Summer at Willow Lake (22 page)

“And those are just the things we know about,” Connor finished. “When he turns eighteen, the record will go away, but only if he keeps his nose clean this summer. That’s where I come in.”

“The judge feels he’ll stay out of trouble if he spends the summer with you.” It sounded logical enough to Olivia.

“Honestly, I think the judge is trying to keep my mother from throwing him out.” He wadded up the printout and tossed it in the fire. “Anyway. Looks like I have a new project for the summer. And you’ve got a decision to make.”

“About…”

“Working with me.”

“You don’t think you can juggle Julian and this project?”

“I’m going to have to.”

“Then there’s nothing to decide. He’ll probably love it here.”

“Maybe you’d better think about it. The kid’s a maniac for risk taking.”

“This will work. And if his thrill seeking gets him in trouble, well, we have liability insurance.”

Connor looked startled, as if he hadn’t expected her to be so cooperative. “Thanks for understanding. I’ll be back tomorrow after I pick Julian up from the station.” Then he frowned.

“What is it?”

“Trying to figure out where to put him.”

“He won’t be staying with you?”

“I’ll have to find a rental for us in town, because I don’t have room. My place is a bit on the small side.”

“Your place.”

“It’s on the river road, between the glass art studio and Windy Ridge Farm.”

She now knew exactly where he lived. It was riverside land, a high meadow and sunny glade surrounded by maple and birch trees. The tiny Airstream trailer in the woods. “That’s your place?”

“Uh-huh.”

She tried not to appear startled, but failed.

He noticed her expression, and offered a grin that disappeared too quickly. “Home sweet home.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“I know.”

She felt badly, though, and blurted out, “Your brother can stay here. We’ve got nothing but room. Bunkhouses, staff cabins and that whole row of bungalows—”

“Thanks, but he’s going to need close supervision.”

“You could stay with him.” She tried to act as though this was all about being accommodating. In reality, it was all about getting Connor Davis to spend the summer at Camp Kioga instead of driving down the mountain every day at sunset. “It makes perfect sense,” she said. “You’re working here every day, anyway, and this will save you the commute.”
Oh, smooth, Olivia. Very smooth.

“This is your family’s place,” he said. “You don’t need to provide housing for the help.”

She recognized the look on his face. It was the same look he’d worn when he was a kid, and people talked about his father. Terry Davis used to be the “help.” “Listen to you,” she said lightly. “Are you really that uncomfortable with this arrangement?”

He sat back in his chair, stretched his booted feet toward the fire and crossed them at the ankles. A silence stretched out to the point of discomfort. Each crackle of the fire sounded like a gunshot.

“I guess I’m not, Lolly,” Connor said finally, amusement evident in his voice. “And what’s that look?”

“I wasn’t giving you a look.”

“Sure you were.”

She was, and he’d caught her. “You could have told your mother no,” she said. “You don’t have to take care of your brother for the summer. You know what I think? I think you act like a tough guy but it’s just a cover.”

He scowled. “A cover for what?”

“Your sweet, creamy center.”

“Oh, yeah. That’s me. Sweet.”

He was, she thought, even though he’d die before admitting it. Ever since she’d known him, he was keenly aware when someone was hurting. “Julian is the same age as Daisy,” she said, intending to seal the deal before he changed his mind. “They can keep each other from getting bored. It’ll be the bungalow colony all over again. Just like when we were their age.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

“Hey, we survived, and kids these days seem a lot more sophisticated than I was. If you share a cottage with Julian, you can keep tabs on him. Assuming,” she quickly added, “we have a deal.”

He stared at her for a long moment. His gaze seemed to be lingering on her mouth, and then her eyes. She had nearly forgotten his silences, forgotten that way he had of studying her as if he actually cared about was going on in her head. She felt her neck and cheeks growing warm.

“I guess we do, Lolly,” he said. “I guess we have a deal.”

Oh, God, she thought. What have I done?

“Now you’re staring,” he pointed out.

“Oh.” She blinked. “Sorry.”

He turned to walk out the door.

“Connor?”

He turned back.

“Do you—” She swallowed, cleared her throat. “I have the same question you asked me the other day. Do you, um, ever think about…us?”

“Nope,” he said, shrugging his shoulders. “Things happen. Life gets busy. I haven’t thought about us in a long time.”

All right. She’d asked for that. She shuffled her feet, stared at the floor, the door, her gaze seeking neutral territory.

He grinned easily, touched her shoulder. “But I am now.”

Fifteen

C
onnor hadn’t told Olivia half of it. From the moment he had first spotted her, stranded atop a flagpole, he’d been intrigued. As time went on, he became consumed by memories of the past, good and bad, of the time he’d spent with her.

He wasn’t sure why he was being so guarded around this woman. He could have explained the Airstream and the Harley to her easily enough. Maybe he even could have explained why he’d hurt her all those years ago. He hadn’t, though. For some reason, he felt he was better off letting her think he was a born son of a bitch, a biker who lived in a trailer. Maybe so she wouldn’t fall for him. Because even though he found himself wanting to go to every forbidden, sensual place with her, he knew they didn’t stand any better chance together now than they had when they were kids.

Last night, he had wanted to explain everything to her, but it sounded too intense. Obsessive, maybe.

There was really no point in wondering why they had parted ways, all those years ago. They were just seventeen and eighteen, fresh out of high school. She was desperately unhappy and he was scared to death, saddled with way too much responsibility. Not exactly a firm foundation for a relationship. Still, that wasn’t the reason the relationship had failed.

Over the past nine years, she had changed everything about herself. Her looks, her hair, her attitude, even her name. She simply wasn’t Lolly anymore. Lolly might as well be a figment of his imagination—shy, self-conscious, a dreamer who once wanted to be a teacher. A girl with a kind heart, a girl who turned out to be the only person in the world who loved him.

For the tenth time, Connor checked his cell phone: 11:15 a.m. No new messages. That was good news, he told himself, slipping the phone into his shirt pocket. Julian was supposed to arrive on the eleven-thirty train.

Connor wondered what Julian would think of Avalon. The place could be a stand-in for Mayberry, populated with folksy types and ex–flower children, earnest ecoactivists, artists and poets. Connor had never imagined himself settling down here, making a life for himself in a town where people didn’t bother locking their doors at night. Yet when life had taken him to the brink of disaster, it had been his connection to Avalon—and to the Bellamy family in particular—that had saved him.

Rourke McKnight, chief of police of Avalon, showed up at the train station. Connor knew he was off duty because he had his two favorite off-duty accessories with him—a woman who was built like a lingerie model, and a pair of dark aviator glasses to hide the evidence of last night’s party. Spotting Connor, he offered a brief wave, and Connor nodded to acknowledge it.

The lingerie model said something to Rourke and headed for the restrooms in the lobby. Connor decided to use the opportunity to offer a heads-up on Julian. “Hey, Rourke,” he said.

“Connor.” They shook hands.

“Got a minute?” Connor asked.

Rourke glanced toward the lobby. “Sure. You know women and their primping.”

Not really, but Connor nodded. Rourke was notorious for his romantic revolving-door policy with women. They were always gorgeous, and they always went back to the city after a brief time—usually a weekend—never to return. Some of the town busy-bodies thought it outrageous behavior for the chief of police, but most people figured what he did in his own time, so long as it was legal, was none of their business.

“I wanted to let you know that my younger brother’s coming to spend the summer with me,” Connor explained. “Complicated family situation. The two of us will be staying up at Camp Kioga, at the work site.”

“Okay.”

“He’s coming here at the order of a judge,” Connor added. “He’s seventeen and has a few incidents of delinquency in California.”

“What, did you lose a bet?” Rourke flashed a brief grin.

“Something like that. Anyway, his name’s Julian Gastineaux, and he should be in on the next train.”

“I’ll keep it in mind.” With that, McKnight removed the dark glasses and held Connor’s gaze. “You let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”

“Thanks.” They shook hands again, and a tacit understanding passed between them. Most people in town—including Rourke McKnight—knew Connor Davis had done time. But no one knew what that time had done to Connor Davis.

Since his mother had put him in the position of taking Julian for the summer, Connor was fiercely determined to make sure his brother never faced that.

When Julian had first gone to live with her, Connor had hoped the kid would do better than Connor had in the Mom department. Judging by the current situation, that was unlikely. Connor would make it a point to tell the kid the problem was not with him. That it wasn’t his job to get his mother to love him. This was something Connor himself had spent considerable sums of his own time and heart on, only to discover for himself that it couldn’t be done.

Rourke’s date returned and he put the sunglasses back on. “See you around, Connor.”

“You bet.” He nodded politely to the woman and moved away on the platform.

The southbound train arrived, and the lingerie model gave Rourke a lingering kiss, then boarded. A moment later Connor’s phone rang. He checked the number on the incoming call and flipped open his phone. “Ma. I was just thinking about you.”

“Is he there yet?”

“His train gets in any minute.” Connor watched the southbound disappear through a cleft in the mountains rising against the sky. He tried to picture her view in Chino, California, where she’d moved after Mel had left her. Freeways, stockyards and strip malls.

“Are you sure he’s on it?”

“You mean you’re not?” Connor frowned. Was she suddenly having an attack of maternal concern? “What’s going on?”

There was a pause. “Sometimes he runs away,” she said quietly.

“Great. Thanks for telling me.” Connor’s jaw tensed. She’d probably have to pay a hefty fine if the kid went AWOL. He wasn’t sure what bothered him more—the fact that his mother had manipulated him into taking Julian for the summer, or the fact that he had let her. “What else you hiding, Ma?” he asked.

“God, Connor. I’m not hiding a damn thing from you. Just checking on your brother.”

“Right.”

“Look, if you’re going to be so pissed off about this, you should have told me. I nearly went broke getting him a ticket at the last minute.”

“How is it that you’re broke, buying a plane ticket?” He wondered if she’d given the kid enough for train fare as well.

“I had to pay full fare.”

His mother was fifty-five years old. She ought to have enough for a plane ticket from L.A. to New York without going broke. Yet she simply could not hold on to her money. She was as addicted to spending it as his father had been to alcohol.

“Tell you what,” he said. “I’ll have him give you a call when he gets here. And if he doesn’t get here, I’ll call you myself.”

A long pause. Through the silence, he sensed an unspoken warning. “What else are you keeping from me, Ma?”

He heard her gather in a long breath. “I, er, didn’t exactly explain to your brother how long he’d be staying out there.”

“How long does he think he’s staying?” Connor didn’t need to ask. Not really. He already knew his mother had lied to get her way. It was what she did.

He only half listened to her lengthy, self-justifying explanation. She’d told Julian it was only for a week or two, and that if he didn’t cooperate, she’d be fined into bankruptcy and he’d wind up in detention.

Connor had heard it all before, or some version of it. He tuned his mother out and focused on the arriving train. A handful of passengers disembarked—a nun with her overnight bag, a teacher he recognized from the local high school, a businessman, a family of tourists who headed for the rental-car counter.

And that was it. No one else disembarked.

Connor paced up and down the platform. A conductor stood at the door, looking up and down the tracks and platform. He put a whistle to his mouth, about to give the all-clear signal.

Still no sign of Julian. Connor cursed under his breath, waving at the conductor to wait.

At the same time, a tall, slender teenager with dreadlocks got off the train.
Julian.

He didn’t use the normal exit but emerged between cars, heaving an overstuffed duffel and backpack onto the platform and then jumping down after it.

His gaze riveted on the impossibly tall kid, Connor lifted the phone to his mouth. “Ma, he’s here. We’ll call you later.”

He ended the call and pocketed the phone. “Yo,” he yelled to his brother. “Over here.”

Julian stiffened, assuming a defensive posture as though he feared a physical assault. It was the posture of someone who was used to getting hurt. Someone who had spent the night in jail, maybe.

The last time they’d seen each other, Julian had been about fourteen, still on the child’s side of puberty. Connor had gone out to California because his mother, in despair after the collapse of her marriage, had begged him to come.