Now it was Emily’s turn to gape in surprise. Aurora Johnston had emerged from the church. She made her way over to them, her steps determined despite leaning heavily on her cane. Hortense followed along behind like a baby duckling, clucking and fussing as she brought up the rear.
“Did you know she was coming?” Julia asked.
“No,” Emily said.
Aurora reached them and greeted everyone as if her appearance wasn’t in the least surprising.
“Hello, Grace,” she said. “You’re looking well.”
Grace didn’t even hint that she found the woman’s presence out of the ordinary. “So are you, Aurora.”
“I understand congratulations are in order,” Aurora said, nodding at Julia.
Julia blinked. “Thank you.”
“Your husband is a gifted preacher. I hope you’ll tell him how much I appreciated his message.”
“Of course,” Julia said.
Aurora offered a brief hello to Sarah before turning to Emily.
“You left the house,” Emily said in astonishment.
“Did you think I would leave you to face today alone?”
“You came for me?”
“I should be offended that you’re doing a good imitation of a fish out of water,” Aurora said. “I am capable of being kind.”
“Since when?”
“Emily!” Julia gasped, though there was a thread of laughter in her voice.
Emily rolled her eyes. “Don’t worry,” she said in an aside to Julia. “It’s a thing Aurora and I do.”
“You insult each other?” Julia asked, eyes dancing with amusement.
“Call it a strange form of bonding,” Emily said. “Thank you for coming, Aurora. It means a lot.”
“You’re welcome.” Aurora took another step closer. “Is the scallywag making an appearance anytime soon? I assume you told him.”
Emily’s gaze flew to the eager ears around them. She shook her head. “Dale knows. Haven’t seen him yet.”
“Don’t let the grass grow under your feet there.”
“I’m not,” Emily said, anxiety making her voice sharp.
Sharp enough to make Julia raise a brow. Then her eyes narrowed to curious, what-are-you-up-to slits.
Emily tried to ignore the stare. “Later, Aurora,” she said.
Aurora opened her mouth but then closed it again. “Fine. Hortense and I need to be getting home. Her knees bother her, you know.”
“I do.” Emily smiled at Aurora’s faithful retainer. “Thank you, Hortense.”
Hortense’s chin wobbled as she fought back tears. “A real tragedy, ma’am. You tell her sweet boys I’ll be saying an extra prayer for them tonight.”
“I will.”
Aurora and Hortense disappeared through the crowd. Then Emily felt a tap on her shoulder.
“What was that about?” Julia asked.
“Nothing.”
She shook her finger. “Spill.”
“I can’t yet—” Emily started when her gaze snagged on the black car parked a ways up the street. She couldn’t see inside from so far away, but she knew. He’d come.
“Emily…”
She whipped around again.
“Are you sick?” Julia asked, regarding her with concern. “You’re white as a sheet.”
Emily glanced at the street. Still there. “Not sick. More like terrified.”
Julia followed her gaze. “Terrified of what? Emily, what’s going on?”
She hugged Julia. “I need to see Nate now.”
“Emily…”
****
Nate spotted a hint of copper coming toward him out of the corner of his eye. He forced himself to be polite to the woman in front of him. Everyone was being so kind, and he tried to be grateful, but no amount of sympathy could banish the urge to bury his hands in Emily’s hair and block out the entire awful day.
Zach must have had the same need because he abandoned the well wishers and went to Emily. Without a word, he buried his face in her shoulder. She had to stand on her toes to hug him properly. Nate was startled to realize how much his brother had grown. A few extra inches didn’t make him a man, though. In so many ways he was still a kid. Fresh panic swept over him again, knowing he was now solely responsible for his brother.
Emily gazed at him over Zach’s shoulder. As always happened when he caught sight of her, some of his turmoil eased. Amazing how she was able to answer some unspoken need without even trying.
It’s called love, man.
His mind sputtered over the thought. In love? With Emily? That couldn’t possible. Could it?
Emily kept an arm around Zach as the two of them walked back. She stretched up and kissed Nate’s cheek. Her scent washed over him, adding to the onslaught of emotion and confusion zigzagging around his head. He suddenly wished everyone else would disappear. He needed to kiss her for real.
“Ride with us to the cemetery,” Nate said.
If Emily was surprised by the offer, she didn’t show it but simply nodded.
Using some kind of magical force, Emily managed to herd everyone into the waiting limo. Nate breathed a sigh of relief as the door closed, shutting out the world. He claimed Emily for the short drive to his mother’s final resting place. Pulled her down next to him and held on tight. Anna took charge of Zach.
“How are you holding up?” she asked, her breath fanning against his neck.
“I don’t even know. I made plans for the funeral, but I honestly can’t remember doing a thing.”
“It was a beautiful service. Your mother would have loved it.”
She would have. Every choice he’d made now left him wondering… would she have chosen a different song? Would she have told him to change his tie? Would she have complained about what he’d eaten for breakfast? Told him to remember to buy milk? Make Zach each less junk?
The questions ping-ponged back and forth in his mind constantly.
“I liked Seth’s sermon,” Emily said. “He has a real gift.”
“He does.”
“Do you believe what he said about heaven and God and where your mother is now?”
Nate heard the hesitancy in her voice, and he shifted so he could see her face. For the first time, he noticed the dark circles under her eyes, making them look bruised and forlorn. The corners of her mouth pulled down, replacing her usual mischievous smile. She’d been hit hard by his mother’s loss, too. How could it not affect her, when she had no concept of what death meant for Christians? He couldn’t imagine dealing with tragedy without his faith.
“Of course,” he said, tracing the frown line between her brows. “I can’t say I understand why my mother had to die, but I know Who is in control.”
“I wish I could believe it.”
“You can if you open yourself up to the possibility.”
“I’m not sure I can,” she said, settling her head on his shoulder.
No one felt much like talking, but Nate didn’t mind the silence. He closed his eyes, praying for the strength to make it through one more obstacle course of emotion. Watching his mother’s casket lower into the ground.
A green tent marked the sight where her body would rest. As he got out of the limo, the finality of the moment seemed to swallow him whole. Every time he thought he couldn’t feel any worse, another hole opened up in his heart.
Seth kept the ceremony brief. A simple prayer, his mother’s favorite hymn. Zach stepped forward and placed flowers on the casket. Then he kissed his fingers and touched the corner in a brief salute. Nate dropped a single rose. He lowered his head.
I’ll do my best, Mom. With Zach. With everything. I’ll even think about the promise I made to take a chance with my heart.
He stepped back to his place as Anna and others filed past the casket. Eyes burning, he shifted away before he lost his composure. His gaze snagged on a figure standing at the back of the crowd. He might not have noticed the man, if not for his utter stillness. Like he was waiting for something
. The hair on the back of Nate’s neck stood up. There was something familiar about the stranger, but from so far away Nate couldn’t make out the face enough to say who it was.
Soon, the guests began to walk back to their cars. A reception was being held at the house, and Anna accepted a ride with Grace and John Graham in order to get everything ready.
Seth touched Nate’s arm. “You can take a few minutes if you want. There’s no hurry here.”
Nate nodded. A breather would be good. He reached for Emily, but her eyes were trained somewhere behind him. Her shoulders were tense and her mouth pinched tight.
“Em… what’s wrong?” he asked.
She spun toward him. “Nothing.”
She was lying. Again. Something had her spooked.
His head swiveled in the direction she’d been looking. The man he’d seen earlier was still there. He’d moved farther away but showed no signs of leaving. What did he want anyway? Who was he? Nate figured the only way to find out was to talk to the guy. He cut across the manicured lawn. His pulse started pounding, and with each step the beat got stronger.
At twenty feet, Nate hesitated.
At ten, he stopped. Stared in disbelief.
At three, he pulled back his arm and swung.
He heard Emily scream somewhere behind him, but he was too focused on the man splayed out on the ground.
Dale Cooper rose to his feet. He touched his mouth, wiping the blood away. “Quite a right hook you have there, son.”
Nate surged forward, but someone caught his arm, holding him back.
“Nate, stop!” Emily cried.
He shook off her hand. “This doesn’t involve you, Em.”
“It involves him, though,” she said, thrusting her chin to the right where Zach stood watching, his mouth gaping.
Dale Cooper stepped around Nate. “You must be Zach,” he said. “I’m ashamed to have to say this, but it’s good to meet you.”
Zach opened his mouth. “You’re my father?” he asked, as if wondering if he were looking at a ghost.
Zach’s eyes drifted down and back up. Nate figured his brother was looking for a resemblance, but anyone with an ounce of intelligence could see Dale Cooper might have chiseled his two sons in his own image.
In a cruel twist of fate, Dale had passed on his looks to children he’d never cared about. When Nate gazed in a mirror every day, he saw a face that was both familiar and foreign, which had messed with his head for years.
“He is not your father,” Nate said as rage built up within his chest. “He’s the man who provided some DNA, but he’s no more your father than Mr. Clark from next door.”
Seth appeared and placed himself in the middle of the face-off. “Is there a problem?”
Julia lined up next to Emily. The color had leached from her cheeks, and she was wringing her hands in obvious distress. Nate was sorry she had to see his family’s dirty laundry on display, but he couldn’t seem to control his emotions.
“Everything will be fine when he goes back to where he came from,” Nate said.
“I can’t leave yet,” Dale Cooper said, keeping his voice soft and even. “Not when you need me.”
“Need you?” Nate spat. “You’ve got to be joking.”
Emily took a tentative step. “Nate, maybe here is not the best place for a confrontation.”
“Emily’s right,” Seth said.
“I’m willing to go anywhere you want so we can talk,” Dale said.
“I don’t need to go anywhere with you, and we don’t need to talk,” Nate said, biting out the words like a machine gun. “I don’t get it. What are you doing here? Why after all these years? Why not when Mom was working two jobs to make ends meet? When she was walking the floor with Zach night after night when he was sick? When he had his appendix out and she practically slept at the hospital? When a doctor told her she had cancer? When he said it was back and she probably wouldn’t beat it this time?”
“That’s why I’m here. I came as soon as I heard.”
“You knew about our mother?” Zach asked. “How?”
Dale hesitated. “She… she wrote to me. A few weeks ago.”
“Wrote to you?” Nate asked. “Are you telling me she knew where you were?”
“She hired someone to find me.”
Nate felt as though he’d been punched in the face. “Has she always known?”
“No. I don’t think she ever tried before.”
The punches kept coming. “Why wouldn’t she tell me?”
“I think she was too ashamed,” Emily said.
He whirled. “What do you know about my mother?”
“She confided in me a couple times,” she said.
Hit number three landed near his heart. “And you didn’t think to tell me?”
“It was her secret. She knew you would be upset if you found out.”
“I don’t believe this,” Nate said. “Anyone else have some secret information they need to divulge?”
“Nate, would you stop yelling,” Zach cried. “Let him talk.”
“Why? So he can tell a pack of lies?”
Zach stuck his chin out. “Maybe I want to know why he’s here. Maybe I want to know why our mother wrote to him and what she said.”
“Rachel told me she was dying,” Dale said. “She wanted me to know. As soon as I got her letter, I came here. I had to see her and try to explain.”
“Explain what?” Zach asked.
“Why I left.”
Nate growled low in his throat. “Perhaps because you’re a selfish—”
“Nate!” Emily gasped.
Dale cleared his throat. “It’s all right. I deserve to be called any number of names.”
Nate chuckled, but there was no humor in the sound. “Do you practice those lines? So humble. So harmless. Pull you in with lies and then deliver the uppercut to the chin. I can’t believe you imagined I’d ever let you near my mother, after the way you broke her heart. My only comfort is she died before you got the chance to do it again.”
His father didn’t say anything, but a shiftiness in his eyes made Nate suspicious. “Just how long have you been in town, Pops?” he asked. “How’d you even know her funeral was today?”
“I’ve been here a week.”
Suspicion hardened into certainty. “You saw her, didn’t you? Somehow you wormed your way in. What did you do? Wait till I left for work one day and knock on the door? Or did you use a key? You kept it for emergencies, right? Anna would never let you in. She’d have gone after you with a frying pan first. Or maybe you pulled a con. I can see it now. Unload your sob story on a gullible stranger and get her to help you.”
Dale’s eyes shifted toward Emily. The glance was so fast Nate might have missed it if he hadn’t been so intent. He spun around. Emily stared at him, guilt stamped all over her death-white cheeks. She looked ready to faint, and Nate wasn’t sure he wouldn’t.
“Em…” He gasped. “Tell me you didn’t help him.”
She shook her head.
Sound retreated as every muscle in his body froze. She might as well have shot him. In the back. He didn’t know how he remained standing.
“That’s why you brought up my father the other day,” Nate said. “All that talk about someone who could be there for us. Maybe there was a good reason why my father left. You’d already teamed up with him.”
“It wasn’t like that,” Emily said, her lips trembling.
Having his worst fear confirmed ripped open the wound even more. If he looked down, he half expected to see an empty hole in the place where his heart had once been.
“Why would you take him to see my mother?” Nate asked. “You knew what he’d done.”
“It was my fault,” his father said.
“Oh, I know it was your fault,” Nate said on a low growl. He regarded Emily again. “What I don’t get is how someone so smart can be so gullible.”
His arrow shot true, and she staggered a little. “I’m sorry. I�
��m so sorry.”
Julia put an arm around Emily. “Nate, maybe you’d better calm down before you go too far.”
“Stay out of this, Julia.”
Seth finally stepped closer. “Watch how you speak to my wife.”
Nate’s fists clenched.
“Will it make you feel better to take a swing at me, too?” Seth asked, matching the stance. “Go ahead, but I promise I’ll hit back.”
“Stop it!” Zach yelled. “Just stop! What are you doing, Nate? They haven’t even filled her grave yet.”
Shame, guilt, and anger roiled around inside him.
“I only did what I thought was right,” Emily said.
Nate couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Letting him weave his web of lies around my mother’s deathbed was right?”
“There were no lies,” his father said. “I finally told Rachel the truth. The truth I should have confessed all those years ago.”
“Must have been one whopper of a story.”
“I didn’t want your mother to die thinking I didn’t love her,” Dale said. “Emily only helped me for Rachel’s sake.”
“Love her?” Nate said. “You never loved anyone but yourself.”
“Nate, I believe him,” Emily said.
“Your first mistake,” he bit out. “Your second was thinking you had any right to stick your nose in my family’s business.”
“I’m sorry if you think I overstepped my bounds.”
He scrubbed his face. “Overstepped your bounds? There you go with the fancy talk. Prettying up what you did. You betrayed my family. You betrayed me. Worst of all, you betrayed my mother. A dying woman.”
“No, I did it for her, and, believe it or not, I wanted Dale to come here today for you.”
“You invited him to my mother’s funeral?”
“Yes.”
“Why? Oh wait… I bet you envisioned some kind of teary reunion. Did you imagine I’d fall into his arms with joy? If so, I know why you choose to write fantasies for children.”
“I hoped you might be able to find a way to forgive him, yes,” Emily said. “For your sake.”
He laughed. “My sake. Good try, E.J.”
“Nate, please. I’d hoped you’d understand eventually.”
“What I don’t understand is how I could have ever thought you were different,” Nate said. “I don’t even know who you are.”
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