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by Tess Thompson

  “When she was sick, and we knew she was dying, we held even tighter to that love. We celebrated it, knowing that soon we would have to part. I swear, we sucked every last drop of happiness out of those last days together. Because at the end, sweetheart, the only thing that matters is love. The rest is just noise the devil puts in our way to distract us from what we’re put on this earth to do—love each other.”

  Maggie’s eyes filled as she swallowed the lump in her throat.

  “Please, sweetheart, after what you and Jackson have both endured, don’t waste this second chance. Cling to each other and vow to get through whatever hardships come your way together. If you’re offered a chance for love, you better take it.”

  Maggie walked along the main street. The scents of eucalyptus trees and sea air and fresh baked goods tickled her nose. The smells of home. At Doctor Waller’s office, she paused, and traced Jackson’s name with her index finger. Next door, little girls in pink leotards did pliés on the dance floor of Miss Rita’s studio. Their instructor, a young woman dressed in black, demonstrated proper form.

  According to Zane, Rita was going strong, still teaching and living by herself in the apartment above the studio. Maggie glanced up to the windows of Miss Rita’s apartment, but the shades were drawn. After she saw her father, she would see Miss Rita. Zane had promised to call her and tell her of Maggie’s return.

  She continued down the street until she reached her family’s home and stopped outside the rickety wooden gate. As much as she’d rather walk past the house and to the beach, she must gather courage and go inside the house.

  Over the years, Maggie had developed a coping mechanism for auditions that served her well in many situations. She centered herself with three deep breaths. With each breath in and out, she expunged any thoughts of current worries or fears until she was focused only on the task at hand. Auditions were comprised of either dancing in a group and hoping to stand out enough to be kept for a callback or singing sixteen or so bars of a song. Both seemed easy compared to confronting her father.

  Jackson’s face slipped into her consciousness, despite her first breath in and out. She could not keep the thought of him out of her mind. Their reunion, so brief, yet powerful, had crept into the molecules of her body. Jackson. Jackson changes everything. He always had.

  She took in a second breath and peered into the yard at the tangled weeds. Her three breaths would not work today. Instead, she spoke kindly to herself. Just go inside. Be brave. You can do it. Shaking, she went through the gate and around to the back. An overgrown hedge narrowed the pathway. She squeezed by a particularly bushy section and into the back yard. It too was in shambles, with patchy grass and a weather worn patio, only a hint of its former attractiveness remained. Mildew covered her mother’s stone bird bath. Would a brave bird drink from the black water? Yet, amid the overgrown yard, a clump of orange poppies sprouted toward the sun with vibrant optimism.

  Maggie knocked on the back door. A moment later, the door opened, not by Darla, as she would have thought, but a beautiful young woman wearing scrubs. Her eyes were the color of melted dark chocolate and brown hair hung in a long braid down her back. “May I help you?” She had a husky voice with hints of an east coast accent. A large diamond ring on her left hand sparkled in the sunlight.

  “I’m Maggie Keene. I’m here to see my father.”

  An expression like a startled deer crossed her pretty face before she stepped outside to the patio and closed the door. She extended her hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Maggie. I’m Kara Eaton.”

  Right, this was Kara. Zane had told her all about her. She was nurse practitioner who worked for Jackson and his dad. She would soon marry Brody Mullen—one of the other Dogs Zane had mentioned. All these Dogs rattled the brain.

  “Zane called us this morning to tell us about…the situation,” Kara said.

  “The situation. That’s one way to say it,” Maggie said with a smile. “Are you here looking after my dad?”

  “I’m on call this weekend, and his wife left a message early this morning that he was having trouble breathing, so I came to check on him.”

  “What’s wrong with him exactly?”

  “The question is more, what’s not wrong with him? Basically, his organs are shutting down.”

  “How long does he have?” How long do I have to get the truth?

  “Weeks at most.”

  “Weeks. I can work with that,” Maggie said.

  Kara raised an eyebrow but didn’t ask for clarification.

  “Did Zane tell you why I came home?” Maggie asked. “The whole sordid story?”

  “He did. It’s only natural you want to get the truth before he dies.”

  “You have any good drugs that would make him talk?” Maggie smiled.

  “The pain medication he’s on might do just that,” Kara said.

  Maggie gestured toward the house. “Better go ahead and get this over with.”

  “You want me to go with you?” Kara asked. “Darla’s out right now. I told her I’d wait until she got back from the store before I left him alone.”

  “No, I’ll be fine.”

  She followed Kara into the small kitchen. It had been remodeled since she was last here, with new appliances and a new floor. The tiles had been black and white checkers. Now, they were a tan linoleum. Ugly. The Postmistress didn’t have good taste.

  The house smelled like damp wool. “Your father’s in the living room,” Kara said. “He hasn’t been able to get up the stairs in a while. I’ll be here in the kitchen if you need anything.”

  The sound of the oxygen machine greeted her even before she entered the room. Her father lay in a hospital bed with his eyes closed. With lead in her sandals, she trudged to his side and stared down at his weathered face. Sallow and wrinkled, he was not recognizable as the young army sergeant he had been when he’d first met her mother.

  His eyes fluttered open. He mouthed her name and looked up at her with rheumy, sunken eyes. “You came.” His raspy voice conjured an image of a long raindrop splattering on hot concrete.

  “Yes.” Maggie’s body and mind had gone numb. Where was the anger that had propelled her across the country?

  “You look pretty, kid.”

  She flinched. His kind words were a hard slap across her cheeks. “Why did you want me to come? After all the trouble you took to make sure everyone thought I was dead, why did you want me back here?”

  “I wanted you to know the truth,” he said.

  “About what? There’s quite the list to choose from.”

  His watery eyes looked up at her. He wonders what I know.

  “I went out to the cemetery and saw my own tombstone,” she said.

  His right hand shuddered and convulsed into a fist. “That, that was for you.”

  “How in God’s name was it for me?”

  “You had to get away from here. That Waller boy would’ve kept you small.”

  The tips of her fingers tingled back to life. How she would love to wrap them around his scrawny neck and choke him until he agreed to tell her the truth. “Jackson Waller never made anyone feel small in his life. That’s your particular poison.”

  “You had to go—had to get out. This town was no friend to the women in your family. I wanted better for you.”

  “That’s not the reason. You’ve never thought of anyone but yourself.”

  “You would’ve wasted your talent on that spoiled brat.”

  “I know you had Darla tamper with my letters. A federal offense, you know.”

  “Leave Darla out of this,” he said.

  “I won’t. She’ll pay for this. Think about that as your legacy. You’ll be gone, but she’ll be punished.”

  “It was the right thing to do,” he said.

  “No. You ruined any chance of my happiness when you told such a wicked lie.”

  “You would’ve given up everything for that miscreant. You were like your mother—could never resist the idea
of romance.”

  “Trust me, you squelched all sense of romance the first time you almost killed her.”

  “She was no angel, Maggie. I need you to understand that.”

  “She’s an angel now. Thanks to you.”

  “I didn’t kill her,” he said. “She slipped.”

  Maggie went to the window and opened the shade, knowing it would hurt his eyes. That’s what she wanted. To hurt him like he’d hurt her mother and the baby. The little sister that would be a young woman now. Someone for Maggie to love. A family.

  Remember the goal. Get what you came for. Maggie turned back to him and purposely softened her voice. “You’re dying, so there’s no chance you’ll go to jail. I just want to know what you did with my sister’s body. Please, as a gift to me, let me bury her next to Mama. That will mean something to God. You’ll die with a clean slate.”

  “I’ve already made my peace with Jesus.”

  “I see. How convenient.”

  “What do you want, Maggie?” His slimy eyes narrowed. A hint of the formidable man he once was glared up at her. “Why did you come here?”

  But she was no longer afraid of him. She had the power now.

  “I came here to get a full confession. I want you to admit you pushed Mama. I want you to admit you killed the baby in a rage and then hid the body somewhere. I want you to tell me where she is. Who knows, maybe it’ll get you points with the God you so conveniently believe in now.”

  He turned his face to the other wall. “There was no baby when I got there. She said it was born dead. I have no idea what your crazy mother did with it.”

  “I saw the baby in your arms. You ran out to your truck with her. What did you do to her? Don’t spare any details. I want to know everything.”

  “That’s not how it happened.”

  “I remember every moment of that night.” Maggie closed her eyes, so she wouldn’t have to look at his twisted, ugly face.

  Her father’s grasping hand reached out to her, bringing her back to the present. She darted from his reach.

  “She told me she’d given birth to another man’s baby,” he said. “It was born dead. She got rid of the body, so I would never know that she’d cheated on me. She didn’t know I was coming home that night. When I found her all bloody, it was obvious what had happened. We fought, and she slipped. It was an accident. Please, let me die in peace knowing you believe me.”

  “You were drunk. Enraged, like you’d get right before you beat the crap out of her. You think I didn’t see it hundreds of times?”

  “She cheated on me while I was away providing for my family and then tried to hide the evidence. That’s the kind of woman your mother was. Who’s to say she didn’t kill the baby herself?”

  “No. No, she would never have done that. She didn’t care if you knew about the baby or the man she loved. She just wanted to get away from you. The night before you killed her, she told me everything. She said it was a second chance for us to be happy.”

  He sat up slightly and gestured toward the water glass on a makeshift table made of cement blocks. “Please, can you give me some water?”

  She crossed her arms, staring down at him. “Admit to me you pushed her.”

  “I admit we had words.”

  “Words? Is that what you call beating the crap out of her? Words?”

  “She sent me papers in Texas. Had me served, like a dog. Like I was nothing. You best understand the truth little girl—how she treated me—how she ruined my life—before I die. I’m the victim, not her. They took you, Maggie. They stole you.”

  “Who did?”

  “The Wallers. I lost my little girl to them because they were rich and I was poor. They spread rumors that I killed your slut mother’s baby and ostracized me from this whole town. That’s the true story here.”

  She staggered away from the bed. It was always about him. He’d brought her here to convince her of his innocence, his victimization. A lying narcissist. He would never change, not even in the face of death.

  “So that’s why you told everyone I was dead? As revenge?” At least she would get him to admit that.

  “They deserved to hurt like they’d hurt me. I knew your death would do it.”

  “You’re a sick and twisted psychopath. You’ll burn in hell.” Maggie stepped away and covered her mouth with her hand, afraid she might be sick. A photograph on the mantel of a younger Darla and her father standing next to his old Ford truck caught her attention. For a second, she couldn’t place what was wrong with it, but then the truth assaulted her like a bucket of ice water thrown in her face. He’d sold the truck shortly after Mama died. But he hadn’t known Darla then. Or, had he? She picked it up and examined it closely. The photo showed the same old, faded blue truck that had been in the driveway that night.

  This meant Darla was with him then. He must have met her in Texas and brought her home with him. Perhaps she helped him. A likely scenario unfolded. Divorce papers served prompted their return. They wanted money or revenge? A plan brought them here. They killed both the baby and Mama. It had to be. But how to prove it? She needed to talk to Jackson and his father—ask them what they remembered of that night.

  Doctor Waller pressed the local police to investigate, but they’d found no traces of blood in his truck or anywhere else. There was no body, so no charges were brought. If Darla were there—she could have taken the baby and hidden her remains. That’s how he got rid of the baby so quickly. He’d had a helper. The baby had been given to Darla to dispose of. She’d done it, too.

  Darla knew what had happened that night. Thanks to the postal service being under federal law, Maggie had the leverage to get it out of her.

  She set the photograph aside and moved back to the hospital bed. His sick eyes burned with a feverish hatred. He knew she knew.

  “Darla came back from Texas with you.” Not a question. A statement of fact.

  “What does it matter?” His voice had weakened since she’d arrived. He would be dead in a matter of days. One didn’t have to be a nurse to see that.

  “This is your chance to tell me the truth,” Maggie said. “Or I’ll get it out of Darla.”

  “The truth is this and only this. Your mother was a whore.” He gasped for breath. One of the machines beeped.

  If Kara hadn’t come in at that moment, Maggie might have placed her hands around his throat and finished him off herself. Fortunately, that wasn’t the case.

  Maggie didn’t stick around to see Kara do the work of keeping him alive. Screw you, old man. You’ll meet the devil soon enough.

  The sun was low on the horizon when Maggie knocked on the Waller’s back door. The scent of lemons from the potted tree soothed her nerves, but not enough to stop the trembling in her arms and legs.

  Doc opened the door and ushered her inside. The layout of the kitchen was as she remembered, other than the countertops and cabinets had changed. The cabinets were now white with silver knobs. The countertops were black with subtle sparkles of blue. “You remodeled.”

  “Just last year,” Doc said. “You’re shaking.”

  “I’ve just come from my dad.”

  “Come into my study. I’ll pour you a drink.”

  “Yes. Thanks. Is Jackson here?”

  “I think he’s upstairs showering. I just got home myself,” Doc said. “I had a few errands to run.”

  As if on command, Jackson appeared in the doorway between the kitchen and living room. Damp hair and flushed cheeks substantiated the shower theory. He wore shorts and a t-shirt, which displayed his trim stomach and wide shoulders to great advantage. Despite her rage, she shivered with desire. When was the last time she’d wanted a man? And this was Jackson. Not any man, but her love. Her one.

  Jackson crossed the room and took her into his arms. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes. I’ve just come from my father’s,” she said.

  “I’m about to fix us all a drink,” Doc said.

  “I could use one,
” Jackson said.

  No one commented on why, even though they all knew. Maggie followed the men to Doc’s study. She almost cried at the familiar scent of leather and scotch of the study. “Oh, Doc, it smells the same.”

  “Does it?” Doc grinned. “Lily used to say she couldn’t smell leather and bourbon without thinking of me.”

  “I was just thinking the same thing,” Maggie said. Above her, a ceiling fan turned lazily. She shrugged out of the light sweater she’d worn to her father’s, as the room was warm and drowsy. I’m calm here. Safe. This is the way it had always been. She and Jackson had come to this room when Lily had told them to run home that night.

  Jackson patted the back of one of the leather chairs arranged with its twin by the tall window. “Sit here, Mags.” He lifted the wooden shades and opened a window. The softness of twilight washed the room in dusty orange. Filmy white curtains fluttered in the breeze.

  Doc poured them all a scotch and took the opposite chair. Jackson perched on an ottoman, his tan, muscular legs crossed at the ankles.

  “I did it. I went to see him,” she said.

  “I’m afraid to ask,” Jackson said.

  “Did you get anything out of him?” Doc asked.

  “Even with his supposed redemption from Jesus, he wouldn’t tell me the truth.” Maggie took a drink and let it burn down the back of her throat.

  “I knew it.” Doc clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

  “He’s sticking to the ridiculous story that my mother disposed of the baby’s body. He suggested Mama had killed the baby to keep the fact of her cheating from him.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” Jackson said.

  “He did admit that faking my death was to hurt you and Jackson. He feels he’s the victim because you stole me from him.”