Sins of the Father (22 page)

I nodded. Furniture on Thursday. I wanted
the room painted before we started arranging the room. “How soon
can they be there?”

She flipped through a calendar. “Mmm, let me
see. I’ve got an opening two weeks from Thursday, and another one
–”

“Oh, that long? This is a very small room in
the grand scheme of the house, Lily. It couldn’t take more than an
hour to do the job.”

“What were you thinking?” she asked.

“Tomorrow?”

She grimaced. “Let me give Stu a call and
see if he can swing a small job on such short notice.

I started bargaining with the universe to
cut me some slack, just this once.

Lily returned quickly. “They can be there at
three tomorrow afternoon, but they’ll need the room cleaned out so
all they have to do is tape and paint. Does that work?”

“I’ll make it work.”

It was after five when I left the store.
Four hours since my last meal. I was famished. Running home to
Johnny made my spirits flag. I hit a drive thru for two reasons –
first and foremost, extreme hunger hurts. Secondly, it gave me a
reason to procrastinate.

When I pulled into the garage, the burger
and fries were toast. Half the large strawberry shake remained in
evidence.

The garage door flew open while I was
dumping the trash into one of the bins in the garage. “I’m still
wearing the damned thing, as you well know. There was no
restriction that prohibited a little shopping, was there?”

Johnny stomped through the garage to the
back of the Expedition and opened the large door. He had three of
my bags clenched in one fist. I yanked the ropy handles away from
him. “I can carry in my own bags, Johnny. I want this thing off my
ankle, unless you want me to electrocute myself in the
bathtub.”

Chapter 20

I woke at nine, to the rumblings of a greedy
stomach. If I didn’t make up the lost weight plus two pounds by my
next appointment, I’d be stunned. Growling commenced.

No, food doesn’t magically appear in the
refrigerator if you stand in front of an open door long enough. I
had my strawberry itch satisfied earlier and then some. I dug
through the fruit drawer. Strawberries. Of course. Some chunks of
honeydew. Blueberries. I popped one of them in my mouth.

“Hungry again?”

I shrugged.

“Want some blueberry pancakes?”

“That’s breakfast food.”

“It’s food, and if that’s what you feel like
eating right now, I’ll make some.”

“Suit yourself.”

“Well, it sounds good to me, so I think I’ll
make some anyway.”

Soon the smell of buttery batter and sweet
fruit filled the kitchen. My stomach enthused over the notion of
breakfast food for dinner. Rather than let my heart perseverate on
what a sweet gesture blueberry pancakes were, my brain focused on
why he owed me this any anything else I could think of.

Johnny held a plate piled high with pancakes
in front of me. “Want these?”

“Whatever.”

He slid them across the breakfast bar at the
kitchen island. “Milk? Juice?”

“Do we have any hot chocolate?” I squeezed a
saucerful of syrup over the sweet cakes and dug in while Johnny
retrieved a saucepan and started making hot chocolate the old
fashioned way. I wasn’t about to complain. I could always taste the
difference between the real thing and powder mixed in hot
water.

He strained the steaming brew into to cups
as I finished my dinner. Hungrier than I thought. “Aren’t you going
to eat?” I asked.

“I had a very late lunch.”

“So blueberry pancakes didn’t really sound
good to you at all.”

“It sounded good for you. Marshmallows or
plain?”

I wrinkled my nose. “Too much sweet stuff
today. I’ll pass.”

Johnny sighed and turned toward the
sink.

“I didn’t mean I don’t want the hot
chocolate, just no extra sugar.”

He walked around the counter and put the cup
beside me. “Your hair…” he said softly.

I hadn’t exactly offered the opportunity for
a scathing commentary when I got home from the wild shopping spree
earlier. It seemed unwise for him to start in now that I had a cup
of scalding liquid at hand. “Yeah, I know. It’s pretty butch.”

Johnny’s hand skimmed lightly over the back
of my head, so soft, I thought I imagined it until his fingertips
tickled my neck. “It’s adorable.”

I watched him retreat to the office. The
door clicked shut. No slamming this time. No stomping. No sullen
silence. I sighed. How long could the battle rage on before both of
us were nothing more than empty husks of humanity?

I rubbed my temples and grabbed my cup of
cocoa. Mmm. Delicious. Just like the blueberry pancakes. I curled
up in the corner of the sofa and grabbed the remote. Mindless drama
played out on the television while I savored the hot brew. One hand
drifted over my belly.

“You know even if he hates me, he loves you
very much. He’s not a bad guy really, even if Mommy gets so mad at
him she could spit bloody nails. You don’t know what that means,
and I hope you never do.”

I curled up in the corner of the sofa and
let the flickering lights on the screen drag my eyelids shut. It’s
the little moments that make life good after all. Full belly. Warm
chocolate. Comfortable nook.

Perhaps it was the happy thoughts, tiny as
they were, that dragged me into a fanciful world in sleep. In the
bluest sky, a fluffy, grinning sun twisted in a merry dance above
me. A giraffe munched leaves from a tree, pausing to smile at me
from time to time. A hippo slogged through sparkling blue water,
baring the whitest teeth in a playful smile. Next to the oasis, an
elephant trumpeted a happy song before taking a snout full of water
that rained on the happy hippo. A monkey swung down from the tree
and perched on the back of the giraffe and began clapping,
shrieking and jumping up and down.

Beside me, two beautiful little boys with
eyes as blue and clear as the sky applauded. They waved chubby arms
and screeched with delight. Soon, they turned the joyful exuberance
on me, giggling and wrapping arms around my neck for wet, sloppy
kisses.

My eyes shot open. “Oh!” Hand over babies.
The fluttering sensation intensified. I laughed softly. “Liked that
one, did you?”

A knee registered in my peripheral vision. I
turned my head slowly. Johnny was perched on the coffee table
staring at me, bland, unreadable.

“How long have you been staring at me?”

“I was debating whether or not I should wake
you up. Looked like you were having a good time. I can’t remember
the last time I saw you smile like you really meant it.”

I dragged myself up and rubbed my eyes.
“What time is it?”

“A little before midnight.”

“Dammit,” I said.

“That’s bad?”

“I had things to do.” I glanced in the
general direction of the main floor guest room. “If I’m gonna be up
all night, I guess it doesn’t matter what time I –”

“You should go to bed,” Johnny said. “You’re
obviously more exhausted than you realized.”

I could dig my feet in and prolong his
departure with another argument, or I could pretend to agree and
send him on his way, free to do as I pleased all night. I chose the
latter option. “You’re probably right. I guess I should turn
in.”

“Helen…”

I spared a brief glance. No words asked the
question anyway.
What?

“I wish we could talk. I think there are
things that we both need to say without becoming angry, and maybe
now… you don’t seem quite so angry with me tonight.”

I knew what he meant, what he was asking
for. My heart leapt at the chance. My brain wasn’t quite so
forgiving. Unfortunately, it’s still in the driver’s seat, and no
matter how hard the tender part of me tries to protest, the brain
always seems to come out of the battle victorious.

My head wagged lightly. “Not ready, Johnny.”
I retreated to the safety and solitude offered behind a closed
bedroom door and waited for his footsteps to fade. I waited another
hour, just to be sure that he had taken up residence in his corner
of the ring before I emerged from the bedroom.

The house was completely dark save for the
nightlight under the microwave oven in the kitchen. I inched
through the darkness to the opposite side of the house. Funny, but
I didn’t know my way in the dark here nearly as well as I did the
brownstone in Georgetown. The head couldn’t wrap itself around the
notion that I’d live here for ten years either.

I flipped on the light in the guest room and
surveyed the contents. Queen sized bed, two night stands, lamps,
window treatments, a moderately sized dresser. If I took the
drawers out, I could drag it to the garage without help. I stripped
the linens from the bed and deposited them next door in the laundry
room. The mattress was heavier than it looked. Even though the
garage door was only a few steps away from the guest room, I paused
several times en route to listen. No sound drifted from
upstairs.

The more I worked methodically through the
task of emptying furniture from the room, the more energized I
felt. If this was what nesting felt like, we were in for some
serious reorganization when the babies were due.

At last, the room was empty. It looked much
larger without the big bed and all the accessories taking up space.
I planned where every stick of new furniture would rest. Northwest
corner would hold the rocker-glider. The cribs would sit against
the southwest corner, L shape configuration. Changing tables along
the south wall. That left the entire east wall empty.

The dream drifted back to my mind. I knew
exactly what I’d do with that wall too. It was merely a matter of
finding what I wanted.

I stopped in the kitchen for a quick detour
to the fridge and grabbed my favorite beverage, another strawberry
shake. Next began the search. I booted up my desktop iMac in the
office and waited for the software to load.

After an hour, I rubbed the frustration and
grit from my eyes. Surely I wasn’t the only mother who had the idea
of decorating a nursery according to the dream I had.

Babies fluttered. I rested a reassuring hand
over their temporary home. “Don’t worry, guys. I liked the idea
too. We’ll figure it out.”

It suddenly occurred to me that rather than
spending what was left of the pre-dawn hours searching for
something not easily found, it might be a better plan to sketch the
ideas onto paper and find someone locally who could simply make the
decor for me. The pages of a white legal tablet quickly filled with
images from the dream.

“What we need is grass, yes?” Back to the
browser. That was easy to find. I discovered a company that sold a
rug that was vibrant green, claimed to be the softest
dig-your-toes-in-and-enjoy weave known to man and was the right
size for my budding nursery. I ordered one.

Noise from the kitchen and the aroma of
coffee drew my attention to the window behind the computer screen.
Pink streaks stretched sunburned fingers across the western
sky.

Shit. Johnny was awake.

I listened to the sound of him fumbling
around the kitchen, no doubt making his extra large coffee to go.
The coffee maker sputtered out the last drops of the noxious strong
brew he notoriously made.

Debate raged. Did I dare try to quietly
close the office door and hope he didn’t notice? Maybe I should sit
quietly and hope he assumed I was still sleeping, or at the very
least, had no interest in seeing him before he left for OSI.

A ring pierced the air. I jumped in my chair
and cursed internally.
Please don’t let him hear me in here!
The last thing I wanted was another heartfelt plea for
the
talk
.

“Orion.”

I held my breath.

“Hey, Crevan. I’m good. Do we have an ETA
yet?”

An estimated time of arrival for what
exactly? I gnawed my lower lip and crept quietly to the door for a
better eavesdropping post.

“I see. No, I’m on my way out the door in a
few. Just a couple of things I need to finish up here.”

Hopefully not in the office. I glanced over
my shoulder. No stack of files. No briefcase. No government issue
laptop computer. I sagged against the door frame.

“She’s all right, as far as I can tell.”

Oh, so when I elicit a little pity, I look
like a fool, but it’s all right for him to mope around to his
buddies about the sad state of his marriage. Never mind it became a
sad state because of
him
.

“No, we’re gonna press forward on that no
matter what Joe does today. I figure we should know our collective
fate by early afternoon. He’s got the press conference scheduled
for three.”

Whoa. What had I missed? Speaking of moping
around. I couldn’t clearly recall the last time I read the paper or
watched the news. I certainly wasn’t interested in hearing anything
Johnny had to say about his job or anything else.

“Don’t worry about it. I told you guys,
you’ve got work no matter what. Darkwater Bay is going to be in
serious need of people like you, Devlin too, if Joe does what I
think he’s gonna do today. We’ll hang out a new shingle at the
security company. Who knows? Maybe it’ll be more liberating doing
this job from the private sector.”

What job? Private investigations? Easier. I
stifled the snort in the back of my throat. Dream on, Johnny.
Without the authority of the justice system, he couldn’t do nearly
as much as he could as a law enforcement officer. The courts don’t
typically grant search warrants to PI’s.

The refrigerator door slammed. Must’ve been
time for half-and-half to cut the sludge in his cup to something
less than the consistency of runny pudding.

“Nope, on my way out the door right now. I
think she’s sleeping in, and I’m not going to disturb her. It’s
been rough, you know?”