Blue eyes flashed. “You think I don’t know that?”
“Just be careful. You’d put Mom in a grave if something happened to you. She’s worried enough about Deidre.”
“You have some nerve, accusing Deidre and me of being martyrs. Who do you think we learned it from, Mr. Defender of Victim’s Rights?” Liam accused.
Marc didn’t fall for the bait, just continued to hold Liam’s stare until his brother sighed and glanced away.
“You sound like Mom. I told her I’d think about quitting the force when I’m done with this assignment, but not before. So the only thing I can do is tell you I’ll be as careful as I always am. I don’t have a death wish.”
You sure as hell act like you do sometimes.
Marc bit his tongue to keep from saying the words out loud. He’d said enough for now. It wouldn’t help things to start a fight with Liam.
Liam grimaced when he lifted his elbow off the table and saw that a miniature plastic hockey puck was stuck to his skin. “I guess we better start cleaning up,” he mumbled.
“Right,” Marc agreed unenthusiastically.
“They say we’re in for a hell of a storm later on tonight,” Liam said as he stood. He picked up the empty bag of cherry tarts Mari had donated for the party. “Hey…weird about you and Mari being back in town at the same time, huh?” Liam asked with affected casualness.
“Yeah,” Marc replied shortly. He carried a stack of pizza boxes to the garbage.
“Marc.”
He turned, something in Liam’s tone making him cautious.
“I…I never told anyone. About the night of the accident. About Mari being at the house with you.”
Marc narrowed his eyelids as memories of that fateful summer night assaulted him.
Liam’s panicked shouts from downstairs had interrupted an intensely private moment between Mari and Marc fifteen years ago. In fact, they’d been about to make love for the first time as a storm brewed on the horizon. The news of the wreck had put a stop to that.
The crash had jolted Mari and him onto complete different life paths.
He was more than a little shocked at hearing Liam speak aloud about a topic that had been forbidden between them through some unspoken fraternal oath. Maybe it was Mari’s presence in town, or maybe it was the threat of a storm in the thick air—the still, oppressive atmosphere not unlike that of the night of the crash—that had made Liam break the silence.
“It must have been rough, being with Mari that night,” Liam said, his voice gruff, cautious.
Marc didn’t reply, just resumed clearing the table.
Liam always had possessed a talent for bald understatement.
Mari kept herself busy that day by meeting the furniture deliverymen at The Family Center and arranging what items she could on her own. She’d dropped in on Natalie Reyes’s accounting practice and spoken to Natalie about the status of the center’s operating license and some other financial matters. They’d ended up chatting for hours. Natalie was one her favorite people—so quiet and reserved, yet so warm and giving once she accepted you into her private world. Mari knew Natalie rarely went out in public, self-conscious about the scarring on one side of her face. Mari had hoped her involvement in The Family Center would bring her out of her self-imposed confinement somewhat, but, so far, her friend remained shrouded.
Afterward, she returned to Sycamore Avenue where she spent the better part of the evening practicing her cello.
When she played, she entered a familiar, focused trance where she lost all sense of place and time. But, suddenly becoming aware of how hot it was, she paused to wipe sweat off her brow, change into a button-up, thin sundress, and open up a window in the bedroom, not that it helped to alleviate the stifling atmosphere. She resumed practice.
Isn’t the air conditioner working? she wondered a little while later. She set her cello and bow aside and went downstairs to the thermostat. “Do not tell me,” she whispered in disbelief when the air conditioner didn’t respond. In the distance, she heard thunder rumble ominously. She hadn’t noticed a storm was approaching. With her air conditioner apparently on the fritz, she welcomed the prospect of relief from the oppressive heat and humidity.
She glanced at a clock. It was just past midnight. A feeling of sadness went through her. Now that the day was over, she realized that part of her had hoped Marc would seek her out following their bitter parting last night.
She walked out on the front porch. A warm wind swirled, causing the porch swing to jerk and sway. Some leaves skittered down the dark, deserted street, the sound striking her as hushed and furtive. She perched on the swing. Lightning flashed over Sycamore Avenue.
The weather reminded her of the night her parents had been killed. Funny how the realization didn’t bring back the horror of rushing to the hospital and hearing her mother and father had been dead upon arrival. Instead, another memory flashed vividly into her mind: the hot, wondrous expression on Marc Kavanaugh’s face when he’d looked down at her in his bed. She’d been naked and overwhelmed by desire.
Mari clenched her burning eyelids tight. Grief had wormed its way into that memory over the years, transforming it from a girl’s gilded dream into a woman’s tarnished regrets.
Tonight, the wonder of that moment had returned. She was so caught up in the poignant memory that she thought she’d imagined it when she heard Marc’s voice.