Beyond a Reasonable Stout

by Ellie Alexander

  I wasn’t sure how to respond.

  “We did not know, but we decided we would adopt you. We would make you our own. We had always longed for a daughter, and we fell in love vith you instantly. So did Mac. But even if Mac had not, we still would have made you part of ziz family.”

  My stomach swirled with anxiety. Otto and Ursula had known about my family the entire time I had known them? My God. How had they kept that from me?

  Ursula must have sensed my discomfort. “We did not say anything because you were so clear about not wanting to look into your past when we met you. I asked you a number of times, do you remember?”

  I nodded. That was true. Ursula had tried to get me to open up about my childhood and had often asked in the early years of knowing them whether I had any interest in trying to track down my birth parents.

  “Otto and I agreed we would not say anything unless you were ze one who made ze choice to begin to search for ze truth.”

  “But I did, just a few weeks ago, and you told me not to.”

  “I know. I am sorry, Sloan. Please forgive me. I beg ziz of you. I did not know for sure if it was you until zat night at Nitro. When I saw ze picture on ze wall, I knew right away. I almost collapsed. I could not tell you. Not now, after all of ziz time has gone by. What would you do? What would you say? You are my daughter, and now you would hate me.” She buried her head in her hands as huge tears poured from her eyes.

  I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t swallow. This wasn’t possible.

  Her entire body shook with emotion. “I can never forgive myself. I should have said more long, long ago, but I did not. At first it was because I was not sure why ze FBI asked us never to mention Marianne to anyone. Could Marianne have been in some kind of trouble? Were zey protecting her? Would we put her in more danger? But, zen it became about you. I couldn’t let you go. I did not want to risk zat you would be so angry at me I might lose you forever. Can you understand?”

  I tried to nod, but nothing felt real. My body had gone numb. I had loved Ursula more deeply than maybe anyone in my life. She was the only mother I had ever known. How could she have kept this from me? Her words were a blow. Maybe worse than when I’d caught Mac with a young woman not that much older than Kat. Ursula had known critical information about my past and had failed to share it with me. I couldn’t respond to her question because I wasn’t sure I could forgive her.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY

  “MOM!” ALEX’S VOICE CUT THROUGH the tension in the kitchen. “Mom, where are you?”

  I forced myself to swallow. “In the kitchen.”

  Ursula started to say something, but I held up my index finger. “Not now. Say nothing.”

  “Ja, okay.”

  “Mom.” Alex burst through the kitchen door. “You have to come see this. You won’t believe it.” His boyish face beamed with excitement. Fortunately, his enthusiasm made him oblivious to the thick layer of emotion in the room.

  “Great.” I forced a smile.

  “Ja, go see.” Ursula pretended to wipe something from her eyes. I hoped Alex wouldn’t notice the fact that her eyes were bloodshot and puffy from her tears.

  I stood to shield him from Ursula. “Let’s go see this mystery object.”

  Alex rubbed his hands together. “Uncle Hans and Opa have been working on a surprise.”

  “What is it?”

  “You have to wait and see.” Alex grabbed my wrist and dragged me out the back door. The blast of cold air outside felt like an assault. I wanted to pinch myself. Maybe I would wake up and my conversation with Ursula would be nothing more than a bad dream. “Cover your eyes, Mom,” he said.

  The woodshop was a few hundred feet from the house. Alex led me through dewy grass. “Your hand is sweaty, Mom. You’re not getting sick, are you?”

  “No. No. It was hot in the kitchen. That’s all.”

  “It’s always hot at Oma and Opa’s house. I don’t know how they can wear wool sweaters inside.” He stopped. “We’re heading inside the shop. Keep your eyes closed.”

  The smell of fresh cut wood and resin hit my nose. It made me think about the pine-infused beer we were trying to master at Nitro.

  “Okay, go ahead and open your eyes,” Alex commanded after positioning me.

  I opened my eyes. There were four beautiful hand-carved canoes lined up on sawhorses. “Wow, did you make these?” I asked Hans.

  “With the help of this old man.” He nudged his father’s arm.

  Otto shook his index finger at Hans. “Is zat any way to talk to me?”

  Hans laughed and wrapped his arm around Otto. “You know I like to tease. This man is the master, Sloan. I couldn’t have done it without him.”

  I hoped the smile on my face looked real. I was tapping into every self-preservation trick I’d learned during my years in foster care to keep from freaking out.

  “They made them for us,” Alex interjected. “You know how I’ve been wanting a canoe to float the river? It was Uncle Hans’s suggestion. He and Opa have been building them in secret for weeks. Now I get to help carve a custom design into mine. Isn’t that cool?”

  “Very cool.” I ruffled his hair, which made him duck away. “You know, you might have something here,” I said to Hans with a chuckle. “Have you considered woodworking as a trade?”

  “Thanks a lot, Sloan.” He pretended to be injured by my joke. “I know we should have probably asked you if it was okay, but we got so into the project that we kind of got carried away. I told Alex that you had to give him permission to take it out on the water. The one thing that I can guarantee is that they float. I already took them out for a test.”

  “Of course you can take it out,” I said to Alex. “With a life jacket, and you need to take the free course that the city offers on boating safety.”

  “Yeah, Mom. I will. I’ll sign up tomorrow.”

  “Ze boy will be a pro in no time,” Otto said with a smile. I was sure that Ursula would inform him of our conversation later.

  Otto, sweet Otto, one of the kindest men I’d ever known, had lied to me too? I couldn’t look at him. What about Hans? Did he know? Did Mac? Had the entire Krause family taken pity on me? Or worse?

  I forced myself to stay in the moment. If I allowed my thoughts to drift to my mother and whoever Forest was, I would never be able to make it through dinner.

  Otto placed one finger on the side of his nose. “What is ziz? I smell Ursula’s cooking. We should probably go in for dinner, before she comes out and yells at us.”

  We left the wooden works of art and headed inside for dinner. My feet felt as if they weren’t making contact with ground. Hans caught my arm as I almost slipped on the grass. I couldn’t see his eyes in the dark, but I could hear the concern in his voice. “You okay, Sloan?”

  “Yeah. Just klutzy,” I lied.

  “You’re not klutzy.” Hans held my arm all the way back to the house.

  I did my best to laugh at Hans’s jokes and taste Ursula’s food. Even the Bienenstich cake couldn’t wake up my senses. Fortunately, Alex was distracted by his new canoe and didn’t seem to pick up on my quiet, contemplative mood. I caught Ursula’s eye a few times across the table, and each time she offered an apologetic smile.

  “We should get you home,” I said to Alex as we cleared the dinner table. I was nearing my breaking point. I didn’t think I could hold myself together much longer. “You have another midterm tomorrow, right?”

  “Yeah, but it’s just health, Mom. I don’t need to study for health.”

  Hans laughed. “I think I remember saying something similar back in the day and ended up bombing my test because I had no idea what the difference between the circulatory and regulatory system was.”

  “See? Listen to your uncle.” I swatted Alex on the hip. “It’s time to get you home and have you hit the books.”

  “Okay.” He sounded disappointed. “But can I come over tomorrow after my test and work on the design for my canoe?”
r />   Otto nodded. “Ja, come over anytime. We love to have you here.”

  Ursula gave us both hugs. I wondered if anyone noticed that she held on to me extra long. When she finally released me, she pointed to a Tupperware on the counter. “You and Alex must take some cake, ja? And I will have Hans bring ze wallpaper stripper by tomorrow, okay?”

  “Sure.” I clutched the Tupperware and waved good-bye to Otto and Hans.

  On the drive home, Alex gushed about the canoes. “Can you believe that Opa and Uncle Hans built those? They are nicer than some of the canoes I’ve been eyeing in Water Magazine. I hope that they’ll teach me how to build like that.”

  “I know without a doubt that Hans would love to teach you the trade.”

  Alex was thoughtful for a moment. “Hey, is there something wrong with Oma? Is her hip bothering her?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “I don’t know. She seemed kind of sad at dinner. She didn’t say very much. You know Oma, usually she won’t stop asking me like a million questions about school and my friends. She didn’t ask me anything tonight.”

  “Hmmm. I’m not sure. It could be that she was tired. She’s still recovering from the surgery.” I wasn’t ready to burden Alex with what I had learned from Ursula.

  “Maybe. But she seemed sad.” He stared out the window. “Do you think it’s because Dad wasn’t there?”

  “That could be. I know she and Opa are trying very hard to make sure that we’re all okay. They love you more than anything. You know that, right?”

  “Yeah, Mom. Duh.”

  I felt guilty for letting Alex think that Ursula’s sadness had to do with Mac, but it wasn’t fair to involve him in this. Not yet anyway.

  We arrived at the farmhouse, and Alex went straight to his room to study for his health test. I made myself a steaming cup of jasmine tea. Then I put on my pajamas and cracked the bedroom window. There was something calming about the cool evening fall air and the sound of the wind rustling through the trees. I closed my eyes, trying to will any memory of my early childhood into the forefront of my brain.

  Marianne. Did the name have any meaning?

  I centered my breathing. Marianne. I said it aloud. Over and over again.

  Who was Marianne? Was she really my mother? What had brought her to Leavenworth with Forest? Was she his sister? Or were they something more, as Ursula had wondered? Could he have threatened her? Abused her?

  Sloan, you have to stop.

  I sighed and reached for my tea.

  Tomorrow I would call Sally. This was the biggest clue we’d had to date. There must be a record of Forest’s arrest. Maybe that could be our starting point. If we could figure out who he was and his connection to me, maybe that would lead us to Marianne.

  Was she still alive? Had she gone into hiding? Or worse? What if he had harmed her? Maybe that was why she had abandoned me.

  My memories of being left at the hospital were fuzzy at best. The only thing that stuck in my mind was a woman’s warm hand, grasping mine so tightly that it hurt. Had that been Marianne? Or someone else?

  I felt completely overwhelmed and weighted down by Ursula’s confession. So much time had passed. What if the trail had gone cold? What if I couldn’t find her?

  “Mom,” Alex called from down the hallway.

  The sound of his voice immediately grounded me in reality. “What’s up, bud?”

  “Want to come tuck me in?”

  I smiled. Alex might have been closer to a man than the baby I used to rock to sleep in my arms, but he still wanted me to kiss him good night. “Coming.” I set my tea on my nightstand and went into his room. “How did the studying go?”

  He was already in bed. His backpack was packed and ready for the morning. “Not too bad. I think I’ve got a handle on this whole health thing.”

  I kissed his forehead. “I’m sure you do.”

  “Mom, there was a chapter about depression.”

  “Oh yeah?” I tried to keep my voice as calm as possible. Was Alex depressed?

  “It went through all of the signs and symptoms, and I think that maybe Dad is depressed.”

  Of course Mac was depressed. He had ruined a long-term marriage, disappointed his family, and was about to have to start over in his forties. Who wouldn’t be depressed?

  To Alex, I said, “What makes you think that?”

  I couldn’t see his facial expression in the dark but could hear the concern in his voice. “It’s just that he has a lot of the symptoms that my health book lists as red flags for depression. Maybe that’s why Oma was upset tonight. Maybe she knows and is worried about him.”

  “That could be.” I sat on the edge of his bed. “Honey, listen, this is a tough time for all of us. I know that Dad is hurting, and he might have some symptoms of depression. But that’s normal. If he wasn’t depressed—if all of us weren’t feeling a range of emotions right now—I would be worried.”

  “Okay. But do you think I should check in with him about it?”

  “I think he would appreciate that.” I kissed his forehead again. “There’s one thing I want you to know, though, and that is that it is not your responsibility to take care of us, okay? That’s our job. Even though we aren’t together, I will always love Dad, and I will check in with him too. Got it?”

  “Got it.”

  “Get some sleep. Love you.” I left with a final parting kiss.

  Why hadn’t anyone ever warned me that parenting just got harder? Maybe the teen years weren’t as physically exhausting as when Alex was a toddler. I remembered chasing him around the park for hours, wondering if he would ever wear out. Those years left me with tired arms from scooping up a toddler and a collection of clothes that were stained with grape juice and chocolate pudding. But the teen years were mentally taxing. Alex was able to make his own lunch or do a load of laundry, but it was my responsibility to make sure that he was emotionally strong and stable. Between the breakup between me and Mac and what I had learned from Ursula tonight, I was worried that I was going to fail my son.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-ONE

  THE NEXT MORNING, I WOKE up in a fog. It felt like I had a hangover. My head throbbed. I was nauseous and in a daze. My only saving grace was that Alex had to be at school early to meet his study group before their health exam. I barely registered the drive to school or dropping him off. I probably shouldn’t have been behind the wheel.

  When I arrived in the village, I found myself parking in front of the bakery and wondering how I had gotten there.

  It was hours before Garrett would be up. I might as well stop in at Strudel for a coffee and pastry. The only way I was going to survive the day was by keeping myself distracted and as busy as possible. There was one obvious way to do that—focus on Kristopher’s murder. It had absolutely nothing to do with my personal life, thank God.

  Once I had a latte and two apple strudels in hand, I walked down to Chief Meyers’s office. I wasn’t sure if she would be in the village yet, but it was worth a shot. I could fill her in on what I had learned from Ross and Valerie and see if she had any other news on Kristopher’s murder that she might be able to share. Plus, I needed to kill time before I called Sally. It was only 7 a.m. As much as I wanted to pick up the phone, I decided the civilized thing to do was to wait at least until eight before placing a call to my former case worker.

  The police station lights were on. I took that as a good sign that the chief might be in. I knew that Chief Meyers had a weak spot for strudel, so I hoped that my sweet bribe might make her more willing to fill me in on the latest with the investigation.

  I knocked softly on the door.

  Chief Meyers’s deep voice bellowed, “It’s open.”

  “Morning, Chief.” I stepped inside. “I was at the bakery and picked up an extra apple strudel. Can I interest you in a breakfast treat?”

  “I never turn down a strudel.” She motioned for me to come behind the counter to her desk.

  “Neither do
I,” I said as I handed her a paper bag with the German delicacy. “It’s un-American. Or, actually, un-Leavenworthian? Is that a thing?”

  Chief Meyers unwrapped the pastry. The flaky strudel was layered with apples sautéed in cinnamon and sugar and chopped walnuts. The top had been brushed with an egg wash and dusted with thick chunks of crystallized sugar. “What are you doing out and about this early?”

  I explained how Alex had midterms.

  She ripped off a piece of the strudel. “That’s why I’ve seen so many teens hanging around the gazebo at lunchtime. I was about to send one of my guys to make sure we didn’t have a bunch of delinquents running around the village.”

  “That’s only during Oktoberfest,” I joked.

  “Got any news for me?” She reached for a yellow legal pad and a pencil.

  “How did you know?”

  She gave me a skeptical stare. “Out with it.”

  I proceeded to tell her what I had learned from Ross and Valerie. Chief Meyers scribbled a few notes as I spoke. When I finished, she set down the pencil and took another bite of the strudel.

  “Have you learned any more information that you can share?” I asked, knowing it was unlikely that Chief could tell me much.

  “Your intel on Ross matches what we’ve learned about the state liquor board reviewing his license. Apparently, Kristopher was not the first person to report the Underground for serving minors. Ross could be in some serious trouble, depending on what we learn from our contacts at the board.”

  “Really?” I was shocked by this news. “What kind of trouble?”

  “According to one of my sources, Ross has been on a watch list for a while. He’s in danger of having his license permanently revoked. There have been dozens of reports of misconduct, overserving, serving minors. I don’t know what’s been going on at the Underground, but it’s given the bar’s name new meaning. I’ve got one of my officers keeping an eye out there while we wait for copies of the reports from the state liquor board.”