The World is a Stage

by Tamara Morgan

  Apparently, their mother’s inability to hold her alcohol was a disaster. In Eric, it was a point of sympathy and charm for him to pee his pants on the way to a party.

  This was worse than she thought.

  “Well, if my humble abode is a bit much for you right now, can I at least introduce you to a few people?” Michael asked. Rachel thought he was talking to them both, but Molly had bounded away toward a kindred spirit in the shape of a slight, pretty woman with dark blonde hair and the kind of floaty layers that always made Rachel feel like an Amazonian in drag.

  “You don’t have to play the charming host for my benefit. I’m fine right here.”

  “I’m sure you are,” he said with a chuckle. “But I didn’t invite you to stand here and stare my guests into submission.”

  “I’m not staring.” She crossed her arms. “Okay. Maybe I am a little. But you have freakishly large friends.”

  He puffed up and preened like a peacock spreading its feathers. He probably screamed like a peacock too. The big ones always did. “You should see us in our kilts.”

  Rachel stopped. “That’s the second time someone has said that. Is that what you were wearing the other day? Are you in some sort of fetish club?”

  “Now, I like the sound of that.” He beamed. “No—the truth is I’m a Scottish Highland Games athlete. Most of the guys here are. You know, caber tossing and stone put. Manly stuff. Do you want me to roar?”

  Oh, for crying out loud. “You throw rocks and sticks? And you live in the woods? In a tin can?”

  “Not the woods—a lentil farm. It’s my cousin’s. I bought us the Airstreams a few years ago. I think you’ll like him.” He said the words with an absurd quantity of misplaced pride. What sort of a man bragged about living among legumes and felling trees? He might as well have one hand pounding his chest and the other liberally scratching his balls.

  “I’m sure any family member of yours is filled with surprises and intellectual insights.”

  “Stop. You’re making me blush.”

  “Oh, go on, then.” Rachel rolled her eyes and took a deep breath. This was going to be like being led to the gallows. “Impress me with your incredible bloodlines.”

  Within half an hour, Rachel was ready to admit she might have been a trifle hasty with her judgment. She’d met quite a few of the men, and they were actually a pretty interesting set of people. The pretty blonde from before was attached to a gorgeous Asian man who had a strangely large working knowledge of historical fashions. Another man named McClellan, who had an affinity for Hammerpants, volunteered to show her the steps of the Highland Fling.

  “These guys are pretty amazing, aren’t they?” the pretty blonde woman asked after Rachel politely declined the dance. She introduced herself as Kate. “You’d think they’re nothing more than overgrown jocks, but they’ve got hearts of gold. Especially Michael.”

  “It’s the hair,” Rachel murmured, trying not to get caught staring at Michael standing across the party.

  “The hair?” Kate asked with a smile.

  Rachel nodded. “It makes him seem nicer than he really is. It’s all floppy and cute and makes you think he’s twelve years old underneath all those muscles. But I’m not fooled. He’s trouble.”

  Trouble that was doing far too good a job pulling down her defenses.

  And Jennings, Michael’s cousin, was the biggest defense-destroyer of all. He turned out to be old, somewhere in his early seventies, and was set up on a vinyl lawn chair with a beer in one hand and a corncob pipe in the other. He also turned out to be quite articulate and was explaining Dostoyevsky’s views on nationalism when Michael pulled up a chair to join them.

  “Are you boring my poor friend here?” he asked. He set a plate of food on Jennings’s lap and exchanged the pipe for a fork. “If that’s the case, then I’m going to tell you the deer are getting into the south field again.”

  “Bullshit!” Jennings used his fork to stab at the air. “I was down there with my gun this morning.”

  “I know. I saw the tree you were making target practice of.”

  “Is that safe?” Rachel asked, taken aback.

  “Not in the least,” Michael said, laughing. “But Jennings here refuses to do anything half-assed. Including scaring the deer away. Or talking about Russian philosophers.”

  Jennings reached up and turned off his hearing aid. With a smile that shone just as brightly as Michael’s, he winked and busied himself with his food. Steak cut up into bite-size pieces. Corn cut off the cob.

  Despite herself, Rachel softened.

  “And you’re really cousins? I find that hard to believe.”

  “Second cousins. Or maybe third? Removed like eight times?” Michael shrugged. “I can never keep track, but he’s been around for just about ever. I think he’s secretly a vampire. You hungry?”

  Rachel wasn’t really hungry—she’d eaten ahead of time, unsure what sort of conditions awaited her here—but she nodded, her head swimming. If she didn’t know better, she’d say she was enjoying herself. Maybe even feeling impressed by the Mule himself.

  That can’t be right. She put a hand on her brow.

  A car pulled up then, the crunch of tires on the dirt road punctuated by Molly’s squeal. Her sister really had it bad this time around. Rachel looked up, expecting to find a miniature sports car or a truck with a pair of blue balls hanging from the hitch. Instead she saw a maroon minivan with a yellow smiley face bobbing cheerfully from the antenna.

  That’s Eric’s car?

  Molly pulled the sliding door open, completely at home and at ease with the strangely paternal vehicle. When she emerged, it was with two small, brown-haired creatures in miniature pink peacoats stuck to either hip.

  “Oh, good. Peterson’s here. Have you met his little demons?” Michael handed her a plate with enough food to feed a small village and raised a hand in greeting. “They’re cute, but if you know what’s good for you, avoid all topics related to bugs, bears and Twinkies.”

  “Twinkies?” Rachel echoed. Eric had kids? Two of them? And Molly hadn’t felt that might be a pertinent fact?

  “Yeah.” Michael crinkled his brow. “I may have said something about cockroaches and Twinkies. You know, in case of an apocalypse? I’m pretty sure they think the damn things are made of cockroaches now.”

  “Rachel, would you like to meet Sammy and Pris?”

  Samantha and Priscilla. The tattoos on Eric’s wrists. Oh God. The juice.

  “Um…okay?”

  Rachel stood there, not all of her bewilderment due to the sudden realization she’d been wrong about Eric. As she took in the pair of them, she was a hundred percent unsure what was supposed to happen next. Did she offer them a handshake? Pinch their cheeks? She might have a piece of gum in her purse.

  “You’re tall for a lady.”

  Rachel blinked. She couldn’t tell which one had spoken. They weren’t twins or anything, but there was something about cherubic young faces swathed in pink that blurred inside her head as one.

  “Yep. I am,” she said when it seemed some sort of response was required of her.

  “Miss Molly is short.”

  “I think she’s more average-size. Statistically speaking, I mean.” Behind her, Michael snorted.

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means, silly pea, that I’m not short or tall.” Molly was cooing. Cooing. “I’m perfect. Just. Like. You.”

  “Your hair is like Ariel’s,” one of them continued. “She’s a mermaid. You’re not a mermaid.”

  Rachel blinked. Apparently, small children liked to make patent observations. She could do that.

  “You have pigtails. And the other one has freckles.”

  The one with freckles began crying.

  Rachel was so bewildered she was on the verge of asking the girls if they wanted Twinkies when Michael placed an arm around her shoulder and veered her in the opposite direction. Under any other circumstances, Rachel would have immediate
ly stabbed his arm with the nearest pointed object, but the way his hand gave her shoulder a little squeeze was so…so…comforting.

  “Don’t worry. They freaked the shit out of me at first too.”

  A shaky laugh escaped her lips. “Was it really bad?”

  “Well, it wasn’t good, I’ll be honest. But I doubt you’ve scarred them for life.”

  “Can I…?” She stopped and turned to look at her sister. Molly had set the girls down, and they were running in circles around her. It was a strange thing to see.

  Molly had almost been a mother. Rachel had almost been an aunt.

  But they weren’t, and they’d barely even had time to process it all, both of them still wobbling around on unsteady legs. Picking up another man’s kids and calling them silly names didn’t change what had happened. Molly had to know that.

  “What?” Michael asked, rubbing his hands together. “Can I show you inside the castle? I knew you’d fold!”

  “No. I need to talk to Eric.” Her jaw tensed, and she felt a headache coming on. “Just…excuse me for one second.”

  She didn’t wait for a response.

  She found Eric leaning against his car, his arms crossed and a smug look on his face. Okay, maybe that wasn’t fair. It might not have been smugness. It might have been a man’s simple pleasure at watching his kids.

  She observed as another man rounded the front of the van and said something in a low voice to Eric. Rachel had seen him milling around the party and thought he looked familiar, but it wasn’t until the two of them were side by side that she realized they were related, both of their faces bearing the same craggy lines of dissipation. They were brothers, probably, though the younger one had a lot fewer tattoos and a messy brown sweep of hair in place of Eric’s signature shorn look.

  “I know you told me to stay away from that place, but I can’t let them get away with saying that shit about me. I’ll just make a quick trip—”

  “Not now, Nick. I don’t care what kind of crap they pull. You have to keep your head down and just suck it up for once.”

  “But you said—”

  Eric gripped his brother’s arm, fury tightening in the corners of his mouth. “I don’t give a rat’s ass what I said. This is about a lot more than you and me. And I’m not talking about this with the girls and Molly standing right over there. Just play it cool.”

  “Does she know?”

  A grimace passed over his face, and Rachel’s blood went cold. “Eric?”

  Eric looked over at her, and she could tell it was a struggle for him to maintain a semblance of calm. “Hey, Rachel. What’s up?”

  For the first time, she felt out of her element talking to this man. Granted, she hadn’t been exactly going out of her way to have conversations with him, but she’d always felt assured in what she said and how she said it—tattoos and muscles notwithstanding.

  But with his face a closed off mask of irritation, his arms crossed over his chest with the veins standing out like twisted ropes, she felt something else.

  Fear.

  This was not a man to cross.

  “I just wanted to say your daughters are really cute. Do you have full custody of them?”

  A tic along his jawline worked furiously. “You want to grill me about my family? Here? Now? Well, here’s an easy answer for you. It’s not any of your damn business.”

  Fear gave way to irritation. “Molly is my business, and I think it’s a fair question. Are you or are you not responsible for the lives of two human beings that you may or may not intend to foist upon my sister?”

  “And Molly knows the answer to it. Why don’t you ask her?” He relaxed a little, rubbing his hand over his mouth and letting out a heavy sigh. “Look, Rachel. I get the protective act you’re pulling—I really do. More than you probably realize. But not everything has to be a life-or-death issue here. Yes, the girls are mine and mine alone, though if you feel like digging through their records, you’ll find lots of shit to rub my face in.”

  She arched a brow. This would be good.

  “Oh, you want it all? Fine. Their mother was a fucked-up junkie who cared more about her next fix than her kids, but all the judges in this city strongly favor the mother for custody cases. Even more so when the mother is the daughter of a politician and the father looks like I do.”

  Rachel’s brow fell, but she still didn’t move.

  Eric took it as a challenge. “What? You want more? You want to know about the dirt I had to sling to get her parents to back down from pursuing their rights? The campaign smear? The photos? Or do you want to go over there and ask my youngest how it feels to know her mommy abandoned her when it turned out she wasn’t going to win the case against me?”

  She did want to know more—a lot more—but she wasn’t about to say it. Rachel could tell when she was being baited. He was practically begging for her to ask questions so he could shove the sob-story answers down her throat. Well, she wasn’t buying it.

  He might try to mask it behind heroics, but there was more to that story, more to his life. He had baggage. There was also that look of intense anger on his face and the unspoken threat of violence as the two brothers squared off next to the family minivan.

  “Sorry I asked,” Rachel bit out, turning away. But she wasn’t sorry. She wasn’t sorry at all. If there was one thing Rachel liked, it was knowing what she was up against. She wasn’t one of those women who turned a blind eye to a man’s faults. She liked to name her foe. Look him in the eye.

  Rip him to shreds.

  “Hey. Have you had a chance to finish eating?” Michael was waiting for her underneath the Welcome Home sign, supremely oblivious to everything going on around him. “I thought I might show you my lentils.”

  “You are impossible,” Rachel said through her teeth. Speaking of a man’s faults. “Do you understand the concept of social cues? Do I look like I want to eat your meat and examine your crops right now?”

  He cocked his head to the side, considering. “Yes. Yes, I think you do. My meat is surprisingly tender.”

  She stomped her foot, puffs of dirt making a mess of her white pants, realizing as she did it that she should have known better than to wear white to any event hosted by this cretin. “Your party sucks, by the way. Are my obligations done? Can I go now?”

  Not even that fazed him. Without losing his smile, he spread his arms open wide. “It sounds like somebody might be ready for that hug now.”

  Rachel clamped her jaw so hard she bit her tongue. And then she turned on her heel and left.

  Chapter Seven

  What Bloody Man

  “The quick and dirty answer? Your ACL is shot. Or rather, what’s left of it is.”

  Michael swore. Those were not a man’s three favorite letters when it came to sports injuries. Especially when his knees already looked like the scene of a recent crime. “What about another surgery?”

  “Can I be honest?” Dr. Monroe, a slight, thirty-something woman he’d become far too familiar with over the last five years, set aside the chart she was holding and examined the scar tissue along the front of his leg.

  “As long as your honesty doesn’t include the words ‘early’ and ‘retirement,’ you can tell me anything you want.”

  The sympathetic look she gave him didn’t fill him with very much hope. “Best case scenario, we could go in there and do another hamstring graft that will hold for three, maybe four months on the field—and you’re looking at twice as much time spent on rehabilitation alone. There’s just not a whole lot left in there to work with. I told you last time to take it easy.”

  “I did take it easy.”

  “There are two types of people you can’t lie to in this world,” Dr. Monroe said with a smile. “Your doctor and your mother.”

  “I took it easier, at least.” In fact, he was starting to get those looks of death from the other guys—the glances at his knee when they thought he wasn’t paying attention, more invitations to work out in the safe,
controlled gym rather than taking the cabers out for a spin. Hell—he’d done it himself a few times, when it was obvious one of the other athletes had peaked and was on his way down, but no one wanted to say as much to his face.

  “It might be time to rethink your career.” She shut the chart and held it against her chest. “I hear there’s good money in knee surgery.”

  Michael smiled and laughed, flirting with the good doctor for a few more minutes before she had to see her next patient.

  For the first time in a long time, the smile was faked and his laugh forced. He’d never been quite as successful at the Highland Games as the other guys, and that was okay. He didn’t need the money, like Julian. He didn’t really need the glory, either. Sure, it was fun to take home a trophy or two, give the ladies something to swoon over, but he didn’t have to win to enjoy himself.

  But the Games were a part of him. They were who he was. Michael O’Leary, local caber-tossing champion and national-award-winning stone putter. The easy-going man in a kilt the other guys counted on for a good time. He wasn’t smart and he wasn’t worldly—and he never pretended to be. He was the type of man women like Rachel Hewitt looked down on, even as she stole covert and highly charged glances at his legs when she thought he wasn’t looking.

  Work hard, play hard. Drink hard, fuck hard. He wouldn’t call himself a simple man, but his needs were few.

  Now, all of a sudden, he was faced with the knowledge that his knee was done, which meant he was too. That left playing video games and drinking and fucking. And while that might have sounded like a hell of a lot of fun a few years ago, Michael was getting a little too old to build a life around the frat-boy party his life had been for the past ten years.

  It was a sobering reflection. Michael didn’t like it.

  As he called out cheerful farewells to the ladies working the reception counter, his cell phone buzzed. He glanced at the screen. It was from Dominic.