by Nancy Gideon
Vera glanced between them, brows lifting. “Come inside. Let’s warm those hands up.”
“I took care of that, Momma,” he said easily, and after he appreciated Kendra’s blush, he led the way through the door.
The interior of the small apartment was immediately familiar. Kendra recognized the pictures on the walls, the knickknacks scattered about every surface, the photographs of Cale from birth to adolescence. There were none after.
She glanced up to catch him watching her with careful neutrality as he said, “Momma, this place is like a museum. Why don’t you let me get you some new things.”
“I like the old ones.”
“At least take some new pictures. These make me feel like I never reached maturity. Or died.”
“Those are the times I like to remember.”
His expression closed down tight at her firm claim, and he preceded them into the bright, modern kitchen. He headed for the coffeemaker while Vera led Kendra to a wicker dinette set with cheerful floral cushions. Then Vera stood at the counter alongside her son, without sharing a touch or a glance, to put together a platter of fruit and bagels with cinnamon cream cheese.
At Vera’s coaxing, Kendra filled her in on a romanticized version of what she, Brigit, and Silas had been doing, making it sound as if her return to the Terriot fold were more homecoming than forced surrender of freedom. She could tell from the older woman’s steady stare that she wasn’t fooled. Cale brought them cups of fresh-brewed coffee, taking the seat next to Kendra’s.
He seemed relaxed as he asked his mother about all her various activities, from pottery class to book club, whether she’d made a decision on getting a cat, and how her favorite couple was doing on her can’t-miss reality show. He was attentive and interested in everything that concerned her. But it became painfully obvious that this was one-sided. Vera expressed no curiosity about him. Apparently, the “Are you in trouble?” covered everything she wanted or needed to know.
“Kendra and I are going to be bonded soon,” he announced abruptly. “She’s going to be my queen, just like I told you. Maybe that’ll rate a few new photos.”
Vera went stiff and still, her eyes flashing worriedly between the two of them. “Bonded? This is sudden.”
“It’s not sudden at all,” Cale argued. “We’ve known each other forever.” His hand pressed over the top of Kendra’s for a hard squeeze. Vera couldn’t miss her slight jump of surprise and the evasion in her gaze.
“Congratulations.”
Cale frowned at that unenthusiastic offer but ventured, “Now you can come back with us.”
“Back . . . where?”
“Home. I miss you, Momma, and so do your friends. I worry about you being so far away. I want to be able to take care of you, and once Kendra’s breeding, she’ll need you there.” He’d obviously put effort into his argument, but if he thought to sway her, he was way off base.
Vera’s face assumed the impenetrable expression that Cale adopted so frequently. Her words were cool and succinct. “If you’d wanted to be part of my life, you would have come with me instead of staying with that beast. Nothing will ever force me to set foot on that mountain again. And if you care for Kendra, I can’t believe you’d want her there, either.”
Cale drew a long, deep breath, his eyes glittering. “I’m sorry you feel that way.” He pulled his phone from his pocket and set it down on the table. “Take some damn pictures so you won’t forget what I look like. Or would you rather not remember that I exist at all?”
Vera went pale, then flushed bright with fury. “Don’t you speak like that in my house.”
His hands smacked down on the glass tabletop as he started to rise, making both Vera and Kendra flinch as he roared, “I bought you this house. I’m a prince of the Terriot clan, and I’ll speak any fucking way I please!”
He continued to breathe hard and fast while his mother drew back, regarding him mutely, as if fearing he’d strike her. A fact he didn’t miss.
Kendra gripped his arm and rose beside him. She could feel the fierce tremors shaking through him, not from violence but from despair, as she insisted, “I’d like some pictures.”
Cale turned away, but she had him about the middle, hanging on tight, when he mumbled gruffly, “We need to go.”
“After we get some pictures.” When he wouldn’t look at her, she palmed the side of his face, leaning close to whisper, “Don’t be a dick.”
He gave a choke of laughter as she angled his face toward her so she could sketch a kiss across his lips. His gaze flashed up to hold hers for a long complex moment, then he straightened, turned back, and stared straight ahead. Kendra fitted herself against him, her head on his shoulder, as she nodded to Vera. “Take our picture.”
Vera picked up the phone with trembling hands, found the photo aperture, and murmured, “Smile.” Again, “Smile. Both of you this time.”
Kendra felt the tension leave Cale’s body as his arms slipped loosely around her. His cheek rested briefly against the top of her head before he quietly told her, “Smile, baby. Pretend you’re happy.”
She looked up at him questioningly, but he was smiling determinedly for the last shot as if resigned to the fact that neither female in his life returned his feelings for them. That stoic sadness devastated her.
He reached for the phone with a soft “Thanks, Momma.”
“I want copies.” Her fingertips caressed his palm. “Don’t rush off.”
“How’s the Buick doing?”
“It’s been making this squealing sound.”
“Why don’t I take a look at it before we go?”
“I’d appreciate it.”
He gave Kendra a brief squeeze and circled around the table, pausing behind his mother’s chair. He bent to lay his head on her shoulder, whispering thickly, “I’m sorry.”
“I know.” She stroked and kissed his hair. “I love you, Cale. Don’t ever doubt that.”
He walked quickly away without a word. Then Vera focused on Kendra. Her question struck like a slap. “Has he hurt you?”
“Cale? No! Never.”
“So you’re with him willingly?”
That was where she stumbled. “He offered me his protection.”
“And you had no choice,” she surmised bitterly. “You don’t need to explain. Bram was never able to recover his full support after that tremendous bungle with your parents. I’m sure he’d see bonding you to one of his spawn as a means to make amends.”
Kendra tensed at her wording. “I chose Cale. He didn’t force me. I’m not afraid of him.” That was mostly true.
“You should be,” came the dire warning. “I wasn’t afraid of his father, either, but I learned. He taught me well. When I saw what your mother was willing to do to escape him . . .” She broke off and took a shaky breath.
“What did my mother do?”
Vera stared at her, realizing she’d said too much.
“Her death was an accident. That’s what my father told me.” Kendra could see his pale, anguished face as he spoke the words without ever meeting her eyes. So she wouldn’t see the lie in them? “What did she do?”
Vera sat beside her, slipping an arm about her shoulders and stroking her hair. “I’m sorry, darling. I thought you knew.”
Kendra shrugged off her embrace. “Tell me!”
Vera clutched her hands together, staring down at them intently. “She and I decided it was best for you and Cale to say nothing about what happened.”
“That Bram raped my mother, you mean?”
Vera paled. “Yes. The attack was a warning for us not to interfere in his business or with his plans for Cale. The situation with the MacCreedys was already tense, and we saw no need to provoke it.”
“No need?” Kendra’s eyes welled, and anger trembled in her tone. “He killed them. He killed them anyway.”
“Gemma was my best friend. You children were our world. But the harm was done to the two of you, to Gemma, and nothing could
change that. And then Gemma discovered she was pregnant and knew it was only a matter of time before Bram found out. She was so distraught when I spoke to her that I asked Martine to give her something so she could sleep. She took all of it, Kendra. She was gone before I could get to her.”
The front door opened, giving Kendra barely enough time to scrub at her eyes before Cale came in, wiping greasy hands on the front of his T-shirt.
“You’ve got a worn belt, Momma. I’ll just run to the parts store and— What’s wrong, baby?”
Kendra put up a staying hand to keep him from coming closer. “We were just talking about my mother, and I got a little weepy. I’m fine.”
“You sure? I don’t have to go—”
“Go,” she insisted. “It’s just girl stuff, and you know how emotional we get.” She smiled to convince him, but that only deepened the furrow between his brows.
“Okay. I’ll be back in a few.”
And he was out the door. Leaving her . . . unguarded.
“Are you in love with my son?”
The blunt question took Kendra by surprise. “I was once.”
“If I gave you the keys to my car, would you take them and get as far away as you could?”
“I couldn’t get far enough that he wouldn’t find me.” How dispirited that sounded. “How did you get Bram to let you go?”
“After Gemma died, I threatened to expose the truth. I couldn’t stand the sight of him and told him I was willing to make the same choice your mother did to escape. Cale would never forgive him if he allowed that to happen.”
“You would have done that?” Kendra gasped in horror.
“He couldn’t be sure.”
Kendra couldn’t be sure, either, from the way Vera’s eyes avoided contact.
“So he let me leave. And my boy stayed behind.” She took a tight breath. “He worshipped Bram. He was too young to understand why I had to go. If I thought I could have protected him, I would have stayed, but what’s a mother’s love compared to becoming a prince of the Terriot clan?” She seized Kendra’s hand, squeezing hard. “If you care about him, get him off that mountain and away from that man. If he won’t go, leave him and save yourself.”
eleven
Kendra leaned against the front porch support post, watching Cale work. Even a week ago, she wouldn’t have believed what an incredible pleasure that could be. He was leaning into the engine compartment of the battleship-sized Buick, torquing a wrench, the sharp movements doing delicious things to his back and shoulders. And then there was the tempting sway of his backside, hypnotizing her into forgetting to breathe. She grabbed a noisy inhalation, letting it out on a sigh.
The wrench came flying out from under the hood on a jet stream of profanity. Cale jerked upright, banging his head on the hood catch as he shook his hand vigorously. “Son of a motherless whore!” He turned, saw her standing there, and went completely still for a heartbeat. Then he was stripping off his T-shirt to wrap it around the injured hand, continuing to curse.
“Are you okay?”
He glared at her. “I practically lost all my damned fingers.” He slammed down the hood. The sight of the rapidly discoloring cotton brought her down the walk at an anxious jog.
“Let me see.”
He pulled away when she reached for him. “I’m fine.”
“Cale, let me see.” She kept reaching, and he kept turning, until they were circling dizzily.
“It’s fine. Goddammit, I’m fine! I’m fuckin’ FINE!”
Kendra stopped abruptly, beginning to laugh. He spun right into her, stumbling, staggering backward to drop down on the bumper, breathing hard and cradling his arm. He stared up at her with a killing intensity.
“What are you?” she asked with an exasperated shake of her head. “Five years old? Give me your hand.”
He extended it with a glower.
Kendra took his shaking fingers carefully and used the other hand to peel back the saturated cloth. As his gaze jumped between the wound he couldn’t quite see and her patient expression, she assured him, “I don’t think we’re going to have to start calling you Stubby.”
Chagrined, he muttered, “Well, it hurt.”
“I’m sure it did,” she soothed. “That’s a pretty nasty gash.” She read his embarrassed frustration and asked, “You don’t know anything about cars, do you?”
He studied the toes of his boots. “I know where the gas goes, and I can drive the shit out of them.”
“Why would you start something like this if you don’t know what you’re doing?”
“I figured it’s a rust-bucket Buick. How hard can it be? It’d help if I could see where I was putting my hands.” His shoulders slumped. “There’s not a damned thing I can do for her and get it right.”
Then she understood. This was about his mother.
“She loves you, Cale,” she softly told him. “You know that. You don’t need to do things to impress her.”
A heavy sigh. “I knew it when I was five. I doubt anything I do these days impresses her.”
She sat on the bumper at his side. “Try being her son.”
“And what? Learn to fix cars? I don’t know how to be anyone else.” He drew a deep breath. “I don’t want to be anyone else.”
Kendra phrased her words carefully. “So you want to be Bram Terriot, part deux?”
He gave her a sidelong glance, catching the dismay in her features before she could school them, and explained himself. “No. I want to be better. With you beside me, I can be.” He stood abruptly. “I’m gonna call for a tow.”
Kendra’s gaze followed him up the walk, but her thoughts spun around his single statement.
With you beside me, I can be.
The sluice of cold water in the bathroom sink dulled the ache in his knuckles but did little to ease the testy throb of Cale’s mood. What did they want? What more could he give? He couldn’t change the things inside him. He couldn’t rip the DNA that offended them from his genetic makeup and become someone else’s child. If he could, would he?
He stared long and hard at his reflection, seeing the answer there. No. He embraced that darkness, the ferocity he’d inherited, because without it, he wouldn’t be strong enough to protect them. They didn’t understand. He could take it so they didn’t have to. He had to take it, every blow, every order that made his stomach churn, every humbling, despicable thing he was told, so they would be spared. That’s who he was. They didn’t need someone who could fix their car or share their feelings. They needed someone who could take the full brunt of Bram Terriot’s insane fury without breaking.
Cale was that man.
He’d just finished taping gauze over his knuckles when his cell rang. He glanced at the number and shut the door quietly before answering. He listened intently to the information Sylvia had for him, then cut her off before she could barter the cost. No time to worry about that now.
He opened the door to see his mother in the hall, calming her concern with a smile. “It’s fine, Momma. Just a cut. ’Fraid your Buick isn’t so lucky. I got in over my head. We’re going to have to call a tow.” When he turned to switch off the light, he felt her hand on his scarred back and whirled to face her with a disingenuous “It’s not as bad as it looks.”
“Look what he’s done to you,” she intoned heavily.
Cale scooped her into his arms and held tight. “Momma, it’s all right. I’ll make you proud of me. Don’t cry. Please.”
After a long moment of clutching at him, Vera levered back solemnly. “Be your own man, Cale. Be a good man, take care of Kendra, and I’ll be proud of you. I won’t ask for more.”
She had no idea how huge that request was.
He kissed her brow. “I’ve got to go. Something came up. I’m going to get some water while you say good-bye to Kendra.”
She put her hand on his arm. “Cale, do you care for her, or is this just political?”
His smile was small but his sentiments monumental. “I’ve lo
ved her my entire life.”
He could hear the two of them talking out on the porch, the sound of their voices grounding him as he moved toward the kitchen, buttoning his shirt; he’d left the ruined T-shirt in the trash. He filled a glass from the tap, and after the briefest pause, pulled the packet Sylvia had given him out of his pants pocket, swirled its contents into the liquid, then drank it down. By the time he’d rinsed out the glass and set it on the counter, he could feel the subtle stirring of warmth. So fast.
Heat flashed through him, a wildfire in his blood, sizzling across his skin, searing, straining muscle and tendons until his whole body burned. He gripped the edge of the sink, panting into it as sweat popped on his brow, on his neck. And then that glorious surge of energy, crackling, spiking, as he closed his eyes and let it consume him in a shuddering rush.
When he opened them, everything was in sharp panoramic focus. So beautiful and clear.
After wiping his damp face on a paper towel, Cale flexed his hand and then unwrapped it to observe smooth undamaged skin. Smiling grimly, he went to retrieve his coat and was putting on his replacement sunglasses as he stepped out the door. “C’mon, baby. Let’s go.”
He glanced up as he slipped his Ray-Bans in place and saw the impact hit his mother as their eyes met. She paled, taking a step back as if something horrible had reared up before her. “Where are you off to?” she asked in a thin voice.
“Like I said. Something came up. Some business I need to take care of.” He helped Kendra slip on her jacket, then let his arm linger about her shoulders. He’d started to steer her toward guest parking when his mother reached out to snag her wrist.
“Kendra can stay here with me while you see to it.” She tugged hard, making Kendra look between them in confusion.
Cale tightened his grip. “It’s on the way. No big deal.”
“It’s a very big deal, and you know it. Kendra, stay with me. You don’t want to go with him. Not now.”
Pulled back and forth without explanation, Kendra grew alarmed. She was missing something in the interplay, something dreadful and unspoken straining the mood between them.
