With a loud exhale, Tate held out a palm, peacemaker style. “Look, Julee, I don’t mean to be a hard case about this, but there are plenty of others to help with this cause of yours. I really am awfully busy, and given our history, I’d expect to be the last man on earth you’d come to.”
Their history was exactly why she had to have his help, but for Megan’s sake she dared not tell him that. Resuming perfect posture on the slick vinyl seat even while her insides howled in terror, she struggled for control and a serene façade. Any act of hysteria on her part was bound to make him wonder why he was more important than any other civic leader.
“We were once such good friends, I just thought—”
“Once,” he interrupted. “And once was a long time ago, a time I don’t care to revisit. Now, if you’ll excuse me…” He tossed the pen down and pushed upward from the desk. “I have to see a woman about a Peeping Tom.”
“Wait. Please.” But Tate was past listening.
Julee watched in dismay as the Sheriff of Seminole County, the man whose very blood she depended upon, grabbed his hat and, as if he couldn’t stand to be in her presence another moment, strode out the door.
Chapter Two
“He says he won’t help, Mom.” Julianna gripped the telephone receiver, trying to keep the panic at bay.
“He has to!” Beverly Reynolds’ strident voice pierced the distance from California to the Blackwood Motel.
“I know that, Mother,” Julianna cried. Then flopping back onto the standard green-and-brown motel bedspread, she relented. “I’m sorry. I’m just so scared. What if I can’t convince him to be tested?” She rubbed at the ache building between her eyebrows. “I don’t know what I’ll do.”
The motel television flickered to a commercial and Julianna saw her own legs hawking a new brand of depilatory cream. She turned away from the inane sight.
“I don’t know, either, honey.” Regret tinged her mother’s words. “If I hadn’t lied to everyone, especially Megan, you could come right out and tell Tate the truth.”
“I don’t want to hurt his family, but if he doesn’t agree to donate on his own, I’ll have no choice.”
“No! Absolutely not. You can’t risk it.” Julianna held the phone away from her mother’s screech. “The doctors have told us a dozen times how important a positive mental state is to Megan’s struggling immune system. Her health is too fragile to suddenly discover the father she thought was dead is alive and well in Oklahoma. Who knows what the shock might do to her?” A tormented sigh came through the phone lines. Julianna envisioned her mother repeatedly pushing short frosted hair behind one ear. “This is all my fault. I never should have started that lie.”
“You did what you thought was best at the time, Mama. I don’t blame you for any of this.”
When Julee had discovered her pregnancy and Tate’s marriage to another woman, her mom had created a deceased husband to save face in the new city and among new friends and co-workers.
“You were so young and so stubbornly determined not to ruin Tate’s chances for a football career. For a while I hated that boy. There you were pregnant, trying to succeed in this crazy modeling business, and wanting to spare the very boy who’d gotten you into trouble. I only meant to protect you and Megan from mean-spirited people.”
“I know, Mama, I know.” Julianna stared at the black spots on the ceiling tile. She’d relived those days in her mind a thousand times wondering what she could have done differently, and the answer always came out the same. She didn’t know.
Her mother hadn’t wanted her united with Tate, though she’d bitterly resented Julianna’s original plan to keep Tate in the dark. But Julee had feared what would happen if he’d discovered the pregnancy. He would have abandoned the athletic scholarship, his only opportunity to move beyond the horrible poverty and despair of his childhood. He would have gone back to work at the gas station and killed himself trying to care for a wife and a baby. In the end, after she’d reconsidered, he’d already traded her for someone else, so she lived with the lie created to protect them all.
“You never did approve of Tate, but he’s different now.”
“Different? Honey, Tate McIntyre was always different.”
“I mean different in a different way.” Julee laughed a little at that, comparing the almost military perfection of the Tate she’d seen today with the long black hair, the wary eyes, and bad attitude of the Tate she’d known ten years ago. “I don’t believe for one minute he’d intentionally hurt Megan. The bad-boy reject has become the golden savior and this town thinks he walks on water. From all appearances, he’s gentle and kind to everyone. Everyone but me, that is.”
“I don’t see why he should be angry with you,” Beverly sniffed defensively. “It’s not your fault he lost the football scholarship. And it sure wasn’t your fault he married that Atkins girl while you were still carrying his baby. I’ll never forgive him for that.”
“Mama, don’t go there. Please. I’ve had such a stressful day.” Gripping the phone a little tighter, she twisted the cord around her finger. “How’s Megan? Is she there?”
“No, she’s at school. Since you told her about having a bone-marrow drive where her daddy’s relatives lived, and explained how some of them could possibly match, she’s been full of zip.”
Julianna said a silent prayer of thanks. As long as Megan remained in remission, they had time to search for a donor. Her chest filled with a familiar mix of joy and pain. Being a mother was the hardest and most wonderful thing she’d ever done.
“Has she gained any weight?”
“In two days? Honey.” Her mother’s voice brimmed with sympathy. “Megan is like you. She’ll never fatten up too much.”
Julee had a vision of Megan’s wide, omnipresent smile in a narrow face with Tate’s high cheekbones and leaf-green eyes. Her arms hung like twigs from her T-shirt sleeves and she’d been bald so often, she’d taken to wearing a ball cap even when her hair had grown out. Julianna’s heart expanded with fierce mother love. Megan was an amazing kid, so full of life and love it seemed impossible that she could be dying.
“I have a meeting with the hospital administrator and the radio-station manager in a while, Mom, so I’d better get moving.” She sat up on the end of the bed. “Give Megan my love.”
“Try not to worry so much, Julee.”
“I won’t if you won’t.” It was an oft-repeated phrase.
“Everything is just dandy from this end. Eugene is coming over for dinner and afterward Megan and I have a hot game of Super Nintendo to finish.”
Julianna knew her mother and their affable accountant, Eugene Richmond, would be much more than friends if not for her and Megan. She had halfheartedly encouraged the pair to take their relationship further, but in truth, she couldn’t work the insane modeling schedules without her mom to help care for Megan. And with Megan’s hospital bills, every penny counted. When she’d discovered Julee’s pregnancy ten years ago, Beverly had moved to L.A. and become housekeeper and nanny while Julianna had provided the finances. So, adding to Julianna’s burden of responsibility, dear Eugene offered only friendship to the woman he wanted to love.
Replacing the receiver, she lay back on the full-size bed. Out of long habit she began the tedious exercises that kept her legs in high demand in commercials, magazine ads and movies. Sometimes, when she wasn’t worrying about Megan, she wondered what would happen when her legs gave out. How would she support her sick child? The agency loved her now because of the huge commission she brought in, but she had no illusions about this silly, shallow business of making a living