Forever Together (17 page)

***

Dan sat at his desk and stared out of the
window. He’d just sat through thirty minutes of Reginald Hill
telling him what a hazard the Saturday parade down Main Street
would be. It didn’t matter that the Arts Festival attracted
thousands of people to Bozeman, or that his granddaughter was the
organizer. Reginald had a bone to chew and Dan happened to be the
most senior pair of ears that would listen.

He’d stopped listening about the same time
Reginald pulled out a sheet of bullet pointed notes. He didn’t care
about Reginald’s food and hygiene concerns, noise complaints, or
potential parking infringement violations. What he cared about most
was seeing Kate and trying to mend the mess he’d made of this
morning.

What Kate didn’t know was that he hadn’t
taken what happened last night lightly. At one
time,
he would have walked away from her without
a care in the world. But he hadn’t been that person in years and
doubted he’d ever be like that again. Last night meant something,
something he’d like to be part of for longer than one day. If that
were
to happen, he’d have to
convince her to stay. She had a life in another city, friends and
opportunities that wouldn’t be easy to replicate in a small
town.

Now that Reginald had gone he clicked through
to his appointment calendar. Someone with a warped sense of humor
had gone crazy with clip art. They’d sent him a pulsing red heart
with a message telling him to meet them in the squad room.

If he’d left the ranch under better
circumstances,
he might have
thought Kate had hacked into the Police Communications Center and
sent him the message. But Colin had forgotten that all email came
with an automatic sender code. And Dan would recognize Colin’s code
anywhere. “Cookie” described his main focus in life perfectly. If
it
was
loaded
with
sugar and bad for your health, Colin would
have eaten it.

As soon as Dan stepped out of his office,
everyone had problems that only he could sort out. It just so
happened that today wasn’t the best time to tell him that two
fluorescent bulbs had blown, or that the cleaner had forgotten to
leave more toilet paper in the cupboard.

He walked toward Colin’s desk, expecting to
see him eating something sweet. He wasn’t disappointed. But it was
the other person at the desk that made him catch his breath.

Kate sat on a chair, yellow frosting smudging
the corners of her smiling mouth. As soon as she saw Dan her smile
disappeared.

“Hi ya, boss. Look who’s come to see you.”
Colin wiped his fingers on a paper napkin and drained the last of
his coffee from his mug. “I’m going on patrol for the next couple
of hours. Call me if you need me. Thanks for the muffin.” He winked
at Kate as he left his desk.

Kate looked as nervous as a cat sitting on a
hot tin roof. She stood up and looked around the room. More than
one pair of eyes
was
focused on
them.

“Come with me.” Dan found an empty interview
room and waved her inside. It wasn’t the best place to have a
conversation, but it was clean and no one else was listening.

Kate lifted a cane basket onto the table in
the middle of the room. “I wanted to come and see you. To
say
I’m sorry. For this
morning.”

Dan hadn’t expected her to apologize. It
wasn’t her fault that he’d left faster than a speeding bullet.
“You’ve got nothing to be sorry for. I shouldn’t have left the way
I did.”

“But dad…”

“Your dad got a shock. If I’d been in his
shoes,
I probably would have done
the same thing.”

Kate looked at him suspiciously.
“You’re being
very mature about this.”

“Hard not to when you don’t have much
choice.”

She pushed the basket across the table to
him. “I made these. Colin said they’re good.”

“Colin would know.”

“So we’re okay? You’re not angry with
me?”

“I wasn’t angry with you.”

Kate made a scoffing noise in the back of her
throat.

“Okay, that might not be entirely true. At
least you were honest about why you had sex with me.”

Kate frowned, then wiped her mouth with her
hand. The smudge of frosting disappeared along with Dan’s blood
pressure. He remembered what they’d done last night, where their
mouths had traveled and the things they hadn’t had time to try.

Kate glared at him. “Just because we slept
together it doesn’t mean I want to marry you. Lots of people have
fulfilling lives without getting married.”

“It’s just as well I didn’t ask you to marry
me, then. I guess we’re on the right track to a meaningless
relationship.” He could have kicked himself. He’d done it again.
Stepped into a conversation that could only end in disaster.

“What do you mean by ‘meaningless’?”

Different answers shot through his brain.
None of them made sense or would make Kate think highly of him. But
he’d gone this far and there was no turning back. He might as well
push her, see how far she was willing to go in her quest for the
perfect relationship.

He tried to think of a worst case scenario.
Something that would put steam between her ears. “A meaningless
relationship could be something based on mutual attraction. Not
necessarily exclusive or long lasting. It fills a
gap,
but doesn’t fill you up. A bit like
chocolate muffins.”

Kate’s faced turned red. She planted her
hands on her hips and glared at him. “Are you calling me cheap?
Because if you are, you might as well forget about any relationship
with me. You can pay for that type of thing in Billings.”

She said that with such authority that Dan
nearly laughed. If she knew half of what went on in
Bozeman,
she wouldn’t be standing there with a
spurt of righteousness keeping her temper alive.

“And as for the chocolate muffins, I’ve
changed my mind. Colin deserves them more than you do.” She picked
up the basket and moved toward the door.

“I was joking.” He moved in front of her,
blocking her exit.

The door to the interview room opened and
Colin stuck his head inside. “Sorry to interrupt, boss. Esme’s
nursing home called. She’s done another runner.”

“Sounds like it could be a long day.” Kate
smiled like a barracuda about to bite the hand that fed her. “How
about a basket of chocolate muffins, Colin? They won’t fill you up,
but you look like a man who would appreciate the effort I’ve gone
to.”

Colin didn’t get a chance to reply. She
shoved the basket in his stomach and left the room.

“Did I come in at the wrong time?” he
asked.

Dan shook his head. “Let’s find Esme.” He
reached for the basket and Colin moved away.

“Kate gave these to me. You’ll have to earn
your own basket of food.”

Dan didn’t think that would be happening
anytime soon. He consoled himself with the thought that at least he
wouldn’t be stretching the seams of his shirt. Especially if Colin
ended up with Anna and Kate’s home baking on a permanent basis.

CHAPTER NINE

“Hi, dad.”

Tom looked up. He didn’t smile, but he didn’t
frown either. Kate wasn’t sure what to say, but she knew she needed
to talk to him. To at least let him know that she loved him.

“I’m sorry about this morning.”

Tom took a deep breath and turned from in
front of the window in the hospital. “I over-reacted and for that
I’m sorry. I didn’t expect to see Dan coming out of your room.”

He didn’t have to mention the word,
‘naked.’
Kate’s mind filled in the
blanks and heat rushed to her face. “We didn’t plan it. It
shouldn’t have happened, not in your home anyway.”

Tom held up his hand. “Maybe you should stop
while you’re ahead. A dad doesn’t want to know his daughter’s
having sex. But if she is, he wants to know she’s safe. I take it
you remembered to use contraception?”

“Dad.”

“Okay, forget I mentioned it. But just nod or
shake your head. I’m worried about you.”

Kate took a deep breath and nodded.

“Good,” Tom sighed. “Where do we go from
here?”

“I’m moving into town.”

Her dad looked surprised. “Anna and I had a
talk. We don’t mind if you and Dan want to…keep seeing each other.
We’ll move back to the ranch so Dan can have his apartment to
himself.”

Kate shook her head. “You don’t have to do
that. Kaylee needs you. If you live on the
ranch,
you’re thirty minutes from town. That’s a long way
to drive if you get a call from the hospital.” She walked across to
a sofa and sat down. “I’ve found a cheap motel. It won’t cost me
much. Loretta’s offered to put a sign in the window of The Beauty
Box to see if someone wants to share an apartment.”

“What about Dan?”

Kate stared at the vase of flowers on the
table. “We’re not speaking to each other at the moment.”

Tom sat down beside her. “Was it something I
said?”

She shook her head. “He wants something
superficial and casual.”

Tom frowned. “Are you sure? That doesn’t
sound like Dan.”

“I guess I bring out the worst in him.” A
tear rolled down Kate’s face and she wiped it away.

Her dad patted her knee. “Give it time.”

“I’m not sure there’s any point.”

“There’s always a point when you care for
someone.”

Kate didn’t know how she felt about Dan, not
after he’d described what had happened between them as meaningless.
She didn’t understand him, didn’t understand why he felt the way he
did. Last night had shot her to the moon and back, left her
emotions raw and her heart in tatters. Not bad for someone who’d
kept the world at arm’s length for most of her life.

She rubbed her hand along the fabric on the
sofa. She wondered how many other people had sat in the same seat,
staring at the same green and gold fabric, wondering if everything
had to be so complicated.

“There’s something else I need to tell you,
dad.”

Tom turned in his seat, a worried look on his
face. “Sounds serious.”

“It is,” Kate said softly. She thought back
to the second conversation she’d had with her mom. Calling her mom
twice in two weeks didn’t
often
happen,
except when it was important. And this phone call
had been one of the most important of her life. Her mom hadn’t been
happy. She didn’t see why Kate had to tell Tom about Lily. Even
after everything that had happened with Kaylee, she didn’t want her
ex-husband knowing he’d had another daughter. A daughter with
HLH.

She picked up her tote bag and balanced it on
her knees. “What I’m going to tell you might come as a shock. It’s
something you should have known about fifteen years ago, except mom
decided not to tell you.”

She took a deep breath and opened her bag.
She lifted out an envelope and held it in her hands. She didn’t
know how her dad was going to react, what he’d feel after she told
him about Lily. She put her bag on the ground and opened the
envelope.

“Mom was pregnant when you left San
Diego.”

Her dad’s mouth dropped open. He blinked a
few times, not saying anything.

“She gave birth to a little girl. We called
her Lily.”

“Lily?” Tom said weakly. “That’s my mother’s
name.”

Kate was confused. According to her mom, her
grandmother had driven a wedge between her and Tom. She didn’t
understand why she’d name her baby after the woman who’d helped
destroy her marriage.

“I didn’t know that was grandma’s name.”

“Where’s Lily now? Is she living with your
mom in Australia?”

Kate shook her head. This was the hard part.
The part she’d been dreading since she spoke to her mom. “Dad, Lily
died. For the first couple of years after she was born she was a
normal baby. But when she turned three, something changed. The
doctors didn’t know what was wrong. It wasn’t until they sent her
to a specialist that they found out she had HLH.”

Her dad’s face turned pale. “What
happened?”

“They gave her chemotherapy and then tried a
bone marrow transplant. It didn’t work.”

She pulled some photographs out of the
envelope. She’d asked her roommate to send them to Montana to help
explain the loss of someone that had meant the world to her. “I
don’t have many photos of Lily before she got sick, but I do have
this one.”

She passed her dad a photo. Kate was holding
her sister in her arms and they were laughing at the camera. It had
been taken at the zoo, a couple of months before Lily got sick. Six
months before she died.

“You look so alike.” Her dad sighed. “And
Lily is so much like Kaylee.”

“Peas in a pod,” Kate whispered. She passed
him another photo. “We took this one just before she started
chemotherapy.” Lily was holding her favorite doll. They’d wound a
bandage around her doll’s arm and wrapped her in a blanket. Lily’s
doll had stayed beside her for the whole time she’d been sick.

Kate blinked back her tears and focused on
the photos in her dad’s hands. “You can keep those. They’re copies
of ones I’ve got at home.”

“Did you donate your bone marrow to
Lily?”

Kate nodded. “I felt so guilty for not being
able to save her. Mom told me that the doctors gave the procedure a
five percent chance of working. It wasn’t because the match wasn’t
right. She was so sick that her little body just couldn’t heal
itself. It didn’t make it any easier when she died. We didn’t want
to let her go.”

She blew her nose and wiped her eyes. “After
Lily died we went to pieces. Mom ended up on anti-depressants and
couldn’t put one foot in front of the other. I tried to help, but I
was dealing with my own grief. I hung out with the wrong crowd and
got into trouble.”

“You’re okay now?”

“As okay as I’m ever going to get.” She
smiled at her dad. “Especially if you discount naked men and
chocolate muffins.”