Always on My Mind (22 page)

“Maybe.” He thumbed through the folder of research he’d downloaded off the net, found a grainy picture of Duncan Rothe. “Do you think this picture looks like him?”

“Maybe, yes.”

“And this picture has him in front of the roadster. Maybe they’re going on their honeymoon.”

“So she
did
come here and she did marry Duncan Rothe. Or she planned to. What do you think happened?”

“I don’t know . . . What does the diary say?”

She reached for her bag, but he touched her hand.

“Just for the record . . .” He took a breath, softened his voice, unable to stave off the words another moment. “You would have been
 
—and you will be someday
 
—a
fantastic
mother. You will be the mother who makes frosted graham crackers and waits for her child after school and tucks her in at night and sings her songs.”

“I don’t know.” She sighed. Her voice was so soft, he had to lean in. “I remember the night my mother died. I remember going in to kiss her and . . . she might have been already gone, but when I did, nothing happened. She didn’t move, didn’t breathe, didn’t take my hand . . . and I remember the disappointment. That maybe I wasn’t enough, that I should have been more
 
—”

“Raina, you were nine.”

“No, see, my mom told me right before she got so sick that I was responsible for Joey. She had no one else
 
—Dad drove every week, and her mom had died. Grandma was Daddy’s mother. Mom told me I was supposed to take care of Joey, but . . .” She swallowed hard and glanced at him. “My brother died when he was fourteen. A drug overdose
 
—meth. I should have been paying attention, but I was seventeen and I wanted my own life. And he was a pain. He came home that night and fell asleep on the sofa, and I was angry at him
 
—he’d left a trail of his shoes and jacket and socks everywhere, his dishes in the sink, and he’d thrown up on the carpet. I walked into the family room and yelled at him. I stood over him and told him that he was worthless and I was sorry I ever took care of him and that he made me ashamed. And he . . . didn’t move. Just . . .”

Casper put down the picture, longing to take her in his arms.

Her voice fell. “He was dead and I was yelling at him. See, I shouldn’t be a mother.” She stared at the picture. “I didn’t sing him songs.”

“Raina.” His voice emerged wrecked, his throat filled with fire. “I don’t think you know what kind of mother you are until you are one. You weren’t his mom
 
—you were his sister.”

“My mom asked me to take care of him
 
—”

“I know, but you were just a kid yourself. Nine years old.”

“And then I was seventeen, my mother was dead, and somewhere in there, I blew it.”

“No.” Now he did take her hand and touch her chin, lifting her eyes to him. “No, see, we all have to make our own choices and live with our own mistakes. Your brother’s mistakes are not yours.”

A tear dripped off her chin. “But he probably paid for mine.”

“That’s how families are . . . We pay for each other’s mistakes.” The words fell on soft soil in his own heart, settled deep. “But that doesn’t mean you’re to blame for your brother’s death. And it doesn’t mean you won’t make an amazing mother someday. Actually, it doesn’t even mean that you weren’t
already
an amazing mother to Layla.”

When she looked at him, the urge overwhelmed him to pull her close, wrap her tight in his embrace so no one could ever hurt her again.

But he drew back, tried to hide the way he trembled, and tucked the rest of the pictures back in the envelope. “What do you say we take a closer look at those pictures you found at Aggie’s house?”

Raina was already slipping the pictures back into the envelope. “That’s a great idea,” she said, way too brightly.

He replaced the envelope in the box, shoved it onto the shelf.

“Let’s see if we can find their names in the register,” she said.

Maybe fifty books lined the shelves. Raina found the right year, paged the book open, and located the right month. “I think we have something here. Look at this,” she said, pointing to the scrawled, sharp signature of Duncan Rothe. “And here’s another.” The loopy signature of Aggie Franklin.

“You’re a genius, Watson,” Casper said.

“We make a great team.”

He closed the book. Tucked it back in its spot, turned off the light.

“Oh, it’s dark.”

“It’s okay. Here, take my hand.” He said it without thinking, and she slipped her grip into his as if it belonged there. He felt his way out of the vault, toward the stairs, and led her up.

He let go as soon as they reached the landing, but the moment lingered all the way out to the truck. He climbed in beside her as she pulled out the diary.

“I think I found something,” she said a few moments later. “Look. If I follow the entries correctly, Duncan left, and Aggie expected him back in June, but he didn’t come back. There’s an entry here in early June that says she is waiting for him to return, and she’s getting lonely.”

“No wonder the marriage certificate wasn’t signed. They didn’t get married then.”

“Not yet. I’ll keep reading tonight, and if I find anything, I’ll let you know.”

He believed her. And tried not to let that spark any more than it should be: two friends, Sherlock and Watson, sleuthing out a mystery.

“That would be great.”

“You can come to Aggie’s house if you want. It might be interesting for you to see how she lived. I’ll try to find more pictures. I don’t know
 
—maybe you’ll find clues to those missing bonds from that story you told me about the legend of Duncan Rothe.”

He glanced at her. “Yeah, I’d like that.”

She smiled, and it lit up her whole face, so beautiful it could turn his heart inside out. They’d had a good day, a really good day,
without treading too far into their past. A safe day. The kind of day he’d hoped to give her.

And she seemed to know it also because she stared out the window, her profile to him, and hummed.

Her music died as he pulled up to the house. It took only a moment for him to connect the sight of Monte’s truck to her quickening of breath, the way she swallowed, her face falling.

“Monte doesn’t want you around me.” Of course, he knew that
 
—but nothing like what he saw on her face.

She shook her head. “Let me out here.”

“A half block from your house? No, Raina, listen, I’ll explain to him
 
—”

“Let me out, Casper!”

He slowed, aimed for the curb, had barely stopped before she opened the door. “Whoa
 
—Raina, seriously? C’mon, he can’t be that jealous.”

She frowned, sharp and fast. “No. There’s nothing to be jealous of.”

The words hurt, a spear through his heart, but wasn’t that what he wanted? “Of course not,” he agreed. “Okay, well . . .” He glanced at the house, and darkness coiled inside him when he saw Monte emerge from inside to stand on her porch.

The man crossed his arms over his chest, his eyes bouncing off Raina, skidding over to Casper.

The whole thing felt . . . unsettling.

But Casper couldn’t scramble up the words to
 
—what, warn her? Or . . . just ask her if she needed help before she said a quick “See ya, Casper,” and slammed the door.

Casper waited, though, watching as she quick-walked up the
road toward the house. Watching as she bounded up the steps, met Monte’s embrace.

He drove away slowly, Monte’s eyes on him until he turned, his arm clamped around Raina’s shoulders as he escorted her into the house.

And Casper prayed for her again because it was better than turning around and repeating the past.

Lord, please protect her.

D
AREK COULDN’T HELP
glancing at his watch.

“Tiger, you want to see the baby?” Ivy lay on the table, her stomach glistening with gel. She gripped Darek’s hand, the residue of worry in her eyes lingering despite her words to the contrary. Maybe she’d finally figured out how close he’d come to losing her, losing their baby, and she’d stop lecturing him on his hovering.

She gestured to Tiger, who sat in the chair, reading a book. “Come over here and take a look.”

“No.”

Darek frowned. For the past week, Tiger had seemed withdrawn, almost angry. “Tiger, your mom said to take a look
 
—”

“I don’t wanna.”

When Tiger kept his eyes trained on his book, it lit a flame inside Darek. He glanced at Ivy to see if the words wounded her, but she watched Tiger with such an expression of gentleness that it tempered his fury.

Still, he wanted to march over, grab his son, make him
 
—

“Do you want to know what the gender is?”

Darek glanced back to the ultrasound technician, a pretty girl with short brown hair, maybe in her twenties, wearing pink scrubs.

His wife raised an eyebrow, smiled at him. “Well?”

He shook his head. “I . . . I think I want to be surprised.”

Ivy squeezed his hand. “Then me too.”

The technician nodded and wiped Ivy’s skin with a towel.

As Darek helped Ivy sit up, she groaned, made a face.

“Labor?”

She pressed a hand to her belly, blowing out a breath. “No. Braxton-Hicks.”

“It’s normal,” the technician said. “Your baby’s heartbeat seems strong. I’ll show the pictures to the doctor
 
—she’ll call you if there is anything to worry about, I’m sure.”

Ivy slid off the table. “We need to get to the conferences at the school.”

“Oh, Ivy, I have to get back to the resort. I’ve barely been in the office since my dad came home, and if he takes a look at the pile of bills . . . Can . . . ?” He glanced at Tiger, back to her.

She caught his hand. “No problem. Drop me off at home and take Tiger with you. I’ll meet you later.”

He tried not to let the image of her sitting in the frozen, smashed car while the cold closed in on her creep into his brain but
 
—

“I promise I’ll call you before I leave the school. And I’ll use the four-wheel drive.”

He’d purchased her the best car he could find for this area
 
—a used GMC Yukon with four new snow tires
 
—after the insurance company deemed her little tin-can compact totaled. Still, it added another dent to his budget, money he didn’t see coming in anytime soon. “Okay. But if it’s too slippery, stay home. I’ll bring home dinner.”

She grabbed his jacket, tugged him down for a quick kiss. “You worry too much. About everything.”

But if he didn’t, who would? Ivy seemed to wear a perpetual smile as the birth of the baby approached. But Darek could only see the lean, muddy spring months ahead, stretching the lodge budget thin, with his unfinished house waiting on the far edge of the property. He heard sleepless nights with the baby crying, and Ivy exhausted, Tiger jumping from furniture or worse, argumentative and sullen, and Darek’s father staring at him with questions as he held their overdrawn checkbook.

The truth about the cabin three repairs had sat like a boulder on his chest, nearly choking his words when his father asked for a report on the resort. He’d offered a quick and too-cheery answer that summed up the high points and omitted the cold snap, the rebuild of cabin three, and most important, his complete abandonment of the operation after Ivy’s accident.

A lie by omission still felt like a lie.

“C’mon, Tiger,” he said, reaching for his son, who slid morosely off the vinyl chair and trudged out after him and Ivy. Darek settled his hand on Tiger’s shoulder, but he shrugged away from it, ran ahead, and took Ivy’s hand.

She smiled at Tiger, eliciting a pang of envy in Darek. Since when had he turned into the bad guy?

He dropped Ivy off at home, waited for her to start the Yukon, then headed to the lodge in his truck.

Tiger sat in the second-row bench seat, buckled in and staring out the window.

“You okay, buddy?” Darek kept his voice light, glancing at him in the mirror. His son needed a haircut, his blond hair poking out the back of his hat, and it looked like he wore his hot-dog-and-ketchup lunch on the collar of his sweatshirt.

Tiger shrugged.

“Anything bothering you?”

Tiger stared out the window.

“You know, when this baby comes, she’s going to be lucky to have you for a big brother.”

“I don’t want a sister.”

Darek frowned. “Maybe it’s a boy. A baby brother to wrestle with you when he gets older? And build snow forts?”

“Dylan has a baby brother and he breaks his LEGOs.”

“We’ll keep them out of reach, then.”

Another shrug.

“Are you mad at me, buddy? I know I’ve been working a lot but . . .”

Tiger said nothing and the silence stirred an ache in Darek, rushing him back to those days after Felicity had died when Tiger fled into himself, not eating, not sleeping. He’d only fall asleep on the sofa with his stuffed tiger nestled between him and Darek.

“I promise it’ll get better,” he offered, but the words seemed feeble.

He sighed in tune with Tiger.

A layer of fluffy snow had blanketed the shore overnight and clung to the shaggy fir on the south, untouched-by-fire side of the road. He turned at his drive and pulled up to the resort. Sometimes the vastness of the flames’ destruction could still blind him with disbelief. But now snow settled grace upon the charred forest beyond the rim of evergreens they’d planted to wrap the resort in an enclave of protection.

If only he could wrap Ivy and Tiger in the same kind of enclave. But God had given them a husband and father to stand in the way of the storms. And he wasn’t going to let them
 
—any of them
 
—down.

Darek turned to see if Tiger needed help unbuckling, but he was already opening the other door and jumping down. He slammed the door shut, running inside.

Darek walked into the resort’s tiny front office, attached to the main house through a side door. A tall counter in gleaming oak portioned the reception area from the workstation, and a rack on the counter held local brochures, coupons, and an activities chart. In the corner, one of his father’s chain saw–carved creations
 
—a black bear
 
—held a
Welcome to Evergreen!
sign in its outstretched paws. The scene only lacked a plate of his mother’s fresh-baked snickerdoodles.

He circled the counter, noticed the machine had three messages, pulled out the rolling chair, and booted up his laptop.

The mail accumulated in a metal in-basket beside the computer, and tucked next to it were a daily diary and an old-fashioned guest book
 
—something his mother insisted on retaining for legacy
 
—that kept the activities and testimonials of their guests.

One of Ingrid’s tricks for remembering everything that happened, year after year. She considered her guests friends rather than customers.

Darek heard Tiger greet his parents behind the door to the house, knew that his mother had probably swung him around and then invited him in for a cookie.

Darek’s stomach growled, but he opened his e-mail.

The messages poured in
 
—spam and a few requests for lodging information.

His pulse quickened at a message from his buddy Jed Ransom. The image of his old fire boss flashed into his brain
 
—his blackened face, white teeth grinning as a wall of flame rose behind him. Like battle, fighting the flames was exhausting, backbreaking work
 
—digging trenches, lighting backfires, and felling trees.

Exhausting and exhilarating, and Darek thrived under the heat of a forest fire. He knew how to read a fire, how to attack it. How to win.

He could almost feel the soot in his eyes, the sweaty moisture of a handkerchief over his mouth and nose. Hear the ruckus of the chain saws, the roar of a greedy fire.

Wow, he missed it.

He opened the e-mail.

Darek!

We’ve been watching the temperatures
 
—frozen much? I don’t know if you’re open yet, but if not
 
—or even if you are
 
—we could use your help here in Arizona. The season hasn’t officially started, so we’re lean on teams. I could use you for a couple weeks just until we’re fully staffed.

Old times, huh?

Jed

Darek read it again. Just a couple weeks. Working again with Jed and the team.

The thought sparked inside him, tasted of hope. But really he couldn’t get away, despite the fact that they had no revenue on the books yet for March.

He could use the month to finish his interior walls, maybe get the kitchen cabinets hung, the bathroom roughed in.

Build the house his family needed.

He was moving to reply to the e-mail when he heard the door behind him open.

“Hey, Son.” His father’s voice entered a moment before he did. Darek closed the e-mail, turned.

His father wore a denim resort shirt and jeans, his head freshly shaven. The way a resort manager should attire himself, instead of Darek’s work pants and sweatshirt. But he’d planned on shoveling and cutting firewood after he wrangled the books into submission.

“How did Ivy’s appointment go?”

“Good. The baby looks fine, thank the Lord.”

His father looked leaner after his trip to Europe, a new light in his eyes. And from the pictures he’d shown Darek of their Paris leg, it seemed the vacation had turned out to be the second honeymoon he’d hoped.

Except for their strange stopover in Prague to pick up Amelia. Nothing but closed-lipped secrets behind her return, but based on the way she’d holed up in her room or the den over the past few days, Darek suspected it might have been boy-related.

“I’m so glad.” His father sat on the old straight-back chair. It creaked under his weight. “You want to tell me about this?” He handed Darek a folded piece of paper.

Darek took it, frowned, his breath catching at the total.

“In my recollection, that’s the largest propane bill this resort has ever seen. I’ll be honest, Son, that’s one too many zeros there.”

Three thousand dollars. For one month’s gas and oil?

“Now,” John continued, “I called the company and they said that propane prices have doubled, which only makes me wonder if staying open in the winter is a good idea.”

Darek’s idea.

“And then there’s the matter of the cabin three repairs. Did you ever think of mentioning that?”

Darek set the bill in the basket.

“Darek, when I gave you this resort to run . . . I believe in you, Son, but
 
—”

“Save it; I get it. I’m blowing this.” Darek got up, stalked away. “I understand what’s at stake here. Seventy-five years of legacy going down on my watch.”

“Darek
 
—”

He rounded on his father. “But the fact is, maybe I’m not cut out for this. I’m a . . . I’m a carpenter. A lumberjack. I’m not good at numbers and schmoozing with the guests and figuring out what ads to run in the local papers
 
—”

His father rose, frowning.

But Darek couldn’t stop. “You know what, Dad? You’re wrong. You
shouldn’t
believe in me. Because I’m not you. I can’t run this place. And frankly, I don’t want to.”

His words stripped all expression from John’s face.

“I don’t want to spend every waking moment running this resort, catering to guests. I hate it. I want to do something that actually accomplishes something. Like . . .” He tried to shake the word
firefighting
from his head, but there it lodged, burning inside him.

He ground his jaw, staring at his dad, and couldn’t help it. “Sometimes I wish I never had a family. I just let them down.”

“Darek
 
—”

“Get Casper to run this place. He’s the one who’s good with numbers and wooing the guests. I’m just . . . the guy who cuts firewood.”

He pushed past his father into the next room. Tiger sat at the high-top counter, eating a Rice Krispies bar. Ingrid stood on the other side, arms akimbo, her eyes on Darek.

So she’d heard.

As had Ivy, who stood in the entryway, her face white. She still wore her coat as if she’d just walked in.

“Ivy, I
 
—”

She held up her hand. “It’s fine, Darek. It’s fine.” She looked at Tiger, Ingrid. “The conference had to be rescheduled. I think Tiger and I are ready to go.”

Tiger slid off the stool.

“Ivy, please don’t go.” Darek reached out to touch her, but she jerked away from his grip, and he felt it like a knife in his chest.

“I’ll see you at home,” she said, her jaw tight. Tiger had slipped on his boots, and Ivy added his hat. He took her hand.

Darek watched her leave, unable to move from the cold entryway.