by Lili Valente
I shrug. “It doesn’t matter. If Aoife sees that what she’s doing is selfish, great. If not, I’ll hire the best lawyer money can buy, and you’ll crush her in court. And I’ll start looking into her story this morning, see if I can find anything we can use to blackmail her into going away. No matter what we have to do, we’ll take care of it. Emmie is staying with you. Where she belongs.”
Caitlin looks comforted, but I’m glad when she hides behind the door and hands out my shirt, and I’m spared looking into her eyes. I want her to get her rest, but I’m not sure everything is going to be okay. The more I think about what Bea said, the more I worry that whatever my parents had against me is something no amount of muscle or money or quick thinking it going to be able to make go away.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Caitlin
“Earth’s crammed with heaven…
But only he who sees takes off his shoes.”
-Elizabeth Barrett Browning
You never forget your first funeral.
Mine was for Great Uncle Tom, who had a heart attack in his peach orchard while checking to see how his new stinkbug poison was performing. He was dead almost two days before Great Aunt Maryanne finally went looking for him. She found him curled up next to his John Deere, bloated in the mid-summer heat, and attracting flies.
The body was in terrible shape, but Maryanne insisted on an open casket. I heard the funeral home director tried to talk her out of it, but Maryanne was a stubborn cuss—the only reason she was able to stay married to a cranky bastard like Uncle Tom for fifty-eight years. She insisted on an open casket, and on Tom being squeezed into the good Sunday suit he hadn’t worn since the day a decade previous when he’d told Maryanne he was too old to waste a perfectly good Sunday bruising his ass on a church pew.
The funeral was held in a tiny country church out a long dirt road, somewhere close to Uncle Tom and Aunt Mary’s farm, though I can’t remember seeing it before, or since. But I remember stepping through the door, into the stifling heat of a one-room wood plank building with no air conditioning.
I remember holding Aoife’s hand so tight the sweat building between our palms dripped onto the dusty floor, and the gray, lumpish face of Uncle Tom peeking up above the top of the casket, looking like something out of a horror movie. I remember the way his chin seemed to be sliding back into his neck, and how terrified I was that his mouth was going to open up and something was going to come flying out. Daddy had said something to Mama in the car about flies laying eggs in dead bodies. I was in the backseat with all the windows rolled down, and wasn’t meant to hear, but I did.
I had nightmares for weeks after Uncle Tom’s funeral. I’d wake up shaking and sweating, feeling like something horrible was crawling up my throat and roll over and hug Aoife so tight she’d wake up groaning. But she never yelled at me. She would simply hug me, sweep my damp hair from my forehead, and tell me it was only a dream until I relaxed enough to go back to sleep.
Once upon a time, Aoife was my rock. I loved her like a mother, a sister, and a best friend all wrapped up together, but that was a long time ago.
Right now, watching her settle into a pew at the front of the church next to Veronica, Veronica’s two daughters, and all the Cooney cousins and second cousins, all I feel is angry and afraid. I wish she’d stayed in Florida. I wish I’d never been forced to see her face again, or realize I mean so little to the woman I once considered the most beautiful, perfect, necessary person in the world.
Aoife is here for Emmie, not to mend fences with me. The fact that I rearranged my entire life and have worked, suffered, and sacrificed to pick up the slack when Aoife left means nothing to her. I mean nothing to her. I am just another person who has outlived my usefulness, and must now be cast aside. It’s the way Aoife works. She’s a lot like Dad that way, but this time I refuse to make discarding people easy for her. She’s going to look this ugly thing she’s doing in the face, and see how much damage she’s preparing to inflict.
I stay at the back of the church during the service, the navy straw hat Gabe bought to match my navy sheath pinned into my upswept hair, my veil pulled over my face, and my eyes on the hands folded in my lap. I haven’t seen any sign of the Alexanders—Gabe said his dad was at work and his mom was consulting for new interior design clients at the country club—but I figure it’s better to be safe than sorry. I keep a low profile, and when the service is over and Chuck’s body is being carried out, I circle around the other side of the church, intercepting Aoife before she can start for the parking lot, where two limos are waiting to take family members on to the graveside service.
“Can I talk to you?” I ask softly, stepping out from between the pews to block her path.
She sniffs and wipes tears from beneath her eyes. “I don’t think we should. My lawyer says I shouldn’t speak to you until everything is settled.” She looks almost as tired as I feel, and for the first time I wonder if maybe this isn’t as easy for her as I’d assumed.
Maybe, deep down, she knows trying to take Emmie away is wrong. Maybe if I can get her alone, and say the right things, this can all go away.
“Please, Aoife,” I beg, ignoring the hard look Veronica shoots my way as she moves up the aisle to hover near my sister’s elbow. “We’re sisters. Let’s talk this out, okay? I don’t want to fight with you.”
“Then you need to give the girl her baby back,” Veronica says, in a hard voice I haven’t heard from her before. “She’s Emmie’s mama. That’s her kid, Caitlin, not yours.”
I’m tempted to snap that Emmie isn’t a possession, but if anyone is going to lay claim to my niece, it’s me. I’m the one who has loved her, paid for her, and cared about her for nearly four years, not Aoife. But that would be a waste of breath. Veronica’s opinion doesn’t matter, and picking a fight in church isn’t part of my agenda.
Brawling at a funeral would be too typically Cooney, and I’ve always tried to rise above my family’s reputation, not lie down and wallow in it.
“Please,” I ask again, holding my sister’s tired eyes. “Just give me two minutes in private. That’s all I’m asking.”
I see Aoife wavering, but before she speaks, Veronica loops her arm through my sister’s and proceeds to voice her full twelve cents on the matter.
“This girl has been to hell and back, and turned her life around. Do you know how hard that is?” She props a fist on her full hips, blocking the path of the two older men trying to move around her, making sure we have an audience. “You should be proud of her, and doing whatever you can to support her, not trying to tear her down and take her baby away.”
I literally have to bite my tongue to hold back my response to that. I bite it hard enough to break the skin and send the bitter, salty taste of blood rushing through my mouth.
“It’s okay, V. But thank you, I appreciate it,” Aoife says, already more cozy with our father’s ex-girlfriend in two days, than I am after years of acquaintance.
But Aoife has always been good at making allies when she needs them. Back in seventh grade, she enlisted her own team of bodyguards from the girls’ track team, all with nothing more than a sob story about another group of girls threatening to beat her up after school, a delicate smile, and a few free manicures during lunch.
“We can talk,” Aoife says, turning back to me. “But I only have a few minutes. I’m going with Veronica in her limo.”
“You can ride with us, too, Caitlin,” Veronica says, moving up the aisle, allowing the people she’s trapped to move past her on the other side. “I’m not the kind to push someone out of the family because they’re doing something I don’t like. Love the sinner, hate the sin, that’s my belief.”
Somehow, through sheer force of will, I manage not to roll my eyes until she’s turned her back, but then I roll them hard enough to send a flash of pain shooting through my eyelids.
“I know, but she means well,” Aoife says, surprising me as we move between the pews, off to the right side of t
he church. “She’s a strong woman. I’m glad Dad had someone like her in his life at the end. It sounds like they got along a lot better than Mom and Dad ever did.”
“Have you heard from Mom?” I ask as we reach the far aisle and stand beneath the stained glass windows illustrating the Stations of the Cross. The sun streaming through the colored glass casts Aoife’s pale face in a golden light, making her look even more angelic—and more like Mom—than usual.
I used to think their physical similarities were the reason she and Mom were always close, but now I suspect it’s their mutual love of revising history that allowed them to maintain a relationship long after I cut Mom out of my life. I don’t like lies to begin with, but hearing miserable situations from my childhood filtered through my mother’s rose-colored glasses was especially torturous. Those months I spent with a horrible foster family weren’t “a good growing experience,” and the time she dropped me off at school on a Sunday and left me there all day wasn’t a “funny story.” Not any funnier than the other traumatizing events of my childhood.
Aoife shakes her head. “Not for about a year. She came to visit me right after Mitch and I got the house, but then she brought home a six-pack of beer. Mitch flipped out and made her leave. He had my cell phone number changed after, so she hasn’t been able to call, and I promised Mitch I wouldn’t call her. He’s really committed to helping me stay sober, so…”
“That’s good,” I say, though I’m thinking that the guy sounds like a control freak. But maybe that’s what Aoife needs to stay clean. If so, I’m glad she found someone who meets her needs, I just don’t want Emmie growing up in that kind of environment. “I’m glad you’re so much better. You know that, right?”
Her lips curve in a sad smile. “You just don’t think I can keep it up? Is that what you’re worried about? I’ve been clean for almost eighteen months, Caitlin. It’s going to stick this time. I promise.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about,” I say. “I’m worried about Emmie. That’s all this is. She had a lot of developmental problems for the first few years after she was born, but she’s been doing so much better. I don’t want her to backslide, and I think being taken away from the only family she’s ever known would be really devastating for her.”
“But I’m her mother, Caitlin,” Aoife says, pleading with her eyes for me to understand. “I know I screwed up, but that doesn’t mean I have to lose my daughter forever, does it? I mean…I’m different now, and I just want another chance. I’m tired of paying for all those old mistakes.”
“I get it, Aoife, I really do, but life doesn’t work that way,” I say, throat tight with emotion. “You can’t just wave a magic wand and erase the things you don’t like about your past. Your actions affected people in dramatic ways, ways that have lasting results.”
“Only if people insist on continuing to punish me for a crime I’ve already paid for.” Aoife crosses her arms protectively over her stomach. “I’ve already lost almost four years of Emmie’s life. I don’t want to lose any more.”
“You don’t have to.” I don’t want to compromise with Aoife, but it might be the only way to get out of here without going to court. “We could split custody. I could have Emmie during the school year, and she could come stay with you every summer and Christmas, or something like that. We could make it work with your schedule.”
Aoife’s brows draw together and she blinks at me like I’ve said something nonsensical. “I’m not going to split custody. Mitch doesn’t want that. He wants to adopt Emmie, and for all of us to be a family. We just want to be normal, Caitlin.”
“And I wanted to stay in high school, and get a scholarship to college,” I say, beginning to lose my temper. “And Emmie wanted to be born without developmental delays caused by her mom using drugs while she was pregnant.”
Aoife’s mouth drops open, but I push on before she can speak.
“But it didn’t work out that way. We don’t always get what we want, Aoife,” I say, forcing a gentler note into my tone. “But if we work together, we can make choices that are the best for your daughter. It might not be ideal for you or me, but it will be what’s best for Emmie.”
“My daughter needs her mother,” Aoife says, but I hear the doubt crimping the edges of the words.
“Your daughter needs the same thing she’s always needed, someone to love her and take care of her and make her feel safe, and I have done a damned good job of that,” I say, driving my argument home and praying I can finish getting through to my sister. “Taking her away from a loving family—a family we would have killed for when we were kids—is pure selfishness, plain and simple.”
“Then I guess I’m a selfish bitch,” she says, tears streaming down her flushed cheeks. “Because I’m not dropping the suit. I want to be happy, and I’m not letting you take that away from me.”
I start to tell her that I don’t give a shit about her happiness one way or another, but she pushes past me, throwing her parting shot over her shoulder.
“I have to go bury my father now.”
Her father. As if I didn’t love him and hate him and live in the long shadow he cast every bit as much as she did. As if I didn’t stay in town and take care of his house and his laundry and his kids and try to make sure he ate a decent meal now and then for years after she left me alone.
The injustice of that stupid “my” is the final straw. I decide to skip the graveside, family-only service and head back to my real family—Gabe, Sherry, and the kids. I slip through the small crowd of mourners still gathered in front of the church and start swiftly toward the parking lot. I don’t intend to cast a single glance toward the limos parked at the curb, or any of the people waiting to get in them, but as I lift my purse to dig for my keys, I catch sight of an elegant figure in a dark gray suit in my peripheral vision.
Even before I turn my head, my pulse is already speeding.
I know that silhouette. I’ve only met Gabe’s father a handful of times, but he and Gabe are the same height, with the same broad shoulders, and long legs, and the same way of tilting their head when they’re listening to something they’re really interested in hearing.
Right now, Aaron Alexander is standing next to the family limo, head cocked as he listens to something my sister is saying. I’m too far away to catch any of Aoife’s words, but when she swipes tears from her cheeks and motions back over her shoulder toward the church, I have a pretty good idea who she’s talking about.
“Shit,” I curse. So much for lying low until we find out what Gabe’s parents used to blackmail him last summer.
With one last look at the impeccably well-dressed man questioning my sister, I turn and start toward the car. But I force myself to walk, not run. Chuck always said that you should never run from danger. Running lets the bad guys know you’re afraid, and attracts their attention. Better to slip away slow and steady, and hope something more vulnerable-looking than you catches their eye. And so I maintain a calm, even gait before slipping into the van and easing slowly out of the parking lot unobserved.
Maybe Chuck did teach me one or two things of value, after all.
But only one or two and that might not be enough to hold my family together through whatever the Alexanders have up their sleeves.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Caitlin
“Life loves to be taken by the
lapel and told, ‘I’m with you
kid. Let’s go.’”
-Elizabeth Barrett Browning
I arrive back at the hotel an hour and a half before I promised to find Sherry and the kids already out at the pool. I park the van, pull off my hat, and let my hair out of the knot that’s pinching the back of my head, before slamming out the door and crossing to the fence.
The moment Sherry sees my face, she knows something’s wrong. “Oh God.” She stands, tugging the bottom of her pink and white polka-dot one piece down as she tosses her Wired magazine onto her lounge chair. “Aoife was horrible.”
/> “Aoife was horrible, and then Gabe’s dad showed up,” I say, hurrying on when Sherry’s eyes go wide. “He didn’t see me, but I’m pretty sure Aoife is going to tell him we’re in town. They were talking when I left.”
“What are you going to do?” she whispers, casting a glance over her shoulder to make sure none of the kids are close enough to hear. “I mean, I’d like to think Mr. Alexander is harmless, but he did blackmail his son into having surgery, then fake Gabe’s funeral. I’m not sure he’s dealing with a full deck.”
I nod, pressing my lips tight together. “I’m going to go talk to Gabe. We may move to another hotel. Somewhere in Charleston maybe, where it will be harder to find us. I want to know the kids are safe.”
Sherry crosses her arms, looking chilled despite the hot summer day. “I wish we could go back to Maui. Giffney is giving me the creeps. I never realized how messed up this town was until I left. It’s like…the place where dreams go to die.”
“You can go home if you want to,” I say, hating that I’ve dragged my best friend into this crazy situation. “I have to stay until the court date, but—”
“No way.” Sherry shakes her head. “I’m not leaving until I’m sure you’re going to have your happily ever after. Mr. Sexy is in the room, by the way. He was trying to dig up dirt on your sister, but your phone was blowing up. I think it was driving him a little nuts. I tried to turn it off, but it was still vibrating every time Isaac called.”
I roll my eyes and let out a sound somewhere between a groan and a muffled scream.
“I know, when it rains, it pours.” Sherry shoots me a sympathetic look. “It just wouldn’t be your life if you didn’t have to bury your father, while dealing with the return of the sister from hell, a custody battle, a boyfriend back from the grave, and an ex-boyfriend who’s discovering his obsessive streak.”
