“About fifteen minutes. He just paddled in circles for a while. But when that CD played, he stood up.”
“Gary,” Sean called again. But before he could repeat the command to bring the canoe in, the boat wobbled. Gary lost his balance. Sean watched in horror as the canoe capsized and Gary sailed into the water.
After a stunned moment, Sean kicked off his shoes and took a running leap off the dock. The water was cold, though that barely registered. He saw Gary splash a few times and suck in air, but then his friend disappeared under the surface. He heard Boyd shout he was calling 911.
The floodlight reflected off the surface of the black water. The moonlight trickled under it. Sean dived, estimating how fast Gary might sink. Adrenaline shot through him. He couldn’t see anything in the murkiness. He didn’t know how long he searched until he either sensed or spotted movement…something. His hand closed on material—Gary’s shirt?
Kicking wildly, he propelled them to the surface.
Sean’s arms and legs felt numb. He remembered the rescue hold he’d learned in the summer safety class he’d taken last year but actually executing it was much harder than he ever imagined it would be. After he maneuvered Gary into the long grass on the shore, Boyd and James and Kent were there, all of them looking panicked.
Quickly Sean hefted Gary over and felt for a pulse. There wasn’t one.
Boyd knelt beside their friend. “I can do chest compressions.”
Gary wasn’t breathing and Sean remembered his mother working on his dad. He began giving Gary mouth-to-mouth. Boyd did his part.
Over and over again, Sean puffed two times, mindful of Gary’s chest rising and falling. Then he waited for Boyd, gave Gary his breath again, feeling light-headed, hearing buzzing in his ears. But he kept on, knowing he had to.
When Gary didn’t start breathing, panic clamped a hold on Sean’s chest. His eyes blurred. Tears ran down his cheeks as he heard the wail of a siren.
He was terrified help was too late.
The house was dark when Laura and Brady returned home from dinner. The giddy feeling in Laura’s stomach had remained all evening. She almost felt as if she were on her first date with Brady. It was a wonderful feeling.
He unlocked the door and disengaged the security alarm. Then he gazed down at her with the crooked grin that had first curled her toes. “We could watch a movie…or we could go upstairs.”
Was he as eager as she was to just hop into bed? To feel skin against skin, lips against lips and bodies against bodies?
“Let’s go upstairs.”
Depending on how this went, maybe they’d lie there all night, talking, holding, sharing. She told herself not to anticipate too much, but she was so hopeful, she couldn’t wipe the smile off her face.
Brady made certain the green light was glowing on the security panel once again, then he took her hand and led her to the stairs.
In their bedroom, they glanced at each other like two newlyweds, uncertain of the protocol. Brady undid his tie and tugged it off. “I missed the chocolate cheesecake.”
It was a habit of theirs to share a piece of chocolate cheesecake for dessert. That night, they’d both had fresh fruit. Sensing Brady wasn’t just making idle conversation, she waited.
After he shrugged out of his suit jacket and hung it around the wooden valet, he crossed to her. “I don’t know how this is going to go.”
“Do you want to wait?”
Taking her face between his palms, he shook his head. “No. The first time is going to be an experiment no matter when we do it. I just don’t want you to be disappointed.”
“I won’t be,” she whispered.
With a smile and a tender look, he stroked her hair, then he wound her in an embrace and pulled her close to his chest. There was comfort and familiarity in being held in Brady’s arms, yet a newness, too, and excitement and a yearning to be so much more than they’d ever been to each other.
When his lips covered hers, they were hungry, devouring, arousing. His tongue played with hers…explored…promised. The kiss seemed endless, and she wanted to drown in it…drown in him.
Reaching up, she wound her arms around his neck. “Make love to me, Brady Malone.”
As he undressed her and she undressed him, they were eager to be rid of their clothes, but neither of them hurried. After Brady lifted her dress over her head, he placed slow tantalizing kisses along her temple. After she unbuttoned his shirt, she slid her hands across his broad shoulders, reveled in his male scent, then kissed his chest and his scar, running her hand down to his navel. His blue eyes darkened as he settled his hands on her waist, lowered his head and teased the nipple of one breast with his tongue. She gasped from the pleasure of it, and she realized exactly what they were doing—they were enjoying the journey. The main event might or might not happen, but getting there was going to be as pleasurable as both of them could make it.
“A chair might be the best place to do this,” he growled into her neck.
The workshop they’d attended advised not putting pressure on his chest.
He took her hand and lifted it to his lips. His gaze found hers as he kissed down her index finger to the hollow at her thumb. As his tongue erotically tasted her, her knees felt weak.
“Come on,” he suggested roughly and led her to the armless, high-backed, velvet-covered chair at her vanity. After he sat, he drew her to him.
“Are you sure this is okay?”
“Positive,” he murmured as his hands played over her buttocks and she climbed onto his lap.
When she slid forward, his forehead tilted against hers. “I feel like I’ve waited forever for this.”
“You’ll tell me if…?”
“I’ll tell you.” His gaze raked over her. “You’re as beautiful as you were the first night I made love to you.”
Brady had never fed her a line and she believed he meant the compliment. She melted around him as she slid onto him.
Their arms went around each other and they kissed in that coming-home way lovers greet each other after a separation. Brady possessively devoured her mouth and she fervently responded, kissing him back just as fiercely, stroking her hands everywhere she could reach, wanting to be as close as she possibly could be. Her heart beat rapidly as desire built.
She couldn’t help but wonder and worry about what Brady was feeling. Was he okay? Was his heart ready for this?
Breaking away, he gazed into her eyes. They were both breathing hard. She saw a wildness in his expression, maybe a recklessness. It was as if he was facing his mortality again but had decided making love with her was worth whatever happened. That scared her and thrilled her, until there was such love expanding in her heart she knew she’d never be able to express it all.
She took him in deeper, rocking with him. He didn’t move inside her right away. As their gazes held, Laura felt the union between them that she hadn’t experienced in years. When Brady began pushing in farther, she rocked with him, climaxing first into exhilarating and bone-melting ecstasy. As Brady groaned his release, she felt his heart pounding against her breast. She prayed it was whole and healthy and would last at least another thirty years.
He shuddered and she held on, wanting the moment never to end.
He was so still afterward that she began to worry. But then he passed his hand down her back and kissed her cheek.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
He ran his thumb over her bottom lip. “Just a little breathless, but that’s probably normal.”
Wrapping his arms around her, he buried his face in her hair. After a few moments, he leaned away slightly, his jaw tensed and he said, “It took a heart attack and seeing another man’s interest in you to make me realize what I could lose. I told you there wasn’t a bright light when I had the heart attack, but over the past weeks, I had this gut knowledge that I hadn’t been grateful enough for what I’d been given. I just didn’t know what to do about it.”
“Do you know now?”
“No, but I’m going to figure it out. Selling my business might be one way to do that.”
“You spent years putting all your energy into your designs, growing your company.”
“I can still design. Maybe I’ll consult.”
When the phone rang, it startled them both.
“We can let the machine get it, but it might be one of the kids,” Brady murmured.
Laura nodded. “Maybe Kat and Sandra had another tiff and she wants to come home.”
After Laura slid off Brady, he went to the nightstand to answer the phone.
Laura headed for the bathroom, but when she glanced at Brady, she noticed his face had gone pale. His lips were a tight line. She stood immobile, watching him.
Finally he said, “I’ll be there in ten minutes. Take a couple of deep breaths and just try to hold it together. Tell them the truth if they interview you before I get there.”
With a stricken expression, he set the cordless phone on its base. “It’s Sean.”
“Is he hurt?”
“No, not physically. But he’s at the police station. Something happened at Gary’s cabin and Gary…drowned. The kids were taken in for questioning. Legally, since Sean’s eighteen, I don’t have a right to be there, but the investigating officer said if he wanted to call a parent, one of us could sit in.”
Laura’s body went cold. Her head swam. Gary…fun-loving Gary…dead. Dead.
Sean needed them. He shouldn’t be there alone. She started for the bathroom. “I have to get dressed.”
“No. You’re not coming with me.”
The vehemence in her husband’s voice immobilized her. “Brady…”
“No, Laura. It will be easier for Sean if he has only one of us to deal with. Just grab some clothes for him while I get dressed. He went into the lake after Gary capsized the canoe and—”
Brady stopped abruptly, went to Laura and wrapped his arms around her. After a few moments, he released her, hurried to the closet and grabbed a pair of jeans. But he didn’t say anymore.
She wanted him to tell her everything would be all right, but he couldn’t. As she ran to Sean’s room, her throat tightened against emotion. She prayed they’d all have the strength to deal with whatever happened next.
Laura sat at the kitchen table, nursing a cup of tea, waiting for Brady and Sean to walk through the door from the garage.
When they did so at 3:00 a.m., they both looked wrung out. Her husband was pale, with dark circles under his eyes. His face was almost gaunt. Worry lines etched the skin around his brows and mouth. Sean’s hair was disheveled, his face was starkly pale, his eyes too bright, too dark, too desolate.
She stood, went to her son and wrapped her arms around him. “I’m so sorry, Sean. I know Gary was a good friend and he meant a lot to you.”
Sean was stiff in her arms, unyielding, almost rigid. He was still holding his duffel and he didn’t even drop it to the floor. He just stood there, clutching it.
She didn’t want to let go of him. She wanted to somehow absorb his pain and erase tonight from his life history.
Although she didn’t know the full story yet, from his face she saw he was changed, that he’d never see life the same way again. When she gazed up at him, she had a feeling he was still in shock and was in too much pain to let tears come.
“I can’t talk about it now, Mom. I just can’t.” His voice was low and hoarse and hardly his.
Brady said, “I’ll fill your mother in. Go on upstairs and try to get some sleep. We’ll talk in the morning.”
Sean shook his head. “There’s nothing to talk about.”
Laura was aching to understand exactly what had happened so she could comfort her son in some way, but she didn’t want to ask questions he didn’t want to answer. “Is there anything I can do for you?”
Numbly Sean met her eyes and shook his head. Without another word, he left her with Brady in the kitchen and went upstairs.
“Let’s go into the living room,” Brady said to her.
A few minutes later, on the sofa beside Brady, she watched him prop his elbows on his knees, drop his head into his hands, rub his face, then sit up straight. “What I wouldn’t give for a cup of coffee laced with caffeine.”
“I can make a pot of decaf,” she offered.
He caught her wrist when she would have gotten up. “No. Just let me tell you what happened and then maybe we can get some sleep before we have to make decisions in the morning.”
“What kind of decisions?”
“Whether we should hire a lawyer for Sean.”
Panic gripped her. “A lawyer? Why?”
“He cooperated tonight. He told the detective everything that happened at least four times. I was there for three of them. But there will be an investigation.”
“Into Gary’s death?”
Brady nodded. “They’re not accepting Sean’s word for anything—or at least, that’s the impression I got. Sean is scared out of his wits and I don’t blame him. He saw his friend die.” Brady stopped abruptly, and Laura knew what he was envisioning—his own buddies dying.
She moved nearer to him, laid her hand on his jean-lad thigh and waited for him to return to her.
When he did, his pain was shut off again. “Gary was gone when the medics arrived. So they called the coroner. I think Sean went on automatic at that point.”
“How did Gary drown? I mean, what was going on? Was Sean in the canoe with him?”
Brady sighed. “No, Sean was on the dock. Apparently Gary was drunk, went out in a canoe, stood up and was acting foolish. The canoe capsized. Sean dived in after him, then brought him to shore. Boyd worked on him, too.”
“So there was alcohol there?”
“Yeah, in plain view. All the kids got citations for possession and consumption of alcohol by a minor. The police treated the whole area like a crime scene, shot pictures, confiscated the canoe as evidence—I guess to check for any damage. I heard one of the kids say an officer asked over and over again if Sean was in the canoe with Gary. I guess they thought it was possible he pushed him overboard.”
“Oh my God! You’re not serious.”
“They’re just trying to get to the truth. Sean’s story didn’t waver. I talked to Boyd for a few minutes and he told them the same thing.”
“I keep thinking about Gary’s parents. His father wasn’t there?”
“Nope. He’d called Gary to tell him he was going to be late. I overheard two officers and there’s going to be an autopsy. I asked the detective how long the investigation would last and he said it could be a week or two. I’ll tell you, when we were in that interview room, I wondered if I should just get a lawyer for Sean and he should keep quiet. But he wanted to tell what happened. He didn’t seem to have anything to hide.”
Laura raised a question that had been troubling her. “Besides the alcohol, were there drugs?”
“I don’t think they found any.”
“Did you ask Sean?”
“I asked. He wouldn’t say. But after the autopsy’s done, the police will know from the tox screen.”
Brady was being so matter-of-fact. Every once in a while his voice went gruff and Laura knew he was more affected than he was letting on. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
He wasn’t, but as always, he was acting strong, not letting anything show, probably for her and definitely for Sean. “I don’t know the best way to help him through this,” Laura admitted.
“All we can do is be here for him.”
“I want to call Gary’s parents.”
“Did you want to talk to anyone after Jason died?”
She glimpsed the knowledge in Brady’s eyes, the understanding and compassion and anguish parents suffer when they lose a child. All of it came rushing back, and Laura felt tears burning her eyes, felt the tightness in her throat, remembered too much of what she’d felt so many years ago.
Finally she whispered, “No, I didn’t want to talk to anyo
ne.”
Although they rarely spoke about Jason, their first son was always there, a bond and a wound between them.
When Brady wrapped an arm around her shoulders, she leaned into him. They had to hold on to each other. They had to. If they didn’t, they’d lose each other…and their marriage would break into pieces. She was sure of it.
Chapter 16
“You can’t stay in your room forever!”
Brady climbed the stairs after spending Tuesday afternoon at his office and heard Kat’s frustrated pronouncement to her brother. He agreed with her, but Sean wouldn’t. Brady didn’t know what to do to help his son. For the past three days, Sean had sat in his room and didn’t want to see or talk to anyone. Brady understood how his son felt but didn’t know how to assuage his grief. They’d heard nothing more from the detective in charge of the investigation. One of Sean’s teachers had called them, explaining she’d been contacted by the police. They’d interviewed her, investigating what kind of kid Sean was. She’d felt Brady and Laura should know. She’d explained to the detective that Sean, Gary and Boyd were best friends and Sean was a good kid, who had to work extra hard in school.
Brady was afraid the police were trying to pin Gary’s death on Sean somehow, or were searching for anything that would lead in that direction. Maybe he was just too cynical to believe when they heard the truth, they’d know it…that when they saw the truth, they’d believe it.
Standing at her brother’s door, Kat had her hands planted on her hips. She was upset. Brady knew she was worried about Sean, too.
When he and Laura had explained to her what had happened, she’d cried and hung on to them.
Brady stepped into the doorway of his son’s room. Sean was lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling.
“He won’t come out,” Kat complained. “He won’t talk to me. He won’t talk to anybody. Boyd called again a little bit ago and he said to tell him he was sleeping. I know he misses Gary and all, but he just can’t stay in here the rest of his life!”
“It’s been three days, Kat,” Brady reminded her, attempting to cut through her exaggeration.
The Bracelet (Everlasting Love) Page 19