You're the One That I Want

by Susan May Warren

  Tiger nodded. “Dad has a picture of you on our refrigerator.”

  Huh, really?

  “Dad said you played hockey. I play hockey. I’m in the peewees.”

  “Dude, that’s great.”

  Ingrid came over, holding a baggie of cookies. “Tell your dad that I’m onto his tricks. And yours, big guy.”

  “Thanks, Nana!” Tiger scooted back out and Owen watched him go.

  “Darek’s working on his house,” Ingrid said. “I think he’s painting with your father. Poor man, it’s taking about four times as long as he’d hoped to finish it. Resort projects come first.”

  Owen glanced at Scotty. “You okay?”

  She was searching through her notes, her finger caught in her cute mouth. She looked up. “What?”

  “I’m going outside.”

  She had returned to the list before he closed the door behind him.

  He hadn’t walked through the resort since returning home. The recently planted evergreens towered between the resort, with its seeded grass and newly rebuilt cabins, and the wasteland of baby scrub brush to the north, scars from the wildland fire that had nearly decimated their livelihood.

  Darek and Casper had managed to rebuild. They’d winterized the cedar-sided cabins, updated from their previous counterparts with Internet and cable television. Darek had planted chrysanthemums along the walkways to each cabin, blooming yellow, crimson, and ocher.

  Beyond the cabins, the lake lapped at the shore. The fire had cleared the view, and Darek had built up the shoreline with boulders and woodchips. Adirondack chairs perched at the edge of the water, inviting guests to linger.

  If possible, Evergreen Resort, like the pinecones and seedlings that survived the fire, had blossomed in the aftermath.

  Owen wound his way through the resort and found himself at Darek’s A-frame cabin. Freshly roofed with green tiles and covered in dark-red cedar siding, with a deck framing two sides and a hand-carved plaque on the door that said Darek and Ivy, probably to direct guests away from private quarters.

  Tiger sat on the deck, his hand in the plastic bag, rooting for a cookie.

  “I thought those were for your dad.”

  “They are. Dad said I could have one.”

  Owen tousled Tiger’s hair as he headed inside and called, “Hello? Need some help?”

  Darek perched on a ladder, screwing a bulb into the recessed lights of the arching, pine-paneled ceiling.

  “Wow,” Owen said as he stood taking in Darek’s hard work. The front room ceiling soared two stories over an open floor plan that included a granite-countered kitchen with stainless steel appliances, a knotty pine hardwood floor, and a hand-built stone fireplace. A stairway led to a loft that overlooked the room, bordered by a railing with hand-hewn balusters.

  It looked like a bathroom and two smaller bedrooms were tucked under the lofted area, and from one of these, his father emerged, holding a paint roller. “Great. We could use another hand. Take your coat off and grab a roller.”

  Owen followed the cardboard taped to the floor to a back room, where his father stood at one wall, covering it in pale blue. Plastic and cardboard protected the floor, blue painter’s tape over the light sockets and window frames.

  “I think this second coat will do it. We’re nearly done.”

  Owen rolled up his sleeves, winced as he bent over to soak a roller in paint. But he hid it from his father—his own fault for showing off today in front of Scotty. “Tiger’s room, I assume?”

  “We’re trying to get them in by Halloween. Darek’s getting antsy in his rental. Had hoped to be in the house a month ago.”

  “I can’t believe all the hard work he’s done on the resort. It looks brand-new.”

  “It is brand-new. And upgraded. He talked me into the Internet in every cabin, although I’m not so sure—”

  “Trust the next generation, Dad.”

  “I just don’t want our guests to miss out on the purpose of Evergreen—to get away. To find a moment of peace outside the bustle of the city. People need silence to hear their own thoughts, even God’s voice. That was my dad’s thinking, at least. He said that sometimes people needed to even escape church. There was a quote he loved: ‘God writes the gospel not in the Bible alone, but also on trees and in the flowers and clouds and stars.’”

  Owen refilled his roller. “Sometimes we worked through the night on the boat, and I’d be awake when the sun came up. I’d watch the sunrise splashing over the water, turning the spray to crystals. It was like God was there, reminding me that He . . . well, maybe that He hadn’t forgotten me.”

  His dad’s voice was low, gentle. “He didn’t, Owen. You were never lost to Him.”

  “I don’t know, Dad. I . . . wasn’t . . .” He couldn’t finish because really, how did he tell his father how abysmally far he’d fallen from his own—or anyone’s—expectations?

  John rolled the blue paint on the wall. “‘I can never escape from your Spirit! I can never get away from your presence! If I go up to heaven, you are there; if I go down to the grave, you are there. If I ride the wings of the morning, if I dwell by the farthest oceans, even there your hand will guide me, and your strength will support me.’” He dipped his roller in for a refill. “Psalm 139. No matter how far you run, you can’t hide from God.”

  No. He got that finally. It was what to do with the grace he’d been given that had him stymied. Shaken.

  “Dad, when I was out there on the raft, I . . . I wasn’t afraid. Not really. I mean, I didn’t want to die, and I wanted to come home, but I wasn’t afraid. I even told Scotty to have faith—me, the guy who can’t seem to figure out how to do anything right. The guy who . . .” He stopped painting but couldn’t look at his dad. “The guy who’s been scared pretty much since I signed that Blue Ox deal.”

  Behind him, his dad painted in silence.

  Which made it easier to just . . . talk. “Ever since I signed that contract with the Blue Ox, I’ve been afraid of screwing up. People were looking at me as if I could be the next Wayne Gretzky, and it freaked me out. I started listening to them and everything went south. But I’m still . . . Well, I have no idea what I’m supposed to do now. Other than trying to figure out how to clear Casper, I’m completely lost.” And frankly, scared out of his head that he would somehow let Casper down, but he wasn’t going to say that to his dad.

  Especially with Darek in the next room. Darek, who had his life together, had managed to scrape new life from the Evergreen ashes and reseed the family legacy.

  Even Casper had managed to land on his feet, despite his current circumstances—Owen still couldn’t get the word millionaire through his head.

  Apparently only one son had crashed and burned. Ironically, the one with the most potential.

  He felt sick.

  Finally John broke the silence. “God is not surprised by what happened to you, Owen. He didn’t look down from heaven and think, Uh-oh, now what? There are no chance happenings with God. God does not stumble around, wondering what He’s doing. He has everything under control, and you are always safe with Him. Even when you’re in the middle of the ocean . . . or coming home to face the child you didn’t know you had.”

  Yeah. Just another of his colossal bumbles. “You have to know how much I . . . I wish I’d played that differently. I’d do anything not to have . . .” He shook the image from his head, hating that it would always reside there, that night with a woman who didn’t belong to him. “I think I’m going to let Casper raise her.”

  His father stayed silent beside him.

  “Casper and Raina are right—it would just be confusing for her to have me in the picture. And Casper loves her like a father.” He hadn’t expected his eyes to burn with the confession, but even as he said it, the words landed, settled, soaked through him. “It’s the right thing to do.”

  Again, silence.

  Owen looked at his father, who had turned, met his gaze, his own dark, unsettled. “You should kn
ow that I haven’t exactly known what to say in this, Owen. She is your daughter. But Casper loves Raina. Still, I just need to ask . . . are you sure you don’t want to marry Raina, try to make it work?”

  “Dad. Seriously. Raina doesn’t love me. And . . .”

  “And you’re in love with Scotty.”

  Owen stilled.

  His father raised an eyebrow.

  “No, I mean . . . yeah, but . . .”

  “What do you mean, Son?”

  “She’s not making it easy.”

  “Didn’t you propose?”

  That again. Owen turned back to his wall. “Sort of. But . . . it was stupid. Impulsive. Which I guess is my worst flaw because now she’s set up rules.”

  “Rules?”

  “Like I’m not allowed to . . . well, propose.”

  He heard a chuckle from his father.

  “Or kiss her. Or touch her in any way. She says we have to keep it professional because she’s planning on leaving as soon as we can clear Casper.”

  “Smart girl, if she thinks you don’t have a future.”

  Aggravating girl. “Except I could have sworn today that she . . .”

  “She what?”

  “I don’t know. She seems to think she’s not the marrying type. Her mom died when she was born. And she calls her father Red. They had a pretty rough life—lived in a cabin in the woods, except when he was fishing. On the boat she acts like one of the guys, so maybe she’s right—I don’t exactly see her in the kitchen baking cookies.”

  “Fresh-baked cookies do not make a successful marriage, Owen. It’s knowing each other, valuing the same things, being what the other person can’t be, making each other better people.”

  “She does make me want to be a better person; I know that. And it’s not like I’m Billy Graham or anything, but when we were on the raft, I told her to have a little faith, and she did. She prayed for us. Which is a miracle. She’s spent so much time alone, she has a hard time believing that God cares about her.”

  “You can’t know how God is going to work in someone, Owen. But maybe you need to slow down, wait and see what He does.”

  Shoot, that’s not what he wanted to hear.

  “Scotty isn’t the reason why I can’t marry Raina. I’m sure I could love her eventually, and of course I want to be a father. But I know the truth, Dad. Casper is Layla’s father. He loves her, and I don’t even know her. Raina’s right; I just showed up for . . . that part. But Casper’s been there for the rest, and isn’t that what being a dad is all about? Besides, there’s no guarantee I wouldn’t screw up the father thing too.”

  “That’s about enough of that.”

  Owen frowned, turned.

  His father had put down the roller and was wiping his hands. He looked up with solemn eyes. “So you made some bad choices. Some of God’s best players were His imperfect, broken prodigals. In fact, iffy players are God’s best picks. He specializes in short-tempered, reckless, flawed people to accomplish His plans. Consider Moses, the murderer; Rahab, the prostitute; Samson, the playboy; Paul, the terrorist; and Peter . . . the impulsive. God is constantly using broken, messy people to restore the world and bring glory to Himself. To touch other people, like you did with Scotty in the raft. And I’d bet they each thought God couldn’t use them before His grace tracked them down, brought them back to His purposes. You can never outsin God’s love, Owen. Or limit what He can do with you if you let Him. You’re dripping paint onto the plastic.”

  Owen’s chest tightened and he turned back to the wall, finished the final section. Swallowing hard.

  His father’s hand landed on his shoulder. Warm. Solid. “Son. You haven’t outrun God’s love. Or our love. I’m glad you’re home.”

  That turned him. They just stood there a moment, Owen even more shaken by the tears in his father’s eyes.

  On impulse, like an old reflex, Owen leaned in and touched his forehead to his father’s shoulder. “Me too, Dad. Me too.”

  In that moment, he wanted to be sixteen again and rewrite his life, starting with the day he left. The day he thought he didn’t need home anymore.

  “Hey, what’s this slacking? I thought you were supposed to be painting.” Darek stood in the doorway, grinning.

  “We’re done,” John said, stepping away. Owen blinked away the glaze in his eyes and gave the wall a final swipe.

  John left to clean his roller, and Owen moved to follow, but Darek stopped him at the door. “What he said about outsinning God’s love and limiting Him . . . You asked how I got here? I dropped to my knees and begged God for a fresh start. Apparently He’s into that sort of thing.”

  Owen said nothing as he pushed past Darek.

  But he wanted the words to be true. All of them—Scotty’s and his mother’s, Darek’s and his dad’s.

  Maybe he could step beyond the name of prodigal into something else.

  Outside, he grabbed the hose, used it to clean his roller, then carried the trays and rollers to the garage, washed his hands, and headed inside the lodge.

  John had already entered, his work coat hanging on a peg. And next to that, two more—the royal-blue team coats of the St. Paul Blue Ox.

  Owen braced himself as he realized his brothers-in-law had arrived. Former enforcer Jace Jacobsen sat on the sofa, arm stretched across the back, watching as right wing Max Sharpe sat with his adoptive daughter, who unpacked her backpack, showing him her daily work.

  The two men looked up as Owen came in the room. Jace leaned forward, started to get up. Max stiffened.

  And in a second, Owen tasted the brisk air, heard the shouts of drunk men brawling, felt the dark adrenaline course through him as he threw a punch, connected.

  Then the blinding, skull-cracking shot to his eye. Pain shattering him, buckling his knees.

  On the other end of that hockey stick that destroyed his eye, his career, had been Max.

  It all showed in Max’s expression, too, even as he got up, held out his hand. “Owen. Hey. So glad to see you.” Wary. Worried.

  Jace had risen behind him, huge, and Owen didn’t exactly know whose side he might be on.

  But he didn’t want sides. Not anymore. Owen stepped forward, met Max’s hand. “Hey, Max. I heard congratulations are in order—on two accounts.”

  Max dropped a hand on his daughter’s shoulder. “Thanks. I’m blessed; there’s no doubt.”

  “How’s the season going?” Owen said, trying to keep it light. No need to make everyone dodge the elephant in the room.

  “We just played the Blades back-to-back,” Jace said, holding out his hand. “We won both.”

  Owen shook his hand. “I saw one of those games. Max was in the penalty box, and they scored on a backdoor pass.”

  “We have a rookie who could use your go-to.”

  Nice of Jace to say that.

  “Owen!” Eden came down the stairs.

  Whoa, Eden looked about six months pregnant. “Wow, when—?”

  “I’m due in February, but this is Jace’s child. He’ll probably be fifteen pounds.” She reached the landing and pulled him into a hug, arms around his neck. “I missed you.”

  Out of all his siblings, Eden best knew the guy he’d been and could have been. She’d been his guardian through those stressful years in the juniors, even pulled him out of a couple bar fights when the money, the fame, went to his stupid head. And for that, he’d shown her annoyance, even rudeness.

  He held her away from him, cataloging the changes. Her blonde hair was longer, her face fuller, and she looked . . . happy. “You still writing for the paper?”

  “Chief editor of obituaries. And I have a book coming out this spring, reflections from working in the obits.”

  “Wow, you’ll be a published author. I always knew you had a book in you.”

  She held his face in her hands. “I hear you have a few stories yourself. Like a high-seas rescue?”

  “How—?”

  “Scotty.” She pointed beyond him t
o the kitchen, and he turned.

  Words slicked right out of him at the sight of Scotty in . . . an apron? Holding a wooden spoon and grinning at him.

  “What are you doing?”

  Her smile fell.

  “Owen!” This from Grace, who put a batch of cookies on the counter. “She’s making cookies; what does it look like?”

  “Yeah,” Scotty said. “I’m making cookies.” But her grin was wobbly, and shoot, he had the weirdest sense that he’d hurt her.

  But . . . making . . . cookies? He scrambled to find the right response. “No complaints here. I do get the spoon, right?”

  She handed it over, chagrin on her face. “I don’t know what I’m doing anyway.” Then she wiped her hands on the apron and reached for a hot cookie.

  Driving him crazy, that’s what she was doing.

  “SPILL THE BEANS, SCOTTY. Do you or do you not have the hots for my brother?” Eden sat cross-legged on a twin bed in the alcove of her old room, dressed in pajama pants and one of Jace’s oversize T-shirts. “Has he kissed you yet?”

  “Eden, leave her alone. That’s none of our business.” Grace had just created a bed for her daughter, Yulia, on the floor. Scotty had tried to protest kicking Yulia out of the third bed, but Grace wouldn’t hear it.

  “What’s perfectly unjust is the fact that Jace and Max have to sleep in the boys’ room when there’s a pullout in the den. I haven’t seen Max in nearly two weeks,” Grace said as she pulled the quilt over Yulia. “If only we weren’t full, I’d talk Darek into renting us a cabin.”

  “Jace isn’t thrilled either, Grace. They just got back from three days on the road. But Mom seems to think that this is more fair—and with the entire family here, she’s probably right that there will be some late-night game viewing in the den on the agenda.”

  Grace rolled her eyes. “I can’t wait until we close on the house. I’m sure you’ll be glad to get Max off the sofa in your living room.”

  “I am a little tired of going to bed alone, listening to them yell at the screen.”