One Perfect Love

by Jessie Evans

  “Don’t be mad, Caity Did,” he says. “I know I haven’t been Father of the Year, but this is a real opportunity. I swear it to you. I just found out Great Aunt Sarah passed away a few months back. It took her attorneys some time to find me, but I got a letter yesterday. Turns out she left me everything.”

  “Congratulations,” I say, feeling sorry for Great Aunt Sarah, whoever she is. She must not have known Chuck very well, or she would have realized she was better off flushing her worldly possessions down the toilet than giving them to a man who pours every dime he has into wrecking his liver.

  “Congratulations to you,” Chuck says, beaming. “I know I said I’d sign over the house here in Giffney to you, for you and the kids, but what would you say to a cottage on a tropical island, instead? I can keep the house here, and you and the kids can start a brand new adventure in paradise.”

  I let out a weary sigh, hoping I’m not going to have to hire a lawyer. I’m sure Gabe’s dad, who was representing me for free, isn’t going to be handling my custody case anymore. Whether Gabe’s mom is lying about his death or not, something strange is going on with the Alexanders, and Deborah made it clear on her front porch the other day that she hates me.

  No matter what happens, my days of free representation are over. With Chuck being so cooperative, I’d hoped I wouldn’t have to find a new lawyer, but if he’s trying to con me before my boyfriend’s body is even in the ground, I was obviously mistaken.

  “I say that sounds too good to be true,” I say, unable to keep the sarcastic note from my voice. “I’m not a dumb kid anymore, Dad. I want what you promised me, and I want the paperwork filed by the end of the week. If you won’t help me make that happen, we can keep the court date, and let the judge decide what’s best for the kids.”

  “Now listen, Kit Cat, I—”

  “I don’t want to listen,” I snap, temper flaring. “Someone I loved more than anything in the world is dead, Dad. Can’t you give me a break? Just for a few weeks?”

  “I’m trying to give you a break. Please, just hear me out,” Dad says, the desperate, pleading expression on his face making me nauseous.

  He’s pathetic. He is weak and broken and…rotten beneath the skin. There’s something twisted up and wrong at the core of Chuck. Maybe, if he’d found something he could love more than alcohol, he would have still been a decent father, but he never loved his kids the way children are meant to be loved. He would never allow himself to be inconvenienced for any of us, let alone die for us.

  I would give my life for my brothers or Emmie in a heartbeat. I would die for them, and maybe, more importantly, I have lived a life that is far from the life of my dreams because of the love I feel for them. I want them to have it better than I did growing up, and I’m willing to do whatever it takes to give them a stable childhood. I’m willing to lie, cheat, and steal; I’m willing to fight to my last breath, and waste precious money from the college fund Gabe helped me build to take my father to court, if that’s what it takes. I’m done letting Chuck roll over me and crush everything good I try to build.

  “I’m going to give you five minutes,” I say in a hard voice. “And then I want you to leave. If you refuse, I’m calling the police.”

  “All right, if that’s the way you want it,” Chuck says, the anger flashing in his eyes making him look more like the dad I’m used to, the one who is selfish to his last breath, and has no patience for people who refuse to give him what he wants. “I just thought you might be interested in a fresh start in a place where no one knows your dad’s a drunk, your mom ran off, or your big sister was such a whore she had no clue which of the losers she’d slept with knocked her up.”

  “Hush,” I hiss, casting a glance across the counter toward the kitchen table, where the kids are finishing up their lollipops. No one looks over, but I know Ray and Sean heard what Dad said, and I know Ray, at least, knows what “whore” means.

  Thankfully, nearly three-year-old Emmie is too little to have any idea what Chuck’s saying, and has no memory of her mother. My big sister, Aoife, left when Emmie was barely two months old, and hasn’t sent so much as a Christmas card for her daughter since. For all intents and purposes, Emmie is my daughter, though she calls me Caitlin, like the rest of the kids.

  I’ve done everything I can to shield Emmie from the negative parts of our family’s history, but she will hear the gossip eventually. One day, she’ll learn that she’s “Easy Ee-fuh” Cooney’s little girl. Maybe it will happen in elementary school, or maybe, if she’s lucky, she’ll stay under the bully radar until middle school. But there will come a day when Emmie will learn that her mom was a drug addict who spread her legs for anyone who promised her the escape she craved. She’ll hear the nasty whispers around town, and probably end up being called a slut long before she has her first kiss, the way I was, simply because she’s a Cooney and the latest in a long line of trash the people in this town expect only the worst from.

  I would love to spare Emmie that pain and shame. I would love to give the boys a chance to grow up without the local police watching them like hawks, waiting for them to screw up, like their dad and granddad before them, but I know better than to trust Chuck. No matter how bright a picture he paints, there is always a dark, rancid lining to his shiny silver clouds.

  Still, I promised him five minutes, and I do my best to keep my promises, unlike the man who raised me. “Fine, talk,” I say, crossing my arms at my chest. “I’m listening.”

  I take the paperwork my father hands over, and give the pictures of the home he inherited from Great Aunt Sarah a cursory glance. The four-bedroom cottage in the tiny village of Haiku, on the island of Maui, is adorable. It has three bedrooms downstairs, and a large loft area overlooking the combination kitchen-and-living-room. It’s situated on a two-acre parcel on a hill overlooking the ocean, and its lush, green yard is dotted with mango, orange, and avocado trees the real estate description promises are very productive. It is beautiful, the perfect size for our family, and allegedly valued at over six-hundred thousand dollars.

  I jab my finger at the number, running my nail beneath the digits to make sure I’m reading them correctly. “This is worth six-hundred thousand dollars, Dad,” I say, glancing up at him, expecting him to snatch the paper away and make a run for the back door.

  He had to have missed the number. If not, he would have listed the house and pocketed the money. He would never give me a half a million dollar home in exchange for our house in Giffney, a house that probably wouldn’t fetch more than one hundred and twenty thousand, even if I put on the new roof the repair guy insists is way overdue.

  “I know.” An impish smile crosses Chuck’s face. “You kids will be living like movie stars. And there’s a cottage at the back of the property, too. They call it an Ohana. The agent says it rents for eighteen hundred a month, which should cover a good chunk of your expenses. You’ll be able to go back to working one job, Kit Cat, and have time for school. They’ve got a college on the island. It’s supposed to be nice.”

  My eyes narrow as I search his face, looking for a fly in the ointment. “Why?”

  “Why what?” Chuck asks, still grinning.

  “Why would you give this to me? You could sell it and have more money than you’ve made in your entire life.”

  “I could,” Chuck says, his expression sobering. “But we both know what I’d do with that much money. I can’t be trusted with my monthly check. If I had more, I’d drink myself to death in a year. Maybe less.”

  My brows float higher on my forehead. Chuck has never talked to me like this before. He’s never been honest about what a problem the drinking is. He’s always said he has an Irish liver, or that the Cooneys can handle their booze better than anyone—like we’re the superheroes of alcohol consumption—or he points out that his own father was drunk pretty much constantly from the age of fourteen, and lived to the ripe old age of seventy-eight. To hear him copping to the fact that the only thing keeping him from d
rinking himself to death is a shortage of funds is surprising to say the least.

  “And I like the idea of you kids living big because of me,” Chuck says. “I never thought I’d be able to give you something like this, but now I can. It feels good. I want to put you all on a plane and wave good-bye, knowing you’re going to a better life.”

  I study his face for a long moment, but he doesn’t flinch or look away. He meets my eyes and holds my gaze. If I didn’t know better, I’d think he was a man who had nothing to hide, but I do know better. And so I look harder, past the sentimental expression, behind the soft blue eyes, down to the heart of my father, where there is nothing but Chuck looking out for Chuck, nothing but an overgrown child wailing and bargaining and snatching for the things he wants with his chubby hands.

  Finally, I see it, that seed of self-interest, that tiny spark of gleeful satisfaction that Chuck gets when he’s pulling one over on some unsuspecting soul.

  He’s up to something. I’d bet my college fund on it. I don’t know what it is, but I’m not going to fall for this Repentant Father act, and I’m not getting on a plane to anywhere unless it’s going to carry me closer to Gabe.

  “That’s sweet, Dad. I appreciate the offer,” I say with my own saccharine smile, lies coming easier to me now than they did at the start of the summer. “Can I think about it for a while? It’s been a hard few days.”

  “Of course it has, and it’s a big change,” Chuck says, nodding a little too fast. “But don’t take too long. Aunt Sarah has her lawyers all paid up. They’ll take care of everything if I tell them what to do in the next week or so. Otherwise, we’ll have to pay someone else, and I don’t have cash to spare.”

  “Okay, I’ll let you know by next week,” I say, knowing it’s the quickest way to get rid of him. By next week, I’m hoping to be so busy taking care of Gabe I won’t have time for Chuck’s crap, but he doesn’t need to know that. Not right now, anyway.

  “Perfect.” Chuck smiles a smile that is too bright for a man hoping to give away a six hundred thousand dollar home and pulls me in for a hug.

  I go into his arms, forcing myself to soften against him, but when I lay my cheek against his chest all I feel is cold inside. Chuck’s making a mistake if he thinks he can play me the way he has in the past. The sweet, gullible Caitlin, who secretly craved her father’s love, is dead. She died that night in Pitt’s attic, when I locked my fingers around his throat and leaned all my weight forward, blocking off the air to his lungs, strangling the life out of the man who had kidnapped me. I’m someone different now, someone who watches the world with a calculated gaze, and who isn’t afraid to play dirty to protect what is mine.

  The kids are mine, and I won’t let Chuck put their welfare in danger. They are mine the way Gabe is mine because I love them all with every cell in my body.

  Gabe is imbedded in my heart, so much a part of me I swear I can still feel his soul whispering beneath my skin. I won’t let his parents keep us apart. If he’s still alive, I’m going to find him, and do whatever it takes to bring him back to me.

  Gabe is alive, and I have to find him.

  That’s all I can think about now. There’s no room for anything else, especially not my father’s latest manipulations. I finish hugging Chuck good-bye and shoo him out the front door as quickly as possible, fifteen minutes with my father already more than I can tolerate.

  As soon as Chuck disappears down the concrete steps, Ray pipes up from the kitchen table.

  “You don’t believe him, do you, Caitlin?” he asks, proving he was eavesdropping. “All of that sounds way too good to be true.”

  “I know, Ray,” I say, ignoring the wave of sadness that rushes through my chest. I wish my brother was like any other ten-year-old kid, and could still believe in wonderful strokes of fortune, and magic, and fathers who come bearing gifts with no strings attached, but he’s not. We all bear scars from the way we were raised, but those scars aren’t wounds we should be ashamed of; they are marks earned in battle that have made us stronger, and better able to protect the people we love.

  “I won’t even consider taking him up on that offer until I’ve checked it out upside down and sideways,” I say. “Don’t worry. I’ve got your back.”

  “Me too,” Ray says, with a smile. “I’ve got your back, too.”

  “I know you do.” And even though a ten-year-old boy isn’t the most intimidating ally in the world, at that moment, with Ray grinning at me with candy-sticky lips, Danny brooding upstairs, and Sean giggling as he bites into the last nub of his lollipop and half of it pops out onto the table, I feel lucky to have a few good, little men on my side.

  Chapter Three

  Caitlin

  “Who so loves believes the impossible.”

  -Elizabeth Barrett Browning

  I’ve never been afraid of the dark, not even when I was a little girl. The dark has always been a comforting place, a shadowy friend that keeps me safe from the scary things that live in lamp lit rooms.

  When Aoife and I were little, before Danny was born, my parents went through one of the roughest times in their marriage. They were both young and angry—drinking too much, working too hard, sleeping too little, and blaming each other for the fact that none of their high school dreams were coming true. By the time Aoife and I went up to bed, they were usually picking at each other, slurring petty insults in sneering tones. Not long after, the shouting started.

  On a good night, they stayed downstairs and threw barbed words and beer bottles at each other. On a bad night, my mom would come stumbling upstairs and drag Aoife and me out of bed, threatening to take us and leave Dad, screaming that she was going to sue him for divorce, and take the house and his family, and everyone was going to see what a loser he was. Just like his dad.

  I remember cringing awake in the sudden glare as Mom snapped on the lights, and curling into a ball. I would squeeze my eyes shut and clench my jaw, praying for the lights to go off, and the darkness to come back. I was safe in the dark, with my pink stuffed pig cuddled to my chest and my big sister’s back warm and solid against my own.

  Aoife and I had our own beds, but we always slept together. She brought me into her bed for the first time when I was barely six months old. She’d heard me crying and had come into Mom and Dad’s room to find me red-faced and screaming in the drawer Mom had rigged for me to sleep in, and Mom passed out across the bed. Aoife shook Mom, but she couldn’t wake her up, no matter how hard she tried, and Dad was nowhere to be found.

  Aoife wasn’t quite four, but she remembered that night perfectly. Years later, she’d tell me the story of how she had made me a bottle of cold milk and then carried me into her bed. She said I stopped crying as soon as she fed me—even though the milk was cold—and that I’d snuggled against her ribs and slept the entire night through without a peep.

  Growing up, I’d loved that story. It made me feel safe to know that my sister had always been there for me. Well, safer, anyway. As safe as I could feel considering the monsters under Aoife’s and my shared bed were real. They were real and they lived at the end of the hall, and we never knew when they would tell us we were their beautiful little girls and cuddle us in their laps, and when they would take a switch to our bare legs for leaving our toys on the floor, or talking above a whisper.

  My parents were changeable and terrifying, but the darkness was always the same. It was quiet and peaceful and hid me away in its gentle arms, rocking me to sleep.

  I feel those arms around me now as I move through the tall grass behind Gabe’s house. The darkness helps me hold myself together, keeping me safe, giving me strength. The Alexanders have cattle in the rear part of their back forty, but the pastures near Darby Hill are empty, and only harvested at the end of the summer for hay. Gabe told me once that Deborah couldn’t stand to eat the beef that came from the cattle raised on the property if she had to look the cows in their big brown eyes every day.

  Knowing what I do about Deborah, I find it h
ard to believe she would care that much about a person, let alone a cow, but people are strange. I once had a foster mother who brushed both of her Shih Tzu dogs for hours every day, attending to their grooming with a joy and tenderness that bordered on worship, while she let the children in her care go a week without a shower. Even her own two girls. Betty was crazy, but she couldn’t be accused of treating her foster kids any worse than she treated her own children. She was fair and consistent in her neglect.

  Fair and consistent.

  I will be fair and consistent with my retribution. If Deborah and Aaron have lied to keep me from Gabe, I will treat them the same way Gabe and I treated the criminals Aaron worked so hard to keep out of prison. I will make them suffer, but only after I have Gabe safe in my arms.

  I reach the edge of the field and climb lightly over the barbed wire fence, landing in a crouch on the other side, taking a moment to survey the plantation house. In the pale light of a sliver moon, Darby Hill is a hulking shadow, its silhouette barely visible against the black sky. Darkened windows reflect the faint moonlight, making them look like the eyes of a beast peering out from the trees surrounding the home. There isn’t a light on anywhere that I can see, but it’s after midnight and Gabe’s parents go to bed early. One, or both, of them could be inside. I’ll have to be careful until I make sure there is no one home to hear me rummaging around downstairs.

  I pull my black sock mask down over my face, concealing everything but my eyes and mouth. Immediately, the familiar, job-in-progress energy casts its calming net over my thoughts. When I’m in my blacks, I’m reduced to the simplest version of myself. I become pure intention, driven by nothing but the determination to get in, get what I came for, and get out without getting caught.

  It’s strange to be in a situation like this without Gabe, but I have the soft leather gloves he gave me cradling my fingers, and the lock pit kit that was once his tucked into my back pocket. He is with me in spirit, and soon he will be with me in the flesh. I’m not leaving Darby Hill without the proof I came for, even if I have to go over every inch of the six thousand square foot home with a magnifying glass.