I Had a Baby without You novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: The Diner

Home with Poppy and Rhona, Morwen faces Morton in front of the regulars; Roark shows up at midnight and Poppy walks in.

Cafferty's Diner had twelve stools, six booths and a coffee machine older than me.

At six in the morning it smelled like onions and burnt toast, and it was the best place in the world.

I came in through the back with my coat still on and Poppy was already on the counter.

She sat cross-legged between the napkin holders, in her rabbit pajamas, with a pencil behind each ear.

"Mama, you were gone all night."

"I was gone till ten, baby."

"That's night." She pointed the syrup bottle at me. "Rhona's cooking."

"Rhona is not cooking," said Rhona from behind the grill. "Rhona is trying not to burn your eggs."

Poppy was four years old and the loudest person I had ever met.

She had copper curls she refused to let me brush, and a small lantern-shaped birthmark under her left ear that she called her "moon."

And she had grey eyes.

Every time she looked at me, I saw the man at table forty looking straight past my face.

I kissed the top of her head.

"Did you get my letter from the fancy people?" she asked.

"What letter?"

"The one that's on the till. It has a gold bird."

I walked to the register.

The envelope was the same cream and gold as the first.

It was thicker.

Inside was a paper with a real signature and a lawyer's name.

The second page was titled *Notice to Vacate, Thirty Days.*

"Rhona," I said. "Who brought this?"

"Some guy in a gray coat, about ten minutes ago. He said the chairman would be by himself at seven."

"The chairman."

"Morton Draycott."

My stomach turned over.

I knew that name from every business page I had ever skimmed.

Roark's uncle ran the company while Roark hid in his tower.

At seven o'clock exactly, the bell above the door rang.

The regulars were already in their seats, as they always are.

There was the retired mailman at stool three, and the two nurses in booth two, and the roofing crew by the window.

They all turned to look at the man in the navy suit.

He was tall, silver at the temples, and he wore a gold ring on his smallest finger.

A lawyer with a leather folder walked a half step behind him.

"Miss Cafferty," Morton Draycott said, as if tasting it. "I wanted to deliver this in person."

"You delivered it already. Twice."

"A courtesy."

He smiled with half his face.

"The building is worth four times what your mother paid.

We're offering you a fair settlement for the equipment."

"How much?"

"Nine thousand dollars."

Behind me the roofing crew made a low noise.

"This diner has been here for thirty-one years," I said. "That's about three hundred dollars a year."

"It's a good diner."

"It's a better home."

He glanced at the little girl on the counter.

His eyes were pale and flat and they lingered on her face a second too long.

"Your daughter," he said.

I stepped between them without deciding to.

"Don't look at her."

"I look at everything, Miss Cafferty.

It's how I've kept the company safe."

He tapped the folder against his palm.

"Sign by Friday, or the sheriff will help you pack."

The retired mailman stood up.

He was seventy and shaped like a barrel and he put down his fork very quietly.

"Nobody's packing anything in my diner," he said.

"Sit down, old man," the lawyer said.

The two nurses stood too.

Then the roofing crew, one after another, scraping chairs.

Six men and women in work boots and scrubs stood between Morton Draycott and my counter.

I had not asked them.

"We'll be here Friday," the mailman said. "And the Friday after."

Morton looked around the room with real surprise.

"Enjoy it," he said softly to me. "It's the last thing you'll enjoy."

He left.

The bell clanged behind him.

I put my hands flat on the counter and breathed.

"I'm so proud of you," Rhona said into my ear. "And I'm going to be sick."

"Same."

I worked the rest of the day without remembering any of it.

I served pie.

I put Poppy down for her nap at one.

I counted the till at eleven, and at ten to midnight I flipped the sign on the door and turned off half the lights.

The bell rang.

I had my back to the door.

I knew who it was before I turned.

I knew from the way every hair on my arms stood up.

Roark Draycott stood in the doorway of my mother's diner, in a dark coat, with snow on his shoulders and no one with him.

He looked huge in the small room.

He looked at the counter, then at the booths, then at a point just beside my head.

"Is the kitchen still open?" he said. "I was told there's pie."

I stared at him.

Then I heard the creak of the back stairs, the slap of bare feet, and a small voice in the dark.

"Mama? I had a bad dream."

Poppy came around the corner in her rabbit pajamas, rubbing her eyes.

Roark turned toward the sound.

"Hi," my daughter said, squinting up at him. "Are you the man with the gold bird?"

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