The Bargain (14 page)

She nodded, a grim look on her face.

“So if Drew’s angry at me, he’s got reason to be. I left quite a mess in his lap when I split. Two shell-shocked parents and the full weight of the Kingston expectations on his shoulders. I wish to God I could take back so many of the things I said and did back then, Shannon, and not just with my parents. But I can’t. And the damnable shame of it is that some of this started sinking in before they died. I was just too stubborn to pick up the phone and apologize. You always think there will be plenty of time for that, you know? I wasted so much time. Best I can do now is to try and protect what’s left of my parents’ legacy.” His voice shook despite his best efforts, and he forced a half-smile onto his face. “Can you understand that?”

“Yes.”

Michael closed his eyes with a sigh and held his head in his hands.

• • •

Go to him, a little voice urged inside Shannon’s head. Put your arms around him, hold his hand, but just
do
something. Heaven knew she wanted to, but something held her back. It might have been shyness, but she thought it had more to do with the confusion she had been feeling since her lunch with Drew. She was supposed to want to put her arms around
Drew
, not his brother, but somehow things had changed when she wasn’t looking.

What if she went to him and did something stupid? The memory of his mouth on hers last night, even if it was only “pretend,” was very vivid at the moment. Emotions were running high now, and emotions could make you do crazy things.

But he looked as if he was expecting her to get up and walk out. Did he really think he was so irredeemable? “Michael … ”

He said nothing and didn’t look up.

Caution be damned. She couldn’t just sit here and watch him heap condemnation on himself like this. Shannon stood up and moved slowly over to the bed to sit beside him. She put a tentative hand on his shoulder, and he stiffened beneath her touch. “Everybody has things in their past they wish they could do over again. You’re not a monster because you’ve made mistakes. You’re human.”

“But my mistakes have hurt other people very badly.”

“Maybe so. But does that make them unforgivable?”

He didn’t answer her, but she knew he was thinking
yes
.

“What if it was Drew?” she persisted. “If it were him instead of you, would you hate him?”

“No, but — ”

“Then you can’t hate yourself either. It’s not … it’s just not fair.”

Now he looked at her, and there was a hint of incredulity in his eyes. “It’s not
fair
? This is your argument?”

“Yes,” she insisted. “It’s a double standard.”

The corners of his mouth turned ever so slightly upward, and the sudden warmth in his eyes made her catch her breath. “Shannon, you — ” He trailed off, and the burgeoning smile faded.

“I what?”

He shook his head. “Forget it. Don’t worry about me. I’m here to try to honor my parents’ wishes, not earn forgiveness.”

“I think maybe you’re here to do both.”

“How?” Michael asked softly, and there was such pain in his voice, she wanted to put her arms around him. “They’re gone. It’s too late for forgiveness.”

“You need to forgive yourself.”

“I can’t.”

Unable to help herself any longer, Shannon reached over to take his hand in hers. “If your parents were half the people you say they were, they wouldn’t want you to spend the rest of your life punishing yourself, Michael. Don’t you think?”

Instead of answering, he closed his fingers around hers and held them tightly. Somehow she didn’t think there were any words she could say to convince him she was right. He would have to find a way to work that out for himself.

They sat in silence beside each other for a long time. “You know,” Shannon said finally, “I’m really mad at you.”

“What?” Michael asked, clearly startled by the turn in their conversation. “You’re
mad
at me?”

“Yes.” She couldn’t quite look him in the eyes as she continued. “When you came to town, I didn’t want to like you. You’ve gone and ruined all that.”

He started to laugh, and it was a relief for her to hear something besides sadness in his voice. Pulling his hand free from hers, he put his arm around her shoulders instead and drew her close to his side. She went willingly. “I apologize for making you like me,” he said against her temple.

“That’s all right.”

He swept a runaway lock of her hair back behind her ear with his free hand, then cupped her chin in order to tilt her head up and press his lips to her forehead. She closed her eyes against the sudden fire that swept through her and found herself half hoping his mouth would find its way to hers again like it had last night. “Thank you,” he whispered, resting his chin on top of her head.

“For what?’ she whispered back.

“Just … thank you.”

Her heart did a strange sort of flip inside her chest, and she knew she was in trouble.

It was getting increasingly harder to watch Shannon leave, especially knowing she was pining after another man. Michael stood alone in his room after she was gone, looking out his window at the bleak view of trashcans and graffiti but not really seeing any of it. His conversation with Shannon left him feeling drained, but there was a certain relief that went with it, and he wondered if this was what it felt like to emerge from a confessional. It wasn’t that he had finally forgiven himself, it was more that she knew the worst of everything now — his past with his parents, his cavalier history with women — and yet, miracle of miracles, she liked him anyway.

Another knock on his door startled him out of his thoughts. Shannon again? His spirits rose at the thought, and he moved quickly to answer the door.

“Long time no — ” He froze as he met Drew’s eyes. His younger brother stood on his doorstep, glowering coldly at him.

“Unless you’d like a scene out here in the hallway, I suggest you let me come in,” Drew said tersely, his jaw clenched.

Old animosities died hard, and Michael had to bite back a bitter and sarcastic response. Wordlessly, he stepped aside to let his brother in, although he suspected Drew cared a lot more about not creating a scene than he did. “How did you find me?” he asked, closing the door after Drew stalked past him.

“Started calling hotels in the phone book.”

“Now that’s dedication. It must have taken a long time to work your way down to the p’s.”

“Not really.” Drew turned around to face him. “I skipped over the nicer places because I knew I’d find you in a hellhole like this one.”

“Oh, it’s not so bad,” said Michael, eyeing the faded wallpaper and decrepit furniture. “You’re just not used to slumming it, little brother.”

“No, I suppose you’d be the one to know more about that kind of thing, wouldn’t you?”

“Touché.”

“What are you doing here, Michael?”

“Renting a room.”

Anger flickered over Drew’s face. “Don’t play games. You know exactly what I mean. What are you really doing back in town?”

“Oh, so now you’re interested in talking about that?” Michael returned, feeling some of his own anger spark now. “After you have me banned from your building? Interesting change of heart. What brought it about?”

“Well, I couldn’t help but notice you trying to seduce my secretary.”

“Sarcasm, huh? Stooping to my level, I see. And it’s personal assistant, by the way, not secretary.”

“What do you want with Shannon?” Drew asked bluntly.

Her lips, her laughter … everything, Michael thought. But he only raised his eyebrows. “Why? What exactly is she to you, Drew?”

“This has nothing to do with me. I know you, Michael. You see a skirt and you can’t resist chasing it. Well, Shannon is not one of your floozies you can have a good time with and then just throw away. She’s a nice girl, and I don’t want to see her get hurt.”

“Yes, she is a nice girl.”

“Then if you had half a conscience, you’d leave her alone. Tell me, Michael, are you just using her for kicks, or are you trying to get to me somehow?”

The words would have stung more if there hadn’t been some truth to them. Not about using Shannon, but about Michael’s blasé attitude toward relationships in the past and about the fact the two of them had made a bargain with each other involving Drew. But the implication that there couldn’t possibly be anything else between them hit a nerve. “Shannon is not a diversion, and she’s not a puppet,” Michael said stiffly. “If you won’t give me any credit, at least give her some, would you?”

“Oh,
you’re
going to defend her to
me
? That’s rich. I give Shannon plenty of credit, but I’m not sure she has enough experience with men to recognize when one of them is bad for her. The thing is, she’s been bending my ear about you lately, and about Kingston Manor. And then lo and behold, it turns out you’ve been — I don’t know if
dating
is the right word for it — but you’ve been hanging around her. Anyway, I’m sure you’ve been giving her some kind of sob story about how rough life has been for you. Then you sent her in to talk to me, didn’t you?”

“Gee, Drew, why would I do that when you’ve been so agreeable about talking to me directly?”

“So you admit it! You did try to manipulate her,” Drew said, his voice rising as he took a step closer to Michael.

“I asked her to listen, and she did, which is more than I can say for you.”

“I don’t owe — ”

“Yeah, yeah, I heard you before. You really hate me so much you couldn’t have given me five minutes?”

Drew’s eyes were stony. “What I hate, Michael, is what you did to our family.”

“Well, that makes two of us.”

“Yeah, right.”

Michael shook his head warningly. “Don’t think you have it all figured out, Drew. Don’t think you have
me
figured out. I know just how badly I screwed up. That’s why I came back to town. What you’re planning to do with the house — ”

“You have some nerve — ”

“I don’t think Mom and Dad would want the home to leave the family. It meant too much to them — ”

Drew’s fist caught him by surprise as it connected with his chin, and the force of it sent Michael staggering back a step.

For a moment he saw stars, and he shook his head to clear it. He put a hand to his throbbing chin and winced. “Not bad, Drew. Nice to know a desk job hasn’t made you go soft. Your constituents know you’ve got a mean right hook?”

“You don’t get to say what Mom and Dad would or would not have wanted. You wouldn’t know, would you? Because you left and didn’t look back. I’m the one who lived with them, and I’d know what they’d want a hell of a lot more than you would.”

“Maybe,” Michael said, letting his hand fall away from his chin. “But just for the record, was that punch for them or for Shannon?”

“It was for me,” Drew returned darkly, his hand still curled in a fist.

“Feel better now, or did you want to take another shot?” Michael took a step closer until he was only inches away from his younger brother.

“Just stay away from Shannon. In fact, why don’t you pack your bags and leave town altogether? There’s no place for you here anymore. God knows I don’t want to see you again.”

Michael said nothing. The words were hardly a surprise, but there was a finality to them that hit him hard. For just a moment he thought he caught a glimpse of the little boy his brother used to be in the angry man before him, and he felt a sudden ache in his chest. There was a time, when they were both kids, that Drew had looked up to him and he had looked after Drew, protecting him from school bullies and initiating him in all the rites of passage that went along with boyhood. Then the glimpse was gone, and all he saw was the bitterness in his brother’s eyes.

Drew might have taken his silence for acquiescence. In any case, he pushed past Michael and walked out without another word, slamming the door firmly shut behind him. Michael stood frozen, dimly aware that his chin still throbbed. Finally, moving as if in a daze, he grabbed a towel from the bathroom and went out to get some ice from the ice machine. He wrapped it up in the towel and applied it to his chin, wincing.

The chances of persuading Drew to change his mind about the youth center were slim to none now, he acknowledged as he laid back on his bed and stared up at the ceiling. The room grew darker as twilight fell, but he didn’t bother turning on a light. Shannon’s chances with Drew seemed to be a lot better than his given Drew’s protectiveness toward her tonight, a realization that left a sour taste in Michael’s mouth. It was what Shannon wanted, and he should have been happy for her.

He was not.

It could have been bitterness that made him feel that way, or resentment. After all, she was within reach of her desires and he was not, but he was honest enough with himself to admit that wasn’t it. The thought of Drew touching her in anything more than a casual way made his gut tighten.

Because, selfish SOB that he was, Michael wanted her for himself. As penance, he pressed the ice harder against his chin until the pressure hurt, leaving it there as the evening air darkened around him.

The wise thing to do was to stay away from Shannon for a while. Not because of Drew’s warning, but because Michael needed to get his head on straight. Maybe it was just a matter of proximity, and if he put a little distance between them it would be much easier to put things into perspective, including the feelings she inspired in him.

Of course he liked her. What was there not to like? She was funny, warm, and made him laugh more lately than he had in a long time. And there was something very sweet and innocent about her, something that brought out an urge in him to protect her from disappointment.

And catty girls, he thought with a wry smile, remembering the evening at the park.

But thinking about that evening might have been a mistake, because it made him recall other things that happened that night, too. Like kissing her and holding her hand beneath the stars while they talked about high school memories. For a kiss that was only for show, it lingered in his head far more than it should have.