturday in April, but it wasn’t the date he’d expected.

“Go wash up now,” Caitlyn said. “It’s time for supper.”

Danny studied Gideon with caution, but then he nodded solemnly, turned, and left the room.

“We have a son?” Gideon whispered, truly feeling the reality of it for the first time. “You and me? We have a son?”

“Yes,” Caitlyn confirmed. “Danny is our son. But he thinks Kevin was his father. Everyone in town believes it too. I wanted to make things easier for Danny, and Kevin agreed. I didn’t want Danny to—”

“Grow up a bastard.”

“I wasn’t going to say that.”

“Were you ever planning on telling him about me?”

“I was. I suppose. I am. I—”

“You were ashamed of me.”

“No! God, no. Never.” She got up, paced, wrung her hands. “I remember how you told me what a tough time you had growing up, never knowing your father. Feeling like you never belonged. Like no one cared. I simply wanted Danny to feel loved. Kevin was so good with him and I thought you were dead.”

Gideon stood up too. “So you lied to our child.”

“You don’t have any right to get angry with me. I tried to find you when I discovered I was pregnant, but you’d left no contact number and then later, when I scraped together the money to hire a PI . . .” She waved a hand. “It’s all water under the bridge. What’s done is done. What we have to decide is how do we proceed from here.”

“Yes,” Gideon said harshly. “Easy enough for you to say. You haven’t just found out you’ve got a child you knew nothing about.”

“We can start again, Gideon. Build a new life.”

God, how he wished it was true. He loved her more than words could say, but he’d learned that love wasn’t enough. “It’s not that easy, Caitlyn.”

“You’re making things harder than they have to be. You were always like that,” she said, “determined to do things the hard way.”

It was an accurate criticism, but he didn’t appreciate her pointing it out now. He was a father. Gideon still couldn’t wrap his mind around it. He had a son.

Gideon experienced this new knowledge in every cell in his body, every muscle fiber, in the center of his bone marrow. He had a son. He had a legacy. He thought of J. Foster. Goodnight blood ran in his veins. Blood that had helped develop Texas. The same blood ran through Danny. Bigger than life, pulsating, hot, and adamant. Gideon was a Goodnight. Danny was too. The boy deserved his inheritance.

Gideon knew what he had to do.

Because having a child changed everything.

D
inner was a tense affair.

No one spoke over the meat loaf and when Danny asked if he could be excused, Caitlyn quickly said yes. She needed time alone with Gideon to get this straightened out. Every time she looked at him, all she could see was raw masculine power and surging testosterone. He was upset and she understood it, but they needed to work past the anger and blame, and figure out their next step.

“I’ll make a pot of coffee,” she said. “We can sit out on the porch swing and talk this through.”

Gideon nodded, stony-faced. She wished she knew what he was thinking. Once upon a time she could look into his eyes and know every thought that passed through his mind. But those days were gone.

Lost forever?

She turned to the coffeepot, felt the heat of his gaze on her. Was he staring at her backside again? She hadn’t missed the look he’d sent her when she bent over the oven. A smile tipped her lips. Maybe he wasn’t as stony as he wanted her to believe.

Then again, a mischievous part of her thought, maybe he was. Caitlyn’s cheeks warmed. Here she was scandalizing herself.

“Pie?” she asked when the coffee was ready. “I picked it up from the Twilight Bakery on the way home. It’s apple. I remembered it used to be your favorite.”

“Designed to butter me up for the news that I had a son?”

“I didn’t know any other way to break it to you.” She balanced the pie plates onto two cups of steaming coffee. He held the door open for her so she could walk out onto the porch. She set the cups down on the small white wrought-iron table beside the porch swing and pulled two forks from her apron pocket.

Gideon sank down onto the porch swing. His weight sent the chains creaking. She handed him a pie plate and tried not to notice how he had carefully settled it onto his thigh. She should have thought this through. Eating on a porch swing was a balancing act for people with two hands. She pushed his coffee cup to the edge of the table so he could reach it, picked up her own cup and plate, and went to sit beside him.

The minute her bottom brushed the wood she completely regretted the suggestion altogether. He was so close to her. So close she could see his coffee-bean-colored irises and thick, dark eyelashes. So close she could feel his body heat as warm as honeysuckle vines in the sun. So close she could smell the alchemy of his scent—a tangy mixture of sage, daylilies, and rugged man.

She felt drawn into a mystical spell of fantasy. Three days ago she could never have imagined sitting here with the love of her life. Maybe this wasn’t real, but some kind of bizarre waking dream.

“I thought that somehow you guessed,” she said. “Or someone had told you I had a kid and you put two and two together.”

“What made you think that?” His eyes were clear and focused on her.

Caitlyn dropped her gaze, worked a chunk of pie off the slice with her fork. She noticed he wasn’t eating, just watching her. “The daylilies. They represent motherhood.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Weird coincidence. Why did you choose them?”

“Their color reminded me of your lips.”

“Oh.” She reached up a finger to brush piecrust crumbs from her mouth.

The sun was setting, casting a soft orange glow over low-lying clouds. The light slanted across Gideon’s face and his skin seemed to almost shimmer. She wondered if her skin appeared the same way. Tingling with life.

“So about Danny,” he said.

Yes, about Danny.

Gideon paused for a long moment, and she could tell he was having a hard time putting his feelings into words. “He didn’t seem to warm up to me.”

“You’re a stranger. He doesn’t know you. It takes him a while to warm up to strangers.”

“Takes after you.”

She bristled, felt as if he was judging her. “There’s nothing wrong with being cautious.”

“I never said there was.”

“You used to tease me about it.”

“That was before I knew how dangerous the world can be. You’re right to be cautious.”

“I worry that I might make Danny too much of a fraidy cat. Especially without a father around. I want him to be strong and independent.”

“He’s got a father around now.”

“You’ve decided to stay in Twilight?” She held her breath and realized that either way, she was afraid of his answer.

“I am now. Danny changes everything. I’ve decided I’m going to accept J. Foster’s inheritance.”

“That’s an about-face.”

“I have a son to think about.”

Caitlyn smiled. “Bowie and Crockett are going to be steamed.”

“That’s not my problem.”

“They’ll fight you.”

“Tulip,” he said, “have you ever known me to back down from a brawl?”

Tulip
.

The nickname he’d given her so long ago. She hadn’t heard it in eight years. “I’m happy to hear you say that.”

“What? That I’m ready to fight?”

“That you plan on being around for Danny.”

Gideon scowled. “Did you ever have a doubt?”

“I didn’t want to assume anything.”

“I’ve already missed almost eight years of his life, I don’t want to miss a minute more.”

“We have to discuss how to break the news to him. We can’t just come out and say it. He’s already been through so much with Kevin’s death. He’s having a hard time at school. I think we should take it slow. Let you two get to know each other first.”

Gideon’s scowl deepened. “I don’t agree, but you’re his mother, you know him best, so I’ll defer to your wishes.”

Caitlyn let out the breath she didn’t even know she’d been holding. “Thank you. That’s one reason I wanted to hire you to refurbish the carousel. So you’d have a reason to be around us.”

“I don’t need an excuse to be around you, Caitlyn.” He drilled her with his gaze. “I want to be here.”

“Well, I need the pretense of an excuse and we do need someone to repair the carousel.”

“All right,” he said. “I did promise to get that carousel running for you one day.”

“You remember that?”

His eyes met hers. “Tulip, I remember everything about you.”

Joy jiggled her heart. “We’ve only got one hurdle.”

“What’s that?”

“Convincing the garden club that you’re the right man for the job.”

A
fter Gideon left, Caitlyn couldn’t sleep. She put Danny to bed, tucked him in, read him a story, and then went to her own room. But after hours of twisting and turning and tossing, she was only more awake than ever. Finally, she got out of bed, slipped into her thick, worn sweater, and stepped out onto the back porch.

A full moon hung in the midnight black sky, fat and yellow. In the distance a whippoorwill called and its mate answered. The sweet scent of hyacinth wafted through the air. She could hear the bullfrogs down by Sweetheart Park start in with the late night strumming noises. Spring was almost here—ripe and rich and full. Spring was always her favorite time of year when the bulbs burst forth with bright pastels, making everything misty and romantic like a Monet painting. She liked Easter with its pageantry and symbolism. Loved dying hen eggs and hiding chocolate bunnies in the fresh green grass for Danny to find.