I’m entitled to my opinion!”
“But your opinions carry so much more weight than most,” Ethan reasoned. “People will follow your lead on this without giving Kelsey a fair chance.”
“Now you’re saying I’m being unfair to her?”
“We haven’t discussed this situation in quite some time and I must admit I’m a bit surprised at how strong your ill feelings still are.”
“Well, I’m entitled. Give it some deeper thought.”
“I was going to suggest the same thing to you.” Ethan rose, went to set his empty glass back on the wet bar. “Guess I’ll be going. Try and get some rest.”
Lewis watched him anxiously. “How can I sleep without knowing what the Graham girl is really up to?”
Squaring his tense shoulders, Ethan turned back to him. “Trust me, it’s nothing.”
“She must have an agenda,” he persisted. “Everybody does. Do me a favor and dig into it a little.”
“What am I looking for?”
“Find out who invited her and when exactly she’s due back. Call everyone on that reunion committee if you have to.”
Ethan realized he wanted to know those things himself. A word with Sarah Yates would be sufficient. “All right, Lew. I’ll check into it and get back to you.”
“I’ll be waiting by the phone.”
“Tonight?”
“Yes.”
“Gee, got any other whims that need immediate humoring?”
Lewis held out his empty glass to Ethan for another slug of brandy.
“SARAH! DON’T MOVE.”
“But I heard a car door slam.”
“I know. It’s Ethan.”
“So what?”
“Whisper, Sarah. Whisper.”
“So what?” she repeated under her breath.
Sarah watched her husband, Derek, ease into their bedroom and flatten his body against the closed door. He looked ridiculous. Sarah was curled up in a rocker near the crib. Watching the infant sleep by the light of the moon was Sarah’s favorite new pastime.
Derek wiped his forehead. “Whew! I closed the windows just in time.”
“In time for what?”
“To muffle Amy Joy’s cry. If she cries.”
“Oh, she’s gonna cry, the way he’s started to lean on that doorbell.”
Right on cue, Amy Joy twisted in her crib and let out a squeaky wail.
Derek abandoned his post at the door, snatched the baby off the little mattress and popped her into Sarah’s arms. “Feed her, honey.”
“She isn’t hungry, just mad that she has a crazy dad.”
“She can’t suspect that at two months old.”
“She already knows it at only seven weeks.”
“This isn’t funny. Please quiet her, Sare!”
With a gentle Madonna smile, Sarah tossed a hank of gold hair over her shoulder, opened her shirt and bra, and settled the baby in a suckling position at her breast. “Why are we acting like secret agents, and stupid ones at that?”
Derek’s eyes darted nervously in the shadows. “Because Ethan’s gotta be here about Kelsey.”
“You can’t be sure.”
“Oh no? The news about her coming home got out today. And since Amy Joy arrived, nobody generally bugs us this late anymore.”
“Is that all you have to go on?”
“My instincts tell me I’m right.”
Sarah wasn’t about to argue with his instincts. Born on the wrong side of the tracks to an abusive father and an overworked mother, Derek had been on the loose early, often one step ahead of the law due to the homemade rattletrap motorcycle he’d ridden without a license. For all intents and purposes, Derek was now a new man. Except for that lingering sense of smell that never failed to pick up trouble.
Derek’s features hardened. “He’s just gotta be here on behalf of a very hot Lewis, to get hard answers for the old coot.”
“About who to blame for Kelsey’s return?” she surmised.
“Bingo. He’s stopped ringing the bell….” He opened the bedroom door and stepped into the hallway. Then shut himself back in again with a soft oath. “He’s still out there. Waiting.”
“Ethan is too obliging to that old tyrant,” Sarah complained.
“Sure he is. But when it comes down to it, we can’t afford to anger Lewis either. He holds the title to my garage and has funneled so many regular customers my way.” Derek raked a hand through his shaggy black hair. “I can’t wait to own that place free and clear.”
It would be awhile yet, Sarah knew, even with her teaching kindergarten. “Maybe we should’ve waited to start a family.”
“No, honey, no. We waited long enough. Too long.”
A faint rap now replaced the ringing bell. She sighed, hoisting the baby onto her shoulder to pat out a burp. “I’m not sure we’re gaining anything by hiding like this.”
“We’re gaining time. Time for Lewis to settle down. Time for us to figure a logical reason for luring Kelsey back.” Derek dropped to one knee beside the rocker. Despite his miffed tone, there was no mistaking the adoring look he bestowed on his girls.
“I suppose I may have acted rashly, sending Kelsey that flyer without even telling you.”
He widened his eyes. “May have?”
“We do discuss important things first as a rule. But I can’t—won’t try to excuse this away with logic. I simply love her. She’s the best friend I ever had—ever could have. Too much time has already been wasted while we miss out on all the dreams we had together as children. If only I could go back and change the day she left on that Greyhound.”
“And do what?” Derek asked gently.
She rubbed her husband’s stubbled cheek, inhaling the smell of motor oil that always clung to him before a shower. There was no answer, of course. Any healing course of action had been up to the adults. Instead they’d chosen to railroad an eighteen-year-old girl.
“All that matters now is that I want her back. I need her back.”
“It’s only a class reunion, hon.”
“Maybe.”
“Sarah…” Derek sounded almost afraid then.
“She might stay. With some encouragement.”
He touched his baby’s downy head. “Please don’t expect too much. People change.”
“Funny, I was thinking how some things never change. How people hold grudges, never give second chances.”
“Sums up our man Cutler, all right. But please, don’t rile him too much.”
“He is being unreasonable.”
“He did lose his kid, Sarah.” He squeezed their baby’s tiny foot. “Something we’ve come to understand so much better in the past seven weeks.”
“Ah, there goes Ethan,” Sarah said suddenly, gazing out the side window just as the taillights of the squad car winked red on the street.
Derek took the sleeping baby and set her