The Fountain of Infinite Wishes (Dare River Book 5) (30 page)

She flinched. “My reasons are my own—as I’ve always told the children when they ask me about him. Shelby is the most inquisitive of my bunch, although Sadie has asked questions too. I don’t want them to get hurt. Some things are best left in the past. I’ve learned that the hard way.”

“Louisa, I love your daughter,” Vander said. “That means I support her. I can’t promise you not to support her if she asks me to.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “If you ‘help’ her in this matter, it could tear apart this family. That is
not
all right by me, and I’m the mama.”

A mama with claws, it was clear. “Forgive me, Louisa, but as a man who lost his father at a young age, I can tell you that sometimes the past doesn’t stay there. In a few weeks, it’s the twenty-fifth anniversary of my father’s unsolved murder. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about him and wonder why it happened.”

“I read that about you online,” Louisa said, giving a deep sigh.
 

A few articles had been written about him opening up shop in Nashville, serving the same community his father had. He didn’t express any concern, which made her frown darken.

“I looked you up,” she said, continuing. “I’m sorry for your loss. Truly. I can’t begin to understand what it must have been like for you, but there’ll be no true peace in your life until you let the past go.”

Vander stood, his shadow covering her. Anger unfurled inside him, some of it not from her. His mother had said the same things to him.

“From my perspective, Louisa, you don’t seem to have let the past go. Not if you’re asking promises of me that could undermine your daughter’s wishes, notwithstanding her happiness.”

“Excuse me?”

“I love Shelby, and she loves me. Yes, we’ve moved fast, but as my best friend recently pointed out, I usually make my mind up about things straight away. Shelby and I are good together, and I want us to keep being good together. That means I support her and her needs—not yours. I hope you can understand that.”

She stood as well, coming only to the center of his chest. “I do understand that, and I respect it. I just don’t like it.”
 

He had to give her points for honesty.

She rubbed her forehead like she had a headache coming on. “I want to like you, Vander. You seem like a good man, and from everything I’ve read about you, you’ve done an incredible job becoming who you are. I also see the way you treat my daughter, the way you look at her—and how she’s been guarding you from me. She’s given her whole heart to you.”

Somehow hearing Louisa tell him how much Shelby had fallen for him cinched everything between them in a whole new way. They didn’t need to rush into marriage, but he could feel it there, waiting on the horizon. For a man who hadn’t thought of growing old, let alone getting married, it was quite a realization.

“I’m glad you see that,” he responded, coming back to the moment. “Given that, how could you expect me to say anything different?”

She raised a brow. “If you said anything different, you wouldn’t be the man for her.”

“So this was a test.”

“Perhaps,” she said, starting to walk back. “You’re right about Shelby always knowing her own mind. It’s how I raised my children.”

“You just don’t like it when their opinions conflict with yours,” he said, falling in step with her.

She stopped and turned to face him. “If and when you ever become a parent, you’ll find yourself struggling with the same thing. I try and be a good person every day. Live a good life. Treat people as I want to be treated. Just like the Good Book says. Vander, I can promise you I would never wish for my children to learn anything more about their daddy and why he left. If I could, I would erase it from my own mind. I hope you’ll remember that.”

When she took off again, he didn’t follow her immediately, sensing she needed time to compose herself before rejoining the others.

He turned around and looked back at the river, soaking in the perfect diorama of the natural order. The water knew which direction to take. The dragonflies knew how to take flight. Soon the turtles would breathe underwater when they took a swim off the log.

Vander didn’t believe things happened for a reason. He believed it was his job as an investigator to figure out why something had interrupted the natural order. A father who wanted to raise his son wasn’t supposed to be taken away from him.
 

Louisa was wrong.
 

Sometimes peace only came from finding out what had happened to make life deviate from the path it should have taken.

As he walked back to the house, he was filled with questions about what had broken the McGuiness home and why a woman as forthright as Louisa didn’t want anyone to find out.

Chapter 27

The minute Shelby and Vander closed the car doors, she pounced on him.

“All right, what did Mama say to you? She was pale as a church mouse when she came back from your walk. It took everything in me not to march across the room and ask her.”

Part of the reason she hadn’t was fear. She wasn’t sure she
wanted
to know what Mama had said.

“So it’s okay to ask me?” he asked, driving them to the main highway.

She worried her lip. “Vander, let’s be real. Of course I’m going to ask you. I’m upset.”

“I know you are,” he said, “and I’m sorry for it. Heck, poor Sadie looked like she was… What do you call it? Fixing to come undone when I came inside too. And Susannah…”

“Everyone was on pins and needles while you were gone,” Shelby said, digging her fingernails into her palms. “We don’t like lying to Mama or causing strife.”

“Well, your Mama is equally concerned,” Vander said, putting his hand on her knee. “Shelby, she’s worried you’re going to ask me to look into your daddy’s whereabouts. She asked me not to.”

“She did not!” Shelby said, shocked Mama would interfere like that. “My goodness, that’s a horrible thing to do to you.”

“And to you,” he added, caressing her knee. “But she means well. Whatever she’s trying to keep a lid on, she’s gripping it with all her might.”

“You didn’t promise her, did you?” she asked.

“Of course not. I told her I loved you and that meant supporting you. I also said it wasn’t good of her to ask that of me, especially since she admitted to knowing how much you love me too.”

Her heart welled, hearing him talk like that. She wanted to take her seatbelt off and snuggle up against his side.

“She also thinks we’re moving too fast,” he said, patting her knee again. “I told her we’d talked about that, but we both know our minds pretty well.”

“What else?”

“That’s about it,” he said with a shrug. “She said she wanted to like me, that she even respected me. But I worried her. You did too. She said you’ve always been inquisitive.”

True that
, she thought. “So Mama didn’t seem to know we’ve already looked?”

“No,” he told her, removing his hand from her knee to take a sharp turn. “I suppose that’s the silver lining in all this. But she thinks you’re going to want to. She’s a little behind the curve, but she’s got your number, all right.”

“Lovely!” Shelby said, falling back against her seat. “Oh, this just makes me all the more curious. By all that’s holy,
why
won’t she tell us her side of things? Dammit, now that Daddy turned coward for the second time and up and ran, Mama is the only one who knows anything.” When Vander didn’t respond, she turned her head. “I wish…”

She trailed off, feeling the deep sadness she’d been fighting so hard descend upon her. Suddenly she felt exhausted and weepy—and cold.

“Can you turn down the air conditioner, please?” she asked, looking out the window.

“Sure,” he said, putting his hand back on her knee and stroking it. “Shelby, I’m sorry.”

“I am too,” she said, turning sideways in the seat and bringing her legs up as far underneath her as possible.

When they reached her home, Vander came around and opened her door. He helped her out and pulled her against him. She let him hold her until better sense prevailed.

“We shouldn’t be making a spectacle by the street,” she said, untangling herself and walking to the door, which she then opened with her key.

He closed the door behind her, and she rubbed the back of her neck. Hours ago, she’d told him she wanted to make love with him. Right now, that was the furthest thing from her mind.

“If you’ll give me a little time, I promise to rally,” she said, putting her purse on the table in the entryway.

He turned her and raised her face to his by tipping her jaw up. “Shelby, when we make love for the first time, we should both be thinking of nothing else. You had a tough day. There’s nothing you need to rally for.”

She wanted to give in to a good cry right then and there.
 

He reached up and caressed her cheek. “But I’d like to hold you if that’s okay. Maybe stay a while. You don’t need to be alone. Earlier when I was upset, talking about my dad, you supported me. I want to do that for you.”

Leaning her head against his chest, she wrapped her arms around him. “Don’t misunderstand what I’m saying, but having you hold me… Right now, it would be better than making love.”

“I know,” he said, and she could hear the smile in his voice. “But that will be good too.”

She already knew that.

Chapter 28

Sadie started Monday breathing easier. She’d gotten through another Sunday family dinner with Mama and held it together.

Then her phone rang, and she felt her lungs shrivel up in her chest. Mama! She thought about letting it go to voicemail, but this couldn’t continue. She didn’t want it to, and Mama wouldn’t allow it.

“Hi, Mama,” she answered brightly, clutching her coffee mug.

“Hi, honey,” Mama said. “I thought I’d see what you were up to. I didn’t get to talk to you much yesterday, what with all the excitement about Shelby’s new beau.”

Sadie’s hand jerked at the mention of Vander, and coffee sloshed over the rim of her mug, spilling onto the counter. “Oh, shoot! Wait a sec, Mama. I just spilled something.”

Hold it together, girl.
She mopped the mess up, wishing she hadn’t taken the call. Clearly she wasn’t in her right mind.

“Okay, I’m back,” Sadie said, deciding the best tack was to get Mama talking. “How’s your day going?”

Monday was usually a lighter day for Mama after all the Sunday services. She was fond of calling it cleanup day.

“Have you started next Sunday’s sermon yet?” she asked.

“Yes,” Mama responded. “It’s going to be about letting go of the past and living in the present.”

Sadie gulped. “That sounds lovely.”
Get off the phone, get off the phone.

“Honey, I’m worried Vander’s profession as a private investigator will give Shelby ideas about looking for your daddy. She hasn’t mentioned anything about that to you, has she?”

Oh, dear sweet baby Jesus.
“Mama, why aren’t you asking Shelby about this?” she feinted, her heart pounding in her chest.

“I don’t think she’ll be honest with me.”

“Mama, Vander doesn’t strike me as the kind of man to put ideas in anyone’s head. He’s not a manipulator.”

“So you like him?” Mama asked.

She cleared her throat. “Yes. He seems like a straightforward kind of person. Shelby talks highly of him.” A flash of inspiration struck. “So do Rye and Clayton, and that’s saying a lot.”

“Your brother said the same thing when I asked his opinion of the man last night.”

Uh-oh. Mama was making the rounds. “See. You’ve always say J.P. is a great judge of character.”

“Indeed he is,” Mama said. “I just can’t ignore this feeling I have. Sadie, I’ve been praying nonstop since I heard about this man. I fear…”

She didn’t want to ask. She really didn’t. “What, Mama?”

“I don’t want Vander’s own tragedy with his daddy to influence him to…well…offer to help Shelby look for your daddy.”

Now Sadie understood where Mama was going with this. “Mama, I don’t think you need to worry.”
 

“I hope you’re right,” Mama said, sighing heavily. “Dale tells me I’m worrying over nothing, but I just can’t help it. I’ve told all of you children how important it is to not look back. The past can only hurt you.”

Sadie could feel herself growing hot, almost like she was standing in the center of the road under the sun, the asphalt burning her feet. “Mama, you don’t always say that. Sometimes you say you have to face the past in order to heal from it. Look at what you did with Jake. He had to face what happened to his best friend in Iraq before he could let it go.”

“That’s simplifying things, Sadie,” Mama said crisply. “It was the chains of the past and wishing things were different that kept Jake so upset. He couldn’t make peace with it or forgive God or himself for what had happened. As I told Jake, the details don’t matter. It’s putting all that pain and guilt aside with grace that helps people move forward.”

Sadie had to bite her lip. Suddenly all she wanted to do was argue with Mama and say something like
How can we let go of the past if we don’t know why Daddy left us and why he ran again when we tried to find him?
“Mama, I need to go.”