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‘Yeah. The bus ride is boring. But soon I won’t have to take the bus. I’m gonna live with Gordon and Bill and Tracey.’
‘Are they your workmates?’
‘Mostly. Tracey works at a café.’ Morgan couldn’t remember the sullen Dan ever grinning like this before. ‘Tracey brings me cakes from the café sometimes.’
‘Dan, what are you doing?’ Becca’s sharp tones brought both men around to look at her.
She was wearing an old-fashioned chenille dressing gown in a dark pink, her hair still mussed from bed. Morgan’s heart lurched at how young she looked, barefoot and pink toed on the cold winter grass.
‘I better go. See yah, Morgan.’ Dan wandered off, taking bites out of his toast with mumbled murmurs of appreciation. Morgan suppressed a smile as the family dog dived out from under the house to scavenge a discarded crust and vanished again.
Becca stayed where she was, hands thrust into the pockets of the dressing gown. ‘You didn’t take your car.’
‘I went for a walk and it was frosted by the time I came back.’
‘I wondered if that was the difficulty. Although it shouldn’t be with a fancy new car like yours.’
‘You didn’t marry Dan.’
Her brows rose over wide eyes. ‘Marry Dan? Why would I …?’ She glanced behind her but her step-cousin had already vanished into the house. ‘I suppose this is about the children.’
‘I always assumed they were his until I met Gabby and saw the family resemblance. And you changed your name.’
‘I wasn’t going to be called after Rodney Bujold. As soon as Mum passed away, I changed it back to Walters. It’s always been my legal name, same as the kids. The creep never adopted me officially.’ She huffed a breath that fogged the air. ‘Dan’s been like this since he got out of rehab. He has issues with concentration and memory. Among other things. Physical mostly. He can’t cope with having the kids around much because the noise bothers him. Anyway, he has a girlfriend at Bialga.’
‘Tracey?’
‘How did you know?’
‘She brings him cakes.’
A stain of colour marked her cheekbones and too late he remembered how often she’d brought him cakes she’d made when she was younger. To share with the other boys, but he’d always known they were for him.
‘He’s moving to Bialga shortly so I’m sure he’ll enjoy being pampered by her.’
He wanted to ask about Edward, but she was already on the defensive. If she’d had a relationship after Gabby was born, it was none of his business. He wondered if she was in a relationship now. She wasn’t married to Dan. So it wouldn’t have been against his principles to kiss her. Although it wasn’t an altogether sensible thing to do with things so fragile while he got to know Gabby.
He suppressed the excitement that brought his heart rate up. He wasn’t any use to any woman. Not even Becca.
She shifted on the grass, curling her toes and a surge of guilt swept him for keeping her out in the cold. ‘You better go back inside. I think the ice has pretty much cleared so I can head off.’
‘It’s all right. I’m used to the cold. The house is like a fridge anyway. But I’ll let you go. You’ve got a date today.’
He wouldn’t call it a date, but he should keep moving. ‘Can I call by and see the kids this afternoon?’
‘Sorry, we’re going out. To visit some school friends.’ She added the explanation quickly, as if she didn’t want him asking where.
‘I’ll see you tomorrow at work, in that case.’
He climbed into the car, aware of her watching him. She was still standing there when he glanced in the rear vision mirror as he turned into his driveway.
He arrived home from his meeting with Sabine after three, satisfied with what had been organised. The early mark meant he had plenty of time before dinner, which made it a good time to go talk to his parents. He’d been putting it off because there’d never seemed to be the right moment. The evening meals were usually fairly rushed with him working full-time and he didn’t linger afterwards, once he’d helped with the washing up. His father’s health meant he needed plenty of rest and early nights were the norm.
His mother welcomed him with a wary gleam in her eye, as if she knew the reckoning was coming. There was no way she wouldn’t have recognised the resemblance long ago. Not with the multitude of family photos on the walls and any spare surfaces. Four generations of Cavanaugh’s and the Taite side from his mother. Gabby was a Cavanaugh through and through apart from the Taite nose.
‘I’ll make a cuppa.’
Morgan sat at the kitchen table, overwhelmed with a kind of nostalgia for the past. He’d spent a lot of time in this kitchen, usually with friends. As an only child, he’d found his playmates among the neighbours. His mother hadn’t always approved of them, but she preferred them coming into her kitchen and eating her food, to running around town getting her golden boy into trouble.
