The Dark Light of Day (31 page)

“Jake! You’re going to wake her up.”

“Fuck this shit.” He stood and started walking back into the
darkness from where he’d appeared not long before.

“Wait!” I called after him. I stood up, but didn’t follow him. He stopped, but didn’t turn around. “You never answered my question.
Why do you care who her father is?
You
were the one who didn’t
believe
in me, or in us.
You
were the one who left. So, why does it even
matter to you now?”

I was sure I already knew. I just needed to hear him say it.

“Because—” He cut himself off and started walking again. Just
when I thought it would remain a mystery forever, he stopped
again, and turned to face me. “Because I wanted it to be me, Bee.”

With that, he disappeared behind the side of the house.

I fell. My ass crashed into the paver deck. I let my head fall back
onto the siding of the house. “I did, too,” I whispered to no one. One
tear fell, and then another, until I couldn’t control the flow. “I did, too.”

It was quiet a while before I pried myself up off the patio and headed back into the house. I checked on Georgia and found her still asleep, her chest rising and falling evenly, her doll still suffocated at her side. Our argument hadn’t woken her.

Had it been an argument, a fight?

It was the best fight I’ve ever had.
Jake’s words from years ago played in my brain.

I made sure all of the doors were locked and went room to room to turn off the lights. It had been the longest day of my life. All I wanted to do was try and get some sleep, although I doubted it was even a possibility. My mind was still reeling over what he’d said. He’d been hoping he was Georgia's dad. The thought made my stomach turn and my heart flutter all at the same time.

Several times during the night, I contemplated telling Jake just how Owen came to be Georgia’s father. But then, I asked myself if his knowing the truth would change anything. I had no idea, and it just wasn’t me I had to think about anymore. I had a daughter by another man. Jake hadn’t trusted me or loved me enough to ignore the gossip four years ago, and according to the events of the evening, that hadn’t changed.

I reached for the switch under the kitchen cabinet to turn off the lights when my eyes landed on a newspaper clipping stuck to the top of the refrigerator. It hadn’t been there earlier in the day. The letter magnets Georgia liked to play with were pinning it to the front the fridge. Someone had spelled out the word LOVE with them. I didn’t even need to read the article. The headline was enough for me to know who left it, and why:

ONE-EYED MAN FOUND SHOT

AND DISMEMBERED IN SWAMP

I remembered his words from the one and only night we’d ever had sex, when I’d told him about the man who I’d stabbed in the eye
with a shard of glass in my mother’s house:
I need to know if you
would like it if I put him to ground for you.

I had told him yes then.

I read the rest of the article and clutched it to my chest. After the initial shock of it all, a kind of warmth spread throughout my body, and I knew without question.

I would have said yes all over again.

I HADN’T SEEN OR HEARD FROM JAKE
since the night we
argued. A few weeks passed, but I knew he was still in town. I’d seen his bike parked at the apartment occasionally. He never came to work at
the shop. I wondered why he was still there. Frank was dead and
buried.
Reggie and I were keeping the shop running smoothly, but
ultimately, we were waiting for Jake to decide what his plans were for Dunn’s Auto Repair.

I dropped off Georgia with Tess early one morning while it was still dark, so I could photograph the sunrise on the beach. Sunrises were my best sellers, and at the rate Georgia had been growing I was going to have to sell a ton of postcards just to keep her clothed.

It was a really clear morning, not a cloud in the sky. The waves
were small. Seagulls flew over my head, on their way to the
restaurants to steal bagels and eggs from the tourists dining outside. Conditions were perfect. I took some standing shots before lying on my stomach on the sand to make myself even with the horizon and taking a dozen or so more. Those always turned out to be my favorites, and it didn’t hurt that they were also the ones the tourists wanted to shell out three bucks for.

When I was satisfied that I’d gotten what I wanted, I tucked my camera back in its bag, shook the sand from my long skirt and fanned out the inside of my tank top. A shadow fell over me and an eerie sense of unease pricked the hairs on my arm. An icy hot panic
coursed through my veins. I looked up just in time to see Owen
standing
over me, gazing down my top. His eyes looked clear and his hair
was
tucked into a backwards baseball cap. He was wearing a clean
yellow t-shirt and board shorts. If I hadn’t known any better, I would have thought that he was just a cute, clean-cut local boy.

But I had known better.

And I’d known worse, too.

I didn’t say shit to him. I just started walking away. I saw the Chicken or The Egg Diner in the distance. Its beach side tables were already filled with patrons, but it was too far for them to hear me if I screamed, so I picked up my pace.

Owen followed me through the sand. “I just want to talk to you, Abby,” he said.

“You are not supposed to be near me!” I shouted without
looking back. He was on my heels.

“I just want to talk about our daughter.”

I heard those words leave his mouth, and suddenly I didn’t give
a fuck what he did to me. I stopped and turned on my heels,
pressing my hand into his chest as he ran into me. I caught him by surprise, and he almost fell backwards.

“What the fuck did you say to me?” With adrenaline coursing through my veins I was no longer scared. He should’ve been scared of me, though.

“I want to know about our—”

“MY daughter, Owen—
MY
daughter. You have no rights, no
claim—no
nothing
. You are a monster she never needs to know.
Forget she fucking exists.”

Owen grabbed my wrist and pulled me to him. A wave of
nausea washed over me. I felt around the inside of my beach bag with my
free hand. “I wasn’t going to be rough with you,” he spat, “but you
seem to always bring out the best in me. I want to know her, Abby.
She’s my flesh and blood, goddammit, and I’ve waited long
enough!”

“You can wait in hell motherfucker.” I yanked my wrist from his grip, and just as he was reaching for me again the barrel of my .22 met his forehead.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he said, straightening up to full height. He lifted both of his hands like I was robbing him instead of protecting myself.

“I’m so not fucking kidding.” I kept the gun aimed at his head. I didn’t want to have to shoot twice.

“All I want is to get to know her,” Owen said.

“And all
I
want is to see parts of your head scattered across the beach.”

“You’d really shoot me?” Owen had the balls to look surprised, and even a little scared. It made me visualize the way his head would look as it exploded at point blank range. I may have laughed out loud.

It was fucking funny.

“If you ever come near me or my daughter, I swear to God I will lay you out, and you will never even see it coming. Consider this my nice warning. You won’t get it again.”

“Abby,” he pleaded. His whine made me want to kill him even more. I had no sympathy for him whatsoever. In fact, there wasn’t a single place in my heart that felt the least bit of remorse for Owen Fletcher. “Please.”

In one quick motion, Owen grabbed the barrel of my gun. I
pulled the trigger, shooting into the sand. The gun fell from my grip, and Owen put his hand over my mouth. “You can’t keep her from me,” he whispered in my ear. “Besides, I know you’d never shoot me.”

“But, I will.” The cocking of a hammer brought my attention to
where Jake stood. Even in the lightest light of day his normally
sapphire
eyes were as dark as night. His black t-shirt and jeans looked like hell against the heaven of the white sand. Owen released me
instantly, and I instinctively ran to Jake. He took my hand and pulled me behind him.
Protected by a wall of Jake.

I liked the thought of that. And the feeling.

“You again,” Owen said. He looked pissed, but also very, very afraid.

“Me again,” Jake said.

“I’d heard you were back.”

Jake turned to me, the gun still aimed at Owen. “Your call,
baby.”
He was asking me if Owen should die, right then and there. As
tempted as I was to say yes, there was too much at risk.

I had my daughter to think of.

“Not today.” It was my honest answer. I had dreamed about
Jake taking Owen down for so long. I savored the sight of Owen
quivering while he stared down the barrel of that gun.

Owen kept his hands in the air. “You two are sick,” he said, as if he could read my mind.

Jake laughed out loud. “It took you
this
long to figure that out? You’re fucking dumber than I thought.” Jake tucked his gun in the back of his jeans and put his arm around me. “If I see you near her again, you’re fucking dead – my choice, not hers. Simple as that.” We turned toward the road and started walking. Jake turned to face
Owen again. “And if you even think about going near Georgia, I
won’t just kill you. I’ll cut you into pieces and scatter your parts.”

We left Owen shaking in the sand. I may have just had a confrontation with my walking nightmare, but all I could
concentrate on was the feeling of Jake’s arm around me and his lips in my hair when he kissed my head reassuringly.

When we got to his bike, he handed me his helmet as if we’d
done
that very same thing every day for the last four years. I got on
behind him, hugging him tightly as we sped down the road. It felt good to touch him. It had been so long. The vibrations of the bike had a way of making me remember that I was still alive. Through the good and the bad, and between all the very blurred lines in between, Jake had always made me feel that way.

I knew we would never be able to make us work. That
knowledge didn’t stop me from finally admitting that I was still madly in love with the killer in my grasp.

INSTEAD OF DRIVING ME HOME
Jake took me back to the
clearing among the orange trees where he’d revealed his last secret to me, the place where he had buried both the body of his childhood friend and his stillborn daughter.

We didn’t speak when he parked the bike or when he led me through the narrow path to the clearing. When we got to the spot under the same tree where he made his darkest confessions to me
years ago, he pulled me down onto his lap and buried his face in my neck. His
heart was beating so quickly. His breath was short and came in
spurts. After what seemed like a silent eternity, he finally spoke.

“Bee, what happened between you and Owen, and why the fuck were you trying to shoot him on the beach?”

That question held so much more than words.

“Pass,” I said, using the same rules of the game we used to play.
I had a daughter to protect now. Jake knowing about Owen raping
me
would just make matters worse. “Why are you still here?” I asked
him.

“What?” Jake asked. Confusion marring his beautiful face.

I thought the question was pretty obvious. “Why are you here
with me? Why did you help me on the beach? Why are you even talking to me? I would hate me if I were you.”

He looked at me just the way he used to: past my eyes and into the broken soul beneath. He brushed some stray hairs from my face and cupped my cheek in his palm.

“Pass,” he said.

“Well,” I laughed. “Looks like we’re back to square one.”

“We can just play again then,” Jake said. “Four years adds a lot of new secrets, don’t you think?” That was an understatement. “We’ll start small.” He reached for the pendant on my neck and ran his fingers over the ornate metal that held his initials hidden within the design. “Why do you still wear this?”

That was one I could answer easily. “I’ve tried to take it off.
Several times. I even went a whole day without it once, but when I got home I went right for the dresser and put it back on, I didn’t even stop to think about it. I haven’t taken it off since.” Jake lifted it and pressed his lips to my skin underneath. My breath hitched at the feeling of his warm soft lips on my chest. “My turn.” He nodded and pulled his lips from me, creating an empty feeling. “Why were you at the beach today?”

“I was looking for you.” It was a simple statement, and he didn’t
explain any further. He was just looking for me, and he seemed satisfied with that answer. “See? We’re doing good already.” He nudged my shoulder and smiled up at me. I rested my head on his
shoulder.

He had destroyed what I believed then was the greatest thing
that
ever happened to me in just a few short words four years ago. He
must have hated me still for what he believed to be my betrayal. I couldn’t
just bring him into my life, even if he wanted to be a part of it. I
didn’t
want to be hurt anymore. And I didn’t want to hurt him. We’d
almost
healed each other once, and the pain of being
almost
healed is worse than the pain of being broken to begin with. And Georgia needed a
mom who wasn’t an emotional mess. She also didn’t need someone in her life who would eventually resent her very being. That girl deserved the world, and I fully intended to give it to her. “What are we doing, Jake?”