What a Man's Gotta Do (7 page)

“Your father and me, we are so proud of you, baby. You and Steven both. Sometimes, Marty and me just sit at the table and talk about how lucky we were, to get a pair of kids like you two. You know that, don't you?”

Afraid to speak, Mala only nodded.

Bev went on, now skimming Mala's hair away from her face. “The way you take care of these kids all by yourself, run a business on your own… God knows, I don't think I could've done it. But sometimes, we worry about you. That you're lonely, y'know?”

“Ma—”

Bev's hands came up. “Sorry, sorry. I didn't come all the way over here to upset you.” She started toward the kitchen. “Anyway,” she glanced back over her shoulder, “I figured it probably wouldn't hurt to have someone around to keep the kids out of your hair for a couple of hours, so you could get a little work done. We'll bake cookies or somethin'. Oh, hell—you haven't had a chance to clean the living room in a while, huh?”

Oh, hell, was right. Mala dashed into the living room right behind her mother, snatching up whatever she could from the most recent layer of kid-generated debris before her mother got a chance. She just didn't get it—she and Steve had never dared
dump stuff all over the place the way her two did. And it wasn't as if she didn't get after them. It just never seemed to take.

“So. Is he here?”

Slightly out of breath, Mala glanced over at her mother, who was about to vanish behind the free-standing sofa. Oh, crud…now what do you suppose was back there? “He, who?”

“Your new tenant.”

“Uh-uh. He went out a couple hours ago.”

Like a bat out of hell, actually.

Bev stopped, her arms full of assorted sweaters, books and a two-foot tall inflatable dinosaur. “In this weather?”

“He's a big boy, Ma. He'll manage.”

Her mother gave her a look, then swooped behind the sofa. Then Mala heard, “He's real good, let me tell you,” followed by her mother's reddened face as she struggled back up.

“Good?”

Bev gave her a “keep up” look. “Yeah, good. As in, cooking. Your father and I were up to
Galen's
Saturday night, figuring we should give it a try, although your father wasn't all that sure he wanted to, since you know how crazy he is about Galen's ravioli. Where do you want these?” she said, holding up a bunch of socks. Mala grabbed them out of her mother's hand. A good half dozen, none of them matching. “Anyway,” her mother went on, “I had the lasagna, but I made your father have the grilled tuna, since the doctor told him he needed more fish in his diet, and they were both out of this world. Between you and me, maybe even a little better than Galen's.”

“Really?”

“Okay, maybe not better, but just as good. He uses slightly different seasonings or something. But when we told the waitress—it was Hannah Braden that night, you know, Rod and Nancy Braden's girl? I mean, isn't that something, with all that money they have, she doesn't think she's too good to wait tables to earn her own pocket money.”

“Ma-aa? Geez.”

Bev swatted at her. “So, anyway, when we told her we wanted to thank him personally, she said she was sorry, but he wouldn't come out front for anybody. Can you imagine that?”

Mala bent over the coffee table to clear away the same assorted cups and plates she'd already cleared twice today. “Eddie prefers to keep to himself. That's all.”

“Still?”

The thin, annoying whine of the teakettle pierced through the whoosh of the heat pumping through the floor vent. Mala straightened, swiping back a hank of her hair with her wrist. “What do you mean,
still?
”

“Nana Bev!”

“I know, honey,” Bev called over her shoulder. “And don't you dare touch it—I'll be there in a sec.” Then to Mala, “From when he was here before, when you were still in high school. Mind you, I only saw him the one time, but the way he hung back, that stay-away-from-me look on his face…” She shook her head.

“I had no idea you even knew who he was.”

“Which just goes to show there's a lot about your old mother you don't know,” Bev said. Mala rolled her eyes. “Anyway, he was staying with Molly and Jervis Turner, y'know—”

Yes, that much she knew.

“—and Jervis occasionally did some work for your father, when he got more calls than he could handle. He couldn't handle the complicated stuff, but he was fine when it came to switching out plugs or installing new ceiling fans, things like that. Anyway, this was when I was still going into your father's office a couple days a week to do the books. Jervis came by for his paycheck, and he had Eddie with him. Jervis wasn't much of a talker, either, but he said the boy was staying with them until he finished out school, that his mother had died when the kid was six, and that the kid'd lived with various and assorted relatives down south since then. And that Molly and him might've taken the kid on sooner if anybody'd bothered to ask. Since you never said anything about him, I figured he wasn't part of your group.”

Mala forced her knotted hand to relax, then shook her head. “By his own choice,” she said, remembering how Eddie had rebuffed everyone's overtures. Not rudely, exactly. But it
hadn't taken long for everyone to get the hint. For a while, Mala had regretted not trying harder—even as wrapped up as she'd been in her own hectic life, she'd sensed Eddie's hanging back was actually a challenge, seeing if anyone would care enough to work for his friendship. But he'd scared her, she realized, even then. So she hadn't met his challenge.

He still scared her, she realized.

He was still challenging her, too.

She sucked in a quick little breath, then said, “I don't suppose you know why Eddie left before he graduated?”

Bev shook her head. “No. I rarely ran into Jervis or Molly. I'm not sure I even knew he had. But whaddya suppose possessed him to come back?”

A question that had nagged at Mala for the past week. “I have no idea. Galen says he could probably find work anywhere, at a top restaurant if he wanted.”

“Well, he's sure not back because of Molly and Jervis, since they both passed on years ago….”

The doorbell ringing made them both jump. Before Mala could answer it, both kids came roaring out from the kitchen, each one claiming whoever it was on the other side. Mala opened it to find Eddie standing there, a huge sack of salt slung on one hip. He glanced at the kids, sort of the way one might regard last night's still unwashed dinner dishes, then up at her.

“Hey,” he said without preamble, his voice just
slightly
laced with contrition, she thought. “I used up most of what you had out there in the shed, figured I may as well pick up some more while I was out. Heard there's another storm predicted for the weekend.” The kids, clearly bummed it was only Eddie, retreated down the hall, halfheartedly calling each other names. Her mother, however, had eagerly taken their place. In fact, Mala noted with a slight twinge of dread, the woman was one step removed from panting.

“Mom, Eddie King. My new tenant. Eddie, Bev Koleski. And yes, she bites.”

“For godssake, Mala, where you get that mouth, I have no idea.” Bev reached out to meet Eddie's already extended hand as Mala grabbed her purse off a hook on the rack. “We met,
when you were here before,” Bev said, “but I doubt you'd remember me.”

“No, ma'am, I can't say that I do.”

Her wallet clamped in her hand, Mala wedged between them before her mother bonded for life. “Okay, how much—”

“Forget it,” Eddie said. “I'll take it out in trade.”

Mala blushed. Her mother chuckled, low in her throat. Mala sent her a brief but lethal glance, then forced her focus back to the deadpan expression in those ice-blue eyes. “Excuse me?”

The eyes thawed, just a little. Just enough to poke at the snoring hormones. Then he grinned, all bad and little boyish, and she nearly lost it. “For the occasional use of your washer and dryer, is all I meant.”

“Oh. Um, yeah, that sounds fair to me.”

“I thought it might.”

The phone rang. “You want me to get that?” Bev asked.

“Please,” Mala said, sending up a prayer of thanks. Bev shuffled away; Mala looked back at Eddie, who shifted the salt to his other hip, which of course caused Mala's gaze to likewise shift before she snapped it back up to his face. “Well, I guess I'll just go on and put this in the shed,” he said.

Mala sucked in a breath, let it out sharply. “Yeah. Thanks.”

Eddie angled away, only to turn back, a combination of regret and defiance shining in his eyes. He glanced into the house over her shoulder, as if to make sure nobody else was in earshot, then said, his voice low, “I apologize if my directness earlier upset you. I didn't mean to criticize your mothering, even if that's the way it came out. It's just that…” He looked away for a moment, then back at her, his mouth pulled taut. “When you live alone as long as I have, you tend to forget about things like being tactful. Or how to put across what you're thinking without—”

“—pissing people off. Yeah, I got it.”

There went that half smile again. Mala's heart stalled in her throat. “It's okay,” she said softly, leaning against the door frame. Leaning into that I-can-see-straight-through-you gaze,
wanting to reach out to him so badly, her teeth hurt. “As it happens, you gave me some things to think about.”

One brow lifted. Skeptical. Amused. “Really?”

A smile tugged at her mouth, even as a little voice said,
“Watch it, sister.”

“Yeah. Really.”

One Mississippi…two Mississippi…

“Well. Okay. That's…good, then. Well…uh, tell your mama it was nice to meet her, okay?” He turned around and trudged away, his strides long and purposeful.

“Nice butt,” Bev observed behind her. Mala jumped.

“Oh, geez, Ma. Besides, what can you see under that shirt he's wearing?”

“A wealth of possibilities, missy. And what was that all about?”

“You heard?”

“Enough.”

“Well, it was nothing. Just a little misunderstanding.” Mala managed a nonchalant shrug. “All cleared up now.”

“Oh?”

The woman could pack more meaning into a two-letter word than
Webster's
in the whole flipping dictionary.

“Don't even go there, Ma,” Mala said, shutting the door a bit more forcefully than necessary and heading back toward the kitchen.

“What? What did I say?”

“You don't have to
say
anything.” She went into the kitchen, pulled a mug out of the dish drainer, a box of tea bags from the cupboard. “What you're thinking's written all over your face.”

“Like you know what's going on in my head, little girl. Well, for your information, Miss Know-It-All, what I was thinking is that Eddie King turned out okay. Not many men can find it in themselves to apologize for anything. Give me that,” she said, snatching the box from Mala's hand. “I can make my own tea. Anyway, he's a nice boy.”

“Ma, he's a year older than me. He's hardly a
boy.
”

“So he's a nice
man.
Even better. You know if the restaurant's open for Thanksgiving?”

Mala frowned. “It isn't. Why?”

“I just wondered if he's doing anything, that's all.”

“Oh, dear God,” Mala said, raising her eyes to the heavens. Well, okay, the ceiling, but it was close enough. “What have I done to deserve this?”

“So you should ask him if he'd like to have dinner with us.”

Us.
Meaning her parents and Mala and Steve and Sophie—whose first Thanksgiving this would be, since they didn't do Thanksgiving in Carpathia—and their five kids and her two.

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because I'm not that mean. Besides, he has other plans.”

“You know this, or you're only trying to get me off your case?”

“Yes.”

Footsteps creaked overhead. “You know somethin'?” Bev said, “I've got half a mind to go up there and ask him myself.”

Mala opened her mouth to protest, when suddenly, she didn't care anymore. What the hell did it matter to her if Eddie King accepted her mother's invitation? He certainly didn't need her protection. And with all those people around, it wasn't as if they'd even see each other. Probably. Besides, her parents had been inviting strays to holiday dinners for as long as she could remember. So big fat hairy deal.

“Fine,” she said. “Go ask.”

Which Bev did. Mala listened, heard faint voices upstairs, then her mother's slow, steady descent on the outside stairs.

“You're right,” Bev said when she came in. “He can't make it. Says he's got plans.”

So how come she felt disappointed rather than relieved?

And what kind of holiday plans could a man have who didn't know anybody in town? And how was this any of her business?

Mala shook herself, yanked open the dishwasher to stack another half dozen dishes inside. “So who was on the phone?” she asked her mother.

“The phone?” her mother said from the kitchen table. “Oh, right. Nobody. A hang up. Which is so rude. Geez. I mean, if you get a wrong number, the least you can do is say ‘sorry' or something, y'know? And when the hell you gonna get Caller ID, anyway?”

Mala just sighed.

“S
o,” Mala said to her sister-in-law as she scraped leftover mashed potatoes into a plastic store 'n' save bowl, swearing softly when a blob landed smack on the front of her new fur-blend sweater, “how'd you enjoy your first Thanksgiving?”

Amazingly, it was just the two of them in her brother's kitchen. Sophie and Mala had combined forces to convince Bev, who'd done most of the cooking, to go play grandma and let them clean up; the living room reeked of football-crazed testosterone; and the kids were…elsewhere. The old country house was cozy and filled with laughter and leftover feast smells, and for the moment, Mala could almost believe she was as content as she would have everyone believe.

Raking one hand through her short, ash brown hair, Sophie chuckled. “I think I'm bloody glad it only comes once a year,” she said in her almost-English accent, ripping off a length of aluminum foil to cover what was left of the auxiliary ham. Her square jaw and angular features prevented her from being pretty in any traditional sense of the word, but her quick smile and the love that constantly radiated from her gentle gray eyes made her as appealing as anyone Mala had ever met. “Oth
erwise, I'd be big as a house from overeating. Not that I won't be that in a few months, in any case.”

She patted her slightly bulging belly underneath the floppy red sweater, then wrinkled her nose, obviously tickled with her condition. Sophie and Steve had only been married since July, but having just turned thirty, the princess was thrilled about her pregnancy.

“And with those hips you
don't
have,” Mala said pointedly to her skinny sister-in-law, “you'll look like you swallowed a torpedo.” She opened the refrigerator, frowning at the already jam-packed interior. The ceiling shook as many small feet stormed down the upstairs hallway, accompanied by shrieks of varying degrees of intensity. Neither woman so much as glanced up. “I hate to break this to you, honey, but you can either get the rest of the turkey in here, or everything else. Not both. And no, that wasn't a call for help, bozo-hound,” she said to the grinning oversize mutt wagging his entire rear end at her feet. She gently shoved at the dog with her knee. “Go away, George.”

“Oh, come here, you big goof,” Sophie said, collapsing into a kitchen chair. Wearing an expression that could only be translated as,
“Yes!”,
the dog pranced across the linoleum floor to gobble down whatever it was his mistress was offering. “You should really get the kids a dog,” Sophie said, making kissy noises at the beast.

“Uh, no, I really shouldn't.” Mala stacked the homeless containers back on the counter, then leaned against it. “So how're you feeling these days?”

“Oh, fine. The morning sickness only lasted a week or so, thank God. So I'll be really up for when Alek and Luanne bring the children after Christmas.”

“Really? I can't wait to meet them.”

“They feel the same way, I gather.” Sophie smiled down at the dog, who'd plopped his muzzle in her lap. “I know it seems a bit precipitous, but Alek's quite keen to introduce Luanne to Steven and your parents. I think he hopes it will relieve her mind somewhat about marrying into a royal family.”

“If it doesn't frighten her off completely,” Mala said wryly.

But then, the circumstances surrounding the reunion of Sophie's older brother, Prince Aleksander Vlastos, and the Texan born-and-bred Luanne Evans Henderson was the stuff of soap operas, involving a secret baby and a marriage-of-convenience gone wrong, a tragic race-car crash that had taken Luanne's husband's life, a love denied for more than a decade. Due to the delicacy of the situation, Mala knew the couple weren't planning on a wedding for some time. But just a few weeks ago they'd agreed, for both their son's sake and the simple fact that they couldn't stand the thought of being separated a minute longer, to live under the same palace roof with Sophie's and Alek's octogenerian grandmother and Carpathia's reigning monarch, Princess Ivana.

Next to all that, Mala's family seemed excrutiatingly dull.

Then Mala caught Sophie's concerned frown. “But what about you?”

Mala started. “What about me?”

“You look ready to drop.”

A shrug hiked up her armor another inch or two. “Just been busy, that's all. Got a new client this week. Owns a ballroom dance studio in Ann Arbor. Man's been keeping his books by hand, which means transcribing everything to the computer. Which wouldn't be so bad except the turkey couldn't see the sense in dealing with ‘those pesky pennies' as he put it, so he's been rounding off all his figures.”

The princess's brows dipped, even though a smile twitched around her wide mouth. “Oh, dear.”

“Oh,
hell,
is more like it,” Mala said, and Sophie laughed. A tiny, dark-haired girl wandered into the kitchen, a much-loved baby quilt in tow, and crawled up on Sophie's lap. “Fortunately—or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it,” Mala continued, “he's also a pack rat, which means he's kept every single piece of paper the studio's generated for the past ten years. So I now have to reconstruct everything from scratch. Plus handle all my other accounts—”

“There you are, you little stinker.” Mala looked up as her brother Steve popped through the door, his short, pale blond hair gleaming in the overhead light. He bent down and scooped
the little girl into his enormous arms, but not before planting a kiss on his new wife's forehead.

Sophie rewarded Steve with a new-love look that only further rocked Mala's tenuous composure. “I was just working up to putting her to bed—”

“Forget it. You've been on your feet all day. By the way, Mal, your two are begging to stay over. We thought we'd take the little ones into Detroit to go see Santa tomorrow. You okay with that?”

She snatched at a breath, then smiled. “Please. Twist my arm.”

Her brother laughed, and it warmed Mala's heart to see how genuinely happy he was. So much had happened to him within the past year—becoming guardian to the five children after their parents' deaths, a princess hiding out from her royal duties by becoming his temporary housekeeper…their marriage. They were perfect for each other, despite the differences in their backgrounds. Still, none of the Koleskis—who'd probably been peasants back in the old country, once upon a time—had quite reconciled themselves to being part of a royal family, even though they all adored Sophie.

She watched her brother and sister-in-law as they exchanged a laugh, a look, the ordinary, effortless communication that was the foundation of a good marriage. From the living room, she heard her mother good-naturedly giving her father grief about something, her resultant whoop when he probably swatted her gently on the fanny on her way out.

Without warning, envy streaked through Mala, hot and brutal. Why did dreams seem to come true for everyone but her? When she'd married Scott at twenty-nine, she'd thought they had. She'd fully expected to have that house full of laughter and hugs and kisses, the kind of marriage her parents and most of the couples she knew had. And the worst part of it was, that nothing had prepared her for the crushing sense of failure when her marriage fell apart. Not as a mother, or in her work—she knew her worth in those areas—but as a woman incapable of finding, and keeping, a life partner.

Self-pity was for wimps, a mantra she'd repeated probably
a thousand times since Scott's departure. But the burning sensation behind her eyes warned her that hanging around would only be an exercise in masochism.

“Well,” she said once Steve had departed, Rosie hitched high on his broad shoulders, “since the kids are staying, I think I'll head on home, see if I can get some work done while it's quiet.”

“On a holiday?” Sophie rose from the chair, stretching out her back as though she were a lot more pregnant than she was.

“As if you don't do the same thing.” The princess was the general director of a major, international charity, a position which might have taken her away from her new family even more than it did, were it not for faxes and modems that allowed her to handle many of her duties right from Spruce Lake. Still, even with a full-time housekeeper, a house with five kids in residence didn't make for an ideal work environment.

Sophie sighed. “True. It just seems a shame you can't find a better way to use your quiet time.” Now she frowned at all the plastic containers lining her counter. “But don't you dare leave me with all this food. Take some of it home. Please. And here—” She opened the fridge, removed two foil-wrapped packets. “Take some of the ham and turkey, too. Oh, drat, I almost forgot—what is it they say about pregnant women losing a certain amount of brain cells? Anyway, Elizabeth called the other day, asked me if I had any ideas for Galen's baby shower.”

Oh, Lord. Elizabeth and Guy Sanford. Yet another adoring wife/devoted husband combo for the gods to dangle in front of her. The containers stuffed into a plastic grocery bag, Mala headed toward the hallway. “I thought we decided not to hold it until after New Year's?”

Behind her, Sophie gave a rueful laugh. “Well, you know Elizabeth. If everything's not all mapped out at least a month ahead of time, she gets an ulcer.”

Oh, yeah, she knew Elizabeth—Galen Farentino's stepsister-in-law and the Realtor who'd sold Mala her house after her divorce—only too well. What was amusing was how quickly Sophie had zeroed in on the petite blond dynamo's endearingly
irritating drive to control every aspect of her—and everyone else's—experience, a trait which not even marriage to a laid-back father of three could diminish. “I haven't even had a chance to think about it. But I suppose she has a point, since Galen's due, when? Mid-January, right?”

“Something like that.” Sophie stroked her tummy and sighed. “May seems light years away by comparison.”

She had her two children, Mala told herself over another prick of envy. On that score, at least, she had no right to feel left out. Annoyed with herself, she leaned over and gave her royal sister-in-law a one-armed hug. “It'll happen sooner than you think, believe me. Kids!” she yelled up the stairs. “I'm leaving!” She turned back to Sophie, then shrugged into her car coat. “Tell Elizabeth we can do the shower at my place. That'll hold her for the moment.”

Carrie and Lucas barrelled down the stairs, throwing themselves into their mother's arms. Her eyes burning, Mala gave each of her children a fierce hug and kiss, thinking, at least she had this. That she had a lot, actually. And it wasn't that she didn't believe in true love, she thought as she crunched through the crusted remains of Monday's snowstorm to her car. She just no longer believed it would ever happen to her.

 

Eddie was just putting away the pair of stockpots Galen had let him borrow, when he heard the key in the restaurant's front door. More curious than concerned, he ambled out into the dark dining room, hands in pockets, wondering who on earth would be crazy enough to come here on Thanksgiving night. Well, besides him of course.

Her head bent so that her hair partially covered her face, Mala shouldered her way through the door, a car-coated blob clutching a briefcase in one hand. She turned and saw him in the shadows, let out a yelp of alarm.

“For the love of Mike, Eddie!” she said, bumping the door shut with her rear end. “Thanks for taking five years off my life!”

“Sorry. I just didn't expect anyone.”

She cleared her throat, the laugh that followed sounding
more forced than nervous. “No, it's okay. I just…” Shaking her head, she scooted past him, her sneakers silent against the tile floor, her scent whispering in her wake. “What on earth are you doing here?” she asked as she pushed open the door to the kitchen.

Eddie followed, just fast enough to keep the door from swinging back in his face. “Just putting away a few things I borrowed. You?”

Still not looking at him, Mala skittered across the kitchen and on into the office. “Galen gave me a key some time ago,” she said, her voice…tight. “Since my schedule doesn't always coincide with hers.” She started in poking around on the desk in the half-light spilling from the kitchen.

Eddie frowned. Something was weird, but he couldn't put his finger on it. “Y'all have a nice Thanksgiving?”

“Yes, thank you,” she said stiffly. “Dammit, I can't find a thing—”

“Which was why Edison invented the lightbulb, I suppose.” Eddie leaned over to flip on the light switch.

“It's okay, I've got it!”

Too late. Stark light flooded the tiny office.

Illuminating Mala's puffy eyes and blotchy skin.

Eddie took a step closer. “You been
cryin'?
”

She folded her arms as tightly across her chest as the heavy coat would allow, not looking at him. After a second, she nodded.

“Wow. The Lions must've lost, huh?”

A small laugh sputtered from her lips. “No, they won, actually.” One hand darted out, started messing with something on the desk.

“Then why the tears?”

Finally, she lifted her gaze to his, her shimmering spring green eyes luminous against her flushed skin. Another strangled laugh, a shoulder hitch, then she shook her head.

“Don't know or don't want to talk about it?”

“Both,” she said on a long, shuddering sigh. “I'm sorry. I…oh, God. Do you know how long it's been since anyone's seen me cry?”

Eddie thought about his options for a second or two,
getting the hell out,
being the front-runner, for at least three-quarters of that time. Then he closed the three-foot gap between the door and the front of the desk, eased a hip up onto it. Held out his hand.

Mala just stared at it.

“You know what you said about not needing a buddy?” Eddie said. “I think you were wrong.”