Point of Attraction

by Margaret Van Der Wolf

“George, have you any idea what Jeffrey might have been into?” he asked.

  “I don’t understand.”

  Mason looked into her eyes, then at Nick, then back at her, then down at her hands. He thought a moment and swallowed before lifting his sight to her and saying, “Roberts was in the perimeters of the CST investigation last night, keeping the neighbors away.” He took a deep breath, his brows twitching before the right one arched high. “Two unmarked, black, Suburbans; official plates, arrived. Four men from each car got out and flashed some IDs. Roberts went in and got Bentley, head of the CST Team. Bentley made a phone call. At the end of the call, Bentley pulled his men out while the eight arrivals went in. An hour later, they came out. Had a few plastic bags with them. Declared the scene was not compromised, gave Bentley a list of items taken, and left.”

  “Oh, my God,” Georgie heard herself say, but there seemed no connection between the sound and her lips.

  “Roberts said he recognized their government seal, but it was neither Portland Police, FBI or CIA. Bentley’s toes were clearly squashed. Roberts said Bentley was on the phone, but each call cut him off at the knees. Roberts said Bentley was fuming by the end of the last call.”

  For a long moment, no one said anything. Georgie pushed at her food then looked to Nick. When he lifted his gaze and met hers, he glanced at Mason, who was also looking at him.

  “What?” Nick laughed quietly as he leaned back, the chair squeaking with his weight shift. “You want me to call the President and ask him what’s up?”

  Mason said nothing and set his sight on the last of his food. If it weren’t so ridiculous Georgie would have pursued that nagging scenario she and Sam had played with regarding Nick. She started to get up, but Nick shook his head, his hand over hers.

  “No,” he said, indicating the food. “You eat that. I’m not having you undernourished. Eat.”

  When she silently pleaded that she couldn’t, he gave her his infamous puppy-dog eyes and pleaded back, “For me, please.”

  Georgie indulged him, but each bite was hard to swallow. There was no telling if it was last night’s tequila or the events. The meal seemed never ending, the eggs perfect, but cold; the bacon nice and crisp though also cold. Finally, quiet and still deep into her thoughts, Georgie picked up their plates, scraped them free of what could go down the disposal, then put them in the dishwasher. She went to the laundry room. Daisy and Max were quick, ran ahead of her, and scooted out their pet door.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Nick asked.

  “I’m going to clean Daisy’s droppings.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “Nick, I’m not crawling in a hole and hiding,” she said. Her words circled her mind, and she wondered if she meant them. “Things have to go on.”

  “I’ll do it. Let me get my jacket.”

  “You’re going to pick up Daisy’s poop?”

  “Trust me. It wouldn’t be the first time I scooped up shit.”

  “On another day,” she said, “I would ask you to elaborate, but not today?” She sat back down.

  After Nick got his jacket and went outside, Mason cleared his throat and leaned forward in his chair. “You know, any other man would be very skeptical of a guy hanging around and spending the night with the woman he’s interested in.”

  All Georgie could do was search his face, eyes, all the little shadows and lines that make us who we are. Interested was an interesting word in itself; non-committal, no laying out of one’s heart or soul for the possibility of stomping.

  “I am interested, in case I haven’t made it plain enough.”

  After a moment, Georgie smiled.

  “Ah, so you have noticed.”

  “I’ve noticed,” she half whispered. “But there’s interest and there’s interest. Do you think if this were being written into a novel it would be too many interests?”

  “Most definitely,” he said. He waited and she knew her evasion wasn’t getting past him.

  “Nick is Cassie. Cassie is Nick,” Georgie said. “For one reason or another, we were each an only child, lonely. I moved in between them and within a year, we became the best of friends and each other’s siblings, so to speak. No one and nothing will ever put that asunder... ever. When my mother died, then later my dad... Nick and Cassie were there for me. When Nick’s mom and dad were killed in a plane crash, Cassie and I were there for him. Nick and I helped Cassie with her father’s death and her mom’s Alzheimer.” She took in a deep breath. “April must accept the fact that Nick and I will always be in Cassie’s life, just as you would have to accept Nick in my life... if you’re that interested, I mean.”

  All Mason did was nod slowly, his eyes refusing to release her. Georgie caught her lower lip between her teeth before getting up to look out the window at Nick. He was picking up dog poop, and obviously muttering something to Daisy as she ran all over the yard, front paws prancing, while Max, as always, sat and watched from the patio table. Three kids, was Gorgie’s first thought, and smiled, seeing Nick toss the bags in the trash can then pull up his collar against the wind and spitting rain whipping across the yard. He cupped his ear a moment then put something in his pocket.

  Reality check, Georgie sighed. Yes, a reality check was needed here. Those three out there, plus Cassie and April, Paula and Steven were a fact. No trauma had brought them together and into her realm. The natural course of life had.

  “Mason,” she said, still looking out at her three dependants. “Emotions in this type of situation can run awry, you know... mix you up.”

  “Oh, stop.”

  “Hear me out, please.”

  He came to stand behind her, his hands rubbing affectionately up and down the length of her arms. Even through her thick sweatshirt, the touch was electric, and she leaned back into him, then moved forward to break the contact, wanting to keep a clear head. They were being pulled into a swirling vortex and one of them needed to grab hold of something, give them time to think, to reason.

  “I’d like you to think about something before you say anything more about your interest in me,” she forced herself to say. “Can you do that?”

  “Okay,” he said, taking a step back.

  She turned around, her back against the sink, but she couldn’t look at him. She would lose her nerve if she did. “I don’t want you to confuse me and this... this thing that’s going on around me with what happened to Jenny. It would be cruel to both of us.”

  “You think that’s what this is?”

  “I’m saying everything is... crazy right now... complicated.”

  When he moved away to the chair holding his jacket, she was overwhelmed with the hurt, his and hers. It was as though she had slapped him, and she wanted to take it back. But watching him slip into his jacket, now a heavy load on his shoulders, she accepted there was no undoing it. This was something that could not be deleted, and it had needed saying. They had to know who they were falling in love with. Yes. The love word. What else could she call this feeling growing inside her for this man? But committing to a lie would be too horrible for both of them, the scar ugly and too long lasting.

  “Nick hanging around for a while?” Mason asked from the door.

  She nodded with an added shrug. “Or, at least until the moment he leaves.” She smiled, but it felt stiff, fake, lipstick put on wrong.

  “You shouldn’t be alone right now. I mean that. No confusing you with anyone else. Just be safe.”

  “Mason, I...”

  “No,” he said. “You’re right. Life was easier when I was just BADGE 747. But... no matter what you say. We can’t go back to that.”

  “No. I don’t want to go back to that. But when we go forward I want it to be without ghosts, and for the right reason.”

  “At least you said when and not if.” He opened the door, but didn’t go through. He turned. “If I find out anything else from Roberts, I’ll let you know. If Nick leaves, will you call me?” When she hesitated, he added, “Or at le
ast call Cassie or one of your kids. You shouldn’t be alone.”

  “I’ll call you.” When he turned to leave, she said, “Mason. I don’t have your number.”

  “I can fix that,” he said, and handed her his card. “I thought you were never going to ask. My cell number is written on the back. Put it in your speed dial.”

  “Don’t you want my cell number?” she asked when he was about to close the door.

  This time, he grinned, wide and perfect. “Nick’s not the only one with certain abilities.” He pointed a finger and added, “Remember that.” He reached around the door, turned the lock, and closed it.

  Georgie had no clue how long she stood there staring at the closed door, its lock set.

  “That Mason’s car leaving?” Nick asked, coming in from the cold.

  “You know it is.”

  “What did you do to make him leave?”

  “What makes you think it was something I did?” she demanded to know, putting soap in the dishwasher, then closed the washer door. She flinched at her slamming of it.

  “Because I know you.”

  “You know me.” This was new, she thought, taking the dish-sponge to wipe off the table. “How could you possibly know me, Mr. Never Around?”

  “I know you because I know you. You’re getting too comfortable in your life alone. You can’t play it safe all your life. That little safe harbor of yours will get iced in and very lonely.”

  “It was nothing like that.” She wished she had bitten her tongue before uttering one word. Damn him, anyway! And she wiped the clean surface with angry swipes.

  “So you admit it was something you said.”

  “No. Yes. I guess.” She had to swallow and take a deep breath to keep from crying. “I don’t want to be a remedy or a replacement.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  The evaporating moisture left by the sponge on the table surface held her focus until the breeze outside scraped a shrub twig across the window. “You know how his wife died?” she asked.

  “9/11, plane out of Boston” he said, as though it was something everyone knew.

  Mouth open, she turned to stare at him, surprised, yet not surprised. “How the fuck do you know these things?!”

  “Oh, you are worked up,” he said, and went over to tap her head. “Don’t use that word. It doesn’t sound right coming from you.”

  “Oh, and it sounds better coming from you? Don’t think so.”

  “Back to the subject here.”

  There was no getting the words out. Each time she tried, they gagged her until she let herself drop into the chair. “She died on 9/11!” The words spewed from her like vomit of guilt. “She died... on 9/11. And he could do nothing. Nothing. He carries the weight of the powerlessness... that he could do nothing.”

  The obvious question hung out there, but she could see Nick was not seeing the problem. How could he be so smart yet so damned dense? She motioned for him to catch up here and see her maelstrom, offer her a lifeline, tell her she was right.

  His light brown eyes peered at her in a side-glance while his head shook in quandary. “Okay, I’m confused. What am I missing here? He wasn’t screwing around on her or she on him. The woman is tragically dead, Georgie Girl. It’s the fault of the fucking terrorists, not yours, not Mason’s. What is the problem?”

  Her reasoning seemed almost silly now, and she didn’t want him laughing at her. She was close to laughing at herself. “Jenny, his wife, died on the plane coming out of Boston. He said so himself he could not protect the one closest to him. Is he trying to save me as a replacement? His penance and mistaking it for... love. I don’t want to live in her shadow, always wondering.”

  “You think it’s easy for Dudley Do-Right to step into Sam’s place?”

  “What? It’s not the same,” she told him. It wasn’t. How could he compare the two? And yet. She felt a stab to a place that nearly made her double over with an outcry.

  She sucked in air, saw herself running through the ER, looking for Sam, a police officer motioning her to a room, the smell of sterilizers and antiseptics nearly gagging her. When she found him, he was sleeping in a room with gauze and gloves strewn all over, machines all quiet, no beeping lights. She talked to him, his cheek cold against hers, telling him everything would be fine, until a nurse came rushing in with Steven and Paula to tell her, Sam had died minutes before she got there. She had been home sleeping in a chair waiting for him, while he lay dying... until the police notified her and brought her to the ER.

  “I wasn’t there when he needed me most,” she whispered, and the tears she thought had long ago dried up, began to flow. Strong arms circled her tightly. “I wasn’t there, and he died among strangers!”

  “Yeah, you were, Georgie Girl,” Nick whispered. “You were there.”

  Chapter twenty-two

  The familiar train whistle made its way into Georgie’s dreams, the darkness giving way to daylight, but it turned out to be Nick opening the drapes. She had cried herself to sleep in the recliner. There was no memory of leaving the kitchen or sitting, only the raving cries for things that can’t be undone, and she breathed deeply under the warmth of the afghan. A high pitch crackling made her turn. Nick had started a fire in the fireplace. Its heat felt good, homey. The hearth had been dormant too long.

  “That was dumb of me,” she said to Nick. “Sorry I put you through that. How long was I out?”

  “No, it wasn’t dumb. And it was way overdue. You’ve been asleep about an hour or so.” Deep furrows formed across his forehead as he pointed a finger at her, while letting his mouth twitch into that half-scolding grin of his. “If you hadn’t chased Mason away, he would have been here for you.”

  “You’re probably right,” she answered with a deep sigh. “But would it have been for the right reason?”

  “Well, Georgie Girl, here’s something for you to consider. A good detour winds up taking you to the right place.”

  “You have your jacket on,” she said, letting his statement pass.

  “I have to go out for a bit. I called Cassie. Told her what was going on and...”

  “Oh, Nick, you didn’t.”

  “She needed to be told. She’s coming over. I thought about calling Dudley Do-Right, but I decided you both needed a breather... sort things out. You know. Besides, I won’t be gone long.”

  “No one ever had more treasured sibs than I,” she smiled at him, and he grinned back.

  “Yeah? Make sure you remember that.” He looked out the window. “Cassie’s here. Oh, good. She brought April.” He picked up his helmet. “You know she put in eight years in the service?”

  “Who? April?”

  “Well, I don’t mean Cassie,” he answered, his face pulling into a smirk. “Four of those years in Special Forces.”

  “Oh, stop,” she told him. Quiet, easy going April? No way, she thought.

  Nick looked almost comical as he slipped on his helmet with that believe-me-or-not grin, leaving the straps hanging loose. “Okay. But I’m telling you. She’s a kick-ass my kind’a gal.”

  April offering that gun to her for protection came to mind, but Georgie shook it off, replaced by scenes from thriller action movies with armed swat teams and special forces. April’s face wouldn’t slip into the character. No. No way. “Yeah, okay,” she told Nick.

  “So don’t believe me. Makes no difference to me.”

  Georgie got up, folded the afghan, and followed Nick through the kitchen. As she activated the garage door, Nick was already straddling his bike as Cassie and April approached.

  April and Nick touched knuckles, sending strange vibes through Georgie. Could Nick be telling the truth? He was such an enigma, yet so... precious to her and Cassie. But what about all the little tid-bit info he constantly came up with? Where did he get it all?

  “Jeeez, Georgie. What am I going to do with you?” Cassie asked, wrapping an arm around her shoulders, and Georgie just smiled back, letting the my
stery of Nick slide away. It just felt good to be hugged by someone who was both sister and friend to her. “Hey, you’ve been crying.”

  “Just a little,” Georgie said.

  “More than a little,” Nick said, “but she needed it.”

  Nick’s motorcycle roared, the sound a painful shrill in Georgie’s ears. He rolled the hideously large bike forward, stopped to adjust the helmet and set the strap. With a wide grin, he gave them a thumbs-up. They watched him make the arc in the drive and go down the slope of the driveway.

  “Come on. I’ll make us some coffee,” Georgie said, listening to Nick’s motor fade away.

  “You still have some tea?” April asked. “Earl Grey with a touch of Chamomile?”

  Georgie laughed, nodding. “Yes, I do.” Special Forces and tea, she thought. Right. She led them inside, accepting that her Nick was, after all, a ninny. But he was their ninny and they would have him no other way.

  “My, God,” Cassie said as they sat at the kitchen table, each sipping their drink of choice. “Shyness.” Referring to Jeffery. “It’s hard to believe he could be a stalker, let alone kill himself.”

  Georgie sipped her espresso. She couldn’t face Cassie and lie. Agreeing with her statement was a form of lying and it rubbed her wrong.

  “What?” April asked.

  Offering April only a quick glance, Georgie then set her sight on her espresso latte. The seconds of silence stretched out, becoming louder than a scream, until Cassie reached over and tapped the rim of Georgie’s cup.

  “What are you not telling us?” she asked.

  Unable to face Cassie, Georgie looked up at April and immediately regretted it, remembering her dad’s soft yet knowing gaze when she kept things from him. Never could Georgie lie to her dad, but keeping the truth from him was as bad as a lie, and he always knew it. April had somehow captured such a pose, and Georgie began telling them what CST suspected, leaving out what Mason had repeated about the eight men arriving midst the crime scene investigation. That was just too bizarre to repeat.

  “But that means...”

  “Yup,” Georgie said, looking at Cassie. “There’s the possibility someone is still out there wanting to... I don’t know. Get at me? Hurt me? Maybe even...”