by Edie Claire
“Still worrying about Thane?” he asked as his whiskers tickled her temple.
“I can’t help it,” she answered. “I just wish he’d find that damned bear and come home.”
“He could be there for weeks, honey. You know that. He’s worked hard in school, he deserves a little fun.”
“I need to see him. We have to talk.”
“It can wait,” Doug assured her. “He’s not thinking about Vanessa now. She’s not his problem or yours either.”
Margot said nothing. She lifted a hand to her mouth and absently bit a fingernail.
Doug gently pulled her hand down. “You’re not thinking about Vanessa. Are you?”
Margot stiffened. “I can’t help it! I know it doesn’t mean anything that they’re both in Alaska, but I just have this awful feeling…”
He rotated her in his arms to face him, his soft brown eyes patient and sympathetic as always. He was a rare prize, this husband of hers, and she cursed her younger self to hell and back for being such a malcontent idiot. Doug had loved her in high school, but back then she’d hardly known he was alive. He was just another hometown boy, destined to work at the pulp mills all his life. She’d wanted a more worldly mate. Someone tall, dark, handsome, and exciting. Ha! If only she’d stayed closer to home and married Doug first, she wouldn’t be tortured by the horrid, sick feelings she was enduring now.
“This isn’t bad news, you know,” he said quietly.
Margot’s eyes began to water. He had always been so understanding. More so than she had any right to expect. “I know it isn’t. It’s just that…” She could not finish the thought.
He held her tighter. “I know. You’re scared. You’ve been doing what you’ve been doing for a very long time now, and it’s hard to think about shaking things up.”
Her heart skipped a beat. Doug hadn’t said much when she’d told him about the detective’s call. He’d just held her and listened to her vent. She shouldn’t have assumed that meant he had no opinion. It had always been his way to let sensitive issues percolate a while.
“You know what you have to do, don’t you?” he whispered.
She pulled away from him abruptly, stung. If she’d thought about it, she could have predicted this was coming. But the prospect of Doug’s disagreeing with her was just one of many things she’d been unwilling to think about.
“I most certainly do not!” she protested. “It’s not that easy!”
“Isn’t it?” Doug returned calmly. “The danger’s gone now. Stanley’s most likely still alive. His sons have a right to know what really happened.”
“They have a right to be happy!” Margot declared, raising her voice. She hated it when they argued. It didn’t happen often, and most of the time when it did Doug let her have her way. But when her husband chose to pick a battle, he was immovable, and she feared this was one of those times. “They’re happy now, just as they are!”
Doug said nothing for a moment, which was a bad sign. The longer he thought about his words, the more important he believed them to be. “They could be happier. You don’t know. You have no way of knowing if their lives would be better or worse.”
“Oh, yes I do!” she retorted hotly. Her cheeks flared with color as years of suppressed worry and pain flooded back into her memory. “You know what that man put me through!”
“Even so, that’s got nothing to do with Thane and Jason.”
Margot’s mouth stuck open. In the past, any mention of Stanley’s mistreatment had elicited her husband’s immediate and affectionate sympathy.
“I’m sorry, sweetheart,” he said gently. “But this isn’t about you. It’s not about Stanley, either. It’s about them. They’re not little boys who need your protection anymore. They’re grown men with minds of their own. Maybe they’ll want to seek Stanley out, make him a part of their lives again. Maybe they won’t. But don’t you think it should be their choice?”
Margot’s insides burned. Doug was right, of course, but that made no difference. Would the consequences of falling in lust with Stanley Buchanan never, ever stop wrenching her guts out? “Don’t you see?” she shrieked, her whole body shaking. “They’ll hate me! Every damn thing that’s happened… the separation, the lies… everything will look like it’s my fault! You know what a hero Thane’s made of that man! And I’m the one who kept them apart! My own son will hate me till the day he dies!”
The sound of her own voice, laying bare her deepest and darkest fear, broke her down. Doug said nothing else. He merely reached out and pulled her to him, stifling her sobs against his chest.
***
Mei Lin made it from the Torpins’ place to Stanley’s cabin in twenty minutes flat. If she’d met the bears again, she would have plowed right into them. Her eyes were unseeing; her mind completely preoccupied. Even Kibbe could sense her mood, as evidenced by the fact that after running out to meet her, he accepted one quick pat on the head and then quietly slunk away.
Stanley was sitting on the porch with his binoculars, as expected. He wouldn’t know, yet, that Dave had tracked the bear family off his property and onto public lands. “Well, hello!” he called out merrily. “I wasn’t expecting you back so soon.”
Stanley’s vision wasn’t the greatest. She got to within ten feet of him before her thunderous countenance made an impression. She could tell the exact moment he noticed, because his eyes widened and the sides of his beard drooped. “Hell’s fire, girl. What’s wrong with you?”
Mei Lin found herself at a loss for words. Never mind the time consumed by the drive and the long walk — advance planning had never been her forte. Instead, she just threw it out there.
“I know who you are, Stanley,” she announced, priding herself on a reasonably calm tone of voice. “Or should I say, Dr. Buchanan.”
His face paled. He stood up with a jerk. The move was unwise. A great deal of pain must have hit him unexpectedly, because he immediately stumbled. He shifted his weight to his good leg and clutched the porch railing. “He knows?” he demanded in horror.
Mei Lin was taken aback. The nurse in her wanted to check his leg — make sure he hadn’t busted a stitch or something — but she was too confused to move. “Who?”
Stanley didn’t answer. He just stood there, or rather leaned there, visibly shaking.
“No one knows except me,” she answered, her pacifist side taking charge again. She was angry, yes, but the poor man looked weak as a kitten. “Sit down,” she ordered, coming closer. “Before you fall down and injure something else.”
Stanley made no move on his own, but when she put her hands on his arms he allowed her to guide him back into his Adirondack chair. She poured him a cup of water and he drank it dry before speaking again. Mei Lin took a swig from her own water bottle, then settled on the washtub beside him.
“How did you find out?” he asked finally, his voice thin.
“I met your son,” she replied as a realization struck her. Did he already know that Thane was here? He must!
Stanley nodded mutely. Miserably. He showed no surprise.
“Did Dave tell you about him?” she asked.
Stanley shook his head without looking at her. “You told me.”
Mei Lin lifted an eyebrow skeptically. “All I was said was that Dave wanted to bring another wildlife specialist from British Columbia.”
“You said his name,” Stanley insisted. “You said Thane. That was enough. I know that he’s been living in Vancouver, working on his master’s. Before that he worked for Fish and Wildlife on Vancouver Island.” He smiled faintly. “He’s always loved bears.”
Mei Lin drew in a breath. Of course. No wonder Stanley had done such an abrupt reversal about having “strangers” on his property! No wonder he’d looked so frightened. One face-to-face meeting with Thane could topple twenty years’ worth of deception!
“Why, Stanley?” she demanded, anger returning to her voice. “Why did you do it? How could you let them all believe you were dead?�
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He wouldn’t look at her. He sighed heavily and stared at nothing. All at once, he seemed much older. “It’s a long and complicated story, Mei Lin,” he said quietly.
“I’m not leaving here until you make me understand.”
After a lengthy period of silence, he turned and caught her gaze. “I don’t know what it is about you. I really don’t. I’ve kept this to myself for so long… not a single slip. Then one day you hike up here and smile at me with those innocent brown eyes of yours and I’m blabbing to beat the band.”
“You were delirious. At least part of the time.”
“See there? Even when you’re angry, you’re not unkind. Makes it easier for a man to let his guard down.” He smiled weakly, then sobered. “You promised me once that whatever I told you about myself — voluntarily or otherwise — would never leave this cabin. Did you mean that?
“Of course I did,” Mei Lin defended. “I haven’t said a word. To anyone. I didn’t ask to be put in the middle of this, Stanley. But here we are. And I need to understand.”
He fixed her with those mesmerizing eyes again. “You have to believe me when I say this is very important to me. There is nothing else more important. Nothing.”
Mei Lin waited. A grain of guilt sprang up within her. She hadn’t broken her promise to him, but what if he made her swear again, right now, that she never would? Even if it hurt Thane? She swore internally. She would cross that bridge when and if she came to it.
“I told you I was never a saint,” he began.
“Repeatedly,” she affirmed. “Go on.”
His face and tone were dismal. “I married Thane’s mother for all the wrong reasons. I’d gotten her pregnant, and I’ll admit I was proud of that, in some stupid, macho way. But I also really did want kids. Not the responsibility of them — I was too selfish for that — but the fun of being a dad. I married her knowing I didn’t feel the way a groom was supposed to feel about his bride, but like the self-confident ass I was, I figured I could make it work. Well, I couldn’t. Turned out she wasn’t all that crazy about me, either.” He chuckled ruefully. “It was a miracle we had Jason, frankly. I spent most nights on the couch — when I came home at all. There were other women; we talked about divorce. But I didn’t want to lose my boys, and she had a thing about admitting failure. So we both just kept up the pretense.”
Mei Lin tried hard to focus. She was not a judgmental person by nature, but hearing any married man talk about “other women” had an embarrassingly primal effect on her. Namely, a strong desire to punch… something. “I know about the kidnapping,” she spouted, anxious to move on. “At least, I know what the Chicago Tribune had to say about it. Your family seems to believe the official version. So what’s the truth? Why are you here?”
A sardonic smile twisted his lips. “Those are two different questions. Let’s stick to the first one. Obviously, I didn’t die. I was shot three times, but my injuries weren’t fatal. And as soon as I told the authorities what I knew, they were all over me.”
“How do you mean?” Mei Lin asked. She thought she knew, but she was trying not to make presumptions.
His eyes darted around the clearing, and she felt a pang of empathy. No one could possibly sneak up on the two of them with Kibbe around. But Stanley had lived with his secrets so long he couldn’t not look over his shoulder.
“They planned all along to kill me,” he said flatly. “I knew that when they didn’t censor themselves. I saw all their faces, heard their names. They were desperate for me to save this guy; he was clearly a powerful player in the organization. They said they’d kill me if he died, but I knew they’d kill me anyway as soon as I was no longer useful. I did my best to keep the man breathing, but I knew he wouldn’t make it. I tried to buy time, asking for more supplies. Nothing short of an ace trauma team in a fully equipped OR could have saved him, but they didn’t know that. The whole time I was with him, weak as he was, this guy still took meetings, made plans, talked on the phone. He even ordered a hit, right there in front of me. But no matter what I did, he kept losing blood. When he started lapsing in and out of consciousness, I figured we’d both be dead soon. Then the raid happened.”
“Who shot you?” Mei Lin asked weakly, remembering the article.
Stanley’s face tightened. “A guy named Tony Russo. He was the worst of the bunch, and that’s saying something. First thing he did when the cops arrived was point his pistol at me. I’d have died right then and there if his aim hadn’t been off because he was getting shot at himself. When I collapsed he got the hell out of there. Unscathed.”
Mei Lin’s face felt hot. She looked out a moment at the rippling creek, which was currently glinting in the sunshine. It was difficult to imagine that such injustice, such horror, could coexist in the same, beautiful world as her rainforest. “Was he caught?” she dared to ask, already knowing the answer.
Stanley laughed bitterly. “Of course not. He slipped away somehow. They caught up with him later, but nothing could be proven without my testimony.” His expression darkened. “I would have loved nothing better than to put him away. To put all of them all away.”
Mei Lin believed him. “But you didn’t.”
He turned to her with an expression she found inscrutable. It was part anger, part regret… perhaps part disgust. “What I wanted was to be the hero,” he said mockingly. “Always had. That’s how I ended up a trauma surgeon in the first place. My motives were never pure, you see. Not in life, and certainly not in love. I couldn’t wait to get up on that stand, to put all those bastards behind bars. I knew they’d kill me in a heartbeat if they could, but I didn’t care — that just made it all the more exciting. To me, being in the Witness Protection Program sounded like a small price to pay… a unique adventure.”
His blue eyes misted over. Mei Lin could read his expression easily, now. His soul was consumed by self-loathing.
“All I ever thought about was myself,” he continued. “I never stopped to think about my sons, my parents… what my exhilarating foray into crime-fighting would mean for my family. But my wife knew. And luckily for the rest of them, she was totally over my sorry hide. So much so that she could stand beside my bed as I lay there bleeding from three bullet holes, look me straight in the face, and say no. No, you selfish bastard. This time, you’re not getting your way.”
He laughed without bitterness. To Mei Lin’s surprise, he seemed genuinely amused. “The woman was a gem, truly. I should have appreciated her earlier. But our marriage was already over by then. She held all the cards; I couldn’t take the boys into hiding without her permission. And I couldn’t testify publicly without putting my family in danger as well as myself. So all I could do was give my statement off the record. Since I was able to clear up a couple key questions and produce some new leads, the cops were happy enough with that. They falsified a death certificate, set me up with a fake identity and passport, and off I went.”
Mei Lin sucked in a breath. “So your wife knew all along. She lied to her children, to your parents, everyone.”
“She had to,” Stanley defended. “Tony Russo was no idiot. He wasn’t a hundred percent convinced I was dead, and he knew the danger of the intel I’d picked up. If and when the police acted on that information, he would suspect. And if he saw anything odd going on with my family — like my parents throwing a party the day after my funeral, or my boys trundling off to visit some mystery relative — none of them would be safe. He would use them to get to me. One way or the other.”
Mei Lin stood up. Her legs felt like jelly. As the circumstances behind what had happened became clearer to her, her anger with Stanley was dissipating. But the rest of her emotions were all over the place. She could understand his wanting to protect his sons. But the cost! It seemed too great.
“For all I know, they could still be in danger,” Stanley added sternly. “Tony Russo is still alive and kicking, and his brother’s been in jail for fifteen years, thanks partly to my information. Guys li
ke them have very long memories. And they were suspicious of my convenient death. They sent a few thugs in suits to my funeral, just to make sure nothing smelled funny.”
Mei Lin looked at him with dismay. She couldn’t imagine it. Thane at the tender age of thirteen — devastated, bereft — being watched for signs of insincerity by a bunch of cunning, ruthless murderers!
“So you can understand,” Stanley finished, gesturing for her to sit again. “You understand why no one else can know. The man that I was has been buried for twenty years now, and that’s where he’s going to stay. Stanley Smith is all there is. And that’s what’s best for everybody.”
Mei Lin couldn’t sit down again. She was too tense, too jumpy. She had a strong, paranoid compulsion to scan the forest for men lurking in dark suits. Yet as much as that thought spooked her, if she suddenly were presented with any of the men who’d threatened an innocent, teenaged Thane, she would scratch their miserable eyes out.
“Tell me about him,” Stanley said suddenly, his voice changed to a plea.
Mei Lin looked to see his light eyes firing with expectation.
“You’ve met him, haven’t you?” he continued. “I can’t ask Dave, but… I’d love to hear anything you can tell me about him. About my son.”
The tender tone of his last words hit her with an almost physical pain. Her conscience was in torment. Stanley loved his son, missed him, was desperate for any nugget of information about him. But why should he get it, when Thane had heard nothing of his father… and never would? It wasn’t fair. To either of them. She understood why Stanley had done what he did, but still, it didn’t feel right to her. It wasn’t right!
She couldn’t think of what to say. She could sing the praises of Thane Buchanan for hours on end, but no words came to her lips. When she looked into Stanley’s hopeful face all she could see was Thane’s wounded one. He needed to know. He should know.
“I think you should ask him yourself,” she answered.