“Oh,” she whispered.
“I expect to pay until you can find another child. I know this must be a difficult time to find a new client.”
“You mean he’s staying there permanently?”
He shrugged, lowering his head. “This isn’t an easy decision.”
“I’m sure it isn’t. You’re giving your son away?”
“It’s best for him,” he snapped.
“I know the adjustment was hard for you at first, but the roughest part’s past. Are you sure about this?”
When he didn’t answer, she knelt beside Jacob, who was reaching for a photo album. Rescuing the open book, she saw photos of Bryan and a woman standing before an elegant white stone fireplace. She wore a stunning cream sequined dress with diamond-and-emerald jewelry that matched her green eyes.
Jacob’s mother was beautiful. Not that that should come as a surprise.
Laura turned the pages. In every picture Jacob’s mother was immaculately dressed. Laura couldn’t imagine this woman pregnant, let alone cuddling the little boy Laura had come to love.
She glanced at Bryan, who continued to stare out the window at the darkened sky, ignoring Jacob’s happy squeals.
“I realize that your family was broken up just when it was starting, Bryan, but this seems so drastic. You and Jacob need each other now more than ever.”
Laura felt her words of comfort were hollow. How could she possibly help someone else deal with his grief when she had such difficulty herself?
“The three of us were never a family.” He grabbed the album from Laura’s hand and flung it across the room. The leather-bound book crashed into the wall and tumbled to the floor.
Jacob wailed, frantically reaching for Laura. She swept him into her arms and bounced him on her hip until he calmed down.
Bryan turned away and began to clean up the mess, carefully replacing the pages in the binder.
“I’m a pretty good listener.”
“We’ll be fine.”
“You think you’re the only one who’s angry about losing a spouse?” she said, her voice racked with emotion.
“I don’t think you understand the situation.” He glared, not at her, but past her, as if at an invisible enemy.
“I’m willing to try.”
“You couldn’t begin to understand, Laura. Your life is so sheltered…” His bellow stopped midsentence. He dropped the album into an empty chair and jammed his hands into his pockets.
“Yes, it was once,” she softly admitted. The guilt she’d been fighting blanketed her. Why was it that this man could infuriate her at the same time her heart swelled with feelings she couldn’t understand?
“I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”
Frustration fed the tension between them.
Bryan continued, “I’m just not cut out for fatherhood. You make parenting look so easy.”
Laura closed her eyes, rubbing her aching temples, giving in to the tension that had been building all day. “Abandoned. Confused. Angry. Afraid.” Her tone hardened. “Easy? I know what you’re feeling, because I was there. I was Mrs. Todd Bates, wife, best friend, mother. Todd was everything to me.”
“I’m not…”
“No, Bryan, let me finish. I’m tired of this pedestal you seem to have put me on. I have the same fears and frustrations you and every other parent has. And like you, I’m learning to face them—alone.” She backed away and collapsed against a closet door.
He sat on the couch, his profile rugged and somber.
She swallowed hard, asking God to fill her with courage. She wasn’t sure if Bryan believed in Christ or not, or whether he would even listen. What she saw as God’s handiwork, others often saw as coincidences. Laura sat on the edge of the sofa.
“Bryan, there hasn’t been an easy day since Todd died, whether we’re talking children or not. As much as my kids mean to me, there are days I don’t know how I can cope. Yet God placed them in my hands, to raise, to love, until He’s ready to take us home. It’s the same with my clients’ children.”
Bryan reached across the sofa and took hold of her hand. The warmth and tenderness surprised her. “He gave you a very special gift, Laura.”
She pulled her hand away, refusing to let herself feel anything for a man who could turn away his own child. “He gave you one, too, Bryan. A son.”
“Right. And I’m doing a real bang-up job with him.”
“It’s no sin to be less comfortable with a baby than an eight-year-old. God made each flower different. Some tolerate heat, some last until the snow falls, and some are only pretty a few weeks in the spring, but God takes care of them all in His special way.”
As he considered her minisermon, she continued. “It won’t ever be easy without Todd, but I know now that I can manage. God answers our prayers every day, big and small.” Tears, trapped by her stubborn will, fought for their freedom.
Laura let the silence lengthen before proceeding. “What is sending Jacob to his aunt really about?”
“Andrea was nothing like you.”
“I can see that. So?”
Bryan remained silent, staring blankly at the wall. Laura waited. He picked up his son, then turned to her. “Until a week before I met you, I knew nothing of Jacob. Had no idea I was even going to be a father.”
Laura gasped.
“She left me right after she found out she was pregnant, by my estimation. A year later her lawyer called and told me she’d died, and that I was a father.”
Laura shook her head. “How could she…not tell you?” How could Andrea look into Jacob’s beautiful brown eyes, touch his smooth olive skin, hold his long fingers and not think of his father, Laura thought.
Jacob grinned, and her tears broke loose with a reluctant laugh. “Good grief, he even smiles just like you, first one side, then a whole smile. He’s a spitting image of you.” Laura’s teary gaze met Bryan’s in a silent shared understanding. “What your wife did was terrible, Bryan, but it’s past. Jacob needs you.”
Bryan looked at his son as Jacob closed his eyes and rested his head on Bryan’s shoulder. He picked up the thermal blanket, walked down the hall, and returned emptyhanded.
When he came back, he again tried to explain the unexplainable. “I need time to work through this. It was so sudden. One day I was giving a 110 percent to my job, and the next, I’m trying to figure out how a baby thinks.
“My career is ready to take off, that’ll mean more traveling, longer hours. It’s all hitting at once. He deserves more than I have to give him.”
“In a blink of the eye, Jacob will be ready for footballs, computers and girls. Where will you be? Still in the office, climbing that corporate ladder. For what? A son who doesn’t even know you?”
Bryan wondered how she could read his mind and verbalize his fears after knowing him only three months. Already she’d made a difference in his son’s life. In his too, if he’d admit it.
“Don’t let whatever happened between you and your wife ruin what you and Jacob can have.”
“I don’t even know what happened between us, Laura. One day she was here, the next