The Homecoming (8 page)

“And the money the woman left?”

“I put it in a trust for Nicholas. It's in care of a local bank until he turns eighteen. I couldn't access it if I wanted.”

The lawyer let a silence hang. After a moment, he said, “Miss Aston, why do you think your son is Noah Crosby?”

Danny closed his eyes for a moment. God, it still hurt so badly.

“Nick has had nightmares,” she said, “from the time he was an infant. Every once in a while he wakes up screaming.”

“I'm no expert,” said Danny's lawyer, “but don't a lot of children do that occasionally? Mine did.”

“This is different,” she said in the same patient tone she'd employed all along. Why wasn't she angry at this
interrogation, Danny wondered. “Margo had told me Nick was about a year old so I chose a January birth date. By his third birthday, he could articulate his dreams. It's always the same dream. Over and over. As he's grown older, he's continued to describe the dream, and it's still always the same. Someone is stealing him. Now, of course, someone is stealing him from me, which obviously wouldn't have been the case four years ago, but the basic dream is the same.”

“Have you ever consulted anyone about these dreams?”

“Dream,” she corrected. “One dream, many times over. And the answer is yes. After we moved to Portland I joined a group called the Parents Adoption Network. After several months I mentioned the dream. Most people had your reaction, but one mother took me aside later and told me that if it were her child, she'd be concerned, too, that what I described wasn't normal. So I took him to a child psychologist, whom we're still seeing. The dream hasn't changed, but he's been having fewer nightmares recently.”

“That still doesn't explain why you think your child is Mr. Crosby's son.”

“Timing,” Sydney said. “I only became aware of the traffic in stolen infants after I joined PAN. A few months ago, Nick's counselor told me the fact that Nick had the same dream over and over might be significant. Of course, I immediately wondered if he was a stolen baby. I did some research on children who had been stolen within the year before I got Nick. The
time frame of Noah Crosby's kidnapping fits most closely within the Pacific Northwest. The only other one that matches the time frame, assuming Nick hadn't been with Margo very long, was a child taken in Georgia, and that was a newborn. I think this might explain why Nick didn't seem attached to Margo when they first arrived. And there was something else: I told you how odd I thought it was that Margo didn't seem especially good at calming her child. He screamed a lot at first and seemed to have a lot of gastric distress. Margo said it was just gas, but after I became his foster mother, I took him to a doctor who diagnosed him as severely lactose intolerant. Looking back, I don't believe Margo knew it.”

Danny caught his breath and his heart leaped. His son, Noah, had been lactose intolerant. Felicia had also been allergic to dairy products. She hadn't even been able to eat a slice of their wedding cake because of the milk content in the recipe and the butter in the frosting. Noah had inherited it. He'd even had a reaction to Felicia's breast milk and they'd had to put him on soy formula.

It was one of the things they'd agonized about after the kidnapping. That and the heart defect.

Still, this could just be coincidence, he assured himself. Nick Aston wasn't his son. Noah was as dead as Felicia. For a long time he'd hoped…but that hope had been futile. He had no intention of destroying himself on that emotional roller coaster again.

On the screen, the lawyer was thanking Sydney,
who got up and left the room. He turned to face the camera, shaking his head. “I don't know, Danny,” he said. “My gut feeling is that she's not lying. Not about any of it. I suspect she'd take a polygraph if you asked her to. And of course there's DNA testing.”

There was no need for DNA testing. None at all.
Nicholas Aston was not his son!
He forced himself to take deep, calming breaths, but he could feel his whole body trembling with the anxiety that had risen again. Dammit! He could not afford to do this again, he thought wearily. He glanced at the cop seated beside him. “So?”

The chief had listened impassively to Sydney's story and the lawyer's subsequent comments. He looked at Danny and then sighed. “What, exactly, do you want me to do? The young lady washed up on a public beach and you invited her to stay in your home. It's true that she did it under false pretenses, but it sounds as if the way she contacted you was a genuine accident. And Dr. Atada said he didn't think she was faking the memory loss. In any case, that's not a crime. And she swears she doesn't want money from you, so I can't charge her with attempted extortion.”

Danny raked his fingers through his hair. Despite his agony, he'd suspected the chief couldn't do much of anything to Sydney. “All right,” he said, exhaling heavily. “Thanks.”

The chief rose, placing a hand on Danny's shoulder. “What if she be right?”

“She's not,” Danny said flatly. “I've hoped over
and over again that some child would turn out to be my Noah. And it never was.”

He felt, more than saw, the cop shrug. “Okay. What you gonna do? I can take her back to Kauai since you canceled Dr. Atada's visit.”

Danny shook his head instantly. Then he wondered just what in the hell he was doing. He should get her out of his life. But…he was curious about her kid. Even if it wasn't Noah, it was still a compelling story.

He saw the two professionals onto their launch back to Kauai, then sped back up the path to the house. “Where is she?” he asked Leilani.

“She sittin' outside by the pool,” she replied. “You want lemonade?”

“That would be nice.” Danny turned and walked out to the pool deck. Sydney sat in a lounge near the shallow end, big sunglasses on her nose and a slim black tank suit covering her curves. It wasn't a revealing suit by any means, but she still was so attractive he caught his breath.
Knock it off,
he told himself. The last thing he needed was to get involved with her.

“Hello,” she said as he approached. “Have you watched the video?”

“I was watching live,” he said tersely.

“Oh. Good.” She paused, then leaned forward anxiously. “Do you have any questions I can answer?”

He shrugged. “Not really. You covered everything I wanted to know.”

She nodded and relaxed. “I can't believe I forgot all that,” she said ruefully. “I wonder if I was afraid to re
member it. I knew before I came here that if I did get the chance to meet with you, it would be a pretty explosive topic.”

“What would you have done if things had turned out differently, if you hadn't gotten to talk to me?”

“Gone home and approached you through your family or through a lawyer, I imagine. I hadn't even considered that you might refuse to see me. I thought you'd be thrilled at the possibility of finding your son.” She sounded as if she couldn't comprehend his attitude.

He sighed. “Sydney…” Suddenly he realized that he didn't think she was lying anymore. She wasn't a gold digger and he was ashamed that he'd leaped to the wrong conclusion so quickly. He lowered himself to the end of the chaise on which she sat, and she obligingly moved her feet and legs to one side. “I'm sorry. For not believing you. For getting angry. I know you're not the kind of person who would use a child as a bargaining chip or a blackmail item.”

“It's all right,” she said. “I can't imagine how you must feel. I think I'd die if someone took Nick.”

“You'd want to,” he said soberly.

She flushed a deep scarlet. “I'm so sorry. I didn't mean— I didn't intend to remind you—” She stopped, distress radiating from her as she realized what she'd said.

“It's okay.” He took pity on her. “It's not that I wouldn't love to find Noah. But I've been through this so many times. In the first couple of years occasion
ally there was a legitimate lead. They always went nowhere. There were also at least twice that many fake leads, with people claiming they would return my son for a price.”

Sydney was silent for a moment. Just as he was about to ask her what she was thinking, she whispered, “Do you still miss him so much? Still think about him every day?”

Danny nodded. “Both of them. Every day.”

She sucked in a sharp breath. “How do you bear it?”

“I don't have a choice,” he said simply. Then, too raw to continue in that vein, he said, “So tell me, did you ever think about placing the baby for adoption once you realized the mother wasn't coming back?”

Sydney's face relaxed, and a small smile played around the edges of her mouth. “No. Never. Nick had me wrapped around his little finger from the first day I held him.” Her voice thickened and he saw her swallow. “I guess I'd always imagined I'd be a mother someday. But ‘someday' was in the future, just a hazy dream. And of course, I'd be married.” She smiled. “But I never anticipated the joy that motherhood brought. Taking on a baby was the last thing on my agenda, but sometimes I feel as if it were fate. He…needed me, and I guess I needed him, too.”

Danny sat silently. Joy. Yes, it was an apt description of the giddy happiness he'd known in that one short year he'd been granted with his own child.

“It's devastating,” she said, her gaze fixed on the ripples bouncing across the pool, “to think that I've en
joyed Nick's life while his own mother couldn't bear to live without him, while his own father has been deprived of him. I know I shouldn't feel guilty, because I didn't know. But somehow I do.”

God, there she went again. He didn't know what to say to her utter certainty that she had his son.

“What are you thinking?” she asked.

He raised his hands helplessly, clearing his throat and hoping like hell he didn't completely break down in front of her. “In my heart—” he touched his chest “—I've accepted that my son is dead. God, I just don't think I can bear to have my hopes raised and dashed again.” The last words were as anguished as the pain tearing at him.

Sydney made a small sound and slid forward. Her arms went around him in a physical expression of comfort much like that he imagined she used to comfort her son after one of his nightmares.

He dropped his head to her shoulder and simply breathed in the sweet, feminine fragrance that was Sydney. His arms came up around her slender back and pulled her closer, and he felt her press a kiss to his temple just above the level of his ear.

For the longest time, he held her, liking the way her arms held him to her, the way her soft curves felt against him, the balm that her understanding and acceptance brought.

“I wish,” she said after a while, “that we hadn't met under these circumstances.”

Danny lifted his head and the moment changed.
Sexual awareness suddenly charged the air around them as he gazed into her blue eyes. “So do I,” he said in a low, rough tone as he set his mouth on hers.

I
f he'd stopped to think about it, Danny never would have kissed her. But once he had her mouth beneath his again, her slim body wrapped in his arms, there was no way he could stop.

Just as before, she responded to him without hesitation. Her arms twined about his shoulders, and one small hand slid up into his hair, gently rubbing over his scalp. He shuddered. It had been so long since he'd made love to a woman that his body instantly wanted to finish what he'd started.

He bent her backward with the force of his kiss, but she never moved away, only clung more tightly.

“Sydney, I have— Oh!” Leilani's voice startled
him. He felt Sydney jolt in his arms, and immediately she began to struggle.

“Sorry,” Leilani said, already backing away. “This can wait until tomorrow.”

As her footsteps receded hurriedly across the stone tiles of the terrace floor, Danny gently made sure Sydney was upright before he released her. For a moment, he just sat with his hands hanging between his knees. How the hell did this happen? He'd never had trouble keeping his hands off a woman before, but it seemed as if he could barely be in the same room with Sydney without giving in to the need to touch her, hold her, kiss her. He'd better get out of here while he still could make himself move.

“Danny?” Sydney hesitated.

“Yeah?” His voice was little more than a growl, and he cleared his throat. Man, she was potent.

“I'm attracted to you,” she informed him.

He couldn't prevent a burst of startled laughter. “No kidding. And it's sure no secret that I'm attracted to you.”

She blushed and he chuckled. As the sound hit the air, he was briefly amazed. He'd laughed more since Sydney had arrived than he had in years.

When he straightened and stood, she stood as well. “This is a problem,” she said. “I'm very attracted to you. But it has to be separate from the other stuff that we have to deal with.”

He sobered instantly. “I know.”

She sighed. “I've never felt like this before.”

“Attracted?” He attempted humor, but the heaviness of the subject before them squashed it flat.

She gave him a bittersweet smile. “It isn't just physical.” She lifted her hand and briefly tapped a finger over her heart. “I'm starting to care for you.”

He didn't know what to say.
“I'm starting to care for you, too”
absolutely wasn't acceptable. He couldn't get involved with her. With anyone.

Sydney pushed out of his arms and swung her legs off the chaise. Her movements were stiff and jerky and he realized he'd waited too long to speak. “Sydney—”

But she cut him off with a raised palm. “Don't. It's my problem, not yours. I'll be leaving soon and you can go back to your quiet routine with no interruptions.” Somehow, she made it sound incredibly unappealing.

As she walked away, a surprising sense of loss swept over him. And a realization that he should have acknowledged before. When he'd decided to take her on the helicopter tour earlier, he'd been looking forward to seeing her face as they toured the islands from the air, looking forward to something for the first time he could remember since he lost his family.

It probably was a good thing she was leaving soon. Sydney was beautiful, intelligent, tenderhearted and compassionate; she had a gentle sense of humor and the ability to put anyone at ease. She was the kind of woman he would want to get to know better—if he ever were to look for another woman again.

But he wasn't, he reminded himself. He'd had all the heartbreak he wanted to taste in one lifetime. No way was he going to get involved with someone again.

 

Later in the afternoon, Danny walked into the kitchen and saw Sydney on the phone.

“Under no circumstances can he bring back a puppy, Mom,” she was saying. “I work all day. I can't take care of a dog.”

She listened for a moment and then laughed. “Okay. I love you, too. Give Nick a big hug from Mommy and tell him I'll be home soon.”

Danny had gotten a glass of ice water and quietly began to leave the kitchen, trying not to appear to be eavesdropping. But as she hung up the phone, she said, “You don't have to leave, Danny. I'm done.”

He paused in the doorway. Her tone was natural and friendly, as if they'd never kissed, never discussed the serious things they had. “Trouble at home?” he asked, trying to match her casual tone.

She smiled. “No. But my son has my parents wrapped around his little finger and he figures if he can talk them into getting him a puppy before I get back, he'll be able to keep it.” The smile slipped. “I'd love to be able to let him have a dog. But it simply isn't practical right now.”

“Because you work?”

“Not only that. We live in an apartment. No yard. No pets allowed, anyway. I've been thinking of buying a house when my lease is up, but frankly, I'm a lit
tle intimidated by the thought of owning a home and being responsible for all the maintenance. I've considered a condo, but even that isn't exceptionally workable for anything but a fairly small dog. Nick, of course, has visions of Irish wolfhounds and Newfoundlands.”

Danny chuckled. “Does your son understand why he can't get a dog?” It was a clumsy redirection but ever since he'd heard her on the phone he'd been consumed by curiosity. Right there, at the other end of that line, was a child she believed to be his son. That wasn't true, but he couldn't help wondering what the little boy was like, anyway.

Sydney didn't appear to think the question intrusive. “I think so,” she said, “but he doesn't want to understand.” She smiled fondly. “Little manipulator.”

He didn't need to hear anything more about her son, Danny told himself. But the urge to stay in her company was too strong to resist. “I'm going to walk down to the beach,” he told her. “You're welcome to come along.”

She hesitated. “Thank you,” she finally said. “I changed my original flight plans today. I'll be leaving tomorrow. One more walk on the beach would be lovely.”

She was leaving tomorrow. He should be relieved. Glad to regain his solitude. But all he could think was that he was never going to see her again.

She ran to her room for her beach shoes, and Danny went outside to wait at the top of the steps leading
down the cliff. He thought of the day he'd first seen Sydney lying on the rocks below him. His life had been quiet, orderly, predictable just a few short days ago. Now he felt like one big mass of conflicted emotion.

“Sorry I took so long.”

He turned as Sydney called to him. She was carrying a wide-brimmed hat and her light sundress rippled around her slender body as she came toward him.

She looked beautiful and happy in the sunlight pouring over them, and Danny felt his heart squeeze painfully. He'd never felt like this before, either. It was difficult to admit, but it was true.

Felicia. For the first time in a long time he allowed himself to think of his wife. He couldn't remember her face anymore, except for frozen shots from photographs they'd taken.

“A penny for your thoughts.” Sydney had come to a halt in front of him. Her hair blew across her face in the light breeze and without thinking, he put up a hand and smoothed it away, tucking it behind one ear. Sydney went still for a moment. Then, in a movement so subtle he wouldn't have recognized it if he wasn't so tuned in to her, she took a step away, ostensibly to look out over the ocean, withdrawing from him.

He forced himself not to reach for her. Instead, he snorted. “My thoughts aren't worth a penny.”

That got her attention. “Yes,” she said quietly, firmly. “They are.”

He shrugged. “I was thinking about my wife, if you
really want to know.” He indicated the path down to the beach. “Shall we?”

Sydney let him take the lead, showing her where to step until they reached the stairs near the steepest section. “What was her name?” she asked, as if their conversation had never stopped.

“Felicia.”

“How pretty.”

He nodded, his gaze on the steps below them. “She matched her name. Blue eyes and blond hair. Very pretty.”

“How did you meet?”

He turned and looked up at her. “In rehab.”

If he'd thought to shock her, he was disappointed. “What kind of rehab?”

“Drug and alcohol. It was actually a treatment center for suicidal people.”

“You tried to kill yourself? How old were you?”

“Twenty-one.”

“A vulnerable age. More so if you've suffered the kind of trauma you did as a child.”

The sun was so bright it was making his eyes water. He couldn't be getting teary just because she offered unconditional acceptance.

“I swallowed every pill I could find in my mother's medicine cabinet.” He gave a humorless smile. “And believe me, there were plenty.”

“Did you change your mind once you'd taken them?”

Danny shook his head. “No.” He hated to admit it,
but it was true. “I really thought the world would be better without me. But my mother's housekeeper came in on her day off and found me.”

Sydney made a small sound and her hand touched his back briefly. “I'm glad she did.”

“Trent and my father convinced me to give in-patient treatment a try when I was released from the hospital afterward.” It had been the lowest of many low points in his life at the time. And why was he telling Sydney all this? She'd asked about Felicia, not a chronicle of The Misfortunes of Danny Crosby.

“Anyway,” he said, “we met there. She also had tried suicide. I guess we helped each other recover.”

“And fell in love,” she said softly. “Only she couldn't be as strong as you when Noah was taken away.”

He nodded, not looking back at her. But he couldn't help comparing what he'd felt for Felicia with the feelings ruffling his composure now. They'd grown together naturally as a result of their mutual experiences and recovery. He couldn't ever recall feeling the wild, undeniable attraction that he fought every second he spent in Sydney's company.

But he'd loved Felicia. Surely he had.

At the bottom of the steps, they walked across the warm sand to the water's edge.

“It's so beautiful,” Sydney said as she looked seaward.

Danny followed her gaze. It was indeed beautiful, but to him, the spumes of white water shooting into the
air where the ocean met the reef at the outer edges of the small lagoon looked deadly as well. “It's deceptive,” he said. “Look out there.”

Sydney obediently looked in the direction he pointed. “That tiny opening is the only break in the reef all along this little bay. Any boat that comes ashore has to come through there.”

“Apparently, I missed it,” she said lightly, but he could hear remembered fear in her voice.

“Fortunately, you made it past the reef somehow.”

“Thank heaven,” she said.

“Have you told your family about your accident?”

She shook her head. “No. It would just have worried my parents. And Nick already has enough anxiety issues with the nightmares without me adding to it.”

“Tell me more about him.” Danny winced at the eager look she sent him. “Not,” he cautioned, “because I think he's my son. Just because.”

A little of the light faded from her face, but she nodded, turning and beginning to walk along the beach. “He's tall for his age,” she said, “but skinny as a rail. He's got big blue eyes and this fine, flyaway blond hair that gets tangled really easily if I don't keep it pretty short.”

As he fell into step beside her, an instant image of Felicia's corn-silk tresses shot into Danny's mind. Coincidence.

“He likes to play computer games,” she went on. “He hasn't even started school yet but he already can
read. I signed him up for peewee soccer, and he loves it. His best friend is the coach's son and when they're together we've learned not to take our eyes off them for a minute. If Nick and Zachary are quiet, it usually means they're in trouble,” she said, chuckling. “Let's see, what else? We go swimming every Saturday evening at the local Y. He's a total fish in the water and he even jumps off the diving board.”

Danny found that he couldn't help smiling at the image.

“He loves stories. I read to him every night before bed. It's probably my favorite time of day, after his bath and his snack, when he's winding down for the night.”

Her love for her son was evident in every word, every expression that crossed her mobile features. It was only natural, he supposed, to compare the little boy's life to his own, Sydney to his mother.

Had anyone ever loved him like that? There was no question in his mind that Sydney's son knew he was loved, knew he was the center of her universe. There also was no question that his own mother hadn't even considered that any of her children might need nurturing of any kind. She hadn't been capable of it.

Then she'd had no business ever having children.
He'd lost any feeling he'd had for his mother years ago. It was sad, but as one of his counselors had noted, necessary for his survival. And actually, because he'd never known what having a real relationship with a loving parent was, he hadn't missed it—until now,
when the emotion bubbling in Sydney's voice showed him clearly what she felt for her son. “You love him very much,” he said aloud.

She smiled. “Yes. He's the greatest kid in the world.”

He tried to imagine his own mother saying something like that. Didn't happen. Never would. Sheila Crosby was as unlike Sydney Aston as the light sand was from the black cliffs just down the beach.

He glanced at his companion. She had her hair bundled up beneath the straw hat, exposing her long, elegant neck and the delicate bones of her shoulders. A light breeze had plastered her dress against her body, outlining the thrust of breasts, the soft roundness of hips and a long, slender length of thigh. He'd felt that body against him, knew the pleasure that merely touching her gave him. Out of nowhere, a rush of need surged through him, and he almost reached for her before he quelled the urge.