Her Mother's Shadow (13 page)

“What's search-and-rescue work mean?”

“You know, let's say a kid gets lost in the woods. They send specially trained dogs out to find them.”

“Or there's an earthquake or a building caves in?”

“Right.”

“Awesome.” The word was said under her breath, but it sounded sincere.

Lacey led Mackenzie through the kitchen and living room, up the stairs and across the hallway. She could hear Clay and Gina's murmuring voices as they read to Rani in their bedroom. They had turned the smallest of the bedrooms into a nursery for their daughter. Although they couldn't truly alter the room, since it would be part of the museum, they were still able to fill it with baby furnishings: a crib, a changing table, cute lamps and mobiles. But Rani refused to sleep there; she had never slept alone in a bed, much less alone in a room. Clay and Gina gave up the battle and put a toddler bed on the floor of their own bedroom, and the nursery remained mostly unused.

Lacey reached the door of the room that would be Mackenzie's and motioned her inside. Mackenzie's suitcases and boxes were piled in one corner, but otherwise, the room held only a lovely old sleigh bed and an ancient dresser. “You can decorate this room any way you like,” she said. It would not be fair to ask Mackenzie to live in the room as it was. Lacey had already decided she would pay to have the room restored before they moved out.

The view of the lighthouse was dead center from the windows. It was a beautiful sight as the gold of the sunset cast a flame against the white brick. She wanted to point it out to Mackenzie, to tell her how lucky she was to have this view, but by now, she knew better than to bother.

The new computer sat on a table near the door, and Lacey could see that the phone line already ran between it and the jack on the wall.

“Can I use this?” Mackenzie touched the keys.

“It's yours,” Lacey said, loving her brother more than ever at that moment. “Clay bought it for you and set it up. And you have your own phone line in here to connect to the Internet.”

“Why would he do that for me?” Mackenzie asked. “He doesn't even know me.”

“I told you,” she said. “He knew your mother. And he knows how hard it must be for you to be here, suddenly cut off from all your friends, and so he wanted to get this for you.”

“Weird,” she said.

“You know,” Lacey said, sitting down on the edge of the bed, “a long time ago, the lighthouse keeper's daughter lived in this room. Her name was Bess and Gina is related to her.”

Mackenzie touched the corner of the computer monitor. “He got me such a big screen,” she said, and Lacey could not tell if she was happy about that fact or not.

“How about something to eat,” she offered. “Or at least to drink. I know you don't have much of an appetite, but—”

“I'm fine.”

“This has been a long day for you, Mackenzie.” She wanted to touch her, to smooth the blond hair back from her cheek. “I understand everything that's happened is so hard and—”

“Don't make such a big deal out of it.”

Lacey stood up, weary of having every attempt at connection with this child thwarted. “I'll leave the bathroom light on for you,” she said.

“I don't need a night-light,” Mackenzie said. “What time is it in Phoenix?”

“Two hours difference.” Lacey looked at her watch. “Only eight.”

“Good.” Mackenzie lifted her cell phone from her shorts and began to dial.

“I
want it to work out,” Lacey said, “but the truth is, I can barely stand her.” She was lying on a raft, floating on the dark water of the sound behind Rick's tiny cottage. She'd thought he was crazy when he led her out here in the darkness, and although she was used to the weedy entry into the water in the daylight, the unseen tendrils wrapping around her legs had given her chills. She'd been relieved to get into the deeper water. Now she and Rick lay on their stomachs on separate rafts, face-to-face, moving their hands through the water only enough to keep their rafts from drifting too far apart.

“I really feel for you,” Rick said. She liked the way he looked out here at night, his hair a bit mussed and his eyes huge and dark in the faint light from the sliver of moon. “Is there any way to get her involved with other kids before school starts?”

Lacey ran her hands through the water. She was dressed in a pair of his baggy swimming trunks and her T-shirt, having been unprepared for this nighttime journey into the
sound. “I contacted the middle school to find out about summer activities for kids her age,” she said. “There's plenty she could be doing. Swim teams, nature clubs, field trips. I told her about them, but she doesn't want to do any of them. I really understand, though. It's too soon for her; she's still completely wrapped up in grieving. But understanding all that doesn't make it any easier for me to tolerate her.”

The past four days had been some of the most trying in her life. She was suddenly responsible for a child who wouldn't talk to her, who, at times, actually seemed to hate her, and who certainly hated Kiss River. Lying in bed at night, Lacey would think of the living, breathing child who was in her care, not only now but for the rest of that child's life, and utter panic would set in. If she couldn't talk to Mackenzie now, if she couldn't summon up a modicum of caring for her when the child was eleven, what would it be like when she was a rebellious fifteen-year-old?

Tonight, Mackenzie was staying with Nola. It was a blessed reprieve. When she'd dropped her off at Nola's house, though, Lacey had noted that there were no hugs, no warm exchanges, and Mackenzie didn't seem any happier to see Nola than she had been to see her. She'd felt a little guilty leaving her there, but she was in desperate need of some time away from her.

“You know who she gets along best with?” Lacey asked Rick.

“Who?”

“Rani and Sasha,” she said. “A toddler and a dog.” Mackenzie would finger paint with Rani or read her one of her picture books or sing songs with her, displaying a gentleness that touched Lacey and that made her see, however briefly, another side to the girl. When Rani was not available, Mackenzie would spend time with Sasha, grooming the
dog or just lying with her head on his flank as she watched television.

“She was extremely annoyed to discover we don't have cable.” Lacey laughed. She'd told Mackenzie that cable didn't reach out to Kiss River, and the girl had replied, “I guess I should be grateful you have plumbing.” She was both smart and smart-mouthed.

“I'm glad you finally have a night off,” Rick said. “I've really missed seeing you.”

“You've been great,” she said, honestly. “You've let me complain on the phone to you nearly every night. I really owe you.”

He smiled. “No, you don't. And I wish I could help you more, but I know zilch about kids.”

She didn't need his advice on dealing with Mackenzie. What she'd needed had been his absolutely amazing listening skills. She'd never known a man quite like him. Good-looking, attentive listener, never pressuring her for more physical intimacy than she wanted to give. Every woman's dream guy, and he might as well have been a plate of mashed potatoes for all the attraction she felt to him.

“All I've done this week is kid stuff,” she said. “Talking to the school. Taking her to a counselor who seems to be having as much trouble talking to her as I am. The counselor said I should tell her things about her mother that I know but that she might not.” She laughed. “There are plenty of things I could tell her about Jessica, but most of them need to be censored.”

“Jessica sounds like she was quite a kid.”

“And I worry Mackenzie's going to be just like her.” Lacey ran her hand through the cool water. “So, anyway, I tried telling her about her mother. I got my old photograph albums from my father's house and brought them back. She couldn't have cared less.” She'd shown Mackenzie the old
pictures of her mother from both the albums and their exceedingly slim middle school yearbook, but Mackenzie barely glanced at them. When Lacey talked about her experiences with Jessica, Mackenzie would tell her to stop. “You were just a teeny, tiny part of her life,” she said. “I have my whole lifetime full of experiences with my mother. I don't need to hear about yours.”

“This must be very hard,” Rick said. “I admire you for even trying to deal with her.”

“She spends all her time on the phone and sending e-mail. I know she's terribly homesick, but she's just so hard to feel sympathy for.”

Rick was quiet for a moment. “I don't understand why Mackenzie didn't automatically go to her father,” he said finally.

“Because Jessica never acknowledged him as Mackenzie's father. Not even on the birth certificate. She didn't want him to have anything to do with her.” She swirled her hand through the water again, making little ripples in the dark surface. “And that brings up a dilemma.”

“What's that?”

“I always thought Bobby—Mackenzie's father—should know about her, but Jessica disagreed. Yet she left her to me knowing that was how I felt. So, did she want me to get in touch with Bobby or not? I just don't know.”

“Do you know this guy?”

She wasn't about to tell Rick the exact nature of her adolescent relationship with Bobby. “Jessica and I hung around with him the summer she got pregnant,” she said. “He used drugs and was…irresponsible and…just a mess.”

“Where is he?”

“I don't know. He lived in Richmond back then. But I could probably track him down.”

“I think you should do it,” Rick said. “If I had a kid wandering around, I would certainly want to know.”

“Yes, but you're a responsible and upstanding type of guy.”

His look turned dark. “I'm not a Boy Scout, Lacey,” he said. “It's just that I think every kid needs a father figure.”

“I agree.” She folded her hands together on the raft and rested her cheek on the backs of her fingers.

“On another note,” Rick said, “how's the legal situation going?”

“With Mackenzie?”

“No, with that parole hearing. Have you had time to meet with a lawyer with everything else you have going on?”

She couldn't blame him for turning the conversation from child care to a legal issue, something he would feel on solid ground discussing.

“Actually, my brother and father and I have an appointment with one tomorrow morning to talk about it.”

“Ah, that's good,” he said, although she was not certain of the sincerity behind the words. She knew he thought it was a poor use of her time and energy.

She raised her head to look at him. “You'll be pleased to know, though, that it's about the last thing on my mind.”

“And it should be,” he said. “You're going to make yourself sick if you take one more thing onto your plate.”

She felt suddenly very tired and wondered if he was right. “Well.” She sighed. “As usual, I've been doing all the talking. Tell me how your book is going.”

“I made a lot of progress while you were tied up,” he said. “I went home for a few days—”

“To Chapel Hill?”

“Right. I needed to do some research in the law library at Duke. Got a lot done.”

He reached for her hand and drew her raft toward him.
Raising himself to his elbows, he leaned toward her for a kiss, his lips light on hers.

“How come you are so willing to settle for just a kiss?” she asked him once he drew away from her.

“Because I know you don't want more than that. At least not yet.”

“Are you going out with other women?” she asked. “I mean, I don't mind. I'm just…curious.”

“Nope.” He smiled.

“Maybe you should.” She felt guilty for taking up his dating time when her feelings for him were so conflicted.

“I didn't come to the Outer Banks to date,” he said. “Meeting you was just a bonus.”

She was never sure how to respond to him when he said things like that. She did not want to encourage him. Instead of speaking, she rolled onto her back, sloshing cool water over herself in the process, and looked up at the stars.

“I wish I could bottle this,” she said. “Lying out here under the stars, I mean. I'm dreading tomorrow morning when I have to pick Mackenzie up again.”

“You said that her grandmother might fight to get custody of her, didn't you?” Rick asked.

“Yes.”

“Maybe it makes sense to let her take her.”

She turned her head to look at him. “Do you think that's what I should do?” The thought was both enticing and guilt-inducing.

“What I think doesn't really matter.”

Lacey looked up at the sky again, then closed her eyes. “Could we just stay here all night?” she asked. “I could fall asleep out here.”

He laughed. “You go right ahead,” he said, as if he really meant it. “I'll hold on to your raft so you don't float away.”