Not My Daughter

Maybe I wanted a full-time father. Maybe those visits back to your parents were too scary, because I didn't know them, and I really didn't know you, and Mom wasn't there. Maybe it would have been better for me if you had married her,' she said, building up steam. 'But no, Mom wanted you to have a career. Rick wants to be the world traveler everyone knows and admires-and we all want what Rick wants, don't we.' It wasn't a question. 'Well, what about what I want? What's so awful about my setting my heart on something? Why can't everyone want what Lily wants for a change?'

Realizing what she'd said, Lily looked shocked. In a flash, she got off the sofa and ran from the room.

When Susan started to follow, Rick said, 'Let her go.'

'She has no right to criticize you.'

'She does.' He was sitting forward now, elbows on his knees. 'I haven't been here for her. Maybe I didn't think enough about what she wanted.'

'She's just upset, Rick. She's never said those things before. I should talk with her. She shouldn't be alone.'

'Do you think she is?' Rick asked, and, of course, he was right. Alone was a relative concept. Lily would either be phoning, texting, or skyping.

Settling beside him on the sofa, Susan took his hand. 'You should have told her the truth. Your parents moved away because of my dad.'

'They didn't have to. They chose to. My mom's sister was in San Diego. They always wanted to retire there.' He laced his fingers through hers.

'Only your father didn't retire. He worked for years afterward. No, Rick, it was my dad's fault. He took his anger out on your dad. They'd been best buddies, and suddenly the friendship was ruined.'

'Well, it was an improbable friendship anyway, my dad the mail carrier, yours the mayor.' He grew pensive. 'When it was good, though, it was good. I was with them on some of those fishing trips. They could talk. It was like they were brothers, totally different from each other but with a really strong bond between them. I never figured out what it was.'

'It was the brother thing,' Susan said. Rick shot her a puzzled glance. 'I had an uncle,' she explained. 'I never knew him. He died young. But my father adored him. They used to fish.'

'No kidding?'

'Big Rick took his place.'

'The brother thing?'

'My father's reaction must have been over the top because he had unrealistic expectations of your dad.'

Rick considered that. 'And here I always thought that was about your father being a public person in a small town and needing to make a statement. But hey'-he tightened his hold of her hand-'either way, my father let him do it. He could have stood up. He could have fought. That's what he should have done.'

Susan studied his face. 'You think so?'

'Absolutely. He might have talked some sense into your father. Instead, he caved-just walked away, and he lost a helluva lot more than just one friendship. I swear, he's afraid to come here to see Lily because he thinks that John Tate will find out. So his relationship with Lily is limited. She can visit him, but he can't visit her. He wouldn't even when Mom was alive. No, he should have fought. Lily's his only grandchild. He should have been more supportive.'

'I never wanted his money.'

'Not with money. With time. With attention.' He sat back and rested his head on the sofa, his eyes still on hers. 'He was on the right side.'

'So is Lily when it comes to singing, but I told her not to fight. Should she?'

'Ideally, yes. But you nailed it. If she calls out the girls for voting her out, she alienates them further, in which case being back in the group wouldn't be fun.' He closed his eyes.

'So she loses either way?'

He was quiet for a minute. 'Maybe she wins either way. She'll have enough on her plate in a few months, and she sure doesn't need those girls.'

'Okay. But she did earn her spot-and it was something I wanted her to have. I can't sing, but she has a beautiful voice.'

'She didn't get it from me.'

'It's from my mom, who has never even heard her sing.'

'Her loss,' Rick murmured tiredly and kissed her hand.

She settled against him. 'Actually, it's ours, Lily's and mine. I thought it was bad when she was little and we had no relationship with my parents, but it gets worse every year. She's grown into such a talented young woman. She deserves to have adoring grandparents.'

Rick's breathing was a little too even. Tipping her head back, Susan saw that he was asleep, and, for a few minutes, she watched. Finally, she closed her own eyes to better enjoy the beat of his heart.

They slept like that for three hours. Susan was the one who finally woke. Nudging him gently, she got him up to the guest bedroom, but he didn't stay there long. She was barely in her own bed when he stole in and closed the door.

There was nothing sleepy about him then. Whispering her name, he stroked her hair, her breasts, her belly. His hunger was contagious. For those precious minutes, she couldn't get enough-couldn't give enough-and when her body erupted, she cried aloud at the pleasure of it.

She would have woken Lily, had he not covered her mouth. He had become good at that over the years. He saw to taking care, both of Lily's sensibility and Susan's fertility-particularly gratifying now, Susan thought in the seconds before she fell asleep in his arms. If this mother and daughter were pregnant and unmarried?

Susan couldn't begin to imagine the havoc of that.

Chapter 9

Rick offered to stay, but Susan sent him on to spend Thanksgiving with his father, who would otherwise have been alone.

Susan and Lily would not be. They were spending the holiday at Kate's, as they had for more than a dozen years. It was one of the few places where their host, at least, knew all their secrets.

Kate loved Thanksgiving-loved the cooking, the smells, the packed dining room, the noise. She loved inviting holiday orphans who had nowhere else to go. At the last minute there were always an extra two or three guests.

This year there were six, all invited weeks earlier, which should have been fine. Only Kate wasn't wild about the two extra card tables sticking into the hall or the folding chairs that didn't match. She had been awake late the night before setting up with the girls, but she didn't like the way the plates looked-too many different ones-so she was rearranging them again at dawn.

Things just weren't right this year. She ran out of butter making the stuffing, and with everyone else still in bed and the turkey needing to be put in the oven ASAP, she dashed to the convenience store herself, which was all well and good, except that since it was the only shop open, she paid nearly twice what she would have had she bought enough at the supermarket, and that irked her.

Back home again, she drafted Will to help with the turkey, which was huge, and when the kids straggled in and began rummaging for breakfast, she had to reach around them, wait for them to move, or actually move them herself.

'That can wait two minutes,' she told Mike as he stretched toward the cereal cabinet over her head. 'Lissie, your father's helping me here,' she complained when her daughter nudged Will aside so that she could get into the fridge. And when Sara weaseled in to peel an orange at the sink, Kate tore off a paper towel with a flourish and pressed it at her. 'I'm trying to work here. Can you not see this?'

'Mom needs coffee,' said Mike.