Valentine's Child Read online

  As she looked up at Patrice now, a flood of uncertain emotions poured through Sherry’s veins. It didn’t help to have Caroline standing behind the woman’s shoulder, a lieutenant in this war with Dragon Lady, the autocratic general.

  Sherry quivered inside, as much from J.J.’s unexpected touch when he removed her black jacket, as from the turbulent emotions plaguing her at the sight of her old nemesis.

  J.J. had hurt her terribly and he was the reason she’d fled without telling him she was pregnant. But it was Patrice — and Sherry guessed Caroline might be involved in there somewhere, too — who had turned Sherry’s wound into a mortal one. It was Patrice who had ultimately forced Sherry to leave town.

  She’d actually come to Sherry’s home a few days after Sherry’s ignominious appearance at the Beckett dinner party — shown up on a hot June night dressed in a lavender silk suit. She’d come from church, she said, although it was a Wednesday night and Sherry had never known Patrice Beckett to be an avid churchgoer. She’d come to offer Sherry money in order to drive her out of J.J.’s life forever. But the money was nothing compared to the pain Sherry was already feeling from J.J.’s belief that she could play such terrible games.

  So, now, with Patrice’s blue eyes staring her down and memories swirling like dust devils, Sherry remembered everything — the lies, the hurt, the money and the deception. The guilt that had been eating at her had lessened over the years because although she was partially at fault, she’d been barely eighteen whereas Patrice had been a grown woman who should have had some scruples.

  “Are you coming?” J.J. asked from the doorway, looking disheveled in a frustratingly sexy way. His hair lopped forward and the grim lines around his mouth were replaced by a hint of dimples. He’d always been way too attractive — blessed by the gods. Wondering what she could possibly accomplish, Sherry took a step after him.

  “Wait,” Patrice muttered harshly. “You have no business being here.”

  Sherry eyed her adversary. “I have business.”

  “What kind of business?” Caroline asked her, her eyes following J.J.’s progress as he threw himself onto a divan at the edge of Sherry’s vision. Unhappiness had drawn fine lines around Caroline’s mouth.

  “You’ve been out of J.J.’s life for years,” Patrice said softly, picking her words carefully. So, Caroline didn’t know. It was Patrice’s own dirty little secret. “You can’t come back now without some consequences.”

  “Consequences?” Sherry inched her chin upward. She hated confrontation as a rule and prayed she could keep up her bravado. But a traitorous little shudder had begun in her lower limbs, a trembling she could not control although she desperately wanted to appear calm and cool. Patrice had that effect on her. She’d always had that effect on her.

  “Caroline, would you mind giving us a minute alone?” Patrice asked.

  Caroline looked from Sherry to Patrice. Clearly she was as confused as J.J. about Patrice’s strange aversion to Sherry. Nevertheless, she headed after J.J., but as soon as she was gone Sherry wished her back. Alone with a viper. Dragon Lady. Sherry met Patrice Beckett’s sharp gaze with hot defiance.

  “We had a deal,” Patrice said in a low tone.

  “You and I never had a deal,” Sherry disagreed.

  She thought back to the ten thousand dollars she’d been forced to accept from Patrice once she’d left Oceantides, pregnant and alone. Her aunt Elena had taken pity on Sherry and given her a home in Seattle while Sherry awaited the birth. But when the check arrived from Patrice and Sherry refused to sign it on principle, Elena had taken matters into her own hands and forged Sherry’s signature. Sherry couldn’t believe it, but she didn’t stop it. Aunt Elena insisted they had to do it for Sherry’s mother’s sake. Cynthia Sterling had tried her best to keep the pregnancy a secret from her husband, but when Donald Sterling found out, his wrath was endless. The money helped Cynthia move closer to Elena and Sherry — and far from her abusive husband.

  But of course, Patrice Beckett wouldn’t understand that kind of desperation.

  “You took the money,” Patrice hissed. “If you break this up now, I’ll demand it all back.”

  “And I’ll get it for you,” Sherry answered tautly.

  Patrice snorted. “You can’t possibly pay it all back.”

  “I don’t have to discuss this with you. It’s J.J. who needs to know the truth.”

  “You can’t talk to him now. He’s drunk.” Her mouth said the word as if it tasted bad; her expression seemed to suggest J.J.’s lack of sobriety was entirely Sherry’s fault. “Go home and think about what you’re doing. I mean, seriously think about it.”

  “I’ve thought about it for fourteen years.” Sherry pushed past her on her way to the salon and J.J.

  Caroline was perched next to him on a burgundy divan that looked old and beautiful and expensive, probably a one-of-a-kind antique. J.J. sprawled, legs out, hands dangling between his knees, his eyes half-closed with sleep. Sherry hated to admit that Patrice might actually be right: now wasn’t the time to tell him about Mandy.

  “So, how long are you in town?” Caroline asked, smoothing her palms on her dress.

  “I’m not sure,” Sherry answered, wondering how many times she’d been asked that question since she’d resurfaced in Oceantides.

  “Sherry,” J.J. sang unexpectedly. “Sherry, baby …”

  Sherry didn’t know which of them reacted the more violently — herself or Caroline. Caroline flinched so hard she half jumped up from the couch, but Sherry’s intake of breath was a faint gasp. Patrice, who’d stepped into the salon’s archway, looked ashen and old, but J.J. seemed completely unaware of his devastation.

  “Still haunting the neighborhood, I see,” he muttered, his gaze narrowing on Sherry in a way that momentarily panicked her. Was he more sober than he let on?

  But no, his head flopped toward Caroline, his temple touching one tense shoulder. She reached up to touch him but it was a curiously reluctant gesture, as if she were unfamiliar with the feel of him — her fiancé. There was absolutely no naturalness about Caroline Newsmith at all. She wouldn’t meet Sherry’s eyes, and Sherry, for reasons she didn’t want to examine too closely, felt her chest constrict painfully.

  “It’s been a long time,” Caroline murmured, her smile forced.

  “A lifetime,” Sherry agreed

  “So, you wanted to see Jake?”

  “Well, yes… among other people,” Sherry added, realizing her small lie was to save Caroline embarrassment. Why she cared, she couldn’t say, but Caroline’s petty meanness in high school seemed far away and remote right now; practically nonexistent, as insubstantial as fairy dust.

  High school itself was an ancient memory and Sherry marveled that such a brief span of her life had produced such a rage of continuing torment.

  It also produced Mandy, she reminded herself. And Mandy was the reason everything mattered so much to this day. Mandy was a product of intense feelings, and maybe that was why she appeared so intense herself.

  “It’s really great to get all misty-eyed over high school, isn’t it?” J.J. declared ironically.

  “People move on. Grow up. Change their lives.” This was from Caroline, surprisingly, who seemed to suddenly feel the need to justify her position. “Did you know Roxanne is marrying Matt Hudson? On Valentine’s Day,” she added, unwittingly sending a frisson up Sherry’s spine.

  “I heard this morning,” Sherry admitted. “Roxanne invited me to the wedding.”

  Caroline’s eyes flared. “Are you going?”

  “I… think so,” Sherry said, wondering what devil had suddenly possessed her.

  “So, you’re staying in Oceantides then,” J.J. said. Beneath his thick, inscrutable lashes she couldn’t tell if he was watching her or not.

  “My business partner wants to make a trade. I take a few weeks off now, she takes a few weeks later.”

  “Kind of like a reunion for you,” Caroline suggested. She looked none t
oo happy with the arrangements.

  “It’s more like a pilgrimage,” Sherry admitted.

  A cool breeze swirled through the room and everyone looked to the doorway where Patrice stood like a statue. Sherry’s fanciful mind wondered if the stirring air was created by her own cold fury, but she could see the front door had cracked back open, and a breath of sea air had swirled inside.

  Examining J.J., Patrice demanded, “How long have you been drinking?”

  J.J. shot her a glance that would have set a lesser person’s knees to quaking. But Patrice was made of stern stuff. “Not long enough,” he told her. “I’m still conscious.”

  “I’m sure you’re making a wonderful impression on our guest.”

  “Don’t worry about Sherry,” J.J. said before Sherry could object herself. “She escaped early. Ran right out of town.”

  Patrice’s hands fluttered. “It’s not like you to do this sort of thing.”

  “Really,” J.J. drawled. “What is like me? Living here with you? Letting the Beckett empire swallow me up whole?” He threw out his arms, nearly overbalancing. “I shoulda up and split, like Heather.”

  Patrice said sharply, “There’s no point in this.”

  Sherry had come to the same conclusion. “I’ll go.”

  “No, don’t.” J.J. struggled to his feet.

  “I’ll… call you,” Sherry told him as Caroline got to her feet, too, as if she were afraid to let him do anything on his own with Sherry in the room.

  “You wanted to see me alone. Now’s a great time. Maybe I can catch a ride home with you.”

  “I’ll take you!” Caroline quickly offered.

  “This can wait,” Sherry agreed. “I’ll be around for a while, and there’s bound to be a better time to talk.” She would call the Craigs tonight, she decided, and tell them what was happening. Mandy would want to know.

  “Got a cell phone?” J.J. asked, and when Sherry pulled hers out, he rattled off his number which she quickly inserted into her call list.

  “What are you going to do?” Patrice demanded, clearly unable to help herself. Small wonder. She had a lot to lose.

  “Go to bed,” Sherry said, deliberately misunderstanding. Then a mirthful sprite inside her suddenly said, “Oh, I took a job while I’m here. It’s just temporary, but it’s a lot of fun. At Crawfish Delish.”

  Patrice gasped. Caroline’s jaw dropped, and J.J. stared at her in a way she couldn’t quite fathom. They deserved it — the whole lot of these “on the water” snobs.

  “Then maybe I’ll see you at work,” J.J. drawled, a grin lightening his face. He, at least, saw the humor in the situation.

  They stared at each other, and Sherry, sensing that somehow he’d joined her “side,” at least for the moment, decided it was a good time to leave. With some muttered goodbyes she hurried out of the house, holding her breath until she was inside her rental car, then letting it out on a sigh of relief as she closed her eyes.

  “Hey …”

  Knuckles rapped against her window. Sherry jumped, her eyes flying open. J.J. stood outside, hunkered against the driving rain and wind. Twisting the ignition, Sherry waved goodbye at him, but her escape attempt wasn’t quite fast enough because he threw open the passenger door and climbed in beside her before she could hit the accelerator.

  “What are you doing?” she demanded

  “What are you doing?” he answered right back. “You’ve got something to say, just say it.”

  “I don’t want to talk to you like this.”

  “You’d rather I was sober?”

  She could smell the liquor, but more than that she could smell the rain on the shoulders of his damp shirt. His hair glistened with droplets and when he shook his head, some of the moisture hit Sherry in a soft spray.

  Her hands tightened around the wheel. “I’ve got to get back,” she said through tense lips.

  “To work? I happen to know the shift’s over at Crawfish Delish. And don’t tell me you didn’t know I own the restaurant.”

  “I didn’t know when they hired me.”

  “But you did before tonight.”

  “Ryan told me.”

  “Ah …”

  She didn’t like the way he said that. Too knowing. Too sure of what she was all about.

  “Is it a problem?” she asked, feeling strained.

  “Ryan’s still your number one fan. I remember that. He’d never let anyone say a bad word about you.”

  “They managed to anyway,” Sherry murmured.

  “I don’t care if you work at the restaurant,” he said, switching topics. “I don’t care if you stay in Oceantides for good.”

  “Well, I’m not.”

  “But I’ve got this feeling that I’m in the dark about something important.” He brushed his hair back with one hand, his face taut and serious. “Patrice is scared of you for some reason. That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense unless there’s some reason more than high school.” He glanced at her. “Gonna enlighten me?”

  She could almost believe he was sober enough to hear the truth. Staring at him, she gathered her courage. “There is something I need to talk to you about,” she admitted. Her heart began pounding once again, slow and heavy, feeling as if it would beat right out of her chest. “But I’m not sure now’s the time.”

  “What did you do to her?”

  “I got in the way.”

  He nodded a couple of times and she realized he was still half-wasted. “You should always stay out of her way,” he said.

  “I’ll remember that. We can talk later when you’re sober and I’m… ready.”

  “I’m pretty damn sober.”

  “Not enough.”

  “You’re just not ready,” he guessed, his eyes narrowing. The sweep of his lashes against his cheek was too seductive, too appealing. She had to look away.

  “I’ll call you.”

  “Will you?”

  She nodded.

  “When?”

  “I’ll stay through Roxanne’s wedding,” Sherry said. “So, we’ve got a lot of time.”

  “Then I’ll see you at the wedding,” he replied, reopening the door and stepping back into the rain.

  “Oh, we’ll talk before then,” she assured him.

  “No.” He was positive. Leaning against the frame of the open door, he ducked his head inside to meet her confused gaze. “I’m going out of town.”

  “Oh.”

  “Yeah, ‘oh’. You and I, we had — ”

  “Jake!” Caroline’s voice stopped his thought. Sherry gritted her teeth as she spied his fiancée coming down the front steps, and the silhouette of Patrice in the doorway like the overprotective mother she was.

  “I’ll give you a ride,” Caroline declared, reaching earshot just then and spoiling any chance for further discussion. “I want to talk to you anyway.”

  J.J. held Sherry’s gaze. She stared right back, unable to break that fragile contact between them. He seemed about to blow Caroline off, but she heard herself say in a low voice, “I’ll see you at the wedding, okay?”

  “We’ll get it all straightened out then,” J.J. agreed, reaching her wavelength.

  Sherry nodded and as J.J. slowly closed the door, she put the car in gear, glancing back at her rearview mirror at him and Caroline who stood side-by-side in the rain. It seemed inevitable, somehow, that the truth about Mandy would come out at a wedding. A wedding on Valentine’s Day. On Mandy’s birthday.

  How ironic. It added a poignant sting to an already sensitive issue.

  But somehow it felt right.

  Valentine’s Day was on a Saturday, and Roxanne’s wedding was slated for five o’clock in the afternoon. With J.J. out of town and the pressure off, Sherry’s days sped by in a blur until suddenly it was the Friday evening before, with Sherry serving shrimp dishes prepared by Gerald, the “chef” who, for reasons unknown, had decreed her fit to work in his restaurant and who was doing his damnedest to get her to stay on, although she’d le
t him know in no uncertain terms that this would be her last day.

  Since that last evening with J.J., she’d been content to just fill in the hours and wait for D-Day. Mandy, however, had not been so understanding when Sherry called the Craigs to let her know there’d be a bit of a delay in meeting her father.

  “He’s out of town and can’t meet you yet,” Sherry said truthfully. “And I’m — uh — reacquainting myself with him, so it’s going to take a little more time.”

  “Next Saturday’s my birthday,” Mandy revealed, sending a shiver up Sherry’s spine. “My mom and dad said I could come to Seattle if I wanted to. Will you be back by then?

  “I don’t — think so.” Sherry ached to be with her daughter on her birthday, but telling J.J. the truth was more crucial. Maybe next year, she fantasized. “Your father’s best man in a wedding that day.”

  That gave Mandy pause, but she recovered quickly. “He doesn’t want me in his life, does he?” she said in her direct way. She had a knack for expecting the worst. Like mother, like daughter, Sherry thought. That way it doesn’t hurt as much.

  “Just because he’s busy doesn’t mean he doesn’t want you,” Sherry told her.

  “What’s he like?” Mandy suddenly asked, as if she couldn’t help herself.

  “He’s — great,” she answered, struggling. “Strong and decent. He’s engaged to a woman we both went to school with.” Now why did I say that? Sherry asked herself.

  “Engaged? You mean, to be married? When?”

  “I don’t know. Sometime soon, I guess.”

  “Do you like her?”

  Sherry emitted a burst of choked laughter.

  “Well, you knew her in school. What’s she like?”

  Sherry gazed out her motel window to the gray waves sliding over the darker gray sand. “She’s probably perfect for him,” she said.

  And Mandy, with a keen sense of awareness that Sherry was just beginning to appreciate, stated flatly, “I hate her.”

  “You can’t hate her. You don’t even know her.”

  “You don’t like her. I can hear it in your voice.”

  Their communication amazed Sherry. Having gotten over her own initial shock, she discovered that she and her daughter talked the same language. It was incredible, and although she knew this just might be Mandy’s way, and that she might simply be reacting to her daughter’s frankness, Sherry truly believed their ability to get past all the rhetoric was because of blood. They were related, mother and daughter, and it mattered.