The picture in the frame was of him, Rose and Joey under the Camp Middleton sign. He’d forgotten they’d even taken that picture until now. They looked just like a happy family in the photo. Joey was beaming with the excitement and anticipation of going to camp. Rose seemed nervous, but she hid it well from her son. Xander smiled awkwardly, as though he felt out of place, but Rose’s grip on his arm kept him firmly in place. It was a nice picture of the three of them.
And then he looked at the words along the top. Spelled out in foam cutout letters was Dad, Mom & Me.
It was as though someone had punched him in the gut as hard as they could. Joey knew. They hadn’t told him. Hadn’t breathed a word of it, but he knew the truth. His son had made this picture frame for him at camp and slipped the gift into his bag when he wasn’t looking. Probably while Xander was in the bedroom fighting with Rose.
His son gave him this gift and minutes later Xander had walked out of his son’s life without a word of explanation. He felt sick. The Scotch that only a moment ago had soothed him was now churning in his belly and threatening to rise up into his throat.
What was he going to do? How could he convince Rose to let him back in their lives?
Xander had no intention of abandoning his son. It was bad enough that Joey had gone through the first ten years of his life without a father. But if the situation with Tommy took a turn for the worse, would it hurt his son more to have an absent father or, as Rose had pointed out, a criminal one?
He dropped his forehead into the palm of his hand and stared down at the picture. His son’s eyes were so much like his own. He reminded him so much of himself when he was that age. The same age when he had lost his father.
It would be cruel to give Joey a father at last and then rip him away in the same breath.
Rose might not like it, but he wasn’t going to stay away. He’d already kept his distance for far too long. No matter what happened on the farm this week or next week or next year, he would be a part of Joey’s life. He wasn’t going to walk away from his son.
Or the mother of his child.
* * *
Rose placed a curl of candied lemon peel as the finishing touch on her lemon chiffon cake. It was beautiful and delicious, the fifth dessert she’d made today. She slid it into the dessert display case and went back out front to check on a few of her diners at the counter.
It had been a month since the bake-off. Three weeks since she’d thrown Xander out of her apartment and tossed away their future together. In that short amount of time, things had changed very quickly for her.
First she was approached at the diner one afternoon by the man who owned three other eateries in the area. He was one of the judges of the bake-off and wanted to know if she was interested in providing all the desserts for his restaurants. One of his locations was a dinner-only establishment, so he offered her the kitchens to bake in the mornings. He even told her she could do any kind of baking she liked, even for other restaurants.
It wasn’t enough to keep her from having to wait tables, but it was a start. The major impediment to starting her own baking business was getting the licenses and permits. She needed a dedicated kitchen that was subject to health inspections. That was something she simply couldn’t afford, but using the restaurant kitchen was perfect. Making desserts for both places was a great supplement to her income and there was always the hope that it would lead to more work with other restaurants. Then maybe, one day, her own bakery.
It was the one bright thought she clung to during the darkest of days. Xander had been the one to suggest the idea of opening her own bakery and it had offered a welcome distraction. It gave her something to talk to Joey about where she didn’t get upset. She didn’t want to cry in front of her son. Then she might have to explain what was really going on and where Xander had gone.
She didn’t know if he was still in town or not, but he had done as she asked and stayed away. It was probably easy for him with everything else happening. She wasn’t entirely sure what was going on; she was avoiding the news as best she could. She already knew more about the situation than she’d ever wanted to.
Rose couldn’t get away entirely, though. As she wiped down the counter, the sound of the local newscast taunted her from the other side of the counter. There was no way she could get away from it with the television in the diner always finding its way back to the local news every time she turned around.
“Rose, can you turn it up? They’re talking about the body again.”
“Which is why I turned it down, Paul. People are eating,” Rose complained, but she still grabbed the remote off the counter and turned the volume up a few notches.