Chapter Sixteen
“I think your sister’s right about Summer.” Hannah Knight dropped a second pork chop onto Damian’s plate. From the living room came the sound of Dinah’s favorite evening television show and the little girl’s laughter.
Damian felt his cheeks redden. He ran a slice of garlic bread around his plate and sopped up gravy. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Please. Dinah adores her. Loves spending time at the house. She’s thrilled that Summer picked her up from practice.” She cocked her head. “And it seems to me you keep some awfully long hours on that job.”
Damian reached for the peach cobbler his mom had made for dessert. “Don’t have much choice. Mac wants to have it finished by Labor Day. Even with the guys that helped out last week, we’re behind.”
When Hannah remained silent, he glanced up. A smile played on her face, and bright blue eyes sparkled at him.
“What?” He didn’t like that look, the one that speared through his skin and into the deepest part of his heart. Try as he might, he couldn’t keep anything from his mom. She caught every emotion that rumbled through his life. She knew when he hurt, when he needed space, when sleep evaded him or when he felt like jumping for joy. He busied himself with forking up pieces of cobbler and willed his mind blank.
Hannah slipped into the chair opposite him and rested her elbows on the table. “Summer seems a little lonely, if you ask me.”
“She just lost her father. And she’s back in the place where her brother died. With a house she doesn’t want.” And an ex-boyfriend who’s still in the picture. He frowned and drank an entire glass of iced tea without stopping.
Hannah smiled. “That’s all the more reason for you to take her out, spend some time with her while she’s here and keep her mind off things.”
“Ah, I…I’m not really interested,” Damian lied. He couldn’t afford to be.
“Why not? She’s attractive. Intelligent. Successful too.” She laid a hand on his wrist. “You can’t shut yourself off forever.”
“I’m not.” Couldn’t his mother just accept that he didn’t want to get involved? “She’s got something going on with Gabe Roberts, anyway.”
Her forehead dipped in concentration. “Who’s that? Someone here in town?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh.” She didn’t say anything after that.
Damian pushed his chair back and slammed his knee against the table. His mom meant well, but she didn’t understand. Gabe wasn’t the only reason Damian was keeping his distance, though he wasn’t about to step on the toes of the guy who knew her better than anyone else in Pine Point. Summer was leaving in less than a week. She had a whole other life on the other side of the country. The bottom line was, he didn’t trust himself to take her out once or twice and then say goodbye. A few kisses had sent his mind reeling. He could only imagine what an entire evening with her would do.
A sleepy Dinah smiled at Damian as he poked his head into the living room an hour later.
“Hey, ladybug.”
“Hey.” She’d tucked a blanket around her legs and curled into the corner of the sofa.
“Ready for bed?”
She nodded, eyelids heavy.
Damian smiled and took her hand as they climbed the stairs. Though she seemed to grow an inch every day, this was still their bedtime ritual, the one he’d started when she was only a few months old. Back in Poisonwood, she’d stopped sleeping for a while as an infant. Between a rough bout of colic and his mom and T.J. fighting, she wailed all night in her crib. Only Damian’s voice singing lullabies in the darkness could soothe her. Seven years later, he hoped it still did.
Damian tucked Dinah into her twin bed and pulled the pink-and-white curtains closed.
“Dame?”
“What?”
“Can I come to work with you tomorrow?”
He switched on the pink nightlight to keep the bogeyman away. “We’ll see.”
“I like it when Summer’s there.” The girl propped herself up on one elbow. “I hope she stays for a while. Do you think she will?”
“I don’t know, sweetie.” Damian hid a smile. First his mother, now his sister. Seemed like all the women in his life wanted to match him up with the one person he absolutely, positively could not get involved with.
Dinah lay back down and pulled the sheet up to her chin.
Damian lifted his guitar from its case in the corner and ran his fingers lightly over the strings. He took a minute to tune it, then settled himself in the chair by the door and began to play. He never needed the light or any music to read. He just listened to his heart and let its rhythm move his fingers. Sometimes he played Dinah’s old favorites, children’s songs she knew every word to. Other times he relied on the Beatles or Elton John, depending on his mood.
Tonight, he played his own composition, a new tune that had been running around his brain the last few days. The notes rippled through the room like slow-moving water, and Damian hummed as the line took shape beneath his fingers.
In a few minutes, Dinah’s breathing deepened, but Damian played on. The bridge formed itself. The chorus turned into something in a minor key. Pieces of lyrics sharpened inside his head. Closing his eyes, he let the notes fall, painting a landscape of brilliant color in his mind’s eye. He hadn’t written anything in a long time, but tonight the song almost composed itself.
When the last note hung in the air, he sat in the dark and let his heart return to normal.
* * * * *
Past midnight, the telephone rang.
Damian jerked awake, clutching at the sheet. He sat up and looked at the clock. One-fifteen. It rang again and he lunged for the cordless extension in his room before Dinah or his mother awoke. Fear squeezed an icy fist around his organs. Telephone calls after midnight rarely meant anything good.
“Hello?”
Silence answered him.
“Hello!” His fingers, slippery with adrenaline, clung to the receiver.
Still Damian heard nothing. Then something mechanical clicked, and a low panting into the phone ran chills up his spine. He glanced at the Caller ID screen, but it read Private Number.
You son of a bitch.
“T.J.? That you?”
“Sure as shit is. Been a while.”
Damian hadn’t heard the voice in years, but it sounded exactly the same: slurred and pissed off.
He found us. Jesus Christ, he found us. Damian crept to the window and peered outside. No moon. No stars. T.J. could have been sitting fifty feet from the house, and Damian wouldn’t have known it. He’d never believed in guns before, but in that moment he wished for a trigger in his hand. He’d point it straight at the guy’s head without thinking twice.
“You know she’s got a restraining order against you,” he lied. “You come anywhere near us, the police’ll dump your ass in jail.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah. You need a personal invitation to your own funeral?” Come and get it, asshole. I’ll take care of you before the police ever have a chance. “I’ll kill you myself if I have to.”
“You and whose army?”
“Did you hear me?” Worse than feeling T.J.’s fists on his back, worse than watching him shove Hannah across the room, was the thought of his threatening presence somewhere out there, close by. “I’m calling the police.”
At that, the line went dead. Across the hall, Dinah mumbled something in her sleep. The floorboards creaked beneath him, and Damian knew the call had woken his mother too. He threw the phone across the room, where it hit the wall and fell onto the carpet with a soft thud. He punched his pillow, imagining T.J.’s face in the wrinkles of cloth beneath his fist. Sleep had fled, probably for good, and in its place rage grew in his belly. A simmering fire spread to his chest and up through his lungs until he thought he wo
uld either scream or vomit in anger.
He retrieved the phone and dialed 911, knowing it probably wouldn’t do any good. Wherever he’d called from, T.J. wasn’t stupid enough to get caught near their house.
If he knew where their house was.
Damian folded himself in half. They’d done everything they could—relocated, changed their phone number, started a new life under the protection of a custody agreement that prevented T.J. from ever seeing Dinah again. He didn’t care about them. He couldn’t. All that man cared about was getting drunk and living off the government’s money. He couldn’t possibly want to be a father to Dinah. Why couldn’t he accept the shambles he’d made of his life and move on?
Chapter Seventeen
“Hey.” Gabe pulled out the chair opposite Summer and smiled.
She smiled in return; she couldn’t help it. He still had it, that way of harnessing the sun and turning her whole day bright. “Hey yourself.” She pushed a cup of coffee across the table as he sat and cracked his knuckles. “Ordered yours.”
“Thanks.” He dumped in two packets of sugar. “How’s the house?”
“Better every day.”
“Got any buyers yet?”
“Couple of people looking. It’s huge, you know. Big price tag for Pine Point.”
He nodded. “I remember people talking when your father bought it.”
She wrapped both hands around her mug. “Yeah? Talking like he was crazy?”
“Nah. Just wondering.” He took a sip. “I think it was his way of making amends. With himself, with the town. With you too, I guess, though he never got around to telling you that.”
“That’s what Joe tried to say.”
“You don’t believe him?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know what to believe. My father was so angry after the accident. The couple of times I talked to him, we fought.” She glanced around the coffee shop, glad for its emptiness. “After a while I stopped calling.”
“Then he leaves you a house.”
“Exactly. And unless someone around here can communicate with ghosts, I don’t think I’m ever gonna know why.”
“Maybe you should stop asking why.” Gabe tilted his head, and Summer found herself watching the dimples that had stolen her teenage heart. “Maybe if there aren’t any answers, you just have to move on.”
“When did you get so philosophical?”
He grinned. “Spent a lot of time thinking after you left.”
“And?”
“And decided that we gotta deal with what life gives us. No use looking backwards.” He paused. “Course I guess it’s probably harder for you, since that’s what you do for a living.”
“Look backwards?” No one had ever phrased it that way. Summer frowned. Maybe Gabe was right. Maybe she needed to turn and start facing forward. But she couldn’t do that until—
The door behind them opened and a teenage couple walked into the coffee shop. They held hands, fingers wrapped tightly as they glanced at the order board and chose matching skim lattes while barely looking away from one another.
“Think we were ever like that?” Summer’s voice broke into his thoughts.
He smiled. “Nah. I was much better looking.”
She stuck out her tongue. “Me too.”
“You still are.” Gabe didn’t know how he felt about her, or about them, only that sitting across from Summer Thompson over a cup of coffee gave him a feeling of peace he hadn’t had in a long time. Maybe ever.
She looked at the table and shook her head. “I’m a mess.”
“You look pretty put together to me.”
“I used to think so.” She spoke to her mug. “Then I came back here. Now I keep having these flashbacks that put me right into that night all over again. I can hear Donnie. I can see you—and me—and the car. And the cops. But then—God, there are these awful holes too.” She lifted her chin and grief filled her eyes. “I can’t remember what happened. I have no goddamned memory of it at all. Was it my fault? Did I distract you? Did I do something to… I keep feeling like I did.”
Gabe chose his words carefully. He’d come here meaning to tell her the truth. He’d convinced himself that full disclosure was his only choice. If she didn’t hear it from him, she’d hear more stories from someone else. But the longer he sat there with her hand in his, the more he lost his nerve. He couldn’t bear to break her heart a second time.
“It wasn’t you. Mr. Hartwell was drunk. He ran the flashing red light.” He shrugged. “And anyway, he died the next day in the hospital.”
Summer sucked in a breath. “Wait—what?”
“Max Hartwell didn’t make it. Had a massive heart attack after he got to the hospital. You knew that, right?” He wasn’t sure what difference it made, all these years later. Neither of them had been close to the man.
“But my father—and Rachael said—” She raised a hand to her mouth. Her eyes widened. “Oh my God.”
Confused, Gabe tried to read her face. He couldn’t. “What?”
“Rachael said once, ‘At least someone went to jail for it.’ No matter what I could or couldn’t remember, at least someone paid for killing Donnie. I thought she meant the other driver. Mr. Hartwell.” She murmured the words, and tears filled her eyes. “But she meant you. Right? Because if he died—”
Gabe’s chest constricted. “Yeah.” He thought somehow she knew that he’d served time. “Two years for involuntary manslaughter. Not that long.”
“You never told me.” Her eyes widened. “Why? Why didn’t anyone tell me that you went to jail?”
“You’d gone through enough. You needed to heal.”
She shook her head slowly, back and forth. “But you did that…two years…and I never knew.”
Gabe rubbed the back of his neck. Now he could never tell her the rest. She looked as though she’d seen a ghost. She didn’t need any more of the details of that night. He could carry them around inside his skin forever. It got easier every day, anyway.
Summer’s hair fell around her face, and her mouth trembled. “Oh, Gabe, I’m so sorry.”
That, he found, was enough.
* * * * *
“Tell me again why you’re rushing back to the west coast.” Joe Bernstein spread butter across a piece of bread.
Summer spun her straw and looked around the diner. She could barely meet the man’s gaze. Why hadn’t he told her about Gabe? Why hadn’t someone? Why had everyone assumed she was too weak to know? “Well first, I’m not exactly rushing. I’ve been here for almost two weeks. And second, that’s where my job is. I never meant to stay this long. It was only going to be a few days.”
The lanky lawyer rested his elbows on the table. “Funny how that works out, isn’t it? How the past pulls you back before you realize it.”
I’m not sure funny is the word for it. Frustrating, maybe. Strange. Not really funny, though. “I’m not meant to be here, Joe. Besides, that house is too big for one person to live in. The major work’s almost done. Sadie has everything in line—I don’t have to be here to sell it. And it needs someone with a family who can fill it up with all the things I can’t. That was my plan all along.”
“You know, family isn’t always made up of parents. Or brothers and sisters and aunts and uncles.”
“You know what I mean.”
The waitress brought their entrees and Joe leaned back in his chair. Steam rose in twisted wafts, obscuring his face in the dim light of the Corner Lounge restaurant. Summer tried but she couldn’t read his eyes.
“I told you I was retiring from teaching at the college, right?”
She nodded.
“Which means they’ll be looking for someone to take over those two classes in the fall.” With deliberate strokes, Joe sliced his steak sandwich.
“Well, I’m sure they’ll find some
one, though your shoes are going to be tough to fill.” Summer’s stomach growled, and she savored the ravioli before her as if it were her last meal.
“I recommended you.”
Her fork dropped to the plate. “What?” She stared at Joe and waited for the rest of the joke. “Oh, no. I can’t,” she went on when he said nothing. “I told you—I’m leaving.”
He held up a hand. “Let me finish. The Adirondack Historical Society has talked for some time about establishing a small museum in this area. Last week, they got the grant funding they’ve been working on for almost four years.” He winked. “Who better than you to help get them up and running? You know everything about Pine Point, Silver Valley, the entire county area. You might even consider using the house as part of the museum itself. Do some research, use some of the grant money to restore the rooms with reproductions of period furniture. People love touring old homes. You know that. Then you can teach on the side.”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
Frustration tied her stomach into knots, and her appetite fled as quickly as it had come. “Okay, I guess I came back for more than just to look at the house. I thought I could say hello to some old friends. Maybe even see my brother’s grave. Then fly home again, no problem.” She drew in a long breath. “But I just feel like being in Pine Point has pulled me under again. I thought I could face all the old memories and move on. But I can’t. And I can’t stay here every day waiting for it to get better. Because what if it doesn’t?”
The worst part was, the old memories had failed her. They hadn’t been the truth at all. Rearranging her understanding of what had happened all those years ago overwhelmed her. Staying in Pine Point permanently would only make her feel as though she were suffocating, every single day.
Joe studied her. “You know, the past only shapes us as far as we allow it to…”
She shook her head.
“…but it’s the stuff of history books and museum exhibits.” He placed one hand on hers. “It shouldn’t be the way we frame our lives. You know that more than anyone. Learn from it, and then let it go. The present and the future…well, that’s up to us.”
Summer's Song: Pine Point, Book 1 Page 14
