Marriage Seasons 03 - Falling for You Again (12 page)

Finally Patsy, too, began to chuckle. If Cody could be happy with autism and view it as God’s gift, maybe she ought to give Pete Roberts more of a chance. What if this twice-divorced former alcoholic—who appeared to be a disability worth shunning—was actually someone special the Lord had prepared just for her?

CHAPTER SEVEN

C
harlie and Boofer were cruising down the lakeside road in the Moores’ golf cart at about four in the afternoon when they noticed something suspicious. Always alert for anything unusual in a neighborhood, Charlie kept a keen eye trained on Deepwater Cove. Mail carriers had been known to save people’s lives. Finding an elderly person who had fallen inside a house and couldn’t get up, discovering someone who had slid on a patch of ice and was lying nearly frozen in a ditch, noticing a nonworking air conditioner in the home of a bedridden invalid—any of these could mean the difference between life and death. Charlie considered himself one of the best in this unwritten aspect of the job.

If Esther hadn’t talked him out of taking the job as a postal inspector and moving to Washington DC for training so many years ago, he might have risen to a high level in the agency. He certainly would have been paid better and built up a bigger pension. Not to mention the satisfaction he would have had in investigating postal violations. It would have been almost like working for the FBI or the CIA.

But Charlie didn’t like to think about the old days and that long-buried conflict with his wife. They never spoke about what had happened—at least, they hadn’t until Esther started bringing it up again. No, Charlie was retired now, and he had a new field of service. Deepwater Cove.

Just at the bend in the road, he and Boofer both heard a faint scraping sound. Ears perked, they looked at each other, and Charlie spoke the words he felt sure his dog was thinking.

“Something’s amiss.”

Slowing the golf cart to a crawl, Charlie peered along the water’s edge and up into the woods beneath a large limestone bluff. Most of the leaves had turned, and a few trees were already bare, making it easier to see into the dense growth.

“What’ve we got there, Boof?” he asked in a low voice.

The little mutt sniffed the air. Charlie did the same. Smoke from burning leaves mingled with a mouthwatering aroma from someone’s barbecue grill. Pork steaks, by the smell of it. Charlie wouldn’t mind a nice pork steak, but he and Esther were still working their way through all the casseroles in their freezer.

A flash of dark blue appeared between two trees and then vanished. “There!” Charlie said. “Someone’s down by the Hanes kids’ house, Boofer. That’s not right. We just saw Ashley headed over to the Hansens’ basement to make beads, and Brad is always at Larry’s Lake Lounge this time of day.”

Boofer stood up on the seat and began panting in anticipation. Charlie stroked the black dog’s head as he eased the cart along the road toward the house. What if someone was stealing the supplies for Brad and Ashley’s spare room? The piles of lumber and siding had been lying around so long that a passerby might think they’d been abandoned. Still, it wasn’t right to trespass. And it certainly wasn’t legal to take another person’s property.

“See anything?” Charlie asked the dog. “You know he’s there, don’t you, fella? We’d better get our protection ready.”

Flipping open a compartment on his dashboard, Charlie took out the small Mace can he always carried in case of emergencies. A mail carrier knew to take these kinds of precautions. As the cart approached the small, forlorn house at the edge of the road, Charlie stepped on the brake. Suddenly the crash of falling lumber echoed across the lake, followed by a string of swearwords foul enough to make Charlie wince.

Boofer let out a low growl that quickly rose to a torrent of staccato barks. Leaping off the golf cart before his master could stop him, the dog rushed toward the shell of the Haneses’ unfinished room.

Charlie slipped the Mace can into his jacket pocket and hurried after him. “Boofer! Come back here, you little rascal!”

Charlie gritted his teeth at the sound of a man shouting at the dog. The scalawag had better not touch Boofer; that’s for sure. Cusswords flew through the air as the small black mutt yipped and yapped. Ducking his head, Charlie climbed into the framed-up room in time to see Brad Hanes take a step backward away from the dog and tumble over a stack of roofing shingles.

“Boofer, stop!” Charlie shouted before the animal could attack the hem of Brad’s blue jeans. “Sit!”

Obedient, even a little sheepish, Boofer plopped down on the bare ground and turned baleful brown eyes on his master.

Charlie commanded his dog to stay; then he climbed over the shingles and stretched a hand toward the young man. “Sorry about that, Brad. Boofer heard you moving around back here, and he took off like a lightning bolt.”

Declining Charlie’s assistance, Brad stood and brushed off the seat of his jeans. “Crazy dog,” he muttered. Hanging his head, he rubbed his eyes with a hand as though he had a headache. “What do you want, Mr. Moore? I’m kind of busy here.”

Charlie dipped his hands into his pockets for warmth and studied the young man. Tall, good-looking, built like the star athlete he’d been in high school, Brad wore a hooded gray sweatshirt and a pair of old jeans. He was too young to have lost any hair or developed even a wrinkle, but his shoulders sloped as if he were carrying the weight of a hundred years.

“I don’t need a thing,” Charlie said. “Boofer and I were just taking our usual afternoon cruise around the neighborhood.”

Eyes still downcast, Brad nodded. “Okay. Well, I’d better get back to work.”

Charlie sensed that something was wrong. Handsome young bucks like Brad Hanes didn’t act this way. Brad had always been something of a show-off, a cocky fellow who seemed to have the world by the tail. This hangdog look surprised Charlie.

“So, you’re building a garage?” he asked, turning away from Brad to examine a weathered stud. “You planning to make it wide enough for Ashley’s car and your truck?”

There was a moment of silence so long that Charlie almost looked around to see if Brad was still there. The younger man finally spoke up.

“I sold the truck.”

The last thing Charlie had heard was that Brad had dented his prized possession while driving under the influence. “I don’t blame you for selling it,” he said, noting a six-pack of beer on the floor near a sawhorse. “I expect you can use one of your company’s vehicles if you need to haul anything. No use making big payments—though the truck sure was a pretty piece of machinery. You had the engine purring like a cat.”

Examining the exposed framework, Charlie could see that it wouldn’t be long before most of the studs Brad had erected would begin to sag and lean. Nails would rust. Lumber would warp, shrink, expand. By next summer, termites would have found the structure. Within a year, Missouri’s poison ivy and wild honeysuckle vines, weeds, carpenter bees, mud dauber wasps, and various other vegetation and pests would creep onto the construction site. In two years, the potential room would be nothing but a pile of rotting lumber.

“You’ve done a good job framing this up,” Charlie said. “I’ve built a fair number of things in my life—garden sheds, decks, front porches—and I’d say you’re off to a great start.”

“Look, Mr. Moore, I didn’t get the building permit,” Brad said. “If that’s what you’re here about, I didn’t get it, okay? I didn’t talk to the Deepwater Cove bylaws committee either. I don’t have time for that kind of—”

At this point the young man spoke a word that stiffened Charlie’s spine and just about knocked his glasses off his nose. Mail carriers were as down-to-earth as anyone else, but he didn’t recall any of his colleagues talking to each other with such coarse language. Maybe construction workers were a different breed, but if so, it was a shame.

“Excuse my French,” Brad said, “but I’m tired of you asking Ashley about the room. And now you come snooping around our place with your dog. It’s my project, and I’ll finish it when I get around to it.”

Charlie knotted and unknotted his fists inside his pockets. He realized he had two choices about how to react to Brad Hanes: He could rear back and punch the kid’s lights out. Or he could stand still for a while and try to figure out what was behind all this hostility.

Seeing as how punching Brad Hanes was not exactly Christlike and would likely result in Charlie’s own hasty downfall, he decided to ponder the situation.

“I never studied French,” Charlie muttered, more to himself than to Brad. “Guess I’m not exactly familiar with that kind of language.”

He watched Boofer scurry around, sniffing at the tools and lumber. In a moment, he heard a sigh come from Brad’s direction.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Moore. I apologize.”

Charlie turned in surprise. As he focused on the young man, he suddenly noticed that Brad’s eyes were red-rimmed. Was the boy that upset?

Charlie tipped his head in acknowledgement of the apology. “Thank you. That means a lot coming from a fine young man like you. I’m glad to see you’re back at work on the room. I noticed Ashley on her way to the Hansens’ house a few minutes ago. She’ll be making more beads, I guess. That wife of yours works day and night on her necklace business.”

Brad kicked at a nail lying on the plywood boards he had set across the floor joists. He ran a finger across one eye and then the other. This time, Charlie knew something was up. Either Brad and Ashley had been in a newlywed battle or something else was troubling the boy. Charlie had learned to “fish” for answers when someone was reluctant to talk. Deciding this might be a good course, he bent down and picked up a length of asphalt shingling that had spilled from a torn packet.

“I’ve always liked a green roof on a house with clapboard siding,” he remarked, examining the material more closely than necessary. “When I was growing up, we had a green roof. Every time I see one, I get a feeling of home. I guess you’ll be reroofing the whole house eventually. That’ll look nice.”

Charlie paused a moment, searched Brad’s face, and then cast his fishing line into the deep waters. “What’s troubling you, boy? You look lower than a mole’s belly button this afternoon.”

Brad gave a momentary scowl and then leaned over to grab a hammer off a sawhorse. “Nothing’s troubling me. I’m fine. I just need to get to work.”

“I guess so. I shouldn’t bother you any longer, though I’ve got to say I’m surprised Ashley’s not here to keep you company. She tells Esther she really misses her husband.”

“Ashley’s schedule and mine don’t match up. I work days; she works nights. We hardly see each other.” He fiddled with the hammer. “I don’t care. Makes no difference to me what she does with her time.”

“Now that’s something I would never say about Esther. I always liked knowing where my wife was and what she was up to—especially so we could work out free time to be together. That was hard sometimes, with me working and her raising the kids, but it mattered a lot to us.”

“I guess that’s how marriage was in the olden days.”

Charlie felt the sting that Brad obviously intended. Sure, he might have said such a thing when he was a young man and full of himself. He remembered a time when he thought he would live forever … when he considered himself the finest husband, protector, friend, and lover a woman could ever want … when his own agenda was paramount in his mind … when his dreams appeared within easy reach. Experience and a long string of years had taught him reality. Taught him that what mattered most was his love for God, family, friends, country. He wasn’t the greatest or best at anything. But he was good enough, and that’s all that really mattered.

“Olden days, golden days,” Charlie muttered. “Yep, Esther and I were plumb crazy about each other. But that changes through the years. It sure does.”

He waited patiently, like a fisherman slowly reeling in a lure. It wasn’t long before Brad bit.

“What do you mean it changes?” he asked in a sullen voice. “You and Mrs. Moore are still married. Don’t you love her anymore?”

“Sure I do. But I’m not crazy in love. I’m into it way too deep for that sort of foolishness. You see that Boston ivy over there? The red vine climbing up the pine tree? If you look close, you’ll notice that the ivy has worked some of its little feet right into the bark of the tree. And parts of the bark have grown around the ivy’s stem. That’s how Esther and I have come to be. We’re firmly attached. Two different people, but stuck together good and tight. A chilly wind can’t tear us apart. A winter frost won’t even begin to kill our love for each other. You and Ashley are that way, aren’t you?”

Brad dropped the hammer into his toolbox. “Are you kidding? I don’t even know why we got married. She’s mad at me most of the time.”

“Mad at you? That can’t be right. She helps Esther with her cooking nearly every day, and she sings your praises until I have to leave the room for fear that my wife will start judging me next to you.”

“No way, Mr. Moore.” Brad turned and faced the direction Ashley had gone. The small muscle in his square jaw flickered with tension. “She’s a … well, I won’t say the word.”

“And I thank you for that.”

“It’s just that she’s on my case day and night. Why don’t I pick up after myself? Why don’t I do the laundry once in a while? Why don’t I put my dishes away?”

“I’ve heard those questions many a time.”

“That’s why I eat lunch at Bitty Sondheim’s Pop-In nearly every day. If I came home for a quick bite, Ashley would gripe at me the minute she got in from work. She expects the house to look like something out of one of her stupid decorating magazines. Pillows stacked up on the bed, dishes put away, shoes in the closet. It’s ridiculous.”

“Well now, I don’t know about the pillows, but Esther does like her kitchen to stay clean.”

“Ashley bought bed pillows we’re not supposed to touch, let alone sleep on. I mean, we
live
in that house, you know? Nobody’s going to take pictures of it or show it off on some dumb ‘parade of homes.’ I can’t even put my feet on the coffee table without her pitching a hissy fit.”

“Mmm. Sounds like a woman. It took me years to figure out what made Esther melt in my arms. It wasn’t my paycheck. It wasn’t my fine physique. It wasn’t even this handsome face.”