Suddenly a Bride / A Bride After All: Suddenly a Bride

It had been Danny’s turn, and he’d run in from left field just as the other players had done, opened his mouth wide just as the other players had done and held out his huge glove, just as the other players had done.

Except instead of catching the ball, or wildly swinging at the ball with his glove or watching the ball bounce and then chasing it … Danny had just stood there, and let the ball hit him on the top of his head. He immediately clapped both hands to his head and fell to the dirt, yelling, “Ow-ow-OW!”

“Steady, girl,” Annie said, swiftly grabbing Elizabeth’s arm as she half rose out of her chair. “The coaches will handle it. The last thing the kid needs is Mommy running out onto the field.”

“But he’s hurt.”

“It’s a rubber ball. Sort of. He’ll be fine. Besides,” Annie said as Elizabeth sat down once more, “he’s got all those curls to act as a cushion. There, see, he’s up and going back to the base to try again.”

“They should have been girls,” Elizabeth lamented. “I’d know what to do with girls. But I’m an only child. I don’t have a brother—or even any male cousins. I’m flying blind here, Annie. That was okay when they were younger. But now …?”

“Now you follow your instincts.”

“Really? My instinct was for me to go running down there onto the field, remember?”

“Right. You figure out what your instincts tell you, and then you do the opposite.”

Elizabeth laughed and then pointed to the field. “Look, he caught it this time! Yea, Danny!”

Her son heard her and looked up the hill and then smiled and waved.

“Okay, I feel better now. Anything else I should know?”

Annie shook her head. “No, now it’s my turn. How well do you know our hunky coach?”

“Will?” Elizabeth didn’t know how to answer that. “Uh … I only met him yesterday. Why?”

Annie leaned closer to her and spoke quietly. “Word is he’s quite a hit with the ladies, as my mother used to say. Handsome, rich—all that good stuff. But also the love them and leave them type.”

“Really,” Elizabeth said just as quietly, and a quick vision of Kay Quinlan popped into her mind.

“I’m just saying, you know? He’s not here because he loves coaching kids or anything. He’s here because otherwise he’d be in the lockup for talking back to some judge. He might be looking around, thinking there has to be a way he can have some fun, as long as he has to be here anyway. You’re young, you’re pretty, you’re available. And I saw the way he was looking at you earlier. I’m not insinuating anything here. Like I said, I’m just saying, you know?”

Elizabeth nodded, looking down the hill to where Will was now showing Mikey how to hold a bat. The man didn’t look as if he wished he could be somewhere else. He looked as if he was enjoying himself. He’d looked as if he’d enjoyed himself at the sporting goods store, at the pizza shop and at the ball game last night. But what did she know about how anything looked? “Thanks. Not that I think you’re right. But I’ll keep your warning in mind.”

“Hey, don’t do it for me. The man is a dreamboat. I’d say go for it.”

“You’re suggesting a fling, Annie? Is that it?”

“As someone who hasn’t flung in a long time? Yeah, I suppose I am. I’ll just live vicariously through you. And look—no, don’t look! But he was just looking up here, and he wasn’t looking at me.”

Elizabeth kept her head down, pretending to search for something in her purse. She looked, she hoped, calm, cool and completely collected. But inside she was already up and out of her chair—running for her life.

* * *

Elizabeth had already folded up her lawn chair and said goodbye to Annie after the two of them exchanged phone numbers and a promise to take all three boys for lunch after the Saturday-morning game.

Elizabeth knew she could count her friends on one hand, and even those she’d known in the apartment building where she’d lived until moving into Richard’s guesthouse had sort of faded away in the past ten months. In truth, her friends had been little more than the mothers of other children the twins played with in the park. Her life had been much too busy and much too lonely once Jamie got sick and after Jamie died.

Living at Richard’s estate had cut her off even more, she realized with a bit of a start. Other than phone conversations with his agent, publicists and others, her life had pretty much revolved around Richard; Elsie the housekeeper; Barry, the sixtyish man who took care of the grounds; and the twins.

Well, she was on a first-name basis with two of the checkers at the local supermarket. But that probably didn’t count.

So it was nice feeling connected to other women again, however tenuously. First Chessie at the bridal salon and now the bubbly Annie.

She was even developing a social life. Dinner and a movie with Will tonight; a planned dinner with Chessie and her manager, Eve D’Allesandro; and now talk of an outing with Annie and her family. She’d soon have to buy her own electronic day planner, she thought with a small smile.

Elizabeth watched from behind the bench as Will and the other coaches handed out some papers to the team and then reminded them that bats and bases and batting helmets didn’t pick themselves up and stuff themselves in the canvas equipment bags on their own.

Mikey, who didn’t seem to know there was a hamper in his closet, immediately raised his hand, volunteering to go bring in second base, and went running off to do just that. Danny was already sliding bats into a long canvas bag, without being asked.

“Way to show initiative, Curly,” one of the coaches said, rubbing Danny’s head as he passed by him.

Danny winced at the nickname, and so did Elizabeth.

Her cell phone began to vibrate in the pocket of her shorts. She put down the folding chair and pulled out her phone, looked at the displayed number, and then lifted the phone to her ear. “Hello, Richard,” she said, turning her back on the crowd of children and coaches—and Will—and walking a few feet away. “How was the interview? I taped it, but I had to get the boys to baseball practice, so I didn’t see it yet. I didn’t want to feel rushed when I—Oh, that’s wonderful!”

She listened, making what she hoped were intelligent comments at appropriate times, as Richard told her all about his interview and about the room-service breakfast that didn’t arrive, so that he had made a pig of himself in the green room and ended up going onto the set with powdered sugar on his tie.

“Speaking of pigs,” she said when Richard was done with his news, “the boys and I went to an IronPigs game last night.” She nodded as she turned around, pushing her hair out of her eyes as the breeze kicked up, watching Will lift two heavy canvas gear bags up and onto his shoulders as if they were stuffed with marshmallows. “No, it was fun,” she assured Richard, who seemed surprised at her news. “Richard? Do you think the boys need haircuts?”

She frowned at his answer. And then she tried to tell herself he wasn’t so uninvolved with the twins that he hadn’t really noticed their hair.

“That’s very polite of you, Richard, but surely you have an opinion. No … no reason you should. I just thought you would, that’s all. Well, tell me this, then. Do you think Mario would cut the boys’ hair?” She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. “How much? For both of them or just one of them? Each? You’re kidding! That’s … that’s just out of the question. No, I won’t have Mario put it on your tab. Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll see what I can do. When’s your next interview?”

After warning her that he’d be flying to Chicago at seven that night and probably would be out of touch for the evening, Richard hung up—but only after reminding her to stay out of his office and consider herself on vacation until he returned.

She closed the phone, feeling suddenly lost, cut off and extremely uncomfortable at how easy it was that Richard hadn’t planned to call her again tonight.

And then, shockingly, following hard on the heels of her momentary unease, Elizabeth realized she also felt good. Very, very good.

Unencumbered. Or at least as unencumbered as the mother of two can ever feel.

And young. She felt young. There had been days, weeks—years—when she’d felt as old as time and just as weary and burdened.

But today? Ah, today the sun was shining. She’d made two new friends. She was on vacation for at least the next week, with nothing to do but be with her boys, to please herself, to remember that she wasn’t even thirty yet, let alone as old as time.

And a man had noticed her. Oh, certainly Richard had noticed her … noticed her as much as Richard noticed anything, bless his heart. But when Will looked at her she felt noticed. And young. And … yes … desirable.

He made her tingle. She would admit that to herself because there was no sense in pretending she hadn’t felt it. That awareness, that sure and certain knowledge that he was man and she was woman. Whether they knew each other well or not, chemistry was happening.

Elizabeth put her hands to her suddenly burning cheeks, and that’s when she realized she was smiling. Oh, what a naughty girl you are, she thought. How long has it been since you’ve been naughty?

“Elizabeth?”

She broke out of her thoughts when she heard Will call her name and saw that he had picked up her lawn chair, the twins standing on either side of him, holding all of their own gear.

“Oh, we’re ready to leave? Here, you have those bags. I can carry my own chair.”

“That’s all right. We’ll all heading in the same direction. Dan’s okay, by the way. Aren’t you, Dan The Man?”

“It was only a ball,” Danny grumbled. “But you’re still buying me a water ice, right?”

“Danny!”

Will grinned at her. “Bribery,” he explained. “When tears threaten, bribery is always an option. Do you mind?”

She looked at her watch. “I suppose a water ice wouldn’t ruin their lunch. But don’t you have to get to court or something?”

“No. Along with playing baseball coach, I’ve been barred from stepping foot in the courthouse for two weeks now that I wrapped up my last case on the docket. I only had a couple of pretrial things going on anyway, and they’ve been pushed back until next month, courtesy of The Hammer. Since I’m my own boss, I’ve juggled some appointments and decided that every hardworking lawyer needs a vacation now and then.”

“That’s nice. Richard always says that there are benefits and problems in being self-employed. The benefit is that you’re your own boss and can work when you want to, but the downside is that you’re your own boss and it doesn’t pay to coddle your employee.”

“I’d say Richard has a point. I’ve been known to beat myself up rather badly when I’m facing a trial deadline. I’ve often thought of reporting myself to authorities for not paying myself some pretty hefty overtime.”

They’d reached the parking lot, and Elizabeth hunted in her purse for her car keys, clicking on the button that opened the back hatch of her SUV. Will had done much the same thing with his Mercedes while the twins piled into her backseat and strapped themselves into their booster seats.

“Today I’ll just follow you,” she told him. “I want to take the boys to the mall after you pay off on your bribe, to see if I can find one of those walk-in hairdressers for them.”

Will cocked one well-defined eyebrow at her. “Heard that, did you?”

She shook her head. “Heard what? Oh, you mean how one of the coaches called Danny, Curly?”

“Okay,” he said, nodding. “We’ll go with that one.”

“What? What did I miss?”

“Nothing. When the team was in line to get their handouts one of the boys called Mike, Mary. Mike didn’t notice, so I let it go. But I was going to try to figure out a way to tell you it might be time for the twins to lose the curls.”

“You were going to do that?”

He held up his hands as if in self-defense. “I know, I know. Butting in where I don’t belong. It’s just … it’s just that you don’t have anybody to help steer you through the waters on this stuff, as it were. I noticed, that’s all.”

Richard didn’t. The thought came to Elizabeth’s mind, and she guiltily shooed it away, telling herself that Richard was Richard, and it was all right that he didn’t notice things. Like the new dress she’d bought last week. Or the fact that she’d cut her hair.

“Elizabeth? Honest to God, I’m not trying to tell you how to raise your sons. God knows it’s none of my business. And you’d already decided to get them haircuts, right?”

“Annie—Todd’s mother—thought they were girls,” Elizabeth told him. “So, yes, I’d already decided. And their hair isn’t that long, is it?”

“No,” Will said quickly. “It’s the curls, and the being blond, I suppose. And they’re how old now, seven?”

They’re my babies. They’re all I have. “Yes, all of seven. But I refuse to shave their heads. I don’t care what other parents do. I’ve always trimmed their hair myself. Do you know of a good salon?”

“You don’t want a salon, Elizabeth. You want a barber. And, yes, I do. I think Sid gave me my first real haircut a million years ago. Well, over thirty years ago. And you know what, I have an idea.”

“Oh, you do, do you?” Elizabeth felt that go-with-the-flow thing sneaking up on her again. “And am I going to like this idea?”

“Maybe not, but I think the boys will. See, I remember my first haircut. I remember the tickle of the electric trimmer on the back of my neck. I remember the oil Sid slicked over my hair. I remember the lollipop he gave me. And I remember my mother sitting on a chair over in the corner, crying because I didn’t look like her baby anymore.”

Elizabeth bit her bottom lip for a moment. “You’re thinking I might cry and make a fool of myself as those beautiful blond curls hit the barbershop floor.”

“Might? No, that’s probably pretty much a given. I’m thinking Mike and Dan will be embarrassed that their mother is crying. I know I was. So how’s this for a plan? I pay off my bribe to Dan, then I drop you at the mall and we plan to meet somewhere in about two hours—after Sid has done his thing.”

“Oh, I don’t—”

“It’s a guy thing, Elizabeth. A man thing.”

She closed her eyes for a moment, actually believing she could see Mikey and Danny smiling and waving as they flew away from her, flapping the little wings on their backs, going off into the big bad world without her.

“A man thing. I understand.” She looked up at Will’s open, smiling face. “And you’re laughing at me, aren’t you?”

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