Dark Series, The Color of Seven and The Color of Dusk (Books We Love Special Edition) (44 page)

“Don’t try to get cute, Ria. Just explain to me why, when I walk in your door I see Paul, who ain’t supposed to be here in the first place, dressed in clothes nobody’s worn in years, talkin’ to the boy in this picture, who just happens to be my grandfather.
In exactly the same voice.
”

Doomed
, she thought again.
We’re doomed
. She didn’t remember the last time she’d tried to lie to her father, mostly because it never worked. He always knew she was lying. It never occurred to her before that all fathers didn’t know when their children were lying. For the first time, knowing now the blood of Joshua, of Sadie, of Tamara of the wondrous powers and the second sight flowed in their veins, she wondered if she and her father were somehow mentally linked.

“Sometimes the house, it—well, it shows things.”

“You don’t say. But why is it showing them?”

“The house used to be his. Dr. Devlin’s, I mean. I looked it up.”

“Oh, I see. Guess that explains why you acted like you’d never heard the name before. Johnny see stuff, too?”

“Good God, no!”

“Didn’t think so. That kid could never even sit through a horror movie. How long you been seein’ ‘em?”

“Since right after we moved in.”

“Passin’ strange you meeting up with your Paul Everett right after moving into this house. Isn’t it?”

“Yes, isn’t it?” Ria agreed brightly.

“Ria, I said don’t get cute. Talk to me, girl.”

She bit her lip. “I can’t.”

“Think you might could later? After you talk to a certain individual, maybe?”

“Maybe.”

“And when do you think that might be?”

“Tonight.”

“You got your cell phone in your robe pocket. Know you do, always have it with you. There’s the house phone, too. Sittin’ right over there. You could call him.”

“No. I can’t.”

“You can’t, huh? Well, ain’t that interestin’?” he asked thoughtfully. “I’ll be home this evening, barring any emergencies. And your mother’s spending the night in
Atlanta
with Aunt Margaret, why in God’s name I don’t know. I’d be real pleased to get a call.” Dr. Knight stood up and headed for the door.

“Can I keep the picture, please?”

Dr. Knight handed it to her.

“Grab a nap if you can, Daddy,” Ria said as she took it and kissed him good-by. “I’m not makin’ any promises but it might be a real long night.”

“But are you all right?”

“Top of the world. I promise.”

“Well, that’s what’s important, after all,” he said. “Do your best for the old man, though, might die of curiosity before too much longer.” He threw his last words over his shoulder as he walked out.

Chapter Five

Ria stood for a moment after her father left, her thoughts spinning wildly off into many-faceted tangents. The first thing to sort out was the relationship.

If Joshua was her father’s grandfather, then he was her great-grandfather, and Paul would be her father’s great-uncle, thereby making him her great-great uncle. No, that wasn’t right, exactly, Paul and Joshua were half-brothers, so Paul would be her great-great half-uncle.

She sighed in relief. The Biblical taboos against incest were deeply ingrained and the thought was unsettling, but there were two generations between herself and Paul and it was a half-blood relationship at that, spanning over a century. Besides, nowhere else but in European nobility had families intermarried in modern times to a greater degree than the families of the American South. Marriages between varying degrees of cousins were commonplace up until World War II and still not unheard of.

Would he let her bring her father into this? How would he feel about it? She knew how she felt about it. Suddenly hopeful. Her father was way past being a good doctor. He was brilliant. And why not? He was the fourth doctor in five generations of Devlins. It was in his blood. He was born to be a doctor. And he knew lots of other brilliant doctors. Maybe, if Paul actually talked to him, there was something, some tests to run that could shed some light on Paul’s medical condition without making him the center of a medical circus. She didn’t dare hope for a cure, but maybe the condition could be at least mitigated.

She moved over to one of the couches and sat down, grabbed a pillow and hugged it to her. Paul had never told her what happened to Joshua and she’d never asked. But now he was her blood, her past. How had that blood, that mulatto blend of black and white, come to mingle with other white blood, trickling down through the years to its final repository in her veins?

But her father wouldn’t be able to follow the continuation of the story without knowing the first part, always supposing Paul would even tell them the rest of the story. And the first part was long and complicated enough. She looked over at her laptop. If nothing else, putting that story into written form would keep her mind focused for the rest of the day until she could talk to Paul.

Still in her robe, she walked over to her desk, sat and raised the cover of the laptop. She was still there when daylight passed into dark.

* * *

She jumped when Paul’s arms came around her from the back.

“Sorry. Thought you were used to me by now.”

“Is it dark already?”

Fatigue showed under her eyes as she turned around. Ria supposed she’d gotten up and visited the bathroom occasionally, but she didn’t remember. She knew she hadn’t stopped to eat. Her neck and back muscles were screaming and her hands ached.

“Yes, it’s dark. What’s the matter? You got a case so hot you had to work on it all day? I take it you’d rather stay in tonight?”

Ria looked down at herself in surprise.

“Oh, Lord! I didn’t even think—I never dressed.”

“I don’t mind.”

“Don’t joke,” she said. She picked up the picture that was turned face down on her desk and stood up. “I’ve got something to show you.”

“What?”

“This,” she said, handing it to him. “Daddy brought it to me this morning. It’s a picture of my great-grandfather.”

Paul’s eyes fixed on the group and widened. All color drained from his face. He reached out and took it from her.

“It’s what?”

“It’s a picture of my great-grandfather,” Ria repeated. She’d expected an intense reaction, but not quite this intense. “Daddy brought it to me this morning.”

Paul turned and sat down heavily on the couch. “Your what?” he asked again, and Ria, suddenly realizing the origin of that anxious look, roared.

“Oh, good God, Paul! Not you! Joshua!”

His breath expelled in audible relief and she roared again.

“Paul, you couldn’t have possibly thought—you can’t tell me you ever cheated on Chloe! I won’t believe you!”

“Ria, I didn’t marry Chloe until I was twenty-five!”

Still laughing, she sat down beside him and hugged him hard. She’d needed the comic relief.

“Sorry I gave you a heart attack. Even though it doesn’t really beat.”

“And so you should be,” he said. He sat up straighter and inspected the portrait again. “But Joshua? I don’t know if that’s any better and I really don’t know how—”. He broke off and stared at her. “Oh, my God!” he exclaimed slowly.

“What?”

“I don’t know why I never noticed, well, of course, I didn’t see her but once or twice, but still—your eyes are dark and hers were blue, you’re a lot taller and your complexion’s darker—”

“Duh,” Ria interjected.

“But your hair, your face, the shape of your mouth. Jesus, you’re the spittin’ image of Serena Wentworth! And I’ve been making love to my brother’s—”

“Whoa! I knew you were goin’ to freak on me! Your half-brother’s great granddaughter. I already worked it all out. Big deal. Whoopee shit. Lots of time and lots of blood between the two of us, Paul. We’re not even as close as second and third cousins, and you know down here they intermarried all the time! It doesn’t change us. It just intensifies us. So straighten it up or I won’t let you use my shower anymore and you’ll have to go back to empty hotel rooms.”

Paul gave a half-smile. “Well, some conveniences I’m willing to do without. And some I’m not.”

“Thanks. My love life saved by a shower.”

“I wasn’t talking about the shower,” he said, pulling her into his arms. “And I guess genetically speaking, we’re probably just as distant as second or even third cousins. You say your father brought this to you?”

“Oh, yeah,” Ria said, relaxing against him. “We had a real enlightening discussion.”

“How enlightening?”

“Not that enlightening. Not yet, anyway. But Paul, please. We need to tell him.”

“Ria—”

“No, just listen to me!” And Ria recounted her breakfast with her father.

“Oh, God! I should have checked on her, especially when I found out she didn’t take the money, but I was so—”

Paul broke off and Ria didn’t ask for explanations. He needed time to sort this out.

“My God! I let my brother’s daughter—oh shit! Papa and Sadie’s granddaughter! Grow up and run a whore house! They’d kill me!”

“Hate to tell you this, babe, but you’re already dead. Technically speaking, that is.”

“Oh, my God!”

In Paul’s time, there’d been no greater shame to a good family than professional gamblers and whores. Give their druthers, they’d probably rather claim a murderer as family.

“Paul, it’s done. A long time ago. You didn’t know Joshua had a child, did you?”

“No. God, no. Don’t you think I’d have made sure she was taken care of?”

“Of course you would. But you didn’t know. And we’re not talking about a child, actually, Paul, we’re talking about my grandmother who was already in her grave before I was born. She made her way in life the best she could with what she had and I don’t care if she was a prostitute, she loved my Daddy and I promise you, I know from this morning—he loved her and he never lacked for anything a child needed. And besides, if anything had been different, Daddy wouldn’t be Daddy, and I wouldn’t be me! I wouldn’t even be here, I’d be somebody else altogether and I seriously doubt that anybody else could have tracked down the real Paul Devlin so you wouldn’t be here, either. Well, not on this sofa, anyway.”

“And you’d be better off if you’d never seen me.”

“Don’t say that!”

“Why not? It’s the truth!”

“It’s a crock of shit!” Ria exploded. “And I think we’re having our first fight.”

“We can’t tell your father.”

“Why not? You don’t think he’s entitled to know what happened to his own grandfather? What about me?”

“We can’t tell your father about Joshua without telling him about me! And I’m sure he’ll just be delighted to know his daughter’s involved with a livin’ dead man. I mean, I know if it were my daughter, I’d just be thrilled to death!”

“He already knows something’s going on, Paul! I told you, he saw you! You and Joshua. There’s your blood connection, Paul. Nobody but me and now Daddy has ever seen the house replay anything. He deserves to know. And besides, Paul, Daddy’s a
doctor
! Do you understand what I’m tellin’ you? And he knows other doctors, and maybe they could—”

“Put me in the middle of a research three-ring circus! And what do you think they’d find, Ria?
‘Oh, it’s just a little virus, we’ll knock it right out’
!”

“Well, suppose that is all it is?”

“Ria, grow up! This is not a fairytale! Something like this, my whole genetic structure’s mutated! Why do you think I’ve tried so hard to keep up? So I can hang a shingle on the door of the mausoleum? And the more research advances, the more certain it is—my whole DNA pattern’s shot to shit!”

“They engineer the genetic structure now. Didn’t you read that part?”

“No. They
play
with the DNA structure and they don’t really know what they’re doin’ or the long-term consequences of it. They can’t reconstruct one!”

“How the hell do you know?”

“They’d have a field day with me.”

“Daddy wouldn’t let that happen. He wouldn’t bring in anybody who’d—”

“Ria!
No
!”

“His best friend from medical school is one of the head honchos at the
Atlanta
Center
for Disease Control. Ever hear of the place?”

“One more time, Ria. This is not a fairytale.”

“Suppose it could be? Sunlight, open pastures, picnics, rainbows. Makin’ love in the daytime. With me. For the rest of our natural lives. I’m not worth the risk?”

Paul sighed heavily.

“You don’t fight fair.”

“I’m a lawyer, get used to it.”

“I don’t know if I can stand to tell it again,” he finally said.

“You don’t have to. I’ve spent all day telling it for you.” Ria got up and walked over to her desk, picking up a thick sheaf of paper. “It’s right here. The first part. And the rest of it, about Joshua, well, you’ll have to tell me that.”