by Shirley Jump
Confusion muddled her eyes. “What...what do you mean?”
“I mean stay the hell away from me. I’m not the man I used to be. And I’m sure as hell not the man you want me to be.”
Then he stalked away, climbed into his truck and pulled out of the driveway, before he could do something even more stupid. Like change his mind and finish what he’d started.
* * *
The morning dawned, slow and easy, like a cat stretching after a long nap. Meri lay in the unfamiliar bed of the guest cottage, listening to the sounds of the lake waking up outside her open window. Birds calling to each other, boats puttering away from docks, a dog barking after a squirrel or rabbit. It was a song, she thought, a different, softer tune than the one she’d heard in New York, but still a song close to her heart.
How she loved this cabin. This escape from her mother. It was as if Grandpa Ray lived on the other side of the moon. Here, there’d never been a reminder to watch what she ate, an admonishment not to leave her room without her hair and makeup done, or a disapproving stare when she forgot to straighten her spine. Here, she was just...
Meri. She could swim until dark, eat candy for breakfast, wear yesterday’s grass-stained shorts with a torn T-shirt. She closed her eyes, snuggling deeper under the cotton duvet. Five more minutes and then she’d go get a cup of coffee and rustle up something for breakfast.
The song of the lake was broken by short, staccato sounds. Whoosh-thwap-thud. A curse. Then another whoosh-thwap-thud.
Meri swung her legs over the side of the bed, wriggled into a pair of shorts and straightened the T she had worn to sleep. She padded out to the kitchen, which in this cozy cabin was really just a glorified extension of the bedroom, stopped to snag a cup of coffee and add some half-and-half to the brew, and then stepped onto the back porch.
Jack stood in the center of the yard, working up a sweat with a growing pile of wood. After all the wood he had chopped the other day, it looked as though he was getting Ray set for the next decade of cold snaps. Jack set a new log on top of an overturned stump, raised his ax, then swung it forward in one powerful swoop. Two chunks of wood toppled to the grass below. Jack bent, grabbed another log, then paused when he saw Meri. “Mornin’.”
Damn, he looked good. Manly and strong and sexy as hell with that ax in one hand and the fine sheen making his suntanned biceps glisten. She thought of that kiss—hell, not a kiss, more of a small nuclear bomb between them—yesterday. Why had he cut it off and disappeared right after? And why had she dreamed about him, about finishing that kiss in her bedroom?
She gripped her coffee mug tighter. “Do you, uh, always start work this early?”
“Early?” He glanced at his watch. “It’s half-past nine.”
“On a Sunday. Don’t you sleep in on Sundays?”
“Don’t you get all gussied up to sit on a hard wooden pew and repent for your sins?”
“Only if I have sins to repent for.” She gave him a grin and took a step closer, resisting the urge to run her hand along his arm, to feel that hard strength beneath her palm. “Maybe you should go. Though they might need to extend the service for you.”
“Oh, really?” He set the ax against the stump and shifted toward her, a tease in his eyes, a smile playing on his lips. “Why’s that?”
“Because you have an awful lot to atone for, Mr. Barlow. You are—” she let out a breath, and with it, the words she’d been thinking in a soft whisper “—sin on a stick.”
He’d been all that and more last night with that kiss. A kiss that had lingered in her mind, like taffy on the roof of her mouth, sweet and bad for her, all at the same time. Jack Barlow had grown up, and so had his kisses, in ways that made her think of dark nights and tangled sheets and climbing on top of him to quench the flames he’d started deep inside her.
Jack shook his head and a shadow dropped over his features. He picked up the ax and swung it into the stump, hard, swift, lodging the metal blade deep in the thick wood. “Atonement.” He spat out the word. “Some things can’t be atoned for. Or forgiven.”
“What do you mean?”
“Nothing.” He sank the ax into the stump and let out a curse. “It’s too damned hot to work.”
Jack ducked under a low-hanging branch, then trundled down the packed-earth path to the edge of the water. What was that about? What had she said that set him off?
Instead of diving into the lake, Jack just stood at the edge of the water, watching a passing boat. Meri waited awhile for him to return, then gave up and went over to Grandpa Ray’s. Her coffee was getting cold, anyway.
Grandpa Ray sat at the kitchen table, flipping through a home improvement store advertisement while he nursed a cup of coffee. “I take it you decided to skip making an appearance this morning with the queen?”
Meri refilled her coffee from Grandpa’s carafe, added a little of the fat-free half-and-half she’d bought him, then leaned against the counter. “You mean church with my mother?”
“It is her favorite place for showing off her family, after all.”
Or used to be, when Meri was young. Her mother would lay out Meri’s clothes the night before, always something sedate but stylish, making sure everything from the color of her bra to the style of her shoes matched the carefully created image. Two hours before the service, her mother would start the beautification process. Manicure touched up, hair curled, makeup applied. A light breakfast, enough to keep Meri’s stomach from rumbling at an inconvenient time, but not so much that it would add unnecessary calories to a perfect size-two figure. Then sitting there, with her gloved hands in her lap, a twin to her mother’s proper posture, attentive and quiet. Never allowed to yawn or fidget, or skip a single moment of greeting the movers and shakers of Stone Gap, as if Meri was an extension of the family’s political and business ambitions.
“I was not invited to church, thank God. Apparently this—” she ran the back of her hand along the scar on her cheek “—invites too many questions. And mars the perfection that Anna Lee demands from a Prescott.” Meri added a wry smile as if the rejection didn’t hurt. As if it didn’t bother her one bit that the one person on earth who was supposed to love her no matter what had shunned her daughter once she lost her perfect sheen and her usefulness in the pageant world.
Clearly, Meri had been a fool, thinking her mother would change.
“Forgive me, but your mother is an idiot if she can’t see that you are perfect the way you are,” Grandpa Ray said. “Hell, you’d be perfect if you had six toes, a giant purple nose and a goiter hanging off the back of your neck.”
Meri laughed and gave her grandfather a quick, tight hug. “You always know how to make me feel better.”
He raised his cup. “That’s my job as chief spoiler for my favorite grandchild.”
Meri grabbed the carafe and topped off her grandfather’s coffee, then did the few dishes in his sink. The quiet of the lake and the cottage hovered like a blanket. She never remembered it being this quiet here, but then she realized why the silence had taken root.
“It’s not the same without Eli, is it?” Meri said softly.
“Nope. And it never will be. That boy brought life to every space he occupied.” Grandpa Ray’s face got wistful and sad. “Betty and George are doing their best, but I know they’re hurting. Losing a child leaves a hole nothing can ever fill.”
Meri glanced out the window. The sun cast a perfect golden wash over the deep blue water of Stone Gap Lake, already filling up with boaters and fishermen. Jack stood on the bank, his hands in the pockets of his khaki shorts, his shoulders hunched. “How’s Jack handling it?”
“Not too well. I think he feels personally responsible for Eli’s death. I don’t know what happened over there. Jack won’t talk about it. But I know he’s been through a lot.” Grandpa sighed. “A lot more than either of us knows.”
Her cousin had been gone for almost a year now, but she still expected to see him loping into the kitchen, helping himself to whatever he could find in Grandpa’s fridge. She missed hearing his voice, seeing his goofy grin, and even missed the way he’d tease her, as if she was a pesky tagalong little sister.
“I remember when I came home from the war,” Grandpa Ray said. “I was a mess. It was your grandmother who set me straight. She sat up with me more than one night when I couldn’t sleep. For months, I wouldn’t talk, wouldn’t do anything but sit in front of the damned TV and fester in my own misery. She sat there, every night, waiting, for me to get over myself and let go of the demons in my head.”
Meri turned back to her grandfather. “And did you?”
Grandpa Ray wrapped his hands around his coffee mug and stared into the steamy brew. “One night, I sat there so long, the bars and tone came on. This was back in the days when television stations shut down at night, and when they started up again, they put up a picture of the Old Glory and played ‘The Star-Spangled Banner.’ After my show ended, I sat there through the bars and tone, a half hour of that, maybe even an hour, and your grandma just waited, as patient as a saint. Then the flag appeared, I heard the first few notes of ‘Oh, say can you see,’ and that was it for me. I started bawling like a baby, thinking of all the friends I had lost, all the mistakes I had made, all the regrets that haunted my nights. It all came out then, every last ugly truth. She listened, God bless her, to every single word. Then she got to her feet, drew me into a hug and held on.” His face curved into a smile at the memory. “She didn’t let go until the day she died.”
Tears brimmed in Meri’s eyes. She swiped at them with the back of her hand. Hearing her grandfather talk about his late wife made Meri envious in a way. Someday maybe she’d know a love like that, too. “Aw, Grandpa, that is such a sweet story. Makes me miss Grandma even more.”
“She was an incredible woman. Truly one of a kind.” Grandpa’s gaze shifted to the picture of Grandma that sat atop the small hutch he had built for her as a wedding present decades ago. “Until you came along. You remind me of her in a hundred ways.”
“Me? Remind you of Grandma?”
“You’re strong like her. And stubborn.” He chuckled. “When you love someone, you love them no matter what. Even when they refuse to eat the spinach you made for supper yesterday.” He gave her a wink.
Meri pushed off from the counter and wrapped her grandfather in a tight hug. He smelled of fresh soap and warm memories, and she held on to that scent and his broad shoulders for a long time. “Thanks, Grandpa.”
“Anytime, sweetheart.” He patted her back. “Give Jack some time, Merry Girl. He needs patience, time and someone who is willing to give him that. Someone like your grandma.”
Was Grandpa Ray implying that someone should be Meri? She hoped not. Even after that kiss, falling for Jack Barlow—or helping him through his own emotional maze—wasn’t in her plans.
“I’m not here for Jack, Grandpa. I’m here for you.” And for herself. Maybe here she could finally find what she had lost in New York, what had been taken from her on that dark street. And at the same time, deal with the grief of losing Eli, a loss that had punched a hole in the family. She remembered the phone call from her aunt Betty, the stumbled, sobbing words. The way Meri’s heart had stopped and her breath had left her. In that moment, she’d known that nothing would ever be the same again, because the middle leg of the tripod was gone and the stool couldn’t stand on its own. “That’s all I have energy for right now.”
Chapter Six
Jack settled his bill with Ernie Whitman, the owner of the hardware store, then started loading the supplies in the back of the truck. He could have just as easily picked all this up yesterday, or even better, waited to buy the siding, but he’d needed an excuse to get the hell away from that look in Meri’s eyes. The one that said she wanted to know what was going on inside him and why he’d damned near bitten her when she tried to make small talk.
Yeah, that look. Not something he wanted to deal with today—hell, any day. So he decided to work instead. Work until he couldn’t stand up. Work until the only thing he thought about was climbing into bed and falling asleep. Sleep would elude him, as usual. Or worse, sleep would come and fill his mind with nightmares worse than any horror movie he’d ever seen as a kid.
As Jack reached for a long board, another set of hands lifted the opposite end and shared the burden. Jack looked up and saw his brother standing there, wearing a faded T-shirt and a pair of khaki shorts. Jack shot him a grin that was half annoyance and half I’m glad to see you because I’m wallowing again and I hate wallowing. “Slacking on the day job again? Wait. Do you even have a day job?”
“It’s Sunday, Jack. Some people rest on Sunday. And some people rest every day. Like me.”
“Yeah, well some people don’t have a schedule to keep.” Jack had never understood how his middle brother could spend his days as aimless as a boat without a rudder. Luke had perfected the art of avoiding work, and still their mother fed him and housed him. “Before I know it, July and August will be here and it’ll be too damned hot to work outside.” And that would mean too much time inside, thinking. Not something Jack wanted to do.
“It’s already too damned hot to work, and it’s only June. I vote for taking the day off and going swimming.”
“Swimming? I got stuff to do.”
“Stuff? What stuff? Dad said he’s starting back at the garage in a few days, which means you’ll have more time on your hands. Time to do things like swimming instead of slaving away seven days a week.”
“Maybe I like working seven days a week.”
Luke scoffed. “I think Mama should have had you tested as a child. You are clearly not right in the head.”
“Are you going to keep on talking?” Jack scowled. “Because I have stuff—”
“To do. Yeah, yeah, I heard you the first three thousand times.” Luke gestured toward the long boards leaning against the cart. “What’s all this for?”
“I’m fixing some siding on Ray’s house.”
“Want a hand? Make up for the one that’s got the big boo-boo.” Luke grinned and nodded toward Jack’s bandage.
“You are offering to help me?”
“Hey, miracles happen every day,” Luke said. “Besides, I don’t have anything going on today, and figured I could give you—”
“You have an ulterior motive.” Jack leaned in close, and studied his brother’s blue eyes. Luke flicked his gaze away. “Don’t bother lying. I shared a bedroom with you for fifteen years. I can tell when you’re lying. What is it? You need me to cover for you while you take date number four hundred and thirty-two out, and don’t want date number four hundred and thirty-one to realize she doesn’t hold the key to your heart?”
“No, nothing like that. Though I do reserve the right to use that at a future time.” Luke gave his brother a sheepish grin. “Okay, sue me. Mama wants to make sure you’re at dinner. No excuses.”
“I knew it.” Jack jerked up the board and loaded it in himself, then waved off Luke’s attempt to help on the next one. “I don’t need your help.”
“No you don’t, you ungrateful caveman. But you’re getting it anyway. That way you go to dinner and I, the favorite son, rack up even more brownie points with the parentals.” Luke raised his chin with an air of superiority.
“What are you, fifteen?”
“Acting younger only accents my charm.”
Jack snorted. “No, it makes you loo
k like a fool. A nonworking, living-off-the-family-dime fool.”
“I’m going to ignore that and chalk it up to your never-ending pissed-off mood. Which I am also ignoring, because I’m feeling charitable. It is Sunday, after all.” Luke picked up two buckets of stain and laid them beside the wood in the truck. “That’s the last of it. Want to ride together? You gotta come back into town for dinner anyway.”
“No, I do not want to ride together. The cab’s filled up with other supplies. And I definitely don’t want to go to dinner.”
Luke cupped a hand around his ear. “What’s that? You want me to meet you at Ray’s and help you out so you’re done early enough to shower and look like a respectable human being at dinner? Then you can drive yourself over to Mama’s, like the grown-up you are? Sounds like a plan. See you in a few.”
Before Jack could protest, Luke, slapped him on the back, hopped in his car and drove away. Jack grumbled to himself, then slipped in behind the wheel of the pickup truck. There were days when he loved his brother, and days when he wished Luke would quit trying to be so damned well-meaning.
* * *
Meri picked up the heavy black body of the camera and let it sit in her hand, a dense, familiar weight. Her thumb traced over the different knobs and adjustments, the myriad of buttons that would frame and capture an image. With this camera, a used Nikon she had picked up two years ago in a secondhand electronics shop, she had framed sunsets and cityscapes, old men playing chess in the park and children laughing in the rain. She had seen the best and worst of New York, on sunny days and cloudy days, and had been on her way to having a damned good career, until...
She traced the line running along her cheek. In that instant, she could feel the sharp, quick slice of the knife, the cold air rushing into the gash on her cheek before she realized what had happened. The fear, paralyzing, an icy rush freezing her to the sidewalk for one long minute, then too late, the screams bursting from her lungs and—
Meri put down the camera, frustrated. Even now, three months after the attack, the simple act of holding the Nikon brought her right back to that night. When would she be able to pick up her camera and see the present, not the past?