by Nora Roberts
“Let’s see.”
She steered him into the kitchen. There wasn’t much left in the fridge but a bottle of jug wine and part of a six-pack of Beck’s. Emma opened a bottle and handed it to him.
“Just like old times,” she said.
“More or less.” He sniffed the glass in her hand. “What a good girl you are.”
“I’m not much of a drinker.”
“That doesn’t require an apology. Bri’s enjoying himself.” He nodded over the wall to where Brian was sitting on the floor and, like a traveling minstrel, plucking an acoustic guitar.
When she looked at him, strumming, singing for himself as much as for the group surrounding him, the love poured through her. “He enjoys playing like this as much as in any stadium or studio.”
“More,” Johnno said before he tipped back the beer. “Though I don’t think he knows it.”
“I think he’s feeling better about all of this now.” She glanced around at the mix of people crowded into her home. Her Home. “After all, he’d had a security system put in that would make the queen’s guards at Buckingham Palace look like pikers.”
“Annoying?”
“No. No, really it’s not. Of course, I don’t remember the code numbers most of the time.” She sipped, content to stand in the kitchen a half-wall away from the crowd and the laughter. “Did Luke tell you that he sent my portfolio over to Timothy Runyun?”
“He mentioned it.” Johnno cocked his head. “Problem?”
“I don’t know. He’s offered me a part-time job, as an assistant.”
He took a little tug on the hair she’d pulled back in a ponytail. “There are pitiful few who start at the top, Emmy luv.”
“It’s not that. It’s not that at all. Runyun is one of the top ten photographers in the country. Starting out with him as a janitor would be a dream come true.”
“So?”
She turned away from the party to look at him, to watch his eyes. “So why did he offer me a job, Johnno? Because of my pictures, or because of you and my father?”
“Maybe you should ask Runyun.”
“I intend to.” She set her glass down, then picked it up again. “I know that American Photographer printed my shot because Luke suggested it.”
“Do you?” Johnno said mildly. “I suppose the shot wasn’t worthy of that honor?”
“It was a damn good shot, but—”
Johnno leaned back against the refrigerator and drank. “Lighten up, Emma. You can’t go through life second-guessing everything that happens to you, good or bad.”
“It’s not that I’m ungrateful to Luke. He’s been great, right from the start. But this isn’t like giving Marianne and me cooking lessons.”
“Nothing could be,” Johnno said dryly.
“I want this job with Runyun to be mine.” She swung back her hair. Thin gold columns danced at her ears. “You have your music, Johnno. I feel the same way about my photography.”
“Are you good?”
Her chin came up. “I’m very good.”
“Well, then.” He considered the subject closed and glanced back at the party. “Quite a group.”
She started to continue, then dragging a hand through her hair, let it go. “I’m sorry P.M. and Stevie aren’t here.”
“Maybe next time. Still, we have some old faces among the new. I see you dug up Blackpool.”
“Actually, Da ran into him yesterday. He’s doing Madison Square Garden next weekend. There isn’t a ticket left in the city. Are you going to catch it?”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.” He cocked a brow. “I’m hardly a fan.”
“But he’s recorded three McAvoy/Donovan songs.”
“That’s business,” Johnno said, and dismissed it.
“Why don’t you like him?”
Johnno shrugged and drank again. “I’ve never been sure. Something about that smug smile.”
Turning, Emma reached in the cupboard for more chips. “I suppose he’s entitled to be smug. Four gold albums, a couple of Grammys, and a stunning wife.”
“Stunning estranged wife, I’m told. He’s certainly coming on to our favorite redhead.”
“Marianne?” Tossing the bags of chips aside, Emma shifted, scanned, then spotted her roommate cuddled on the shadowy window seat with Blackpool. She felt a surge of emotion that was tangled jealousy and alarm. “Let me have a cigarette,” she murmured as she struggled to shrug it off.
“She’s a big girl, Emma.”
“Of course she is.” She drew in the strong French smoke and winced. “He’s old enough to …” She trailed off, remembering that Johnno was four or five years Blackpool’s senior.
“Atta girl,” he said with a chuckle. “Bite your tongue.”
But she didn’t smile. “It’s just that she’s been so sheltered.”
“Of course, Mother Superior.”
“Cram it, Johnno.” She picked up her drink again, and kept her eye on Blackpool. The name suited him, she thought. He had dark, lush hair and favored black clothes. Leathers, suedes, silks. He had one of those moody, sensual faces. Heathcliff, as Emma had always imagined him. And she’d always thought Bronte’s character more self-destructive than heroic. Beside him, Marianne looked like a bright, slender candle ready to be lit.
“I’m only saying that she’s spent most of her life in that damn school.”
“In the bed next to yours,” Johnno pointed out.
She wasn’t in the mood to laugh. “All right, that’s true. But I also had all that time with all of you, seeing things, being a part of things. Marianne went from school, to camp, to her father’s estate. I know she puts on a front, but she’s very naïve.”
“I’d give odds on our favorite redhead. Blackpool’s slick, dear, but he’s not a monster.”
“Of course not.” But she was going to keep her eye on Marianne nonetheless. She lifted the cigarette again, then froze.
Someone had put on a new album. The Beatles. Abbey Road. The first cut on the A side.
“Emma.” Alarmed, Johnno gripped her wrist. Her pulse was scrambling, her skin was ice. “What the hell? Emma, look here.”
“He say one and one and one is three.”
“Switch the record,” she whispered.
“What?”
“Switch the record.” She could feel the breath backing up in her lungs. Clogging there. “Johnno, please. Turn it off”
“All right. Stay here.”
He skimmed his way through the crowd, moving quickly, smoothly enough to prevent himself from being detained.
Emma gripped the edge of the wall until her fingers went numb. She wasn’t seeing the party any longer, the pretty people mixing together, laughing over plastic glasses of white wine or chilled bottles of imported beer. She could only see the shadows of a hallway, hear the hissing and snapping of monsters. And her little brother’s cries.
“Emma.” It was Brian now, standing in the tiny kitchen alcove, Johnno at his side. “What is it, baby? Are you sick?”
“No.” It was Da, she thought. Da would make it all go away. “No, it’s Darren. I heard Darren crying.”
“Oh Christ.” He took her shoulders and shook. “Emma, look at me.”
“What?” Her head snapped up. The glaze seemed to melt away from her eyes into tears. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I ran away.”
“It’s all right.” He gathered her close. His eyes, anguished, met Johnno’s over her head. “We should get her out of here.”
“In her bedroom,” Johnno suggested, then casually began to clear a path. He slid the frosted-glass doors closed behind them, muffling the sounds of the party.
“Let’s lie down, Emma.” Brian kept his voice soothing as he set her on the bed. “I’ll stay right here.”
“I’m okay.” Her worlds had separated again. She didn’t know whether to feel grief or embarrassment. “I don’t know what set that off. Something just clicked and I was six years old again. I’m sorry, Da.”
&
nbsp; “Ssh.” He pressed his lips to her temple. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It was the music,” Johnno said, then settled beside her. “The music upset you.”
“Yes.” She moistened her dry lips. “Yes, it was the music. It was playing that night. When I woke up and heard Darren. It was playing when I started down the hall. I’d forgotten. I’ve never been able to listen to that cut, but I didn’t know why. Tonight, I guess with the party, it all rushed back.”
“Why don’t I start clearing people out?”
“No.” She took Johnno’s hand before he could rise. “I don’t want to spoil it for Marianne. I’m all right now, really. It was so strange. Almost as if I were there again. I wonder if I’d gotten to the door, if I’d have seen—”
“No.” Brian’s hand clamped down on hers. “It’s over and done with. Behind us. I don’t want you to think about it, Emma.”
She was too weary to argue. “I think I’ll just rest awhile. No one’s going to miss me.”
“I’ll stay with you,” Brian told her.
“No. I’m fine now. I’m just going to sleep. Christmas is only a few weeks away. I’ll come to London, like I promised. We’ll have a whole week.”
“I’ll stay until you sleep,” Brian insisted.
He was gone when she woke from the nightmare. It had been so real, so horribly clear. Just as the reality had been over twelve years before. Her skin was clammy with sweat as she reached for the light. She needed the light. There was so much that could hide in the dark.
It was quiet now. Five A.M. and calm, quiet. The party was over and she was alone, behind the glass walls of her room. Painfully, like an old woman, she rose out of bed to strip off her clothes and pull on a robe. She slid the door back, hit another light.
The room was a jumble. There were scents—beer going stale, smoke trapped near the ceiling, the lingering breath of perfumes and sweat. She glanced up the stairs to where Marianne slept. She didn’t want to disturb her by tidying up now, though her ingrained neatness rubbed at her. She would wait until sunrise.
There was something else she had to do, and she wanted to do it quickly before cowardice could take over. Sitting by the phone, she dialed information.
“Yes. I’d like the numbers for American, TWA, and Pan Am.”
Chapter Twenty
She wasn’t going to feel guilty. In fact, at the moment, Emma didn’t want to feel much of anything. She knew if her father discovered she’d flown to California, without her guards, he’d be furious. She could only hope he didn’t find out. With luck, she would have her two days in California, catch the redeye Sunday night and be in New York again, attending class, Monday morning, with no one but Marianne the wiser.
Bless Marianne, Emma thought as the plane touched down. She hadn’t asked any questions once she had seen that the answers would be painful. Instead, she had roused herself barely past dawn, tossed on a blond wig, sunglasses, and Emma’s overcoat and had cabbed it to early mass at Saint Pat’s. With the guards trailing behind her.
That had given Emma enough time to dash to the airport and catch her plane to the Coast. As far as Sweeney and his partner would be concerned, Emma McAvoy would be spending a quiet weekend at home. Marianne would have to do some fast talking if Brian or Johnno called, but then Marianne was nothing if not a fast talker.
In any case, Emma decided while she deplaned, the die was cast. She was here, and she would do what she had come to do.
She had to see the house again. It had been sold all those years ago, so it was doubtful she could wangle her way inside. But she had to see it.
“The Beverly Wilshire,” she told the cab driver.
Exhausted, she let her head fall back, let her eyes close behind her dark glasses. It was too warm for her winter coat now, but she couldn’t find the energy to shrug out of it. She needed to rent a car, she realized, and let out an annoyed breath. She should have taken care of that already. With a shake of her head, she promised herself she would arrange it through the concierge as soon as she had unpacked the few things she’d tossed into her bag.
There were ghosts here, she thought. Along Hollywood Boulevard, in Beverly Hills, on the beaches at Malibu and throughout the hills looking over the L.A. basin. Ghosts of herself as a young girl on her first trip to America, of her young, heroic father hoisting her on his shoulders in Disneyland. Of Bev, smiling, a hand laid protectively over the child she carried in her womb. And always of Darren as he giggled and ran his tractor over the turkey rug.
“Miss?”
Emma blinked and focused on the uniformed doorman who stood waiting to help her from the cab.
“Checking in?”
“Yes, thank you.” Mechanically, she paid off the driver, walked into the lobby to registration. She took her key, forgetting for the moment that this was the first time she had stayed alone.
In her room she opened the discreet Gucci carry-on, by habit neatly folding her lingerie, hanging her clothes, setting out her toiletries. Once done, she picked up the phone.
“This is Miss McAvoy in 312. I’d like to arrange for a rental car. Two days. Yes, as soon as possible. That’ll be fine. I’ll be down.”
There was something else that had to be done, though she was afraid. Picking up the phone book, she opened it, skimmed through to the Ks. Kesselring, L.
Emma noted down the address in her neat hand. He was still here.
“Are you going to eat all morning, Michael, or are you going to cut the lawn?”
Michael grinned at his father and shoveled in more pancakes. “It’s a big lawn. I need my strength. Right, Mom?”
“The boy doesn’t eat right since he moved out.” Pleased to have both men at her table, Marge filled the coffee cups. “You’re skin and bones, Michael. I’ve got the best part of a nice ham I cooked earlier in the week. You take it home with you.”
“Don’t give this deadbeat my ham,” Lou objected.
Michael lifted a brow, then doused the remaining pancakes with Aunt Jemima. “Who you calling a deadbeat?”
“You lost the bet, but I don’t see my grass getting mowed.”
“I’ll get to it,” Michael grumbled and snatched another sausage. “I think that game was fixed.”
“The Orioles won, fair and square. And they won over a month ago. Pay up.”
Michael gestured with the sausage. It was a conversation they’d had every weekend since the World Series, and one they would undoubtedly continue to have until the first of the year when the bet would be paid in full.
“As a police captain you should be aware that gambling’s illegal.”
“As a rookie, assigned to my precinct, you should have better sense than to make a sucker bet. Mower’s in the shed.”
“I know where it is.” He rose, swung an arm over his mother’s shoulder. “How do you live with this guy?”
“It isn’t easy.” Marge smiled and patted Michael’s cheek. “Be sure to be careful with that weed whacker around the rosebushes, dear.”
She watched him go out, slamming the screen door as he had always done. For a moment she wished he could be ten again, but that feeling passed quickly, leaving a quiet pride. “We did a good job, Lou.”
“Yeah.” He took both his and Michael’s dishes to the sink. He’d aged well, putting on less than ten pounds over the last twenty years. His hair was fully gray now, but he’d kept most of it. Though he occasionally realized he was uncomfortably close to sixty, he felt better than he had in his life. Due, he thought as he put his arm around Marge, to his wife’s diligent watch on things like cholesterol and sugar.
As for herself, Marge had settled contentedly into middle age. She was as trim as she’d been the day they’d been married. Nothing kept her from her twice-weekly aerobic classes. Her hair was colored a flattering ash-brown.
Five years before, she’d gotten what Lou had thought was a bee in her bonnet about starting her own business. He’d considered himself indulgent when he’d stood back and
let his “little woman” open a small bookstore. He’d been kind and considerate, like an adult patting a child on the head. Then she had astonished him by showing a keen and often ruthless head for business. Her little shop had expanded. Now she had three doing brisk business in Hollywood, Bel Air, and Beverly Hills.
Life was full of surprises, he thought as he heard the mower gun. His wife, who had seemed content for years dusting furniture and baking pies was a businesswoman with her own accountant. His son, who had breezed carelessly through college, then had spent nearly eighteen months drifting, had enrolled in the police academy, without saying a word. As for himself, Lou was giving serious thought to something that had always seemed years off. Retirement.
It was a good life, Lou thought, drawing in scents of sausage and roses. On impulse, he spun his wife around and planted a long hard kiss on her mouth.
“The kid’s going to be busy for at least an hour,” he murmured as he cupped her breasts. “Let’s go upstairs.”
Marge tilted her head back, then grinned.
Michael turned the mower, enjoying the physical release and the light sweat that was working over his skin. Not that he liked losing the bet, he thought. He hated to lose anything.
But he missed a lawn, the look of it, the smell of it. His apartment suited him with its postage-stamp pool and noisy neighbors. But the suburbs, he mused, with their big, leafy trees and tidy yards, their backyard barbecues and station wagons, were home. You always felt like a kid again there. Saturday-morning bike rides. Ricky Jones down the street trying out his skateboard. Pretty girls walking by in thin cotton dresses while you traded baseball cards on the curb and pretended not to notice.
The old neighborhood hadn’t changed much since his youth. It was still a place where paperboys rode bikes on delivery and tossed today’s news into bushes. Neighbors still competed with each other over the best lawn, the best garden. They borrowed tools and forgot to return them.
Being there gave him a sense of continuity. Something he hadn’t known he wanted until he’d moved away from it.
A movement caught his eye, and he glanced up in time to see the shade of his parents’ bedroom window go down. He stopped, openmouthed, the grip of the mower vibrating under his hands. He might not have had his gold shield, but it didn’t take a detective to figure out what was going on behind the shade. At nine o’clock in the morning. He continued to stare a moment, unsure if he should be amused, embarrassed, or delighted. He decided it was best not to think about it at all. There was something spooky about imagining your parents having sex.