Chapter 34
~~ James ~~
I watch Lorelai’s face as she wanders the living areas on the bottom floor of the house. I don”t know what she expected, but I”m guessing it wasn’t this.
She runs her fingers along the thick mantle across the top of the tall stone fireplace. It holds a mix of formal and candid photos. Some of Emilie and Becca, a few of my Army buddies that I don’t dare look at too long or I’ll choke up, and some of the FreeDivers Team on our boat.
The photos were the one thing I’d fought the interior designer on. She’d wanted to have them in identical frames mounted in the hallway, but I had insisted on having them the same way my grandmother had hers, in mismatched frames in varying heights and designs. Without the lace doilies, though.
She seems particularly delighted in the game room I have set up with a pool table, video games, and a smaller area for the girls to play their games with child-size sofas and a table and chairs for tea parties. She touches the triangle of balls that are waiting for someone to break.
“Do you play pool?” I ask.
“I never learned,” she confesses. “I always wanted to.”
“I can show you the basics,” I offer. “Sometimes Trevor and I play. Kaiden, Morgan, and Luce play, too. Occasionally, we have a kind of tournament when we all get together here.”
“I’d like that,” she whispers. She seems nervous, but I guess that’s normal, seeing someone’s home for the first time.
She peeks out the back sliders that open onto the pool deck. She gasps when I switch on the pool lights. They flicker like candlelight, illuminating the waterfall at the far end. I’d opted for a natural stone look, with plants scattered throughout making it seem like a pond in a magical forest. “This is beautiful!”
“Do you swim?”
“I couldn”t when I was a kid, but I learned while I was in college. My grandmother insisted. She said everyone in Miami should know since there is water everywhere.”
“This is heated, so we can swim any time. When summer starts, we’ll throw pool parties and grill burgers and steaks. Would you like to get in?”
“Oh, I don’t have a suit.” She flushed. “I left the one I had at Nan’s.”
“Tell me about your Nan? You haven’t mentioned her, but she seems important to you. Where was she when you were growing up?”
“She didn’t know about us. My mother OD’d somewhere in Florida, they reached out to Nan since she had been listed as next of kin on old hospital records. I was 22 and waiting tables when she tracked me down. She brought me to stay with her for a little bit and paid for school. It was a difficult transition for both of us, but in the end, we grew to respect each other.”
Lorelai ventured into the dining room as she was talking. She sank onto one of the chairs, looking around the room at the art prints, the chandelier over the table, the buffet standing waiting to set the formal table with designer dishes, silver, napkins and placemats and runners tucked away in its drawers. This room wasn’t well used. There was a breakfast nook in the kitchen that sat in a bay window overlooking the small garden my landscaper had designed. Emilie and I used that table more often.
She looks down at her hands, clasped together on the edge of the table. “I know I promised we’d talk about this.”
I took a seat around the corner from her and covered her small hands with mine. “It will make it easier to help if I know what I’m dealing with.”
She took a giant breath.” Nan passed away over a year ago. She left me and my brother her estate. We were the only relatives left.
“I don’t know if you remember I’d told you my brother left when he was young. He was a drug user from an early age and got involved in some street gangs. He’d come back occasionally, but he never stayed long. It seemed his paranoia got worse with every visit, and I hadn’t seen him for about four years. Until this week.”
I give her hands a squeeze. “So the man at the BB is your brother?” I’d suspected. The brief glimpse I’d gotten through the glass seemed to match the description and photo in Kaiden’s file. I also knew that whenever Braydon Mills showed up in the timeline, Lai had changed jobs. There were no clinic visit records in the file, but there were police reports showing property damage in almost all cases.
She nods.
“Were you hiding from him? Has he hurt you before?”
“No. He’s always been a little irrational and unpredictable. He would get angry and throw things, he only ever slapped me once, just grabbed me by my hair. I could almost always get him to settle down.”
“Why did he get angry, Chipmunk?”
“He’s always asked me for money. I’d give him what I could, but often I just didn’t have any to spare. He sometimes showed up at my job and made a scene, and I’d get fired. Then it had been so long since I’d seen him, I wasn’t sure he was even still alive.”
I can hear unshed tears in her voice, but she is holding the emotion in. I’m not sure if that is good or bad, but I know my heart aches for her. The anger at someone trying to hurt her hasn’t subsided, but I can see how affected she is.
“Nan’s attorney had PIs trying to track him down. When she made her will, she put restrictions in place so he can’t access the money without the attorney signing off, and he has to successfully complete rehab to get anything at all. He thinks we’re trying to put him away.”
“Does he also have any emotional or mental challenges that might be aggravating the situation?” I ask her softly.
Her shoulders slump even more. Her voice breaks on her words, but she pushes through. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
She looks over at me, and the tears finally spill over. “James, he took care of me when I was a toddler. A toddler. By himself. He stole to feed me and clothe me. He got me potty-trained. He taught me to read and to tie my shoes. What kind of young boy has that capacity?
“I don’t know what would have happened to a two-year-old with an abusive, alcoholic, absentee father?” She shakes her head and swipes at the tears dripping off her chin. “No, I do know. I owe him my whole life.” My chest tightens. I want to gather her in my arms like the day of the accident and hold her. But I know that has to be her move to make.
Then her voice goes firm. “But James, I can’t have him going to the preschool. If he’s this desperate, all of those children are at risk. Emilie and Becca—”
“Nothing is going to happen to them, Lorelai.” I put as much strength and reassurance as I can into my words. “Trevor’s men are looking for him. I’ll see if he can put an officer by the preschool. Or you can take some time off.”
“I have to go in and talk to Mrs. Corbyn.”
“She’s a tough old bird.” I let a laugh slip. “Think she’ll let you take a few days?”
Lorelai shakes her head, “She needs me to be there. Her husband is debilitative and at home with a nurse. Mrs. Corbyn’s been taking more and more time away from the school.”
“Oh, I hadn’t heard about Mr. Corbyn. They keep to themselves a lot. I’ll ask Cami to let The Roses know.” I pull out my phone and send out a text before it slips my mind.
“What’s the roses?” Lorelai sniffs. At least her tears have stopped falling. I lean over and wipe away a stray drop with my thumb.
“A local ladies group. They do a lot of community planning and volunteering. They should be able to find someone to help the Corbyns out.”
“Oh, that would be great. She”s a bit touchy about it, though.”
”They”ll be gracious.” My phone chimes, and I read Cami’s text aloud. “On it, she says.”
“I can drop you off at work in the morning if you’re sure you have to go. Then after work we can see about getting you some transportation.”
Lorelai blows out a harsh breath.
“I know it’s a lot, but you have a whole community around you now.”
That starts fresh tears, but she quickly staunches them.
“Let me show you the guest rooms, and you can choose.”
“Rooms?” Lorelai’s eyes get bigger and her auburn eyebrows shoot up.
“Well, one is more of a princess playroom. But the other two are nice. They have their own bathrooms.”
She looks around again. “How did you... How do you...” Her nose scrunches up.
“How do I afford this on a search rescue salary?” I fill in the blanks.
“I’m sorry. That’s such a rude, presumptuous question.”
“It isn’t the first time I’ve been asked.” I try to use a reassuring tone. “It isn’t really a secret. I made a few lucky investments early in my Army career. I was deployed so often, I didn’t even keep a home base. I had almost zero living expenses until I got out and moved back home. It was easy to invest and save money. When Emilie’s mother passed away, I still had life insurance coverage. I built this place with that money.”
“You didn’t have to explain.” She’s flushed with embarrassment.
“We’ve shared a lot of personal things with each other. I want you to know,” I tell her. “The Team is a way for me to stay busy and give back to the community who helped raise me.
“Let me show you those rooms.”
I get Lorelai settled then make a call to Trev. “You up, man?” I say, closing the door to my room behind me.