Her Mother's Shadow (26 page)

L
acey lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, aware of Bobby's presence in the room at the end of the hall. She could feel his nearness in her bones. It had been a mistake to ask him to move in. She'd been caught up in the moment, wanting to please Mackenzie, and maybe wanting to test herself. She'd felt strong when Mackenzie had brought up the idea in the sunroom. After all, she was involved with Rick, spending time with him, focusing on him, waiting for those feelings of love and desire to magically emerge. But the truth was, her body yearned for the man at the end of the hall.

At one in the morning, she gave up trying to fall asleep and got out of bed. She was wearing the boxers and tank top she often slept in, and she padded quietly down the stairs in her bare feet. In the kitchen, she reached into the cabinet next to the sink for the bottle of insect repellent and the flashlight. Then she walked outside, softly shutting the door behind her.

She never felt afraid out here. Even though she had witnessed her mother being gunned down in front of her, she never feared such a thing would happen to her. It had been
an aberration, a rarity of enormous proportions in the Outer Banks. And in Kiss River, where only an occasional tourist ever ventured, she never felt endangered. God, she was going to miss living here!

The night was hot, but breezy. A half-moon lit the sky as she walked toward the lighthouse and the sea. She could still feel the heat of the sun in the sand beneath her feet, and she dug her toes into the fine powder as she walked. The ocean was gentle tonight; she could tell by the way it whispered instead of roared, and as she neared the lighthouse, she could see that the water was lapping at the steps instead of devouring them. She walked through the calf-high water and up the steps into the dark octagon of the tower. The tiled floor was always cool. Sometimes she would come into the octagon just to cool off. Tonight, though, she wanted to climb.

She didn't bother with the flashlight, even though it was quite dark in the interior of the lighthouse. Instead, she climbed the stairs in the pale wash of light from the sky. When she reached the top step, she turned and sat down to face the ocean. There were no lights on the water except for those reflected from the sky, and the moon lit the jagged edges of the bricks that surrounded her.

She often wondered what would have happened if the Kiss River lighthouse had remained intact. Like the Corolla light farther north, it probably would have been refurbished and opened to the public. The keeper's house might already be a museum, and the gravel road leading to the parking lot would have been paved. With a jolt, she realized that, once the keeper's house
was
turned into a museum and open to tourists, the Coast Guard would have to find a way to block the lighthouse off from public access. Then even she would not be allowed up here. The thought was unbearable. Funny
how something she had once hated had become something she loved.

She remembered how Bobby—the Bobby she'd known in the summer of 1991—had found her hatred of the lighthouse strange.

“What's it ever done to you?” he'd asked her once, after she'd unleashed a ten-minute tirade against Kiss River and its light. They'd been standing in line at one of the amusement parks, waiting to ride the roller coaster for the fourth time. Jessica was there, of course, and Bobby had his arm possessively around her, his hand on her neck. Jessica's long blond hair fell over his forearm, making Lacey regret chopping her own hair off. She could have just dyed her hair black or blond and left it long, but she'd gone a little crazy with the scissors in her hand, furious with her father for calling her “Annie” over and over again, as though he'd forgotten her own name. She'd wanted to look as little like her mother as possible.

Some other guy, whose name she couldn't even remember now but whom she slept with on the beach later that night, had been with them as they waited in line for the roller coaster. His breath stank of alcohol and she remembered wanting the sex, the physical closeness, the human touch, but not the kissing.

“It's taken my father away,” she'd said in answer to Bobby's question. “First, my mother gets killed. Then my father gets, like, totally obsessed with the stupid Kiss River lighthouse.”

“What do you mean, obsessed?” Bobby had asked.

“It reminds him of my mother, so he takes pictures of it practically every day. He's head of the committee that's trying to save it from falling into the ocean. He knows every fact about it. I mean,
everything.
He knows more than anyone else and he still tries to learn more. It's sick.”

“He forgot her birthday because of it,” Jessica said, adding fuel to Lacey's fire.

“He's so busy thinking about the lighthouse, he can't think about anything else,” Lacey said.

“He sounds wacko,” the other boy said, and she'd felt just the tiniest edge of guilt at her portrayal of her grieving father.

“He
is
wacko,” she agreed. “I really, really wish that stupid lighthouse would just fall into the ocean. Get it over with. Make him come back to the real world again.”

Bobby let go of Jessica to rest his hand on Lacey's arm. “You need a little something to relax you,” he said, sounding like a doctor. His hand was warm and smooth against her skin, and she remembered how it had felt on her small breasts and the inside of her thighs only a few weeks earlier, the night she'd lost her virginity to him.

He pulled a few pills from his shirt pocket and held them out so that only she could see them. “Take a couple of these,” he said quietly. “They'll make you feel better.”

She shook her head. She drank, but she couldn't make herself take drugs, although she'd faked it a couple of times so she didn't look like a complete dork, taking the pill and pretending to place it in her mouth while she really pocketed it in her very short shorts.

“Sounds like her father's the one who needs some of those,” the other boy said. “You could, like, slip them in his OJ or something.”

The slamming of a car door jerked Lacey from her memories. She turned to look toward the parking lot. Bobby's van was there, along with a strange car that did not belong to anyone in the house. The parking lot was dark, but not too dark for her to see Bobby get out of his van and pull a slender, blond-haired woman into his arms. She'd thought he'd been
asleep in his room. Had he actually been out with this woman? This stranger? Were they kissing? From this distance, she couldn't tell. The only thing she was sure of was that the old jealous feeling was back, the same feeling she used to have when she'd see Bobby and Jessica together. It spread out from the center of her chest and tightened itself around her throat.

The woman took a step away from Bobby and opened the car door. In the light spilling from the car, Lacey could clearly see Bobby hand her a thick wad of green-tinged bills. Her first thought was that the woman was a prostitute. Her second, even worse, was that he was buying drugs from her. Either way, she knew then that she'd made a mistake inviting Bobby Asher into the keeper's house. Was it Mackenzie's needs she'd been thinking of or her own?

The woman got into her car and drove out of the parking lot, and Bobby walked toward the house, his hands deep in the pockets of his jeans, under what he probably assumed was the cover of darkness. Lacey stayed rooted to her seat on the top of the lighthouse, unable to move. Maybe she had witnessed a completely innocent exchange. Maybe Bobby owed the woman money for a carton of cigarettes.

Or maybe Jessica had been right when she said it would be a mistake to bring Bobby into Mackenzie's life. Maybe, despite his protestations to the contrary, he was the same man he used to be, after all.

A
t breakfast that morning, Lacey watched Bobby pour his third cup of coffee and eat his second bowl of cereal and wondered if she was being used. She was feeding him, giving him a roof over his head, letting him work in her sunroom and providing him with a pass to her gym, and all he had to do was hang out with an eleven-year-old kid he would not even acknowledge was his. Before inviting him into their lives, she should have had a session or two with her counselor to examine her real motives.

It was a rare breakfast at the keeper's house, because everyone was present. Usually one of them would have eaten alone or skipped breakfast altogether and taken off for work. This morning, though, it was raining, the sky so dark that they had the kitchen light on, and no one seemed in a rush to go anywhere. It was a strong and steamy rain, and through the screen door they could hear it pummeling the sand outside. They'd shut all the windows on the east side of the house, but it was just too hot to shut the kitchen door, as well.

Rani was fussy. She'd finished her breakfast and was
kicking her doll-like brown feet, ready to get down from her high chair.

“Can I take her out and hold her on my lap?” Mackenzie asked Gina, who nodded her assent. Rani went to Mackenzie easily and sat comfortably in the girl's lap, and Mackenzie played a little game with her using Cheerios on the tabletop.

Bobby was watching the two children with a smile on his face, and Lacey felt guilty for her negative thoughts about him. She was making something out of nothing. There was no doubt that he was good to Mackenzie, and no doubt that Mackenzie felt a bond with him. Lacey reminded herself that Tom had been an alcoholic at the time she'd learned he was her father. She still would have wanted to know the truth about her relationship to him. As troubled and screwed up as Tom had been, he had welcomed her as his daughter. Bobby was doing no less for Mackenzie. No matter what sort of person he was, Lacey wouldn't harm the relationship between father and child.

Despite his smile, though, Bobby seemed pensive this morning, and Lacey couldn't help but wonder if his mood had something to do with the woman in the parking lot. Was she the one he'd been having those secretive cell phone conversations with? Her brain hurt from trying to figure him out, and she knew she needed to shift gears and focus on the day ahead. If she didn't leave the house soon, she would be late for work at the animal hospital. She turned her attention to Mackenzie.

“Do you have the book you're reading to take to your grandmother's with you?” Lacey asked her.

“I don't need it today,” Mackenzie said, moving the Cheerios around on the table in the game only she and Rani seemed to understand. “Grandmother's taking me shop
ping.” Nola had discovered the one activity that Mackenzie would embrace. “But I was wondering if I could come home early?” she asked, glancing at Lacey. “I mean, could you pick me up after you get off work at the animal hospital? I want to help Clay with the training.” She looked across the table at Clay. “You're training this afternoon, aren't you?”

He nodded. “I'm working with Boomer,” he said.

“Oh, I love Boomer!” Mackenzie said. “So, can I come home early?”

“I want
finger paint!
” Rani insisted, apparently growing tired of the Cheerios game.

“Do you want me to take her?” Gina asked Mackenzie.

“I've got her,” Clay said, getting to his feet.

“I'll finger paint with you tonight,” Mackenzie said to the little girl as she transferred her to Clay's arms. “I have to leave in a few minutes, so I can't do it now.”

Rani pouted, pressing her head against Clay's shoulder.

“Let's get you cleaned up.” Clay carried her to the sink, where he washed her hands and face, a procedure Rani had only recently been able to tolerate. Then he set her down on the floor. “Why don't you go look at one of your books?” he said to her, and she ran into the living room, Sasha at her side.

Mackenzie looked at Lacey. “So, can I?” she asked again, as Clay poured himself another cup of coffee. Lacey had to hand it to Bobby; at least he'd had the courtesy to make a second pot when he realized he was going to be drinking most of the first.

“It's okay with me,” she said. “But it's really up to your grandmother. Call me at the animal hospital after you talk to her.” She felt certain that Nola would be delighted to have less time with her granddaughter. A couple of days ago, she'd actually thanked Lacey for taking her in, although
she'd also made it clear that she was still angry at her for contacting Bobby. Oh, God. Maybe Nola had good reason to be angry.

“Speaking of calls,” Clay said as he took his seat again, “I got one yesterday from a woman whose dog I trained years ago.” He leaned back in his chair, fingering his napkin on the table. “The dog's name is Wolf,” he said, “and he was one of the best I'd ever worked with. He and his owner, Susan, were a great team, but a few months ago, they were involved in a search-and-rescue operation looking for a little girl. She'd been camping with her family and disappeared, and they thought she'd wandered off, but she'd actually been snatched by some guy. Wolf was the dog that found her. She was safe and unhurt, but the guy who'd taken her kicked Wolf around a bit and then shot him.”

“Oh, no!” Mackenzie's hand flew to her mouth and a pained expression came over her face. “Did he die?” she asked.

Clay shook his head. “Susan said that he recovered from the gunshot wound, and for a while, he seemed fine. Then, all of a sudden, he changed. He would growl at people on the street, and he attacked Susan's friend when she came over to the house.”

“Like, what do you mean, he attacked her?” Mackenzie asked.

“He lunged at her and took a chunk out of her arm.”

“Man,” Bobby said. “Did they put him down?”

Clay shook his head. “The friend he attacked was, fortunately, a dog person, and she and Susan both realized that something was radically wrong. Wolf had always been very gentle. Susan's afraid that he's not only been ruined as a search-and-rescue dog, but that he's not trustworthy around anyone besides herself anymore.”

Lacey knew from the moment Clay started talking about the dog that he wanted to attempt to rehabilitate him, but Gina only seemed to be catching on now. “You're not thinking of working with the dog again, are you?” she asked him.

Clay turned to his wife. “I'm telling you, Gina, this is one of the best dogs I've ever worked with. He has some kind of…post-traumatic stress disorder.”

“Oh, Clay, please,” Gina pleaded. “Don't bring a dog like that here.”

“It'll be fine,” Clay said. “He'll be locked up in the kennel.”

Gina looked as though she wanted to say more, but wisely decided to save it for a private conversation.

“You should have Dad look at the dog,” Lacey suggested, “Maybe there's something physical going on with him.”

Clay nodded. “That's first on my agenda.”

Bobby looked at his watch, then reached for the box of raisin bran and poured himself another bowlful.

Lacey turned to him. “You're quiet this morning,” she said. She heard the suspicious edge to her voice and wondered if anyone else noticed it.

He smiled at her, that smile she still could feel down to her toes regardless of any negative thoughts she might have about him. “All the dog talk made me think about the piece I'm working on,” he said. “The belt buckle. I start adding the colors today.”

“Can I watch?” Mackenzie asked.

Bobby laughed. “You've got a lot you want to do today, don't you?” he asked. “Shop with your grandmother. Help Clay train a dog. Finger paint with Rani. Watch me work.”

Mackenzie shrugged, drawing in a little, as if afraid to let
her housemates know that she was enjoying life in any way, shape or form.

“I'll show you how I do it tonight, okay?” Bobby asked, and she nodded.

 

It was midmorning when Rick stopped by the animal hospital with flowers for Lacey. Everyone made a fuss over them, and Lacey felt embarrassed by the public display of his affection for her. She would have to answer her co-workers' questions about him later. Still, it was kind of him. He was a sweet man.

“You're spoiling me,” she said across the reception counter as she slipped the mixed bouquet of flowers into a vase.

“You deserve to be spoiled,” he said.

She arranged the flowers so that they appeared to spring from the vase like fireworks. “I have a question for you,” she said, the words slipping from her mouth before she could stop them. She turned to one of the vet techs. “Could you cover for me for a few minutes?” she asked.

The tech agreed, and she walked through the waiting area and its community of dogs and cats as she led Rick outside. The rain had stopped, leaving thick steamy air in its wake, and they walked to the curb at the edge of the parking lot. She turned to face him, her arms folded across her chest.

“When Bobby was staying with you,” she began, “did you notice any…druggie behavior or anything?”

He shook his head with a frown. “Why? Have you?”

“Did you ever see him with a blond woman?”

“A woman did come around once,” Rick said. “Tall. Thin. Pretty. Bobby went outside with her for a while. I didn't think much of it.”

“I saw him give her money.”

Rick raised his eyebrows. “For what?” he asked.

“I have no idea, but it worries me.”

Rick pursed his lips and looked in the direction of the ocean. They couldn't see the water from where they stood, but they could hear the waves pounding the beach behind the line of cottages. “Maybe you should just come out and ask him,” he suggested.

She knew he was right. She should ask Bobby about the woman instead of wearing herself out with guesswork, but she didn't think she had the right to poke around in his private affairs without stronger evidence that he was doing something wrong. Besides, she was not certain she wanted to know the answers to her questions.

“I'm torn,” she said. “He's so good with Mackenzie.”

Two SUVs pulled into the parking lot, and she watched a Great Dane jump out of one of them, a yellow lab out of the other. She would be needed inside.

“I'd better get back to work,” she said. She stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “Thank you for the flowers,” she said. “You really are too good to me.”

 

Lacey sat with Bobby in the sunroom that evening, both of them working by lamplight. She was creating a pattern for a stained glass panel, drawing the same lines over and over again with her pencil, unable to concentrate. If she didn't ask him now, she would never get any work done.

Bobby was bent over the second table, working on the belt buckle under the circle of light from a halogen lamp.

With a sigh of resignation, she set down her pencil. “Last night,” she began, “I couldn't sleep and I went up to the top of the lighthouse.”

“Uh-huh,” he said, still engrossed in his work. Unsuspecting. Innocent?

“I was up there when you met a woman in the parking lot.” She saw his hands pause and watched him slowly set down the tool he was using. He swiveled his chair to look at her, and he wore the expression of a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

“And you're wondering who she is?” he asked.

She nodded. “It's none of my business, I know that, but it just…”

“She's someone I met at an AA meeting,” he said. “Just a friend. She called me last night because she was about to have a drink. She picked me up here and we drove around a bit while I…you know, talked her down. I'm sorry if I weirded you out.”

“I just…” Lacey looked past him to avoid his eyes. “You don't owe me any explanations,” she said. “It was just unexpected. I thought you were asleep upstairs and so it came as kind of a shock to see you out there.”

“In AA,” he said, “if someone needs you to keep them from taking that drink…well, you've got to do it.”

She nodded, not truly believing him. She wanted to ask him more questions. Was this the person he spoke with on the phone all the time? Why did he give her money? But her worry and her jealousy felt like a combustible mixture in her chest, and it was far easier to simply retreat.

“I'm sorry to be so nosy,” she said.

“That's okay,” he said. “I understand. It's your house. You have a right to know who's coming and going.”

She watched him turn his chair to face the table again, apparently satisfied that he'd sufficiently answered her question, and she knew she would have to be satisfied, as well.

 

In spite of all the thoughts churning in her mind, she fell asleep quickly that night. The hot, oppressive air had finally
given way to a cool breeze that blew the heat from her room and made it the perfect temperature for sleeping.