Family Of The Year

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Ben’s voice was icy. “That can be arranged.”

Maria watched father and son stare at each other, testing, identical gray eyes probing just how far each was willing to go this time. She glanced uneasily at the children, dismayed to find them watching the exchange with wide-eyed interest.

Connor was the first to look away. He straightened from his slouch and turned to the little girl. “Thank you very much.” Then he addressed Maria. “Mrs. Soldata, this spaghetti smells absolutely delicious. It’s one of my favorite meals. And I’m looking forward to some authentic Mexican food while I’m here. I’m especially fond of chicken enchiladas. Dad, would you care for some spaghetti?” He held the platter toward his father, smiling agreeably.

Maria couldn’t help herself. She laughed out loud. What a rogue! Connor’s smile became impish and, as he’d obviously planned, his father’s face relaxed and there even appeared a ghost of a rueful smile on it. From then on, Connor was absolutely charming, and Maria became more and more amused as she watched the skillful con artist wind everyone around his finger. Even Veronica, jaded as she’d become lately, was soon smiling and blushing at the boy’s outrageous flattery. And when he complimented their mother on her dress, the old woman had to struggle to keep her disapproving frown.

“I mean it, Mrs. Romero, that shade of brown is very attractive on you. A mature woman such as yourself should always wear classic colors.”

Ben listened to the baloney his son was dishing out and the way the women smiled indulgently at him and could only shake his head. Connor had always handled his mother in exactly the same way. Lori let him get away with murder and his stepfather blatantly bribed him to keep him out of his hair. The end result was a spoiled, willful, soon-to-be-man with a strong aversion to hard work. And Ben was at a loss as to how to change any of it.

“Come on, Veronica,” Connor was saying. “Let’s drive into Wyberg and see what they do for excitement out here in the boonies.”

“No thanks, Connor. Not tonight.”

“Come on,” he wheedled. “There’s no cable out here, you know. I’m going to go nuts without MTV.”

“I can’t. Ashley will wake up from her nap soon and I’ll have to bath her and feed her again.”

“Aw, let Maria take care of her own kids. You’ve done your baby-sitting thing for the day.”

The women glanced swiftly at each other. Ben was surprised when none of them volunteered to correct Connor’s mistaken assumption that the baby was Maria’s.

Veronica just shook her head.

The petulant look returned to Connor’s face in a flash. “Fine!” he snapped. He scraped his chair from the table. “But I’m not going to sit here and rot.”

With a flip of bangs and an insolent, “Later,” he slammed out the door. The roar of an engine and spurting gravel said his more eloquent goodbyes.

The room was uncomfortably silent, the adults making a studied effort to avoid each other’s eyes. A cry from the infant seat in the corner was a welcome diversion.

“Right on schedule,” Veronica said with false brightness. She picked up the crying baby, murmuring soft, comforting sounds.

“Kids, why don’t you clear the table?” Maria said in the same too-cheerful manner. “Trisha, make sure you rinse those plates before you put them in the dishwasher, okay?”

“Yes, Mama.” The children hopped from their chairs and began stacking plates and carrying them to the kitchen. Soon rattling dishes, running water and childish arguing could be heard coming from the next room.

Just an obedient “Yes, Mama,” and three children went to work? Ben thought in amazement. No whining. No back talk. He couldn’t remember the last time Connor had responded to the simplest request without some smart comment.

He put his elbows on the table and cleared his throat. “Uh, sorry about Connor. He’s been having a rough time of it since his mother and I divorced.”

The women nodded sympathetically. “It can be hard on kids. David’s still reeling from my sister’s divorce,” Maria told him. “I hope he manages to adjust pretty soon. How long ago was your divorce?”

“Six years.”

When Maria looked surprised, Ben realized what he’d said. “I guess six years is a long time to adjust. Maybe I can’t blame all of Connor’s behavior on the divorce. I mean, your girls seemed to be doing okay.”

“I’m a widow, though. Maybe that makes a difference.”

Ben was surprised; he’d assumed she was divorced. “I’m sorry.”

“It was a family tragedy,” Mrs. Romero’s voice unexpectedly crackled out. “Marcus was the only man in the whole bunch worth a centavo.”

“He was a good father,” Veronica agreed, patting Ashley with a wistful look.

“A good husband.” Mrs. Romero nodded.

“For our family, he was a saint,” Veronica said.

“He had that one problem, though.” The old woman looked very wise.

“What’s that, Mama?”

“He died.”

The three women’s eyes met. Maria’s lips were the first to twitch. Suddenly, they were all laughing. Rich, full laughter, laughter of shared tears and understood fears, the laughter of the women who were left, who held the family together, who made due, got by—who survived.

And Ben felt as excluded as if he were watching from the other side of a glass wall.

Ben padded in stocking feet into the kitchen and ran a glass of water from the faucet. He’d been working in the office, going over the accounts, but was finding it difficult to concentrate. The sounds of soft, feminine voices, accented by the higher notes of the children, coming through the open windows of the study had made him restless. Once again he found himself staring out the kitchen window, surreptitiously watching Maria and her family enjoy the evening from the porch of the guest house.

He strained his ears, trying to make out individual words, but he couldn’t. It was only rhythm, rising and falling, carried to him and past him on the cooling breeze, engulfing him and caressing him but never allowing him to be a part of it.

He managed to pick out Maria’s form where she sat on the steps surrounded by the children. Her long hair hung around her shoulders and seemed to flow and merge with the shadows, making her appear ethereal and without substance. But Ben knew how far that was from the truth. Maria was turning out to be the most real, solid and determined woman he’d ever met.

What kind of life must she have back in Phoenix that would force her to stay in a place where she’d been clearly ordered to leave? he wondered. What kind of desperation must she have felt to disobey him, knowing she faced an embarrassing scene when he returned?

Maria’s voice, lifted in a Spanish lullaby, came to him, the words incomprehensibly foreign and yet universally understood. Ben felt a protective surge of emotion well up from somewhere deep inside of him. He didn’t want her to have to fight so hard, to have to courageously face the enemy, even if the enemy was only himself. He wanted…He wanted…

Ben set down the glass and moved away from the window, away from the disturbing sound of her voice. As he made his way back to his office, he heard only silence, the loudest, loneliest silence of all—the silence of a parent waiting in the night for a teenager to return.

Chapter Three (#ulink_b471aae4-8a59-579b-b079-0f69dedd1020)

“One…Are you ready? Two…Hold your breath.” Ten toes curled into Ben’s shoulders as he gripped Tina’s thin legs, steadying her above him. “Three!” He launched her up and over his head, smiling as she splashed into the pond and came up wet and sputtering, dark hair dripping into her eyes, demanding to do it again.

“No! It’s my turn!” Trisha shouted, jumping up and down next to him.

“Stop that, you’re soaking me.” Maria laughed. She stood beside Ben, thigh-deep in the pond. The bottom of her blue shorts were wet, darkened almost to black, and her white flowered tank top was splashed with muddy pond water.

“This is the last one,” Ben warned the children as he lifted Trisha onto his shoulders. “You’re wearing me out. And watch my hat this time.” With a flick of his powerful arms, he flipped the girl into the water next to her sister and cousin, using one hand to clamp his cowboy hat to his head. Dressed only in ragged cutoff jeans and ever-present hat, Ben squinted into the late-afternoon sun, watching for her small head to bob to the surface. Satisfied, he turned to Maria with a whoop. “You’re next!”

Maria’s squeal was loud and unladylike as she ran for the edge of the pond, its muddy bottom sucking at her feet. She made the grassy bank and darted for the safety of the quilt they’d left spread on the ground next to the cedar fence that separated the pond from the horse pasture. Ben was only a step or two behind her as she collapsed onto the blanket. Laughing, trying to catch her breath, she tossed her hair over her shoulders and threw her head back to look up at him, supporting herself on her arms.

Ben let the sun warm his bare back while he appreciated the sight she presented. Maria’s hair was free from the braid she usually wore and reddish highlights shot through the dark chocolate mass. Her wet top clung to the swell of her stomach, emphasizing full breasts that raised and lowered with each quick breath. Water ran down her long, tanned legs and soaked into the blanket beneath them, and Ben couldn’t keep his eyes from tracing one particular drop that trickled along the curve of her calf and wrapped itself around a slender ankle.

Maria patted the blanket next to her. “Have a seat.”

Swallowing with a suddenly dry mouth, Ben lowered himself onto the worn quilt. He pushed his hat down over his eyes, ostensibly to ward off the setting sun but also to hide the uncomfortable turn his thoughts had taken.

“Thanks again for letting the kids use the pond,” Maria said. “They’ve been in it every afternoon this week.”

“I’m glad it’s getting some use. Connor’s sort of outgrown it, I guess. He used to practically live down here. If he wasn’t in it, he was next to it, catching frogs or grasshoppers or waterskippers.” “David already has a jar full of those horrible things.” Maria made a face. “They look like spiders to me.”

“The girls don’t seem to mind them.” Ben watched the three children who now squatted among the cattails near the edge of the water, trying to guide the leggy insects into David’s half-submerged mayonnaise jar.

“They’re a couple of tomboys, all right. Which is sort of surprising when you consider their father died when they were so young. Not much male influence in their lives.”

“How long ago did he die?”

“Five years,” Maria answered matter-of-factly. She rubbed her feet back and forth on the grass to try to wipe off some of the mud that covered their soles.

“They probably don’t remember him, then?”

Maria shook her head and Ben found himself suddenly curious. She certainly didn’t sound like she still grieved the loss of her husband.

“What happened?” he ventured, willing to probe a little.

“Car crash.”

“That’s too bad.”

“Hmm.” Maria nodded.

Ben turned his head to look at her from under the brim of his hat, trying to gauge her reaction to his questions. But she didn’t appear uncomfortable; in fact, she had a slight smile on her face as she watched the children begin a rowdy sword fight with broken-off cattails. “Did he work in your family’s restaurant, too?”

“No, he was an auto mechanic.” This time she volunteered more information. “He had his own shop. Marcus was a very good mechanic. A lousy businessman, but a good mechanic.” She spoke with wry affection. “He gave credit to every relative we had, and between the two of us, that’s most of south Phoenix. He was always helping some high school kid fix up his car for free.”

“He sounds like a good man. Your mother and Veronica spoke highly of him the other night.”

“They loved Marcus.”

Ben was surprised to find himself wondering if Maria had loved Marcus. “Tough for the girls, being so little when he died.”

“He was a wonderful father. Kind. Dependable. A good man.”

The gentleness in her voice had Ben shifting uncomfortably on the soft blanket. A wonderful father. No one could accuse him of that these days.

“Stop that, Trisha,” Maria called. “You’re going to put somebody’s eye out.” She jumped to her feet and started down toward the pond.

Ben watched her snap off the sharp, pointed ends of the heavy brown stalks before returning them to the children. Then, without warning, she broke off a stalk for herself and pointed it at David’s stomach. “En garde,” she challenged. The fight was on—shouting, splashing, tumbling children, with Maria right in the middle.

Ben remembered playing the same game with Connor years ago, and the memory brought a curve to his lips. It was good to hear childish laughter on the ranch again. Maria and her family had been there almost a week, and Ben was surprised at how much he was enjoying the children. Noisy meals, full of spilled milk and breathless chatter; tracked mud on the hardwood floors and smudged fingerprints on the refrigerator; shouts and giggles piercing the normally subdued, blue-gray evening sounds. And dark, excited eyes always smiling at him, happy to tell him about their day, eager and pleased to have his attention.

Ben’s smile faded.

Connor had looked at him like that, a long time ago. Then, bit by bewildering bit, Connor’s gray, loving eyes had turned sullen. They’d begun to skitter away when he’d try to hold them, until eventually they wouldn’t raise to meet his at all. And if they ever did, Ben would almost wish they hadn’t, because they would be filled with antagonism, resentment—dark emotions Ben didn’t even want to name. He didn’t think he could bear to watch it happen again with another child.

With determined movements, Ben pulled on socks and his dusty cowboy boots and started back toward the house without a word of farewell. Those long, dark legs that had tempted him all week came with two little girls attached, he reminded himself sternly. It was a package deal and he wasn’t going to touch it with a ten-foot pole.

“So where’s Connor?” Maria asked, picking out a pair of David’s dirt-encrusted jeans from the pile of clothes heaped on the floor and stuffing them into the sink.

“How should I know?” Veronica responded innocently.

“Yeah, right. Like he hasn’t been following you around like a lovesick puppy.” Maria added a splash of detergent to the jeans and turned on the faucet. “How much longer are you going to be able to keep from going to Wyberg with him? He asks every single night.”