She scrutinized Max cautiously as Michael ushered him into the house. Max immediately seized her hand and pumped it. “She’s still beautiful,” he said to Michael. “I could see why she turned your head five years ago—and I can see why she turned it again now.” He turned back to her and released her hand. “Emmie, I don’t know if you remember me, but—”
“I remember you,” she said, her voice soft and reserved, laced with a vestige of her Virginia drawl. “You’re looking well, too, Max.”
“I look like sh—” He cut himself off, smiling sheepishly. “I look lousy, but you’re polite enough not to say so. Emmie, I really appreciate your letting me come by.”
“It’s all right.” She seemed mildly uneasy. Michael knew how much letting Max come by had taken out of her. If Max didn’t know, he could guess. “I’m just going to throw some burgers on the grill outside,” she said, pivoting and heading toward the kitchen. “Michael, why don’t you get Max something to drink?”
“Where’s Jeffrey?” Michael asked, gesturing for Max to join him as he followed Emmie down the hall to the kitchen.
“He’s down the street at Adam’s house. I told him to be home for dinner by six.”
Relief swept through Michael, unexpected but real. Not that he didn’t want to see Jeffrey, but given Emmie’s tension and Max’s determination to see this reunion through, Michael didn’t have much energy to concentrate on Jeffrey.
Emmie pulled the fixings for a salad from the refrigerator. Michael wanted to kiss her, or at least just touch her shoulder and thank her for letting Max come, but he felt odd with Max watching them. Instead he asked, “Would you like a hand with anything?”
“No, thanks.” She exuded a brisk, businesslike attitude, cool and off-putting.
“Then I guess we’ll stay out of your way.” Michael’s offer won him a fleeting smile from her. “How does a beer sound, Max?”
“I’d love one.”
Michael grabbed two bottles from the fridge and led Max out through the kitchen door onto the patio. There, in the balmy late afternoon, they sat and drank, surrounded by more New England greenery. Max commented on the simple charm of small-town life—maybe it took a hardened urban cynic to appreciate the peace of suburbia, he said—and Michael focused on the woman inside the house, tearing greens and slicing tomatoes for her salad, her blond hair held back from her face with a tortoiseshell barrette. He thought about her reticence and her trust, and how much he loved her, how sweet the world seemed when she was nearby.
Max broke into his thoughts. “She’s not happy I’m here.”
Michael sipped some beer. “You remind her of a bad time in her life,” he pointed out.
“I remind me of a bad time in my life, too.” The sun was fading from yellow-white to rose, heightening the ruddy undertone of Max’s complexion. “I remember when you first met her. I was so ticked off. I thought she was going to ruin our plans.”
“As it turned out, we ruined them without any help from her.” Michael heard a trace of bitterness in his tone.
“But now you’ve got the chance of a lifetime, Molina. The chance to undo the past, to overcome everything that got ruined. A woman, a home, a family—I envy you that. You don’t know how lucky you are.”
“I do know.”
A familiar shriek roiled the air, high and filled with laughter. Jeffrey appeared around the side of the house, galloping at full speed, his Red Sox hat askew and his denim overalls bearing grass stains on the knees. “Michael!” he whooped, barely acknowledging the stranger seated on the patio. “Mommy says we’re eating outside!” He held out his hand, and Michael slapped him five. Jeffrey loved eating outside. It was almost like camping out, he thought, and it didn’t matter so much if crumbs dropped off his plate onto the ground.
Jeffrey slapped Michael’s palm back, then paused to acknowledge Max. Before Michael could introduce them, Emmie swung open the back door, poked her head out and said, “Jeffrey, I need you to wash your hands and then you can bring out some plates and napkins.”
Michael exchanged a look with Max, who didn’t seem too ruffled. If he could face down a murderous thug like Cortez, Michael supposed he could cope with a protective woman exuding enough arctic vibes to give him the chills on a late-spring evening.
Insisting she didn’t want any help from the men, she organized Jeffrey to assist her in bringing food outside to the picnic table. Michael fired up the gas grill without being asked, but once it was hot she took over, broiling the burgers. He would have asked her to sit and relax, maybe have a beer while he cooked the meat, but then she would lose her excuse to avoid Max. He wouldn’t deny her that
But in a few minutes the burgers were done, sandwiched in their toasted rolls and carried to the table, which Jeffrey had set with a colorful plastic tablecloth, napkins and plates. A garden salad glistening with Italian dressing was heaped in a wooden serving bowl, and bottles of ketchup, mustard and relish pinned the tablecloth down so the breeze couldn’t steal it.
Max fixed Emmie with a determined smile. “Michael tells me you’re a schoolteacher, Emmie.”
“That’s right.”
“Just like you were in San Pablo.”
“What’s sampablo?” Jeffrey asked.
“It’s a place down in Central America where your mom, Michael and I all knew one another before you were born,” Max explained. Michael glanced at Emmie. She sat poised, as though prepared to grab Jeffrey and flee if necessary.
“Before I was born?” Jeffrey had a lot of trouble conceiving that the world existed before he was in it.
“That’s right.” Max returned his gaze to Emmie, even as he addressed Jeffrey. “I ran into some trouble down there, and it caused your mom a lot of sorrow. And I came here to apologize to her.”
Michael continued to watch Emmie, angling his gaze so he wouldn’t seem to be staring. She appeared to relent slightly, her posture just a little less rigid, her muscles a little less primed to pounce.
“My mistakes caused a lot of pain for Michael, too,” Max continued to explain, even though Jeffrey looked bewildered and not too interested. “They would have been friends all along, except that Michael was busy saving my life. And because he was such a hero to me, he and your mom kind of lost each other. I’ve always felt bad about that.”
Jeffrey appeared marginally intrigued. “He saved your life? How?”
“The details don’t matter,” Michael said quickly. “We were friends, and then I met your mom, and she became a very special friend to me, too. But I lost her.”
“Because of me,” Max interjected. “So I was about the happiest person when Michael told me he found your mom again.”
Jeffrey bit a mouthful of burger and chewed on it, his round, dark eyes searching his mother’s face. “You knew Michael before?”
“Yes, I did.” She picked at a lettuce leaf on her plate, then smiled at Max. “You didn’t have to travel all this way to tell me you were sorry.”
“Oh, yes, I did. For my sake, if not for yours. I’ve had to stand by and watch Michael miss you and try to find you for so long. I always felt it was my fault.”
“Well.” Her smile was genuine. “Consider yourself forgiven.”
Michael let out a long breath. That was it, then. The past had finally been sorted out and locked into storage where it couldn’t cause them any more problems. He and Emmie had each other, Max had the absolution he’d wanted and Emmie was smiling. He dug into his food, his soul glowing as warmly as the twilight sun.
As if he sensed the grown-ups were done talking, Jeffrey took over the conversation. He described a game he and Adam had invented at Adam’s house that day, a convoluted make-believe adventure involving invisible cops and a pirate named Mo Vaughn, with gold hoop earrings in both ears. He offered a comprehensive analysis of a toy-car crash he and Adam and Todd choreographed at school, and a critique of several of his classmates’ lunches. As he talked he ate, slurped his milk and separated the shredded carrots out o
f his salad. “Can I feed these to the monster?” he asked Emmie.
“I’d rather you eat them,” she suggested.
“I wanna feed them to the monster. I haven’t fed him in days. I bet he’s hungry.”
“What monster is this?” Max asked with an amiable grin.
“It’s a big monster with poker-dot hair and he lives in that tree.” Jeffrey used his fork to point out the crab-apple tree at the rear of the yard. “And if I don’t feed him, he might starve to death.”
“You’d better feed him, then,” Max said. “As a matter of fact, I’ll help you feed him.” He picked a few bits of carrot out of his salad and added them to the pile on Jeffrey’s plate.
Emmie grinned, apparently touched by Max’s kindness toward Jeffrey. Michael’s soul grew even warmer. He understood why Max had needed to come here. It was one of the reasons he, too, had needed to find Emmie. When he’d hired Finders, Keepers to locate her, he hadn’t expected that they would reconnect as lovers. But he’d needed to see her, to apologize, to put the past away. Max needed the same thing.
He watched as Jeffrey solemnly led Max across the grass to the tree and left the carrot scraps on a branch. He could hear Jeffrey’s high-pitched voice, an incomprehensible babble. His gaze met Emmie’s across the table, and he reached for her hand and gave it a squeeze. “How are you doing?” he asked.
“Fine.”
“I love you,” he murmured.
“I love you, too.”
“So you know monsters?” Jeffrey was chattering as he skipped and Max walked back to the patio.
“Well, the kind of monsters I’ve known don’t live in trees, and they don’t have pollca-dot hair,” Max told him.
“What kind of monsters do you know?”
“The kind of monsters who do terrible things to people,” Max answered.
Michael shot Max a quick look, but Max didn’t notice. His attention was on the bubbly boy at his side. Emmie slid her hand out from under Michael’s. Her smile chilled a few degrees. “Max,” she said, “I don’t think—”
“What kind of terrible things?” Jeffrey persisted.
“Well, do you know what criminals are?” Max asked.
“Bad people on TV.”
“In real life, also,” Max emphasized.
“Don’t scare him,” Michael said when Max failed to acknowledge his quelling look.
“I’m not scaring him,” Max said genially, sitting on the bench and patting it for Jeffrey to sit next to him. “He’s asking me questions, and I’m telling him the truth. There are bad people in this world, and some of them are monsters. And I’ve dealt with them. So have you.”
Michael gave his head a subtle shake, but Jeffrey hoisted himself to his knees so he could get a better view of Michael above the salad bowl. “You know monsters, Michael?”
He didn’t want to lie to Jeffrey, but sometimes a lie was better than the truth. “No, I don’t.”
“He did once,” Max said, almost bragging. “He saved my life by killing a monster.”
“You killed a monster?” Jeffrey seemed about to burst with excitement. “You killed a monster, Michael? How? With your bare hands or with a big sword like a pirate?”
“Jeffrey,” Emmie warned.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Michael said.
But Jeffrey wouldn’t be silenced. “How’d you kill him? Did you blow him up with a big bomb?”
“He used a gun,” Max said calmly. He was accustomed to guns; they’d been a part of his life and his work for years. “He shot the bastard—excuse me, he shot the monster. He was a very bad man, and Michael shot him.”
“Was there blood?” Jeffrey asked, his eyes so wide they seemed too big for his face. “Lots of blood? Did the man scream? Was it exciting? I bet it was exciting!” He aimed his fingers like guns and made exploding noises with his mouth. “Blam! Blam! Like that! And blood everywhere, and screaming, and—”
“That’s enough.” Michael shoved back from the table, suddenly nauseated. Yes, there had been explosion noises and blood everywhere, and probably screaming, as well. Screaming inside Michael’s head, if nowhere else. Screaming in his black, black dreams for months afterward. Screaming and blood and death, so grotesque that Michael had never believed he would ever feel clean enough to deserve Emmie’s love.
Jeffrey didn’t appear to hear him. “I wanna be a hero, too!” he shouted, leaping off the bench and scampering around the patio. “I wanna kill monsters and save lives just like Michael! I wanna shoot a gun like Michael did!”
“No,” Michael said. He felt as if he were yelling, but the word came out choked, blocked by the tension in his throat. “No, you don’t want to be like me. You never want to do what I did.” He felt he had to say something to Emmie, also, and Max, but he couldn’t even look at them. The nightmares were rushing at him, sweeping down on him like icy shadows, reclaiming him. He did not want his son to be like him.
Unable to speak, he stalked into the house. He could escape from Jeffrey, from Emmie and Max. But he couldn’t escape from what he’d done five years ago. He could never escape from that, and he knew it.
And, God help him, he knew Emmie knew it, too.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“WE’RE GOING IN THE WATER!” Jeffrey bellowed.
Emmie glanced past him to peer out the jet’s rounded window. As it approached the runway at the San Francisco airport, it did seem to be flying awfully close to the water. She patted Jeffrey’s hand and said, “We’re not going in the water. We’re going to the airport, just like I told you.”
It was his first flight, and she couldn’t blame him for being excited. During the entire five and a half hours, he’d marched up and down the aisles, inspected the plane’s tiny lavatories, made buddies with the flight attendants and stolen an hour’s nap. All the while, Emmie had tried to keep her mind on him. But it traveled on its own secret route, backward and forward, following an itinerary she couldn’t control.
She hadn’t tried very hard to convince Michael to stay. She hadn’t been sure she’d wanted him to, not after that night. No matter what had happened in the years since they’d first met, no matter how much he’d healed, no matter that the love they’d kindled once had instantly reignited when Michael had found her, the ugliness of his experience in San Pablo could not be erased.
She’d been sure she could accept it. She’d been sure Michael had made peace with it, too. But that night, when she’d seen her son—Michael‘s son—so enraptured with the brutality of it, charging around like a homicidal maniac and swearing that he wanted to be just like Michael, that he wanted to shoot a gun and kill people, too...
When Michael said he had to leave, she’d let him go.
She’d been regretting it ever since.
School ended for her the second week in June. The third week in June, she’d purchased two tickets on a flight bound for San Francisco. Thank goodness for credit cards and children’s discount fares.
The plane touched down with a light bump. Michael squealed with delight “That’s cool. I wanna fly in a plane again.”
“You will.” In a matter of days, no doubt. She’d bought round-trip tickets with the intention of returning to Massachusetts once she and Michael had seen each other—assuming she was able to find him. She had no idea whether she would, let alone whether she could convince him that she loved him.
Despite what had happened. Despite what he’d done. Maybe because of it. She loved Michael Molina.
Max Gallard had been beside himself. When he’d gotten back to Los Angeles, he’d telephoned her, distraught. “I’m going to spend the rest of my life apologizing to you—” he’d said.
She’d cut him off. “No. That won’t be necessary.”
“I came between you and Michael once, and now I’ve come between you two again. I’m like the kiss of death to you.”
“Maybe our relationship just wasn’t meant to be,” she’d argued, swallowing her tears. How could she love Mic
hael? How could she possibly include him in the safe, secure world she’d created for Jeffrey?
“I told Jeffrey about Michael because he saved my life. Both our lives. He is a hero.”
She’d wanted to press her hands to her ears to shut out Max’s voice. “I’m sure you’re glad for what he did, but—”
“What he did was brave and honorable. What he did was right! How could you let him leave you?”
“He wanted to go. It was his decision.”
“You let him go.”
Because I realized I couldn’t deal with his past, she’d wanted to say. Because I couldn’t let my son idolize a man who had done what Michael had done.
“Cortez was responsible for Michael’s brother’s death,” Max had reminded her. “It could just be that I’m not the only life Michael saved. There could be lots of other people, street kids who are alive today because Cortez didn’t flood Los Angeles with more illegal guns. People’s baby brothers could be alive today because of Michael.”
I know this, she’d sobbed inwardly. But I can’t stand it.
“He risked everything, Emmie. He risked his own life to put an end to that man. Even worse, he risked your love. How could you let him leave you?”
“It was his choice,” she’d said weakly.
Long after she’d hung up the phone, her words had echoed hollowly inside her. What choice had he had but to leave? He’d found her because he wanted her forgiveness, and that horrible night in the backyard, he learned that even if he had her love, he didn’t have her forgiveness. No wonder he’d left.
But she did love him. He had done something noble and courageous. And now she might have lost him forever because she hadn’t been able to give him what he’d needed that night, what he would always need.
He’d come to Wilborough from somewhere in the Bay Area, but she had no idea where he lived or how to reach him. She didn’t even have Max’s number to call him back and ask. She’d learned something vital from Michael, though: how to find a lost lover.
Found: One Son Page 23
