Fade To Black

After a few seconds, Pierce picked up the other sandwich and began eating. Jay reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and withdrew a pack of cigarettes and lit up, leisurely blowing a thin stream of smoke skyward.

“I thought you’d quit,” Pierce said as he eyed his brother-in-law curiously.

“I’ve quit several times since you left. If I hadn’t already started again this last time, I’m sure I would have after tonight.”

Pierce’s brows arched. “I’m glad I don’t have to take the responsibility then.”

Jay blew a trail of smoke from the corner of his mouth as he spoke. “What about your other responsibilities? You as anxious to dismiss those?”

“Meaning?”

“Jessica and Max. You left them high and dry five years ago. If it wasn’t for Jesse’s grit and determination, I’m not sure what they would have done.”

“You don’t have to remind me of my responsibilities to my wife and son. I’ll take care of them from now on.”

Jay crushed his cigarette in his saucer as he stared at Pierce. “You still don’t get it, do you? They don’t need you to take care of them. Jesse’s managed just fine without you. More than fine. The business you left behind is booming, thanks to her. This house is worth a small fortune, and Max, well, Max won’t even know you, will he?”

It was a reality Pierce had been trying to come to terms with since he’d stared into those wide, accusing eyes this morning. Max. How strange that Jessica had named him that after she’d fought him so hard about it. It gave Pierce a small thrill of happiness to know that even after he’d left, Jessica had still wanted to please him.

“Look.” Jay folded his arms on the table and leaned toward Pierce. “Let’s cut through the crap, shall we? This memory business may work with Jesse, but it won’t wash with me. I can recognize a man in trouble when I see one, and I’d say you, my friend, are definitely in trouble. You don’t have to tell me what, you don’t have to tell me how or when or who. All you have to tell me, Kincaid, is why? Why did you come back here?”

“This is my home.”

“Was your home.”

Brown eyes challenged gray. It gratified Pierce to see Jay glance away first. He’d always thought his brother-in-law a little too cocky, a little too self-possessed. Pierce could spot a phony when he saw one, but he’d never had the heart to tell Jesse just how one-sided her sibling devotion was.

“This is my home,” he said, feeling the warmth of anger stealing over him. “I don’t have to justify myself to you. I may owe Jesse an explanation, one I don’t have at the moment, but let’s get one thing straight. I don’t owe you a damned thing.”

The air buzzed with tension. Jay’s gray eyes glinted with steely anger as he half rose from his seat. The unspoken challenge lay in the air between them like a gauntlet thrown to the ground. Slowly Pierce stood up.

“What’s going on in here?”

Both male heads whipped around to find Jessica standing in the doorway, watching them with an expression that wavered between curiosity and disgust. Her assessing gaze went from one to the other as she did her own summation of the situation.

Jay spoke first. “I need to be shoving off, Jessica. But I don’t want to leave until I know everything’s all right here.”

Her expression softened as she smiled at her brother. “I’m okay. Thanks for coming over.”

Jay’s gaze returned to Pierce. “Can I drop you somewhere?” he asked bluntly.

The question struck Pierce like a physical blow. He was being asked to leave his own home. For one black moment, it was all he could do to curb the sudden rage hurtling through him. He turned to face Jessica who still hovered in the doorway. He tilted a brow in question.

Her gaze burned into Pierce’s until his heart started to pound. What was she thinking? he wondered. Did she still feel anything at all for him? It was impossible to think that for him only a moment ago they had been in love, happy, and now she might feel nothing at all for him except pity.

God help him, he could stand anything but that.

Jessica took a deep breath and released it as if she was gathering her courage for what she needed to say. Pierce’s own breath seemed suspended somewhere in his throat.

“This is your home, too, Pierce,” she said finally. “I can’t ask you to leave. Not when….” Her voice trailed off as she gazed at him, the gray of her eyes turning to mist. Pierce knew how he must look to her, and it made him cringe.

“Go on,” he said evenly.

Her gaze dropped. “Not when you obviously need a place to stay.”

“Jessica, for God’s sake, what do you think you’re doing?” Jay objected. “He can’t stay here. What about Max?”

“What about Max?” Pierce said in a deadly quiet voice that seemed to hold both brother and sister in thrall.

“My God, man, you have to know what this will do to him. He’s only five years old.”

“I’ll take care of Max,” Jessica said, and the firm note of resolve in her voice surprised Pierce. Once she would have turned to him to make such an important decision.

Five years, he thought again. Five years of his life gone in the blink of an eye. How much more was lost to him than just that time?

“I hope to hell you know what you’re doing,” Jay muttered angrily as he pushed past them both and strode out of the kitchen.

Jessica chewed her bottom lip, a nervous habit Pierce remembered so well. It heartened him to know that at least some things hadn’t changed.

“I’ll be right back,” she said, then turned and hurried after her brother. Pierce hesitated a moment, then pushed through the door, too, distracted once again by all the changes Jesse had carried out on the house. Changes they had once planned to work on together.

Had she done all this by herself? he wondered as he walked through the formal dining room. The decor was elegant, but somehow the room left him cold. It was almost too perfect, he thought, remembering the house he’d grown up in. There was no life in it. No warmth. No love. It was a room that matched the hard chill in Jessica’s eyes.

He walked through to the living room and looked around. He liked this room better. The pictures of Max in here added a homey touch that somehow soothed him.

Jessica had walked her brother to the door, and now they both stood in the foyer, their furtive whispers attesting to the nature of their conversation.

Pierce crossed the hardwood floor to the fireplace and picked up one of the pictures of Max he’d studied so intently that morning. A baseball cap angled over the boy’s forehead as his brown eyes squinted into the sun. There was a rip in his shorts and a scab on one scrawny knee.

Pierce’s heart melted. He’d loved the baby Jesse had been carrying, and now he loved this little boy with an intensity that astounded him.

Jessica stood at the end of the sofa and watched Pierce. He didn’t look up, and she realized he hadn’t heard her come in. She watched him trace a finger gently along the photo, and the look of fierce possessiveness that came over his face shocked her. Her heart skidded with warning as her own defenses rose in reaction.

Pierce glanced up, and the expression in his eyes confirmed her deepest fears. When he spoke, his voice gave rise to new ones. Jessica trembled with dread as his gaze continued to hold hers.

“Where is he, Jessica? Where’s my son?”