A Hickory Ridge Christmas

Father. He couldn’t wrap his thoughts around the title yet, let alone apply it to himself. Everything he knew about himself changed with that single admission.

“Why did you have to come back?” Hannah whispered when she returned to him, appearing more agitated than before. “We were doing fine. Just fine. Now you’ve messed all of that up. We’ll never be the same.”

“Come on, Hannah. We have a lot to talk about.”

“I don’t think so. You’ve got your answer now, so go.”

“I can’t leave now that you’ve told me this.”

“Please go.” Her eyes filled again.

Her plea tore at his heart. Clearly, they had more to say to each other, but maybe now wasn’t the best time. He was still too shocked, too confused to make any decisions that would affect their lives. Three lives.

“I won’t stay gone, you know. I’m living in Milford now, and I’m sticking around this time.”

Either she didn’t hear him or she refused to answer, but Hannah hurried him toward the door and closed it behind him. As the cold enfolded him, this time seeping to his very core rather than only touching his extremities, Todd realized that Hannah was right about one thing: None of them would ever be the same.

It wasn’t until Todd was back at his Commerce Road town house and eating chicken noodle soup that refused to warm his chilled insides that he realized he’d never apologized to Hannah. After traveling from the other side of the world in miles and in years of effort, he hadn’t even managed to do the most important thing he’d come to town to accomplish.

“You were too busy trying not to swallow your tongue to remember anything else,” he said to the stacked boxes around him.

Sitting at the new glass dinette in the kitchen, he stared down into the soup bowl and stirred the noodles into a whirlpool. His thoughts traveled in a similar circular pattern, but unlike the liquid, they wouldn’t stop spinning.

A child. His child. Of course, he should have considered the possibility that Hannah could have become pregnant. He knew the textbook mechanics of reproduction and the potential consequences of unprotected sex, but he’d never once considered that they might have made a child together. He and Hannah had only made love that one time. Apparently, it only took once.

The returned letters and unanswered calls made sense now. Not only had he left her alone with her guilt over what had happened between them, but he’d also left her alone with his child.

Alone. He felt that way now as he sat with only the bare walls and the truth to keep him company. He suddenly felt a stronger need to connect with his parents than he had at any time since he’d hugged them goodbye in Kranji a week earlier. But what would he say to them if he called? He could just imagine how that conversation would go: “Hello, Mom and Dad. Or should I say Grandma and Grandpa? I have just the best news.”

He shook his head. No, that conversation would have to wait for another day when he was prepared to hear disappointment of that magnitude over international phone lines. He wasn’t ready for that when he hadn’t digested it himself yet.

But there was one call he could make now. He pulled out the phone book, looked up the name and dialed. He didn’t even identify himself when the man answered on the second ring.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Todd said simply.

Andrew Westin sighed loudly into the line. “Todd. I had an idea I would be hearing from you.”

“You could have saved yourself the call by telling me before.”

“You make it sound so easy.”

His jaw was so tightly clenched in frustration that it took Todd a few seconds to be able to answer at all and a few seconds more to answer civilly. “It was easy. The first time I called the church, you could have said, ‘Hey, Todd, it’s good to hear from you. Just thought you should know, you’re a dad.’”

“Sure, I could have done that.”

“Then why didn’t you?”

“It wasn’t my place. Then or now.”

Todd stalked over to the tan striped couch, dropped onto it and sank into the backrest. “Then or now? What do you mean by that?”

“Hannah never told anyone who the father of her baby was. Until now.”

“Until now?” Todd straightened in his seat. There could be no slouching after a comment like that, one that crushed as much as it confused. Hannah had been more ashamed of him than she’d been of being an unwed mother. He didn’t know what to do with that information.

“Wait. Then how did you know?”

“I told you Serena and I had guessed you two were more than friends when we saw you together.”

Todd swallowed. “Oh.”

“So, when Hannah became pregnant, we suspected. Then when little Rebecca arrived, we…well knew.”

The image of those pretty green eyes filled his mind again. If Andrew and Serena had already been suspecting, he could easily see how they’d connected the dots to solve the puzzle. They’d probably put it together faster than he had.

“What about Reverend Bob?”

“If he knows, he’s never mentioned it to me.” Andrew paused. “Bob was always more concerned with supporting his daughter than tracking down his grandchild’s father.”

“Another reason I never found out the truth.”

“Todd, I always thought she would open up eventually, that she would tell you. But she didn’t. So when you called looking for answers, I figured God was suggesting that I help the truth along.”

“I don’t know whether to say thanks or not.” Todd shoved his free hand through his hair.

“But you know now, right?”

Todd blew out a breath. “Yes, I know.”

“And how do you feel about that?”

“Don’t use all that psychobabble on me, okay Reverend?”

“Fine. But she’s a cute one, your daughter.”

Emotion filled Todd’s throat with a speed that surprised him. Rebecca was his daughter, and she didn’t even know him.

“Yeah…she’s beautiful,” he choked out finally.

Andrew chuckled into the line. “Spoken like a true father. I do have one more question for you.”

“What’s that?”

“What are you going to do about it now that you know?”

What are you going to do? Todd didn’t have an answer for the minister’s question or for his own as they said their goodbyes. He clicked off the phone and laid it on the end table. It was a given that he would take some responsibility for the care of his child. His parents would expect that, and he expected that of himself. He didn’t even want to remember all the other things he’d expected to happen when he returned to Milford.

Disquiet had him pushing off the sofa and crossing to the light wood bookshelf he’d just purchased and already had crammed with books. His fingers closed over a heavy cloth-covered album his mother had insisted he take with him on the plane at Changi International Airport. He took it back to the table and plunked it next to the bowl of soup that had already congealed.

He sat and opened it to the first page. It was as he predicted: a tribute to the lives and loves of the McBride clan. He would expect nothing less from Sharon McBride than a maudlin display, sure to cause more homesickness than to cure it.

The first few pages were all family pictures, both of the posed professional variety and informal shots taken in front of their homes in Milford and then in Kranji. His mother had a talent for pulling heartstrings.

Todd flipped through images of himself eating his first birthday cake, standing proudly on the first day of kindergarten and marching in the high school band. Then came photos of his friends in Singapore and even a few of Todd and Hannah hanging out at the Milford Memories festival. Because those last shots tempted him to feel sorry for himself, he turned the page.

The next pictures made him smile: first the wedding portrait of Roy McBride and the former Sharon Quinn and then a few other black-and-white snapshots of the two of them as children.

When Todd reached the last yellowing image at the bottom right, he stopped. He stared at the little girl looking out at him from the paper. In the white trim at the photo’s bottom edge, someone had written in a slanted script, “Sharon, age four,” but the picture could just as easily have been of Hannah’s child. Not subtle like the similarity his daughter had to him, the resemblance between his mother and Rebecca was so obvious that at the same age they could have been twins.

Why that was the trigger—this mirror image— Todd couldn’t explain, and yet he was suddenly furious. His hands clasped the edge of the table so hard he could feel the glass side imprinting on his palm. His jaw flexed, and he could feel his pulse beating at his temple.

How could Hannah not have told him? No matter what he’d done, no matter how angry she was with him or how much she wanted to cast him as the villain who deserved all the blame, he still had the right to know he’d fathered a child. The chance to be a father to his child.

He’d deserved the truth.

Would he have been a great father at seventeen? It was hard to say, but he’d deserved the chance to try. So much time had already passed. Rebecca was four years old. Whether she’d done it consciously or not, Hannah had stolen that time from them, time they could never get back.

The whole situation just didn’t make sense. The Hannah he’d known could never have been so cruel as to keep this monumental secret from him. Then a thought struck him at his foundation. Maybe he hadn’t known her at all. Maybe the girl he’d fallen in love with had only existed in his mind, and the future he’d planned for them was just as much of an illusion.

None of what he thought before could matter. Everything was different now that he knew about Rebecca. He still wanted to apologize to Hannah for past events, but the present was much more important. They needed to discuss Rebecca’s care and to work out a plan for him to get to know his daughter.

Hannah would fight him on that, he was sure, but she didn’t know him, either, if she thought that battle would be an easy one. Maybe he hadn’t fought hard enough when Hannah had decided to eliminate him from her life five years ago, but he’d done a lot of growing up since then—physically and spiritually. Hannah had just better get it through her mind that he was here and he wasn’t going away.

Chapter Four

“I’m hungry,” Rebecca announced as she raced through the front door her mother had just unlocked. “When are we going to eat dinner?”

Hannah somehow managed to keep her sigh a silent one as she followed behind her with several plastic grocery bags draped over each arm. It wasn’t Rebecca’s fault that Hannah’s day had been lousy, or even that they’d had to stop at the grocery store on the way home from Mrs. Nelson’s because there wasn’t any food in the house.

Hannah had no one to blame for either of those things but herself. When Todd had finally left Sunday, she’d been too exhausted to even think about grocery shopping for the week. She’d barely been able to just keep her promise and play dolls with Rebecca.

As they’d sat together on the floor, diapering, swaddling and feeding two hairless baby dolls with plastic milk and juice bottles, her thoughts kept returning to another baby and the father who’d just been blindsided by her existence. Would Hannah ever be able to forget the look of bewilderment that had strained his features? Even the fresh ache she felt every time she remembered that Todd hadn’t immediately recognized Rebecca as his child couldn’t compete with that. Still, it hurt her that he’d assumed she’d been intimate with someone other than him.

I won’t stay gone. As they had several times in the twenty-four hours since he’d spoken them, his words echoed in her thoughts. Until the evening service and after it, she’d sat anxious and alert, waiting for him to make good on his promise.

All she’d gotten for her trouble was a sleepless night and a drowsy day at work when she needed to be sharp while doing year-end accounting for several small businesses. Too many more days like that and she could add joblessness to her list of problems.

“Mommy, didn’t you hear me? I’m hungry.” This time Rebecca said it in the woeful tone of the starving. She still hadn’t learned that mothers often heard even when they didn’t answer.

“Have patience, sweetie. Your chicken nuggets are coming right up.”

At least they would come up as soon as Hannah preheated the oven and baked them for twenty to twenty-five minutes, but she didn’t want to give Rebecca that bad news and risk a meltdown. That was the last thing she needed when her friend, Grant Sumner, would arrive at any time for the home-cooked meal Hannah had promised him weeks ago. She didn’t even have the pork chops defrosted.

A bachelor who claimed an allergy to anything domestic, Grant already could recite every take-out menu in Milford verbatim. He didn’t need her ordering a pizza on the one night when he could have been enjoying home cooking.

“But I’m hungry now,” Rebecca whined. “Can I have a cookie?”

Irritation welled in her, but Hannah forced it back. “Maybe after dinner.”

Already, Rebecca was cuing up the waterworks, so Hannah grabbed the first distraction that came to mind. “Why don’t you watch your video until dinner’s ready?”

“Yay, TV!”

Her daughter’s glee came with its own sting of reproach. Hannah was convinced she was a bad mother now. She’d even started using “Aunt TV” as a nanny. “Just for a few minutes. Mr. Grant should be here soon for dinner.”

Rebecca hurried off before the offer of the rare visual treat evaporated with the arrival of company.

As if he recognized his cue, Grant rang the bell, pushed the unlocked door wide and stepped inside.

“Hannah, you know better than to leave your door unlocked like that. Anyone can walk right in off the street and—”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Hannah interrupted, smirking at her friend over the fact that he’d done just that.

Grant flushed in a way his fair skin failed to hide and shrugged out of his coat, hanging it on the coat tree next to the door. “You know what I mean.”

“Of course I do. And thanks for worrying about me.”

“Somebody’s got to do it.” As Grant started pushing the door closed, another pair of hands on the other side stopped it.

“Hannah, it’s me.” Todd’s voice slipped through the crack.

“Me?” Grant yanked the door back open and came face-to-face with the man a few years younger and a couple of inches taller. “Who are you?”

“Todd McBride.” With that curt answer, Todd pressed past him into the entry. “Who’s asking?”

“Grant Sumner, Hannah’s—”

“Friend,” she finished before Grant had the chance.

Hannah didn’t miss the confusion in Grant’s eyes or the irritation in Todd’s, but she wasn’t about to have a scene here with Rebecca in the next room. “Todd, this really isn’t a good time.”

Grant shot her a perplexed glance but jumped in with his support. “Yeah, sorry, buddy. We were just getting ready to have dinner.”

Todd’s jaw tightened, but he stood where he was. “It’s never going to be a good time to—”

Hannah put her hand up to cut him off before he could say more. “I wish you would have called first.”

“You mean so that you could not answer.” Todd closed the door behind him and stood in front of it with his arms crossed. “Been there, done that. I’m over it. How about you?” His gaze locked with hers and wouldn’t let go.

“What are you two talking about?”

At Grant’s words, Hannah could finally pull her gaze away. Her friend was staring at them both by turns, and then he faced her alone.

“It’s him, isn’t it? He’s the reason—”

Grant managed to stop himself before he said more, but Hannah ached for his hurt feelings. That she’d never led him to believe there could be more than friendship between them didn’t seem to exonerate her for putting him in this awkward situation.

“I’m sorry, Grant,” she found herself saying, though she couldn’t imagine what she would say next.

Rather that looking at her for confirmation of his assumption, Grant turned back to Todd. “Maybe you’d just better leave right now.”

Todd started out by holding his hands wide. “Look, friend, I don’t have a problem with you, but—”

“I’m not your friend.” Grant took a step toward Todd, but instead of holding his hands wide, he had them tight by his sides, fisted. “But I am Hannah’s. And since she doesn’t seem to want you here…”

Immediately, Todd’s posture tightened, and he stepped forward, as well. “Don’t you think that’s her decision?”

“She already said this isn’t a good time.”

Hannah couldn’t believe her eyes as she looked back and forth between them. With all this male posturing, they looked like a pair of gorillas, pounding their chests and announcing their dominance. The two of them standing their ground, just feet apart, would have been comical if the situation hadn’t been so not funny. Her daughter was right in the next room.

Stepping to the side, Hannah peered into the living room. Rebecca was sprawled on the floor in front of the TV with her elbows jutting out and her head cradled between her tiny hands. Maybe “Aunt TV” wasn’t so bad just this once.

When she returned to the front hall, Hannah stepped between the two men. “You know, maybe we should all just call it a night. Can I give you a rain check on dinner, Grant? I didn’t get started the way I’d planned, anyway.”

Grant gave her a distracted glance. “That’s fine, Hannah. I’ll just show him the door first.” He pointed around her at Todd.

“I’m not leaving again until Hannah and I have some things settled, so you can go ahead.”

Sidestepping Hannah, Grant faced Todd again. “Can’t you see she doesn’t want you here?”

“And can’t you see this is between Hannah and me? I’m her friend, too—at least I was, once upon a time.”

“Some kind of friend you were.” Grant spat the words. “Friends don’t take advantage of an innocent girl and leave her alone and pregnant.”

“Stop it, you two!” Hannah looked around when she realized she’d raised her voice, but since Rebecca didn’t scurry into the room, she figured she hadn’t been as loud as she thought. Still, she spoke at just above a whisper. “I mean it.”

Todd looked directly at Grant, not appearing to have heard Hannah at all. “It wasn’t like that. I lo—” He stopped himself, waving his hand as if to wipe away what he’d almost said.

That nearly spoken word stopped Hannah when she should have been shoving both Neanderthals toward the door. After everything, Todd still claimed he’d loved her back then. Maybe he really remembered it that way, though it had probably just been infatuation, just a teenage hormone-induced haze. She knew that feeling well. She’d made the same mistaken assumption in her own heart.

“You don’t know anything about it,” Todd said to Grant.

“I’ve been around for the last few years. That’s more than you can say.”

Todd tilted his chin up. “I’m here now.”

“For how long?”

Grant posed the question, but Hannah was dying to know the answer to it.

“Not that it’s any of your business, but I start a job at GM Proving Grounds tomorrow. I’m here in town. To stay.”

“What if she doesn’t want you here? What if no one wants you here?”

Todd raised his hands in surrender. “Resent me all you want. It doesn’t change the fact that I’m Rebecca’s father, and I intend to have some kind of relationship with her no matter what you think.”

Hannah gasped and closed her eyes. Please God. Please God. Tell me she didn’t hear. But when she opened her eyes again, the expressions on both men’s faces told her the bad news before she could even turn toward the living room. In the doorway, Rebecca stared at Todd, her eyes wide with amazement. Finally, she turned back to Hannah.

“Is it true, Mommy? Is Mr. McBride my dad?”

Todd let the phone ring four times, waiting for the answering machine to pick up as it had each time he’d called Monday night and again since he’d been home from work that day. This time the machine didn’t answer, which could only mean that Hannah had returned from work and had shut it off.

Too bad he couldn’t turn off his guilt over last evening’s events as easily as she’d switched off the power. If he continued to be as distracted at work as he’d been on his first day at the Proving Grounds, then he wouldn’t have to worry about having a job for too long.

With the phone continuing to ring, Todd switched the handset from one ear to the other, as he shed his maroon-and-white pin-striped dress shirt. He was already sitting on the edge of the bed in his undershirt and trousers when something clicked on the other end of the line.

“Hello,” a small voice said.

His breath caught, but he forced words anyway. “Hi, Rebecca. This is your— This is Mr. McBride.”

“Hi,” she said automatically. Then she added an uncomfortable “oh.”

He frowned. After Hannah had insisted that both he and Grant leave, she had probably initiated a heart-to-heart talk with their daughter. What a four-year-old would be able to understand from this impossible mess, he hadn’t a clue. He barely understood parts of it himself. Whatever else Hannah had told his daughter, he guessed from Rebecca’s surprised reaction that her mother had also said they wouldn’t be seeing him anymore.

That’s where she was wrong. He hadn’t just found out he was a father and then faced his parents’ extreme disappointment when he’d told them know they were grandparents, only to be shut out of his daughter’s life.

He was still coming up with something to say to Rebecca when he heard another voice in the background.

“Sweetie, do you remember that I told you not to answer the phone?” Hannah said.

“But it’s…Mr. McBride.”

After some muffled voices and footsteps, Hannah’s voice came on the line. “Would you please stop calling here? I had to unplug the machine.”

“I’m sorry about yesterday.”

“You and Grant—what you did was unforgivable. This time you hurt my child.”

“Our child,” he corrected, though he couldn’t argue with the rest of what Hannah had said. “I didn’t want Rebecca to find out that way any more than you did.”

“So why’d you tell her?”

“You were there. You know I didn’t intentionally—”

“Anyone who knows the first thing about parenting knows that children hear and see everything that’s going on around them.”

“Whose fault is it I don’t know—” He managed to stop his retort before he said, “How to be Rebecca’s father.” Hannah was at fault for that, but as far as he could tell, there was plenty of blame to go around. He wasn’t going to make any progress by pelting her with accusations.

After counting from ten backward, he tried again. “Okay, this isn’t about fault, but she knows now. We have to deal with that…together.”

“I’ve already dealt with that.” Her voice screeched at the end of her sentence. “Just like I’ve dealt with everything else in her life. Neither of us needs you or your help.”

“Hannah, I might have let you do it before, but I’m not going to allow you to cut me out this time.”

“Me cut you out?” She became quiet for a few seconds, as if she realized she’d said more than she intended. Finally, she sighed. “Don’t you think you’ve done enough?”

“No! I haven’t done enough.”

What happened to that patience he’d just found? But the fact remained: He hadn’t done anything to care for Hannah or to provide for their daughter’s needs. That he hadn’t been given the chance didn’t change the bottom line.

“Don’t call anymore, Todd. I won’t answer.”

The connection went dead as she clicked off the phone. He didn’t bother dialing again. She would probably just leave it off the hook, anyway, and even if she didn’t, she would be screening his calls.

Todd ignored the hopelessness threatening to take hold in his heart. He couldn’t give up, not when there was so much at stake—more now than even a teen romance that had seemed so real at the time. This was about their daughter, and Rebecca deserved to have a father in her life.