Chapter 17
IF rain showers wash the earth down, then we were about as squeaky clean as it gets. My dad’s dock looked mostly the same, if not a little pressure-washed. Minus the boat that once hung out there. Dad joked that it was down somewhere making a really good fish harbor if he could just find that sweet spot.
I sat down at the end, leaning against a post and fiddling with a cracked plank. Bo lay with his head in my lap, nose twitching and little eyebrows bouncing back and forth at the dragonflies that skimmed the water.
The river was glass smooth. The slightest insect touch made ripples you could see all the way across. It didn’t even resemble the monster that tried to kill us a week earlier.
The buzzing was gone. The wind, the sounds of fear and pain and water rushing—all gone. I could only guess it was because we’d lived it again, Sarah and I, and survived. Sarah and I. That was weird. But nearly losing my Riley had put that little gem of information in perspective. It didn’t matter who was hanging around in another realm, outside my reach. What mattered was right here.
I turned at the sound of feet on the creaky boards, even though Bo’s tail thumps told me it was Riley. If it had been Dad, he would have gotten up. Respect for your elders.
Riley sauntered down, hair pulled up, no makeup, barefooted and wearing a T-shirt and sweats she’d cut off into shorts. She looked young and innocent. But she wasn’t. She sat down opposite me, Indian style, and snatched a stick out of the water. I watched the concussion of that ripple spread out for half a mile before she spoke.
“You still mad at me?” she asked softly.
I met her eyes. Eyes so much like my own, it was eerie. They held and hid so much, and yet could touch your soul.
“I’m not mad at you.”
“Lie.”
“I’m not.” I shook my head and rubbed my eyes. “Just—” I looked out at the water and blew out a breath.
“Disappointed.”
I was so many things, I couldn’t even pick one. I felt like a ball in a pinball machine, bouncing from one emotion to the next.
“I don’t know what I am, boog. That’s the honest truth.”
Her eyes watered. “I told you I was sorry.”
“I know, Riley, and—and that’s fine. But you don’t understand what it was like to think you were—dead.” I nearly choked on the word.
She lowered her eyes and two tears fell.
“You nearly got yourself killed. And Grady. And me. I have never been so sick, so devastated in all my life, as I was thinking I’d lost you. And for what?”
“Mom—”
“For sex.”
And that was the kicker. Once we’d finally gotten back home from getting a clean bill of health, we talked.
“I told you, it wasn’t a plan, Mom. I had to get away. Grady caught me trying to take the boat out and said he’d drive.” Tears fell freely. “I couldn’t even look at him. All I wanted was to be normal. Make him see me as normal.”
“He already did.”
“I know.” She wiped her face. “But I wasn’t thinking that then. I begged him till—” She didn’t go further. She didn’t have to. I’d already been floored with it in the first round, when I tongue-lashed her about irresponsibility and unprotected sex. I wasn’t going there again. And I wasn’t buying the begging part.
“Okay.”
“I’m serious, Mom, it was me. He actually said no for a while.” She frowned. “It was really weird.”
I closed my eyes. Something inside me felt closed up and hurt. It wasn’t really logical. Like my little girl was gone. Like—that part of her—of us—had died. And too soon. It had been taken too soon.
But it was done. Move on. I looked back at her.
“How do you feel about it now?”
“About doing it in a boat? It sucked.”
I dropped my head. “Don’t ever say that out loud again. Pop would have a coronary.”
“Sorry.”
“How do you feel about yourself?”
She paused and dragged her stick in the water, focusing on the patterns it made. “I don’t know. Weird, I guess. Wasn’t what I expected.”
“What did you expect?”
“I don’t know. Love and glowy romance, I guess. All I got was panic when the wind kicked up. I was pretty lucky just to get dressed.”
“Well, here’s a tip. Even when not in a boat, if the glowy romance isn’t there already—sex isn’t gonna bring it.”
We sat in silence for a little while, each lost in our own thoughts.
“So—have you seen anybody?” she asked finally.
I looked over at her. I hadn’t left the house since we came home from the hospital. Hadn’t gone to work. Jason made sure we were okay and hadn’t been back or called since. Couldn’t really blame him. Swimming out to take Riley from a talking dead man was probably disconcerting. For a newbie.
Grady hadn’t quit calling or coming by, much to my annoyance, so he was clearly not as bothered by it.
“No.”
“Me, either.”
Then I realized what she meant. Alex hadn’t been by, either. And although I couldn’t talk about it, it was eating me up. Tears sprang to my eyes as I recalled his face as he told me his secret. The torture in his eyes. And then right before he went back under the water—that one was for Sarah. I’d seen all his demons when he touched me. That last look was for her.
As anxious as I was about seeing him again, I had a gnawing fear that I wouldn’t. What if that was it? What if that was the closure he needed to move on? What if he just didn’t want to face me anymore? Or worse—and what kept poking at me—what if the strain of holding Riley’s dying body took too much?
I knew how that worked. That each felt everything the other had. The shock I received when he pushed me up confirmed that. But holding someone whose life force was nearly gone—would that feel like dying all over again?
“Do you think he’ll show up again?” Riley asked, her voice sounding small. “I mean, I’d like to thank him at least.”
I gave her a shrug and a small smile. “I don’t know, boog.” I watched her as she looked far off. “What do you remember about it?”
Her eyes filled up again. “His family. He—drowned underneath his daughter, Mom. The little girl in the picture.”
My skin felt like it could move on its own. I’d never told her that.
“Yeah,” I breathed.
“And he loves us.”
That took me off guard. “What?”
She looked back at me. “He really loves you.”
I blinked fast so I wouldn’t cry. “Well.” I cleared my throat. “We’ve been connected for a really long time.”
“Do you love him?”
Damn it. I let out a breath and swiped at my eyes as a little laugh escaped my throat.
“Always.” Lord, she didn’t know the half of it. “But obviously that’s not a workable situation.”
“That’s sad.”
“It’s reality. Or, at least our reality.”
“What about Jason?”
“Mr. Miller,” I corrected.
“He gave me mouth-to-mouth, Mom. I think we’re on a first-name basis.” She gave in to a laugh as my face contorted. “Just kidding. Sorry, I couldn’t resist.”
“Try.”
“So what about Mr. Miller?”
I sighed and scooped my hair back. “I’m not sure. He may not be interested anymore.”
“You just gonna sit around and wait to find out?”
I gave her a look. “As opposed to what?”
She shook her head, exasperated. “Going to the source.”
I looked down at Bo and scratched his neck till he smiled. Oh, for life to be that simple.
“He knows where I am, boog.”
“Ugh, that’s so old school!”
“And we’re old,” I said pointedly. “It works for us.”
“Whatever,” she said, rising to her feet in one motion. “But you’ll get old alone with that attitude.”
I saluted her. “I’ll survive.”
She turned to walk away, but two steps in, she turned back around. “Mom—I love you.”
I looked up at my baby girl and got up—much slower than she had. I slung an arm around her and we walked back toward the house, Bojangles reluctantly coming to his feet to follow. I kissed the side of her head, since I couldn’t reach the top anymore.
THE ground under my feet was dry and dusty, no traces left of the deluge. I kicked a rock in my path and recalled a similar stroll I’d taken with Alex. The night he’d told me Sarah’s name. So many things made sense now. His reluctance to tell me any details about his family.
My anger was gone. As much as part of me—the me part of me—wanted to be hurt and angry, the memory of his face after saving Riley melted me to the core. Would we ever be the same? Probably not. But we could still be okay. Assuming I ever saw him again. And the possibility of that going negative made my stomach hurt.
What started out to be a random walk brought me within throwing distance of the Bait-n-Feed. Well, within someone else’s throwing distance. I’d need another twenty or thirty feet.
I hadn’t gone back to work initially to make sure Riley was okay. After that, it was pretty much my own chicken-ness. I knew I needed to be a big girl and go back to earning a paycheck, but the thought of dealing with the people in town made me nauseous. And yes. There was the Jason issue. As long as I didn’t see him, I could tell myself he was just working through it. But what if—what if I made eye contact and saw that look. The one I’d seen all my life. I knew it would crush me, and so avoiding it seemed the logical choice. Until Riley pointed out my spinster potential, that is.
So I stood there in the middle of the road, the sun cooking my shoulders, playing with a smooth clear rock I’d picked up for luck, staring with anxiety at the building. Miss Olivia’s car was there—that was good. Diversion. Because Jason’s was, too. Bob ambled out of his trailer next door and waved, grinning as he made his way to a giant pot of something cooking on a propane tank. Knowing him, it was best not to ask what.
“Okay, wuss,” I muttered. “Time to put that thick skin back on.”
I got my feet moving again and took a deep breath as I opened the door. Please don’t let him be standing there.
Miss Olivia and Marg both turned my direction as the bell jingled overhead. I smiled warily and tried not to do the five-second room scan.
“Hey, my Dani girl!” Miss Olivia said, her straw hat bobbing as she made her way around a barrel of mousetraps and bar bait. I looked down at the new display all front and center.
“Somebody have issues?”
“Whatever,” Miss Olivia said, waving at that barrel. She gave me a giant hug. “Glad to see you out and about. Where’s that girl?”
“She’s at home. Going back to her job at the store tomorrow.”
Miss Olivia and Grady had been at the house together three times since the “incident,” as it had come to be called. I had all but ignored Grady, but I was starting to soften a little after the talk with Riley. And the fact that he called and tried to come by in some way every single day. He was persistent. And after what he’d seen and learned, that said something about him. More than I could say for some people.
“Good for her.”
“What about you?” Marg asked, leaning on the counter with her typical no-nonsense stare. “When are you coming back?”
Involuntarily, I looked toward the back hall. “Um—”
“He’s out at the dock, playing with the boats,” she said dryly. Miss Olivia chuckled. I smiled and cast my eyes down, releasing a breath I’d been holding.
“I guess in a couple of days—” Why? What was I waiting for? Jason to call and make it all cozy?
Yes.
“Can you be here Wednesday? I’m supposed to be—somewhere.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Somewhere?”
Marg blushed, which made me even more curious. “Yes, somewhere,” she repeated. “Can you be here?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
That gave me two days to gear up for seeing Jason again. Assuming he didn’t drum up a road trip once he heard I was back.
“Good. I’m tired of hanging out with his grumpy ass all day,” she said, hitting a button on the register to run the hourly report. “Thinks he runs the place.”
I held back the urge to laugh.
“By the way, you conjure up ghosts at will?” Marg asked, turning to face me openly with her ice-blue eyes.
My mouth dropped open and some little squeaky noise came out. I wasn’t used to conversing in public about it. Blinking in succession was as good as I could do.
“No, she can’t,” Miss Olivia said, jumping in there for me, giving me a second to find my tongue. “I’ve asked her that since she was a little skinny thing snapping beans on my front porch.”
Thank you, Miss O. I let a forced little laugh out. “Um, no, they come to me. I don’t go looking for them.”
“Hmm. So they just pop up out of the blue?”
I nodded. “And usually at the most inopportune time.”
She chuckled, nodding. “Cool.”
And then she went back to her work, done with me. Well, that went okay. One down. Then the bell jingled and in walked Lisa Marlow. Her mouth dropped open as whatever she was going to say fell away when she spotted me. I had the urge to snap it shut but smiled instead as I clenched my fingers tightly together.
“Dani,” she said awkwardly, averting her eyes as she passed me.
Oh yes, don’t look, you might catch it.
But then she surprised me as she slowly turned around.
“Um, Dani—I—” She stopped as her eyes met mine. And I saw something there I’d never seen. Not ever.
Regret.
She looked down at her hands, and back to me. “I wanted to apologize for my son’s behavior with your daughter. I—heard about some of the things he said.” She closed her eyes. “I’m just mortified. I’m sorry.”
My thoughts went straight to high school. You did the same thing back—
“It—it kind of brought some things home to me as well,” she said, glancing toward Miss Olivia and Marg. Miss Olivia turned and busied herself with a pack of gardenia seeds. “We—we did some pretty awful things to you, years ago.” She shook her head. “I don’t know what to say.”
I blinked a couple of times. “I don’t know, either, Lisa. But thank you.”
She nodded and then turned uncomfortably back to the counter. Miss Olivia strolled up to me and wiggled her eyebrows.
“Got one of them baits stuck up her ass, that one does,” she whispered.
I pushed Miss Olivia out the door ahead of me. “You’re bad! She was trying. She was actually human there for a minute.”
She waved that off and adjusted her hat back a little before she got in her car.
“Just words, Dani girl. Let’s see what she does when she’s with the pack. But you’re right.” She swung her legs in and made sure her dress was in there with her. “Sometimes people have to say what needs sayin’. Tomorrow might not be around to get another chance.”
She was smiling, but her eyes were fixed on me when she said it. I let the words bounce around my skull a little. Say what needs sayin’.
Hmm.
“Dani.”
I turned toward the voice, already yelling Oh crap! in my head as my stomach shimmied.
“Jason.”
“Hmm,” Miss Olivia said as she shut her door. I looked at her with what I knew was a deer-in-the-headlights look, but she just winked at me and left.
Crap.
Jason waved at her, standing there with a rag in his hand, grease on his hands, in a muscle shirt and dirty cargo shorts. I’d never seen him that casual. Well, except for that day in the towel. His hair was sticking up in back. And he’d never looked hotter.
I really wasn’t ready. I was supposed to have two more days. So I stood there with all the grace of a fourteen-year-old girl, wondering what a grown-up would say. My relationship experience consisted of a ghost and someone who vanished like one. I licked my dry lips and attempted coolness.
His eyes were intense on me, as he nodded casually toward the door.
“You back today?”
“No, um, Wednesday. Marg—she has to be somewhere. So—Wednesday.”
Somebody please tape my mouth shut.
His eyebrows rose in what I knew was amusement. I knew the look, I’d been stupid around him way too much.
“How’s Riley?”
I nodded, thankful for something solid to talk about. “She’s good. Has her strength back, going back to work tomorrow.”
“That’s good.” He smiled and it made my breath catch in my chest for a minute.
“Yeah,” I managed.
It was contagious; I felt myself smiling, too. And then Miss Olivia’s words nagged at me. Damn it. Say something. But as the seconds ticked by into awkwardness, the window of possibility started to close. Jason broke eye contact, studying his greasy rag. My stomach fell. There hadn’t been the look of shame, but he wasn’t jumping through hoops for me, either.
“How’s the boat? And the dock?” I threw out quickly.
He nodded, meeting my eyes again but this time he looked troubled. “Not too bad. I’ve been working on it in the evenings.”
The distance suddenly felt solid, like concrete. My heart pounded, and I felt the hurt filling up my chest. I suddenly wanted to be anywhere else. I wanted to go cry in a pillow like a kid. And I had to make my exit before he saw it.
“Well—I’ll let you get back to work. I’m just gonna—” I pointed at the road and gave my best smile.
“What are you doing for supper?”
My mouth dropped like Lisa’s had moments earlier. The temperature change was boggling. Then I remembered this was Jason.
Then Lisa walked out and stopped short when she saw us. She looked uncomfortably from me to Jason, and then settled on the ground as she made it to her car.
Jason glared at her although she didn’t see it. I had to smile again. He could definitely hold his own here. He took a few steps closer, fiddling with his rag again, before looking at me again. He wasn’t going to repeat the question. I knew that.
“Probably a bowl of cereal. It’s on-your-own night at our house tonight.”
A small smile tugged at his lips, and I suddenly wanted to kiss them. Two-day growth and all. “Meet me at Ella’s?”
In public. I took a deep breath. “Our last experience there wasn’t so good.”
“Part of it was.” I looked in his eyes for that memory. They were soft again. “Relax.”
I got goose bumps. Yeah. I was a wimp.
“Okay.”
“Six thirty?”
“Okay.”
He nodded, backing up a few steps. “Okay.”
“Okay.”
I turned and walked away before either of us could say “okay” again. I refused to look back to see if he was watching. I just pretended he was and didn’t breathe until I was around the corner.
THE walk back home was slightly more optimistic. I both looked forward and dreaded the evening, because I knew those damn “things had to be said.” I was going to have to come clean about everything, in order to be fair to Jason. Well—maybe not everything. But he’d seen Alex, for reasons I couldn’t explain since Alex hadn’t come around to fill me in.
It was going to be a conversation. That much I knew. What I didn’t know was why Micah Sims was sitting on our porch banister.
“Hello?” I announced as I approached.
“Oh—hi. Riley’s getting us drinks,” she said while pointing at the door, as if I would throw her off the banister otherwise.
“Okay, no problem.”
Riley emerged holding two Cokes and a bag of chips, and chin-nodded at me.
“Hey, where’d you go?”
“To see if I still had a job.”
“Do you?”
“Yeah.”
“Was he there?”
“Yeah.”
Riley shook her head with a look at Micah. “And she calls me cryptic.”
They chuckled together in the bond of all things parentally stupid, as I raised my eyebrows at this new duo. I gave them another once-over, then went inside. My guard was up—I didn’t trust that girl. But I didn’t know if it was because of her or her parents. I couldn’t sink her on that relationship alone, so I tried to give her the benefit of the doubt. Riley had to make her way here now just like I did, so I mentally backed off.
And thought about my date. Oh lord.
Which I must have said out loud when I went in the kitchen, because Dad walked in from the opposite doorway asking, “What’s the matter?”
I grabbed a glass and filled it full of ice and sweet tea and plopped down in a chair.
“You notice we never sit anywhere else?” I asked.
He shrugged. “Close proximity to my favorite pastime,” he said as he slathered two pieces of bread with butter and sprinkled a liberal dose of sugar on top. Then he poured a little Steen’s into a saucer and brought it all to the table, handing me a piece.
We munched in decadent silence for a moment.
“Riley tell you Micah Sims was here?”
He gave me a curious look. “Stranger things have happened. I think she’ll be okay. What about you?”
“Go back to work on Wednesday.”
“Oh? Good. You went down there?”
I sighed. “Yeah. Sorta.”
“Was he there?”
“What is it with that question?” I slugged back some tea.
Dad chuckled. “I take it he was.”
I blew out a breath. “Yeah, it was—awkward. But we kinda have a date tonight. I think.”
“Well, hey, that’s good,” he said, popping a hand down on the table and making me jump. “You look so gloomy, I thought it went badly.”
“Well, I mean, the reality is this may not be a big ball of laughs, Dad,” I said, soaking up the syrup into my last bite of sugar bread. “I’ve got to talk about things I’ve never talked about. I have to explain the unexplainable.”
“You think he won’t understand?”
“I think he would have understood better before he saw it in person. I think that wigged him out.”
“You really think that’s what it’s about?” he asked, giving me his furry-eyebrowed eagle eye.
“Okay, what do you think it’s about?”
Dad sat back in his chair, all happy on his sugar high. “Well, if it were me, I’d be pretty ticked off to find out I wasn’t worth trusting.”
I stared at my groove in the table. “It’s not that simple, Dad.”
“Not for you. But for him, it’s probably very simple.” He scraped his chair back. “Men aren’t complex creatures, sweetheart. We depend on the basics. Trust. Loyalty.”
He rinsed his plate and then turned back to me, leaning against the counter. “But also we want to take care of the people we love—make them feel safe. I failed at that. Made your mother feel like she couldn’t talk to me about it. Don’t put that assumption on Jason. He seems to be okay. Give him a chance to do better than I did.”
I got up and let him wrap me up like he did when I was little. I didn’t tell him about Mom and Alex and Sarah and all that. I figured Mom could drop that particular bomb on him one day, up there in the happy place.
“I think you’re wonderful,” I said.
“That’s why I keep you around.” When I laughed, he continued. “Hey, since you’ll be working Wednesday, you probably won’t miss me much, but I’ll be out all day. Probably pretty late getting home that night.”
“Okay, where you going?”
“Spending the day in Spring.”
I backed up and narrowed my eyes at him. “A whole day in an antiques village? You?” Spring, Texas, was antiques heaven—if that was your idea of heaven. “Since when?”
He shrugged. “Trying new things?”
“Since when?” I repeated. “By yourself?” Then my eyes flew open wide and I pointed a finger at him. “You’re going with Marg, aren’t you?”
He feigned ignorance but he blushed. “Don’t you have a date to hyperventilate over?” he said, putting up the syrup.
“Oh my God!” I said, laughing. “Not when I can talk about yours.”
“It’s not a date.”
“Please! A whole day of antiquing? That’s such a date.”
“Told you. I’m trying new things.”
I tossed a dishrag at him. “Marg is nice. And she’s got it bad for you.” Which was a very weird thing to fall out of my mouth toward him.
“Next subject.”
“Hope you have fun,” I prodded.
“You first.”
“Ugh.”