Adding Up to Family Read online

  “Ask her if she wants to go camping with you after summer school’s over,” she suggested. “What do you have to lose?”

  He gave her a dubious look. “You’re really asking me that?”

  She could understand his leeriness. “Okay, then how about this?” she proposed. “Concentrate on what you have to win if she says yes. You two might start really bonding again. I have a feeling that Stephanie’s ready to do that.”

  He had to admit that it was more than tempting. “Okay.”

  “Just remember to call her Stephanie,” Becky reminded him.

  He knew she was right, even though his inclination was to ignore that part of the advice and just call her what he’d always called her.

  Reluctantly, he agreed. “All right. Sure,” he murmured.

  Becky could tell by his tone that he wasn’t nearly as hopeful about the success of this venture as she was. “Look, call her Dandelion if that’s what she wants. The name doesn’t matter, because under all that is the girl you taught how to ride a bike and cast a line and throw a curveball. And that’s who you’re trying to rebuild your relationship with, not her name.”

  He looked at Becky, stunned, when she named all the things that he and his daughter used to enjoy doing together. Apart from the learning to ride a bike part, they weren’t exactly the first things that came to mind when thinking about what a father would do with his daughter.

  “How do you know about all that?” he asked her.

  Becky smiled. “It’s not something I just happened to pull out of the air, if that’s what you’re asking,” she told him. “Stephanie told me. Not all at once,” she added, not wanting him to misunderstand. She hadn’t pumped his daughter; she’d just let the girl do the talking. “But over the course of several different conversations. By the way, you fared very well in all of them. Whether you realize it or not, you still are her hero.”

  He shrugged his shoulders helplessly. “Well, she doesn’t act like it.”

  It took effort for Becky not to laugh at him. “Stephanie is a preteen with warring hormones. She’s not supposed to act like her dad’s her hero, at least not when he’s around.”

  Steve shook his head. “None of this makes any sense to me,” he lamented.

  Rather than commiserate with him, Becky just nodded knowingly. “Welcome to the confusing world of the preteen.” Finished with the dishes, she dried off the counter, as well.

  “I am not cut out for this,” Steve complained.

  She wasn’t about to let him bail out, even if he was so inclined—which she doubted. “Sure you are. You can’t fail her now.”

  “Fail her?” Steve repeated, puzzled. He didn’t know what she was getting at.

  “Yes,” she insisted. “No matter what Stephanie says or doesn’t say, deep down inside she’s counting on you to be there for her through thick and thin. You’re her dad. Her rock, and she depends on you. That really makes her one of the lucky ones,” Becky went on. The words had just slipped out without her thinking about them. “She’s as confident as she’s able to be that if something goes wrong, you’ll be her parachute.”

  He looked surprised at the unexpected imagery. “Never thought of myself as a parachute.”

  She shrugged, trying to be nonchalant. Deep down, she knew she’d made a mistake, and wished she hadn’t said anything.

  “Maybe you should start,” she told him.

  “Was your dad your parachute?” he asked, and then before she could say anything, he laughed. “I can’t believe I just asked that. You certainly have changed things around here, Becky.”

  She didn’t want him focusing on her; she wanted him to focus on Stephanie and rebuild his relationship with the girl.

  “I’m just here to cook and clean and to watch over Stephanie when you’re not home,” she said, summing up her duties way too simply.

  He looked at her for a long moment before saying, “You do a hell of a lot more than that.”

  When he gazed at her like that, she forgot to breathe. She needed to remember that this was all about Steve and his daughter, not about her.

  “If you say so,” she finally replied in a quiet voice that sounded almost deceptively subservient.

  “By the way, you didn’t answer me,” he reminded her. He knew she was trying to divert him. He just didn’t know if she’d done it because she was embarrassed about her father for some reason, or if she just didn’t like talking about herself.

  “Oh?” Becky asked way too innocently, wishing he would drop the matter.

  “Yeah. I asked about your dad. Was he your parachute?”

  How did she word this without sounding as if she was feeling sorry for herself? She gave it a try. “Let’s just say he never got a chance to be my parachute.”

  “And why’s that?” Steve asked, puzzled. “Because you didn’t need one?”

  Anyone who graduated from college at eighteen most likely hadn’t needed to be sheltered, he assumed. She’d probably been way too independent. If anything, he guessed, her father came to her for advice.

  “My dad left when I was eight,” she told him stoically. “He told my mother that he wasn’t cut out to be a father and he just...left,” she repeated simply.

  Steve found himself struggling with the desire to take her into his arms and comfort her. But that would probably raise a lot of problems instead of resolving any, so he remained where he was and kept his hands at his sides.

  “I’m sorry,” he told her solemnly.

  “Don’t be,” Becky said. “You didn’t make him leave.”

  Steve wasn’t someone who was normally into feelings, or at least he hadn’t been until Becky had come into his life and opened his eyes, allowing him to view his daughter in a different light. He could sense now that Becky blamed herself for the fact that her father had taken off.

  “Neither did you,” he said, as he looked into her eyes.

  She took a breath, distancing herself from the story, from the heartbroken girl she had once been. “Oh, I don’t know about that. It’s what he told my mother and what he believed.”

  “What did he tell you?” Steve asked, unable to understand a man could just abandon his flesh and blood like that. He was trying to move heaven and earth to get closer to his daughter. How could Becky’s father have just turned his back on her?

  “Nothing,” she answered stoically. “Not even goodbye.”

  Her words echoed back to her and she suddenly realized what she was doing. Something she didn’t believe in doing. Ever. She never indulged in talking about this part of her past. The last thing she wanted was sympathy from Steve. The only one who knew about this, other than her mother, was Mrs. Parnell. The woman’s caring, motherly attitude had coaxed the story out of her.

  She had found herself sharing the story with Mrs. Parnell one day after they had returned to her office after work. It was her father’s birthday, and out of the blue, Becky had suddenly found herself feeling sad and hating the feeling.

  But other than that incident, she’d managed to keep it together. What had happened with Steve was a slipup.

  “I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to go on about this,” she said, turning away from him. She began tidying things that didn’t need tidying.

  “No, it was my fault,” Steve insisted, apologizing. “I have no business digging into your life.” He moved around her in order to see her face as he spoke. When he saw the tears, he felt twice as bad. Digging into his pocket, he pulled out a handkerchief and handed it to her. “I just keep making things worse. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to.”

  “You have nothing to be sorry for,” she insisted. After a moment, she used his handkerchief to wipe away the tears, then, taking a deep breath, handed it back to him. “You’re a great dad and Stephanie knows it. Just don’t give up on her when she makes life difficult for you, because she really doe
sn’t mean to.”

  He was more concerned about the hurt he’d caused Becky by prodding her and causing her to dig up the past and bring it to the surface. Had he known what she’d gone through, he would have never pushed her the way he had.

  “Is there anything I can do?” he asked, thinking there had to be some way to atone for inadvertently making her cry.

  She looked at him for a long moment. “Yes, there is.”

  Surprised, he asked, “What?”

  Steve was relieved to hear that there was something he could do to make up for stirring all this up for her. Since Becky had been here with them, he hadn’t ever seen her look sad, much less in tears. To have brought up all these hurtful memories in her made him feel extremely guilty.

  “You can ask Stephanie if she’d like to go camping with you like in the old days,” she told Steve with a smile.

  He’d say one thing for her: Becky didn’t back off. “You really think she’ll say yes?”

  “Only one way to find out,” she answered. Then because she sensed that he wanted reassurance, she said, “But yes, I do.”

  He nodded. It was worth a try. “Tell you what. If she does say yes, why don’t you come with us?”

  The invitation startled her. “What?”

  “Come camping with us,” he repeated.

  “I don’t think you’d really want me along. I’ve never been camping and I have no idea what to do,” she told him, trying to beg off.

  “Then this’ll be a first for you.” He saw the resistance in her eyes. Normally, he wouldn’t have pushed, but Becky just might be the very leverage he needed to get Stephanie to agree. “Having you along might be the very thing to encourage Stephanie to say yes.”

  She’d done this to herself, Becky thought. She’d helped him paint her right into a corner. Now she was stuck.

  “Sure,” she answered, resigned to her fate. “Why not?”

  Chapter Eleven

  “Are you excited that this is your last day of summer school?” Becky asked Stevi as she drove her to class that Friday morning.

  The girl’s expression was unreadable. “I don’t know. I guess so,” she replied with a careless shrug.

  Becky knew that she should leave talking about the proposed camping trip to Steve, but she was aware of how tenuous the relationship between father and daughter was at the moment. If he asked her to go camping and she turned him down, Becky had a feeling they could wind up right back at square one. Who knew how long it would take to talk Steve into making another attempt this time around?

  She decided that she wanted to warm the girl up to the idea. This way, when Steve asked Becky to go on that camping trip this weekend, the girl might still behave as if she was bored by the idea, but she’d go because she’d had time to think about it and, deep down inside, she wanted to go.

  “Well, your dad’s really excited about it,” Becky told her.

  Stephanie looked at her as if she’d just declared that she was a Martian here on vacation. “Yeah, sure he is.”

  “Well, he is,” Becky insisted.

  Stevi made a disparaging sound of disbelief under her breath. “My dad doesn’t even know it’s my last day at summer school,” she retorted. “I didn’t see him come home last night and I didn’t see him this morning, which means he left for work early—or he didn’t come home from the office last night.”

  There was concern in Stevi’s eyes. For a moment, she wasn’t the bored, blasé preteen she kept trying to project. She was Steve Holder’s little girl.

  “He did come home last night, right, Becky?”

  Becky was quick to assuage her fears. “Yes, your dad did—”

  The annoyed, disinterested expression returned to Stevi’s face. “I knew it. He just can’t wait to go back to work.” She blew out an angry breath. “He doesn’t even know I’m alive.”

  Rather than arguing with the girl, Becky just gave her the facts. “Your dad stayed late last night and left early this morning so that he could finish a project that’s due on Monday—without having to spend the weekend working on it.” She sent the girl a long look as they waited at a red light. “Your father wants to spend the weekend with you, going camping and fishing.”

  “Camping?” Stevi echoed. She waved her hand dismissively. “We don’t go camping anymore.”

  “That’s because you haven’t wanted to,” Becky pointed out. “Your dad told me that he misses those camping trips and he’d like to go camping and fishing with you again—if you’re willing to go,” she added, watching Stevi’s reaction.

  “That stuff’s for kids—and old people,” she protested, turning her nose up at the idea.

  They had arrived at the school. Rather than pull the car up to the curb and let her out, Becky drove into the parking lot just beyond the school building.

  Stevi looked startled. “What are you doing? The door’s over there,” she cried, pointing toward the entrance.

  “I just want to talk to you for a second,” Becky stated. “Don’t worry. I won’t make you late,” she promised, seeing the frown on the girl’s face. What she was about to do was out-and-out interfering, but Stevi had left her no other option. “I think you should go camping with your father.”

  The frown deepened. “Why?” she asked defiantly.

  “Because pretty soon you’ll be going away to college and there won’t be any time for camping or fishing, or doing any of those things that you and your father used to love doing together. You’ll be sorry that you missed this opportunity just because you were trying to prove a point.”

  Stevi glared at her, daring Becky to convince her. “What point?”

  She met the young girl’s eyes. “That you were just too cool to spend time doing things with your father. Stephanie, it’s hard for him to watch you grow up—”

  “Yeah, don’t I know it,” Stevi muttered dismissively.

  But Becky pressed on. “Your dad feels sad about losing his little girl and you really can’t blame him for feeling that way.”

  Stevi tossed her head. “Sure I can. Look, I’ve gotta go—” She began to reach for the door, but Becky stopped her.

  “Stephanie,” she said, her voice low, “you have no idea how lucky you are to have a father who wants to spend time with you. I didn’t.”

  “You didn’t?” Stevi questioned. It was obvious that she was trying hard not to sound as if she was interested—but she clearly was.

  “No,” Becky replied quietly. Every word was costing her, but this was for a worthy cause. “I didn’t. My dad didn’t want to spend time with me. Didn’t want to so much that he left.”

  “For how long?” Stevi asked suspiciously, not ready to believe what Becky was attempting to tell her. She thought she was making it up.

  “Forever,” Becky told her simply, as if making the admission didn’t still cut her up inside. “Do you want my advice?”

  Stevi shrugged, her small shoulders rising and falling. “I guess.”

  “If your dad slips and calls you ‘Stevi’ once in a while, don’t get mad. Let him. And if and when he asks you to go on that camping trip with him, go,” Becky urged. She saw students hurrying in through the school’s front doors. It was almost time for classes to start. “Now get in there,” she told her.

  It was as if Stevi suddenly came to. “Oh. Yeah. I don’t want to be late.”

  Opening the car door, she jumped out of the passenger seat and hurried over to the double doors.

  Becky turned in her seat, watching Stevi disappear into the school. She wondered if she had done more harm than good, telling her about the camping trip. There was a lot of rebellion there. But she had to believe that beneath all that bravado, Stevi really wanted to spend some time with her father, doing what they used to do before her hormones had made her feel that it wasn’t cool.

  * * *
/>   Becky had been listening for the sound of a car pulling up into the driveway for the last half hour. She’d been afraid that despite all his good intentions, Steve had either lost track of time or gotten bogged down in the project because, as she recalled, something always went wrong at the last minute, necessitating more time being devoted to correcting the problem.

  So when she finally heard Steve’s engine in the drive, five minutes before dinner was ready, she let go of the breath she’d been holding all this time. Stevi was in her room, playing the new video game Becky had given her as a “happy summer school graduation” gift.

  With Stevi busy, that gave her enough time to waylay Steve before he came in.

  Grabbing the card she’d bought for him to sign, she quickly and quietly slipped out the front door—and wound up walking right into him.

  They would have collided had he not reacted quickly and grabbed her shoulders to prevent a crash. But not quickly enough to prevent the momentary full body contact, with all the accompanying electricity that was created.

  Catching his breath—and ignoring the way that his heart was suddenly racing—Steve looked down into her face. A face he’d caught himself thinking about more than he should.

  “Whoa,” he cried. “Something wrong?”

  Her whole body was tingling. It took Becky several seconds to clear her brain and regain her composure, not to mention the use of her tongue.

  “Um, no.” She took a step back, away from him. Her body still felt as if it was heating up. “I just wanted to catch you before you came in so I could give you the card that I bought for you to give Stephanie.”

  “A card?” he asked, trying to understand why she would be giving him a card to hand to his daughter. She hadn’t mentioned anything about it.

  “Yes, a card,” Becky verified. “To celebrate the end of her summer school classes.”

  His eyebrows drew together in confusion. “They have cards for that?”

  Spoken like a man who hadn’t been to a card store lately. Patiently, she explained, “They have cards acknowledging completing something important, which summer school was to Stephanie.” She could see that he was still a little mystified by all this. That was the engineer in him. “Don’t ask questions, Steve, just sign, okay? It’ll make her happy. She might not show it,” Becky added, “but it will.”