The Backup Plan. Sherryl Woods

at the chaos Dinah had created. “You’re too big for me to be following around after you and cleaning up your messes, young lady. You put those things back before your daddy gets home, you hear. He might not be so tolerant these days. You’re a grown-up woman who ought to know better than to mess with someone else’s things.”

      “It’s a few phone books, Maybelle. Not top secret files.”

      “In his mind, there’s not much difference.”

      Dinah laughed. “Stop fussing. I can handle Daddy.”

      After the housekeeper left, Dinah finally found the current Atlanta phone directory and flipped through the pages. She found two Robert Beauforts and one Bobby, but after calling all three numbers, it was evident none was the right man. She called information to see if there happened to be a more recent listing that hadn’t made the directory, but she struck out there, too.

      That left hotels and motels, she concluded with a sigh. She dragged over the Yellow Pages and started with the downtown hotels. It was a mindless, tedious task, but that was just about all she could cope with.

      She’d made at least a dozen fruitless calls, when she heard her father’s voice escalating in the foyer. It was countered by her mother’s equally exasperated response. Dinah sat there in shock. She’d never heard either of them raise their voices. It wasn’t that they hadn’t had disagreements. It was just that her mother especially had been brought up to believe that a raised voice was unseemly. She soothed and placated when it was called for. She certainly didn’t shout.

      Listening to them now, but unable to discern what the argument was about, Dinah sat frozen in place. She’d always assumed that her parents’ marriage was calm, if not passionate. She’d seen nothing since coming home to change that view. So, what had she missed? Was this heated discussion an anomaly or was it a significant symptom of a problem they’d been hiding from her? Did they feel free to argue now because they thought she was out of the house? Or were they so furious that they simply didn’t care if she overheard? Whatever the explanation was, hearing them was an unwelcome shock.

      She was tempted to open the door and step into the hallway, but concluded that would only embarrass all of them. She stayed where she was and hoped that her father would go upstairs to change clothes, rather than stepping directly into his den as he usually did.

      Luck wasn’t with her. The door to the den opened and he stalked into the room, slamming the door shut behind him. When he spotted Dinah, he stopped short. Embarrassment sent a tide of red flooding his handsome, patrician face.

      “You heard, I suppose,” he said, looking chagrined.

      “Just that you were arguing,” she said. “Not what it was about.”

      He nodded slowly. “That’s good, then.”

      “Can I help?”

      His lips curved slightly. “Your mother and I have been working out our own problems for a lot of years now. I don’t think we need counseling from you.”

      He said it without rancor, but somehow it stung. Dinah busied herself with putting away the phone directories to avoid having him see the hurt that was in her eyes. Maybe she hadn’t been around for years now, but she still considered herself to be a part of this family, not some intrusive outsider. Her father finally muttered a curse under his breath, then hunkered down beside her. “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings, Dinah. I was just trying to say that there’s no need for you to get all worked up over this. Your mother and I have been doing this a long time now. We’ve survived so far.”

      Dinah regarded him with disbelief. “I never once heard the two of you argue.”

      “Because we didn’t want you to,” he said reasonably. “Sounds as if we did one thing right.”

      She studied him curiously. “You did a lot of things right. You were great parents.”

      “Thanks for saying that, though it seems like you’re revising history a bit,” he said, his eyes suddenly sparkling with amusement. “Didn’t you tell us we were smothering you right before you left for New York and college?”

      “Of course I did,” she said, nudging him with her elbow. “How else do you think I’d have gotten out of here without drowning the two of you in tears? There was a part of me that wanted to stay right here in my safe little cocoon.”

      His expression sobered and he gave her a penetrating look. “Is that what you’re doing now, hunkering down someplace safe?”

      Apparently Dinah had always sold her father short. It seemed he had more intuition than she’d ever given him credit for. “Maybe just a little,” she admitted.

      “Did something happen over there?” he asked. “I mean something worse than the obvious mayhem you must have seen on a daily basis?” He searched her face, a worried crease in his forehead. “Dammit, Dinah, did someone hurt you?” he demanded angrily.

      She winced at his sharp tone. “A lot of things happened over there,” she said a little too lightly, hoping to change the entire tenor of the conversation. She knew the kind of things he must be imagining and she didn’t want to go there.

      “You know what I mean, Dinah,” he chided. “If there’s something on your mind, if you were hurt in some way—any way—you surely know that you can talk to me or your mother about it. Does it have anything to do with what happened a few months ago? Were you just covering up when you said you were fine so we wouldn’t worry?”

      “I am fine and I do know I can always talk to you.”

      He lifted his brows at her quick response. “Of course, you should know that, but just in case you’d rather talk to someone else, I do know a few people who are good listeners and more impartial than your mother and I.”

      She gave him a startled look. “You mean a shrink?” It was the very last thing she’d ever expected to hear her father suggest.

      He seemed amused by her surprise. “Yes, a shrink. There’s no shame in asking for help, Dinah. I imagine a lot of folks coming home from that war over there could use professional counseling to deal with what they’ve been through. When I came back from Vietnam, I wish I’d done that, rather than wrestling with all those demons on my own.”

      His admission barely registered, though she knew it was something she would ponder later. It wasn’t the same for her. She wasn’t a troubled soldier.

      “I don’t need a psychiatrist,” she said sharply. “I’m just a little tired. A couple more weeks of rest and I’ll be good as new.”

      Her father didn’t look as if he believed her, but he nodded finally. “So what were you looking for in here? Can I help?”

      She realized that he might very well know exactly how she could get in touch with Bobby, but she didn’t want to ask. She wasn’t entirely sure why, either. Maybe it was because she didn’t want to have to explain to her very traditional father why she wanted to find a man she hadn’t seen in more than a decade. Or maybe it was because she was afraid he, like Cord and Maggie, would not agree hers was a good idea and then withhold some crucial piece of information.

      “I’d just like to borrow one of your phone books, if you don’t mind,” she said.

      “Of course,” he said at once. “Just put it back when you’re finished.”

      “Believe me, I will,” she said fervently, taking the Atlanta directory and giving her father a quick kiss before heading back up to her room.

      She assured herself it was better to finish this search the way she’d started … on her own.

      After all, she thought a little ruefully, she’d been independent and proud of it for a number of years now. Somehow, though, in recent months independence had lost its allure.

      6

      Dorothy was still seething over her argument