The Sweetest Thing
Page 16

Mia didn’t look away as a myriad of emotions crossed her face. After a long beat, she swallowed hard. “Okay. Thanks.”
In the heavily weighted silence, Ford went to the refrigerator. Time for improvisation, and his eyes locked on a big, juicy-looking strawberry pie. Worked for him. He grabbed it, carrying the tin heaped with brilliant red strawberries and dripping with glaze to the table.
“That’s my Kick-Ass Strawberry Pie,” Tara said, surprised.
“Yes, and now it’s Kick-Ass Breakfast.” Ford pointed to the chairs. “Sit.”
Tara shocked him by actually following his direction. Mia followed suit, and he cut the pie into three huge thirds.
Tara choked. “I can’t feed our daughter strawberry pie for breakfast.”
“Why not?”
“Yeah,” Mia asked. “Why not?”
“Because…” Tara appeared to search for a reason. “It’s not healthy.”
“It’s got fruit,” Mia said.
Tara looked at her. The awkwardness was still there. The air was filled with it, as well as unspoken questions and answers. But finally she nodded. Kick-Ass Breakfast it would be.
Mia gazed down at her third of the pie, her pretty hair sweeping into her eyes—which might be Ford’s own green but they were guarded like Tara’s.
His daughter, he repeated to himself. God. His daughter. She was careful. Controlled. Smart. And when she reached up and impatiently shoved her hair out of the way, he couldn’t hold back the smile.
“What?” she wanted to know.
“You remind me of Tara at your age,” he said. “Ready to tell us how you found us?”
“My dad helped me.”
Ford couldn’t help it: he flinched at the word dad, something he’d certainly never been to her. Tara met his gaze, and the understanding and compassion in her eyes were far too much for him to take. Getting up from the table, he poured three glasses of cold milk.
“I’d tried to find you before,” Mia said, “but I couldn’t. Then when Phoebe Traeger died, she left me some money.” She looked at Tara. “I’m sorry about your mom.”
“Thank you,” Tara said quietly. “You got the money around Thanksgiving.”
“Yes, and with it came a letter from her. She said she wasn’t supposed to make herself known to me. That she was breaking rules and promises all over the place, but that she was dead and if people didn’t like it, they could suck it. Her words,” Mia added with a small smile. “She included your contact information in case I ever wanted it. For both of you.” She paused. “I’ve always wanted it, but it took me a little while to find the nerve to do anything with it.” She looked at Tara. “It said you lived in Texas, so I was surprised when I saw that ad to find out you were here.” She paused. “I have a good life only half an hour from here. Two parents who love me very much. It should be enough.” She paused. “I wanted it to be enough.”
“It’s natural to be curious,” Tara said quietly. “It’s okay to be curious.”
“Yeah, well, at first I told myself I didn’t care, about either of you.” Mia pushed a strawberry around on the plate. “You gave me up, right? So I didn’t care. I wasn’t going to be curious. I refused to be, natural or not.”
Tara looked devastated. Ford reached for her hand and gave it a squeeze. “I’m glad you changed your mind,” he said.
“Who says I did?”
“You’re here,” he pointed out. “That indicates a certain level of caring. Of curiosity.”
She sagged a little. “Yeah. I always was too curious for my own good.”
“And now that you’re here?” he asked. “What do you want to happen?”
Mia very carefully cut a large strawberry in half with her fork. “I realize I really should know, since I came to you, but I don’t. At least not exactly.” She looked at Ford’s hand. He was still holding Tara’s fingers in his, and had been stroking his thumb across her skin, soothing her without even realizing it.
“I know I’ve asked this already,” Mia said wryly. “But it really does seem like you two are together.”
Ford understood why she thought it. But he’d told himself it was about sex. Hell, Tara had told him as well. And he’d been absolutely sure that’s all there could be. It was a self-protection thing. But when he met Tara’s gaze, that protection urge turned to her, as she was revealing a heartbreaking vulnerability. She’d gotten hurt the last time they’d been together, much more than he. It’d left her gun-shy, no doubt. He couldn’t blame her for that. She’d been the one to face the consequences of their relationship.
“It’s hard to explain,” Tara said.
To say the least. Ford braced for Mia’s reaction, but she was as resilient as she was smart. She merely nodded and stood up. “Can I borrow a computer?”
Tara looked confused. “Computer?”
“I want to go to Facebook and vote.” Mia turned to Ford. “I’m going to vote for you. It’d be nice to have my parents together.”
Tara turned to Ford. “She wants to vote for you,” she said faintly.
“That’s possible, right?” Mia asked. “You two getting together? You’re not going to give me a line of crap about how you care about each other but it’s not in the cards or something, are you?” She drew a breath. “Or how you each want to live your own lives, you have to be true to yourselves, you won’t be held back anymore—” She broke off and winced. “Sorry. Wrong kitchen.”
“Your parents are splitting,” Ford said.
Mia nodded.
Shit. Ford found himself wanting to reach for her, but she was vibrating with a very clear don’t-touch vibe, so in the end he refilled her milk. It was all he could think of, but she clutched her refilled glass and smiled at him.
“Mia,” Tara breathed. “I’m so sorry.”
“Yeah. Thanks.” Mia got to her feet. “So… a computer?”
“Mine’s in the small office behind the laundry,” Tara said after a beat. “Second door to the right.”
“Thanks.”
When she was gone, Tara moved to the sink to stare down at the blackened mess of an omelet pan. “I burned breakfast,” she murmured. “Burned it black.”
Ford came up behind her. Like mother, like daughter, she was also sporting a don’t-touch vibe, but he walked right through it and slid his hands to her hips. “You okay?”
Surprising him, she turned and faced him. “She’s… ours.”
“Yes.”
“I mean, did you get a good look at her? We did that. We made her,” she marveled.
“We did good.” He pulled her in close.
She swallowed hard, clearly fighting tears. “We did really good. God, it brings me back, you know?” She dropped her forehead to his chest. “Back to that time when it was all so messed up.”
“I know.” He felt the same. Tara had spent the last five months of her pregnancy in Seattle. When she’d gone into labor, she hadn’t wanted him there. He’d gone to the hospital anyway, though as far as he knew she’d never known he was there. He’d sat in the waiting room by himself staring at the walls, agonizing over the hell she was going through for all those hours, terrified for her.
Afterward, he’d spent more long hours just staring at their daughter through the nursery glass until they’d eventually carried her away to deliver her to her new parents.
To her new life.
“When I had her,” Tara said, voice muffled against him, “it was so much harder than I thought it’d be. The pain. The worry. I kept telling myself that it would be over soon, and then when it finally was, they asked if I wanted to hold her for a minute. I had told myself no, no way could I do it and give her up, but I did. I took her.” She paused, lost in the memory. “It was only for a second, but she was awake. She opened her eyes and looked right at me and I knew,” she whispered. “I knew she was going to be beautiful.” She pressed her lips together. “And for a minute, I didn’t think I could give her up.”
“Tara.” Ford pressed his forehead to hers and fought with the what-ifs.
“I’d made my decision, and I was okay with it,” she said, nodding as if to help convince herself. “It was just that when she looked at me… God, those eyes. She still has your eyes, Ford. And her eyes—your eyes—they’ve haunted me for seventeen years.”
“You’re shaking,” he murmured.
“No, that’s you.”
Well, hell. It was.
“You were so good with her today,” she said and sniffed. “You knew just what to say, and I… I froze.”
“You did fine. It was a shock.” Ford slid his fingers in her hair and tugged lightly until she lifted her face to his.
Her eyes shimmered, and she gave him a small smile that reached across the years and all the emotions, and grabbed him by the throat. As if it was the most natural thing in the world, he cupped her face and lowered his mouth to hers, just as Mia came back into the room.
After an interminable beat of silence, she said, “I don’t know whether to cheer or be grossed out.”
“Did you find the computer?” Tara asked, clearly trying to change the subject.
“Yes.” Mia turned to Ford. “You’re up in the voting so far, but not by much. Maybe you should help a few ladies across the street today if you get the chance.” She grabbed her plate of pie and paused, head cocked as she studied the both of them. “Were you two really just about to kiss again?”
Tara winced. “Only a little bit.”
“But you’re not together,” Mia clarified.
Tara winced again. “No.”
Mia studied them both. “I don’t have any siblings, do I?”
Chapter 12
“For some unknown reason, success usually occurs in private, while failure occurs in full view.”
TARA DANIELS
Tara introduced Mia to her aunts, and both Maddie and Chloe fawned all over her, loving her up. They’d all gone to dinner, but not before Tara had called and checked in with Mia’s parents, giving Tara some peace of mind that they were really okay with this.
With sharing their daughter.
Her daughter.
Mia had warmed up to Maddie and Chloe easily, telling them all sorts of things about herself, like how she planned on being a lawyer because she had a talent for arguing.
“You come by that honestly, honey,” had been Maddie’s response as she’d patted Tara’s hand. They’d all laughed except Mia, who hadn’t looked as amused as everyone else to hear she took after Tara.
Later, after Mia had gone home and it was just Maddie, Chloe, and Tara sharing some wine on one of the marina docks, Tara admitted her fear—that she and Mia wouldn’t connect. Maddie assured Tara that Mia had only connected with Chloe and herself so quickly because they were aunts and not a birth mother, and therefore had the benefit of not carrying any emotional baggage into the relationship.
Tara was well aware of the emotional baggage. It was currently weighing her down so that she could barely breathe. So was the bone-deep, heart-wrenching yearning for more with Mia, instead of the awkwardness, unspoken questions, and tension.
It’ll happen, Maddie promised. Tara wanted that to be true more than she’d ever wanted anything.
The next day, she tried to lose herself in routine. She made a trip to the grocery store, something that usually, oddly, gave her peace, except not this time. This time she ran into Logan, and there in the ice cream aisle he introduced her to the circle of fans around him as his ex-and future wife. Annoyed, she corrected him and pushed her cart onward, running into several acquaintances who couldn’t wait to tell her which way they’d voted on Facebook. The poll seemed to be running about 60 percent in Ford’s favor, but Logan was charming the pants off Lucky Harbor and steadily gaining ground.
It was official. Her life was out of control. She had a daughter looking for a first chance, an ex-husband looking for a second chance, and Ford looking for…
She had no idea.
Shaking her head, Tara made her way back to the inn. When she got out of the car to unload, she was surprised when Mia came out to help. “Thanks,” Tara said with a heartfelt smile.
Mia returned it, though it didn’t quite meet her eyes. It never seemed to when it came to Tara.
Something else to work on, Tara thought: getting her daughter to let go of seventeen years of resentment and trust her. “Mia,” she said softly as they came face to face at the trunk of the car. “What can I do?”
Mia didn’t pretend to misunderstand as she reached to grab bags of food. “I don’t know. I just…” She shrugged. “I thought that this would be easier, that’s all. That I’d instantly feel this bonded connection with you, that…” The girl sighed and shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“Tell me how to help,” Tara said. “I want to help. I want the same thing you do.”
Mia nodded. “I guess maybe I still have questions.”
“Then ask. Anything,” Tara said, and hoped that was true.
Mia hefted six bags in her thin arms. She was stronger than she looked. “Anything?”
“Yes.” But Tara braced herself, hoping against hope that she’d start off light. Like maybe what was Tara’s favorite color and astrological sign? They could work their way up from there.