Painting Home

A Company of Snipers Short Story

 

Tired out from the short drive home from the hospital, Lacy sank into the plush leather of her very own easy chair with her firstborn son. She had it all. A handsome new husband who doted on her hand and foot, a darling baby boy with lots of dark, curly hair like his dad, and her first home in the ‘burbs. So why was her heart pounding to beat the band again?

It made no sense. For the first time since she and Jake had moved into the charming fixer-upper in Alexandria, Virginia, it creeped her out. Seriously. They’d spent months house hunting until this particular one called to the both of them. Yet now, it felt—haunted. Lacy knew ghosts, and she couldn’t shake the unsettling sensation at the back of her neck that someone was looking over her shoulder this morning. Watching. Waiting.

At first glance, the house was nothing more than a brick box, a perfect starter home, if you didn’t mind investing weeks of sweat labor and tons of elbow grease. Unfortunately, the most recent tenant hadn’t cared for it properly, which got them evicted. But man. The interior was a disaster with holes punched through the sheetrock walls, deeply soiled and matted carpets that should have been burned instead of hauled to the dump, and an odor that led them to stacks of garbage bags in the basement.

The outside was no better. Weeds had overtaken the flowerbeds beside the concrete front porch. Not to be outdone, the died-and-gone-to-goat-head-hell lawn boasted nothing but the promise of a lot of hard work in Jake and Lacy’s future. The frayed blue tarp that had dangled dangling by nylon ties off the carport had truly been the icing on the cake. The place had absolutely no curb appeal, and nothing going for it. They really should have run from the money-sucking-pit. But then...

They bought the place. Something about it had cried out for rescue to Lacy that day. All it needed was a little—make that a lot—of TLC, and she’d felt certain that it could be turned into a home again. It had been once. She could feel honest vibes from the poor place. It had potential.

Further investigation proved her right. Once upon a time, someone had done a bang-up job remodeling the interior of the place. Walls had been moved where two of the three bedrooms had been converted into a master suite, complete with a walk-in closet. How cool was that? The lavishly tiled, adjoining bathroom with the sunken tub also testified of someone with definite carpentry skills in the house’s past.

Jake was the one who’d said it first, when they’d stopped at the curb. “This is it.”

Lacy had agreed wholeheartedly—then. But now? Now she had a baby to feed and a jittery case of nerves. Motherhood seemed a daunting task for the Marine she was at heart, and bringing her brand new baby home turned out to be the pinnacle of stress.

She hadn’t been around many babies growing up. Had no sisters or brothers. No cousins, nieces, or nephews. Give her an artist’s palette, her camera, or an M16 any day. Those things she understood, but the infant who now relied on her for every second of his care, his future, and his next meal? Just too much!

“Found it,” Jake called from the baby’s room. He’d left Raymond Elias, so named after Lacy’s and Jake’s paternal grandfathers, in the twitchy fingers of his exhausted mother like she knew what she was doing simply because she’d given birth. The funny guy.

Lacy forced a confident smile as Jake strolled into the living room with the powder blue baby blanket Kelsey Stewart had made. He’d positioned her chair near the living room picture window. Now shuttered with hunter-green shutters that offset the crisp red of their freshly power-washed brick home, the spotless windows let in the lovely view of her re-sodded front lawn. Lacy wished she could enjoy it.

He’d been extra busy while she was in the hospital. Her home now boasted new paint throughout, a sprinkling system to tend both front and back lawns, and matching hunter green trim along the eaves and windows. He’d divested the piles of garbage and junk in the basement and attic.

A crew was due early Monday morning to enclose the carport, turning it into a garage, complete with a garage door opener. How cool was that? To a girl who’d been living in a cramped tiny apartment and parking in an uncovered, assigned parking stall for the past couple years, this place felt like a mansion. She had a full-sized kitchen for heaven’s sake. A sunken tub that, now sanitized and sparkling clean, she loved to lounge in.

Baby Ray curled his entire hand around Lacy’s pinkie finger, and that went a long way to calming her, so why was she still on edge? Maybe because her perfect little home had also once boasted a high-end security alarm system, and the leftover frazzled magnetic tapes on every window declared a scary need to keep someone out. The frayed wires from security cameras dangling under the eaves warned of unscrupulous neighbors. Or stalkers. Or worse.

“What’s wrong?” Jake asked as he covered her and Baby Ray with the blanket. “Did the trip home wear you out? Can I get you something to drink? Are you hungry?”

Ah, she loved him so hard. “I’m fine. Just crabby.”

He dropped to his knee at her side and reached one hand to the nape of her neck. Drawing her forward, he kissed her forehead. “Not crabby. Just tired. Want me to take him off your hands while you catch a few winks? I can do that, you know.”

Closing her eyes, Lacy pulled the spicy scent of her man into her soul. He’d brought so many things with him into their marriage, but the smell of him was her number one favorite. She craved it now, the strength of him, the intimacy of his touch, and his steady foresight. Tears blurred her vision at the ways he’d changed right before her eyes. The scruffy vagrant he’d once been was gone, replaced by a fiercely protective, clean-shaven male who—most days—seemed ready to fight the world again.

Lacy squeezed her eyes to stave off the flood of tears that came at the thought of how much she loved this guy and what she wouldn’t do for him. Hormones! Who knew they ruled the world like they did? Her breasts ached like two bags of milk about to burst, and her heart hurt because she should be better than this, not falling apart like some sniveling woman who couldn’t take care of a little seven pound infant. Her baby!

Jake looked past her to the front walk. “Don’t look now, but Alex and Kelsey are here. Damn. Gabe and Shelby, too.” He pushed to his feet. “We’ve got company.”

“Oh, great,” Lacy said, not feeling up for visitors. Why couldn’t everyone leave her alone?

“Enter,” Jake announced proudly from the new steel security door he’d installed all by himself just days ago. The man couldn’t seem to do enough with their home. “Mi casa es su casa.”

He loved saying that. Lacy brushed her tangled hair behind her ears, determined to look more energetic than she felt, but really. Didn’t these people know a new mother needed rest? They should’ve come tomorrow. Maybe next week. At the very least, they should’ve called.

Kelsey stepped over the threshold first, her eyes wide and bright as she scanned the hall to her left. Chocolate fudge tangles curled over her shoulders. Dressed in jeans and a soft pink blouse, she smiled, but a shadow shifted across her pretty face. She schooled it quickly, but what was that about anyway? Could she smell the lingering scent of garbage? Lacy doubted it, but suddenly, her feminine territorial radar was on full alert.

Alex entered second, his hand at the small of Kelsey’s back. Like his wife, he’d dressed casually. Jeans. Gray polo shirt. Boots. Blue eyed, dark-haired, and the most intense man Lacy had every met, his razor sharp gaze zeroed straight to the backdoor Jake had recently painted a clean, crisp white. If Lacy didn’t know better, she’d swear Alex had been in this home before the way his eyes quartered the house from left to right, rear to back. Interesting.

Gabe and Shelby ducked through the front door together, his arm around her shoulders. Like Alex and Kelsey, they wore jeans. Shelby’s were black, Gabe’s faded blue and torn at both knees. Shelby was one of those tiny women who looked almost pixyish, not that Lacy would ever tell her that. Her blond hair cascaded in fluffy curls over a tiny white t-shirt that stretched tight over her breasts but barely covered her tummy.

Gabe on the other hand, towered over her like a bodyguard. His t-shirt declared allegiance to some hotrod club, Cruisin’ Nova Knights. Lacy couldn’t help but shiver as their gazes settled to the junction in the hall that separated her cozy but small living room from the newly restored kitchen. The sensation of being watched prickled up her spine again. What the heck?

“Wow,” Kelsey said breathlessly, her nose wrinkled. “Fresh paint. You guys have been busy.”

“That would be Jake,” Lacy said. “I’ve been too busy being pregnant to paint.”

Jake grinned in his humble way, a bright red flush creeping into his cheeks. His hands went deep into his jeans pockets. “What can I say? A man likes to work on his castle, and I can’t seem to do enough around here. I knew Lacy’d be worn out when she got home with the baby and all, and…” His voice trailed away as their visitors’ gaze drifted elsewhere. “What’s up, Boss?”

He’d picked up on the same strange vibes resonating from the Stewarts and Cartwrights that Lacy detected. A chill whispered over the fine hairs at the back of her neck. Someone else was here, damn it. Unseen and silent maybe, but she could feel—him! Aha. I have a male ghost in my house, but who could it be? Why now? Why today?

Alex turned on Jake then, his palm still protectively at his wife’s back. “Do you know what you’ve done?”

“I do,” Jake declared, his shoulders squared as if ready to fight, and Lacy felt that way too. She didn’t care who these folks thought they were. They had no right showing up unannounced and acting so proprietary. “I bought a home for my wife and my son,” Jake said.

Kelsey stepped between the men, blinking, her big brown eyes shimmering. “Yes, and it’ll be the perfect home for your little family, Jake,” she soothed. “We wanted to help with the renovations, but Alex and I have been in Oregon a couple weeks. My sister’s husband hurt his back, so Alex helped bring in the hay for him. Congratulations on becoming a first time homeowner and a Dad! What did you decide to name your son?”

Lacy cocked her head, trying to figure out what was truly going on. Kelsey had said the right words, but there was something left unspoken in her eyes. Whatever this off-balance, creepy sensation climbing up Lacy’s spine was, she’d sort it out later. “Come meet Raymond Elias,” she said proudly. “Raymond after my grandpa, and Elias after Jake’s grand—”

With a startled cry, Kelsey turned into Alex, her hands on his chest. “Raymond. Did you hear that? They named him Raymond.”

Alex just stared like he owned the place, damn it. These people were bugging the shit out of Lacy with everything they weren’t saying. “What?” she asked point blank. “You all know something about this house, don’t you? Spit it out.”

Shelby’s head bobbed and Gabe opened his mouth to say something, but Alex beat him to it. “This cracker box used to belong to me,” he bit out, his gaze down the hall to the master bedroom and his jaw clenched tight.

“It was our home,” Kelsey corrected softly. “We lived here for years before—”

“Before I killed a man in it,” Gabe ended, his usually soft green eyes narrowed and hard.

“Shit,” Jake hissed. He couldn’t get back to Lacy’s side fast enough. “Here? You sure about that?” The world felt better the moment he settled one hand to her shoulder, but why was he rattled while she seemed calm?

Alex nodded, his eyes grim. “Right here in this room. Ever hear of Ron Fallon? Chaos Now?”

Lacy shook her head, but those names jostled something loose in Jake’s mind. He remembered reading about the treacherous VPOTUS somewhere, maybe at Zach’s house or a newstand. He’d been living on the streets then. “Weren’t they involved with Vice President Winston’s treason a couple years back? We all heard about the helo going down on the White House lawn that night. That was you who took him out, wasn’t it?”

Alex neither confirmed nor denied, but Gabe spoke up. “There were a lot of people involved in that mess. Mark Houston. Zack Lennox. Me, Kelsey and Shelby, but yeah, Winston was behind Chaos Now. He masterminded Ron Fallon’s scheme to bring the District to its knees with a dirty bomb. He had big plans for this country that didn’t work out like he’d planned.” His gaze shifted to Alex. “I can’t tell you all Alex went through, but Fallon followed Shelby and me back here the same night Winston died in that crash.”

“He shot Gabe,” Shelby said. “Right in this room, but then Gabe killed him, and I... and I…”

You fell apart, Jake thought. Shelby suffered from a case of PTSD comparable to what some of the guys coming back from the sandbox endured. Jake didn’t know what triggered it, but that explained Gabe being overly protective where his wife was concerned. Even now he had one arm circling her waist and her waif-like body aligned with his. Normally an easygoing guy, he didn’t look too happy being back at his ground zero.

“It’s okay, Shelby. You don’t have to remember if you don’t want to,” Lacy said quietly. “Want to meet my baby boy?”

“Yes, please.” Shelby blew out a shaky breath and took a seat in the corner of the couch nearest Lacy. Visibly shaken, the poor woman was wound as tight as if that shooting had just taken place.

Lacy must’ve picked up on that vibe. She shifted Baby Ray into Shelby’s outstretched hands, and, with a sigh, Shelby tossed her blonde hair back over her shoulder and tucked the little guy’s head into her neck to snuggle him. The little guy moaned and instantly, motherly instinct kicked in and her body began to sway. “He’s so small,” she told Lacy as she tilted forward and backward, the same way Jake found himself doing when he held his little man.

“I know, right?” Lacy grinned, her first real smile since she’d been home. “I’m so afraid I’ll hurt him when I feed him. He’s so tiny.”

“He’s tougher than he looks,” Alex cut in gruffly, and in that instant, it seemed even the rafters in the house took a deep breath, sighed, and relaxed along with Shelby.

Kelsey joined her on the couch, cooing over the new arrival. Jake closed in on Gabe and Alex in the hall, wanting all the details. To find out now that he’d bought not only his boss’s old place but a prior crime scene was disconcerting at the least. Weren’t there laws requiring real estate agents to conceal that kind of horrific information to prospective buyers?

“Where’s Suzette?” Lacy asked after Gabe and Shelby’s daughter.

“She’s with my mom and dad,” Shelby said as she licked her lips. “I didn’t want to bring her here. She doesn’t need to hear how her daddy nearly died. It still gives me nightmares.”

“Can I get you folks a drink?” Jake offered, finally remembering his manners. “Coffee? Beer? Lemonade?” He ended up bringing beer for Alex and Gabe, lemonade for the ladies.

Gabe took a thirsty pull on his long neck and explained, “I woke up alone that night and went looking for Shelby. By then, the president was safe, and the bomb was disarmed. We should’ve been home free, but Fallon was here. He had his hands on her, and God, I’ve never been so scared in my life.”

Alex dragged his fingers through his dark hair and down the back of his neck. “Fallon was running for his life. Somehow he suspected I was working with the FBI, and he wanted revenge. Zack already had Kelsey stashed at another location, but damn it to hell. I thought I’d arrived too late again.”

Jake nodded as more details came back to him about that horrendous few weeks in The TEAM’s history. Under orders from President Adams, the FBI had ‘shot’ Alex in his own parking garage. They made everyone believe that the number one sniper on the East Coast had been assassinated, when he’d really gone—albeit involuntarily—deep undercover to serve his president. That cleverly planned tactic had to have been a time of pure hell for Kelsey, but the ruse fooled VP Winston into believing that Alex was sick unto death of the politics running rampant in America, and that he wanted change badly enough to betray his wife, his president, and his team.

Winston fell for it. Alex infiltrated the conspiracy of Chaos Now. Days after the nation was once again secure, President Adams showed up at TEAM headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia, and explained the plot to the men and women Alex had inadvertently betrayed.

Shelby’s head came up from snuggling Baby Ray. “It was awful. Gabe almost died. I nearly lost him.”

He tapped his upper chest. “Fallon missed my heart, though I was sure I was seeing ghosts for a minute there. Turned out to be Alex. Damned glad to see you that night, Boss.”

Alex grunted. “Son-of-a-bitchin’ bastard.”

That made Jake smile. Alex was one bad-assed man’s man, born to lead and die in the process. A hard but fair taskmaster, he expected perfection from his men and women, but mostly, from himself. Knowing he’d arrived in the nick of time to save Gabe’s life that night cast a different light on Fallon’s death. Yes, a fatality had happened in Jake’s new home, but what a testament to honor and valor. To courage and loyalty. There weren’t enough leaders like Alex in the world.

“So what’s the deal with Raymond?” Jake had to ask. He hadn’t missed the way Kelsey had gone pale and leaned into Alex at the mention of Jake’s son’s given name.

“Ah, that.” Again, Alex raked a hand through his hair, and Jake noticed the silver at his temples. Alex had to be in his late thirties, too young to be showing the wear and tear of his chosen profession. “Kelsey? Would you mind? You’re better at telling that story than I am.”

Her face brightened. “Sure. I love talking about my boys.”

Gabe plopped cross-legged on the floor opposite Shelby while Kelsey told how she’d lost her two small sons to her murderous first husband before she’d met Alex. As hard as that was to hear, she continued through her unexpected love affair with the grouchy owner of this little home. “I was a mess back then, and what’d he do? He whisked me out here to the East Coast and he saved my life is what he did.”

Still standing in the hall doorway, Alex looked out the kitchen window at time or two instead of adding to the tale. But God, what these two people had suffered on their way to happily-ever-after. Not only had Kelsey’s ex killed her two baby boys, but the rat bastard had nearly killed her and Alex at a later date, too.

“For a while, we were happy here,” Kelsey insisted, her eyes warm and her tone wistful. Jake believed her.

“Not me,” Alex grumped, his gaze still out the back window. “I wanted to buy her the moon, but the damned woman wouldn’t move.”

She giggled. This pretty abused woman who’d survived more than her share of crap—giggled!—like a happy little girl. “Oh, Alex, you know I couldn’t leave this place. It was your home, and the first time I’d been happy in a long time. You gave me that. How could I have left it behind?”

He turned and winked then. And there it was again—the invisible bond between one hard-assed warrior and his queen, reminding Jake of his feelings for Lacy. A smile crept over his mouth, curving his lips. He chanced a glance in her direction, and there she was. His queen. Smiling at him as if she’d read his mind.

“So...” Kelsey drew in a deep breath. “How do I describe Raymond…?” Another sigh. “I guess you could say he was a lost little boy who got tangled up with a bitter older woman.”

“Ethel Durrant. Kelsey’s ex mother-in-law,” Alex bit out. “The bitch. Another close call.” The man couldn’t seem to speak without swearing.

“Yes, but Alex,” Kelsey said. “You saved me that time.”

“Like hell I did.” He snorted. “You ended Ethel before I got there with Harley and Judy. You showed the whole damned world how much better than her you were.”

Kelsey’s shoulders lifted, her eyes shimmering under Alex’s praise. “But I still lost him.”

“You never stood a chance, honey,” Alex replied, his voice gone soft and kind. “Acromegaly ended Raymond long before you met him. He was already living on borrowed time.”

“But I didn’t know that then. All I knew was he was my second chance to make up for losing my sons, and I failed him.”

“You made him happy,” Alex said, a definite hint of tenderness in his gruff voice. “Probably for the first time in his life, he had someone who really cared for him, and that person was you.”

She nodded, her eyes brimming. “Yes. I did. I still do.”

Jake watched the way these two talked, not tearing each other apart as much as building each other up. They loved each other and it showed.

“What’s acromegaly?” Lacy asked.

“A dysfunction of the pituitary gland,” Kelsey explained. “Raymond was a very big man with the mind of a very little boy. The first time I saw him, he scared the daylights out of me. I thought he was a giant, but he was so sweet, it was impossible not to fall in love with him.”

“Seven feet, three inches tall and built like a damned brick shithouse,” Alex said. “Four hundred pounds. Over-sized head. Protruding forehead with one thick, black unibrow that made him look like Frankenstein’s monster.”

“Poor Raymond had a bad heart and other health problems due to his disproportionate size,” Kelsey added.

“Kelsey collects strays,” Alex grumbled like that explained everything.

Her lashes fell to the slender fingers she was wringing on her lap. “Yes, I’m afraid I do, but I’d do it all again. Raymond needed someone to love him. Ethel used food to entice him to kidnap me. He was so hungry from living on the streets, and she knew just how to trap him. She had him dig a hole, a grave really, for me out west in the Shenandoah Forest. I was supposed to die there, and she meant for no one to find me. She did it to torture Alex, because she blamed him for her son’s death, which wasn’t true. Harley ended Nick, but that’s another story. Poor Raymond never understood how twisted she was. He wasn’t made that way. He only cared about the hamburgers she’d bought his soul with.”

Kelsey wiped one slender finger under her eye. “One day she left him alone, and he let me go. We ran away together, but we got lost. The last day in the Shenandoah, she caught up with us, and she nearly killed me. But I knew that if I died, if I let her win, she’d kill Raymond, so I... so I…” She swallowed hard. “I defended myself, but it was too much for Raymond. He died there under the trees and I miss him.”

“We can stop by our family plot on our way home if you’d like,” Alex said.

So tough guy Alex had buried a stranger in his family plot? Jake didn’t miss the desperate plea hidden within his boss’s words. Like any man who loved his wife, Alex would do anything to make her smile.

Kelsey nodded. “I’d like that, Alex, but Jake? Lacy? Don’t you find it strange that you bought Alex’s old house and—?”

“Your old house,” Alex cut in.

Now it was her turn to wink. “Yes, my home,” she corrected before she turned back to Jake. “You also named your baby, Raymond. That isn’t a trendy, popular name, and to be honest, it surprised me to hear it again, especially here.” Her fingertips fluttered over her heart.

“Tell me about him,” Lacy said.

Jake recognized the command in her voice and the light in her eyes. The ghosts she painted home always brought it shimmering to the surface like a sympathetic echo lifted up from her soul. A glow really, it radiated in all of her paintings as if she gave part of herself away to each ghost she enabled to go home.

“I have a picture if you’d like to see him.” Kelsey reached for the cell phone in her pocket. Thumbing it to life, she handed it over. “There. That’s my Raymond.”

Jake ducked closer to Lacy, needing to see the lost boy Kelsey had befriended and loved. It was a photo of an artist’s rendering, a pencil sketch. But whoa! Alex was right. This was no boy, but an adult male with the bulky body of a monster. A gentle smile graced his crooked face but those brows…

“He has blue eyes,” Lacy said brightly, as if that were a good thing. Of course, she’d noticed that, not the monster-at-first-glance. And she’d spoken wisely. In the present tense. Has. Not had.

“It’s no wonder he scared you,” Jake said. Imagine running into that guy in the dark.

Alex finally joined Kelsey, his arm stretched behind her back on the couch, his other hand cupping her knee. “He scared everyone, poor kid.”

Jake bonded with Alex in that instant. They had something in common. They both needed to touch the women who’d saved—yes, saved—them. Alex might be the supreme alpha at war and at work, but he was right when he’d said Kelsey collected strays. Apparently, Lacy did, too.

Lacy traced her fingertips over the sketched shaggy head of the man-child that Kelsey still loved. This was the presence she’d felt in her new home, the one watching and waiting. She was sure of it. That evil Fallon guy Gabe that killed wasn’t the one who needed to go home. It was this lost soul who, apparently, still loved Kelsey like a little boy loved his mother. Raymond hadn’t been watching Lacy as much as waiting for his mom to come save him again. And here she was.

“Would you like me to paint him home for you?” Lacy asked Kelsey.

“No, I’m good,” she said, shaking her head, not that Lacy believed her. “I’ve made my peace with what happened with Raymond and my boys. It’s okay. Save your talent for people who really need it.”

“I’m sorry. I should have asked that differently. I meant to say: May I paint Raymond home for him?” Lacy offered quietly. “I think this is more about Raymond and what he needs, not what you need. What if he hasn’t made his peace with what happened in the Shenandoah, with leaving you? What if he’s been waiting for you to come rescue him again? To show him the way?”

“He never had the chance to tell you goodbye,” Alex told his wife. “That had to be as hard on him as it was for you.”

“I know but…” Kelsey’s lips pinched as her eyes flooded. “Oh, God, I don’t know if I can go through it again.”

“Sure you can, honey. You’d do anything for your boys, wouldn’t you?” Alex knew the way to his wife’s heart.

Her lashes fell even as her head bobbed. “Yes, please,” she whispered, swiping her cheeks again. “Since the day Zack told me about your incredible paintings, I’ve thought about Raymond. He must’ve had a mother and father, maybe brothers and sisters. I might never know their names, but he does. Besides me, someone had to have loved him once upon a time. I’m sure he’d like to be with them again.”

Lacy swallowed one of her noisy gulps. This was an opportunity of healing like no other. “I can paint him now if you have the time.”

She didn’t need to hear an answer. ‘Yes’ glimmered in Kelsey’s soft brown eyes. This woman still loved Raymond as if he’d been her biological child. What a rare find she was in this crazy, selfish world.

Without being asked, Jake scrambled to his feet, ran down the hall to their bedroom, and returned with Lacy’s easel under his arm, her case of oil paints, and a fresh canvas. “You want me to set up here or in the kitchen?”

She could’ve kissed him. “I think the light in the kitchen’s better this time of day. Do you mind?”

“Not if it makes you happy.”

With Baby Ray sound asleep and still snuggled with his new Aunt Shelby and Uncle Gabe, Lacy began another journey home for a lost soul. She closed her eyes and breathed in the scents of linseed and oils, the lingering turpentine she cleaned her brushes with, the smells of a thousand possibilities on the untouched, waiting-to-be-mapped canvas. “This one’s for you, Raymond,” she whispered, sure he was listening.

Kelsey sat at one end of the table, while Lacy took the middle. Jake and Alex had stepped out on the back step, a concrete block that led to a cracked sidewalk into what would be a new garage by the end of the week. Lacy lost track of their deep voices as an image crystallized front and center in her mind. Drawing in a deep breath through her nostrils, she caught the scent of pine needles, sunshine, and wind.

“It happened in the spring?” she asked Kelsey to be sure.

Kelsey’s head bobbed. “Yes. Springtime in the Shenandoah.”

That was all Lacy needed to know. The painting flowed through her like water out of a faucet. She began with a wash of blues and yellow for sunshine and sky. Next came the almond outline of two deeply set, indigo blue eyes, shadowed by a thick fringe of black lashes. Not cat eyes. Not Asian eyes. More the childish eyes of innocent wonder.

She painted an overlay of green pine tips and boughs, the fresh new growth of spring, the kind where every pine tip glistened with beads of dew as if those eyes were peering through them. Adding a sprinkle of baby green pinecones in one corner, she placed a yellow star in the other. Kelsey watched as silently as that other person in the room, the one Lacy could almost feel peering over her shoulder.

“He’s here, you know. Raymond. I didn’t feel his presence until I came home today with Baby Ray, and I can’t help but wonder if he knew you were coming to visit.”

“He’s here?” Kelsey asked.

Lacy nodded as she added—of all things—a squared off chunk of chocolate cake dripping with fudge frosting in another corner. Odd, but that was the impression that came to her.

“Oh,” Kelsey whimpered when Lacy ended the frosting of that very out of place image with a flourish, almost as if she’d just frosted a real piece of cake. “He is here. He’s really here.”

Lacy nodded, never more sure that Raymond’s spirit lingered as close to this side of the veil as he could get. The air was thick with his presence. Lacy could almost picture him with his arms wrapped around his earthly Mom.

“Hug yourself,” Lacy told Kelsey. “Do it now. Wrap your arms around yourself and close your eyes. Picture him hugging you. He’s here, and he wants you to know it.”

Tears dripped over Kelsey’s cheek and ran down her chin to her neck as she complied. “Those are his eyes,” she murmured. “I’d know them anywhere. One day we were tired, hungry, and covered with bug bites. We were both on our backs looking up at the trees and he said… he said… ‘The sky is blue and the trees are big and you…’” She could barely go on, but she squeaked, “‘…and you is my bestest friend in the whole world.’”

This was the hardest ghost Lacy had ever painted home, more so because his Mom was right here helping him like she’d done before. Suddenly, Alex knelt beside Kelsey, tugging her into his arms. “You were his only friend, honey. Believe me. He knows you love him.”

Lacy’s eyes watered at the tenderness in this tough guy’s voice.

Kelsey sobbed. “But I told him I’d make him a great big hamburger and chocolate cake when we got home. He loved hamburgers. My poor boy. I never got the chance...”

“Don’t cry.” Alex pressed his mouth to her temple. “Let him go, Kelsey. Please. You’ve got to let him go.”

Lacy’s lips pinched. She tried not to look at the intimate scene unfolding at her kitchen table, but she couldn’t make her eyes not see the beauty this painting home had created. Her heart grew tenderer by the second. It seemed as if all Kelsey’s lost boys were suddenly here, reaching for their Mom to comfort her. The kitchen felt full, almost crowded.

It took no time at all to add a border of little boy handprints, one small, one a little larger, and every third print man-sized. With every stroke of her brush, Lacy filled Raymond’s homecoming with love from him to Kelsey and from her to him. But the hardest was yet to come. There was a downside to painting people home. They left.

Lacy didn’t understand how her crazy gift worked, but now she worried. Did Kelsey feel the presence of her sons surrounding her now? And if she did, could she handle Raymond  and her sons leaving her again? Lacy wasn’t sure that she could. This gentle smiling giant’s presence was a nice addition to her little home. He certainly filled it up.

“I may have to keep this picture for myself,” she murmured. “Raymond’s been watching over me and Baby Ray all morning. I kind of like having him around.”

Jake shifted his hands from his pockets to her shoulders. “Say what?”

She looked up at him standing behind her. “That’s right. This guy’s been hanging around our house this morning. Didn’t you feel someone watching us?” She set to outlining the blue eyes of an angel and the shadow of each individual pinecone scale. She highlighted each and every needle, adding depth here and definition there, hopping between charcoal grays and bright yellows to bring Kelsey’s beloved man-child to life.

Jake ran a hand over the back of his neck. “Now that you mention it, yeah. I thought it was just, you know. Crazy.”

“You’re not crazy,” Alex growled.

“Yeah, I am,” Jake asserted unabashedly. “It’s the only way to survive in this world, Boss. Be a little crazy.”

“Then I’m certifiable,” Kelsey said, finally letting go of her biceps and taking a deep breath. “So are you, Alex. You still dream of Abby and Sara. I know you do.”

There was another story Lacy wanted to know. “May I paint someone home for you, Alex Stewart?” she had the nerve to ask.

“No,” whipped out of his mouth as quick as lightning. “I’m good.”

No, you’re not, but that’s what guys like you always say, and believe me, it’s okay. Whoever Sara and Abby are, the day will come you ask me to paint them home. I can wait. She finished Raymond’s painting, willing to work until her baby needed her or until Gabe and Shelby got tired of babysitting him.

At last the piece was done. Her shoulders ached as Lacy settled back in her chair, calmer now. Still kneeling with Kelsey, Alex reached for his back pocket. “What’s your going rate?”

“I don’t charge for works of love,” Lacy said. “It ruins the gift.”

Alex stopped cold. His chin dropped, and it seemed he found the new linoleum floor interesting—until Lacy saw him blink. The muscles in his cheek clenched. This was as hard on him as it was on Kelsey. “With your talent, you should be living in a mansion, not here in this... this...”

“Cracker box?” Lacy chided him as gently as she could. “I’m happy here, Alex. This is my home now and I’ll take good care of it.”

“You’re as bad as my wife,” he bit out.

“Thank you,” Lacy replied. She understood. Really, she did. Alex was a battle-hardened jarhead who’d done well transitioning out of the Corps. He’d started his own business and he made good money. He paid his men and women well, but her mission in life was different now. She wasn’t in the business of painting war heroes home for the wealth or the fame.

These paintings, as bizarre as some of them were, were merely gifts of her heart. Besides, what could she possibly have charged all those poor moms and dads for the priceless gift of being reunited with their sons and daughters one last time? This was Lacy’s way paying it forward, the least she could do.

“Look, honey,” Kelsey told him. “Lacy caught the boys’ handprints just like you did. Remember?”

His head came up then. He ran a quick hand over his faced. Sniffed. Then nodded. “Thank you,” ground out of him. “Thank you for…” He cleared his throat. Coughed. Finally looked Lacy in the eye. “Everything.”

“You’re welcome,” she replied, pretending not to notice the raw emotions raging within the windows to his soul. Some things were just hard, damn it, and a warrior shouldn’t have to defend or explain his tears to anyone, not even to her.

Setting the canvas back from the edge of the table where it wouldn’t get bumped, she leaned into Jake. “I hope this helps Raymond find peace,” she told Kelsey, “but you need to know that ghosts usually leave once I paint them home. One minute, they’re there; the next they’re… whoosh. Gone.”

“As they should be,” Kelsey said with a drawn out sigh. “It’s time for him to move on. I’ve made my piece with what happened long ago, but it’s nice to know Raymond wanted to say goodbye to me, too.” She dabbed her eyes, took another deep breath, then said, “Let’s go home, Alex. The dogs need a run before bedtime. So do I.”

He lifted to his feet and pulled her into his side. “You sure I can’t pay you?” he asked Lacy, his hand at his rear pocket again. “I’d feel better if I could.”

Somehow, she doubted Alex would ever feel better. He had an entire squadron of ghosts around him, but none of them looked like a Sara or an Abby. Whoever those two women were, they were already home. Like Raymond with Kelsey, Alex just hadn’t let go of them yet. He hadn’t moved on, but they had.

“No, sir, it’s been my pleasure,” Lacy told him firmly. “The painting will be ready after I apply a coat of varnish to protect it against ultraviolet rays and dirt. Pollution. Stuff like that. I’ll deliver it then.” I’ll have painted your Sara and Abby home by then, too. When I give you that picture, you’ll see. It really does work.

“We’ll pick it up,” Alex corrected. Man, he was persistent. Wasn’t he in for a surprise?

“Okay,” Lacy acquiesced. “I’d love that. Next Sunday. Just tell me when.”

“Thank you,” Kelsey said, her eyes dry and her chin up. “I think you’re right. I don’t sense Raymond as much as I did for a moment there. He’s finally at peace. I can feel it. So am I.”

“That’s how it works,” Jake declared as he tugged Lacy against his side. “She paints ’em home, and they’re happy to go.”

Gabe and Shelby strolled into the kitchen, both sleepy-eyed. “We, umm, fell asleep,” he admitted sheepishly as he delivered a squirming and wide-awake infant into Jake’s hands. “Sorry. What’d we miss?”

“Raymond’s gone home,” Lacy said simply.

“Damn, and we missed it?” Gabe asked, raking a hand through his thick, mahogany hair. “Can you do it again? I mean for someone else?”

Lacy narrowed her eyes, striving to see past the boyish good looks of one of Alex’s best snipers. “I’d love to paint someone home for you, Gabe.”

“It’s not for me, it’s for a guy I know. It’s for…” He shook his head. “Man, he’ll be freakin’ pissed at me, but—”

“Maverick,” Jake said what Gabe didn’t seem able to say. “It’s for Maverick, isn’t it? You want Lacy to paint his brother home.”

Gabe nodded. “Yeah. Maverick. I think this might help, only, crap, he’ll beat the shit out of me if he finds out I put you up to this.”

“Then don’t tell him,” Lacy declared. “I painted a hundred warriors home before I ever gave a single painting to their families, Gabe, and to be honest, I didn’t start doing this for their parents or anyone they’d left behind. I did it for them, for the ghosts. They talked to me, and I just listened. Why don’t you bring Maverick and China over for a beer sometime? Let me take care of the rest.

“That’s an ambush,” Alex growled. “Not fair.”

“Not really,” Kelsey said, one hand on her touchy husband’s forearm as she looped her other arm around his waist. “Think of it as an intervention on Maverick’s brother’s behalf. Darrell’s like Raymond, Alex. He wants to go home, and deep down, Maverick wants that, too. He just doesn’t know it.”

“Darrell, huh?” Lacy asked as an image of Batman and Robin, stick horses, and little boys with cowboy hats raced through her mind. “I really like that name.”

Jake strolled up the dark hallway. The deal was that after Lacy fed Baby Ray during the night, Jake got burp duty, because, well, she had equipment Jake didn’t have for the feeding part of this new adventure. But burp time was Daddy time. Just a man and his son, the way it should be.

With Baby Ray tucked into his arm like a football, they roamed the hallway, circled once through the living room, then headed out the back door into a humid August night. Stars glittered down from an inky black sky and the moon shed silvery light on the white vinyl fencing Jake had installed around the backyard. Crickets chirped and some neighbor’s dog barked a block away. Which reminded Jake…

He now knew a kennel for Alex’s dogs, Whisper and Smoke, had once stood in the corner of hisbackyard. The previous owner had torn it out and replaced it with—nothing. Whoever they were, they must’ve loved dirt because before Jake had this backyard re-sodded, there’d been nothing but ruts, weeds, and dust.

The disgust on Alex’s face when he’d heard how much work, time, and money had gone into restoring this little cracker box, as he’d called it, was heartwarming. He’d gotten uncharacteristically chatty for a minute there. Talked about fighting a wisteria vine that choked the wooden swing he’d built for Kelsey every spring. Told Jake an oak tree had once stood guard over the dog kennel, and how it shaded the entire yard when the afternoon sun got high in summer. Shared a couple stories about that empty space in the basement where his woodworking shop once turned out toys for tots at Christmas. Told Jake how Kelsey couldn’t handle a sheet of sandpaper, much less a nine-millimeter pistol when he’d first met her.

“Poor thing was scared of guns back then,” he’d said. “You ever need a hand installing a security system or building a doghouse, you let me know.”

Somehow that sounded like an order. Jake agreed, but that was the moment Alex left him standing on his back porch alone. Apparently the guy had radar when it came to his wife. He was back inside the house before Jake knew what happened. But it was okay. All that guy-chat had opened Jake’s eyes to the real Alex. He wasn’t so different than other married men. Everything he did, he did for Kelsey, his country, or the people on his team.

Baby Ray squirmed so Jake snuggled him against his chest, humming low and soft, but nothing operatic. Not any more. That day was in his compulsive past where it belonged.

“Wanna swing, little guy?” he asked as he dropped his butt to the new cedar swing he’d bought Lacy, but hadn’t had the chance to show her yet. Oddly, he’d placed it at precisely where the swing Alex had made for Kelsey had once stood. Talk about weird. Tiny green sprouts were breaking through the cracks in the concrete. Apparently that wisteria vine was making a comeback.

Weirder still, Jake looked forward to fighting the pesky vine almost as much as he looked forward to mowing his lawn and raking his leaves from the sugar maple soon to be planted by the kennel he still needed to build. This tiny house needed a couple diligent trees standing guard over it, maybe an English walnut or two in the front yard. what was more, Jake looked forward to shoveling snow off his front walk in the winter, and coming into the bright, warm heart of his home after a hard day’s work, hugging his wife and his little boy. Mostly of—coming—with that unexpected angel sleeping in his bed. God, life is good.

Easing Baby Ray upright to his shoulder, Jake cupped his son’s head extra carefully. Sure enough, the little guy let out a man-sized burp to be proud of. “Way to go,” Jake praised. “Wanna do it again?”

Easing two fingers up the little guy’s spine, he coaxed another wiggle and a smaller burp out. Nothing extraordinary but still. “That’s my boy,” Jake said, his heart filled with pride for the child in his arms. “Wait till I tell Mom what a good job you did.”

Baby Ray settled his cheek into the crook of Jake’s neck and let out a tiny sigh of contentment. And there they sat, father and son rocking in their backyard, surrounded by their fence, and living in their very own—home. The word meant everything to Jake now that he’d finally gotten his head straight. Well, mostly straight.

He didn’t time warp like he once did because he knew how to anchor himself to reality now, as in Lacy, and that went a long way to solving most of his other issues. He’d gotten the counseling he’d needed, and he’d reunited with his family. Mom and Dad both cried like babies when he’d shown up in Little Rock with a pregnant wife, but Grandpa Elias damned near crushed the life out of him, he’d hugged Jake so hard. Hugged him like he wasn’t a former Marine but that hard-headed ten-year-old kid who needed to remember who was boss again, and just who loved him best. The old coot made Jake cry. Even now.

He ran a quick finger under his eye, not ashamed of his tears. “Thing is, Baby Ray, tears need to come out else they’ll mess up your head,” he whispered. “They weren’t meant for storage, no sir. They’re a gift to wash out the heart, so you cry all you want. ‘Course, not in front of the other guys and not when Mom’s sleeping, okay? She needs her rest right now, but you just give me the word, and we’ll come out for another swing if you need to let loose. Don’t ever be ashamed to have a heart, son. That’s what makes this country great, men and women with hearts like your grandpas’ hearts. Like your Mom’s.”

Baby Ray offered a tiny sigh of agreement, and that was enough for Jake. He stretched his long legs and rocked that wooden swing, loving the quiet creak of complaint between the chain and the S-hook overhead. Might need a drop of oil for that. Loving the stars in the sky and the woman tucked in his bed. Loving just about everything at the moment. Life couldn’t get more perfect than this.

Oh, wait. Yes, it could get maybe just a teensy bit more perfect. Jake rubbed his lips over Baby Ray’s downy head and drew in the powdery scent of his firstborn. Pressing a fatherly kiss to his boy’s dark hair, he whispered the first of many father and son conspiracies. “Don’t tell Mommy yet, but Harley’s giving us a puppy. His name’s Blade and you’re gonna love him.”

 

The End