Black Ember (17 page)

“You can come by the station tomorrow morning before work if you like, and pick up your things,” Cal continued. “Rough break, I know. But I’m speaking for all of us when I say you’re welcome to stay at the bunkhouse until you save up some money and figure out your next steps.”

Incredible. Caryn had never been so relieved not to be recognized. “I don’t know how to thank you,” she said in a wobbly voice.
 “No problem. I was just literally doing my job.” Cal smiled, a little grimly. “You know, Caryn…Carrie…a long time ago, I got into some trouble with the law. I was kind of lost, as a kid. For a lot of years, it held me back, seeing myself the way the rest of the world saw me, as nothing but bad news, dangerous, a loser. I was lucky; I got a second chance. But it always made me wonder.”

He paused, as though gauging her response. “What did it make you wonder?” she finally asked, mystified. Was this leading up to his “scared straight” speech? Was he going to warn her against the dangers of a life on the run?

He looked at her searchingly, unmistakable kindness in his soulful dark brown eyes. “What it must be like. If you’re on the other side. If people are always expecting you to be perfect, instead of expecting you to fail. Because it seems like that might have its own problems. Like some days, you might want to run away from that, too. If you were…famous, for instance.”

He didn’t look away, and neither of them spoke for a moment. He
knew
. The whole time, he knew who she was, and he was letting her know, giving her a chance. If she left now, maybe he wouldn't tell anyone else. Maybe no one ever had to know, and she could be back in New York at her desk by the day after tomorrow, business as usual.

But then she would never meet Buddy. Never know the man who had given her life. Who had wooed her mother. Would never have the answer to the question of why he had left.

And she’d never see Zane again. And as wretched as it felt to know that it was over, that he had loved her and left her, she wasn’t ready to lose him entirely.
 “You know,” Caryn said miserably. “Who I am.”

“Actually, it was Roan who figured it out. When I told her we’d found your things. She said you looked familiar from the minute you met, and she’d been racking her brain trying to figure out where she knew you from.”

Caryn sighed. “You don’t have to tell me, of course, but…how many people know?”

“Just the two of us. The guys at work—well, let’s just say they aren’t too concerned with celebrity gossip. And no offense, but I hadn’t ever heard of your jewelry company. I mean, I’ve heard of your dad, of course, and I’ve seen some of his movies, and Roan says your mom does a lot of good work for charity. But we figured…well, we thought you must have had your reasons for staying quiet about who you really are. Like I said, I have to imagine it can get kind of old, being famous. So we’re not going to say anything.”

He patted her knee through the full, swooping skirt. “Everyone at the house likes you, Carrie. Uh, I mean Caryn.”

“Actually…I kind of like ‘Carrie.’ If that’s okay.”

“More than okay. And Zane…well, I haven’t seen Zane get that worked up about anything in all the time I’ve known him.”

The elation Caryn felt at escaping being recognized quickly faded. “That was just a fling,” she muttered.

“You sure about that? The thing is, Zane’s a great guy. I mean, he’s not what you’re used to, I understand that, but he’s got everything that truly matters. Character, loyalty, he doesn’t leave the toilet seat up—”

Caryn realized with a start that Cal thought
she
was the one making a hasty exit from their brief affair. “Wait, you don’t understand,” she said.

“I’m probably saying this all wrong,” Cal said. “It’s just, I hope you’ll give him a chance. I know you’re probably not going to be here long. You’ve got responsibilities back home. I won’t even pretend to know what’s involved in being you. But being in the limelight all the time…that can’t be all that much fun. You need time off sometimes. Think about it—we’d be glad to have you around, whenever you can get away. Like Chase’s girlfriend, Regina, she’s up here a couple of times a month, they make it work.”

“Why are you being so nice to me?” Caryn asked in a wobbly voice. “I lied to you all. I’ve taken advantage of your kindness.”

Cal raised one eyebrow. “From where I sit, it looks like you’ve put up with the cyclone that is Deneen, slept on a couch that’s older than the original Star Trek, and agreed to wear a giant purple dress that looks like it belongs in a Disney movie. And you’ve done something that I’ve never seen anyone else do, which is to hold Zane’s attention longer than the time it takes for him to notice the next woman to walk down the street. So I’m not quite sure what you’re talking about.”

“I—I don’t know how to thank you,” Caryn said.

“No problem. I left your things at the station with instructions to give them to you, and I marked the bag only with your first and middle names, so I don’t think anyone else is going to put two and two together, at least for a while. Your cover isn’t blown, and you can go back and party down with all the locals without a care in the world.”

He offered Caryn a hand and helped her to her feet, which were starting to ache in the high, pointed shoes.

“What you’ve done…it means so much to me,” she said.

“No problem. Now, go dance with my boy Zane.”

He was standing under the mulberry tree that usually held up one end of the clothesline. Tonight, the tree’s branches held hundreds of twinkling lights, and under its boughs was a table bearing the remains of the wedding cake.

Everyone was dancing in the clearing or talking at small tables. Jayne had bustled up her skirt with the help of her mother, and kicked off her shoes, and was leading a ragtag assortment of wedding guests in a conga line. Matthew was right behind her, his five-year-old nephew on his shoulders.

Zane stood apart from all of it, hands jammed in his pockets, scowling. His tie was loosened and his jacket was nowhere to be seen, but he still looked like a few million dollars to Caryn. No: better than that, better than any amount of money in the world. He looked like home.

A ridiculous notion, Caryn thought, brushing a tear away, the sort of thing she would have rolled her eyes at just a week ago. Last week, she knew who she was and the direction she was going in life. She’d recovered from the humiliating breakup with Nathanial, work was going well, Georgia was talking about inviting Caryn to spend Labor Day with them on the shore. Sure, she was a little lonely, but that was just the price one paid for a certain kind of celebrity.

Now she was dressed in about ten yards of shiny lavender satin and no one knew who she was, other than a ridiculously kind small-town cop. She was confused, she was hungry, and her feet hurt.

And she was pretty sure she had fallen in love.

She took a deep breath and stepped out of the shelter of the crowd of guests, still going strong late into the evening. There was one way to face things, Georgia always said, and that was head on. Caryn walked across the lawn, her feet aching with each step, until she was only a few feet away from Zane, and still he didn’t look up.

“Hey.”

It wasn’t until he noticed her and dropped the frown that she realized she had been holding her breath.

“Where the hell did you get off to? You’re supposed to be my date, remember? I had to dance with someone’s great grandmother. I’m pretty sure she pinched my butt.”

“Lucky you.”

“How are you holding up?”

“All right, I guess. I mean I could do without the stilettos and the push-up bra—and I’m not sure I’m receiving enough oxygen because my Spanx are too tight—but it was a beautiful wedding and….”

She was stumped. Usually she could do this for hours, complimenting the food and the flowers, the inspirational words of the officiant, the choice of music. She could find a connection with any guest, no matter how obscure, and get an entire table of shy people talking. But tonight she felt like she had nothing to say.

“…and they seem very happy,” she concluded lamely.

“Yeah. Yeah…they do.”

Neither of them spoke after that. Zane reached for her hand, closing his fingers around her wrist, and gently tugged her toward him. She nestled in the crook of his arm, turning so that his chin was on top of her hair. His arms wrapped around her and she felt safe and snug, anchored there in his arms, exactly where she was meant to be.

It was a perfect moment. But Caryn was an expert in perfect moments gone bad, especially when it came to weddings. A memory came back to her, of another wedding, another time. She had been dressed in a junior bridesmaid outfit, all of ten years old, holding tightly to the hand of the nanny who’d been hired to stay with her so that her mother and her new husband could go on their honeymoon. Caryn had been promised a new family, a new daddy to always love her, and she had just realized that the first thing her new daddy was going to do was take her mother away for two weeks while she was moved into a new house where nothing was familiar.

Or how about Randall’s wedding to Cleo? Caryn had been in college for that one, and she’d had to take time off from spring semester of her sophomore year. Georgia had been perfectly understanding—“Of course you’ll go, darling, don’t give it a thought”—and had even offered to come stay with Caryn in the California coastal town where the ceremony was to take place, even though she hadn’t been invited to the wedding. Instead, Caryn had gone alone and been seated at a table with Cleo’s model friends, and felt both guilty and ridiculous all evening.

And then there was Georgia’s marriage to Harry. That one had actually been rather nice. Seven hundred guests at the Plaza, with the governor himself in attendance. By then Georgia and Randall and Cleo were all cordial, so they were there too. Caryn had spent that night smiling for all she was worth, for one photo after another, and it was only when she watched her new stepfather toast his bride that she realized with a pang that while Georgia and Harry were fond of each other, and would make a great team, there was no passion between them.

“You sure you’re okay there, Barracuda?” Zane said. “Those sighs get any longer, I’m probably going to have to do CPR on you.”

“I hate weddings,” Caryn mumbled, leaning back against his chest. It would be so nice to just ask him to take her somewhere, anywhere, and kiss her senseless, make her forget everything that was wrong, but she was a bridesmaid, and bridesmaids stayed until the end. Caryn may have enjoyed her brief stint as carefree Carrie, but there was still enough of her mother in her that she couldn’t skip out on her responsibilities.

As if reading her mind, Zane said, “I’d offer to take you for a long drive, and keep going until we ran into another rainstorm. But somehow I don’t think you’d take me up on it.”

“Zane.” Caryn closed her eyes, hoping she was doing the right thing. “There’s something I need to tell you. A few things, actually.”
 “Uh-oh,” Zane said, his arms tensing slightly. “This sounds awfully familiar. Except usually I’m the one winding up for the see-you-later pitch.”

“No, no, it’s not that.” Was she really going to do this? Cal had promised to keep her cover, and if she just kept her mouth shut, she could hang onto the perfect memory of her time with Zane. Unsullied by drama, by messy exits, he could live in her memories as a perfect story, the one man with whom she truly lost herself, the man who made her believe in love again.

But if she told him who she was, he would know she’d deceived him from the start. He’d lose all respect for her and the story would be tainted. It would be just another failed relationship in a string of them, and Caryn would go back to her old life knowing it was just a little more empty than before.

Except…she owed him this. Zane had showed her who he really was the other night, with rain pounding down and lightning flashing. He’d opened up and offered her his heart, even if it was just for a few hours, and she wasn't going to repay that by hiding.

She gently disentangled his hands from hers, and pulled away from his embrace, turning so she could say what she had to say while looking into his eyes.

An eruption of cheering caught her attention. They both turned to see the wedding party closing ranks around a man and woman who were making their way over the lawn from the parking area.

“I’m so glad you made it!” Matthew yelled, shaking hands enthusiastically with the man, while Jayne gave the woman a big hug.

“Well, look at that—Buddy made it after all,” Zane said. “Now you can meet your boss before you go back into work. Come on, I’ll introduce you.”

He had his hand around hers, tugging her toward the group. Tottering on the painful heels, Caryn had no choice but to mince along trying to keep up.

She briefly wondered if she could kick off her shoes and make a run for it, but the couple had spotted her. The man—Buddy Travers, her bio-dad—was dressed in an ill-fitting shirt and a wide shiny tie, and he didn’t have much hair left, but what there was had been slicked carefully over his bald head. He was grinning from ear to ear, but he never let go of the hand of his date who, as they got closer, Caryn could see wasn’t a woman at all but a girl, a teenager with the combination of features that suggested Down syndrome. She was smiling too, clutching a flower from Jayne’s wedding bouquet in her hand.

Who was the girl? Was this Melanie? As Caryn’s mind raced to catch up, Zane reached them and enthusiastically shook Buddy’s hand and then gave the girl a hug, taking care not to crush her flower. Then he grabbed Caryn’s hand and pulled her forward, into the light of the candelabra hung from the tree.

“Buddy, I’ve got someone for you to meet. This is—”

But Buddy’s face had gone stark with shock. He stumbled forward, peering at Caryn intently. She could smell aftershave and as she looked into his watery blue eyes, she had the unsettling feeling of seeing a face she knew not at all and also very well, because his features were so like her own.

“Oh, sweet heaven above,” the man who had fathered her thirty years ago said. “Caryn Louise Carver. I’d know you anywhere.”