By Your Side

by Candace Calvert

  “She got a letter from his office. A brochure about viatical investments. When I asked Rush about it, he implied—rubbed my nose in it—that you’d shared medical information about Mom’s cancer diagnosis. And about her . . .” His voice choked. “Her projected prognosis. So you could add her life insurance policy to your investment portfolio.”

  Oh no . . . “Wait—”

  “No. I won’t wait; I need to know. Right now.” Fletcher’s lips were a grim line. “Is it true? Did you do that, Macy?”

  38

  PLEASE, LORD . . . Fletcher’s gut twisted as he sat on the edge of the couch, waiting for Macy to return from closing the dog in her bedroom. He’d nearly heaved into Rush’s jungle of landscaping as he headed back to his Jeep. Then prayed all the way over here that the pompous little man had lied. It had to be a lie. But that look on Macy’s face . . .

  “He’s contained,” she reported, taking a seat next to Fletcher. “We’re safe.”

  He wished that were true.

  “Talk to me.” Fletcher captured her gaze, confirmed the guilt on her face; he hadn’t imagined it. “I’m going crazy here, Macy. Explain this.”

  “The money . . .” She closed her eyes for a moment. “That part’s true. There’s this fund that my . . . biological father set up through a lawyer. I never wanted it. But . . .”

  “You let Rush manage it,” Fletcher finished, remembering what she’d said that day on the freeway. She’d said that her interrupted dinner with Elliot Rush was a business meeting. “He invested your money under your direction.”

  “No. I didn’t even want to talk about it. I just wanted him to handle things. Do what he thought was best.”

  “Like viatical investments.” Fletcher’s jaw tensed. “Because there’s such a ‘good return’ on the investment.”

  Macy looked almost as sick as he felt. “He only mentioned viaticals a few weeks back. I told him I didn’t like the idea. On principle—I’m a nurse. I took an oath to help save lives.” She hugged her arms around herself, rocked forward. “In all these years, I’ve never even touched that money, Fletcher. Not a dime. I hated the thought of it. It was a humiliating payoff from a man who wished I’d never been born.” Macy trembled. “But then they found mold in the house I’m buying. I didn’t have the money to fix it. So I borrowed it from the trust. I told Elliot to work his magic with investments to replace what I used.”

  “‘Magic’?” Fletcher asked, disgust stomping on any empathy he felt for her story. “You mean trading on people’s lives? Making yourself a beneficiary to life insurance policies and then—what? Gambling that those people die fast? So you don’t have to make more monthly premium payments?”

  “No.” Macy’s face paled. “That’s not what—”

  “Did you tell him to make those investments?”

  “I . . . Maybe.” Her voice dropped to a halting whisper. “I’m not sure. I think I just gave him free rein. All I was thinking about was getting the house. I didn’t ask for any details.”

  “But you offered some. Plenty. Information about my mother’s cancer.”

  “No.” Macy’s eyes held his. “I swear, if Elliot did that—approached Charly—I didn’t know anything about it.”

  “But you talked to him about her condition. That’s how he knew?”

  “In conversation maybe. Your mom didn’t hide the fact that she had AML. I might have said that I felt bad for her . . . for you. I didn’t say anything about her prognosis or ever imply her condition was terminal.” Macy touched his arm, wincing when he recoiled. “I swear, Fletcher, I’d never give Elliot the go-ahead for something like that. I’d never consider trying to benefit from your mother’s situation.”

  “But it’s okay to gamble on the lives of strangers. Buy anonymous life insurance policies and cash in. You think that’s fair.” Fletcher wanted to shake her. No, he wanted to get as far away from her as he could. “A house is more important than human life? You’re fine with . . . betting against hope?”

  “I can’t look at it like that.” Macy lifted her chin, blinked against gathering tears. “I need this house. For my sister. Elliot’s making it happen. I have to trust him.”

  “Great.” Fletcher shoved himself up from the couch. “I’m going.”

  “Wait, Fletcher. Please.” Macy began to rise. “You need to understand—”

  “No.” He raised his palm. “I don’t understand. I don’t even begin to get you, Macy.”

  “Please . . . wait.”

  He jogged to his Jeep, gunned the engine, and sped away without looking back.

  Macy glanced toward the window, shadowy now as the sun dipped toward the horizon. She swallowed a mouthful of green tea; it might as well have been used bathwater. She couldn’t taste and wasn’t all that sure about breathing, either. It had been two hours since Fletcher’s Jeep roared off, and she’d sent a minimum of six texts to his phone. All unanswered. She took another sip from her cup, trying to ease the ache in her throat. Elliot hadn’t responded to her voice mail either. He probably thought her tone sounded accusing. And didn’t want to deal with her questions so soon after butting heads with Fletcher.

  Macy could well imagine that ugly scene in Elliot’s office. Why on earth had he said those things to Fletcher—done all of that? Was it payback for the embarrassing confrontation on the freeway? Elliot had been humiliated, beyond furious. Plus, it was clear he wasn’t happy with the fact that she’d been seeing Fletcher socially. But neither was an excuse for revealing Macy’s private financial information. And for telling Fletcher she’d violated his mother’s privacy—breached confidentiality. Illegal and heartless. She’d never knowingly do something like that. But the way Fletcher had looked at her . . .

  Tears welled again. It seemed impossible that only short hours ago she’d been happy, practically overcome with cheesy bliss. So much so that she’d been willing to risk telling Fletcher how she felt about him. How she loved the way he made her feel, happy and hopeful and—

  “You’re fine with . . . betting against hope?”

  Macy set her cup down, swiped at a tear. She had to buck up, get a grip. Even if she’d had a chance to tell Fletcher about her sister’s pregnancy, she wouldn’t have made him understand that owning the house was even more important because of that. He wouldn’t see that Leah needed a home, a real home. Fletcher Holt couldn’t understand because he’d always had those things. A home and a family who loved him. Things that were almost unimaginable to people like Macy and Leah. Someone like Fletcher couldn’t know what it felt like to never really belong anywhere.

  “I don’t even begin to get you, Macy.”

  It was true. She’d been a fool to hope for anything else. And to start to believe . . . what? Macy scraped her teeth across her lower lip, feeling the ache in her throat return with a vengeance. It was true. She’d almost fallen for it all: a man who could love her for who she was, and maybe even a God who wanted what was best for her. She reached up, once again found the dyed stripe in her hair. She’d almost bought into the fairy tale. What a fool. The fact was, God didn’t get Macy either. He wanted as much to do with her as Lang Wen did. Her hard-knocks life had proven it over and over, taught Macy the most valuable lesson of all: the only thing she could fully count on was herself. Period. And despite what had happened today, her own plan was still moving forward.

  Before Fletcher arrived, she’d contacted Elliot’s associate, the real estate broker. They’d made an appointment to meet at the Tahoe Park house tomorrow. She’d signed the papers to get the mold removal started. He’d agreed to give her an opportunity to take some photos of the house—from the little brick oven in the kitchen to the bedroom that could be Leah’s and the tree in the backyard that would be a perfect spot for a child’s swing. Macy already had her sister’s promise she was coming to Sacramento, but the photos would help Leah get it on a heart-deep level. She’d see that she and her baby would have a real home.

  Macy reached for the brass door set
she’d brought out from her bedroom. She would ask the contractor to install it. It had been as much a part of their foster mother’s home as the scent of warm oatmeal cookies. Nonni might have been gullible about a loving God who knew all of his children down to the number of hairs on their heads, but she knew everything there was about making a lost and lonely child feel wanted.

  “Welcome home, Macy girl.”

  Macy nodded. It was time to pay it forward.

  She lifted her phone from the coffee table, checked once more for messages that weren’t there. And then reached for her tea again. She’d finish it, then work on her to-do list—things to accomplish as escrow ticked forward and preparations for Leah’s move to Sacramento. It all needed to be done, and without Fletcher it would be easier to stay focused.

  Without him. Macy’s heart cramped. Right now they should be together at Lake Tahoe . . .

  “No. Thanks,” Fletcher told the waiter, raising his voice over shouts from a raucous darts tournament that drifted onto the brewery’s deck each time the doors opened. “I’m good here.” He nudged a half-eaten potato skin, frowned at the beer he’d ordered—flat, untouched. “You can take this away. The beer too. Bring me some coffee. Black.”

  Fletcher couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a beer. Never much liked the stuff. But it seemed like a good idea tonight, the same way driving to Tahoe City had. He’d been wrong on both counts. Thin air combined with a little beer buzz should have been a feel-good prescription. But it was obvious that nothing would make today feel better. He drew in a breath of pine-scented evening air and exhaled slowly, trying to diffuse the gut-churning disappointment.

  He wasn’t a tissue match for his mother. Not even close, according to the percentages and science-speak accompanying the HLA results. “Even with a parent or sibling, it’s only a one in four chance of being a marrow donor, at best.” His mother’s words on the day he’d had the blood drawn. She’d tried to warn him, but Fletcher had been confident he would beat those odds as handily as he’d aced his firearms qualifications. If his mother needed a marrow transplant, it would come from him. But there it was, in black-and-white: no match.

  The waiter set his coffee in front of him, steam rising in the cool air.

  “Thanks.”

  The letter had been waiting for him when he arrived home from Macy’s place—couldn’t have been lousier timing. Not only had he failed a major opportunity to save his mother’s life; his girlfriend’s money manager was trying to place a wager on her early death.

  Fletcher closed his eyes against an image of Macy’s face, the reaction when he confronted her about Rush’s viatical brochure. She had looked confused, then horrified. Genuinely. He wanted to believe it, but he kept remembering what she’d said about the “acting lessons” from her mother. How she’d survived when they were forced to live on the streets. From homeless orphan to a trust fund millionaire? How was he supposed to take that in? And reconcile it with the woman he’d come to . . . love? Had he really been headed down that path?

  Fletcher didn’t know anything for sure anymore. Except that . . . I don’t belong here. He turned to look out across the deep-blue expanse of Lake Tahoe, to the snow-topped peaks beyond, still visible in the waning light. The chill breeze lifted his hair. June, and it wasn’t much over forty degrees. And so dry a spark had arced from his finger when he reached out to close the door of his Jeep. It was foreign . . . No, he was the foreigner here. Homesick. And after today, he only wanted—

  His phone signaled a call. Jessica.

  “Hey,” Fletcher said, cell against his ear.

  “Well now, if this isn’t a for-sure miracle,” she laughed, the honeyed sound so very familiar. “What are the odds? Me thinking of you. And you actually picking up.”

  “I’m here.” Fletcher glanced toward the snow. “Where are you, exactly?”

  “Not where I want to be. I’m at work. On my break—at the tables outside Houston Grace. By the ER. You remember.”

  Fletcher swore he could hear the thrum of summer cicadas. “I remember.”

  “I was thinking of that time I got an itch to run the beach on Galveston Island. After my p.m. shift. And you insisted on driving me. Insufferable, overprotective bully that you are,” Jessica teased. “Picked me up right here.”

  At nearly midnight. Because the thought of her driving there alone made him crazy with worry. And because it had been one more chance to—

  “We had such a great time, Fletcher. Running down that beach, watching the stars, laughing at your stupid jokes . . .”

  It hadn’t been that way at all. Not even close. Jessica had been desperately sad then, scattered, fragile—riding a self-destructive roller coaster that threatened her life. Fletcher was the only constant, the one person she trusted. He’d done everything he could to keep her safe, and accomplished it. The same summer he’d rescued a child from a storm-damaged house. But now, when it was his own mother who needed help, he couldn’t make it happen.

  Why, Lord? Where are you?

  “It was July, I think. Sweltering, anyway.” Her voice sounded wistful. “The air was so thick you could spoon it up. It smelled like pink popcorn . . . and a bucket of those fat, grilled Gulf shrimp. Except that they’d already closed the restaurants.” She sighed with obvious regret. “And we missed the live music up on Pleasure Pier. My bad timing, of course. But it was still so great having the whole beach to ourselves . . .”

  Fletcher closed his eyes, letting the soft-taffy pull of Jessica’s voice transport him across the miles. Home . . .

  “Do you remember that time, Fletcher?”

  “Kind of.” He turned his collar up against the frigid Sierra breeze. “Feels like a long time ago.”

  “And it sounds like I’m keeping you from something important. Sorry.” A distant siren replaced the drone of cicadas. “I just needed to hear your voice, that’s all. My break’s almost over, so I should—”

  “Wait.” Fletcher’s fingers tightened on the phone like it was a last vestige of hope. “How much time’s left on your break?”

  “I don’t know. Three or four minutes maybe.”

  “Good.” He released the breath he’d been holding. “Remind me of that time in Galveston. And anything else you can think of. Just keep talking, Jessica. I need to hear your voice too.”

  The Buick was parked not twenty feet below him. In the garage, directly beneath where he lay now—on his belly on the floor of the master bedroom. An empty, echoing space, cold and dark. As black as the unseeing eyes of his first deer kill. It was his father’s bedroom. And being here felt good . . . right. Especially tonight. This last night.

  He propped himself up on one elbow, ran a palm over the familiar gold shag carpet. It smelled like his father’s cigarettes. Lucky Strikes. And like dog—there had always been a dog sleeping at the foot of his father’s bed. But the last dog was gone. And so was his father, three weeks tomorrow. It was for the best. He’d never belonged in that nursing home. Never would have wanted to see it all come to this.

  He reached for the old, tasseled couch pillow he’d snagged from the Buick, comforted by its lingering scents of gasoline and gun oil. He thought of the last time he’d seen his father’s face, the only time he’d ever been glad not to find recognition there. He folded the couch pillow to his chest, closed his eyes. The bed pillows at the nursing home stank the way those places always did: adult diapers, soured Ensure . . . and hopelessness. Even a flea-infested jackrabbit deserved better than that. His father should never have gone there.

  He crawled across the carpet, raised himself just high enough to peer over the windowsill and across the driveway to the neighbor’s roof. He knew it like the back of his hand; he’d nailed every one of those shingles in place himself fifteen years back, when he was between jobs. And he’d plinked a few BB gun shots off that same roof maybe twelve years before that. He smiled, enjoying the thought.

  Then he crawled back across the carpet, bunched the couch pillow
under his head. Tomorrow it would finally be over.

  39

  “IT’S A LITTLE RED,” Macy told Taylor, shifting the phone as she leaned down to lift the Band-Aid away from her ankle. The tattoo was laser-zapped and gone as of two hours ago. “I probably shouldn’t have done the bike miles. My sock rubbed it. They said to expect some swelling.”

  “Sounds painful.”

  “Not too bad.” Macy sat back up. She’d forgotten the appointment until the reminder popped up on her phone this morning, then raced to the dermatologist’s office after only a few hours of fitful sleep. She’d been kept awake by a merciless flood of should-haves, regrets, and achy-sweet memories. Fletcher had never answered her texts. Or the pitiful “Call me?” voice mail she’d left around eleven o’clock last night.

  “My ankle’s okay,” Macy added with a sigh. “I’ve had things that hurt a lot worse.”

  “I hear you.” There was empathy in Taylor’s voice. “Did you get tired of people asking if you’d tattooed pinto beans on your leg?”

  “Just . . . not a ballerina.” Pain jabbed that had nothing to do with the laser procedure. Nonni had been wrong about that, too.

  “But you’re almost a homeowner.”

  “Yes.” Macy glanced at the brass door set she’d polished during those sleepless hours. If the contractor agreed to install it, she wanted it shiny. “I’m meeting the Realtor there this afternoon. To take a thousand pictures.”

  “I can’t wait to see them. You’re at work tomorrow, too, right?”

  “Bright and early.”

  “Good. I need to get to that dentist appointment, but we’ll talk in the morning. I . . .” Taylor seemed to hesitate. “I want to run something by you. A new life plan, I guess you’d call it.”

  “Wow. Sure, I want to hear it. I’m all about making a new plan . . .” Macy stopped herself before she told the volunteer chaplain the rest of her thought: Because it’s not like God’s working on one. She wasn’t going to dump any of this on Taylor.