Allie Pleiter - His Surprise Son

She tugged gently on Jonah’s hand to get his attention, then pointed to her friend Kelly Nelson’s Love in Bloom Flower Shop.

“Stop and see Lulu’s mom?” she signed to Jonah. She didn’t really need to settle any floral details for Violet’s wedding, but she needed to talk out what was happening with Kelly.

Jonah raised his eyebrows and made the sign for “cookie?” in reply.

Kelly often kept a stash of goodies for her daughter, Lulu, and Jonah to share at the shop. “Maybe one.” She held up a single finger as she led Josh toward the door.

“Hello, you two!” Kelly said, setting a vase on the counter. “Good timing—I just put a fresh pot of coffee on.” She looked down at Jonah, signing, “Lulu’s at a friend’s, but I still have cookies.”

Jonah’s head bobbed in a “yes” that needed no translation.

“Can we set out a few coloring pages with those, Kelly?” Jean asked. “I need to talk.”

Kelly raised a questioning eyebrow. “Oh. I see.” She waved Jean and Jonah toward her work area in the back of the shop. “Maybe I should get out my stash of chocolate croissants from the bakery? Has it been that kind of day already?” she called over her shoulder as she pulled out cookies, crayons and the stack of coloring books she always kept to keep customers’ children occupied. “Our first bride looks pretty happy to me. And that brother of hers—quite the handsome fellow.”

Everyone always noticed Josh. He effortlessly commanded a room back then, and it wasn’t any different now. “No croissants. I’d eat a dozen. But I won’t turn down coffee.” Best to just spit it out while Jonah was occupied. Jean slipped onto one of a pair of stools after settling Jonah at the end of a smaller table. “It’s actually the brother I need to talk about.”

“The brother?” Kelly came back with two steaming cups of coffee and slipped onto the stool opposite Jean. “Isn’t it usually brides who cause the trouble?”

The scent of Kelly’s cinnamon coffee felt like just what she needed. Well, that and an hour’s conversation. She’d be grateful for twenty minutes if Jonah didn’t start getting antsy. “This problem isn’t wedding related. Well, not directly.”

Kelly took a sip of coffee while she sorted through some stems of luscious white roses. “Meaning?”

Just say it. You need someone else on the planet to know. With a quick glance to make sure Jonah’s attention was on the cookies and crayons, she unnecessarily whispered, “That brother, Joshua Tyler, is Jonah’s father.”

Kelly nearly dropped the bouquet. “What?”

“Our bride’s stepbrother is the man I was engaged to when I came back. He is Jonah’s biological father.”

Kelly scowled. “And he hasn’t shown up before today?”

“That’s because he hasn’t known about Jonah until today. It’s...complicated.”

Kelly’s gaze shifted between Jonah and Jean. “You mean to tell me that somehow Jonah’s father showed up in Matrimony Valley as the brother of our first bride? Without knowing you were here?”

Kelly’s sense of astonishment felt comforting. The situation really did merit the overwhelming shock Jean had been feeling since Joshua Tyler got out of that car yesterday.

Had it really been only yesterday?

“Sounds outrageous, doesn’t it?”

“Unbelievable. Did you...tell him? Did he meet Jonah?”

“I told him. He worked it out before I told him. It’s not a big reach for a brilliant engineer to count to five. And there is a resemblance.”

At just that moment, Jonah looked up at her, and there it was—Josh in his eyes. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t seen it before, but it seemed to shout at her right now. “Juice?” he signed.

“Sure, sweetie,” Kelly signed back, hopping up from her stool to fetch a juice box from next to the buckets of flowers in the shop cooler. “How’d he take the news?” she asked.

“How anyone would take discovering they were a father after you’d hid it from him for five years.” She’d hid it from everyone—well, everyone except Bartholomew Tyler and Dad—and the weight of that secret caught up with her now. She could no longer be sure it had been the right decision. Had she protected Jonah from rejection? Or deprived him of his father?

“So, not well.” Kelly returned to her stool.

“I don’t really know. He was more shocked than angry, I think. He’s asked to meet Jonah. In thirty minutes, actually.”

“Are you ready? Is he ready?”

Jean felt her face heat up with the threat of surprising tears. “Of course I’m not ready. I know Josh’s surprise was ten times the size of mine, but I’m still reeling. I’ve thought about this since the day I learned I was pregnant. I thought I was preparing myself, but this is all too fast. I’ve decided Jonah will meet him as Violet’s brother for now. It’s not perfect, but I don’t want Jonah’s heart broken if Josh doesn’t stay in his life. And I don’t trust Josh to stay in his life—at least not yet.” She let her head fall into her hands. “Why did this have to happen now?”

“You’ve maxed out your drama quotient, I’ll give you that.” Kelly leaned over the table, nodding toward Jonah. “So he doesn’t know.”

“No. I’ve told you a bit about what Josh was like when we were in California. I can’t bring myself to set Jonah’s hopes up for something he may not have in the end.”

“I know things weren’t good when you were out there, but could he have helped? Been involved? I mean, the guy’s helping his sister get married. He’s got to be a stand-up guy in some respects if he’s here doing that.”

“Stepsister,” Jean corrected. “They don’t have the same last name. That’s why I never connected the dots on this.”

“Well, sure. I mean, who would think? There have to be thousands of Josh Tylers in the world.” Kelly cleaned leaves off the rose stems. “But he shows up here, now.” She offered Jean a sympathetic smile. “You sure you don’t want a croissant? I’d need three.”

The tiny laugh that escaped Jean made this feel like the first lighthearted moment since this whole tense day began. “No. This and your sympathy are fine. And your discretion. I can’t let this get out—at least not yet.”

Kelly put a hand to her chest. “Cross my heart. Wow. I mean, really wow. It’s crazy. But it could be crazy good, right?”

“Or crazy bad. Josh was a workaholic in the third degree then. I can’t believe that’s changed much. He lived life at a hundred miles an hour back when we were together, and I got left in the wake. I don’t have any faith he can be a good influence on Jonah.” She swirled her spoon in the rich brew. “I’ve got to be really careful.” She considered telling Kelly about Bartholomew’s cruel offer, but opted against it. Why complicate an already complicated situation with a dead man’s cruelty that no longer mattered? “Most of the reasons I had for keeping this from Josh haven’t changed. Only now I’ve got to find a way to live with the fact that he knows.”

Kelly narrowed her eyes at Jean, wiggling the scissors in her hand. “You don’t still... I mean...there’s nothing between you two after all this time, is there?”

Jean put her coffee down with enough force to spill a bit, and Jonah looked up. “Absolutely not!”

“Okay,” Kelly said. “Just asking. He looks rich and handsome.”

Jean gave Kelly a look.

“...And he’s a jerk. We don’t like him or trust him. Got it.”

“I don’t know him, Kelly. I kept out of his life. I wasn’t the kind of person who could stand up to him then. So I just shut down that part of my history.”

“You didn’t look him up on the internet now and then? Weren’t curious who he turned out to be? I’d be cyberstalking the guy if I were you.”