by Teresa Hill
"Well... doesn't everybody feel that way at one time or another?"
He stared down at her. After a long moment, she caught the faintest upturn of his lips at one corner. The barest hint of a dimple appeared in his right cheek, and then he started laughing. It rose ever so slowly from deep inside and trickled out.
"What?" she asked.
He put his arms around her, picked her up at the waist and swung her around in a circle.
"Zach!" she screamed.
He laughed even harder, hoisting her up onto his shoulder in something resembling a fireman's hold and spinning around in a circle some more. She shrieked and clung to him as best she could, getting dizzier by the minute, until he slowly began to lower her to the ground. Either he was dizzy or they hadn't completely stopped revolving when he did it, because she felt herself slipping out of his hold, and him struggling to hang on to her and keep them both upright.
It didn't work that well. They finally collapsed together on the ground in her pile of leaves. He ended up flat on his back with her sprawled on top of him. She managed to rise to her hands and knees, straddling him, laughing herself. Late-afternoon sunshine came streaming through the trees, a beam of it settling like a spotlight on him and her. It was like being anointed by the gods, she decided, and felt so amazed to be here like this with him that she just had to kiss him.
Which was probably a bad idea, since he'd finally managed to tell her some of what was wrong. But she just couldn't help herself. Besides, she wasn't supposed to wait for him to ask for anything, which she supposed meant she'd have to try her best to figure out what he needed and give it to him.
Kissing seemed like a good idea at the moment.
She leaned over him, the weight of her upper body on her hands. Her hair draped around her and him, and she thought about what she could do to him with it another time, when it wasn't broad daylight and they weren't in her backyard.
He liked her hair. She remembered him playing with it last night, the way he'd grabbed it at one point and held her to him. Not that she'd been trying to get away. But she'd liked the idea of him grabbing on to her and keeping her close. And then she'd loved his fingers stroking through her hair so soothingly just before she'd finally fallen asleep.
For now, it simply hung there around them, giving them the illusion of being alone. She fitted her mouth to his, the sweetness of it bringing more tears to her eyes. She was going to cry more over this man than any she ever had in her life, she feared, but she hoped to have more happiness with him, as well.
The kiss was soft, full of yearning, and a measure of patience they hadn't shown each other before. Almost like a promise. Like saying, Let me take care of you. Let me give this to you, any kind of comfort you can find in my touch and in my heart. She'd always known she'd give him anything.
"Here." The pressure of his hands urged her down to lie fully on top of him.
She did, and he rolled her over until she was on her back on the bed of leaves and he was on his side, leaning over her. His hand brushed her hair off her face and his palm curved around her cheek and the side of her face. His thumb traced the crease of her lips in a touch that felt almost like a kiss, and she closed her eyes and pulled his mouth back to hers, because it was one thing she knew to give him.
It seemed the ultimate in luxuries and joy, lying in the grass with Zach in the late-autumn sunshine, kissing like two people who had all the time in the world.
She thought about telling him she loved him, just because she wasn't sure she could hold in the words, and because it seemed to be a day for crazy kinds of risk taking. There he went, being her irresistible truth serum again.
One more minute and the words would come spilling out of her, no taking them back, no more fighting the feelings. She did love this man and opened her mouth to tell him so.
But he glanced up and turned abruptly to the right.
"What?" Julie turned her head in that direction and saw Peter standing about five feet away from them and glaring at them.
"So this is why you came back," Peter growled.
Chapter 13
Zach sat up. She did, too. She had leaves all over her, and she quickly checked to make sure her sweater covered everything that needed covering.
"You came for him. He was down there with you in Memphis. That's the only way anybody even knew how to find you. And I knew—" His voice broke, lips quivering. He was going to cry. "I knew you didn't give a shit about me, but some guy to fuck around with—"
He didn't get out another word. Zach got to his feet and grabbed Peter by the arms, hauling him up until they were nearly nose to nose.
"Don't say another word," Zach said slowly, enunciating every syllable.
"You don't tell me what to do—" Peter began.
"Don't." Zach could growl, too, apparently very well.
This was probably the look he saved for people like Tony Williams's father and maybe that man who claimed to be his own father. She envied the don't-mess-with-me quality, because it silenced her brother and left him looking a bit scared, which probably wasn't a bad thing at the moment. Peter certainly scared her at times.
"You're upset. That's understandable," Zach said, easing up a bit. "But you've got some of the facts wrong, and now you're jumping to conclusions and using the kind of language a man does not use in front of a woman. Particularly a woman who happens to be his sister and who is trying to take care of him at the moment. So you need to calm down and be quiet, and if you want to talk, we can. But not like this."
Peter tried his best don't-mess-with-me look on Zach, but at thirteen, he was far from mastering it. He finally backed off.
Zach let go of him, but ordered, "Tell her you're sorry."
"Sorry," Peter said, as sarcastic as could be.
Zach arched a brow at that and continued to stare.
"I'm sorry," Peter repeated.
"Okay. Now that the music's not threatening to bring down the house, why don't we go inside?" Zach said.
Peter looked from one to the other, then said, "I'll talk to her. But I don't have anything to say to you."
Zach started to say something, but Julie put her hand on his arm to stop him. "It's okay. Go inside, Peter. I'll be there in a minute."
He stalked off, wrenching open the door and slamming it behind him.
"Sorry," she told Zach.
"You didn't do anything."
"Not for him," she said. "Not for the longest time, and he knows it."
Zach took her into his arms, comforting her now. "You couldn't have taken him with you, Julie. You were eighteen. He was what? Five?"
"I know," she admitted, her face tucked into the hollow between his shoulder and his neck.
"So you did all you could then. You saved yourself. And now that you can do more, you are."
"That's a pretty generous portrayal of the situation." She eased away from him. "I don't deserve you."
"Then I'll just have to convince you that you do."
"God, this is so scary," she said.
"Yeah. Life's like that sometimes."
"Zach, we haven't settled anything, but I have to go inside and talk to him."
"I know." He kissed her forehead. "You be careful. You can't know for certain what he's capable of."
"You think he'd hurt me? Physically?"
"He gets into fights at school, and you don't know what might have happened to him in this house."
"I know, but—"
"Honey, I'm sorry to just... throw this out here, but you need to know. He had some nasty bruises on him when social services took him into custody. They took X rays. Found a couple of old fractures."
Every bit of pleasure she'd found in the day slipped away. Reality was back with a vengeance. Her mother and stepfather were in jail. Julie was a woman who'd run away from these problems ages ago and come back to find them still here waiting for her. She had a brother who'd likely been abused and had learned to hate her, and Zach, a man she couldn't imagine
ever deserving, but wanted so badly.
"Did they hit you when you were here?" Zach asked.
She shrugged it off, as she always did. "It wasn't that bad."
Zach's look told her he feared that it had been.
"You saw it," she said. "You know. It was chaos. It was like falling into a hole. You keep thinking surely you'd hit bottom already, and damned if things didn't keep getting worse. My mother fell in love with this jerk. If I'd just disappeared, he might have been happy. As it was, the best I could do was try to make myself invisible. When I grew up and got sick of that, I decided to try to make them as miserable as I was. You know how well that worked."
She made the mistake of stopping to take a breath and looking up at him.
"Don't look at me like that," she cried. "Don't feel sorry for me."
"I don't, I think I lov—"
"And don't you dare say that. Don't."
"Okay," he said softly.
"He didn't really hurt me. He'd get mad and drunk, or my mom would, and if things got bad enough, they'd hit, but... you were there. There were no broken bones, no... nothing that bad. I just tried to stay away and hoped the world wouldn't fall apart on me, you know?"
"Yeah, I know."
She wondered how much he really did know of living like that. And when he talked about knowing, was he talking about his life before he came to Sam and Rachel's? Or about something else? He was definitely upset about something. He'd tried to tell her, but she'd made him laugh, and she couldn't help but be a little suspicious about how easy it had been to get him to laugh. Laughter was her first response when she didn't want anyone to know how really lousy she felt, how afraid she was.
Would Zach try to cover up his feelings that way?
"So... it was just kind of crazy here?" he asked.
She nodded. Distraction was another of her favorite tricks. "You had things you wanted to talk about?"
"They'll keep," he said, trying to smile. "Maybe even come out a little easier another time. You should get in there and talk to Peter. And be careful. Call me if you need me for anything. Promise?"
"I promise."
His hand was hanging by his side, and she slipped hers into his and leaned up to kiss him softly on the lips, wanting to say so much and not able to find a place to begin.
I love you would sum it all up nicely.
She couldn't quite manage the words at the moment.
"Go on," he said, squeezing her hand before he let her go.
"You'll be all right?"
He nodded, then turned and walked away.
* * *
Peter was again locked in his room, his hideous music blaring through the house. Julie stood on the other side of the door, thinking about the social worker's advice. Big thing or little?
It felt big. Which meant she had to do something.
Her stepfather would have broken the lock or the door. She wouldn't do either of those. She turned off the electricity instead. Silence reigned throughout the house. Peter came out of his room, not realizing he'd been tricked.
That's one point for me.
He started to go back inside, but she barred the door, and thankfully it didn't come down to a shoving match, because she would have lost. Zach was right. Peter was a lot bigger and stronger than she had realized.
He also looked like he was in no mood for a prolonged or civil discussion, so she boiled it down to as few words as possible.
"I didn't come here for Zach, although I am very grateful he's here, because he's just about the best thing that ever happened to me. And not just now, Peter. When I was your age and even when I was smaller, he was one of the few people in the world who cared about me. Can you understand that? Is there anybody who cares about what happens to you now? Anybody who helps you when things get really bad and really scary?"
"I don't need any help," he insisted.
"Well, I did, and Zach helped me. Back then and in Memphis. I was scared to come back here—"
"You didn't want to. I know you didn't."
"Would you, if you ever managed to get away?" she asked.
He said nothing. She thought she'd just scored Point No. 2.
"I was every bit as miserable here as you were," she said. "I know what you're going through. I know how angry you are, how hurt."
"They don't hurt me," he insisted.
"That's strange, because they sure hurt me."
"I'm fine," he insisted. "And I don't need you. I don't need anybody. I take care of myself most of the time anyway, so why don't you just go?"
"If I did, you'd go back to the group home."
"So? I told you, I don't need anybody—"
"You can try arguing that with social services, if you like, but you won't win. They don't leave thirteen-year-olds alone to take care of themselves. So I guess you're stuck with me."
"You won't stay," he said. "Unless you stay for him."
"I didn't even know he was going to be here. When I saw him in Memphis, he was working on a case, and when that one was done, he was supposed to go straight to another trial in Texas. I don't know what happened with that one. He may be leaving tomorrow." It was a terrible thought. She desperately wanted him close, no matter how much he scared her. "But I didn't come for him. There wasn't... Zach and I have never been anything but friends."
"Sure didn't look like that," Peter snapped.
"Until today. Or the last five or six days. It's never been like that between us, but things change, Peter. All the time. Sometimes they even change for the better."
He glared at her.
Fine.
"I came for you, and because I was angry at myself and ashamed for leaving you here all those years."
"I was fine," he claimed.
She ignored that and went right on. "I should have found a way to help you. To stay in touch with you."
"Why?" He snarled. "I didn't miss you."
"Well, I missed you."
Peter tried hard to hide it, but his face took on that hurt look once again. Julie figured she'd pushed it as far as she could today. She let him return to the sanctuary of his room. Thankfully, the music didn't come back on when she turned the electricity on. She ended up outside again, raking the leaves, needing to work hard and stay busy. She really didn't like being in the house.
She supposed she should ask Zach about the foreclosure process. She'd probably have to face her mother to find out about the criminal charges and if there was any money to keep them from losing the house.
She needed to ask Zach why he was here and how long he could stay. Try to figure out what had him so uneasy, and then... Lord, she had no idea what would happen then. Her head was still spinning from all that he'd said and the look he'd had in his eyes when he'd told her he wanted her, he needed her.
They were going to have some kind of relationship, it seemed, and she knew what she wanted from it.
Everything.
She wanted everything she was so sure she'd never have. With Zach.
* * *
Okay, so he hadn't said much of anything he really needed to say to Julie. He'd gotten distracted by how good it had been to see her, to touch her. But he would tell her. He'd pick his time and force it out. For the moment, he settled for facing his older sister instead.
Emma, the pro.
The shrink.
He closed his car door and stared up at her house, wondering why his sister had to go and do that with her life. It was proving damned inconvenient to him. Not that he would ever deny her one bit of happiness. But surely he could at least be mildly irritated with her at the moment.
He got out of his car, slammed the door shut and leaned against the right fender, stalling for a moment.
The house looked great. He was happy to think of his sister living here now and so joyous in the life she'd made for herself. In an odd little twist that still had people talking, Emma had taken one look at Sam's long-lost brother and not only figured out who Rye was but had somehow fallen in love
with him and finally convinced him to marry her. What did it really matter if she was the adopted daughter of the brother Rye hadn't seen in thirty years? And quite a bit younger than him? Most everyone had learned to overlook those little details.
Zach didn't think either his sister nor her husband had regretted their decision for a single day. Sixteen years of marriage and three children later—with a fourth on the way—it was obvious that they belonged together.
Standing outside their house, with children's toys littering the lawn and the driveway, the sound of laughter drifting over from the backyard, Zach found himself wondering how they'd known they'd end up like this, still so obviously in love after all these years.
And he wondered what Emma had taken with her from those chaos-filled years with their other mother. Emma had to have scars. She had been almost twelve when they escaped for good.
Zach heard a shout. His nephew, Jamie, the four-year-old, came barreling around the corner, howling with laughter as he ran down the sidewalk. He was halfway there when he spotted Zach, then ran to him, stubby legs pumping wildly as he plowed through the flowers that edged the driveway.
He launched himself into Zach's arms, yelling something that sounded like, "Unka Dack."
"Close enough, short stuff." Zach grabbed him and wiped a bit of dirt from the boy's cheek. "Where's your mom?"
"Back dair." He pointed to the backyard.
"And probably looking for you," Zach said, heading that way. "I might as well haul you back to her."
The kid chattered the whole way, a string of gibberish about his new red truck, the cookies he'd had for a snack and his best friend, whose name might be Jeremy or Jimmy or even Jennifer. Zach couldn't tell. He just kept smiling and nodding and let the kid talk, happy that his sister had so many good things in her life. Hoping she could help him.
They ran into his niece Tricia, who was seven, heading toward the front yard as they were heading for the back.
"Looking for this?" Zach asked, pointing to the little boy.
"Uncle Zach!"
She threw herself into his arms just as he rounded the back corner of the house and spotted Emma. She was sitting on the ground under a giant oak tree, planting purple and yellow pansies. Her twelve-year-old, Dana, was lying in a hammock on the other side of the yard, talking on the phone. Soon he found himself mobbed by females, the girls first and then Emma.