Live for Me (24 page)

“Tiffany,” he said. That’s it. Just my name. Tears in his eyes.

And as the door closed entirely, blocking my view of him, I gave a choked sob.

Out on the sidewalk I asked the bellman for a cab and I got in, breathless, giving the driver the address on my phone. After a nauseating twenty minute ride we arrived in mid-town, at the office building of Randy Hart. My father. I didn’t know what I thought I was going to do, but I gave the cab driver the majority of the cash I had in my purse. I hadn’t been anticipating traveling. All I had was twenty dollars.

There was a seating area outside the building where employees smoked, and probably ate lunch in summer. But now it was briskly cold. Windy. I sat down on a bench next to a middle age woman shivering, cigarette up to her lips. I sat there for three hours, until my fingers went numb and my head spun. I hadn’t eaten in twenty-four hours and I was still hurting from the wine. But I didn’t have any money to buy lunch. Devin was blowing up my phone but I didn’t answer his texts.

Finally around two, a man came out the front door. I knew instantly it was him. I’d seen his picture on social media. Had studied his features to see if I could see myself in him.

I stood up and approached him. He gave me a smile, but then said, “Look, I don’t have any change for you.”

He thought I was a panhandler. A homeless kid. He had a kind face, with warm brown eyes. He wasn’t very old, and he was fit, handsome in his dress shirt and tie. “Are you Randy Hart?”

He frowned now. I rushed on before he went back into the building or called the cops on me. “Did you know a woman named Charlene Ennis? And have a daughter with her named Tiffany?” I reached out to steady myself on the concrete wall of the building. Everything was swaying now and I swallowed hard, the hot saliva in my mouth increasing.

“What the hell is this all about?” he asked cautiously.

“I’m Tiffany Ennis. I think I’m your daughter.” I lost focus on him as everything in front of me went fuzzy, dark.

Then my knees buckled and I passed out cold.

Six months later

“That’s it,” my father said, taping a box shut. “Last box.”

I smiled at him. “Thanks for helping me.” There was very little I had wanted to keep in my grandmother’s house, but I did decide to be practical and take dishes, glasses, towels with me back to Cat’s. The rest had been donated to charity or thrown out, but it had been a big job dealing with it. My father had been there twice now helping me sort through stuff and I really appreciated it.

“It’s the least I can do, hell.” He gave me a rueful shrug.

The guilt he carried was substantial and I kept reassuring him none of it was his fault. To me all that mattered was knowing that if he had known about me, he would have taken me in. He still felt bad he hadn’t verified my grandmother’s story, but who the hell would think a grandmother would lie about her grandchild dying? Not anyone with a heart, that was for sure.

“It means a lot to me.” I reached over and gave him a hug. The more time I’d spent with him, and his wife Tamara, the more of myself I’d seen in his features, his mannerisms. We had the same eyes, the same short build, the same laugh.

He held me tightly. He and Tamara had a four-year-old boy, my little half-brother, Tyrell, who was a bundle of energy and a sass master. He’d been just as accepting of me as his parents and when I looked at him, my heart melted. I had a family, though not in the traditional way. But it was good enough for me. It was more than I had ever expected.

Living with Cat and Heath was working out, short term, and I was starting college in the fall. I couldn’t afford to live on my own, and while there was no market for rundown houses in Vinalhaven, I had managed to rent Gram’s house to the new ferryboat operator, a single guy who didn’t seem to care that it was a dump. He just liked the cheap rent. I liked the money in my pocket. Cat wasn’t charging me rent but I knew someday I would pay her back. I’d have my LPN in less than two years and my father had offered to help me with tuition.

I felt more optimistic than I had since I’d first arrived at Richfield last fall.

It had been a hard winter. I had missed Devin every second of every day, but I had stood by my decision. I needed to establish my own life. I needed to step away from the drama of his life. I still had Google alerts on him and I saw what he was doing, what his friends were up to.

Cassandra had come out of rehab healthy and was back in the studio, according to the gossip sites. Sapphire had embarked on a summer tour. Lizzie and Alex had split up and she was dating a professional UFC fighter and planning a year-long stint in Vegas. Kadence was dating one of the owners of the Knicks and when she was frequently photographed courtside, she did not look pregnant.

Devin’s divorce didn’t seem to be final. I found no official filing of it in public court records.

There were a few pictures of him at music industry events and a mention of a beach vacation in February, with Jay and Sapphire. Nothing about him being involved with a woman.

He hadn’t texted me. Not since the first week after I’d left him in the hallway outside the elevator.

And every day since I’d wondered if I’d done the right thing, while knowing that I had.

“Let’s get these out to the car,” Randy said.

I still couldn’t quite bring myself to call him “dad.” It felt forced. So for now I was calling him Randy. “Sounds good.”

We stepped outside and I breathed in deeply. The June air was clean and warm. The old raspberry bush by the corner of the house had young fruit growing on it and I could practically taste the sweetness on my tongue. Funny how I had fantasized about fitting in in New York, but Maine was home. It just was. It was in me, and I wanted to stay there.

“What’s that?” Randy asked, two boxes in his arms as we went down the steps to the gravel drive. “Looks like something is on fire over there.”

I glanced in the direction he was pointing and my heart almost stopped. That was almost exactly where Richfield was. I knew because I had used the Internet to map out exactly where in relation to me Richfield was. The house wasn’t visible from the island, but I had narrowed down the shoreline to the approximate location, and many a night had stood there, arms crossed, heart aching, staring across the ocean at it even though I’d known most likely Devin wasn’t even there.

“That’s a big fire,” I commented. Smoke was billowing up rapidly, an angry black cloud. It had to be Richfield. That wasn’t any other house in the area large enough to make a smoke cloud like that.

Pulling my phone out of my pocket, I called 911. I was sure someone else had reported it but I needed to know if I was right or wrong. I prayed I was wrong. “Yes, um, there’s a fire on the mainland, halfway between town and the point. I just wanted to make sure someone has called it in already and trucks are on their way.”

“Yes, we are aware of that fire, thank you.”

“Where is it exactly? Are any roads closed?”

She rattled off the address. “Please stay out of the area so emergency vehicles can have access.”

I murmured “thanks,” then hung up. It was Richfield. On fire in a big, big way. I dropped the box I was holding on the ground and turned to Randy. “That’s my old job, where I was housesitting. It’s on fire.”

I had told my father most of what had happened with Devin, other than that I had sex with him. I had been so upset and raw I hadn’t been able to prevent myself from blurting it all out. Besides, Randy had wanted some kind of explanation for why I had fainted at his feet, nearly frozen solid.

“Seriously?” Randy popped the trunk of his car and put the boxes in. “But Devin’s not there, right? He’s in the city most of the time.”

“Yes. I mean, he wouldn’t be there now. That’s probably how the fire got so out of control. No one there to monitor it.” But nonetheless I was still worried.

And the idea of the house I had fallen in love with being destroyed brought tears to my eyes. It was like none of it had ever happened then. Like I had never lived there. Like Devin and I hadn’t had coffee and doughnuts in the kitchen. Like he hadn’t taught me to drive there, like we hadn’t cuddled on the couch with Amelia, or spent that one night together in my room off the kitchen.

I did what I hadn’t done in six months. I texted Devin.

Where are you?

He didn’t answer, even though I could see immediately he had read it. I realized it was coming out of nowhere so I typed a second text.

Richfield seems to be on fire. Are you safe?

Yes.

That was it. Just a yes.

Where are you?

Outside Richfield.

I had to go. There was no other option. “I have to go over there and make sure everything is okay. Devin says he’s at the house.” I felt sick to my stomach. If something had happened to him…

“Sure, okay. Let’s catch the ferry. We can drop this stuff off at Caitlyn and Heath’s first.”

I glanced at the time. “Okay, great. Thank you.”

“If he answered you, then clearly he’s fine,” Randy said, clearly wanting to reassure me.

“Yeah.” I texted Devin again.

Please let me know what happens.

Sure.

That was it. Just a casual, cold response. Not that I could blame him. He hadn’t heard from me at all.

As we waited for the ferry, took it across the water with a group of summer vacationers, and drove towards Devin’s house, anxiety had my knee bouncing up and down. My palms were damp and I was biting my bottom lip. The smoke had decreased substantially which was either a good thing or a bad.

There were firetrucks everywhere. I expected someone to wave us away, but everyone was too busy. The fire was mostly out.

But the house was mostly gone. “Oh, my God,” I breathed, tears in my eyes.

All that was still standing was the garage and half of the family room. The rest was nothing but a charred, smoldering heap. The garage door was open and sitting inside it was my jeep. The jeep I’d never driven. The blue paint was still visible below a layer of ash. He hadn’t sold it back to the dealer or online. Scanning the yard, I looked for Devin.

He was sitting on a stretcher, waving off a paramedic and looking… defeated. It was an expression I’d only seen him wear once. On the other side of a closing elevator door. I ran. I just dropped my arms and ran. His hair was longer, but he looked gorgeous. My heart ached as I got closer and I slowed down, wanting to throw myself into his arms.

When he looked over and saw me, he froze. “What are you doing here?” he asked tightly.

“I needed to make sure you were okay.” I came to a stop in front of him. I was wearing flip flops that slid on the grass. “Are you okay?”

“I’ve been better.” He gave a shrug. “But I’ll live.” When he lifted his hand off his stomach, I saw his shirt was open and he was bandaged. “I’m not sure why you care.”

He sounded petulant and I couldn’t blame him, but that wasn’t my concern at the moment. I wanted to know how badly he was injured. “What happened? Did you get burned? How did the fire start?”

The paramedic was hovering and Devin turned to him. “Hey, can you give us a minute?”

“Sure. Don’t go anywhere,” he told Devin, clapping him on the leg.

“I promise not to run a marathon.” When the man moved across the grass, Devin studied me. “You look beautiful, Tiffany.” But then he shook his head, sighing in exasperation. “So is that what it takes to hear from you, my house burning to the ground?”

My bottom lip was trembling. “Why are you bandaged?”

“I may have gotten shot by Kadence.”

“Oh, my God!
What?
” I couldn’t stop myself. I reached out and pushed his hair back off his forehead. It was longer than it had been at Christmas. “She shot you? Why?”

He gave a shrug, moving his head away from my touch. “She was threatening to kill herself. I tried to stop her, she shot me. But it just grazed me. It hurts like a motherfucker but I’ll be okay.”

“I don’t know what to say.” But I did start crying. “If anything had happened to you…”

“You would be free to live your life without me,” he said, gruffly. “Just like you have been.”

“Don’t say that. I don’t want to be free of you. And if you suffer, I suffer.”

“That’s ironic, because I only suffer when you’re not with me.”

I touched him again, more confident now, both that he wasn’t severely injured, and that while I was right to leave him the first time, it would be wrong to leave him again. “So let’s not suffer anymore.”

He didn’t answer me though, just brooded. Happy to see him, happy to know that he had missed me, I kept talking. “So Kadence snowed me, didn’t she?” The pictures, the doll, the pregnancy test, had all been a manipulation. I shivered when I thought about being alone with her. What she could have done to me. I wondered if she had been in Richfield without my knowing it. If she had watched me. It was disturbing and I felt like an idiot. It had taken her all of an hour to convince me she was sane, when she was clearly anything but.

“She’s a sociopath, Tiff. She’s good at lying. Pathologically good at it.” He took my hand off his shoulder and kissed it, staring at me carefully. “We’re officially divorced. Went to court yesterday and everything is filed.”

That’s what I had been waiting six months to hear. “Really? That’s good news. I’m happy for you.” I leaned closer to him. The air was acrid with smoke. “So where is she? Please tell me they arrested her.”

“They did. Though they may conclude it was an accident. The arson, though? I don’t think she can get out of that one. She threw gasoline all over everything. Funny thing is, she was trying to destroy your jeep. That TIFFANY license plate enraged her. But the jeep is still standing.”

“Like you.” Like me. Hopefully, even like us. I kissed his forehead, immensely relieved that he was okay. If she had shot him straight on and killed him, I didn’t know what I would do.

“I don’t know. I’m feeling kind of beat to shit. And I just lost about three million dollars between the house and everything in it. There wasn’t any insurance on it. I let it lapse. Between that and the divorce settlement, I’m hard up for cash. I may need to sell the apartment in the village.”