Family Ties (24 page)

“There’s a man in your yard.”

“What?”

She pointed to his place. “A man’s there.”

Gray stretched up and looked out the kitchen window but couldn’t see anyone. Shrugging off the irritation of the interruption, he went outside and looked again.

Then did a double take.

“Pops?”

The stooped man ringing his back door bell turned. “Gray?”

“Pops? What are you doing here?”

“I figured we owed you some answers son.”

His heart dropped out of his chest. He’d never heard such a beaten tone in his dad’s voice.

“I’ll be right there.”

He ran back inside and told Andie about Pops. “I’ll be back later.” He kissed her quickly then ran down the steps.

It took only a couple of seconds to reach his back yard, but his heart pounded as if he’d run a marathon. He rounded the corner at the back of his house on a dead run then stopped. An old man was waiting for him.

It had been how long, a few months? No, six months since he’d seen him last and he’d aged a lifetime in between visits.

“Are you okay?” he asked, concerned for the only father he knew.

“As well as can be expected.” His father’s face sagged, his eyes sad.

He gently hugged his frail shoulders. “Come inside.”

After directing his father to the sofa in the living room, Gray brewed a pot of coffee. While waiting, he tried to bring his erratic pulse under some control. His life was going to change in the next few minutes and he wasn’t sure how he felt about the possibilities. The pot dinged and he poured two cups, adding sugar and cream to his dad’s before carrying both mugs into the other room.

Pops held the model car he’d hauled from place to place all his life. When he looked up, his eyes were filled with tears.

“I didn’t know you kept this.”

“Of course. It’s the first one you and I built.”

“You started to come out of your shell as we worked on it.” He carefully set the car on the table, then rubbed a finger tip over its roof. “It was the first time I began to think that maybe we’d be okay.” He looked up. “As a family I mean.”

“We were okay as a family, Pops.” Gray scalded his tongue on the coffee as he tried to wash down the emotion tugging at him. “But I’ve got to know about it. The past.”

“I always feared this moment would come. I told your mother...Ida...that we’d have to tell you the truth someday.”

He stirred his coffee. “She didn’t agree. You know your Ma. She has her way of seeing things or not seeing them. And I’m not usually strong enough to stand up to her. Or change her mind.”

“Does she know you’re here?”

The old man nodded, then straightened his shoulders. “She’s not happy with me, but she knows.”

“Good.” Gray leaned against the back of the chair, stretching his legs out in front of him. He’d always loved this man who’d provided a balance for the overprotectiveness of his mother. Who’d had time and patience for a little boy and a confused teenager. Who’d understood when the man had to leave the city he’d been raised in.

“Where is she?”

“At home.”

“She hasn’t answered the phone.”

“I know.” He slowly raided and sipped his coffee. “She unplugged all of them.”

Gray took a deep breath. “I’ve been calling every half hour for the whole day.”

“I figured you would. Told her so. She decided somewhere along the way to ignore the truth and pretend it would never come out.” With a shaking hand, he lifted his cup and took another sip of coffee. “She’s decided she isn’t going to talk to you about this, so she won’t.”

Gray nodded. It hadn’t ever been easy to change her mind about anything. Almost impossible.

“I nearly flew to Vancouver.”

“Kind of expected you.” He rubbed his mug in the moisture on the coffee table, then dropped both arms to rest on his thighs, leaving his hands to hang between his knees. Gray noticed the fingers were gnarled and old. They were also twisted white with pressure.

His dad’s head dropped. Dejection and defeat sweated from his pores.

Gray’s heart nearly pounded out of his chest. His breathing was shallow and he was sweating. He wanted to know the truth, but after a lifetime of love, he could give Pops the few minutes he needed to compose himself.

The ticking of the clock filled the silence until his dad straightened up and looked him in the eye.

“You’re due the truth, Gray. I only hope you won’t hate us after you know.”

Pops rose slowly and moved to the window, then stood looking out at the dark.

“Ida and I always wanted children but it never happened. Month after month she cried with disappointment.” His Adam’s apple bobbed as he remembered.

“It was more important to her than to me, for some reason. I had the woman I loved in my life. Kids would have been a great addition, but I was happy.”

He looked over his shoulder at Gray. “We both know how there’s no changing her mind when she gets an idea.”

Gray nodded. Ma had never been an easy woman to live with. As a boy, he’d wondered why Pops had put up with her moods and rules. Eventually he’d figured out there was no rhyme or reason to love and let it go. Shortly afterward, he’d moved to Calgary.

His dad dropped the curtain and returned, sagging to the couch.

“We were in the process of moving back to Canada when we got you. I’d been seconded to the company’s head office in Seattle for a year and my term had ended.”

He picked up the model and turned it over in his hands, running his fingers over the glue spots. “On the day we were leaving, she came home with you.”

Gray’s hands were sweating enough he doubted he could hold his cup. Fear clawed at his guts. “Are you sure you want to tell me this?”

Pops stared at him with a look of deep love and sheer terror. “No. But I will.”

“The moving van had pulled out with our stuff. My boss had a few things he wanted me to bring back, so I returned to the office. Your Ma decided she had a few errands to run so she dropped me downtown and drove off.”

“What was so important to her? Especially on moving day?” Ma’s behavior was out of character. He couldn’t imagine her having things left to do on moving day – she was the most organized woman he knew.

“You.”

Feeling as if he’d been punched, Gray sank back against this chair. Foreboding filled him. “Me?”

His dad swallowed again. Harder this time. “We’d met this couple in church. They weren’t friends or anything, but they had a bunch of kids and Ida was fascinated – especially with the youngest.”

Gray could feel a lump of something black building in his stomach, forcing him to sit straight and tighten everything, waiting for the blow.

“I waited in the lobby for her. She finally pulled up and hurried me out to the car. I noticed she was in a big hurry and she walked funny, kind of keeping her head down.”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “She seemed agitated and irritated we had to put the files in the trunk but I didn’t give it much thought. She got into the passenger seat and I drove away.”

He hung his head. “She seemed interested in the back seat as we drove north on I-5, back toward Vancouver. Still I didn’t think too much about her behavior. She didn’t want to stop. Got really angry when I wanted to make a pit stop.”

The blackness in Gray’s stomach had filled his chest, pulling him deeper into the pain. He could taste fear in the back of his throat.

Pops sagged against the sofa, looking at the pattern in the carpet. “I know I should have realized something was wrong, but I didn’t.” He looked up, searching Gray’s eyes as he shrugged. “I thought she was in a hurry to get home, is all.”

“Tell me the rest of it.”

“We drove straight home, about three hours to the front door of the house we’d bought. When we pulled into the garage, your mother told me about her errand.”

“Her errand?”

“She’d picked up something before she left Seattle.”

Watching his dad age in front of his eyes, Gray wasn’t sure he wanted to hear the rest.

“You.”

At the airport, Gray waved his father through security then pulled his keys out of his pocket as he walked back to the parking garage. What to hell did he do now?

Apparently he had family in Seattle.

A brother named Geordie and two other siblings. Parents. Perhaps grandparents. Aunts and uncles probably too.

What was next?

He climbed into his truck and rested his forehead on the steering wheel. He could take a couple of days off and go to Seattle. See what he could find.

His job wouldn’t fall so far behind he couldn’t catch up. And his own house could wait.

He raised his head and looked out the windshield. There was still the problem at Andie’s house. She wasn’t safe there alone. And he couldn’t live with himself if something went wrong.

Pain clutched his gut, twisting it.

If something happened to Andie…his breath stopped and twisted in his chest. If something happened to her…he didn’t know what he’d do.

In a matter of a few weeks she’d become an integral part of his life. Seeing his dad and learning about his past seemed to open another part of him. It felt ragged and rusty.

He rubbed his chest. Andie would be waiting for him. He took a deep breath, filling his lungs and expanding his chest. Andie would be waiting for him.

The ragged, rough edges softened and smoothed. Andie would be waiting for him. He put the key in the ignition and started his truck. Andie was waiting for him.

And he had no intention of letting her get away from him. He needed her waiting for him every day. Every single day.

***

Gray paced back and forth across Andie’s living room, still in shock from his dad’s news.

“Why didn’t he do something?”

Gray shrugged and rolled his lips together. “What could he do?” He shook his head. “In a crazy sort of a way I can understand his reaction. The love of his life had committed a serious crime and he’d become an accomplice by driving across the Canadian border.”

He poured himself another whiskey from the bottle he’d brought back with him.

“So they kept me.” He tossed back half the glass. “Cut off connection with their families and focused on making a life with me.”

“Didn’t the police question them?”

He shook his head. “No reason to, I guess. Pops said their move had been planned and they didn’t know my birth family very well. In fact, he doesn’t remember their last name.”

Andie’s heart broke for him. The fabric and story of his life had been ripped out from under him.

“All those nightmares?” He turned back to her. “They were memories too.” He crossed to the dining room table and opened the bottle then turned to her. “Apparently I was on my way home from school when she pulled me into the car.”

“How come your dad didn’t realize you were there?”

“She admitted giving me half a tranquilizer in a soda.” He shuddered. “No wonder I don’t like taking pills.”

“She’s lucky you weren’t seriously injured.” His glare showed he didn’t understand, so Andie crossed the room and palmed his chest in to reassure him.

“Adult medications can be very dangerous for children. Too much can be fatal.”

“Come sit with me.” After taking the bottle from his hand, she placed it on the sideboard then led him to the sofa.

“What is your next step?”

His eyes were blank as he turned to her. “What do you mean?”

“Are you going to Seattle?”

“I haven’t thought that far ahead yet.” He stabbed his fingers through his hair as confusion swamped him. “A part of me wants to race there right now. Catch the next flight and see what I can find. But who knows where my parents live? Or what they’re like?” He took a deep breath. “Or even if they’re alive.”

He turned to her. “Besides we’ve got a problem needing resolution before I go chasing off to another country. I’ve waited this long, another month or two won’t matter.”

“Gray, you don’t have to stay here with me. You need to find your answers. We’ll be okay.”

“Not a chance.” He pulled her against him. “You know what I kept thinking on my way back here from the airport?”

“What?”

“How grateful I was to have you waiting here for me. I knew you would be.”

“Of course.”

He tipped her chin and gazed into her eyes. “I counted on it. On you.” He kissed her gently then relaxed, tucking her against his side.

“I realized something else tonight. I know the timing sucks and I’m not much of a catch.” He cleared his throat. “It meant a lot knowing you were waiting for me and ... I’m hoping when all this is over, you’ll marry me Andie.”

Her heart filled. “You are a wonderful man and I’d love to be your wife.” She squirmed around and kissed him. “I love you.” She swallowed her pain for him and took his hand. “Let’s go to bed. I want you. I want to seal our future by making love.”