They stared at each other for a long moment. He was scarcely aware of someone else exiting the back room, some woman. Jon knew Lucy had a couple of part-time employees. Sierra had been one, he remembered belatedly. He hadn’t thought of it, but by yanking her away, he’d left Lucy in the lurch in more ways than one.
“Go, Lucy,” the other woman said, and Jon flicked a grateful glance at her.
He knew immediately who this was, and shock punched him. He didn’t know what he’d expected, but not this sweet-faced, middle-aged woman. Their coloring was quite different, but without any trouble he could see Lucy in her features. She, too, was small, with the same round chin and gentle mouth. She looked ten years older than he knew she was. Drug use took a toll. Damn it, he shouldn’t be taken aback by the fact that she looked as if she should be a grandmother taking her grandkids for the day. He knew better; crooks looked like everyone else. They didn’t all have tattoos wrapping their arms and sneers twisting their lips. They came in grandmotherly packages, too.
Yet for some reason, experience didn’t keep him from being unsettled.
He and she gazed at each other, and he saw that she knew who he was. She wouldn’t have heard anything good.
“I’m Lucy’s mother,” she said quietly, and came forward to her daughter’s side.
Jon bent his head. “Ms. Malone.”
Lucy’s gaze challenged him. “Mom’s working part-time for me.”
“I forgot that Sierra did. I’m sorry.”
She gave a sharp laugh. “That’s actually funny. Of all things to be sorry for.”
He was sorry for more than that, but he clamped his mouth shut.
“Fine,” she said at last. “Mom, you sure you can hold down the fort for half an hour or so?”
Her mother smiled at her. “You know I can.”
“Yeah.” Lucy’s face softened for an instant. She gave her mother a quick hug that was far more awkward than the ones she’d so often given Sierra, then stalked toward the front of the store.
Jon reached the door before her and held it open. “The Country Table?”
She sailed past him. “Sure.”
The small diner was only half a block away. They’d eaten there several times before, or he’d gotten lunch from there and brought it to her store. Without even looking at him, she headed for a booth and slipped in. Jon sat down opposite her.
Neither said anything until the waitress brought ice water and menus.
Lucy pushed hers aside. “Sierra has been calling me.”
“I know.”
“I’m surprised you haven’t forbidden it.”
Despite everything, her hostility stung. “I’m not that big an SOB.”
“You gave a pretty good imitation of one.”
Jon sighed. “I know I did. I…damaged what we had going.”
Lucy stared him down. “You think?”
“Why didn’t you tell me, Lucy?”
She studied the uninspiring art hanging on the opposite wall. “I would have before Mom’s release day. I was working my way up to it.”
He wanted her small hand nestled in his, but knew better than to reach for it. “Telling me was that hard?”
A spark of hurt in her eyes, she finally looked at him again. “It went so well when I did.”
“I was blindsided. You shouldn’t have kept something like that from me. You knew damn well how I’d feel about it.”
“And that,” she said, “was exactly why I didn’t feel like I could talk to you. I never had the slightest doubt how you’d react. But as long as we didn’t have the conversation, I could—” She shrugged, as if to express the hopelessness.
“You could what?”
“Pretend.” Lucy’s twisted smile didn’t look like any he’d seen on her face before. “Apparently I’m good at that.”
“What’s that supposed to—”
The waitress’s arrival disrupted his question. They gave their orders without having looked at menus. He had no appetite, and suspected Lucy didn’t either, but they had to go through the motions.
“What do you mean?” he asked when they were alone again.
She shook her head, her expression closed. “Never mind. Jon, why are you here?”
“I was angry.”
“I noticed.”
“I miss you. Sierra misses you.”
She shifted on the bench seat as if to hide the way she’d flinched. “So you’re saying you were wrong?”
Taking a chance, he reached for her hand. She moved it before he could touch her, tucking her hands out of sight beneath the table.
After an uncomfortable moment, Jon admitted, “I was hoping you might have realized I was right.”
Lucy made a soft sound that could have been a laugh. “Then you’re out of luck. My mother let me down on a pretty regular basis when I was a kid. But she was also a really good mother a lot of the time. She’s the only person who ever truly loved me.” Her face spasmed. Her voice hitched. “And right now she needs me.”
“Lucy…”
Despite the brief display of emotion, she managed to look nearly expressionless. “She may not make it. And if she doesn’t, it won’t be because I failed her. Do you understand? I’m her only hope. Not even for Sierra—” again her voice wobbled “—can I turn my back on Mom.”
Jon leaned against the booth feeling… Hell. So much that he couldn’t have articulated it. He hurt, he knew that. And he knew she did, too.
“Sierra loves you.” The rest was hard to say. He hadn’t been sure he ever wanted to make himself this vulnerable. But he had to say it. “I’m in love with you, Lucy. Your mother’s not the only person who has ever loved you.”
Her eyes were bright with hurt as profound as anything he felt. “Sierra loved me because I’m all she had. And you…” She swallowed. “If you were really in love with me, you would have listened to what I was trying to tell you. You’d have helped me find a way to do what I have to do for Mom, instead of charging in and snatching Sierra away as if I’m too dirty to associate with her. I thought maybe there was the smallest chance you were here to say ‘I was wrong.’ But I should have known better. I did know better.” She slid off the seat, even though the waitress was bearing down on them with their food.
In desperation, he said, “Don’t do this, Lucy.”
The waitress came to a stop at their table and began unloading the tray. Probably assuming Lucy was on her way to the restroom, she beamed and said, “Enjoy your lunches,” before leaving.
Lucy looked at him. “You know what? I actually wish I thought this was all about Sierra. You going all noble and paternal. I’d still think you were wrong, but at least I could understand that. But I don’t think that’s what it’s about at all. It’s the election, isn’t it? How it would look to the public that you’re seeing a woman whose mother was convicted of armed robbery. That you’re trusting your daughter to that woman.” She mimed an expression of shock, clapping her hands to her cheeks. “Dear God, what does that say about your judgment?” She dropped her hands and her voice hardened. “You don’t really believe that nice woman you just met is going to corrupt your daughter. Nope. It’s all about public perception.” Her gaze moved over him one last time, scathing. “Do you do a self-check every evening? ‘Did I come across looking good today?’ Here’s a clue. In my eyes, you didn’t.”
She grabbed the sandwich off the plate, then marched out. The door settled softly closed behind her. He saw her through the window, and then she was gone. Jon was left frozen in place, bludgeoned by her contempt.
Did he deserve every word?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
IN THE NEXT COUPLE OF WEEKS, Lucy saw Sierra several times. She came by the store after school, and Lucy drove her home after closing. For each of those visits she’d told Sierra in advance that her mother wouldn’t be there so she could, in turn, assure Jon that she’d remain uncorrupted.
Lucy and Sierra talked at least briefly every day. Sierra told her
Jon was trying, but he wasn’t home that much.
“He’s…different. He hides it, but I can tell he’s mad or…something. I don’t know. He never smiles. He tries to get me to talk, but he’s all fakey.”
Aching inside, Lucy reminded her, “You know, you might want to cut him a break. He doesn’t have a whole lot of experience at being a parent. It’s not surprising that knowing what to say to you doesn’t come naturally for him.”
“Why do you make excuses for him?” Sierra asked. “You should hate him.”
Yes. She should. Why didn’t she?
Because I love him. Duh.
“Because I understand why he did what he did,” Lucy said softly. “I don’t like it, but I understand.”
“Well, I don’t.” Sierra choked up. “It was stupid. And you know what else? It showed that he doesn’t trust me.”
Lucy supposed it did. “Remember that he hasn’t known you that long,” she said, somewhat weakly.
Sierra’s response was a rude noise.
In fact, Lucy reflected later, Sierra was quite frequently sounding more like a teenager than she ever had. Lucy’s vengeful side took a certain pleasure in Jon’s discovery that his daughter wasn’t the bright, cheerful, startlingly mature young woman she’d seemed. That in fact she could be sullen, rude and uncooperative. He deserved everything she could throw at him.
Only, Lucy didn’t like knowing Sierra was miserably unhappy.
So am I, Lucy admitted to herself. And it sounded as though maybe Jon was, too. He certainly hadn’t looked very happy that day he came to see her.
The only positive in all this was Lucy’s relationship with her mother. So far they’d avoided the talk Terry had suggested, the one where she wept and expressed all her regret and repentance and Lucy exploded and vented her rage and hurt. The odd part was, it didn’t seem as if they needed to.
They did talk. Mostly about little things. Lucy about her garden and Sierra and the few guys she’d dated. Friends and the several cooking classes she’d taken through the local food co-op. Her mom about the other women she’d called friends at Purdy, the various jobs she’d held there, books she’d read, tidbits about her parents.
They worked in Lucy’s garden, doing a final weeding, cutting back dried stalks and mulching. Terry happily took on the task of painting the bathroom once they settled on a cheerful shade of peach. Despite a light rain one day, Lucy got up on a ladder and cleaned the gutters while her mom followed along below scraping up the sodden leaves and putting them in the wheelbarrow to add to the compost pile. Her mom worked at the store three days a week now and proved herself a natural at retail.
What Lucy kept discovering was how much she’d gotten from her mother. Maybe it was hereditary, maybe learned, but the truth was they had a lot in common.
And eventually they started talking about the bigger things. Why Lucy had wanted to go into business for herself, why creating a real home mattered so much. Why she couldn’t have imagined not taking in Sierra. Terry did talk about regrets, but they were personal ones. Never learning to rely on herself. The fatal flaw of needing a man around, even if she didn’t love him, even if he was a creep. Her stupidity in starting to take drugs in the first place, in not seeing where she was going until it was too late, in convincing herself over and over that she didn’t need help quitting or that no one would help her anyway.
“And really,” she admitted, “that wasn’t it. I was lying to myself. It was addiction. Going to an AA meeting and saying ‘Please help me’ would have meant not taking that drink, and I wanted it so much. Do you know, every single time it started with me telling myself I could use today, have a drink today, but tomorrow I’d be straight again? Today was just a little stressful—I deserved it. I can’t even say I knew I was lying. I was all about the lies. I had to believe them. If I didn’t…” She grimaced. “I’d have to despise myself. And that wasn’t acceptable.”
So in the end, Lucy realized that they were talking about regret and hurt, but in a way that was gentler than she’d expected. The emotions felt muted.
She was beginning to think she could forgive her mother after all. Which convinced her she had made the right decision. This was what mattered. If her relationship with her mother could be mended, maybe Lucy wouldn’t feel so broken.
She should be happier than she’d ever been in her life instead of desolate.
All her misery was Jon’s fault. She hoped Sierra made him miserable. She hoped he lost the damn election. She hoped he came begging some day, giving her the chance to curl her lip and say, You wish.
And then she laughed at herself, if ruefully, because she wasn’t acting any more mature than Sierra, but that was okay.
He didn’t deserve mature.
JON STOOD at his mother’s kitchen window and watched Sierra out in the yard with the older of her two cousins, Reese. His mother’s dog raced in circles around them, yapping away.
Patrick, only ten, was fascinated by Sierra and eager to have her show him the cool things she could do on the computer. Reese, on the other hand, at twelve had become self-conscious with girls. He wasn’t quite as beanpole skinny and therefore homely as Jon had been at that age—he’d gotten a somewhat more compact build as well as brown eyes from his father—but having just started middle school he didn’t have a lot of finesse with girls, either. Earlier, when Sierra had smiled at him and said, “Hey, will you push me on the tire swing?” poor Reese had turned beet-red and barely managed to mumble, “Um, sure. I mean, if you want. I mean, yeah, okay.”
She hadn’t smiled at her father that way in weeks. Not since she’d found him waiting in front of Lucy’s house and heard that he expected her to pack her things and come with him.
Today’s visit to his mother’s house was the first outing of any kind she’d agreed to with even a semblance of good humor. Even so, he’d done all the talking on the way here. Her relief at escaping him once they arrived was blatant.
In her eyes, he sure wasn’t Father of the Year. He watched her sail high on the tire swing attached to a sturdy branch on the maple tree. He felt old when he realized the maple hadn’t been big enough to support a swing when he was her age.
“She’s a sweetheart,” his mother said behind him. “You must be counting your blessings.”
Jon gave a grunt that was half laugh. You betcha. I’ve got so many blessings right now, how can I count them?
He turned away from the window to face his mother, who sat at the round oak table nursing a cup of tea and looking serene. She did that well. He’d never been able to understand it.
He hadn’t even known the question was brewing until it came out of his mouth, the edges ground ragged with anger. “Why did you put up with Dad?”
Her flinch was tiny but visible. “Were our lives really so bad?”
Jon shoved his hands into his pockets and leaned against the kitchen counter. “He was a bastard, and you know it.”
“He loved us.”
“Maybe you. And Lily. I don’t think love was one of the things he felt for me.”
Guilt should have chilled his anger when he saw the distress on her face, but it didn’t. He’d been burying his resentment for too long.
“That’s not true,” she insisted. “He didn’t know how to express it—”
“Beating the shit out of me seemed to work for him.”
“If you just hadn’t been so defiant—”
“So it was my fault?” His shoulders and neck were rigid. He maintained the casual pose, though.
“No,” his mother cried. Tears glazed her eyes. “Of course it wasn’t. I think he simply didn’t know how to relate to you. His father hit him, you know. That’s all he grew up knowing.”
He looked at her in disbelief. “How could you love a man like that?”
She bent her head and seemed to gaze into the teacup. “I didn’t know he had it in him. With me, he was…impatient, sometimes gruff, but I could make excuses for it. He had a lot of fine qualities,
too, you know. He was a good provider, and faithful. I always believed he loved me. And Lily.” When she lifted her head again and met Jon’s eyes anguish had transformed her face into someone he hardly knew. “Maybe if he hadn’t had a son… If we’d only had girls… I used to wonder. I did leave him the once, you know. But what would have happened to us? I couldn’t have gone home again, and I had next to no job skills. What kind of life would we have had?” It was a cry from the heart.
Jon couldn’t do anything but ponder her question and his deep, bitter belief that she should have left his father for his sake.
Lily had been the apple of Dad’s eye. His little flower, he’d called her. Jon knew his sister had been distressed by the different treatment their father doled out. But he couldn’t, in all honesty, argue that she would have been better off if Mom had left Dad.
Mom? She probably wouldn’t have fared better, either. Jon loved his mother, but she wasn’t a career woman. Maybe she would have remarried. But what were the odds a stepfather would have done more than merely tolerate his two stepchildren? Jon knew a few people who’d gotten lucky and had great stepparents, but he knew others who hadn’t.
He’d survived his childhood. As brutal as his father had sometimes been, Jon suspected he’d pulled his punches out of fear his wife would leave him again if he didn’t. She had protected Jon, although not the way he’d wanted her to.
“I don’t know,” he said slowly. “I haven’t thought about any of this for years. I suppose it’s suddenly having a daughter that got me started.”
And Lucy. Lucy, whose childhood made his seem like a trip to Disneyland. Lucy, who was struggling with complicated feelings toward the only parent she had. The mother who was the only person who’d ever loved her.
He clenched his teeth against the pain. Damn it, no. He knew she hadn’t believed him when he said it, but he loved her, too. He’d even been entertaining thoughts about forever when her mother exploded between them. He suspected he would have asked Lucy to marry him by now, if she hadn’t chosen Terry over him and Sierra.
But she had.
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