Chapter Thirteen

Lacey had backed out of the baking and the movie, claiming exhaustion and the need for a long bath. True enough, as excuses went, so she spent most of the evening in her room—well, her parents’ room because she didn’t even have a room anymore—in the tub and then on her laptop, digging up resort-management sites and thinking about Clay.

Around ten, David tapped on her door. “Lacey, Ashley’s gone to bed. Any chance you want to take an evening stroll down to the beach?”

She closed her computer and rolled off the bed to open the door. He was in sleep pants, his bare torso lean and fit. She refused even to look at a single hair on his chest, meeting his eyes instead, with one hand on her half-opened door. “Ashley went to bed? It’s so early.” And she hadn’t said good night.

He gave a slow, sly smile. “I think she wants us to have some alone time.”

Oh, God. “Well, I have no desire to go to the beach,” she said.

“That’s too bad, because I need to get out.”

After a few hours? Really, how long could this man last on Mimosa Key? She nodded toward his bare chest. “Better put a shirt on or the Mimosa Key sheriff’ll haul you in for indecent exposure. They’re tough like that here. Excuse me.” She brushed by him, walking down the hall to Ashley’s room.

The door was closed, so she tapped and pushed it open, expecting to find Ashley crouched over her computer or on her phone.

But the room was dark, except for a beam of moonlight that highlighted some clothes on the floor. That mess would normally be the source of a conversation, but, whoa, Lacey had bigger problems than keeping the house clean.

“You really asleep, Ash?”

“Almost,” she said groggily, sliding around in the bed. “You and Dad going for a walk?”

“Ashley, do you have to call him that?”

She sat up with a loud tsk. “He’s my father, Mom. Why are you so determined to keep us apart?”

Lacey squeezed her fists and let the wave of fury pass. “I am not determined to keep you apart. I’ve let him stay here.”

“Well, where else would he stay?”

A hotel. On another continent. Where he’s been for fourteen years. “Did you like the movie?”

“We watched Rio instead.”

For some reason she was relieved. Casablanca was her movie.

“Are you two going to take a walk?” Ashley asked again, hope in her voice.

“I think he is, but I don’t feel like it.”

“You should go, Mom. I’ll be fine here alone.”

“I know you will. I just…” She sighed into the darkness. “I don’t want you to get too attached to him.”

Ashley reached over and snapped on the light, her eyes blazing. “Why not?”

“Because you don’t know him. He’ll just—”

“Why can’t you just accept that people change, Mom?” Her hands clutched the comforter in frustration. “People grow. He has. He’ll tell you. I think he’s amazing.”

“I’m sure he is, but—”

“But what? What is with you?” She gave her big put-upon huff of breath. “I mean, most moms in this situation would be thrilled that their daughter wanted to have a relationship with her dad. I could hate him, you know?”

“Yes, I know.”

“I could push him away and say ‘no way, you’ve been missing for my whole damn life, so screw you.’”

“Ashley, don’t talk like—”

“I could! But I’m not and I think that’s very mature of me.”

“Yes, honey, it is mature.” And instead of sounding like her own mother and finding fault with Ashley, Lacey knew she should be congratulating her daughter on her behavior. But she couldn’t. “It’s also dangerous.”

“Dangerous?” She practically sputtered. “He wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

“Not intentionally.” How could she warn her daughter that loving this man could mean deep and profound hurt? “But he hurt me.”

“Mom, that was fourteen years ago.”

“But it shows you that he’s the kind of man who can, and does, leave when something more exciting comes along.”

“Oh, that’s just a lame excuse so I don’t get close to him.” She sank back on her pillow. “I think you’re jealous.”

“I think you’re…” Absolutely right. “A little out of line talking to me that way.”

Ashley made a pouty face but withheld an apology.

“Don’t you see, honey?” Lacey sat on the edge of the bed to get closer and make her point. “I’m terrified that he’ll get you all wrapped up in a father-daughter relationship and then, you’ll see. He’ll get a call from a friend in Madagascar to go zebra hunting or rock climbing or jungle hopping and, wham, you’re all alone.”

“He said he’s done with all that travel, Mom. He’s a chef now. He wants to open a restaurant.” She leaned forward, grabbing Lacey’s hand. “Ohmigod, Mom, what if he opened one here on Mimosa Key?” Her voice jumped an octave in excitement.

“Honey, please don’t start harboring those fantasies.”

“It’s not a fantasy. He likes it here. And, Mom, he still cares about you. I could tell when he picked your tart pan.”

“It takes a lot more than a tart pan to demonstrate love,” Lacey said. It took trust and sticking it out through tough times and it took a commitment. Nothing Lacey’d ever gotten from any man, least of all David Fox.

Ashley grinned, looking suddenly much younger than fourteen. “Mom, haven’t you seen the way he looks at you?”

“At me?” She waited for the expected impact of those words, but there was none. No feeling, no happiness, no excitement. “You’re always imagining things, Ash.”

“Aunt Zoe noticed, too.”

“She’s always imagining things, too.”

“Maybe you’re just too busy making out with that architect on the hammock to notice the guy who really matters.”

Was she? “We weren’t making out. Okay, a little.”

“Ewww, Mom. He’s too young for you!”

“No, he’s not.”

“Won’t you even give Dad a chance? It would be so awesome if you two got back together.”

Lacey just shook her head, very slowly. “I gave him a chance, a long time ago.”

Ashley leaned forward, taking both of Lacey’s hands. “Don’t you feel anything for him? Just a little gooey inside when you look at him?” The sheer desperation in her voice almost broke Lacey’s heart.

“No,” she said honestly.

“Well, can’t you try? For me? So we could have a family? He could buy us a house and, and, we could get all the stuff we lost and—”

“Oh, Ashley, please don’t put that on me. I don’t want your happiness to be contingent on this… this fantasy you have about David and me getting back together.” Because it was almost impossible for Lacey to say no to her daughter.

“Just give him a chance, Mom.”

“He’s staying with us for a few days. That’s enough of a chance.”

“A step in the right direction.” She gave a secret smile. “And I promise I won’t check to see if the guest room’s been used.”

“Ashley!” Lacey flicked her fingers on the blanket, tapping Ashley’s leg. “Don’t even think about that.”

“Why not? You were thinking about it with that Clay guy.”

Lacey reached over and switched off the light, her only defense against a rising blush. “End of conversation.”

Ashley just tunneled into the covers and turned over. “It’s okay, Mom. Clay’s cute and he obviously wants to get into your pants.”

“Ashley Marie Armstrong, you cannot talk like that. Go to sleep and stop having opinions.”

Ashley laughed softly at the admonition. “Only if you stop flirting with boys and give my father a chance.”

“Good night, Ash.” Lacey closed the door on her way out, ready to warn David to quit planting these stupid fantasies in Ashley’s head.

The rest of the house was quiet, so David must have gone for his walk alone. Relieved, Lacey went into the kitchen to make some tea, stopping to examine the tart pan on the counter. The bag of apples sat untouched next to it.

The gesture had been sweet, she admitted to herself. Fingering the pan, she pictured the blossoming rosette of apple slices covering a sweet compote and buttery crust.

Without giving it much thought, she preheated the oven, loaded up the counter with flour, salt, butter, and some ice water, and mentally calculated some recipe amounts that would kick up the flakiness, which made this tart so divine.

She’d like to use her mixer with the paddle, but…

Don’t think about what you’ve lost, Lacey. But the homey scents of flour and salt alternately soothed and tortured her, reminding her of all that was gone.

Would she bake at Casa Blanca? she wondered. The resort name still felt unfamiliar and awkward in her mind, so new that she couldn’t imagine that it might ever exist, let alone become a place for her to live and bake. Was that possible? Or would she and Ashley find an apartment when Mother and Dad came back?

The thought made her dig deeper into the coarse and crumbly dough, the simple action sending a soothing, sweet numbness up her arms. Of course she’d bake wherever she lived. She’d need to, because—

The back door opened as David walked in, looking with surprise at the counter.

“A walk would have de-stressed you, too, Lace. It’s a gorgeous night out there.”

She wiped a hair away with the back of a floury hand. “Thanks for the tart pan,” she said. “It’s a nice one.”

“You’re welcome. Here, I brought you this.” He held up a bright pink bougainvillea blossom, then sniffed it. “Smells like Indonesia.”

“I wouldn’t know what Indonesia smells like, David.”

He chuckled. “Okay, you can call me David. But only you. Is Ashley asleep?” He came closer, laying the flower on the counter while her gaze flitted over his loose-fitting T-shirt and cargo shorts.

“No. But she’s having dreams.”

He looked at her, a frown making him no less attractive in the soft kitchen light. “How’s that?”

She shook her head, not quite ready to start that conversation and kill the mellow happiness of making dough. “When were you in Indonesia?” she asked instead.

“When I got serious about cooking, as part of my internship with the Aman Resorts, a corporation that owns some of the most amazing luxury hotels in the world.”

She stilled her fingers. “You worked for a resort company?”

“Don’t be so surprised. I am capable of holding down a job,” he said, grabbing the bag of apples and dumping them in the sink. “I know you think I’m a trust-fund slacker.”

“You are a trust-fund slacker.”

“I’m not a slacker and the trust fund is well invested. I can’t just hop from one adventure to the next, Lacey. A man’s got to settle down at some point. Where’s the peeler?”

She nodded toward a drawer. “Should be in there. What did you do for this company?”

“I started as a busboy and worked my way up to chef. There’s not a kitchen in the Aman organization where I haven’t worked, and that includes Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, French Polynesia, Montenegro, Turkey, Morocco—”

“Morocco?”

“Yes, and, trust me, it’s nothing like your movie.”

Her movie. “I understand you went with Rio instead,” she said, lifting the dough ball out of the bowl to turn it on the counter. “Good choice.”

“And, believe me, that cartoon was no more realistic a depiction of Rio de Janeiro than Casablanca is of Morocco.”

Morocco. Even the word reminded her of Clay and how much she would have liked to have watched their movie together.

Oh, now her movie was their movie. “Did you like Morocco?”

He shrugged, starting to expertly peel a Granny Smith. “What I saw of it. Mostly I worked.”

“That’s not like you. Usually you trek.”

“I still do now and then,” he admitted. “Once I finished my time with Aman, I took a year to hit a few of my favorite haunts, like Kuala Lumpur and, of course, Chile and Argentina.”

“Of course.” She knew what was down there in Chile and Argentina. “You’ve always had a soft spot for Patagonia.”

He had the apple peeled and cored in a matter of seconds, his hands smooth as silk and lightning fast. “That didn’t take too long.”

“The apple?”

“The Patagonia dig.”

She smiled, shaking her head and giving the dough another fold. “This has to chill for a while,” she said. “I can finish the apples.”

“Let’s do them together,” he said. “Do you prefer to peel or slice?”

She wrapped the dough in plastic, then opened the fridge. “You look like you’re pretty handy with the peeler. I’ll slice.”

They worked in silence for a few minutes, the only sounds the sweep of his peeler and the slide of her knife as she made the paper-thin slices. When she started on the second apple, she took a breath and decided to attempt the more serious conversation.

“So, David. What exactly are you doing here?”

The peeler slowed infinitesimally. “Does my being here upset you that much, Lacey?”

“What upsets me is the ideas that are being planted in Ashley’s brain. Ideas that will never happen.”

“You never know what’s going to happen.”

“But I know what isn’t going to happen: You and I are not getting back together to live happily ever after as Ashley Armstrong’s married parents.”

“Married?” he choked softly. “You know I don’t believe in marriage.”

Oh, yes. That she knew for sure and certain. “I know you don’t believe in marriage,” she replied. “I think that’s why we’re in this situation to begin with. I do believe in marriage.”

“Then why aren’t you married?”

She should have seen that coming. “Because I haven’t met a man I think would be an ideal partner, a perfect father to Ashley, and a great husband.”

He finished an apple and put it on her cutting board, the sweet smell making her want a bite of one of her slices. “Maybe you’ve already found that man.”

She looked up at him. “Clay?”

He let out a sharp laugh. “I meant me.”

“You?” A thousand responses warred for air time, but she glommed on to the easiest one. “You just said you don’t believe in marriage.”

“And you think that twenty-something longhair with a tattoo does?”

“Now you sound like a parent.”

“Well, I am a parent, and my daughter’s well-being is at stake.”

What was he saying? “You think Clay could hurt her?”

“I think Clay could hurt you. It’s obvious what he wants, drawing naked pictures, bringing beer over to your house, rolling around on the hammock.”

It was so obvious she couldn’t argue the point. “He’s going to work for me. He’s doing the work pro bono.”

“Oh, he’ll get paid all right.”

She turned to him, lifting the knife from the apple just enough to make her point. “Watch it,” she said. “You’re over the line.”

He held up both hands and took a step back. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I’m just jealous.”

Jealous? “All right, then, color me confused. I mean, how can you be jealous? Why? You’ve been gone for a lifetime. Suddenly you care who I’m involved with? About Ashley’s well-being?”

“I’ve always cared about Ashley’s well-being.”

She focused on the blade, sliding it through the apple and letting it thunk to the board. “Then you had a lousy way of showing it,” she said. “Or are we supposed to just erase the years, like your absence didn’t hurt her?”

There was no answer from him as he worked his magic on one more apple, flipping the fruit like a seasoned pro baseball player handling the game ball.

“I screwed up,” he finally said.

The apology didn’t feel good, but it didn’t hurt, either. In fact, when Lacey looked up at him, met the eyes that had once melted her, she felt… nothing at all.

Well, maybe a little relief because she felt nothing. But she wasn’t inclined to let him off the hook that easily.

“Yes, you screwed up, David. There were too many Christmases and birthdays with not even a phone call.”

“But I could make it up to you,” he said. “If you’d let me.”

“No, thanks.”

“Lacey, I screwed up the past. Let me change our future.”

“We don’t have a future,” she said. “There is no ‘our’ in our future, David. There is a daughter, yes, and I have never, ever tried to deny you the opportunity to know her. Not doing so has been your choice.”

“I know—”

“From the beginning,” she interjected, dark emotions building inside of her, words she’d wanted to say for years finally getting a voice. “You made that choice from the day I told you I was pregnant, as I recall.”

Again, silence.

“And we both know what you wanted me to do.” Take care of it, Lace. It’s legal. She could still hear his voice.

“That would have been a grievous error,” he said.

“No shit, Sherlock.” She spat the cliché, not caring if it made her sound more like Ashley than a rational adult.

“And you’ve done a marvelous job with her.”

“Don’t patronize me,” she said. “I’ve done all I could and it hasn’t been easy.”

“She’s a lovely young lady.”

Lacey snorted softly. “Most of the time, yes. But she’s also a teenage hormone factory at the moment, given to drama and self-absorption. More than anything, she’s a girl searching to fill a great big hole in her life that happens when you are raised by a single parent.”

“Which brings us right back to why I’m here.”

Suddenly she suspected she knew exactly why he was there. “Is it possible, David, that you’re here to fill a hole in your life, not hers?”

“Anything’s possible, Lace,” he said as he gave her the last apple, then nudged her out of the way. “Let me.” He took the knife, gave his shoulders a little flex and started slicing like a human food processor.

“Holy shit,” Lacey murmured, rearing back in surprise. “Where’d you learn to do that?”

He grinned at her. “All over the world.”

She leaned over, propped her chin on her elbows, and watched him work, unable to hide her admiration. David Fox was once the man of her dreams and she’d loved him with everything she had.

And he’d crushed that love with a hiking boot.

But the act of baking late at night, talking and sharing and not being alone, the comfort of it, pulled at her heart. Not that she wanted David Fox to fill that role, but, Lord, she wanted someone.

And her most recent find had just hours ago admitted that he’d been so burned by love he only wanted sex. Lacey, girl, you sure can pick ’em.

“I’ll start the compote,” she said, pushing off to grab a bowl and the sugar.

“You know, Lacey,” he said, letting her take over and start sugaring the apples. “One of the reasons I’m here is because I had an epiphany a while ago.”

She looked up from the bowl, some sugary apples slipping through her fingers. “An epiphany?”

He leaned back against the edge of the counter, crossing his arms, his expression distant. “I was in Bolivia hiking the salt flats. We left late in the day and ended up having to spend the night in this little village, if you can even call it that, across the border in Chile. There was no hotel, no nothing. We stayed with locals, in a hut. They cooked the most amazing food, and the stars that night? You’ve never seen anything like it.”

No, she hadn’t, and probably never would. Bolivia held no interest for her. Which was why they were so wrong for each other.

“The next morning,” he continued, “just before sunrise, I saw the woman who lived in our hut—a girl, really, barely twenty—outside nursing her baby.” He gave her an expectant stare, like she should react to the monumental power of his story.

She didn’t. “And?”

“The moment was suspended in time, like God’s tableau. A young mother, her black hair falling over her face, her breast giving sustenance to an infant who clung to her with two tiny hands.” He held up his own hands as though clutching a breast, which struck her as melodramatic and bizarre, but Lacey just listened.

“And it hit me, Lacey. This girl was just about your age when you had Ashley. That thought just speared me in the gut like nothing I’ve ever felt before.”

She layered the apple mixture over the baking pan, furious that her hands shook a little. But how could they not? It had taken him fourteen years to figure all this out?

“What exactly got you, David? The fact that you ditched me for sheep in Argentina or the fact that the last time you saw your own daughter she was a year old?”

Putting his hands on her shoulders, he turned her from the apples to face him. “The raw power of procreation.”

She wiggled out of his touch, an old fury bubbling up. Little late to figure that out, Daddio. “It is powerful.”

“No, no, Lacey, it’s everything. It’s all that matters. It’s the reason we are alive, not to see the seven or seventy wonders of the world. Every single person on this earth is a wonder, and what we need to do—what I need to do—is… is…” He balled up his fists like he was grabbing something. “Seize the life we made. That’s why I came here.”

“To seize Ashley?” Her heart skipped. “You can’t take her.”

“I don’t want to take her, Lace,” he assured her, putting his hands on her shoulders again, too tight for her to escape. “I want to be with her, near her, to have a father-daughter relationship with her. You never said I couldn’t.”

No, she hadn’t. But she never thought there was a remote possibility of it happening, either.

“When I looked at that young mother, so connected and alive because of the life she created, I knew that what I’m doing with my life is meaningless. Even the chef’s work, which I love, doesn’t fill a hole in me. Everything is meaningless without that connection to another human that is part of you.”

“I was just thinking that,” she admitted. “Although not quite so eloquently.”

“Of course you were, because family is all there is, Lacey.” He pounded his fist on the counter with each word, making the pronouncement like he’d invented the concept. “Nothing else matters. Nothing.”

So now he wanted her family? No, not happening. “Family is important,” she said, choosing each word carefully. “So why don’t you go see yours in New York? They matter, too.” Plus, added benefit, they’re a thousand miles away.

He gripped her shoulders again, doing his damnedest to inch her closer. “Anyway, I’m not talking about that family. I’m talking about our family.”

Our. That word again. “We don’t have a family, David. We have a child and two separate lives.”

“But why?”

“Why?” Was he serious? “Because you had to go to Patagonia. And Namibia. And Botswana. And—”

“Shhh.” He put his fingers over her lips, another intimate breach of personal space.

“Don’t shush me,” she ordered. And don’t touch lips that hours ago were kissing another man.

“Then don’t say things that don’t matter anymore. I went. I’m done. I’m back. Why can’t it be that simple?”

“Because it isn’t simple at all. For one thing, you can’t come ‘back’ to a place where you’ve never lived or spent more than a week. This is my home, not yours. And she’s…” My daughter.

But she couldn’t say that. She was his daughter, too. Biologically, anyway.

“I had another epiphany in that little village, watching that girl.”

Watching that girl’s breast, more likely. “Which was?”

“I’m still in love with you.” His voice was husky. “In fact I never stopped—”

“Well, stop now.” She put up both hands in the international sign for shut-the-hell-up. “You aren’t in love with me. You don’t even know me anymore.”

He gave her a patient smile. “And I’m here to rectify that. And I know this: I loved you once.” The words, a direct hit at her heart, left her speechless. “And I think—I think—I could love you again.”

She stared at him. He reached for her, but she grabbed the baking sheet and whipped around to the oven.

He was next to her in a second, opening the oven door for her. “I believe that deep down, in your heart of hearts, you feel the same.”

She stuffed the sheet onto the rack. “Then you’d be wrong.”

“Now I am, maybe. But if I’m here long enough, you might change your mind.”

How he could he not get this? She felt nothing for him. But there was no way to convince him of that right now. Instead, she closed the oven door and stepped away from him.

“However long you’re here, David, I don’t want you to make promises to Ashley. Do you understand? I will not have her getting hurt.”

“And what about promises to you?”

“You can’t hurt me anymore, David,” she said simply. “But I admit you can annoy the hell out of me.”

“That’s a start.”

How could he be so dense? No, he wasn’t dense. He was David. And he’d never had any trouble with her in the past; she’d gone along with his every idea except that she terminate her pregnancy. That one, thank God, she’d stood her ground on.

And she would with this, too.

“Look, this is my life and my family and my dreams, and, I’m sorry, but you are fourteen years too late and not invited to be part of it. Can I make myself any clearer, Fox?”

“You’re clear,” he said with a soft chuckle. “Perhaps you’re forgetting how I love a challenge. I live for a challenge. I can climb Kilimanjaro and I can change your mind.”

No, he couldn’t. She started to wipe the counter with long, sure swipes. “I’m going to read while the dough chills and these apples cook.”

“We could watch the movie,” he suggested.

No, they couldn’t. “I’ll pass. You should go to bed. Surely you have jet lag or something.”

He just laughed. “All right. But I have to tell you one more thing because I believe in total honesty and having all my cards showing.”

She gathered a palmful of crumbs. “Yes?”

“Lacey, I want to have another baby.”

A baby? He didn’t want the child he had. “Well, good luck with that.”

“I want to have another baby with you.”

Tiny little flour crumblets slipped through her fingers and fluttered to the floor. She stared at the dusting on the tile, unable even to look at him. “Why would you even say something like that?”

“Because you’re a wonderful mother, a lifelong friend, and we make beautiful children together.”

She brushed off her hands, let more crumbs hit the floor, and finally lifted her head to check the clock. Because never in her life had she needed to beat out her misery with a rolling pin more.

Of course she’d always wanted another child. Just not with him.