When Adelia, Gabe and her children walked into Wharton’s, Adelia didn’t miss the speculative look Grace cast at them. She wondered just how long it would take before word of this outing spread through town.
“Well, this looks like it might be some sort of special occasion,” Grace said.
“We’re celebrating,” Tomas piped up. “’Cause we all got good grades in school and Gabe helped us.”
Grace’s eyes lit up. “Is that so?” she said, regarding Gabe with approval. “Times surely have changed.”
Adelia wasn’t sure she cared for Grace’s implication, but Gabe didn’t seem to be taking offense, so she, too, let it pass.
“What does this celebration call for?” Grace asked. “Cones? Hot fudge sundaes?”
Tomas’s eyes lit up. “I want a hot fudge sundae,” he said eagerly. “Or a banana split.”
“That’s too much for you,” Adelia told him. “You’ll never finish it.”
“Gabe can share with me,” he said, then turned to his newfound hero. “Wanna?”
“Sure,” Gabe said, then looked to Grace. “Do you still make those small banana splits?”
“I sure do,” she said.
“But I want a big one,” Tomas protested.
“A small one that you share with Gabe or none,” Adelia told him firmly.
Though he wore a pout on his face, Tomas grudgingly agreed.
The girls ordered cones and then Grace turned to her.
“How about you, Adelia?”
She thought of how hard she’d fought to take off the pounds she’d gained after carrying each of her babies. Ice cream had been off-limits for months now. As if he were reading her mind, she realized Gabe’s gaze was on her.
“I think you deserve a hot fudge sundae,” he told her solemnly.
“But—”
“I’ll eat what you don’t finish.”
She laughed at his hopeful expression. “Are you thinking that half a small banana split won’t fill you up?”
He leaned closer and whispered in her ear, “No, I’m thinking of how much I’m going to enjoy watching you savor every bite of that sundae. Maybe I’ll even get to lick a little hot fudge off your lips later.”
Adelia felt an instant rush of heat into her cheeks. She quickly turned to Grace. “A very small hot fudge sundae,” she requested, a breathless note in her voice.
Grace chuckled. “Good choice.”
Because there were six of them, they took two booths, with the girls seated in the one behind Adelia, Gabe and Tomas. Apparently her disappointment at not being alone with Gabe showed in her face, because within seconds after their ice cream had been served, Gabe put down his spoon with a dramatic sigh.
“That’s it for me,” he announced. “Tomas, you can take the rest and finish it up with your sisters.”
Adelia saw the storm clouds darkening her son’s eyes, but before she could second Gabe’s suggestion, he held her son’s gaze. “Please,” he said quietly. “I need a few minutes to speak to your mom alone.”
“Okay,” Tomas grumbled, his tone resigned.
She studied Gabe with a sense of wonder as her son took his ice cream to the neighboring booth. “Do you have some kind of magic touch? I was expecting a full-blown tantrum.”
He shrugged. “He usually listens to me.”
“Because you have something he wants,” she realized.
Gabe looked confused. “What?”
“Tools,” she said. “And the willingness to spend the time to teach him how to use them. I imagine to Tomas that’s a pretty good bargaining chip.”
“I’ve never resorted to bribing your son,” Gabe protested with a touch of indignation.
“Haven’t you? I heard that just this afternoon you told him he couldn’t help you till his homework was done. Well done, by the way.”
Gabe regarded her with a startled expression. “I was just trying to be responsible.”
“An excellent parental attitude,” she commended him. Before she could lose her nerve, she asked, “Gabe, you’ve told me you didn’t think you were any good at relationships. Didn’t you ever want kids?”
He seemed taken aback by the question. “I never thought about it,” he claimed.
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t have a very good example in my life. My mom did her best under the circumstances, but her best wasn’t so great. I never even knew my dad, and the men who paraded through her life weren’t exactly role models. I didn’t want to take any chances about messing up some kid’s life.”
“You’re certainly not doing anything to mess up my kids’ lives. They’re happier than they have been in months. They’re doing well in school, something I’d despaired of seeing this school year. A lot of the credit for that goes to you. And in my book that makes you great parent material.”
Gabe looked shaken by the comment. “Adelia, I don’t know. I’m still grappling with whether I can give you what you need, much less your kids.”
“First of all, you’re already giving them what they need, your love and attention. Second, we’re a package deal. You can’t separate me from my kids.”
“No, of course not,” he said at once. “I guess I was just compartmentalizing.”
“How so?”
“I thought maybe we could figure out the whole relationship thing. Then if that’s going okay, we’d start thinking about the rest.”
She laughed at his naïveté. “Then I think you’ve done things backwards. You already have my kids thinking you hung the moon. Even Selena has come around a lot more quickly than I’d anticipated.” The implications of that suddenly had her sobering. “I wonder if that’s been a mistake.”
Gabe frowned. “What do you mean?”
“What if this thing between us doesn’t go anywhere?” she asked. “What is wrong with me? I never should have let this happen. I just saw how the kids seemed to be blossoming under your attention and stood by and let them start to care about you. Even when you and I split up so they wouldn’t get ideas about us, I still let them spend time with you. Naturally they were going to get attached.”
Gabe reached for her hand and gave it a squeeze. “I won’t let them down,” he promised. “No matter what happens between us.”
“I don’t think it will work that way,” she said. “If we can’t figure things out, they’re bound to be crushed.”
“So, what are you saying?” he asked, a frown on his face. “Do you want to call it all off, after all?”
Before she could respond, he added, “If you do, just say the word. I can probably rearrange things with Mitch so I can work while they’re at school. Or with most of the work already done, someone else could finish up. I can ease out of their lives, if that’s what you think is best.”
“It’s not best,” Adelia said, thoroughly frustrated by his willingness to end things before they even got started. Was he really that skittish? Or was she that unimportant to him? Or was this another one of those misunderstandings that could easily spiral out of control and have them making decisions they’d come to regret.
She sighed, determined not to let that happen. “It’s already too late to do what’s best, Gabe. They adore you. I don’t know about the younger ones, but Selena’s already getting ideas about the two of us. You should have seen how excited she was helping me get dressed for our date and that was before she fully approved of me being with you at all. Then again today when you’d planned that surprise for me, I think she was almost as excited as you were.”
Gabe regarded her with confusion. “Help me out here, Adelia. I’m getting mixed signals. What exactly do you want me to do?”
She’d never felt so utterly helpless in her life. Anything she suggested would wind up hurting someone she loved. Her kids. Gabe. Even herself. “I honestly don’t know.”
“Is this one of those times when we should be listening to Lynn’s advice?” he asked. “Are we getting in our own way, complicating something that doesn’t need to be that complicated?”
“I have to think about my kids,” she said stubbornly.
But wasn’t that the rub? If she pushed Gabe away now, her kids would be miserable. If she let him stay in their lives and they grew even more attached and he left eventually, they’d be devastated.
Gabe shoved a hand through his hair, his expression filled with obvious frustration. “This sure wasn’t how I envisioned tonight going,” he told her.
“Me, either.” She studied him, sensing she didn’t have the whole picture. “I know about the reward thing you were hoping for later. Was there more?”
He nodded. “After listening to Lynn and putting up with Raylene’s commentary, I was ready to make it official.”
Adelia’s heart thudded. “Official?”
“To tell you I wanted us to be a couple, or at least to try to be. I figured we could go on more dates, hang out in public.” He gave her a rueful smile. “Let those Sweet Magnolia friends of yours have a field day.”
She knew exactly what it was costing him to express a willingness to submit to all that well-meant teasing and interference. And here she was suggesting they take not just a step back, but maybe call it off entirely. Talk about crossed signals.
Her dilemma must have showed on her face, because he leaned forward and kept a tight grip on her hand. “What do you want, Adelia? Forget the kids for a minute. Forget all the potential complications that may or may not happen. What do you really want?”
She thought of the kisses they’d shared, the way Gabe made her feel, as if she were incredibly special. “You,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. She dared to meet his gaze. “I want you.”
“Are you sure?”
She nodded. “But what if—”
A smile broke across his face. “Too late for what-if,” he declared, cutting her off. “You’ve already said you want me. I heard you.”
“But—”
“Nope, too late,” he said again. “We’re in too deep for what-if. Your kids are already invested. We need to play this out. If we don’t, if we cut and run because you’re scared for them or because I’m just plain terrified, it would be wrong. We’re going to do the adult thing and see where this goes.”
He sounded so sure, so confident, but Adelia could see the uncertainty in his eyes. Ironically, it was that uncertainty and his willingness to rise above it that gave her the courage to nod. “We’ll do the adult thing, then,” she said softly. “At least we can be terrified together.”
He nodded. “Sounds like a plan.”
Despite all her reservations, despite the panic that she was barely keeping at bay, she had to agree. It sounded like an amazing plan.
* * *
“I warned you!”
Gabe’s head snapped up at the threatening tone. Ernesto Hernandez was just inside the doorway at the construction site, his voice echoing across the cavernous room. Every worker in the place had gone silent. Gabe gestured for them to resume working, but they ignored his words and kept a careful gaze on Ernesto as Gabe crossed to stand in front of him. Apparently his maturity was about to be tested again, because he wanted like crazy just to slug the man.
Instead, refusing to let the scene escalate if he could help it, he said mildly, “Something I can do for you?”
“You can stay away from my kids,” Ernesto said. “You don’t get to parade them around town as if they’re yours.”
“When have I ever done that?” Gabe asked, barely restraining the desire to remind the man that he wasn’t exactly filling up the hours of their days with his attention.
“Last night,” Ernesto said. “I heard all about your little outing to Wharton’s. What was it you were celebrating? A few good marks at school? The kids are supposed to make good grades. That’s their job. There’s no need to reward them for it.”
“Their mother doesn’t seem to agree,” Gabe said.
Ernesto shrugged off the comment. “She’ll ruin them before she’s done. I have half a mind to get Tomas out of her house.”
Gabe’s temper kicked up another notch at the threat. “Adelia is a wonderful mother. No court would take that boy away from her.”
“Are you so sure about that? Even after they hear about the kind of man she’s allowing to influence him?” He pulled his cell phone from his pocket. “I have my lawyer on speed dial. Maybe we should ask him.”
“Be sure to remind him why you’re divorced in the first place,” Gabe suggested.
The remark hit home. Now Ernesto looked as if he wanted to throw the first punch. A part of Gabe actually hoped that he would. It was plain, though, that even Ernesto recognized that doing it in front of witnesses wouldn’t help his cause. Gabe’s crew, led by Henry Davis, had moved a little closer just in case Ernesto dared to start something. Or maybe they’d moved so they could hear better. Either way, their presence kept things from turning even uglier.
“This isn’t over,” Ernesto warned him. “I can still make Adelia’s life hell.”
“Worse than you have already?” Gabe inquired.
Ernesto leveled a cold look straight at him. “Watch me.” He turned then and left, leaving Gabe both shaken and furious.
One of his men edged closer. Gabe turned to meet Henry’s worried gaze.
“Boss, you don’t want to mess with him,” Henry warned. “He’s a nasty, self-important son of a gun.”
“I’ve noticed,” Gabe said.
“He’ll get to Adelia by going after you,” Henry said. “I know his type. It took a strip out of his pride when she left him. He’s been waiting for a chance to get even.”
Gabe had figured out that much for himself. “Thanks, Henry. I’ll watch out for Adelia.”
The older man smiled. “I don’t doubt that, but who’s going to be watching out for you?” He held Gabe’s gaze. “You might want to sit down with Helen Decatur-Whitney. That woman has a good head on her shoulders. She tangled with Hernandez once and I’m pretty sure she’d be eager to take him on again.”
Gabe nodded. “I think I’ll do just that. Can you handle things here for an hour or two?”
“I’ve got it,” Henry said at once. “And I know how to reach you or Mitch if anything comes up I can’t handle.”
Gabe walked the few blocks to Helen’s office, using the time to try to cool down. He was not going to let a slime bag like Ernesto make Adelia miserable or ruin what they’d just agreed to try to build together.
Unfortunately, when he walked into Helen’s waiting room, it was packed. Her secretary, a woman he thought he recognized from working in the high school office years ago, scowled when she saw him.
“I know you don’t have an appointment, Gabe Franklin,” Barb told him. She gestured to the crowded waiting room. “Helen doesn’t have time for you. You might just as well turn around and leave.”
Since he didn’t want everyone in the waiting room in on his business with Helen, he leaned down and tried to practice some of that charm he was supposed to possess. “Darlin’, I know I don’t have an appointment, but this is a little bit of an emergency.”
“Are the police on your heels?” she asked. “It wouldn’t surprise me a bit.”
Gabe bit back his annoyance. “No, but they could be my next stop. Ernesto Hernandez is making threats about trying to take Adelia’s son from her. I thought Helen ought to know about it.”
Barb’s expression went from annoyance to dismay in a heartbeat. “He wouldn’t dare.”
“Not if he has half a brain,” Gabe agreed. “Do you think he does?”
“Hardly,” she said, clearly concluding that whatever her beef might be with Gabe, he was the lesser of two evils. “Give me a minute and I’ll squeeze you in.”
“Thank you, darlin’.”
“Stop calling me that. It won’t work on me.”
Gabe gave her an innocent look. “No idea what you mean.”
She shook her head, but for an instant, he thought he saw her expression mellow just a little.
He stood off to the side and waited. The second Helen’s current client exited her office, Barb stood up and headed in. In less than a minute, she was beckoning for him.
“Fifteen minutes,” she warned both Gabe and Helen. “Not one second more or I’ll have a rebellion on my hands out there.”
Helen’s serious expression reflected Gabe’s mood. “Tell me,” she said.
Gabe described the incident and the threat. “It’s the second time he’s warned me to stay away from his kids and suggested he’d take Adelia to court to make sure I couldn’t be a bad influence on them.”
“He doesn’t have a leg to stand on,” Helen said. “I know all about the trouble you got in back then. It was kid stuff. I’ll check, but you never spent a single night in jail or even had a charge against you that stood up, right?”
“Not a one,” Gabe said. “It doesn’t mean I didn’t cause my share of trouble. I don’t want that to be used against Adelia.”
To his surprise, Helen grinned. “Spoken like the honorable man I’ve been hearing a lot about recently. Stop worrying, Gabe. I’m on this.”
He didn’t believe it could be as easy to keep Ernesto in check as she was making it sound. “But—”
“Gabe, I am very, very good at what I do,” Helen assured him quietly. “And what I do, among many other things, is neutralize threats against my clients, especially when it comes to their kids.”
Gabe saw the fire in her eyes and realized this was not a woman he’d want to go up against in court, not when she thought she was on the side of right and justice.
He nodded, satisfied. “I’ll leave it in your hands then.”
“By the way,” she said, a smile on her lips. “Good job in not punching the guy’s lights out. It might have been satisfying, but it wouldn’t have helped.”
“I figured as much. If he hurts Adelia, though, I can’t promise I’ll show the same restraint.”
“Try,” she said. “But if you do lose control, and frankly I could hardly blame you, call me. I’ll bail you out and represent you pro bono for doing what a whole lot of us would like to do to that man.”
Gabe chuckled. “Now you’re just tempting me.”
She held up a hand. “Last resort, okay? Promise.”
“Last resort,” Gabe confirmed. Somehow knowing the kind of friend Adelia had on her side made it a whole lot easier to swear to that and mean it.
* * *
At the sound of the bell, Adelia glanced up from the catalogs she’d been marking while waiting for any customers to turn up at the boutique. To her surprise Selena stood hesitantly in the doorway, her expression dark. It had been weeks since Adelia had seen that particular look on Selena’s face.
“What’s wrong?” she asked at once.
“Is it okay that I’m here? Are you busy?”
“It’s fine. I’ve told you before that you can come by here whenever you want to. Where are your sisters and brother?”
“Next door at the bakery,” her oldest reported. “It’ll take them forever to pick out cupcakes. I needed to talk to you when they’re not around.”
Adelia beckoned her in. “What’s going on? Did something happen at school today?”
Selena nodded. “Daddy was waiting outside of school when I got out,” she said. “He was with that woman again.”
Adelia wanted to utter a curse, but she refrained. “What did he want?”
“He said we needed to get to know each other because she’d be our stepmother and we’d all be living with them soon.”
Adelia’s control vanished. “He said what?” she asked, stunned by what she was hearing.
“Mom, he was lying, wasn’t he?” Selena asked, real panic in her voice. “He can’t make us come and live with them. I’ll run away if he does that. I swear I will.”
“You’re not going to live with your father,” Adelia said flatly, already reaching for her phone.
Selena’s eyes widened. If anything, she looked even more frightened. “You’re not going to call him, are you? I don’t want you fighting again.”
“I’m not calling him. I’m calling Helen.”
Selena immediately looked relieved. “She’ll fix it, won’t she? She’ll stop him before he says anything to Tomas and the girls, right? I know they’re supposed to spend the day with him Saturday, but he’s never shown up before.” Her panic suddenly returned. “What if he does this time and gets them all worked up? Or even worse, what if he won’t bring them home?”
“Not going to happen,” Adelia said fiercely. She held up a hand to silence Selena when Barb answered the phone in Helen’s office. Adelia quickly explained the situation and was put right through.
“Blast it all!” Helen said when Adelia had filled her in. “I was afraid of something like this. I thought I had time to deal with it before Ernesto did something stupid. I guess I underestimated how angry he was.”
“Angry? What are you talking about?” Adelia asked.
“Gabe was here earlier. Apparently Ernesto confronted him at work earlier.”
“Why?”
“He was furious about your outing last night to Wharton’s,” Helen explained. “It must have triggered some sort of macho pride thing because he told Gabe he was going to take Tomas away from you. He didn’t say anything about the girls as far as I know. Obviously after giving it more thought, he concluded that Selena would be a great target to stir things up even more. He knows she’s never forgiven him. By going to her, he’s escalated the situation and gotten her to panic.”
“You have no idea,” Adelia said, as Selena leaned into her side, tears on her cheeks. She kept a firm arm around her daughter’s waist. “What can we do?”
“You said his mistress was with him when he spoke to Selena?”
“That’s what she said.”
“I know this is personal, but have you and Gabe slept together? I know it’s what we’ve all been hoping for you, but it could complicate this situation.”
“Not yet,” Adelia said, cheeks flushed.
“Keep it that way for now. I want to be able to use the way Ernesto flaunts his mistress in front of his children. I’m calling the judge’s office now to set an emergency hearing. Try not to worry, okay? He’s not going to take your kids. He hasn’t even exercised the right he was granted for visitation, has he?”
“Not more than a couple of times way back at the beginning. He doesn’t even call, as far as I know.”
Selena nodded. “He’s never called me. Not even once.”
Adelia started to repeat it, but Helen said, “I heard. I’ll let you know the minute I have that hearing scheduled.”
Adelia uttered a sigh of relief. She knew she was in good hands. Helen’s reputation as a barracuda in the courtroom wasn’t an idle designation. She’d tear Ernesto apart if he tried to hurt Adelia’s kids. In fact, she’d probably do a better job than Adelia could ever do on her own.
When she hung up, she looked into Selena’s worried gaze. “Helen’s going to fix this?” her daughter asked.
“Absolutely.”
“Mom, is this because of Gabe? Did I hear Helen say something about Dad going after him?”
“It’s nothing for you to worry about,” Adelia insisted. “Helen’s got it.”
“But it’s not fair that Dad would try to hurt Gabe,” Selena protested. “All he’s done is be nice to us and to you.”
“I know, sweetie. You don’t need to worry about Gabe. He can take care of himself.”
“But he shouldn’t have to,” Selena protested.
No, Adelia thought. He really shouldn’t have to. Perhaps last night’s decision had been premature. Perhaps this was just one more sign that their attempt to form some sort of relationship was a really bad idea.