Free Where Does My Heart Belong? by Libby Kingsley

eat our lunches under a big old tree.  He offers to share his
potato chips with me and I give him two of the oatmeal raisin cookies that Meg
baked.  He's a wonderful conversationalist and divides his attention between
the three of us, never leaving any of us feel left out.  When it's time to go back
to work, he reaches out, takes my hand, and kisses it.  "I'm glad I got to
meet you, Libby, I hope I’ll get to see you again."  Angie hugs Grandma
and me and then they're back in the truck headed to their next destination. 
What a wonderful, nice man, I think to myself.  It’s too bad I’m soured on men,
because contrary to what I told Grandma, this is one guy I’d really like to get
to know better.

 
    CHAPTER
17
    March
1972
     
    Later that evening
Grandma tells me about Tony.  He’s 32 and from Cuba.  He came to the U.S. when
he was ten years old.  The youngest of five children, he has three older
brothers and one sister.  The family is wealthy.  They are commercial growers
of thousands of acres of fruits, vegetables, and wine grapes.  Tony and his
father manage the business end of things and his three brothers manage the
crops.  They employ hundreds of people during the growing season.
    “Angelita is not Tony’s
biological daughter.  He had a relationship with her mother and got her
pregnant, or so he thought.  Being the decent man that he is, Tony stuck by
her.  Gave her a place to live and told her that he would take care of her and
the baby.  She wanted him to marry her, but he said no.  When the baby was
about 6 months old, Tony was convinced that she couldn’t be his.  She had fair
skin and blue eyes.  Angie’s mother was Mexicana, with dark skin and brown
eyes, as Tony has.  Tony confronted her about who the real father was but the
she insisted that he was her father.   One day Angie got hurt, and they typed her
blood in case she needed some. Her blood type is B negative, a rare type.  Tony
is O positive and her mother was A positive.  There’s no way that combination
can produce a B negative child.   When Tony learned this, he was determined to
get out of the relationship with her mother but he wanted to keep custody of
Angie.  Even though his name was on her birth certificate, the lawyers told him
that it probably wouldn’t happen.  Courts usually award custody to the mother. 
Then fate took it out of everybody’s hands when Angie’s mother was killed in a
car accident.  So, there you have it.”
    “Oh, my goodness, that
poor little thing will never know who her real parents are.”
    “That’s true, but Tony is
a wonderful father and Angie has Tony’s family who dote on her.”
    A couple of days later
I’m lying on my bed reading a good book when Grandma calls down and says there
is someone here to see me.  What the heck, I don’t know anybody who would come
to see me but I make my way upstairs to see who it is.  I can hear her and a
man laughing uproariously.  It’s Tony. 
    “My goodness, what’s all
this mirth and merriment?” I ask.
    “Tony has invited both of
us to take a tour of his family’s farms, and have dinner with his parents. 
What do you think, would you like to go?”
    “That sounds great.  I’d
love to go.  Thank you, Tony.  But what’s so funny about that.”
    “Nothing, your Grandma
was just telling me a funny story,” he says.  “How does Friday sound?  Plan to
stay overnight.  I’ll send a car for you.”
    “Oh, no, I want to drive. 
My new car is 2 years old and only has like 2,000 miles on it because I
never have any place to go.”
    “Okay, I’ll write down
the directions for you.” 
    ”Libby, take Tony
downstairs and show him our wine cellar and get his opinion of it and the
wines.”
    So I take him down and
show him the cellar.
    “Wow, this cellar is
really great, Libby, and you’ve got a fine selection here too, seeing that most
of them come from our winery,” he teases.  “Which is your