Chapter Sixteen
Thursday, April 13 eight-thirty p.m.
Peach was still getting used to the feel of the rug under her feet. She couldn’t take it being pulled out from under her again. “Just tell me fast. Like ripping off a Band-Aid.”
“He knows,” Katie said.
Tom pulled Peach close, rubbing her arm. “Damn it, guys. You knew it was important—”
“We didn’t tell him, Tommy.” Katie laid a stilling hand on his arm. “He told me and Carolina this morning, before lunch, that you were going to find him. He asked us to help him find a Catholic Church. Then, this evening, he found Jeb and asked if it was done.”
“How…how is he?”
“Sad but holding up well, considering. Carolina is with him.”
She told herself it was a gift. There was no guilt, no shame. Still, she found Tom’s hand and held it on the short drive to the farm. Leaving the others to the baggage, she went directly to Tom’s living room. Quiet laughter floated down the steps. Poppy told Carolina a story of Rico and her father trying to fly off the garage when they were boys.
She stepped into the doorway, and the conversation abruptly ended. As Carolina turned, Peach saw the grief in her eyes, one of which was distinctly bruised. Before the question could be asked, she was in the Carolina’s arms, being hugged and kissed. “I’m sorry, Peach. Your uncle was an amazing man. I feel like I know him with the stories. I would have liked him.”
Peach held on as her voice cracked. “He would have liked you, too.”
Then Carolina left them. She trembled as she walked to her grandfather, her sadness so complete, it weakened her. She should have thought of something to say. Something poetic. Something noble. Instead, she said, “I’m here.”
Poppy stood from the couch, opening his arms. She filled them without hesitation. They clung to each other. Tears came but without the exhausting sobs. Poppy began to sing in her ear. It was that same silly song Rico had sung as he worked. Laughter burst forth, and even to her ears, it sounded crazy. “That song, what is it?”
“Your grandmother made it up when the boys were little. She sang it as a lullaby. It was her happy song. She sang it in the garden and cooking and all around the house.”
“You’ll have to teach it to me. I could use a happy song.”
His hand stroked her back, offering her silent strength when she had been determined to provide it to him. “Where is he now?”
“With the coroner. They are going to do an autopsy to confirm the cause of death. It is going to be a while…before we can bring him home.” That brought a flurry of decisions and options she just didn’t have the strength for. Instead, she wrapped her arms around his neck and held on tightly. “I love you, Poppy.”
“I love you, my little peach.” He kissed her temple before gently pushing her back. “Now, I am going to rest my weary bones. You find Tom. I know he worries about you.” At his doorway, he turned back to her. “We are going to cremate him and let the wind take him home.”
She waited until Poppy went into his bedroom before she returned to the courtyard. Some instinct told her Tom would be there, waiting for her.
And he was.
On an ATV.
She needed to talk to her grandfather alone. She needed to be there for him. He got that. He also got that she needed someone to be there for her. The hailstorm on the boat was just the leading edge of the front. You don’t live through what she did without feeling the turbulence.
He wanted to give her a space of peace, and nothing had that like the country.
She opened his door, the light spilling around her, bathing her silhouette in warmth. As the light succumbed to the closing of the door, he saw her features. Torn, worn, blanched. She had thinned in the minutes since he left her, withering beneath the jacket she pulled tightly around her stomach.
“What are you doing?” she asked, one brow raised, curiosity taming heartache.
“We are going for a ride. Get on.”
Peach hastily braided her hair, took the helmet he held out, and climbed on, pressing against him. The stone of the courtyard crunched under the tires as he crossed into the garage, then past the barn and out into the night. The chilled air was silent, still too cool for the insects that filled the summer nights with songs. He unleashed the machine, riding the ridges and rills like a jet ski on water. She moved naturally with him, her front to his back. They quickly drove out of the modern glow of Elderberry Farm and into the fields. The narrow headlights provided a glimpse into the world that was all around them and yet invisible.
Silence was their companion. It wasn’t awkward or distant but comfortable. Warm in the way it was welcomed without being invited. He drove to the small pier that jetted into the glass-topped pond. He took blankets, pillows, and a thermos of hot chocolate from the storage compartment.
“What’s all that for?”
“Looking at stars. Don’t tell anyone, but it hurts my back to sit on the hard wood and look up for a long time.”
Her eyebrows pressed together. “How is that a secret?”
He shrugged and laid out a flannel blanket. “Some people might take it as I’m getting soft. I’m not. I just don’t see a reason to be uncomfortable.” He patted the blanket. “Have a seat.”
She sat obediently, watching as he set up two of the big pillows that she had seen in the TV room by the video games. He squatted, waiting patiently until she lay back and found a comfortable place. He sat next to her, draped another blanket over top, and then opened the thermos.
The steam swirled into the moon-lit night as he poured. She took the first and sipped the thick, sweet drink. “This didn’t come from a container.”
“Hell no. I make it my own secret way.”
“How’s that?”
“It wouldn’t be a secret very long if I went around telling everyone how I do it.”
“No. I suppose it wouldn’t.” She looked up at the eternal black sky.
He watched her face. The infinite depth of night took time to adjust to. He saw the moment her eyes did.
“There must be a million of them.” There was awe in her voice. “Where have they been hiding?”
“Behind city lights. I tried counting once. Fell asleep at one thousand eighty-seven.”
She giggled and slapped at his hand. “You’re making that up.”
“No, I’m not. I take counting very seriously. It’s the nerd in me.”
They fell silent for a minute, then she sighed heavily. “Can you imagine what it was like, being those early explorers who navigated just by the stars?”
“Terrifying and thrilling—in equal measure.”
“Thrilling would outweigh terrifying a hundred to one. Then there is the call of the ocean. Have you ever been on one of the oceans?” When he shook his head, she patted his hand. “You should someday. There is something about a horizon that stretches forever that obliges you to see what’s on the other side. Terrifying, maybe at times. But thrilling and compelling. That’s why I would go.”
They fell into silence again. She tilted her cup and patiently waited for every last drop of the thick chocolate to fall to her tongue.
Tom covered the hand that rested on the blanket with his own. She turned her hand over and laced their fingers together. “How is Poppy?”
“Poppy…I don’t know…he’s just a rock, you know?” She rolled on her side. “He has an infinite capacity to accept life. He appreciates every moment and regrets nothing. Even mistakes have a purpose.” Her voice quivered, emotion choking her words. She took a breath before continuing. “He deserved to have Tío Rico home and to make sure he wasn’t set up as the fall guy. I did the first. You did the second.”
“Not yet, but I will.” He squeezed her hand. “Your uncle may be a hero. Hawthorne credits Rico with saving his life. I know what he did behind the controls changed the story. A lot more men could have died if the crane fell over land.”
She was quiet for a moment. “I told myself I would do right by Poppy. I thought once Rico was found that I would feel…I don’t know…satisfied, relieved. But I’m just empty. I’m trying to think of what to do next. Once his body is released, we’ll have him cremated. Poppy wants to scatter his ashes, to set him free. Then what?”
The question was rhetorical, he realized. She was ordering her thoughts.
“I need to go back to work. Looking for my uncle took most of my cash and all of my credit. Then how much longer can Poppy live on his own? His eyesight is only going to get worse. God, I’m tired.”
Tom moved closer. “Let’s just look at the stars. Tomorrow is for everything else. That one is my favorite.” He pointed to a flickering star low in the sky. “It looks like it’s up to something.”
She stretched and let herself be distracted. “You like troublemakers?”
“Hmmm. I find them compelling characters, just like your sea.” He smiled at her soft chuckle, gave her hand another squeeze. “Tell me your favorite story about your uncle.”
“What?”
“After my mother passed, my father would have us boys tell one of our favorite stories about Mom each night. It helped us focus on the good. Tell me a story.”
She snuggled closer, and he lifted his arm to make his shoulder her pillow. “I didn’t really know my uncle before I went to live with Poppy. He would come to visit two or three times a year and stay for a week or two. When I started living there, well, neither one of us knew what to make of the other. He didn’t have kids. I didn’t have family who had an interest in me. One Saturday, I must have been about fifteen, we were trapped in the house by heavy rain.”
“Just like the kids in The Cat in the Hat.”
“Exactly. Poppy wasn’t home. I don’t remember where he went. Maybe that was why my uncle stayed home. Anyway, I caught him at the kitchen table playing four hands of poker by himself. So I went in and sat myself down.” Peach smiled. “We played every night while he was home, and after he left, I kept playing by myself. I wanted to be ready when he came back.”
“When did he come back?”
“That fall. He didn’t get both feet inside the door before I had the deck of cards out. We played for pennies, and I cleaned him out. A few days later, I heard him tell Poppy he was going out to a card game that night.”
“You didn’t.”
“Well, see, there were these pair of boots I wanted. Poppy said I had to save my own money to buy them. I had been working odd jobs in the neighborhood and had eighty dollars. The boots were two hundred. So I took my stake and hid in the back of the Beast. It was new back then. And clean. Tío pulled into a drive thru for a snack, and I popped up and knocked on the window. I wanted a milkshake.” Her grin broadened when he laughed. “After he got over the heart attack, he ordered me to get into the cab. I blubbered all over him about the boots and my working and the eighty dollars and begged him not to take me back home.”
“He let you stay.”
Peach giggled. “There were conditions.”
“Of course.”
“One, no matter what time we got home, I had to get up for church with Poppy without whining, bitching, or ratting him out. His exact words. Two, I had to use my own money. When I went bust, I was done. Three, we were leaving when he wanted to, not me. And four, if I won money, he got half.”
“That’s a pretty steep take.”
“We both knew there would be hell to pay if Poppy knew Tío took me to a poker game, so I figured he was earning it. The card game was at a local attorney’s house. He lived close to us, but the neighborhood was different. Better, I guess. That was the first time I was in a really nice house. Everyone at the table knew my uncle and raised eyebrows at me tagging along in his shadow. He pulled out a chair, introduced me around, took my money, and bought me in.”
“How much did you take them for?”
“$525.50.” She couldn’t keep the pride from her voice. “Even after I paid off my uncle, I had enough for the boots. Or I did.”
“Oh, no. Poppy found out.”
“Oh, yes. Poppy found out. In hindsight, we weren’t all that sneaky. True to my word, I was up early for church, dressed in the skirt Poppy liked the best with my hair tied up.”
“Sounds smart to me.”
“No. Not when you consider my modus operandi was to wait to get up until Poppy yelled three times and then drag myself into the kitchen wearing whatever was on the floor in my closet. He was suspicious from the first minute. Then I asked him if he would take me to the mall after church to buy the boots. Of course, he knew how much I had saved to that point. He asked me where I got the money, and I froze. I did not rat out my uncle, but Poppy took all of my money and put it in the collection plate.”
“Harsh.”
“Even worse, Poppy and Tío got into an argument. Tío was gone by the time we returned from church. I didn’t even get to say good-bye.”
He wrapped his arm around her and gave her a hug. “That’s a rotten ending to a happy story.”
“Oh, that’s not the end. A week later, a package came for me from Arizona.”
“Rico sent you the boots?”
“Oh, yes, he did. And a deck of cards and a book on poker games and probabilities. I still have it. Every time he came home we played. And…I got a job in that lawyer’s office helping with the filing. Technically, I wasn’t allowed to play for money until I was eighteen, but…”
“Do you still play?”
“Yes. And I still kick ass.”
“You mean antes.” He laughed at his own pun. “Let’s go inside. It’s getting cold.” When she put her hand in his, he pulled her to her feet.
Peach smiled up at him, drawing her fingers along his shadowed jaw. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Always.”
Thursday, April 13 eleven p.m.
Peach went into the courtyard carrying the picnic remnants and feeling lighter. She volunteered for clean-up duty, firmly believing that since he prepared their midnight picnic, she should tidy things up. The dirties were rinsed and set in the dishwasher. The pillows were returned to the family room, where she set the now neatly folded blanket. Her hands on her hips, she looked around the quiet room. It was a good space, one built piece by piece as nothing matched, and yet it all went together. The couches and chairs were sized for active men while the frosted glass lamps screamed Carolina’s name. Crown molding, trimmed doors and windows, sculpted and beveled glass windows reminded her of much older houses, and she wondered whose taste that was. Katie, she remembered, was the architect and thought she must be talented. Where was Tom in here? He was in the “comfort” of it, she decided. The same touches that made a wooden pier perfect for star gazing made this room perfect for living. Suddenly, she craved him, wanting that…that…that whatever the word was for how he made her feel.
She closed up the room and hurried into the courtyard where disappointment awaited. The only light from Tom’s floor was a soft glow from her own bedroom. His room was as dark as the night in which she stood.
She wrinkled her nose, disheartened. It was perfectly reasonable for him to be tired. It had been a very long day.
She shuffled the rocks as she went to Tom’s house, sulking. The hallway light was left thoughtfully on. Peach climbed the stairs, stepped into his living space as she turned out the hallway light. In the dark, a soft yellow light snuck from under her door acting as a beacon. With regret filled glance at Tom’s dark door, she turned the knob and walked into her fairy tale.
The light didn’t come from the elegant lamps that stood sentry aside the bed but from twenty candles. Thick white candles, short and tall, were bundled in small groups on the bedside tables, the dresser, the small table in front of the windows.
In the bed lay a dark and handsome man. The white comforter covered his hips. Tom lay on his side, his head propped up on his hand, his broad chest bare in the flickering candlelight. His eyes twinkled, and the small grin was pure sex.
Her heart skipped a beat, and the exhaustion from the day fell away. He lifted the comforter, an invitation. His bottom half was as bare as the top. She kicked off her shoes and pulled off the socks. She glanced at him and saw the hunger in his eyes. She slowed down. On a groan, she dropped her head back and raked out the weave from her braided hair. The long, thick waves poured down her back. She turned away from him and pulled the tight knit shirt over her head.
Hips swaying back and forth, she slowly walked the cotton to the floor. Standing in her black bra and panties, she looked over her shoulder at him.
Oh, yeah. He was paying attention.
She unclasped the bra and let it fall to the floor. She shook her head until she was draped in the black length of her hair. She turned to him, her pink nipples peeking through the silky strands. Her hands went to her hips.
“No,” he said, his voice thick with need. “Leave them on. Come here.”
With the sultry confidence of a diva, she walked on bare feet to the bed. When the covers were lifted a second time, she slid in. He didn’t draw the exquisite cotton back over her but blanketed her with his body. His hands and his mouth went to her breasts. He followed the line between her breasts down to her stomach to her belly button, paying it a lot of focused attention. Her skin was alive; every place he touched was so sensitive, every place he hadn’t craved his attention. He crawled down her body to the juncture between her legs. The air was cool where his heated body had been. She wanted him back, but then his large hands parted her thighs, putting her legs over his shoulders.
He settled in. A man not planning to go anywhere for a good, long time.
Not that she had any sense of time. He wiped all sense from her mind, replacing it with feeling.
He coaxed sensations, familiar and new, with his very talented mouth. The world around her was solely sensory. Her breasts were heavy, peaked, demanding attention. She cupped herself, gasping at her own touch. His tongue lapped and teased. She floated on the waves he created, a lone surfer in search of that perfect ride.
She felt it before she saw it. The perfect wave. It built as she fantasized about the man loving her. Her fantasies were replays of their times together. Destroying the hotel room. Crying his name when he spread her wide across the Queen Anne chair. Eating him for dessert and then being the dessert. The large hands, rough from work, brushed along her ribs, a trail of flames in their wake. He squeezed her hands as they covered her breasts. He sucked and licked and…
The world ceased to exist except for the waves that crashed over her body. Again and again, her muscles convulsed. Every nerve ending was at attention and screaming for joy.
Air. She gulped it in. Her empty lungs greedy. He licked again, her body tightened again, and her breath was lost again. She pushed at his shoulders, needing a respite. He locked her hands to the mattress and coaxed more than she’d ever given.
Her body was done. Totally done. “You have to stop. You fried my brain and everything else.”
His weight shifted, and she lifted her lashes by sheer determination, not wanting to leave the space he’d created. The face that looked down at her was very cocky. She took a deep breath and touched that shadowed jaw.
It would have been easy to close her eyes, let him have his way, and then slide into sweet oblivion. The pleasure he brought her redefined, well, everything. It was running naked in the morning surf and skinny dipping in the moonlight. It was lying in the tender spring grass while a soft rain cooled heated bodies. It was everything she’d ever wanted and nothing she’d ever had.
While the idea of sleeping blissed her out, it would have been selfish.
And with what this amazing man had just given her, he deserved more than a warm body to park in.
She reared up, grabbed the back of his neck, and fixed her mouth to his. She wrapped her legs around his waist, rolled him, and took him on the ride of his life. It was leaping from an airplane without a parachute, landing on a virgin white mountain slope, and snowboarding recklessly down the avalanche they just caused. Every time he got close to the edge, she left him dangling just long enough that he started building again.
The white comforter twisted around their feet and was kicked off the bed. They rolled over the bed, contending for the top. She dug her fingers in when he went for her already sensitive breasts, came off the mattress when he nipped, and sent the pillow across the room.
She got a fist of that thick hair and pulled, peeling him off her enough that she could get to his own sensitive nipples. He bucked and flipped.
They sprawled over the bed, panting, sweating, and grinning like fools.
Pinned beneath him once again, she lifted her head and blinked. “Tom. Something’s wrong.”
He shifted his leg and pinned her down. “Not from where I’m sitting.”
“I’m serious. It just got brighter.”
“It’s just the sun.”
“It’s after one in the morning.” She got another hold of his hair and pulled. “Ohhhhh, this isn’t good. Fire!”