Everything but the Baby

“What are the odds that he’d carry a thing like this around with him?”

“A thousand to one. But if there’s even that one chance, I’d like to take it. I agreed to your plan, Allison. Will you help me with mine?”

She gazed at him for several seconds. And then, holding out the peacock, she nodded. “For what it’s worth, I’ll try.”

He settled the brooch back into its velvet nest and slid the box back into his duffel. When he looked up again, he realized the cab was slowing down.

“We’re here,” she said. So much for his distraction. Her tension had returned.

From the street, O’Hara’s Hideaway looked unassuming—with none of the Irish “old sod” kitsch of its name. It had, instead, a strong Spanish-Mediterranean influence. The stucco walls were pale salmon, with clean white trim and glossy black wrought-iron balconies. The deep orange tile roof rose cleanly into the cloudless turquoise sky.

Thick green palmettos and red bougainvillea spread over everything, giving the small entrance a shadowy, cloistered feel—just what a visitor craved after taking a few soggy breaths of this hundred-degree Florida sunshine.

A red-haired teenage boy opened the front door the minute the cab came to a complete stop. He would have been good-looking if he hadn’t had a typical adolescent glower, announcing that nothing had pleased him since he was about ten and nothing ever would again until he had his own apartment and regular sex.

He wasn’t wearing a uniform, but he was dressed better than any teenager would voluntarily, so obviously he was on the payroll. Mark eyed that wavy auburn hair. Family, maybe?

The boy opened Allison’s door. “Welcome to the Hideaway,” he said with rote courtesy but no change of expression.

Oh, yeah, he was an O’Hara, Mark concluded as he found his own way out of the cab. Only a family member could get away with that attitude.

Emerging, Allison smiled at the boy. “Hi,” she said. “I’m Allison Cabot. This is Matt Travis. We were on the same plane, and when we realized we were both headed here, we decided to share a cab.”

She wasn’t a great liar—here she was, spilling the whole thing to the first person she met—but Mark had seen worse. She’d get better with practice and she had an innocent smile that just might pull it off.

Obviously, Mark had to use an alias. Though Lincoln had never met Mark and wouldn’t recognize his face, he would recognize the name. Mark had chosen a pseudonym as close to his own name as possible, so that if Allison slipped it might pass unnoticed.

They’d also decided on this strangers-on-a-plane story, agreeing that it would be foolish to reveal too much. Island communities tended to be close-knit—it was impossible for a newcomer to guess exactly how all the residents might be connected. For all they knew, the O’Haras might go fishing with Lincoln Gray every Sunday afternoon.

“Allison Cab—” The kid looked oddly troubled. “You’re—” He frowned. “You’re Allison…Allison who?”

“Cabot.” She smiled again. “I’m checking in. I’m here for two weeks.” She shifted her purse to her other arm, clearly wondering if something had gone wrong with her reservation. “From Boston?”

“Yes. Yes.” The boy looked right, then left, as if he needed backup. “Umm…excuse me just a minute.”

Allison shot a worried glance toward Mark.

No room at the inn? Mark knew from the Web site that the hotel had only twelve suites, six in each wing, with the family quarters in the center of the U-shape building that enclosed an old-world courtyard. They’d been lucky to get reservations on such short notice.

He nodded, assuring her that everything would be fine. If the paperwork had gone awry, she could always take his room and he’d find somewhere else to stay.

But within a few seconds, a storm of people poured through the arched entryway, all redheads with beaming grins and outstretched arms.

“Allison Cabot! Could it really be you?”

Allison turned, looking half startled, half embarrassed. “I—”

If she finished the sentence, Mark couldn’t hear it. The oldest of the group, a man with a leonine shock of wavy white hair, got to Allison first and, without waiting for permission, enveloped her in a robust embrace.

“Sure and I’m not believing my eyes,” he said. “It’s our own little Allie, come home at last!”

“You must have thought we were terrible people,” a woman with matching white hair added, cupping Allison’s cheek with the palm of her hand. “Taking your reservation like that, as if you were a stranger.”

“I thought she said Talbot, Gram.” The boy who had opened the door was flushing. “It sounded like Talbot.”

“Then we’d better be buying you new ears, Daniel O’Hara, because those are clearly failing you.”

A pair of little girls, identical twins of about eight or ten, giggled at the joke. They had the fine red curls and pale skin of expensive porcelain dolls, but right now they were dressed in blue jeans and flamingo-pink T-shirts that fought hideously with their tangled masses of hair. One of them carried a scruffy backpack patterned with stars.

The old man, who Mark deduced must be Stephen, kept his hands on Allison’s shoulders, but moved her a few inches out, so that he could feast his eyes on the prodigal granddaughter. Mark couldn’t think of another way to describe the wistful, half-starved expression the old man turned on her.

“You’re so beautiful, child,” he said, his voice husky. “And so like your mother. You might be our Eileen, come back to us after all these years!”

“Do I really look like her?” Allison’s voice sounded stiff, an odd contrast to her eyes, which were wide and shining. “I—I would like that.”

“You’re the spitting image.” He grinned, the movement folding deep, comfortable creases into his cheeks. He probably smiled as much as he cried, which was obviously a great deal. The whole lot of them needed pockets sewn onto their shirtsleeves for holding their hearts.

“Yes, you’ve got her sweetness,” her grandfather continued. “And not a whit of your father’s arrogance, thank God.”

“Stephen!” The old woman batted his shoulder.

“It’s true, Kate, and weren’t we all thinking it?” Stephen was gleefully unrepentant. “I’m sorry for your loss, Allie darling, and I know you loved your father with a good heart. But the man never liked me and I never liked him and there’s no use pretending any different just because he’s dead.”

“No,” Allison said, no doubt overwhelmed. “I understand. I’m sorry I haven’t come sooner, but—”

“None of that, now, none of that!” He hugged her again. “Aren’t you here now? And isn’t that all that matters? Let’s get you settled. We’ll have to call your uncle in and Moira, too. They’ll be wanting to hear all about you.”

“Grampa.” The twin with the backpack tugged at Stephen’s sleeve, pointing at Mark and whispering. “Grampa, what about him?”

“Who?”

Mark realized wryly that he might as well have been invisible. “I think she means me,” he said with a smile. “I’m Matt Travis. I have a reservation, as well.”

The second little girl, apparently the more confident of the two, stared at Mark while chewing the nail of her pinky finger as if it were her afternoon snack. “Are you Allison’s boyfriend?”

Allison shook her head quickly, flushing again as she had to trot out her rehearsed lie. “No, no! Matt and I…we just happened to be on the same plane. We just shared a cab from the airport.”

“Well, come on in, son,” Stephen said, waving his hand expansively. “We’ll get your room eventually, but you may have to wait. You’ve stumbled into a family reunion, as you see, and family comes first.”

“Of course,” Mark agreed.

“And our poor Allie, she’s like a miracle, showing up here,” Kate O’Hara said as if she owed Mark a better explanation. “She’s lost her dad, you know, so we’re her only family now.”

The nail-chewing little girl stared up at Allison, frowning. “Your father’s dead? What happened to him?”

Kate hushed her granddaughter with a soft hand. “You remember, now, don’t you, Fannie? We talked about it. Her father had a heart attack, poor man.”

The little girl nodded slowly. “That’s right. I do remember, because Grampa said it was ironic, and I asked him what ironic meant, and he said it was when someone who didn’t have a heart in the first place—”