Once a Family

by Tara Taylor Quinn

  Hardly. She didn’t even want to lift it for him again, and she was in love with him.

  But she promised she wouldn’t and when, as she hurried back toward the high school, she looked back to find him still watching her, when she saw him smile and wave, she knew that she’d done the right thing.

  * * *

  THE NEXT WEEK passed in a bit of a blur for Sedona. May was approaching and in another few weeks Tatum would be out of school.

  As would many other kids whose lives would be drastically changing that summer, whether they knew it yet or not. Why people waited until vacation time to split up, she didn’t know, but typically, she had twice as many new clients in the summer months as she did during the winter.

  She spoke with Tanner every night, because she’d made a verbal agreement to try to get to know him in exchange for Tatum’s residency at The Lemonade Stand. And because she wanted to. She couldn’t pretend anything different.

  She could sense his growing frustration and wasn’t sure how much longer he was going to be patient with Tatum’s stonewalling them all so she could continue to live at the shelter.

  Sedona wasn’t sure how much longer she could continue her balancing act, hoping that Tanner had done nothing to warrant his sister’s aversion to coming home.

  Why would a fifteen-year-old girl prefer being locked in at a women’s shelter every night to living a normal life?

  She talked to Tanner, lay in bed at night and tingled as his voice came over the line. One night, late, in a low, sexy voice, he asked if she had regrets about her lack of a love life and she told him about the lonely law school years, when it seemed that life didn’t exist outside case studies and torts. He asked about her toughest case—just an overview, not personal details. She told him about the few times she’d had to excuse herself to the restroom after court to allow herself to shed the tears that sometimes welled up inside her.

  And one night he confessed that he didn’t know what he was going to do when Tatum left for college. “Other than the vineyard, my whole life has consisted of looking after my siblings, and even the vineyard was for them. To have a way to support them,” he’d said, his voice softer than usual. “I’m not sure I’ll know what to do when I’m no longer a guardian. Based on these past weeks, I’m going to suck at living alone.”

  Staring out her window at the blackness of the beach in the distance, she’d listened to the waves through her open window. She’d been living alone for almost ten years. Since she’d started law school.

  “Maybe it’s time you started thinking about a life for yourself.” Her parents had encouraged her to make her own way. To find out what she wanted and focus on obtaining it. She couldn’t imagine not having had that chance.

  “Sounds lonely.”

  Sometimes. A lot of times. But it was wonderful, too. Straightening her legs, she’d moved them along the cooled softness of her sheets, and thought about evenings like the one she’d just spent—when she could come home, bathe and crawl into bed without having to answer to anyone.

  “It’s nice now and then to have some hours without any expectations on your shoulders.” Then she’d told him about long days and being able to come home and not have to do anything, to answer to anyone or have anyone expect her to do something for them.

  “Yeah, but what if you’d come home to find a plate of your favorite food warming in the oven, a glass of wine waiting and, while you undressed, your bubble bath being drawn for you?” She’d thought maybe his tone had changed. And she might have imagined the difference.

  Moving her legs again, pulling them tightly together, she’d allowed her mind to play out his imagined scenario.

  “What’s the wine?”

  “My pinot grigio.”

  Her toes had tingled. Along with every other part of her.

  “Would I be drinking it alone?”

  “Depends.” His tone had changed. Most definitely.

  “On what?” So had hers.

  “On whether or not you’d like me to join you in that tub.”

  “Hmm.” She’d never actually shared a tub with anyone.

  “Is yours a double-wide garden tub?” He’d dropped his voice to just one step above a whisper.

  “Yes.”

  “Plenty big enough for two.”

  “Mmm-hmm.”

  “Was I out of line when I kissed you the other night?”

  “Yes.” She’d agreed to get to know him. Not to get physically involved.

  “Did you like it?”

  Black was black and white was white. She’d never settled for shades of gray. “Yes.”

  She’d heard some rustling. And then he’d said, “Yeah, me, too.”

  It had been a long day. And maybe that was the reason coming home to hot food, a glass of wine and a shared bubble bath had sounded so very much better than lying in bed alone with no one there to know or care that she’d come home late and exhausted.

  “You kiss...for someone who’s never been involved in a committed relationship...you do it...well.” The darkness had taken away most of the embarrassment she’d felt for having made the admission out loud.

  “So do you.”

  Did that mean her kiss had had the same effect on him as his had had on her? Maybe she should have poured herself a glass of wine before she’d climbed beneath the sheets. Or maybe she should have called him first.

  “I...I’ve never actually quite felt like... Your kiss had... It was...good. Different.”

  She was normally quite eloquent.

  “Would you like it to happen again?”

  She’d closed her eyes. Listened to the ocean. Thought of hot baths. And warm nights out on the sand. “Yes.”

  “Yeah. Me, too.”

  Liquid had pooled inside her. Opening her eyes, Sedona had sat up in bed, upsetting Ellie, who’d tucked herself into a ball on the pillow next to Sedona’s. “It’s not a good idea, though.”

  “Why not?”

  Because a fifteen-year-old girl was depending on her to make the right choice if it came down to choosing between her and Tanner.

  Truth was, each day, as she got her Tatum report from Sara, coupled with the few times she’d stopped in at The Lemonade Stand to see the girl, or spoken to Lila about Tatum’s future, she knew she couldn’t trust herself to be alone with Tatum’s brother.

  According to Sara, Tatum was exhibiting signs of trust issues that reached beyond the scope of being recently hit. So even if Del Harcourt had been the one to leave the physical bruises, there had to be something else driving Tatum’s behavior.

  Something the girl didn’t seem to be able to talk about. Due to the very real confusion the teenager exhibited, Sara suspected Tatum might not remember everything that was driving her fear. That perhaps the recent events in her life, having been hit, had triggered something else inside of her.

  And so on Thursday night, when she was overtired and wanting to make love to a man she wasn’t sure she could trust, when, during their longest conversation yet, he was at the most open and vulnerable point she’d ever known him to be, she said, “We’d like to put Tatum under hypnosis.”

  He was a practical man. And too controlled for her to know who really lived inside the facade he gave to the world.

  “What? That’s crazy! Why?”

  She’d both expected, and dreaded, the response. Someone with something to hide would find any form of mind release therapy threatening.

  But she explained Sara’s theories, anyway, adding that Sara would need to speak with him herself before proceeding.

  “Hypnosis is for circus acts,” he said, all evidence of emotion wiped from his voice. But she was on to him now. The calmer Tanner got, the more something raged inside of him. Not raged with anger. Just raged. As though he fought silent ba
ttles that he didn’t dare let the world see.

  And so she patiently relayed the research she’d done before making her call that evening. Citing scientific evidence of the successes renowned psychotherapists had experienced with the therapy.

  “It won’t work unless we have Tatum’s full cooperation,” she added. “If your sister doesn’t believe in the treatment, then she’ll be resistant to the level of relaxation that must be reached in order for hypnosis to produce any true results.”

  “Has anyone talked to Tatum about it?”

  “Not yet. Not without your approval.”

  Which probably was not on its way. She could hear his “no” loud and clear.

  He asked a couple more questions. She answered them.

  “Who would do the hypnosis? And who would be in the room?”

  “A psychiatrist that Sara works with. And Sara, the doctor and Tatum.”

  “Let me talk to her about it tomorrow,” he said after an inordinately long pause, a note of defeat in his voice. “If she wants to try this experiment, if it will somehow give her the excuse she needs to open up and tell us what’s going on, I won’t stand in her way. I want my sister well, Sedona. Well and back home where she belongs.”

  There was no doubting the truth in those words.

  * * *

  TANNER DIDN’T GET to talk to Tatum the next day. Instead, he spoke with Lila McDaniels, the shelter’s managing director, who called to tell him that his sister wasn’t feeling well and would be staying home from school that day.

  Tatum had a sore throat and Lynn, the nurse practitioner, had already seen her and was running a culture. They’d call him as soon as they knew anything.

  He called the high school to let them know that Tatum wouldn’t be at school that day.

  The attendance counselor wasn’t in, but the school secretary assured him that she’d pass on his message.

  She also asked how he was doing. How his wine was coming along. And whether or not he’d been to the new steak house up the coast.

  He’d made the mistake of sleeping with the woman once—after Talia had left and before Tatum started high school. She never missed a chance to let him know she wouldn’t say no to a repeat performance.

  But Tatum didn’t like the woman. And so he wasn’t bringing her home.

  Period.

  Pretending he was getting another call, he rang off before she pinned him down to a definitive answer on the steak house front. He wasn’t going to sleep with her again—which meant no dinner, either—but he didn’t want to hurt her feelings.

  Let her think he was too busy to date. He’d found the excuse usually let him off the hook without any ill will.

  One thing was for sure. With Tatum in a shelter for abused women, threatening to have him arrested for something he hadn’t done, he didn’t need an enemy from Tatum’s school.

  * * *

  SEDONA WASN’T GOING to call Tanner Friday night. After spending the entire night before dreaming about having sex with him, she needed a break.

  Tatum’s throat culture had come back negative and after a day lying on the couch in Maddie’s bungalow with Maddie fussing over her and bringing her tea, the teenager was feeling much better. Just to be sure, Sedona stopped by the shelter. And was told that, since Tatum hadn’t been at school, she hadn’t spoken with Tanner.

  “Did he call you?” she asked as she perched on the edge of an armchair in Maddie’s living room while Maddie had dinner with Darin and his brother, Grant, at Lynn’s larger bungalow on the edge of the property. The June double wedding was looming closer and it seemed as though everyone at The Lemonade Stand was catching the fever of excitement that Maddie didn’t have the ability to contain.

  “Yeah, but I didn’t answer.”

  Understanding that the girl needed this space, supporting her right to have the time to work through whatever was traumatizing her, Sedona also felt a strong pang for the man who was now going to have three days without a word from his little sister instead of just the two she knew he’d already been dreading.

  It also meant another three days before they could make arrangements for the hypnosis. Another three days of a stand-off that was getting harder and harder to bear.

  “I think he had something in particular to talk to you about.” The line she was treading was stretching too thin. If it broke she would have no one to blame but herself.

  “What?” Tatum asked.

  She was the girl’s lawyer. Owed Tatum her loyalty.

  “I’d rather he spoke with you about it.” She chose her words carefully. “I don’t want to influence your conversation.”

  Nodding, Tatum turned her face toward the television that she’d muted when Sedona had walked in. Some reality show was on.

  Sedona, who faced far too much reality in the course of a day’s work, didn’t watch them. She didn’t watch much television at all, preferring the sound of the ocean for company over laugh tracks and rehearsed speeches.

  She stood. “So you’ll take his call?”

  “Yeah.” Tatum seemed unhappy. Not so much afraid as concerned. “I need to talk to him about my cell phone, anyway,” she said. “My month of grounding from my smartphone is almost up.”

  * * *

  TANNER HAD JUST come in from the vineyard on Friday, satisfied that his crop was healthy and going to produce as planned, and was on his way in to shower when his cell phone rang.

  Thinking of Sedona, and then of Tatum, his heart leaped as he grabbed the phone from the holster on the waistband of his jeans.

  “Mr. Malone?”

  He didn’t recognize the voice and steeled himself. “Yes?”

  “This is Nancy Pawloski calling from Oceanside High School.”

  Tatum’s school? “Yes?”

  “I’m the attendance counselor, sir.”

  Returning his call from the morning. “Oh, hello. She’s fine,” he said now. Lila McDaniels had phoned him that afternoon to tell him so. “It’s not strep so she’ll be back at school on Monday.”

  Hand in his pocket, he stood in the living room he and Tatum had arranged together, staring out at the dried-up yard and dusty roundabout. He’d meant to lay sod. And plant flowers...

  “I’m glad to hear that, sir.”

  Heading toward the shower, he said, “Thanks for calling. I should have let you know and I’m sorry.” He’d been pruning when Lila had called.

  He stood in the bathroom, pretending not to notice his sister’s empty spaces, and heard, “It’s not a problem, Mr. Malone. I’m glad, with as much as she’s been feeling unwell lately, that you’ve had her checked out. Glad to know that she’s fine.”

  His reflection in the mirror shocked him. Not only because of the lines that had formed around his frown, but because he looked so...old. And worn. “She’s been feeling unwell a lot?” he asked, schooling his voice to a calmness he didn’t feel.

  “She’s missed nine classes over the past month.”

  What? Heart thudding heavily, Tanner waited for the intensity to pass. “There must be some mistake in your record keeping,” he stated calmly when he’d regained control of his emotions. “I drive Tatum to school every day. And watch her until she’s inside the door,” he added, just so there’d be no further misunderstanding. “And I pick her up every afternoon.”

  “There’s no mistake in the record keeping, sir. Several of Tatum’s teachers have reported her leaving class due to illness. She always returns, and it’s not always the same class so it’s not a big deal. Girls go through things and it’s not uncommon for them to need to leave class at this age. Teachers report every incident, as a matter of rote, and it’s up to me to chart them and watch for trends. I’ve just been starting to get concerned enough about Tatum to call you, but then you called this morning.” />
  Watching his expression in the mirror until the tension had eased he asked, “Did she say what was wrong?”

  Gather the parameter of the problems, then find the solution. Every problem had one.

  “Just that she wasn’t feeling well. We usually assume that means cramps.”

  “Nine times in a month?” He wasn’t accusing. He just needed to know.

  “It does seem a bit excessive, but it happens. I take it she didn’t tell you about the situation? Probably didn’t want to worry you.”

  The situation? The man in the mirror didn’t look like him. The panic was unacceptable. And Tanner looked away.

  The counselor continued. “Thomas, he’s made good for himself, largely because of your support. And Talia, you kept her at home and in school as well as any parent could have done. And now Tatum, she’s such a good girl, Mr. Malone. Straight As. Polite and thoughtful and―”

  “Excuse me.” He didn’t need a history lesson. “I’m sorry, but have we met before?”

  “Not directly, no. But I’ve been with Oceanside schools for twenty years, starting out as a teacher’s aide. I had both Thomas and Talia in my class.”

  And obviously the gossip mill worked as well in the adult sector of the public education system as it did among its students.

  Tanner pulled himself upright. The thought was unfair. And unlike him. The personnel at Oceanside public schools had been a godsend to him. Many times. Supporting his right to have custody of his siblings, helping him pick up the slack a time or two in the early days...he owed them.

  “I’ll talk to Tatum,” he said now. “If there’s more going on with her health, I can assure you, she’ll be seeing the doctor immediately.”

  “I told Tatum you’d want to know.”

  “You’ve already talked to my sister about this?”

  “Yes, sir. Her chart flagged me and I called her in yesterday afternoon. I told her that I’d be calling you.”

  He didn’t know how to respond without giving himself away.

  “She said that you wouldn’t care, but I knew you would. Girls have a way of underestimating the opposite sex, you know? A lack of outward affection translates as a lack of caring,” the woman said, the compassion in her voice mostly lost on him.