“I’m sorry,” Aidan said.
“Don’t be sorry,” Kate said. “Zelda is so happy, there’s absolutely no reason to be sorry.”
“I just hate it that it caused you pain when you think of him.”
“Here’s the thing.” Kate leaned forward. “Zelda’s happiness is such an inspiration. If she can be happy after going through hell, maybe there’s hope for the rest of us.”
Aidan blinked. He loved the sound of that.
She reached into her pants pocket and pulled out something.
“Chloe made this for me tonight,” Kate said. “While all the other little girls were painting rocks to leave in Forsyth Park, Chloe came up to me and pressed this into my hand. She told me she had painted it for me and wanted me to keep it.”
Kate handed the small, colorful stone to Aidan.
On one side, it said, “I love my family,” in rudimentary bold blue letters. On the other side, Chloe had painted a man, and a woman with flowing red hair. Between the two of them was a little girl with curly blond hair holding the hands of the man and woman. The three were encircled by the outline of a red heart.
“This is just....” Her eyes glistened with tears, but she was smiling as she looked at the rock. “You and Chloe mean the world to me, Aidan.” She put her hand on her stomach. “This little baby and I are so lucky to be part of this family. It is overwhelming, really.”
“We’re lucky to have you. You complete us. Or maybe we should say that we complete each other. Let’s never forget how fortunate we are.”
Kate closed her fingers around the rock and nodded. He pulled her into his arms and held her like that for a long time.
“I know you wanted things to be different. You wished that the wedding could have been more traditional.”
“At the very least, I wish I could remember our wedding rather than waking up married. It is as if I wasn’t even there.”
“I want you to remember it, too. You deserve that and a real proposal. Let’s do it again. Let’s have a real wedding. I will surprise you with a proposal. I want you to buy bridal magazines and pick out the dress of your dreams and have your sisters next to you as bridesmaids.”
“Chloe can be our flower girl,” she said, her head still resting on his shoulder.
He was going to make that happen. He was going to make sure Kate had a proposal she would never forget and the wedding of her dreams.
The tall man exiting Aidan‘s office looked familiar, but Kate couldn’t place him as she watched him walk to his car, which was parked ahead of her car, on the street in front of the Victorian townhouse that housed Quindlin Brothers Renovations.
It was after 6:00. She had just dropped off Chloe at Dori’s house.
Dori had invited Chloe to join her and Beatrice for dinner.
Since Chloe would have a much better time with her best friend than attending the formal dinner to meet Zelda’s mystery man, Kate had taken Dori up on the offer, with a promise to reciprocate as soon as things settled down.
She watched the man get into his car and then texted Aidan to let him know she was waiting for him outside. Two minutes later, he greeted her with a kiss that curled her toes in the pointy flats she was wearing.
When they came up for air, she asked, “Who was that guy that just left? He looks so familiar.”
“That’s my friend Randy Ponder.”
“The private investigator?”
“The one and only.”
Kate frowned. “Please tell me you are designing a house for him or he has some other business here because I still haven’t made up my mind about whether I want to open the Pandora’s box that is my father.”
Aidan grimaced. “Yeah, about that. He, uh, found your father.” Aidan opened the folio he had brought with him and took out a sealed manila envelope He tried to hand it to her, but she held up her hands and refused it as if the missive would burn her fingers.
“I don’t want this, Aidan.”
“Then put it away, because you might change your mind.”
“I am not going to change my mind and it was presumptuous of you to do this since I never gave you the go ahead. In fact, I thought I asked you to drop it.”
Aidan frowned. Kate’s heart was beating so fast she thought it might break through her breastbone and fall into her lap.
“You didn’t ask me to drop it. You didn’t make a decision at all. But you did acknowledged that you needed to sort out your feelings so we can both get on with our lives. Since you were having such a hard time deciding what to do, I took matters into my own hands.”
“I told you I did not want to find him.”
“Kate, I don’t think you’re going to be able to put everything behind you until you talk to him.”
Kate saw red and it threatened to engulf her. “Just because we’re married, it does not give you the right to decide what is best for me. We are late. I don’t want to talk about this anymore. I’ll pretend like this never happened as long as you agree not to overstep bounds like this again.”
Before Aidan had a chance to respond, she started the car and headed toward the Forsyth Galloway Inn. She saw him tuck the envelope beneath the sun visor on the passenger side of the car.
Okay, fine.
She grabbed the envelope and shoved it into her purse. When she got home, she would throw it away the without opening it. The last thing she wanted was to talk to the man who broke her heart and did his best to ruin her family’s life.
Even though they shared the same blood, it didn’t mean
