Her Reason to Stay (7 page)

The gates stayed closed.

An intercom speaker was embedded in a brick stanchion close to the driver’s side of the car. Daphne opened her window and punched the button to speak. “Raina?”

Static answered her. She listened hard for a voice, but static rattled again into the otherwise still night.

The gate swung open.

“Thanks,” Daphne said, rolling her eyes for a glimpse of spruce branches and darkening sky. “I’ll be right up. Don’t loose the hounds upon me.”

“You like to make fun, don’t you?”

“Raina, you can speak. I thought you were sending Morse code in static bursts. I’ll be there before you know it.”

The driveway wound like a snake through formal plantings, cut back for winter but beginning to bud. Not a dot of anything untoward touched the velvet lawn. The Abernathys must have spent more than Daphne’s best annual salary on landscaping and maintenance.

Her sister opened the big glossy black door and came onto her wide porch like Scarlett welcoming the Tarletons.

Daphne parked and jumped out of the car. “I expected the old family retainer.”

“Who would that be?”

Raina’s spike-edged tone deflated Daphne’s flippancy. “I guess that would be Patrick,” she said, feeling more vulnerable just from saying his name. “You aren’t hiding him in there somewhere?”

“Come search if you’d like.”

“I forgot my posse.”

“Your—”

“My hotel TV barely picks up
Gunsmoke
reruns on some local channel. I’m becoming an expert on the American western.” She stayed on the first brick step. “I’ve never seen a place like this that wasn’t a museum. Or a castle. I’m not sure I belong.”

“Come inside and stop making a big deal about it. We shut the dungeon down generations ago. Keeping the rack in good repair really saps the capital.”

Daphne followed her twin up the steps and inside the cool, wide hall. Victorian darkness shrouded the place in shadows.

“You need more windows.”

“You don’t have to be nervous. Tell me what happened to you.”

What had she expected? A chair as comfortable as any rack and an invitation to tea?

“Can we start with your college thing? I’m sorry about hurting your feelings. I put you on a pedestal and I didn’t expect you to be human.” She held up her hands, begging for a truce. “I like you human. I prefer you human because there’s some chance you’ll be able to deal with the rest of what I have to tell you.”

“That was my only big secret, and I wasn’t eager to share it, but I thought it would be safe with you.” Raina went to a spot on the wall and light flooded the hall. Sort of flooded. Heavy, scrolled furniture drew more sinister shadows that seemed to hover. “Telling you took nerve,” Raina said.

Daphne nodded. “I let you down, but I didn’t mean to. You surprised me. I hardly know you, but I already assume you won’t choose to do something wrong.”

Raina rubbed her face. “I made a bad choice in college, and I get ashamed when I think about it, But I’m also sorry I stomped out like a teenager, and if it matters, I only did a few papers. I couldn’t take the guilt back then, either.”

Without thinking, Daphne hugged her sister. “You don’t have to explain anything to me.”

Raina hugged back. “I didn’t expect you to get upset.”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t assume I mean because you’re an arch-criminal or something. I just thought that because you’d lived more, you’d understand more.”

Daphne’s heart melted for the second time that day. “I’m so sorry I didn’t.”

“Let’s call a truce.” With her arms still around her sister, Raina eased Daphne toward the kitchen. “Come to the kitchen. I’ll make us sandwiches.”

“We’ll make them together. You’ll need plenty of sustenance before the night is over.” Daphne stopped before an actual suit of armor. “Don’t you have a horde of servants to wait on you and throw that thing into the dungeon?”

“You really have funny ideas. My trust fund pays a limited amount, and I have bills. I can barely afford Mrs. Dodge, the woman who makes sure I eat daily, but my mother would rise like an avenging angel if I tried to let her go. She usually leaves something, but I told her I wasn’t hungry because I thought we’d have sandwiches.”

“I like the privacy.”

“You can escape without anyone knowing you were here?”

They reached a long kitchen bound by tall windows, paned with wavy glass. “Don’t kid yourself, Raina. You may want me to disappear like a bad dream.”

“Sure I will.” Raina went to a porcelain sink as big as any bathtub Daphne had ever seen. She turned off the evening news on a TV that looked out of place in an alcove set among period cabinets above a limestone counter.

“This room is bigger than most apartments I’ve lived in,” Daphne said. “And you have all the comforts. The TV’s kind of small for a rich girl, but—good grief—it’s high definition.”

“You’re nervous again.”

“I’m going to be until we’ve had our talk.”

Raina washed her hands. “You act like you won’t be my sister if I don’t approve, but look at us. We’re together for life even if we both decide we loathe each other.”

Raina dried her hands and hung the towel on a rail. Then she wrapped her arms around her waist, a gesture that also came naturally to Daphne. She would have bet her next breath that her sister didn’t know she looked afraid.

“I didn’t lead your kind of life,” Daphne said.

Raina’s folded arms slipped a little. She tossed Daphne a look that said “Duh” loud and clear.

“I had some bad luck with foster families.” In her head, a memory began to take form—a door squeaking open to let in a thin strand of light. She pushed it away, breathing hard. “So I ran away. A couple of times.”

“What happened to you?”

Nope. Raina wasn’t ready to hear that yet, and Daphne wasn’t ready to tell. “I was a kid when I ran away. I couldn’t exactly find a job, and I stole some things. Food, mostly. Once, a book.”

“Why didn’t you go to the police?”

It was her turn to flash the “Duh” look. “Where would they send me? Another foster home—or back to the same one. I wasn’t adoptable.”

“Who would have been, after a childhood like that?” Raina started toward her.

Daphne wanted to walk into her sister’s arms, but she held out both hands. “You’d better hear the rest. I tried a—substance or two.”

“Daphne, I want to know exactly what you did. Don’t soften the facts for me.”

“I try too hard when I’m nervous. Remember?”

“Don’t, with me.”

“I don’t feel entirely safe yet. Let me finish. I got a clue after I was sent back to the one house where I’d felt sort of safe.”

“They took care of you?”

“It’s never that simple, Raina. I was too busy protecting myself to let anyone take care of me, and I just wanted out, but a friend of mine was there, too, and we promised to look out for each other.”

“But?”

She hesitated, but forced herself to go on, in a rush. “My friend overdosed. She was pregnant and scared and she didn’t want to think about it so she died, and I got totally clean and stayed in school and actually did the work. Afterward, I managed to persuade the D.A. and a judge to seal my juvenile record so I’d have a chance with the colleges I wanted.”

“How’d you pay for school?”

“Not with scholarships, for sure. I pushed grocery carts anytime I could get a shift at the local market, and I read SAT exam guides in libraries until I could pass with an acceptable score.” She caught her breath, lifting her face to find her twin’s imprinted with dread.

“When did you start going to AA?” Raina asked.

Daphne shook her head, so lost in getting all the truth out, she barely understood. “I got a degree in criminology on the fast track, and I found a job as a jury consultant. One good thing about my kind of life, I knew people. I had to be able to size up a guy or I could end up…” Again, she’d let herself slip out of bounds. “Hurt,” she said. “And people begged me to work for them, almost from my first case. I read truth the way most people read their own names. I mean, I could tell who was lying right away. I could tell which potential juror the lawyers should select to make the case go our client’s way.”

“That’s good.”

“Until Milton Stegwell.”

“Milton—”

She lifted her hands, this time pleading. It was almost over. “Good God, the pictures in my head,” she said, and Raina flinched. “Crime-scene photos. They’ll follow me until the day I fall into my own grave.”

“Stop, Daphne.”

“In a second.”

“I can’t move.”

“I don’t mean to frighten you, but you have to know everything because this is who I am.”

“You’re not some guy who obviously did something unforgivable.”

“He killed his wife and their three children, but back then I believed he was innocent. I only chose juries for innocent defendants. Until he bragged about destroying his family after his acquittal, I would have bet every stick of furniture in my safe and tasteful apartment. I would have handed over the keys to my Jag to pay for his defense. I almost did his case for free because he was so damn misunderstood.”

“God.”

“Yeah. I’ve done some praying since that case. Nothing scares you more than the innocent blood of three children and their real live loving mother. She fought for her children. She gave her life for them. She loved them, and he killed her and their babies, and I helped him go free.”

Her legs wobbled. She grabbed the cool limestone counter.

“Daphne.” Raina reached for her. “He’s the one who should feel this guilt.”

“I was part of his defense. I can’t shut my eyes and say it was just a job. I helped recommend the people who set him free.” They held on to each other. Daphne couldn’t stop. “He sent us a note afterward—something about how you really can broadcast your guilt on the evening news if a jury thinks you’re innocent.”

“Let me talk for a second.” Raina, weak and sheltered and rabbit-like in Patrick’s office, was stronger than Daphne now. “You did nothing wrong. That man had to be psychotic. How could you expect to see through him?”

Daphne staggered out of her sister’s arms, slipping against the counter. “Because I’ve been a bad person, too. I know how to lie. I know what to look for, but he fooled me. He could marry another innocent woman and then kill her and her children, too.”

“No, he can’t. You and I will find him and make sure wherever he goes, people know what he did.”

Daphne smiled, despite the fact that Milton and his crimes had all but destroyed her life. “You’re vengeful.”

“When it comes to family.”

“The D.A. had the same plan. He asked for volunteers in his office to keep tabs on Milton.”

“You can’t do more. I’m not naive,” Raina said. “You did your job and this creep fooled you. I’m surprised his attorney didn’t resign.”

“We visited a bar or two together, wallowing in guilt. That’s why I try not to think about it. Guilt is a good excuse to drink.”

“Not ever again.”

Daphne had saved the worst for last, and shame nearly choked her. “I hope you’re right. I plan never to drink again because I got a DUI after I took out a power pole about eight months ago. Once they stitched up my head—” she showed the scar above her ear “—I had a night in jail to think what might have happened after I got behind the wheel of that car.” Daphne pressed her fists into her eyes and then tried to laugh. “I must seem even more of a hypocrite being shocked that you’d written a couple of assignments for pay.”

“Forget it.”

Daphne stared at her. “It’s that easy for you to forgive me?”

Raina came to her again and refused to let her move away when she held her. “You’re so tough. What you need is to forgive yourself.”

It was good to lean against Raina. Her sister. Her family.

“I want you to like me. I’m scared you won’t.”

“Maybe I feel the same about you.”

It was strange, exactly what she’d hoped for, and yet, silence pressed against her ears. As a finale for tonight’s performance, she might just faint.

“Why did you tell me all of this now?” Raina asked.

“For the same reason I had my last whiskey about half an hour before I hit that pole. I work best with pristine starts, and I didn’t want you to stumble across something that might make you think I’d kept the truth from you—or even tried to shade it.”

Daphne saw a mother’s patience in Raina’s eyes. Maybe only a woman who’d been raised by a good mother could be so kind and so strong.

“I am human. I understand choices, and you are my family now. We’re going to say things that hurt each other.”

Daphne smiled. “You amaze me.”

“Because you don’t expect enough for yourself. Open your eyes. You don’t need to be punished. You’ve been trying to do that killer’s penance. You don’t think you deserve a good life.”

Raina turned to a white tin with a loaf of bread painted on its front. Daphne grabbed the counter again and finally gasped as if she’d fallen from a great height, landed on her back and…survived.

R
AINA TURNED
,
drawn to the rasp of Daphne’s breathing. “What’s the matter with you?”

“I guess we’re going to say things that heal, too.” She yanked a stool away from the counter and collapsed onto it.

“What did I say?”

“I’ve been trying to do that man’s time.”

Raina opened the bread box. “The trick is to see yourself without guilt. You aren’t like him. You think you’re a bad person, but you’ve spent your entire adult life making sure you aren’t.”

“So the trick is to believe I don’t need to do penance.”

“It’s not a trick,” Raina said. “You simply have to see yourself the way I see you.”

“Maybe I can’t do it that way. Thinking I’m not bad takes some practice after all these years.”

“You had lousy foster care. I wonder why my parents didn’t adopt us both.”

“I guess we’ll never find out, but maybe they didn’t know about me,” Daphne said.

“I hate what your life has done to you.”

Daphne hated the amount of time she’d wasted assuming she’d be wrong for everyone. Even this afternoon, when Patrick had kissed her, she’d pulled away, thinking she was the kind of woman who’d be a bigger problem for him after his ugly divorce.

“Raina, can I ask you a question I have no right to ask?”

“Maybe.” She took out four slices of bread. Still holding it in one hand, she managed to open a cupboard and pull down plates.

“Are you in love with Patrick?”

The plates clattered to the counter. “What is the matter with people in this town? Who told you that?”

“You did, with the way you depend on him.”

Raina stared at her for a second before she set the bread on the plates. “You’ve read me wrong. He’s my friend, nothing more. What makes you ask?”

“I don’t want to be his friend,” Daphne said.

Raina paused at the fridge. “Meaning?”

“I’ve only known him for a couple of weeks.” Daphne crossed to a mesh basket beside the stove and chose a tomato from a rich, red pile of them. “But I care about him.” She pretended the tomato fascinated her. “I think. I’d like to find out, if you won’t be hurt.”

The fridge door opened. From the sound of things, Raina was searching for something specific. At last a glass jar connected with the counter.

Daphne turned to see if Raina needed help, but no, she’d set fancy mustard on the limestone.

“I don’t mind if you see Patrick,” she said.

“It may come to nothing. I don’t want him to come between us.”

“Does he feel the way you do?”

“I’m not sure.” She didn’t know how to answer. She couldn’t talk about the kiss.

“His ex-wife is addicted to prescription drugs. He’s going to be afraid when you tell him about your problem,” Raina said. “I don’t want you to hurt each other.”

T
HAT NIGHT
,
when she left Raina’s, she dialed Patrick’s number. He answered just after the first ring.

“Daphne?”

“About that talk.”

“Where are you?”

“In my car. I’d like to meet you somewhere, but I know you have your son.”

“I can’t get a sitter this late. Maybe we could meet tomorrow night.”

“Can I come to your house?” Daphne said. She’d rather tell him about her alcoholism before gossip got to him first.

“Don’t take this the wrong way,” he said, “but I wouldn’t want my son to see you here, and he might wake up.”

“I’m not suggesting a sleepover,” she said.

“I don’t want to confuse him.”

Raina had said he was overprotective. “Maybe you could come outside to talk to me.”

“I was thinking dinner, or at least comfortable chairs,” he said.

“I’m not sure we’ll need that.”

“I’m damn near seduced already. Come on over. You can have Will’s tire swing and I’ll sit on our oak tree’s roots.”

“I don’t have your address.”

“I’ll talk you here. Where are you now?”

“I’m getting close to the square. Going up to Raina’s seemed to take longer than coming down.”

“Have you been thinking about this afternoon?”

The kiss. “I guess I haven’t thought of much else. That’s why I need to tell you some things.”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

She didn’t blame a single father whose ex-wife had nearly neglected their son to death for putting up his guard. “I’ll tell you in a few minutes.”

“I remember the curve of your waist,” he said. “I can still feel it against my palms. Wanting you is so intense I feel as if I’ve recognized you even though we don’t know each other very well. I never believed I’d feel this way.”

She concentrated on breathing and avoiding the poles along the road. “I’m almost at the square.”

“Take the first red light after the square. Turn left. I like the way you taste, too, Daphne.”

“Please don’t say that.”

“I like the way your voice goes husky when you look at me.”

“How many times has that happened?”

“The other day, when I saw you on the bench. Today, when I kissed you. You know I want more from you. I want to touch all of you. Now.”

“I’m turning left.”

“You should be on Bryerly. I’m in the yard.”

He walked into the pooled illumination of a streetlight. Daphne parked at the first open spot on the street. Her heart raced as she walked toward him. He came out of the streetlight. There was no mistaking the desire in his eyes.

He caught her close. She ducked away from his mouth, but his lips trailed across her cheek. He kissed the pulse beneath her jawline.

“People might be watching,” she said.

“Come through here.”

A wooden gate opened in the brick wall that surrounded his house. A brief walkway took them to the back, where a rope swing shone in the moonlight and an oak’s thick trunk stood guard over the otherwise empty lawn.

“I wasn’t kidding,” he said. “There’s no place to sit.”

“Over there.” She pointed to the steps on a brick patio just outside his backdoor.

“They’ll be chilly now that it’s dark.”

She sat but found she didn’t know how to start her second confession of the day.

“What do you want to tell me?” Patrick asked.

“About my past.”

“Is it any of my business?”

“Don’t get scared. I’m not suggesting a lifetime commitment, but Raina told me about your ex-wife.”

“I wish she hadn’t.”

“You’ll understand if you let me finish.” But the lighted windows above her presented a moment of justified procrastination. “What if Will wakes up?”

Patrick pulled a monitor from his jacket pocket. “I’ll hear him.”

“He can’t hear us?” The last thing that little boy needed was the story of another woman who couldn’t resist the allure of oblivion.

“No.” Patrick speared his fingers through her hair. “What can you have to tell me? You know I looked you up. I found your record in track and a news story about a bike accident when you broke your wrist.”

“I never broke my wrist.” Normally, she’d have objected to anyone snooping, but she understood that Patrick was being cautious.

“I found the wrong Daphne Soder?”

She nodded and he sat beside her, stretching his legs in front of him. She looked up, drawn to the glitter in his eyes. As cool air swirled between them, she felt more detached from him than she had since he’d touched her arm in his office lobby

“You found a nice innocuous girl with my name, but I’m not like her.”

He stared at his feet. Somewhere, a horn honked. Her heart tight with regret, Daphne wished she was sitting in this same spot, next to Patrick, hearing about his day, telling him about the things she’d done. Nice things that hadn’t hurt anyone.

He lifted his head, “What did you do, Daphne?”

“Telling you seems premature and extreme. We don’t know each other well, but Raina and I talked tonight and something she said convinced me to tell you.”

“I don’t need to be massaged. Just give me the truth.”

“It started—I don’t remember when…” She spoke slowly. Life drained from his expression with each word. He didn’t interrupt, but he didn’t have to. He never moved a muscle, but she felt him pulling away all the same. She finally finished with the meeting at the church.

“After I talked to Raina, I wanted to tell you before someone who saw me there mentioned it.”

He nodded, his mouth a thin line.

“You knew I couldn’t afford to bring another addict into my son’s life.”

“I guessed you might feel that way. I’m not an addict,” she said. “But the feelings between us are strong, and I didn’t want you to confuse me for someone safe like Raina, for instance.”

“You know that my son nearly died because I was blind to my wife’s problems.”

“That’s why I came tonight. To tell you about mine.” She stood. “I need to move. I already know what you’re going to decide.”

“He’s my son, Daphne, just a baby, and he can’t decide whether being with you might be worth the risk. Hell, I can’t decide that, even though I’ve never wanted a woman the way I want you.” He stood, as well, and pulled her into his arms. He was warmth in a world that felt ice-coated, and he was life on a night when she’d finally begun to believe she had a right to live. He turned her in his arms, and her legs slid between his. Their thighs met and she wouldn’t have said no if he’d lowered her to the ground. She couldn’t speak for wanting him. “But I can’t believe these feelings last because they seem so overwhelming.”

“Then why are you doing this?” she asked, her voice hoarse. He was also aroused. He’d left her in no doubt. “You’re saying goodbye, but your body…”

“Wants a woman it cannot have.”

She turned toward the glow of the streetlight on his brick wall. “I have to go.”

“What did you think I would say?” He grabbed the rope swing as if he wanted to pull her back but didn’t dare. “I want to pretend it doesn’t matter and I’ll trust that you won’t drink.”

“But I’m damaged goods?” She pushed his hand away. “There was a time when I would have agreed. Hell, maybe that was this morning, but I’ve been working since the day I was arrested on trying to do the right thing. I may be damaged, but I haven’t touched a drop since I climbed out of that car. I work hard at staying sober.”

“And what about the day something makes you feel bad enough to drink again? Something that acts like whatever triggered you before?”

“I can’t think that way.” Raina and her talk of penance put some steel in Daphne’s backbone. “The things that triggered my thirst were guilt and living without love. Raina said tonight that I was trying to do Milton Stegwell’s time. Well, I’ve done more than he ever will, and I finally believe I’m worthy of love. I might make mistakes again, but one of them won’t be choosing a man who believes the worst about me.”

“I don’t.”

“I know.” She stopped at his gate. “You just have to prepare yourself for the chance that it might happen. I understand it’s because of Will. I don’t even blame you. But that fear of yours makes you the wrong man for me. I need trust and you can’t give that.”

She’d made her stand, grabbed at a future she deserved. All her life she’d assumed that kind of future was closed off to the little orphan who’d never been loved. Tonight, that girl had begun to heal herself after a long battle.

And, as she slammed the gate, she tried to convince herself that Patrick was a fool for losing his chance with her. Still, deep inside, she suspected she might have done the same thing if Will were her child.

W
ILL SWUNG
from Patrick’s hand as they walked Gloria out to the car on Mother’s Day morning. “Ooh, Grandma, can we get a hamburger for lunch?”

“Sure. We’ll go to Draper’s Diner,” she said.

Edna Draper had been Patrick’s babysitter when he was Will’s age. She’d opened the diner after her husband’s untimely death had forced her to make up for the deficit in his company’s pension plan. Mrs. Draper’s food was good, the ingredients hand-chosen, organic and healthy.

“See, Dad? I told you Grandma wouldn’t mind.”

“Are you sure you don’t want something fancier?” Patrick asked.

“Edna needs her friends to drop in today. She opens because none of her children live in town anymore.”

Patrick helped Will fasten his seat belt and then checked the booster seat to make sure it was secure. “Today is Raina’s first Mother’s Day alone.”

His mother immediately rummaged in her purse and pulled out a fancy cell phone that made Patrick’s look like something out of Alexander Graham Bell’s lab. She punched in a single number and waited.

Nothing appeared to happen.

“She’s not answering,” Gloria said.

“Should we go by the house?”

His mother paused to consider. Then she flipped the phone shut. “She’s a big girl. She may have made other plans, and she doesn’t need us nursemaiding her the way her parents did.”

They could call Daphne. The thought passed through his mind, but he discarded it with an eye on his son in the rearview mirror.

“Can I play your phone game, Grandma?” Will strained to reach it, sticking out his feet. He was getting so tall his toes brushed the back of Patrick’s seat. He wouldn’t need the booster much longer. “Fix it for me.”

She set up the game and passed her phone back to him. “Things are looking better around here,” she said.

Will hit the buttons without a care about anything except winning. Patrick had to believe he’d made the right decision. The status quo was the best environment for his son.

But then he remembered Daphne in his arms, her hands clinging to his shoulders, her slender hips cradling him until she’d pulled abruptly away.

The wheels were coming off that bus he and Will often sang about. He glanced at his mother, trying not to see Daphne last night, proud and furious, walking out of his life.

“You sure about the hamburger?” She’d recently become vegetarian except for the meals she cooked for him and Will.

“I talked to Edna about her menu. She’s put in a wonderful stir-fry for me.”

“You have pull.”

“I like that smile on you.”

“Feels kind of funny.” He rubbed his chin, hating that his mother had noticed the change in him since the final episode with Lisa. “Will could use a dad who smiles.”