Walking on Air (19 page)

Well, hell.
This was a new one. Here he’d been trying to figure out a way to apologize to her, and she’d beaten him to the draw. That didn’t happen often. He already felt bad enough about the whole stupid mess.

“Don’t,” Gabe pushed out. “It’s me who should be saying I’m sorry. You did nothing this morning that any sane woman in the same situation wouldn’t have done, and I acted like a total ass.”

She brushed at her cheeks with her free hand. In the other, he finally noticed that she held the satchel. He almost groaned. She’d actually pried up that damned board, and he’d been so mad when he pounded in the nails, he knew he’d driven them deep. Loosening them had to have been an arduous task for a slightly built woman.

She stepped toward him, extending the bag. “I want you to have this, every dime of it. And with it, I extend my abject apologies. I misjudged you from the start, and I’ve—” She broke off and swallowed. “Though I’ve tried to make you feel welcome in many ways, I’ve withheld my trust. I’d like to rectify that.”

Only Nan could turn a heartfelt apology into a formal speech. But Gabe knew it truly was heartfelt. He saw that in every taut line of her body and also in her eyes. She laid the bag at his feet and walked over to the chopping block to sit down. That surprised him. He doubted she often sat on anything but a straight-backed chair, and he’d sure never seen her spine come into contact with one. He suspected she was afraid a slump in her posture might snap her vertebrae.

“Would you mind joining me for a moment?” she asked, patting the blade-scarred surface of the stump next to her hip. “I have a few things I’d like to say.”

Gabe was so exhausted from cutting wood that the thought of sitting for a few minutes held some appeal. He took a seat beside her, careful not to crowd her. Fortunately it was a huge block, the lower end of a monstrous ponderosa pine that had met up with a saw years ago, judging by the grayed hue of its grain.

“Shoot,” he said.

She smiled slightly. Then she released a shaky breath and leaned her head back to look up at the darkening winter sky. After an endlessly long moment, she finally said, “Do you know what I realized about myself this afternoon?” She licked her bottom lip and turned that quicksilver gaze on him. “I never learned how to laugh.” The dimple in her cheek flashed, not with a genuine smile, but more a sad twist of her lips. “There was no real laughter in my childhood home. Once the guests left, there was none at all, in fact. My mother—her name was Helena—was a beautiful woman, born into a wealthy family, and thinking back, I can’t recall seeing her smile. Not
real
smiles, anyway, only the polite kind, which are for show and not heartfelt. I wonder now if she wasn’t raised in much the same fashion that I was, with a father who expected daughters to be decorative ornaments of barter, not living, breathing people.”

Gabe felt something shift in his chest. He couldn’t say it hurt, but it didn’t feel particularly good, either.

“You love to laugh,” she observed softly. “I don’t know who taught you how, but whoever it was gave you a priceless gift.”

Gabe followed her lead and stared up at the sky for a long while. “My mother,” he finally revealed. “It was my mother who taught me how to laugh.”

“Will you tell me about her? She must have been wonderful.”

Startled by the request, Gabe gave her a curious study. “Nan, my mother was a—” He couldn’t push the word
whore
past his lips. Not now, with his memories of Mary Susan Miller resurfacing in a painful yet sweet rush. “She was . . .”

“An unfortunate?” Nan offered.

“Yes, an unfortunate, and no, I won’t tell you about her.” Gabe’s memories of his mother were precious and intensely personal. He’d never shared them with anyone, and he didn’t intend to start now. “Sorry.”

“But I shared so much with you about my father—and other things. How is that fair?”

“You
needed
to share those memories.”

“Well, as defensive as you are, perhaps you need to share yours, too!”

“You don’t see me not sleeping for fear of bad dreams. Since I got you to talk, you’ve slept like a baby.”

She lifted her hands, conveying bewilderment. “I didn’t ask to hear bad things, only about what she was like and how she taught you to laugh.”

“Everything about her was
bad
, Nan. At least, you’d think so. I’m not about to tell you about my mother so you can look down your
ladylike
nose at her. I loved her with all my heart, and I still love my memories of her.”

“You think I would do that? Look down on her, I mean?”

Gabe gave a bitter laugh. “Yes. How could you not? For you, the whole world turns around propriety. A lady does this, and a lady does that. Well, cupcake, my mama was no
lady
, not by your standards anyway.”

“But by yours she was?”

“Damn straight, the finest lady who ever walked.”

Nan puffed air into her cheeks and went back to sky watching. After a second, she softly said, “So you think it impossible for me to comprehend how life can back one into a corner and make one do unthinkable things. Me, Nan Sullivan, who murdered a man.”

That was another thing Gabe meant to discuss with the angels if he ever got another audience. It wasn’t right that Nan still scourged herself for killing a man who was actually alive and well. Being responsible for another person’s death . . . Well, Gabe knew from firsthand experience how heavy a burden that was.

“All right,” he heard himself say. “I’ll tell you a little about my mother, but God as my witness, if you criticize her, by word, action, or a noise in your throat, I’ll leave you to sit here on your stump throne and never tell you anything else.”

To his surprise, she replied, “You shan’t hear a word of criticism from me or see any sign of it. I promise.”

Gabe had been so bent on not talking about his mother that he had to collect his thoughts and invite the memories back again. “I don’t know what she found to laugh about. She had a horrible life from start to finish. Well, maybe not
horrible
. A better word might be
difficult
, at least when she was young and still at home. The horrible parts didn’t come until later.” Memories unfurled inside Gabe’s mind, nearly too sweet and precious for words. “Like your mother, she was pretty. Beautiful, in fact, with merry blue eyes and long, curly brown hair that shone like she gave it a good polish every morning.”

“She probably gave it a hundred strokes with a brush every night before she went to bed. I used to do that before you came.”

“You’re right. She did brush her hair at night.” Gabe recalled that now. “That was how I first learned to count, while she brushed her hair.” He settled a questioning regard on Nan. “Why’d you stop brushing yours when I came?”

She shrugged. “It’s a bedtime ritual, and it seemed improper to do it in front of you.”

Gabe chuckled. He couldn’t help himself. “Brushing your hair?” He shook his head. “We’ve got a whole different idea of proper, apparently.”

“Enough about me,” she said. “I want to hear about your mother.”

Gabe settled his elbows on his knees, more comfortable talking when he leaned forward slightly. That way, if Nan stuck her nose in the air, maybe he wouldn’t notice. “She came from poor folks, the oldest of fourteen kids. Only nine of them survived infancy, so by the time she turned fifteen, she’d loved and lost three baby sisters and two brothers. Her father was a farmer with a hurt back. After having so many babies and laboring to raise the ones who lived, her mama grew old before her time.”

“I’m sure the grief aged her as well,” Nan observed solemnly. “Imagine the pain of losing five babies.”

“Yeah, well, they couldn’t afford to send for the doctor, so home remedies were all they had. Given the conditions, it’s probably amazing that nine of the fourteen kids survived. Babies sicken more often than not when they’re born into poverty. Food was scarce. My grandmother probably never got enough nourishment when she was carrying them.”

“Oh, Gabriel, not enough food? How awful. It makes me feel terrible for whining about my own childhood. At least there was always plenty to eat.”

Hearing the sincere ring in Nan’s voice, Gabe started to relax. Maybe he’d misjudged her, and she truly wouldn’t grow condescending. “At fifteen, my mother felt it was up to her to save her family, so she packed a knapsack and walked barefoot all the way to Kansas City to get a job so she could send money home to keep food on the table.”

“Oh, my stars. I doubt I’d have that kind of courage even now.”

“It was courageous, all right. Sadly, being brave of heart isn’t always enough. She quickly learned that there were no jobs worth having for a girl her age, with the exception of one: selling her body to men. So that’s what she did.” Gabe waited, but he heard no muffled snort to indicate a negative reaction. “And somewhere along the trail, she met my father, a fancy gambling man with a lot of money and no heart. She went to work in one of his establishments, and he took a temporary liking to her, insisting that she service only him.”

Gabe paused, trying to recall where he’d come by all this information. He knew his mother had told him some of it—about her family and how she’d ended up in Kansas City. But he couldn’t picture her telling a little boy the rest of it. He guessed he’d ferreted out most of the story as a grown man, after he’d found his father and confronted him. What a shocker that had been. Gabe had learned during the meeting that he was the spitting image of his sire, and even now, the resemblance didn’t sit well with him. Luther Valance had been a conscienceless, greedy, and viciously cruel man who’d used other people like ladder rungs to reach the top. Gabe had no doubt that he had illegitimate half brothers and sisters scattered helter-skelter across four states, but Luther had chosen to acknowledge only his firstborn when he died.

“Anyway, she got pregnant with me, and when my father found out that he’d put a bun in her oven, he tossed her out on the street. I was born in a seedy Kansas City brothel. I don’t know what she did with a baby while she worked. Maybe the other whores helped her out by taking turns looking after me.” Gabe shrugged. “When I was old enough, I hid out under the brothel staircase until the men stopped tapping on my mother’s door. Then I got to go up to her room.” He smiled at the memory. “She could make a feast out of one cookie and a cup of tea. She’d pretend to nibble while I ate most everything. We didn’t have plenty, like you, so when we got something, she always made sure I got the lion’s share. We’d sit cross-legged on her bed. It was the only furniture in the room besides a dresser. But it was home to me—the only one I ever really had. We had good times there, really good times. She’d tell me stories. I remember the ring of her laughter and how she was always ruffling my hair. Somehow, no matter how rotten her work that night may have been, she always found something to laugh about.”

“And you thought I might feel moral indignation? A woman who could laugh in the face of desperation and heartbreak, and give love and laughter to her little boy despite horrific circumstances, deserves honor and respect, not condemnation. Despite her circumstances, she tried to be a good mother.”

Gabe felt relieved to hear her say that. “Better than that. She
was
a good mother. The best she could be, anyway. Believe it or not, I was a fairly happy kid.” He shrugged. “I know the way we lived must sound horrible to you, but it was all I knew, and she made what little we had seem special. Not to say there weren’t some awful moments.” He remembered the night he’d tried to defend his mother against an abusive client and been tossed down a steep stairway for his trouble, but he hesitated mentioning something like that to Nan. “Mostly my memories, vague as they’ve become over the years, are good ones. Then Mama got sick. I was five, maybe six. When there is no adult around to remind a kid, he loses track of how old he is until he’s mature enough to do some digging to learn his birth date. I don’t know what took my mother, but she up and died on me, and from that point forward, I grew up on the streets.” Gabe sighed. “I guess you’re right, though. She gave me a great gift by teaching me to laugh. In this nasty old world, if we don’t laugh, what can we do but cry?”

Nan’s gaze clung to his. “Will you share it with me?”

“Share what with you?”

Her throat convulsed in a hard swallow before she replied, “The gift your mother left you—the ability to laugh at silly things.”

Gabe’s heart caught at the yearning in her expression. “Honey, laughing is the simplest thing in the world. You just let go and do it.”

She shook her head. “No, first you have to see the humor in something.” The corner of her mouth quivered, and in her attempt to suppress that, she flashed the dimple at him again. “I’m blind to those things, so bent on everything being done properly and having order in my life that I’m stifling Laney’s ability to be carefree. Save her from that, Gabriel. Save
me
from that. If she grows up to be a killjoy like me, I’ll never forgive myself.”

It was Gabe’s turn to swallow hard. “You’re not a killjoy, Nan. You’re just a little too serious about stuff.”
Way too serious, mostly.
But not for anything would Gabe have hurt her feelings by saying so. “Relax a little bit, and laughing will just come naturally.”

“I need help.” She turned up her palms where they rested on her lap and stared at them. “I’ve heard we all have a life line and a love line. Do you suppose I was born with a serious line?”

“Nobody’s born with a serious line,” he refuted. “You’re going to be fine. You’re already a great mother. Let up on yourself. It’s hard to improve on damned near perfect.”

“That’s the problem, don’t you see, my penchant for perfection.” She bent her head, fell quiet for a moment, and then stood. “Your answer is no, isn’t it?”

“It’s not that, Nan. I just don’t like to make promises I’m not sure I can keep. I’ll try. How’s that sound?”

She nodded. “That’s all that can be asked of anyone.” She gestured toward the building. “Supper is in the warmer. I hope you’ll leave off chopping wood and come upstairs before everything ruins.”