His smile spread brilliantly across his dark face. "Thanks." He shut the book, dropped it in the drawer. "Can I leave Nicholas here?"
Sarah didn't like that. She didn't want Nicholas with his little body around, his guileless enthusiasm rending her like a vulture's beak. What would she do with him? Jake's smile disappeared. What did he expect? Was she supposed to leap up and down and cry, "Oh wonderful! What fun!" for heaven's sake? Some women would. But she couldn't.
Still, the thought of Nicholas confined in the small car, carted around from one place to another disturbed her. He'd been carsick yesterday. He didn't need to be cooped up in a car again so soon.
Sarah watched Nicholas jump with gleeful abandon out of the old swing. She'd done the same thing when she was young. Sarah smiled at the memory of blazing sky and sun whirling over her head as she pumped higher and higher and then, eyes tightly closed, leaped into the void.
"Well?" Jake lounged against the door between the living room and the kitchen. "Hell, I'll even pay you to kid sit if it's such a big deal." He reached toward his pocket.
Sarah blanched. "Keep your money," she said in a chilly voice, forcing her words past the anger and humiliation as she remembered the way he'd flung the quarter at her. "I wouldn't take your money if I were starving!"
"Really?" One eyebrow arched. "Fastidious of you. I'd have thought otherwise."
Sarah's hand prickled, her blood roared in her head.
"No comment?" Jake shoved himself off the door.
She wouldn't cry. She wouldn't give him that satisfaction. She fought for control and dammed up her tears. He
could stand there until hell froze over before he'd make her cry.
Like a net made up of the threads of her hurt and anger and his contempt, the moment stretched between them trapping Sarah. Jake reached to touch her. She slapped his hand away and pushed past him, jerking open the door. Breathing as hard as though she'd run a mile, she held the knob in her shaking hand. "Leave Nicholas. I'll watch him."
Jake nodded once, as though satisfied about something. Sarah kept the edge of the door and the edge of her anger between them as he walked out of the kitchen, his booted heels smacking on the wood of the living room.
Following him, she grabbed the car keys off the rack by the kitchen door and hurled them at him. He reached in back of him in midstride and caught the key ring as it jangled towards him. "I'll tell Nicholas he's staying, then." The screen door shut quietly behind him.
Sarah wrapped her arms around her middle and absorbed the shaking that slashed through her with Jake's departure. She didn't owe Jake anything. He was asking too much of her without even knowing it. Nicholas and his need sliced at her, but she'd function. Survival had been made up of worse moments than this. Emptying her mind, she sought control. Don 7 think. Don't think.
She'd give the boy what she could for the time being.
"Hey, sport!" Jake let the door close softly behind him as he yelled for Nicholas. Sarah puzzled him. Every time he thought he had a handle on her, she surprised him. He'd have bet the shine of tears over sea-blue eyes was real.
He knew he'd been vicious. Every time she retreated, he felt driven to slash at her. She hadn't cried, though.
The urge to comfort her startled him. He rubbed his chin hard, chasing away the imagined feel of her soft, wet skin against his palm. He wasn't interested in her pain, real or false. She'd get no sympathy from him.
4 'So, Jake, are we gonna get some worms and pop and go fishing?"
"Not right now, kid." Jake caught the flying body in his arms. "Hey. Careful, Nicholas. Warn a person before you jump on them."
"It's all right, Jake. I knew you'd catch me." Nicholas bumped Jake's chin companionably.
"Yeah, but warn me next time."
"Sure, Jake. Let's go fishing, now, okay?"
"Not right now, sport. We'll see about later."
"But, Jake—" Nicholas squirmed.
Jake explained the situation to him. For a long moment the boy clung to him, his small fist clutching Jake's collar. Powerless, Jake patted Nicholas's back. Jake wanted to leave, to take Nicholas with him and not come back. He wanted to let Sarah Jane Simpson keep her home filled with secrets and shadows. Jake swung Nicholas up on his shoulders and took long strides towards the orange VW under the porte cochere.
Absentmindedly Nicholas chewed on his fingernail.
"Stop that, sport." Looking at the painfully chewed nails, Jake winced.
"Oh yeah. I keep forgetting. It's just a bad habit I got. You got any bad habits?"
"Kid, you ask the craziest questions." Jake shook his head in frustration, thinking of several not-to-be mentioned habits. "I reckon I do. Maybe. I don't know!"
"Don't worry about it, Jake. You don't bite off your nails, anyway. I been watching."
"Good, now let's change the subject," Jake grunted.
"'Kay. I like it here, Jake. I've never been this near so much water. You gonna take me swimming while we're here? You said we'd stay while you took care of business." Nicholas thumped cheerfully on Jake's head.
How could he desert the boy now, with the whole mess still unsettled and himself the most unsettled of all? Jake's
brain told him to run like hell, but deep inside a barely heard plea cried out when he looked into the woman's pain-filled eyes.
Jake perched Nicholas on the steps from the porte coch-ere to the front porch and looked at the face that had grown so important to him. He was trapped.
"You'll be back, right, Jake?" Nicholas hid the worry.
Just as his mother, Sarah, had hid her tears.
"I said I'd never go off and leave you, shortcake."
"But people disappear, Jake."
Sarah would never know if they disappeared. There'd be no one to tell her, no tortuous thread for her to unwind. He was a stranger she'd be glad to see the last of. And as for Nicholas... How could she not recognize her son? Wouldn't she recognize her own son if she were any kind of mother?
Nicholas wouldn't be abandoned the way Jake had been, not while Jake was alive. To hell with Sarah Jane Simpson. Jake smoothed Nicholas's hair behind his ear.
In his turn, Nicholas pulled on Jake's ear. "When you going, Jake?"
"Right now, sport. I'm going to fix our tire."
Nicholas wrinkled up his face. "You're crazy, Jake! First you cut the tire and now you're going to fix it?" He laughed, a clear, careless sound that echoed in the morning.
Jake opened the car door. "Yeah, sport, you're right on target. I'm crazy, that's for sure." Jake scrunched inside the car and said through the rolled-down window, "You mind Sarah, you hear?"
"Don't be a dope, Jake! But hurry back, okay?" The boy's expression wavered between excitement and anxiety as he stuck one finger in his mouth. "Hurry back!"
As Jake drove down the shell-lined driveway he watched the small figure in the rearview mirror waving goodbye. Jake swore and second-geared the VW out onto the highway.
Going to the kitchen window, Sarah heard Nicholas humming. He was shoveling sand with his hands, digging a hole. What was he up to? He wiped his arm across his face and returned to his industrious shoveling. Sarah's fingers strayed to the cutlery drawer. When she felt the cool metal in her fingers, she looked with astonishment at the big soupspoon. Why not?
She stroked the curved back of the old spoon, felt the dents. She'd put one there banging on a rock. Her cousin Buck had made another when he'd tried to use her forehead as a drum. There had been no meanness in Buck, who was a lawyer now, just too much energy. Smiling, Sarah pressed the metal slope to her face as she went outside to the child.
"Nicholas?" Her shadow fell over him.
"Mmm?" He squinted up at her.
Maybe Jake hadn't been negligent. She'd sent the boy out clean and he looked now as though he'd been in a pig wallow. Dirty and happy. "Could you use a spoon? To dig with?"
Sarah could see the wheels turning behind his bright eyes as he considered the offer.
&
nbsp; "Yeah, maybe." He squatted on his heels. "Sure. I'm done digging right now, but it would make a great bridge, see?" He laid the spoon across the top of his hole and tamped dirt on each end. It was, indeed, a bridge, a shining, silver bridge.
Sarah dropped to her knees beside him, drawn despite her caution. "Where does the bridge go?"
His look was patronizing. "Bridges don't go anywhere, Sarah, ma'am. They just are, you know?"
Yes, she remembered. Everything didn't have to have a purpose. Some things could just be. "What did you do with the frog?"
He pushed on the spoon, testing its stability. He wouldn't look at her.
Sarah waited.
The lake was calm today. She'd have customers tonight. Fish would be biting out around the Birdcage even after last night's blowup. She should be exhausted, but lack of sleep hadn't hit her yet.
Nicholas wasn't going to answer her. She could identify with that kind of stubbornness. "Nicholas?"
He scratched his nose. "I turned him loose."
"Oh?" Sarah wondered why he was making such a mystery of the frog. She handed Nicholas two twigs.
He stuck one at the edge of the hole and broke the other into bits he scattered on the bottom. "He was homesick."
"I see." Sarah trailed sand through her fingers, sprinkled it on the broken twigs.
"He missed his daddy." Nicholas picked a periwinkle blossom and arranged it neatly down in the hole, away from the twigs and sand.
"Not his mommy?" Pain seared her memory.
"Nah."
Sarah touched the sand. A hard shell pricked her finger when she grasped it. "Where's his mommy?"
Nicholas didn't answer. His fingers were busy scrabbling in a patch of sandspurs. He chose several and ringed the top of the hole making a thick fence of the prickly burrs. "There. They'll be safe now."
"Will they?"
"Course."
Sarah knew the anonymous "they" wouldn't be safe, but she envied Nicholas's certainty. "Who's after them?"
He avoided her eyes. "Oh, nobody." He leaped to his feet. "Want to swing?"
He darted before, this way and that, mapping out his route. Sarah gave in. The warm air chased away fatigue.
Well, Nicholas was a treasure and she let him beguile her into forgetting that he'd be gone soon, pretending for a time that the past had never happened.
She knew she was foolish. She'd been foolish when she'd opened the door to Nicholas and the disreputable-looking Jake, but maybe God wouldn't begrudge her this moment that warmed her frozen heart with might-have-beens.
Sarah swung Nicholas until her arms were ready to drop. They walked down to the lake when an airboat roared in and captivated him. She couldn't ignore his wiggling eagerness, either, and begged a ride from the Seminole guide. Nicholas sat in the boat, his smile ear-to-ear.
When they returned, they ate tuna fish sandwiches out on the porch. Nicholas picked out the pickles and wadded them in his napkin. Downing the last of his iced tea—she wished she had milk—he flopped on the floor and focused on the revolving blades of the ceiling fan. Sarah had switched on the fan as the afternoon had become warmer. She leaned her head back on the chair, her feet near Nicholas. It was turning out to be a warm winter and the afternoons were downright hot. Not the best weather for fishing, but she'd make out. She wasn't solely dependent on income from guiding and boat rentals.
Nicholas interrupted her reverie. He was wiggling his legs in the air. "You like me, don't you, Sarah?" He rolled over on his belly and propped his chin on his hands as he waited for her answer.
Sarah couldn't give him a straight answer. "How could I not, Nicholas?" She evaded his gaze. Oh, she liked him. She did. And she'd like to roast the mother who'd let Jake take Nicholas off on this harebrained trip. Yet Sarah envied her.
He nodded. "Last night I thought you didn't like me, but it was just the dirt, huh?" At her startled look, he shrugged magnanimously. "I'm glad you like me. Jake's okay about stuff like dirt, but my dad didn't like me messing around much." His voice was obstinate. "He loved me a lot, so I didn't care."
"Of course he loved you, Nicholas." The pain was unbearable.
"My mom didn't." He rolled on the floor.
"Excuse me?" Sarah's thoughts scattered like sand in the wind.
"My mom didn't love me." He rolled from side to side, not concerned with the impact his words were having on her.
"Of course she does, Nicholas. Moms love their boys." Sarah's nails snagged on the wicker chair.
"Mine didn't love me," he insisted. He walked over to her chair, his knees bumping against her, those sharp-pointed little knobby knees.
"Oh, Nicholas, she must." As Sarah lifted him onto her lap, his bony body knocking and jabbing against her, she laid her chin on his head. Rocking him, rocking him, easing her own hurt and silencing her questions.
Nicholas looked up at her. "Are you crying, Sarah?" He rubbed his thumb under her eye.
"No."
"Looks like it." Inquisitive, he sat up straighter.
"No, must be my allergies." She let him go as he pulled off her lap, leaving her lap and arms empty. Sarah rubbed the wicker chair arm hard.
"That's too bad. I'm glad I don't have 'lergies." He opened the screen door and leaned out. "When's Jake coming back, Sarah?"
She wished she knew. She couldn't endure much more. Her mind was weaving fantasies.
When Jake rattled up the driveway, his headlights picked out Sarah down by the dock. She was hunched over her knees, looking out at the lake. A full moon shimmered in the dark of the night. Good. She'd put Nicholas to bed. She wouldn't kick them out tonight. He'd bought some time.
All afternoon Jake had driven around, delaying his return. After he paid for the new tire, he picked up smoked mullet and milk. Then, as an afterthought, figuring he
might be in for a long night out in the truck, he added a six-pack of beer.
Now, after he shut off the ignition, he could hear crickets. "Sarah?"
She walked over to him. Leaning in the open window, she said, "You took your time, Donnelly." She twisted the door handle. "Come on out. I won't shoot." Her face was a pale circle in the moonlight. Weary lines etched the outside of her soft eyes.
Jake's skin prickled with alarm. What had happened? Sarah's edginess had vanished. She seemed all curves and softness in the wan light, an illusion. Losing himself in the watery light and her low voice, he had no defenses against this Sarah. He couldn't stay here.
"Come on in the house. Nicholas is upstairs asleep. But you knew that, didn't you?"
Her voice wrapped around his senses. "You timed your return very well. He's been asleep for half an hour. You're staying, of course." She paused, pointed to the sack of groceries in the VW. "I see you'd already made plans. Provisions?"
He nodded warily and removed the key. He'd been in control since he arrived, and while he'd been so cleverly tying her up with knots of responsibility, she'd undergone a change. Touched with shadows and mystery, her skin glowed in the moonlight. In spite of himself he wanted to touch it, see if it were satiny.
Jake walked beside her, shifting the paper sack to his outside arm. Once her arm brushed the hairs on his. She opened the screen door and beckoned him in. He followed.
In the kitchen she peered in the sack, got a bottle opener, plates and forks. "Want to eat on the porch? It's warm enough."
"Your house," Jake said, letting her take the lead. He'd follow her dance steps while she was in this mood. A bull-
dozer couldn't have pushed him out of her house at this moment, and he turned the heat of his anger to simmer.
He pulled the wicker table and chairs together and spread the fish on newspapers. "Beer?"
"Sure. Thanks." She sat yoga-style while she picked at the mullet with her fork. Then she smiled contentedly and pulled the succulent flesh off with her fingers, licking them free of clinging bits. "I love mullet, especially smoked."
The spicy scent rose between them, earthy, evocative,
making Jake ache for long afternoons of lovemaking with rain drumming down. He shook his head, clearing his thoughts and gestured to the fourth fillet.
"I couldn't possibly., .well, possibly," she amended, digging off one final white strip.
He wrapped up the bones and skin while she went to the kitchen.
She returned, carrying a knife and lemons. "Come on. Out on the stoop." She sliced the lemons and handed him one. Squeezing the juice over their hands, she rubbed hers together, sniffing them. "Nice."
Slick and wet her fingers twined. Jake wanted to slide his fingers between hers, touch the delicate webbing of lemon-bathed skin.
A long silence filled with possibilities thrummed between them, and then Sarah spoke. "Why did you lie about Nicholas's mother?"
Watching Sarah's face, Jake figured Nicholas had let something slip. She'd been setting him up. He should have known all the moonlight and magic were false. "I said three accusations of lying were enough. I didn't lie about Nicholas's mother." He hadn't, not really. He'd been very careful.
"Nicholas said his mother didn't like him."
Jake was as angry with himself as with Sarah. "She doesn't." He shifted into the shadows where he could watch her and not be seen.
"But he made it sound as if she were dead. You said his mother gave you permission to take Nicholas with you." Sarah's hands were folded tightly in her lap. "What's your game, Jake Donnelly? Why are you in my home?"
"Okay. I confess. I'm a drug dealer and the kid is my cover. All right? Call the cops." His voice was all calculated irritation.
She frowned and leaned back.
"Look, I said I had permission. I didn't say who gave me permission. Hell, I'd have brought references if I'd known I was going to wind up being given the third degree." Jake watched her face wrinkle as she tried to remember what he'd said.
Her eyebrows rose in disbelief.
His indifferent shrug was more convincing than an argument. "I'm sorry to destroy your swell, little conspiracy notions, but Nicholas's mother is alive. She just can't handle him right now after her husband's death."
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