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“What should I call you?” Penelope asked.
Taylor seemed slightly taken aback as if he hadn’t thought this far. “Taylor’s fine. It would be weird to call a complete stranger Dad.’”
“Maybe,” said Penelope and regarded him. “Except I wouldn’t ever call you Dad.”
“Oh.”
“Because in Swedish, we say Pappa.”
Taylor’s grin uncovered his deep laugh lines, which disappeared when Dany entered, dressed for the office in dark, worn jeans and a plaid, untucked flannel that he’d probably gotten from Sofia fifteen Christmases ago. The two men were similar in height, but her fiancé was inflating his chest as if trying to appear taller and more intimidating. Their handshake was brief but no less terse.
Yesterday, after they’d fought, Dany had left fuming, ignoring Analise’s calls and text messages. Yet when he arrived home, he was apologetic, groveling even, and transparent about his fears. How he’d always been prepared to protect Penelope from her father, not to have to fight the insecurity of competition. He was desperate to communicate that with his lovemaking, something her conscience felt obligated to do, but her body did not. Afterward, wracked with guilt, Analise swiped through pictures on her phone of Dany—the four of them—their Scanda-Tino family as Julia and Penelope self-described them. The girls even crafted future baby names by combining Swedish and Latino from Google searches—Elsa and Maria—Elaria! Dany would join in the clowning, “What about boy names? Carlos and Hans—Cans!” She loved him for that. That laughter only he could pull from her daughter.
Analise looked to Taylor now, reminding herself that this was her life. No longer was she a reckless, lovesick seventeen-year-old. Her kiss with Taylor the other night was nothing but a reflex leftover from the past. And yet she’d read through Taylor’s emails and wondered—wished—it were possible to split herself, to exist in two lives at once.
“A que hora me volverás, amor?” Dany asked in quiet Spanish and placed a lingering kiss on her mouth.
Analise asked Taylor, “Do you know when we’ll get home?”
Taylor glanced at Penelope. “I thought Penelope could decide, but I have one request if that’s okay?”
Analise caught Penelope’s questioning eyes, and said, “Of course, what is it?”
His brow pinched and he cleared his throat, but his voice still came out small. “Could we see my mom first?”
Analise crossed to him at once and touched his shoulder, a gesture meant to absorb the sadness, and the woeful recognition that someone was about to meet her granddaughter for the first time. And possibly the last.
Chapter Forty-Five
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Linnea
With every pang that paused her steps, every bite of food that became intolerable, Linnea wondered how close she was to death. When Taylor had found her on the bedroom floor in vomit and urine, he whisked her to the hospital, but she’d insisted he still go to Mora. He only left because Everett agreed to care for her.
Her ex-husband tucked her back home yesterday, and she slept fitfully, groggy from the anti-seizure medication. Taking morphine for the pain would make her comatose. Besides, she wanted to wait the pain out, see how much she could bear. Today, though, she took a fraction of it in anticipation of meeting her granddaughter. Hopefully, the opioid would quiet the physical pain and allow room for the bittersweet joy to saturate her instead.
She couldn’t stop the blitz of emotion once again as she replayed her son’s face, his tearful breaths as he’d exploded into the house yesterday morning. “Mom—Mom . . . I’m a dad!” Her granddaughter, Penelope, what a perfect name, a promise, would not want to see a stranger making a blubbering mess of herself.
Her home was spotless. Devoid of all the wilting sympathy flowers and gift baskets that had piled up. A diffuser misted lavender and frankincense. Taylor had commanded she rest, not get up when they arrived, knowing she wouldn’t have slept, that she’d be counting down the hours, minutes, until she could see her granddaughter’s lovely face. Could he even fault her sleeplessness, the unending marvel of the pictures he’d sent that Analise shared of Penelope? Especially when they included Ulla. That certainly piled her emotions into a lump. The anger that Ulla would dare keep her grandchild a secret, the longing for her touch still, and the shame at what Linnea had done to destroy it all.
She reclined in the leather chair, curled her legs inward, and wrapped the cream fleece blanket around herself, concentrating on the lake outside the window. Her hand went to the scarf concealing her patchy hair. Would Penelope even be happy to meet her? She remembered Taylor as a pre-teen. He never cared much for Everett’s mother. Neither had Linnea. His mother had gone from a tolerable alcoholic to a mean drunk, never accepting of Everett and his older sister’s interventions. Her death several years ago was one they all felt with a complicated relief.
She heard the slam of a car door, footsteps, low voices, and the opening of the front door. Her heart catapulted.
“Mom?” her son’s voice echoed.
“In—” Linnea’s voice snagged on budding tears. “In the family room.”
Taylor came in first, and she trained her attention on the two people who stepped hesitantly from behind him. Seeing Analise again, in the flesh, reminded her of how strongly she still felt about Ulla. It was Penelope, though, that fully captured Linnea, how her son’s features were perfectly woven into her granddaughter, especially those eyelashes. Taylor hated his eyelashes as a boy. The children in grade school called him, “Minnie Mouse.”
No one would dare tease Penelope. Linnea worried the opposite. Girls at this age were likely to be jealous. Like I’d been of Ulla.
Analise murmured something to Penelope, resembling Swedish. Visions engulfed Linnea, of Ulla and her mother, Ronja, carrying on in Swedish.
Ronja.
“Hello, Ms. Barnes,” Analise spoke first and closed the distance, bringing her daughter with her. She embraced Linnea in a long, warm hug, reminding Linnea of why her son had fallen in love with Analise, and how this girl’s aura managed to contain Taylor’s intensity and hold it. Like she’d been his sigh of relief. Clearly, the head injury had not erased her personality.
