Don't Stop Me Read online

  Vic had an uncanny way of looking at her. It made her feel as if he could see through everything she was wearing, as if she were standing naked in front of him. He’d always had that, but it was so much more now.

  “You didn’t answer me,” he said.

  “I didn’t realize there was a question.” Of course she had. She was evading.

  He stepped closer, and he was so damn tall. He took up more space in this tiny office than she was comfortable with. There was no room to escape. She wondered whether she touched her throat, as the walls were beginning to close in. “You have a family?” he said. “A husband, children.”

  She nodded but said nothing to correct him.

  “You’re married?”

  She looked to her desk and considered lying. Maybe then he’d go away. “No, John’s father isn’t in the picture.”

  “Sorry, you have just the one child?”

  “Yes.” Enough about John. “What do you want from me, Vic? What do I have to do so you’ll go away and leave me be?”

  “The reporter is digging, and she wants to set the record straight for you, for your parents and what happened to them. She’s a dog with a bone. I asked her to stop and leave it alone, to bury the story. I’m working on other channels, but I’m dealing with unpredictable—”

  No, no, no, this couldn’t be happening. “It was so long ago. It’s over… Stop dredging up the past. It’s done. There’s no making any of it right. What do you want from me? Tell her to go away! I’m of no importance.”

  “Badra, I’m just trying to protect you. Let me do that much for you. I just don’t want you blindsided and hurt again.”

  “Who’s Badra?”

  When she turned to the voice she knew so well, Fiona didn’t miss the question in her son’s eyes, and she knew in that moment he’d heard too much of her discussion with Vic.

  Chapter 16

  “Who’s Badra?”

  John was behind him. This was the first time someone had come up like that without him hearing. Fiona appeared so pale he thought she was going to faint. He’d been careless, speaking so openly.

  “John, I, uh…” She stopped talking and didn’t look his way, but Vic was watching her son closely. “What are you doing back here?” she finally spit out as if she’d gathered herself, but anyone could tell how flustered she was.

  “I got change from Barbara.” He was holding out a few dollars in his hand. “You didn’t answer me, Mom. Why did he call you Badra?”

  Fiona opened her mouth to speak, and Vic could see all the ways she was struggling to come up with some answer. Her secrets were clearly something she hadn’t shared with her son, and he wondered how much he knew.

  “And why is a reporter wanting to do a story on you?” John said. “To make what right?”

  This time she shut her eyes and lowered her face, slowly tapping her forehead. “I’m sorry, John. It was just something that happened when I was young. It was before you were born. It was nothing.”

  It was everything, and it had altered everything for both of them, turning their lives upside down. Vic had landed on his feet, made something of himself. Badra had run away to hide, and she was still hiding.

  “How can it be nothing, Mom? You’re upset.” John stepped into the office, setting the bills on the desk before looking back at Vic. “Have you known my mom long?”

  Forever, it seems. “Yes.”

  “Did you know my father?”

  He didn’t have to look over to Fiona to see how upset she was. This was a situation she had controlled, but she had a lot of secrets. “I don’t believe so,” he said, seeing something in Fiona’s reaction.

  “Enough questions, John. You need to go back to school. We’ll talk tonight.” Fiona actually stepped forward and somehow had her son ushered out of the office. She waited a second in the doorway, her hand resting on her chest, before she stepped back and shut the door.

  “John doesn’t know his father?” Vic said.

  Fiona wouldn’t look at him as she set her hands on her hips and walked back to her desk and leaned against it, her hands resting on the top. Her expression was so guarded. “No. Enough about my son. I have a life here, Vic. Please don’t stir things up.”

  “You never told your son about your family and what happened?” Of course she hadn’t. He realized she was holding on to every secret herself. It had to be so lonely.

  She shook her head. “No, he doesn’t need to know.”

  “So what did you tell him about your family? He doesn’t know your name? Who is his father, Badra?” Every time he called her by that name, he could see the hurt, as if he were driving a knife into her.

  “Please, Vic, stop asking so many questions. I’ve buried my past, I’m not Badra anymore. My name is Fiona. The last thing I want is for anyone to start asking questions.”

  Of course he understood that, but at the same time he couldn’t help noticing she was evading a lot. “Tell me about John’s father. How old is the boy?”

  She was so still, and she wouldn’t look at him.

  “Fourteen, thirteen? He looks older, almost fifteen, but that was when I knew you,” he said.

  She still wasn’t looking at him, and her jaw was so tense, stubborn. She just didn’t want to talk. “Why are you so interested in my son? Just leave it alone. Please go,” she said softly, and it was in that moment, as he recalled the image of her son, his dark hair, his features, that he started to wonder a lot of things.

  He took a step toward her and another until he was right in front of her, and she had to look up at him. That was when he saw it. John was his son.

  Chapter 17

  Vic had left.

  That should have had Fiona breathing a little easier, but it didn’t, because in that moment, that second when he’d asked her if John was his, she knew he’d finally figured it out. It was what she’d feared all along. Though she hadn’t said a word, she knew it from the look on Vic’s face as he stepped back. He knew John was his.

  She didn’t have a clue now what he was planning. Would he show up again, or would he honor her and finally leave her in peace, leave her son in peace?

  She hoped he would. She knew he wouldn’t.

  Vic as a boy had never been one to roll over and walk away, and the man who’d walked back into her life just the day before seemed even less inclined to do so.

  She took her time closing up, keeping to herself, and she decided to give Barbara a pass on her prying, too, mainly because everything else in her life was spiraling out of control. She couldn’t take on one more thing.

  She stepped out the back door of the cafe and was looking at the ground, trying to figure out what to say to John, when someone said, “Fiona.”

  She jumped and dropped her keys. “You scared me.”

  Vic was leaning against her four-door Volvo. It was metallic blue, ten years old but in mint shape.

  She bent over and picked up the keys. “You’re stalking me now,” she snapped, far past caring how it sounded.

  “Why did you hide him from me?” He didn’t move as she walked toward her car, and she took in how serious he looked. He was a hard man to read, but right now he appeared unforgiving. It wasn’t her who had wronged him, though. Right?

  She unlocked her car, and it beeped. “I didn’t hide him. I hid myself, and John’s part of me.” She reached for her door handle, and Vic’s hand shot out and pressed against the door so she couldn’t open it.

  “You hid him. You should have told me you were pregnant.”

  Was he serious? “Tell you? After what you did to me, my family?” She still had nightmares every time she saw the police, wondering if they’d detain her, question her, or God forbid figure out she was that girl from Phoenix. She’d never forget how she had been held, questioned, never once read her Miranda rights, and that was after they’d come crashing through the door of the hotel room where she’d been waiting for Vic.

  “Stop it, Badra! I never told them about your pa
rents. I never had the police storm your parents’ house. I could do nothing but sit there on my ass, chained to a table in a concrete box, knowing they had you in the next room, helpless, not knowing what they were saying or doing to you, wondering what I had gotten us into. It was a fucked-up mess, and yes, I stole the damn car, I was a car thief, but whoever called the police wasn’t looking to pin me for theft. By the time they’d set all the wheels in motion, the agencies were hitting the panic button. It was no surprise that when they figured out their mistake, they didn’t give me a second look.”

  She was staring at him and then swung her purse, throwing it. It hit the door of her cafe as she jammed her hands in her hair, wanting to squeeze away the memory of how those cops and the other asshole Feds had said they were on their way to her parents’ house to drag them in, too. She remembered the horror of being accused of terrorism, being asked what was in the bag, the powder, being questioned about whether she had any contacts in the Middle East. What was she planning? Where was she planning the attack? She hadn’t known what the hell they were talking about.

  “I didn’t know what happened. I remember sitting there, so scared I’d pissed my pants. I was crying. They had somehow linked me to some big terrorist plot because of a Ziploc bag of white powder in the trunk of a car. Only I didn’t know what they were talking about. I was begging, and then one of them said they were dragging my parents in, and what were they going to find in our home when they tore it apart? They said it would be better for me, for my parents, to tell them what we were planning.

  “I thought they would hurt me more than they had and I’d be tossed in some dark hole and no one would ever know I was gone. They could make it happen. I realized then that I was no one. I was terrified. I didn’t know who did it or why, but they said my parents resisted, my father pulled a gun, that it was self defense and they were shot, but it was a lie. My mom and dad were nothing. Mom was a housewife, and Dad was just a store manager. They didn’t even own a gun!”

  There was so much between them, so much hurt, that just standing there with Vic was ripping at her heart.

  “Did you know you were pregnant when I last saw you?”

  She remembered it like yesterday: standing in her parents’ house, in the middle of the destruction, the house torn apart, after the police had let her go. The cops had said not a word about anything, just opened the door, uncuffed her from the table, said she could go, and let her walk out of the station. She never looked back. “They never told me why. They never said they were sorry. They ransacked the house, there was blood from where my parents died—where they were gunned down. No, I didn’t know I was pregnant. I was barely holding it together.” Trying to make sense of something that made no sense at all.

  “But you never tried to contact me. I have a son,” he said again, sounding accusing this time.

  “No, I didn’t want you in my life,” she said. “You were a car thief, not a father.”

  He just watched her, giving nothing away. “Maybe I had that coming, but it was a long time ago, and I’m here now. I’m not the same person. He’s my son, and he has a right to know. I have a right to know him.”

  She couldn’t believe he was saying that, and she wondered whether the horror showed on her face. “No! Just get in your car and leave. Go back to where you came from.” She turned away and went to where her purse had landed on the pavement, items scattered everywhere. She shoved everything back in and turned back around, but he was still there, blocking her door with his body. It was then she noticed his car parked, too, blocking hers so she couldn’t leave anyway. “You’re not going to leave, are you?”

  “No. Not now. I want to meet him, talk to him.”

  Oh, this couldn’t be happening. “That’s not possible. I never told him about you.” She’d told John his father had died before he was born, and he’d never known about him. It was a lie, but she never wanted him one day needing to seek him out.

  “Well, you have two choices, Badra. You tell him about me, or I will.”

  She went to hit him, but he was so quick that he grabbed her arm before she could lift her hand up, before she could connect with his face. His grip was strong.

  “Let me go!” She tried to pull away, realizing her mistake too late. He held tight as her body remembered his touch. “Please,” she said, and he released his hold but didn’t step back. “Give me time. I can’t tell him now,” she said, turning her face to Vic. “He’ll hate me for lying to him. Let him finish this year at school, a few more months, and then…”

  Vic was already shaking his head. “No, he needs to know now. I’ve lost a lot of years. You’ve kept him a secret too long. He has a right to know me. I have a right to know my own son.”

  “Okay, a few weeks, then.”

  “No, no more stalling.” He opened her car door. “I’ll follow you,” he said, and he held the door until she slid behind the wheel. Then he leaned down close to her. “And just so you know, I already know where you live.”

  Chapter 18

  It was respectable and plain, the small apartment block. As Vic followed Fiona up the stairs, he took in the brown walls, the faded rusty carpet on the stairs.

  “Vic, please.” She stopped outside the door on the second floor, her keys in hand, and faced him.

  Of course she was scared. He should be furious, given the fact that he had a son and he knew nothing of him. The girl he’d loved had basically hidden him.

  “It’s been just me and John for so long. There’s so much you don’t know.” She wasn’t looking at him again, and even though he was angry with her, he could see how hard it had been, as well.

  “You need to tell me, but it isn’t just you and John. He’s my son, and I have no intention of just up and walking away.”

  The door opened. “Mom?” John was standing there with a whole lot of questions, but as he looked up at Vic, there was something else in his expression. “I thought I heard you.”

  “You remember Vic?”

  “Of course I do.” He was such a nice kid, not the surly troubled thug Vic had been as a teen.

  He followed her in and closed the door, taking in the small space, which was homey and warm. It had a sofa and matching chairs, a square sofa table and a flat-screen TV. A round table for four was in an open dining room. There were pictures on the wall and shelves of books.

  Fiona rested her purse and keys on a side table, and he could see her face and all the emotion she was fighting to hide in the hall mirror.

  “Does Vic have something to do with what you were going to tell me?” John said.

  Vic found himself trying to pick out similarities in John, his expression, his stance.

  Fiona took her time shedding her coat and folding it, then resting it over the back of the sofa. She put all her focus into what she was doing as if she were stalling.

  “Mom?” he asked, impatient, as he stepped toward her. It was something Vic could see himself doing. He waited.

  “Do you remember the things I told you about your father?” she started as she stepped around her son and over to the window, which was large and open and had a window seat with a colorful long cushion.

  “Yeah, you said he died before I was born, an accident.”

  She nodded and then lowered herself to the seat, refusing to look Vic’s way.

  John tensed. Even Vic could see how this was messing with him as he waited for something unexpected to come his way. The kid had no idea what he was about to hear. It was too much for most adults. A kid his age, Vic wondered how he’d take it.

  “Your mom had her reasons for saying what she did.” Vic leaned against the back of the sofa, resting his hands on the top of the soft cushion.

  “What reasons? What’s going on?” John turned from Fiona to Vic.

  “Your father is not dead,” she said as she slowly turned sorrowful eyes to her son. John was so stiff that the shock seemed to double him over.

  “What! Why would you lie? Who is my father?�
�� he shouted, fisting his hands, and Fiona appeared so sad as a tear slid down her cheek.

  “I didn’t know what else to do at the time, and then it just became easier.”

  “How could you, Mom? Answer me! Who is my father? Where is he?” John was in her face, and Vic found himself standing, wanting to move him back.

  “John, listen to me. I didn’t do it to hurt you. Your father was never going to come into your life, be a part of our life. I didn’t want you searching him out.” She was on her feet now, trying to reason with her son, but Vic recognized a kid who was done listening, who was all attitude and was about to say or do something really stupid.

  “Hey, stop this,” he said. “It’s not solving anything. John, your father is here now.”

  The boy turned to him and was quiet.

  “I’m your father,” he said, and as he looked over to Fiona, he saw a hurt he hadn’t ever wanted to see on her face again.

  Chapter 19

  Explaining to her son that Vic was his father was the hardest thing Fiona had ever had to do, even considering all she’d been through just to find some measure of peace for herself and her son. John was hers, and he was the only good thing to have happened to her after she’d walked through hell, after her life had been ripped apart all because of the color of her skin and who her mother was. It was hard being judged.

  “Your mom had her reasons for not saying something, but I’m here now.” Vic was standing in the opening of the dining and living room. It was an open-concept design like many apartments, and it had been home to her and John for the past five years.

  “Did you know about me? Did you not want me? Where do you live? What do you do?” His questions for Vic were flying out of his mouth, and at one point she thought Vic laughed, but Fiona had turned away and was staring out the window, seeing people on the streets below, walking, driving past—a world continuing with its own problems.