Redemption Road (Jackson Falls #5) (21 page)

“I lost my mother when I was thirteen. She was a gracious, lovely
woman. The most solid presence in my entire life. Her love was unconditional. I’ll
miss her until the day I die.”

Their gazes locked across the table in perfect understanding. With
no need for words, he nodded curtly. “I left that place as soon as I graduated
from high school. Worked my way through college. Got a law degree. I met Amy—my
ex-wife—at the University of Southern Maine law school. Two kids from Georgia,
here in the frozen north, we were naturally attracted to each other. We had all
these glorious ideals. We’d sit up all night talking about the future. We were
planning to practice family law in some rural county in the Deep South.” His
smile was rueful. “We were young, too young to understand that the two of us
weren’t enough to save the world.”

“So how’d you end up in New York?”

“Amy’s dad was an Atlanta lawyer. Very successful. I should’ve
known right from the beginning that it wouldn’t work out. She grew up with all
the advantages. Ballet lessons, private school, country club. A new car for her
sixteenth birthday. Me, by the age of five, I was milking cows by hand. But she
said the lifestyle her parents lived was bullshit. Phony. I believed her. And
for a while, life was good. Until some friend of her father’s offered her a job
with his Manhattan firm. Corporate law. I was against it. We had a small
practice outside of Atlanta. We weren’t rich, but we were getting by. But she
insisted this was the chance of a lifetime. Told me how great it would be for
Annabel, to be raised in the cultural capital of the Western world. I finally
caved, and she told the old man that she’d take the job if he’d hire me, too. Ten
seconds later, I was a junior associate in a corporate law firm, living in a
high-rise condo in uptown Manhattan.”

He straightened in his chair. “Corporate law was the absolute
antithesis to my own values. I cared about people, not the fat-cat corporations
that were raping them. New York was exciting. It has this dynamic vibe that you
can get drunk on. I never regretted raising Annabel in that atmosphere. But I
hated what I was doing with my life. Amy, on the other hand, ate it right up. She
loved the money, the power, the high-roller lifestyle we were living. Loved
crushing less powerful entities in court. She lusted after that corner office,
the one with the dramatic view of the Manhattan skyline. And she got it. By
sleeping with the old man.”

“Her father’s friend?”

“That would be the one. When I found out about the affair and
confronted her, she left me. Walked away from me, away from Annabel, without so
much as a backward glance. When I met you—”  He paused.

She finished his sentence for him. “You thought I was just like
her.”

“I did. I’m sorry. I don’t believe that anymore. I don’t know what
happened between you and Jesse, or why you left Mikey behind. But you’re not
like Amy. You have a heart. She has a big black hole in her chest where her
heart’s supposed to be.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be. It’s behind me. What she did to Annabel is inexcusable,
but we’re doing our best to move past it. Amy’s married to the old goat now. He’s
a serial womanizer with five or six broken marriages before this one. I hope
she’s happy. I hear karma’s a bitch.”

“So you walked away from it all. The ruined marriage, the city,
the life you hated so much.”

“And I came back to farming. It just felt right. Pretty much every
penny I have is tied up in this place. The house needs work, I don’t always get
the single dad thing right, and the hours are grueling. I’m exhausted most of
the time, and I’m in debt up to my eyebrows. And you know what? It’s the
damnedest thing, but I wake up every morning, before the sun comes up, glad to
be alive. I have no idea what’s ahead of me, but I’m grateful that I followed
my instincts. Because coming here was the best decision I’ve ever made in my
life.”

“And now,” she said shakily, “you are, among other things, a
savior of lost and damaged dogs.”

“Not to mention lost and damaged women.”

A tear trickled down her cheek. Her gaze dropped to the plate of
food that sat virtually untouched in front of her, then it returned to his
face, that beautiful face, with its dark, arching brows, its full lips, its
widow’s peak. What was this emotion blossoming inside her, squeezing her lungs until
it threatened to cut off her breath and smother her?  Was this the legendary,
mythical, inexplicable Moment she’d heard about?  The moment when everything
that had previously been muddled became crystal clear, changing hearts and
lives forever? Because if it was, this was a really shitty time for it to
happen. Her husband had been dead for less than a year. Her life was in turmoil.

And she’d be gone in a few weeks.

He set down his fork and narrowed his eyes. “Colleen?” he said. “Why
are you crying, sweetheart?”

She shook her head, unable to speak. This was a disaster of epic
proportions. She was leaving here forever. And Harley was staying, as firmly
rooted in the rocky Maine soil as the row of hemlocks her grandfather had
planted behind the house as a wind break. She couldn’t fall in love with him. Not
now. Not ever. Except that she suspected it was already too late. Because she’d
never felt this way before. Had never experienced this wild, exquisite blend of
joy and pain. Certainly not with Jesse. Nor with the second husband she’d
divorced after seven months of marriage.

Not even with Irv.

Oh, Irv
, she thought,
I’m so sorry
.

And into her ear, as clearly as though he’d been standing at her
side, her dead husband whispered: 
Go for it!

Slowly, Harley scraped back his chair. Stood and walked around the
table to her. Knelt in front of her. “Honey?” he said.

Nobody had ever called her that before. Not since Mama died. Instead
of answering, she did what she’d been waiting to do since the first time she’d
seen him minus the mud and the overalls and the ugly yellow slicker. She
reached out a hand and touched his face. It was warm and smooth, unmarred by
any wayward whiskers. He turned his head and pressed a soft kiss to her palm.

“You shaved before I got here,” she said.

“Guilty as charged.”

“Does this mean you had expectations for tonight?”

He shrugged. Said amiably, “A man can always hope.”

Through tears, she let out a snort of laughter. “Atkins?” she
said.

“Yeah, Berkowitz?”

“Turn that boom box back on and go lock the damn door.”

Mikey

When his stepmother opened the door, Chauncey raced outside to
greet him, hindquarters wagging an ecstatic hello. “Hey, buddy,” he said,
bending to rub the dog’s thick, tangled fur. “How’ve you been?” When his dad
had married Rose, Chauncey had been one of the added bennies, along with a new
stepbrother and stepsister. He and Luke were tight. They’d hit it off right
from the start. Devon had taken a little longer, but then, at the time Devon’s
mother dragged her off to Maine, his stepsister had been going through a black
period when she hated the world. Once she’d outgrown that and turned into a
regular human being, she’d been awesome. And when he got to Stanford, a year
behind her, she’d taken him under her wing and played the role of big sister to
the hilt.

“Rose,” he said, straightening.

“Mikey. I didn’t expect to see you tonight.”

“Can I come in?  I know Dad’s not here, it’s his school board
night. I waited at the Big Apple until I saw him go by. If it’s not too late, I
was hoping to see Beth.”

Rose hesitated for an instant, then swung the door wider and
stepped back. “Come on in. I just put her to bed, but she’s not asleep yet. Go on
up.”

He climbed the carpeted stairs. In Luke’s room, the television was
playing softly. His stepbrother used to run his stereo at a volume that shook the
house to its foundation, but after Beth came along, things had changed. Babies
had a way of doing that, changing people’s lives in unexpected ways. Mikey
passed Luke’s closed door, passed the master bedroom, and stopped at the room
across the hall from Rose and Dad’s. The door was ajar, the room illuminated by
a Sesame Street night light. He opened the door all the way and paused at the
threshold, watching her as she carried on an unintelligible conversation with
her stuffed elephant. She was going on two now. Soon, she’d be out of the crib
and in a twin bed. Time moved on, and little kids changed so quickly. Who knew
when he might see her again? He could end up anywhere. Europe, Japan, the
Middle East. It could be years before he came back to Jackson Falls. Hell, it
was even possible that he might not come back. His throat swelled with emotion.
The rest of them, he didn’t mind leaving behind. Beth was the only one it would
be hard to say goodbye to.

He took a step toward the crib, and she saw him from the corner of
her eye. His baby sister sat up and gave him a smile that wrapped itself around
his heart and squeezed. “My-my,” she said in delight, and reached out her arms
to him. “My-my!”

“Hi, Bethie. How’s my girl?” He crossed the room, lifted her out
of the crib, and cradled her to his chest. She began babbling in some language
that might as well have been Martian. His dad and Rose claimed they understood everything
she said, but to him, it just sounded like gibberish. It clearly meant
something to Beth, though. Her words might not make much sense yet, but she had
a good ear; her inflections were correct, and her babbling sounded like English,
only with different words. Pretty soon, the right words would follow. By the
time he saw her again, she’d sound just like a regular kid. He hated the idea
of her losing that wonderful baby innocence. Hated even more his fear that by
the time he came home again, she wouldn’t even remember him. He’d never cared
that he couldn’t translate her primitive speech into English; he understood her
anyway, because no matter how the sounds came out, what she spoke was the
language of love.

He found one of her books, one he knew she liked, and he sat in
Rose’s old wooden rocker, held his baby sister in his arms, and read to her. She
helped him, turning the pages, pointing to the pictures, and talking in her own
special baby language. When he finished the book, she held it up, flapped it
around a little, and said something that he interpreted to mean
again
.

So he read it to her again. She leaned back against him, sucking
her thumb, and listened quietly. By the time he finished, she was asleep. Mikey
carried her back to her crib and gently lay her down.  He carefully pulled the
thumb out of her mouth and placed a gentle kiss on her forehead. “I love you,
Bethie,” he whispered.  “Don’t ever forget that.”

And he escaped before Rose could corner him and start asking
questions.

He drove into town, to the Big Apple, where there was a pay phone
attached to the side of the building. He tossed in a couple of coins, listened
as they fell. When he heard the dial tone, he punched in Paige’s number.

Antsy, he danced around on nervous feet, waiting for somebody to
answer. If it was Casey or Rob, he would hang up and try again later. But to
his immense relief, it was Paige who picked up. “Hi,” he said.

“Hi.”

“Can you talk?”

“Yeah. They’re out somewhere. I’m babysitting.”

“Sunday night,” he said. “Can you be ready on Sunday night? That
should give us plenty of time to get there. We can stop in Vegas and get
married. It’s on the way.”

“What time on Sunday?”

Some guy came out of the store and eyed him with suspicion. Mikey
turned away from him, faced the wall of the store. “Midnight. You know the
school bus turnaround just past Conley’s? I’ll pick you up there. If I’m at my
mom’s, they’ll hear the truck start up in the yard. We can’t take that chance. I’ll
hang around with a friend or something until it’s time to get you.”

“Can I bring my guitar?”

“Of course you can.”

“What about Leroy?”

He hadn’t given a thought to Leroy. “Jesus, Paige…I don’t know. They
might not allow him.”

At her end of the phone, there was a heavy silence. For a minute,
he thought he’d lost her, and his heart rate skyrocketed. What if she refused
to come if she had to leave Leroy behind? That little dog was her best friend. Leroy
had been her only comfort when her mom died, had been her only friend when she
first came here to live with her dad.

“I’ll leave him with Dad and Casey for now,” she said. “But later,
if we find out I can have him—”

“If you can have him, we’ll find a way to get him. Even if it
means we have to fly home to pick him up. Do you trust me?”

“If I didn’t trust you, I wouldn’t be doing this.”

He didn’t know what else to say. For a time, as he held the
receiver to his ear, there was nothing but the sound of his own breathing. “Paige?”
he said. “Are you still there?”

“I’m here.”

“I love you.”

There was a moment’s hesitation, and then she said, “I love you,
too.”

And she hung up.