Fires of Autumn

PROLOGUE

Pasadena, California

Mid Twenty-first century

The Santa
Ana winds had been strong the previous night and the sun rose to reveal a concrete
and steel landscape that was scattered with downed trees and mounded leaves.
But the sky of the new day was a brilliant blue, the temperature already on the
rise. The San Gabriel Mountains, brown with dry brush, were stark and imposing
against the clear sky.

Jack could
remember the smog of the San Gabriel Valley when he was a kid, how the
Santana
,
or Santa Ana, winds would blow away the brown layer of
air
and leave
everything fresh and clear and brittle. Usually in the fall it would happen,
inviting the brush fires that were so prevalent to the area. He could recall
the home he used to live in, nestled right up against those dry, dry mountains.

Mother's
last husband had been determined to have a home with an ocean view, even if
that ocean was
thirty
miles away.  The price Kevin had to pay for a view of Catalina
on a clear day was the never-ending threat of a brush fire, and more than once
they had come close to losing everything. Jack still had visions of Kevin on
the roof of the garage with a garden hose. But somehow, they always emerged
unscathed.

Jack
continued to stare at the mountains, recollecting.  All of that, the fires of
autumn as well as his childhood, seemed so long ago. He'd kind of pushed it all
from his memory after
Kevin had died at age forty-five of a heart attack. The man
wasn't his biological father, but he was the only father Jack had ever really
known and his death had left him shattered. Now, looking at the mountains
seemed to bring those bitter sweet memories around again like a never-ending
merry-go-round.

Jack had
been six years old when Mother had married Kevin. She had just moved back to
the west coast after living in Maryland for a while. But Mother never really
talked about those years she had spent in the east. Jack wasn't even sure if
Kevin had known the details. He was a good man, and maybe he'd just let it all
slide, like Mother's secrets didn't matter to him. 

Once, Jack
had asked about his 'real dad' when he was old enough to realize that Kevin
wasn't the man who had given him life. Mother had turned white and stammered
something he didn't understand
.
But when Jack got older, Mother
told him, very matter-of-factly
,
that his biological father was a
U.S. senator who had died in a plane crash when Jack was four years old. She
had stammered and wept through the story, and Jack realized why his mother had
been so reluctant to talk about that period in her life
.
His death
had crushed her. At least, that was his impression.

Jack
didn’t recall his real father, nor did he have any real memories of life on the
east coast. His only memories of his youth were of living in Pasadena with his
mother and Kevin. He had grown up in a happy house with a couple of older
brothers from mother’s first marriage and a sister from her marriage to Kevin.
Siblings who had grown up and moved away. They were heading to the west coast
now as their mother lay dying, but that would take time. Jack wondered if they
would make it at all.  Out of the four siblings, Jack was the one who had
always stayed close to his mother.  There was a very strong bond between them.

A feeble
cough roused Jack from his train of thought. He turned away from the window,
turning to the sterile hospital bed upon which his mother lay. She was hooked
up to one line that monitored her heart rate, oxygen saturation, respiration,
and other vital information. It was all printed out on a screen above her head
and Jack glanced up at the screen, noting that her life signs were weaker now
than they had been an hour earlier. His heart sank but his mother's violet eyes
fell on him and he forced a smile. He didn't want her to see how badly her
illness was affecting him.

"So
you're awake?" he asked softly as he moved to the bed. Taking his mother's
tissue-paper thin hand into his palm, he kissed it. "Have a good
nap?"

Mother
didn't respond for a moment. Jack wondered if she even heard him. Then, she
coughed again and closed her eyes. "Jack," she murmured. "What
time is it?"

"Time
for dinner. Are you hungry?"

Mother's
head twitched weakly, trying to shake her head. "No."

"I'll
go get Chinese take-out and sneak it in like I did last week. Sound good?"

"No."

"Pizza?"

''No.''

Jack tried
not to let his mood dampen. The woman could not afford to lose any more weight
"You always did like a big greasy burger. I'll run up the street and....
"

"No."
Mother's voice sounded strangely firm. The violet eyes opened and she was
looking at him, her face still lovely in spite of her age and illness. Such a
sweet, beautiful face. "What day is it?"

"Tuesday."

“It’s a
good day to die.”

Jack tried
not to show how badly that comment hurt him but he couldn't. Mother read his
emotion and squeezed his hand in a surprising show of strength. "Don't
grieve, Jack. There isn't time."

Jack met
her eyes, then. "What do you mean?"

Mother
held his gaze, memorizing every line of his strong-jawed face
.
"Exactly
that," she whispered. When he looked away again, uncertainly, she squeezed
his hand to force him to meet her eye. "Jack, the time has come. I think
we must... talk."

Jack
didn't like the tone of her voice. "About what?"

She didn't
say anything for a moment. Then an eyebrow lifted. "You know," she
said. "Just..
.
things."

Jack shook
his head. "What things?" Even as he said it, he knew exactly what she
was talking about. But he wasn't sure he wanted to hear any more and he was
about to divert the subject when Mother sighed heavily and began coughing. Even
in this day and age, the marvels of medical science had yet to find a cure for
cancer, and Mother's case was advanced. The doctors figured she had less than a
few days to live, at best. The thought brought tears to Jack's eyes. He held
her hand as she coughed, her body wracked with disease and a hint of anguish he
couldn't begin to understand. When the spasms died and she lay gasping, her
luminous eyes turned to him once again.

"Mom,"
he whispered, ''you don't have to talk about anything. There isn't anything you
have to explain to me."

Mother
took a deep breath, struggling to form the words. "Yes, there is,'' she
insisted. "You've ... you've got to know. And there isn't much time
left."

Jack
fought back the tears. He was a grown man, an FBI agent with a world of
responsibility, but  the sight of his dying mother made
him
feel like
a four year old again. The woman, for so many years, had been his whole life.
Even though he had a wife and kids now, still, his mother had a special place
in his heart and like a clingy child, he didn't want to let her go.

"Mom,"
he said hoarsely. "I don't need to know anything. I've had a really good
life and I've never wondered about the what-ifs or has-beens.
It
just
doesn't matter, whatever you may feel necessary to say."

"I
know," Mother said softly. "But it's right that you should know the
truth. I... I've just  never had the nerve to tell you."

Jack gazed
down at his mother, his jaw ticking faintly. "Does it really matter? I
know that my father was a U.S. Senator from Wyoming, Scott Dane. I also know he
was killed in a plane crash more than forty years ago. What else matters?"

"A
great deal."

He stared
at her a moment before rising from the bed, shoving his hands into his pockets.
His mother watched the gesture, something that hadn't changed since he was a
kid. A sort of dejected, frustrated look.

"Look,
Mom," he said, kicking at the wheels on her bed. "You've never wanted
to
talk
about your life on the east coast. I know everything up until
that point in time, and then there's a four year time gap that's like this big,
mysterious void. I will admit that it used to bug me. When I was a kid, I used
to imagine all sorts of things, like maybe you were a hooker or a spy. But now
... well, now I really don't care. If you want to keep that part of your life
private, then that's your business."

“Did
Hunter or Brody ever say anything?”

“Not a
word.  And I never asked.”

Mother was
smiling faintly. "You're far too accepting."

He
grinned. "I've had to be."

She tried
to shake a fist at
him
and he laughed; it was so much like Mother of old. But they both
sobered, for the subject was too serious to take lightly.
It
was the
first time in all of Jack's forty-six years that his mother had been willing to
discuss her life in the east.

"Mom,"
he took his hands out of his pockets and leaned on the end of the bedrail,
"you don't have to do this."

"Yes,
I do," she said firmly. "Don't you want to know?"

He
shrugged, lamely. "Know about what? Frankly, I don't care. You've already
told me all I need to know."

She gazed
at him, steadily. "Don't pretend to be so detached. There is far more to
the story and you've been dying for years to ask me."

He didn't
say anything. He stared at the floor, fidgeted with the end of the bed, until
Mother finally put a stop to his twitching.

"Ask
me something," she demanded. "Anything at all."

Jack
snorted. "Christ, Mom
.
... "

"Come
on, just ask. You've always wanted to know. Can't you think of one single
question?"

He pursed
his lips, half in thought and half in irritation. He could see in her eyes that
she wasn't going to let the subject go. All of these years and now, she was
almost desperate to talk about her secrets. "All right," he said
softly. "I'll ask you something."

Mother
lifted her hand. "Shoot."

She had
meant to be flippant. Mother was a real character when she was feeling fit, and
it was a brief glimpse into her normal nature. But he couldn't respond to it;
not now when she was dying and he was about to hear the mysteries of her life
.
Secrets
she had lived with, hanging over her like a great dark shadow. To finally
discuss what she had hidden for decades was the supreme act of finality; she
was dying, therefore, the need to relieve her conscience was strong.
It
all seemed
to come back to this death thing again, like an endless circle, and Jack was
torn between the excitement of finally hearing her truth and the grief of
knowing why she was doing
it.

"Okay,
here goes."He kicked at the bed again as he summoned his courage. "Do
... do I look like my dad?"