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He snorted. “Goddamn foolishness, if you ask me.”
Nobody had. Both were too polite to say so.
He sat back down in a recliner that dominated the dark-paneled living room.
Suzanne gave Mark a glance in which he read apology, dismay and a question: Now what? He nudged her toward a love seat and they sat side by side, facing her uncle Miles.
His wife, appearing with a tray, said, “For goodness’ sakes, Miles! Turn off the TV.”
So she wasn’t completely cowed.
He scowled at her but complied.
She set down the tray on the coffee table and let them all take a cup and add sugar or cream. Mark sipped his. Instant. Not even the good strong stuff you found in rural cafés, and sure as hell not the espresso he made at home. He set his cup down.
He opened the briefcase he’d brought just to look official and took out a notepad that he rested on his knee. The click of his pen made the aunt jerk.
“Thank you for agreeing to see me,” he began. “Ms. Chauvin, your niece, has hired me to find her sister and brother. My agency specializes in finding adoptees or birth parents. This shouldn’t be a difficult quest.”
Dead silence. The aunt stared at him as if he were toying with the pin on a grenade. Uncle Miles simmered, shifting in the recliner, his fingers flexing on the armrests. Obviously neither was real happy to learn that Mark thought he could find their long-lost niece and nephew.
He cleared his throat. “However, it appears that Ms. Chauvin had some mistaken information. She believed that an attorney, Henry Cavanagh, had handled the adoption. I was able to locate his files and discovered that he was involved in very few adoptions. Your niece’s and nephew’s were not among them.”
The aunt gasped, “Oh dear! I thought… Didn’t we put it in his hands, Miles?”
“We never told you he did anything but give us advice. Some agency took those kids. And they were glad to have ’em! Said there were people pining for cute young kids. You were too old,” he said directly to Suzanne, “to be as appealing.”
Mark’s jaw tightened. Son of a bitch.
Suzanne’s aunt squeaked in protest.
Uncle Miles harrumphed. “Anyway, Jeanne always wanted a daughter. I guess they would have taken you, too, but it never came up.”
“What agency took them?” Mark asked as if the question wasn’t the grenade that had Aunt Jeanne twitching.
The Fultons looked at each other.
“Oh, I’m not sure…” Aunt Jeanne pressed a hand to her chest as if to still palpitations. “Miles…?”
He glowered at his niece and Mark. “What if we choose not to cooperate in this wild goose chase?”
“I’m very good at finding people. I will find Linette and Lucien.” Mark paused. “I know when I do they’ll want to meet you, their blood relatives. To make a connection, and to find out why you were unable to take them into your home. The fact that you did everything you could to help my client find them will make a big difference in how they view you initially.”
They got what he was saying. He saw Miles Fulton swallow, heard his wife’s stifled sob.
“Come,” he said. “Aren’t you curious? Won’t you be glad to find out what they’re like now?”
In a thick, frustrated voice, Uncle Miles said, “It was called Adoption and Family Services. Based in Everett.”
Mark had worked with the organization before and found the staff willing to cooperate within the limits of the law.
“Satisfied?” Miles Fulton snapped at his niece.
She met his furious gaze with a dignity that Mark admired. “I will be as soon as you sign a waiver so that they’ll open the records.”
Handy to have a client who’d educated herself. Without a word, Mark pulled out a waiver he’d already typed up and handed it, with a pen, to Miles Fulton. Suzanne’s uncle signed with an angry slash, handed it to his wife and stalked out of the living room.
CHAPTER THREE
MAKING THIS KIND of phone call was one of the easy thrills of his line of work. No complications or hurt yet, just simple joy.
Rotating his chair so that he gazed out his window at Lake Union and the Fremont Bridge, presently open to let a tall-masted sailboat through, Mark dialed. “I have news,” he said without preamble. “Ready to hear their names?”
“You have them?” Suzanne sounded awed. “Already?”
“Once we had the name of the agency and your aunt and uncle’s waiver, there wasn’t anything to it.”
“We’d never have had that if it weren’t for you.” She was quiet for a moment. “Were they adopted together?” When he told her they hadn’t been, she let out a soft, “Oh.” Then, “Please. Tell me the names?”
“Lucien was adopted by a family named Lindstrom. I haven’t found his first name yet. Your sister has grown up as Carrie St. John.” He let her take that in, then said gently, “Suzanne, she lived right here in Seattle. I looked up her adoptive parents. They have a place on Magnolia. Her adoptive father is a doctor. A cardiac surgeon.”
Magnolia was a hill that was virtually an island in the Sound connected to the city only by two bridges. It was also one of Seattle’s wealthiest neighborhoods, made up principally of gracious old brick homes with spectacular views of the Puget Sound, the Seattle waterfront and Vashon Island.
His client didn’t care about the wealthy part. All that mattered to her was her sister. “You…you found her?” she whispered.
“I don’t have an address or phone number for her yet. I can contact the adoptive parents, but I wanted your permission to do that.”
“She was that close?” Suzanne was openly crying. He could hear the tears thickening her voice. “If I’d known, I could have just driven to Seattle?”
“She’s been that close all along. Her parents still live at the same address they were at twenty-five years ago.”
“Oh, dear. Can I call you back?”
She did, fifteen minutes later, still sounding watery but more composed. “I had to take it all in. I’d begun to think I would never find her. Carrie. Is that what you said her name is?”
“Carrie St. John,” he repeated.
“And her adoptive father really is a doctor? That was true?”
He rocked back in his chair. “Yep. A surgeon. So she grew up with money.”
“What…what do we do now?”
“We need to plan our next step. I can try to track Carrie down without speaking to her adoptive parents. I can approach them. Or you can approach them.”
“You mean, just call them out of the blue? And say, ‘I’m Carrie’s real sister?’”
“Yep.”
“Wow.” She gave a shaky laugh. “Isn’t it funny? I wanted this so badly, and now I’m terrified!”
They talked about how she felt, with him reassuring her that it was natural. She’d dreamed all her life about finding her sister and brother, but dreams weren’t the same thing as being only a phone call or two from actually meeting her sibling.
“Will you do it?” she finally asked.
“Talk to the adoptive parents?”
“If you think that’s the best thing.”
“I do. They may not be pleased, but there’s always the chance they’ll think this is a good thing for her, and they’re certainly the best go-betweens. Besides, if we bypass them, they’re more likely to be hostile to your appearance in Carrie’s life.”
He heard her take a deep breath.
“Okay. Do it.”
MARK CALLED TWICE that afternoon, getting only voice mail and choosing not to leave a message. At five-thirty, he left for home.
Michael was in half day kindergarten this year. He attended the morning session and was home by twelve-thirty. Mark considered himself amazingly, miraculously lucky to have found and been able to keep a young woman who stayed for the afternoon with Michael, put dinner on and cleaned house besides. Heidi was often willing to watch Michael evenings, as well. She was working gradually on a degree from the University of Washington.
When he walked in the door of his house in the Wallingford neighborhood, only ten minutes from his office, his son and their dog both raced to meet him.
Daisy skidded to a stop, her tail whacking Mark’s legs, her butt swinging in delight.
“Dad! Dad!” Michael shouted, leaping into his father’s arms with the full trust that he’d be caught. “I can read! I read ‘cat’ today. And ‘bat’!”
“Hey, that’s fantastic.” Mark gave him a huge hug, kissed the top of his head and swung him back to his feet. He scratched the top of Daisy’s head and got slopped with her long, wet tongue in reward.
Daisy had joined their household two years ago, after Emily died. The house and Michael both had become painfully quiet. Grasping at straws, one day Mark had thought, a dog. Every boy needed a dog. And right now, some unconditional love and companionship would be invaluable.
So they’d gone to the shelter with the intention of picking out a puppy. Daisy, a middle-aged Spaniel and God knew what mix, had entranced Mark’s three-year-old son more than the heaps of fat, sleepy puppies. Instead of being scared when her tongue swiped his face, he’d giggled. The first giggle Mark had heard in months.
“We want her,” he’d told the attendant.
Some idiot had surrendered her because they were moving to a no-pet apartment. He couldn’t imagine how you could have a dog as loving, eager to please and well-behaved as Daisy and be willing to discard her like a couch that didn’t fit into a new living room.
Their loss, his and Michael’s gain. She was part of their family now.
So was Heidi, as far as he was concerned.
As usual, dinner was in the oven and smelled damned good. Sometimes she stayed to eat with them, but tonight she appeared right on Michael’s heels, her bookbag already swung over her shoulder.
“Um, Mark? Can I talk to you for a minute before I go?”
Surprised, he disentangled his son and gave him a gentle push. “Go find a book. You can read to me before dinner.”
“Okay!” the five-year-old declared, and raced for his bedroom.
“What’s up?”
Heidi was short and a little plump. She had mousy brown hair, wire-rimmed glasses and ears that stuck out, making him think of an elf. She also had a laugh as carefree as Michael’s and the willingness to play with him by the hour as if no demand on her time was great enough to keep her from wanting to built a Lego spacecraft.
“Well, you know Peter?” She held out a hand at him. “He asked me to marry him!”
Good Lord. A diamond winked on her finger. Mark looked up to see the glow on her face and, despite his own dismay, he grinned and hugged her. “Congratulations! When’s the big day?”
Not too soon. Please, not too soon.
“Peter wanted to get married in June. But I talked him into waiting until September. So Michael’s in first grade. I want to keep working for you, but…but maybe not as many hours. You know? Once he’s in school all day, maybe he could go to after-school care sometimes, when I’m busy.” Her voice faltered and her glow dimmed. “Unless, um, unless you want to find someone else to be full-time.”
“Someone else? We could never replace you. You’re a saint. If you can stay on days through the summer, we’ll figure it out from there. Tell Peter thank you for being patient.”
She chuckled and, looking pleased with herself, opened the door. “See you in the morning!”
He had one hell of a mixed bag of emotions after she left. He’d grown fond of Heidi and was genuinely happy for her, but she’d also scared him. He didn’t like realizing quite how dependent he and Michael were on her; it made him feel a little resentful.
He thought he’d buried most of his anger at Emily, but surprised himself now with a burst of stomach-clenching rage. She’d done this to them. Left them alone. Some inner need had been way more important to her than her husband and son were, and he couldn’t get past that.
Shoving the mess of emotions out of sight, as he’d had to do for Michael’s sake since the funeral, Mark went to the kitchen and peered in the oven to see what was cooking. Then he listened to Michael sound out not just “cat” and “bat” but also “fat” and “rat.”
Feeling like every other overanxious parent, he asked, “Is everyone in your class starting to learn to read?”
“Annie already reads,” his son said. “And Kayla, too. They think they’re better than everyone else.” He added grudgingly, “I guess they are better readers. But lots of the kids can’t remember letter sounds. I sounded out b-a-t all by myself. Miss Hooper got really excited.”
Embarrassed at himself, Mark relaxed. Okay, so his kid wasn’t the most advanced in the class. But apparently he was doing better than most. And didn’t researchers say that girls usually started to read sooner than boys? Michael would be kicking Kayla’s butt by the time they took their SATs.
Over dinner, they talked about Heidi getting married, which worried Michael a little bit. “Will she have her own kids?” he asked.
“She probably will, eventually. She’ll be a great mom, don’t you think?”
“Yeah.” The boy was silent, his head bent over his plate. Finally, in a small voice, he said, “Sometimes I wish she was my mom.”
Mark’s heart contracted. “Well, in a way she is, isn’t she? Except, it’s a little like we’re borrowing her,” he explained. “Like a library book. We know we can’t keep it forever but we can sure enjoy it while we have it.”
Forehead creased, Michael looked up. “You mean, she’ll go away sometime. Like Mommy did.”
“Hey. Come here.”
His son slid off his chair and came to Mark, who lifted him onto his lap.
“Heidi won’t go away like Mommy did. It’s just that she’ll get married, and someday she and Peter will have children of their own. By that time you’ll be such a big boy, you won’t need someone to take care of you after school. And you know what? I bet Heidi will always be a good friend.”
The worried face looked up at him. “She won’t die. Right?”
“I hope Heidi won’t die until she’s an old, old lady.”
The five-year-old pondered that. “Okay,” he finally agreed. “But…is it okay if I pretend sometimes that she’s my mom?”
Damn. Mark should have guessed that any kid Michael’s age would be thinking like this. Remarrying wasn’t something he’d given any thought to; hell, he’d hardly been on a date since Emily died. But clearly Michael would be delighted to have a new mother.
