20 The Inner Shark #2
We had left the city heading east, where it was warmer.
The houses thinned out as we kept going until at last the highway was empty, with nothing but farmed fields and livestock for miles.
At a crossroads, Jack turned onto a smaller road that passed through forest, and after five minutes, he started to slow down.
We stopped in front of a gray fence, newly painted, that opened automatically onto a gravel road that forked, leading toward the main house and another house, equally big but a little further off.
There was a carport off to the side with one car already parked in it.
Jack stopped there, and Mike and I got out.
It wasn’t until I was in front of the house that I realized how big the place was.
It dwarfed their home in the city. Everything was hardwood, marble, and stone, with an immaculate lawn and a pea gravel path.
Jack and Mike hadn’t bothered packing; they already had everything they needed there. But Jack was a gentleman and took my things for me without asking.
“Is it me, or is it almost hot here?” I asked.
“Listen, I’m open-minded. If you want to take it all off and turn this into a nudist retreat, go for it,” Jack joked.
“I’m serious, Jack.”
“Just wait. It’ll get cold tonight. The daytime here’s a different story, though. That’s why I told you to pack something besides just sweatshirts.”
He gave me his hand. It was still warm from gripping the steering wheel. He guided me toward the wooden porch with its elegant stairs. There were cushioned seats all around, and the double oak doors had small windows near the top. Mike rang the doorbell.
A middle-aged woman I’d never seen answered. I thought it was supposed to just be the family and me. She greeted them and Jack said, “Hello, Lorna,” with a smile.
I could be wrong, but I think her eyebrow rose slightly when she saw we were holding hands. It was so fast, so subtle, that I couldn’t tell. Then she stood aside and let us through.
Inside it smelled like cooking, and my appetite awoke with a bang.
The vestibule was huge, with armchairs and shelves all around.
In front of us, a doorway led to a huge living room.
The dominant tones were brown and red, and everything looked very expensive.
Windows lined the walls, some looking out onto the forest and some giving a view of the lake. It was stunning.
Jack must have realized how impressed I was.
I won’t say he smiled proudly—he was too down-to-earth for that—but he looked happy that I was happy.
It was clearly nothing special for Mike, who just walked into the living room and jumped onto one of the sofas as he always did, before groaning, “Shit, I forgot there’s no TV here. ”
“There’s internet, though. You can stream something on your phone.”
I was dying with curiosity as I looked into the kitchen. It was as big as the bottom floor of my home. And the smell…
“Jen,” Jack called to me. “Let’s go put up your things.”
I nodded and followed him through the living room, past a dining room with sophisticated wooden furniture, and up a staircase to the second floor.
There were more rooms above us, but here he crossed a hall through a round room with armchairs and a piano and stopped at the second-to-last door on the right.
“If this room doesn’t work for you, feel free to pick another,” he said. “We have plenty.”
He opened the door to a room with an exposed brick wall and wooden shelves full of books and keepsakes I didn’t have time to look at.
The windows were immense, with cream curtains that were pulled back at that moment.
A gray rug lay under the huge bed with its gray sheets.
Walking over to the window, I saw the small dock leading out into the lake and a furnished back deck with a bar and grill.
“Why don’t you live here all the time?” I asked. “I feel pretty sure I could die happy here.”
“I think you’re exaggerating a bit. But the thing is, Dad doesn’t really like it out here. He says it’s too far from everything. Which some might see as a good thing, but I don’t know. Hey, are you stealing my glasses?”
I had just picked up a pair of sunglasses from his shelf and tried them on. “They look better on me,” I said.
“You’ve got me there.” He pulled me on top of him and onto the bed and kissed me in that special spot just under my ear that made all my hairs stand on end. I loved it. I wasn’t used to a man being so sweet.
“Who was that woman downstairs?” I asked, sitting up a bit.
“Lorna,” she said. “She and her husband, Ray, take care of the house when we’re not around. They live nearby. They look after the neighbors’ place as well. You know, mowing the lawn, dusting, raking leaves, that kind of thing. I don’t think we’ll see them again.”
“Jackie?”
Agnes’s voice reached us from downstairs.
When we went down to see her, we found her with Mary and with Jack’s father, who must have just arrived.
Agnes looked happy to see me—she always did—but Jack’s presence was clearly a joy to her, and she immediately started pinching his cheeks the same way his mother did.
And he complained the same way he did with his mother.
“How are you, Jenna?” Mary asked, coming over and hugging me. “I’m really so, so happy you came.”
“Yes, it really is a pleasure having a few new faces around here,” Jack’s father added. “I hope everything’s to your liking.”
I wasn’t sure how to react—I’d only seen him once, and he’d been cruel and stuck-up then—but I wanted everything to go well, so I just smiled and said, “You’ve got a beautiful home. I was just telling Jack.”
“Speaking of Jack,” his father said, “what kind of host are you, Son? It looks like you haven’t even offered your guest something to drink.”
“He did,” I lied, “but I’m fine.”
Mr. Ross left to arrange things in his room while Jack went to find Mike. I stayed with Agnes and Mary in the salon.
“Well,” Mary said, “they seem to be getting along. At least, I haven’t heard them screaming at each other yet.”
“Give them time.” Agnes sighed.
“Why do they get along so badly?” I asked.
Maybe I shouldn’t have. I noticed the two women looking at each other a little nervously before Mary replied, “They have very different personalities.”
There had to be more to it, I thought, but I wasn’t going to insist. My job while there was to make a good impression.
Jack walked in just afterward with his brother.
Mr. Ross remained upstairs, which I found strange.
We talked and laughed for close to an hour before Mary and Agnes went to the kitchen to see what Lorna had left for them to eat.
I got the sense that they were making excuses and they really wanted to talk by themselves.
Looking a little bored, the brothers brought out a deck of cards and started throwing money on the table.
I felt a little nervous betting the one twenty-dollar bill I had in my billfold, but if I lost, I figured I could work it out somehow later.
Jack encouraged me, telling me he’d distract his brother so I could beat him.
“Shut up, Ross,” Mike said. “You should try and focus on actually learning to play instead of trying to drag me down.”
“Sorry, Bro. There’s twenty dollars at stake. This is no time to fight fair.”
Silence overtook the room as Mike laid down his two aces. Too bad for him, I had a three of a kind. “Yes!” I shouted, and Mike said, “Wait a minute… Was my brother sharing his cards with you?”
“It’s called teamwork,” Jack said, hugging me to his side and kissing me on the lips.
“I was coaching her. And I’m as proud as if she just won the Olympics.
Plus, I need a protégé. I’ve been beating your ass at cards since I could crawl.
” He gathered up the bills on the table and pulled them toward us.
Mike was grouchy, then tense, and I turned to find his father on the stairs, observing us. I felt Jack stiffen as well as his father said, “Please, don’t interrupt anything on my account. It’s so rare to see you two boys having fun together. I suppose you have something to do with that, Jenna.”
I smiled, a little embarrassed, but also grateful.
On the surface, the comment was friendly, but something about his expression—an expression that said I’m rich and I know it, and I don’t need you —made it feel almost like an insult.
Especially when Jack gripped my shoulder tighter, consciously or unconsciously.
I wasn’t sure. Mike gathered the cards without a word.
I wondered if Mr. Ross was aware he’d ruined our amusement, and if that had been the point.
“Jack,” he said with a cold smile, “when you have a moment, I’d like to speak to you in private. Now, preferably. I’m assuming you’d like to keep this issue between you and me.”
I wondered if this issue , whatever it was, was bad, because I could hear Jack’s teeth grinding. After a glance at me, Jack stood, and he and his father walked out on the back porch. When the sliding glass door closed, Mike exhaled audibly, and I asked him if they were fighting about something.
“Maybe?” He shrugged. “I’m trying to stay out of it.”
“Can I ask what it’s about?”
“Trust me, you don’t want to know.” He stood, changing the subject. “Is that mashed potatoes I smell?”
Thankfully, our dinner was less tense than the last one. Mr. Ross barely spoke, and Agnes and Mary were the life of the party. Not to mention, the food was delicious. At one point, Mary asked me how my parents were.
“Great,” I said, swallowing what I had in my mouth. “They miss me, obviously. But it’s kind of nice because they treat me special now that I don’t live there. I’ve never experienced that before.”
“Yes, I remember how I started to truly treasure these two disasters when they left home,” she responded.
“Wow, Mom, thanks for the unconditional love,” Jack said.
“Yeah,” Mike added.