Betting on Grace

by Salonen, Debra

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  NIGHT ON THE DESERT was a formidable thing—the vast blackness, broken only by scattered pockets of lights belonging to homesteads, that reminded Nick of a movie where aliens took over the planet. Mountains, illuminated by the smidgen of starlight and slice of moon, encircled the vast basin, like the hulking monsters that had lived just outside the glow of Nick’s childhood night-light.

  The drive from Vegas to Laughlin had been strangely peaceful. Nick figured after the life-and-death drama of the afternoon, he and his passenger were both suffering from a type of post-traumatic letdown.

  Nothing like a smooth road in unbelievably wide-open spaces to make you feel small and insignificant, he thought.

  “Grace mentioned that you have a dog?”

  Nick was caught off guard by the question. “Um…yeah. His name is Rip.”

  “As in Rest In Peace?”

  He laughed. “If you were a basketball fan in Detroit, you wouldn’t have to ask.”

  “Oh.” A second later, she said, “I suppose your parents are taking care of him while you’re gone.”

  He nodded. It struck him that he’d have to put Rip in a kennel next time he needed a dog-sitter. The thought saddened him.

  “This is the first time our family has been without a pet since before Alexandra was born,” Yetta said conversationally. “The girls offered to buy me a little dog after Ernst died, but I couldn’t risk it.”

  “Risk what?”

  “Loving and losing. The two go hand in hand, of course, and I was too cowardly to try again.”

  Nick shifted uncomfortably. He’d expected some kind of lecture. That was part of the reason he’d resisted her offer to introduce him to his father. But after ten minutes of arguing with her, he’d realized that Yetta had a lot in common with her youngest daughter. Grit and determination.

  “You strike me as a pretty brave person. I would say your daughter came by her daring quite honestly.”

  She sighed softly. “Actually, Grace is more like her father. Kind, generous, optimistic and, yes, brave. I’m the worrier. The one who cautions against change. My mother blamed this on what happened to me when I was a baby. Have I told you this story?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “There was a tragic accident shortly after I was born. A fire. Two of my sisters were badly burned—one fatally—and I suffered smoke inhalation. My lungs never have worked quite right. Cold moist air is particularly hard on me, which is why we moved to the desert. Ernst was terrified that I would die before him. He always said he could handle anything but that.”

  Nick almost smiled, thinking he understood the feeling. He wasn’t prepared when she said, “I would have died in that fire if not for your father. Jurek—or, George, as people call him—saved my life.”

  “What happened?”

  “I only know what I’ve been told. My sisters were playing by the camp’s cooking fire. One of their skirts caught alight. The fire spread to the wagon where I was sleeping. Your father, who was only about nine or ten at the time, was a hero, but he also was the one who took the blame for what happened. And has paid for that mistake ever since.”

  Nick’s curiosity made him ask, “What do you mean?”

  “He was left in charge to watch over me and my sisters while my mother stepped next door for some herbs. He became distracted by a couple of his older cousins, who enticed him away for a moment. When the girls started screaming, he rushed back and pulled me from the burning wagon. Sadly, my sister Alba died from her burns and Beatrix was severely crippled.”

  “What happened to George…uh, Jurek?”

  “He was sent to Poland to live with his grandmother. Not long after that, Hitler invaded the country and closed the borders.”

  This must have been the story Grace’s sisters had alluded to. The deep, dark secret.

  “Perhaps you’ve studied history,” Yetta said. “Hitler regarded Gypsies as subhuman.” Her voice was low and bleak. “In 1934, he ordered the sterilization of the racially inferior, mostly Gypsies, African-Germans and patients in mental institutions.”

  “How did George survive?”

  “By his wits. He was young and strong. And handsome. Like you. He was the fairest of his family, I’ve been told. Although you also have your mother’s Scandinavian genes.”

  Nick watched the glow of lights in the distance start to take shape. They would be in Laughlin soon. He would meet for the first time the man who both gave him life and gave him away. Anger and resentment, the two coping strategies that had served him well most of his life, suddenly didn’t seem to be working.

  “Are you telling me this so I will feel sorry for him?”

  She turned toward him. “No. Jurek is a proud man. He wouldn’t want your pity. I told you so you might begin to understand that some of the decisions we make as adults are based on what happened to us as young people.”

  “Is that his excuse for giving me up for adoption?”

  Yetta made a soft sound that seemed slightly reproachful, but all she said was, “You can ask him that yourself.”

  Nick glanced around as they joined the traffic in this booming river town. Laughlin wasn’t Las Vegas, but it was the place where he’d finally meet his father.

  CHARLES IGNORED the noises and smells of the holding cell the same way he’d blocked out the coarse reality of his childhood. The ugly sound of punches being thrown. Of angry voices and foul language. His mother’s crying. The revolting odor of his father’s drunken breath when he collapsed on Charles’s bed.

  They’d lived in a tiny three-room apartment at the time. Charles’s bed had been located on what was euphemistically called the screened porch, although the curled and rusted screen wouldn’t have kept out a hummingbird, much less a mosquito.

  There’d been better times, but inevitably something had gone wrong. Maybe something he’d done. No one would say. If Charles asked, he’d either get a lecture from his father or his ears boxed by his mother. He’d learned to keep his mouth shut.

  That night, when he heard his father staggering toward the back door, Charles slipped out of bed and hid beneath it. It was a small bed and he was a big boy, but he pressed the length of his body against the wall and hoped his father was too drunk to notice.

  Charles was tired of providing comfort when his mother wouldn’t. In his heart of hearts, he knew what his father did wasn’t right. The way he touched Charles and wanted to be touched. It made Charles sick, but to refuse meant something even worse. It meant being called “a worthless sack of shit that no one would ever love.”

  That might have been true. He hoped it wasn’t but even if it was, he didn’t feel like being a good boy tonight. Instead, he’d make himself invisible.

  His father was too drunk to even make it into the bed. He stumbled and crashed to the floor an arm’s length away from where Charles was hiding. His invisible self watched his father’s chest go up and down for the longest time. Then, for no reason that Charles could see, it quit moving. His father twitched for a little while and white stuff came out of his mouth, but then that stopped, too.

  After his father’s death, life improved. Until his mother hooked up with another loser. There were tears to deal with when the asshole left. And a baby. But Charles never resented his new sister. Amy was a tiny, perfect gift.

  Charles loved his sister with all his heart. She turned ten the year he graduated from college. He’d worked his way through law school and still had managed to give his mother money to help make Amy’s life easier. When he began working for a law firm that served three of the largest casinos in Vegas, Charles could afford a nice apartment. Sometimes Amy came to visit him, to spend the night.

  Charles had never intended to let history repeat itself with Amy. But she was such a docile child. With the softest skin. The brush of her tiny fingers made him feel healed. He couldn’t help himself when he touched her the way his father had touched him.

  She never complained. She ne
ver told their mother. She’d taken his secret to the grave with her, or so he’d thought. But, no, the ungrateful little bitch had blabbed to MaryAnn, who’d told Grace.

  Charles heard the whole story from Nick, who had flashed his badge when Charles was arrested. “A fucking cop,” Charles muttered under his breath.

  He’d been blindsided because he knew how much the Romani disliked and mistrusted the police. That Yetta would have the balls to go behind her daughters’ backs and invite a cop into the family boggled his mind. He’d underestimated Yetta. He should have been on his guard. He’d counted her out because of the way she’d gone to pieces after Ernst’s death. An understandable—if costly—mistake.

  But how could dull, bland MaryAnn, who followed orders like a drone and never questioned the ethics or legality of his actions, have come up with a plan to blackmail him? How could he have misread her so completely?

  The district attorney who’d been in earlier had alluded to stacks of damaging evidence that MaryAnn had squirreled away. The bitch. He fully expected to be released on bail after his hearing. When he got out, the first order of business was payback. He still had connections. Favors to collect. People who feared the dirty laundry he could air. By the time he got done with Grace and her family, the name Charles Harmon would become synonymous with apocalypse in Romani lore.

  JUREK WAS GLAD he’d taken a pain pill right after Yetta called. Normally, he would have toughed it out. Lord knows he’d been through worse, but he needed to maintain his focus on the young man sitting across from him.

  His son.

  He’d waited thirty years to see his boy and he wasn’t about to let pain rob him of the moment.

  Yetta, who was in the adjoining kitchen making a pot of tea, called out, “We don’t have much time, Jurek. Nikolai is leaving in the morning.”

  Nikolai—his son—shifted uncomfortably on the sofa across from him. Jurek’s small, utilitarian apartment was part of a seniors-only complex. He’d purchased the unit at a time when he was temporarily flush from a string of wins at the craps tables. Instead of partying it all away, as was his usual style, he’d banked the majority of the money and looked for an affordable piece of property.

  He’d qualified for a low-income loan. The one-story, stucco bungalow wasn’t fancy, but it had tripled in value. It would be his only true legacy to his son when he died.

  “You have to leave so soon?”

  Nikolai nodded. “This was a job, not a vacation. Chuck, the snake, is in jail. My work here is done.”

  He said the phrase with a bit of humor. Jurek didn’t get the joke, but he smiled anyway. It was hard not to smile. His son was so handsome and fit. His musculature belonged to his mother. Lithe and strong.

  “Do you like being a policeman?”

  “Yes, for the most part.”

  Jurek felt a nagging pressure around his wound. He made every effort not to wince when he shifted his upper-body weight to his left elbow.

  Nikolai’s eyes narrowed, telling Jurek he’d spotted the telltale display of weakness. Such a show would have gotten him killed in Sobibor.

  “Tea?” Yetta asked, carrying a tray with three cups and a teapot.

  “Tell me about your parents. How is Pete? Last I heard, he’d made chief of police or something.”

  Nikolai looked nonplussed. “You know my dad?”

  “I knew him. He was one of the first people I met after your mother…er, Lucille and I, moved to L.A. The Lightners lived in the same apartment complex as we did. Had a cute little daughter, a few years older than you. They were real nice to us. A lotta people weren’t back then.”

  Yetta handed them cups filled with pale golden liquid. Nothing she’d found in his kitchen, he was sure. Must’ve brought it with her. “Thank you.”

  “Green tea has therapeutic properties. It will help you heal,” she said.

  “Uh…um…what exactly is wrong with you?” Nikolai asked. “Yetta said you’d been sick.”

  Jurek didn’t want pity. He wanted…he didn’t know exactly what he wanted, but whatever it was didn’t involve talking about his health issues.

  “Nothing big.”

  Yetta set down her cup with a crack. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Jurek. Tell him. He deserves to know.”

  He gave her a frown that should have kept her silent but didn’t. “If you don’t, I will. Your father has cancer. Not that he told me about it, but his doctor gave me the truth because Jurek put me down as next-of-kin.”

  “What kind of cancer?” Nikolai asked, his brow crinkled.

  “I didn’t ask, but he told me they caught it early, and Jurek has an excellent chance of making a full recovery.”

  “That’s good,” Nikolai said.

  Jurek was pleased to see the tension leave his son’s face. Until Yetta made a huffing sound. “It would be good news for most people, but this man—” she pointed at Jurek “—prefers to believe that Hitler’s henchmen planted some kind of poison in his bowels that is released slowly over time. Something his doctors can’t detect.”

  Jurek felt a shiver run down his spine. He’d never told anyone, not even Lucille, about his fear. “How do you know that?”

  Yetta sat back, as if the fight had gone out of her. “I…felt it. When I visited you before. I closed my eyes and we went back to that place. That awful place. And I…I…” Her voice dropped to a husky whisper. “I felt as violated as you must have.”

  She reached out, tears in her eyes. “They were evil men, Jurek, but their poison has long since left your system. Thanks to Lucy.”

  He closed his eyes and gripped her hand. He fought to keep his emotions under control. How could he let his adult son see him reduced to tears the very first time they met?

  “Do you remember when I visited you in jail after Lucy died?” Yetta asked.

  Jurek nodded. “We had a big fight,” he said softly.

  A smile touched her lips and she looked at Nikolai. “I was a lot like Grace back then. Passionate about family. I was incensed that your father had given you to a gaujo family. I accused him of robbing you of your birthright. Do you know what he said?”

  Nikolai shook his head.

  “Tell him, Jurek.”

  “I said being Romani never brought me anything but grief. That you were better off not knowing anything about us…me.”

  Yetta’s smile was touched with sadness. “I didn’t understand at the time. But I do now. And having met Nikolai, I agree, Jurek. You were right to do what you did.”

  “Huh?” Nikolai said, setting down his cup. “He was right to give me away?”

  Yetta nodded. “Yes. You’re a fine man, an honorable man. You grew up safe and loved. Not that you wouldn’t have known acceptance and a sense of family with us, but Jurek gave you an opportunity most people never have. He gave you two worlds. What you do with that is entirely up to you.”

  She rose and picked up the tray. “I need to call the hospital and check on Grace. I’ll be outside for a few minutes.”

  Nick watched her leave with a sense of panic. He was alone again with a man he’d spent most of his life hating. He’d constructed elaborate fantasies about what he’d tell his birth father if their paths ever crossed.

  But the man sitting in the cheap recliner didn’t fit the image Nick had of a self-centered, low-life egoist who couldn’t be bothered to raise the kid he’d fathered. This man, George, or Jurek, as Yetta called him, was old, withered, yet too proud to show that he was in pain.

  “Do you prefer I call you George or Jurek?”

  “George. Only Yetta calls me Jurek. When I first came to America, I found the name sounded too much like jerk to gain me any respect. George was on every dollar bill. I thought that would be a good omen.”

  Nick smiled for the first time since entering the small, tidy residence. He hadn’t had any idea what to expect, but a white crushed-rock yard with two pink flamingos wasn’t even close. Nor was the aluminum foil that covered the window near the door. An energ
y-saving technique, Yetta had whispered under her breath while they’d waited for permission to enter.

  “Nice place you’ve got here, George. Have you lived here long?” he asked, hoping small talk could take the place of the important questions he was afraid to ask.

  “Ten years. Before that, I traveled around a bit. California, Arizona, New Mexico.”

  “Warm states.”

  George nodded. “I had enough of the cold when I was a boy.”

  “Is it true about the concentration camp?”

  George nodded.

  “Which one?”

  “Sobibor.”

  “Never heard of it.”

  “It wasn’t famous.”

  Nick wondered if he would have survived if he’d been the one taken from his family and subjected to torture and abuse.

  “The answer is yes.”

  “I beg your pardon?” Nick said.

  “You’re asking yourself if you would have been a survivor, and the answer is yes.”

  “How do you know?”

  George smiled. “You survived being separated from the safety of the only family you ever knew. You survived losing your mother at a very young age. You survived moving from California to Michigan. That alone takes a very strong person.”

  The last was said with a wink, and Nick laughed. He decided he might have liked this man if things had been different. “I’m not complaining about my life. My adoptive parents have been good to me. I don’t have any regrets.”

  “I’ve kept tabs on them…and you over the years. I knew when I asked Pete and Sharon to take you that they’d give you a better life than I could.”

  “Because you were an ex-con?” Nick asked, his throat tight.

  “Because my heart was gone. Your mother was the light of my life. The only light I’d ever known, although I’ve always felt a special connection to Yetta. Unfortunately, I’ve never been able to look at her without remembering that awful day when she was a baby.”

  “The fire. She told me.”

  “Did she tell you that one of her sisters died? That the other was disfigured for life, and that Yetta’s own health was never the same? All because of me.”