Just Like Yesterday (Magnolia Sisters Book 4)

Chapter One

Hazel entered the departure lounge of the Norman Manley International Airport in Kingston with one bag in hand, a throbbing headache, and a nagging feeling of guilt. She was dressed in an all-gray ensemble, which she hadn't bothered to change after attending the depressing funeral for her husband. He had asked to be cremated and his ashes put beside his father's in a mausoleum at the head offices of their family business in Texas.
She had stayed for the fiasco of the reading of the will, where his stiff-upper-lip family had treated her with barely-held contempt. His four sons, three daughters and their children had all stayed back in Baron’s lavish Florida mansion to hear what they would inherit from the rich oil businessman.
Even Hazel didn't know what to expect. She had gotten married to John because she wanted to be rich enough to fight for the right to see her son, Sebastian. John had told her that marrying him would be her ace card. He had gleefully told her that he also wanted to punish his over-entitled children.
And he had.
He had left the companies and the houses to them; most of those things had to stay in the family anyway. He had left her the house in Jamaica and an apartment building and a whopping, eye-watering five hundred million dollars—most of his personal fortune.
She still couldn't wrap her mind around the figure. She had gotten the bulk of his cash. He had given the rest of his large family, his three ex-wives, some charities, his old schools, and the workers who were close to him cash sums in the thousands. Nobody had gotten such a huge payout as her. Not even close.
When her sum had been read out, she could feel the palpable shudder of disbelief running through the room. Hazel had held her head ramrod straight, focusing on the lawyer and the shiny bald patch in the middle of his head and a wad of guilt had descended on her.
How many zeroes were in five hundred million dollars? The figure seemed so unreal to her.
She shouldn't have done it. She wanted to get back her son, but she shouldn't have married an old man to get him. Five hundred million was too much money! She couldn't spend that in this lifetime.
Remorse swept through her. She shouldn't have helped him to get back at his family. He said they were greedy, grasping leeches. He had even threatened to leave his fortune to his old cat, Mr. Pudding.
She had glanced at them surreptitiously as the figure sunk in. His three ex-wives were there. Sheila, the first wife who was probably not a day under eighty, was obviously agitated at the revelations. She was running her gnarled fingers through her blue hair and was practically frothing at the mouth. If she had not been in a wheelchair because of a recent hip surgery, she would probably have leaped at Hazel from across the room.
Her eyes met Hazel's, and it seemed as if she growled. Hazel had hastily looked away. The second and third wives had huddled with their respective broods and were whispering furiously.
"This is preposterous!" she heard one of them whispering fiercely. "She must have drugged him. Dad was not in his right mind! First, he married the help and then left her his money. We must contest it! We have to find a way to get this greedy, grasping pig out of the way."
Hazel flinched.
The lawyer, Mumsford, looked up at them blearily, as if in agreement. He was an old family retainer. He was a distinguished-looking gentleman who was in his mid-sixties. Hazel remembered him from a visit some months ago. He had argued with Baron about changing his will the way he did. She wasn't surprised that there was not a sympathetic figure in the crowd of hostile faces. He had been against the idea of Baron cutting out his family from the bulk of his cash wealth. And she couldn't blame them.
Sure, they hadn't treated her right from the get-go, but she was sure that if she was in their place, she would probably have the same attitude to an interloper. They were a rich family who could trace their lineage to the Mayflower.
Their forefathers had struck it rich in gold and then oil exploration, and John had taken his personal fortune and given it all to a nobody who didn't even have a family. If they knew that she was found on the steps of a shopping mall when she was a baby they would all be appalled.
Her eyes had met Edmond’s, the oldest son, who was sitting on the other side of the room. He had looked unconcerned; he was very rich in his own right and had left the family business years before because of a feud with his father.
He had nodded to her, almost approvingly, as if he liked the fallout that the will would cause. His son, who was sitting beside him, also looked pleased; he even winked at her. Hazel struggled to remember his name. She knew all the children's names. The grandchildren were a different matter; there were so many.
Hank. The name came back to her. When she first saw him, she had thought how different he looked from his blonde and blue-eyed relatives. He had dark brown hair, a heavy tan, and green eyes, the color of polished emeralds. He was thirty-something if she remembered correctly. He had tried chatting her up at the hospital when the rest of them had treated her as if she had the plague.
She dragged her eyes from Hank's and looked around to the rest of the family. They had all looked at her with varying degrees of dislike. Misplaced anger, if you asked her. She wasn't the one who rewrote the will and left herself five hundred million dollars!
Hazel couldn't wait to leave after the lawyer read the will; she was cheerily escorted out by Hank after shaking hands with Edmond, who wished her well.
"So where are you off to, Mrs. Baron?" Hank had asked her, a twinkle in his green eyes. "Some exotic city with a staff of a hundred to do your bidding?"
"No." Hazel failed to crack a smile though she saw that he was teasing. "I am heading back home, to Jamaica."
"The islands? How quaint. I thought that as a merry widow you would be off to conquer the world. Buy a chalet in France, a penthouse in Milan, a ginormous yacht to go sailing on the French Rivera?" Hank grinned. "The world is your oyster!"
"Jamaica is where my heart is right now," Hazel said tiredly. "And I just want to go home."
"Home," Hank said cheerfully. "That's an elusive place for me these days. I might come and check out Jamaica, maybe sometime next year. Granddad loved it. You obviously do too..."
"That would be marvelous!" Hazel had replied, injecting some enthusiasm into her voice. "Whenever you come by, I will be sure to welcome you. You and your dad are the only friendly faces around here."
She had slid into the waiting limousine that had been at her service for the duration of her stay in Florida.
And now here she was, back in Jamaica, rich beyond her wildest dreams, a multi-millionaire widow.
She contemplated taking a taxi home. She would probably reach there before the driver came to get her anyway; he had been expecting her on a later flight.
"Hazel Brown… er, Baron." She felt a tap on her shoulder, and she swung around.
A handsome guy was standing behind her. She looked up at him and swallowed. He was well over six feet tall. It was impossible not to notice how extremely handsome he was. He had his hair in low-cropped curls; honey-gold down-turned eyes surveyed her unsmilingly.
No wonder Caitlin had compared him to Jason Momoa!
"Curtis Decker!" Hazel gasped. "You look different without the locks."
"Thought it was time for a change," he said. "How are you, Mrs. Baron?"
"Uhm," Hazel swallowed. Curtis had an unsettling effect on her. "I am fine. Just getting back from my... er... husband's funeral. You can call me Hazel, you know."
"My condolences... Hazel," he said, pushing his hands into his jeans pockets. His muscles bunched when he did that, drawing her eyes to his powerful physique. She realized that he was dressed casually. He had no luggage either, just a carry-on bag like her. She looked around; maybe he had Sebastian with him?
"He is not here," Curtis said curtly as if he read her mind. "You promised that you would call me so we could talk."
"Sorry," Hazel sighed. "I was in Florida. I tried calling you to let you know I was going to be away, but I didn't get through and then I got caught up in a whirlwind of craziness. I am sorry."
"No need to apologize. I wasn't around either. I had some business to take care of in Canada. Now I am back home."
"For good?" Hazel asked, her voice hitching at the question. That meant that Sebastian would be here with him. This was turning out even better than she thought it would. She would get to see her son all the time. She could fight for him easier here. Well, not that it would matter where he was, she now had the means to do anything and she would.
"Yes." Curtis regarded her solemnly. "For good. It is a decision that is long overdue. Sebastian loves it here. I recently bought a house, and I can work anywhere in the world."
"What do you do?" Hazel asked curiously. She had always been curious about him, from the moment she realized that his parents had taken her son, but he had ended up raising him.
"I am an architect," he said, "and we own a restaurant franchise. Surely you have been to Rizzle before. I have seen you there more than once." He then looked at his watch. "Want a lift home, or is someone coming to pick you up?"
"I was just considering taking a taxi," Hazel said. "My driver doesn't know that I am here. I got an earlier flight."
"Well, let's go then," Curtis said, striding toward the exit sign. She grabbed her hand luggage and hurried behind him. She had a million and one questions to ask him. Why was he the one taking care of her son and why on earth did his parents adopt him?
Whether Curtis Decker liked it or not, she was about to get back her son, and she would fight tooth and nail to get him. She now had the means, and she was going to use it.

****

Curtis looked over at Hazel as she slid into his car. The clip that held back her hair had come loose, and her hair had escaped its enforced enclosure and was bunched up at the back of her neck in ringlets.
Individually her features were quite interesting: an upturned nose that gave her a cute, almost inquisitive air, finely-arched brows above deep brown eyes and bow-shaped, kissable lips which looked like they were always on the verge of smiling. In a moment her face could change from cute girl next door to classically beautiful.
Like now she was cute. She turned to him, interrupting his cataloging of her features. She smiled at him shyly.
"Ready?" she asked breathlessly. Her light brown skin revealed just how uncomfortable she was. Her ears were turning red. She was acting shy, almost innocent. He found that contrast uniquely interesting. She was a widowed mother of one, and she still had that innocent air about her.
"Ready." He smiled. "You are very interesting. Pardon me for staring."
Hazel cleared her throat. "Why do you say that?"
"Well, you are Sebastian's mother," Curtis said. "And the widow of a very wealthy man. I am sure there is quite a story."
Hazel grimaced. "Well..."
"Which you don't have to tell me about now," Curtis said hurriedly. "I don't want you to feel uncomfortable."
Hazel cleared her throat. "Can you tell me about Sebastian? Now that you are in Jamaica, can I see him?"
Curtis regarded her in amazement and then started the car. "Sure, you can see him. I have always wanted the two of you to get to know each other better... but we were living in different countries and..."
He paused so long and had such a faraway look in his eyes that Hazel looked across at him sharply. "And?"
Curtis snapped himself out of whatever self-induced trance he was in. "And you had some growing up to do. I was waiting for the right time to approach you..." He paused. "You haven't fully recovered your memory, have you?"
"No," Hazel said slowly. "So this means that you knew about me all along?"
"Yes," Curtis sighed. "I have had Sebastian since he was a year old. I took him from my parents as soon as I got settled in Canada."
"But why?" Hazel asked. "I mean you are young, right? Why didn't your parents want him anymore? Why did they steal him from me in the first place?"
Curtis frowned; his heart jerked at the passion in her face. Sebastian really got her riled up. She might not know who his father was, but she obviously felt passionately toward her child and strongly about his parents having taken him.
"Yes, I am fairly young," he said as he turned toward the major roadway. "I am seven years older than you are."
Hazel frowned. "You know my age?"
"Yep," Curtis said. "I know your age."
"So obviously you know that I was a teenager when I got pregnant?"
Curtis glanced at her. "That sounds defensive. Are you sensitive about that?"
"What else do you know about me?" Hazel didn't respond to his question. She curled her fingers together and clenched them in her hand; that was answer enough for him.
"Did you have me investigated?" she demanded aggressively. She looked like a little trussed up cat with her pink lips, her curls bouncing all over her head.
Curtis tried to get the image of her as a cat out of his head, but it stuck there. If she were a cat now, she would be bristling or snarling. She looked like she wanted to throttle him for having her investigated.
"Yes, I did, and aren't you happy I did? I am offering you the chance to have a relationship with your son. That would not have happened if I had not tracked you down and found out who you were."
"Well..." All the fight left her voice. "Thank you, I guess. I don't get why your parents went through the trouble of stealing him in the first place..."
"They didn't steal him," Curtis interrupted her. "You were a pregnant teenager living in a home, and you had amnesia. Your situation was not good. How were you going to take care of a child? You don't even know who his father is."
Hazel stiffened. Curtis could see from the corner of his eye that he had hit a nerve. So she really didn't remember anything about Sebastian's conception.
For a long while, he had wondered if she had just made up that story to save face. He had even wondered if she wanted contact with Sebastian. She had jumped to get married to a ridiculously wealthy old man last year to Curtis that had seemed as if she did not want anything to do with her child but was more into material things.
Now he was rethinking his initial thoughts about her.
She really had amnesia. She had no clue, and her reaction was no pretense. She was in genuine turmoil about that summer when she lost her memory.
He sneaked a covert peek at her. No clue whatsoever. He had never known anyone with that problem before. He wanted to ask her more about it, but she had a shuttered expression on her face.
Mentioning Sebastian's father was obviously a no-go area. He made a mental note of that.
He turned on his CD player and turned the volume really low. He would wait until she was ready to talk to him again.
She was silent for so long he had almost reached Mountain View Avenue, twenty minutes into the drive before she said something.
"That's the same song you are playing over and over again." She looked at him interestedly, her spark restored, the bloom back in her cheeks and her eyes once again vibrant.
"I didn't even notice I had it on repeat." He pressed a button, and another song started playing. "I seem to have a thing for that particular song."
"Always on My Mind by DaVille." Hazel looked at him curiously. "You have somebody special on your mind?"
Curtis pondered how to answer that. He ended up with a cryptic, "Maybe."
She looked uncomfortable at the thought, and that satisfied him somewhat. He hastened to reassure her. "Don't worry, I have no plans to supply Sebastian with a stepmother anytime soon."
Hazel nodded. "Well, that's good news. Well... not that I mean, it's not as if I would care..."
Curtis chuckled. He couldn't help it she was sputtering so much. He decided to help her out.
"I understand that you want to get to know Sebastian without competition from any other female in my life. I get that."
"Yes." Hazel breathed out deeply. "Yes, that's it."
"Tell me about your memory loss," Curtis asked softly.
Hazel rubbed her temples before she spoke.
"I lost six months of my memory after I fell at a party. I don't remember the party, by the way. Apparently, there was a shootout and a stampede…I fell and hit my head. The doctors said that I may get back my memories one day. The main doctor who deals with this kind of thing, Dr. Jerome, said I should not force it."
She sighed. "I am hopeful though. My sister Casey had a similar issue, but hers was trauma-based, and she got her memory back. It took her many years, but I have hope that I will get mine back too."
"Years... before you remember who Sebastian's father really is." Curtis glanced at her. "That must suck."
"Listen, I am not promiscuous." Hazel turned in her seat, almost fully, to look at him. Her eyes were blazing. "I never had a boyfriend before him, whoever he is, and then I found out that I was pregnant."
"I never said you were promiscuous," Curtis pointed out, wishing that he had never mentioned Sebastian's father again; it was apparently her hot button issue. "I am sorry that you would think that I even implied it."
"I doubt there are a load of candidates for the position. I don't know who it could be or who I could let...anyway, your parents took my baby without my permission. The home had no right to give him up!"
"You were under eighteen," Curtis said soothingly. "You were their charge."
"But they could have kept him. They do it for other girls. I didn't even get the chance to say goodbye to him, one moment I had him, and then the nurses took him away. They said your parents were waiting outside. That was the first time I knew that they were going to give away my baby. I loved Sebastian from the first moment I saw him. I wanted him with me. He was my baby!"
She was getting passionate and upset again. Curtis shifted the subject smoothly.
"It's curious that you named him Sebastian." He turned into the upscale neighborhood where Hazel lived.
"Why is that?" Hazel asked. Her voice was wobbly after the emotional outburst. "It is a nice name."
"Yes, it is. My twin brother who died in childbirth was Sebastian," Curtis said grimly.
"When you insisted that your baby be called Sebastian my parents were quite happy to comply. Apparently, at the hospital you kept screaming, ‘I want Sebastian back; give me back my baby.’"
"And nobody listened to me." Hazel frowned, reliving the sense of hopelessness she had felt at the time. She dragged her mind from that and focused on Curtis. "That's a strange coincidence, though, with the names."
Curtis grunted. "I'd say."
Hazel looked out the car window and saw that he had made a wrong turn.
She glanced at him; his expression was slightly grim as if he remembered something distasteful.
"You made the wrong turn. I live on Palm Drive."
"I know where you live," Curtis said. "I live on Westchester Street. Right here."
He slowed the car in front of a large Mediterranean-style dwelling with a circular driveway in the front. There were small trees planted along the front lawn, which was obviously recently planted. They had not evened out yet there were still patches of dirt between them.
"It's nice. Your lawn will look gorgeous when the grass fills in." Hazel looked across at him. "We live pretty close to each other."
"Yes, I know." Curtis sighed. "That was a factor in me getting this place and renovating it. Besides that the location is good."
"So you really want me to be a part of Sebastian's life?" Hazel whispered hoarsely. "I must confess I was prepared for a fight with your parents, not this acceptance."
Curtis shrugged. "No need to fight; he's in my full care. He's my child, not theirs, and I am of the view that a boy needs his mother. It is my opinion that the softer side is important for a more balanced life."
"Why did they adopt him just to give him to you?" Hazel frowned. "Did they get tired of him or something?"
"No." Curtis tapped his fingers on the steering wheel as if he was considering how much to tell her. "My mom was diagnosed with stage three cancer when he was six months old. Luckily, they caught it early, but she was in and out of the hospital for a while. My mother is better now but having a new baby and dealing with a life-threatening illness was a huge strain on the two of them. I had just finished my internship at an architect's firm, so I took Sebastian soon after that."
"That's truly amazing." Hazel looked at him, a little glow in her eyes. "A twenty-four-year-old guy taking a baby. Really amazing. Don't you have other older siblings?"
"Yes, two brothers. They couldn't take Sebastian at the time, not that I asked. I lived with my aunt and uncle in Canada. I had more than enough help. They are a childless couple, and they loved having Sebastian around."
"You must love kids, though, to have taken him," Hazel said. "Very unusual for a guy your age."
"I love him," Curtis said. "I don't know about kids in general; didn't know I loved kids till I met him. He's the best kid in the world. Having him around is like seeing life through new eyes. Children are a blessing. So I know how you feel, okay?"
"Ah," Hazel smiled at him happily; it seemed as if her dark brown eyes were glowing. "So when can I meet him? I am dying to meet him. I have scores of pictures. I even had a detective follow the two of you once; he's a beautiful child."
Curtis couldn't help himself; he touched her cheek gently. “You will soon. He is with my parents in Trinidad. We have a couple of restaurants there, and they do a yearly checkup on the franchises. They will be back in a week. One of the perks of being homeschooled is he can go anywhere at any time. I intend to enroll him in school for the New Year, though. I think he needs to socialize with other children his age."
He didn't imagine it; she pressed her cheek into his palm firmly. He allowed his finger to run across her silken skin. A wave of longing rising up within him. He struggled to quash it.
He pulled away his hand jerkily and then cleared his throat.
"So now you know where I live. In time we can share the care of Sebastian. Unfortunately, I have a meeting with my partner, Brandon Blake. We worked together on a project in Canada. We still have some stuff to do on that job, but we just acquired offices in New Kingston, and we have a new contract. We have to hit the ground running, I am afraid."
Hazel nodded. "Well, uhm, congrats."
She sounded disappointed, though, like she had wanted to talk to him some more. That did his heart good because he was more than curious about her. He wanted to get to know her properly.
He wanted to know why she had married the old Baron guy. Just when he had been on the verge of making his move to approach her last year she had upped and married the rich old man. She had set back his plans by a year. And he must admit that he had felt angry and disappointed at the time.
"We can get lunch together tomorrow," Curtis said smoothly. None of the emotions he was harboring showed in his voice. "Surely if we are going to share Sebastian we should get to know each other better."
"Yes. Definitely." Her eyes lit up again.
Curtis looked at her so long he forgot to start the car to drop her home.