A Father, Again

Since he was a kid, he’d enjoyed rain, would walk hours in it when his mother was on an extrarotten binge. When her drunken cursing defiled their home, and his father escaped out back to the shed and his brothers hid in their bedrooms or the basement.

Listening to the rain, feeling its blunt, wet needles cool his skin, helped him forget some of life’s uglies. Of course, no matter how hard it rained, how far he walked, one of those uglies would never fade.

A sound to the left drew him. Rianne Worth, still in heels, skirt and clingy top, was piloting a giant purple umbrella while lifting two bags of groceries from the trunk of her car. Success evaded her; the trunk was loaded. She, on the other hand, kept dodging a sheet of rain baling through the tattered roof of the carport directly above the bumper. She had to move the car forward another two feet, which was impossible, or back it up, which would put her smack into the rain.

He could help.

Don’t get involved.

She struggled another minute, gave up and carried a lone bag around back.

Ah, damn it.

Crossing his soggy mess of lawn, Jon stepped over the pruned shrub roses edging her drive. Behind the car, the cold stream from the roof caught him full across the neck and shoulders, drenching his ponytail and T-shirt. Five plastic bags in one hand, six in the other, he shook his head, blinked water from his eyes and rounded the rear bumper.

She stood ten feet away. A petite gold and black silhouette under a purple mushroom. Rianne.

Twenty-two years, and what could he say?

You’ve grown up damn pretty?

You’re someone I don’t recognize?

Hell, most days he barely knew himself.

“Shut the trunk,” he ordered, shouldering past her and heading for the back of the cottage. He bowed his head to the striking rain while her shoes clicked behind him.

Under the porch overhang, she flipped the umbrella closed, parked it against the wall, then held open the door, waiting for him to proceed into the warm house.

In a minuscule entryway, he stopped. “Where?”

“To the left.”

A whiff of her scent mingled with the damp air.

Rain on woman.

He turned into a kitchen about the size of his bedroom closet and set the bags in front of the stove and refrigerator. When he straightened, she stood near the door, hands clasped in front of her, little-girl fashion.

“Thank you,” she said in that same soft tone he remembered.

“You’re welcome.” He looked at his grubby harness boots. Sprigs of dead grass clung to the toes. “I’ve dirtied your kitchen.”

“Don’t worry about it. Would you like some coffee?”

He ran a hand down his dripping cheeks, scraped back his soggy hair. He could stay, get to know her as a neighbor—the five second Hi-how’s-it-going? type—or he could leave.

Seth’s comments pitched both options. “You remember me.”

Her eyes didn’t waver. “Yes. I do.”

He flinched. She would. Two decades ago, every kid from first grade up knew the Tuckers. Not hard in a town of a thousand souls. Not hard when, on any given day, the mother of those Tuckers stumbled down the sidewalk, drunk.

“Well,” he said, disgruntled she undoubtedly recalled those days. “I’ll go then.”

“Jon.” His name was a touch. “I’d really like you to stay for coffee. You were kind enough to help, and…” The half smile from yesterday returned. “I feel responsible for what Sweetpea did to your shirt.”

“Forget it. Cat needed a spot, shirt fit the bill.”

“I’ve washed it. Wait a second.” She disappeared down a short hallway.

He took a breath. Fine. He’d stay for a cup. He went to the door, took off his boots, set them on the outside mat with its white scripted Welcome to Our Home.

Her footsteps returned. “Jon?”

“Here.”

“Good. You stayed.” She smiled and placed his neatly folded shirt on the table, then began scooping coffee into a maker. He approached the end of the counter where she worked.

Abruptly, she faced him. “Are you a cop?”

“I was. I quit a month ago.”

He’d been asked to take stress leave and had opted for retirement. After Nicky’s death, his work had suffered. Hell, after the loss of his son life became an abyss—where he still floundered.

Rianne set the coffee on.

“Where are your kids?” he asked. The boy with the bike?

“Downstairs, watching TV.” She checked a sunflower clock on the wall above the stove. “It’ll be Emily’s bedtime in fifteen minutes. We’ll have time for one cup before the nightly whining begins.” She sported another of those sweet smiles. He sported fantasies that were way out of line.

Not wanting to hear about kids, tooth-brushing or bedtime rituals, he asked, “That decaf?”

“I’d be wide-eyed as an owl with the real stuff. Please. Sit.” She motioned to the table with four ladder-back chairs, then opened a tiny pantry to shelve the groceries.

He stepped beside her and placed three cans of spaghetti sauce on an upper shelf. Before he could reach for another tin, she said, “Would you please sit at the table?”

“I don’t mind a little kitchen duty.”

She took the tin from his hand. “I’d rather you sat.”

It took two seconds for irritation to plant itself. Good enough to play pack mule and carry groceries, but apparently lacking the aptitude to see where they belonged.

Just like Colleen. “Go do your man thing and stay out of my kitchen. I don’t need you here.”

In the end, had she needed him anywhere? As her husband? As the father of their kids?

“Thanks, but I really don’t have time for coffee,” he said, stepping over three bags. “Got a ton of work that needs doing.” Grabbing the shirt she’d laundered, he headed for the door and his boots. So much for neighborly ways.

“Jon. Don’t go. It’s…”

A sitcom’s cackle drifted up from below. Rain drummed on the roof above.

“It’s not you,” she went on, throat closing. “It’s me. I…” Her heart thrummed. Men in general make me edgy. Logically she knew Jon was not “men in general.” Still… He defeated her own height of five-four by almost a foot. And in that soaked navy T-shirt his chest appeared unforgiving.

She avoided looking at his arms, his hands. She’d seen them lift the groceries like a spoonful of granola. Powerful. Dusted with dark, masculine hair, right to the knuckles on his work-toughened fingers. A wolf tattoo prowled along rain-damp skin above his left wrist. Once the town rebel, now a man of dark secrets and possible danger.

But look at him, she did. Straight into eyes as indifferent as a tundra windchill. “I’m not used to having company.” Purposely, she kept her hands loose. “You took me off guard.” Because she hadn’t expected to see him again for at least another week or two, except maybe across the distance of their yards.

Then out of the wet, dark weather he’d loomed…black ponytail plastered to his neck…frown honing every determined angle of his face… And her breath…

She hadn’t breathed calmly since.

He said nothing, but neither did he leave. Just looked at her. Waiting.

“I’m sorry,” she offered finally.

“For what?”

“For how I must sound. As I said—”

“You’re not used to company or want it. That makes two of us.” The words were sensitive as winterkill.

He turned and stepped out onto the deck, pushing wool-socked feet into his boots. Without bothering with the laces, he walked down the steps, into the rain.

She wanted to call out. Invite him back. Wanted to explain it wasn’t him, but another that had her fluttering worse than a nervous house wren. Silent, she went to the edge of the porch. Self-control was difficult to teach, arduous to learn. At the moment, she needed strength. If it looked cowardly, she didn’t care. She clasped her hands in front of her.

Halfway across her lawn, he stopped. Rain lashed his heavy shoulders and skimmed from an implacable chin.

“Good-bye, Rianne.”

Securing the laundered shirt under an arm, he shoved his hands into his pockets and disappeared through the hole in the juniper hedge. He had known who she was. Why hadn’t he acknowledged her yesterday? Or had Seth sitting on those steps confirmed it today?

“You remember me.”

She’d never forgotten.

She listened to the downpour on the roof. Heard it gush in the eaves. Watched a mini waterfall at the side of the porch.

Chilled, she went back into the house, where she finished the groceries, working efficiently, rolling up the plastic bags and tucking them into a drawer. From the skinny broom closet, she hauled out the mop. After wetting the sponge under the tub tap in the bathroom down the hall, she set about tidying up puddles left by big, work-battered boots. He means nothing to me. Nothing.

Then why did you put him in your journal?

She clenched her jaw to an aching point.

God help me, I’ll erase it tonight.

But she heard again her name, submerged in a deep quiet timbre.

Chapter Two

Phone to his ear, Jon propped a hip on the counter in his spacious kitchen and stared absently at his reflection in the dark glass shielding the wet night. Three rings.

“Come on,” he muttered. “Pick up.”

Five rings. “Hi,” said a familiar, breathless voice.

“Hey, Colleen.”

A pause. “It’s you.”

Who were you expecting? “It’s me,” he acknowledged. “Brittany around?”

“She’s busy watching TV.”

He tamped down a flash of ire. “Could you get her please? I’d like to talk to my daughter.”

Muffled tones told him his ex-wife had covered the mouthpiece. Then, “Brittany would rather not tonight. She’s not feeling well.”

To hell with it. “Just get her, Colleen. If she doesn’t wanna talk she can tell me herself. Or should I drive up this minute and see what the problem really is?”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Try me.”

Again silence, again the muffled conversation. “Fine, I’ll get her.”

He winced as the receiver slammed the light-green counter he knew so well. In the background, he heard a male voice comment, “Don’t let him hassle you, Col.” Jon pinched the bridge of his nose and counted to two hundred by fives. Finally footsteps, running ones, came closer. The phone scraped off the counter.

“Daddy?”

“Hey, peanut. How ya doing?”

“Okay, I guess.”

“Not feeling so hot, huh?”

“No.”

“Got a cold or a tummy-ache?”

“Uh-uh.”

Pause.

“You can tell me, sweetheart.”

“Mom said I shouldn’t talk to you.”

Anger leapt, a fresh flame. He curbed the urge to bellow through the phone for his ex-wife. “Why not, Brit?”

“I dunno.” He imagined her tracing patterns along the countertop. “Mom said it gets me mixed up. Especially now that she’s gonna marry Allan.”

With effort Jon pulled in a calming breath. He didn’t give a flying fig who his ex married, but to play on Brittany’s feelings made his blood pump. He forced his fingers loose on the receiver. “Do you want me to stop phoning, honey?”

He felt her hesitate. His heart disintegrated.

“When I’m with you—” her voice was tiny “—I don’t want to come home. But I don’t want Mom to be alone either.”

“Aw, peanut…”

He heard her sniff. God, he wished he had Harry Potter’s broom to zip himself there. But what good would that do? Right or wrong, good or bad, he and Colleen were divorced. End of story.

“Dad?”

“Yeah, love.”

“I don’t like Allan,” she whispered.

Jon’s inner antennae shot up. “Why, Brit?”

“I dunno. Just that he pretends he’s you, and I don’t like that.”

He emitted a relieved sigh. If that was all—

“And Allan says things about Nicky.”

A chill spiked Jon’s skin. His son. His beautiful, dark-haired, blue-eyed son. Who at fifteen had attracted girls, gloried in the attention, but still found time to read his sister a bedtime story. Who would have grown into a fine, upstanding young man had his father been there to guide him.

He swallowed the burl in his throat. “What things, Brit?”

“Mean stuff. Like, if we’d had him for a father Nicky would still be alive. Stuff like that.”

Jon squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his lips together. The SOB was right. If they’d had anyone but Jon as a father, his son might very well still be kicking a football or slam-dunking baskets with his high school buddies. But then, if they’d had anyone else, Nick wouldn’t have been his son, and Brittany—with her little freckled nose and long, pale hair—wouldn’t be his daughter. The proverbial catch-22.

One totally unfair to play on his baby girl.

He opened his eyes and pushed a rough-padded finger above his right eyebrow where a headache festered. That Brittany wasn’t in some psychiatrist’s office with the mumbo crap being fed her by Colleen and the esteemed twit, Allan, was a wonder. “Sweetheart, I want you to listen real careful, okay?”

“Okay.”

“When Allan, and even Mom,” he added with a wince, “start saying things about Nicky that you don’t like, I want you to get up and walk out of the room.”

“But what if we’re in the car going somewhere?”

Ah, hell. “Ask them to not discuss Nick in front of you and if they continue, sing to yourself. Try to block it out as best you can. All right?”

“I’ll try.”

“You know I love you with all my heart.”

“I love you, too.”

“I’ll see you soon, all right?”

“When?”

“Summer…in a couple of months, like we talked about.”

“Allan says I should stay here for the summer.”

Jon bounced a fist on the counter. How he kept his voice from shaking, his emotions from screaming, was a miracle. “Peanut, that’s not going to happen. Now, I’m going to say good-night because I still need to talk to Mom before I hang up.”

“Okay. She’s in the foyer saying goodbye to Allan.” There was a shuffle on the line. “Gross. They’re kissing and I can see Allan’s tongue. Yuck!”

Damn you, Colleen. Not in front of my daughter. “Brit, honey, tell her I need to talk to her, pronto.”

“Right. Bye, Dad.”

“Bye, peanut.”

The phone met Formica a second before he heard her yell for Colleen. It took almost six minutes of long-distance time for his ex to pick up. She got right to the point.

“Just so you know, I don’t like being yanked away from an important matter.”

“The next time you want to do the tongue tango with your lover, do it without my daughter around.”

“How dare you. Al and I were discussing our wedding.”

“I won’t beat around the bush, Colleen. Brittany is staying with me when school’s out whether your boyfriend likes it or not. It’s what we decided on paper, and no one’s going to keep my daughter from being with her daddy. Understand?”

“Perfectly. Why should I expect anything different?” she said bitterly. “It’s always been you, hasn’t it? Whatever’s good for you. The kids and I were always last on your list.”

Pain lanced through him. “I can’t help what happened in the past. But I sure as hell can help what’s happening right now. If Brittany wants to be with me for two months, then she can. Neither you nor that jackass you’re marrying has a right to take that away from her. And—” his voice turned dark “—if you do, we’ll revisit this in court. Oh, and another thing. Brittany doesn’t like Allan playing dad around her. Tell him to lay off.”

“He does not play anything around her. He just wants to be a good father figure. Which is a lot more than her real daddy’s been over the last ten years.”

That stung. “Look, I’m sorry I’ve hurt you, but dredging up the past is useless. We can’t change it.”

“Tell that to your daughter when she cries at night for her brother.” The phone clicked off.

Jon had no idea how long he stood there with the receiver humming before he finally set it back in the cradle.

Blindly, he looked at the oak cupboards housing his few cracked dishes. He should go upstairs, take a long, hot shower. His clothes were sticky and cold on his skin from the rain, his hair knotted and damp. If he wasn’t careful, he’d be down with a bug and where would that get his plans to finish this house?

In a daze he looked around the room. Like you really need a place this size, Jon.

Where had his mind been when he’d bought it? Brittany was ten years old, a sprite with his blue eyes and her mom’s fair hair. A sprite who’d visit three times a year. Who required one bedroom, not five.

And when she went back to Seattle?

Here he’d be.

Lone wolf prowling inside four dozen tall walls.

Evenings, he’d sit out back. Sip a cool one as the sun dwindled. Day after day, year after year. He’d watch the grass grow, the trees spread wider, the hedge reach another ten feet toward the sky. All for what? Brittany?

In three, four years Seattle would be prime pickings for a teenager doing all the things young girls do at that age.

Misty River, Oregon, with its conservatism, offered piddly.

He didn’t fool himself into thinking she’d want to spend even a weekend with him when that time came.

Then why not let Allan-the-Great take over? Be the father figure she needs? A man home every evening, staying till morning. A family man. A man who could give Colleen another baby.

Another brother for Brittany.

Jon spun around and cursed. Stalking to the door, he yanked it open and stepped onto the back deck. The rain had quit and the moist night air struck like a frigid fist. Let him come down with SARS. Everything that mattered was lost already.

Job.

Marriage.

Family.

Nick.

The floorboards thundered under his socked heels as he paced from one side to the other.

Stopping abruptly, he gripped the new wood railing he had hammered into place two days ago. The rain slackened into a fine mist. He let it bathe his face, easing the pain. When he could think again, he hauled in a long breath and found himself staring across the dripping hedge. From behind frilly curtains, amber light glowed in the windows of the small house next door. A woman’s shape hovered in the closest window, then was gone.

Rianne.

Getting ready for bed? He checked the big, luminous digital on his wrist. Nine-forty-three. He fancied her changing into some cotton affair, cool for the upcoming warmer nights, but unadorned, unsexy, wholly feminine, wholly her.

He pictured himself there…her skin warm, soft like the down of the bed’s duvet…

He turned and strode into his barren house.

“Yo, Joe! Hang on a sec, man,” Sam called as his best bud passed him in the corridor of milling students and clanging lockers. They had five minutes before Friday’s last afternoon class started and Joey Fraser, Sam knew, was on his way to the upper level.

Slamming shut his locker, he turned and pushed through the crowd to where Joey waited near the outside doors. “What up, man? Aren’t you going to math?”

“Me’n a couple guys’re skipping,” Joey said.

“Skipping?”

Joey sniffed. “No big deal. I can catch up. Wanna come?”

Brown fuzz grew along his friend’s upper lip and on his pointy chin, and Sam had to raise his eyes an extra couple of inches to meet Joey’s. “Can’t, man. Gotta test. Old lady Pearson’ll have my butt if I don’t show.”

“Tell her you’re sick.”

Sam snorted. “Yeah, like that’s gonna work. She just saw me two minutes ago in the library.”

“So?”

“So, if I don’t pass this lab, the witch is gonna phone my mom. I’ve already failed the last two.” He hadn’t really, but he might as well have. The marks barely skimmed sixty. Lately, his concentration was the pits. Studying was the pits.

He knew why. It was Joey. His pal. His best bud.

Who looked at Sam as if he had two heads. The way he was right now. What’s the matter, Joe?

His pal turned toward the doors.

“Want to do something after school?” Sam asked. Almost too eagerly, he realized, when Joey shrugged and looked away. Sam pressed on. “I have to baby-sit Emily till four. We can dunk some balls at my house.”

The week they’d moved in, Sam’s mom had bought a basketball stand for the driveway. Last summer, he and Joey had done a lot of one-on-ones and hung out at each other’s houses, watching movies, playing computer games, roller-blading.

Joey never saw Sam’s deformity as untouchable. In fact, the first time they met, Joe had given Sam’s hand its highest praise ever with his cool “suhweet.”

This last month, though, Joey acted squirmy whenever Sam suggested they do stuff together. When he called Joey’s house, Sam often heard other guys in the background. Twice he’d recognized Cody Huller’s voice. Cody with earrings, nose-ring and orange, half-shaved hair. What Joey saw in Cody was beyond Sam.

Joey said, “After school me’n the guys are hanging on Main.”

The guys. Did he mean Huller? Sam hitched a careless shoulder. “Sure, whatever.”

“Gotta go,” Joey said. “Later, okay?”

“Yeah.” Sam watched his friend push through the doors, toward the warm afternoon sunshine. “Later.”

Walking to class, Sam knew something had changed between them. He couldn’t name it, couldn’t describe it. Joey still looked like Joey, still walked like Joey, still talked like Joey. But there was a difference.

Like Sam was a big waste of time to his friend.

The cranky sputter of a lawnmower unwilling to catch grated on Jon. Tossing the crowbar he’d been using to rip apart the front veranda steps this particular Saturday morning, he considered his options. He could walk into Rianne’s yard and see about the problem, or he could jam in a pair of earplugs and pretend she didn’t exist.

Neither option appealed to his good sense.

But then, good sense had taken a hundred-year hike, so what the hell?

Scowling, he yanked off his battered leather gloves, shoved them into his right hip pocket and headed once more into her backyard. Four days and this would be his third visit. Soon, they’d be attached at the hip.

Was that as good as attracted to her hip—among other things? He scowled harder. “You’re depraved, Tucker.”

Adjusting the brim of his Seahawks cap over his brow, he rounded her road-weary car.

She was in pink cutoffs, bent over the machine.

Jon stopped. Shook his head. Blew a weighted breath. Hightailing it back to his house—or the Pacific—loomed like one grand invitation. The farther from this woman the better.

“Dang thing,” she grumbled, oblivious to all but the mean red machine squatting idle at her feet.

“Troubles?”

Her head jerked up. “Jon.” His name, a silken thread on the warm, sunny air.

He walked over, focused on the mower. “Did you prime it?”

“Yes, and probably flooded it.”

Hunkering beside the mower, he checked the carburetor. The Columbia River was in better condition. “Yup, flooded.”

She expelled air. “The thing’s been acting up ever since I started cutting the grass a couple of weeks ago.”

Grunting in response, he inspected the wire to the ignition. While the machine appeared adequate enough to work, it could do with a cleaning. A second scan and he found the problem. “The spark-plug cap is off.”

“It is?” Her shoulder came level with his chin as she peered at the tiny cup between his fingers. If he leaned sideways a little, he could bury his face in her hair.

“When’s the last time this thing had a tune-up?” he grumped.

“Don’t know. I bought it from a friend. It worked fine until…” She turned her head. Their eyes caught. “Now.”

She had brown lashes. Straight and thick as a baby’s toothbrush.

He shoved the cap on to the spark plug then climbed to his feet.

She moved to the opposite side of the mower.

Okay. You want the machine between us? Well, baby, so do I. He said, “It’ll need to sit ten minutes for the primer to drain before you can try it again.”