“I THINK YOU should write each one of your kids and your mother letters,” Cora told him later. “I know you wrote them before when you dealt with a different person, but this is your uncle. Perhaps he can be trusted at least to deliver the notes.”
Beau paced the yard, tossing the ball for Jezzy to run after over and over. Like meditation.
Cora didn’t say anything else. She merely watched him pace as she drank her tea. He liked that about her as much as he loved her vibrant energy. When she needed to be quiet, she was.
“That’s a good idea.” He’d been hoping his uncle would give him a phone number or an address, but he realized that was very unlikely. His uncle had to sneak away from whatever business his father had Obie on to contact Beau, so it might be easier to have the letters with him. So if his uncle took the money and dashed, he’d be able to convince him to at least take a few envelopes. Less risk than exposing the group to Beau’s presence.
He’d begun spinning out all the possibilities from the most unlikely to far more realistic. Would Obie bring the twins? Or his mother? Would Beau be able to go and sit at his mother’s bedside when she was in treatment? Would Obie be able to convince Beau’s dad to even let her get the help she needed? Would his sons even want to have contact after what he knew they must have grown up hearing about him?
“You’re going to ‘what if’ yourself into a heart attack if you don’t stop,” Cora told him. Of course she knew when to speak up too. Knew when to snap him out of whatever he’d gotten himself tangled up in.
“I know. I’m trying not to. When I spoke to him on New Year’s Eve, Obie said he’d call back within two weeks. It’s been two weeks today.”
“Wanna have sex to distract yourself?” she asked with the same casual tone she’d use offering him coffee or waffles.
Only this was sex, which was far better than coffee or waffles. He turned to her. “You’re offering yourself up?”
“I’m sure as hell not offering anyone else up to sex you into distraction,” she told him with a mock frown.
Okay then. Sex would most definitely be preferable to pacing back and forth, and Jezzy had been taking longer and longer to bring the ball back so even their fetch-loving dog was getting sick of it.
But instead of going inside, she got up to turn off all the outdoor lights. The standing heater was on because she liked being on the deck even in the cold weather. The glow from within was the only illumination as she tossed her pants on a nearby chair.
“I’m leaving the sweater on because it’s too chilly to be out here sexing totally naked,” she told him.
“It’s okay. I know your tits from memory. I’ll just imagine them,” he assured her.
With an imperious point of her finger at him, she said, “You should get yourself similarly available.”
Amused and definitely interested in making himself similarly available to have sex with his woman, he unzipped his jeans and went where she indicated—the chaise she’d been on before.
“I have honestly fantasized about having sex in this chair at least a dozen times,” she said, directing him to sit so she could be on his lap facing him.
“Wish fulfillment is something I’m happy to provide.”
She took his face in her hands and kissed him before letting go to get a condom on him. Cora knew he wasn’t about long and slow. Not when he was worked up the way he’d been.
Instead she sank down onto his cock so fast they both got a little surprised and breathless at the end as body met body.
“So far so good,” she murmured into his ear, and began to rock and grind herself against him. Deep and relentless. She was going to take him straight to climax.
No one else had ever read him so well. Knew him the way she did.
That was nearly as sexy as the way she felt, hot and wet while all around them the late afternoon was settling into a brisk night.
“I love you so fucking much,” she told him, taking him deep again and again. Her angle meant she was totally in control, which she used to break him down until all there was was sensation. Hot and wet. Tight. Over and over, as her breath caressed the side of his face.
He found her clit, not wanting to go alone. Climax screamed toward him, barreling down, and he wasn’t going to be able to resist much longer.
Her moan caught then, shifted into a snarl, the sound so dirty he ended up panting to keep from coming.
“Let go, my beautiful Cora. Come all over me,” he urged and her head fell forward to rest on his shoulder as her body obeyed. Groaning as his body followed, his climax swallowed by hers in a feedback loop of sensation until he managed to get them both in the house and onto the couch.
“I’ll get your pants in a few minutes,” he wheezed as she snuggled against him. He needed to get rid of the condom. Should close the door leading out to the back deck. Should do lots of things and probably would again once he got his breath.
The plus was that he’d forgotten entirely about the phone call he’d been expecting. Until she came barreling into the bathroom an hour later holding his phone up as it rang in her hand. The shower had been pounding down on him hard enough he hadn’t even heard.
She shoved it his way along with a towel. “I’ll get the water handled. Answer it.”
It was Obie.
* * *
THE FOLLOWING DAY she stood in front of where he’d been loading things into a messenger bag at the dining room table.
He’d already taken two surprisingly heavy duffel bags with the money to the truck and now he was gathering the letters he’d written and some other stuff like antibiotics that might be helpful to the rest of the group. He and a group of other survivors of religious cults had connections for certain kinds of medication to get to people still inside those groups. Beau had no real idea if they ever reached the people left behind, but he could only control so much. He just had to hope.
Beau knew she wanted to come with him. Wanted to be there to help in any way she could. But though he’d never worried about physical danger in the past toward him, he wasn’t going to put her in harm’s way if he didn’t have to.
“Obie said to come alone and that’s what I’m doing,” he reassured her, kissing her before she followed him out to the front driveway. Not knowing what he might have to drive over or through, he’d borrowed one of the trucks from her dad’s landscaping business. A bonus was the lockbox in the truck’s bed where he’d been able to secure the money.
It was a lot of cash to just be rolling around with so he wanted to keep it as low-key as possible.
“Call me when you’re done. I mean it, Beau. I’m going to be worried sick until I know you’re okay. Don’t go off and do something stupid. Please. I know you want to see your kids and your mom but use your head. I know you can do this and I’m hoping and praying this is that final step to finally getting reunited with the twins.”
Cora hugged him. He knew she was trying not to cry but she failed. In some weird way it actually helped him stay calm. He kissed her, and then set her back. “I’ll be in touch. I promise. And I’ll be careful. You and Jez be careful today too.”
She lifted a hand. “Love you.”
“Love you too,” he said before driving away.
Two hours later, he pulled down a dirt road and at the end of it was a small house perched on a river. His uncle sat on the front porch when Beau arrived.
He’d forgotten how alike his father and uncle looked and it brought him to a momentary pause as he thought about the last time he’d seen them both. Remembered his father looking right through Beau, the son he’d beaten and had kept locked up on near starvation rations for asking questions. For wanting the truth. Remembered too, Obie standing next to his brother. His gaze had settled on Beau briefly and he saw pity there before it hardened and Obie had looked right through him.
That had been the last time Beau had seen his father in person. In the intervening years he’d only seen grainy surveillance photographs.
Beau sure couldn’t miss how his uncle had aged. He’d lost weight and most of his fiery red hair—same as Beau’s and his dad’s—had joined the pounds. Life on the run wasn’t glamorous.
Beau didn’t know what his uncle had planned for their meeting, but Obie came off that porch and pulled him into a hug and the child he’d been a long time ago remembered the connection he’d had to his uncle. “Hey there, boy. How you been?”
“Missing my children grow up. How about you?” he responded. Whatever that nostalgia, they’d stolen his fucking children and he wasn’t about to let it go.
“I surely do feel bad about that. God’s honest truth. You made your choice though. You left us and in doing so, you lost your grace.”
Beau barely withheld a sneer. He guessed having sex with a fourteen-year-old was so much better than calling it out as abuse. If he’d remained silent at other people’s suffering that truly would have stolen his god-given grace.
“Where’s my mother now? Were you able to talk him into letting her get help?” Beau asked, rather than get into a pissing match with his uncle. Obie had something he needed. Once that was handled he could be as frank as he wanted. Until then, he’d hold his anger in check.
“She’s still with your dad. He’s off praying about it. If I can come to him with that money, a clear and free way to get her help, I think he might be convinced to let her go. I was able to secure her a spot somewhere. A private medical facility. No, don’t ask where because I’m not telling you. Just know that your money will be a big factor in saving her life.”
“Will they know where the money came from?” Beau asked.
“I told your mom I was going to see you when I came back stateside. She’ll know. It’s best if your dad thinks I got it elsewhere. You look good, Beau. Your mom is real proud of you even though cooking is women’s work.”
There was a lot there to parse through. Enough backhanded compliments to give Walda a run for her money.
“What’s her outcome if she doesn’t get the treatment?” Beau asked. Obie had refused to say exactly what cancer it was his mother had, not wanting to give any more specifics than he had to. Beau wanted to assure him that knowing if his mother had liver cancer or lung cancer wasn’t going to help him sic the authorities on his dad.
Beau wished it could. But his dad knew the score. Knew it had been nearly two decades and the authorities had other cases to pursue. George Petty had kept his head down, kept the group in places no one would find them unusual enough to investigate further, and in doing that, he’d stayed under the radar.
He hated all the undercurrent of unsaid things between him and Obie at that moment. Beau knew his uncle still loved him. It was in his manner, even when he was being a judgmental prick. It was in the way he’d come to Beau, knowing he’d help his mother. Obie shouldn’t even be talking to anyone who’d been excomm’d from the group. Beau was pretty much Satan’s minion as far as the group members were taught. But the hug had been real. And in his own way, Obie was trying to help. At least that was what Beau had decided to believe.
Beau held on to that small thing. It was more than he had before he’d shown up here.
“Even with the treatment she’s got a thirty percent chance of survival. Without it she won’t make it through the summer.”
Beau scrubbed his hands over his face. His mother hadn’t been in his life since he was seventeen years old. She’d been the one to refuse contact with him. But that didn’t mean he was comfortable with the idea of her death from whatever illness she was suffering through. She was still his mother.
“You do what you need to. Make him understand. If anyone can, it’s you.” Beau stalked over to the truck and brought the money over, tossing the duffels at Obie’s feet. “Here. Now where are my sons?”
“I can’t tell you where exactly because it would endanger everyone else. They don’t have phones or I’d just give you the number. I promise to work on your dad to get him to let your mom get medical help. And I promise to work on getting your sons to be open to contact.”
Beau pulled out the envelopes with the letters he’d written. “One for the boys and one for my mom. Will you give these to them?”
Obie nodded. “I’ll have to do it when they’re alone, but yes. I promise that too.” Obie paused. “I saw you on the TV at the airport. Cooking some kind of French fancy food. Glad to see you successful and happy.”
Beau was in so many ways, but there was still that glaring empty spot where his kids should be.
His mother was an adult. She’d made her choice to stay more than once. Beau wanted to give her the opportunity to leave and he had, twice since he’d left, but she’d refused contact with him both times.
His sons, though they were adults now, weren’t when the choices for their life were made. And they’d been raised to hate him and think he was out to destroy the group and their lives.
“Tell me if the boys are all right, at least,” Beau asked his uncle.
“They’re healthy. Handsome like you. Their names.” Obie broke off a moment before speaking again. “Their mother changed their names when she took on a new church marriage. Dyed their hair until they got to be teenagers. They never complained. Always helped bring in the harvest if we was farming. Never once shirkers.”
“Are they married? Did they get an education? Do they have jobs or are they only working on group land?” Beau asked, hungry for details.
Obie shook his head. “I already said more than I should. They’re happy. And faithful members of the flock. I got places to be.” He kicked one of the duffel bags. “Gotta get things in motion now that I have the money.”
“Will you be in touch?”
Obie shrugged. “If I can. I’ll keep my promises. Even if you never hear from me again, know I delivered those letters and did all I could to help your mom. Take care of yourself, Beau. God bless and keep you.”
Beau made it home, but once he turned the ignition off he could no longer hold back the shaking of his muscles and the ache in his heart.
* * *
CORA HEARD BEAU’S truck pull up and waited impatiently for him to come in. But after a few minutes she headed outside, concerned.
And found him, head resting on the arms he had folded on the top of the steering wheel. Worry had her quickening her steps, opening his door, and then the look on his face broke her heart.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
He turned and slipped from the truck’s cab, pulling her against him with a barely suppressed sob. Cora’s heart began to thunder, worried his mother had already passed or that his children had rejected him somehow.
Worried because, damn it, she loved him so much and seeing him so obviously upset filled her with an urgency to make things better.
She led him inside and into their bedroom, where she took off his shoes and settled against him, her head on his chest as he got himself under control again. Jezzy seemed to know exactly what was best. She laid over his feet at the bottom of the bed, giving him warmth and some weight.
“I gave him the money. He promised to give the letters to my mother and my sons. He said my ex dyed their hair until they were teens. I don’t know why that hurts me so much, but it’s all I could hear as I was driving back.”
These motherfucking people made her so angry. That they did this to him and called it religion really pissed her off.
“A rejection of you? I assume they have red hair too so she erased that connection. She’s terrible and I hate her very much. It hurts because they’re yours and she’s doing all she can to keep them from you.”
He didn’t say anything else for a time and it wasn’t necessary to. She simply wanted to be there. Wanted him to know she would always support him and listen to him. Would burn shit down on his behalf. All she could do was hope things turned out however was best for him. Knew most likely he’d be hurt again before the end, but hoping for the best anyway.