Dan waited for something more.
“I don’t love him, if that’s what you mean. Not like that, anyway. I love him like an in-law.” She shook her head, wryly. “Even though he’s not really, is he? Not legally.”
“What about me?”
She studied him. “What about you?”
“Do you love me?”
She looked away.
“Lorraine, don’t punish me by withholding your love.”
“I’m not punishing you.”
“Then say it. If you love me, damn it, say it.”
She kept her gaze on the counter. “I love you. All right, damn it! I love you.”
She’d said it. The way she’d said it, the way he’d forced her to, struck Dan as humorous, and he couldn’t help a chuckle. Maybe it was nervous relief, but cussing at each other was suddenly the funniest thing that had happened all week. He laughed out loud.
“You’re losing it, Beckett.” She stood and zipped the deposit bag, a smile on her own face.
He wanted to pull her against him and hug her tight. But it hadn’t been that way between them for a while. They were lovers, in the dark secret cloak of night. But they were no longer friends.
“I’ll run this to the night deposit box.”
“Take someone with you.”
She glanced back.
“Just to be on the safe side.”
“Thad?”
“Thad’ll do just fine.”
She nodded and left the shop. Dan locked the cash drawer in a cabinet under the counter and turned out the lights. He still had a couple of hours of work before he finished for the night, but the prospect didn’t seem like a burden.
He felt like his dad must have felt when they got all the fluid away from his heart. He was breathing easier tonight.
Lorraine still loved him.
Chapter Ten
On a Wednesday three weeks later, Lorraine went to shop and see a movie in Omaha with her sisters. Dan cleaned the presses, stocked the coolers, and prepared for the final weekend. Even though the Festival operated Thursday through Sunday, the rest of the orchard’s operation had to be handled on the other days.
Tom and Cedra had gone somewhere for dinner and Dan and Gil fixed a meal for themselves and the children. Lorraine’s sister Lorna’s five-year-old daughter had come for the night while her mother was gone, and the girls giggled over something Jori had said.
“You had a record crowd this year.” Gil pushed his food around with his fork
“Our net sales are already higher than last year, and we have another four days left.” Dan eyed the baked potato on his father’s plate. “Use the salt and butter substitutes and eat that.”
“They can’t really expect people to eat this crap,” Gil complained. “What pleasures are left to an old man who can’t eat what he likes?”
“It’s not that bad.” Dan shook the shaker over his own potato and tasted it. Couldn’t hurt to develop better habits before he had a problem like his dad’s. “I’m sure you must get used to it.”
Gil grumbled, but he ate.
“Dad, the red moped keeps killing out.” Thad forked another slice of tomato onto his plate. “Can you help me look at it?"
“I don’t know when I’ll have time, but we’ll do it first chance I get,” Dan promised.
Satisfied with that reply, his son finished his meal and excused himself. Bram and Jori followed him out the back door.
“Me and Jackie are gonna play Barbies now, awright?” Autumn asked, taking her cousin’s hand.
Dan got out of his chair and knelt to give each a hug. “Just don’t play beach in the bathroom this time, okay?”
“We won’t,” freckle-faced Jackie piped up. “We’re gonna play daycare baby-sitters.”
He watched them skip off, only slightly reassured that their current pretend game would be less messy than the last, when they’d carried buckets of sand from Autumn’s sandbox to the bathtub and created a swimming area for their dolls.
He and Gil cleared the table. Thad returned and the three of them played a couple of games of Yahtzee before it grew dark and the kids went up to sleep. Thad hadn’t pulled out his phone as soon as he’d eaten, and that pleased Dan immeasurably.
“Thanks for hanging out with us old guys,” he told his oldest son as they climbed the stairs.
“Yeah.”
“Wanna watch a movie with me or something?”
“I’m gonna call somebody.”
Dan grinned and didn’t ask if it was the girl he’d mentioned. He raised his fist for a bump and Thad went into his room and closed the door.
In his own room, he stretched out on his stomach on the bed and watched his favorite home videos, backing up the DVDs and rerunning several places. The twins’ first birthday always made him laugh. Even then, Bram had been more laid back, hesitant and wide-eyed over the colorfully frosted cake on the table. A five-year-old Thad fed him a taste of frosting from the tip of a spoon and he grinned and waved his chubby arms.
Jori, on the other hand, caught sight of the cake and before anyone could stop him, grabbed two fistfuls and jammed them in his mouth. Watching, Dan laughed along with the voices on the tape, and laughed harder when Jori grabbed another handful of cake and plopped it directly on top of Bram’s head.
Memories of happy times flashed across the screen: Thad learning to ride a bike; a much thinner Gil waving from the cab of their old Ford truck; Lorraine, flushed and glowing, holding newborn Autumn in her arms; their trip to Dallas; the kids on amusement park rides. So ordinary.
So special.
Dan slipped in another DVD. He’d watched this one so many times, he knew exactly what was going to happen, how the voices sounded, had memorized the colors and the expressions. After he’d taken the footage, he’d never been able to show it to anyone but Lorraine, and she’d blushed furiously.
After a few scenes of the boys playing softball in the yard came a shot of the bathroom door in the hallway. Behind the door, soft voices could be heard. The door opened and the camera jiggled a little as Dan wedged it into the opening.
Autumn and Lorraine sat in a tub full of bubbles, Lorraine’s hair piled on her head, dark wet tendrils stuck to her neck. A thick lather enveloped Autumn’s head, and she sat contentedly in front of her mother, playing with a bright yellow sponge duck while Lorraine massaged her head and created silly shapes with her shampooed hair.
Mother and daughter talked and laughed, oblivious to the camera’s invasion. Lorraine’s nipples peeked out above the rich bubbles, her breasts moving in a tantalizing sway with each motion of her arms.
Dan could never watch without becoming aroused. His response wasn’t simply a physical reaction to Lorraine’s body, however; it was to the intimacy of the scene. It came from the knowledge that this precious woman and child were his. The vision unerringly touched him.
The sound of water squeezed from the duck echoed in the small room. Dan watched, transfixed as always, knowing the exact moment Autumn would notice him.
“Daddy!”
“Tom,” Lorraine admonished, a wondering smile on her shiny-clean face. “How long have you been there?”
“My hair’s gonna have body and—and what, Mommy?” Autumn turned her soapy head to glimpse her mother’s face.
“And manageability,” Lorraine supplied. “That’s what the bottle says, anyway.”
“And managerility,” Autumn predicted. “I’ll be as pretty as Mommy, won’t I?”
“You are as pretty as Mommy.” Dan’s voice came from behind the camera.
“Our water’s getting cold, we’d better rinse you.” She waggled sudsy fingers at Dan. “ ’Bye.”
“Go right ahead, you’re not bothering me,” he teased.
She took the water-soaked duck from Autumn and hefted it. The camera lens careened across the ceiling and the cabinets for several seconds while Dan dodged the sponge, amidst laughter and water splashing. In the next shot Lorraine reached across th
e bathroom for a towel, water sluicing down her glistening body. Then she reached him, and the film stopped.
Gray and white spots dotted the screen. He’d never taped anything else on the cassette. Dan flicked it off with the remote at the same time he saw Lorraine standing a few feet away, holding her purse. A network program came on and he turned down the volume and sat up. “I didn’t know you were home.”
“Got here a few minutes ago.” She sat her purse in-side the closet and kicked off her shoes. She wore a short flowered sundress with a little white T-shirt underneath, enhancing her tan and her slim legs and arms.
“How was the movie?” he asked.
“Good. It was nice to relax. How were the girls?”
“Great. They play so well together. Maybe we should have tried for another girl, after all.”
She tossed him a tolerant glance. “Yeah, right. More likely we’d have had another wild set of boys.” She grabbed a nightshirt and went into the bathroom. A few minutes later, she returned and pulled down the rumpled comforter. Her hair had been brushed and fell in waves around her shoulders. “I forgot about that video.”
Without reply, he handed her the remote and propped himself against the headboard with a pillow behind his shoulders.
“I thought maybe you’d taped over it.”
“Nope.”
A few minutes later, she picked up a book from the night table.
“I get turned on every time I watch it,” he admitted.
Abruptly, she sat up and aimed the book at his head.
Dan knocked it aside with one wrist and reached for her. Lorraine laughed and tried to roll away, but he pinned her beneath one leg and half his chest.
She didn’t try to escape. Instead, she looked up at him with eyes as pure as twenty-four-karat gold, a smile gracing lips he knew were warm and soft and oh-so-kissable.
Dan framed the side of her face with one hand and caught his fingers in her tumbled mass of hair. “I want you to be my wife again,” he said, all playfulness removed from his tone. “Not just pretend this time. I mean marry me. For real.”
She tried to turn her head, but he didn’t let her. “You don’t have to say anything right now. I know you love me. I know what we have together—what we had all those years together was real, even if the law says it’s not legal. You’re my wife.”
Her eyes glistened brightly in the lamplight as she fought tears.
“Just think about it. And think about the alternatives.”
She frowned and, quick as lightning, her gold eyes darkened to gemlike topaz. Lorrie’s heart pounded erratically. “What alternatives?”
His hold on her relaxed. “We could—” He paused. “I could tell everyone.”
Lorrie had imagined it a hundred times. She dreaded anyone knowing the truth, and could only guess at the reactions. The children finding out disturbed her most.
“You could leave me,” he said, his voice flat. “Or kick me out. We wouldn’t need a divorce.”
Hearing him say it, hearing his words and his voice make it reality, pierced her heart to its very core. He allowed her to turn to her side and bury her face in the sheet.
“Is that what you want, Lorraine?” he asked, his lips in the crook of her neck.
She shook her head and drew her fist to her mouth.
“Or... ” he said, kissing her neck, her ear and her jaw, sending a tremor of need and desperation through her body, “we could go back to what we were—two people who love each other.”
She wanted that more than anything. If only it were that simple.
“I want to be with you.” His voice was gruff against her ear. “I want us to be together. If that’s what you want, too, please help me decide what to do.”
“You want me to tell you what to do, that’s what you want.”
“No. I need help. I need to know what you’re thinking and feeling.”
She turned to face him then, something about his broken plea penetrating her hurt and humiliation, and slid her arm around his neck. “I want to forgive you,” she said almost angrily. “I want things to be like they were before, and I don’t know how to do either one of those things.”
He touched his forehead to hers. “I know.”
“Sometimes I almost forget,” she confessed. “When we’re working at the barns or when I’m just going about my daily chores. I forgot for a little while tonight.”
Dan stroked her shoulder.
“And then I remember. It comes back to me and this sick, sinking feeling hits my chest and I’m jerked into reality. I want to share it with you. I want to come to you and tell you how I’m feeling, and then I remember, you’re the one who brought it all on, and I get mad all over again.”
“It’s okay,” he said. “You can be mad at me. You can be mad. Just don’t stop loving me. Don’t shut me out anymore.”
She ran her fingers through the hair at his temple and he moved his head back to look at her. “Okay,” she said.
He gave her a quick, urgent kiss. “Okay. We’ll figure it out together, then?”
She nodded.
Relief relaxed his features visibly.
He was right. The alternatives were unthinkable. They had to come up with something that would preserve their family, their relationship, and help Tom. And right now Lorrie didn’t have a clue what that might be.
“Hi, guys. What’re you doin’?”
“Hey, Uncle Buzz!” Thad called from the open doorway of the tractor barn. Father and son were hunkered down beside one of the mopeds.
Dan laid a wrench on the concrete with a clang and glanced up. “Trying to get this bike running again,” he said. “What have you been up to?”
“Not much,” he replied, approaching. “I’m enjoying not seeing that crowd of cars down at the barns.” On the weekends, the parking lot had been full and vehicles had even parked along the highway.
His twin, grease streaked up one forearm to his elbow and a rag jutting from the hip pocket of his faded jeans, hunkered back down beside the bike and studied the motor intently.
Another scene superimposed itself over the sight of his brother and nephew, another day, just as real as this one: In the open garage doorway, Dan had been squatting beside the black Harley, a spoke wrench in his greasy hands. Tom had walked toward him with an ache in his gut, dreading what he was about to say, what he was about to do.
“Sometimes I want to take the top of your head off and screw your brain in right.” Dan had said to him. “You can’t be serious. ”
“Never more serious in my life, Danny-boy.” He’d said the words aloud. Hadn’t he?
“What’d you say?” Dan asked, glancing over his shoulder.
Tom stood, his Nikes welded to the cement drive, while an avalanche of inevitable memories crashed down on him, burying him in a ferocious sense of deja vu and sending a wave of dizziness across his eyes. He flung his arms out as if to steady himself and took a few awkward steps.
“Are you all right?” Dan asked, slowly standing. “Hey, what’s the matter?”
Tom blinked and oriented himself. He stared at his twin, noting the scattering of gray hairs along his temple. Thad looked just like him. Just like Dan.
He backed out of the tractor barn and took a good hard look around outside. The metal building had been extended and painted white. The cement drive was wider and the concrete pad beside the gas pump hadn’t been there before.
He surveyed the meadow to his left, where their house used to stand. It had been two-and-a-half stories with a wide front porch and rose bushes climbing the south side. They’d washed up at the old hand pump in the side yard.
He turned in a circle and stared.
He knew exactly who he was. He was Thomas Beckett, eldest son of Gil Beckett by three-and-a-half minutes. The man standing in front of him was Daniel. Daniel.
“Are you okay?” Dan asked.
Tom gathered his wits. “I just got a little dizzy there.”
“Maybe you’d
better sit down for a minute.”
“I’m okay now.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
Dan went back to the bike, he and Thad exchanging a light banter as they cleaned the spark plugs and put them back. Tom watched for a while. Dan had always enjoyed working on cycles. He liked the work, getting his hands into the job. Tom, on the other hand, liked where the wheels took him.
“What, you’re not offering your expert advice?” Dan asked after time had passed and Tom hadn’t spoken.
“You’re doing all right,” he replied.
“D’ya hear that, Thad? We’re doing all right.”
What had he walked into? He’d been considering a trip home before his accident. After years of wandering, working in one place after another, he’d settled into a life he enjoyed, met a woman he could love.
Cedra. Tom thought of her back at the house, no doubt sleeping in. He’d met her nearly two years ago, and after six months they’d moved in together. He’d been about to ask her to marry him, but had waited, wondering if he should tell her about his family, if he should come home and make peace, tell them about her—about himself now that he had things straightened out in his head—now that he had his head straightened out.
Maybe not remembering had worked out for the best. Here was Dan pretending to be him and nobody the wiser! What the hell was that all about?
While Dan worked, Tom studied him covertly, noting the subtle ways he’d changed over the years. He remembered nights sleeping in narrow beds side by side, morning after morning taking the school bus together, playing the usual look-alike pranks on anyone and everyone they could fool.
Adolescent years came to mind with less fondness. His dad had harangued him ceaselessly, harping constantly about college and the damned orchards.
It was hard enough looking exactly like his brother who did everything right and yet being so different. Teachers compared them, relatives compared them, and Gil... Gil wanted Tom to fit the nice, neat mold he’d created. He’d chipped and chipped and chipped away at Tom’s distinctive edges until Tom knew he’d be a round peg just like Dan if he didn’t get the hell away from this place.
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