Meant-to-Be Mum

Thereby saving himself a whole boatload of heartache.

“And they were already in private school in Philly, anyway,” he said, seeing a mind-numbing, body-exhausting workout in his near future. Because if he dreamed about Sabrina tonight, he was a dead man. “Hey, sweetheart,” he said when Brooke slogged into the kitchen and collapsed into his arms. He’d never thought of himself as the kind of daddy to actually have a daddy’s girl, but what did he know? “Movie over?”

She shook her head. “But my eyeballs were about to fall out of my head, it was so disgusting. Why do boys like stuff like that?”

Diana chuckled. “A question I’ve been asking myself for years. Want another piece of cake?”

“Di—”

“Have you looked at your daughter recently? I swear she’s grown two inches in the week since you guys got here. Kid needs fuel.”

“And I did eat two helpings of veggies,” Brooke said, all big green eyes. “And a salad—”

“Okay, okay,” Cole said, laughing in spite of himself. And honestly, it wasn’t as if either of his two showed the slightest indication of having the same weight issues that had plagued Cole for so long—equating food with comfort, as some sort of compensation for whatever he’d believed was missing from his life. His own parents had turned a blind eye, for reasons Cole would never understand. But damned if he was going to do the same thing.

While Brooke downed her second piece of cake and the boys finished up the movie, Diana packed up enough food to last them until fall.

“You know,” Cole said, the bulging bag knocking against his thigh as they walked outside and the kids raced ahead “I really hate it when you pity me.”

“That’s not pity, it’s looove.” Cole groaned; his sister laughed before giving him a one-armed hug. “I’ve missed you, twerp.”

“Yeah. Me, too.” And amazingly enough, he meant it.

Brooke let out a shriek at something Wes said to her, and Diana chuckled again. “They’re going to be fine, honey,” she said softly. “And so will you.”

“I am fine, Di.”

She gave him one of her looks. “No, you’re not. And don’t argue with me, I know you a helluva lot better than you know yourself. You need someone, Cole.”

Yep. Still the same pain in the ass as ever.

“I have someone. Two someones, in fact.”

“Not what I mean, and you know it.” She paused. “I didn’t regret for one minute my decision to stay home with the boys. But if Andy hadn’t been there, too...” Cole could feel her gaze on the side of his face. “Raising kids is hard. Raising them on your own—”

“Is not beyond the realm of possibility.” Bemused, Cole lowered his eyes to his sister’s. “And if you even try to fix me up, I will kill you.”

She laughed. “Not to worry. Every woman I know who’s even reasonably the right age is either married, insane or a skank. Sometimes all three.”

“You need new friends.”

“Tell me about it. But you need—” she rubbed his arm, her voice gentling “—to put yourself out there, sweetie. And don’t give me any flak about having the kids full-time. Because they’re always welcome here while you—” her mouth twitched “—search.”

Smirking, Cole ignored the headache trying desperately to take hold. His sister meant well, she really did. But even if he had the time—or energy—to pursue a relationship, right now was about the kids’ needs. Not his. Because damned if he was going to do to them what their mother had.

“Thanks for the offer, but we’re good.”

Then he hotfooted it down the walk before she could regroup. A talent at which Diana excelled.

* * *

Despite his aching head—which the kids’ near-constant bickering behind him for the past ten minutes hadn’t helped—Cole smiled for the trio of wriggling, curly-tongued pugs swarming Brooke and Wes when they got back to his parents’ house.

“Let ’em out,” he said, dumping his keys on the same little dish on the table by the front door that had been there forever, as the beasts raced through the modest bungalow and through the now-open patio door. Cole quickly unloaded the bag of food, stuffing what needed to be refrigerated into the old white side-by-side before joining kids and dogs outside.

The yard wasn’t particularly large, but it backed onto a wooded parcel separating the neighborhood from a secondary highway. Dimly, Cole could hear that same hum of traffic that used to lull him to sleep at night as a kid, that had served as a comforting backdrop to now-forgotten conversations.

Maybe not so forgotten.

Expelling a breath, he shoved his hands into his pockets as he stood on the cement patio, willing the almost-cool evening breeze to unclog his brain, relax the muscles strangling the base of his skull.

Ironically, his sister’s prodding about the future—the one she saw for him, anyway—had only jerked awake another scene from his past, of a scrawny sixth-grade girl who’d had no trouble verbally smacking down that trio of bullies, all twice her size, who’d been making Cole’s life a living hell. Trying to, anyway. Since in reality their ass-hattery hadn’t bothered him nearly as much as it apparently had her.

His mouth curved in spite of himself as he remembered the good times, of how natural and easy things had been between them.

Until an influx of rowdy hormones drowned out every ounce of intelligence and common sense Cole had possessed, blinding him to who, or what, Sabrina had become—

“Dad? You okay?”

He hadn’t even realized Wes had plopped into one of the patio chairs, long legs stretched in front of him, his pant hems hovering north of his ankles. A trip to the mall was in order, Cole thought, suppressing a shudder. “Sure.”

“Really? Because you’ve been, I don’t know. Weird.”

Out in the yard, Brooke threw a ratty old tennis ball for the dogs, laughing when they all tripped over each other trying to get it. Smiling, Cole crossed the patio to sink into the chair next to Wes’s, then leaned forward to link his hands between his knees. “Hey. Weird is my middle name.”

The kid snorted a laugh through his nose. “Okay, weirder. Seriously, on the way back from Aunt Di’s? You didn’t even tell Brooke and me to stop messing with each other.”

“And you’re complaining?”

“I’m... Well, no. I guess. But...” Something made a peeping sound in the woods. Frog? Bug? “I thought you said you and Sabrina had been best friends?”

“We were.” Brooke flopped on the grass in the fading light, then writhed in laughter as all three dogs assaulted her with sloppy kisses. “Actually, she saved my butt when we were kids. Thinks she did, anyway. Took on a bunch of bullies who apparently took issue with the way I looked.”

“Took on? As in, beat them up or something?”

Cole laughed. “Bree’s a lot tougher than she looks, but...no. Read ’em the riot act, though. And pointed out her twin brother, who was easily twice her size. And theirs. But like I said, we hadn’t seen each other in years. And I certainly wasn’t expecting to see her today. Or her, me.” He glanced over at his son. A breeze ruffled the kid’s too-long hair, almost as curly as Cole’s. He looked back out over the yard. “So it was definitely strange.”

“So, what? You guys just hung out together and stuff? You didn’t date?”

“No,” Cole said mildly. Truthfully. Although with a slight, if insistent, pinch to his chest. “We spent most of our time at the Colonel’s. But sometimes here. Where it was a lot quieter.”

“Quieter?”

“The Colonel and his wife Jeanne had adopted four kids—including Sabrina and her twin brother—and then had a baby of their own right about the time Bree and I met, in middle school. Add to that everybody’s friends...place was definitely hopping.”

“And Mom couldn’t even handle two kids,” Wes muttered, and Cole’s gaze snapped back to his son. He’d given Bree a severely edited version of the story, of course. Partly because he was hardly going to air his—or, in this case, his ex’s—dirty laundry to someone he hadn’t seen in almost twenty years. But partly because he was ashamed, truth be told, that he hadn’t made it his business to find out what exactly had been going on. Then again, how would he have known, if the kids didn’t tell him?

But in the past few days, the truth had leaked out bit by bit, how often Erin would leave them on their own, or forget to pick them up, or even when she was there, retreat to her room and computer rather than interacting with her own children. He’d assumed, since she’d fought for primary custody, they’d be her priority. Instead, they’d apparently been so far down the list they were barely on her register.

His eyes burning, Cole reached over to clamp his hand around the back of his son’s neck. God knew Cole was still jerking awake at night, heart pounding at the realization that no one was coming to get them on Sunday. That he was it. At the same time, no one was ever going to take them away, either. Ever again. Or leave them alone, or ignore them, or let anything—or anyone—come between them.

“All in the past now, buddy,” he whispered. “Not that I know how to handle you guys, either—” that got a chuckle “—but we’ll figure it out together.”

Wes straightened up, his cool gray gaze far too trenchant for thirteen. “You make it sound like this is all new to you. We were with you almost every weekend—”

“This is different,” Cole said. “This is...real.”

“And forever?”

Cole’s throat clogged again. “Yeah.”

The boy stared at him for a long moment, then suddenly, and awkwardly, launched himself into Cole’s arms to give him a sweaty, slightly funky hug.

And Cole thought that this was all he could want. Or need. Or, as his son so succinctly put it, handle.

Wes pulled free, scrubbing a hand through his hair. “C’n I go play on the computer for a little while?” He grinned. “I’m on level sixty-four.”

“No kidding?”

“Yep. Nobody else in school—my old school, I mean—was even close.”

“Huh. Clearly I didn’t make it hard enough.”

“Oh, it’s plenty hard, believe me,” Wes said, his cheeks dimpling. “Can’t help it if I’m a genius.”

“Well, genius, only for an hour. It’s already late. You guys need to be in bed.”

His son made a face, but he knew better than to argue. The bedtime rules—at least with Cole—had been set in stone from the time they were babies. And yet, they’d still wanted to come live with him.

After Wes went inside, Cole settled back in his chair, watching his daughter. It’d become a game, over the past few days, to see who’d run out of steam first—her or the dogs. So far, the dogs had won, every time. Lots of energy packed into those squat little bodies—

His phone rang. He dug it out of his pants pocket, frowning at the unfamiliar number.

“Cole here—”

“Yeah, so your sister said,” a familiar voice barked in his ear. “Not that you’d bothered to tell me.”

“I was going to call you tomorrow, I swear,” he said, and the old woman snorted. Loudly. Aunt Lizzie had always been his mother’s favorite aunt, hovering around ninety and with an attitude befitting a former Rockette who’d once “dated,” or so the story went, someone high up in New York politics. After years of fighting the family about giving up her house in town, a broken hip two years before had finally convinced her to move into a retirement community, where she’d been blissfully raising hell ever since.

“So I need a favor,” she said, as though it hadn’t been months since they’d talked.

Cole’s brows arched. Fiercely independent, Lizzie rarely asked for anything from anyone. One of the reasons Cole hadn’t seen her was because she’d made it clear ages ago she didn’t want anyone clinging to her any more than she wanted to cling to them.

“Oh?”

“Yeah. This friend of mine up here at Sunridge, she invited all of us to come to her granddaughter’s wedding next Saturday. When I asked your sister a couple weeks ago she said she’d take me, so I wouldn’t have to ride that god-awful community bus with all the old biddies. So I call her a couple minutes ago to make sure she remembers, and what does she say? That she totally forgot, she and Andy are taking George up to Adelphi that day to tour the place. Can you believe that sweet little boy is going to college next year? Damn, I’m getting old. But anyway. She said I should call you. So here I am. Calling. Can you take me?”

Cole smiled. “Don’t see why not. But I’ve got the kids—”

“For the weekend?”

“No,” he said quietly. “For good.”

Silence. Then, “And you were planning on telling me this, when?”

“Tomorrow. When I called. It’s a brand-new development, Lizzie,” he said when she snorted again.

“So bring ’em. Anybody can come to the ceremony. And that way I’ll get to see them. ’Cause it’s been a while, you know.”

“Hey. Not my fault you were on a cruise the last time they were here.”

“Okay, you might have a point. Although remind me to never let Myrtle Steinberg talk me into going anywhere with her again. Alaska was pretty and all, but not exactly rife with hot young men in Speedos—”

“So who are these people?” Cole said before the discussion got worse. Which, with Lizzie, was a foregone conclusion. “The ones getting married?”

“What? Oh. Well, like I said, my friend’s granddaughter. Laurel. Lovely girl, brings her baby boy when she comes to visit. Adorable, both of them. She’s marrying one of the Noble boys, actually. The youngest one, I think. You still keep up with that Sabrina?”

Cole’s heart knocked against his ribs. “How on earth would you remember Sabrina? You only met her once. At graduation.”

“Once before that, too. When I was still living over on Edgewood. You’d brought over a cake or something your sister had made, and Sabrina was with you. You don’t remember that?”

“Um...sure?”

Lizzie snorted. “And they say old people are the ones with the sketchy memories—”

Panting, Brooke tromped over to the patio, collapsing into the same chair recently vacated by her brother. She frowned, pointing to her ear. Cole held up one hand as Lizzie repeated her question. Because one did not evade Lizzie.

“So you two still keep up?” she asked.

“Actually...I saw her today. First time since graduation.”

“Get out. So what’s she up to?”

“I don’t know, really. She didn’t say. She’s been living in New York, though.”

“No fooling? Good for her. Sure, I’m okay with living out here now, I’m old as dirt. Who the hell needs to fight those crowds anymore? Not me, that’s for sure. But to be young and living in the city...” He heard her sigh. “But you say she’s back?”

“Visiting, apparently. Because the rest of her family is still here.”

“So I suppose she’ll be there. At the wedding?”

“I...imagine so.”

“Then I’ll get to see her. She still cute?”

Cole laughed in spite of himself. “She’s the same age as me, Lizzie. Thirty-five.”

“And I’m ninety-one next birthday. And still cute as a damn button. Although why buttons are supposed to be cute, I have no idea. Okay, gotta go scope out a good spot for the movie before all the good chairs are taken, I’ll see you on Saturday. The wedding’s at two, but pick me up at one-fifteen, I want to get a good seat in the church. And dress nice, for God’s sake, I got an image to keep up!”

“Dad? What was that all about?”

His phone pocketed, Cole turned to his daughter. “Your grandmother’s aunt Lizzie asked me to take her to a wedding on Saturday. Meaning you guys get to go, too.” He frowned. “Do you even have a dress?”

A look of utter horror flashed in his daughter’s eyes. “I have to wear a dress?”

Just shoot him now.

Chapter Three

As Cole drove through the retirement community gates to pick up his aunt, the kids merrily bickering behind him, he grumpily acknowledged that it was a perfect day for a wedding: bright blue sky, puffy clouds, the barest breath of a breeze set at exactly the right temperature.

Unlike his own wedding day, which had been marked by miserably cold, torrential rains, the tail end of some far-reaching hurricane. Not that it would have mattered, the ceremony being a justice-of-the-peace affair with only their immediate families in attendance. Because neither he nor Erin had wanted a fuss. As if getting married was no big deal. Like buying a couch.

Except, looking back, they’d probably discussed the pros and cons of Ikea over Pottery Barn far more than they had whether or not to make things legal between them.

He still had the couch. Ikea. Erin’s choice, and Cole pretty much hated it, but she hadn’t wanted it when they broke up, and the thought of buying another one made Cole’s brain hurt. So there it was, along with the rest of the crap from his apartment, in storage. Although even he had to admit, after more than a dozen years of food spills, ground-in city dirt and more than a few unidentifiable stains, he supposed he should really think about buying a new one. Couldn’t be any worse than dress shopping with his daughter, right?

Mercifully, the kids called a cease-fire as he drove around to Lizzie’s apartment, a ground-floor unit with a courtyard view.

“I’ll go get her,” Wes said, bounding out of the car and up the short walk before Cole could ask, the beginnings of a swagger evident even though the kid’s legs hadn’t yet acclimated to his growth spurt. Of course, that might have had something to do with his “cool” outfit, all of the kid’s choosing—khakis, designer sneakers, untucked dress shirt with preppy tie. Cole released a sigh, relieved that the boy seemed to be getting his mental feet under him again, at least, even if not his virtual ones.

Lizzie popped through her apartment door the instant Wes knocked, all dolled up in something flowery and floaty Cole vaguely remembered from his sister’s wedding twenty years before. But with a floppy yellow hat and gold ballet slippers to complete the look. And jewelry. Lots and lots of jewelry, dangling and jangling as she made remarkably fast tracks toward the car, jabbing her cane into the sidewalk so hard he half expected to see sparks.

Wes scurried up from behind to open the car door for her, earning him a squeal of delight and a pat on the cheek. Even if she had to reach up a foot to do it.

“Such a good boy!” she said, carefully arranging sticklike limbs as she lowered herself inside, giving off enough mothball scent to fell a horse. “So rare to see good manners these days. Thank you, honey,” she said to Wes when he climbed back into his seat. Then, as Cole backed out of the parking space, she twisted around to smile for Brooke, letting out a little gasp of delight. “And don’t you look pretty, sweetheart! Is that a new dress?”

“Yeah.”

“What’s the matter? You don’t like it?”

“It’s okay, I guess.”

Chuckling, Lizzie turned back around. “Tough customer,” she muttered over the soft whirr of the car’s airconditioning, and Cole thought, with a smile, You should know. He’d seen pictures of his aunt in her glory days, the stunning blue-eyed redhead who’d lived, with five other girls, in a two-bedroom Brooklyn walk-up through the war. So Lizzie definitely knew tough. And now, even though a maze of wrinkles obliterated the dimples she’d said she’d always hated because they’d made her look like a kid, nothing was gonna dull the mischievous spark in her eyes. Or the joy.

Brooke could do a lot worse than to take after the old gal.

“What an absolutely gorgeous day,” she said as they headed toward the church on the other side of town, closer to his old neighborhood. Behind them, both kids plugged into their phones, probably playing games. Cole couldn’t decide whether to be annoyed or relieved. “It’s funny,” Lizzie went on, “how as you grow older you learn to appreciate all the crap you took for granted when you were younger. Like pretty days.” She poked his arm. “And weddings.”

Cole grunted. Weddings. Yeah. Not his favorite thing. Especially weddings where Sabrina Noble would be present—

“So what are you up to these days?” Lizzie said. “Still messing around with all that computer stuff?”

“Same old, same old,” Cole said, grateful for the subject switch, even as he mentally shook his head at his aunt’s take on his work. Although he supposed “messing around with all that computer stuff” was how it appeared to most people. Hell, there were plenty of times it seemed pretty trivial to him, too...until he opened his monthly statement from his investment broker.

“I’ve seen some of the people here playing that game on their whaddyacallits, those little flat TV screens you carry around?”

“Tablets?”

“Right. Those things. Or their phones. Your mother tried to convince me I needed one, but really, where do I go that I need to carry a phone around with me?” She let out a cackle. “The laundry room?”

Fortunately, she easily kept up both their sides of the conversation for the rest of the way to the church—a lovely, nineteenth century stone relic, built in a time when most of the then-predominately Catholic community went to mass every Sunday. To someone whose only church experience had been the occasional visit to the Quaker meeting house downtown, All Saints felt ridiculously overdone. Until he got inside, where a syrupy light filtered through jewel-toned stained glass windows, and giant ceiling fans gently hustled air pleasantly thick with the scent of flowers and ancient, much-polished wood.

Both kids were suitably awestruck. “It’s really pretty in here,” Brooke whispered, taking Cole’s hand. Ahead of them, Lizzie clung to Wes’s elbow, chattering a mile a minute, her voice ricocheting off the rafters. Amazingly, his son didn’t seem to mind. Brooke giggled, then gave Cole a sheepish smile.

“I’m glad I’m wearing a dress.”

Smiling, Cole squeezed her hand. “So’m I. Even though it’s scary.”

Pale blond brows scrunched at him. “Why?”

“Because you look way too grown-up in it.” He shuddered, which got another giggle. Because she was still his little girl. At least for the next five minutes.

They slid into a pew, the wood smooth as glass. “I forget,” Lizzie said around the kids, sitting between them, “how peaceful old churches are.”

In theory, Cole thought as he caught a glimpse, through all the hats and hair, of Sabrina near the front, trying to keep a wriggling baby—a boy, he guessed, judging from his little blue outfit—from launching out of her arms. Beside her sat a younger woman, with another, younger baby, who was sound asleep. With a start Cole realized the tiny blonde must be Sabrina’s baby sister Abby, whom Cole hadn’t seen since she was five or six.

Then, because he was clearly a masochist, his gaze drifted back to Sabrina. Damn, she was gorgeous, her dark hair loosely piled on top of her head, a pair of dangly silver earrings grazing easily the most beautiful neck in the world—

“Dad? You okay?”

Cole smiled for his son, even as he thought, Dude. Get a grip. “Why do you keep asking me that?”

“Aren’t the flowers pretty?” Lizzie said, nodding in obvious approval at the simple floral displays on the altar, large cut-glass vases overflowing with branches of mock orange blossoms. “That’s her grandmother’s doing, I’ll bet my life on it. We have a million of those bushes on the property. She probably got them from there. Absolutely gorgeous. Oh! Isn’t that Sabrina? Sitting down there with the family? My goodness—she hasn’t changed a bit, has she?”

Physically? Maybe not. He doubted she’d gained five pounds since he’d last seen her. But the pretty teenager he remembered had nothing on the fully ripened woman sitting twenty feet away, her smile—as she kept up a conversation with the babbling baby on her lap—twisting his heart even more than it had the other night.

A heart he didn’t dare let be twisted. Not now, not by anyone...but especially not by Bree.

Some guy in official, churchly garb appeared in front of the altar, along with a good-looking blond dude wearing the standard nervous/happy look of the about-to-be-wed—Sabrina’s younger brother Tyler, obviously. And that could only be Bree’s brother Matt beside him, darker and broader and more imposing than ever. The processional began, starting off with an adorable, curly-headed tot in a frilly white dress scattering rose petals, closely followed by a boy of maybe nine or ten whose chief job was apparently to keep the little girl on track. Next down the aisle was a stunning redhead—an almost unrecognizable Kelly, radiating confidence. Joy. Cole smiled, genuinely pleased for her. Then everyone stood for the bride, a trembling, sparkly-eyed brunette in a poofy, pale pink gown that threatened to swallow up the much older woman walking her down the aisle.