He glanced up in the process of cutting his chicken.
“Both Roger Dayson and Jack Andreason seemed to be intimidated by your father on that night. But I’m getting the impression from you that your father wasn’t an angry person by nature. Is that correct?”
“I can only remember him getting mad once in my entire childhood. It was the year before he died. I played football in high school, and I had this overzealous coach my freshman year who got aggressive at times. You know the type—dude put his entire identity into leading a bunch of skinny fourteen-year-olds into battle. Anyway, he got a little rough one afternoon practice with one of my friends on the team. My father had shown up unexpectedly to watch me practice, and he saw the whole thing. When Coach ended practice and told us to go shower, my dad barked at him to stay behind. Said he wanted a word. I’d never seen my dad look like that before. He looked like he was going to chew up Coach Bragg and spit him out.”
“What happened?” Natalie wondered.
“I wanted to know that myself, so I took an awful slow walk to the locker room. My dad reamed Bragg out. Nothing physical happened, but it seemed to come close to blows a few times.” Liam shook his head as if to clear it. “I never saw my coach the same way after that. I used to be intimidated by him, but the memory of how scared he looked while my dad let him have it changed that forever. He never got rough with any of us kids again. I can only imagine what my father threatened him with, if he did. Legal action, probably.”
“You remember it so well. It must have made a big impact on you.”
“I’m thinking Coach Bragg remembers it a hell of a lot better than me,” Liam said wryly before he ate a slice of roasted potato.
“I can imagine. Your father seems bigger than life.”
“He made friends wherever he went. My mom used to say he could have charmed the devil into doing good deeds.”
Natalie smiled as she buttered a steaming roll. “Sounds like a true Irishman.”
Liam’s angular jaw slowed in its chewing motion. Natalie paused when she saw the way his stare speared her.
“Why don’t you just go ahead and ask it, Natalie?”
“Ask what?”
“Why don’t you just ask whether or not my father was a true Irishman in another stereotypical sense? You want to know about his drinking habits.”
Natalie carefully set down her ice water, acutely aware of penetrating dangerous territory without intent. Well, she was here now. Might as well deal with it.
“Eric told me that during the hearings, your mother testified that your dad was merely a social drinker. She insisted she never saw Derry drunk.”
“And you don’t believe her?” Liam asked with what struck Natalie as forced neutrality.
“I would believe it if you told me that was true.”
He glanced up sharply. Their gazes held. Natalie realized muted live music was trickling in from the bar area of the restaurant—a piano, a drummer and a saxophone.
Liam was the first to break their stare.
“I try to give my mom the benefit of the doubt, even if Deidre never has. I think my mother believed what she said in court was true.”
“Deidre doubts your mother’s opinion on the matter?” Natalie asked, referring to Liam’s eldest sister.
“Yeah,” Liam said broodingly. “That’s why Deidre never comes back to Harbor Town, or at least that’s what my brother, Marc, has insinuated. Deidre has never spoken to me about it, but I guess she holds my mom responsible for being in denial about my father’s drinking.”
Natalie sat back in the booth, stunned. “What do you think, Liam?”
He jabbed at a chunk of chicken but he didn’t eat it.
“I remember him drinking regularly when he came home from work. It mellowed him, made him more cheerful. He seemed to need it to unwind. I never even thought about it, until after the crash. I never saw him drunk, but the truth is…”
He set down his fork abruptly and looked across the table at her. “One of my dad’s closest friends at the end of a hard day was a bottle of whiskey.”
“Thank you for telling me,” she said quietly after a strained moment. He nodded and picked up his fork.
Natalie exhaled with difficulty. She could tell by the tension in his face it hadn’t been an easy admission for him to make. It might have even been the first time he’d ever admitted it out loud.
And he’d done it in front of her—a Reyes. She resisted an urge to reach across the table and place her hand on top of his in gratitude.