A Second Chance by Bernadette Marie Page A

Kathy said quietly as she tilted
her head toward Carlos.
    “ Really?” A surge of mixed
emotions ran though him. He was happy. He’d wanted her to be there
more than he could have admitted, but even though Kathy was
smiling, the sadness in her eyes burned him. How could he have such
contrasting emotions?
    Kathy nodded. “Go see her.”
    He moved to her and placed his hands
on her cheeks. “Are you okay with this?”
    “ Yes.”
    “ I love you.”
    “ I love you,
too.”
    Carlos kissed her softly and then went
in search of Madeline.
    Chaos enveloped the room where
everyone he loved sat watching the greatest football game of the
year. But in the corner, the mother of his children rocked his tiny
nephew, gazing down upon him. She was beautiful.
    The thought hit him hard. He tried to
shake it away, but it lodged there. He remembered her holding
Eduardo just as she held Tyler. She’d been twenty-one and just had
their first child. Most people at that age would have been
panicking about everything, but not Madeline. She took it all in
stride and had patience he’d never seen in any other woman. Not
even his mother had patience like his wife’s. Ex-wife, he had to
remind himself.
    “ Park your butt or go
somewhere else,” Alan said to him, and he realized he was standing
in plain sight of everyone, gazing at Madeline.
    She looked up at him and smiled. He
walked toward her and knelt down by the chair.
    “ He is so precious,” she
murmured as Carlos touched Tyler’s soft cheek.
    “ He really is, isn’t
he?”
    “ I’m so glad I came. I
needed this so much. Maybe on my bad days I’ll just go over to
Regan’s house.”
    “ She’d love that.” He looked
up at her and caught the love and patience that radiated from her
eyes. She looked much better than she had earlier that
week.
    “ Dinner is ready.” Kathy’s
voice filled the room, but Carlos heard the tension in it, and when
he looked up he saw the pain in her eyes again. But she smiled and
stepped aside as his family filtered through the house toward the
dining room.
    “ Good, my team is losing,”
Alan protested as Eduardo helped him up from his chair.
    Zach reached out his hands to take
Tyler from Madeline. “I’ll take him.”
    “ Would I be horribly out of
line if I asked to hold him during dinner? You have no idea how
much this is helping me.”
    “ I think that would be
fine,” Zach said, smiling down at her as Regan placed her hand on
her husband’s shoulder.
    Carlos helped her up and walked with
her to the dining room. He kept to her side, a hand on the low of
her back to steady her. She wasn’t weak, but it felt necessary to
guide her with such a small and wonderful gift sleeping in her
arms.
    He pulled her chair out, and as she
sat, he looked for the next open chair. A sharp pain pierced his
chest when he realized his empty chair was across the table, next
to his fiancée.
    Kathy’s eyes were lowered and the pain
increased. He was hurting her, and yet he couldn’t help
it.
     
    Dinner around the Keller table was as
she always remembered it. It was noisy, full of discussions of
work, school, and news of Arianna’s latest adventures in New York.
Curtis had been the last to arrive, just as they’d all sat down at
the table. Madeline sat between her sons and across from her
daughter, who sat next to her father and he next to his fiancée.
She knew she should feel out of place, but she didn’t. She wished
she’d taken them up on dinner offers sooner.
    “ Are you sure you don’t want
me to take him from you?” Regan asked as Madeline struggled to lift
her fork to her mouth without dropping food on Tyler.
    “ Please, leave him. This has
been the very best therapy.”
    “ I’m glad.”
    “ How is your recovery
going?” Emily asked in her calm, motherly manner.
    “ I think it’s going well.
The doctor gave me some medicine to help my blood count and to keep
me from getting sick.” She cut another piece of ham and managed it
into her