Inclusions

by Emily Duvall

  “You shouldn’t have made a deal with Luke.”

  “What did you think I would do after you begged me to help you? I don’t think it’s fair for you to be angry with me. Why didn’t you tell me about the tourmalines?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Yes. You do. The same tourmalines that went missing from Luke’s apartment the night the two of you got in a fight. Luke wants them back. He’s so convinced you have them that he hired me, his ex-girlfriend and sister to a felon, to work with his daughter. Why would he do that?”

  “He’s desperate.”

  “He’s also smart. Tell me what you know. I need something, Mark. You have to let me in on this and help me or I cannot help you.”

  “When Luke and I worked together, you remember our cramped office. We heard each other’s conversations. I knew he’d gotten something from Brent, but I didn’t know what and I didn’t ask. I thought since we were partners he would have shared in his find. He didn’t.”

  “You just dropped the subject?”

  “Jesus, you’re falling for him. Aren’t you? Let me remind you that Luke doesn’t forgive. Don’t kid yourself in thinking he’s falling for you. He’s trying to get his way. Aren’t you tired of him always getting his own way? The tourmalines are irrelevant. They are probably in some obscure hiding spot. Maybe right under your nose.”

  She grew suspect. “How do you know all this?”

  “I have a lot of time to read. Don’t focus on me. Use your brain. I’m willing to bet the tourmalines magically appear and he won’t uphold his end of the bargain. You better start to think of a plan-b.”

  Melanie bit her lower lip. She didn’t know what to think. “Did you take them?” she asked him again.

  “Come on, Melanie. You’re talking to me.”

  “I need to know before I stay one minute longer. I gave up a lot to help you. I don’t want all of this to be for nothing.”

  “When I worked with Luke, I didn’t do any of the treatment processes or actual cutting of the stones. I wouldn’t know how to sell them in their natural form. I wouldn’t be able to do much except pawn those tourmalines off as a bunch of rocks to the right dealer.”

  Melanie heard a burst of laughter down stairs. “I have to go.”

  “I appreciate all you’re doing to help me. Be careful.”

  “Good-bye, Mark.”

  Melanie sat on her bed and felt worse than before the phone call, like her arms were stretched in opposite directions. She didn’t know whether to believe Mark or Luke. She glanced around the room. The tourmalines could be anywhere. Perhaps, right under her nose as Mark had suggested.

  The first time she’d met Luke, he’d come over to her house. She’d answered the door, surprised at the sight of him. He’d knocked the breath right out of her with his good looks. She’d been eighteen and ready to leave for college and had never met a guy with such transparent strength to the point of a being a repellant, a shield, a natural protectiveness about his life that he wouldn’t share with anyone. Even then she’d seen the standoffishness and the drive. He wasn’t like anyone else and she hadn’t wanted there to be anyone else.

  They didn’t go on their first date until three years later. Melanie had been home from college and Luke had been at her house, waiting for Mark to arrive. He’d asked about school, as he always did. They were standing in the kitchen and she told him about a date she’d go on later that night. He crossed the kitchen, backed her up against the sink, and kissed her in way she’d not been kissed before. It was all-consuming. The kind that makes your stomach flip and shoot pleasure down your legs. The kind that erases everything else from the background.

  Melanie saw him romantically for a full year after thinking she would soon walk down the aisle and into his arms. There’s no way she could have predicted how quickly everything would change. The phone call her mother made on an ordinary Friday morning telling Melanie to come home. The detectives came next and brought their questions. The lawyers soon followed and invaded their lives. Luke had accused Mark of attempted murder and she’d heard the news second-hand. Then he broke up with her before ever facing her and looking her in the eye. She could have known the truth…if he’d just looked her in the eye. Time had robbed her of knowing the truth.

  Dressed and hungry, Melanie went down the stairs to the kitchen. Latonya wasn’t in the kitchen though her culinary footprints remained in the form of a mini-breakfast bar of scrambled eggs still steaming, bacon, and a plate of various toasts and pastries. Not even the buttery English muffin and sidekick of coffee improved her mood. There was work to be done and Melanie went straight to the playroom to find Stevie and Vivian and try to spend a full minute in the present.

  “Hi, Vivian,” Melanie said, entering the playroom. She took a seat next to Vivian. Vivian looked up with unfocused eyes. Melanie snapped her fingers and pointed to her own eyes. “Right here.” Vivian’s gaze focused at Melanie’s eyes. “Hi.”

  Vivian broke attention for a second, curious at the big bag. The bag’s zipper snagged halfway through opening. The zipper enchanted Vivian. She scooted over to the bag and put her hand around the tiny object.

  “Z-z-z, zipper,” Melanie commented, not one to miss out on a verbal application. She opened the bag, took out the binder, and flipped through to halfway. “Does Vivian often have trouble transitioning between activities?” The document she looked for hid behind an Articulating Screening questionnaire, a document used to test if a child needed further assessment with regards to oral and phonological development.

  “She’s two; she gets upset at everything.” Stevie frowned and cleared her throat. “She reminds me of her mother when she doesn’t get her way.” She snatched the document from Melanie and took a look at the paper.

  “These are letters.”

  “I’m familiar with the alphabet.”

  Melanie tapped the paper. “These are the letter sounds we’re going to work with Vivian on making first. B, p, m, and w are important for speech development. They are easy to learn. All sounds are good of course. The goal is to saturate her with language and sounds. Part of learning speech is imitating sounds and from what I’ve seen, there’s not a lot of purposeful interaction with Vivian. I see grown-ups talking around her, over her, and she’s hearing a muddle of words attached to complex sentences. The vowels and consonants aren’t broken down. It’s too high-level. All the words are going over her head. We need to bring our speech down to Vivian’s level. Break down the letters and sounds for her.”

  Stevie turned the paper over and perused the back side. “You also wrote down d, n, and t.”

  “Those letters are good to work on as well. I’ve already heard her make the d sound. The point is also to get her to understand da-da is her daddy, I’m not sure if she understands and there’s a difference.”

  “Vivian knows her father.”

  “Does she?” Warily, Melanie glanced at the open door. “I understand Luke travels quite a bit.”

  “There’s less travel now than he used to do. You don’t know our family dynamics. Luke adores Vivian.”

  “From a distance,” Melanie added.

  Stevie paused and contemplated what Melanie had said. “I won’t disagree with you.”

  “The question is why?”

  “You’ll have to ask him yourself.”

  “I was afraid you’d say that.” Melanie smiled weakly at Vivian. She sensed Stevie knew a lot more about Luke than she’d realized before and every part of Melanie wanted to push Stevie for answers. She couldn’t push though. The phone call from Mark reminded Melanie to keep a distance and distance meant no prying, no caring, no doing anything other than solving the mystery of the tourmalines before Luke could and not give her the letter of support. “Make eye contact with Vivian when you speak with her or ask something of her. Try not to anticipate her needs. If she wants a ball, you make the b sound, say the word, and point to the object. Make her work for it. Let her make
the sound. Force her to use her own words.”

  “Do you want me to stay during your session?” Stevie said.

  This surprised Melanie. “I think Vivian would benefit.”

  “Alright, get started.”

  “Time to play.” She made the sign for “play” and began the session by using the book close to Vivian’s foot. Melanie pointed to a picture of a baby. “B is for baby, ba-ba-ba-by.”

  Uninterested in the sounds, Vivian tried to open the slider and couldn’t thanks to Melanie’s firm hand in the way. Vivian wiggled and grunted in response and tried to move Melanie’s hand away. She blew up in a string of wails and threw herself on the floor.

  Stevie picked her up and held her in her lap. “Listen to Melanie.”

  Melanie waited until Vivian calmed down. “Ba-ba-ba. Your turn.”

  Frustrated, Vivian used more force to push away Melanie’s hand. The task Melanie repeated five times until Vivian made the sound. Stevie took a deep breath. “She’s never done that with me.”

  “She will.” Melanie took out her binder and pulled out the PLS-5 and began where she’d last left off. The question she started with gave Vivian a chance to identify basic body parts using a doll. “Show me the nose.”

  Vivian stared at Melanie.

  “Point to the doll’s ear.” Melanie recorded a zero and continued on with, “Point to the doll’s hand.” She went through each item on her list and went to the next category which included identifying things a person will wear. “Point to my shoes…point to my shirt…show me socks…” Melanie finished out the category and gave her another score.

  They moved onto other tasks with Stevie fully on board for the first time. “I think we’re going to try something new.”

  The blue plastic cup from the play kitchen would work well and Melanie got out one of her red blocks. She retrieved a bag of Cheerios from her bag and put one in the cup to see if Vivian could dump out the Cheerio by turning it over. Vivian smacked the cup away.

  “Tell me there’s a point to this,” Stevie said.

  “There’s always a point,” Melanie said and tried the trick again.

  Vivian flailed, thrashed her legs, and inadvertently, knocked over the cup again.

  The session ended close to lunch time and Melanie helped Stevie clean up the toys and the books before they headed for the kitchen.

  Activity overflowed in an unusually quiet and well-managed ship of a kitchen by Latonya. Bowls of cream-of-something-wonderful soup sat on the counter, with a little wildflower placed lovingly on each plate, along with a soup spoon and napkin. The pans on the stove bubbled with what sounded like water. Fresh greens, tomatoes, and red onions garnished the countertop. Melanie reached out to touch the plate holding the soup bowl.

  “Don’t touch,” Latonya said. “Mr. Harrison and his guest are dining outside in a few moments. I have lunch for Vivian over here and you’re on your own. There’s sandwich bread in the pantry and cold cuts in the refrigerator. Help yourself and make it yourself.”

  The soup smelled divine, like cream, butter, and leeks. A dry turkey sandwich would have to do and she said unhappily, “I’ll put Vivian in the high chair.”

  A movement at the far end of the kitchen caught Melanie’s attention and she saw Luke pacing outside and talking on the phone. Tanned and rugged, he took over the room with the sheer force of his handsome face and muscled body. Melanie gulped and stood there speechless. Damn, he looked good. It wasn’t fair.

  “Who are his guests?” Melanie asked, not daring to raise her voice too high and be heard. Thankfully, the stone columns made the separation from the inside to the outside much better than the main room.

  “Well, there’s Brent, and then some of Luke’s friends.”

  Melanie kept her gaze on the buckle of Vivian’s chair. A violent thwack of Vivian’s foot hit Melanie in the thigh. She shook out her finger and tugged at Vivian’s strap until she settled in securely. The steaming pan of mac-and-cheese on the burner made its way over to Vivian’s bowl thanks to Latonya.

  Melanie blew off the steam before offering the plate to Vivian. The time Luke spent in the background talking on his phone or speaking to Latonya irritated Melanie. Stevie should have returned by now, which only boosted Melanie’s impatience to get away from him. Melanie leaned her head to her hand, while Vivian kept playing with her food. She’d never wanted an apology from him more than any other time.

  “Hello,” Luke said, suddenly behind her. “I hope you’ve recovered from the trip.”

  The warmth of his presence radiated over her, making her anger and confusion towards him dissipate with frightening ease. The slump of her shoulders straightened out and she commented nonchalantly, “If one can get over a gun being pointed at one’s head, then no, I’m not recovered.”

  He shrugged. The cavalier attitude got under Melanie’s skin. Blood simmered beneath the surface. She glanced up at Latonya, doing her best to mind her own business and not doing a very good job. Melanie couldn’t put the subject to rest. “I would have thought someone capable of letting another human die right in front of them would have had something more prophetic to say, like an apology.”

  He shrugged, done with the topic. “I’ve been in situations like the one with Sedra before. It’s all one big bluffing game. A negotiation, if you will. We hadn’t even gotten to the part where I would have offered Sedra more money when you up and dropped the rock.”

  “You gambled with my life.” She scooped up the cheesy noodles and offered them to Vivian. Vivian smacked the spoon away.

  An intimate chuckle escaped his mouth. “Don’t pretend you didn’t get a little satisfaction in letting Sedra take back the rock.”

  Melanie’s gaze widened. The aloof attitude, his growing agitation towards her made sense now and she wanted to slap him across the face. “You think I let the garnet go on purpose?”

  “Did you?”

  Melanie slowly rose up to her feet. The chill in his eyes clashed with the fire in hers. The indifference on his face drove her mad. She dropped the spoon. “You should have your lawyer to tell me this. That’s how you communicate your insults to me.”

  The comment stumbled Luke’s response. “What do you mean?”

  Cognoscente of Vivian, she lowered her voice and carried her rage through a whisper. “I’ve waited years to tell you what a jerk you were for sending your lawyer. You owed me an explanation and you were too chicken to come tell me you didn’t want to be with me. Your accusations of me giving up the garnet on purpose is seven years ago all over again. You have no idea how your cruelty affects me and how hurtful you can be.”

  Luke’s hand slammed on the table. They stared at each other eye-to-eye. “What did you expect me to do? Your brother had tried to kill me.”

  “And you would have let me die out there in the desert. What’s the difference?” Melanie shook her head. “You invited me on your trip, and then when it didn’t work out your way, you blamed me. Now you accuse me of losing the garnet on purpose. You put your precious blue garnet above my own life. Congrats, Luke, because every time I get too close you; every time I think we’re good, you find some way to push back. Well, congratulations, you’ve achieved your goal. Go. Be alone and miserable. Live your life in that cold shell you’ve created for yourself. I’m leaving at the end of the summer and I will never see you again.”

  She walked out of the room and didn’t look back. Not surprisingly, Luke didn’t follow. She closed the door of her bedroom and fell into the pillow. The bedspread felt cool on her skin and she rolled onto her side. The people in the house moved and talked below—someone dropped a pot in the kitchen. The conversation with Luke swam around her. She turned over on her back, stared up the ceiling. The time had come to put him behind her in a way she never had before: totally, completely, inside and out. They could have no future together. Not when he’d find ways to push her away. She couldn’t spend her life waiting to find out if the next morning he would wake up and go away
. It’s what he did. It’s why he chose gem-hunting as a career whether he would admit this or not. He’d picked a job that gave him an out-clause, the second he needed a break. From this moment forward, she would get down to the business of finding those tourmalines; assist her brother with getting out of prison, and get on with her life.

  Chapter 16

  The intimate dinner party took place later in the evening. The guest list consisted of friends of Luke’s, along with Goldie and her two daughters. The laughter and noise of the party injected life into the house. Melanie hung out with Vivian in the playroom using her job as an excuse to keep busy.

  “Dinner is going to be served,” Kendra said and peered into the playroom, “and time for you to come out of hiding.”

  “I’m not hiding,” Melanie retorted and continued putting books back on the shelf. “I’m busy.”

  “Hiding from Luke after a fight is the worst thing you can do.” She put her hand on her hip and smiled. “Don’t let him think you’re weak now.”

  “I don’t recall asking for your advice.” She wedged a book in the last possible space.

  “All I know is with you around, Luke has been in the worst mood of his life. He must care for you.”

  “Luke only cares about himself.” Melanie paused and glanced at Vivian. “I shouldn’t have said that in front of you.” She would be more careful in the future. Kendra and Luke played on the same team. Melanie didn’t want her words in the mix of their conversations.

  “I think you’re wrong.” Kendra straightened and held out her hand to Vivian. “I think you get to him in a way nobody else can. In any case, I came to tell you Kari and Alyssa have arrived. Dinner is ready and Stevie needs your help with the children.”

  The unusually pale color on Kendra’s face led Melanie to ask, “Are you feeling okay?”

  “I can’t shake this bug. Whatever I eat doesn’t agree with me.”

  Melanie actually thought Kendra looked beyond sick. She looked terrible. “You make standing look painful.”