by Brenda Novak
“Maybe I’ll go by there.”
“It might be hard to talk to him while he’s in class.”
“When will he be out?”
She finished making the bed. “He has a prep hour at one,” she said, hoping to save Isaac the embarrassment of having to react to the sudden appearance of his father in front of a room full of students.
“I guess I can wait a couple hours.”
Why not? Liz wanted to snap back. You’ve already waited years.
“Towels are in the bathroom,” she said. “There’s plenty of food in the kitchen.” At least she hoped there was. She’d been so busy with the new store that she hadn’t kept up with the shopping as well as she normally did.
“Thanks,” he said. “Do you have any plans for dinner?”
“I promised the kids we’d have pizza at the shop tonight. I’ll be working late.”
“When do you open?”
“I’m shooting for next weekend. Now that I have Carter, that might actually happen. He seems to know what he’s doing, even if I don’t.”
“Maybe I’ll stop by later and lend a hand.”
“Sure,” she said. “If you want.”
“Great.”
She stalled a moment longer. It was awkward, leaving her father alone in the house. Especially when she hadn’t seen him for more than a decade. But she had so much to do. She was beginning to feel extremely guilty for abandoning Carter while she ran around taking care of her personal problems.
“Okay, I’d better go,” she said.
He nodded. “I’ll see you this afternoon.”
He’d see her this afternoon…. He stated it so casually. For years she’d doubted they’d ever speak again. Yet suddenly he was staying with her. And the strange thing was, deep down she was happier about his presence than she’d ever dreamed she would be.
NOW THE CREAK OF HIS OWN footsteps was the only sound as Gordon Russell returned to the hall. Chloe’s picture drew him close, the one that used to grace his desk until he’d remarried.
Chloe had been a beautiful woman. Prettier than Luanna. More refined. But weaker, too.
He sighed, telling himself to turn away. He’d been driving for eighteen hours. He needed some sleep.
Yet he remained transfixed.
When he looked at his first wife, he felt so much. Pain. Loss. Betrayal. Regret. Admiration. He’d spent years trying to forget what he’d learned two weeks after she’d died. He flinched with the memory of it even now—and yet the truth resonated through every cell of his body. He believed it; he had believed from the beginning.
Was it time to tell the truth? To lay out all the secrets of the past?
He wasn’t sure. Especially because he doubted it would make a difference. Chloe was gone. She couldn’t do anything by way of atonement. He couldn’t even hear her side of the story.
“SO WHY DID YOU DO IT?” Carter asked above the song playing on a small, battery-powered radio that sat in the corner.
Liz kept her paintbrush moving. She knew what he was referring to, but she didn’t want to admit it. Except for the music on the radio, they’d been working together in silence for almost thirty minutes. She didn’t see why that pattern shouldn’t continue.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
The masking tape screeched as Carter ripped off a long strand. “Yes, you do.”
“I already told you. He’s my father. I couldn’t turn him away.”
He fixed tape to the windowsill to protect Liz’s white trim from the darker cranberry they were using on the walls. “You wanted to.”
That wasn’t entirely true. Liz was afraid to let down her guard. She didn’t need to be disappointed again. But she’d meant what she’d said to Isaac. She was thirty-two years old. If she wasn’t going to forgive Gordon now, when would she? When she was forty? Fifty? Never? What good would it do to carry a grudge?
“My mother’s death couldn’t have been easy on him, either,” she said.
He finished taping the window. “How long has it been since she passed?”
“They discovered her heart problems when I was thirteen. Then, she had a heart attack and died when I was fourteen.”
Most people said, “I’m sorry to hear that,” or offered some other words of condolence. Carter made no comment. At least for several seconds. Then he said, “I’d tend to think that would make you and your father draw closer.”
“No, he changed.” She remembered how quickly he’d withdrawn from her, how the love he’d always lavished on her had dried up like a shallow puddle beneath a burning sun. Because she was the family baby, she’d always secretly believed she might be his favorite. But it was Isaac who’d become his favorite after that. She’d often wondered if it was that she reminded him too much of Chloe.
“It was as if they both died,” she went on. “And then he married Luanna.” She toyed with the paint in her pan, watching rich-looking cranberry drip from her brush.
“You had an evil stepmother?”
Straightening her shoulders, she went back to work. “I did. But that happens to a lot of kids. So who am I to feel singled out?”
“Having a mean stepmother isn’t what makes you different,” Carter replied. She could hear him moving around as she continued to paint. “It’s the fact that your father hasn’t met your children that seems a bit odd to me.”
It seemed odd to her, too. How could Gordon have let her go so easily? Her own children meant the world to her. “Can we talk about something else?” she asked.
“Like what?” He moved his ladder to the wall with the window.
“I don’t know. You, I guess.”
He turned up the radio. But she wouldn’t let him put her off that easily.
“What was it like growing up in Brooklyn?” she asked.
“Not so bad.”
“You weren’t particularly poor?”
“I don’t have any sad stories about my childhood. My father was an electrician, but he owned his own business and did quite well. We were definitely middle class.”
“What did you do before you came here?”
When he pretended not to hear her, she lowered her arm to let the blood flow back into it, walked over and turned down the radio again. “I wouldn’t expect that to be a difficult question.”
His eyes flicked her way, the light-brown irises contrasting markedly with the darkness of his hair and the olive tone of his skin. “A little bit of everything.”
“So you didn’t have a specific profession?”
His roller began to squeak, as if he’d increased the pressure. “I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t name one.”
“No, I didn’t.”
Obviously he didn’t plan to, either.
She went back to painting a section of the wall she’d left half-finished, but curiosity got the better of her earlier reticence. “Does your family still live in Brooklyn?”
“No.”
“Where are they now?”
“I have a younger sister in upstate New York, on a dairy farm. My older sister married money and lives on a large estate in the Hamptons.”
“And your parents?”
“My mother recently sold her house and moved into a cottage on my sister’s estate.”
“Sounds very English,” she said. “Are your parents divorced, then?”
“My father died in a scuba-diving accident when he was sixty-four.”
Several drops of paint fell from Liz’s brush. She jerked back to avoid getting any on her clothes and in the process nearly fell off her ladder. “I’m sorry to hear that,” she said when she was sufficiently recovered. “How old were you when you lost him?”
With one eyebrow cocked, he’d watched her teeter. “If you ever have to make that decision again, choose the paint.”
“What?”
“When you’re weighing things in the balance. A drop of paint on your shorts or a broken arm. Choose the paint.”
She mad
e a face at him. “It was an instinctive reaction, okay?”
“That’s what worries me. Some people can’t seem to avoid getting hurt.”
“I’m not one of them.”
“I’m betting you are.”
She gaped at him. “You’re not always very nice, you know that?”
He seemed unconcerned about her accusation. “Because I’m telling you not to break your fool neck?”
“Call me sensitive, but I think it’s the ‘fool’ part I find objectionable.”
When he chuckled and didn’t say anything, she shook her head. His responses always ran opposite to what she expected, to what she’d get from any other guy. She thought they were arguing, when actually he was enjoying himself.
“Have you always had such a big chip on your shoulder?” she asked.
“Chip? What chip?”
From the amusement in his voice, he knew it existed, but she let it go and repeated her earlier question. “How old were you when your father died?”
“My father has nothing to do with the chip on my shoulder.”
“The one that doesn’t exist?”
“Exactly.”
“So you were older.”
“Twenty-one.” He gave her a pointed look. “Any chance you’d like to listen to the radio now?”
“Not yet.”
His ladder creaked as he shifted his weight, and she thought she heard him murmur something about Pandora’s box. But she didn’t care. He was the one who scorned meaningless small talk. That opened him up to almost any query. “Do you have children?”
No response.
“A little boy? Maybe a girl, as well?”
“Did I bring any children to town?” he asked.
“They could be with their mother.”
“You were certain, at the restaurant, that I’ve never been married.”
“Some men have children without ever marrying.”
“Not me.”
She considered his answer. “That’s admirable, at least.”
“Glad you approve.”
He didn’t give a damn whether she approved or not, and she knew it. “Why won’t you tell me what you did before returning to politics?”
No response.
“Are you being secretive on purpose?”
“What do you think?” he asked.
“I think so. Definitely. And that makes me ask why? Why are you so guarded about your past?”
His eyebrows gathered into a glower and he swiveled to face her. “Forget about it.”
She grinned at the strength of his accent as he uttered that classic Brooklyn pronouncement. “Perhaps you’re beginning to reconsider your low opinion of polite conversation,” she said sweetly.
He moved his ladder, to start another section of wall. “Not really.”
“Good. Because you’ve made a believer out of me.”
His gaze slid her way. “I’m happy to hear you’re experiencing some personal growth.”
“Thank you. I have a few more questions.”
“Ask what you want,” he said. “I can’t promise I’ll answer.”
He’d already proven the truth of that statement.
She eyed his dark hair and skin, the beard growth that already shadowed his jaw. “What’s the big secret?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“What happened between growing up in Brooklyn in a middle-class family and winding up in Dundee to run a campaign?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s a ten-to thirteen-year gap. Were you part of the mafia?”
She was teasing, of course, but he seemed to take the question at face value.
“No.”
“You could pass for Italian,” she said, still speculating.
“My mother’s Greek.”
“That would explain your coloring.” She addressed a section of the prepped wall where the masking tape was peeling away from the molding. “Okay…maybe you don’t have a past, at least one that you can talk about. Are you in the witness protection program?”
“Wrong again.”
“That was still a good guess.”
He balanced his tray on top of his ladder and descended. “Why don’t you tell me something?”
“What’s that?”
“Why would your ex-husband want to tear the sink from the wall?” he asked, bending to retrieve a jug of water he’d brought in from his truck an hour or so earlier.
She stepped back to admire their progress. “Because he doesn’t want me to succeed?”
He opened the spigot on his Thermos. “You don’t sound completely convinced.”
“I’m not. A friend of mine mentioned it, that’s all. He was guessing Keith wouldn’t want me to make it on my own because it’d diminish the odds of me taking him back.”
When he’d finished drinking, Carter set the Thermos back on the ground. “Your ex hopes to reconcile?”
“Now that Reenie’s off the market, he acts quite sincere about how much he loves me.”
He wiped his hands on his jeans, which hugged him in all the right places. “What’re the chances?”
“Not very good.”
A slow smile curved his lips. “Maybe you’re smarter than I thought.”
“That’s supposed to be a compliment?”
“Coming from me.” He climbed back onto his ladder.
The view of his washed-out denims was even better from behind. Since she didn’t really like Carter, since he wasn’t a threat to her, Liz let herself enjoy the view. “Keith isn’t the type to be vindictive.”
He turned and caught her admiring him. Recognition sparked in his eyes, making her believe he might call her on it. But he didn’t. “Who else might’ve had a motive?”
She quickly anchored her attention to the wall in front of her. For not liking him, he was having a strange effect on her. “Motive? You make it sound like there’s been a murder.”
“Okay, let me put it another way. Who’d want to set you back?”
“Keith thinks it’s Mary Thornton.”
“Who’s that?”
“She owns the shop next door. She pokes her head in almost every day, just to take note of my progress and secretly wish me bad luck.” Liz stretched her back, which was beginning to ache. “I’m sure you’ll meet her soon enough.”
His paint roller made a continuous warp, warp, warp sound. “Why would she vandalize your property?”
“It’s a long story.”
“I think we’ve got time.”
He was right. According to her watch, the kids wouldn’t be out of school for another two hours. Besides, she was suddenly far too aware of him and she needed a distraction. “Two months ago, just before Mary opened her shop, she intended to sell cards and gifts. She was very excited about her plans and told anyone who would listen exactly what the business would be like. Then word got out that I was going to open a chocolate shop, and Mary was so afraid I’d hit on something better that she started selling candy along with those cards and gifts, including a whole range of truffles and chocolates.”
“I can see where she might be unhappy about you copying her,” he said.
Liz’s jaw dropped, but a flash of straight white teeth told her Carter was joking.
Rolling her eyes, she slid her paintbrush carefully along the edge of the tape that protected the molding. As contrary as Carter could be, she was beginning to find him a little appealing. That smile…It was rare enough to make her feel as if the sun had just come out.
So he had a sort of dark allure, she told herself. Maybe she got that now. But it was like the beckoning call of craggy rocks at the bottom of a high cliff. A woman would have to be crazy to get involved with a man like him.
And yet she could almost understand the temptation….
“What is it?” he asked when he realized Liz was staring at him again.
“I was thinking.”
“About…”
“Have you ever heard
of that book, Men Who Hate Women and the Women Who Love Them?”
His expression revealed his doubts about this most recent shift in conversation. “No. But I can imagine what’s inside. What brings that up?”
She’d read it, wondering if she might find some key to understanding her father’s behavior. She’d decided the definition didn’t apply to her dad, but Carter seemed like a possible candidate. “I’m wondering if you’re the type.”
“To hate women?”
“Yes.”
He shook his head. “Let me save you the guesswork. I’m not.”
“You could be,” she mused, pursing her lips as she studied him. He was brooding, bitter. He didn’t go out of his way to attract female attention and he barely responded to a friendly word or gesture. He said and did exactly as he pleased, as if he longed to tell the whole world to go to hell—
“I don’t hate women,” he snapped, as if he could read her mind. “The rest of my family consists of three females.”
“Your mother and sisters don’t count,” she replied. “In any case, I just realized something else.”
“Do I want to hear it?” he asked with a scowl.
She told him, whether he did or not. “You weren’t coming on to me last night.”
He straightened, still on the first step of his ladder. “You thought I was?”
“I thought perhaps you were hoping to get lucky. But now that I know you better, I can see you weren’t really interested.”
She could tell he didn’t quite know how to take her frank appraisal of the situation. “I’m not sure I’d go that far,” he admitted.
A strange sort of energy hummed in the room. Liz could feel it. Whether she wanted to acknowledge it was another story entirely. “You didn’t even try to make me like you.”
No response. She imagined he was tired of the conversation, but when she turned, she discovered him looking at her legs. “I would’ve taken you home, had you asked nicely,” he said.
“Asked?” she scoffed. But she couldn’t deny that the tension level in the room had just edged up another notch.
He produced a crooked grin. “I’m not opposed to providing a lonely divorcée with a little pleasure.”
Now it was getting very warm, and Liz’s heart was beginning to hammer against her chest. “Who says I’m lonely?” she asked, trying to appear nonchalant as she stripped off her sweatshirt.
