The Edge of Heaven (24 page)

Empty.

Spent.

Lost.

She walked up to the bars then and hung on to them, leaning her forehead against them. In the short time they'd had together, she'd come to crave his touch. Not just his lips, but his hands, his arms, the curve of his shoulder, the shelter of his embrace.

He came to her, just stood there for the longest time, then bent his head, too, so that, if not for the bars, their foreheads would be touching. He slipped his hands through the bars. They slid along her forearms and cupped her elbows in as much of an embrace as this place would allow, and it was just as she remembered it, every bit as powerful, every bit as necessary as breathing.

"You do care about me."

"Not the way you're thinking," he insisted.

Was that true? She didn't want to believe it. So what if she was not quite nineteen and he was thirty-three. She was still the same person he'd met six days ago, a girl who'd never really been young in her whole life, and he was...

He'd killed someone.

How could that be?

"Go on," he said. "Get out of here."

"I can't just forget about you."

"You will, in time. You have to. I want you to be happy, Emma."

"I want you to be happy, too."

"Well I just don't see how that's going to happen for me. But that's my problem. Not yours." He kissed her forehead and then backed away. "Go home. And don't come back."

Chapter 12

Emma stayed stubbornly right there, but Rye wouldn't say another word.

Fine, she thought. It wasn't like he was going anywhere.

Emma went back to find Joe, who took one look at her face and swore. "What did he do to you?"

"Told me to go away and forget about him," she said.

"Good for him."

"Joe—"

"You know what he did. He killed someone."

"I spent six days with him, Joe. He's not—"

"What? Not your idea of a killer? An ex-con?"

"Don't call him that," she insisted.

"That's what he is."

"Surely he's more than that," she argued.

"Come on." Joe took her by the arm and steered her down the hall. "You need to understand some things about this."

"No, you do. He's Sam's brother, and he was kind to me. He was gentle and considerate, and he protected me. And as for what happened when he was seventeen... Do you know what happened?"

"A fight in a juvenile detention center. What's there to know?"

"There has to be something more. It's not... I don't want people to look at him and see just that." She wanted them to know the man she'd spent those six days with. "Can you look into it, Joe?"

"I guess I could," he said, pushing open the door to his office.

"Thank you." She followed him inside and then got to the really hard question. "What's going to happen to him?"

"I don't know. It's up to the county attorney to decide what to charge him with, and from there, it's up to a jury. But he's still on probation from the manslaughter conviction, Emma."

She sat down, afraid of what was coming. "What does that mean?"

"They sentenced him to sixteen years. He served a little more than half before he was paroled on the condition that he stays out of trouble. A conviction for assault, and he may well go back to prison to serve the rest of those sixteen years."

"Oh, my God." Emma sat back, feeling winded. "Does he know?"

"Oh, yeah. He knows."

And there he was, calm as could be, telling her it wasn't her fault. Telling her to forget about him.

"We can't let that happen to him, Joe."

"I told you, it's not up to me."

"Do you think he deserves to go back to prison for this?"

"I think it's hard to know what's inside of a man, what he's capable of, and I've misjudged people before, Emma. I know you think you know him. But you saw what your ex-boyfriend looked like when Rye was done with him."

"And if Rye hadn't been there?"

Joe frowned. "If you'd had to depend on the law and not an ex-con to protect you?"

"That's not what I meant, Joe."

"I know, but it's what I'm thinking. I'm sorry. I should have done more. Couldn't have stood it if that guy hurt you. Either one of 'em."

"Rye wouldn't hurt me," she said.

"So you say. I'm still sorry."

"Then make it up to me. Do it by helping Rye now."

* * *

Sam felt sick, literally.

He stood in the cold on the back porch of his house because he wasn't sure what he could say to either Rachel or Emma, and when he couldn't stand it any longer, he reached for the door to go in.

There'd been a time when his little brother had been all he had left in the world, and losing him had felt like the last straw, like losing everything. He'd wanted Robbie back in his life so badly, and now here he was.

Sam pulled open the door, coming in through the combination utility room/laundry room in the back of the house.

Rachel was there pulling a load of clothes out of the dryer. She stood up straight, a bundle of clothes in her arms, frowning. "It was bad?"

"Worse than I ever imagined," he admitted, toeing off his boots on the mat by the door. "I should have listened to you. I should have found him and told him everything. I could have brought him back here to stay with us, before anything happened."

"You know why you didn't." She dropped the bundle of clothes onto the top of the washer. "You didn't want to tear his life apart. You said he was happy then, that everything seemed fine with him."

"It did."

"So what happened?"

"I don't know." He watched as she started to fold the clothes, then went to help her, pulling an old, worn sweatshirt from the pile of laundry. It was still warm, and he shook it out and folded it. They'd had a million conversations right here in this room, her folding clothes and him helping her. He'd never thought they'd have this particular one.

"Emma might know what happened to him," Rachel said.

Sam took a breath and let it out very, very slowly.

Emma
.

Emma and my brother.

He was torn completely, between bone-deep sorrow over the mess that was his brother's life and fatherly outrage over anything that might have happened between Rye and his daughter.

"I told him she was eighteen, and if I hadn't been so damned mad at him, it might have been funny," he admitted. "The look on his face..."

Rachel shook out a shirt and held it against her chest to fold. "He really didn't know?"

Sam shook his head, then got mad again. "Hell, he could have asked."

"Do you know that he didn't?"

"I know that he's a grown man, and he damned well shouldn't be putting his hands all over a girl without knowing how old she is."

"Sam"—Rachel left the laundry alone and turned to face him—"I hate telling you this, but Emma thinks she's in love with him."

"Shit," he said, staring down into the face of the woman he'd loved since she was even younger than Emma. Of course, he'd been nearly as young himself. He'd fought and lost a long, raging battle with himself to try to keep his hands off Rachel for years. So he knew what that was like. But he hadn't been nearly fifteen years older than she was.

"What the hell happened between them?" he growled.

"Nothing." As always, Rachel soothed him. She put her hands on his arm, running them up and down for a moment. "She said nothing happened."

"She doesn't think she's in love with him over nothing."

Rachel's mouth twitched at that, the corners curling, and then her soft lips stretching into a smile.

"What is so funny?" Sam asked, putting his arms around her and hauling her to him.

"You, like this. Better be careful. You might remind me of my own father when he was so mad about you and me."

"I wasn't thirty-three when you and I got together."

"No, but you can't tell her she's too young to know what love is. She knows I was married to you and pregnant with your child before I was eighteen."

Sam choked back what he'd been about to say:
Hell, yes, she's too young.
Instead, he said, "How did she get to be eighteen anyway?"

Rachel kissed his cheek, whispered, "I don't know. One of those mysterious things. You turn your back, and they're grown."

They hadn't had enough time with her. She'd been almost twelve when she came to them, and a little grown-up even then.

"She has her whole life ahead of her. We'll start there," he reasoned, then remembered something else. "Oh, hell, it's not like Emma's going to have a choice. He's still on probation for the manslaughter conviction years ago. If he gets convicted of assault here, he's going back to prison for a long time. That'll keep him away from Emma."

"And away from you," Rachel reminded him.

"Shit."

"I know. And I don't think Emma would ever forgive herself if either of those things happened." Rachel held on tighter.

Sam stood there, still stunned sometimes by how very much he needed his wife. He'd always believed she had saved him. He'd been as lost and as angry as he thought his brother must have been, and who was to say what might have happened to Sam if not for Rachel. She was every bit of softness and love he'd ever known, except for those very early years with his parents and the last seven years they'd had with the kids.

He thought of all he had now, Rachel and the kids, his work and the home they'd built here. It was more than he'd ever imagined having, more than he thought he deserved. Life had been very, very good to Sam McRae and just lousy to his brother.

"I could have been just like him," Sam said, holding her tighter, pushing her face to his chest and kissing the top of her head. "It would have been so easy. I could be sitting right where he is now."

"I'm not sure I believe that."

"I do. Emma probably thinks she can save him from himself."

Her head came up at that. "Maybe she can."

Sam let her go. "Don't tell me you're okay with this."

"I'm not crazy about the idea of Emma growing up, but I think parents have been trying to stop it from happening for thousands of years, and as far as I know, it's never worked."

"She's eighteen," he said, totally unable to connect his daughter now with the age his wife had once been when they'd gotten together.

"And she's not foolish or reckless. She's careful and smart."

"And the last guy she got involved with smacked her around." Sam groaned. "How the hell can I condemn my brother for doing something I'd really like to have done myself. I'd like to tear that little bastard who hurt her apart limb by limb."

"I know that, too." She understood him better than he did himself.

He took her hands in his, holding on. "I don't know what to do," he confessed. "I have absolutely no idea what to do."

"Sure you do. We'll try to help your brother. There's no reason to get crazy about him and Emma, especially when he's in jail. Nothing's going to happen between them as long as he's there."

"Okay." He could do that. Sam was just afraid it wouldn't be enough. That nothing he could do at this point would be enough. But Rachel was here. They were in this together. He could do anything as long as he had her, couldn't he?

"I love you," he said.

"I love you, too."

"How's Emma?"

"She went to see him this afternoon. I think she had to hear it from him before she could believe he'd killed someone."

Sam braced himself to hear. "What did he tell her?"

"That he did it. What did he tell you?"

"Just that. I meant to ask, but we never got around to the details. We didn't get around to much except me jumping down his throat about Emma, and..." He swore softly and looked up at the ceiling, defeated. "Oh, hell, Rachel, he saved her."