1022 Evergreen Place - Debbie Macomber [116]
“Hey, Rachel,” Bruce said, crashing into the bedroom. “What’s the holdup? If we don’t leave now, we won’t make our reservation.”
She gave him a weak smile. Bruce didn’t appear to notice her uneasiness as she reached for her purse.
Jolene was waiting in the living room and eyed Rachel curiously when she appeared. “You aren’t sick, are you?” The question wasn’t one of concern. She asked it as if she expected Rachel to do something to ruin this evening her father had planned for them.
“I’m fine,” she lied.
Bruce pulled the car out of the garage and Rachel got into the front seat beside her husband.
Jolene slammed the rear door as a reminder that until Bruce had married Rachel, she’d always sat in front. Bruce had yet to comment on the abuse his daughter gave the rear door. Rachel let it go. That door was the least of her problems.
Bruce located a convenient parking spot at D.D.’s and the three of them walked to the restaurant. Rachel saw that Jolene stayed close to Bruce’s side, preventing her from walking next to her husband. Bruce seemed unaware of the girl’s maneuvering and Rachel wasn’t about to get into a shoving match over whose right it was to be next to Bruce. She followed quietly a couple of steps behind, desperately hoping she’d make it through the evening.
The hostess seated them and Jolene instantly slid into the booth beside Bruce.
“The last time we were here we split a bowl of steamed clams,” Jolene told him. “Can we do that again?”
“Sure,” Bruce said, without looking up from his menu.
Jolene knew that Rachel disliked clams. She hated to be paranoid but her stepdaughter seemed to be going out of her way once again to prove that Rachel was an intruder on their happy family.
This was all the more reason, in Rachel’s view, to delay telling Jolene about the pregnancy. Unfortunately, Bruce didn’t agree. He also disagreed that counseling might help. Rachel had tentatively brought it up, but he insisted that they could work out their own problems—and that Jolene would refuse to go anyway.
Bruce and Jolene had steamed clams as an appetizer, while Rachel sipped herbal tea. She did her best not to watch for fear that looking at them eating clams would upset her stomach even more. Jolene made slurping sounds as she ate, suggesting that she was thoroughly enjoying herself.
“Let’s order dinner,” Bruce said as the waitress removed the bowl of clam shells. “Do you know what you want?” he asked Rachel.
“Can I have steak?” Jolene cut in, not allowing Rachel to respond.
Bruce smiled indulgently at his daughter. “You can order anything you like, sweetheart.” He looked at Rachel again.
“Dad, what are you going to eat?” Again, Jolene cut Rachel off before she had an opportunity to answer.
“I believe I’ll have a T-bone. This is a celebration, after all.” He smiled at Rachel, clearly pleased with himself.
He didn’t seem to share any of her concerns about Jolene’s reaction to their news. Rachel wondered how her husband could be this oblivious. After helping Jolene with her algebra, she thought her relationship with the girl had improved. That peace, however, was short-lived. Within a matter of days, everything returned to the way it was from the moment Rachel had married Jolene’s father.
Instead of the family friend Rachel had been, starting when Jolene was in first grade, she became an interloper, the woman who’d trespassed on the girl’s territory. It’d been just Jolene and her father for so long that no one, no matter how close, would fit into the family picture.
When the waitress came for their dinner order, Rachel was finally able to announce her choice. She asked for crab cakes with rice pilaf and a green salad. Both Bruce and Jolene chose the full steak dinner, complete with baked potato, soup and salad.
Bruce, at least, was in high spirits. Rachel tried to catch his mood; she ignored every slight Jolene threw at