Once in a Lifetime (27 page)

“Mummy, Mummy. It’s from Aunt Velma. It says Velma. It says Velma, Mummy.”

Russ looked at Tara. “Isn’t it a good thing I don’t mind if they know who sent it?”

Tara slapped her hand over her mouth. “Is that what means secrets, Mr. Henry? I forgot.”

“It wasn’t a secret, Tara,” Russ said. “I’ll have to call Velma and thank her.”

“You remembered what I wanted,” he said to Alexis as he savored the cake and ice cream. “This was one great meal.”

“I let her cook this stuff, too. Sweet potato soufflé. My brain
burned trying to imagine what it would taste like. Pretty good, too,” Henry said.

“Wasn’t better than the one she cooked for my birthday,” Drake said. “And that caramel cake. Man, I can still taste it.”

“Drake, you and I are not smart,” Russ said. “We could have this stuff regularly. Get another housekeeper, build a fire under Telford and tell him to do the honorable thing toward our…er…sister here. Then, man, we could—”

“I haven’t left the table, and neither has you-know-who,” Alexis said, reminding the two men of Tara’s presence.

“Sorry,” Russ said, “but I was dead serious. Not about the cooking, though that would be a bonus, but I want to see this mixture jell.”

Drake stopped eating and looked at Alexis. “You’re the one holding this up, aren’t you? I know Telford’s stubborn, but he isn’t crazy. I’m going to have a real good talk with you.”

What could she say? “Russ, Drake, Henry. I love all of you. Please don’t upset me.”

The phone rang, and Drake jumped up. “I told you he’d call.” He handed the phone to Russ.

“Thanks, brother. Yeah. She pulled out the stops and cooked all my favorites. Sorry you missed it, because I doubt it can be duplicated.” He passed the phone to Drake, then to Henry and then to Tara.

“Mr. Telford said to tell you he’ll call you later, Mummy. He talked to everybody else. Is he mad at you?”

There were times when she’d like to muzzle her daughter. “No,” Henry answered for her. “He wanted some privacy.”

“Oh.”

“Come on,” Drake said. “Let’s all take this stuff into the kitchen and straighten the place up. I’ve got a couple of bottles of Moët & Chandon, and we’re all going to drink champagne.”

“Me, too?” Tara asked, giggles spilling out of her.

He rubbed the tip of her nose. “I got you some bubbling grape juice.”

Henry stood and stretched to his full height, which even he admitted wasn’t much. “This is a great family. Perfect with all six of us, and ain’t nobody should break it up.”

When she got a minute to herself, she’d try to digest that. She drank two glasses of champagne with them, told them good-night, went to her room and put Tara to bed. If Telford had been there, if would have been perfect.

S
he couldn’t control her restlessness, and a cold December evening wasn’t a time for walking in the garden where she always found peace and tranquillity. If she lived to be a hundred, she wouldn’t get used to waiting on a man’s telephone call; indeed, she had rarely done it. But this one had a hold on her. She looked at her watch. Dinner had been over for nearly two hours, and he still hadn’t called her. She wanted to be annoyed but, instead, she was worried as to whether something had happened to him.
Oh, for goodness’ sake, girl, get yourself back on track.
She stripped and headed for the shower, mainly for want of something to do, since she’d had one earlier. As soon as she turned on the water, the phone rang. She grabbed a towel and raced to answer it.

“Hello,” she said, with a huskiness that embarrassed her.

“Whoa. From the way you sounded, I take it the big guy isn’t there. How about I come out tomorrow, since I’ll be away on business Wednesday?”

She hadn’t thought her heart could hit the bottom of her belly so fast and so resoundingly. Recovering as quickly as
she could, she agreed and added, “Four o’clock for half an hour.” If he put forth some effort to help Tara like him, she’d lengthen the visiting period, and she told him as much.

“Bring me one of your recent photographs, and I’ll frame it and put it in her room.”

“What if I bring you one for your room, too?”

“No, thanks, Jack. See you tomorrow.”

She started back to the bathroom, glimpsed herself in the mirror and let the towel drop to the floor. What did Telford see when he gazed at her body? Did a man focus only on what his eyes beheld? She looked at the tiny stretch marks on her belly and the upper part of her thighs, barely visible, but sufficient to mar the beauty of her flat belly, narrow waist, full bosom and flared hips. She picked up the towel, drew it tightly around herself and walked slowly back to the bathroom. She was as she was.

After the shower, she patted herself dry, applied some lotion and crawled into bed. Immediately the phone rang, and she reached over and lifted the receiver.
If it’s Jack, I’m going to hang up.

“Hello.”

“Hi. How are you? Sorry I had to miss that great banquet you gave Russ. It blew his mind.”

She rolled over on her belly, luxuriating in the sound of his voice. “It was as perfect a meal as I ever cooked. The only thing it lacked was you.”

“How’d it happen that Henry let you do that, cook a whole meal, I mean?”

She twisted the telephone cord around the index finger of her right hand. “He said if I wanted to get that fancy, I could do it myself, but I sensed he was tired.”

“That doesn’t sound like Henry. Tell Russ to check on him, will you? Henry acts like he’s a piece of iron. I’ll call him tomorrow. Seen or heard anything of Biff?”

Hmmm. So Biff was on his mind. “Not a thing, thank the Lord.”

“Good.” His voice vibrated with relief. “I wouldn’t walk out on that road alone or with Tara. Biff’s devious. You miss me?”

“Do birds fly?”

Though miles away and with half an ocean between them, his laughter warmed her and a delicious, sweet feeling snaked through her body like a searching wind. “Unless their wings are damaged,” he said. “How’re your wings?”

Oh, talking with him was so good. Liberating. Joy suffused her, and she wrapped her free arm around her middle and burrowed beneath the covers. “My wings? Never better.”

He laughed aloud. “When I get back there, we’ll fly together.” Her nerves shimmered in anticipation, and she tingled from head to foot.

She kicked up her feet and let laughter peel from her throat. “Promises, promises,” she teased.

“If I was with you right now, you’d scream ‘uncle’ before I left you.”

“Talk, talk. My grandfather always said, talk’s cheap. It takes money to buy land.”

She knew she was getting to him when he said in a voice minus the rich vibrato she loved, “You are one fresh woman. What happened to that decorous female who came to my home last April?”

She flipped to her back, crossed and uncrossed her legs. “I’ve wondered about that, and all I can come up with is that mind-altering experience she had with us…Tel…er, what’s his name? Turned her inside out.”

“Yeah? She’s not bad at mind-blowing herself. Listen, sweetheart, I’ll call you in a day or so. Give Tara a hug. Kiss me?”

She blew him a kiss. “Take good care of yourself, hon.”

“Thanks. You do likewise.”

She hung up and lay there staring at the phone that she gripped in her left hand. Where was her resolve? She’d better remember the price she had to pay when he learned of her
schoolgirl folly, of her lie. He’d had her understand that he placed a high value on honesty. She’d been dishonest, and she’d hurt him. Sleep came slowly.

“Jack, I can
not
force Tara to like you,” she told him during his visit the next day. “You have to teach her to love you. Where’s the photograph you promised?”

He leaned against the doorjamb at the entrance to the foyer, his arms folded as if he lived there, and gazed at her in the way of a man cataloguing the assets of a woman he wants.

“I forgot the photo,” he said, as if it were of no import.

Tara walked up to them and pulled on Alexis’s arm. “Mummy, Grant wants me to come over to his house and see his new computer. Can I go, Mummy?”

“After your daddy leaves, I’ll call Grant’s mother and we’ll see what’s what.”

With neither deference nor embarrassment, Tara looked up at her father. “How soon are you going? I have to tell Grant.”

“Look,” Jack said in a tone that signaled a rising temper, “I’m getting out of here.”

“Stay right where you are, Tara,” she said when the child turned to leave. “You said you wanted to go to the bathroom, but you made a phone call.”

Alexis hurt for Tara, because even at so young an age, the child didn’t like to compromise and usually made that clear. She couldn’t remember Tara disobeying or being uncooperative, except in connection with her father.

“I’m sorry, Mummy, but I promised Grant I’d call him, and you said I have to keep my word.”

“Who’s Grant?” Jack asked.

“Grant Roundtree, her playmate. They’re good friends.”

“Fast company. Where’s the big guy these days? What’s his name? Telford?”

“Mr. Telford is working in Barbaby.”

“You mean Barbados, darling,” Alexis said.

“Barbados. Mr. Telford calls me lots of times.”

“I’ll just bet he does. How about you, your mother and me going for a ride in my brand-new car?”

Tara hung her head for a second and then looked straight at him. “Sorry. I have to call Grant.”

Jack shrugged, but the scowl on his face bespoke anything
but
indifference. “Five will get you ten there’s something going on here that they don’t teach in Sunday school.”

His gloved hand was already on the doorknob, and he simply turned it and left without another word. Not a hug or even a pat on the head for his daughter. It occurred to Alexis that she had never seen him hold and kiss Tara, not even as an infant. She flung open the door and raced after him.

“Why do you come here? I have never seen you show Tara the affection a child expects from a father. Don’t you know she sees other children with their fathers and understands what fathers are supposed to be? No wonder she rejects you: you don’t try to teach her. And another thing, when are you going to introduce her to her half brother?”

He stared at her almost as if he didn’t understand. “What was I supposed to do with a baby? As for Pierce, I never see him, because his mother and I don’t speak.”

“Mummy, here’s your coat.”

She spun around and saw Tara standing in the open door holding a coat. In her anger, she hadn’t thought of the cold. She ran back inside, taking Tara with her.

“Thanks, honey.” She took the coat, hung it in the closet and walked with Tara to her room.

Sitting on the edge of her bed, she positioned Tara between her knees, and Tara smiled up at her, the essence of sweetness and the innocence of a child. Her heart brimmed with love, but if she didn’t discipline Tara, she would become a replica of her cunning, self-centered father.

“Because you told me an untruth, Tara, you can’t visit Grant today, so phone him and tell him you can’t come.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Tara dialed the number and asked for Grant. “Hi, Grant.
I was bad, so I can’t come over today. Nope. Just don’t invite me on Wednesday. I’m always bad on Wednesday. You will? Oh, great. Bye.” She walked over to her mother. “Mummy, can Grant come to see me next Wednesday?” Before she could say no, Tara added, “After he leaves.”

“We’ll see.”
He!
It struck her that Tara rarely referred to her father and that, when she did,
he
and
him
were the only titles she gave him.
My goodness, and she won’t even be six for several months.

At first, Telford called her every other evening after dinner. But by the end of the first week after leaving for Barbados, he’d begun calling her daily and at different times during the day. His phone call awakened her the following Sunday morning.

“I know I woke you up but, heck, I’ve been waiting for daylight for the last nine hours. Talk to me.”

“Hmmm? What time is it?” She pulled the pillow over her face. “I’ll be there soon as I…” She rolled over, imagining being closer to him so that his fingers could reach her body, but his arms didn’t seem long enough. “Honey, stop moving away from me.”

“You can believe me, if I could, I’d be as close to you as a man can get to a woman.”

“You’re teasing me.”

“You’re the one teasing, baby, and my blood pressure’s rising by the second. You’re still asleep. I’ll call back in a couple of hours.”

“Huh? Oh! Telford?”

“Yeah. I’ll call back.”

“No. No, I’m… I’m awake.” She sat up. “How are you?”

“I’m not sure you want to know. Tell me about you. Anything. I just want to hear you.”

“Will you be home for Christmas?”

“You bet. No matter what, I’ll be there.”

“Do you mind if I invite Velma? There’re only the two of us, and—”

“Of course you may, but be sure to let Russ know.”

She hadn’t thought of that. “Thanks. I will.”

No matter how long they talked, she never wanted their conversations to end. “Bye, love. Hurry and come home.”

“On the first day possible.”

Several days later in midafternoon, Russ looked up from his drafting table and turned on the light. A glance at the windows revealed a blackened sky and trees bending in the wind. He closed all the windows, brought candles and lanterns up from the basement and put boxes of matches in strategic places. Then, he put Alexis’s car into the garage, locked the door and dashed into the front door to escape the storm.

“I don’t see how I can leave here in this storm,” Jack said to Russ and Alexis. “For the last few minutes, the wind’s been blowing so hard it’s bending those trees, and it’s pouring rain out there.”

Russ rested his hands on his hips and stared at Jack. “This storm’s been forecast for the last three days, so you knew it was coming and you should have arranged your visit accordingly. You’ll have to spend the night. I’ll show you your room.”

Good grief,
Alexis said to herself.
You can almost cut the hostility between these two men with a knife.

“Alexis can show me,” Jack said.

With his left hand on his hip and his other one braced against the wall above his head, Russ stared at Jack. “I say what goes here, and
I
will show you where you’ll sleep. We eat at seven, not later.” He headed up the stairs, leaving Jack to follow him or sleep on the floor wherever he could find space.

“If I was his type, I’d introduce him to my fists,” Jack muttered beneath his breath.

“That would be foolhardy. Never try it,” Russ said without stopping or looking back. “If you were my type, you’d be reading your daughter bedtime stories.”

Alexis didn’t know how she got through dinner that evening. For once, Tara didn’t declare the necessity of saying grace before they ate, though Russ said it anyway, and cabbage stew tasted like gourmet fare. Not even Tara complained about it.

To her amazement, Jack asked her, “Where’s your room?”

She was about to slap her hand over Tara’s mouth when Henry answered for her. “Why you asking? That ain’t none of your business.”

Alexis strummed the table with the fingers of her left hand. “Run into the kitchen and get Mummy a paper napkin, please,” she said to Tara.

Jack’s face contorted into a scowl. “I’ve got a right to know where my child sleeps.”

“You wasn’t asking about Tara. Exercise yer rights some other place, some other time,” Henry said. “At this table, we don’t speak of nothing unpleasant.”

“For a cook, you got a lot of mouth.”

“Sure have. Everybody in this house is equal, so don’t pull your highfalutin stuff on me.”

Tara came back and took her seat at the table. “Here’s three napkins, Mummy,” she said, pride in her accomplishment evident from her expression. “Thanks, honey.”

Russ, who hadn’t uttered one word since saying grace, laid his fork down and looked at Henry. “What are we having for dessert?”

“Apple turnovers.”

“I’ll get mine later. Thanks for a great meal, Henry. I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed it.”

And he said that with a straight face.
She had to stifle the laugh that threatened to burst from her throat.

She folded her napkin and prepared to leave the table, but Tara jumped up ahead of her. “Ask to be excused, Tara,” she said.

Tara looked up at her and forced a smile. “Excuse me.”

“Please.”

“Please.”

She couldn’t believe her eyes. Tara scooted off to her room without hugging Henry or Russ or saying anything to them, and Henry’s knowing look told her that the child’s unhappiness hadn’t escaped him.

Good manners dictated that she not leave Jack alone, and she might have remained with him if he hadn’t slammed both palms on the table.