whatever it was, it was there since she was a just a girl. Her sisters were older than she—larger, stronger, presumably smarter—and yet they were sometimes afraid of her. When we got married, she didn’t want any family there… . Nora, I don’t know what caused your mother’s problems, but if you don’t have those issues now… I trust you’re free of it. I hate that I had to miss so much of your life.”
“I have something to tell you,” she said. “There are… I have…” She swallowed. “I have children. Two girls. Ten months and almost three years. And no, I haven’t been married. Their names are Fay and Berry.”
She heard a strange sound on the phone. “God,” he said in a whisper. “Oh, my God…”
“They’re very smart and beautiful,” she told him.
“Can I… Will you let me meet them?”
“You can visit for an afternoon when I’m not working,” she said. “Even though you’re my father and we’ve been talking for a couple of weeks, I’m not ready to leave you unsupervised with them, so that’s the best I can do. I work a lot. I’m not close to Stanford—I’m in Humboldt County. A little town called Virgin River. There are a couple of motels on the coast a good half hour away, but no guest room and no bed-and-breakfast.”
He sniffed loudly. “Don’t worry about that. Tell me when I can come. I’ll take time off. Oh, Nora, thank you for telling me. Thank you for giving me a chance.”
“Yeah, don’t screw up,” she said. “I’ve somehow survived one really mean parent. The first time it looks like it’s going down that road with you, it’s over.”
Chapter Six
Nora rode to the orchard with Tom and said, “I’m going to let Jed visit for a couple of hours on Sunday afternoon while I’m there.”
“Jed?” Tom asked.
“It might be quite a while before I call him Dad.”
“But you’re going to let him meet your daughters…?”
She laughed lightly. “I’m not going to give him my daughters, I’m just going to let him see them. And let them meet him. I think it’s the right thing to do.”
“Want me to be there? Just in case you get nervous?” Tom asked.
She smiled at him. “I could have sworn you found me annoying… .”
“Well, maybe I did. At first. But you’re not a bad kid.”
“I’m not a kid,” she said with patience. “And I’m a little unsure of him, but I’m not afraid of him. My memories of him are good. Reverend Kincaid has checked him out—I guess Jed’s telling the truth about everything.”
“Does it feel like the truth?” Tom wanted to know.
“It does, but I’m not relying on that. I don’t think I quite trust my instincts about truth versus lies. I’ve been wrong too much. How do you think I ended up just about penniless with two little kids and no husband or partner?”
Tom surprised her by pulling the truck to the side of the road. “As a matter of fact, I’ve been wondering. I didn’t think it was polite to ask. But since you brought it up…”
“Curious, huh?” she said.
“I won’t say anything to anyone,” he said. “And if you don’t want to talk about it—if it’s none of my damn business…”
“It probably isn’t,” she said. “Your business, I mean. But, six months ago I could hardly talk about it at all. Noah has me slowly coming out of my shell. I’m starting to put things into perspective, giving myself a break sometimes. I was so hard on myself at first, but—well, here’s the thing—I was a college freshman, away from home for the first time. I had only had a couple of very brief boyfriends up to that point. I never had dates or anything. I wasn’t one of the popular girls in high school, so…” She shrugged. “So—I went with some friends to a baseball game. They knew a couple of the players because they’d been on the local college team and had their eyes on going to the big league. But first, the minor league. And one of them, a real handsome, athletic, talented guy flirted with me. And boy—I just bit the dust. I fell for him. Bam! Five months later, before the start of my sophomore year, I was pregnant and he was traveling with the team.” She looked down and gave another shrug.