by Eileen Wilks
"Well like the picture here, I guess."
"My dad's house," he said impatiently.
Of course. What other "he" was there these days? "It's painted white and has a staircase and a big front porch. I think all the bedrooms are upstairs, so we'll probably have a room on the second floor."
"Will we be next to my dad's room? Or my uncle's?"
"You have three uncles now, remember? Your dad's two brothers are your uncles, and his sister is your aunt, so his sister's husband is your uncle, too. That makes three." Ben's sister and her husband were someplace in Africa at the moment, and the youngest brother was a long-haul truck driver who lived with Ben when he wasn't on the road. And the other brother, the one she'd met, would be there at the house, though he didn't usually live there. "Which uncle did you mean?"
"The army uncle," Zach said. "I forgot his name."
"Duncan," she said, her mouth oddly dry. "He's your uncle Duncan. I don't know where our room will be, sweetie. We'll just have to wait and find out." She began reading again, hoping to stem the flood.
Zach had been brimming over with questions ever since she told him about his father – but they weren't the ones she'd expected. And dreaded. He'd wanted to know what his dad looked like and if he liked little boys. How long would they stay there? Were there other kids to play with? Could he take his army guys with him? How big were the mountains? Could he climb one? Did his dad have a dog?
Puppies hadn't been entirely eclipsed by the advent of a father.
Gwen didn't fool herself that the other questions wouldn't come up at some point. When she'd told him about his father, she'd tried to scale her explanations to a four-year-old's understanding, saying simply that she hadn't known how to get in touch with Ben when Zach was born, so his dad hadn't known about him. "You didn't have his phone number?" Zach had asked.
"No, I didn't. I didn't have his address, either, so I couldn't write him."
"So how come you found him now?"
"I hired a private investigator."
Zach had been desperately impressed. A real private eye? Wow. He'd wanted to meet the man and maybe see his gun. Gwen had been glad the investigator and his gun, if any, were safely distant in Denver … and selfishly relieved she hadn't had to face the other questions. Yet.
When they finished the book, Gwen judged it time to make a trip to the rest room or else Zach would undoubtedly need to go the moment they were instructed to stay in their seats. "C'mon, short stuff, time to take a walk down the aisle."
Since Zach was fascinated by airplane washrooms, he didn't object. No doubt he was tired of sitting still. So was she. Her mother often said she was as fidgety at thirty as she'd been at three. She wasn't far wrong.
An older woman who reminded Gwen vaguely of Aunt Bee from The Andy Griffith Show was already waiting her turn. She fussed over Zach, insisting he go ahead of her – "it's difficult for them to wait at this age, isn't it, dear?" – and asked him if this was his first time on a plane.
"I been on lots of airplanes," he informed her. "My mama an' me like to fly. We don't like airports very much 'cause they won't let you run, even if there is lots and lots of room. But we like airplanes."
She smiled at him indulgently. "Are you going on vacation, or is this a family trip?"
"We're going to see my dad. He lives in the mountains in a big house with a porch, an' he likes little boys. My mama said so."
"Oh, ah … how nice." She gave Gwen a quick glance, her eyebrows raised. "I assume he's talking about a new stepfather?"
Zach answered before she could. "No, he's my dad. A private eye found him for us."
The woman's rather protrudent eyes bulged further. Fortunately the rest-room door opened just then. Gwen breathed a sigh of relief and chivvied her talkative son inside. Zach was blithely unaware there was anything odd about meeting his father for the first time at the age of four. She didn't want some stranger's attitude casting clouds over this visit, making him worry about things he couldn't understand.
Not that Gwen herself didn't worry. How could she not? Between her mother's furious disapproval and the expectations Zach had built up in the past eleven days, she had plenty to worry about.
Her nervous stomach clenched tighter as she helped Zach refasten the snap on his jeans. Heaven knows her own expectations had been knocked sideways when she'd seen her son's father again – expectations she hadn't known she'd had.
The plane was descending when they emerged, and she had the dickens of a time keeping Zach halfway still through the landing process. Finally, though, they were off the plane and headed for the lower level, where they could claim their four suitcases. And one father.
Over Zach's protests, she scooped him up onto her hip before stepping on the escalator. She'd read a horrible story about children whose clothing got caught in the treads…
"Do you see him, Mama? Is he here? Do you see him yet?"
"Zach, you have to be still or I'm going to drop you." The tote was trying to slip off her shoulder. She didn't have a hand free to anchor it, and her heart was pounding, pounding… "Ugh," she said, shifting him slightly. "I must be feeding you too much. You weigh two tons."
He giggled.
Gwen looked over the top of his head. Waiting at the bottom of the escalator were two men. Two, not one.
Her face felt hot. Ben had brought his brother to welcome his son to the family – and that was good, that was wonderful. She was here because Zach needed his family – all of it. But it wasn't what she'd expected. Why do I keep expecting things? she thought fretfully. It doesn't do any good. I just trip over those stupid expectations every time.
Ben's gaze was fixed on the boy in her arms. As the moving stairway carried them to him, a smile spread over his hard, square face. The man who waited with him neither moved nor smiled. His expression was every bit as intent a Ben's. But his gaze was on her, not her son.
Gwen's mouth went dry. "Zach," she whispered. "Zach, that's your dad waiting for us at the bottom. The man in the blue windbreaker."
He twisted around to stare. The little arm around her neck tightened. "There? The big one?"
"Yes." She swallowed. "The big one."
The escalator deposited them on level ground. She stepped aside to let those behind her get off, then cleared her throat. "Zach, this is your dad. And this is your uncle Duncan."
"The army uncle."
"That's right."
Zach's choke hold on her tightened. The boy's blue eyes met the man's brown eyes – met and held in the same straight-on way. Two male faces focused completely on each other, one of them large and hard, the skin weathered and shadowed by beard; the other small, soft and rounded, but with the same stubborn jaw and short, blunt nose.
"You're my dad," Zach whispered.
"Yes." Ben's throat worked. "Yes, I am. I'm so glad to see you, Zach. So damned glad."
Zach nodded solemnly. "I'm dam' glad, too."
Duncan made a choked noise. "Ah … been a while since you were around kids, hasn't it, Ben?"
"Yeah." Ben's eyes never left his son's face. "Your uncle Duncan means I wasn't supposed to say 'damn.' You shouldn't, either."
"Okay." Zach squirmed around so he could capture Gwen's face in his two small hands. "Mom, put me down. Put me down now. I'll show my dad our suitcases. I bet he can carry all of 'em. He's really big."
Slowly she lowered Zach to his feet, stricken by a pang of separation so acute it was a physical ache. She wanted to scoop him up and run away, but it was already too late. "Keep hold of your father's hand, Zach. Don't be running off."
He held up a hand, his face turned up to Ben's in sunny confidence. "C'mon. Mom packed hunnerds of things. I brought all my army guys. We're gonna stay with you for two weeks!"
"So I hear." A large hand reached down and swallowed the little one. Ben glanced at her. "I won't let him get lost."
She nodded. "I'm not sure which carousel is ours."
"I'll find it. I know your flight n
umber." He looked down at Zach, his expression soft and grave. "I don't know if I can carry hundreds of things. I might need some help."
Zach giggled as they set off. "It's all in suitcases. Do you have a dog?"
Gwen smiled. And swallowed hard. Dammit, she was not going to cry.
"Ben's good with kids," the man still beside her said quietly. "And he's already gone on this one."
"Zach's good with everyone." She gave Duncan a smile – and looked quickly away. Damn, damn, damn…
"I take it your flight was uneventful?"
"Aside from reading Green Eggs and Ham twenty times, yes." What was wrong with her? Couldn't she get anything right? She tried to pull her thoughts together, watching as Ben and Zach stopped at the first of the baggage carousels.
Ben hunkered down, putting himself at Zach's level. Zach was chattering away. His clear voice carried enough for her to catch a few words – something about his army guys. Then he pointed at a blue suitcase. Ben stood and heaved it off the conveyor belt.
They were so delighted with each other. She couldn't do anything to mess that up.
The man beside her spoke quietly. "The two of them look right together, don't they?"
"Yes. Yes, they do." Her body was humming to itself, making her feel so alive. Making her feel, for the first time in so long, very much a woman.
Stupid, treacherous damned body – this wasn't the first time it had betrayed her. "We'd better catch up with them," she said. "My luggage isn't blue."
* * *
Chapter 5
«^»
"Hey, buddy, you paying attention? Gotta bid if you wanna stay in the game." Pat grinned at Duncan. "You chickening out on me?"
Pat looked just as he always did, the red hair a few weeks past a trim, his fatigue shirt unbuttoned. His stubby little excuse for a nose was peeling as usual – Pat always said he could get a sunburn from standing under a hundred-watt lightbulb. He was sitting in the notch of the old oak out back, leaning against the trunk, holding a hand of cards.
Duncan was straddling the same wide limb, his legs dangling down on either side. He used to sit out here like this with his brother Charlie.
Part of Duncan knew this wasn't right; Sgt. Patrick McConaughsey didn't belong to the time of his life when he'd sat in this old oak. But it seemed rude to ask Pat why he was here in Highpoint when Duncan was so glad to see him. "Hey, Pat, it's good to see you."
"You gonna play cards or not? It's jacks or better to open."
Duncan glanced down. Sure enough, he was holding a hand of cards. All jacks. All red Jacks, in fact. Alarm trickled in. "Pat, there's something wrong here. Something wrong with my hand."
"Is it your hand or your eyes? Look again." There was something wrong with his eyes. He couldn't seem to focus. No, maybe it was getting darker. He looked around, his alarm deepening. Everything was dark, murky. "There's some weather moving in. We'd better get inside."
"Duncan, we need you on the force." That was Jeff standing on the ground beneath the branch Duncan straddled. "We need you to kill for us. You're good at it. Here's your rifle." He tossed it up.
"No!" But he caught the rifle one-handed – he couldn't let it fall to the ground. It was loaded. He knew it was, and even as he protested, his hands were checking it out, making sure everything worked. "You don't understand. I can't do this anymore."
"Duncan, you playing cards or not?" Pat demanded. Horror bit, clear and sharp through the darkening air. He remembered. "Pat, you're—"
Gunfire. They were under attack. They—
"It's a backfire," Jeff said. "Just a bunch of kids. Nothing to worry about."
"Duncan," Pat said again, but his voice was wrong. All wrong, breathy and liquid. Duncan knew what he'd see when he turned his head, but he couldn't stop himself He couldn't stop any of it.
Pat leaned against the trunk of the tree, his legs straddling it as before. But he wasn't grinning. He didn't have enough face left to grin. In the middle of the dripping, meaty mess that used to be his face, the blood bubbled.
He was still breathing.
"No!" Duncan screamed and he grabbed Pat's shirt and shook him. "No, no, no – damn you, don't keep doing this, coming back and dying on me. Damn you!" he said again and shook him over and over, and his friend's blood spattered everywhere, on his face, his chest, his hands—
Knocking. Someone was knocking on … on his door?
Duncan sat bolt upright in bed. Daylight slanted through the blinds to fall in bright bars on the blue bedspread covering him. He shoved his hair out of his face. His hand shook, but it wasn't bloody.
God, he was sick of that dream.
Rap. Rap. Rap. Out in the hall, but not on his door, someone was knocking. A little boy said impatiently, "Aren't you ready yet?"
Zach. Duncan recognized the voice, but hung still between horror and waking. What did Zach want him to be ready for?
"Mo-om!" the boy's voice rang out.
The bathroom door opened. "Shh," Gwen said in a low voice. "Keep it quiet, okay? I think your uncle Duncan is still asleep."
Oh. Right. The boy wanted his mother, not his uncle. Of course. Duncan had a sharp sense of dislocation as he swung between the horror of his dream and the cheerful, everyday sounds outside his door.
He threw back the covers, climbed out of bed and crossed to the window, lifting one of the slats of the blinds so he could look out. Mrs. Bradshaw, the neighbor who used to baby-sit for his mother back in another world, was digging in her flower bed.
His unconscious mind wasn't exactly subtle. Over and over it hammered home the same points. The script changed slightly – this had been Jeff's first time to make an appearance, for example – but the essence was the same every time. At the start of the dream, Pat was alive and well and wanted to play poker. At the end he was a bloody wreck … and still horribly alive.
Zach's whisper was every bit as audible as his normal voice. "I'm hungry, Mom."
He heard Gwen say something, her voice still low. A giggle from Zach. Then the thud of little feet, fading as they headed down the stairs.
This was supposed to be reality, wasn't it? Crisp, sunny spring mornings. Neighbors weeding their flower beds. Little boys who were hungry for breakfast, mothers who tried to keep them quiet. It was all so blasted normal.
It was a reality he didn't fit into anymore.
Get a clue, he told his unconscious. Pat was dead. One hundred percent dead, not breathing in bubbles through his ruined face.
The ruined face had been all too real, though. Duncan scrubbed his hand over his own face. So had the blood.
He turned away from the sunshine and grabbed his sweatpants. She'd headed downstairs with her kid, which meant the bathroom was empty. He wanted a shower, hot as he could stand it and as soon as he could get it.
The bathroom smelled of woman stuff. There was a tidy little makeup case by the sink and a plastic cup holding a yellow, adult sized toothbrush and a smaller red one. The yellow one was damp. The shower stall was wet and smelled like flowers.
One good thing, he thought as he scrubbed skin that didn't show the bloodstains from his dreams. At least he'd gotten over his weird initial reaction to her. He'd discovered that when he'd gone with Ben to pick up her and her son at the airport. Not that he'd stopped reacting, but that spooky whatever it was he'd experienced the first time he'd seen her had faded to normal lust. He could handle that.
He lathered his face, then reached for the razor he kept on the small shelf. There was another razor beside it. A pink one.
Had she noticed his razor when she showered earlier?
Oh, no, he told himself. Don't go there. But it was too late. The instant mental picture of her, wet and naked, annoyed him a much as it aroused him. He held the skin of his cheek taut with one hand and started shaving. She needed to be sharing a bathroom with Ben, not him. But Ben's bathroom opened off the master bedroom. Chances were, she'd start using it once Ben talked her into his bed again.
&nbs
p; Ouch. Damn. He'd cut himself.
Ben had better start paying more attention to her than he had last night. First he'd insisted Duncan go to the airport with him. Then he'd barely spoken to her, either on the ride back to Highpoint or once they arrived. That was no way to impress the woman. Duncan had suggested that he go out for a while, leave the three of them alone, but Ben had been unusually nervous – about seeing Gwen again? Duncan wondered, frowning. No. Nervous about getting to know his son.
Well, what of it? He snapped off the water. Of course Ben was focused on Zach. That was the way it should be.
It did seem that if he'd been half as interested in Zach's mother five years ago, he would have known about his son all along.
But that didn't make any difference. Gwen wasn't free, not in any way that counted. Maybe he didn't see her as a sister-in-law yet. That, he thought grimly as he dried off, was going to take time. But once she was sleeping with his brother again, his body would get used to the idea that she wasn't available.
Right now, all he had to do was go downstairs and act normal. He grimaced as he opened the bathroom door. That shouldn't be too hard. He'd been acting normal for a month now.
The mingled smells of coffee and bacon drew him to the kitchen. He paused in the doorway.
Ben stood at the stove, pouring batter into neat circles onto the griddle. Zach sat at the table, elevated on one of the couch pillows. He had a milk mustache, a piece of bacon in his hand and a plate empty of everything but syrup. His mother sat beside him with her back to Duncan. She wore a sweater the color of raspberries. In the bright sunshine, her pale hair was almost incandescent.
They looked like a family.
"Hi, Unca Duncan! My dad made us fatjacks for breakfast!"
A smile eased onto his face. "Fatjacks huh? Is that sort of like flapjacks and do I get any?"
Ben spoke from the stove. "I'm putting yours on now. You'll have to flip them yourself – I've got to get out to the site."
Gwen pushed her chair back. "Come on, Zach, let's wash a few layers of syrup off your hands and get you dressed."
"No need for you to rush just because my day starts early," Ben said.