Why had he offered to help at all? He knew better than to open Frank and himself up to the world.
What if George Lowen had them investigated?
The thought stopped him cold.
And what if he did? Ramsey Miller couldn’t find anything to prove that Frank was guilty of wrongdoing. All of the cops before him hadn’t found proof.
He and Frank had been living in the past for too long. Frank’s reputation was no longer as important as it once was.
Cal had built his own reputation. He had a good job. He could support the both of them. He wasn’t going to let his own paranoia and fear of George Lowen keep him from being Morgan’s friend. He wasn’t going to desert her in her moment of need.
And he wasn’t going to keep running scared for Frank’s sake. Feeding his father’s fears. He’d just have to make sure his father remained unaware of any queries. That shouldn’t be too difficult, since no one knew how to reach Frank directly unless they waited for him outside the Alzheimer’s unit. Net fixed, Cal grabbed the box containing a new basketball and went into the house to seek out his old man.
“I did what you said, Dad, and talked to that girl. Morgan.”
“How’s her son?”
“There’s some backlash. I’m bringing them over here to spend a little time with us this morning,” he said, extracting the basketball from its packaging.
“Fine.”
“You going to be around?”
“Aren’t I always?”
“I mean, will you come out of your damn room and be a part of this?”
“If you want me to, fine.”
Dressed in jeans and a T-shirt with a big orange T, for University of Tennessee Basketball, emblazoned across the front and new sneakers on his feet, Cal stood in the doorway of his father’s room and stared.
“Really?”
It was that easy?
Just bring someone over and his father would join the world of the living?
“The girl obviously means something to you, Cal.”
“She’s a student.”
“You’ve never visited a student at home before.”
“Her son was missing. It reminded me of…you know what it reminded me of.”
“At first, that’s why you went. It’s not why you stayed.”
“I’m seeing someone, Dad. I told you that. I was there Thursday night, remember? Her name’s Kelsey. She’s an art professor and I like her a lot.”
“Sure you do. Just like you like all the others.”
“Yeah, so? What’s your point?”
“I have no point to make, son. You started this.”
Sometimes his father really pissed him off. Tossing the new basketball into Frank’s room, he walked out.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
MORGAN FOLLOWED Cal to his place, driving Sammie. She’d agreed to his request to meet Sammie on Sammie’s turf, thinking the boy would be more comfortable with that. And Cal had said his place was kind of hard to find. But at the same time, she wanted to be free to keep her promise to Sammie and leave the second he said he was ready to go.
Or, if she got really lucky, to be able to slip out to the grocery alone while her son spent time with Cal and his father.
For the first ten minutes of the drive, her son had been engrossed in the handheld gaming device his grandmother had given him. Morgan was trying to decide if she was going to let him take it into Cal’s house or not. On the one hand, she didn’t want to incite an argument with Sammie by forcing him to leave the game in the car. On the other hand, she didn’t want her son wasting two grown men’s time by sitting in their home and ignoring them while he shot at martians.
Putting the unresolved issue aside for a moment, she wondered what Cal had thought of her son. Their meeting replayed itself in her mind. Her answering the door. Calling out to Sammie, who showed up dressed in respectable cotton shorts, a tank top she’d picked up for two dollars at a discount store and the basketball shoes with the hole in the toe. Cal looking her straight in the eye for a second, like he was as glad to see her as she was to see him, then turning his focus on Sammie and saying hello.
Sammie had answered back, politely enough. And then they’d split up into the two cars to make the trek out to Cal’s place.
It had been completely uneventful. But she was obsessing about it anyway.
Had the UT basketball shirt he’d had on been for Sammie’s benefit?
Could he tell she was sexually attracted to him?
Where in the hell had that thought come from?
Morgan glanced at her son. “Thanks for doing this, Sammie.”
“Whatever.” It’s not like I had a lot of choice, her son’s tone seemed to say.
“What did you think of Professor Whittier?”
“He says hello nice.” Sammie’s voice dripped with sarcasm.
Morgan took a deep breath. She loved her son more than life. If she had to go through pain and stress while raising him, then so be it. He was worth anything she might have to endure. Anything.
Cal’s house was set back in some woods, down a curving driveway. The brick house was quite a bit larger than her duplex, but still not huge. The bungalow was well kept and had a newish-looking roof.
“New ropes,” Sammie said. Following her son’s gaze up to the garage roof line, Morgan saw the old rusty hoop hung with a fresh white basket and couldn’t speak.
Not that she needed to. Her son had already opened the passenger’s side door and was climbing out. It was only when the door slammed shut behind him that she saw the gaming device resting abandoned on his seat.
* * *
YOU’D THINK A MAN who made his living by teaching others would learn from his own lessons. Especially when he’d learned his lessons the hard way as Cal had.
You didn’t bring anyone into your home. You didn’t let anyone that close.
It was too personal.
It opened your life up to more than just casual curiosity and questions.
Morgan looked out of place sitting at the hand-carved wooden table Frank had bought from an Amish family fifteen years before. That, the file cabinet and the recliner in Frank’s bedroom were the only pieces of furniture that had moved with them every place they went.
The intricate carvings on the table depicted a family, and each of the four chairs had the likeness of a mother, father, sister or brother on the wooden back.
Morgan perched on the edge of the mother chair at one end of the table. She looked ready to take flight.
“Where’s your television?” Sammie asked, standing under the archway between the living room and kitchen.
“Over there.” Cal pointed to a small flat screen mounted on the back wall across from the couch. “The big screen is in Frank’s room.”
Sammie looked at the old man who sat in the father chair. In the ten minutes the Lowens had been there, Frank had slowly scooted his chair away from the table and into the far corner of the room. He hadn’t said a word since his initial hello.
Cal had taken a chance bringing Sammie here. He’d known that. His father hadn’t had one-on-one contact with a child other than Cal since they’d left Comfort Cove twenty-five years ago. Certainly not in their home.
He’d wanted no suspicion whatsoever that he had a thing for kids.
Sammie returned from an inspection of the television, looking around some more before stopping about six feet in front of Frank.
“You watch a lot of TV at night?” Sammie asked.
“Yes.” That was it. No smile. Frank didn’t even look Sammie in the eye. This from a man who had once been known for his charisma with kids.
Nodding, Sammie continued with his exploration of their small space.
“You guys don’t have much stuff out,” Sammie declared next. “No pictures or stuff on the walls.”
Sitting up straight, Morgan said, “Sammie, that’s not polite.” She glanced at Cal. “I apologize. Now where are those curtains you wanted me to take a look at?”
“Those are the ones over there.” He pointed to the window over the kitchen sink, and to a bay window farther down the wall. Morgan went over to look. She noted the type of rod, asked for a measuring tape and talked about finding something in yellow to brighten up the room. Then she offered to pick them up for him.
Silence fell on the room again. Cal felt like a tongue-tied schoolkid who’d invited the popular kids to a party that was a total flop. What about Morgan Lowen had prompted him to break his and his father’s rules? Why had he suddenly opened up their lives to someone after twenty-five years of living in relative seclusion?
And then he remembered…
Retrieving a shopping bag from the closet, he held it out to the boy. “Sammie, this is for you,” he said.
Sammie got up from the floor in front of the bookcase where he’d been perusing their collection of DVDs, came over and took the sack. Holding the handles open he glanced inside.
“Cool! No way! Look, Mom!” He pulled out the shoebox the salesclerk at the sports store had placed in the bag the day before. “They’re even the right size.”
The boy’s grin made every awkward second of the past half hour worth the agony.
And then Cal looked at Sammie’s mom. She wasn’t smiling.
“I got his shoe size from the description on the Amber Alert.”
Sammie stilled, dropping the lid of the shoebox to the floor, but not touching the name brand basketball shoes inside. “I can have them, can’t I, Mom?”
Frank stood, his six-foot frame appearing increasingly diminished each day as his weighted shoulders slumped more and more. “If you’ll excuse me…”
Frank left the room. Cal heard the bathroom door click quietly closed a minute later. Cal wanted to go after him. His dad was acting more strangely than usual.
He shouldn’t have pushed this.
“Mom? Can I have the shoes?”
“I can’t afford them, Sammie.” Morgan’s words were softly spoken.
“Uh, I thought maybe Sammie could work them off,” Cal said. “We’ve been overrun with weeds this summer and I could sure use some help digging them all up.”
“Can I, Mom? Please?”
Morgan glanced at Cal, and the look in her eye, promising a long talk as soon as they were alone, gave him a weird thrill inside. But when she told her son he could keep the shoes if he worked them off, Cal allowed himself to be distracted by the boy’s enthusiasm as he dug into the box.
“You going to stick around forever, Mom?” Sammie asked as he carefully laced up his new shoes.
Morgan glanced at Cal. He wasn’t sure what to do. Or say.
“You said you wanted me to have some man time, Mom. We can’t very well do that with you sitting there.”
“Sammie, please be more careful with your word choices.”
“Sorry.” Sammie’s big brown eyes lowered for a second and then, with a curious glint in them, he glanced over at Cal. “Did you ask my mom to bring me here?”
“Yes.”
“Because of her? Am I an excuse for you to spend time with her? I mean, the shoes are cool and all, and I’ll still work them off, but if this is just so you can get closer to her I’d like to know.”
He could see why Morgan had challenges with this kid. But he liked him. “No, this isn’t so I can spend more time with your mom.”
“You swear?” The kid’s gaze hadn’t wavered.
“Yes.”
His father’s bedroom door closed.
Morgan looked at Cal. And then down the hall where Frank had disappeared. “What would you like me to do?”
“How about you give us an hour?” he said to Morgan. “We can shoot some hoops and maybe get some ice cream.” He’d get the kid out of the house, out of his father’s space. He could deal with his father later. Cal pulled some bills out of his pocket. “Maybe you could pick up some curtains while you’re out?”
Morgan stood, nodding, but didn’t smile as she took his money. “Okay. Call me if you need anything… .”
“Sammie, why don’t you grab the ball over there and head out to warm up the hoop?”
With a serious face, Sammie nodded, looking from Cal to Morgan. “You’re coming out, too, aren’t you?” he asked Cal.
“Yes. I’ll be right out.”
With a glance toward the hall leading to the bedrooms, Sammie walked out the door.
“I’m really sorry about the shoes,” Cal said the second the door shut behind Sammie.
“You should have asked me first.”
“I figured if I did you’d just say no.”
“So you manipulated me instead?” She didn’t sound mad. Just bewildered.
“I guess I did.” He looked right at her. “But not purposely. I remembered what you said about his shoes with the hole in the toe…”
“…to the point of remembering his correct shoe size,” she added, her gaze soft and warm even when she was upset.
“I thought they’d be a good ice breaker with Dad and Sammie.”
“It was nice of you,” she said, and then asked softly, “What’s up with your father? Is he angry that we’re here?”
“No. He’s just not used to being around people. Not anymore.”
“You said he has a job.”
“On an Alzheimer’s unit, cleaning floors and fixing things that break, not working with the patients. Or even the staff, really.”
Frank hadn’t been around kids since Cal had grown out of being one. And Cal was giving away too much. The more he answered, the more questions she’d have. He had to stop this.
“Will he be okay?”
“He’ll be fine,” Cal assured himself as much as her. Today’s episode had been just one more failed attempt to bring his father out of himself and back into the living world.
Not that he blamed Frank. He thought of Ramsey. Of the suspicions that had followed them for twenty-five years. They weren’t ever going away.
Which meant that his father would never be free.
* * *
MORGAN BOUGHT THE CURTAINS right away. She wanted to be able to get back, just in case she received a call that there was a problem.
She wasn’t sure about his father. The man was more than just depressed. He was removed from the world.
He’d kind of given her the creeps. To the point that she’d considered not leaving Sammie, after all. But she trusted Cal.
And her son needed male companionship now. Before their court date in nine days. Stating that she’d applied to a mentoring program wasn’t going to be good enough.
Not when she was up against her father.
Instead of going grocery shopping next, Morgan drove to the state park that was only a few miles from Cal’s place. Pulling into a lot that overlooked the lake, she turned on the MP3 player hooked up to the car’s stereo system, chose her country music playlist and turned up the vol
ume. She lay back in the driver’s seat to indulge herself for the last private half hour she’d have this weekend.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
SAMMIE TOOK THE BALL in and shot at the net. The leather spun off his little fingertips and swooshed through the hoop.
“Good one,” Cal said, rebounding and taking the ball out for a three pointer.
He made the basket.
“You ever play on a team?” Sammie asked, going in for his next attempt. He performed a mock hook shot layup by jumping, launching the ball with one hand and using the backboard to propel the ball where his height couldn’t take it.
“No,” Cal answered, grabbing the ball as it came through the net. “My dad’s the real basketball player around here. He used to coach.”
“You’re pretty good.”
“We spent a lot of time playing one-on-one, or Around the World, when I was a kid,” he said. “But I didn’t play sports in school.” He hadn’t been at any one school long enough to make a team. Nor had he been able to take a chance that any newspaper clippings regarding local games might somehow trigger something for someone in connection to what happened in Comfort Cove, Massachusetts.
The boy double-dribbled and made another shot.
“Why don’t you like my mom?”
Cal missed his answering lob. “What?”
“Don’t you think she’s pretty?”
“Of course!”
“She’s worth a lot of money, someday, you know.”
What was this? Was the kid selling his mother? Was it something he did a lot?
“I would hope no one likes her just because of that.” He stole the ball from the boy and took it downcourt. Shot. Missed.
“Sure they do.” Sammie rebounded, but tossed the ball back to Cal for another try. “That’s why she doesn’t date.”
Holding the ball midair, Cal stared at the boy. “She told you that?”
“No, Grandma did. And she didn’t really tell me. I heard her telling Grandpa.”
It took a lot of willpower to keep Cal from asking what the older man had said. Because it would be wrong to use the kid that way.
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