Echoes (21 page)
Her life had grown so full. By admitting one man with a mission to change the world one corner at a time, she had found more than she'd ever expected. She had been a starving sheep and hadn't even known it.
S
ofie opened the door to Matt, who stood with hands stuffed into his frayed jacket pockets. After several days of fog and drizzle, the sun shone in a clear, cool sky. The air held a hint of spring. Matt's face didn't. His eyes were dull and a little combative as he greeted her.
She frowned. "Are you all right?"
"Yeah. Why?"
"Only that I thought this was your idea." And he looked as though he'd rather be anywhere else. "You can change your mind."
He expelled his breath. "Sofie, I'm here, and I want to do this. Okay?"
"Okay." It was only a drive, in the daylight, with no shadows to confuse them into thinking it mattered in any way that got complicated. She closed the door and followed him to the car.
They drove in silence to the country highway that wound northeast toward Napa before he said, "Maria and the baby are gone?"
"Yes." They'd said their tearful, clutching good-byes days ago.
"You miss him?"
"I'm sleeping through the night—no dirty diapers, no burp cloths." She stared out at the last of the homes and buildings as they passed into the fields and vineyards along the Sonoma highway and thought of Diego's soft head nestled beneath her chin, the curve of his spine, his warm milky scent. "Yes, I miss him."
Funny that Matt should be the one she told. "But he's where he belongs, and I'm glad things worked out."
"According to God's will?" The bite in his tone took her by surprise. He hadn't been sarcastic when they'd talked before.
"I think so."
"Nebulous, isn't it? God's will?"
"I doubt it's nebulous to God."
"Well, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems things worked out better for Maria and her child than for you and yours."
Hurt bloomed in her chest. "What are you doing?"
"Trying to understand the arbitrary benevolence of your Supreme Being."
She'd never seen him caustic. Even the night he got angry he'd been courteous and composed. "What's the matter, Matt?"
His knuckles whitened on the steering wheel. "I just left a five-month-old whose mother's boyfriend shook his brain into cottage cheese."
She pressed her hand to her heart. "Oh, Matt, I'm sorry."
He clenched his jaw. "Before, I would not have looked for an explanation, not tried to make sense of a baseless act. Now I keep wondering why. As though there could be an answer."
She dropped her chin. "If there is, I don't know it."
"Well, you'd better. Because you opened things up that I didn't need opened."
She shot him a glance. "It helped you to talk."
"No it didn't. I had things under control."
"You hadn't dealt with Jacky."
"Well, now I can't stop. I can't sleep without dreaming. I can't dream without trying to find him, stop him, save him."
She knew the pain of those dreams. "Healing takes time."
"I guess you know. And speaking of which, why did God let you run a blade through your wrists in the first place?"
Her breath escaped in a rush, hurt and confusion flooding her.
"I wouldn't have." His stare pierced her. "Does that mean I care more than the God you think is real?"
She swallowed. "God gave me the people who loved me, who brought me back to life."
"Yeah? Why didn't He give Jacky someone?"
She looked into his face, the need there raw and insistent. "Maybe He gave you Jacky."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
Matt had tried to be his brother's protector, should have been—in his mind—and couldn't. But he hadn't left it there. "Because of him, you've helped other children."
He turned back to the road, hollow-eyed, jaw tensed. "That baby's in a coma. What am I supposed to do?"
"It's too big for you. That's why you're asking. It's why you're wondering if—"
"I just want it to stop."
She understood too well. "God isn't only in the glorious moments, but the dark and hopeless ones as well. Maybe most of all."
"So there's—" The phone tucked on the dashboard rang, and with an exasperated sigh, he pressed the speaker button. "Yeah, Bec."
"I'm giving you a chance to get Ryan before I call the police."
He dropped his head back against the rest. "Come on, Becca, you know he's harmless."
"He's parked a cherry picker—which he no doubt stole from his former employer—in front of my apartment. He's perched outside my balcony."
Matt jammed his fingers through his hair. "Okay. I'm coming." He clicked the phone off and his turn signal on. "I have to deal with this."
"All right."
"It won't take long. One bullet in his skull."
The mood he was in, she hoped he didn't have a gun. "Who's Becca?"
"A friend. She and Ryan both."
"The ones that are breaking up."
"Broken up. Becca's done; Ryan just won't believe it."
"Where do you fit in?"
"Right smack in the middle."
As she'd been caught between Eric and his daughter six years ago and now again. Carly hadn't called back, and her own attempts to reach the child had repeatedly gone to message with no voicemail set up.
They pulled up to a two-story apartment building and easily found the cherry picker, where the blond man perched, complete with megaphone. Matt parked and got out. She got out too.
"I'm not leaving," Ryan hollered down without the megaphone.
"You want to go to jail?" Matt hooked his hands on his hips.
"If that's what it takes. I told her I just want to talk."
"She has the right to say no."
Ryan shook his head. "I know whose side you're on."
"I'm not on any side. I'm trying to keep you from serious unpleasantness."
"Then talk to Becca, not me."
"She's calling the cops. You want to add harassment to your DUI?"
"I only want to talk to her."
Sofie stepped up. "If she hears you out, will you leave?"
Ryan hung his head over the side. "Who are you?"
"A friend."
He looked from her to Matt and back. "Yeah. Okay. If she wants me to leave when I'm done, I'll go." He tucked his hands into his armpits. "But she won't."
He looked like a little boy playing chicken. Sofie turned to Matt. "What number?"
He was watching her with a mixture of surprise and annoyance. "Two fourteen."
She went inside and climbed the stairs. Since Matt's friendship was the rope in their tug-of-war, a neutral stranger might be better. She knocked on the door.
"No, I will not—" The door swung open. The vivacious blonde took a moment to regroup. "Oh. I thought you were Matt."
"He's outside with Ryan. I'm Sofie." She extended her hand.
"Becca Daley. And that idiot outside my window has two minutes to remove himself—"
"He does get points for innovation."
Becca put her hands on her hips and looked over her shoulder. "Oh, he's never lacking that."
"How many of us can say someone staked out our balconies in a cherry picker? Like a modern day Romeo."
"Who are you again?"
"A friend of Matt's. Sofie Michelli."
Becca cocked her head. "Did you two go out to dinner?"
"We did once."
Becca gave a knowing nod. "You want to come in?"
"Sure. I'd like to see him up close."
"Do not be fooled. He's too cute for his own good. And spoiled rotten. He's never grown up and he never will."
"Last of the lost boys." Sofie followed her to the glass doors at the balcony. Ryan was fully visible above the banister. They stood side by side observing him. "He is cute. Great hair."
"He's a loon. Look at him panting like a puppy."
Sofie laughed. "I'm curious what he'd say if you gave him one chance."
"Oh, believe me, I've heard it all."
Sofie folded her arms. "Still . . . you'd have the rest of the story."
Becca looked from her to Ryan. "If I listen, will he leave?"
"He said he would."
She slid the door open. "Okay, dufus. Say what you came to say."
Sofie stayed inside as Becca stalked onto the balcony. Ryan's earnest voice carried in, but not his words. She waited a few minutes, but when it seemed they might talk awhile, she let herself out. Maybe something good would come of this drive.
Leaning against the Pathfinder, hands in his jacket pockets, Matt watched her emerge. He seemed more puzzled than put out. "You got her to talk."
"Women tend to be reasonable and willing to attempt a solution."
"In other words I could have talked myself blue and not budged Ryan?"
She smiled. "They're your friends. You'd know better than I."
"I wonder." His forehead creased.
"What?"
"How can you have all this insight, and yet . . ."
"Be foolish enough to cut my wrists?"
"Let that guy mess with your head until it almost killed you, then make excuses for him."
She looked away from the anger in his eyes. "I wasn't excusing; I was explaining."
"No." He pointed his finger. "You defended him. I know what it looks like."
"Matt, Eric is—"
"None of my business? You're right."
"It's old news."
"Is it?" His face was fierce. "Stop me if I'm wrong, but I doubt you faint at the sound of my voice."
"I didn't expect it. Carly—"
"Is not the whole story. I watched you let go of Diego."
"I cared for him one week. You cannot compare that to four years with a child I loved as my own." She'd taken his previous stabs, but how dare he question her commitment to her little girl? She turned and stalked away.
"Sofie."
Walking faster, she felt her pocket for her cell phone. But it was in her purse, in Matt's car. She would deal with that later.
"Sofie, stop."
She clenched her jaw. There were businesses nearby that would have a phone she could use.
Matt caught up. "I'm sorry."
She spun. "Then get me my purse."
"What?"
"In your car."
His head dropped. "Just listen."
"I've heard enough." She stalked past him. Ryan and Becca were still conversing on the balcony as she tugged the door open and grabbed her purse. The phone and her checkbook tumbled to the floor. She bent and stuffed them back in.
"Sofie . . ."
She shouldered the purse. "I don't need this."
"I know."
"No you don't. You don't know anything about me, except one dark place. I'm sorry I gave you the key. I'd appreciate your staying out now." She shut the door and started off the other way. She'd call Lance. Or Rese. Or anyone.
"At least let me take you home."
She kept walking until the sound and scent and sight of him were gone.
Matt watched her go with a sense of loss disproportionate to the time they'd spent together. An ache of wasted possibilities, and he had no one to blame but himself. He should not have called, should not have thought she could somehow lift his dark mood. Why did he think she'd have the answers? And had he really wanted any?
Some days it sickened him to be human. If there was a God, why had He made such a pathetic attempt with His creation? Why couldn't each life start fresh without the garbage passed on from generation to generation? He got into the car and clutched the steering wheel.
He tried not to think, but it came anyway, a conversation he had not been intended to hear.
"Matt? He's just like him. He'll be fine."
"But Jacky . . ."
"Jacky's a little slow."
"Liz, you have to get them out of here."
"Webb just wants them to be strong."
"Strong? He wants them to be mean dirtbags like himself."
Matt swallowed the bile that rose to his throat.
Just like him
.
————
Lance parked the Harley and helped Sofie remove Rese's helmet. Since Matt
had
offered a ride, he'd let him live. And until he'd heard exactly what had happened, he'd withhold judgment—but he intended to get the story. Baxter greeted them with leaps and yelps as they walked to the carriage house, then trotted away when their response lacked sufficient enthusiasm.
Lance stopped at the door. "Going to tell me what happened?"
"You don't need to worry. I'm fine." She opened the door.
"Sof." She couldn't expect him to leave it at that. Not after the last time.
"I overreacted to something he said."
Sofie didn't overreact. She weighed and measured and excused. If Matt had pushed her far enough to ditch him, it must have hit a nerve. "What did he say?"
"I don't want to go into it, Lance."
Her counselor had insisted she keep the doors of communication wide open.
"You have a family that loves you. No more
secrets."
Did she intend to protect Matt as she'd kept Eric's failings to herself? That past silence had almost killed her. She could not expect him to let it go.
She touched his hand. "Come downstairs a minute."
"As in the cellar?"
"Scared?"
"Get-outta-here. I've uncovered all the skeletons."
She opened the hatch. "I want to show you something."
He followed her down through the iron gate in the tunnel to the huge cellar beyond. Most of the racks stood empty since the majority of the valuable vintage had been transported to the auction house, but the dank smell from bottles that had popped their corks mingled with the scent of old stone and lost hopes. This was, after all, the place their great-great-grandfather had fallen and lain undiscovered until last year. What could Sofie want down there?
She shone the light around the room. "Picture the racks gone, mirrors on the walls, a polished wood floor."
He caught her drift at once. "A dance studio?"
She nodded. "I've been out too long to dance professionally, but Momma's right that I enjoyed teaching."
"You should finish your degree, Sof. You'd make a good shrink."
"I need to let that go, Lance. I wanted to understand how he was, how I was. But the more I learn, the more it draws me in. I've been immersed in the darkness of troubled minds. I can't do it anymore. There's no freedom there."